While the following post is going to be critical, I want to clarify that it is critical out of love. I truly love this game and want it to succeed in a way that surpasses all the developers dreams. The idea behind this game is solid. The possibilities are truly endless.

I'm sure the rest of you have noticed this, but the activity level on TFW is down. It's just about impossible to get a Keep Cards game these days: the usual reason being "I'm waiting for the new set". That's the same reason I hear from the players that would usually be in a Domain.

The Expert Clash, Domain League, Keep Cards, and even sim games are all suffering because people are waiting for the new set.

The first thing is needed is a solid, set, exact, date for the official release of Borderlands. I'm not talking about a alpha, beta, gamma, or delta testing date, but a date when eagerly awaiting world can buy the new cards in packs, in Keep Cards, in Domain, and can play these new lovlies in the EC. I'd be overjoyed to see a month-day-hour-minute-second date set and a countdown on the front page showing us how many days-hours-minutes-seconds are left before we can empty our coffers into the Far Wilds.

Secondly, I'd like to make a suggestion for the next release. I strongly believe the release of a new set will provide more hype, more happiness, more activity, and more money for TFW if it comes on a specific date (announced months before the release) and comes in an already balanced fashion.

This means the pre-balancing (Beta) games need to be played by a dedicated group of players in a closed setting, outside of the public eye. Rumor has it that there weren't many games in the closed-testing this time. Take a look at the active and good players that have participated in the open Beta. Those should be your next closed set testers.

This will allow you to release a balanced set when the hype for it is at a max, and not when it wains for weeks after the "beta" release.

All that said, I can't wait to play Borderlands!

Bring on the Fun! Bring on the Pain! Bring on the Glory! Bring on the Borderlands!

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Altren wrote:

I agree with Keyser, and that's what I'm planning to implement actually.

|| The Rise of the DCC | Plasmatium Netherious | Tastes Like Chicken | The Astridian Conspiracy ||

Guild -> | Platypus Rising|

although my rating has never been steady and I was never one of the top players I have been around for quite a while and i think i have a fair understanding of the game. the way I see it the reason for lack of activity is that there seems to be an inflation of cards and I'm not talking about borderlands. this is very frustrating for alot of players who dont want to spend real money and have to work hard for their cards while playing people who just started and bought their dream deck in a flash. those BTW get board of the game real quick and usually dont stick around. I hope with the new release this also will change and not that i have any ideas on how to do this but the fact is that rare and odd cards are easy to come by if you are willing to invest some cash and it would be nice if a few less players would draw a sequence of very strong cards that are suposed to be hard to come by. maybe not every deck should have an odd and maybe cut down the number of rares in a deck but in any case it shouldnt be this easy to own so many good cards just by buying them

It IS possible to make a good deck with just uncommons and commons. I don't think a single rare or odd is in the deck that Wrath uses -- and he gives just about everyone a run for their money.

I think that having Rare and Odd cards that are valuable and that people want in their deck is a necessary aspect to any CCG.

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Altren wrote:

I agree with Keyser, and that's what I'm planning to implement actually.

|| The Rise of the DCC | Plasmatium Netherious | Tastes Like Chicken | The Astridian Conspiracy ||

Guild -> | Platypus Rising|

A timer would be nice! It would also be nice if we could add a timer of our own that matches the official one on various other forums.

At least we could get people to the website by just having posts saying:

The Expansion is coming! 12:12:12 [and make the timer clickable]

Anyway, yes, the level of activity is down and during European mornings it is so low that it is almost ridiculuos. It is not unsual that there are 5 or less players on at this time. We can talk about balancing issues and the new expansion, but neither of those things will on their own somehow miracuously bring the masses to TFW. Jed mentioned a 'critical mass' of players that needs to be reached. We better talk about how to reach that mass much more!

Cheers!

I totally agree.. the game must reach critical mass.

However, the game must be READY to reach critical mass. There are a few things that need to happen in order to get players to not only show up to check out the game, but also to stay and play the game.

There are those of us who have been bitten by the vampiric addiction of TFW, but many players, even some of the more active players, have now decided to sell their collections and leave.

The game, game management, and game policies need to be in position to keep players. The game concept is very solid. The game management and policies need to be defined in a public fashion, posted, and visible to all -- giving this a much more "official" feel.

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Altren wrote:

I agree with Keyser, and that's what I'm planning to implement actually.

|| The Rise of the DCC | Plasmatium Netherious | Tastes Like Chicken | The Astridian Conspiracy ||

Guild -> | Platypus Rising|

At the risk of making this a Keyser/Voices thread, I must add that I also think that this is what is needed. In fact, this is what I have been urging for some time.

