The Tournament Arena in Tacticus That We Deserve

[@TechPriestFred]

The video is prepared and uploaded in a 21:9 aspect ratio, meaning that: 1) On Ultrawide monitors and phones, you can go full-screen and enjoy it without any black bars! 2) On 16:9 monitors, on full-screen you get the cinematic black bars on top and bottom of the screen (I tried to make sure that everything looks good, still!) 3) On standard phones, the video most likely positions intself into the centre of the screen- you can zoom in on the video (by using a finger gesture) to get it to fill out the WHOLE screen. I'd greatly appreciate feedback on the new format- 2K instead of 1080P, 60fps instead of 30fps (won't matter much yet, but it's there), 21:9 instead of 16:9 aspect ratio and the new microphone (to which I will have to learn to talk properly when recording) are big steps clumped up together and I hope that they are in the right direction! Thanks for watching, everyone, cheers! And for anyone that managed to get to the end of this comment, here's a reward: ARENACHAMPION Enjoy the in-game code :)

[@francohealy3705]

It renders well, thank you!

[@Vangalorr]

Very easy watch on iPhone

[@magdalenabanaszkiewicz6243]

Nobody cares

[@Brecf2p]

TA is swamped with the same dull Ragnar/aunshi/celestine/kharn teams. Fair enough but the issue is beginning players are facing these end game teams in common and uncommon. I am not a beginning player so this is not for me. The suggestion is a cap on legendary unlock characters (the tier they unlock at not what tier they are) Common: 0 legendary unlock characters Uncommon: 1 legendary unlock Rare: 3 Epic and legendary: 5 This gives the TA tiers meaning. Newer players play in a safer more enjoyable tournament at common and uncommon and players who want to show off their teams play against each other in higher tiers. Perhaps they even develop new teams to counter Ragnar rather than using these teams on weaker players.

[@hafurg]

Snow print should hire you as a game designer dude. Hope this feedback reaches them! great work mate

[@Cadllmn123]

I have tried live arena in two events, a couple times each event. Both times I got one shot by every enemy character every single time and I haven’t touched it since. I’ve literally never killed a character in live arena in 5 attempted matches. I doubt I’ll ever try it again. I think I was in stone3 - iron 3 sort of range for main characters. Pretty new, but boy what a bad first experience of the event.

[@MidnightHozz]

Iron1 and 8/8 abilities is the Common cap. Stone characters will get you killed for sure. The game of course does not mention this or if it does its in a pop up somewhere you have to find on your 5" screen and then it will be in a 4 point font so good luck. But even assuming you have the roster for it, TA as it currently exists is a meat grinder for new players.

[@GarkKahn]

It seems like you play against your boss or his son, when you're handicapped so hard so they win no matter what

[@TechPriestFred]

@@Cadllmn123 make sure to use Iron 1 characters with Level 8 skills and equip them with max level common items! Then queue up for common rarity game, you never killing a single character in 5 games must mean that you were outside of your rarity

[@Cadllmn123]

​@@TechPriestFred Fair it enough! Maybe I am misunderstanding the queue system. Should I be queuing based on the lowest equipped character? Median? Honestly, I am not sure what I did last time, as I didn't/don't understand what the implications of choosing where to queue. Is it the case that you need to choose the difficulty? I assumed it was match making based on the pwr lvl of the accounts.

[@TechPriestFred]

@@Cadllmn123 All your characters that you pick should be maxed out for the rarity that you pick, this is indicated by the white sparkle on the character frame. If it is sparky then it means that it is maxed out for the rarity and that you will have an equal footing against the enemy during the match. For common, that'd be: 2 yellow stars of character level Iron 1 rank level Level 8 skills Common Equipment at Level 3 each Hope that this helped!

