1600MMR for context, and I play about 40% aggro, 60% standard. Jota's "Fake Diversity" comment resonates really hard. It seems like countering your opponent's early mistakes, and actually committing into these counters, means your chance of winning only slightly improves compared to "random chance". High-value drops which mitigate your counters, or require you divert some tempo into a reaction, can 100% kill any tempo you can generate via forcing your opponent to react. The winning play is always to just generally improve your board, with as few weaknesses as possible, so that you don't die to turn 6 hacker drops (or something similarly swing-y). And what's worse, is that against gimmick strategies, turn 4/5 drops can easily turn into 2000 damage worth of surprise, so the winning play against gimmick strategies is still to play conservatively and mitigate damage until you have your chance to counter harder. Fake diversity is exactly the right phrase for these feelings.
Surrey you are spot on. The devs are lost in my opinion and instead of the 1000 things to improve this game they could have done, they see the free units as an easy way to code and will make this game into a casual game not a competitive game.
6 unit drops are a little much. Those wasps come up, I feel I have to take them, because I can't build that much anti-air with only 2 or 3 deployments.
Metzkermeister is my hero :> I think you aren't negative at all, Surrey. You are very invested into the game, so of course it affects you when things start to develop in a way you dislike, and you're allowed to voice that, just as people who like the direction are allowed to voice their assent. I'm not sure where the idea is coming from that every criticism needs to be sugar coated or that criticism is a bad thing when clearly you are speaking from a position of love for the game.
You are so right on the user interface problem. Just look at lichess. Simple. But, the one thing that always attracts attention are the tournaments. I think they should encourange competition, incentivize tournaments and give out cooler badges and some other benefits. Maybe even create leagues. The current u. i. is dogshit, let's face it. The chat is the worst part. I guess this costs more money, but I'm willing to pay.
Yep they keep putting resources into the gameplay. I think the gameplay was pretty good even like 9 months ago. But the UI or player profiles or any kind of new player onboarding experience hasn't changed at all in that time.
All other talking points aside, theres one thing that *really* grinds my gears about their “experimental” phase. They mentioned how they may introduce separate queues for no free units and with free units, *however* this may divide the player base too much so they may not do it. Why did they not then include that separate queue into at least part of the experimental phase to actually test how queue times would be??? Like they leave a hypothetical as their reason to not include the separate queues, but then refuse to use their own testing period to test if that really would be the case. Hell they could freaking get a direct comparison of how much people prefer either mode just by how their queues stack up against each other.
They told us "three weeks of chaos". Three weeks are over now, and at around ~4weeks of chaos, they do a tiny bit of changing to the chaos, but the chaos continues... "THREE WEEKS!"
@@jordanrea2311how can you assume that i like or dislike the patch by my previous comment? It says nothing else than that the devs kinda lied (again) about goals and data. I actually like the patch but can fully understand the frustration some have with it.
shortcut keys:: 1, 2, 3, 4 for 'call ins' like oil bombs, 'Press E' for upgrade unit' also it'd be nice if Move orders stayed between turns needing to be manually changed.
They could also create alot more unit and do season with a specific roster. So if there's a total of 40 unit, but you can only use 25 of them for a season. Maybe it could a create more dynamics gameplay every couples of months where you create new strategies with the unit you have. It could also create the same feeling of Fiesta and just kill the game... idk.
I quit after reading this. Uninstalled, left the discord, etc. They clearly aren't actually interested in our feedback - just interested in paying lip service to us while preparing the game for a wider audience.
yea this game was in a very unique position in the market. From gameplay perspective it felt very different since the game had a huge emphasis on the position of the units. That what drew me to it. Now its starting to feel like any other autobattler. There's so much shit on the board that you just build the best composition with what you are given - like what you do in all the other autobattlers on the market.
@@SurreyEZ Absolutely. That's part of why I always played aggro pre-patch. It really gave you a feeling of control about positioning, taking real advantage of the way the opponent responded to your aggression.
