Greetings,

As this thread is in regards to Tales of Tribute, we have moved it to the appropriate section of the forums.

I only just found how the rewards system works. I could see it becoming something you could get into if you put in the time.

I really enjoy the game and would participate in player run tournaments, but I'm just not a fan of the current leaderboard structure. I'd prefer a 2 out of 3 set (to somewhat mitigate RNG) and would also add a "loser of previous match chooses who goes first" rule for a 2 out of 3 set (to also mitigate RNG). The completely unreliable massive spikes in points gained/lost combined with just enough RNG in a single game match makes things a bit too swingy for my liking.

The game is fairly well designed for fun casual games, but there is just a bit too much RNG for me to take competitive leaderboard games completely seriously. Some of the card changes on PTS look promising so ZOS does appear to want to take the game seriously from their side so I'll watch with cautious optimism over the course of the PTS regarding Tribute changes.

Ranking around the 200-250 mark and having all of the available ToT achievements (still missing the bugged one) you could say I take ToT seriously, but only up to a point.

Sometimes I prefer playing ToT over the other dailies ESO offers since I've been doing those for years now. This is just something I enjoy more than doing the same old undaunted or fighters guild daily that won't even benefit a companion, let alone myself. I take ToT seriously insofar I find it an entertaining part of ESO like some people enjoy PVPing.

But in the end, it's just entertainment, nothing more, nothing less. And if it goes well, great. If not, oh well.

Its mainly what I play now. I don't have much time to play alot so I play about 5 games per day. I am usually between 150 and 50 level. Somedays I win 5 straight and sometimes I lose 5 straight.

Its like any card game, there is a bit of skill and sometimes you just don't get anything and take the lose. Usually when I lose like 5 straight i play badly twice and three times I just dont get anything at all. And when I win 5 straight Skill gets me 2 wins, luck gets me two and my oppenent just sux gets me a win....

Sync01 wrote: »

Personally no, but I do play it for the achievements.
I looked up some tips on how to win games, got to rubedite, and I'm now just playing it for the dailies and the achievements that you need to rank up for.

Honestly though I find it to be a bit boring It's not the worst but it feels like it takes ages, especially against npcs.

I haven't seen much to read in the way of tips. Is there a Discord somewhere?

Tales of tribute is serious game and even companions plays it for real. Look for example at Bastian Hallix. When he started playing, it was just couple games for fun. Everyday he felt that he WANT more fun, so he played more. And more. It quickly turns into addiction. Couple games in morning, some after dinner with many Huzzah's. That was not enough. So he played more and more often. At some point there was not enough players to play with, so Bastian becomes angry man. At beginning it was only shouting at some people, but with time he started to beat them to force them playing. It was against his personal values, so he started to drink and with time he becomes agressive, skooma addict.

Here is picture of Bastian after many sleepless nights full of playing, beating people and skooma:



So yes, some people take this game seriously.

Austacker wrote: »

But I'm under no false illusions on it's drastic shortcomings or so bias as to try and explain away it's tactical flaws with an asinine comment like 'it's literally called deck builder' to try and say it's on the same tactical level as it's competition.

It's one thing to hate the game because of its balance (if you dig just a bit into this sub-forum, you'll see that there are plenty of complaints about it). It's another thing to hate a deck builder/area control game because "there's no deck building". When you fail to get the core concept of the game, it's hard for anyone to take your criticism seriously.

Deck builders aren't a new concept, they come in different flavours - Dominion has a pre-determined pool of 10 different types of cards that players can always purchase - the only real luck element (I haven't played all the expansions, though) is the shuffling and drawing, which is always going to be present in CCGs.

[snip] Armoury/Midnight Raid/Rally/Siege Weapon Volley are oppressive, but it's not just because of their cost/amount of power they generate. Other cards that generate power either generate very little, are too expensive and in general are low in quantity (Rahjin has no power generating cards, while Hlaalu can generate a whooping 1 via Hostile Takeover). There's also the fact that other cards in the same price range are either not strong or are very situational. F.x.: you don't purchase Imprisonment on turn one, bar very few specific edge cases (mainly dealing with Anseir patron). Other cards require a well-built deck to proc all the combos to be valuable, whereas Rally/SWV/Armoury give you a lot of power upfront. Even Midnight Raid is still decent without the combo.

