It's time to stop using band-aids to fix systemic problems
It seems that recently, EA/CG has been all about trying to make things better. The only problem is that most of their solution are very short-term oriented, and don't actually adress the underlying issues that this game currently faces.
Raids and the random ties system
As much as I agree that the previous player ID system was severely flawed, the new one isn't really better.
Instead of having inequalities based on a fixed, uncontrollable constant; they will now be based on a random, uncontrollable variable.
Yes, using RNG to break ties is better than using player ID. But its still a bad system that is NOT FAIR.
The real problem here is that the current Raid models is bad and feels random and unrewarding.
Raids should be about cooperation, not competition within a guild.
A tier system that works based on the amount of damage done is a much better way to solve these issues. Create 1 tier for each 5% of the Raid's health done as damage. Player who solo it get the Tier 1 rewards, players who do 50% get Tier 10, and so on.
There, you got a fair system where people don't compete between each other, but still thrive to do as much damage as possible.
No RNG, no competition, better rewards for everything.
The Thrawn issue
This one was rather hard to accept as a F2P. The announcement that Thrawn needed Phoenix to unlock 2 weeks before the actual release was a vicious kick in the nuts to anyone who was interested in him.
So what did they do to make it easier? Double drops on all the Phoenix nodes! Amazing!
Once again, a band-aid to make the actual truth easier to swallow: We had almost no notice for Thrawn.
I don't care that it was "doable" for everyone. It's just a terrible business practice and everyone who keeps claiming it was ok-ish just encourages them to do the same thing for the next events.
The stall meta and new character releases
It's now clear that the situation has gotten out of control since the release of Chaze.
Power creep is all over the place, and characters need some overpowered, uncounterable, overwhelming new abilities or stats to even hope to have a chance to be usable.
Look at all the recent releases: Imperial Troopers, Phoenix Squadron, ATF, the Empire Pass (up until Thrawn).
All those new characters and rework STILL seem pale compared to the triple cleanse teams that, unlike other teams, require 0 Zetas and only decent mods to be incredibly effective.
Nowadays, to have a character that changes the meta, he needs to be blatantly overpowered or have an incredibly powerful ability.
And unresistable debuffs of course, because since Rex has been at the top of Arena, debuffs don't mean jacksht unless they are unresistable.
Instead of reworking the problematic characters and mechanics that make up a huge part of the high-end arena, they prefer to keep power-creeping the heck out of everything.
Team synergies are meaningless unless you're ZMaul, and it's a same. Some factions are left compeltely in the dust, miles behind the current meta.
I want diversity. I want to have the choice to use different factions based on my playstyle or personal preferences. But no, I'm stuck with using Chaze and their boring, uninteresting kits because if I don't, I'll probably fall below 50.
Entire team synergies with multiple Zetas (FO, Imperial Troopers, Nightsisters, Jedi, Clones...) are simply not viable enough to be a major part of the game.
Fix the core of Arena, stop adding bandages on a severed leg. It will bleed out anyway.
Galactic War
You're probably thinking, what the heck, a GW complain, what is this, 2016?
The truth is, GW is rather easy since the TM changes a while ago.
But the problem with GW is not that it's too hard. The problem is that it's boring and could be so much more.
They had to make it easier (with the TM changes) and quicker (with the 4x update) because let's face it, it feels more like a chore than anything.That was a band-aid.
And do you know what the worst is? I feel like GW is the most fun part of the game nowadays, that says something about the state of Arena.
Seriously, we need a REAL Galactic War. Themed battles. Entire factions to defeat. A real challenge that feels difficult but fair. Something that isn't "another arena battle but with either terrible teams or a whale triple-cleanse fest".
Give us more Galactic War content! I'd gladly accept to diversify my roster if that allowed me to experience more epic battles.
Flash events
Let's be honest, we all love the flash events, because they drop stun cuffs and stun guns.
You know what the problem is? We need hundreds, even thousands, of those things, and they are hard af to come by.
Once again, they are just a band-aid for the gear crunch, which is terrible and limits the creativity of people.
Guess what? THERE ARE SLOTS FOR THEM IN THE DAILY CHALLENGES! Stun cuffs and guns could easily be added there, especially since the INT challenge's rewards are worthless.
Ships
Don't even get me started on ships. There was SO MUCH potential, and it all got wasted because there literally no ship content.
The Ship meta is Biggs + Target Locks. Period.