I like the new free units, however the communication from the devs was pretty bad. Also, I think balance changes for free units should be much-much quicker. I think that is sweet spot for free units would be like two cards per game. One card in 2-4 rounds and one card in 5-7 rounds. And yes of course no level 8 fangs in round 2. For context: 1500 MMR and 100 hours
I'm not a competitive player. I play for fun- I'm about 700 MMR right now. I do not like the update and won't be playing until the dev team changes their philosophy on feedback. It doesn't solve any of the supposed problems it claims to, it just takes choice out of the hand of the players and puts it in the hands of chance. - Regardless the lack of proportionate response to criticism from the dev team is enough to make me back off of the game for now and obfuscating a permanent update as temporary one is pretty annoying. I might play again in the future if things change, but for now they're just going to have to hold onto my negative review.
The devs keep doubling down on this nonsense that people don't want. Even if it has fans they have essentially split their playerbase in half at least. I have 180 hours and I can't even be bothered to queue up anymore as it isn't fun. What a joke.
When they released the chaos patch they announced they are gonna be on holidays because of chinese new year etc. That was the crazy part imo. If you introduce something this wild you NEED to respond immediately. Like tune it a little bit in 2-3 days, communicate during the period etc. Imagine if this was some normal business. Just release something that has this much controversy and just casually go on vacation with the whole department
9:12 I think the purpose of the free units is to reduce the predictability of the game, to combat stale metas. I think it makes sense to have a little bit of fair randomness in the game to make each game unique and interesting. And to even out the balance of certain units. For example, if mustangs or sledgehammers are the meta pick, it would be good to have a mechanism in the game to prevent everyone always playing / forcing these units. Maybe a reasonable middle ground is to reduce the impact and frequency of free units - maybe just once or twice with less cost? Enough to still build some strategy and gain a lead but also to change the direction of a game? Another idea could be to give more starting units instead, to prevent the player from selling too much and forcing some other composition.
The first round already is a problem of not knowing what the enemy is going to play, like a one sided push or standart/defense. I highly doubt more starting units is a good idea.
You know, I think the main issue I have with people complaining about free units is because they wouldn't say a thing about it if it was in the game from the beginning. We'd just all have learned to play with or around it, just like we do with the choice of specialists which are not mirrored. or when storm/nuke comes at the same time as much better cards but you know your opponent would end the game if he picks it. At least free units are mirrored. Yes there is a lot of balancing work to be done, but just saying "I don't like it remove it or I leave" isn't helping you (I don't mean you, Surrey, I mean you, any player complaining), the devs, or the player base.
I don't mean to sound impatient, but where's that new FFA game mode man? I get we're guinea pigs in unit selection data and I'm okay with supporting that data, but these three updates have been a bit of a let down. While the game is still stable in numbers - at the moment - I'm worried the lack of (promised) things will burn further goodwill in the community.
The game is a living thing; and I'm pleased about that. I find the dev's vision compelling so I am happy to let them experiment. Decisions are made and unmade as new data arises; it's to be expected and shouldn't be taken as "lying" (as some thoughtless people are doing). Not sure what was meant by calling their refinements to the free unit values in late rounds "lazy"; it's a healthy change very much along the lines of what Jota asked for. ~20% infrequent major changes & ~80% frequent small, data-aligned refinements is healthy strategy. As far as I can tell, of the complainers, there are maybe ~10% that are deep and thoughtful about it like you - and 90% that are emotionally unhinged; and after losing eagerly look to shift blame for their losses away from themselves rather than adapt - I'd be cautious about teaming up with people like that.
The lazy part refered to the fact that it was pretty obvious to all the players around day one that the unit drops are very overtuned. This should have been like a patch after 3 days. Not after 3 weeks. Now we could actually be somewhere. Change is usually very good if it has a path to a good end. I have a lot of confusion about everything. My first thought is that why are they making this drastic change now? why NOW? why are they feeling really pressured all of a sudden? Why have they been making like really really minor balance patches for 9 months just to trash most existing balance with a patch like this? This is not me complaining btw, it's me questioning why they didn't do this 6 months ago? Their actions don't add up to me. While you find the devs vision compelling, i find it very confusing. Maybe that's why we have the opposite feelings on what is going on!
