About the Angry Birds 2 Arena

[cognitive]

The thing is, given the idiocy of how score is calculated in AB2, the mystery points brigade is actually plausible at times. Just plausible. Time after time I’m playing some guy (real or not) and he’s down to 3 birds and 3M points, then the last 3 birds, wham! 4M each and all of a sudden he’s 3+12=15M. It’s plausible because I get 4M on a level on occasion, but assuming we play the same level, it simply is not possible.

The way the system works, a simple structure with a half dozen pieces can yield outlandish scores if completely destroyed. OK, I buy that. But we aren’t having such structures in this particular moment. So, there’s a good chance that the opponent isn’t even playing the same or similar rooms. Come on, Rovio, let’s come clean on this one.

 

[Rovio_Hank]

Hey Flingers!

I just wanted to address the “mystery points” from our perspective. There is zero incentive from us as developers to give you players a negative playing experience. We’re not tampering with any scores, we simply pair you players together through the match making. I do agree with you however, that the visualization of what is happening during a run is not very clear and it can lead to confusion. We’re talking about improving the interface for that; but also looking into how we can improve the Arena overall.

If you find something that looks like a bug in the Arena, we’d love for you to document it and we might be able to find a solution. Long time ago I remember having an animation bug in the interface that didn’t update opponent birds flung instantly, and hence added double score for the next bird instead. This of course doesn’t change the outcome of the final score, but could be experienced as cheating/unreasonable for the player.

On a side note: What would you like to see from an improved Arena?

Thank you!
/Hank

[ryan-kochie]

I think live match making would be pretty cool, with a safe emoji chat? And to address the scoring as well, remember they may be a room or 2 behind or ahead of you depending on how your and their birds did against the pigs. So while you might not have 1 of those easy 1 tower rooms at the time, they might.

A view my opponents playthrough would be cool, either during somehow or after the game. Though I’m not sure if you just record the birds and their score and not the actual gameplay.

I said before in the suggestion thread I’d like to see more tiers, like epic levels of everything that are perhaps optional. Like there is a “prestige” button that unlocks after a certain amount of gold medals or medals, or star rank, that you don’t have to click but if you do then it levels up all the tiers and you start over at “pristine bronze” or whatever, with greater rewards. So some people can stay in the diamond league or take a chance if they choose and go for pristine diamond or epic diamond, etc.

Maybe a report player button as well (when you click their profile), when it seems clear someone in your league is using cheats. It can be very frustrating trying to get to first when someone seems to have an endless supply of tickets. Though the system should not be based on how many reports they receive so it can’t be abused, just flags their profile to be looked at.

[jo-ha]

A report player button might be a good idea, but Rovio really needs to work with the feature. I know a lot of report-players-supporting games, but if the developer is lazy about that, I doesn’t do any good.

[ryan-kochie]

Agree, or ones where it’s all automated with no human checks at all, and then people abuse it and simply by volume of reports can get a player taken care of. That’s very unfair of as well.

[cognitive]

The mystery points issue is one of scoring methodology. I don’t think Rovio is out to get us (on this one at least :)) but the current methodology seems to assign score based on percentage of destruction, not amount of destruction.

consider the easy case of four boxes sitting on top of two balls. Any bird in the stable can obliterate this one, and depending on your rank this should yield 2.5 to 4.0M. At the same time, a room with three mostly rock structures can sustain much more destruction, require several birds to rid of pigs, and still may not yield those many points. This is seriously wrong. If it isn’t then the way points are awarded should be transparent.

The way the destructometer fills up and awards birds also leaves MUCH to be desired. In the beginning of the game 1M is usually enough to fill the meter, as the game moves along this requires a lot more points to move. We’re aware of it, but it really makes for inconsistent gameplay.

The user experience engineer in me would LOVE to see an option where after the opponent is done with a room, you have the option to see what the opponent’s room looks like after he or she played their last bird for that room.

What really bothers me personally is not the opponent scoring 4-5M points in a game. I’m a decent player, and I know there are players that are far better than me. But when you see time after time someone getting 3M out of 4 birds (while you’re at 8M-9M) and all of a sudden his last 3 birds (plus bonus) are all 3M-4M EACH… I mean, come on now, if someone is good enough to score 12M out of 3 birds they can do better in the beginning.