[@MidnightHozz]

The biggest problem with Tacticus is that it is not new player friendly. The game will happily take all the money and time you want to give it, then beat you down and see if you come back for more. If you don't research the game, you're pretty much fucked. TA epitomizes the new player unfriendliness of the game. It has a lot of things working against it. Wildly different player skill levels. Time (and to a much lesser extent, money) gated rosters. Maps that don't align with TA modes. Turn order. Not all of these are easily fixable but there is some low hanging fruit that has been ignored up to now. First they simply must have a completely separate new player bracket. They could do this using player power level or account age. But basically a mechanic to where the first 2-3 TAs that come around for you, you are only being matched with players with similar rosters and experience levels. Getting steam rolled by a team of characters you've never seen, let alone can get in the short term, is extremely demoralizing for most. Second, we need a curated roster mode. So instead of a cap to your own roster, each player would have access to the exact same 15-20 characters, whether they own them or not, who all have the same gear/upgrades/abilities. No more getting beaten by a roster of characters you literally can't get. Turn order and maps will still be a problem but we've solved one of the four problems TA faces. Finally we need an open (Legendary) uncapped mode with rewards good enough to get the best players into this mode and out of Common/Uncommon. There's no real fix for turn order. Chess has this problem and it's 5000 years old. The maps...some of them just don't seem to make sense. Like crazy power up placement that seems to favor one side. Weird choke points. Easy trench access for one side, but not the other. Shit like this. They clearly made some effort with this current Draft Power Up iteration to reduce the effectiveness of the Ragnar-centric teams, but I think complicating maps just makes the mode even easier for the people that are already great at it. On a related note, the last chest is currently way too hard to get. There are 41 tokens per TA. Assuming you use all 41 tokens (who does this though, given the schedule?) you need to win ~70% of them to get the last chest. This is nuts. Just spot checking the Leaderboard, I am top 3000 (there are at least 50K active Tacticus accounts, so this is top 10%) with 191 points. There are only 9 tokens left in the event.

[@alexkoh1709]

If its about not being new player friendly, perhaps the issue is we r having very experienced players competing as low as common along side newbies. Perhaps restrict at least for common for those below a certain power level. Its not just about capping units at common but since newer less experienced players will not have accumulated very high power levels. More experienced players certainly have

[@Daniel-qr6sx]

People play at low levels because it takes so much investment to get the new characters to a decent level.

[@Kika_18]

Agreed 👍👍👍👍.

[@MidnightHozz]

@@Daniel-qr6sx Some people, sure. Most players are in Common because 1) it's the default setting 2) they are new and assume its easier or 3) they have a meta roster that will lose maybe 1 in 10 times and they can get to 250 easier in Common than in another bracket.

[@BritAnicus-bd1ul]

Matchmaking throws people together who have selected Different Rarity caps. It then uses magic to scale up / scale down So you see your opponent at the rarity you selected. & they see you at the rarity they selected It’s done to prevent long waiting & Que times. I

[@ishalamboo6446]

Totally agree with the idea to reward playing more and reward winning separately. But it's not enough. Losing before taking your first turn would also take the fun out of trying to complete any quests. Not sure how Snowprint can fix the current issues without nerfing premium chars into the ground. Perhaps taking turns moving one character at a time might work? Either way, I'm really grateful that the Lucien event bug gave me enough extra points to skip TA this round and still get Epic.

[@TechPriestFred]

@@ishalamboo6446 Taking turns one at a time sounds like an amazing idea to try out at least for one event! It reminds me of Darkest Dungeon and the Butchers Circus DLC, where a singleplayer roguelike dungeon crawler changed into a 1v1 battle arena

[@HMHo-ku6pi]

⁠i am a new player who have played for 3 months. I both love and hate TA. I played TA 4 times IIRC and managed to get the final crates in the last 3 times. Building your own team with characters you like is fun, not when you got crushed by meta team. But i think most of the stress is related to the fear that you couldn’t get to the final crate every time you lose, especially in a losing streak. Before yesterday I almost gave up TA in losing hope to get the final crates and i only managed to get it with only 3 tokens left. So I think if points are rewarded even if you lose without scoring, and those points guarantee you to the final crate, I can enjoy TA as it is without fearing the loses

[@konradcurze31]