@@SurreyEZ Perhaps we have different time preferences; for me a few weeks is not a long amount of time - I'd rather the devs be conservative and collect data for a few more days, rather than making impulsive balance changes (unless it's an obvious bug). Also; they lay out their vision clearly under the heading "Q: Why launch the free unit cards system?" of the patch notes - perhaps the confusion is with their ways of going about it and what epiphany they had that has lead them to this now? I understand, they haven't communicated this. - but they make their vision clear: Increased variation, adaptability, opportunities for strategic adjustments, reduced sense of powerlessness, increasing occurrences of previously low-use units... it's all there.
Hello I believe the trouble with the patch is a sort of religiousness trouble. "Divide and Conquer" did work in Germany and Korea. Depeche mode made a song named "john the revelator" I guess it is just the problem that the mental connection to the developers got disturbed. So you realize that they got their own head. So this "divide and conquer" freed the oppressed developers from the community ? I would prefer instead of a custom game model a ladder skip model. Every one can input his preferenced playstyle. And give the most important things the most points. The ai trys to match the people with the same preferences. And after this you can skip if it is not fitting. Cause if it takes too long to search the ai starts to match less fitting players. Since the developers are chinese ? it would be interesting if democracy works in china. Someone could try to explain. But they could be some sort of chi manipulating vampires. I don't know how higher religios trades are exactly working. It could all just be some imposter stuff.
I would much prefer they get rid of ALL cards, items and individual unit tech and instead have branching tech paths that open up units, abilities etc. was opposed to access to all units and random cards.
We play to win or to have fun, we must understand the difference. Said this, is wrong to loose? Its a skill issue the issue is to be unhealthy competitive, and frustrating about loosing , the game is unfair? All the player get the same cards at the same time , its a mirror match, and if we take the wrong decisions we get mad? Come on people we cam grow up and handle it as mature gamers, yes we get joy winning, but we get mad about loosing? No no no, life is about unexpected shiiit and the unexpected, in our life we dont know what will happen and we will get the best about it, if you want a RTS game go play RTS , like age of empires, StarCraft, warcraft, hellstorm , command and conquer, ... We can do better as a community of players .
Soooo much hate for the free unit drops, but clearly it's going to be expanded and improved upon. You even say yourself when they mention boss and mercenary units that it's interesting. This is the foundation for more. People LOST their minds the VERY second this was announced and have not changed their minds since, and ya know what? That's ok! You can certainly disagree with the Devs vision, or other players enjoying and having fun. But all too often, the screed includes "the game is dying!" "look at the reviews!" and other bad-faith arguments that literally any group of people, unhinged enough, could cause. Why can't we just trust them? it's not our game! it's not even fully released! Paying for the download, you KNEW you were buying an early access game. Why are you so MAD that it's being updated and mechanics are added on? You don't like it? That's not the same as it being bad. I've heard good arguments, and the devs have announced changes that address those issues. But "OMG, they added a feature! We can NEVER trust them again, my day is ruined and dissapointment is a meme because i fear change". I'm left with nothing to even argue against, this is just childish, immature, every adhom that comes short of cussing you out for idiotic, baseless trash mongering. Ok, i went too far. The patch has added a feature that I fully expect to be fleshed out further, incremented and iterated upon with more features until THIS initial step is barely recognizable. They're still adding layer! Just give it time. Pulling out torches because "you promised this" is pure entitlement and gross.
@@deaczorz This game has: - A spectator and betting system - A replay review system - A bot arena for testing matchups - Regular tournaments ... This game has "esport game" in its roots, man.
1600MMR for context, and I play about 40% aggro, 60% standard. Jota's "Fake Diversity" comment resonates really hard. It seems like countering your opponent's early mistakes, and actually committing into these counters, means your chance of winning only slightly improves compared to "random chance". High-value drops which mitigate your counters, or require you divert some tempo into a reaction, can 100% kill any tempo you can generate via forcing your opponent to react. The winning play is always to just generally improve your board, with as few weaknesses as possible, so that you don't die to turn 6 hacker drops (or something similarly swing-y). And what's worse, is that against gimmick strategies, turn 4/5 drops can easily turn into 2000 damage worth of surprise, so the winning play against gimmick strategies is still to play conservatively and mitigate damage until you have your chance to counter harder. Fake diversity is exactly the right phrase for these feelings.
Surrey you are spot on. The devs are lost in my opinion and instead of the 1000 things to improve this game they could have done, they see the free units as an easy way to code and will make this game into a casual game not a competitive game.
