The elephant in the room is (as mentioned previously) combining T2s with T3s. They are completely different beasts.
I will quote myself from a different post on the same subject:
"Quite simply, the point many of us have been making all along is that FBI and MSP are T3 dungeons - in the same class/bracket as To9G. As such they need a T3 capable group.
They are completely different to T2s. Players require more of everything in terms of capability.
A T3 RQ bracket with FBI, MSP & T9G (plus an incentive to run it - e.g. guaranteed Ultimate Mark or Superior Enchantment once per day!) would see high level players all queuing up to get theirs whilst enabling mid level players to queue for T2s without the fear of getting into something they can't handle.
It would be a win for all sides.
More UM's & SE's on the AH bringing the price down for everyone, guilds can get their heroic shards, the RQ goal of making all dungeons run is met and the T3 RQ is entered knowingly with players prepared for the experience instead of voting to quit as soon as the timer allows."
I know you don't want to do this but I am of the firm opinion that this is a case of 'ideology over pragmatism'. As long as T2s and T3s are grouped together the ERQ will continue to result in negative player experience.
Please Do Not Feed The Trolls
Xael De Armadeon: DC
Xane De Armadeon: CW
Zen De Armadeon: OP
Zohar De Armadeon: TR
Chrion De Armadeon: SW
Gosti Big Belly: GWF
Barney McRustbucket: GF
Lt. Thackeray: HR
Lucius De Armadeon: BD
I´m kind of sad Merchant Prince´s Folly is taken out of random skirmish, because thats the one I was hoping to roll when I queued for that one, to get both AD and totems in one go. For skirmishes I think it would be best to allow everyone to queue, and pick from the list of thouse they qualify for.
The way I´d change the epic dungeon queue is to shove everything with level 73 opponents into hero´s accord, so we´d still have three dungeon RQ only: leveling; with level 72 opponents; with level 73 opponents.
I understand that it was partially an attempt to get people to revisit older/less popular content, but I don't think this was the right way to go about it. This may seem brash, but if all of the content was interesting and engaging, then there wouldn't be a problem with alienated content.
Populating older content is only a small part of the goal of random queues. We'd also like everyone to experience more than just one or two queues. Unfortunately, making that content "interesting" and "engaging" isn't enough. Certainly, it's safe to say that the popularity of Temple of the Spider and Shores of Tuern was not due to the majority of players finding that content the most engaging. To varying extents depending on the player, the amount of astral diamonds gained per hour is the most important factor when choosing what to do.
The game design being what it was before the changes, the least varied path was also the most profitable, and that was our mistake. Certainly it's possible that the rewards could have been tuned more tightly such that each dungeon awarded a very specific amount of AD based on the amount of time it took to clear it, and this could have somewhat ameliorated the problem. However, that target would always be moving, because players would choose a new dungeon that was the best AD per hour whenever there was an adjustment. At that time, the run times would be pushed lower than what we anticipated based on data we gathered when the given dungeon was not as popular. We'd be changing the rewards for dungeons constantly and the systems design team would be so busy balancing those payouts that it would have little time for making new content.
Even if each queue's AD per hour was within a few percentages of each other queue, certain queues would be identified as the most likely to succeed with a public group, or the easiest to understand, and it's unlikely a true "play anything" mentality could emerge. In addition, whenever the item level were raised or PvE balance were adjusted, the whole process of rebalancing the old rewards would have to be started again with new data.
With all this talk of AD per hour, it's easy to feel cynical. However, as I've stated before, we're not actually trying to necessarily slow down anyone's AD earn rate, but instead ensure that the most profitable avenue is not the most repetitive one. Not because we want to force you to do something you don't like, but because we honestly believe the game will be in a better place when everyone is playing more of the content available.
A lot of players are playing content for the first time that they've never played before, or may have never played before random queues, and everyone is still getting used to that content. We're going to continue to watch clear rates and consider making adjustments if necessary. Please continue sending us your feedback.
Finally. Random Trials. Specifically Svardborg/ Master Svardborg... FOR HEAVENS SAKE. Please tell us is Svardborg is master or not! it's not fun having a cleric go down and not being able to get in because "well heck, it's master. Didn't know that was coming!"
The situation you describe is definitely an oversight and so I'd like to apologize for that not being caught in testing. I will make sure that the mission tracker is updated ASAP so that it will be clear which version of Svardborg you have entered. Thanks for letting us know about this!
I think it should be also noted that instead of wasting time and resources making a new queue system you could have just revamped and added back in the 5 remaining dungeons that were removed from the game.
That would have given us some more dungeons to run and at the very least be an interesting change.
I spoke a little about the old dungeons you are referring to on a recent maintenance stream, but since I am sure most did not have a chance to watch it I'll address this a little here. It's very unfortunate that the team decided to remove a bunch of dungeons at the launch of Module 6. There wasn't a good plan with what to do with the existing endgame dungeons, and there was a move to overhaul the leveling dungeons that made it so they simply couldn't be left in the game as is.
The team only had a limited amount of time to port those dungeons over to the new level cap and team size and so that's why only some of them were brought forward. That being said, I'd like to apologize for those dungeons disappearing. As far as bringing them back is concerned, bringing the rest back is definitely still on our list. However, bringing them back as endgame dungeons isn't straightforward.
If we simply scale up the difficulty and bring them back to the game as-is, we could really only bring them back at a lower item level, around where Temple of the Spider is now. If we brought them back in that item level range, there wouldn't be much of a reason to run them, unless one of them happened to be faster than Temple of the Spider.
We could of course bring them back with significantly more work as new top tier dungeons, similar to Spellplague Caverns (Master) but for the design, character and effects team, something like that is nearly as much work as building a new dungeon from scratch. When we're telling stories in a new area, generally we'd like to bring in dungeons that support that new story, so that's why you've seen us mostly leaning towards creating new dungeons.
Of course, there's also bringing back old dungeons as leveling dungeons, which is something we've done with a few dungeons recently. We'd like to continue to do that, however, it also takes some time to make sure the dungeon is in working order and scaled down to three players. Generally bringing them back as leveling dungeons won't have a huge impact on the average player's day-to-day, for instance, when we brought back a number of missing leveling dungeons, we didn't necessarily see that there was tremendous interest in running them. Which is to be expected with a leveling dungeon. But we would like to bring more back, so we appreciate your patience.
In terms of bringing back old dungeons vs. introducing random queues. Fortunately, it really wasn't an either-or situation. The team that worked on random queues could not have been tasked on bringing back old dungeons. Primarily, the random queue work was mostly on our programming team and user interface team. Often times it can be difficult to imagine, but since our team is made up of a number of members working in different departments, tasks aren't necessarily interchangeable.
As for other feedback, I am still getting Illusionist's Gambit 99% of the time on any character high enough to run it. Something is seriously off with your "random" algorithm with such results.
I've touched on this a bit before, but the results won't truly be random unless you and everyone else in the group came from the random queue system. Basically, the only way to guarantee truly random results would be to queue with a full group. What I mean by this, is that if a lot of players are queuing manually for a specific queue, you're reasonably likely to fill into one of their groups, thus skewing the results towards that queue.
In the same vein, if someone queues for an obscure queue, random queue players will be added to that queue as well. We've been monitoring the results, and a lot of less popular queues that did not used to pop are popping much more than before, but the results won't ever be truly random.
Even if each queue's AD per hour was within a few percentages of each other queue, certain queues would be identified as the most likely to succeed with a public group, or the easiest to understand, and it's unlikely a true "play anything" mentality could emerge. In addition, whenever the item level were raised or PvE balance were adjusted, the whole process of rebalancing the old rewards would have to be started again with new data.
With all this talk of AD per hour, it's easy to feel cynical. However, as I've stated before, we're not actually trying to necessarily slow down anyone's AD earn rate, but instead ensure that the most profitable avenue is not the most repetitive one. Not because we want to force you to do something you don't like, but because we honestly believe the game will be in a better place when everyone is playing more of the content available.
A lot of players are playing content for the first time that they've never played before, or may have never played before random queues, and everyone is still getting used to that content. We're going to continue to watch clear rates and consider making adjustments if necessary. Please continue sending us your feedback.
Here's an idea: Instead of picking the dungeon for the player, to prevent them from repeating the same "most efficient" dungeon, why not put diminishing returns on repeat runs?
So if you run ToS once, you get 6k AD, but then you only get 3k the next time, and maybe 1k after that... Worried about picking the "2 most efficient"? Ok, then keep those AD debuffs active until running 2 other dungeons. 6k on first ToS, then it's only 1k. Run GWD next and it becomes 1k while ToS rises up to 3k. Now run CC, and ToS jumps back to 6k while GWD rises to 3k.
Dungeons were tiered for a reason, and with the key changes some dungeons may have specific exclusive items a player may be looking for. Players have other reasons for picking (or excluding) specific dungeons to run besides "most efficient AD per hour". Maybe their goal is "finish within an hour before I have to leave" (FBI being over an hour long), or "get this specific item that doesn't drop anywhere else" or "anything except ". When you take that choice away, you inhibit players' progress, and then punish them when they fail (e.g. "leaver penalty" for giving up on FBI).
In the same vein, if someone queues for an obscure queue, random queue players will be added to that queue as well. We've been monitoring the results, and a lot of less popular queues that did not used to pop are popping much more than before, but the results won't ever be truly random.
Well of course they're "popping more". That's because you're the ones picking them. Rate of specific dungeons being "chosen" isn't even a scientific metric anymore.
I was really hoping that there would be a change to the dungeons & skirmishes I could do. Feeling sad & dissappointed. I've been level 70 for while & about 11K IL I can comfortably do EToS, VT, CN, ELOL, Shores of Tuern & Kessels but because I haven't completed SKT & RD I am destined to boredom running through dungeons where if I breath they die, it is NOT FUN or a challenge! or I miss out on some free AD, either way sad & dissapponted!
When you say that you are 'destined to run through dungeons where if you breath, the enemies die,' are you referring to the first random dungeon you run that day, or are you running random dungeons subsequently instead of queuing for a specific epic dungeon? We've been receiving a lot of feedback from players that they can only run regular dungeons since they don't meet the requirements for the epic dungeon random queue.
However, I'd like to take a moment to reiterate that nothing is preventing you from running a specific epic dungeon or endgame skirmish that you'd like to run, and I would absolutely advise that after you've finished your random dungeon. The rewards will be much better both in terms of progressing your character's equipment, and providing astral diamonds per hour, in the form of salvage and refinement.
Although we're receiving a lot of feedback like this, the data is actually showing that plenty of players are still queuing for endgame content by selecting a specific queue. In fact, there's been some speculation that we will misinterpret presumed data showing high adoption of the random queues as a success because players are "forced" to participate. However, we are actually seeing a very healthy mix of random and manual queuing. For those interested, the split is about 60:40 in favor of manual queuing.
That means that on average, for every 4 players that are matched with a group through random queues, 6 players are matched who queued for something specifically. (This only includes public queues. Those queuing privately for specific queues are not included in this data.) This is a fairly healthy breakdown that we expected, and it shows that many players are knocking out whatever random queues they can, then manually queuing for what they'd like to play.
We understand that with the repeated, albeit very small AD bonus attached to the random skirmish and random dungeon queue, it may feel like you're being directed to run those, instead of queuing for something else directly, even if that something else would drop significantly more rewards overall. Those repeated rewards are designed to give a small bonus for those that might be running the queue a second time that day with a friend, or other similar situations. This is something we'd like to continue monitoring as everyone gets used to the new system. It's definitely an area we'll consider adjusting so that the correct path of running what's currently most relevant to you after random queues feels like the correct path.
