Changes in the battle creation system

[Smooth_Operator 3]

Well i tried it again today - sofar been lucky enough not to have a map mission.

 

Even so ijust dont like the inability to choose the type of gameplay i like.

I have no option of what other ranks i am facing , no control over the number of players in the battle and very little control overthe type of map.

 

It truly is Pro pass or no fun.

 

I'm not going to say im quitting however i would definately never spend real money on the gamenow and my playing time will no doubt be reduced drastically.

My normal playing habits are complete my mission (s) and then play in some battles i enjoy for an hour or so (quite a few hours on the weekend.

Today i completed 1 mission on both accounts and then quit.  I feel this is how its going to be from now on.

 

Tanki - you got this one wrong.

I'm agree. Today only 1 mission on each account. In some of them even quit before the battle end (collect boxes).

But there's one good thing in this -- I spend more time with family :) 

[Adel 567]

Dear Tanki Online, i love tanki online and i have been playing it for long. i love all the new updates but...

please please put the battle button back pls

 

best regards,  

             gti_dev

Topic merged.

[GeeVuh 1,647]

Lelouch vi Britannia - Life without change isn't life at all...

[r_perishable0 8]

Tanki devs are using the Pro Pass mechanism as a measurement of a player's output in crystals. If a player doesn't generate enough crystals to afford a pro pass, the player is defined to be a 'casual' gamer. This is why they claim they've separated 'casual' gamers from 'pro' players. But this assertion breaks down on many fronts, introduces hidden penalties and significantly reduces the game's playability - you know, fun.

 

First and foremost, it's a tax. For a player to maintain their output, they now need to buy a Pro Pass - the tax. I'm sure there is a spreadsheet somewhere in Tanki's offices with a 'Pro' player's threshold monthly output per rank, a Pro Pass percentage (the tax) and the resulting Pro Pass crystal cost from multiplying those two together. Another way to look at a tax is as a devaluation - crystals are now worth less. To compensate for the devaluation, ideally the cost of in-game goods would be multiplied by the same percentage to yield the same effective cost as before the change. This obviously didn't happen. The result - crystals are now objectively worth less.

 

It doesn't separate pros from casuals. It separates those with crystals from those without. Crystals can be derived from battles, a real pro, or they can be bought by a casual. This obviously does not help separate players based on skill so it doesn't solve the imbalance and "I hate casuals ruining my game" problems.

 

It's too complicated. Players come to play and have fun, not make financial decisions. The Pro Pass decision is qualitatively different from deciding which turret, hull, MU or supply to get.

 

It removes choice and increases grinding. Removing choice, aka fun, from a game is rarely a good idea. The daily missions introduced grinding to an extent but that was mitigated by the fact that you had a hope of completing them reasonably quickly. Now with the new battle constraints, grinding has been taken to a whole new level. You have grinding missions that you don't have a reasonable hope of being able to complete by the next cycle of missions.

 

The Pro Pass mechanic doesn't resolve game imbalances for casual players - which is everyone new to the game - as there is nothing preventing 'Pro' players (with more resources by definition) from raiding regular games and making them lopsided. I've seen this happen in games already.

 

 

The Pro Pass mechanic pre-supposes that players play uniformly at all times. If you play sporadically or not enough hours a day, you have no hope of being able to meet the 'Pro' threshold and thus the cost. It makes no difference how good a player you are.

 

An alternative can be to directly measure a player's output per hour played and using that to separate casuals from pros - this is objectively a better measurement of pro vs. casual skill. Buyers (even the casuals) can still buy passes, potentially defeating the separation, because they are important, but it does not penalize everyone. It may be more subtle to explain to players but it doesn't sound impossible to package nicely and understandably in a progress bar. It yields better separation, no tax, more fun, a simpler mechanic and no financial decision penalty.

[GeeVuh 1,647]

 

Choice =/= fun. Google's definition: Enjoyment or lighthearted pleasure.

 

I find that this hasn't decreased my level of having "fun".