Reworking TA in some capacity is direly needed - but your rework would only mean that "leaderboard" players would have to play casual and ranked since the missions would force them to use non meta chars. As a person that has been in the top 50 consistently I hate having to play the same chars every season, but if they implemented something like this it would just mean I have to do that and also play casual games. This sadly does nothing to adress the problems with the maps and meta chars we have at the moment. Further imagine having to face a meta ragnar team with a team that has no synergy because you want to accomplissh as many missions as possible during a casual game - this will happen for sure because ranked and casual battles aren´t seperate at the moment. So one player queing for ranked can be matched against one trying to do missions in casual - this would most likely mean that the ranked player kills you before you can do anything for your mission. Also introducing even more missions to a game plaqued by stale "kill X enemys with x damage type" doesn´t sound fun. I think we need more standard measures against meta building like pick/ban phase in LoL, char stat adjustments for TA and a PvP person at SP that playtests their maps before releaseing them. Because as you correctly said they did adjust some maps but the newly released ones are in just as bad a shape as the original ones were before adjustments so clearly they need to do more playtesting and learn from past mistakes. At the moment with the introduction of Mephiston and Mataneo PvP feels as unhealthy as never before and these are the newly released chars which makes me very unoptimisitic for the future of the mode.

[@TechPriestFred]

@@konradcurze31 Tbh, if the numbers were adjusted correctly on the "accessible" missions that I proposed, they could be designed to be done within 25-35 tokens even without focusing on them. It's doable and there shouldn't be a problem to find numbers that allow you to play whatever you want without touching Casual and still get your rewards from the chest if you are active in the gamemode in Ranked.

[@rubensdonin5617]

I love TA and always end up pretty well on the leaderboard. But the double Ragnar active with aun'shi plus the +1 mov is really unfair and has no counterplay. You either eat a Kharn's charge or surrender all the buffs and map control to the enemy, it's so dumb.

[@toughguy1999]

Preach Fred! I love your ideas! Listen to the man (tech priest…) Snowprint!

[@Feamert]

Just no nonsense situations! Units that deal twenty percent damage when I use them turn into butchers when they face me!

[@TechPriestFred]

@@Feamert from my experience, I noticed it only in Guild Wars I'm like no way this dude oneshot my frontliner, in TA that shit wouldn't happen Maybe there is something to be found underneath the code...

[@francisvigoreaux3965]

One way they could change it is to give people a set roster/even a set team that everyone gets to use at the same level. This would remove a lot of the roster/time onvested difference that can lead tl bad experiences, and encourage people to try new teams or chase different characters. Kinda like a Character Quest but PvP.

[@TechPriestFred]

@@francisvigoreaux3965 I think that giving people free characters to try out during TA is a fun idea thatd allow newbies to try out new characters and be excited to grind them in different ways I don't enjoy the idea of giving set roster or teams tho, theorycrafting a good comp that can survive the meta is a skill on its own and should be promoted, not removed or restricted

[@kwadrol4238]

The problem with arena is facing legendary and late game teams on common tier when i barely have any characters available. Veterans just que for common to stomp on newbies. This is unfair. Never seen something like this in any game when veterans with everythimg unlocked can bring their busted chatacters to lowest rank and roll on people who just started. Why is it common rank when you can bring any character rarity to it? No ome in their right mind would fight in higher tank when you have free win whenever you meet new players in common rank lol

[@HMHo-ku6pi]

i heard SP mixes ranks to ensure quick matching

[@Antrositic]

This was my fourth time playing TA. I played in uncommon and placed 674 this season. This mode isn't even that bad, and I think people's complaints are valid, but also blown out of proportion. I think double howl is not good for the game, but everything else I am fine with. Cheers

[@BritAnicus-bd1ul]

What time zone are you in & do you play the arena tournament at the same times each day And if so what time ( in your country ) are you most frequently playing

[@magdalenabanaszkiewicz6243]

Dziękuję za ten taktyczny poczęstunek. Przypomniał mi Pan o wakacjach u babci pełnych radości lecz i rozczarowań. Pozdrawiam serdecznie

[@elchingon91335]

I think the worst part of tournament arena is the horribly unbalanced maps. The power-ups are spread out to hugely favor one side of the map. And they are not always equal. The damage power up should always be in the middle with more passive power-ups like the health and armor being the closer ones to get but as it stands now one side reaches the damage power-ups within two movement points sometimes while the other one has to Traverse four or more. The medicare's are not a big deal as there will always be met up teams and characters.

