Tales of Tribute - game is TERRIBLE for new players. What is even going on?

tahol10069

Dahveed wrote: »

Just an update on this absolutely ATROCIOUS new player experience:

I'm trying to do the daily for 3 wins against other opponents. I still only have the 2 starting decks. and I keep selecting the "casual" (non-ranked) option.

I'm getting absolutely decimated on a regular basis. I think my record is something like 4 wins and 30 losses. About half my losses aren't even remotely competitve: The final score is something like 52-7 or something.


This is absurd.

People playing casual pvp ToT are not casual players, they are very experiensed players. They play casual because it does not affect their placement in the ranked, and they probably have a high ranking place since the beginning of the season.

You will get easier opponents on the ranked side, low level players there are not that good. I'm speaking from experience here, I've been once where you are now. Also, train against experienced NPC-player. If you can't beat them, you will have trouble against any human player, unless they are totally clueless (some are, but it is a toss if you encounter enough of them to get your wins). NPC players make stupid moves because computer has limited ability to read the game, human opponents make mistakes but read game much better and if they have any experience, they can predict your moves.

M0ntie

Hamish999 wrote: »

"Tales of Tribute - game is TERRIBLE"

You could have left the whole first comment as just that.

I came here to say just this.
Did one game to stop the NPC harassing me and never again. It was incomprehensible what you were supposed to do. And very boring.

ADarklore

What's interesting, is that ZOS is even aware of the complicated nature of this game, and when it was originally in PTS, they were looking for YouTube videos that helped explain it so they could turn players to for reference. I mean seriously, if you have to go to outside sources for help to explain your own game mechanic, that's pretty bad.

BXR_Lonestar

TBH, I tried Tales of Tribute when I started doing the High Isle quest and even starting off, the game makes zero sense and it feels very random whether you win or lose a round. I wish for quest purposes the first time you tried it you would automatically win, and then I wouldn't have to play it again. As it stands now, I've accepted that I will never have that quest marker completed.

jlmurra2

I have yet to play it. If I wanted to play a card game I would do so, instead of playing ESO.

vuwuv

NPCs are extremely bad at this game (though they can still win with Orgnum and some decent luck) and that is intentional so an average player could win games against them. As for PVP, the player base is kinda small and shrinking, so you will get a lot of experienced opponents and a lot of frustration.

MercilessnVexed

I don't even bother with Tales of Tribute. Ridiculous extras don't make a game better.

virtus753

vuwuv wrote: »

NPCs are extremely bad at this game (though they can still win with Orgnum and some decent luck) and that is intentional so an average player could win games against them. As for PVP, the player base is kinda small and shrinking, so you will get a lot of experienced opponents and a lot of frustration.

Part of the problem with NPC AI is that Novices are markedly harder than Proficient NPCs, ever since the AI overhaul.

Proficient NPCs routinely make mistakes in terms of which patron to use when, which cards to sacrifice or buy, etc. I see them make these mistakes much more often than Novices. Some of them made quite the gaffes yesterday when I was playing.

Yet new players have to make it through the higher difficulty “Novices” to get to an easier difficulty. I don’t blame players for finding that a turn off, especially if they figure (logically so) that it should only get harder from there.

Taril

virtus753 wrote: »

vuwuv wrote: »

NPCs are extremely bad at this game (though they can still win with Orgnum and some decent luck) and that is intentional so an average player could win games against them. As for PVP, the player base is kinda small and shrinking, so you will get a lot of experienced opponents and a lot of frustration.

Part of the problem with NPC AI is that Novices are markedly harder than Proficient NPCs, ever since the AI overhaul.

Proficient NPCs routinely make mistakes in terms of which patron to use when, which cards to sacrifice or buy, etc. I see them make these mistakes much more often than Novices. Some of them made quite the gaffes yesterday when I was playing.

Yet new players have to make it through the higher difficulty “Novices” to get to an easier difficulty. I don’t blame players for finding that a turn off, especially if they figure (logically so) that it should only get harder from there.

I've not really noticed that.

Novices still make tons of mistakes. Sacrificing their good cards, using patrons terribly (Like using Crow patron with 1 gold), buying bad cards etc.

I think the major thing that makes Novice seem more difficult is that the basic starter decks have much less room for self-sabotage (AI will wipe their own board of agents with Alessia, will remove their good cards with Red Eagle, spam Hermaeus cards to buff you etc) as well as Pelin + Hlaalu working well with the default AI logic of "Spend gold on the highest cost card"

Essentially, coming down to "The starter decks are so newb friendly, that pleb AI can still pilot them somewhat effectively"

Personofsecrets

AzuraFan wrote: »

SeaGtGruff wrote: »

I knew my opinion would be an unpopular one, but I'll repeat again that I did NOT say it IS cheating, I said it SMELLS LIKE cheating to me.

