Changes to Rated Matches for October 2017

[Spartan]

Serious question: Is the Gold and XP per win not high enough to encourage grinders? We could tweak that if necessary. There's also the possibility of enhanced rewards (e.g. random foil for 10 wins in a row with specific hero) and spot prizes. I could add those things in server-side during October.

If you can add quests like win 5 qm matches, play 10 games with a rogue hero for example you can keep interest fresh and the game maybe will have even more variety especially for new players

[Spartan]

With carefully designed quests who can guide the player base to use some classes or heroes the game will have a richer and ever changing meta at lower leves, so new players will face and use more heroes and decks.

The rewards can be, depended from the difficulty of the quest, from sc and foils to some amount of gold.

Sort term and longer term quests is ideal to coexist. Eg a random daily and a weekly one that enhances variety.

[jonmaciel]

We need an unrated option, that would allow a random match up without risking rating. This change is going to force high rated players to only play competitive decks. Or make another account for experimenting or just fun. Doesn't seem to add anything so good to warrant the change imo. Just going to take fun away.

And I've spent the last month experimenting with new decks, and this is how my rating gets started?? No one month warning or anything??

There already is an unranked system. Making a custom game with no password puts you into an unranked queue. Maybe its not advertised enough.

[tolerance]

The grind factor is a 2 edged sword. On one hand it can make you not care about the score since you have to invest time. On the other hand it servers as motivation to put in more time because its like "im rank 50 in Score right now, if I came that far I can keep getting more and get rewards". I have been on both sides in the equation in the past. When I started playing I wasnt good enough to get to the top 100 rating, so I tried to compete in the score leaderboard and earn some foils. And thats exactly the problem in my opinion, who do you think will be able to get the best winquotes in those 50 games? It will be nearly exclusively the players who dominate the ratings right now.

New players who cant compete with them in terms of skillevel and are not super competitive get next to no return for the time they invest into QM. With the score system we have now newer players had a motivation to play since they knew their time investment gets rewarded even if they arent highly ranked. That also makes it more likely they get hooked and keep playing. Also I have a hard time seeing how the new system should increase activity. Sure in an ideal world where everyone is super competitive and trying to 1 up himself and others it could be true. But from my experiences it will be the opposide. The system introduces ladder anxiety. Most people who managed to get a good placing/winquote will be questioning themself if they should keep playing and ruin their score. Thats especially true for newer players who are not confident in their ability to just get the same placing again.

Also the grinders who made up the top score list are imo important for the game. SE doesnt have a huge playerbase, so having people who play alot is very important to reduce queue times and fill QM.



Yeah I got that part. I still think there has to be a reward for activity aswell, not only for being the best.

agreed

would be interesting to see if the quest or spot prizes proposed can offset the downside

[Vexmaw]

Serious question: Is the Gold and XP per win not high enough to encourage grinders? We could tweak that if necessary. There's also the possibility of enhanced rewards (e.g. random foil for 10 wins in a row with specific hero) and spot prizes. I could add those things in server-side during October.

Better perks for the grinders would be awesome. Gold amounts are low for starting players IMO

Edit: a gold sink for veteran/rich players would be a welcome addition. For some, gold is useless at this point.

[Dvsklown]

How about we wait one month so players don't get screwed? I've been playing fun and new decks just messing around for a month. And now my rating is going to reflect that forever??????? Seeing how it's the basis of the new system, should be started fairly.

[tolerance]

How about we wait one month so players don't get screwed? I've been playing fun and new decks just messing around for a month. And now my rating is going to reflect that forever??????? Seeing how it's the basis of the new system, should be started fairly.

You can still climb the rating if continue to play with competitive decks, just that there's no reset to 0 like it used to be

[AmberFade]

Serious question: Is the Gold and XP per win not high enough to encourage grinders? We could tweak that if necessary. There's also the possibility of enhanced rewards (e.g. random foil for 10 wins in a row with specific hero) and spot prizes. I could add those things in server-side during October.

For very new players it might be initially because they want to unlock some new cards. In middle-long term it isnt, it lacks a tangible goal. I like the suggestions fo the previous posters, imo you need smth that makes it worth it to log in and play some matches on a daily basis. Daily quests would be a good idea for that, you could also utilize a probability system like "there is a foil in every 10th daily chest". That motivates people with a tangible goal to play some games daily. Most people enjoy working towards a goal, not simply aimlessly playing and get fixed amount of Gold/Exp, that gets stale after a while.

[Spartan]

For very new players it might be initially because they want to unlock some new cards. In middle-long term it isnt, it lacks a tangible goal. I like the suggestions fo the previous posters, imo you need smth that makes it worth it to log in and play some matches on a daily basis. Daily quests would be a good idea for that, you could also utilize a probability system like "there is a foil in every 10th daily chest". That motivates people with a tangible goal to play some games daily. Most people enjoy working towards a goal, not simply aimlessly playing and get fixed amount of Gold/Exp, that gets stale after a while.

+1 Well said!

[Gondorian]

Thanks for all the feedback.

I have some updates for people.

1. I've just confirmed you can do Unrated matches just by creating a Custom Match with no password (it automatically pairs two people who do this and you can see the other person waiting), so that should be the way to test out decks risk-free with automatic pairing if you don't want to line one up via the Global Chat or Telegram or some other means.

2. The Ratings will need to be reset one last time with everyone aware of this new system going forwards.

I'll update the OP to mention these things.