šŸ•µ Act Casual ā€“ How do you go from being a very active player to somewhat casual?

43nqgs

43nr0m

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I didnā€™t realize that i am a Very active player, after i read your definitionā€¦ :sweat_smile:

Anyway if you want to take a little break from the game, maybe you can try summon. Do 30x summon and try to have 0 5* and plenty of Dawasā€¦ your mood will automatically changed to ā€˜not activeā€™ for a couple of daysā€¦ anyway try limit your dawaā€™s to max 4, because study says getting 5 dawas on 30x pull will result in permanent burnout from the gameā€¦

On a more serious note, what i did recently was changing alliance. New alliance means no expectation, so no pressure. I also stop my spending and start play with different heroes either for raid or farming. I still very active based on your definition, so I donā€™t know when will Iā€™ll feel that burned out thing. One thing for sure is I hate my Summon result.

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Hereā€™s what Iā€™ve done, although I need to state that I donā€™t quite meet every requirement in the OP. I still particpate in every Trial, Challenge Event, Rare & Useful Quests, and Raid Tourney. However, I am not trying to place highly in anything scored - although I donā€™t want just completion rewards - the tier above that is fine.

I am possibly the least scheduled person on this board. Iā€™ve long been self employed, working on contract basis, and almost exclusively for former employers, or direct referrals from them or friends. Iā€™m semi-retired now. I am close to not having a sleep schedule, beyond ā€œIā€™m tired, and want to go to sleep.ā€

  1. Forum use:
    I stopped doing the forum games, as they were a time sink, and often not fun. Sometimes they were, but I just decided that it was time to move on from them.

  2. PoV. Iā€™ve never finished PoV. The first time, by inability to do so. Last time, by choice. I couldā€™ve finished it, but I didnā€™t need an ugly avatar to tell me that. Iā€™m a tier 48 guy, planning to get what I want, and not what I donā€™t. Thatā€™s not really a change, but a realization.

  3. War. I try and opt out of one war a month now. Ideally itā€™s when I am too busy, or just want a break. My alliance is casual, and I like that. We hit 6-8* titans, and weā€™re around 45% in war, and thatā€™s ok. Iā€™ve only failed to use war flags due to connection issues, except for 1 flag when I fell asleep.

  4. Raids. This is the part that is the least fun for me, so doing the minimum here has worked well. Iā€™ve set a defense that can hold Gold tier comfortably. Most of my raiding is revenge or tourneys, and I rarely even end up in Platinum any more.I could strive to hold Platinum, but itā€™s more work than fun.

  5. I am trying to keep my optimization in check. I do have a spreadsheet of what heroes I have and levels, and reference stuff that I cobbled together, but Iā€™m not so worried about having a free summon slide. Turning off notifications has helped, but I may try that again, as I do miss the titan notification.

My mobile gaming day tends to run like this:

I tend to play a bit when I wake up, lounging in bed. Kicking off the day using up some energy to get things going. I will note when my chests will be available, and will plan to have energy full by then. Letting the game auto-play as needed to use up some energy. Will hit titans at least once, normally twice to get that refill flowing also.

I will finish the chests as I can. If both are up at same time. I spend 1 raid energy, then do monster, then back to raid. If no tourney I will refill to finish raid chest - I have about 50 raid refills unused.

I am not signing on as often, and making sure to use auto-play to help me. Unless Atlantis is Rising - then loot tickets get used often, and I play more actively.

In general, I agree that gaming needs to be fun. For me, itā€™s a hobby & a pastime. I have resisted many attempts to be drug into it as a business over the last 30 years. Iā€™ve been asked to buy into or back many stores and ventures, I lost count.

I run a boardgaming club in real life, and one of my mantras is that ā€œGaming is supposed to be fun. If youā€™re not having fun, youā€™re doing it wrong.ā€ Note that there are exceptions to this. When a member has a heart attack at the game club, and the ambulance is trying to revive him, and Iā€™m calling his wife whom Iā€™ve never met, ainā€™t no more fun coming. This is the most severe one, but you get the idea.

I spend a lot of time playing games, and online gaming has ramped up massively for me with the pandemic, as I am losing something like 2 whole days of face to face gaming a month. Some of that is ā€œworkā€ meaning playtesting, reading rules and seeing how they work with a prototype, etc, so the rest needs to be fun. My ā€œworkā€ gets paid with thanks, or a copy of the game if it gets published.

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Indeedā€¦ And itā€™s not just the time spent on the forums, but at times itā€™s easy to get caught up in the hypes over certain heroes, events etc and wind up sinking more time and/or cash into completing or obtaining them.

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This is really interesting stuff and some great points all round, this is something Iā€™ve thought about lately and will come back and post properly when Iā€™ve had time for proper reflection.

