Decided to merge my gaming blog over. Maintaining 2 separate blogs seem unnecessary for now. Not that I'm consistently writing anyway.
Anyway, I'm back on Heroes Charge. For the past 2-3 weeks actually. They seemed to have fixed the matchmaking for crusade, so things are humming along quite nicely, with a good influx of gold everyday. Keeping my fingers crossed.
Just found out that there is a refund trick being used by some friends to get free In-App-Purchases:
Say, you pay upfront $100 for some in-game currency. Spend it all in your game. Contact Google play store for a refund, saying something like your silly kid pressed it accidentally. Somehow Google will refund you with no questions asked, and the developer is supposed to claw back the in-game currency you spent. Depending on how often this happens to the developer, you might be considered not worth the effort to claw back. And tada, free IAP.
AFAIK, this works for Summoners War: Sky Arena. Not that I play this game.
The $100 upfront risk is too big for me. Paying $100 for Heroes Charge would be one of the most ridiculous things to do.
Speaking of cashing, I'm really amazed at how much people spend on freemium games. Especially when I read the HC forums, you can see how all the payers dole out expert advice, and then end off with a "I'm VIP 11 btw". That's about $700 spent. On a mobile game. With simple graphics and simple gameplay. Like seriously?
Freemium games is where all the money is at.
I think pay-to-win (p2w) games blows to the max, because there's no way the non-payer can keep up. And the only way for the payer to keep up is to pay more than the other payers. HC is a little less p2w, in the sense that paying only gives you more options and slightly faster leveling speed.
An analogy would be like a payer who bought 90% of all the NBA players, but he could only field 5 at a time. And somehow he didn't manage to get Lebron James on his team. Super unlucky payer.
Patch 2.1.2 for D3 is coming. Dragon Age: Inquisition is coming.
Decisions decisions.
Wednesday, November 19, 2014
Monday, October 27, 2014
Random Gaming Rants
Accomplished my mission of getting paragon 600 in D3. Initially i thought i would start farming for hellfire amulet materials. But i guess it is immaterial now, as it is too much hassle and i'm not aiming for leaderboards anymore.
Stopped playing Heroes Charge as well. Managed to clear crusade 15/15 for 2 straight days with the help of my guildmate's LOA. LOA = king of crusade. For today's crusade though, i'm facing teams with 2 level 1s and 3 level 48s. Got wiped in a instant. They got to take into account the variance of team power instead just simply average team power. Not quite sure why anyone would field such a lineup, but it's definitely irritating.
Failed crusade = low gold = low skill levels = low crusade/arena ability = failed crusade.
I see this as a design flaw (bad matchmaking), thus I think it is quite pointless to continue with the game. Nonetheless, it is a good game overall, just that it hinges on whether you can get a DK early or not.
Played my first match of Dota in a long while. Intense 1 hr experience where my team got owned early but somehow we managed to push back and win in the end. I find 1 hr to be a little too taxing for me. GRs are 15 minutes and I don't enjoy them either. But I guess Dota requires no grinding, though you have to play constantly to grind your skill. Something good to keep in the pocket and play once in a while.
For the longest time, I have no games to play. Good to know.
Stopped playing Heroes Charge as well. Managed to clear crusade 15/15 for 2 straight days with the help of my guildmate's LOA. LOA = king of crusade. For today's crusade though, i'm facing teams with 2 level 1s and 3 level 48s. Got wiped in a instant. They got to take into account the variance of team power instead just simply average team power. Not quite sure why anyone would field such a lineup, but it's definitely irritating.
Failed crusade = low gold = low skill levels = low crusade/arena ability = failed crusade.
I see this as a design flaw (bad matchmaking), thus I think it is quite pointless to continue with the game. Nonetheless, it is a good game overall, just that it hinges on whether you can get a DK early or not.
Played my first match of Dota in a long while. Intense 1 hr experience where my team got owned early but somehow we managed to push back and win in the end. I find 1 hr to be a little too taxing for me. GRs are 15 minutes and I don't enjoy them either. But I guess Dota requires no grinding, though you have to play constantly to grind your skill. Something good to keep in the pocket and play once in a while.
