Irrelevancy

I like to think of my place as “just another person”, as opposed to irrelevancy.

To be “someone special” in this game, you either needed to start playing a long time ago or spend money often or both. I recognized that my relatively low spending could not impact my in-game standing. So, no more money, no more playing marathons, just plug along. Find enjoyment where I can from playing a phone-app game that will never end up on my resume, nor be part of a conversation with friends/loved ones.

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That’s exactly why I put up the requirement in the first place, because when it was a 0 cup requirement, I was getting requests nearly every day and I felt bad rejecting them.

My alliance says “invite only” for a reason… you need to be invited to be allowed in.

We only unlock the doors when we’re expecting guests. You need only tag me if you want a reservation. :wink:

I’m certainly not looking to be “someone special” in the game… I already know who the special ones are. I’ve heard of most of the top players, top alliances. I’m not one of them, never will be.

Just another person? Yes, that is exactly what I am in this game. But once upon a time that counted for something on this forum. I could give the “average Joe’s” point of view and regardless of whether people liked or agreed with it or not, it was at least relevant to the conversation.

By conversation, I mean the forum conversation. That is where I am starting to lack relevancy. Which means that if I want to communicate with anyone outside of my small social circle, I will need to stop socially distancing and go out and catch Coronavirus so that I can talk about all the other exciting things going on in the world…

Oops, wait, nothing good going on out there either.

:neutral_face:

As long time Civilisation player I do enjoy the monotonous grind. I like building it all up and then one day I said “I’ll throw some money at it” almost like a tips jar kinda approach.

And I’ve spent more than some but nowhere near the top and I’ve been super lucky. I’ve never done a 30 pull, never used any of the secret methods and I’ve picked up more than my fair share of heroes.

I look to my F2P mate who bemoans my “bought” roster but his is actually pretty decent too. He’s got enough to play the level he wants to.

And that’s the point I think. If you aren’t an Uber try hard then why does anything really matter other than enjoying that game? It’s not nearly perfect but it’s still scratching the itches it did at the start.

And the alliance factor elevates this above a lot of other games. You get a good alliance it’s brilliant. You can share the highs and the lows that this brings. And man does it…

But to somewhat bring this on-topic you are a relevant as you want to be. Do we always agree which each other’s opinions? Probably not. Do I read your opinions and consider what you’ve written? Yes I do. Does it change my mind or view? Perhaps surprisingly it sometimes does.

That keeps you relevant. Whether that opinion matches everyone else’s isn’t the point. I don’t think “Popular opinion” makes someone more relevant than the next.

But that’s just my 2p worth :joy:

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I did spend some money on this game, early on, before I knew how these games worked. I thought that if I spent a few dollars, I would get some nice heroes to start out with. Wasn’t expecting to get the best heroes right out of the gate, but I thought, “hey if I play long enough, I can eventually earn those heroes. Right?”

“… right?”

Turns out no.

You either get lucky, or you spend until you get lucky.

Orrr… you just level up your TC20 and do the best you can with season one heroes. :laughing:

That is where I’m at. Did I get a few lucky pulls for fancy heroes along the way? Yes, here and there. Oddly enough, I spent money, and there are many players in this game who spent nothing and still have better heroes than I do.

RNG gonna RNG rite?

So I’m here. Playing the game with whatever heroes the game feels generous enough to “allow” me to have. And they’re good enough to get me through the majority of basic stuff. But not good enough to get me up to certain levels. I can’t keep my raid defense team up in diamond for more than a day at most. Usually I get knocked back to platinum within 10 minutes of logging off. :confused:

Which are all things I’ve come to accept. People who play harder, pay harder, try harder, are all going to occupy those top spots and I’ll never come anywhere close to besting them. Okay, okay. That’s cool, whatevs. :man_shrugging:

But where is the forum community for those of us who are just “sorta good” at the game?

There are lots of topics discussing the fancy new shiny heroes. I don’t have them.
There are lots of topics discussing which of the new shinies are the shiniest. Hell if I know, I don’t have any of them.
Lots of topics discussing how to git guder, in which most replies suggest using heroes that. Yep. You guessed it. I don’t have.

Are there lower and mid level players posting here? Yes. Mostly the posts that say this is the first time Eddard12345 has posted here, let’s welcome them to the community! and Eddard12345 says something along the lines of “this is ridiculous, I keep getting my ■■■ kicked every time I try to do anything” and the community tells them “git guderer”

And I don’t even know what to say or if it’s even worth it for me to say anything at all…

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Oh I get it. The forum caters to a lot of the new shiny because they get a lot of feature threads.

