The game needs a Limited mode

[htrajan]

The game needs a Limited mode

There has to be a better way to acquire kegs than grinding or shelling out your hard-earned $. This is where a Limited format like Hearthstone's arena would come in. A small number of players (3-5%) would be able to become really good at this game mode and basically use it to "go infinite" (i.e., acquire more kegs without paying money by achieving consistently good results in this limited mode). I currently do this in Hearthstone and would love to do the same in Gwent.

Pros:

• Everyone is on relatively equal footing regardless of what cards they have in their collection.
• It's fun and spontaneous in that (given a large enough card pool) you'll never build the same deck twice (or even close), so there's tons of replay value. (I've been playing Hearthstone arena regularly since 2013.)

Cons:

• Late in the game's development cycle (years after release), modes like this tend to have a high barrier to entry and discourage new players from participating. The workaround is to match-make new players more leniently (e.g., treating them as having one more "loss" than they actually have).

What we need to make this happen would be a large number of bronze neutral units. There would of course be an entry fee of more ore than is required to get a keg (HS does 150% of the amount required to buy a pack: 150 gold) or simply $2.00. For the price of a small micro-transaction, this game mode can provide 45 minutes to 2 hours of gwent fun with a thrilling, gambling-like, feel of gaining more rewards as you amass more wins.

Would love to hear other opinions on this.

 

[Exentryk]

No idea what Limited Mode is from reading the opening post.

 

[htrajan]

Limited is a game format where you construct a deck from a limited pool of cards (hence the name). You might either "draft" a deck from a series of choices or open a bunch of "sealed" kegs from which to build a deck. You use the deck for several games against other players playing the same format then retire the deck. It can have a very small entry fee, but you wouldn't keep the cards from the deck you create. Instead, you can earn rewards for getting a high number of wins.

 

[bloodcount]

Having a mode like that would be interesting, however I don't think it should have the HS arena reward format. Maybe just a normal mode (you know, free mode where you get good cards to play around with. This IMO will reduce the frustration of newguys not having many cards and you can slowly build your deck from that)

 

[bre3zer]

No idea what Limited Mode is from reading the opening post.

Basicly draft. You have let say a given pool of 60 cards. and out of those 60 you have to make a deck and compete agaisnt other people who are under the same rules.

The deck last until you lost X time or win Y time. Y being the highest score you could achive.

Take HS for exemple.
You will draft a deck of 30 cards the game ask you to pick 1 card out of 3, 30 time.
After that you compete for the max 12 win. The high you go the more rewards you get.
Loose 3 time. Your draft run is over. But you still get rewarded for the numerous wins you got.

The machtmaking is "relatively" fair imo. It match you only on win rate.

You won 2 time loose 1.
The game try to find you an opponent with same results.

Note that if you take HS as exemple, rule can be broken and lead in really funny, or overpowerd deck.
e.g. having more than 4 golds or 6 silver. Or even having twice the same Gold or Silver. That's what make the replay value.
But in my opinion you don't need to allow the player to break the rules for the replay value.

Hopefully it help.

 

[bre3zer]

There has to be a better way to acquire kegs than grinding or shelling out your hard-earned $. This is where a Limited format like Hearthstone's arena would come in. A small number of players (3-5%) would be able to become really good at this game mode and basically use it to "go infinite" (i.e., acquire more kegs without paying money by achieving consistently good results in this limited mode). I currently do this in Hearthstone and would love to do the same in Gwent.

Pros:

• Everyone is on relatively equal footing regardless of what cards they have in their collection.
• It's fun and spontaneous in that (given a large enough card pool) you'll never build the same deck twice (or even close), so there's tons of replay value. (I've been playing Hearthstone arena regularly since 2013.)

Cons:

• Late in the game's development cycle (years after release), modes like this tend to have a high barrier to entry and discourage new players from participating. The workaround is to match-make new players more leniently (e.g., treating them as having one more "loss" than they actually have).