For the longest time, I have no games to play. Good to know.
Monday, October 20, 2014
Heroes Charge - How to make it better
Been playing Heroes Charge for the past few days. It's one of those f2p mobile games where u collect heroes, upgrade them, then send ur customised team to pvp against other in the arena for leaderboard rankings.
iOS Android
What I like about it:
1) Heroes and skills resembles those from DoTA. So there's some sense of familiarity as to what you are getting from each hero, without referring to guides.
2) Lots of free stuff and you get rewarded for doing stuff. Everyday you can open some treasure box 5 times, and doing so gives u some exp. Every 2 days, you can open a better box for free to get heroes and some other cool stuff. Daily quests gives you exp for simply playing the game
3) Heroes feel attainable with sufficient grinding. Most heroes have a particular quest which you can grind for their souls. When sufficient souls are collected, the heroes can be summoned to join your team. Assuming a 33% drop rate for heroes, on average you can get 1 soul per hero quest (3 attempts each day). There are other good sources of attaining heroes as well.
For perspective, the game gives you 5, I have 12 now, and I've only played for less than a week.
4) Auto combat and raids. When you can clear a quest with 3 stars, you gain the option of auto combat and raid for that quest. Raiding simply means you clear the quest immediately, and they give you the item looted for that run, as well as the exp you can get if you were to fight the mobs yourself. Auto combat is used if you wished to level certain characters. Both are time-savers imho.
5) Good timings. The game resets at 5am daily, so there's plenty to do during my morning commute. At 12 pm, you get your first dose of free stamina, which gives you something to do during lunch. Then the next dose comes at 6pm, for the commute home. And the final dose at 9pm, for after dinner. I think it's a very beautiful system to entice players to keep playing at regular practical intervals throughout the day.
What can be better:
1) Assuming all heroes are balanced, players should be given a choice to choose their starting hero from the pool of heroes. Or at least have a choice to pick a tank, a dps and a support.
2) Players should also be allowed to gear their heroes as they please, within some restrictions. If I want a tanky party I should be allowed to do it.
3) Players should be allowed to rearrange their hero formation as they please, to add further diversification in strategy.
4) More diversity in skill effects. Probably a little harder to balance, but right now almost every character has a stun, a dps skill, and a support-ish skill. Slightly bland for now.
5) Right now everyone attacks at almost the same speed. Or at least I can't tell the difference. Let agility boost attack speed, so that at least agility heroes make sense in this game. Also adds to more complexity in the game, i.e stack nukers or stack agi carries?
Not quite sure how to fix this, but it's essentially a P2W game. Players who can cash will have more stamina, which translates to higher team levels and therefore higher max hero levels. And levels are everything in a PVP game. So that's that.
Personally, I just enjoy the collection of heroes for now, knowing that the arena is way out of my league. Just clear 3 for my daily quest.
iOS Android
What I like about it:
1) Heroes and skills resembles those from DoTA. So there's some sense of familiarity as to what you are getting from each hero, without referring to guides.
2) Lots of free stuff and you get rewarded for doing stuff. Everyday you can open some treasure box 5 times, and doing so gives u some exp. Every 2 days, you can open a better box for free to get heroes and some other cool stuff. Daily quests gives you exp for simply playing the game
3) Heroes feel attainable with sufficient grinding. Most heroes have a particular quest which you can grind for their souls. When sufficient souls are collected, the heroes can be summoned to join your team. Assuming a 33% drop rate for heroes, on average you can get 1 soul per hero quest (3 attempts each day). There are other good sources of attaining heroes as well.
For perspective, the game gives you 5, I have 12 now, and I've only played for less than a week.
4) Auto combat and raids. When you can clear a quest with 3 stars, you gain the option of auto combat and raid for that quest. Raiding simply means you clear the quest immediately, and they give you the item looted for that run, as well as the exp you can get if you were to fight the mobs yourself. Auto combat is used if you wished to level certain characters. Both are time-savers imho.
5) Good timings. The game resets at 5am daily, so there's plenty to do during my morning commute. At 12 pm, you get your first dose of free stamina, which gives you something to do during lunch. Then the next dose comes at 6pm, for the commute home. And the final dose at 9pm, for after dinner. I think it's a very beautiful system to entice players to keep playing at regular practical intervals throughout the day.
