Please eliminate effect randomness

[151Huntsman]

Please eliminate effect randomness

Good day to everyone

My suggestion: Randomness in some card effects needs to be eliminated and there are 3 reasons for it:

1) To make more cards playable in a competitive setting, their effects which include playing random cards, like a random unit or item, need to be fixed. My suggestion would be - ''look at two (three) different cards from your deck and play 1. And it is important to write ''different''. Because for example - Reconnaissance can pull two SAME cards randomly and you are stuck, especially if you dont want to play the card that is pulled twice.

2) Randomness decreases consistency which is not good for competitive gameplay. There are several cards like this - First Light, Archespore, Vrihedd Dragoon, Magne Division, Daerlan Soldier. I might have missed some, but you get the picture. Btw here I would NOT include cards that target the ''Lowest'' or ''Highest'' unit because you know exactly which card will be targeted, there is no randomness to fix there.

3) Less randomness and more player choice will lead to more precision in strategy and in the future might spawn new strategies, previously not possible. If not, then at least, the consistency of existing strategies will be improved. Gwent is a competitive game, so players need to know what will happen when they play a card. There is a reason 99% of people dont use Gaunter O Dimm, because its a gamble. Sure, its fun, but if you want to win, and usually in competitive games people do want to win, then gambling with the odds is not reasonable and can cost you the game.

This is one of those little things that is of high priority in my opinion. Every time I have played these cards, I wished for more consistency so that I can decide for myself what and how I want to play.

 

[OG.laloquaint]

I would appreciate that too. It would also make that new unicorn card more reliable. I used it once in Arena and it literally only got like 8 value because it hit 3 low strength units. The card's already risky enough. I think the bronze tutors that play random cards are fine. I would like more control over certain effects though, that's for sure.

 

[4RM3D]

RNG is one of the core mechanics of Online Card Games. Without it, those games usually turn more stale. Furthermore, Gwent is already one of the most consistent games because you have a smaller deck, with a bigger opening hand and more ways to thin it. You don't want to turn the game into a simple game of numbers, where everything is predefined.

1) To make more cards playable in a competitive setting, their effects which include playing random cards, like a random unit or item, need to be fixed.

A lot of RNG cards are already very competitive and reducing the RNG quickly makes them too strong. Gaunter O'Dimm and Avallac'h: the Sage are not meant to be taken seriously, though. Some cards are just for fun.

2) Randomness decreases consistency which is not good for competitive gameplay. There are several cards like this - First Light, Archespore, Vrihedd Dragoon, Magne Division, Daerlan Soldier.

You basically repeat the same argument. If Archespore wasn't random, it would be able to align Scorches or just ping a target to create a stronger combo, which can lead to insane situations. Same with Vrihedd Dragoon, it could be used to constantly buff Swordmasters, which can also become too strong. Remember that some cards have RNG, not for the sake of RNG, but because it's needed to weaken their effect, otherwise it would be too powerful.

3) Less randomness and more player choice will lead to more precision in strategy and in the future might spawn new strategies, previously not possible.

More RNG also leads to different strategies. For example, Dwarven Agitator spawns a random dwarf from your deck, but you can reduce this RNG by only using one dwarf. Because of the RNG you have to take a different approach when building decks and think about the order in which you play your cards.


Closing note: There is good RNG and bad RNG. The opinions are divided on how much RNG should be allowed in a game. Either way, some RNG should be allowed to exist. You are not differentiating between the good and the bad, instead just indiscriminately shooting down all RNG. This is not the way to improve Gwent and your suggestions will unfortunately make the game worse. Now, if you would talk about the Create mechanic, then we can have an actual discussion about the bad side of RNG.

 

[Hellsmoke77]

I agree. The Iris companions card for example, who in their right mind would risk it throwing out your win condition? There are plenty of "play a random unit" I'd never use one as that can just ruin your game. The cards that are "just for fun" see zero play, people aren't having much fun with them obviously so why not make them useful? This would give people more options and lead to more deck diversity which is more fun imo.

 

[erathias]

There is good RNG and bad RNG. The opinions are divided on how much RNG should be allowed in a game.

I can Quote 1 Bad RNG : Runestone

Why ? Simple ...

