St. Patrick's Day 2023 Feedback

[LeCron]

Please leave your feedback for the St. Patrick's Day 2023 below.

 

[Johnny B. Goode]

Yes! My favorite event mini-game! Played it on Beta and can't wait to play it in all my live server cities! I look forward to this event every year!

 

[Henry the 92nd]

I like this event in general, BUT I don't like making players pay real money for the final level of the Grand Prize

 

[BlackHole338]

More fair than the last event and I find it easier to obtain the levels than any other event because of the chests at the end of each town. Also easier to get the 10th level because the 9th level gives you fragments of the 10th without spending money. Even if you usually need to spend money to get the last level guaranteed, you will eventually get the last level from waiting time. This is still fair because most of game already has waiting times that can be sped up by spending money.

 

[UBERhelp1]

This is still fair because most of game already has waiting times that can be sped up by spending money.

Keep telling yourself that buddy. It's not fair that ~30% of free to play players that complete 10 towns won't be able to get to the 10th level within the span of the event, even if they did it all right (assuming a 20% chance for the fragments to appear in the end of town boxes).

I'm fine if there's a paid level that can only be accessed via payment upfront or achieved over time, but I'm not fine with the fact that the players who do and don't get that upgrade comes down to luck. If, say, it was guaranteed that every third or fourth town, the Archdruid Hut Upgrade fragments would appear as a chest, that would be fair, because it would still require a decent time commitment to get, but by using a strategy and working hard, you could get it by merit alone. How it is now, it is literally just decided on if you are lucky or not.

 

[Pericles the Lion]

Keep telling yourself that buddy. It's not fair that ~30% of free to play players that complete 10 towns won't be able to get to the 10th level within the span of the event, even if they did it all right (assuming a 20% chance for the fragments to appear in the end of town boxes).

I'm fine if there's a paid level that can only be accessed via payment upfront or achieved over time, but I'm not fine with the fact that the players who do and don't get that upgrade comes down to luck. If, say, it was guaranteed that every third or fourth town, the Archdruid Hut Upgrade fragments would appear as a chest, that would be fair, because it would still require a decent time commitment to get, but by using a strategy and working hard, you could get it by merit alone. How it is now, it is literally just decided on if you are lucky or not.

Presuming a player plays daily they can get the L10 building by (1) purchasing the event Pass, (2) spending diamonds on extra pots of gold, (3) following MooingCat's spreadsheet and get lucky with the end-of-town chests, or (4) if unlucky with the chests build the L9 building and collect the frags of the Archdruid upgrade kit for 150 days. No cash or diamonds needed for (3) or (4). Even with bad luck, in the grand scheme of things, 150 days is not a big deal.

 

[xivarmy]

Keep telling yourself that buddy. It's not fair that ~30% of free to play players that complete 10 towns won't be able to get to the 10th level within the span of the event, even if they did it all right (assuming a 20% chance for the fragments to appear in the end of town boxes).

I'm fine if there's a paid level that can only be accessed via payment upfront or achieved over time, but I'm not fine with the fact that the players who do and don't get that upgrade comes down to luck. If, say, it was guaranteed that every third or fourth town, the Archdruid Hut Upgrade fragments would appear as a chest, that would be fair, because it would still require a decent time commitment to get, but by using a strategy and working hard, you could get it by merit alone. How it is now, it is literally just decided on if you are lucky or not.

There technically is the no-luck-required 600 tasks option if the grand prize line is still the same... An insane amount of work, but possible.

 

[UBERhelp1]

There technically is the no-luck-required 600 tasks option if the grand prize line is still the same... An insane amount of work, but possible.

The problem is that you'd have to rely on incident luck to get about a thousand extra pots. No matter what you do you're stuck with it coming down to luck as a free to play player.

So in summary, the options are:

• Spend money and never actually need strategy in a strategy game
• Hope you're lucky or wait 150 days
• No-life the minigame for three weeks

To make it clear, I'm not mad about the 150 days waiting period. I think that's fine, if a little long (maybe 90 days instead of 150?), but when it comes down to luck for that waiting period it just feels really bad.

Presuming a player plays daily they can get the L10 building by (1) purchasing the event Pass, (2) spending diamonds on extra pots of gold, (3) following MooingCat's spreadsheet and get lucky with the end-of-town chests, or (4) if unlucky with the chests build the L9 building and collect the frags of the Archdruid upgrade kit for 150 days. No cash or diamonds needed for (3) or (4). Even with bad luck, in the grand scheme of things, 150 days is not a big deal.

And spending money isn't a strategy. You can tell yourself that, but it's like celebrating that you won a sports game after you paid off the refs to be favorable to you. You didn't actually have to do any effort.

 

[xivarmy]

The problem is that you'd have to rely on incident luck to get about a thousand extra pots. No matter what you do you're stuck with it coming down to luck as a free to play player.

Not unless the pots of gold have changed. It's very tight, involves some level 0 managers (that only really matter for the first hour or so of a city), but you can do it without incidents.

But yes, it does involve no-lifing it.

---

Regarding the waiting period, you don't even have to go full no-life to shrink that. 300 tasks (i.e. 10 cities) already has it down to 100 days max. 450 tasks has it down to 50 days max (and the amount of bad luck required to have not eliminated it at that point is also quite awful (if it's still 20% to see it in the chests) - you'll have seen at least 14 end-of-city arrangements - the odds of not seeing fragments once is ~4%).

Luck can be part of strategy. And with the fallback being "you just wait a little longer", it's fine imo.