What can be better:
1) Assuming all heroes are balanced, players should be given a choice to choose their starting hero from the pool of heroes. Or at least have a choice to pick a tank, a dps and a support.
2) Players should also be allowed to gear their heroes as they please, within some restrictions. If I want a tanky party I should be allowed to do it.
3) Players should be allowed to rearrange their hero formation as they please, to add further diversification in strategy.
4) More diversity in skill effects. Probably a little harder to balance, but right now almost every character has a stun, a dps skill, and a support-ish skill. Slightly bland for now.
5) Right now everyone attacks at almost the same speed. Or at least I can't tell the difference. Let agility boost attack speed, so that at least agility heroes make sense in this game. Also adds to more complexity in the game, i.e stack nukers or stack agi carries?
Not quite sure how to fix this, but it's essentially a P2W game. Players who can cash will have more stamina, which translates to higher team levels and therefore higher max hero levels. And levels are everything in a PVP game. So that's that.
Personally, I just enjoy the collection of heroes for now, knowing that the arena is way out of my league. Just clear 3 for my daily quest.
Monday, October 13, 2014
Nimble Quest - How to make it better
Nimble Quest is a cute little mobile game that is similar to the snake game in old Nokia phones, with a slight RPG twist. You start with your hero (head of the snake), and you walk around the map to collect other heroes to extend your conga line. Each hero has his/her own attack move that will shoot/slash at nearby monsters when in range. Monsters move about freely in the map, and they have their own attacks as well.
Can learn more about it here: iOS Android
At it's current iteration, the game is a little simple, and there's nothing much to do after you max out every single character in the game. Which isn't a hard thing to do. I find the gameplay and idea solid, and it's a pity to leave this game at its current state.
My suggestions to improve the game with more content :
1) Change the leveling/character system.
Right now, each hero has only 3 levels. Change it such that heroes can level almost infinitely, but only via kill exp. Let each hero have a character sheet where you can view the stats of the hero, like damage, hp and armor. Upon leveling, players can pump x points of stats into damage/hp/armor/ and maybe pump 1 skill point to improve the heroes' attack move. Throw in a skill tree while we're at it.
2) More interesting attack moves, improved by skill points.
The attack moves right now are not very varied amongst the heroes
Possible alternatives include:
- Chain lightning (more skill points more chained targets)
- Split shot (more skill points more targets)
- Piercing shot (more skill points more pierce)
- Homing shots (more skill points better homing)
- DoT attacks
- Thunderstorm attack (no projectile, more points more targets)
3) Auras
Heroes can have auras that buffs/debuffs nearby heroes/monsters, like more attack speed for party members adjacent to the hero, or slows the movement speed of monsters within x radius.
4) Passives
Heroes can have leader and member passives. Leader passives trigger when they are selected as the head of the snake, while member passives trigger only when they are party members. Maybe unlock them as the keystone skill in the skill tree.
5) Boss Fights
Nuff said
6) Items
Let each hero wear some item to improve their stats. Legendary items can introduce new attacks, or simply like a +1 to all skills.
7) More mechanics
Monster/Hero effects on kill, on death, on hit etc, like monster leaves a cloud of poison on death, heroes that passes through this cloud take damage.
8) More heroes.
Nuff said x2.
---
But of course, these are just some ideas of mine. For hypothetical discussion's sake.
Can learn more about it here: iOS Android
At it's current iteration, the game is a little simple, and there's nothing much to do after you max out every single character in the game. Which isn't a hard thing to do. I find the gameplay and idea solid, and it's a pity to leave this game at its current state.
My suggestions to improve the game with more content :
1) Change the leveling/character system.
Right now, each hero has only 3 levels. Change it such that heroes can level almost infinitely, but only via kill exp. Let each hero have a character sheet where you can view the stats of the hero, like damage, hp and armor. Upon leveling, players can pump x points of stats into damage/hp/armor/ and maybe pump 1 skill point to improve the heroes' attack move. Throw in a skill tree while we're at it.