I've only played once against a human, but I didn't even know you could peek at the other player's cards. It would have never occurred to me to do so, because yeah, in any serious card game, it would be cheating.

In card games, you usually have to rely on your memory if you want to keep track of what an opponent has played or discarded. It's part of the challenge of the game. But that's the problem. It's a challenge. So in ToT, the game lets you peek. Often in digital games, these types of easy mode features are present to make the game more accessible, which is understandable.

Another reason it might be there for ToT is that the interface is just so bad that it would be difficult to keep track of what's being played and discarded - as the subject of this thread states. So even if you were up to the challenge, you wouldn't be able to do it because stuff just flashes by too quickly.

So I'd just go with the flow and peek, even though it will feel wrong. It's not wrong for ToT - just easy.

Given the point of the topic, which is that the UI lacks basic information regarding game actions taken by the opponent, peeking is the next best thing.

One may not have the list of game actions that show a card was played, but they can see if the card is in the cooldown pile to understand if they just missed it being played or not. It's also the case that the Almalexia patron discards cards without revealing those cards - the only way to see what card the opponent discards from their hand to use it's effect and the only way to see the card that was placed in ones deck to the cool down pile via its effect is through peeking.

Maybe the game could be made to just show the card, as it seems more fair to show players cards that are sent to the cool down pile, but such possibility is reaching even further into unliklihood of what will happen with TOT.

Peeking isn't going to be changed. Many powerful cards aren't even balanced in a way to make the game less of a casual experience. Some game piece text, such as the Delmene, is still written in misleading ways. There is also the issue of time abuse trolls that should be addressed and hasn't been over the years. Peeking can get in line behind the more important game aspects.

Personofsecrets

dk_dunkirk wrote: »

ToT is a pretty direct takeoff of a real deck-building game called Dominion. (Maybe that's already been mentioned, and I missed it.) If you can learn to play Dominion, you can play ToT. That being said, sticking it in a video game like this is kind of like Gwent from The Witcher 3, which I'm sure people have talked about. I hate that game. It's not nearly as fair as ToT. However, I don't think either belong in a fantasy RPG.

THAT being said, hiding achievements FOR OTHER THINGS behind this mini game is achingly terrible game design, and cruel to people who hate this slog, and would otherwise just ignore it. People drawn to a complex game like ESO with thousands of achievements and collectibles tend towards OCD. IMO, ZOS is abusing us by doing this. I think each of these new, broad systems, like ToT, IA, and each zone, ought to be discrete in their achievements.

Be careful ZOS, once you squeeze someone with OCD too hard, and they're forced to abandon the 100%, they'll just quit. But, hey, almost nothing from these forums makes a dent in the game, so who am I kidding?

Not only are achievements locked behind TOT, but in order to finish the achievements, completing card morphs are required. Completing those card morphs can give players a SEVERE strategic disadvantage when playing TOT. The morphs fundamentally change how the game is played.

That's all to say that even players who enjoy TOT and take it seriously have negative incentives for completing the achievements. This part of TOT really is poorly designed and is terribly disappointing.

And yea, there are definitely players who can get tweaked to the point of not wanting to play if there is some game aspect that is too inaccessible. For example, Party Clown was a relatively expensive card from The Spoils card game which players could use any number of copies of. When I saw that I'd have to get a bunch of copies of that single card, I just decided to only play with the Base Set and First Edition. Though, I suppose, that new people are still starting ESO. Some even do quite well with their new accounts. I have no idea how anyone looks at everything in the game and figures that they can catch up.

Lyraen_Skyforge

ToT (I have played a lot now) is as much about random luck as it is skill. Over 50% of game outcome is related to RNG for both players.

Personofsecrets

RomanRex wrote: »

ToT (I have played a lot now) is as much about random luck as it is skill. Over 50% of game outcome is related to RNG for both players.

How do I have a 91% win rate after thousands of games?

Lyraen_Skyforge

Personofsecrets wrote: »

RomanRex wrote: »

ToT (I have played a lot now) is as much about random luck as it is skill. Over 50% of game outcome is related to RNG for both players.

How do I have a 91% win rate after thousands of games?

i’m talking PvP. you have a 91% win for PvP?

Eliahnus

Every ToT player was a 'new' ToT player once...
Once you get the hang of it, you will notice that novice NPC players make very silly mistakes and hence they can very easily be beaten.
And no, it is not necessary at all to count the cards.

