Coliseum Updates

For discussion of the Subeta pet site, including new colours and other features.
Huggles
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Re: Coliseum Updates

Post by Huggles »

And now that the new system is official, I'm getting the lower gems off of every battle with the gelatins. So, it really doesn't make any sense now at all for newbie opponents to be giving them out to people who either can't use them or don't need them. I am now officially uninterested.
AngharadTy
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Re: Coliseum Updates

Post by AngharadTy »

So, now that it's abruptly official, what are the stats on those cash shop shields? Are they worth it?
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Re: Coliseum Updates

Post by Sunwolf »

ARGH. Now my Eternal, instead of doing 40 damage like it's supposed to, does 20. TWENTY. Bye, $30!

In fact, it seems that all god weapons have been downgraded.

And Shrines are now useless, but they might come back as normal weapons, which totally defeats the purpose of having a shrine.

Yeah, unimpressed. :x
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Huggles
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Re: Coliseum Updates

Post by Huggles »

My lucent also does only 20 now, instead of 40. If indeed EVERY weapon of that level has been downgraded, then it isn't so horrible because its function is the same relative to the others. Of course, if they're just picking at random...
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Re: Coliseum Updates

Post by AngharadTy »

Yes, all the basic legendaries got downgraded. I think I read that all weapons everywhere had their icon damage reduced. Because... something about not liking one-hit knock-outs, and making PVP less of a lose-on-the-first-turn thing. I dunno.

Also, I've had 200 battles today, and my Aemis with 2 freezing gems has frozen the opponent twice. The second time on battle #200. Hahaha. I was shocked. That's pretty worthless. I realize it's a small chance, blah blah blah, but geez. Aemis is one of the very very few weapons that can even be modified. If there aren't going to be any "better" gems released, then this is... well, I already said it--worthless.

Also, what is 0.5 of an icon? How does that even work?

Y'know, I have several ideas for how to just tighten up the action of battling (e.g., it'd be great if, when you win, there could be a big "YOU WIN" button at the TOP of the page, instead of a small "Game Over" button at the BOTTOM; positive text and not having to page down all the freaking time would be SUPER), but none of my recommendations as a GA member got taken into consideration, so why bother posting again.
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Huggles
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Re: Coliseum Updates

Post by Huggles »

There are lots of other gem cuts that have shown up on Subeta HQ and the search, that have yet to be released. Since you can only fight the gelatins right now, I don't know if they'll be introducing them with each wave or just adding them to the regular opponents.

I think they were really going to completely redo the coliseum, and somewhere along the way decided that that wasn't feasible and went for an update instead. At least, that's the extreme degree of change the word "revamp" and surrounding chatter lead me to think. It's like the gulf of difference between a patch update and a new expansion.
AngharadTy
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Re: Coliseum Updates

Post by AngharadTy »

What irritates me is that they're clearly not done testing it. The news said, "We've finished testing the new Battle Coliseum!" No, you haven't. Obviously, you haven't. There's only one opponent. Something is keeping the others back. Something is still being tested.

I guess it's minor, but being lied to is one of my pet peeves.
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Keith
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Re: Coliseum Updates

Post by Keith »

Nothing is being tested. The others will be added back sometime tonight, once we're sure that there isn't some crazy query that is going to kill the database. I might run through now and readd them :). (also loot tables on some of them are wonky) Edit: Opponents added back :)

As for the shields, you have to remember that all weapons were changed and it was a huge sweeping change. Your shields are still very good because a lot of weapons do far less icons, and there are few less defensive weapons that block everything, or even all of one icon. We wiped out something like 45% of total damage from weapons, and 60% of total defense. That's a huge change, but it's something that happened on all weapons.

Also, this was a huge change. We changed the way that stats work (no more boosts, which was the basis of the old system), we removed a lot of the things that just made battle too easy (reflection), we added a lot of new features (curses, blessings, modifications) and changed a lot of things around.

For the modifications, we're already looking at this. To be completely honest, I feel like 4 sockets is way too many, and I feel uncomfortable that there are so many weapons with that many. I guess if we add one socket to all of the starter weapons, it wouldn't make me feel so strange, but ... that's just how it is now. The reason being that we've currently got 7 tiers of gems (though you can only get one) and by the end that means 7% freezing/healing (or 4.5% stealing) from one. If you put four of them in a weapon, that is 28% healing from one weapon if you manage to get your hand on four tier 7 gems.