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Excellent excellent topic for discussion. Thank you so much @zephyr1!!

I have been playing E&P for about a year now. I am quite competitive by nature and try to be good at anything I do. And I didnā€™t know the depth of things I was getting into when I started E&P.
Result? Within a span of 3 months - I became so active that I think my-then-self would tick almost all the boxes you mentioned.

I soon realized that my productivity has decreased quite a lot, and it has affected every part of my life.

Thatā€™s when I had to take a step back and think about how to get things in order.

For that, I need to get my priorities in place for the game.

  1. Loots - need to get them regularly for getting those mats. (Damn you SGG :frowning:ā€¦ but thatā€™s for a different topic)
  2. Extra flags - probably okay to miss them (This was the hard part for me to let go as for me Raids are the most fun part - I get to test all my wacky ideas against random peopleā€¦ I learnt a huge part of the game through self-experimentation like this.)
  3. Challenge events - obviously, Iā€™ll have to balance them along with filling monster chests.
  4. Atlantis event - probably the only non-negotiable part for me for reasons mentioned below.

Changes I have made in my day:

  1. Log into E&P 3 times a day - 2 times (morning and night for filling those chests); 1 time sometime in the afternoon to check the status of titan/war or anything else that might need my attention - in my alliance or otherwise
  2. Raid more carefully to fill the chest - this is the difficult part for me. I enjoy raiding and I donā€™t care if I lose a lot of raids. They let me learn a lot of battle tactics. But now, I try to make the best use of my 6 raid flags. Then try to fill the raid chest with 2 of the tournament flags. Save the remaining tournament flags for filling the next raid chest (Obviously, this means that I make do with filling raid chest only once a day over weekends. The plus side - I can have fun with raids as I have more flags to spare :smiley:)
  3. Challenge Events: I try to fill the monster chests by replaying stages 1,2,3 of the rare tier. You can get done with the chest and still have WE to go through some stages. During challenge events, my afternoon login will be of slightly more duration as I try to complete some more levels.
  4. Atlantis: This is the only time I make an exception to my first rule (login only 3 times). Because this is the only time I can accumulate resources required for the rest of the month. So, auto-farm continuously through out this period. (Definitely affects my productivity to some extent. So, I try to schedule less-priority and less-impact work tasks around that time)

I find this grind helps me find a good balance between my E&P time and everything else.

Hope this info is helpful for some of you out there.

Cheers!! :beers:

EDIT: Adding one more point to the Filling Chests point. Itā€™s okay if somedays I am not able to fill the chest in my login time. Iā€™ll just fill it the next day. No point in waiting for flags and definitely not worth spoiling my sleep over it.

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For me opting out wouldnā€™t be good enough. Iā€™d still want to watch and encourage my teamā€¦ help others pick the best target or best team to takeā€¦

To get me to cut down on my playtime successfully, Iā€™d need to be goneā€¦ maybe to our vacation alliance or something.

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Thank you, @zephyr1 for creating this thread and opening a healthy important discussion around avoiding burnout and game/life balance. We want and encourage all players to play responsibly, especially in these very troubled times. Empires & Puzzles should always be a source of fun and escape and appreciate all our active players.

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I am a very active player.

It started as a distraction from some rl ā€œstuffā€ and it was a great distraction.

I ended up as leader of an alliance, long story, but it wasnā€™t ambition that placed me there, just a desire to be in an alliance with an effective leader.

After a year of that, I realised that it had taken over my life. So I just stopped. I had to leave the alliance, it was a shock to them, but I had to break the obligations to get free. They were good people.

I joined another alliance, I still enjoy the game. I quickly ended up co-lead (because I canā€™t keep my mouth shut lol) I was, and continue to be clear that I will not do more than I want to do.

I want to be in an alliance with people who enjoy working together to achieve stuff. So I chose an alliance with other very active people. This means the odd day when it can be a bit much. If it becomes more than the odd day, I will get out of the way :slightly_smiling_face:

Events: I had to have a long talk with myself. I could feel how much it stressed me when I tried to truely compete. So I donā€™t anymore. I set myself realistic, relaxing goals and stop when I reach them.

Wars: I enjoy the challenge of wars. I try very hard not to stress myself or others for bad luck. I appreciate team work very much, if people are trying, results are secondary and laughing about fails helps keep things fun. Bad performance feels bad. Donā€™t take wars too seriously! People half arsing it isnā€™t fun for me. If you donā€™t want to war. Opt out, no judgement here.

The game fills in some spaces in my life. I hate to be idle, but if it isnā€™t fun or satisfying (ups and downs are part of that) then I ainā€™t doing it.

Its a game. One day I will stop playing and life will go on.