Personofsecrets

RomanRex wrote: »

Personofsecrets wrote: »

RomanRex wrote: »

ToT (I have played a lot now) is as much about random luck as it is skill. Over 50% of game outcome is related to RNG for both players.

How do I have a 91% win rate after thousands of games?

i’m talking PvP. you have a 91% win for PvP?

RomanRex wrote: »

Personofsecrets wrote: »

RomanRex wrote: »

ToT (I have played a lot now) is as much about random luck as it is skill. Over 50% of game outcome is related to RNG for both players.

How do I have a 91% win rate after thousands of games?

i’m talking PvP. you have a 91% win for PvP?

Yes, originally I made a thread about win rates last year in December.

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/649312/general-thoughts-on-a-ninety-percent-win-rate-and-the-path-there#latest

I achieved a 90% win rate in casual and an 80% win rate in ranked. If you view the thread, then you'll see that my post in December was a review of my progress after a snapshot in the prior August. I'll repost the relevant pictures.

August 2023



December 2023



November 2024



As you see, after an additional year of time, I was able to add nearly a percent to my unranked play (this has hit actual 91% before today) and I was able to add several more percent to my ranked play.

And just to be clear, the unranked play stat is PVP. It's against real humans via the unranked que. Presumably, they want to win when they play TOT. So please reconcile how my findings are possible.

Personofsecrets

Also, please note. If you look at just the games I've played since December, which is a more accurate representation of my current play rather than historical play, then I have a 91.5% win rate in unranked over 1613 games and a 86.7% win rate in ranked over 924 games. That is to say that there is only a 4.8% difference in my chances to win a game between the unranked and ranked PVP.

Lyraen_Skyforge

Personofsecrets wrote: »

RomanRex wrote: »

Personofsecrets wrote: »

RomanRex wrote: »

ToT (I have played a lot now) is as much about random luck as it is skill. Over 50% of game outcome is related to RNG for both players.

How do I have a 91% win rate after thousands of games?

i’m talking PvP. you have a 91% win for PvP?

RomanRex wrote: »

Personofsecrets wrote: »

RomanRex wrote: »

ToT (I have played a lot now) is as much about random luck as it is skill. Over 50% of game outcome is related to RNG for both players.

How do I have a 91% win rate after thousands of games?

i’m talking PvP. you have a 91% win for PvP?

Yes, originally I made a thread about win rates last year in December.

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/649312/general-thoughts-on-a-ninety-percent-win-rate-and-the-path-there#latest

I achieved a 90% win rate in casual and an 80% win rate in ranked. If you view the thread, then you'll see that my post in December was a review of my progress after a snapshot in the prior August. I'll repost the relevant pictures.

August 2023



December 2023



December 2024



As you see, after an additional year of time, I was able to add nearly a percent to my unranked play (this has hit actual 91% before today) and I was able to add several more percent to my ranked play.

And just to be clear, the unranked play stat is PVP. It's against real humans via the unranked que. Presumably, they want to win when they play TOT. So please reconcile how my findings are possible.

I don’t put stock in your stats to be fair. The ranked maybe, but definitely not casual. Sorry. Your causal stats are high because you are playing people who just want a daily and don’t even know how to play. Not because of some amazing skill.

Most people only play a couple times casually then move back to the real game once they get whatever was locked behind playing ToT.

Let’s see you play a real tournament against other people who play the game and know what they are doing. You won’t have nearly as high of a rating. Stomping casuals who never play isn’t really winning.

My guess if most humans don’t care enough about this game and if they win. I have never played a ranked game and never will.
Only casual and I don’t really care if I win because I despise ToT.

Lots of players don’t care enough to learn the game and play against players. I definitely don’t and am guessing 99% of ESO players really don’t like this mini-game.

It is low skill and decided (at least in part) by RND.

vuwuv

RomanRex wrote: »

I don’t put stock in your stats to be fair. The ranked maybe, but definitely not casual. Sorry. Your causal stats are high because you are playing people who just want a daily and don’t even know how to play. Not because of some amazing skill.

Most people only play a couple times casually then move back to the real game once they get whatever was locked behind playing ToT.

Let’s see you play a real tournament against other people who play the game and know what they are doing. You won’t have nearly as high of a rating. Stomping casuals who never play isn’t really winning.

My guess if most humans don’t care enough about this game and if they win. I have never played a ranked game and never will.
Only casual and I don’t really care if I win because I despise ToT.

Lots of players don’t care enough to learn the game and play against players. I definitely don’t and am guessing 99% of ESO players really don’t like this mini-game.