2) More interesting attack moves, improved by skill points.
The attack moves right now are not very varied amongst the heroes
Possible alternatives include:
- Chain lightning (more skill points more chained targets)
- Split shot (more skill points more targets)
- Piercing shot (more skill points more pierce)
- Homing shots (more skill points better homing)
- DoT attacks
- Thunderstorm attack (no projectile, more points more targets)
3) Auras
Heroes can have auras that buffs/debuffs nearby heroes/monsters, like more attack speed for party members adjacent to the hero, or slows the movement speed of monsters within x radius.
4) Passives
Heroes can have leader and member passives. Leader passives trigger when they are selected as the head of the snake, while member passives trigger only when they are party members. Maybe unlock them as the keystone skill in the skill tree.
5) Boss Fights
Nuff said
6) Items
Let each hero wear some item to improve their stats. Legendary items can introduce new attacks, or simply like a +1 to all skills.
7) More mechanics
Monster/Hero effects on kill, on death, on hit etc, like monster leaves a cloud of poison on death, heroes that passes through this cloud take damage.
8) More heroes.
Nuff said x2.
---
But of course, these are just some ideas of mine. For hypothetical discussion's sake.
Wednesday, October 08, 2014
Paragon Leveling - 18 more to go
Have 18 more levels to go before I hit paragon level 600.
Been trying to clock in 1 level's worth of play each day, chipping at it slowly.
Just doing speed T6 rifts myself. Tried with a party of 4 yesterday and it seems a little faster.
The thing with parties is that it is hard to find players that are at the same level as you. For my case, I'm literally carrying 3 other players for 75% more exp. I guess it might be a worthy trade. Whatever gets me to my end goal faster.
Tried Steady strikers and Tal Rasha chest, with a Tiki Torchers and Rabid Dogs. Reaching 2.1m sheet dps with close to 10m toughness. This should be sufficient to clear GR37 in a good time. Don't understand why my toughness is so low compared to most players, and yet my DPS is not that much higher. Can't imagine how low my toughness will drop if I ever find another SMK with a damage roll instead of vitality.
When I reach P600, I will focus full time on farming a nice hellfire ammy.
May RNGesus be with me.
Been trying to clock in 1 level's worth of play each day, chipping at it slowly.
Just doing speed T6 rifts myself. Tried with a party of 4 yesterday and it seems a little faster.
The thing with parties is that it is hard to find players that are at the same level as you. For my case, I'm literally carrying 3 other players for 75% more exp. I guess it might be a worthy trade. Whatever gets me to my end goal faster.
Tried Steady strikers and Tal Rasha chest, with a Tiki Torchers and Rabid Dogs. Reaching 2.1m sheet dps with close to 10m toughness. This should be sufficient to clear GR37 in a good time. Don't understand why my toughness is so low compared to most players, and yet my DPS is not that much higher. Can't imagine how low my toughness will drop if I ever find another SMK with a damage roll instead of vitality.
When I reach P600, I will focus full time on farming a nice hellfire ammy.
May RNGesus be with me.
Tuesday, October 07, 2014
Diablo 3 - Random thoughts
Attempted several times to improve my GR record, but to no avail. What is heartening is that I can reach GR37/38 without fail when climbing using my WD. I just freeze up every time I play GR37/38 and start to make silly mistakes.
Rain of Toads and Fetish Sycophants is more or less compulsory for the damage output.
Tiki Torchers seems semi important for the fast bbv refresh, AOE.
Rabid Dogs + Templar, vs Leeching Beast + Enchantress?
Enforcer and Gem of Efficacious Toxin seems to be on par DPS wise, but Toxin gives a nice little DOT for more AOE, whereas Enforcer gives a defensive buff to pets. But what I think is, what kills pets, will kill pets anyway. So Enforcer doesn't seem that appealing anymore. They need to make Enforcer such that pets have significantly higher survivability,
I might need a pair of steady strikers with no elemental damage, and couple with Tal Rasha's chest.
And yes, please drop me a perfect roll SMK. This is really praying for a miracle.
Rain of Toads and Fetish Sycophants is more or less compulsory for the damage output.