[@eeriedemonble8414]

Nice ideas you got there. Let's see if devs will take note.

[@roxen1429]

A colossal amount of work has been done! A great option for people who have just entered the game and may not sweat too much over the result. I thought to split the teams simply by factions, conditionally you can recruit a team of only chaosites or Tau. Like a classic board game. And for example, during the event, two factions or three completely give for free (if all the characters are not open). And make some kind of mixed mode for all factions. That is, at the end we will have an Ultramarine team fighting against Orcs or Nurglites against Necrons.

[@TechPriestFred]

@@roxen1429 While I like the idea of giving freebie characters for TA to try out in PvP, restricting teams by faction makes one faction meta (which most follow) and disables team building aspect. TA player population is on the lower side anyway, so unfortunately splitting it into two gamemodes (factions and mixed mode) would make matchmaking a living hell. :(

[@roxen1429]

@@TechPriestFred There is hope that they will fix it somehow :))

[@ArmContingencyCommander]

The worst thing is when you are playing casual to have fun but people are playing the meta for no reason (no points are rewarded in casual) besides to flex their legendaries.

[@stevestevens1457]

That is to optimise strategies man

[@francohealy3705]

To be fair, our player community seems to be less toxic than others, but you do get one or two who will use Galatian on a Casual match and then meta cheese you without a single "Hi." They're rare though.

[@GarkKahn]

I play to have fun Arena is no fun, i don't play it Simple as

[@stevestevens1457]

@@francohealy3705 there are lots of bullying victims spamming FF

[@HMHo-ku6pi]

i heard the matching mixes casual with leaderboard to ensure quick matching

[@Kika_18]

It would be wise to introduce power level restrictions (seperate experienced players from newbie)

[@TechPriestFred]

@@Kika_18 Could be totally considered for Common TA, but Uncommon should still be accessible by all in my opinion

[@doesntmatter6736]

From Tech Priest Fred's lips to Snowprint's ears ..

[@Carnagepwnz]

I enjoy the various types of tournament arena. I think the differences encourage changes in roster. Overwatch not being as effective in the Nid version for example. I am glad they added a silver rank as it's moved most of the try hard Ragnar Aun'shi combo users up to that level. It's still active in Uncommon, but not near as much. Last 2 season I HATED playing. Even though I had the combo myself I refused to use it so I usually only won when they made a mistake. I've noticed the latest map changes have actually helped balance the spawns a bit this season. That said, I would like to unlock the final chest more often. I don't think a 'mission' based system is the right answer though. We have enough of that from other modes. Plus some of us want to use a specific team/faction, so forcing people to switch out for 'blast damage' ruins that. Besides that, you make it harder on new players with limited rosters to complete missions. Where as they can compete in common as it is and try their luck with the starting unlocks. If it's changed to a mission based rather than kill based progress chain then it would need to be new player friendly and have no damage or faction specific quests. Frankly I feel it's best left AS IS.

[@HMHo-ku6pi]

i think giving free points for participation guaranteeing all the crate rewards would remove most of the stress/fear losing a game(token)= less likely to get all rewards and let people enjoy arena for its sake

[@TechPriestFred]

@@Carnagepwnz that's exactly why my Quests have 2 options of completion, one restrictive and specific to push people to try different things and one accessible so everyone that started playing could complete them with the starting roster of characters

[@micodlestari4736]

I love the thought that you put into this. These are great ideas. I think you nailed it when you talked about the problems caused by the pressure of winning to get rewards. The TA quests suggestion actually sounds fun. I'm looking forward to try and blow up a character with Snappa.

