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worldfamous · (This post was last modified: 10-14-2012 03:13 AM by worldfamous.)

(10-13-2012 07:23 PM)Harti Wrote:
(10-13-2012 07:14 PM)blckace Wrote: I don't know how i feel about the extra wit / kill, is it for both players? Is it just for the first turn? What do the beta players say about it? Doesn't it encourage turtling because players would think twice about sacrificing a unit?

Applies for both players, multiple times per turn. Allows for devastating attacks and devastating retaliations. I have the feeling that the turtler will always prevail.

OML feels that the added speed of games attracts casual players.
They are aware that... ~80-90% of the betas who commented on the change are against it. But yet it seems they're very serious about implementing it.

It's a completely different game now, though. You need not stockpile wits anymore to perform devastating attack waves.

That's a really lousy reason to change a nearly perfect game. Casual players avoid multiplayer strategy games altogether. They just don't like playing against others, unless its a words with friends type game, and that's only because of their familiarity with the game. A better draw would be a single player mode, but I still don't think that's enough. Start with a better icon and mess with the gameplay later. Just my opinion.

(10-13-2012 08:33 PM)blckace Wrote: It's interesting but this change means bombshell becomes even more superior and might be the only way to go? Which would cripple the options for someone who prefers a different play style. One attack you might kill two scouts and it's gonna be impossible to catch up to that advantage.

What are the changes to the scrambler?
Did they consider decreasing the four day / turn limit to give players even more of a rush if that's what they're looking for?

You don't get 1 wit for each kill, do you? I understood that your wit for the kill was refunded. That would be pretty bad if you received multiple wits from a bombshell attack. You could theoretically get 6 wits from one shot.

(10-13-2012 07:41 PM)Ravernoth Wrote:
(10-13-2012 07:23 PM)Harti Wrote: OML feels that the added speed of games attracts casual players.
They are aware that... ~80-90% of the betas who commented on the change are against it. But yet it seems they're very serious about implementing it.

It's a completely different game now, though. You need not stockpile wits anymore to perform devastating attack waves.

It would be a real shame if they break the elegance and balance of the game in an effort to speed things up and give players more of a 'rush'.

The fact is being multiplayer async, it will never offer the promised instant fix of a single player or realtime game, and I think it's a mistake to try to mutate this into an action game.

From the Wired article, their conversion rate from free to paying customers is not the problem - it's 2%, which is the average.

The problem is that they need downloads in the millions for this model to work rather than the 500k they have. OML still has opportunities to increase download rate and/or change the business model.

This change would be tackling the wrong problem while breaking the game. I feel lessening the game whilst ignoring the appeals of 80-90% of their staunchest fans can only be a long term loss.

Whether or not its the average, that 2% seems like a big problem to me. That's an astoundingly low number. I'd be curious to know what some of the higher conversion rates are. Does anyone know if Hero Academy is having the same problem? I haven't heard anything about it, but the games are so similar in so many ways. If not, I'd love to know why. The one big difference I've seen in HA is the speed at which they add content. They never go more than 3 months without adding a team or other content.