Right now we're throwing around ideas on how to manage that going forward, trying to figure out ways to entice people to use certain gems more than others (including a few that we'll be adding for each set soon that do specific things in battle) instead of saying YOU CAN'T DO THAT, we're trying to give alternatives that are a bit more fun.

I don't know if it's been brought up but I saw someone mention that the shrines are useless? They aren't, they have stats, and most of them have really good blessings or curses (depending on the type) that bypass defense completely and can change a long battle for the better.

For things like cash shop items, I'm still looking at them and figuring out if we need to add more modification slots, or special effects like curses/blessings.

I just don't think that this is really equatable to a patch over a complete revamp. We completely redid the entire back system. It's all new code, and it gives us the opportunity to see this kind of feedback (which I read, I promise!) and turn around and change things very easily, and continue to do that moving forward.

The next bit of testing will be soon, and it'll be the multiplayer which will include 2v2 teams :).
Seerow
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Re: Coliseum Updates

Post by Seerow »

Any chance of the old Shrine NPCs popping back up in battle? I loved those.

I wish it was more streamlined/less clicking. I can already chose the battle pet on that first page with all the challengers as well as have a default set of weapons, so why do I have to go through another page to confirm all that? Would it be possible to add a button that makes you go straight to the battle while skipping that extra screen?

And holy crap lotta boxes on said screen! I wonder if there is a way to remove at least the outer one with css.

Edit:
Annnd the hp blue box still isn't rounded for firefox :(
Last edited by Seerow on 17 Mar 2010 04:55 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Keith
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Re: Coliseum Updates

Post by Keith »

The Shrine NPCs will probably come back as opponents sometime in the future (soon!) if we can get some prize item images for them (we have all hands on deck right now for the masquerade) they'll get added then.

As for the skipping the confirmation page, I'll see what I can do :)
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Re: Coliseum Updates

Post by bonecrivain »

Maybe I'm missing something, but I don't understand the crystal system. How do we get the non-tear crystals? Are they from battles, too?
Keith
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Re: Coliseum Updates

Post by Keith »

Right now you can only get the tear crystals. In the future we will be trickling out the other ones in other areas of the site (though mostly through battling).
Huggles
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Re: Coliseum Updates

Post by Huggles »

Well, it's still the basic Neopets system, which is incredibly tedious on its own, much like restocking. It's mostly just mindless clicking until you work your way up to your limit where a few battles with opponents who are markedly better than you, solely because they have higher numbers of X, allow you to interject a bit of strategy into the battle. And if the act itself isn't terribly interesting, then there needs to be more surrounding it to make it worthwhile.

Ichumon has a similar battle mechanics to Neopets and Subeta, but they use a lot more rpg elements to make much more interesting. Instead of just fighting NPCs via a dropdown menu, you are out exploring the world and fighting random battles with monsters. You click around a map similar to NeoQuest, which helps flesh out the world more by giving you a chance to actually see where you're fighting. You can even form parties to take on Bosses with other users.There are quests to pick up from NPCs that give you a reason to go out and fight. Monsters drop items and money, and also give experience to increase the fighting capabilities of your pet. If you want quick fights without having to click your way through the rpg/mostly single player experience, you can go head to head directly against other players.

They've implemented many of the features I've always complained about other sites not having. Even so, there's still a lot left to be desired. The art is a bit dodgy at times and lacks a consistent style. The battle interface is still clunky and awkward, and needs much more polish. There's no armor, no weapons customization, and no fighting styles. I'm not sure if there a any species abilities like on Neopets, which function like added weapons akin to Subeta's scrolls, but there definitely aren't any classes or roles. That isn't necessarily a bad thing, but this isn't a 3d fps where there's a visceral difference between using one weapon over another. I'd like to see basic classes which determine what types of damage and weapons you use, and how you defeat opponents. There's no healers or tanks or spies or heavies. There's no long range or close range or AoE classes or even attacks like in NeoQuest 2. There's no differentiation between species. Should my alien squirrel really be as physically strong as my T-Rex? Should my tiny armed T-Rex be able to even use a gun or a sword? ? Can the environment I'm fighting in affect the outcome of my battle? Are certain enemies or pets stronger during the day or night? Are arrows less effective when fighting in a land filled with windstorms? Does a fighting midair leave you open to the possibility of falling to your doom? Do I need an aquatic pet or scuba gear to fight underwater? Does being underwater mean that I'm better off trying to cut my enemies rather than trying to punch them? There's a whole possible array of options left to be explored.