New randoms are fine, queues are good. There are no 4k clowns looking for a free ride in skirmishes. Stronghold shards is not an issue you can churn them fast on alts. The only thing I despise with the new system has not been mentioned at all. The new kick rules and leave penalties are stupid. When someone gets a random they don't want they they just disconnect/change character trying to avoid the leaver penalty. This leaves your team with a dc'ed player taking a slot. You can't kick them for 15 mins - insane. You can't kick anyone for abuse or other reasons for so long that the instance is over or so close to that it's to late. You can't even vote to abandon. The whole system needs some serious looking into.
There should only be a 5 minute delay before players may be kicked, 15 minutes is the delay on vote abandon. If you're seeing a 15 minute delay to kick other players, I would like to apologize. Please submit this as a bug report in the bug reports section of the forums and we will look into this issue right away!
We're also continuing to monitor the levels of abuse you describe, and we will definitely consider making adjustments. Unfortunately, if we are overly lenient with vote kicking, there will be abuse in the other direction, so this is something we have to be very careful with. As people get more used to the system, we should see the normative behavior emerge and get a better picture of what sort of adjustments need to be made.
We may even consider things like account wide penalties if abuse is bad enough, so please consider carefully before simply signing off to avoid a queue you don't like. Please give it a shot, and if things really don't seem to be working out, use the vote abandon feature when it becomes available.
Fangbreaker and Spellplague, by your own (linked) press releases, were specifically designed and balanced as a super-challenges for end-game players. They had with high item level requirements to keep it feasible for random queues, and were balanced only for the best of the best. There's a HUGE difference between players who are just reaching the point of finishing off VT or LoL with/without help from their guild, players who can speedrun those and succeed 4/5 tries in T2 dungeons, and players who have a chance at successfully completing FBI/SP.
I've addressed in a previous post why we would not like to simply add more and more random queue categories. Basically, we'd like to keep the number of random queues to something reasonable and fairly low. Although we have not moved Fangbreaker and Spellplague, we have heard the feedback about breaking epic dungeons into three categories, or moving those dungeons into Hero's Accord.
It's often assumed that simply because we don't act on a piece of feedback that we simply haven't heard it, but that's not the case! I assure you, we definitely hear your feedback. If we broke them out and created a third queue, and built the random queues by "tier" there would be an expectation that the same tier breakdown would extend to the skirmish and trial categories, and soon we'd have a dozen random queues, each with only a few queues in them. With each new update, that list would get bigger.
Also, as we would like to continue releasing content that gives players who have been increasing their item level steadily something to do, we might not necessarily create a large number of queues in a single "tier." For all of these reasons, a tiered approach really isn't viable.
The other approach of moving Fangbreaker and Spellplague into Hero's Accord is more realistic, however, as it stands right now, Hero's Accord represents whichever queues are currently at the maximum item level. Right now this means just Tomb of the Nine Gods. However, as I hinted at in a maintenance stream, there will be another queue that falls into that category in the not too distant future. However, later on, when something comes out at an even higher item level, those queues will be pushed down into epic dungeon or epic trial, wherever they belong, and the new highest item level queue will take up residence in hero's accord.
If we included queues like Fangbreaker and Spellplague which are not the highest item level, it starts to become significantly more nebulous about when something is moved out of that category and down into epic dungeons. It also means that queue cannot award bonus seals of the brave, though this is a comparably trivial issue. Mostly we'd like there to not be a whole lot of confusion and consternation about when things move from one category to another.
Keep in mind, that although Fangbreaker and Spellplague are comparably difficult now, queues like Valindra's Tower were not designed to be easy. We see some statements like 'Fangbreaker and Spellplague were never designed to be part of the AD farm.' No dungeon was designed with the explicit purpose of being farmed for AD. It's absolutely true that we have worked to make encounters that are more mechanically interesting and taxing on the group since Fangbreaker Island. However, we are not continuing to dramatically up the difficulty from dungeon to dungeon. The item level may increase, and we may introduce new mechanics, but for instance, Tomb of the Nine Gods is not meant to be more difficult than Fangbreaker, if you are at the required item level for either of them when you run it. As everyone's item level continues to rise, the challenge provided by these queues will go down, and eventually Fangbreaker will be as easy as Valindra's Tower is now.
We would like people to look at the Random Epic Dungeon queue as a bonus that can be earned once you're able to complete all but the most difficult dungeon out there. However, we know that because it seems like it's where we "moved" the old bonus, that it's something that should just be accessible right away whenever any epic dungeons can be run. That's why we tuned the numbers so that just running a random skirmish and random dungeon should provide that huge boost of AD that everyone is used to. Hopefully if you can look at the Random Epic Dungeon queue as a bonus to unlock, and a way of distributing those who are strong enough to run those dungeons to help out everyone who may even be working on a lower epic dungeon, things will start to make a bit more sense.
I know this might not feel like a satisfactory answer, depending on what you were hoping to get out of the epic dungeon random queue. However, hopefully it helps you to understand a little about why it is currently setup the way it is. This explanation does not mean that it's impossible that we might make adjustments as we continue to watch how everyone is engaging, so please keep the feedback coming, as always it's greatly appreciated.
From the latest dev post on this 'Our goal is that everyone feels they are earning roughly the same AD while having a more varied experience' - personally I am now earning less AD and have a less varied experience.
I'm sorry to hear that! Definitely one of the concerns a lot of players had when these changes were first announced on preview was that their overall AD earn would go down. We made some adjustments based on initial feedback, with the intent that they would possibly even go up, and our data is showing that the amount of AD the average player is earning has definitely gone up. We're also seeing that the average player is experiencing a wider variety of queues.
However, stories like yours are important to help us identify the outliers and consider how to make improvements, so we appreciate you taking the time to post your experiences.
Why not just do two random skirmishes like there are two random dungeons? Skirmish and Epic Skirmish maybe? And why are Kessell's Retreat and the Shores of Teurn NOT in the "skirmish" queue at all? They were always treated as a skirmish before and this would increase the base number of skirmishes to make it more feasible to have two sets.
Absolutely. It would also solve the problem of having missed out on achievements. How hard can it possibly be to downlevel us the same way it does for dungeons?
It's not impossible to level scale players down for skirmishes, and this is something we'd like to do in the future. Unfortunately, skirmishes were never adjusted to scale like dungeons when Module 6 was released and it's not completely trivial to adjust them. With that in mind, we'd like to fix level scaling and then hopefully make skirmishes available even once you've passed the level band. We apologize for the inconvenience until that day.
I've talked at length about why we don't have a second skirmish queue, but as far as why Kessell's Retreat and Shores of Tuern are not in the skirmish category, but instead in the epic dungeon category, they've actually been in that section of the queue system for some time, although their AD bonuses may not have been update in all cases.
Although we shipped them as skirmishes, they were a bit inconsistent with how other skirmishes have played in the past. We had some internal discussion and standardized the internal guidelines for what makes a dungeon a dungeon, a skirmish a skirmish and a trial a trial around the release of Module 9 or Module 10. At this time, we recategorized a few queues that felt out of place.
Keep in mind, that although Fangbreaker and Spellplague are comparably difficult now, queues like Valindra's Tower were not designed to be easy. We see some statements like 'Fangbreaker and Spellplague were never designed to be part of the AD farm.' No dungeon was designed with the explicit purpose of being farmed for AD. It's absolutely true that we have worked to make encounters that are more mechanically interesting and taxing on the group since Fangbreaker Island. However, we are not continuing to dramatically up the difficulty from dungeon to dungeon. The item level may increase, and we may introduce new mechanics, but for instance, Tomb of the Nine Gods is not meant to be more difficult than Fangbreaker, if you are at the required item level for either of them when you run it. As everyone's item level continues to rise, the challenge provided by these queues will go down, and eventually Fangbreaker will be as easy as Valindra's Tower is now.
As the time goes and item level raise through the different modules, yes FBI and MSP challenge decline a bit. BUT only for high-geared groups! Yes now I can run door to door in T1 and solo T2 with my close-to-endgame toon. But the challenge in these dungeons is still here for lowbies or new players. I sometimes queue in public etos and man, lowbies still have a hard time with big groups of mobs or the boss.
So keeping FBI/MSP on the epic dungeon random queue, and add TNG in it when the next dungeon will go in Hero's Accord is not viable. - The requirements in terms of experience is huge. The mechanics added in dungeons since CN (good thing) change radically the run experience, as it's not as linear as T1-T2. - But there's more than that. The gear requirements are so much higher for Tomb that when it'll go to the epic random, more and more people will be locked. Keep in mind that Tomb is the first dungeon to require 85% ArmPen, that alone is a huge difference. Good luck doing damage with the usual 60% needed on the other random epics. - And last but not least, the group requirements change dramatically when you go up in difficulty. T1-T2 can be done without a problem with the classic 1-1-3 recommended in random queue. But when you hit FBI, meta is more adapated to 1-2-2, and once you reach TNG, meta is now 1-3-1. Not saying my opinion on that, but it's the meta.
So in my opinion keeping dungeons with that big of a difference in terms of requirements, speaking now of FBI/MSP and TNG when next dungeon will be introduced is not viable as if you queue with the composition required in random queue, there's a higher fail probability if you reach the T3.
@ Asterdahl I understand why you have introduced Random Queuing system but I am afraid it has created more problems than it have solved. One of the problems I see is the requirement to have everything unlocked in order to get in the random queues (and thus earn AD). New players could start earning AD from level 12+, now they must wait until they get 54+. That is a serious setback in their progression. Even worse, level 70 players need to unlock all the dungeons in the list in order to participate in epic dungeons, which can take a lot of time (not to mention alts where the time needed to do so is probably not worth to invest in). An alternative to RQ for underplayed dungeons could be: a) to increase the reward compared to overplayed ones (like the system you introduced for underplayed classes), or b) to make all dungeons similar in time to finish (much harder to implement since they need to be reworked).
Players have definite time to play and they choose how to spend it. If dungeon A takes 2/3 of the time to finish than dungeon B and they both reward the same, why would they ever want to play dungeon B? If the reward to effort ratio is good, be rest assured that players would go for them, no need to force them.
Regarding skirmishes, the problem I had with Merchant Prince’s Folly, was not the item level needed but the fact that I had not finished the Chult campaign to earn the keys for that. I entered the Random skirmish 3 times and all of them got this skirmish. Never entered it again (until now obviously) since doing the skirmish without the lockbox’s rewards is not worthwhile. Chult is an end game campaign and many players are still working on it, so excluding it was a good move.
You said : “Something specific we are looking at is the inconvenience of dealing with campaign tasks that generate dungeon chest keys. We plan to adjust these in the future but were unable to get them in for the current release.”
I am glad you recognize an existing problem. RQ has brought the need to work on a large number of campaigns (that we already have finished) just to get a large number of different keys to open at the end of different dungeons. This is tiring and often boring. In the past players selected which dungeons they would enter and focus on getting keys for them. Now this is much harder.
My suggestion is to find a way to make keys easier to get or limit the amount needed. Easier access could mean to win “key marks” from some activities (like daily quests) and those could be exchangeable with the key of your choice (assuming you are eligible for the dungeon requiring this key). Limiting their amount (my favorite option) could mean to reduce the number of keys needed to 3 universal types (like for Tier 1/2/3 or dungeon/skirmish/trial dungeon types) by readjusting the means to get them.
Also, as we would like to continue releasing content that gives players who have been increasing their item level steadily something to do, we might not necessarily create a large number of queues in a single "tier." For all of these reasons, a tiered approach really isn't viable.
