Fix for Gauntlet Walls
AviTrek
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in The Bridge
First, I'd like to thank DB for making it easier to get all the gauntlet crew.
But now that more people will have a full set, is any work being done about the walls of crew we face? Once everyone has the 4 gauntlet crew plus mirror Picard and surak, the gauntlet will become even more aggravating than it already is. I hope some thought has gone into this or it will become like the threshold changes, a theoretically player positive change that has a side effect making the experience even worse than before the change.
But now that more people will have a full set, is any work being done about the walls of crew we face? Once everyone has the 4 gauntlet crew plus mirror Picard and surak, the gauntlet will become even more aggravating than it already is. I hope some thought has gone into this or it will become like the threshold changes, a theoretically player positive change that has a side effect making the experience even worse than before the change.
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let's be clear, this is what people asked for. you are rightly pointing out this will make the "wall" problem worse, but it's not DB's fault that people requested this change. In essence, the players WANT more walls of gauntlet crew. **tsk tsk** to be you if you've got bad RNG luck for a year and don't get them all, your gauntlet rank could be worse than it was typically 2 days ago, for the following YEAR.
So now is better.
And if 25% of the player base who did not have him gets Locutus in the next 3 months and you don't for a year, I'm sure you'll still feel it's better? I don't think people are thinking this through.
Now we can ask for it to be even better again.
DB make Gauntlets more interesting, maybe by releasing tons of new Legendaries that are Gauntlet relevant in weekly packs. Don't make any more Gauntlet mega event characters. What we need is variety, variability and possibly some power creep.
Edit: They did however say they were changing traits as well so hopefully there will be different "walls" and not just the gauntlet regulars.
Maybe something like limiting the amount of the same crew being shown on the current wall to two?
Perhaps players could be given the option to do this on Day 2?
My understanding of the gauntlet changes is that they give more people a chance to get the Gauntlet exclusive crew which quite often make up the walls. This gives you a fighting chance: instead of just being stuck with your Mirror Phlox vs 50 Guinans, you now have better chances of getting your own Guinan to use against the other 50 Guinans.
It would be difficult to completely design out walls in the Gauntlet as it is currently set up. If there are a couple hundred players in each gauntlet and all the most engaged and top-ranking players all have a crew like Kahless, it doesn't matter how you're matched up or how much things are randomized, right? If you get tossed into a CMD-DIP fight, you're going to hit a wall of Kahlesses or another similar high-value Gauntlet crew.
The changes that we made try to help balance Gauntlets was to reduce the frequency with which some crew get 65% or 45% crit bonuses so that means everyone uses the same crew for that Gauntlet if they have them. This doesn't eliminate walls but it does make the walls a little bit less formidable. Ideally, these changes also empower other crew so that your Nechayev might actually be more useful than a Kahless or a Mirror Picard.
This isn't a silver bullet for all Gauntlet complaints, but I would hope most people would agree this update is a big step in the right direction
(B) I've beaten this horse a little dead in other threads, but I think part of the power to make walls go away lies in our own hands. Having studied (yes, I know, everyone's shocked) this problem for a few weeks now, I'm thoroughly convinced that people are underplaying good cards in favor of perceived heavies ... which leads to wall feedback loops (I see a wall of characters, therefore I perceive I need the card, then I play them more often than I probably should, so even more people see walls ...).
The traits tweaks should definitely help with this problem.
I think there are multiple reasons for why some cards get overplayed, beyond just availability (number of people that have them):
So my proposition is: the more people have an incentive to find and field diverse crew (e.g., the trait tweaking DB did), the more diverse the lineups everyone sees are, and the more likely that players will adjust some of the dynamics on their own. Not a 100% solution, but part of one...
Edit : PS, I forgot to mention how I fell over laughing staring at a wall of 65% Locuti today. Either this was a great example of "enough monkeys in a room with typewriters will eventually generate a Locutus wall on the exact same day DB announces changes soon to fix the problem", or else DB is having an awful lot of fun messin' with our heads to show how good it will be when the first New Format Gauntlet starts ...
1) I think your analysis is spot on.
2) These three traits do give Locutus a 65% crit chance but they do the same for at least Assimilated La Forge, Assimilated Troi, and Drone Seven of Nine. I don’t remember ever seeing more than two 65%ers at once, never mind four. 65% on a mediocre gauntleteer like Drone Seven makes her pretty stout, even competitive against a 5% Caretaker.
Players are asked to tag 12 Gauntlet crew, much like players can tag favorites now.
When players enter a Gauntlet, they get to choose 2 crew from their entire roster, but then the final 3 will be chosen at random from the 12 tagged. It breaks up walls and rewards careful/strategic planning.
It may need some tweaking, but I think it is close to perfect.
If it wasn't 5000 who thought of it, I want to claim the idea
That’s a great point .... ALF and Drone Seven have been particularly challenging for me as opponents today and I think that’s awesome and appropriate. I’m hesitant to say this, but Gauntlet is almost ... ... ... ... “fun” ... when there’s an unexpected and diverse lineup. Well played, Drone Seven, you just earned your keep for someone.
@ByloBand - I can’t take credit for the tagging idea so it’s yours to claim unless an owner shows up
Yep. People forget that at the end of the day, DB wants to break streaks by RNG and cause you to spend DIL to keep them going. These changes are all achieving that. They seem player friendly upfront, but will just prompt even more complaints about RNG and evil streak breaker algorithm conspiracies.
That's the problem. Current setup is poor. You need to completely redesign it. The only thing you need to implement is: much lees RNG and much more actual human skill.
The problem is, if you take that approach the entire game needs to be redesigned.
They can’t figure out how to show how many replicator uses left in a day, you think they have anywhere near the capability for that?
I think I see your point, but not convinced I entirely agree. There are already a good 1-2 dozen cards each day due to skill and trait featuring that are competitive with the Gauntlet legendaries. Tweaking the trait approach (potentially) just increases the diversity of who’s in that lineup each day if it means the same traits don’t get overused. I don’t see how it necessarily means there will be *more* strong cards on a given day, just different ones? Did the announcement say we’ll get more triple trait crits? I didn’t think it did, but maybe I’m reading what I want to into the announcement.
OTOH, if you’re saying that Crit rolls by their nature add even more variance to the already huge variance built into the proficiency skill ranges (and more variance = more RNG dependence) then yes, but we already have that situation today, it’s just, e.g., that El-Aurian shows up bonused way more often than it should given the number of El-Aurians in the game...
Always seems to be the case that I lose more streaks when there is a prize box awaiting me over the next hill. I imagine in my head that the code for this part of the game is like this:
if( streak % 3 ){ // If streak is divisible by 3 gauntlet.result = lose; }else{ .... }FWIW, my analysis of gauntlet rounds doesn't support this:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1sYlf7A6M-kaENSsxoHhiUrpNuv71zNRz50Izi-ARB6E/edit?usp=drive_web&ouid=108030541003240600170
Compare the results from the "reward rounds" tab to "other rounds". Win rates are right in line with expectations.
That's not a problem. That's a solution.
Yeah.... I was joking.
Lots of people have made posts with this exact same sentiment and are 100% not joking.
On a positive note, that was an impressive feat of micrologging and analysis. Nice...