So yes, *** on the game all you want - but do so for the right reasons. Dismissing it because of the genre (especially when you haven't played one before) is dumb. There are plenty of other (better, IMO) deck builders out there - both physical games and apps you can play on your PC/phone (you even have weird things like Slay the Spire - a rouge-like deck builder).

[edited for profanity]

Skvysh wrote: »

There are plenty of other (better, IMO) deck builders out there - both physical games and apps you can play on your PC/phone (you even have weird things like Slay the Spire - a rouge-like deck builder).

Won't disagree with you on that one.

My comment on no 'deck building' is more in line with the traditional sense of building decks in CCGs where there's no common card pool in play and you don't 'build decks' on the fly.

it's a matter of context here, I'm looking at it from a different perspective to you is all - which is why we're not seeing the same summation of the point the same way.

No harm, no foul - I recognise that.

But I will stand on the hill regarding the fatal flaw of the shared pool concept.

In ideology it sounds balanced as you can't 'outplay' your opponent by having the stronger deck from the start.

But I'll say that the alternative here is worse in that whilst you 'share' the power of the Tavern pool, it's not an equal opportunity there to take the cards you want/need and once taken, you're playing against the clock to match that power creep is just straight up lose the game.

Having an entire turn to take cards from the Tavern can wildly swing the power balance.

There has to be a better way here to make the game feel more strategic, less 'snowbally' and less frustrating.

Austacker wrote: »

My comment on no 'deck building' is more in line with the traditional sense of building decks in CCGs where there's no common card pool in play and you don't 'build decks' on the fly.

I understand the confusion, but your idea of "deck building" is a dangerously wrong term to use here. In my limited CCG experience, people would instead call it "constructed", to differentiate between the drafting phase seen in "arena" game-modes. Dominion's recognized as the "grandfather of deck builders" and dates back to 2008 - not as old as MtG and such, but old enough to establish the then new mechanic as a completely separate sub-genre of card games.

Austacker wrote: »

But I will stand on the hill regarding the fatal flaw of the shared pool concept.

The concept itself isn't flawed - just different from what people are used to. The main benefit is that it's easy to pick up the game and you don't need to learn all of the cards before you can even play a casual game. Card synergy is often simple, there's little text to go through, so you don't need to know much before diving into your first game. The cards are then easier to memorize and so it's easier to get into a competitive scene, since you don't need to know every single card that was released up until now (compared to the walls of text you see in traditional CCGs).

Besides that, the idea is that a) every game's different due to strategies not being determined at the start of the game and b) players are, more or less, on even ground - you can't be at a disadvantage for not having certain cards available to you before the game. While luck's a factor (as with any card game), it should only become a really strong one only when two players are equally matched in skill i.e. able to determine the allegedly best course of action at every turn.

Austacker wrote: »

There has to be a better way here to make the game feel more strategic, less 'snowbally' and less frustrating.

Proper card balance. The core mechanics can and should stay the same. The issue is that some cards are too oppressive, while others are very situational and just barely decent in even the best of circumstances. While it's fine for certain cards to go well with most strategies, it shouldn't come to a point where people do everything to either pick them up or Remove them from the tavern row. Purchasing a couple of lucky "powerhouses" and then not purchasing any more cards for the rest of the game to not alter your frequency of drawing those cards shouldn't be a valid strategy. Nerfing certain cards is one way to go, but there are other issues - just because Armoury will cost 1 gold more doesn't mean that people will stop picking them up. And when your opponent gets one of those cards and then the rest of the tavern row is filled with either cards you won't be able to afford for a long time or contracts like Tithe and Ambush - that's a bad game design from balance side.

It's perfectly fine for certain cards to be strong in general, certain cards to be stronger with specific strategies or situational. But a lot of Treasury contracts are too situational and so you end up with a situation where people don't buy any cards at all because their purchase won't be rewarding and they risk revealing a strong card for their opponent to acquire next turn.

Other issues, IMO, are the fact that high cost cards generally aren't as rewarding as the ones in 5-6 range; the fact that both regular and upgraded cards are in play (limiting the number of unique cards there are in a deck) and the fact that agents' cost is high just because they are agents, especially given all the removal available in the game.