Use the force, jedi jed!

This post tries to tie together my thoughts on several different recent threads. Sorry for the excessive length.
I agree with many, many other players that the biggest problem TFW has is a small player base. Unfortunately, I have no good suggestions on how to get more people to try the game. What I do have is some suggestions on how to alter the battle matching to convince more people to stay once they do try the game and also to increase activity on the game. Most of these have been suggested elsewhere, some too many times to credit. I apologize if anyone thinks I’m trying to steal their ideas; that is not the intent.
First, starting new players at 1300 rating is much too high. To me, a rating of 1300 is somewhere between “really good” and “elite”. I’d suggest 1000 or maybe 1100 at the most.
Second, I think there needs to be three types of standard person vs. person battles: Ladder, Similar Player, and Anyone. Battle matching would be done using the following two criteria:
1. Absolute Value (R-b – R-a) < 300
2. Absolute Value (U-b – U-a) < 75
As the numbers are adjusted upwards, possible matches increase. I would not suggest lowering the matching limits any, but moving them upwards wouldn’t hurt. Increases to the uncertainty matching limit will open up possible matches between experienced and non-experienced players very quickly, though.

The matches would be as follows:
- Ladder: I’d follow Zavia’s suggestions in the Top Players thread (viewtopic.php?f=1&t=1323) for not opening ladder games to any account, except I’d make item 2 five wins against real people and eliminate item 4. Players in the ladder queue can play each other if BOTH Criteria 1 and 2 are met. Games, of course, count towards ladder points and affect a player’s rating and uncertainty.
- Similar Player: Players in the similar queue can play each other if BOTH criteria 1 and 2 are met. Similar games do not count towards ladder points, but do affect a player’s rating and uncertainty.
- Anyone: When a player clicks the Anyone button, a timer starts for that player. My suggested length of the timer is 30 seconds. Before timer expires, players are matched only on Criteria 2 (uncertainty). After the timer expires, players are matched against any available player requesting an Anyone match. I don’t really like the timer, but I think it a good compromise until there are enough players to ensure an Anyone match fairly quickly when one is desired. Hopefully, the timer can one day be eliminated and the Anyone matches will be between people of similar uncertainty. Anyone games do not count towards ladder points, but do affect a player’s rating and uncertainty.
- Games can be played between people in Similar Player and Anyone queues if both criteria are met. This already happens.
- Maybe games between people in Ladder and Similar/Anyone queues can occur if both criteria are met, but only the person in the Ladder queue gets ladder points.

I think the changes will have the following effects and believe them all to be beneficial to the game:
- Dropping the initial rating on new accounts is the easiest way to prevent noobs from getting matched against highly skilled players. It will also prevent ego deflation when noobs see their rating plummet as they start playing real people. This may prevent them from quitting right away.
- It seems as the ladder closing time nears, people play less. I assume this is because they are worried about losing ladder points. Separating ladder from similar will stop this and hopefully make people more willing to play similar. Allowing games between similar and ladder but only giving ladder points to the person in the ladder queue will prevent the number of games being reduced.
- Changing the battle matching will do a few things. It makes it harder for noobs to get matched up against experienced players. It allows players to experiment with new decks and not have it hurt their ladder rating. It slightly opens the window of possible matches that elite players have for getting similar and ladder matches. This means that experienced but non-elite players will be more willing to play elite players in similar games as it doesn’t hurt their ladder rating. It also means they run the risk of getting an elite player in ladder games.

What the exotic beer drinking player just said, but in fewer words. The changes he recommends r/t starting at 1300 and how to change the dynamic of Similar and Ladder games is bodacious! Thanx for the time and energy it took to formulate this plan.

Cordially,

DarkJello

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Ad astra per alia porci!$!

well, said, Ugly Pug!
just one thing; dont forget that the real ranking is counted with substracting the uncertanity from the number before brackets. (Forgot the name, sorry )
So in fact, noobs are starting with their ranking on 950... Not many ppl realize this tho

I think this is only for display purposes. Matching is based on actual ranking.
My rating recently dropped below 1400, and I got matched with (and crushed) two 1300(350) players. I don't think anyone involved enjoyed those games.

I also remember how frustrating it was to start at 1300, then see my rating drop to 1000 or so (which reflected my true ability at the time).

Definitely start players low, maybe as low as 900. There's no harm in having the better beginners climb a bit - the high uncertainty makes them climb rapidly (if they're really better than 900), and also means they don't really affect the ratings of opponent's, anyway.