What we need to make this happen would be a large number of bronze neutral units. There would of course be an entry fee of more ore than is required to get a keg (HS does 150% of the amount required to buy a pack: 150 gold) or simply $2.00. For the price of a small micro-transaction, this game mode can provide 45 minutes to 2 hours of gwent fun with a thrilling, gambling-like, feel of gaining more rewards as you amass more wins.

Would love to hear other opinions on this.

If you are experience in HS arena, what would be your global setrule(how the draft work.) for a draft in gwent ?
I'm thinking X kegs would be more fitting. With deck building. As for breaking the limitation of the rules, i'm not too certain..

 

[bre3zer]

Having a mode like that would be interesting, however I don't think it should have the HS arena reward format. Maybe just a normal mode (you know, free mode where you get good cards to play around with. This IMO will reduce the frustration of newguys not having many cards and you can slowly build your deck from that)

Yeah the idea of the Draft is really to start split differencies in decks/cards collections. But i do think, it should have a fee. Remove the fee you loose 70% of the thrill.
And like @

htrajan ​

said,

45 minutes to 2 hours of gwent fun with a thrilling, gambling-like, feel of gaining more rewards as you amass more wins.

The whole thrill would be remove. And rewards are great.
Since most new player think they don't fight at equal weapons and might be even better that some veteran who got decent decks.
It should reward tremondously a new player(or a veteran) who understand well the game and game mechanics, and might in some case punish a veteran who is too used to play around set cards.

I'm going to repeat myself but the fee is really important. Make it free people won't tryhard as much when making a deck / playing. Whic therefor reduce the amount of good game you will have. Greed tend to make people better player when it come to rewards haha.

On a side note there is also others intresting formats that come from other games.

For exemple Duel Of Champion(DOC) is one of the few to do Swiss tournament ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss-system_tournament )

Wich is also a really nice format to play(And generaly please way more people than arena/draft since you play with your own decks).
But is played with Card collection and decks you own. If i'm not mistaken DOC allow you only to use 1 deck through the tournament (With a pool of maybe 5 cards spare cards that you can switch before your next match).

It would look like that:
http://i.imgur.com/8ER5Yvz.jpg
Display of the "Factions" & Leader (In DOC it's a little different but you get the idea.)

The only downside of Swiss Tournament is that you have to sign in and wait for it to fill to it's max capacity & might have to wait for you next match opponent to finish his match (Since some decks are way slower.). But if you could for exemple sign in and play casual game while waitting i don't see the problem. As long as you opponent receive a decent GG bonus(double?) for you quitting mid-game if your tournament start.

Having such gamemode in place is also really healty for community (Again streamers for exemple.) In DOC you can make your own Swiss T and invite friends into it. and see who the better player !

Note also that swiss tournament should reward less player than a draft. Since it's deck base. and not as random as draft.
(Here a video as ref: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lprGVTeHGlo)

One way of the other i hope one of the game mode above is introduce soonish in the game. The two would be the sweetest.

Edit 1:
For the Swiss T while waitting for you next opponent to finish his game some game allow you to spectate a game in the tournament in progress while waitting. But there is 2 down sides to that:

1) If you are lucky you get to spectate the end game of you next opponent(s) probably giving you an huge strategy advantage.
As some faction rely on end game combo. Even being able to watch the graveyard of a player would give you a HUGE edge.

2) you need to have a spectate mode in place.

Some also put a timer in place so games cannot be too long. Let say in the exemple of DOC 10 minutes for a match(5 minutes for each player). And each player got a reserve pool of another 3 minutes that they keep though the tournament. It assure more smooth game. While forcing Slower deck to play a little faster. But not discouraging using those since you have a reserve time that serve this purpose.

I'm not too sure what the numbers would be in Gwent but i'm certain it wouldn't be too hard to find out.

 

[bloodcount]

The whole thrill would be remove. And rewards are great.