And the new “posters” tend to be the ones who just want to rant. And then never come back.

But the community section is your friend. You want to start a thread about the middle of the road side of the game then start one.

You could be the torchbearer for that section of player base I guess. Will you attract a legion of new players to the forum? Probably not. Do you actually care? Probably not. Will it add some value? Yep, always.

I don’t have a lot of the shiniest heroes either, but since the game is random and gives me more heroes than perhaps it should from not a huge amount of pulls I do a month like to keep my eyes open to the latest stuff. RNG be RNG. I’ve ended up with 3 S3 5*…yet have none from Grimforest, Wonderland or Morlovia…I have 1 pirate and 2 guardians. No Sand, East, Halloween or Christmas ones :man_shrugging::man_shrugging::man_shrugging: Go figure…that said, I do have a mass of HOTM…I get them for fun usually…4 Noor? Sure why not…3 Malosi, help yourself :laughing:

I’m not commenting on every single thread either. I’ll just comment on the ones that either interest me, directly impact me or just annoy me (looking at you “the board is rigged” threads…)

Do you have experience to add? Sure you do. You seem to get more from Alliance wars than you would expect your alliance too. Can you share the experience of how your team does that in something not meme form? Don’t know :joy::joy: (But FWIW I think you guys are really organised from what I see, that’s pretty rare in a more casual alliances. What’s the source and secret??).

Ultimately though the choices are yours. People agrees and disagree all the time but that doesn’t mean those discussions shouldn’t happen. I just see the forum splits into sides pretty quickly…a sad reflection of the real world presently. The middle ground is there…it’s just covered on craters…

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The above reminded me of a great Calvin and Hobbes piece. Bill knew the score :joy:

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Love that we have this side of things. It’s like an escape away from the escape.

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Hence why I started this thread here. Because it wouldn’t be welcome anywhere else.

Honestly? No, I’m not looking to attract new players to the forum. I’m just looking for some conversation in my spare time. Conversation where my opinions are actually relevant. Instead of chiming in on subjects I know nothing about. Like “hey guys! I see you’re all discussing the newest HotM, and I’m bored, so just chiming in to say, I don’t have this HotM, therefore I have no opinion on the matter. But anyway, what else is going on?”

Yeah, I have done that stupid kind of :poop:posting before. And actually that’s exactly what I’m doing now.

I haz been accused on several occasions of attention seeking. And that accusation is… not without merit. But I am not seeking attention attention, like the “hey everyone, look at me, look what I did!” kind of attention. I’m just looking for a nice friendly conversation over a cup of coffee. Meet new people, learn new things, share ideas and perspectives. Something to keep my brain engaged once I run out of useful stuffs to do in the game.

“Get a life!” people might say. And that… is a valid suggestion.
But see… I’m way beyond the age of appropriateness for that sort of stupidity. Going out to the clubs, trolling for dates, getting into bar fights, drag racing down the street with my “bro-homies”, etc.
I have no interest in getting arrested, nor is that a good look for a middle aged man to be caught out in public acting like a dumb kid who doesn’t know any better.

And how is it any better for you to come acting like a dumb immature idiot on the internet?

Better in several ways. One, it doesn’t cost me anything to post here. Two, I don’t have to drive home, I’m already here. Three, most of y’all don’t actually know me, so not that big a deal if I make a fool of myself, I’m just a random internet persona thingy. Fourth, I can’t get arrested from posting here unless I post something incredibly stupid. Etc. etc.

Posting on friendly, well regulated forums is something I happen to enjoy doing to pass the time in between gameplay stuffs. I know better than to waste my time posting stuff on unregulated forums, as those are all just filled with the absolute worst that humanity has to offer… but this place has always been mostly nice and friendly and civil.

I know, I know, some of you are reading that last line and saying “seriously? this forum? friendly and civil???” Sadly, compared to many others, yes. Very much so.

But I iz running out of relevant things to talk about…

My alliance is casual until you voluntarily opt into war. Those who don’t opt in are civilians, they are free to go about their business as they see fit. But when you sign up for the army? You done signed up for the army, son. Here’s your uniform and your gun, be prepared to try to kill something. If you complete your first tour and decide that the army is not for you, feel free to discharge yourself from the next war. There will be no hard feelings either way. Unless you continue to voluntarily opt in and either refuse to fight, or do things that might undermine your fellow soldiers. That is some :poop: that I will NOT tolerate, soldier! I will shut that :poop: down, no exceptions!!!

ahem

The source was my first training alliance. Where the original leader was a former military guy himself. And he expected us to use all flags. It was drilled into my head from my first few weeks of playing the game. If you log onto the game? Hit the titan! If you opt into war? Use all 6 flags! If you fail to do either of those? Be prepared to give a damn good excuse!