Tiki Torchers seems semi important for the fast bbv refresh, AOE.
Rabid Dogs + Templar, vs Leeching Beast + Enchantress?
Enforcer and Gem of Efficacious Toxin seems to be on par DPS wise, but Toxin gives a nice little DOT for more AOE, whereas Enforcer gives a defensive buff to pets. But what I think is, what kills pets, will kill pets anyway. So Enforcer doesn't seem that appealing anymore. They need to make Enforcer such that pets have significantly higher survivability,
I might need a pair of steady strikers with no elemental damage, and couple with Tal Rasha's chest.
And yes, please drop me a perfect roll SMK. This is really praying for a miracle.
Friday, October 03, 2014
Diablo 3 - Some Suggestions
Didn't play much last night as I was pretty sleepy. Still continued with the physical build, but used Pain Enhancer this time. Probably should get more Fetish Army affix compared to dog affix on my gear.
Anyway, here's some suggestions to make Diablo 3 a more enjoyable game:
1. Auto pickup of materials and gems.
Not quite sure why they haven't implemented this. Complete no-brainer and a massive quality of life improvement for players. Should also include a toggle for players to decide what not to loot (i.e potions), or simply make it automatic that if the player has a legendary potion then the auto-loot for health potions is turned off. Simple fix in my opinion.
2. Make pickup radius a useful stat.
Simply make pickup radius extend the the AOE of any effect, say 25% of PUR is added to the range of any effect. So a single target skill will have some AOE now, a skill with AOE will have a wider AOE now. I think it is a good change, as it opens up a lot of possible builds, and makes several skills suddenly viable, i.e Carnevil WD. Imagine the darts you shoot are all AOE now. This also makes everyone gear up differently.
3. Allow enchanting of one primary and one secondary.
Right now some pieces of gear are somewhat not optimal, because the secondary is a resist affix and therefore you can't roll for all resist for the primary. And most people roll for primary affixes as they are stronger, and completely leave the secondary to fate. Allowing rolling of one secondary will fix this inefficiency in gear.
4. Allow reset of enchanting.
Simply put, some people screw up, and patches change the way we evaluate items now. This will help correct for mistakes as well as the introduction of new patches, without making the player hunt for the item again. Just make the cost the existing cost of enchanting right now. Doesn't need to be punishing. Might be hard to implement if Blizz does not store the pre-enchanted state.
5. Hellfire keys drop rate.
Just make the drop rate equal to the organ drop rate (i.e 100% for T6). Not sure why they didn't implement this. In fact i'd rather they implement this than the organ drop rate. At least I can consistently make machines to hunt for the organ I miss. Now I just have unequal stacks of different keys and hope RNGesus gives me the right key.
6. Make thorns a % instead of flat damage
Like area damage, make the thorns affix proc X% weapon damage. This scales well and is easy to understand compared to the existing thorns implementation. It is also easier to assess if 200% thorns dmg is worth gearing for, compared with 80,000 thorns damage (which is also affected by 25% of your mainstat, omg).
7. Change all proc mechanics to be like Life on Hit
Just have the same proc chance per cast when the skill lands on anything. Makes both AOE and single target viable, and players do not need to worry about proc coefficient whatsoever. Opens up more skill choices.
8. Gem exchange.
Allow players to trade any 3 gems for 1 gem of any colour they wish. Or let players break gems into gem splinters (1 splinter for Marquise, 3 for Imperials, so on), then use splinters to make gems (3 splinters for Marquise, 9 for imperials, so on). Might be a cleaner solution, but slightly more tedious.
9. Materials Vendor.
Right now gold is somewhat overflowing due to Boon of the hoarder. Even enchanting can't quite keep up the rate that the gold is falling (if using a Pet WD). Create a materials vendor that sells crafting materials and gems. Like enchanting, the price of each unit is increasing, albeit at a slower pace than enchanting.
If we start at the cost of 1 per unit, increasing by 1 each, the first 1000 materials will cost ~500k. The first 10,000 materials will cost ~50m, and the first 100,000 will cost ~5b. Not quite sure if players will get there, but this scaling seems reasonable.
