Guest posts by davidy22

133

Game Suggestions and Feedback / Re: [Poll] Do ultra-rares add or detract from elements?

« on: July 06, 2011, 08:30:14 am »

And the community is filled with people who support the asinine system.

Although I have to disagree with you on one point. Elements has a great card balance, and plenty of testing. While the quantity of cards is lacking, the card balance is enough to make me continue to play this game, even with so many implementation problems and the ridiculous grind.

Ultra rares are ok, so long as their power does not match their rarity. In games where all you have to worry about is the CPU, having an uber weapon is fun, but multiplayer will not benefit from super-powerful rares like some of the nymphs. Alternate methods for obtaining the rares should be available.

134

Game Suggestions and Feedback / Re: Issue with game..

« on: July 06, 2011, 08:03:41 am »

If the trainer is so useful, why isn't it built into the game? I only found out about the trainer when I went on the forums, and not all players have the time to browse forums. Maybe a trainer button in the deck builder, identical to the supplemental trainer on these forums.

And I agree with the poster above. A crash-course in deck building should help newcomers avoid the elementary mistakes that would otherwise lead to frustration and humiliating losses against level 0. It would also reduce the number of people complaining about not being able to stand a chance against level 3.

135

Game Suggestions and Feedback / Re: Rewards for win totals

« on: July 06, 2011, 08:00:10 am »

Why not have both? A sort of achievements system, with spoonfuls of electrum for every conceivable milestone. It's the dirty trick that makes Zynga games so addictive, but it would also serve to draw in newcomers and supply the money they need to start building decks.

9001 electrum: lose 10 times in a row.

136

Game Suggestions and Feedback / Re: Upgrading Pillars

« on: July 06, 2011, 07:51:13 am »

It's also prohibitive to new players who can't access upgraded without grinding. And what do you mean "work" for upgrades? I spend 6 hours a day doing real work programing, sometimes more if a deadline is due. I HAVE been playing this game for years, but have very few upgraded cards because I have REAL WORK to do. I like elements because it's a good game; There are other options like Xonotic and Wesnoth, but I come back to elements because I enjoy CCGs, and elements is the best free CCG there is. I don't have to grind Xonotic to get access to the best guns, I just have to be good at the game and know where they are on the map. Grinding does not take skill, it is pushing a button and getting a pellet in return. If getting cards is your goal in elements, fine, but my goal is to play good players and be able to beat them on merits of my own skill. I am effectively blocked from a portion of the metagame because the upgrade costs are so frustratingly high.

I read a great text called "Playing to Win" by a person called David Sirlin. He does work on game balance, and holds the opinion that in competitive play, all assets should be readily available for equal play, with no restriction. Admittedly, the "no restriction" clause applies to actions that people commonly label as "cheap", but he still makes the point that if ability to compete is determined by the attributes of your avatar and not the attributes of the player, the game cannot be called "competitive"

137

Design Theory / Re: The Idea factory values your opinion. You may comment here.

« on: July 06, 2011, 07:43:42 am »

@davidy22
Zanz, the author, has the code.
I heard Chriskang, now gone, once saw a sizable portion of the code.

How am I going to get the code from Zanz without bugging him? Steal?

Also, The void type looks like a good idea. Maybe different cards could have their void quanta behave in different ways? Some cards would let you choose which type to affect, some cards that always give your opponent quanta of one
I've also noticed that bad draws are far more detrimental to my play in elements than they are in games like MTG and yu-gi-oh. Maybe it's because there are more cheap cards in MTG and no cost to playing most cards in yu-gi-oh. Either way, something needs to be done about that.

138

Game Suggestions and Feedback / Re: Upgrading Pillars

« on: July 06, 2011, 01:59:15 am »

I don't think that changing the price for any upgrades is a good idea. I definitely think that it takes a long time to upgrade but changing things is usually a really bad idea.

Zanzarino changes things every time there's a new update. If the changed isn't retarded, it's a good thing. Lower upgrade costs make the game accessible to new players. What's your argument?

New players can't buy all the cards they want. They usually aren't good enough to build a deck that can fight false gods without reverting to a pre-defined one from the wiki. And grinding is BORING. Some people have other things to do in their lives, like work, or relationships.

139

Design Theory / Re: The Idea factory values your opinion. You may comment here.

« on: July 06, 2011, 01:52:49 am »

@davidy22
Unfortunately that is the extent of my knowledge (despite my searching Zanz's posts on the forum). Some of my 'knowledge' may even be inaccurate.

Would you be willing to investigate this further? (Within reason of course. Do not annoy Zanz and do not hack the game.)

I can't hack the game. Flash is advertised as being near-impossible to figure out implementation from the compiled result. The most I could do is give myself a million cards.
Do you know anyone who has access to the source? Or the location of the source?

140

Design Theory / Re: The Idea factory values your opinion. You may comment here.

« on: July 05, 2011, 02:05:07 pm »

????

I didn't know there were that many different data types in flash.


Joking aside, just saying that an array is used isn't very precise. Are the quantities stored in the array? Or is the array just used as a signpost to the actual variables?

141

Game Suggestions and Feedback / Re: Upgrading Pillars

« on: July 05, 2011, 01:55:47 pm »

No way the refund would happen and towers are one of the better upgrades even if you do need several of them upped for it to be effective, so probably fine as it is

Why couldn't the refund occur? Have a small script count upgraded pillars and add a lump of cash for each one.
Towers are better upgrades than many cards, but many other cards are better choices than the towers. They also need to be upgraded en masse to be of any use, which makes the current cost exorbitantly high.

Because not all towers were bought, some were won, and some people may have also sold off towers, whether because they thought they wouldn't use that kind at the time or to fund a deck that they were building.  In short, what you are proposing is not nearly as simple as it sounds.

Then a large compensation for everyone? The new players would benefit from the lower upgrade cost, and the veterans would get more cash to splash around on upgrades.

142

Game Suggestions and Feedback / Re: Ok.. this game should really employ some keyboard shortcuts

« on: July 05, 2011, 10:25:48 am »

Tehe.. I would enjoy people complaining in chat about playing the wrong cards alright.

I personally have no use whatsoever for this, so I have to ask why you want this. Just to speed up farming? Making it easier to play on a laptop during travel?

Operating my 4-year old laptop touchpad feels like trying to pick up soap with a dead squid. Plus, I'm used to the terminal and have an allergic reaction to mice.

143

Game Suggestions and Feedback / Re: Upgrading Pillars

« on: July 05, 2011, 10:22:22 am »

No way the refund would happen and towers are one of the better upgrades even if you do need several of them upped for it to be effective, so probably fine as it is

Why couldn't the refund occur? Have a small script count upgraded pillars and add a lump of cash for each one.
Towers are better upgrades than many cards, but many other cards are better choices than the towers. They also need to be upgraded en masse to be of any use, which makes the current cost exorbitantly high.

144

Game Suggestions and Feedback / Re: Daily Quests

« on: July 05, 2011, 10:15:39 am »

Maybe one quest could be to defeat a half-blood with a particular name.  (There are 144 different names according to http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,23323.0.html (http://elementscommunity.org/forum/index.php/topic,23323.0.html)).  It could provide some incentive to grind the oft-underused (compared to the other levels) ai5.

Excellent idea. "Hunt Aquonos" or something

"Here, bash your head against that rock over there and I'll give you a shiny new card"

Or we could make the quests enjoyable.