6 unit drops are a little much. Those wasps come up, I feel I have to take them, because I can't build that much anti-air with only 2 or 3 deployments.
Or if you can, then 3 elite anti air mustangs better be all you need for the round because that's all you're getting.
@@shakacienoh boy, only 1050 to partially counter a single card. 1350 if I want anti air.
Metzkermeister is my hero :>
I think you aren't negative at all, Surrey. You are very invested into the game, so of course it affects you when things start to develop in a way you dislike, and you're allowed to voice that, just as people who like the direction are allowed to voice their assent. I'm not sure where the idea is coming from that every criticism needs to be sugar coated or that criticism is a bad thing when clearly you are speaking from a position of love for the game.
You are so right on the user interface problem. Just look at lichess. Simple. But, the one thing that always attracts attention are the tournaments.
I think they should encourange competition, incentivize tournaments and give out cooler badges and some other benefits. Maybe even create leagues. The current u. i. is dogshit, let's face it. The chat is the worst part.
I guess this costs more money, but I'm willing to pay.
Yep they keep putting resources into the gameplay. I think the gameplay was pretty good even like 9 months ago. But the UI or player profiles or any kind of new player onboarding experience hasn't changed at all in that time.
@@SurreyEZ I agree. They should build a community. Just pitching some ideas: cool forums, allowing posts with short replays.
These kinds of videos and discussions are important and super interesting. Keep it up!
All other talking points aside, theres one thing that *really* grinds my gears about their “experimental” phase. They mentioned how they may introduce separate queues for no free units and with free units, *however* this may divide the player base too much so they may not do it. Why did they not then include that separate queue into at least part of the experimental phase to actually test how queue times would be??? Like they leave a hypothetical as their reason to not include the separate queues, but then refuse to use their own testing period to test if that really would be the case. Hell they could freaking get a direct comparison of how much people prefer either mode just by how their queues stack up against each other.
My guess is that they didnt have the technology for a separate auto matchmaking system
They told us "three weeks of chaos". Three weeks are over now, and at around ~4weeks of chaos, they do a tiny bit of changing to the chaos, but the chaos continues...
"THREE WEEKS!"
Also give me back my 2 squares!!!!
@@theRizza791 if you dont like then dont play until they remove the chaos simple as find something else to play
@@jordanrea2311how can you assume that i like or dislike the patch by my previous comment?
It says nothing else than that the devs kinda lied (again) about goals and data.
I actually like the patch but can fully understand the frustration some have with it.
shortcut keys:: 1, 2, 3, 4 for 'call ins' like oil bombs, 'Press E' for upgrade unit'
also it'd be nice if Move orders stayed between turns needing to be manually changed.
I have already said everything I had to say. Great video Surrey
They could also create alot more unit and do season with a specific roster. So if there's a total of 40 unit, but you can only use 25 of them for a season. Maybe it could a create more dynamics gameplay every couples of months where you create new strategies with the unit you have. It could also create the same feeling of Fiesta and just kill the game... idk.
I quit after reading this. Uninstalled, left the discord, etc. They clearly aren't actually interested in our feedback - just interested in paying lip service to us while preparing the game for a wider audience.
yea this game was in a very unique position in the market. From gameplay perspective it felt very different since the game had a huge emphasis on the position of the units. That what drew me to it. Now its starting to feel like any other autobattler. There's so much shit on the board that you just build the best composition with what you are given - like what you do in all the other autobattlers on the market.
@@SurreyEZ Absolutely. That's part of why I always played aggro pre-patch. It really gave you a feeling of control about positioning, taking real advantage of the way the opponent responded to your aggression.
I like the new free units, however the communication from the devs was pretty bad.
Also, I think balance changes for free units should be much-much quicker.
I think that is sweet spot for free units would be like two cards per game. One card in 2-4 rounds and one card in 5-7 rounds. And yes of course no level 8 fangs in round 2.
For context: 1500 MMR and 100 hours
I'm not a competitive player. I play for fun- I'm about 700 MMR right now.
I do not like the update and won't be playing until the dev team changes their philosophy on feedback.