[@TechPriestFred]

@@micodlestari4736 hope that he will be the next rework after Gulgortz!

[@conorslater8295]

TechPriestFred I love this, thanks for sharing your thoughts. If I may I'd like to share some of my thoughts and for clarity I want to say that I got to position 1497 on the leaderboard last season so I'm not a top tier player but I did get the final crate. Most match ups I actually find really fun and I love adapting my strategy but double Ragnar is just too OP, it needs a nerf and I think a cooldown makes sense like you said. Once per round only. The special ranked frame is a great idea but I think you should expand on it a bit more and kind of align it with the current Arena leagues. What do I mean by that? 1, 2 & 3 get a special frame like you said but then the top 500 can get one too (call it Captain or something) the top 1500 get one (call it Lieutenant) and then go all the way down to like Sergeant. A TA questline would be brilliant, kind of like when a new character drops, it just makes sense. Lastly, I want to say a lot of the newer players don't necessarily understand the level caps so perhaps some additional explaination would help clear up any confusion. Say you want to play in the Rare tier, it's not enough to look at your 5 best characters and see that they are rare and think you are well matched. You have to have level 26 abilies, silver 1 upgrades and level 7 rare equipment because your opponent will. The same obviously applies for other caps but with different numbers. I think this is why when you look through the comments you can see people saying their team can't kill anyone while the enemy always one shots them. Thanks again Fred, I hope Snowprint take note of your suggestions because, even though I like TA, I know a lot of people don't and I worry about the longevity of the gamemode.

[@DanielHCassidy]

Yeah great idea I love missions and I like your idea of a two tier missions one easily achieved one more specific. The only thing is I've noticed missions always seem to be global as in they can be achieved by doing any game mode it would have to be coded so that only TA activity would meet the criteria of the missions

[@TechPriestFred]

@@DanielHCassidy they don't always work globally, there are Guild missions that require you to do damage in Guild Wars! so the code is ready!

[@SamwellFuqua]

I like what you said in the video. I’m always pressed for time.

[@BritAnicus-bd1ul]

Not sure if introducing more mission chains for another game mode will actually help new or free players Many f2p players are only using bs during HRE , the rest of the time they are saving it for the next HRE. So the only way a TA mission chain would be viable for new & f2p is if it was completed by actions only in game modes that do not use energy Matchmaking pairs players together who have selected different rarity caps. And uses magic to scale down / scale up in the background. You see your opponents stats at the rarity You selected. & your opponent sees you at the rarity that they selected. I have no confidence that it works correctly. I understand the reason for doing it They don’t want long Que times for match making & it appearing to look like nobody is playing the game For me the solution is preventing Lvl 40+. From playing in OR being matched with common opponent & Lvl 50+ From playing in OR being matched with Uncommon & common However , this won’t work as it will lead to Long Que / match making times for the whales who fund the game

[@TechPriestFred]

@@BritAnicus-bd1ul the Quests that I proposed wouldn't be using energy or any limited resource, so that'd be F2P-friendy

[@VasiliyMarakulin]

I would vote for this!

[@lAsteriosl]

No, fckn hate quests. I Complete up to quest #19 every HRE event in the first 24 hours each time just because I hate quests and want to get quicker to just raid my 575 campaign battles.

[@TechPriestFred]

@@lAsteriosl you hate Quests from HREs because they are badly designed and force you to do manual play against weak ai where it's just labor instead of active play things like 25 lighting victories, killing Necrons, using actives or imperial-only teams in manual battles are awful experience for everyone involved, which is why each of my quest designs has a space for easier completion like "Kill X units in TA". HRE Quests deserve a video on their own on how bad they are right now, but that doesn't mean that every quest is bound to be like this- I don't see people complaining about Anniversary event quests or LRE quests. It's just a matter of good design regarding gameplay experience and adjusting the numbers correctly for the quest to not drag too much (which is exactly what happens in HRE).