[Venezuel 3]

It is unfortunately that if you have a (Pro pass) you can not create battles that forces you to spend crystals to create battles with Pro pass to be able to fulfill the daily missions since, the battles created are not the ones that you have to fulfill to do the mission,Should, let us do our battles normally as before :angry:  :angry:

[GeeVuh 1,647]

It is unfortunately that if you have a (Pro pass) you can not create battles that forces you to spend crystals to create battles with Pro pass to be able to fulfill the daily missions since, the battles created are not the ones that you have to fulfill to do the mission,Should, let us do our battles normally as before :angry:  :angry:

 

Lelouch vi Britannia - Life without change isn't life at all...

[LittleWillie 3,199]

More impressions so far.

 

Players without PRO Passes are 100% definitely no-question going to have a hard er time completing specific map missions and finish in 1st place missions.

 

In the case of the 1st place missions maybe it is not so bad that they require an actual 1st place finish. But they are not going to be easy to complete for many players. Here buying a PRO pass does help because there are many many more small games available.

 

In the case of map specific missions the Battle button is not working as we were told.

 

We were told the Battle button wold create games on certain maps if you had a mission on that map. We were told the Battle button would not put you into a game with less than 10 minutes remaining. I tested these and they failed.

 

I found a server with only one open CTF game in my rank. I had a map mission open. I waited until the game was under 10 minutes and clicked Battle. There were no games open with more than 10 minutes left so a new game on my map should have been created. It was not. I was sent to the map with about 9:30 left in the game. I could not try again because the above onditions no longer existed.

 

Anyway, it is clear that many players will be left high and dry on their map missions and they will not be happy.

 

Next Impression

 

The PRO battles are now the place to find all the Poly, Island, Sandbox, and other snoozefest slaughterhouse games. Ironically the basic games are now where you find the best games. The Battle button uses more maps and games tend to fill up.To tell the truth if I just want to play a game the Battle button has done pretty well producing good games.

 

OTOH you can find no-drug games in the PRO section. These games are definitley different and worth playing.

 

So it looks like in the long run most every plqayer might want to buy a PRO Pass - but not to use the PRO Pass all the time. 

 

That being the case I think Tanki satisfies everyone by further reducing the PRO Pass by another 50% across the board. 2,500 Cry / month for the top level, Legend? That's a compromise we cann all live with I think.

[Redlinezak_EN 83]

When we had the free pro pass for the first week i created a few battle but therein lies yet another problem.

 

There are now so many different options available (supplies , drugs, flag/kills/time limit etc) that people with pro passes are all creating / preferring very slight variation in the battle type.  This means that even if you do buy the pro pass the battle are less likley to fill up due to people wanting that slightly different format to the one you have created.  Prior to this the only real selection was length.

 

This means (or will mean IMO) that there will be more battles with just a couple of players in as everyone will be creating their own preference with their own options.

 

Result - even buying pro passes will not ensure good battle - just that you can be on your own in a map of your choosing rather in a busy map that you dont want to be in.

[LittleWillie 3,199]

a7x_Pedro48: That depends on the hours playing. As an adult player who also has lower accounts i try to keep them up and strong. But work, sports and family.. I'm not able to play that much. And having a pro pass does not guarantee that there will be enough non drugging fun battles to choose from. For clan yes i have to but.. If not i would rather invest in MU than pro and have little choice. Had some many pro passes that i only used for max 4 hours cause of the lack of time and choices in battles, that lead me to finish my mission in non pro :(

Sorry but this is wrong. I am a daily mission payer. I play my daily missions for each account and little if any more. That means two things:

 

I make a LOT Of Crystals per minute played compared to people who pay longer. I earn roughly 10,000 / week / account pretty regularly playing almost nothing but daily missions.

 

I don't think this PRO Pass approach is the 100% best approach but it is worth giving a chance. I do think Tanki will have to further reduce the price too.

[Redlinezak_EN 83]

Sorry one other thing.