These dungeons were already broken down into tiers though. Different difficulty, with different tiers of rewards, and players pick what difficulty/reward they want. That's how they were designed, and that's why grouping same-tiered dungeons together is a more practical approach. Instead, you're lumping them all together as if they're the same difficulty, insisting that (this many) tiers shouldn't exist, locking out anyone who doesn't have the most difficult ones unlocked, and it's not working.
And it's not just T3 that's way out there. There's a big difference between T1 players and T2. This is by your own (former?) developers' design. T1 players still struggle with ToS, and even more so CC and GWD, just as badly as T2 players struggle with FBI and SP I daresay.
If you don't want tiers, then you shouldn't have made tiered content. And FBI will always be imposing that useless everfrost requirement on unrelated dungeons for the offchance that's what you pick for players. Lower the requirements from FBI, SP, and all the T2 dungeons to be the same as T1 and drop the item level and everfrost requirements, and most the problems with epic random queue will go away. Adding more difficult "higher item level, but just as easy" content to the top-level queue later on? Well, then you're just going to keep locking more players out. It's almost as if merging formerly-tiered doesn't go well in a single random queue...
Please listen to your players and separate out FBI and MSP from the random epic dungeon queue. These two dungeons demand a completely different tier of item level and ability than that required for Malabog, Lostmauth or even Spider and this will not change. FBI and MSP will always be higher tier dungeons regardless of the average item level in the player base.
2
adinosiiMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 4,294Arc User
edited November 2017
Here is my take on the changes:
The developers are listening to the complaints, but not understanding the real issues.
The change just described is an improvement, yes - but the whole RQ system is still broken . You are still penalizing some groups of players, discouraging others and damaging the play experience of yet others.
The reason is still the same as before and you are still taking the same, flawed approach of attempting to fix the symptoms instead of fixing the underlying causes. You say you want players to " experience more varied content", which is fine, except you take the approach of forcing players to do so, instead of making them want to do so.
That is just wrong.
Let me give you two examples of how you could have accomplished the goals, without causing the massive dissatisfaction you are dealing with now.
Example approach 1:
Get rid of Random queues and bonus AD altogether. Use the dungeon/skirmish quests formerly given out in the stronghold - giving them a 3-4 day cooldown instead of a week, and have them give a RAD reward so that basically, if you do all the different dungeons and skirmishes you qualify for twice per week, you get the same total RAD as you would have gotten from the Bonus system. And yes, do not give L 70s RAD for doing the leveling dungeons.
Example approach 2:
Get rid of random queues. Keep the bonus RAD system, but with a strict maximum per day. The first time you run specific dungeon/skirmish any given day, you get a bonus - however, you have full freedom over what you run, and when you run it. And yes, do not give L 70s Bonus RAD for doing the leveling dungeons.
Example approach 2a:
A variation on the previous approach, except the bonus rewards for any particular dungeon/skirmish are dynamically adjusted, depending on their popularity. So, if very few people want to run eCC, for example, it would start to give more and more RAD, until people start running it. This would give people a choice - they could either run a few unpopular dungeons skirmishes, or multiple popular ones to reach their daily maximum RAD.
Example approach 2b:
Another variation on approach 2 - instead of a daily maximum Bonus RAD, have a weekly maximum. This would be very popular with people who have limited play time on weekdays, but can play a lot more on weekends.
Example approach 3:
Keep the current flawed system, but allow private groups to queue for a random dungeon even if they do not match the 1+1+3 composition. Currently you are hurting guilds that want to give everyone a chance, or groups of friends that want to run together,even if they don't fit your idea of what a group should look like.
Choice is good. Give players choices.
Note that I am not suggesting implementing more tiers of random dungeons - that will not really fix anything.
A variation on the previous approach, except the bonus rewards for any particular dungeon/skirmish are dynamically adjusted, depending on their popularity. So, if very few people want to run eCC, for example, it would start to give more and more RAD, until people start running it. This would give people a choice - they could either run a few unpopular dungeons skirmishes, or multiple popular ones to reach their daily maximum RAD.
I'd buy this. We know that system is possible, as there's a "needed role" bonus in random queue. They'd implement a "needed dungeon" bonus when a dungeon is less run than others. If I see that eGWD rewards goes from up to 20k I'd certainly run it. (with the group I want because no random queues group conditions, yay)
All I know is that since the random queues came in, I have been forced to do content I do not want to and this has created resentment. I have absolutely no enjoyment as a lvl 70 player to run through Cloak Tower for instance, where it has become an unpleasant drudge to see three people running through one-shotting everything purely going through the motions desperate to get through to the end and get their daily AD's. It's taken all the joy out of playing. So when I hear that a random epic dungeon will now be included in the random queue, this is a good thing. However, this is what I see as the second time you have made a major change to daily AD's for the wrong reasons. First you got rid of Rhix's quest, citing at the time that people "forgot" to pick them up, and that because people were missing out on AD's, you were making it an automatic system. At the time I disagreed with this, because I was doing the right thing and quite happily picking up his AD daily quests every single day as the game intended and it suited me fine, but I was now being punished because some players couldn't get their act together. Those who were doing the right thing were being penalized because others could not play the game properly and had bad memories. So I disagreed with this. With this most recent change so that daily AD's can only be gained through random queues, I again disagree, as the CHOICE to play the content I want to is being taken away if I am to get my daily allowance, and we all know AD's are the main bread and butter of game currency and hard to get. You say that some content is less popular, but this is probably for a reason. Making people play content which is not currently popular is sort of like forcing people to listen to music which sells badly because you think the music-listening public needs 'educating'. -Would the music-loving public accept that? Probably not, they would likely say "I will listen to what I like thankyou." If some content is not as popular as others there is probably a reason for it. Anyway, once again, even though I happily play my game my way, I am being forced to change purely because you are not happy with how some others are playing it and want to tweak it. I would offer a word of warning that if you continue this trend of trying to artificially engineer the way people play the game, a game where one of the strongest things going for it is the vast variety of ways to play it and content to choose so it can be tailored to your own tastes, you risk alienating your player base. We are all different and we all play in different ways and like different content, the good thing about this game is that it has a vast variety of places and things to do and it is in my mind wrong to force people into specific content they may not like purely because they have no choice and need the AD's. You can try to guide people in this or that way by promoting content, but there is a large danger of trying to grasp too hard onto the control and direct the experience too much and if you do this, people will become more and more unhappy. Cheers.
Have a 'Dungeon of the hour' linked to both AD and Shards. The shard quest can be "run a dungeon of the hour & earn 10 Heroic Shards".
Players can avoid dungeons that they really don't want to do as the DotH changes at the top of the hour but there is an incentive to queue for whatever comes up to save time.
You get some player choice where players aren't dropped unwillingly into anything they know they can't handle, but you also get people queuing & knowing there will be more players wanting that dungeon at that particular time.
Please Do Not Feed The Trolls
Xael De Armadeon: DC
Xane De Armadeon: CW
Zen De Armadeon: OP
Zohar De Armadeon: TR
Chrion De Armadeon: SW
Gosti Big Belly: GWF
Barney McRustbucket: GF
Lt. Thackeray: HR
Lucius De Armadeon: BD
" we’re opening up the “Random Dungeon” daily dungeoneering shard quest to all level 70 players."
In other words you replaced "Dungeons: insert dungeon" with "Random dungeon". Now you would think this gives us more freedom as to what to play, yet it doesn't as the system decides it for us. I don't want to spend 1-2 hours in a mSP on my incapable alt to farm some shards for the Stronghold.
"We’ll be monitoring the activity in that skirmish, and at some point in the future, we’ll be returning it to the random skirmish queue once everyone has had some time to adjust and increase their item level."
That's only delaying the issue, not solving it. Now if this means that by mod 20 or whatever the power creep will have taken care of it, fine I guess? but until that time the skirmish will sooner or later be disregarded by the player base. How about properly balancing random queues on their difficulties instead?
"Something specific we are looking at is the inconvenience of dealing with campaign tasks that generate dungeon chest keys"
Annoying but I think this is the least of our concerns here.
"When possible we’d all prefer players to play with their friends and guildmates, and so we haven’t excluded the option to queue with a full group"
Then why are we being limited with class roles? I can't play with my friends and guild mates due to class restrictions. Plenty a dps tank, healing sw and other perfectly well working but interestingly build characters cannot join in the random dungeon parties due to these limits. I don't like turning players down, or having to tell them what class they should play. I understand that content could be and should be more enjoyable for the solo players, but not at the expense of group players.
"The fact that astral diamond bonuses were paid out identically from any queue created a world where only a small subset of queues were ever run. If new players didn’t have this tribal knowledge they could end up waiting in an unpopular queue forever. Additionally, we don’t think it’s particularly exciting to run the same dungeon forever."
Because Cryptic doesn't consider having the option to run the dungeons we want over and over again to be fun is part of your reasoning? That's the most arrogant response I seen thus far. I see the appeal in making all content more interesting to run and therefor their queue times shorter, but not at the expensive of free choice.
"Of course, we know for many of you it’s about efficiency and that’s why we made a more varied experience the most efficient one."
By putting mSP/FBI and eLoL together is most efficient? Because not knowing whether your dungeon is going to take 15 min or 2 hours, let alone if you can even run it, is efficient?
"We want to reiterate that with a big change like this, we’re absolutely relying on all of you to provide your continued feedback."
Then please keep reading the feedback you are receiving over and over. The solution isn't even in sight yet.
1. Removing Prince's Folly from R. Skirmish is a bad desicion. Why not have the chance to run new content among old ones? More players will get to know it and get some totems on the way. I liked the feeling that some alts were earning totems for future boon unlocks. Last and most important: the non IL reqs for the random skirmish q will now open the gates for bots and for ultra low-geared toons (free riders) who will make achieving gold rank impossible in IG/PoM/Throne. Sollution: 7k (or 7.5k) IL min req.
2. I run random epic dungeon q a lot, and my findings (as predicted) are that 90% of players abandon/disconnect when fbi/msp pop. Sollutions: a. Move them to hero's accord (H.A). Seals of brave won't be granted this way (none runs H.A for the extra seals anyway), but instead, players have a chance of superior/ultimate enchanting stones or marks of potency (I remind you that we had the chance at past to get gmops from bosses, when they costed 100k). b. If you insist on keeping them on RED (random epic dungeon) q, make the system pick players above some min IL level (13k for example).
3. Currently, the chest of a leveling dungeon gives a piece of rare (blue) gear, which is totally useless as it can't be used as rp (is this intended btw, or a bug?). Sollution: Make blue gear available for refining, or replace them on the leveling dungeon's chest with a piece of rp like emerald/aquamarine etc.
4. Many players who don't want to run a randomed skirmish/dungeon and try to avoid the leaver penalty, they change char and seem disconnected, and the remaining players can't remove them via voting. Sometimes, the deserters return to their toon just before 5 mins have passed so they aren't autokicked by system and leech the run that others trying to complete (I've seen this on long leveling dungeons like karru or cc). Sollution: The system detects if a disconnected toon is/isn't in line with a disconnected account. If it isn't, after 1 min of being disconnected, the toon gets auto-kicked.
You want people to run more differents dunjeons ? Make the dunjeons rewarding IN THE CHEST. Something that would make us think, the decent drop chance at something good is there.
Otherwise you can turn this how you want this is just an other attempt to nerf da earning and making us lost even more time...
We run this etos/tuern x2 thing because of the AD not for the dunjeon itself. There is nothing challenging at all doing dunjeons we already did thousands of time all we get is salvage in 99% runs even in To9g Fbi Mspc.
I manage to save a little zen but i keep buying these keys for 250z and i got absolutely nothing from that. Add to that scrolls that cost an arm...
So now every time you run a dunjeon we loose ad/zen. Is this your definition of f2p, pay and get nothing in return ?
