Quests? Stuff!

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Erundil
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Quests? Stuff!

Post by Erundil » Sun May 26, 2013 01:06

So, I wanted to give my opinion as someone that comes from 'outside' the dev team, and yet is familiar with the CCGs enviroment (even more than I was in the past)

Quests (and heroes)
Quests might be a good addiction that differentiates wtactics from other games, however, since the game it's still on early development, would it not be better to leave them for later?
Comparing to the (in)famous Magic, the first sets were rather simple (eg. no equipments, no multicoloured cards, just to name a few).
Further on, I believe the first set should be simple, both for players and devs. The players need to familiarise with the game, and the devs need to establish a rather basic set of cards from where they can start.
This concept would apply to heroes too.
Notably, Magic, made new game features the main element of some new sets, which were caracterized by the new addition.


Confusion
Then, I found some confusion in visiting the site and the wiki.

1 - I have seen different batchs of cards, yet I am unsure which one is the correct, and found no place that listed all the so far developed cards. If I wanted to test the game with a friend, I would be put off.
2 - The quick rules says that the starting influence depends on the hero - yet I have seen no heroes in the drafts, so again, I would be unable to play with a friend ( I can assume of course, but that's another story)

Other than that, I think the rest is quite great, specially the way cards do look: they have a simple layout, and are easy to read and get information from.

The core set
I was done writing, but I wanted to add this paragraph. A core set is important because it gives players something to actually play. If they have fun, they will support the project, spread the word and maybe even join us - even if the set is not perfect!
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Re: Quests? Stuff!

Post by snowdrop » Sun May 26, 2013 03:18

I agree that we should start of with a not so overly complicated core set and that it will help out a lot with development if we are restricted from the start and add on later. For that reason Heroes have been put on hold and will likely not be in the core set playtesting since having them around at this stage would make it much harder to playtest. Also, their existence is still not obviously warranted.

Quests on the other hand are not complicated in any way and it's very straight forward to evaluate how/what they affect while playtesting. They are likely to be around for playtesting, but are also not really required to be so to test the basics of the game, as they mainly present another win condition and maybe some other benefit(s) if you complete the quest. A very old mockup that doesn't reflect the current Quest-rules >> https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B-0EDiX ... Q3b1k/edit ...so, quests will likely be in the core set if we can create good Quest cards and also playtest them. Else they can also wait.
1 - I have seen different batchs of cards, yet I am unsure which one is the correct, and found no place that listed all the so far developed cards. If I wanted to test the game with a friend, I would be put off.
Thanks. You had a point. We made that clearer now on http://WTactics.org/cards

The core set
I was done writing, but I wanted to add this paragraph. A core set is important because it gives players something to actually play. If they have fun, they will support the project, spread the word and maybe even join us - even if the set is not perfect!
Yups, I totally agree: If the core set sucks then we don't get any more chances short of re-branding the project, revising and then re-launching. That is also why it's important to be very patient and work hard with getting it as near perfect as possible and have high standards on it.
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Erundil
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Re: Quests? Stuff!

Post by Erundil » Sun May 26, 2013 23:57

The point I was making against quests is because of that: they are another victory condition that needs to be taken into account. Not so straightforward, since most of the casual gaming will be relying on beating your opponent, and not questing him/her out.

Also, having quests in game so early and in a such important way will take away the attention from the fronts. So, deciding to put quests is also deciding to give less importance to fronts, whilst I think they (the fronts) should be kept in great consideration.

Yups, I totally agree: If the core set sucks then we don't get any more chances short of re-branding the project, revising and then re-launching. That is also why it's important to be very patient and work hard with getting it as near perfect as possible and have high standards on it.
This is a bit off from what i said. The core set should be good, but from the wotc experience, "we will come to regret things we have put into it".
It needs to be fun to play and get enough interest in the players to have them come back to check if any other set were released. I think expecting too much from the core set is wrong: simply there is no experience and data to do so.
It should simply be something that has most of the game features and is fun to play.
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Re: Quests? Stuff!