 

I now find that i need to use drugs (I am currently paying on my ALT at Rank First Lieutenant) because I am having to face ranks much higher than i normally do due to not having the choice i used to.  I used to generally create rooms where i was the third from highest rank available but the higher ranks i am facing now (normally at least one brigadier in battle) cause me to have to drug more to try and keep up.

I was desparatley trying to be virtually drug free on my alt just to see how i could do but now that is not an option (especially if i need to finish 1st for a missaion as I am then also competing with druggers on my own team).

 

In short i think this update will increase drug use and that is how it has appeared to me in the last 2 days.

[Maf 32,300]

Hi, Tanki

 

Recently, there are changes almost every week.

 

Would you please stop fixing non-existing "issues", unless many players start to complain? 

Topic merged

[LittleWillie 3,199]

 

Are you kidding me? Are you for real? Do you hear me making sheep noises whilst being led Lemming like to the dustbin full of Pro-Passes. Playing in a drug game allows me to at least try to compete with those that are spendings fat wads of cash to speed their way through the ranks. Once upon a time I could at least compete with the limited amount of skill I had and trying to earn crystals in order to improve my tank, now I am confined to Battles full to capacity mostly with big tanks and big weapons that I cannot compete with.

So you are pissed off no matter what options you are given. Youy complain about druggers but belittle a chance that allows you to avoid drugging entirely.

 

Devs hear this sort of stuff and just figure they can't win no matter what they do. So they do what they were going to do anyway.

 

Oh well, I've been wher you are too annoyance wise.

 

 

So… do You think, that creating battles is an important game mechanic?
But now I'm forced to buy PRO pass to reach that important thing. Is it free will of mine? No.
And if I have my PP, still cannot create a normal battle, to invite anybody w/o PP. Tell me more about this free game…

Well, since you asked.... no. I do not consider crating battles to be a fundamental feature.

 

I would create maybe 2 battle per month. Always Farm CTF for my Titan account if it was taking me too long to complete CTF missions normally. That's it. I got tired of creating battles, waiting 2 minutes, then leaving because no one else joined. So I for one hardly ever create battles PRO Pass or noi.

 

 

Anyone else think the next update will eliminate the battle list completely? Only way to prevent mults and raiders in standard battles. Seems like the direction this is going...

Nope. That does not seem claer to me in the slightest.

 

What seems clear to me is TA NKI is trying to create two large groups of games. PRO game and Basic games. That's what is we are now seeing in place.

 

Basic games: Fewer games at any one time - but with more players per game and more games that play out to a normal finish. Very few of the slaughterhouse games! More maps in actual play despite fewer total games.

 

PRO Battles: many more games much more variety of game parameters but ironically a choice of fewer maps. Here all the slaughterhouse games will collect. Since yo can earn more Cry / hour on a slaughterhouse the PRO Pass can in fact pay for itself.

 

We will never see the Create Button for Basic maps again.

 

The reason is to keep all those small fragmentary games in the PRO section so the Basic section remains a place for fewer but larger games. The Battle button will not work if there are 50 tiny 1:1 or 2:2 games out there. So give it up... Create is for PRO Passes frok now on.

 

 

When we had the free pro pass for the first week i created a few battle but therein lies yet another problem.

 

There are now so many different options available (supplies , drugs, flag/kills/time limit etc) that people with pro passes are all creating / preferring very slight variation in the battle type. This means that even if you do buy the pro pass the battle are less likley to fill up due to people wanting that slightly different format to the one you have created. Prior to this the only real selection was length.

 

This means (or will mean IMO) that there will be more battles with just a couple of players in as everyone will be creating their own preference with their own options.

 

Result - even buying pro passes will not ensure good battle - just that you can be on your own in a map of your choosing rather in a busy map that you dont want to be in.

No, the number of parmeters has not changed. All that has changed is vastly more players actually had PRO passes.

 

The PRO section will always have more gamaes available and those games will tend to be smaller ... that is the design goal IMO not a flaw!