It's NOT interesting and NOT interactive.
No matter how many ships they add, it will always remain like this unless they fix the whole system and maje ships more strategic and interesting.
Right now, ships are a lesser version of Arena, which is already dull and boring itself.
Fix ships. Add content. Add different viable strategies. Add more synergies and capital ships.
Raids and the random ties system
As much as I agree that the previous player ID system was severely flawed, the new one isn't really better.
Instead of having inequalities based on a fixed, uncontrollable constant; they will now be based on a random, uncontrollable variable.
Yes, using RNG to break ties is better than using player ID. But its still a bad system that is NOT FAIR.
The real problem here is that the current Raid models is bad and feels random and unrewarding.
Raids should be about cooperation, not competition within a guild.
A tier system that works based on the amount of damage done is a much better way to solve these issues. Create 1 tier for each 5% of the Raid's health done as damage. Player who solo it get the Tier 1 rewards, players who do 50% get Tier 10, and so on.
There, you got a fair system where people don't compete between each other, but still thrive to do as much damage as possible.
No RNG, no competition, better rewards for everything.
The Thrawn issue
This one was rather hard to accept as a F2P. The announcement that Thrawn needed Phoenix to unlock 2 weeks before the actual release was a vicious kick in the nuts to anyone who was interested in him.
So what did they do to make it easier? Double drops on all the Phoenix nodes! Amazing!
Once again, a band-aid to make the actual truth easier to swallow: We had almost no notice for Thrawn.
I don't care that it was "doable" for everyone. It's just a terrible business practice and everyone who keeps claiming it was ok-ish just encourages them to do the same thing for the next events.
The stall meta and new character releases
It's now clear that the situation has gotten out of control since the release of Chaze.
Power creep is all over the place, and characters need some overpowered, uncounterable, overwhelming new abilities or stats to even hope to have a chance to be usable.
Look at all the recent releases: Imperial Troopers, Phoenix Squadron, ATF, the Empire Pass (up until Thrawn).
All those new characters and rework STILL seem pale compared to the triple cleanse teams that, unlike other teams, require 0 Zetas and only decent mods to be incredibly effective.
Nowadays, to have a character that changes the meta, he needs to be blatantly overpowered or have an incredibly powerful ability.
And unresistable debuffs of course, because since Rex has been at the top of Arena, debuffs don't mean jacksht unless they are unresistable.
Instead of reworking the problematic characters and mechanics that make up a huge part of the high-end arena, they prefer to keep power-creeping the heck out of everything.
Team synergies are meaningless unless you're ZMaul, and it's a same. Some factions are left compeltely in the dust, miles behind the current meta.
I want diversity. I want to have the choice to use different factions based on my playstyle or personal preferences. But no, I'm stuck with using Chaze and their boring, uninteresting kits because if I don't, I'll probably fall below 50.
Entire team synergies with multiple Zetas (FO, Imperial Troopers, Nightsisters, Jedi, Clones...) are simply not viable enough to be a major part of the game.
Fix the core of Arena, stop adding bandages on a severed leg. It will bleed out anyway.
Galactic War
You're probably thinking, what the heck, a GW complain, what is this, 2016?
The truth is, GW is rather easy since the TM changes a while ago.
But the problem with GW is not that it's too hard. The problem is that it's boring and could be so much more.
They had to make it easier (with the TM changes) and quicker (with the 4x update) because let's face it, it feels more like a chore than anything.That was a band-aid.
And do you know what the worst is? I feel like GW is the most fun part of the game nowadays, that says something about the state of Arena.
Seriously, we need a REAL Galactic War. Themed battles. Entire factions to defeat. A real challenge that feels difficult but fair. Something that isn't "another arena battle but with either terrible teams or a whale triple-cleanse fest".
Give us more Galactic War content! I'd gladly accept to diversify my roster if that allowed me to experience more epic battles.
Flash events
Let's be honest, we all love the flash events, because they drop stun cuffs and stun guns.
You know what the problem is? We need hundreds, even thousands, of those things, and they are hard af to come by.
Once again, they are just a band-aid for the gear crunch, which is terrible and limits the creativity of people.
Guess what? THERE ARE SLOTS FOR THEM IN THE DAILY CHALLENGES! Stun cuffs and guns could easily be added there, especially since the INT challenge's rewards are worthless.
Ships
Don't even get me started on ships. There was SO MUCH potential, and it all got wasted because there literally no ship content.