Now nothing change exept it become longer and more painfull to make ad and it's still not rewarding.
Your key change was a joke as everybody know the first week many players saw goods drops then it was nerf days later somehow.
@asterdahl So I understand the development team is afraid there will be too many categories available for random queues, which will lead to too much time required to run all the runs. There is a way to solve this issue.
If each category has multiple tiers, with all their own RAD bonusses, you could make it that running 1 T2 eDungeon gives you the bonus for T1 eDungeon and T2 eDungeon. Running the T3 eDungeon in the first places give the T1 eDungeon, T2 eDungeon and T3 eDungeon. Of course you can only get each bonus once.
That way, you will run the most difficult dungeon that you are able to run. No need to scale down by removing armor, since if you're 15k iLevel and you insist on running a T1 (eSoT for example), you will just get a lower RAD bonus rewards compared to what would be possible for you to achieve at max.
1.) Like others have said, lvl 70's should not be running leveling dungeons for rad, it's just not right. Allow 2x epics to get the same amount of rad if players had run the leveling dungeon plus the epic. And when characters reach level 70, change the stronghold cleric's quest from random dungeon, to random epic dungeon. The current solution still has the same basic problem, characters below a certain i/lvl can't help the guild as much as lvl 70's.
2.) Not all characters are created equal. When you consistently have people droping out of fbi etc. because of the obvious, or speed running MC cuz 15k+ ilvl something is broken (basically same problem w/ the leveling dungeons). Epic dungeon queue should be split into tiers (or have the queue add t2 and possibly t3 dungeons to selection if char.ilvl >= X) Should be really simple code to add to queuing function.
I know y'all have said you wont split queue N into X queues, for reason Y, so like I said, adding a chunk of code to append t2, t3 dungeons to the selection list before a random one is selected would be pretty easy, and then you just lower the ilvl requirement for joining the random epic queue. I mean, if your devs have problems with if statement, you need new devs.
@asterdahl So I understand the development team is afraid there will be too many categories available for random queues, which will lead to too much time required to run all the runs. There is a way to solve this issue.
If each category has multiple tiers, with all their own RAD bonusses, you could make it that running 1 T2 eDungeon gives you the bonus for T1 eDungeon and T2 eDungeon. Running the T3 eDungeon in the first places give the T1 eDungeon, T2 eDungeon and T3 eDungeon. Of course you can only get each bonus once.
That way, you will run the most difficult dungeon that you are able to run. No need to scale down by removing armor, since if you're 15k iLevel and you insist on running a T1 (eSoT for example), you will just get a lower RAD bonus rewards compared to what would be possible for you to achieve at max.
Populating older content is only a small part of the goal of random queues. We'd also like everyone to experience more than just one or two queues. Unfortunately, making that content "interesting" and "engaging" isn't enough. Certainly, it's safe to say that the popularity of Temple of the Spider and Shores of Tuern was not due to the majority of players finding that content the most engaging. To varying extents depending on the player, the amount of astral diamonds gained per hour is the most important factor when choosing what to do.
The game design being what it was before the changes, the least varied path was also the most profitable, and that was our mistake. Certainly it's possible that the rewards could have been tuned more tightly such that each dungeon awarded a very specific amount of AD based on the amount of time it took to clear it, and this could have somewhat ameliorated the problem. However, that target would always be moving, because players would choose a new dungeon that was the best AD per hour whenever there was an adjustment. At that time, the run times would be pushed lower than what we anticipated based on data we gathered when the given dungeon was not as popular. We'd be changing the rewards for dungeons constantly and the systems design team would be so busy balancing those payouts that it would have little time for making new content.
Even if each queue's AD per hour was within a few percentages of each other queue, certain queues would be identified as the most likely to succeed with a public group, or the easiest to understand, and it's unlikely a true "play anything" mentality could emerge. In addition, whenever the item level were raised or PvE balance were adjusted, the whole process of rebalancing the old rewards would have to be started again with new data.
With all this talk of AD per hour, it's easy to feel cynical. However, as I've stated before, we're not actually trying to necessarily slow down anyone's AD earn rate, but instead ensure that the most profitable avenue is not the most repetitive one. Not because we want to force you to do something you don't like, but because we honestly believe the game will be in a better place when everyone is playing more of the content available.
A lot of players are playing content for the first time that they've never played before, or may have never played before random queues, and everyone is still getting used to that content. We're going to continue to watch clear rates and consider making adjustments if necessary. Please continue sending us your feedback.
Why not just automate this part?
It can be at any granularity needed for example: At server reset, evaluate last 3 days queue times and last day. Weight those in, for example 3 days lower weight, last day higher weight. This gives the run frequencies / queue times, etc.. Then based on this give either the simplest +5% AD, +10% etc.. bonus AD (Or other reward from a fixed loot table per the percent you want to increase) per dungeon.
For example eToS = no need to modify gets base. eGWD = large queue time, increased AD rewads 10%.
Add lower and high bounds so there are no glitches and variety with ad/hour solved. The granularity can be adjusted, for example, to per hour to make a more responsive system.
This will automatically make "eToS" hour, eGWD hour etc.. as an encouragement, but not a forceful one, most will jump on it, not may actually like doing the same thing over and over, this adds the nudge needed without the negative fallout.
Specific queue doesn't pop? Add a global bounty system, for example a page, with automated bounty based on the matchmaking server priority needs:
"FBI needs DC" 1k AD bonus. Or +5% chance on bloody +5 ring, or whatever.. (reward on completion)
Leveling dungeons are trickier, because the point is not to throw in a high level 70 farmer there, it's counter productive. So a few solutions, same as before (bounties, and bonsues, suited for lowbies) but limited to lower than 70 players. RQ for lower levels. etc..
of-course the starting point of those suggestions is pre mod12b.
RQ as a just random queue is not a bad idea, it can be fun, the issue is the mix of players types in leveling dungeons. The discrepancy in dungeon difficulty and player ability across the entire range. The 'forceful' AD change. And the 3-1-1 Class disposition, 3 DPS is not working well, especially when the support is newer / undergeared. Adding wildcard / 'dont-care' positions will help immensly, especially in premades. We know better who can solo tank / heal and who can't.
Just here to say that I'm a little pissed off. I don't like to be told what to do, I like to choose what I want to do. Ah, of course, I can choose, in a private queue, right? And get no AD at all? Well, like someone said in this thread, I'm logging in everyday to get my key til VIP runs out. Keeping an eye on the updates to see if they finally listen to the players. In the meantime, I'll be playing a game where I have the freedom to select which dungeon I want to run and get rewards from it. I just regret spending real money on this game.
Fangbreaker and Spellplague, by your own (linked) press releases, were specifically designed and balanced as a super-challenges for end-game players. They had with high item level requirements to keep it feasible for random queues, and were balanced only for the best of the best. There's a HUGE difference between players who are just reaching the point of finishing off VT or LoL with/without help from their guild, players who can speedrun those and succeed 4/5 tries in T2 dungeons, and players who have a chance at successfully completing FBI/SP.
I've addressed in a previous post why we would not like to simply add more and more random queue categories. Basically, we'd like to keep the number of random queues to something reasonable and fairly low. Although we have not moved Fangbreaker and Spellplague, we have heard the feedback about breaking epic dungeons into three categories, or moving those dungeons into Hero's Accord.
It's often assumed that simply because we don't act on a piece of feedback that we simply haven't heard it, but that's not the case! I assure you, we definitely hear your feedback. If we broke them out and created a third queue, and built the random queues by "tier" there would be an expectation that the same tier breakdown would extend to the skirmish and trial categories, and soon we'd have a dozen random queues, each with only a few queues in them. With each new update, that list would get bigger.
Also, as we would like to continue releasing content that gives players who have been increasing their item level steadily something to do, we might not necessarily create a large number of queues in a single "tier." For all of these reasons, a tiered approach really isn't viable.
The other approach of moving Fangbreaker and Spellplague into Hero's Accord is more realistic, however, as it stands right now, Hero's Accord represents whichever queues are currently at the maximum item level. Right now this means just Tomb of the Nine Gods. However, as I hinted at in a maintenance stream, there will be another queue that falls into that category in the not too distant future. However, later on, when something comes out at an even higher item level, those queues will be pushed down into epic dungeon or epic trial, wherever they belong, and the new highest item level queue will take up residence in hero's accord.
If we included queues like Fangbreaker and Spellplague which are not the highest item level, it starts to become significantly more nebulous about when something is moved out of that category and down into epic dungeons. It also means that queue cannot award bonus seals of the brave, though this is a comparably trivial issue. Mostly we'd like there to not be a whole lot of confusion and consternation about when things move from one category to another.
Keep in mind, that although Fangbreaker and Spellplague are comparably difficult now, queues like Valindra's Tower were not designed to be easy. We see some statements like 'Fangbreaker and Spellplague were never designed to be part of the AD farm.' No dungeon was designed with the explicit purpose of being farmed for AD. It's absolutely true that we have worked to make encounters that are more mechanically interesting and taxing on the group since Fangbreaker Island. However, we are not continuing to dramatically up the difficulty from dungeon to dungeon. The item level may increase, and we may introduce new mechanics, but for instance, Tomb of the Nine Gods is not meant to be more difficult than Fangbreaker, if you are at the required item level for either of them when you run it. As everyone's item level continues to rise, the challenge provided by these queues will go down, and eventually Fangbreaker will be as easy as Valindra's Tower is now.
We would like people to look at the Random Epic Dungeon queue as a bonus that can be earned once you're able to complete all but the most difficult dungeon out there. However, we know that because it seems like it's where we "moved" the old bonus, that it's something that should just be accessible right away whenever any epic dungeons can be run. That's why we tuned the numbers so that just running a random skirmish and random dungeon should provide that huge boost of AD that everyone is used to. Hopefully if you can look at the Random Epic Dungeon queue as a bonus to unlock, and a way of distributing those who are strong enough to run those dungeons to help out everyone who may even be working on a lower epic dungeon, things will start to make a bit more sense.
I know this might not feel like a satisfactory answer, depending on what you were hoping to get out of the epic dungeon random queue. However, hopefully it helps you to understand a little about why it is currently setup the way it is. This explanation does not mean that it's impossible that we might make adjustments as we continue to watch how everyone is engaging, so please keep the feedback coming, as always it's greatly appreciated.
You don't need to add more, and more, or even mess about with multiple skirmish queues for tiered difficulty.
All you need to do for now is to move MSPC and FBI into Heroes' Accord.
Then... As more 12K dungeons appear they too could fit into Heroes' Accords until the eventual release of a 13K dungeon at which point drop the Heroes Accord 11k dungeons into ONE new queue called, I dunno... "Legendary Random Dungeon Queue".
Because that will keep Heroes Accord an active list when new material drops. See, if you drop everything out of HA and introduce a shiny new dungeon, that entire queue "list" will be unplayable till enough people unlock said dungeon... Do you really prefer the idea of month long dead dungeon queues to having the very top two tiers being grouped together instead of just one and people still playing the queue?
There IS no expectation of multiple tiers of skirmishes, no exaggerated "dozen" queue lists... just one more is needed. Just one...
Also, as further new 14k, 15k or whatever level super dungeons then come on line that drop of the next highest gateway will not land in the mix with MC, VT et al. but will all be grouped together to comprise a functional genuine "End-Game" tier of random dungeons.
Tiering really high end dungeons together with Valindra's Tower because apparently one day they will be equally as easy really misses the point that right now... for the vast majority of players... they are FAR from being just as easy. Maybe, one day, when the overwhelming majority of players find that to be the case, implement a system that groups them together. But until that day... DON'T! No one is suggesting you never change the formula... just don't make changes based on the alleged future proofing of high end dungeons.