It doesn't solve any of the supposed problems it claims to, it just takes choice out of the hand of the players and puts it in the hands of chance. - Regardless the lack of proportionate response to criticism from the dev team is enough to make me back off of the game for now and obfuscating a permanent update as temporary one is pretty annoying.
I might play again in the future if things change, but for now they're just going to have to hold onto my negative review.
The devs keep doubling down on this nonsense that people don't want. Even if it has fans they have essentially split their playerbase in half at least. I have 180 hours and I can't even be bothered to queue up anymore as it isn't fun. What a joke.
When they released the chaos patch they announced they are gonna be on holidays because of chinese new year etc. That was the crazy part imo. If you introduce something this wild you NEED to respond immediately. Like tune it a little bit in 2-3 days, communicate during the period etc. Imagine if this was some normal business. Just release something that has this much controversy and just casually go on vacation with the whole department
I like the patch very much, without the patch I would not play the game.
Sorry Lord, I would sacrifice you to get rid of this
Free units is good but the free unit power/unit count is just too high.
9:12 I think the purpose of the free units is to reduce the predictability of the game, to combat stale metas. I think it makes sense to have a little bit of fair randomness in the game to make each game unique and interesting. And to even out the balance of certain units. For example, if mustangs or sledgehammers are the meta pick, it would be good to have a mechanism in the game to prevent everyone always playing / forcing these units.
Maybe a reasonable middle ground is to reduce the impact and frequency of free units - maybe just once or twice with less cost? Enough to still build some strategy and gain a lead but also to change the direction of a game?
Another idea could be to give more starting units instead, to prevent the player from selling too much and forcing some other composition.
The first round already is a problem of not knowing what the enemy is going to play, like a one sided push or standart/defense. I highly doubt more starting units is a good idea.
You know, I think the main issue I have with people complaining about free units is because they wouldn't say a thing about it if it was in the game from the beginning. We'd just all have learned to play with or around it, just like we do with the choice of specialists which are not mirrored. or when storm/nuke comes at the same time as much better cards but you know your opponent would end the game if he picks it. At least free units are mirrored. Yes there is a lot of balancing work to be done, but just saying "I don't like it remove it or I leave" isn't helping you (I don't mean you, Surrey, I mean you, any player complaining), the devs, or the player base.
Not negative, but still holding shitty devs accountable. Well done 👍
I don't mean to sound impatient, but where's that new FFA game mode man?
I get we're guinea pigs in unit selection data and I'm okay with supporting that data, but these three updates have been a bit of a let down. While the game is still stable in numbers - at the moment - I'm worried the lack of (promised) things will burn further goodwill in the community.
Yea! The communication has not been good. Hope we get the FFA mode soon. That's the kind of fun mode I personally want
The game is a living thing; and I'm pleased about that. I find the dev's vision compelling so I am happy to let them experiment. Decisions are made and unmade as new data arises; it's to be expected and shouldn't be taken as "lying" (as some thoughtless people are doing). Not sure what was meant by calling their refinements to the free unit values in late rounds "lazy"; it's a healthy change very much along the lines of what Jota asked for. ~20% infrequent major changes & ~80% frequent small, data-aligned refinements is healthy strategy. As far as I can tell, of the complainers, there are maybe ~10% that are deep and thoughtful about it like you - and 90% that are emotionally unhinged; and after losing eagerly look to shift blame for their losses away from themselves rather than adapt - I'd be cautious about teaming up with people like that.
The lazy part refered to the fact that it was pretty obvious to all the players around day one that the unit drops are very overtuned. This should have been like a patch after 3 days. Not after 3 weeks. Now we could actually be somewhere.
Change is usually very good if it has a path to a good end. I have a lot of confusion about everything. My first thought is that why are they making this drastic change now? why NOW? why are they feeling really pressured all of a sudden? Why have they been making like really really minor balance patches for 9 months just to trash most existing balance with a patch like this? This is not me complaining btw, it's me questioning why they didn't do this 6 months ago? Their actions don't add up to me. While you find the devs vision compelling, i find it very confusing. Maybe that's why we have the opposite feelings on what is going on!
