What If New Feature Thread

[Logress]

This is probably going to turn into a compilation thread of suggestions that have been popping up for years, but I'd like to have it in one place and feature the ideas of our current players.

Here goes!


WHAT IF...

There was going to be a new version of Alteil, where the core rules of individual games are the same, but everything else could be changed. What changes / new features would you suggest?

RULES:
-Read what has come before in this thread so you don't repeat an idea.
-It's fine to repeat an idea that is in another thread. If the idea is simple enough, just write it out in your post. If not, make a good enough summary for everyone to understand at a glance, and then link to the original thread.
-No specific card balance suggestions, but general systems that would help card balance are fine. For example, "nerf emana" doesn't belong in this thread, but "add an automated system to analyze card usage and, in response to the data, nerf Emana" would. (but that would probably not be a great idea for a number of reasons -- little known fact, 11 seconds before Skynet decides to glass the planet, it will Nerf Emana).
-This thread may be used for reference, by me and other developer types, so lets keep it clean. If we get bogged down with a lot of one-line comments and stuff I might engage in "slash and burn" forum management, nothing personal, just trying to keep it useful and easy to read. I understand that someone may make a _terrible_ suggestion, and you may be filled with fear that I take it seriously, so maybe after we get some suggestions we can start putting up polls so we can see relative interest/popularity.

[Khiruki]

Some more filter/search options for cards? Like, filter by number of copies, search by name (or by text in soul skill or something), filter UD, etc. Like Otonashi's tool, but more official.

[GOSCAR]

More errata to stabilize the arena comes to mind. Also nerf any bs like harpist immediately.

[Peralisc9001]

2v2 duels - one player can be the leader, only his SS count for the battle and field remains the same way

Add the minigames, lavato heroes and napoleon. The minigames also give FM, so it solves another issue.

Some achievements or events or special requirements for your deck in order to earn extra FM. Maybe reward extra according to the amount of underdog cards in your file.

You really have to add something to the game that encourages any active players to play, not just those that win. It really looks to me as if winning is everything in this game and then it becomes a straight forward jump to the strongest meta deck. Think about this when you decide on your events and on the way you reward players.

There used to be players that spent money and all they were interested in was for example adding their favorite girl cards to their deck and then jump into folrart. Chaotic playing like this (as in not win oriented play) is part of what can make the game fun for many players. Add an on-going, permanent, 24/7 event that gives a +1 weekly gran and +30 FM (or a small reward like that) for something else than winning. It will be much harder for the game to get boring that way.
Aside for rewarding winning, you could as well reward:
- playing an underdog deck
- playing a deck with cards that have HP less than their level x10
- have a card of the week deck, where you need to keep card X alive on the field for certain amount of turns (and if you really want to go crazy about it double the reward for the winner)
Even minor increases such as 10 FM for simply having 6 LP is great to see!

When there's a treasure battle give a reward to those that loose or draw too. You could give some point cards. If you don't like giving point cards away for that, how about some card pieces, where you need X card pieces of a certain card to get the real card. If not then you can have something similar to the materials system in sword girls. The fact alone that you get mats to craft any cards of your choice in sword-girls, makes it more appealing for many players, that's how they ended up with a greater number of players.

If i were you, i'd accept any fan-fics, fan-made drawings/wallpapers, videos, mangas and have a special section for them. Have a rating system in that section that allows people to cast their vote, unless you want to judge by written opinions. Then i'd reward the good ones with in-game reward. The really great ones that i could use to advertise the game and improve the game's image i'd even buy off (at a decent to low price) and use have it officially be part of the game's story. I know i wouldn't be able to rely on staff alone, there are talented people that would share their good ideas once in a while (thus their art would never be able to contribute to the game without this "event") and there are people that have one good idea once in their life time (which is worth buying off). Ofcourse i'd attribue a low budget to this, unless i want to gamble or that art just left me flat faced, but it's rather up to you how you manage it.

You could replace the guild wars that you had with group wars or faction wars. Have 5 player groups duel in folrart for a period of time and those that have more of whatever achievement is needed win the war. Again, it dosn't have to be restricted to number of wins or number of duels, it can be number of underdog decks played, number of lolies used in your deck, whatever adds more to the fun of the game.

Just take an example of my tourneys when making events, the crazier the better and the more fun people have. I guarantee a 100% improvement in the players' mood with this.

[Haku-Chan]

guild events
I think that would be fun to see

[AngelicDeath]

Pera has some great ideas. He beat me to it by a split second.

1. Definitely need to untie treasure battles to win streaks and reward both players involved not just the winner. I cannot tell you how many times I came across a TB only to have it be a match in which I was just testing a new deck idea. You could make the TB 's be (x) %of all battles- given your daily data of battles total you could find an acceptable number that would be sufficient.

2. Keep Underdog that is just plain fun although against the meta grinders all I wanna do is win people kinda frustrating.

3. Add a page for most used cards - gives people anidea of what is being used and possible ideas for counters

4. Monthly subscription for 3-5 usd option Monthly subscription gives 1 set of Ex 3 cards that would be like how set completion is rewarded. Perhaps, other things could accompany the subscription thing like A2 has.

5. Monthly newsletter. Keeps players informed on what is going on and what is planned. Each week you show a preview of ( x) number of cards from the upcoming set for player input and review. This means that if you plan on releasing 4 sets a year at 60 cards per set you need to be working on card stats at almost 1 a day or more if EX included.