Yeah, I didn't really consider that. Woopsie.

 

[Rufus.255]

The main issue I see with Limited in Gwent is that you can't mix the factions. The issue here is once you pick your first couple cards your decisions for the rest of the draft are basically on autopilot as you have to take the card in your faction or a neutral every time. I'm not sure how Gwent would handle this.

 

[bre3zer]

Yeah that was my concerns as well. I'm feeling like there isn't enough neutral at this stage or faction cards.

 

[htrajan]

Great discussion so far! I will address a couple questions/points:

If you are experience in HS arena, what would be your global setrule(how the draft work.) for a draft in gwent ?
I'm thinking X kegs would be more fitting. With deck building. As for breaking the limitation of the rules, i'm not too certain..

This is a very interesting problem to solve. Recall in my OP that I mentioned that you would need to have a large pool of neutral bronze minions in order for this to be viable. Now, in Gwent, we have bronze/silver/gold as deck constraints and rarity for card acquisition gating. So here is one way to design a draft:

-Offer 10 choices for bronze common cards
-Offer 5 choices for bronze rare cards
-Offer 4 choices for silver rare cards
-Offer 2 choices for silver epic/legendary cards (much larger chance to be epic)
-Offer 3 choices for gold epic/legendary cards (much larger chance to be epic)
-Offer 1 choice for gold legendary cards

Here, we have a deck that is 25 cards and fits the exact constraints around gold/silver/bronze.

If event cards are not a large part of the pool, they might need an offering bonus.

Limited format would deviate from constructed in that you can have more than 3x of any one bronze and more than 1x of any one silver/gold.

The main issue I see with Limited in Gwent is that you can't mix the factions. The issue here is once you pick your first couple cards your decisions for the rest of the draft are basically on autopilot as you have to take the card in your faction or a neutral every time. I'm not sure how Gwent would handle this.

Yep, with the current card pool, this is an issue. This is why I said that we need a really huge pool of neutrals in order for this to be viable. I think that would be healthy for the constructed game too and create much more diverse decks.

 

[bre3zer]

Great discussion so far! I will address a couple questions/points:



This is a very interesting problem to solve. Recall in my OP that I mentioned that you would need to have a large pool of neutral bronze minions in order for this to be viable. Now, in Gwent, we have bronze/silver/gold as deck constraints and rarity for card acquisition gating. So here is one way to design a draft:

-Offer 10 choices for bronze common cards
-Offer 5 choices for bronze rare cards
-Offer 4 choices for silver rare cards
-Offer 2 choices for silver epic/legendary cards (much larger chance to be epic)
-Offer 3 choices for gold epic/legendary cards (much larger chance to be epic)
-Offer 1 choice for gold legendary cards

Here, we have a deck that is 25 cards and fits the exact constraints around gold/silver/bronze.

If event cards are not a large part of the pool, they might need an offering bonus.

Limited format would deviate from constructed in that you can have more than 3x of any one bronze and more than 1x of any one silver/gold.



Yep, with the current card pool, this is an issue. This is why I said that we need a really huge pool of neutrals in order for this to be viable. I think that would be healthy for the constructed game too and create much more diverse decks.

Really good stuff i see nothing wrong in it.

But then again we indeed need more Neutral & faction cards. Daft at this point would be as @Rufus.255 said. Autopilot after 2 or 3 picks.

Any though on Swiss tournament maybe ? Doesn't seems like people care really about it.

 

[Kinglionsfox]

MTG drafts were fun. Hearthstone's version wasn't. MTG's larger pool size (15 card packs) made it easier compared to heathstone's 3. Also you could omit cards you drafted at the end in case you made a mistake or didn't fit the theme. Just noticed these are things that help ease the RNG of drafts, and that's basically it. Ease the RNG screw that can happen in draft to make it more fun.

Plus what Bre3zer said, Gwent needs more cards first.

 

[htrajan]

Any though on Swiss tournament maybe? Doesn't seems like people care really about it.

