Improve the weapon system

[fleet token]

PROBLEM

The current weapon system forces you to be flexible between games, because you cannot effectively play your favorite comp with any weapon.
It also prevents you from being flexible during a game, because you cannot predict what weapon will be offered to you.

This frustrates rigid players who just want to play their favorite comps every time, and the game shouldn't force them to change their playstyle.
It also frustrates flexible players who cannot pivot the way they want, they cannot even prepare a pivot not knowing what choice will be offered.

SOLUTION

The ideal would be to build our own weapon at round 6 or so by choosing the exact class and affinity we want.
Then offer another full choice at round 13 and round 20 for example.
We get our weapon round 6 because it's a choice that flexible players make based on their shop and lobby so it shouldn't come too early.

This way nobody is forced to be flexible inter-game, and we gain more flexibility intra-game.

POTENTIAL OBJECTIONS

"Where’s the randomness?"
→ Randomness comes from amplifications.

"What if one weapon is OP?"
→ That’s a balance issue, solved with hotfixes.

“Isn’t this too much freedom, making weapons irrelevant?”
→ No. Weapons still define middle and late-game direction, but now players aren't locked out by bad RNG.

"The ranger will look lame without any weapon for 6 rounds."
→ Either give it a good default weapon and suit or make the ranger join the game at round 6 instead of round 1.

"The game will be boring because everyone will play the same comps"
→ That's a balance issue, if rigid players cannot play the way they want they will not adapt, they will just uninstall the game. TFT allows you to play whatever you want and the game is successful.

PS: Since this is an NFT game, players naturally want to use their own assets. Forcing rigid players into comps they don’t want makes the problem worse because it prevents them from playing their favorite illuvials.

[short night]

I agree that it could be less rigid than it is right now. But I don't agree with effectively removing the important decision making process entirely. Having more insight into what options will come for your pivot later could be good. Or having 1 additional option when initially choosing your weapon could be good too

[fleet token]

This new system doesn't remove important decision making, in a comp there are several composite choices and the best one depends on your lobby if the game is balanced enough

[floral bough]

Thumbs up as i think its a good idea for the team to consider. Can you elaborate on why we would need to wait till round 12 and not an earlier round? even as early as round 4 as an example

[hollow lark]

Quickest bandaid fix: turn first weapon reroll on round 10~ or close to that into the same kind of paid reroll as suits, offer another one at round 20-25, you've basically soft solved every problem except the part where you'll have the whole lobby go the same 1-3 weapons.

Time commitment fix: weaken the power of most weapons so that ranger is at most a soft unit, not a carry -> when ranger is your main unit or top 3 and you spent 0 on it and you compare it to an octius or synalph and it's just way stronger that's not gonna make sense.
At the same time compare the gold values/dmg/effective hp values of 4x composites and how hard it is to achieve them. As Fox says it makes no sense that revenants which is one of the easiest composite to get is also the strongest and a 5 cost 3 star requiring composite is way worse.

Biggest problem in the game right now is that player agency is gated behind too many things outside its control: round 2 weapon straight up dictates your whole game at least half the games and im very generous here. The round 2 weapon alone just gatekeeps the shop, you can't just play what you hit, you need to find the units that go with the weapon, and this is my biggest bad feeling generating thing in the whole game, the shop should be above everything, what your shops give you should determine most of your game because anything else than this makes the game extremely frustrating and coinflippy.

Composite crates are way too common, imo if the majority of games you had to assemble plug and play boards with 2-3 synergies instead of 3 the game would be better than if you're always chasing 4x.

Also for the love of god stop offering composite emblems on carousel please.

As it stands currently playing flex is not a thing, an ideal state should allow you to play the units you hit not roll dozens of gold to hit a 2 star 1 cost or your comp straight up can't function. (This doesn't mean literally make the most random board with the units you hit, but if im on my lvl 7 rolldown with a board inclined to let's say corner psions and i hit a fernite and a phosphorus and maybe a ryplance at that point i should be able to confortably play fighters not hate my life because there's no way to play these units because i had to commit on round 2.)

[fleet token]

Because usually there are early game comps that are better than others so if you get to choose your weapon round 4 and you are a flexible player, what will you choose?

You are probably always going to choose the same weapon to play the best early game comp or the most flexible because you don't have enough information to make you choose something else instead

If round 12 is too late for the first weapon we can start earlier of course, I chose round 12 because it's a PvE round and usually players have a clear direction by then

It could be round 6 --> round 13 --> round 20

I just edited the post because round 12 for the 1st weapon is too late I agree

[grizzled otter]

for current weapon system, i can play different every game, based of weapon i got.
with different weapon you have 3-5 different comps you can play, and with most of them, if you know strong/weak part you can win, got top-4 at lest.
yes, some weapon/synergy undertuned now, but 1 day we got good balance of synergys/weapons in game.
every gam now different for me, and i whanna play more and more to test different builds, find best match-up against other different weapon.
if it will be not random, meta of the game become even worst.
people will play only with 2-3 weapons which best, then everyone start spam same comp.
my opinion - it's should be random in the game, otherwise after 20 games it's become even more boried play it, that now.

