Let's See If the Designers Are Paying Attention

Personofsecrets

I've already described how the designers didn't seem document a change to the Treasuries card sacrifice effect. For those not in the know, the Treasury used to be able to be used when sacrificing cards from the hand or played cards pile. Now the treasury can only be used when sacrificing cards from the played cards pile. I speculated that this change was done to help new players.

It's also the case that Grandmaster Delmene's Patron ability now says to sacrifice cards from the played cards pile. But how his ability works doesn't actually follow the description since Agents can still be sacrificed as normal with Delmene's Patron ability. Also, cards in hand can no longer be sacrificed with Delemene. That is another seemingly undocumented change and technically a nerf since you may not want to play some cards before sacrificing them in certain corner cases. I've never really liked that Delmen can be used to gain power from sacrificed Agents, but I accept it begrudgingly since players often sacrifice their own agents in a strategic way even though the strategic correct move is often keep them around. Yes even sometimes when they only have one health point left. It's also that this interaction is part of the core game at this point. It's not good, in my opinion, to change fundamental strategic points of a game.

Long story short, Delmene's Patron ability is now incorrectly worded and there are now internal inconsistencies regarding what game pieces can be sacrificed accross all of the different ways that can sacrifice a game piece. So will Delmene be further adjusted, further nerfed? We will find out.

Someone can still mistakenly click on an Agent game piece with a sacrifice effect and have a bad experience. And what about Red Eagle which has cards still able to sacrifice cards in play? Again, players can have a bad experience if they click the wrong thing when they are not paying good attention or misclick. My predictions are as follows.

The Delmene patron effect will have it's coding adjusted so that the current wording of it is correct. Yes, that means that a major use of Delmene, sacrificing Agents, will be removed. I think this because designers do want things to be worded correctly and they typically don't change their ideas. So even though sacrificing Agents has been a fundamental part of Delmene, them doing what they intended to with the most recent update will be prioritized. Remember, they want to make the game easier for low skill or new players. I also don't believe that any additional changes will occur which would make Red Eagle consistent with the Treasury or Delmene. Designers like consistency, but they also like making up reasons as to why certain things don't follow the rules that other things follow. In this case, they could say that sacrificing cards is a fundamental aspect of Red Eagle, so even they they changed the Treasury and Delmene to be more newbie friendly and to be consistent with eachother, they will be fine with Red Eagle as is.

Okay, I know that I sort of went off into fantasy land there, but tell me what you think. Hey designers, I'm a free agent and willing to work for less than you are.

tsaescishoeshiner

I think all they needed to do was make the UI show on the "sacrifice" window whether the card is in your hand or your played pile. IE a little hand or deck icon over the card, or show the window in 2 labeled sections.

rbfrgsp

I think they'll want to retain the sacrifice of agents from Hlaalu because they want each deck to be more or less viable on its own. Hlaalu generates what, one power as a standalone deck? The theme of them as mercenaries and traders is to generate coin, buy people to work for them, and then backstab them when the time is prudent. In fact I'd say that the coin > contract > assassinate play style was the fundamental concept of the Hlaalu deck, so I can't see that going away.

@tsaescishoeshiner has the right idea: just add a visual highlight to the burn/destroy screens. Because you SHOULD be able to burn any card whether in hand or on the played pile. It's a strategy game, and decisions should count for something.

Personofsecrets

rbfrgsp wrote: »

I think they'll want to retain the sacrifice of agents from Hlaalu because they want each deck to be more or less viable on its own. Hlaalu generates what, one power as a standalone deck? The theme of them as mercenaries and traders is to generate coin, buy people to work for them, and then backstab them when the time is prudent. In fact I'd say that the coin > contract > assassinate play style was the fundamental concept of the Hlaalu deck, so I can't see that going away.

@tsaescishoeshiner has the right idea: just add a visual highlight to the burn/destroy screens. Because you SHOULD be able to burn any card whether in hand or on the played pile. It's a strategy game, and decisions should count for something.

I definitely agree with your analysis of Deleme. As mentioned, the wording of the Patron ability is already reworded to only include discarded cards. We should be able to destroy any card, but we have to deal with needless coddling.

SeaGtGruff

I think it was a good idea to limit the sacrifice-for-power, convert-to-writ, and destroy-just-because as they did, because there were times when I wasn't paying attention and sacrificed, converted, or destroyed cards in my hand when I'd really intended to play them. Perhaps there are certain cases where a clever player might want to do that on purpose, but I'll bet those cases are far outnumbered by the times when new or careless players accidentally made a boo-boo.

As for patrons not being in the "played cards" pile, I think it can be argued that they technically are in a manner of speaking, since they've been played (and are still in active play), as opposed to being in the discard pile after having been purchased, or in the draw pile waiting to be drawn, or in your hand waiting to be played.

Personofsecrets

SeaGtGruff wrote: »

but I'll bet those cases are far outnumbered by the times when new or careless players accidentally made a boo-boo.

As for patrons not being in the "played cards" pile, I think it can be argued that they technically are in a manner of speaking, since they've been played (and are still in active play), as opposed to being in the discard pile after having been purchased, or in the draw pile waiting to be drawn, or in your hand waiting to be played.

Your first insight reminds me of the old saying that "a few bad apples spoils the bunch." I'm not saying that anyone is bad and you are right, that is why they changed the Treasury mechanic, but I still can't help but to think about the crabs below preventing their friends crawling out of the pot and escaping. I've already had two instances of not being able to sacrifice cards in my hand that I wanted to sacrifice today.

In one instance I didn't want to play my Ritual Herbs because I didn't want my Eldertide Fenwitch to add a card to my deck. I did want to remove the Ritual Herbs by sacrifice and had no way to without playing it. Yes, I had used the Eldertide Fenwitches ability to generate a gold already. Another instance, I was caused to draw a card by Bloody Offering because I had already purchased a Karth Man-Hunter. After drawing the card, which was a coin, the Man-Hunters effect triggered and I would have wanted to sacrifice the coin that I drew, but was unable to because it was in my hand. Oh well.

You second insight may be a little more controversial. The reason is that because even if you are right in considering the in play area to be a form of "played" cards, the game doesn't universally treat in play cards the same way. So not only is the played cards pile defined as something very specific that doesn't count in play agents, it is the case that the Treasury does not see in play Agents as proper targets for sacrificing. Delmene may, but the Treasury doesn't, so even by your standard there is some ambiguity. Thanks for mentioning this though, it is an interesting point.

PinkApple

I do think there are lots of alternative UI solutions to the problem and that when feasible the developers should avoid removing options.

Whether it's color coding, some sort of icon, or a prompt asking "Are you sure you want to sacrifice this unplayed card", you can protect players from making said mistake while still allowing for the more nuanced plays. Bonus points if you can disable the prompt