Now that may seem a bit ironic, that I would still more or less operate with that original mindset, seeing as how I’m running a “casual” alliance. Or as I like to call it - semi casual.

The reason I went with “casual” for my alliance is because I realize that people have real lives outside of the game, and I don’t want them to feel like the game is a job. I’m certainly not going to pay them to play, anyway LOL. And in my experience thus far after spending time in a few different alliances, I have realized that most of the time, the most competitive players in the game are also the most toxic. And that is not the kind of :poop: I want in my alliance.

No secret really. Half my team, I trained personally. Told them all, “make sure you have 30 heroes for war; if not, opt out”. Taught them basics about color stacking, ghosting, nuking, hit-and-run, etc. The importance of going after level-appropriate targets and avoiding the temptation to glory point hound by taking out all the easy targets. Be respectful of your lower level mates, leave the easy mop ups for them. Don’t go wasting a freaking 4k team to mop up one halfway dead 4* guy in the wing (that is the kind of stupid :poop: some people in my original alliance would actually do) :man_facepalming:

Really pretty basic stuff. Unfortunate that this game punishes good team play with their war matching algorithm, almost as a means of rewarding lazy players who can’t beat anyone their own size. Not much different than cup dropping, really. Keep dropping in score and eventually you’ll get something you can kill without even having to try. :roll_eyes: Feels like my alliance has become a “consolation prize” for all the stronger alliances who kept getting their asses handed to them by other strong alliances. Like “here, guys, you obviously aren’t good enough to fight at your own level; how about you beat up on these little guys instead?” Sure. Reward them for their incompetence. Why not? Heaven forbid my team get an even match. “Oh but you guys don’t need an even match! Y’all know what you’re doing, and actually try. We figured you guys needed more of a challenge.”

Okay, thanks and all, but I’d like to go back to our original winning streak please and thank you. This constantly having to fight overpowered teams stuff is starting to get old.

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We shall see about that…

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Someone’s roster should never, EVER be the measure of someone’s relevance to the forums.

Ok, yes, not having all these shiny new heroes maybe means you can’t comment on them.

Like, I stay away from all the new hero threads AND most of the “who do I ascend” threads AND most of the “help me set my defense threads” because I don’t have most of those heroes. My last non-vanilla 5* was Malosi, and the only valhalla 4* I have so far is Shadereave… so I can’t really comment on those.

but there’s plenty of other stuff to respond to on the forums.

There are still tons of threads started by new players who jump at their first vanilla 4* (ah, I remember when I got my first 4* healer - Sabina; my first 4* Blue - Kiril - and my first 4* Yellow - Li Xiu - I was so happy to finally have a rainbow 4* team. Li Xiu camwe from an elemental summon because my Yellow bench was so bad!)

But I digress.

I mean come on @TGW , I’d rather read insights from someone with only a handful of hard-to-get 5*s, then pore through endless posts of

“Oh I just ascended my 3rd Gravemaker, can someone help me choose between Mitsuko / Zimkitha / Natalya”

makes me bang my head sometimes, we get it, you must have spent a lot OR gotten really lucky, and I can’t relate cause I’ll never have all those nice heroes

but you know what, FTP like us have a limited roster, so we learn to appreciate and use our heroes better. we become more strategic when deciding when/where to summon :slight_smile:

i’m definitely luckier than most FTPs - but I recognize that, and it makes me appreciate my progress even more.

and you yourself said, the forum isn’t representative of all players. and I always remind myself - there could be a ton of lurkers and non-forum members checking this - and posts from those like us help them see that they’re not alone. Maybe they won’t ever join the forums… but they still read. and we give them hope :slight_smile:

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… and I will add,

I’d much rather hang in here in community content with the fun folks, who have open minds and can appreciate multiple sides of an argument…

… than spend my days hyper-debating on hero usage theory and endlessly debating minutiae…

… I avoid the parts of the forum full of people, who will blow a hole in your post just because you forgot some hero was Fast and not Average, as if that little fact somehow invalidates your whole reasoning.

And yes, power creep IS a problem, and I do agree that having an all-vanilla roster will make it tough to compete. But so what.