 

 

Sorry one other thing.

 

I now find that i need to use drugs (I am currently paying on my ALT at Rank First Lieutenant) because I am having to face ranks much higher than i normally do due to not having the choice i used to. I used to generally create rooms where i was the third from highest rank available but the higher ranks i am facing now (normally at least one brigadier in battle) cause me to have to drug more to try and keep up.
I was desparatley trying to be virtually drug free on my alt just to see how i could do but now that is not an option (especially if i need to finish 1st for a missaion as I am then also competing with druggers on my own team).

 

In short i think this update will increase drug use and that is how it has appeared to me in the last 2 days.

In my experience on my Major account I also started having to drug more in the LT ranks. I think that is more an aspect of the eqiuipment syste,m than the battle choices.

 

You can still oook for battles with th rank you want and try different servers. They should have a search function thjough ... and maybe one day they will.

[Tess_Tickle 12]

So you are pissed off no matter what options you are given. Youy complain about druggers but belittle a chance that allows you to avoid drugging entirely.

 

Devs hear this sort of stuff and just figure they can't win no matter what they do. So they do what they were going to do anyway.

 

Oh well, I've been wher you are too annoyance wise.

Either you have misunderstood my post or I have used the wrong terminology.  Apologies, LittleWillie, I don't really understand your final paragraph.  If you are inferring I am annoying then that's water off a ducks back with me because that I am afraid is in my nature.

 

As I understand it, drugs are the items that come down by parachute and/or they are the supplies I visit the garage to obtain when I have sufficient crystals to buy.

 

That being said I am perfectly happy to play along with others who do the same thing because then you win some and you lose some.  What I have issue with are the players that come in at the bottom rank and immediately spend money to buy big tanks with big weapons to move swiftly through the ranks whilst at the same time scooping up everything that drops by parachute.

 

Because I refuse to buy the Pro-Pass I am left with the few battles open to me with none of my my favourites being there and more importantly no ability to create my own battle with others of like mind.  The battles open to me are nearly always full so it's a constant process of being blown up by big tanks passing through the ranks.  I will never have the ability to get much further than my present ranking, nor do I want to, so with the present system whenever I go back to the bottom rank it will be the same old thing all over again  and with the present system the fun element has gone.

Edited December 3, 2016 by Tess_Tickle

[TilosAzA 6]

This is a stinking load of @#$& I created plenty of battles when I wanted to play a particular map or style. All you had to do was exclude created battles from the battle button. Problem solved, everyone happy. 

[LittleWillie 3,199]

Either you have misunderstood my post or I have used the wrong terminology.  Apologies, LittleWillie, I don't really understand your final paragraph.  If you are inferring I am annoying then that's water off a ducks back with me because that I am afraid is in my nature.

 

As I understand it, drugs are the items that come down by parachute and/or they are the supplies I visit the garage to obtain when I have sufficient crystals to buy.

 

That being said I am perfectly happy to play along with others who do the same thing because then you win some and you lose some.  What I have issue with are the players that come in at the bottom rank and immediately spend money to buy big tanks with big weapons to move swiftly through the ranks whilst at the same time scooping up everything that drops by parachute.

 

Because I refuse to buy the Pro-Pass I am left with the few battles open to me with none of my my favourites being there and more importantly no ability to create my own battle with others of like mind.  The battles open to me are nearly always full so it's a constant process of being blown up by big tanks passing through the ranks.  I will never have the ability to get much further than my present ranking, nor do I want to, so with the present system whenever I go back to the bottom rank it will be the same old thing all over again  and with the present system the fun element has gone.

No I just meant I have in the past let my annoyance close my ears for a time. It's human nature.

 

Sounds to me that some of your concerns go away if you buy a PRO Pass and swicth between PRO games and Basic games. I agree the PRO Pass costs Cry but if spending them makes the game more enjoyable then that is reason enough. But if you don't want to try that then you don't want to try that.