[fleet token]

This is not casual player friendly and if you want to pivot into a certain comp but your current weapon doesn't allow it you have to be lucky

TFT has no weapon system that forces flexibility inter-game and yet they still manage to hook millions of players

[hollow lark]

tft has the devs play the game every patch for a lot of games that's the biggest difference

[fleet token]

We have Sl1ckz that can advise them

[hollow lark]

it's not the same thing, devs don't understand how fucked things are from just being told

[grizzled otter]

it's why everyone tell about rev meta and they 1 month not fix them? xD

[fleet token]

Well they need to listen to him

[hollow lark]

ye that's a lot of delay, if tft dev plays a game and something's completely not right next day he goes and hotfixes it

[grizzled otter]

i agree, they need person who will play game, and not just look from the side.
then probably balance in game will be better.

[hollow lark]

they have nil, but then they have to listen to him and that's the problem

[grizzled otter]

in dota or wow, if some kind of bug/OP finded, if it's owerpowered, it's got fixed also in 1-2 day

[floral bough]

yea that makes sense

[grizzled otter]

he not play game.
and now he develop ow mmo.

[dim jacinth]

Ill thumbs up it because it's worth looking into!

I would add that this may remove frustration with the rng, but the cost may be even more people playing the same lists repetitively and a less interesting game play

[hollow lark]

you will never truly have a game where people don't play the same things over and over, the problem now is that it's always 1 comp instead of 3-5

[limber dune]

Hi, I agree that the weapon system needs improvement. My suggestion would be a change that would eliminate randomness, give the player more control over his gameplay and be super friendly to newcomers. The idea is something like picking 3 weapons before queuein up for a game. Weapons would be exchangable antytime thought the game. This would;

• eliminate 3 pop up screens, which we have TONS and interrupt game experience
• reduce game time, around 40 to 50 mins per game is way too much
• give newcomers the change to stick to a basic build until they learn more about the game
• add strategies to change weapong through eraly, mid or late game.
• remove one source of rng which we also have way too much.

Let me know what you think. cheers

also you could showcase your weapon of choosing along the character and drone skins in queue, and it would add to every players ''style''.

[inland bluff]

@fleet token Hi, my friend. Sorry, but I like the current weapon system.
I think it’s great.

[fleet token]

In TFT they play the comp that they want and they have millions of players and a rather successful competitive scene

[fleet token]

I like the idea but it doesn't solve the problem of not being able to pivot the way we want because of bad luck

[fleet token]

Even if you like it, is preventing players from playing what they want good for the game?

[limber dune]

doesnt it? you basically know the 3 weapons you take with you, so the pivots you are able to do are actually fixed from the start. And you'd be able to swich weapons/pivot at any time

[fleet token]

Oh I get what you mean now, I like the idea as a rigid player but some more flexible players will want to be able to have a wider choice than 3 weapons

[inland bluff]

Yes, I think it’s actually good to put players within some small limits.
It forces them to learn and use new builds.

I didn’t like the previous weapon system — the limits were too strict.
I really like the current system.

I think it’s well balanced now.

[hollow lark]

main reason to pivot is your shops don't match your weapon, if you somehow have a 3 weapon combination that can just match any shop then everyone's just gonna take those, which im not against compared to what we have now, but if 3 weapons are not enough to cover all comps then nothing changes from live.

[fleet token]

I think that rigid players will just uninstall the game if they cannot play what they want and flexible players cannot even pivot the way they want

[limber dune]

it would really add to the personality and gameplay style. If you are a rouge player then you can take a slayer, vanguard and rev weapons for example. If you lets say are more of a defensive or mage style you'd take harbringer, invoker, colosus weapons. Combine them as you want, either more agressive pivots or more controlled ones.
You will also be able to play different type of games if you get bored, switching strategies.

[limber dune]

yes excatly that would be the only downside. Still 3 pivots is a decent amount, and if you need to pivot outside of that for some reason well we could add that choice at the expense of an item for example. Add a defensive augment to a weapon to change its affinity or something. That extra pivot should have a price imo

[fleet token]

I don't think that pivoting should be expensive considering that being flexible has an inherent price in the form of not picking the best items for your final comp and not picking the right units right from the beginning

[limber dune]

I can see that. But im sure theres a solution for it that just needs a little bit more thought. Going back to the main ideas upsides, like less time, less pop up screens, less rng, more player agency and personality specially being able to have an idea which kind of game you want to play from the get go.. etc. I think its better in many ways

a fix to that problem could be using a similar aproach to suits, and combine them

have suits add to the element, weapons add to the affinity. Then with 3 suits and 3 weapons you have 9 different combinations

[fleet token]

I prefer your idea over the current system but I still think that being able to build our weapon the way we want something like round 6-13-20 is better because in your system we cannot effectively adapt to our shop early game
For instance if you pick a fighter weapon but you have a psion/empath/tank start then having this weapon is frustrating

The weapon should not come too early so that we can adapt to our shop at least

[limber dune]

yes indeed adaptability to early game is VERY important, i guess the idea need a bit more thought. I just really, really dont like the generic ''ok here are options pick one'' kind of thing without any conection or relevance to the player or game. Hope we can change the current system soon

keep in mind you would have 3 weapons to chose from from the start. Like, you would start with all 3 wapons available and be able to switch them every round

[fleet token]

I think that it would add too much complexity unfortunately, the skill floor is already too high so we can't afford this kind of things imo