I understand Swiss to be a type of reward format (i.e., one pack per win) rather than an actual game format. Correct me if wrong.

 

[bre3zer]

I understand Swiss to be a type of reward format (i.e., one pack per win) rather than an actual game format. Correct me if wrong.

It might be wrong in some case but in video game i think it not a reward system but a format to play. i always used it since DOC as it was (i think) called that way.
Here the idea of the reward system and how it would work.

You get for exemple 8 players

4 winners.
4 loosers.

Then the 4 winners face each others.
The 4 loosers face also each other.

Out of that you have:

2 persons at 2 win zero loose.
4 persons at 1 win 1 loose.
2 persons at 2 loose. <= those generaly loose and are kicked off the tournament.

Then:
The 2persons with 2wins match one another for the 1st and 2nd place.
Leading in a 3-0 and a 2-1

The 4 left are fighting each other to get the 3rd and 4 place. (as for 5 to 8 no rewards.)

For rewards i'm thinking (based on the fee).

1st get 250% 1 keg +scraps. (Might be overkill but it should be hard to have 1 deck who doesnt struggle agaisnt any others. (It's also great to test decks in that environement it usualy lead to see what might be the most overpower))
2nd 150% +Scraps.
3 & 4 get less than refund 75% seems fair.
5 to 8 can cry.

This format is intresting both for players, and for buisness. as 1/4 of the players get high bonus.
and as for 2 first get enormus bonuses.

For exemple if the fee was 100 2nd place get 50 bonus ores.
50 ores is worth 24 match win when your daily are finished.
12 if you are between 3rd level or 4th level of daily.
6 for the 2nd level.

 

[moljac024]

I would like the limited mode to be free to enter and give no rewards, so you can always play it. Having it cost ore means you wouldn't be able to play it any time you want.

Why can't it exist just for fun?

Actually, the rewards should be the same as if you invested the same time in casual/ranked. Just earn a small amount of ore and count towards level ups. I think making it always playable is REALLY important for the new and F2P player experience. Can anyone think of a downside?

 

[Vaishar]

I liked the Swiss system Mode in Doc up to a point. In the limited number of rounds (3 in the Doc's case) only the first player is decided by skill. The second is decided by tiebreaker because 3 players will be tied to the second place.

The mode i liked in Doc was the Jackpot mode (or what it was called). Where the more people that played the format the more gold you made the closest to the top you arrived at the end of the time limit.

 

[aholeel]

I would love, love, LOVE to see something like this. Drafts are incredibly fun, in just about any game, and it all-but-removes the barrier to entry. With a mode like this, I can happily play the game when I have time, without having to treat Gwent like a second job.

This sort of mode gives players a fun and rewarding way to earn new cards, that's based on a little bit of RNG (just enough to be exciting) plus a whole lot of their own skill.

At the price point of $1-$2 (or equivalent in-game currency--which is definitely an important option to have), for at least 1-2 hours of fun. I could definitely see myself putting a decent amount of money into Gwent.

I would even go so far as to say that I think this kind of mode would end up being the deciding factor for me on whether or not to play the game past the beta.

 

[april6e]

This is definitely something I really want but there are two large issues.

1. There aren't enough Bronze cards like you said. The current card pool would need to be doubled or tripled to introduce a sealed mode.

2. Based on how this game works (the factions), this mode would be impossible to do in the game's current state (as this game limits the type of deck you can build based on the leader you choose). There would need to be way more neutral cards (again, the first point).

 

[bre3zer]

1. There aren't enough Bronze cards like you said. The current card pool would need to be doubled or tripled to introduce a sealed mode.

2. Based on how this game works (the factions), this mode would be impossible to do in the game's current state (as this game limits the type of deck you can build based on the leader you choose). There would need to be way more neutral cards (again, the first point).

Yes i didn't though about the card pool at the time i suggested Sealed draft. the requirement might be even higher than a draft.