 

[Angry.Blanket]

If it were possible for every player to get a 10 lvl building for free would that not eliminate the need to spend money?
I thought this event lvl 9 is a full building with a bonus level for those willing to spend money , and fragments for those willing to wait.
To me the value to the paying player goes away if all the free players can have the same thing for free.

 

[Pericles the Lion]

And spending money isn't a strategy. You can tell yourself that, but it's like celebrating that you won a sports game after you paid off the refs to be favorable to you. You didn't actually have to do any effort.

But that's where you are wrong. Spending money is most certainly a strategy. For example, the Yankees spent $215MM on payroll last year and went 99:63. The Oakland A's spent $41MM and went 60:102. Tell me that spending money isn't a big part of the Yankee's strategy. Spending money, or not, is a strategy used in sports, politics, games, you name it.

 

[xivarmy]

If it were possible for every player to get a 10 lvl building for free would that not eliminate the need to spend money?
I thought this event lvl 9 is a full building with a bonus level for those willing to spend money , and fragments for those willing to wait.
To me the value to the paying player goes away if all the free players can have the same thing for free.

To get multiple (level 9s) will cost diamonds - there is no strategy to get an extra 9 kits without some diamonds.

That is the typical value offered by FoE in the past to the paying player - they can get more of what they want, while the free players get a single complete building and will take longer to catch up.

It's only recently they've started experimenting with giving special even-better-stuff to the paying player.

They did try to float the Archdruid Hut as a "bonus level", but noone was buying that - Level 9 isn't good enough to compete with other event buildings while Archdruid Hut is amazing. The gap between them is too large to make it "exclusive to paying players".

 

[Angry.Blanket]

To get multiple (level 9s) will cost diamonds - there is no strategy to get an extra 9 kits without some diamonds.

That is the typical value offered by FoE in the past to the paying player - they can get more of what they want, while the free players get a single complete building and will take longer to catch up.

It's only recently they've started experimenting with giving special even-better-stuff to the paying player.

They did try to float the Archdruid Hut as a "bonus level", but noone was buying that - Level 9 isn't good enough to compete with other event buildings while Archdruid Hut is amazing. The gap between them is too large to make it "exclusive to paying players".

The gap needs to be big enough to make it worth money, the cost to go after more than one building isn't in everyone's budget there needs to be a pay to play version of the first building. And it needs to be enough improvement that the FTP players wish they had it.

 

[xivarmy]

The gap needs to be big enough to make it worth money, the cost to go after more than one building isn't in everyone's budget there needs to be a pay to play version of the first building. And it needs to be enough improvement that the FTP players wish they had it.

There are many mobile games that follow that model - they have extreme turnover and don't succeed in building a stable player base. If you want to see worlds become ghost towns, going too far into the world of P2W options for buildings would be a great way to do it.

 

[Johnny B. Goode]

As one of the paying players I am ok with this. If I pay above and beyond specifically for the event then why shouldn't I expect something that the non paying players don't get ? If this wasn't the case they why would I spend money on the game ?

Because if that were their game model a lot of us would not be here. I have tried and quickly deleted lots of games where there was stuff you could only get if you spent money. Wouldn't be much of a game if it was only the P2W players here. Nobody for you to feel superior to.

 

[Angry.Blanket]

So why doesn't Inno cut out all the pay to play part off the game.

 

[Ebeondi Asi]

wemustwatchtheboatwemustwatchtheboatwemustwatchtheboat
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wemustwatchtheboatwemustwatchtheboatwemustwatchtheboat
wemustwatchtheboatwemustwatchtheboatwemustwatchtheboat
wemustwatchtheboatwemustwatchtheboatwemustwatchtheboat
wemustwatchtheboatwemustwatchtheboatwemustwatchtheboat
wemustwatchtheboatwemustwatchtheboatwemustwatchtheboat

the clack clack clack is Mesmerizing

 

[xivarmy]

So why doesn't Inno cut out all the pay to play part off the game.

Because it's a balance. They're a company and they need to make money. But the free players are an asset that makes the world lively ; they're an essential portion of the social fabric of the game.

Perhaps most important is a sense of stability - one of the biggest worries right now with their trends is they haven't shown a sign of slowing down on increasing monetization. So there is an upcoming event that it would not be impossible I would buy the pass for - but at the same time there's the deterrent that even if I do and get what I want, that will seem lackluster another couple events down the road when they offer even bigger incentives. Do I spend money now only to quit the game in 3 months when *then* I decide they've gone too far?

With a sense of stability (like "you can always get 1 complete event building for free with the right strategy, but if you want more you have to pay"), players can either decide they're ok with it or not. With this continuing increase in monetization, there's also an anticipation of "where does it end?"

It kinda also reeks of desperation that they've decided FoE is nearing end-of-life and no longer care about a stable population and are just milking it for whatever more they can get before pulling development resources for a new project.

 

[Pericles the Lion]

Just posted by the CM on the Beta Fourm:

• Lastly, we have also removed the 50 Fragments of the Archdruid Hut Upgrade Kit from the Celtic Chests (after each town), as well as the Druid Tree Selection Kit and replaced it with a low chance for the Tree of Vitality and a higher chance for the Tree of Patience.

 

[Angry.Blanket]

The cost for getting one more building is just to much, I feel there needs to be something in-between.
I have been cutting back because it seems there are only two choices spend a bunch or dont spend at all. I either spend a bunch to get a second building or go the FTP route.