@@SurreyEZ Perhaps we have different time preferences; for me a few weeks is not a long amount of time - I'd rather the devs be conservative and collect data for a few more days, rather than making impulsive balance changes (unless it's an obvious bug). Also; they lay out their vision clearly under the heading "Q: Why launch the free unit cards system?" of the patch notes - perhaps the confusion is with their ways of going about it and what epiphany they had that has lead them to this now? I understand, they haven't communicated this. - but they make their vision clear: Increased variation, adaptability, opportunities for strategic adjustments, reduced sense of powerlessness, increasing occurrences of previously low-use units... it's all there.
Hello
I believe the trouble with the patch is a sort of religiousness trouble.
"Divide and Conquer" did work in Germany and Korea.
Depeche mode made a song named "john the revelator"
I guess it is just the problem that the mental connection to the developers got disturbed.
So you realize that they got their own head.
So this "divide and conquer" freed the oppressed developers from the community ?
I would prefer instead of a custom game model a ladder skip model.
Every one can input his preferenced playstyle. And give the most important things the most points.
The ai trys to match the people with the same preferences.
And after this you can skip if it is not fitting. Cause if it takes too long to search the ai starts to match less fitting players.
Since the developers are chinese ? it would be interesting if democracy works in china. Someone could try to explain.
But they could be some sort of chi manipulating vampires. I don't know how higher religios trades are exactly working. It could all just be some imposter stuff.
مرحبا بك يا صديقتي اشكرك على هذا الفيديو الخاص بك اتمنى لك يوم سعيد أنا صديقي جديده في انتظارك احلى لايك
I wish you a happy day as well
I would much prefer they get rid of ALL cards, items and individual unit tech and instead have branching tech paths that open up units, abilities etc. was opposed to access to all units and random cards.
I quit and I wont come back until they remove the free units or reduce the worth of them alot. (not from 1000->900)
nah, free troops are good, i escalated from 1400 to 1800 in a week playing with that
We play to win or to have fun, we must understand the difference.
Said this, is wrong to loose? Its a skill issue the issue is to be unhealthy competitive, and frustrating about loosing , the game is unfair? All the player get the same cards at the same time , its a mirror match, and if we take the wrong decisions we get mad? Come on people we cam grow up and handle it as mature gamers, yes we get joy winning, but we get mad about loosing?
No no no, life is about unexpected shiiit and the unexpected, in our life we dont know what will happen and we will get the best about it, if you want a RTS game go play RTS , like age of empires, StarCraft, warcraft, hellstorm , command and conquer, ... We can do better as a community of players .
Soooo much hate for the free unit drops, but clearly it's going to be expanded and improved upon. You even say yourself when they mention boss and mercenary units that it's interesting. This is the foundation for more.
People LOST their minds the VERY second this was announced and have not changed their minds since, and ya know what? That's ok! You can certainly disagree with the Devs vision, or other players enjoying and having fun. But all too often, the screed includes "the game is dying!" "look at the reviews!" and other bad-faith arguments that literally any group of people, unhinged enough, could cause.
Why can't we just trust them? it's not our game! it's not even fully released! Paying for the download, you KNEW you were buying an early access game. Why are you so MAD that it's being updated and mechanics are added on? You don't like it? That's not the same as it being bad. I've heard good arguments, and the devs have announced changes that address those issues. But "OMG, they added a feature! We can NEVER trust them again, my day is ruined and dissapointment is a meme because i fear change". I'm left with nothing to even argue against, this is just childish, immature, every adhom that comes short of cussing you out for idiotic, baseless trash mongering. Ok, i went too far.
The patch has added a feature that I fully expect to be fleshed out further, incremented and iterated upon with more features until THIS initial step is barely recognizable. They're still adding layer! Just give it time. Pulling out torches because "you promised this" is pure entitlement and gross.
Sure it can be good when worked. The problem for me is I see 10 clearly better paths for achieving the goal they are trying to achieve (variety)
You're an overthinker. The future will take care of itself, the evil of today is enough.
future always takes care of itself, but the path can be influenced
@@SurreyEZ should play for fun, not for rating. this game isnt reallynot a "esport" game
@@deaczorz This game has:
- A spectator and betting system
- A replay review system
- A bot arena for testing matchups
- Regular tournaments
... This game has "esport game" in its roots, man.
@@deaczorz it was introduced to me as one (by their marketing). Thats the only reason why I started playing this game.
He's just talking about the game, man. Users should have a say in the way the game develops.