It is low skill and decided (at least in part) by RND.

A lot of pro players play casual matches, there were days when I only got top 100 guys in casual. From my experience I might say that skill decides A LOT in this game. If it wasn't so, we wouldn't be talking about noobs. Randomness factor may be frustrating, but not that many matches are so one-sided. Also psychological state matters, even for pro players.

Lyraen_Skyforge

Flouting casual win rates when most people who cue for casual play don’t know what they are doing is not a flex. The ranked W/L is a better metric, but skewed.

My point is this, most players will never care enough to learn the small portion of the game that is skill. ToT is boring and most people who want to play ESO don’t want to play a RNG card game.

If you want to flout the win rates the only one that really matters is ranked and I would guess even some of those players don’t fully take time to learn it. The game isn’t entertaining enough to draw a big enough player pool to flex win %’s. It’s largely random and luck.

Lyraen_Skyforge

Also, if you pull out conceded matches because people leave when they see they have zero clue how to win… the number would drop a ton.

Personofsecrets

RomanRex wrote: »

Flouting casual win rates when most people who cue for casual play don’t know what they are doing is not a flex. The ranked W/L is a better metric, but skewed.

My point is this, most players will never care enough to learn the small portion of the game that is skill. ToT is boring and most people who want to play ESO don’t want to play a RNG card game.

If you want to flout the win rates the only one that really matters is ranked and I would guess even some of those players don’t fully take time to learn it. The game isn’t entertaining enough to draw a big enough player pool to flex win %’s. It’s largely random and luck.

Okay, you can review the other post that I made above which reviews my ranked win rate.

Personofsecrets wrote: »

Also, please note. If you look at just the games I've played since December, which is a more accurate representation of my current play rather than historical play, then I have a 91.5% win rate in unranked over 1613 games and a 86.7% win rate in ranked over 924 games. That is to say that there is only a 4.8% difference in my chances to win a game between the unranked and ranked PVP.

In the past year, my ranked win rate is nearly 87% after about 900 games. That's pretty close to my casual win %. I doubt that many of us could tell, for example, the difference between a product that is 91% quality and 87% quality.

You wrote that you play a lot. You also wrote that you will never play ranked mode. You wrote that you definitely don't care enough to learn the game.

Is it possible that you don't really understand Tales of Tribute and therefore made an incorrect sweeping conclusion about the the interplay between skill and luck within the game?

Lyraen_Skyforge

Personofsecrets wrote: »

RomanRex wrote: »

Flouting casual win rates when most people who cue for casual play don’t know what they are doing is not a flex. The ranked W/L is a better metric, but skewed.

My point is this, most players will never care enough to learn the small portion of the game that is skill. ToT is boring and most people who want to play ESO don’t want to play a RNG card game.

If you want to flout the win rates the only one that really matters is ranked and I would guess even some of those players don’t fully take time to learn it. The game isn’t entertaining enough to draw a big enough player pool to flex win %’s. It’s largely random and luck.

Okay, you can review the other post that I made above which reviews my ranked win rate.

Personofsecrets wrote: »

Also, please note. If you look at just the games I've played since December, which is a more accurate representation of my current play rather than historical play, then I have a 91.5% win rate in unranked over 1613 games and a 86.7% win rate in ranked over 924 games. That is to say that there is only a 4.8% difference in my chances to win a game between the unranked and ranked PVP.

In the past year, my ranked win rate is nearly 87% after about 900 games. That's pretty close to my casual win %. I doubt that many of us could tell, for example, the difference between a product that is 91% quality and 87% quality.

You wrote that you play a lot. You also wrote that you will never play ranked mode. You wrote that you definitely don't care enough to learn the game.

Is it possible that you don't really understand Tales of Tribute and therefore made an incorrect sweeping conclusion about the the interplay between skill and luck within the game?

Nope! I have played enough to understand it, but also realize it’s a boring waste of time with too many RNG factors deciding the outcome.

People concede casual matches to me all the time too. It isn’t a flex.

I can give you credit for the ranked, but stomping casuals who don’t like and don’t want to play ToT doesn’t prove skill. It shows how unpopular the game is to me.

If this were a game designed around ToT, maybe. No one plays ESO for ToT though. It’s an after thought in a game where people are already concerned about the population declining.

Personofsecrets

RomanRex wrote: »

Personofsecrets wrote: »

RomanRex wrote: »

Flouting casual win rates when most people who cue for casual play don’t know what they are doing is not a flex. The ranked W/L is a better metric, but skewed.