The Ship meta is Biggs + Target Locks. Period.
It's NOT interesting and NOT interactive.
No matter how many ships they add, it will always remain like this unless they fix the whole system and maje ships more strategic and interesting.
Right now, ships are a lesser version of Arena, which is already dull and boring itself.
Fix ships. Add content. Add different viable strategies. Add more synergies and capital ships.
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Replies
It's not a single time event. It will come back.
Play it, when you can. Prepare for it on your own speed.
Want it now? Cash helps, but even f2p got it done
Next time? Slowly prepare
Have thrawn, when you are ready? Don't care about the 3rd or 4th time, the event is live.
I agree on ships
Partially agree on RNG rewards in raids
Oh please, with the opposite extreme argument. Only Siths deal in absolutes.
I am uncomfortable with Thrawn, mostly cause of not given any time to even make a decision. I waited a day or 2 to decide and that hindered me in getting Thrawn, even though I still got him to 5*. I had to drop everything else I was doing for a week with no notice. I did appreciate the help, with the double drops and making Phoenix farmable though. I am not happy with how Phoenix ships are released and not older ships yet though. The bias is pretty glaring towards rebels in this game.
I fully agree with everything else you wrote apart from when you say Maul is the only team with synergy. Resistance, Rogue 1, Nihilis leads, first order etc. I do agree that Chaze, particularly with Rexx leads is ruining the game. Someone in my shard yesterday was ranting about how overpowered his team is. He runs Wedge, R2, Chaze, Kenobi. Chirrut and Baze require no zeta and is very free to play friendly since Baze is so viable at 3*. I had an easier time starring up Chirrut than most of the other strong characters I have solely in shipments. Didn't take too long to get to 7*. They have far too much utility for just 2 characters. Baze has multiple dispells, taunts whenever Chirrut drops below 100% health, whenever someone dies, and is one of the tankiest characters in the game. Speed down too I think. Baze came out the same time as Shoretrooper, but I don't see shoretrooper at all in my shard cause with all the dispelling going on one needs an auto taunt tank. Chirrut is an attacker that can hit for over 30k, yet he is by far the best healer in the game. You can get Baze down to 2 health and then in one move Baze is full health with hots again. Since you can't attack Chirrut without Baze taunting you often need to rely on Annihilate or some other super move like Execute. Chirrut also has an Aoe dispell, tenacity up, crazy hots, and counters on everything. I can't keep up with the laundry list of utility for this duo. The problem with the full synergy teams is that you need multiple zetas, and specific compositions to be competitive. Even then they can't compete at all on defense with Chaze, and get beaten pretty easily. I do believe that in adjusting characters for the sake of balance in drastic measures is necessary, and this is one such case. I know a lot of people would be up in arms, but it would be very beneficial to the future of this game in my opinion End generic Chaze rant.
I believe that ships are getting an update soon, so I will hold judgement on that. I am just hoarding up ship credits now since I maxed out all the ships I needed a while ago. Sitting on about 25 million and place top 5 every day. Problem is that we all lose on defense so it becomes a game every day of locking each other out for pay out. If you go too early then the person you beat beats you right back in time. If you go a second to late then you can't attack and have to wait. Battles typically last around 3 minutes, and the lock out is 7 and a half minutes. Why is defense so much worse than offense? This is not fun at all. I really hope this design gets fixed soon. Some payouts or more competitive than others as well, and this is the case for regular arena too making it even less balanced.
I fully agree with your suggestion on raid Rancor rewards.
The flash events I actually like although they became very tedious rather quickly with the monotony. The rewards are pretty good, and first time rewards were great Mix it up a bit please.
There needs to be something to do with characters that are not fully geared. Characters are useless in this game until you gear them up to T10 or T11 which takes weeks, and weeks, and need to be 7* for raids That's one of the biggest problems I see in the game right now. Hopefully, the new content that has been teased will address this.
I'm also not a free to play player, but more of a dolphin.
I agree 100% here. A raid should not be about competition.
I would also add that making a raid soloable kinda ruins the purpose of that feature.
I think Ships introduced 2 promising mechanics that make the battles a bit more strategic than Arena: Ultimate on cooldown and reinforcements. Both help in building up the battle and add some depth to it as opposed to the very shallow Arena ones where every action is just about playing the most devastating available attack, with no build up at all.
