New Content New Guild Expedition Trials - Feedback Thread

[Droppy]

It was probably edited by a community manager

Then it will show the words "edited by a moderator" and as Forwandert says, they have not been online. You should not try to be smart when you are clueless how it works.

 

[Astro-X]

I did it, scchhh don't tell anyone about my superpowers, you would not like to get on the wrong side of them.

 

[Big boss cz]

@angry hamster was your post #14 eddited?

 

[Ariana Erosaire]

We were all ignoring this thread because it's been spammed with junk. The real GE changes convo is in another place. Between the 3 of you (droppy, Astro, michal) almost every thread has become unreadable and whenever someone tries to talk constructively about the game you come in and add a bunch of bickering or unrelated spam again.

FFS the forums are almost unusable thanks to that, and there was only about a dozen people left trying to make any use of them.

https://forum.en.forgeofempires.com/index.php?threads/guild-expedition-changes.47120/

 

[Ariana Erosaire]

I just wish they never did this GE update (so do all who live to see such times, Frodo... lol) It's not adding anything to the game play and has created another complication and reason to boot people for saddling their guilds with costs that are forever attached to them AND hidden to the player, just auto-magically lumped in with everyone else so that guild leaders have to be BOTH the teachers and the enforcers.

GE was the one relatively uncomplicated thing left in the game that people could just do every week, because the new regime at Inno hadn't got their mitts on it yet to try to "improve" it (read "monetize" it.) Yeah it needed updating, but not obfuscation, and not even more fragmenting so that it takes 4-6 months to earn any that is actually new.

• Trial selection interface blocked out final GE results and participation list from last week.
• Confusing trial interface, lots of people selected trial 6 by mistake because that's where the window started (Deceptive!) and they didn't see the scroll arrow to go to lower trials.
• Confusing rewards, it lists everything from trial 1 onward no matter which you select, forcing you to add them all together, shouldn't a computer do that and present the actual total for each trial, no one can see exactly what they are getting in any trial this way.
• Confusing cost structure, we had to educate people about costs for trials UNLOCKED versus the trial they actually play, what if I choose trial 3 and what if I choose trial 8. ad nauseum.
• Rewards aren't worth the effort, or the permanent increase in unlock costs to the guilds. No one wants to wait 4-6 months to get 1200 fragments of a silver anything, these items are barely on par with what we get already from GBG or Events. Why?

There's a FAQ with about 15 items to explain all this and a table of costs, and all THIS released on the day of a the 2nd and much harder Rivals running for the St Pats event.

Thank you <sarcasm> for making this week with neo GE a nightmare for players, and especially leaders.

 

[DJ of BA]

Think these new GE changes are unwarranted, rewards are no better, diamonds non existent, no increase in fragments for forgotten temple ( the only reason a lot of higher players bother ) even L 8 was easier than the old GE, I'm sure lower players would argue that fact, and where the hell does Inno get off charging the Guild for an Individuals choices, I am sure everyone would be happy to pay " an entrance fee " to play a " higher level " I have stopped playing on 2 worlds as I find it just ridiculous Don't need any rewards that are on offer, those that Could be of use by the time the frags are assembled it will be out of date and superceded by event building, Well done INNO, another feature killed off.

Rest In peace..... GE

 

[Ariana Erosaire]

where the hell does Inno get off charging the Guild for an Individuals choices, I am sure everyone would be happy to pay " an entrance fee " to play a " higher level "

Exactly. THIS is the most egregious part. In the old GE unlocking as a group by guild leaders makes sense because everyone is the same.

Now that they added an interface for individuals to select their trial level, why the hell wasn't the additional goods cost above and beyond the "base" we are all paying now (for being on trial 5 and having trial 8 unlocked by default) shifted to the player? Where the individual interacts to select a trial before they begin, they can pay 0 additional to select trial 5 or below because that's included with the default guild cost, or pay X goods to select trial 6 or higher if they choose. So simple it boggles the mind why it wasn't done.