[Tess_Tickle 12]

No I just meant I have in the past let my annoyance close my ears for a time. It's human nature.

 

Sounds to me that some of your concerns go away if you buy a PRO Pass and swicth between PRO games and Basic games. I agree the PRO Pass costs Cry but if spending them makes the game more enjoyable then that is reason enough. But if you don't want to try that then you don't want to try that.

I have just been back to my other (much lower ranking) tank to find there are only about a dozen battles available to me,  As you say, and you are most probably correct, I could buy a Pro-Pass but I do not want to do so for a few reasons.  The main one being this site is littered with scammers and I don't trust using real money to run the risk of being ripped off.  The other is that I have been playing this game for about three years without spending any money at all and I am not going to start now as it's the principle of being pushed into doing something that offends me. 

 

Most probably young people see no problem with spending money whilst sitting alone in their bedroom playing games but my kids, the eldest of which is over 50, would think I have gone "doolally"  (Deolali) if they knew.

[a7x_Pedro48 13,999]

Map-related missions are the hardest for Pro Pass owners too. Not many battles are on Industrial Zone or Tribute and even if you can create those battles not many players will join.

I have 300exp in Industrial Zone. I'm still stuck to 0 exp. No maps lol.

[LittleWillie 3,199]

I have just been back to my other (much lower ranking) tank to find there are only about a dozen battles available to me,  As you say, and you are most probably correct, I could buy a Pro-Pass but I do not want to do so for a few reasons.  The main one being this site is littered with scammers and I don't trust using real money to run the risk of being ripped off.  The other is that I have been playing this game for about three years without spending any money at all and I am not going to start now as it's the principle of being pushed into doing something that offends me. 

 

Most probably young people see no problem with spending money whilst sitting alone in their bedroom playing games but my kids, the eldest of which is over 50, would think I have gone "doolally"  (Deolali) if they knew.

Ahhh maybe you are confiusing the Premium Pass (real money) with the PRO PAss (Crystals money)?? The Premium Pass gives yo the PRO Pass in a package deal but not the other way around.

 

So you can do the PRO section for Crystals only. It is a bit of a cost but --- my way of looking at it is like this. Tanki has a lot of built-in weird policies. THis Pro Pass idea might be the best we are going to get. And if that costs a few Cry / month ... well it is worth trying it.

 

I have more thn one account. So I will have at least one with the PRO Pass and at lest one w/o it ... we'll see.

[ironCzar 36]

fork out for the pro pass big boy, ban drugs!

Why don't you buy one for me?

[tankmaster0012 0]

Look, I've seen battles after this update, and they are a mess. How are we supposed to get gems enough to buy the PRO passes, if the only thing there are are pro battles? Also, we used to be able to join maps we like. But now we can't, because you want you to use "The Most Helpful Button In The World Called A Battle Button", that puts us in a random battle with players 5-6 ranks above me, so that we cant even get crystals! Why!

[euphonium 40]

"Why" ...

 

I have to think it's because they want buyers to have fun, as usual, and non-buyers to be the cannon fodder .... as usual.

 

I bought the pro pass just to see how it would work and so far it has been a waste of crystals, just like the last time I bought one.

 

Every battle I have joined using the battle button is a stinking sewer of drug monsters, or empty.  Really not worth playing any more.  The raiders and hackers and cheats and mults are all still in every game, in greater numbers than ever.

[BLASTER872 1,892]

You are a prime example of how this game is being ruined.  Very early on you bought Vulcan and Titan in order to rush through the ranks against weaker opponents.  Now you preach from a position of artificial superiority.  Is this game just for those with plenty of money?  Is there no place for those with limited ability and cash?  Let me know so I can understand what steps to take......and those would be blooming great big ones to the door marked exit.

Titan M1 Vulcan M1 is weak af at his rank... do your research

[one_shot_wonder 0]

How is the Battle button supposed to know that I want to join a non pro wave battle?

 

[Virgil_69 0]

If we can't create maps then the servers should create at least 1 of each map.