Post by snowdrop » Mon May 27, 2013 22:06

Also, having quests in game so early and in a such important way will take away the attention from the fronts. So, deciding to put quests is also deciding to give less importance to fronts, whilst I think they (the fronts) should be kept in great consideration.
The fronts contribute with the following:
  • They make creature movement possible, and movement is just the relocation of a creature at the expense of marking it the turn it moves.
  • They decide if you can attack or defend with a particular creature. You can seldom do both. What you can do depends on what front the creature is in.
  • They decide what effects are applied to the creature and other cards: Some could be in effect in one front, but not the other, and vice versa.
Please explain how having Quests around diminish the roles of the fronts, as I'm not sure I understand what you mean.
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Erundil
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Re: Quests? Stuff!

Post by Erundil » Mon May 27, 2013 22:19

That's quite obvious to me actually.

There are two ways to win, as of now: reducing influence to 0 and victory points from quests.

If you could win only by fronts, they would be the most important part of a game, as the game result is decided on the fronts.

If you can win by quests too, then you will take a choice: go with the fronts, go with the quests, go mixed.
As such, i can ignore completely fronts, ignore quests, or consider fronts half of my game, and quests the other half.
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Re: Quests? Stuff!

Post by snowdrop » Wed May 29, 2013 21:18

Erundil wrote:If you can win by quests too, then you will take a choice: go with the fronts, go with the quests, go mixed.
As such, i can ignore completely fronts, ignore quests, or consider fronts half of my game, and quests the other half.
For the sake of simplicity in this discussion, let's just forget that fronts exist and there is only one single front. What does exist still is a state a card can be in. It can either be defending or attacking during a turn, or it can switch state from one to the other. Let's pretend that you each turn put small labels on each card that says either "attacker" or "defender" on it, and that you get to re-arrange those labels once every turn.

In the above scenario you can still win by questing, or win by lowering your opponents influence. Even if there is one single front. Also, as the above construction shows, fronts is just really a very visual/spatial way of showing which cards are potential attackers or defenders. Being in a front is just a state. That state exists, with that current attack/defense system, regardeless of number of fronts.

What you seem to describe as a problem is not really the number of fronts. It seems that you believe that the issue is that there is more than one win condition and that it could result in situations where the players ignore each other and run for the win, using their favourite method, ignoring the other players actions.

While that is a possible path, I can't imagine players that ignore their opponent or don't try to hinder him/her winning. Why? Because let's pretend you only want to quest. So what? If your opponent starts attacking you or picking of your creatures with spells and so on, what does your isolation help you? You still have an angry opponent to deal with, else he'll beat the crap of you.

If on the other hand what you describe really occurs and we have a game where people usually don't interact and only play two-player solitaire, then we would indeed have an issue caused not by separate winning conditions and strategies possible, but by the lack of their crossroads and intersections.
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Erundil
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Re: Quests? Stuff!

Post by Erundil » Wed May 29, 2013 23:56

What you seem to describe as a problem is not really the number of fronts. It seems that you believe that the issue is that there is more than one win condition and that it could result in situations where the players ignore each other and run for the win, using their favourite method, ignoring the other players actions.
The point is exactly that: too many victory conditions for a first edition, that would have two points to be counted (influence and vps)

I believe the classic two are fair enough.

Ignoring the opponent is not as much as a problem: it will occur anyway in combo decks. The problem relies on the gameplay that there will be with quests: a very important feature like fronts will not be used and appreciated fully, both by players and developers. Also if the player is supposed to be an army commander, then quest do not really fit? They could, with heroes, but they will be out of this first core set.

So a decision is to be taken: both quests and heroes, or none. With all that comes afterwards, such as less interest from the more strategics oriented players, drift towards a game that is more hero-based than army-based, and of course, a less welcoming "trinity".
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Re: Quests? Stuff!

Post by Mattaiyah » Thu May 30, 2013 00:21

I think that before this discussion goes any further something needs to be made clear. Heroes do not exist in the "core" set. Heroes have been ditched, and only appear in the Developer's Notes section of the rules so that we can remember how they used to be if we decide to bring them back.
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