Then leaders wouldn't have to be in the business of putting snouts up every players' rear to check what they are doing, and how much they are costing, and how high their treasury contributions are. Let them pay it themselves if they want higher than trial 5.

 

[Droppy]

We were all ignoring this thread because it's been spammed with junk.

That should not stop you. Most feedback threads contain a lot of comments that are not feedback at all. CM's have stated they will wade through it all and will forward all real feedback.

 

[klods hans]

Exactly. THIS is the most egregious part. In the old GE unlocking as a group by guild leaders makes sense because everyone is the same.

Now that they added an interface for individuals to select their trial level, why the hell wasn't the additional goods cost above and beyond the "base" we are all paying now (for being on trial 5 and having trial 8 unlocked by default) shifted to the player? Where the individual interacts to select a trial before they begin, they can pay 0 additional to select trial 5 or below because that's included with the default guild cost, or pay X goods to select trial 6 or higher if they choose. So simple it boggles the mind why it wasn't done.

Then leaders wouldn't have to be in the business of putting snouts up every players' rear to check what they are doing, and how much they are costing, and how high their treasury contributions are. Let them pay it themselves if they want higher than trial 5.

Makes perfect sense. Let guild members pay directly from their own stash if they want to play at a high Trial level.
But I guess it's because it's supposed to be a guild feature. The cost must be taken from the community bank, not from individual pockets.

 

[Astro-X]

Most feedback threads contain a lot of comments that are not feedback at all.

Yes, you are the most prolific off-topic poster here. You have even got me to do it due to all your insulting intimidating comments.
Why Inno allows it, I will never know, I think most people have had enough of you.

On-topic, Matt has had it in his head for some time that guilds should do everything together, I prefer a more independent GE and QI like it was before, playing how it suits you to help your guild.

 

[L84Dnr]

OK, a few constructive thoughts for Inno. I know, very long odds that anybody is even listening, much less paying attention.

• Keep the player-driven progression. It's one of the few positives in this update and makes GE more easily tailored to the player's abilities and desires. If anything this feature should be expanded.
  • Find a thesaurus or somebody with a soul and give it a better name than "Trials". It's a pretty lackluster term and there's a whole language full of better words.
  • Possibly make the levels more granular, especially at the lower end. I have a moderately advanced city and am struggled to finish Trial 5. This puts the overwhelming majority of this feature out of reach of new players. If you rescale it so that Trials 1 through 10 are more or less accessible to your average player then you'll get more interest. From there you can punch it up to Trial 50, with the uppermost Trials being playable only with the stompiest cities and the most absurd bonuses.
• Burn the unlock costs completely. It isn't as if this nets Inno anything and simply discourages players from using this feature. They were ill-conceived when GE began and amplifying them hasn't improved their foolishness. You want players to use these, so stop locking them out. At the very least pare the costs down so that it's only the elite, uppermost levels that cost anything more.
• Make those fool in-encounter buildings good for something. Scale them with the Trial and the level. If I'm clipping along at +3500 Att/Def fighting opponents with similar bonuses then a Temple of the Gassy Hippo that provides a +47 Attack Bonus for this one encounter isn't worth the time to construct it. It's a rounding error in anything above Trial 3.
• Make the upgrades more gradual so that you can roll something out faster than months down the line. Playing a new feature for no gain is incredibly underwhelming and a ridiculously bad way to roll a feature out. Huge buzzkill. Instead of a silver upgrade with an FP boost that causes integer roll-over errors and a gold upgrade that provides enough attack bonuses to kill god go with levels 1 through 12 upgrades, each one being a smaller, more reasonable improvement. That way you don't have to hold back on every upgrade until the sun burns out but can release a handful of +10% or +20% improvements on the first week. It takes us just as long to get the full boosts but there's something to show for it in the interim. That little dopamine hit that we didn't get this week because all we got were splinters.
• Add upgrades for those other useless GE buildings. FotA, GotSG, TS, etc. ToR produces craploads of the rubbish that has no purpose anymore (did Tribal Squares ever have a purpose?). There are a whole fistful of features that have features that have been released since and could easily be incorporated into upgraded versions of these.
• Add a few new buildings. Seriously, it doesn't take that much effort and they don't have to be that overpowered, just something to provide a little variety. Simply making more fragments of more upgrades of the same old, same old feels incredibly low-effort.
• Ditto on the artwork. It hasn't changed since the dawn of time. The way that it's presented in the release as if this zero-effort lack of feature is such a positive is laughable. You didn't do more for Level 5 than char the edges of the map slightly.
• Link ToR rewards in somehow. Higher levels and higher trials should have cooler ToR rewards.
• Make GE multipath. It's pretty clear that one size doesn't fit all and the different levels of Trials have been a decent attempt to fix that, but playstyles and needs vary too. At the start of each level let the player pick a path for that level. Any path can contain elements of the others, but in general, they'd be more focused on a particular outcome allowing players to try for the rewards that they want rather than being saddled with a handful of coins for encounters on level 5:
  • The Walk of the Novice: Designed with junior players in mind, this path is heavy on coin, supplies, BPs, lower level buildings, etc. Encounters are generally easier and rewards less exciting but more useful for starting cities.
  • The Caravan Route: Designed with Farmers and Traders in mind, this path concentrates on negotiations and rewards are focussed on goods, goods buildings, and related buffs.
  • The Way of the Warrior: Designed with fighters in mind, this path focuses on Att/Def and rewards are similarly based on Att/Def bonuses.
  • The Road Less Traveled: A generally tougher fight and possibly a good way to check if you're up for the next Trial up while doing the current one. Rewards are more interesting and higher value, much like the next trial up (hint: you can save yourselves some effort with a little clever coding here).