Story is also a big missing feature. While the Subetapedia did help to provide some more in-depth features about the world, it also suffers from tl;dr syndrome in the form of a giant info dump. A more expansive battle system would give you more chances to show us what the world is all about instead of just telling us. I'll be the first person to tell you that fighting battles in Neopets' wars, which were ostensibly the only time you were really rewarded for all your mindless clicking, were not fun. But, I like many others, slogged right on through because they were the biggest and more memorable outlets involving us in the story of that world. Not much changed about how the battles went down, but we got to follow along the ineffable Plot with comics and movies and interact with some of our favorite characters. Heck, those were the times we actually got to see NPCs develop into characters.

So, yeah. I'm not sure what exactly I was expecting, but certainly not just a less glitched and less clunky version of the same old thing. That's NICE and I appreciate the effort. But, I've been there done that over the past 11 years of browser gaming and it's just not terribly enticing.
AngharadTy
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Re: Coliseum Updates

Post by AngharadTy »

Yes. What Huggles said.

Completely recoding it from the ground up is great. But you know, from a user point of view, it's not impressive. I mean, I know how much work that entails, or at least I can guess. But functionally, except for making it easier to choose weapons and spells (which is a definite plus), it's pretty much the same.

Yeah, things do different amounts of damage. There are extra "frills" like infrequent curses (still don't know how to cause them) and mysterious images that appear (some kind of soulstone kept appearing under my pet; a curse? who knows! I sure don't). Stats are somehow applied "differently." There are crystals you can apply to a select few weapons. This is all edging. It's all frilly borderwork. The core, the guts, the way you play--basically identical. The items I was using before are the items I'm using now. So, yeah. This does not feel like a completely new system. Because, to a user, it really, really isn't. It's the same old system, tightened up in places and with a couple extra things stuck to it. Click, choose. Click click, choose. Click, win. Rinse, repeat, pass out on keyboard.

Also, you say that shrines have stats and do things. How the hell is a player supposed to know? My shrine is one of several items with no explanatory text in its hover tooltip. Great, it's once per battle. That's... all I get to know? I either have to test extensively on my own, or dig up something about it on the subeta forums, hoping that account is accurate? It'd be great if we could actually tell what things do. Yes, there is always a degree of "play and find out" (and most gamers hate to hear PAFO from a dev). Completely blank tooltip? That's beyond "frustrating," into "not reassuring," and bordering on "alarming." Same with the mystery soulstone image I mentioned. There's no label, hovertext, anything. So who knows what it means!

So yes--like Huggles said, I appreciate the work and the ways the battle system is better now. But it's not a massive overhaul, it's not more interesting, and it's nothing to write home about. The only reason I spent so much of today battling was so that I could get the exp for a bunch of my pets so that I could make them better so that I could do better in whatever war-like plot we have later. It wasn't because it was fun. It wasn't bad, either. It was a pretty neutral way to spend my day.
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Rakumel
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Re: Coliseum Updates

Post by Rakumel »

I'm actually about to leave in a few minutes, so I'm writing this in a hurry and it probably won't make a whole lot of sense. I'll fix it later if so.

I like some of the new features, especially the armory. And when I heard that there would be a weapons customization system in place, that really piqued my interest. I restocked a few materials, made a few of the cheaper swords, and even went ahead and forged one of the Flame of Red Rreign items with the expectation of being able to play around with its stats. I even had plans to start training 3 more of my pets and looked forward to tailor-making weapons that actually suited their fighting style, instead of, say, having my archer settle for using a sword because all the bow and arrow sets suck in actual combat. You can't imagine how disappointed I was to find that only the high-end weapons were able to be customized, and only a little bit at that.

This is NOT primarily a weapons customization system, is it? This is primarily a system to discourage users from lending weapons. Which is fine, I don't care as I won't be battling much after all. I'll just stick to training only Valtam as usual, in case some plot thing comes up. And hope I can sell the whole mess of gems I just aquired. :(
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