When rl is intense, I ignore line and the forum.

Beta is unreasonably stressful a lot of the time, its the first thing I drop when necessary.

Casual doesnā€™t suit me, If I go casual, Iā€™m a hair away from quitting. But thats just me.

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I have been active in this game for 24 months and I had family problem 3 months ago and started to realize that I am into the game more than family and my work.

  • I firstly left the main chat room on LINE app and participate only in the Leader/Co-leader chat room where only 7 members are in, discussing only very important topics.

  • I do not wake up at night for game anymore. let the WE, raid flags, titan flags filled up.

  • I skip weekend war where I can spend my time taking care of my family. I use auto-play for farming at maps rather than moving the tiles myself.

  • I stop chasing points on monthly challenge, completing 15 stages on each difficulty at any score has already rewarded you very good loots. Tier rewards are bonus.

  • I have found out that with current rosters, I can finish seasonal quests with-in couple of days. I will take it easy on Sand Empire and will start on Advanced level first and may skip the easy one.

The most important one is to always keep in my mind that filling chest does not mean that I am going to get good stuffs. And always remind myself that I have been playing for 27 months, rosters are decent already, donā€™t bother chasing 5* heroes.

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Lots of great insights and tips hereā€¦ thank you all for that.

The more I think about my own situationā€¦

I realize itā€™s the alliance ā€œcultureā€ and goals that make or break things. In my alliance weā€™re all ā€œletā€™s do our bestā€¦ but if we lose, itā€™s ok!ā€ If we lose because we didnā€™t use our flags, itā€™s a shame, and the person who misses using the flags genuinely feels bad. But if we lose cause our War hits werenā€™t good enough, itā€™s all OK.

And hey, even if we lose the war, we inch closer towards the War Chest AND get progress on the POV challenge.

Itā€™s gotten so that I actually do NOT want to recruit. I feel like weā€™ve gotten into a nice groove where we can enjoy the game the way we play it, and Iā€™d rather not risk messing the dynamic up :slight_smile:

Another thing that helps is with Raids. It used to drive me CRAZY every time I couldnā€™t revenge someoneā€¦ it still happens maybe once a week, Iā€™ll fail to revenge sometime 3xā€¦ and now Iā€™ve just accepted it. Thanks, enjoy the cups, good job, there are times Iā€™ll pick on someone and they canā€™t revenge me too after 3x (and I sympathize). What goes around, comes around, itā€™s only a game :slight_smile:

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My playstyle has changed quite a lot.

Iā€™m less active in the chatrooms (alliance and global).

I still hit the titan, but I donā€™t use all my flags especially when itā€™s about to escape/die.

Iā€™m still serious about the chests, but I donā€™t feel compelled to finish them as soon as possible anymore.

I ignore the quests unless itā€™s gems or rare.

Sometimes, I donā€™t watch mystic vision when itā€™s available.

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I feel Iā€™m getting burned out to. I got tired of old alliances I was in because of the rules,so I decided to start my own. Which is a waste of time it seem. I canā€™t get anyone to join. Posting in global chat is a total waste of time as your post is gone within minutes and no one seems to be interested in my post on here. They need to make a way for us leaders to find people not in an alliance without tons of searching on the forum.So Iā€™m about to cut way back on the game. Definitely not spending anymore real money on this game. Not until things improve

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Isnā€™t it weird that a game can produce this level of stress and anxiety!

They are supposed to relax usā€¦

Something has gone wrong :joy:

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You wonā€™t get refunded for anything in the game except with having lots of fun. If playing isnā€™t fun any more, youā€™re about to burn out, since the only ā€œcashbackā€ from the game is missing now.

I experienced that in a top alliance and got it back by joining a more casual but also competitive alliance. A game shouldnā€™t be duty, it should be fun. Choose the right alliance for exactly your needs and get positivity back by having fun instead of pressure.

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Funny enough I was expecting more ā– ā– ā– ā–  in this :rofl:

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Thatā€™s a very good suggestion to reduce in-game time without falling behind.

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:rofl: I rarely watch it but I always hit the button when available. On occasion I let it sit too long before getting back to it and have to hit the button again after reconnecting.

Some of my best loot has been from MV.

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For me, i started a laid back alliance. No Line chat, no minimum titan damage, no war strategy. Give people a chance to be active and play the game without the required planning on how to actually use war flags, setting timers to use titan flags, etc.

I have a few higher level players who have joined and it seems to be going well. Especially the higher level players, they know how to play and can maximize their time in game without having to chat and plan how to do things. Been quite refreshing!

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If you are still looking, I started an alliance for the same reason you tried, an alliance without all the rules. We have moved to 6* titans and have 15 members. Welcome to join us!

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