My point is this, most players will never care enough to learn the small portion of the game that is skill. ToT is boring and most people who want to play ESO don’t want to play a RNG card game.

If you want to flout the win rates the only one that really matters is ranked and I would guess even some of those players don’t fully take time to learn it. The game isn’t entertaining enough to draw a big enough player pool to flex win %’s. It’s largely random and luck.

Okay, you can review the other post that I made above which reviews my ranked win rate.

Personofsecrets wrote: »

Also, please note. If you look at just the games I've played since December, which is a more accurate representation of my current play rather than historical play, then I have a 91.5% win rate in unranked over 1613 games and a 86.7% win rate in ranked over 924 games. That is to say that there is only a 4.8% difference in my chances to win a game between the unranked and ranked PVP.

In the past year, my ranked win rate is nearly 87% after about 900 games. That's pretty close to my casual win %. I doubt that many of us could tell, for example, the difference between a product that is 91% quality and 87% quality.

You wrote that you play a lot. You also wrote that you will never play ranked mode. You wrote that you definitely don't care enough to learn the game.

Is it possible that you don't really understand Tales of Tribute and therefore made an incorrect sweeping conclusion about the the interplay between skill and luck within the game?

Nope! I have played enough to understand it, but also realize it’s a boring waste of time with too many RNG factors deciding the outcome.

People concede casual matches to me all the time too. It isn’t a flex.

I can give you credit for the ranked, but stomping casuals who don’t like and don’t want to play ToT doesn’t prove skill. It shows how unpopular the game is to me.

If this were a game designed around ToT, maybe. No one plays ESO for ToT though. It’s an after thought in a game where people are already concerned about the population declining.

What should players win rate be in the ranked mode given the number of RNG factors that are deciding outcomes?

Lyraen_Skyforge

80% win in ranked doesn’t seem crazy.

50%-50% is the base.

Bumping 30 points because of skill (where applicable) and opponents who still don’t know what they are doing seems accurate.

spartaxoxo

If a game is as RNG reliant as it's being made out to be, new players wouldn't get stomped constantly.

Top Players would not have 90% winrates in any mode. Because RNG isn't going to favor them that often.

A game that was pure RNG or mostly RNG would see winrates closer to 50/50 because player skill wouldn't play a large role. RNG is an element to any and all card games but as far as this card game goes it is fairly balanced away from RNG. There's some cards/patrons that clearly need tuning that just makes this perception worse to new players but the overall game's fundamentals are solid.

I lost a match the other day that was easily mine because my sleepy self did not clear out a card that I knew could potentially lend itself to a patron victory (my opponents only hope). And I actually thought I need to clear it at the beginning of the turn and then forgot after I played my cards and then they won. LOL. That's the type of mistake that good players make less of. A player that could read the game worse than me probably would have chalked that up to RNG because they turned 3 patrons in a single turn. It wasn't though. I knew it was coming and what cards they played to get there and I still let it happen. My fault, not RNG.

Personofsecrets

spartaxoxo wrote: »

If a game is as RNG reliant as it's being made out to be, new players wouldn't get stomped constantly.

Top Players would not have 90% winrates in any mode. Because RNG isn't going to favor them that often.

Not only that, but it would be strange for a player to gain 7% of win rate over the course of a year. How would one become 7% more lucky?

The_Boggart

if the games rules aren't in Hoyle I am not interested

Lyraen_Skyforge

when i can tell the cards aren’t in my favor or the game is going to take forever i concede and leave. the game is so boring, long and unenjoyable.

people like me also help boost the win rates of those people who take ToT “seriously”. win rates in this game don’t tell much to be fair. the only thing it shows it who is willing to suffer through thousands of boring games.

Lyraen_Skyforge

Personofsecrets wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

If a game is as RNG reliant as it's being made out to be, new players wouldn't get stomped constantly.

Top Players would not have 90% winrates in any mode. Because RNG isn't going to favor them that often.

Not only that, but it would be strange for a player to gain 7% of win rate over the course of a year. How would one become 7% more lucky?

they put stuff behind ToT to force people to try it. for example, the rapport building for the new companion.

that’s brings lots of new players who don’t know how to play, or don’t want to spend time learning, so your win rate goes up.

pushing more players into ToT will help the handful who take it “seriously” by giving them more people who don’t care about winning and are just playing to get a drop or some other element of the game fulfilled. like me. i see the same names over and over in casual play. i’ve played against people in this thread. these are the people who benefit from fresh marks.

your win rate will stay high so long as there isn’t broad adoption of this wildly unpopular game. if anyone asks me about ToT, i politely steer them into a better direction. it’s not worth the time or effort.