Hi All,
Long-time lurker, first-time topic creator here! I want to say that despite this topic’s title/content, I enjoy the game (When it isn’t being merciless in its RNG!) and enjoy reading everyone’s thoughts about it. And while I still don’t consider myself an expert at the game (only just recently built a 4K team) I think I’ve experienced enough to be able to say this: a concerning amount of anti-quality of life (“quality of death”?) changes have been made in recent months. This isn’t a new sentiment from what I’ve seen here, but I (too) feel like these changes add up to a big step backward for what is otherwise a very solid game, and I’ve wanted to compile my thoughts on those changes here along with what I think is proof of them being intentional. Please share your thoughts, and if you point out something wrong I’m happy to correct it.
Anti-QOL changes with tangible proof of implementation:
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Secretly increasing the stats of monsters in the cheapest, most-farmed season 1 stages (like 8-7, 7-4, etc.). This meant levels took longer to farm than normal, which adds up when you’re farming. It’s not significant, but what is annoying is that there was no reasoning ever provided by SG for why they did this, and it was only pointed out when a player discovered it while farming. What if that player never discovered it? Proof: V28 monster HP increase, for instance in S1:8-7? [Solved, Ack by staff in post #27]
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Telluria/Vela nerfing. No matter what side of the debate you were/are on, many players spent tons of money just to get someone whose stats were changed without their consent after money changed hands. This was after SG likely posted one of the (if not the) highest revenue months in their company’s history, releasing to production a hero they had to have known (and I believe were warned in beta) would imbalance the game. Proof (of nerfing, not record-high revenue): Upcoming Balance Changes to Telluria & Other Heroes
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Nerfed mystic vision rewards (though decreasing time between vision availability). Now we watch twice as many ads for even less reliable loot. Proof: Version 22 Release Notes & Status
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Moving Atlantis Rises up a day earlier to accommodate a new event schedule without also extending it by an extra day, so that players can play it over the entire weekend (rather than letting it span the whole weekend by just making it 3 days, like most other portals). Proof: Event Schedule Changes (Version 30 Onwards)
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Removal of free reroll option when trying to revenge someone who happened to be offline (admittedly a bug, but one that was left in for so long that many players had gotten used to it, and its removal wasn’t softened by doing something like slightly reducing reroll costs). Proof: Please give us the reroll back - or another solution for our raid groups [MASTER]
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Nerfed loot ticket drop rate. Loot tickets are low-impact on the game economy and still cost energy, so it’s not like getting more of them was breaking the game. The only(?) hit to SG is that with more loot tickets available as a reward for filling chests, players spend less time in the game and less money on loot ticket packages. Proof: Version 27 Release Notes & Status
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Complete removal of Atlantis tokens as a chest/vision reward, replacing them with Valhalla coins instead of putting in the development effort to include both as possible rewards. Proof: Upcoming Change: Valhalla Coins Introduced as Reward (Version 28 Onwards)
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Introducing a summon portal (ToL) that had both false advertising in its first month, as well as (it continuing to have) the lowest summoning odds yet. Since S1 heroes continue to be added to this, it couldn’t at least match the Epic Hero Summon odds? Proof of false advertising (Since corrected): Should we sue small giants? They are falsely advertising the legend summons!
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Making Hero Academy non-FTP friendly and out of reach for most players (months of building just to get to the good stuff), and needlessly expensive to both research and fund without any real guarantee of quality rewards. This after dangling it like a carrot in front of players for months (years?). And despite going through a revision or two after feedback, it is also at odds with what SG promised in their AMA, who said it would be intentionally FTP friendly. Proof: [Master] Improve / Fix Hero Academy, SGG "Ask Me Anything" AMA transcript - 13 March 2019 - #3 by Kerridoc
Concerning trends that lack clear proof or are more subjective, but also have some consensus among many players:
- Making Alchemy Lab initially terrible (though they have worked to somewhat improve its viability) and a money/resource pit.
- Nerfed chest rewards of all types
- Power creep (unintended(?) consequence of introducing emblems and new portals/heroes at such a fast rate)
Again, I do still enjoy the game, but seeing things like these again and again despite the devs talking about how much they want to actually benefit the players by adding QOL improvements is just demoralizing. What do you think? Did I miss anything? Was I too harsh on one of these?
Thanks for reading! I may add to this topic over time if more anti-QOL changes are made. But hopefully, we see a shift in the other direction and SG keeps their word and gives back to the loyal players who have made them so much money.
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And to be fair, here’s a great thread about things SGG has done well (along with other things they have not) that I agree with: 10 things SGG did wrong and 10 things they did right - #6 by IvyTheTerrible