And if Seals of The Brave remain a sticking point... just make them part of the Heroes Accord reward rather than the dungeon reward. That small concession, and the removal of FBI and MSPC from ERQ is the one thing that will make this whole sorry mess work again. Not faffing with keys, or trying to explain why doing three dungeons instead of two for the same rewards is somehow faster and more efficient. (It isn't...)
@asterdahl A fundamental aspect of my enjoyment of this game comes from my ability to choose exactly which content I am going to run. Random Queues remove this aspect of my game playing entertainment entirely as they take that choice away. No matter how much you tinker with the way dungeons and skirmishes are distributed amongst the queues or with the rewards that are given for joining them, you will never alter the fact that not being able to choose the content I play completely removes my enjoyment of playing the game. There are dungeons that I do not want to run and one that I never, ever run or ever want to find myself in (for the record, it is either version of Temple of the Spiders). To ensure that I never get dumped in that dungeon and to make my protest against the current arrangement, I am simply not joining any random queues.
Could you please explain how being dropped into a piece of content that I do not want to run is somehow improving my experience of playing this game ?
Your earlier comment:
'Not because we want to force you to do something you don't like, but because we honestly believe the game will be in a better place when everyone is playing more of the content available.'
Suggests you are only interested in forcing players to run content whether they like it or not. A little bit like the Svirfneblin in the Artificer's Workshop being kicked unconcious 'for their own good, of course' >:)
7
therealprotexMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 526Arc User
There should only be a 5 minute delay before players may be kicked, 15 minutes is the delay on vote abandon. If you're seeing a 15 minute delay to kick other players, I would like to apologize. Please submit this as a bug report in the bug reports section of the forums and we will look into this issue right away!
We're also continuing to monitor the levels of abuse you describe, and we will definitely consider making adjustments. Unfortunately, if we are overly lenient with vote kicking, there will be abuse in the other direction, so this is something we have to be very careful with. As people get more used to the system, we should see the normative behavior emerge and get a better picture of what sort of adjustments need to be made.
We may even consider things like account wide penalties if abuse is bad enough, so please consider carefully before simply signing off to avoid a queue you don't like. Please give it a shot, and if things really don't seem to be working out, use the vote abandon feature when it becomes available.
Seriously, I don't get it. You said above that you do not want to force anyone to run something that they don't like and your arguments sound like you are convinced that the random queue system is the best for the game and for us. Somehow it seems that we only did not fully get it yet. What I do not understand is, if you are so convinced that the random queue system is best for the game, for all of us, why a leaver penalty at all? Convince us and noone will abuse the system, no leaver penalty will be necessary. Of course, it will happen that someone leaves/has to leave but that should be a minority and no problem at all. If you are right about the random queues...
I'm not really sure yet, whether I like the RQ system or not, so I'll list some of my experiences I had with the system so far.
#1 Item Level Requirement The Dev Blog on Random Skirmishes says: "So for the time being, we’re removing the new skirmish from the random skirmish queue. [...] We’ll be monitoring the activity in that skirmish, and at some point in the future, we’ll be returning it to the random skirmish queue once everyone has had some time to adjust and increase their item level." I'm not a native english speaker, so I had to use google translate and it returned me: "We locked out new players, but we will not lock them out for the time being now, however we will lock them out in the future again."
Less sarcastic, what I mean is: There is a huge difference between new low IL players and low level alts. Everyone with a reasonably sized main char can gear up their alt - and at some point the majority of players will be done with it. But you would hope (I guess?) that there will always be new players joining - so you cannot set the entry bar for them higher and higher. Bringing my four alts to 12k IL didn't take me even half as long as bringing my first main char to 12k IL.
On the other hand, all IL requirements are so unrealistic. Someone with 11k is not holding up in eCC or eGWD (I'm not talking about FBI or MSP, it has become pointless). I went with my 12k GF and a DC friend into random queue and we got eGWD. All DPS were low (some as low as a private queue allows them to be). It was challenging - and I have to say I really enjoied it. I really had to tank, we really needed that healing, we really had to play as a group - considering I only went in there, hoping for eSOT, to quickly get my RAD on a twink, it was really good - until we met the boss and got slaughtered. We tried twice but we really didn't stand a chance. I don't mind the spending 35 minutes in this dungeon. I don't mind explaining new players, how to lure the spirit wolf, kill the stormcallers etc... I actually think this really is a giant upside of this system (no I would never have queued into eGWD privately/previously). But I do mind not being able to finish the dungeon, not getting my AD, having wasted all that time knowing that all I needed to do was change character - That's what is really frustrating. Now I'm not going to ask to change the IL requirements on those dungeons, but you guys really have to think about this. A lot of people struggle and it's not our alts, it's players that don't voice out in the forums.
#2 Class/Role Requierment I should actually be glad about this. I have never been this demanded as a DD. Our standard group of friends and guildmates is like 8 - 9 people, where at least 3 main an OP. Not everybody is always on. In the previous system we would always find 5 people and run stuff together. Now we are prohibited to do so. Or worse we are 5 online together but 4 queue randomly and only the fifth one is excluded - Do I really ave to tell you how unfair, frustrating, annoying and negativly impacting this is?
Most of us have started a DC twink just for some daily RAD. Most of us suck playing it. Most of us are not even interested in playing it. So we now RQ for something we hope we can run with 4 people and the DC is barely doing more than manually /follow. The queue isn't going to pop for four people if you publicly wait for a healer. Don't even dream about it.
#3 Epic Trials It sort of comes down to IL requirement but also knowing what to do - the failure rate on RQ trials is just immense. I mean like unbearable. I stopped doing those, except as a last thing a day, so if it's bad I leave (penalty) and shut down. Same goes for Svardborg, the failure rate is not justifiable. People even started to go afk for the 20 min because they know it'll fail and they still get those AD. Please prefix the Master Svardborg version someway, I'd want to know that befor opening the chests.
#4 One-Hit Zerging Ahead This concerns the mainly adressed leveling dungeons but to a lesser extend also the T1 (and tiamat). People running ahead and leaving lower geared players behind / not paying attention to other players in their queue. Now, there isn't much you can do about it directly but I think something should be done about the leveling dungeons. Your observation of a lot of lvl 70s doing the leveling dungeons previous to mod 12b is absolutely correct - in our guild we did just laugh at people, doing that twice a day with a dozen chars - and now we all have to do it.
You actually twisted your own reasoning. Asterdahl said on page one: "Obviously we can't open up an easier queue to replace the reward from a more difficult one, because that would be abused regularly to avoid the harder content.", and yet that's exactly what you did. You replaced the second epic dungeon of the day with a leveling dungeon. Not only is the leveling dungeon the fastest ways to RAD, it also gives out the most! I don't understand that system. You observed many lvl 70s running 2 leveling dungeons a day, were not happy with that observation and encouraged them to do so. If I were cynical i'd say you made the game more bot friendly.
On the opposite side people are left behind. I recently spent 20 mins in GWD (leveling version), because I had to run back, picking some lvl 55er up, who got lost on the way. The other 70 and I just raced ahead, killing everything, but he didn't even find the way (which is pretty sad on its own). If there's someone low in the group I usually ask if it's there first time in that paricular dungeon - and I am happy to help / guide / stick with them - provided I get an answer. People that don't respond or are not willing to learn get vote kicked by me quite quickly (like those players, shooting Hulks through the door when there's a giant bubble over the throne).
For Tiamat you have the same, people zerging ahead, killing the black head, others standing around, not knowing what to do, others afk'ing, lower geared players being left behind, not told what to do, those who are, don't listen or respond ... but that leads back to #3.
#5 The Game Decides For You. Overall I like the "randomness" it is what I used to do (select all and wait for one to open), and when I ask who wants to join to run somthing I quickly get 4 more players. When I ask what to run I seldomly get answers (other than no POM!). So that's good. The downside is I always could choose what I feel up (capable) to do. All my twinks are 12k and sinco the RQ I did tank FBI twice and failed MSP once. We alwys leave MSP even with the mains, it's just so not worth it sadly
#6 Seal Cap Please raise the seal caps. Everything is giving Seals of the Protector now (skirmish, dungeon, daily reward, heroics, etc ...) and the Seals of the Adventurer are obtained mor frequently as well. This is an annoyance for players. Like, really!
Those were my overall thoughts on the RQ system. Sorry if they weren't well sorted after all. I'll run RQ this evening again, that's certain. Please have a look into the blue gear conversion topics (there are already several of them). I think if that stuff could be converted or salvaged, even if only for small amounts it would make "lesser" queues somewhat worthwhile (I am looking at you, Master of the Hunt, Dread Legion).
Edit: Removed a hamster running through my thread.
The elephant in the room is (as mentioned previously) combining T2s with T3s. They are completely different beasts.
I will quote myself from a different post on the same subject:
"Quite simply, the point many of us have been making all along is that FBI and MSP are T3 dungeons - in the same class/bracket as To9G. As such they need a T3 capable group.
They are completely different to T2s. Players require more of everything in terms of capability.
A T3 RQ bracket with FBI, MSP & T9G (plus an incentive to run it - e.g. guaranteed Ultimate Mark or Superior Enchantment once per day!) would see high level players all queuing up to get theirs whilst enabling mid level players to queue for T2s without the fear of getting into something they can't handle.
It would be a win for all sides.
More UM's & SE's on the AH bringing the price down for everyone, guilds can get their heroic shards, the RQ goal of making all dungeons run is met and the T3 RQ is entered knowingly with players prepared for the experience instead of voting to quit as soon as the timer allows."
I know you don't want to do this but I am of the firm opinion that this is a case of 'ideology over pragmatism'. As long as T2s and T3s are grouped together the ERQ will continue to result in negative player experience.
I agree with you but I think they are doing this for financial reasons. They can't come right out and say this but having FBI and MSP in the Epic: Random Dungeon category will sell more Campaign Completion Tokens for Storm Kings Thunder and Cloaked Ascendancy in the Zen store. I bet sales for those tokens have spiked since Mod12B released.
Comments
I will quote myself from a different post on the same subject:
"Quite simply, the point many of us have been making all along is that FBI and MSP are T3 dungeons - in the same class/bracket as To9G. As such they need a T3 capable group.
They are completely different to T2s. Players require more of everything in terms of capability.
A T3 RQ bracket with FBI, MSP & T9G (plus an incentive to run it - e.g. guaranteed Ultimate Mark or Superior Enchantment once per day!) would see high level players all queuing up to get theirs whilst enabling mid level players to queue for T2s without the fear of getting into something they can't handle.
It would be a win for all sides.
More UM's & SE's on the AH bringing the price down for everyone, guilds can get their heroic shards, the RQ goal of making all dungeons run is met and the T3 RQ is entered knowingly with players prepared for the experience instead of voting to quit as soon as the timer allows."
I know you don't want to do this but I am of the firm opinion that this is a case of 'ideology over pragmatism'. As long as T2s and T3s are grouped together the ERQ will continue to result in negative player experience.
Xael De Armadeon: DC
Xane De Armadeon: CW
Zen De Armadeon: OP
Zohar De Armadeon: TR
Chrion De Armadeon: SW
Gosti Big Belly: GWF
Barney McRustbucket: GF
Lt. Thackeray: HR
Lucius De Armadeon: BD
Member of Casual Dailies - XBox
The way I´d change the epic dungeon queue is to shove everything with level 73 opponents into hero´s accord, so we´d still have three dungeon RQ only: leveling; with level 72 opponents; with level 73 opponents.