[@daluigi1]

Though i enjoyed the video and the ideas, it worries me that you dont see the inherit tecnoheresy in trying to "improve" what the omnisiah has done

[@GarkKahn]

I'd rather fall to chaos than spend another 30 seconds in TA

[@lianobrown6592]

Great ideas and would definitely improve

[@HMHo-ku6pi]

just give out basic points for participation which are guaranteed enough for all the crates. no need for more quests which take me more time to complete them

[@TechPriestFred]

@@HMHo-ku6pi that's not a bad idea at all! they'd have to do some code for people quitting to not get the participation points, though

[@jeffevio]

I think something like giving away character shards for a random character you used in TA would be a cool reward too. I'd be very much motivated by this to play. Whereas I have not played in TA in the better part of a year for many of the reasons pointed out in the video.

[@realLagMaster]

Instead of getting 1 token every 2 hours get 3 tokens every 6 hours or 4 every 8 It seems the same, except in case the event ends when people have to sleep or have to work, they can still use their tokens last minute.

[@Kika_18]

Sorry to say that but the purpose of the gratification system is absurd. It forces(if you don't want to stay behind) you to play this game mode even if you don't like it because compared to other game modes it gives too much.

[@GarkKahn]

Back then i used to play once and leave because it gave you something, now apparently it changed because last 2 times i got nothing so i 100% left this arena

[@TechPriestFred]

@@Kika_18 Those rewards are still nothing when compared to high level guild Raids rewards, those gratifications would make climbing fun and engaging for more than top 5 people. the current reward structure is so biased towards rewarding only 5 people in THE WORLD and getting a top 100 or top 250 gives you basically nothing in terms of real roster progression (mostly tied to XP)

[@Heezuzz]

An easy fix to this would be giving players the freedom to host non exp live PvP skirmish matches with guild mates or added friends, at least then it will be a little more engaging for players just starting out that want to practice their own builds be it with a guild that they joined or friends, i.e. a less challenging environment. Plus it will retain people’s engagement towards the game itself thus increasing profits

[@jbeatch]

Always great ideas Fred. I hope SP is listening!

[@omathitis8498]

Ragnar team + first turn to enemy = just quit and save the precious minutes of your life That's how bad TA has become. It can't be considered a "tournament" anymore. More like Snowprint giving us the middle finger saying, "Are you not entertained? Are you not entertained?", while siphoning us players with every bit of money we have on overpriced in game packs.

[@WokeBegone]

This doesn't do much for new players

[@rubyrhodhooligan859]

I have a good roster in comparison to some f2p players. I still can’t build a meta team to win anything and can’t seem to make anything work more than 10% of the time.

[@machineakuma]

can we get some traction on this video as a new player (1month) i get completely shat on in TA and have to just skip this event entirely because i can not compete vs everyones decked out teams and i keep facing the same broken units that decimate my entire squad turn 1

[@stevestevens1457]

No MoWs, no draft, no power ups.

[@TechPriestFred]

@@stevestevens1457 Draft is one of the healthiest mechanics that we can get in PvP gamemodes in Tacticus, I wish that drafting 5 characters instead of 3 would be the norm so we could position and choose our team step by step based on the enemy choices.

[@stevestevens1457]

@@TechPriestFred oh yeah, you talking about normal draft, not the shit we have now. Then you’re right.

[@GarkKahn]

To this day i don't understand how time works there Why i have only 30 seconds to act while my enemy can spend more than a minute doing their stuff??? It's never explained at all

[@HMHo-ku6pi]

there are 2 time counters the first one renew every turn the second one does not for everyone you move your character with timer 1 ticking. Once it used up timer 2 will tick. If both use up before you finished, you automatically pass the turn. When you feel your opponent has more time to move than you, it is likely because they have already used up the first timer and are using the second timer.