I would love to see Arena borrow some of this, and move a tiny bit towards a chess game where you need to build up your battle, prepare some actions over many turns, and subtly disturb the opponent's strategy.
A starter would be that all specials start on full cooldown. The first turn would be skirmishes of basics, and only then would the heavy artillery come into play.
Pretty much so.
I agree 100 % good way of putting it. Ships has potential . I actually enjoy ot more then arena
'They' dont think of it as band aid. 'They' think 'good job' lmao
Raids have been and will always be a mini leaderboard. They are not going to give out 1st place rewards to all. Believe it or not there is an economy to the games resources and they are simply going to dramatically increase reward payouts. If one "tier" goes up another will go down.
I am sorry but I see no Thrawn issue. I see many players unhappy about the time line but it is what it is. You do not have to have everything maxed on the first run. Personally I hope they run more legendary events like this. I mean it is a legendary event for an exclusive character. How exclusive can it really be if the entire player base can get it to 7* on day 1 because there are no exclusive requirements.
The new characters are flooding the game for sure and I like it. I so think the Rex triple cleanse is boring but they are not god on defense and as such players are starting to go away from them on my leaderboard. Players kiwis is not directed and any specific person but is the mob mentality of players) are part of the problem with the meta also. We don't all try new things. The majority waits for 1 or 2 others too try something new and then rich to follow. I can happily say my leaderboard board is back to a top 25. No one holds top 5 or top 10 or even top 15 (by hold I mean defense wining for them). This has brought back diversity and players trying new things and "fun" teams.
Edit: hit post to soon
There is and always be a gear "gate." they will add cuffs and stun guns to challenges when they come out with the new cuffs and stun guns.
Ships I agree is just... I don't really know what is going on there.
I am aware that most of it is actually intentional.
What I despise, however, is the way they handle such issues.
"Look, we're fixing Raids ties!"
No, you're not.
"Look, the new Flash events will help with the gear crunch!"
No they won't.
"You have double drops for a few days so it's okay to require toons that were literally unavailable outside paying a massive amount of money!"
No, it's not.
Regarding the mob mentality, I disagree. Many people try new things, but in this game, if you fail, you're basically dead. You can't allow yourself to divert from your path, and taking a wrong turn can mess up your account really badly.
There's little incentive to actually discover new things, and those who do are usually Whales.
But if there is an optimal tactic, it WILL be discovered and heavily used. There's no secret techniques to dominate Arena that isn't currently known. It's just what it is.
I see that come up often, so let's tackle the Thrawn issue: I'm fine with requiring specific factions to unlock powerful characters. What I'm not ok with, however, is making the said faction ONLY available to farm 2 weeks prior the event.
I want people who make bold choices rewarded. People who farm worthless factions because they believe they'll be amazing one day is great.
It requires people to be visionary and I'm all in for that.
It was not the case with Thrawn. There was no strategic planning needed. You KNEW Thrawn was coming when they released Phoenix, so you had no risk, no bold choice to make.
It was literally a money grab. And that's bad, because it worked and some people defend EA/CG.
I don't want these legendary events to become a mere money making tool to force players to buy toons. I want them to be a surprising moment where people who made a risky bet and farmed bad characters are rewarded.
A way to reward strategic and visionary people.
I believe they are favoring rebels highly. The empire pass was overshadowed by Fullcrum and R2. Not seen much of Fullcrum in my arena shard, but R2 was quickly coming into the meta making Chaze combos even stronger. A lot easier to get than Thrawn since many people already had an Empire team. A lot got to 7* too, and no investment needed for many people. I managed to get it to 6*. Wedge and Biggs dominated the game for a very long time before shoretrooper came out. Now Chaze is dominating the game. What duo does dark side have? Krennic and Deathtrooper. I don't know much about that one since I only have seen 1 person in my top 50 use it, and the impression I get on the forum is it is kind of average. Certainly not a plug and play team you can just put behind Rex or in any other team, especially one with no zetas. Shoretrooper came out around the time as Baze, and did not take long to be completely overshadowed by Baze, and I see no one in arena using it. I'm seeing some Thrawn teams using it in my GW shard, but no one in my top 50 uses it apart from one or two people, neither of which can make it into the top 20. Emperor Palpatine is the one legendary character I invested in, and he is the only one with no option for a zeta. Under a Nihilis lead a single Aoe from Baze (a tank) just puts him well into the yellow. He dies really fast. Hopefully there are some plans to update him.