A Letter to Those With Expansion Anxiety

[johnbob78]

Going to agree with Maelrawn on this.

Most of the cards in the set seem to be balanced on each other with every new card having something that balances it out. Excelsious is very good, but with the new toys the control sets are getting it won’t cause much of a disbalance of power, while punish is also very good, but it needs to be in order to balance the other cards. And worst comes to worst, CPG can re-balance things it’s a digital card game after all.

Also can someone tell me when this expansion is coming out? I know it’s soon, but is there a date yet?

[mrmana3]

I believe the expansion comes out tomorrow! That’s what I’ve heard. Get hyped!

[nicon]

I’m a bit concerned about powercreep making the game more aggro. Every card that gets used will be replacing another strong card by being even more powerful (in stats or synergy), every set adds power and speed to the game.

[gabriek]

Honestly, a lot of these cards are control oriented, or could be used in both. And the game isnt all that fast this season, not like how it was during the tyranny of reva at least, I play plenty of games that last until 9 mana

[owlington]

Actually i see no powercreep, could u please compare the creeps? Such as by mentioning the card that is being made unplayable due to the powerlevel of another

[tundranocaps]

Obviously one is not better than the other, but fanboying is dumb, and serves only as a way for people to needlessly say “I told you so” later on. Realism is important.

You can easily shift it around.

I see people throwing around phrases such as “Don’t you trust the intelligence of the designers,” and such, while at the same time discounting the intelligence and experience of people who’ve been playing TCGs for decades as well, some of whom have game design experience, and can more or less tell the power level of a single card (in some cases) in the context of over 500 already extant cards.

Edit: English is hard.

[tsevech]

Frankly, after the initial hype, I’m also a bit worried about the new expansion. Do I think it will ruin the game? Likely not, I really think developers will rebalance stuff if it gets out of control. Do I think in the current state is fine? Likely not, especially after seeing the very last cards.

The main problem I see is an excessive presence of oppressively strong cards. If too many cards are too strong, the game depends too much on who draws the broken cards first. I may be a bit salty, due to a recent losing streak, but sometimes I already have the feeling of losing because I didn’t draw Makantor at the right moment. I fear this expansion will exacerbate this feeling.

To be fair, before Shimzar release, I was very concerned about battle pets, because their stats looked too good for the mana cost. In the end, most battle pets are mediocre and the game has been quite balanced so far.

[misanthropovore]

I’m not Nicon but I can see several candidates:
Punish + Necrotic Sphere are both superior versions of Dark Transformation.
Trinity Oath will definitely replace Solarius and other card-draw cards for Lyonar.
Meltdown will almost certainly replace Red Synja.

[maelrawn]

Every single card you listed there is different. Punish is conditional, so is Sphere, where Trans is not and also blocks DW spawns; if this were a concern, where is the uproar about Ritual Banishing, which is almost identical to Punish?

Trinity oath will replace Solarius cause Solarius sucks basically all the time, but Sojourner is still a good buff target.

Meltdown and Red Synja fill wholly different roles; Synja lets you pick what you kill, more or less, while with Meltdown the best chance you have is 50%. When you want to affect the board, “50% chance of doing nothing” is pretty awful odds.

I get the feeling my nice op has been summarily glossed over :?(

[genkei]

Duelyst will be fine, it stuck for a while and the community is growing. HsS has been fine and when it comes to their expansions, it feels like they are throwing darts in the dark. Thanks for spreading the positive vibe.

[thematsjo]

Can I just say I’m loving this thread? It’s a real testament to how you can do civil disagreement right.

[gamemaster]

i’m sure if any of the new cards are overpowered i’ll just make a thread about them and CP will nerf them. just like Mana Vortex.

[owlington]

Thats what we love about Duelyst am i right pal

[locoblutaxt]

As @genkei said: Thanx for the good vibe!
I know I have the tendency to see the glass of water rather half empty then half full.

I agree that some people (me definitively included!) should trust the Devs more then they do. But I disagree to the way you do.

Shimzar for an example:
It brought us more cards - which is good. At the same time it pushed once strong cards cards into insignificance (Archon Spellbinder for example - I think I’ll give this card a thread when new expansion settled a bit). Well - maybe this is what CCGs are.
The goal of Shimzar was to push to push faction identity, right? Did it do that? I don’t think so.
Is the game better balanced then before Shimzar? I don’t think so, too.
Don’t misunderstand me: I don’t think the game is worse then before Shimzar! What I want to say is that Devs are humans and humans can fail.