And most of us have been blessed with a couple of non-vanillas at least. it’s really how you use them. I remember being laughed at by some forum folk for ascending Margaret - she was not only my first Green 5* ascended, but my first 5* ever…

… but now she’s a key part of my offensive team. She protects my fragile, key heroes like Hansel and Proteus. And against sniper-heavy teams she can dodge like crazy. No joke, she once made herself and her flanks dodge Finley, Joon, Seshat and Kingston all firing in one turn (I had a REALLY bad board then). Managed to win that one in the end…

… and my experiences should help any Margaret user out there. You just know a few folks will have Margaret as their only ascended 5*, too :wink:

And I remember sharing my story about how Vlad won my alliance a war. I know at least one player who went and ascended Vlad after reading that :wink:

so keep posting. just because people aren’t reacting, doesn’t mean nobody’s reading…

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I feel I must apologize RE: Margaret!

I said some unflattering things about her early on after my girlfriend pulled her and I did the research. She had an interesting special skill, yes, but it seemed to only be useful for niche purposes. Compared to the other new shinies they released around the same time? It really looked like someone dropped the ball when designing her.

She has since been buffed and is now useful and relevant.

Then I found myself on that part of the spectrum when pulling Noor. I thought “oh cool! A red minion creator who kills minions! She will be perfect for killing Telly!”

Forum sez… “NOPE! NOOR TRASH! FEED HER TO SHARAN AND DELETE YOUR GAME!”

:cry:

I will never trash anyone’s heroes ever again!

Except for Obakan. I have that guy, he was my very first 5* hero, and he is absolute trash.

:laughing:

Kidding! Sort of. I mainly keep him around as a kamikaze hero. He is my purple team’s deflector sponge.

“C’mon! Go ahead! Hit him! That’s what he’s here for! I brought him along in the hopes that you would hit him and kill yourself! Do it! Do it now!!!” :rofl:

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I agree with others that you’re not irrelevant. That being said itelling you you’re not won’t change anything if you’ve convinced yourself you are. I personally think you’re getting stuck in a bad perspective. I know I have droned on about perspective before, but I think I am right.

As a fellow F2P, the game is as fun as you make it. My version of fun isn’t being at the top. Not to say I don’t want to win, but my goal is to compete against similar teams, and I do. While there are cup droppers, etc you can still find people to fight that would be a tough match. You can’t help cup droppers finding you, but I don’t personally care about cup count. I am sure it levels out to where you should be in the long run.

Make your own fun too. Aside from the Vanilla Challenge and current 4* only challenge thing, I mess around with teams all the time. It’s as as fun as you make it. Bringing your top team to every fight is boring IMO. The game would get stale.

I think F2Pers get a more true sense of the game. Event, S3, etc heroes are supposed to be rare. I think the originally intent was for a roster to have vanilla heroes with the special ones speckled in. That is a very different dynamic then teams of all special ones. It keeps it challenging, but still possible, to win. I think that’s the key to a game.

For example, I hear the top players complain everything aside from raiding is too easy and raiding is boring because every had the same team. I have not encountered this. Am I weaker? Yes. Do I seem to have more fun? Yes. Then is weaker bad? No.

To @sleepyhead point. When I post F2P perspective in threads I don’t do it for likes or to expect most responders to agree. Remember the boards get more lurkers than posters. Most the lurkers are in the same boat as us for power. They’re getting the message their heroes aren’t garbage, or at least I hope they do. I post because I hate to think someone finally pulls a 5*, gets pumped, and then immediately crushed because top tiers come here and call them junk. My best purple hitter is an emblemed Quintus! The heroes work fine and almost all are viable! If the hero is new, be excited! You should be!

Now why I bring all this up is we have comparable rosters, so if you’re not enjoying the game and I am, is it the heroes or perspective/expectations.

Same with posting, you do it more than me and your thoughts are eloquent and elaborated upon well. Some people don’t respond because you did a good job, there is nothing to add. I am also certain there are a ton of lurkers who appreciate your input. Your input is invaluable to the F2P Rebellion too.

I get wanting other, like minded people to respond is nice. In something as nebulous though as the internet you can’t really take a lack of quality response to dictate how to feel about your self to that level of that makes sense?

:beers: pal, we better still be seeing you around!

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I still find relevancy in the game, absolutely. There are many many many teams of lower powers who don’t all have greatest heroes (I kinda wish those were the ones we got matched against in wars? but that’s another discussion entirely).