That's just a bunch of notions off the top of my head, so if I can think up a bunch of ways to make this better with relatively little effort then I'm going to assume that Inno's team could have managed it too.

 

[Ariana Erosaire]

But I guess it's because it's supposed to be guild feature. The cost must be taken from the community bank, not from individual pockets.

The group benefit of GE is almost nothing, and we stopped needing the guild power from GE 4 years ago, ever since battlegrounds came out it's the hands down biggest producer of guild power in the game. GBG even made hall of Fame and statue of honor in cities totally obsolete within a year, so by late 2020 it was all obsolete: GE power, halls of Fame, all of it. Guild levels are effectively capped at 60 now even though it still shows up to 100, so guild power is even more pointless than ever before. The point of the higher trials is those silver and gold upgrades, THAT isn't for a guild that's for an individual!

They are simply hiding the increased GE cost per player inside a group unlock, the player should be paying their higher trials goods cost themselves, now it has to be from guild leaders telling them to raise their Treasury contributions and Treasury GB's while having to gesture wildly at a long FAQ and explain the cost structure, but it should be the player paying 400 of each kind of good themselves (or whatever price) at the trial unlock interface if they want a higher trial.

Bonus: if the player pays their own costs for trial 6 and higher at the moment they select a trial, the whole confusing thing of charging you for what is UNLOCKED instead of what you actually PLAY each week could go away. They did this UNLOCKED-based cost structure because the guild needs to have a fixed goods cost when GE starts without waiting for the players' selections every week, and that's exactly why it should be individuals determining and paying the higher trial costs! Let guilds have a base trial cost and players pay individually to go beyond it.

Double bonus: if players paid for higher trials individually with every weekly selection, then a player who wants to go to trial 30 wouldn't burden their guild or themselves forever with higher costs! If individuals paid the extra goods to go beyond trial 5 or all the way to trial 30, they could always return to trial 5 for "free" at the base guild unlock costs any time they 1) got low in goods 2) didn't want to play trial 30 that week 3) wanted a break or more casual game, instead of being saddled with high goods cost forever because they dared to unlock higher trials!!!