The game design being what it was before the changes, the least varied path was also the most profitable, and that was our mistake. Certainly it's possible that the rewards could have been tuned more tightly such that each dungeon awarded a very specific amount of AD based on the amount of time it took to clear it, and this could have somewhat ameliorated the problem. However, that target would always be moving, because players would choose a new dungeon that was the best AD per hour whenever there was an adjustment. At that time, the run times would be pushed lower than what we anticipated based on data we gathered when the given dungeon was not as popular. We'd be changing the rewards for dungeons constantly and the systems design team would be so busy balancing those payouts that it would have little time for making new content.
Even if each queue's AD per hour was within a few percentages of each other queue, certain queues would be identified as the most likely to succeed with a public group, or the easiest to understand, and it's unlikely a true "play anything" mentality could emerge. In addition, whenever the item level were raised or PvE balance were adjusted, the whole process of rebalancing the old rewards would have to be started again with new data.
With all this talk of AD per hour, it's easy to feel cynical. However, as I've stated before, we're not actually trying to necessarily slow down anyone's AD earn rate, but instead ensure that the most profitable avenue is not the most repetitive one. Not because we want to force you to do something you don't like, but because we honestly believe the game will be in a better place when everyone is playing more of the content available.
A lot of players are playing content for the first time that they've never played before, or may have never played before random queues, and everyone is still getting used to that content. We're going to continue to watch clear rates and consider making adjustments if necessary. Please continue sending us your feedback. The situation you describe is definitely an oversight and so I'd like to apologize for that not being caught in testing. I will make sure that the mission tracker is updated ASAP so that it will be clear which version of Svardborg you have entered. Thanks for letting us know about this! I spoke a little about the old dungeons you are referring to on a recent maintenance stream, but since I am sure most did not have a chance to watch it I'll address this a little here. It's very unfortunate that the team decided to remove a bunch of dungeons at the launch of Module 6. There wasn't a good plan with what to do with the existing endgame dungeons, and there was a move to overhaul the leveling dungeons that made it so they simply couldn't be left in the game as is.
The team only had a limited amount of time to port those dungeons over to the new level cap and team size and so that's why only some of them were brought forward. That being said, I'd like to apologize for those dungeons disappearing. As far as bringing them back is concerned, bringing the rest back is definitely still on our list. However, bringing them back as endgame dungeons isn't straightforward.
If we simply scale up the difficulty and bring them back to the game as-is, we could really only bring them back at a lower item level, around where Temple of the Spider is now. If we brought them back in that item level range, there wouldn't be much of a reason to run them, unless one of them happened to be faster than Temple of the Spider.
We could of course bring them back with significantly more work as new top tier dungeons, similar to Spellplague Caverns (Master) but for the design, character and effects team, something like that is nearly as much work as building a new dungeon from scratch. When we're telling stories in a new area, generally we'd like to bring in dungeons that support that new story, so that's why you've seen us mostly leaning towards creating new dungeons.
Of course, there's also bringing back old dungeons as leveling dungeons, which is something we've done with a few dungeons recently. We'd like to continue to do that, however, it also takes some time to make sure the dungeon is in working order and scaled down to three players. Generally bringing them back as leveling dungeons won't have a huge impact on the average player's day-to-day, for instance, when we brought back a number of missing leveling dungeons, we didn't necessarily see that there was tremendous interest in running them. Which is to be expected with a leveling dungeon. But we would like to bring more back, so we appreciate your patience.
In terms of bringing back old dungeons vs. introducing random queues. Fortunately, it really wasn't an either-or situation. The team that worked on random queues could not have been tasked on bringing back old dungeons. Primarily, the random queue work was mostly on our programming team and user interface team. Often times it can be difficult to imagine, but since our team is made up of a number of members working in different departments, tasks aren't necessarily interchangeable. I've touched on this a bit before, but the results won't truly be random unless you and everyone else in the group came from the random queue system. Basically, the only way to guarantee truly random results would be to queue with a full group. What I mean by this, is that if a lot of players are queuing manually for a specific queue, you're reasonably likely to fill into one of their groups, thus skewing the results towards that queue.
In the same vein, if someone queues for an obscure queue, random queue players will be added to that queue as well. We've been monitoring the results, and a lot of less popular queues that did not used to pop are popping much more than before, but the results won't ever be truly random.
So if you run ToS once, you get 6k AD, but then you only get 3k the next time, and maybe 1k after that... Worried about picking the "2 most efficient"? Ok, then keep those AD debuffs active until running 2 other dungeons. 6k on first ToS, then it's only 1k. Run GWD next and it becomes 1k while ToS rises up to 3k. Now run CC, and ToS jumps back to 6k while GWD rises to 3k.
Dungeons were tiered for a reason, and with the key changes some dungeons may have specific exclusive items a player may be looking for. Players have other reasons for picking (or excluding) specific dungeons to run besides "most efficient AD per hour". Maybe their goal is "finish within an hour before I have to leave" (FBI being over an hour long), or "get this specific item that doesn't drop anywhere else" or "anything except ". When you take that choice away, you inhibit players' progress, and then punish them when they fail (e.g. "leaver penalty" for giving up on FBI). Well of course they're "popping more". That's because you're the ones picking them. Rate of specific dungeons being "chosen" isn't even a scientific metric anymore.
However, I'd like to take a moment to reiterate that nothing is preventing you from running a specific epic dungeon or endgame skirmish that you'd like to run, and I would absolutely advise that after you've finished your random dungeon. The rewards will be much better both in terms of progressing your character's equipment, and providing astral diamonds per hour, in the form of salvage and refinement.
Although we're receiving a lot of feedback like this, the data is actually showing that plenty of players are still queuing for endgame content by selecting a specific queue. In fact, there's been some speculation that we will misinterpret presumed data showing high adoption of the random queues as a success because players are "forced" to participate. However, we are actually seeing a very healthy mix of random and manual queuing. For those interested, the split is about 60:40 in favor of manual queuing.
That means that on average, for every 4 players that are matched with a group through random queues, 6 players are matched who queued for something specifically. (This only includes public queues. Those queuing privately for specific queues are not included in this data.) This is a fairly healthy breakdown that we expected, and it shows that many players are knocking out whatever random queues they can, then manually queuing for what they'd like to play.
We understand that with the repeated, albeit very small AD bonus attached to the random skirmish and random dungeon queue, it may feel like you're being directed to run those, instead of queuing for something else directly, even if that something else would drop significantly more rewards overall. Those repeated rewards are designed to give a small bonus for those that might be running the queue a second time that day with a friend, or other similar situations. This is something we'd like to continue monitoring as everyone gets used to the new system. It's definitely an area we'll consider adjusting so that the correct path of running what's currently most relevant to you after random queues feels like the correct path. There should only be a 5 minute delay before players may be kicked, 15 minutes is the delay on vote abandon. If you're seeing a 15 minute delay to kick other players, I would like to apologize. Please submit this as a bug report in the bug reports section of the forums and we will look into this issue right away!
We're also continuing to monitor the levels of abuse you describe, and we will definitely consider making adjustments. Unfortunately, if we are overly lenient with vote kicking, there will be abuse in the other direction, so this is something we have to be very careful with. As people get more used to the system, we should see the normative behavior emerge and get a better picture of what sort of adjustments need to be made.
We may even consider things like account wide penalties if abuse is bad enough, so please consider carefully before simply signing off to avoid a queue you don't like. Please give it a shot, and if things really don't seem to be working out, use the vote abandon feature when it becomes available.
It's often assumed that simply because we don't act on a piece of feedback that we simply haven't heard it, but that's not the case! I assure you, we definitely hear your feedback. If we broke them out and created a third queue, and built the random queues by "tier" there would be an expectation that the same tier breakdown would extend to the skirmish and trial categories, and soon we'd have a dozen random queues, each with only a few queues in them. With each new update, that list would get bigger.
Also, as we would like to continue releasing content that gives players who have been increasing their item level steadily something to do, we might not necessarily create a large number of queues in a single "tier." For all of these reasons, a tiered approach really isn't viable.
The other approach of moving Fangbreaker and Spellplague into Hero's Accord is more realistic, however, as it stands right now, Hero's Accord represents whichever queues are currently at the maximum item level. Right now this means just Tomb of the Nine Gods. However, as I hinted at in a maintenance stream, there will be another queue that falls into that category in the not too distant future. However, later on, when something comes out at an even higher item level, those queues will be pushed down into epic dungeon or epic trial, wherever they belong, and the new highest item level queue will take up residence in hero's accord.
If we included queues like Fangbreaker and Spellplague which are not the highest item level, it starts to become significantly more nebulous about when something is moved out of that category and down into epic dungeons. It also means that queue cannot award bonus seals of the brave, though this is a comparably trivial issue. Mostly we'd like there to not be a whole lot of confusion and consternation about when things move from one category to another.
Keep in mind, that although Fangbreaker and Spellplague are comparably difficult now, queues like Valindra's Tower were not designed to be easy. We see some statements like 'Fangbreaker and Spellplague were never designed to be part of the AD farm.' No dungeon was designed with the explicit purpose of being farmed for AD. It's absolutely true that we have worked to make encounters that are more mechanically interesting and taxing on the group since Fangbreaker Island. However, we are not continuing to dramatically up the difficulty from dungeon to dungeon. The item level may increase, and we may introduce new mechanics, but for instance, Tomb of the Nine Gods is not meant to be more difficult than Fangbreaker, if you are at the required item level for either of them when you run it. As everyone's item level continues to rise, the challenge provided by these queues will go down, and eventually Fangbreaker will be as easy as Valindra's Tower is now.
We would like people to look at the Random Epic Dungeon queue as a bonus that can be earned once you're able to complete all but the most difficult dungeon out there. However, we know that because it seems like it's where we "moved" the old bonus, that it's something that should just be accessible right away whenever any epic dungeons can be run. That's why we tuned the numbers so that just running a random skirmish and random dungeon should provide that huge boost of AD that everyone is used to. Hopefully if you can look at the Random Epic Dungeon queue as a bonus to unlock, and a way of distributing those who are strong enough to run those dungeons to help out everyone who may even be working on a lower epic dungeon, things will start to make a bit more sense.
I know this might not feel like a satisfactory answer, depending on what you were hoping to get out of the epic dungeon random queue. However, hopefully it helps you to understand a little about why it is currently setup the way it is. This explanation does not mean that it's impossible that we might make adjustments as we continue to watch how everyone is engaging, so please keep the feedback coming, as always it's greatly appreciated.
However, stories like yours are important to help us identify the outliers and consider how to make improvements, so we appreciate you taking the time to post your experiences. It's not impossible to level scale players down for skirmishes, and this is something we'd like to do in the future. Unfortunately, skirmishes were never adjusted to scale like dungeons when Module 6 was released and it's not completely trivial to adjust them. With that in mind, we'd like to fix level scaling and then hopefully make skirmishes available even once you've passed the level band. We apologize for the inconvenience until that day.
I've talked at length about why we don't have a second skirmish queue, but as far as why Kessell's Retreat and Shores of Tuern are not in the skirmish category, but instead in the epic dungeon category, they've actually been in that section of the queue system for some time, although their AD bonuses may not have been update in all cases.
Although we shipped them as skirmishes, they were a bit inconsistent with how other skirmishes have played in the past. We had some internal discussion and standardized the internal guidelines for what makes a dungeon a dungeon, a skirmish a skirmish and a trial a trial around the release of Module 9 or Module 10. At this time, we recategorized a few queues that felt out of place.
So keeping FBI/MSP on the epic dungeon random queue, and add TNG in it when the next dungeon will go in Hero's Accord is not viable.
- The requirements in terms of experience is huge. The mechanics added in dungeons since CN (good thing) change radically the run experience, as it's not as linear as T1-T2.
