The game has three cards with a keyword “randomly split” : Hellfire, Ignus, Crackthorn. And card Blood Song with similar mechanics. But random is absolutely not needed in these cards! For example Hellfire and Blood Song looks very attractive but little used because of RNG. Crackthorn RNG tedious enough.
I have a brilliant idea how to cut rng without stat rebalance: change keyword " randomly split " for " evenly split " !!! So this cards will distribute properties for all available targets. Thats it!
You can even make a queue by targets force or health, If you decide to completely remove the random.
Buff/damage can be added randomly or by some priority. For example The biggest creature gets the damage first, The smallest creature gets the damage last or vise versa.
I think crackthorn would be not weaker but more predictable !
Or we could even use the natural order of the lands on the grid : up and left first, then bottom and right (this order is already used to solve priority questions such as Faeria collecting). It could induce some serious strategies to defend against.
A few points on this issue (all IMHO, and that I’ve said before, sorry to those who’re reading repeats):
You’ve chosen to play one of the most RNG-heavy game genres. Dealing with RNG is a skill of its own - you now have to do some rapid statistical analysis. The downside is, of course, switched games (where the better player loses) - but the effect of that can be reduced by simply playing more (to reduce noise). So I’d say the issue mostly only affects tournaments - and the solution is just more games per match.
Decks are randomly shuffled. I actually think that by reducing the RNG of these cards you’re actually amplifying the effect of shuffle RNG.
Determinism is a buff in itself. All those cards now probably need a small nerf.
What about Steam Forge? Is the split somehow even over multiple turns?
I think having choosen to play Faeria doesn’t mean we can’t challenge the way that rng is used in this game.
Actually, choosing a cgg just mean we agree with the rng induced by draw and by matchmaking (other ways to increase rng aren’t required : they are just options). And even draw and matchmaking-rng can be reduced by choices of game design !
Moreover, although I agree with you that the rng-effect is reduced when you play more games, I think that a “strategically deep” game shouldn’t leed to so much “closed” games at the 5th turn (win or loss), or even earlier, just because of rng.
I agree with you… only if your 3rd idea can’t be solved ! Otherwise, rng isn’t increased I think (or perhaps I forget something ? ^^)
I agree too, but it is an easy change to make (and so it can’t be used as a counter argument against the will to lower rng in these cards, but perhaps that was not your point )
I can’t find a logical solution for now : as it is a small advantage, it could stay as it is now ? or choose the creature you give the buff to ? (but it would be almost as green tower then…)
I think rng nature of CCG does not mean that more random the better. Especially if rng is bad as in my example. Also сard games can be very intelligent as a sports bridge.
I dont see how reducing of RNG amplifying the effect of shuffle RNG.
Almost no one plays cards: Hellfire, Ignus, Blood Song. So these cards needs up
i’m a bit late to the discussion, but i think the best way to reduce randomness for cards like hellfire and Ignus is to make them deal damage randomly split among enemy creatures and then deal excess damage to the enemy orb.
So for example, if your opponent has say three fire elementals (4 faeria 5/2) all at full health and nothing else, if you cast hellfire with this idea it would 100% of the time kill all three fire elementals and deal 3 damage to the opponent’s orb
My opinion is the complete opposite. There should be no randomness in this game at all. I used Hellfire when I got really desperate sometimes where I got extremely lucky and felt that I won because of this. I felt very bad about it to be honest.
Even the fact that decks are shuffled is not good in my opinion. Why not give the opportunity to play every card right from the beginning? That would include very strategic question like when to play specific cards or to hold on playing good cards so that these are available in the later stages of the game. The limiting factor would be the Faeria here which is a good thing in my opinion.
Another good approach to eliminate the deck issue were to give the possibility to play a card over and over again with a certain cooldown so that one can not spam a card even if there is enough Faeria to do so.
It’s certainly possible to create a decent, strategic game like that. However, IMHO that would be a totally different game. It’s a bit like asking for puzzles in Need for Speed, or rocket launchers in Portal.
Faeria is a RNG game at its core. The cards have been balanced around RNG. Some cards would gain immense power from choosing when they’re drawn (or being always available) - eg Elementals. Others would not. So you’d need to completely and drastically rebalance everything.
IMHO RNG has plusses and minuses. Many (most?) games are better with exactly zero RNG. The minuses are hard to avoid. The main point (good and bad) is that a match between players of significantly different skill has a far less certain result. This encourages more players of different skill, and can increase excitement, but it means that competition results are less skill-dependent - which can be remedied by playing more games (I seem to say that a lot here ).
If they get around to increasing the flexibility of custom matchups it’d be interesting to add something like fixed deck draw as an option, though. But, due to altered balance, only a small handful of cards would be worth playing in that game mode.
Well, you can reduce the effect greatly. What if Hellfire deals 6 times 1 damage, but youi can choose the targets?
Same for Crackthorn; what if you can deal damage twice and buff thrice (opposed to 4 times each) but again, you can choose the targets). Ignus could have an Activate ability that can be activated after you collect Faeria from the Power Wheel, and Bloodsong could also manually target anything in hand.
Steam Forge (and similar) could target the closest creature first.
RNG also adds its own kind of strategic value - you have to evaluate all outcomes of the RNG and figure out if using it increases your chance of winning - and that analysis also depends on the skill of your opponent.
Apart from the land creation mechanic, having RNG (and RNG’s strategic value (mentioned above)) is actually something that drew me into the game simply as a change from the other kinds of board games I like (to me, Faeria is a board game with cards, not the other way round) - eg Hive. My feelings on this aren’t stable, though. Sometimes I like it lots, sometimes I don’t.
I disagree. One of the things which brought me to this game is that it was said that apart from deck shuffling there is only very small amount of randonmess in this game compared to other games of the genre. Meanwhile, there were things like Hellfire introduced. I don’t think that such a game must contain randonmess at all.
It doesn’t. But what I’m saying is that if it didn’t contain RNG it wouldn’t be Faeria. That’s how the devs designed it, and it’s what paying players signed up for. Many people see it as a net positive, or at least don’t see it as a net negative.
The shuffle RNG is the vast majority of the RNG IMHO (measured by its effect on the results of games). You often have to judge whether shuffle RNG is worth gambling on (eg, do I draw?). You have similar decisions with the non-shuffle RNG - so I don’t see why (based on its effect on results) that should be treated differently.
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