6. "rolling set" sale. As a new set is released, make older sets on sale for less. So when set 12 is released then sets say 1-2-3 are discounted. Set 13 released then sets 1-2-3-4 is discounted. Etc etc. This encourages new players who would be buyers an incentive to go after earlier sets.

7. Make buyer's incentive a quarterly event. Have an annual " box of ? " event. The latter would reward players who bought booster packs from the past year sets. So if you released sets 12-15 then had a box of ? event for every booster packyou bought you would get an additional but random 3 to 5 star card from any set 1-15. This would betricky with pricing and such to ensure you always remained above recycle rates but should be possible.

I have more stuff written down at home. I think the biggest hurdle is going to be reengaging the playerbase and recruiting new players based of what can only be termed a " failure" for Alteil's first run. I am sure it can be successful because it is a great game but there is alot to accomplish to make it happen.

Cheers,
AD

[Icyglare]

Recycle needs to be better.

Some of us will open the file editor and use that to search what cards we want to recycle because it's much easier to find cards. But sometimes forget that we can't hit recycle until we close out of the editor, then it gives us that message and all the cards we selected to recycle disappear and we have to repeat the process.

TL;DR = Better search option on recycle (maybe mix recycle and file editor together)

[angelspawns]

Retention ideas

- "intergraded chatroom".
Direct link with the rest of the community. Newbies can ask questions during their battle when they arise, and are more inclined to do so. (perhaps devide in different Tabs, with one saying 'general' and the other 'beginner questions')

- "Lapierre Advice"
Display Tips and tricks. We have this Partner aviable, a loadingscreen, and wasted space everywhere. Display good advice in the cardfile editor to the left about deck construction, the importance of openings on the loadingscreens/chatboxopenphrase, etc.

- A "Decline match" option. For the struggling player (only when 1599RP or below): when the RP difference is 150RP+, an option will be given to decline the match. It's the middle road between 2 seperate arena's and current RP-based system.

- Learning system. I named this "Take an Apprentice".
The idea is to let Sensei's view their Apprentice matches LIVE as if they were playing it, and provide advice in the BattleChat. (comments blocked for the opponent, perhaps under a new Tab in the chatbox if necessary)
Challenges must further encourage this player interaction, like:
- Apprentice wins his first match!
- Apprentice levels up!
- etc.
More details and ideas on how to implement: viewtopic.php?f=50&t=11566&p=144412&hilit=apprentice#p144412

- Guild Incentives. Like for example: Guild Achievements, challenges done by guildmembers or guildleader.
It's official! (1GP + Lavato's Heart)
Reach level 1. You recieve your very first GuildPoint! Exchange GP in the Avatar Shop, under items, for Guild Potions.
*Lavato's Heart*
Level 1 Guild Potion. Increase all members FM gained from matches by +10%.
More details and achievement ideas: viewtopic.php?f=50&t=10781&p=133960&hilit=guild+potions#p133960

- FM usage. Let people exchange FM for things like: "rent a card", potions.

- Visual stimulation. More animebased characters in layout, loadingscreens etc. Right now we only have event banners... lol? Just an example how only colorscheme and background can change the overall feeling of the game:
Blue (nighttime): http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v128/ ... _small.jpg
Yellow (morning): http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v128/ ... _small.jpg
Green (noon):

Ofcourse a battlefield is more apropiate. It also takes more time for me to create obviously... PM if interested?

**reserved** I've had tons of ideas just like these or perhaps better. Remembering & gathering them all here takes time... and motivation to continiou. ;/

[Pikeru]

I'd like to see a more in-depth card tier system. As it stands, everything is either Underdog or not. The lower the tier of your deck, the more incentives would be given for attempting to play such cards. In the reverse, the highest tier 1 cards would slightly penalize a player in FM and XP or some such for using cards that are overly popular, only the most overused cards that would appear in too high a percentage of decks. This could also be used as somewhat of an alternative for buffing and nerfing certain cards in some cases.

[WhiteDragon2]

Change deck based on opponent

All in all a match is most fun when both sides have a chance. In alteil we currently choose a file we want to play and then wait for an opponent to arrive, which can have any level of file. I think a lot of players wouldn't mind or might even prefer playing weaker files like modded starters if they know their opponent will be playing something similar in power level, but most don't do that because they might instead face something they know those files can't beat regardless of how they play (especially when having to face meta files).

An issue would be how to make accurate judgements based on the opponent. As long as players have different tier files knowing just their RP isn't enough to make the best judgement (for instance if both players try compensating based on RP, a lower RP player might end up playing a much stronger file then there high RP opponent), though it would already be a good start.

One way to do this better would be by letting both players change their file multiple times until they both agree (or a certain condition is met in case both can't seem to agree on a file matchup (e.g. a timeout), in which case the match could either be cancelled or the server could choose a matchup where both files seems close to each other in power level). Preferably they could also chat with each other during this selection.

As showing each others file is probably not what we'd want, we would need some way to rate a file's power level. If we had something like a more in-depth card tier system like Pikeru suggest we could use this system to give a rating to the files used. This system would preferably not be based solely on usage as it generally scews in favour of hard to attain cards, giving starters and files with a lot of commonly used utility cards (shade, salamander, fire arrow, return, etc) unnecessary high numbers. Generally factoring in the rarity of cards, the amount the card is used and the number of high RP files the card is used in, and making some exceptions for common utility cards, would probably give a reasonable heuristic, but that's more implementation detail that can be left for later discussion.