- But there's more than that. The gear requirements are so much higher for Tomb that when it'll go to the epic random, more and more people will be locked. Keep in mind that Tomb is the first dungeon to require 85% ArmPen, that alone is a huge difference. Good luck doing damage with the usual 60% needed on the other random epics.
- And last but not least, the group requirements change dramatically when you go up in difficulty. T1-T2 can be done without a problem with the classic 1-1-3 recommended in random queue. But when you hit FBI, meta is more adapated to 1-2-2, and once you reach TNG, meta is now 1-3-1. Not saying my opinion on that, but it's the meta.
So in my opinion keeping dungeons with that big of a difference in terms of requirements, speaking now of FBI/MSP and TNG when next dungeon will be introduced is not viable as if you queue with the composition required in random queue, there's a higher fail probability if you reach the T3.
I understand why you have introduced Random Queuing system but I am afraid it has created more problems than it have solved.
One of the problems I see is the requirement to have everything unlocked in order to get in the random queues (and thus earn AD). New players could start earning AD from level 12+, now they must wait until they get 54+. That is a serious setback in their progression. Even worse, level 70 players need to unlock all the dungeons in the list in order to participate in epic dungeons, which can take a lot of time (not to mention alts where the time needed to do so is probably not worth to invest in).
An alternative to RQ for underplayed dungeons could be:
a) to increase the reward compared to overplayed ones (like the system you introduced for underplayed classes), or
b) to make all dungeons similar in time to finish (much harder to implement since they need to be reworked).
Players have definite time to play and they choose how to spend it. If dungeon A takes 2/3 of the time to finish than dungeon B and they both reward the same, why would they ever want to play dungeon B? If the reward to effort ratio is good, be rest assured that players would go for them, no need to force them.
Regarding skirmishes, the problem I had with Merchant Prince’s Folly, was not the item level needed but the fact that I had not finished the Chult campaign to earn the keys for that. I entered the Random skirmish 3 times and all of them got this skirmish. Never entered it again (until now obviously) since doing the skirmish without the lockbox’s rewards is not worthwhile. Chult is an end game campaign and many players are still working on it, so excluding it was a good move.
You said : “Something specific we are looking at is the inconvenience of dealing with campaign tasks that generate dungeon chest keys. We plan to adjust these in the future but were unable to get them in for the current release.”
I am glad you recognize an existing problem. RQ has brought the need to work on a large number of campaigns (that we already have finished) just to get a large number of different keys to open at the end of different dungeons. This is tiring and often boring. In the past players selected which dungeons they would enter and focus on getting keys for them. Now this is much harder.
My suggestion is to find a way to make keys easier to get or limit the amount needed. Easier access could mean to win “key marks” from some activities (like daily quests) and those could be exchangeable with the key of your choice (assuming you are eligible for the dungeon requiring this key). Limiting their amount (my favorite option) could mean to reduce the number of keys needed to 3 universal types (like for Tier 1/2/3 or dungeon/skirmish/trial dungeon types) by readjusting the means to get them.
And it's not just T3 that's way out there. There's a big difference between T1 players and T2. This is by your own (former?) developers' design. T1 players still struggle with ToS, and even more so CC and GWD, just as badly as T2 players struggle with FBI and SP I daresay.
If you don't want tiers, then you shouldn't have made tiered content. And FBI will always be imposing that useless everfrost requirement on unrelated dungeons for the offchance that's what you pick for players. Lower the requirements from FBI, SP, and all the T2 dungeons to be the same as T1 and drop the item level and everfrost requirements, and most the problems with epic random queue will go away. Adding
more difficult"higher item level, but just as easy" content to the top-level queue later on? Well, then you're just going to keep locking more players out. It's almost as if merging formerly-tiered doesn't go well in a single random queue...The developers are listening to the complaints, but not understanding the real issues.
The change just described is an improvement, yes - but the whole RQ system is still broken . You are still penalizing some groups of players, discouraging others and damaging the play experience of yet others.
The reason is still the same as before and you are still taking the same, flawed approach of attempting to fix the symptoms instead of fixing the underlying causes. You say you want players to " experience more varied content", which is fine, except you take the approach of forcing players to do so, instead of making them want to do so.
That is just wrong.
Let me give you two examples of how you could have accomplished the goals, without causing the massive dissatisfaction you are dealing with now.
Example approach 1:
Get rid of Random queues and bonus AD altogether. Use the dungeon/skirmish quests formerly given out in the stronghold - giving them a 3-4 day cooldown instead of a week, and have them give a RAD reward so that basically, if you do all the different dungeons and skirmishes you qualify for twice per week, you get the same total RAD as you would have gotten from the Bonus system. And yes, do not give L 70s RAD for doing the leveling dungeons.Example approach 2:
Get rid of random queues. Keep the bonus RAD system, but with a strict maximum per day. The first time you run specific dungeon/skirmish any given day, you get a bonus - however, you have full freedom over what you run, and when you run it. And yes, do not give L 70s Bonus RAD for doing the leveling dungeons.Example approach 2a:
A variation on the previous approach, except the bonus rewards for any particular dungeon/skirmish are dynamically adjusted, depending on their popularity. So, if very few people want to run eCC, for example, it would start to give more and more RAD, until people start running it. This would give people a choice - they could either run a few unpopular dungeons skirmishes, or multiple popular ones to reach their daily maximum RAD.Example approach 2b:
Another variation on approach 2 - instead of a daily maximum Bonus RAD, have a weekly maximum. This would be very popular with people who have limited play time on weekdays, but can play a lot more on weekends.Example approach 3:
Keep the current flawed system, but allow private groups to queue for a random dungeon even if they do not match the 1+1+3 composition. Currently you are hurting guilds that want to give everyone a chance, or groups of friends that want to run together,even if they don't fit your idea of what a group should look like.Choice is good. Give players choices.
Note that I am not suggesting implementing more tiers of random dungeons - that will not really fix anything.
https://www.arcgames.com/en/forums/neverwinter#/discussion/1235700/all-i-have-to-insure-that-i-have-a-positive-gaming-experience-is-choice/p1?new=1
Have a 'Dungeon of the hour' linked to both AD and Shards. The shard quest can be "run a dungeon of the hour & earn 10 Heroic Shards".
Players can avoid dungeons that they really don't want to do as the DotH changes at the top of the hour but there is an incentive to queue for whatever comes up to save time.
You get some player choice where players aren't dropped unwillingly into anything they know they can't handle, but you also get people queuing & knowing there will be more players wanting that dungeon at that particular time.
Xael De Armadeon: DC
Xane De Armadeon: CW
Zen De Armadeon: OP
Zohar De Armadeon: TR
Chrion De Armadeon: SW
Gosti Big Belly: GWF
Barney McRustbucket: GF
Lt. Thackeray: HR
Lucius De Armadeon: BD
Member of Casual Dailies - XBox
In other words you replaced "Dungeons: insert dungeon" with "Random dungeon". Now you would think this gives us more freedom as to what to play, yet it doesn't as the system decides it for us. I don't want to spend 1-2 hours in a mSP on my incapable alt to farm some shards for the Stronghold.
"We’ll be monitoring the activity in that skirmish, and at some point in the future, we’ll be returning it to the random skirmish queue once everyone has had some time to adjust and increase their item level."
That's only delaying the issue, not solving it. Now if this means that by mod 20 or whatever the power creep will have taken care of it, fine I guess? but until that time the skirmish will sooner or later be disregarded by the player base. How about properly balancing random queues on their difficulties instead?
"Something specific we are looking at is the inconvenience of dealing with campaign tasks that generate dungeon chest keys"
Annoying but I think this is the least of our concerns here.
"When possible we’d all prefer players to play with their friends and guildmates, and so we haven’t excluded the option to queue with a full group"
Then why are we being limited with class roles? I can't play with my friends and guild mates due to class restrictions. Plenty a dps tank, healing sw and other perfectly well working but interestingly build characters cannot join in the random dungeon parties due to these limits. I don't like turning players down, or having to tell them what class they should play. I understand that content could be and should be more enjoyable for the solo players, but not at the expense of group players.
"The fact that astral diamond bonuses were paid out identically from any queue created a world where only a small subset of queues were ever run. If new players didn’t have this tribal knowledge they could end up waiting in an unpopular queue forever. Additionally, we don’t think it’s particularly exciting to run the same dungeon forever."
Because Cryptic doesn't consider having the option to run the dungeons we want over and over again to be fun is part of your reasoning? That's the most arrogant response I seen thus far. I see the appeal in making all content more interesting to run and therefor their queue times shorter, but not at the expensive of free choice.
"Of course, we know for many of you it’s about efficiency and that’s why we made a more varied experience the most efficient one."
By putting mSP/FBI and eLoL together is most efficient? Because not knowing whether your dungeon is going to take 15 min or 2 hours, let alone if you can even run it, is efficient?
"We want to reiterate that with a big change like this, we’re absolutely relying on all of you to provide your continued feedback."
Then please keep reading the feedback you are receiving over and over. The solution isn't even in sight yet.
1. Removing Prince's Folly from R. Skirmish is a bad desicion. Why not have the chance to run new content among old ones? More players will get to know it and get some totems on the way. I liked the feeling that some alts were earning totems for future boon unlocks. Last and most important: the non IL reqs for the random skirmish q will now open the gates for bots and for ultra low-geared toons (free riders) who will make achieving gold rank impossible in IG/PoM/Throne. Sollution: 7k (or 7.5k) IL min req.
2. I run random epic dungeon q a lot, and my findings (as predicted) are that 90% of players abandon/disconnect when fbi/msp pop. Sollutions: a. Move them to hero's accord (H.A). Seals of brave won't be granted this way (none runs H.A for the extra seals anyway), but instead, players have a chance of superior/ultimate enchanting stones or marks of potency (I remind you that we had the chance at past to get gmops from bosses, when they costed 100k). b. If you insist on keeping them on RED (random epic dungeon) q, make the system pick players above some min IL level (13k for example).
3. Currently, the chest of a leveling dungeon gives a piece of rare (blue) gear, which is totally useless as it can't be used as rp (is this intended btw, or a bug?). Sollution: Make blue gear available for refining, or replace them on the leveling dungeon's chest with a piece of rp like emerald/aquamarine etc.
4. Many players who don't want to run a randomed skirmish/dungeon and try to avoid the leaver penalty, they change char and seem disconnected, and the remaining players can't remove them via voting. Sometimes, the deserters return to their toon just before 5 mins have passed so they aren't autokicked by system and leech the run that others trying to complete (I've seen this on long leveling dungeons like karru or cc). Sollution: The system detects if a disconnected toon is/isn't in line with a disconnected account. If it isn't, after 1 min of being disconnected, the toon gets auto-kicked.
You want people to run more differents dunjeons ?
Make the dunjeons rewarding IN THE CHEST.
Something that would make us think, the decent drop chance at something good is there.
Otherwise you can turn this how you want this is just an other attempt to nerf da earning and making us lost even more time...
We run this etos/tuern x2 thing because of the AD not for the dunjeon itself.
There is nothing challenging at all doing dunjeons we already did thousands of time all we get is salvage in 99% runs even in To9g Fbi Mspc.
I manage to save a little zen but i keep buying these keys for 250z and i got absolutely nothing from that.
Add to that scrolls that cost an arm...
So now every time you run a dunjeon we loose ad/zen.
Is this your definition of f2p, pay and get nothing in return ?
Now nothing change exept it become longer and more painfull to make ad and it's still not rewarding.
Your key change was a joke as everybody know the first week many players saw goods drops then it was nerf days later somehow.