Hopefully this gets players excited about crafting and enchanting. It's always a downer to run out of materials.
10. Ramaladni's Gift on all equipment
I forsee that this will happen in the future. Currently makes no sense to shift the burden of a socket from weapons to all jewelry. So now instead of 1 item that is deemed useless without a socket, we have 3. Let players have their trifecta rings and ammys, and also give them a socket. Players want to feel powerful, not gimped.
Here ends the current iteration of suggestions. Will post more if I have more ideas.
Anyway, here's some suggestions to make Diablo 3 a more enjoyable game:
1. Auto pickup of materials and gems.
Not quite sure why they haven't implemented this. Complete no-brainer and a massive quality of life improvement for players. Should also include a toggle for players to decide what not to loot (i.e potions), or simply make it automatic that if the player has a legendary potion then the auto-loot for health potions is turned off. Simple fix in my opinion.
2. Make pickup radius a useful stat.
Simply make pickup radius extend the the AOE of any effect, say 25% of PUR is added to the range of any effect. So a single target skill will have some AOE now, a skill with AOE will have a wider AOE now. I think it is a good change, as it opens up a lot of possible builds, and makes several skills suddenly viable, i.e Carnevil WD. Imagine the darts you shoot are all AOE now. This also makes everyone gear up differently.
3. Allow enchanting of one primary and one secondary.
Right now some pieces of gear are somewhat not optimal, because the secondary is a resist affix and therefore you can't roll for all resist for the primary. And most people roll for primary affixes as they are stronger, and completely leave the secondary to fate. Allowing rolling of one secondary will fix this inefficiency in gear.
4. Allow reset of enchanting.
Simply put, some people screw up, and patches change the way we evaluate items now. This will help correct for mistakes as well as the introduction of new patches, without making the player hunt for the item again. Just make the cost the existing cost of enchanting right now. Doesn't need to be punishing. Might be hard to implement if Blizz does not store the pre-enchanted state.
5. Hellfire keys drop rate.
Just make the drop rate equal to the organ drop rate (i.e 100% for T6). Not sure why they didn't implement this. In fact i'd rather they implement this than the organ drop rate. At least I can consistently make machines to hunt for the organ I miss. Now I just have unequal stacks of different keys and hope RNGesus gives me the right key.
6. Make thorns a % instead of flat damage
Like area damage, make the thorns affix proc X% weapon damage. This scales well and is easy to understand compared to the existing thorns implementation. It is also easier to assess if 200% thorns dmg is worth gearing for, compared with 80,000 thorns damage (which is also affected by 25% of your mainstat, omg).
7. Change all proc mechanics to be like Life on Hit
Just have the same proc chance per cast when the skill lands on anything. Makes both AOE and single target viable, and players do not need to worry about proc coefficient whatsoever. Opens up more skill choices.
8. Gem exchange.
Allow players to trade any 3 gems for 1 gem of any colour they wish. Or let players break gems into gem splinters (1 splinter for Marquise, 3 for Imperials, so on), then use splinters to make gems (3 splinters for Marquise, 9 for imperials, so on). Might be a cleaner solution, but slightly more tedious.
9. Materials Vendor.
Right now gold is somewhat overflowing due to Boon of the hoarder. Even enchanting can't quite keep up the rate that the gold is falling (if using a Pet WD). Create a materials vendor that sells crafting materials and gems. Like enchanting, the price of each unit is increasing, albeit at a slower pace than enchanting.
If we start at the cost of 1 per unit, increasing by 1 each, the first 1000 materials will cost ~500k. The first 10,000 materials will cost ~50m, and the first 100,000 will cost ~5b. Not quite sure if players will get there, but this scaling seems reasonable.
Hopefully this gets players excited about crafting and enchanting. It's always a downer to run out of materials.
10. Ramaladni's Gift on all equipment
I forsee that this will happen in the future. Currently makes no sense to shift the burden of a socket from weapons to all jewelry. So now instead of 1 item that is deemed useless without a socket, we have 3. Let players have their trifecta rings and ammys, and also give them a socket. Players want to feel powerful, not gimped.
Here ends the current iteration of suggestions. Will post more if I have more ideas.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)