[@konosuba350]

Conquest is ok because it end fast win or lose, power up draft pick is worst ta because mataneo everywhere

[@HMHo-ku6pi]

I disagree. conquest is not ok because ragnar aunshi teams can kill you two characters and grab all the objectives to immediately win and leave you losing with no score. in power up i can at least kill one or 2 of their characters to score 1-2, and sometimes I can even win with some luck in picking some appropriate power up item

[@michastrozek2978]

Hey. Im day1 player. I like TA because it's with other human, not stupid ai so it's challenging. I don't care which mode of TA is it, but like u said I take my 250 crate and normally I stop playing. If halfway I'm top100 I keep playing so normally I'm like top50-250 if I play after final crate. I don't mind meta as I know how it works and I have counter for it so I can play those characters that I like. I totally 100% agree with your proposition. I think sp should go this way. Higher rewards are needed for top100 because it's now only for own satisfaction. If they are taking so much time from our life to play this than make us happy with xp books that we need to produce more d3'. Because now it's like forever... I hope they will hear you bro ❤

[@richardkneller7887]

I disagree with you're assessment of there always being a meta. The current state is one team that overpowers everything. There is space for multiple team comps being equally high power but needs to be looked at to max turn 2 win

[@TechPriestFred]

@@richardkneller7887 there will ALWAYS be meta, it can be more or less diverse, though. right now it's not diverse at all since we have one powerhouse and a few potential runner ups, but if there is a 60% winrate and 55% winrate team, most players will pick the 60% one because they want to grind the crate rewards ASAP

[@GarkKahn]

That game mode feels like you play vs someone who uses cheats or somehow without telling you the rules got changed at some point It's literally the only part of the game i don't touch, it just f-ing sucks!!!

[@elenamiller3610]

The code doesn’t work

[@TechPriestFred]

@@elenamiller3610 Are you sure? A lot of my Guildmates and several people on Discord said that it's a nice code

[@CountCasual]

I must say, I don't agree with any of this. While the revamped quest tracks are a novel idea, i don't see what that has to do with TA. You could put that in any game mode and it'll have the same effect. Furthermore, based on every other game mode with a quest track, that is an opportunity for SP to monetise progress, and I don't like it. The casual game mode isn't just for people with too much time on their hands - it's a place where you can try out different comps and figure out how to play them, without losing tokens. It is an essential training ground for players who are trying to beat the meta. Which brings me to my final point: the game mode isn't un-fun because the rewards aren't great. It's infuriating because going first is the most important thing for winning, and being one-shot on their first turn - before you've even had a go at all - is an actual thing now. And it's demotivating because there doesn't seem to be a counter to the current meta and it's only getting worse. In other tactical games, the developers strive to have at least three meta comps competing against each other. A rock, paper, scissor sort of setup. In Tacticus, there is only the rock, and whomever had the fastest rock wins. Rewards are fun, but winning is more fun. And winning because you outsmarted and outplayed your opponent is the most fun. I bet you could take the rewards away entirely and people would still play TA if they thought they stood a decent chance of winning every game they played.

[@jeffevio]

I think some of Fred's ideas would have a positive impact on getting more players to play TA. I think getting more players to play TA is good for variety and fun. To your point about winning being fun - yes its fun to win but not everyone gets the same stimulus from it. Some people are more competitive than others and get more out of winning. Some less competitive players are driven away from TA because of how competitive it feels. I am one of these people (though there are other reasons that contribute for me too). Driving away less competitive players means an ever growing concentration of highly competitive players doing whatever they can to win (using the meta). Bringing in less competitive players will un-concentrate TA's competitiveness, bringing in more variety of teams to fight against, possibly discovering new viable comps among other knock on benefits. Would quests be an effective way to get people to play TA? I would certainly be more motivated by them. I think anything that does more to reward the **process** of doing TA rather than the **outcome** of your performance in TA would almost certainly bring in less competitive players. I recognize that the current chest unlocks do this sort of thing, and yet it isn't at all enough to motivate me to do TA.

[@CountCasual]

@@jeffevio Fair enough, people are motivated by different things and rewards are obviously one of them. I'm the same, I grind through most daily quests for just a little bit of progress on the season bar. That said, I still think if a game mode is broken, they should aim to fix the problem rather than make it more profitable to suffer boredom and frustration.