This is my issue. I am trying to be relevant and useful and helpful on the forum. But most regular forum posters have 5x of every hero in the game!?

I know they don’t represent every player, not even close! But the other players who don’t have those heroes either, aren’t posting here…? They just play casually and really don’t care that much. That is the average E&P gamer. They are not represented here because they have better stuff to do than post here.

I’m posting here to try to be a representative of those who don’t post here. Looking for conversation that relates to issues that us non top players face on a regular basis. But the forum mostly only represents the top X %. The lower percentile players don’t care enough to post here, and I fully understand that… to them it is just a game. And it is just a game. To take it more seriously than that is not healthy.

I :heart: you guys in my alliance but you all have your own lives. And I fully respect that, which is why I set my alliance “requirements” as such. I would feel horrible if I “forced” one of my members have to choose between doing a war / titan hits etc. versus something far more important. Your jobs, your families, your spouses, your children, your health, etc., all take precedence over our alliance “needs”. Always have and always will, that is one “rule” in my alliance that will not ever change. Do not ever put the desires of the “alliance’s success” over anything important in your life.

I’m absolutely 100% serious… I would be more upset if someone in my alliance neglected an important real life obligation in order to hit a titan or use their war flags than I would be if they neglected to use their titan or war flags.

Do not ever come and tell me “well I had to miss my son’s birthday party so that I could hit the titan…”

Or “I was supposed to go to my dad’s funeral, but I wasn’t sure if they would have wifi on the plane, so I stayed home to make sure I used my war flags.”

No. NO. Don’t do that. Don’t EVER do that.

You guys have your lives. Keep living your lives. I will keep playing the game and try to do the best I can as your leader when I’m able to.

The “irrelevancy” I’m speaking of is only about the forum itself. Because sometimes I like to chit chat in between flags and stuff. I’m finding fewer and fewer things to chit chat about on here lately.

Of course I have many other better things to do with my time, and I should be doing them instead. But it’s not often that I find myself feeling comfortable and somewhat relevant in a social group… it was nice to feel like a part of something bigger than myself for a while.

Then they all started talking about stuff that I’ve never even heard of and well I just can’t keep up anymore. :man_shrugging:

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Well wolves don’t have thumbs. While that is only 1 con, it is kind of an important one in their ability to post. :wolf: + :computer: - :+1: = :face_with_symbols_over_mouth:

:beers:

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I use my tail as a thumb. :wink:

:beers:

UPDATE: good freaking lord…

forum is a joke now, apparently.

So maybe my being irrelevant here is a good thing.

Some of it is. I for one don’t look that hard at every post. I skim at best. I imagine I am not the only one. Tag people who you’d like to chime in. Most people will when tagged. You can tag me any time. Granted, I will be curious why you want to hear my opinion :laughing:, but I will blurt something out there.

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@Muchacho I am curious as to why you did not hit our last titan!

Not at all mad, is your choice, you know I’m not a tryhard. But is it because you thought it was going to escape anyway? Because admittedly, that was a very real possibility. :grin: By the time I got around to logging in and seeing how much health it still had and how little time it had left, I debated myself on whether or not to bother hitting it.

I really was about 50/50 on it. Decided to go for it, “against all odds”. And got it.

No lie though, I feel very bad that you didn’t get any credit. So I ask you here and now: did you not hit it because you didn’t have time? Or because you thought it was going to escape? Or did you just not care either way?

I would have called you in to hit it before it was dead if I had a way to contact you… if I tag you on here, do you get a notification on your phone? If so, I will tag you next time.

EDIT: I only ask because I don’t want you to feel like we killed it “early on purpose” to keep you from getting hits or anything like that. I really do want everyone who is willing and able to get credit, to get credit.

If someone tells me “hey guys I can’t hit yet, can you save a little bit for me? I’ll be around in a couple hours”… I will hold my hits. I will do that for any member upon request. But without a formal request? I have to assume that some might not show up.

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Pfft says the guy who made half the forum change their profile pics into cups

I don’t buy any of that, you are who you are, and we like you the way you are. Or at least I do

Forget about rosters, that’s overrated :grinning:

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LOL I never told them to do that!!!

I just want to keep talking about stuff here, but as time goes by it is turning into a lot of “hey which hero is better, Aigwerhoy-Khalrulf or Jangawerogh?” Responses are “oh well I would use Aigwerhoy unless you have Thaslwoerhf and a level 357 mana troop”

Wut? :confused:

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