Runestone monster => Very Bad in Ranking, much deathCard ( Crones )
Runestone ST => OP
RuneStone NF => OP
Runestone NR and SK => Good pool of Card Silver with Combo


Balance of Runestone is very Bad

 

[FG15-ISH7EG]

I don't agree on the NR runestone. There is a reason why it is hardly used. With Pavetta, Sabrina and Sabrinas Specter you have 3 cards that are nearly always useless (the last one except in cursed decks). Then are Lubberkin and Botchling, of which the first is useless and the second one is worse than a bronze. Hubert Rijk isn't good either, because either you have him in your deck and want to play him last, so you don't want him from a runestone or you just don't need him. Vincent Meis is also useless without armour on the board, but has at least 9 points. And except decks build for her, Nenneke is also just a plain 10 point power. And then there is Vandergrifts blade, which is in most situations just an Alzurs with banishing, which is mediocre most of the time too. Even Sile can be useless if you don't have any special cards left in your hand (which is quite likely as you already used one and even if you have more, you might not want to use them now).
At least decent are Trollolo, Ves and Foltest Pride, because you will normally get more value than normal bronze units out of them. Odrin will be in the worst case a removal target for the enemy, else outside a spam deck, it really depends on the numbers of turns left, but can get his value back. Ronvid can also be good, but only if used in the first round or with a machine deck. And even there, a bronze siege engineer might get more value.
The only really good cards are Margarita, Stennis, Dethmold and Reinforcement

So:
-nearly always bad: Pavetta, Sabrina, Sabrinas Specter, Lubberkin , Huber Rijk
-below average but can be usefull sometimes: Vandergrifts Blade, Botchling, Vincent Meis, Sile, Nenneke.
-ok, but good in some situations: Trollolo, Ves, Foltest Pride, Odrin, Ronvid
-great: Margarita, Stennis, Dethmold, Reinforcement

That means half the card pool is useless, and only 20% is great. That is much less than other factions.

 

[Cpt_Myrinn_Eilorv]

I love RNG and would not see my victories through dumb luck come to an end

 

[151Huntsman]

I agree. The Iris companions card for example, who in their right mind would risk it throwing out your win condition? There are plenty of "play a random unit" I'd never use one as that can just ruin your game. The cards that are "just for fun" see zero play, people aren't having much fun with them obviously so why not make them useful? This would give people more options and lead to more deck diversity which is more fun imo.

EXACTLY. It is fun to pull of cool combos, not win a coinflip in RNG. Iris Companions is a great example btw

 

[EdJohnnyBoy]

RNG is one of the core mechanics of Online Card Games. Without it, those games usually turn more stale. Furthermore, Gwent is already one of the most consistent games because you have a smaller deck, with a bigger opening hand and more ways to thin it. You don't want to turn the game into a simple game of numbers, where everything is predefined.

I think Create cards and the increase of randomness are the wrong direction for this game.
Play an RNG card and win = nothing is learned
Loose to a RNG card = This is usually infuriating
I dont see any gain in randomness. Some say its fun - I dont feel this way. I feel like randomness is contrued as fast food, it gives a kick for the moment without persistent value.

Gwent should NOT incorporate randomness to its game to make it interesting or fun to play - other games have done it. Thats how I feel about it.
My hope with this post is to convince CDPR to not go for randomness.
Instead there should be more complexity to the game to make it impossible to play perfect and keep it interesting.

Take Chess as an example = Only the position of the figures at a specific time are important - the only randomness are the moves of the opponent.

Gwent has a 3 lane board. The position of the cards should have an impact on its card-value. Maybe 3 lanes are not enough then the position of the card on its lane needs to have impact on the value of the card.

10 cards in hand thats too few I guess. So to make it more interesting, the players can move their cards on the board ( 1 card per turn or maybe ? more ) dictated by a ruleset to add complexitiy to the game that can not be fully understood by the human to archieve: its nearly impossible to make perfect play.
The position is important and Gwent needs its interactions, like it already has, between cards on the board - I wish me more.

Conclusion:
I dont know exactly how to add complexitiy to Gwent - A possible direction I have mentioned with the idea of card position.Due to limited cards to play I very much think movement of cards on the board should be possible with impact on value.

The exact implementation I cant mention. Havent thought about it enough to figure it out how exactly it should work. I rely on the the Gwent development team to figure it out and of course to have them like the idea: Complexitiy makes the game interesting - a nearly endless pool of learning. Randomness makes the game frustrating.

 

[4RM3D]

I think Create cards and the increase of randomness are the wrong direction for this game. [...]
Gwent should NOT incorporate randomness to its game to make it interesting or fun to play - other games have done it. Thats how I feel about it.

First of all, let me quote something I've already mentioned:

There is good RNG and bad RNG. [...] Now, if you would talk about the Create mechanic, then we can have an actual discussion about the bad side of RNG.

CREATE is an example of RNG done poorly, just to artificially increase the dynamic of the game. It doesn't mean the game has become worse because of it, but it does mean there is untapped potential by solving the problems differently.

Having said that, let's zoom in on the following statement:

the increase of randomness are the wrong direction for this game.