GIVE BOTH THE TRIAL CHOICE AND THE HIGH TRIAL COST TO THE PLAYERS INDIVIDUALLY, not the group/guild costs. Inno, you have actually given an incentive for players NOT to use or unlock the new GE trials at all and I have recommended the same to my whole guild and anyone who will listen. What a total and utterly BS way to setup a new feature.

 

[Dastar]

I am trying to understand what the actual reasoning for this change to the cost is ? Like truly WHY?!?!
all I can see is a deceptive way to drain small guild treasuries that can not be controlled by the guild or its leaders. There is no way to know who chose what but the costs will be detrimental to the guild as a whole. and the rewards... OMG seriously ? same old tired $#!_

 

[klods hans]

There is no way to know who chose what

 

[Ariana Erosaire]

I am trying to understand what the actual reasoning for this change to the cost is ? Like truly WHY?!?!
all I can see is a deceptive way to drain small guild treasuries that can not be controlled by the guild or its leaders. There is no way to know who chose what but the costs will be detrimental to the guild as a whole. and the rewards... OMG seriously ? same old tired $#!_

as klods hans showed above, you can see what trial each member selected in the current week, what you can't see unless you keep track (my god what a painful thing!) is the highest level EVER unlocked by that player.

So the first person in klods' list above, yeah they chose trial 8 and they completed it, so from now on the minimum they can cost their guild is for trial 11 unlocked cost. But where this will get impossible to keep track of who is draining out the treasury, what if next week that person selects trial 6, unless you keep track of the fact they already unlocked to trial 11, next week you will be thinking that guy has only completed trial 6 and will be at level 9 unlock cost, but no he unlocked trial 11 the week before and that's his cost forever, even he goes back to lower trials.

This will quickly become a nightmare for leaders who will just throw their hands up and boot anyone going to high trials unless they have level 100-150 of at least 3 treasury GB.

 

[klods hans]

boot anyone going to high trials

And other guilds might not want to let them in if they are on a high trial.
It's the new questions guild leaders might want to ask before they accept a new member: "What GE trial are you on?" and "Can you cover the cost?".

 

[Ariana Erosaire]

And other guilds might not want to let them in if they are on a high trial.
It's the new questions guild leaders might want to ask before they accept a new member: "What GE trial are you on?" and "Can you cover the cost?".

I don't want to be in the business of policing what trial individuals select, how high they ever completed, what they are costing the group unlock, and I should not have to be in this position. It is NOT a group responsibility when the player is choosing those costs themselves and we have no control over that.

And I am sure we will not be shown the highest unlocked trial as new people join. It already blocked out the GE results from last week with the selection window, they're not in the information sharing business, it's always as obfuscated as possible. Only hope is FoE helper may be able to track it.

The game didn't need this complication, it's beyond stupid.

 

[Paladiac the Pure]

The game didn't need this complication, it's beyond stupid.

But on the other hand, it is very much keeping with the direction (or lack thereof) that Inno has decided to pursue (or drop).. And yet, there will still continue to be a number of players with more money than brains, continuing to fund this disastrous product.

 

[Droppy]

This will quickly become a nightmare for leaders who will just throw their hands up and boot anyone going to high trials unless they have level 100-150 of at least 3 treasury GB.

Since you also need previous age goods it is more than just GB's.

Only hope is FoE helper may be able to track it.

Due to the latest game update multiple thinks stopped working. Makes you wonder.

 

[I AM COLOSUSS]

Ugh - so we can no longer go in and see the results from our guild and what members did after the last GE finishes? We're stuck on this waiting selection box - they didn't learn from QI that we need to be able to see (especially leaders) who did what, final scores, after a season closes? We should not for a day just be locked out of the results and final standings. They learned this for GBG and for QI, and forgot again with neo-GE?

strange, i have no problem seeing all player progress. level they are in and all fights they have completed