So I understand the development team is afraid there will be too many categories available for random queues, which will lead to too much time required to run all the runs. There is a way to solve this issue.
If each category has multiple tiers, with all their own RAD bonusses, you could make it that running 1 T2 eDungeon gives you the bonus for T1 eDungeon and T2 eDungeon. Running the T3 eDungeon in the first places give the T1 eDungeon, T2 eDungeon and T3 eDungeon. Of course you can only get each bonus once.
That way, you will run the most difficult dungeon that you are able to run. No need to scale down by removing armor, since if you're 15k iLevel and you insist on running a T1 (eSoT for example), you will just get a lower RAD bonus rewards compared to what would be possible for you to achieve at max.
Twitch
Patreon
But...
1.) Like others have said, lvl 70's should not be running leveling dungeons for rad, it's just not right. Allow 2x epics to get the same amount of rad if players had run the leveling dungeon plus the epic. And when characters reach level 70, change the stronghold cleric's quest from random dungeon, to random epic dungeon. The current solution still has the same basic problem, characters below a certain i/lvl can't help the guild as much as lvl 70's.
2.) Not all characters are created equal. When you consistently have people droping out of fbi etc. because of the obvious, or speed running MC cuz 15k+ ilvl something is broken (basically same problem w/ the leveling dungeons). Epic dungeon queue should be split into tiers (or have the queue add t2 and possibly t3 dungeons to selection if char.ilvl >= X) Should be really simple code to add to queuing function.
I know y'all have said you wont split queue N into X queues, for reason Y, so like I said, adding a chunk of code to append t2, t3 dungeons to the selection list before a random one is selected would be pretty easy, and then you just lower the ilvl requirement for joining the random epic queue. I mean, if your devs have problems with if statement, you need new devs.
It can be at any granularity needed for example:
At server reset, evaluate last 3 days queue times and last day. Weight those in, for example 3 days lower weight, last day higher weight. This gives the run frequencies / queue times, etc.. Then based on this give either the simplest +5% AD, +10% etc.. bonus AD (Or other reward from a fixed loot table per the percent you want to increase) per dungeon.
For example
eToS = no need to modify gets base.
eGWD = large queue time, increased AD rewads 10%.
Add lower and high bounds so there are no glitches and variety with ad/hour solved.
The granularity can be adjusted, for example, to per hour to make a more responsive system.
This will automatically make "eToS" hour, eGWD hour etc.. as an encouragement, but not a forceful one, most will jump on it, not may actually like doing the same thing over and over, this adds the nudge needed without the negative fallout.
Specific queue doesn't pop?
Add a global bounty system, for example a page, with automated bounty based on the matchmaking server priority needs:
"FBI needs DC" 1k AD bonus. Or +5% chance on bloody +5 ring, or whatever.. (reward on completion)
Leveling dungeons are trickier, because the point is not to throw in a high level 70 farmer there, it's counter productive. So a few solutions, same as before (bounties, and bonsues, suited for lowbies) but limited to lower than 70 players. RQ for lower levels. etc..
of-course the starting point of those suggestions is pre mod12b.
RQ as a just random queue is not a bad idea, it can be fun, the issue is the mix of players types in leveling dungeons. The discrepancy in dungeon difficulty and player ability across the entire range. The 'forceful' AD change. And the 3-1-1 Class disposition, 3 DPS is not working well, especially when the support is newer / undergeared. Adding wildcard / 'dont-care' positions will help immensly, especially in premades. We know better who can solo tank / heal and who can't.
Here is a very relevant thread, I hope you can take a moment to look at it and it's comments:
https://www.arcgames.com/en/forums/neverwinter/#/discussion/1236053/random-dungeon-low-level-toon-booted-from-the-party-in-the-freakn-cloak-tower
All you need to do for now is to move MSPC and FBI into Heroes' Accord.
Then...
As more 12K dungeons appear they too could fit into Heroes' Accords until the eventual release of a 13K dungeon at which point drop the Heroes Accord 11k dungeons into ONE new queue called, I dunno... "Legendary Random Dungeon Queue".
Because that will keep Heroes Accord an active list when new material drops.
See, if you drop everything out of HA and introduce a shiny new dungeon, that entire queue "list" will be unplayable till enough people unlock said dungeon...
Do you really prefer the idea of month long dead dungeon queues to having the very top two tiers being grouped together instead of just one and people still playing the queue?
There IS no expectation of multiple tiers of skirmishes, no exaggerated "dozen" queue lists... just one more is needed.
Just one...
Also, as further new 14k, 15k or whatever level super dungeons then come on line that drop of the next highest gateway will not land in the mix with MC, VT et al. but will all be grouped together to comprise a functional genuine "End-Game" tier of random dungeons.
Tiering really high end dungeons together with Valindra's Tower because apparently one day they will be equally as easy really misses the point that right now... for the vast majority of players... they are FAR from being just as easy.
Maybe, one day, when the overwhelming majority of players find that to be the case, implement a system that groups them together.
But until that day... DON'T!
No one is suggesting you never change the formula... just don't make changes based on the alleged future proofing of high end dungeons.
And if Seals of The Brave remain a sticking point... just make them part of the Heroes Accord reward rather than the dungeon reward.
That small concession, and the removal of FBI and MSPC from ERQ is the one thing that will make this whole sorry mess work again. Not faffing with keys, or trying to explain why doing three dungeons instead of two for the same rewards is somehow faster and more efficient. (It isn't...)
Move FBI and MSPC... that's all you need to do.
Could you please explain how being dropped into a piece of content that I do not want to run is somehow improving my experience of playing this game ?
Your earlier comment:
'Not because we want to force you to do something you don't like, but because we honestly believe the game will be in a better place when everyone is playing more of the content available.'
Suggests you are only interested in forcing players to run content whether they like it or not. A little bit like the Svirfneblin in the Artificer's Workshop being kicked unconcious 'for their own good, of course' >:)
#1 Item Level Requirement
The Dev Blog on Random Skirmishes says: "So for the time being, we’re removing the new skirmish from the random skirmish queue. [...] We’ll be monitoring the activity in that skirmish, and at some point in the future, we’ll be returning it to the random skirmish queue once everyone has had some time to adjust and increase their item level." I'm not a native english speaker, so I had to use google translate and it returned me: "We locked out new players, but we will not lock them out for the time being now, however we will lock them out in the future again."
Less sarcastic, what I mean is: There is a huge difference between new low IL players and low level alts. Everyone with a reasonably sized main char can gear up their alt - and at some point the majority of players will be done with it. But you would hope (I guess?) that there will always be new players joining - so you cannot set the entry bar for them higher and higher. Bringing my four alts to 12k IL didn't take me even half as long as bringing my first main char to 12k IL.
On the other hand, all IL requirements are so unrealistic. Someone with 11k is not holding up in eCC or eGWD (I'm not talking about FBI or MSP, it has become pointless). I went with my 12k GF and a DC friend into random queue and we got eGWD. All DPS were low (some as low as a private queue allows them to be). It was challenging - and I have to say I really enjoied it. I really had to tank, we really needed that healing, we really had to play as a group - considering I only went in there, hoping for eSOT, to quickly get my RAD on a twink, it was really good - until we met the boss and got slaughtered. We tried twice but we really didn't stand a chance. I don't mind the spending 35 minutes in this dungeon. I don't mind explaining new players, how to lure the spirit wolf, kill the stormcallers etc... I actually think this really is a giant upside of this system (no I would never have queued into eGWD privately/previously). But I do mind not being able to finish the dungeon, not getting my AD, having wasted all that time knowing that all I needed to do was change character - That's what is really frustrating. Now I'm not going to ask to change the IL requirements on those dungeons, but you guys really have to think about this. A lot of people struggle and it's not our alts, it's players that don't voice out in the forums.
#2 Class/Role Requierment
I should actually be glad about this. I have never been this demanded as a DD. Our standard group of friends and guildmates is like 8 - 9 people, where at least 3 main an OP. Not everybody is always on. In the previous system we would always find 5 people and run stuff together. Now we are prohibited to do so. Or worse we are 5 online together but 4 queue randomly and only the fifth one is excluded - Do I really ave to tell you how unfair, frustrating, annoying and negativly impacting this is?
Most of us have started a DC twink just for some daily RAD. Most of us suck playing it. Most of us are not even interested in playing it. So we now RQ for something we hope we can run with 4 people and the DC is barely doing more than manually /follow. The queue isn't going to pop for four people if you publicly wait for a healer. Don't even dream about it.
#3 Epic Trials
It sort of comes down to IL requirement but also knowing what to do - the failure rate on RQ trials is just immense. I mean like unbearable. I stopped doing those, except as a last thing a day, so if it's bad I leave (penalty) and shut down. Same goes for Svardborg, the failure rate is not justifiable. People even started to go afk for the 20 min because they know it'll fail and they still get those AD. Please prefix the Master Svardborg version someway, I'd want to know that befor opening the chests.
#4 One-Hit Zerging Ahead
This concerns the mainly adressed leveling dungeons but to a lesser extend also the T1 (and tiamat). People running ahead and leaving lower geared players behind / not paying attention to other players in their queue. Now, there isn't much you can do about it directly but I think something should be done about the leveling dungeons. Your observation of a lot of lvl 70s doing the leveling dungeons previous to mod 12b is absolutely correct - in our guild we did just laugh at people, doing that twice a day with a dozen chars - and now we all have to do it.
You actually twisted your own reasoning. Asterdahl said on page one: "Obviously we can't open up an easier queue to replace the reward from a more difficult one, because that would be abused regularly to avoid the harder content.", and yet that's exactly what you did. You replaced the second epic dungeon of the day with a leveling dungeon. Not only is the leveling dungeon the fastest ways to RAD, it also gives out the most! I don't understand that system. You observed many lvl 70s running 2 leveling dungeons a day, were not happy with that observation and encouraged them to do so. If I were cynical i'd say you made the game more bot friendly.
On the opposite side people are left behind. I recently spent 20 mins in GWD (leveling version), because I had to run back, picking some lvl 55er up, who got lost on the way. The other 70 and I just raced ahead, killing everything, but he didn't even find the way (which is pretty sad on its own). If there's someone low in the group I usually ask if it's there first time in that paricular dungeon - and I am happy to help / guide / stick with them - provided I get an answer. People that don't respond or are not willing to learn get vote kicked by me quite quickly (like those players, shooting Hulks through the door when there's a giant bubble over the throne).
For Tiamat you have the same, people zerging ahead, killing the black head, others standing around, not knowing what to do, others afk'ing, lower geared players being left behind, not told what to do, those who are, don't listen or respond ... but that leads back to #3.
#5 The Game Decides For You.
Overall I like the "randomness" it is what I used to do (select all and wait for one to open), and when I ask who wants to join to run somthing I quickly get 4 more players. When I ask what to run I seldomly get answers (other than no POM!). So that's good. The downside is I always could choose what I feel up (capable) to do. All my twinks are 12k and sinco the RQ I did tank FBI twice and failed MSP once. We alwys leave MSP even with the mains, it's just so not worth it sadly
#6 Seal Cap
Please raise the seal caps. Everything is giving Seals of the Protector now (skirmish, dungeon, daily reward, heroics, etc ...) and the Seals of the Adventurer are obtained mor frequently as well. This is an annoyance for players. Like, really!
Those were my overall thoughts on the RQ system. Sorry if they weren't well sorted after all. I'll run RQ this evening again, that's certain. Please have a look into the blue gear conversion topics (there are already several of them). I think if that stuff could be converted or salvaged, even if only for small amounts it would make "lesser" queues somewhat worthwhile (I am looking at you, Master of the Hunt, Dread Legion).
Edit: Removed a hamster running through my thread.