So what I see with the new Expansion:
Devs stated they want to make BS more strategic and not the “always use it whenever you can”-style it’s now. Does this change with the expansion? I say: No. It will stay the old style with the difference that everybody brings a Blood Surge Minion on board before using BBS.
As a Magmar-Player I want big Minions on board. What do the Devs? They bring big Threads on board. (See the difference?) To be fair: Devs never said they will give us big Minions.
As a Duelyst-Player I want to have a board. What do the Devs? Making the board more and more irrelevant.

Plz don’t see this all as a rant! I think Duelyst is a great game! I just want to point out that having trust in the Devs not only mean having trust in their balancing skills. (Seeing the new cards I don’t see a big change in the Meta regarding the Generals btw.). It’s also having trust that they bring the game in the direction the players want it to be. And at this point I’m not shure if they do right.

You can call it “fear”. I don’t disagree.

[qeltar]

Obviously one is not better than the other, but doomsaying is dumb, and serves only as a way for people to needlessly say “I told you so” later on.

I am not saying anything about whether or not the expansion is OP, simply the fallacious form of reasoning you are using here, which is, as I said, merely an argument from authority.

Reality is important. “Doomsaying” is exactly as dumb as “cheerleading”. Both terms are in quotes because they are derogatory ways of dismissing another’s viewpoint.

That said, yes, I do think many of the cards that have been revealed so far represent substantial power creep. It’s not causing me “anxiety” because frankly, I am not even playing the game right now. If I like how the meta turns out after this expansion I will start playing again. If not, I will probably uninstall and move on.

[persona0]

Well regardless newer players will have a harder time getting into the game because they are new. What cp needs after their mobile release is to get. That adventure mode so newer people can aquire gold quicker to buy packs and such. Really it should have been present before the mobile but hey not a big deal

[eudaimonia]

As others have alluded to, I think it may have been more prudent to address the major concern underlying this ‘anxiety’: power creep. From my understanding of the concept, I don’t see any issue of power creep from the currently revealed cards (i.e. a new card [in-faction] is not invalidating an old card [in-faction] that did see play). However, I do see some highly questionable decisions in regards to costing and rarity (e.g. Enfeeble, which I fully expect to be nerfed to 4 if not 5 mana by the end of Feb.).

Another salient point, doomsaying ≠ critical thinking ≠ optimism, and an appeal to CPG’s design authority does nothing but dismiss the concerns of others (rather than addressing them with reason). CPG has demonstrated its design fallibility many times, especially in their “hyperpolar” response to imbalance (e.g. Kron, Mana Vortex, Time Maelstrom, Shadow Nova, Siphon Energy, Zirix, Kara, etc.). Thus, there is reason to be somewhat wary, not full-on doomsaying, but nonetheless wary.

[thanatos996]

Very much agreed. I’ve suffered through many blatant design issues in the past, and often everyone said ‘That looks OP af’ when the card was revealed, before it was played much, and were later proven undeniably correct (ie old Sunsteel, or old third wish). Other cards were indescriminately hit with nerfs that made them nearly-but-not-quite unplayable, like Kron recently but also Locke, twilight sorcerer, and Mask of Shadows-- though I must say recent nerfs have been far better- lanter fox to 3 health and Skorn nerf, those felt on point.

CPG may not be infallible, but they have always eventually returned Duelyst to an interesting meta, which is reason for confidence-- many games never stayed this playable for this long. For that, I give them benefit of the doubt on this release, with the promise that they’ll have nerfed broken cards by the end of January.

[persona0]

Kron was played In EVERY DECK I came across in my trip from bronze to gold before it was nerfed. That card needed to be nerfed there is no other way around that one.

[cassador]

Yeah because we still lack playable proactive 5-drops till today, but this discussion is pointless.
Anyways, some cards will be broken, others we are now losing our shit over not so much, they will be nerfed end of story. I am not gonna rely on CPGs playtesting, simply because releasing untested shit is a bad habit in the gaming industry as a whole, but till mid january the meta is going to be a total mess anyways, so i am just gonna toy around with the broken shit and be happy. If until then something severely annoys me, i am prolly venture of to gauntlet again, unless thats broken as shit as well.