API for 3rd party deck management

[StrayDogStrut]

I was originally intending to make some suggestions for your deck management interface. Because the current one is, frankly, pretty bad. Then I realized that all my ideas would have already occurred to you, and you're doing your best with limited dev resources.

So here's an alternative: A relatively simple RPC API, which would let us create deck management utilities for you!

These generally have two parts. First, we would need an interface by which players could generate and reset their "API Key". This is an authentication token associated with that player, which applications must provide in order to access that user's collection.

The rest of the interface could be pretty simple. Here's a sample one, in pseudo-code:

// Return a list of card_ids, representing all cards owned by the player.
String[] listAllCards(userId, apiKey);

// Returns cards_ids currently in the specified hero's deck.
String[] listCardsInDeck(userId, apiKey, heroId);

// Create a new deck for this hero
void setCardsInDeck(userId, apiKey, heroId, String[] cardIds);

Note that the API doesn't provide a mechanism for serious abuse. The worst a rogue application could do isn't all that bad.

The above would be enough to let 3rd parties fulfill all the management features your players have been asking for. They'd be able to create and name decks, using interfaces more suitable than Unity provides. They could have multiple decks per hero, and share their creations. They could import decks they found online, and immediately see what cards they need to add to their collection.

A web interface for this is a no-brainer... if no one else built one, I would. Maybe native Android and iOS apps? With some planning, these tools might even be applicable to Phantom Spirit, et al.

Anyway, there's my idea. I understand that our Calmdown is the same one of scrapheap-challenge notoriety, so perhaps he can testify for how community-enabling this can be.

[StrayDogStrut]

I understand that our Calmdown is the same one of scrapheap-challenge notoriety, so perhaps he can testify for how community-enabling this can be.

Also... if this is the same Calmdown, then here's my second suggestion:

Fighting in Falloff (Neutral Ability)
Cost: 2
Ongoing: Target friendly ally has -1 attack. Target ally can defend.
Flavor: "This fixes everything"

[arebelspy]

What's scrapheap-challenge?

Site is dead so I can't get any real info about it.

Also OP's idea is awesome.

[StrayDogStrut]

What's scrapheap-challenge?

Site is dead so I can't get any real info about it.

Also OP's idea is awesome.

Scrapheap Challenge was mostly a private forum for discussing EVE Online... mostly to discuss ship design and combat tactics. EVE spaceships are modular, and trying to design your own ship has a lot of similarities to trying to build your own deck. Calmdown founded the site, and it became very popular since the discussions were moderated and very well informed, while the official forums had been overrun with the usual suspects.

My understanding is that Calmdown was hired by CCP, EVE's publisher, to help with game balance. But that was after I left the game. I imagine that's how he ended up designing games here.

Also...

A web interface for this is a no-brainer...

Just to clarify, I wasn't trying to say that building a web-based tool was trivial. I was just saying that building a web-based interface probably makes more sense than starting with a bunch of native apps.

[Rizla79]

+1 deck naming
+1 sharing/importing deck lists
+1 multiple decks for same hero

[squishyvillian]

some good ideas even though i dont speak computer sounds like it would work

[CodeDomination]

While I agree this would be great since the deck builder is rather poor, I'm not sure of how feasible it would be to release an API. I'm not sure Unity would allow it, but that's just my vary limited knowledge of Unity.

[StrayDogStrut]

While I agree this would be great since the deck builder is rather poor, I'm not sure of how feasible it would be to release an API. I'm not sure Unity would allow it, but that's just my vary limited knowledge of Unity.

Unity is a client technology... it's the piece that runs in your browser, phone or tablet. They're using "something else" for the backend, so I'd be surprised if Unity was involved in the solution.

On the surface, this idea doesn't seem very difficult. But I've also learned not to guess how hard something is to implement, on an architecture I know nothing about.