[@jeffevio]

@@CountCasual I like your point about fixing broken game modes rather than enticing people to play broken game modes. That would definitely solve any feeling of monotony or of being basically forced to do it. That being said, I would imagine it's a tricky mark to hit for the devs (game modes that are just intrinsically fun for most people).

[@Voxon199]

TA def need work as makes me want to quit the game as it annoys me so much its souring my opinion of the game. I like your some of the quest ideas. Not sure i like kill x number with BA etc as some people wont have them etc but good ideas overall.

[@doesntmatter6736]

I think TA is a major reason Cagedslinky quit...

[@francohealy3705]

This is what I worry about. The TA meta is so aggressive that it may also drive off new players who aren't savvy to influencer channels like this one. They feel like they can't do anything.

[@francohealy3705]

​@@doesntmatter6736 He said he wanted more campaigns and some balancing stuff. You might be on to something. Ironically, TA is my favorite mode. I just know it's incredibly flawed.

[@HMHo-ku6pi]

@@francohealy3705i am a new player who played for 3 months. I both love and hate TA. I played TA 4 times IIRC and managed to get the final crates in the last 3 times. Building your own team with characters you like is fun, not when you got crushed by meta team. But i think most of the stress is related to the fear that you couldn’t get to the final crate every time you lose, especially in a losing streak. Before yesterday I almost gave up TA in losing hope to get the final crates and i only managed to get it with only 3 tokens left. So I think if points are rewarded even if you lose without scoring, and those points guarantee you to the final crate, I can enjoy TA as it is without fearing the loses

[@francohealy3705]

@@HMHo-ku6pi Makes sense. We all deserve a fair shot at our energy and scrolls.

[@brunozeigerts6379]

My problem is with the regular arena ... and the ridiculous ranking system. I have less than 4000 power, yet I'm pitted against opponents of 6000 or higher, even five digits. It's annoying to have to spend blackstones looking for a contest at least reasonably close. Can't the contests be limited to a thousand or so power difference?

[@brobrochannel2387]

Aunshi should be unallowed to affect ragnar in TA. OR Force any team that has Ragnar and aunshi to go 2nd. Easy nerf

[@Carnagepwnz]

Oh yeah an 'If Team a or b Includes: Ragnar + Aun'shi = team a or b goes turn 2' 'Unless Team a + b includes: Ragnar + Aun'shi' rule. That'd help a heap. At least give other teams a chance to set up.

[@HMHo-ku6pi]

most of the time i went first and still lose to aunshi ragnar so it doesn’t matter that much

[@brobrochannel2387]

@@HMHo-ku6pi that might be user error lol

[@johnnysvensson]

In itr's current iteration it's the worst mode in the game tbh..

[@MohammedSinclair-b4h]

Easily the worst game mode , I rarely play even when all my other tokens are gone. The pace of play is maddeningly slow

[@richardgrant3237]

I love your branched quest idea, it could be implemented in other grindy modes too, like HRE

[@Heavenknight_Infinite]

imbalance team A LOTS. LOL.

[@Slaneshhhh]

Amazing idea!

[@rainerzuvall8400]

I get that newer players feel overwhelmed and chanceless in TA. I had this feeling myself the first two Seasons. Then i got better and better with every new TA. Today i got the last chest with my second last token. Chars used where Mataneo, Ulf, Lucien, Baraquil, Calandis, Aleph and Bellator. Level uncommon. The first evening was terrible and i was swearing a lot in my guild chat. The next day till the end I had quite a run. Sidenote. Owning the meta chars does not equal using them to their best effect. Don't give up. Accept the challenge.

[@TechPriestFred]

@@rainerzuvall8400 many people give up quickly, starting fresh in a competetive environment is bound to hurt. right now I'm stable at 90% winrate in Uncommon at any TA with Powerups and it wasn't like this at all when I started learning it

[@Mflash8hy]

Once a month they should have have unlimited onslaught mode. Easy to progress your characters to legendary.