It's interesting you've mentioned "the increase of" because randomness is inherent to the CCG genre and cannot be avoided. The most basic examples of this are the card draws and the coin flip. While you can never completely remove the RNG, you can prevent increasing it up to a certain point. As such, comparing it to chess is moot. The only question that should be asked is: How much RNG is necessary (and what will I gain extra by going beyond that)?

 

[BlunderMan]

RNG is a blast sometimes. Love seeing a guy play slave driver on R1 and pull a priestess of Freya.

 

[Void_Singer]

I've had worse days... blue coin: Slave Driver > Assassin

 

[4RM3D]

I've had worse days... blue coin: Slave Driver > Assassin

And better days and betterer days...

 

[Void_Singer]

lol also true...neither is a constant... RNGesus is fickle and mercurial

 

[bighunkofmeat]

Nah all RNG cards are just fine except the Gunter O Dim one they need to change so you don't need to guess number instead a random card with the number you picked will be played.

 

[EdJohnnyBoy]

It's interesting you've mentioned "the increase of" because randomness is inherent to the CCG genre

My whole post was about a solution to the randomness problem, you didnt mention once. I havent explaind good enough. Bare with me !
Hope I can deliver a more colourful look into the idea.

I seperate two types of randomness:
1) Randomness through mechanic
2) Randomness through player ( the player can less likely predict the opponent action )

Explained:
1) the outcome by the acting player is not or very minimal in control of him/herself
2) the player is fully in control of the outcome through his/her action

Examples:
1) Card draw, Create random card, Coinflip, random target, draw random card
2) Card played, sometimes card targeted/selected, pass round

Randomness through mechanic:
-Card draw ( this stays as it is for the moment )
-Create random card ( the feeling of gambling increases massively, player skill less of an impact, suggestion: remove this mechanic )
-Coinflip ( difficult: going first, opponent plays Silver Spy(13), Dun Banner will spawn = guaranteed 1 card less than opponent in last round, Opponent has last card on last round )
Coinflip means: going first, player can play for last card on last round
going second, player can play for card advantage on last round
- random target ( I dont see an issue how its currently implemented ) ( and to some point it gets unpleasant for the player to select 9 targets and to 1 damage to each one )
- draw random card ( I dont see an issue how its currently implemented ) ( can be mitigated through deck-building/card composition in deck )

Randomness through player:
My idea is reduce randomness through mechanic and increase randomness through player action. This leads to complexity in game-states. That means it is difficult to analyse a game-state. A way to increase complexity in game-states in to introduce that cards produce different value on differnt lanes( currently 3 ). I Would suggest the horizontal position also matters and it should be possible that every player may move one of his/her own card to a differnt position to counter the oppoents card positions on the board. Value produced through card position on the board can be done by inflicting little amount of damage to the oppoents card with respect of the card positions. Moving cards to differnt board-position will leads to differnt values produced.
Player interaction increases, that is positive, makes the players more active with choices that matter when good implemented. The exact implementation I havent thought through and is left for the development team to figure out. Maybe this idea will not get picked up, thinking about it from my position as a consumer and a developer is probably fruitless.
This is one example of increasing the complexity - increasing randomness through player action not through game mechanic. The conceived randomness of the opponents action.

Main idea to the solution of randomness:
increase randomness through complexity - the complexity of a game-state - to archieve: very difficult to analyse a game-state.
That means the main random facter can depend on the opponents actions, NOT mechanics with an outcome which the acting player can not control him/herself.

Dont go to far with randomness through mechanics. Preferably the outcome of a match should be decided by skill not by randomness through mechanics (luck - a bad opponent can also be described as luck for the other player, so I use the inconvenient phrase "randomness through mechanics" ).

 

[TrompeLaMort]

I agree completely that RNG is important to ensure different board states from game to game, which helps to avoid the game becoming stale and increases strategic complexity. But I second OP that some forms of RNG currently in the game do not increase strategic complexity and variety, namely effect randomness.

Mahakam Ale, Archespore, all them having random effects, I believe this removes skill from the game with no real payoff. I believe this randomness should be lessened. Examples:

Mahakam Ale: Boost by 4 the strongest unit in each row. (That also counts as a nerf for it, other option would be the leftmost unit in each row.)

Archespore: Cycle up one row and cause 1 damage to the leftmost unit in the opposite row. Deathwish: cause 4 damage to the leftmost unit in the opposite row. (Also counts as a nerf. Could be to the lowest enemy unit, if you don't like that.)

Petri's philter: Boost up to 6 lowest allies by 2.

And so on and so forth. I feel this increases strategic complexity of the game, by allowing players to play around effects, placing strong/weak units where they might be hit by these spells, and such. But I wouldn't mess with card draw RNG, otherwise decks can become too consistent.