Hi Everyone,
Thanks for having a constructive and frank conversation while respecting each other's opinions I can appreciate a good read on feedback and observations from players when there's level-headed discussions about the topic at hand, of which there are several here. So let me take a moment to address some of them with you all.
- How do you see Alliance and Skirmish? Are they separate games that can(and should) provide separate experiences
Essentially yes they are designed as two separate experiences. The main goal was to provide an easy means for players to hop between the two modes for different and varied game experiences. Although there are several mechanics that link the two together and would be interpreted as a single game in this way the design has generally been predicated on creating two separate experiences. The convenience of hopping between the two is a strength in the game we wanted to draw on.
- Can the numbers and mechanics differ between the two? Will you try to unify them or keep them separate?
Ideally we want to keep content for both game modes as synchronous as possible since it'll make the back end work a bit easier, its rather complicated setting up two separate parameters for each mode since there are many aspects of the game and information that link themselves to one another. There are of course some exceptions that we can make but we try to minimise it as much as possible since the unified method works in a much more streamlined fashion.
- How do you see the competitive play? Is it something rudimentary or is it the central pillar of the community?
Some of you have known me to have been pretty heavily involved with this area for some time prior to joining Muse so I have a vested interest in cultivating it. Its also important to remember that a vast majority of players are not competitive and for all the various features we have in the game we wanted to accommodate for all kinds of player demographics. Naturally I feel events and competitions are a healthy part of this whole process and I want to do whatever we can to build on this. I've been listening very carefully to various players and following threads on features and formats that can for example, improve the lobby and in-game process of hosting an event match. Several of these features are definitely on the to-do list when we can prioritise those, it goes without saying that the feeling 'they're not listening to us' seems to take shape in some people's minds but as a player, and now a dev team member, I can say that this is far from the truth. There's just a lot of big milestones for us to cover but I anticipate seeing these features come to fruition in time.
So to answer your question the competitive scene is more than a rudimentary function since they play an integral part for their own bit in how our balances play out in high-level play but also in community participation and events. Its also fair to say that as much as this aspect of the community holds a fair bit of importance in matters pertaining to the game it is also not a central pillar since as a whole there are other demographics and categories that together are central to the community.
- Related to the previous question, which audience is the game balanced for? New players? Competitive players? Casuals?
Everyone really. There's no group that takes greater precedence over the others but we so keep in mind changes and track and observe how it affects each demographic so we can tweak any changes for improvements to the game; In that way it can accommodate for many demographics.
As an example demographic from the previous question, I would generally model competitive players as the most flexible since they tend to be the quickest adapters to metas and trends. Despite any impassioned beliefs about any one build, ship, gun, etc. in any which way these players feel is right or wrong the fact is, this group can identify key strengths and weaknesses in the game and contribute just as much data for us as the brand new players learning the interface and the basics of gameplay.
- Are new game mechanics planned? Is proposing a new mechanic valid feedback or will it be scraped as being too low ROI?
Yes and absolutely send your ideas in! We didn't introduce game mechanics like VIP Death-match without a lot of references to events hosted and player feedback to make it happen.
- What is the general balance strategy? The current devapp tests are not enough for thoroughly testing things, so it's either greatly increasing the quality and quantity of those, or just stuffing things onto the live server and doing the balance later. This could be pretty important for the competitive community.
We carry out some internal testing of content but we also host public testing each week for players to voluntarily participate in (although I definitely encourage more of you to join in on it if you want to help us craft the features a bit) from there we go through every single feedback email and report we document from these sessions. Sometimes we'll get feedback from players who do it in their own time which is totally acceptable data to look at. We'll have meetings and discussions over this kind of material so you can bet it's being looked at.
Now with that said it is harder to really gauge how a gun or ship tweak, new map or entirely new feature will do when we do add it to the retail version of the game, when thousands more players tinker with them. Especially since small testing groups (our team and players who voluntarily test this material in Dev App each week) can only sample so much data and by introducing it to the game we can, at times, suddenly find ourselves looking at unique circumstances that were not so easily discovered in the testing regiment, of which we take more feedback and examine changes and adjustments that need to be made.
I really can't stress how important it is for us to get player feedback when we look at all this data, even if you feel like your opinion wasn't heard it was certainly observed and examined in the broader determination of crafting the feature so your thoughts carry an influence on the design one way or another. Let me also stress how useful it is to get more of that feedback from more players, like the more the better. Emails from 50 people is nice but from 200 or 400 man, that's some expanded data we can draw on and it really helps in sampling more of it for the sake of improve the game to thresholds that feel good and solid.
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Hopefully that has provided you some insights on the questions you had. I am also aware that some of you feel frustrated by discussions you have in the player council. Remember you can always email those ideas to us too no matter how radical they may be. I want to make sure all of your thoughts reach our team members so they can see what you guys have come up with.
Also let me add that if testing times need to be adjusted to accommodate more people this is totally doable. Just provide us an idea on what you guys feel works well with your schedules. This current time frame we host is mean to accommodate both American and European players (we try to cover the other time zones but it can be pretty challenging with our time resources).
Our team is watching and reading so keep us informed, and again you can always reach out to any of us if you have something you want to share more directly. Thanks for taking the time in reading all this I look forward to seeing what improvements we can make with this understanding.
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