 

[Katydid]

I don’t like feeling like I am being forced to do something. Like tonight’s 6 items claim the gem letter; the letter you must buy monthly. Claim the daily feather. Then play the daily challenge, play the KPC, play the arena, play the tower of fortune.

I normally do those things anyway.  I wouldn’t mind paying a reasonable monthly fee for play that would be preferable to being told I have to do six items.

ALSO       The feather reward at the end of the list needs work. I have to tap it several times, close the tab reopen it and tap it some more before I even get the bonus feathers.

[desperados]

Arena is still empty with non active players with lvl 1 birds as usual..heh it’s me and a person with 1100 stars in it now.

[hamvestor]

I was leading my Diamond League arena with double the points of the next closest player, but after this morning’s update, with two days left in the weekly competition, I was suddenly switched to a totally different group, with much higher scores, so I have only a narrow lead over the second-place competitor. What’s up with that?

[CaptSternn]

2nd place in my group was at 64 stars before the update. After the update in a different group where 2nd place has only 37 stars. Guess it is a good thing to not be in a hurry to do the update right away,

[AggieGuy]

Yep, I got hosed on the arena.  Went from a solid third place (no way to catch the cheater at #1)  down to 10th.  Seven of the people ahead of me now are all clustered together with around 450-500 stars each.

 

Oh well, bigger problems to deal with than that.

[Katydid]

The update has several glitches that need to be fixed. It won’t show my fried list no matter what I try. I got to level 3 of the daily boss game only to have the game end instead of moving to the third level?

Will they ever iron out the wrinkles before the release updates?

 

[cognitive]

Another Rovio-ism this week in the arena. 1st place is a measly 1100 points and 12th place is 600. The number 13 guy is busy putting up 100 points in an hour to stay in diamond league, forcing the rest of us to play accordingly to avoid getting demoted ourselves.

Very believable ?. Not to mention every player I’ve faced last couple of days has been the 20M variety from flock strength in the 280-290 range. Again, very believable ?.

I suppose that’s a good way to get people to burn thru their stash of spells. Not a bad plan.

[Katydid]

It has taken two requests for help because the update isn’t working correctly  to even get a response from Rovio. I am about to delete the game.

[ABeggerToo]

This update really has reminded me of some of the disasters of the past. Frequent crashes, no friends available for sending gifts. I wonder if they will still pay out for their lack of testing with gems – as in the past.  “We’re sorry, we won’t fix the problem, but here’s some gems to keep you quiet.”

[Katydid]

I’ll let you know. Rovio really showed how much they care when it took two requests to even get a response!

[CappyP5240]

That’s it… I’m Done with Angry Birds 2. Although I like the latest update and the FEATS feature, The Arena is skewed for nothing else but to make money. I have spent my share of $$$ to get gems but no more. I have a power level of 247 and have completed all the leagues so I am no beginner. Since the last update, I tested the fairness of the challenges and have found it is near impossible to win a challenge without using a spell or spending gems (at the end to get an extra bird.  I’ve played close to 15 challenges (never using a spell or spending 60 gems) and cannot get past level 2 (I used to get a full streaks with no problem). And the amount of single pigs left in a room is STAGGERING. I bet I had 18 single stranded pigs out of all 15 challenges. And, in roughly 9 of the 15 games, by the end, I was 100 to 400 thousand short of winning, watched the video only to get the blues bird to go against a standing block tower of stone OR i’d have to watch a video to get a bird to get that last single stranded pig, get within 10,000 points of winning  and asked to spend 60 gems. it used to be fun. not anymore. I repeat, I’M DONE!!!!

[ryan-kochie]

So question, if we are always matched against other player’s previous runs, where did the first runs come from? Are there computer generated players we play against as well as humans?

[Angry Beaver]

@ryan-kochie When player-vs-player arena format started i remember i got few times opponent called “Arena”. But it was long time ago.

[ZoomRhonda]

@hank

When can we connect to our friends list again to give and receive gifts? This is an important part of the game for me and I have quit playing till that is fixed. I noticed in Facebook under the apps section it doesn’t look the same as it used to and there is an right arrow in the box  to look at all my friends, as only a partial list can be seen, but when I click it nothing happens…

[ryan-kochie]

Thanks, so started off with computer generated players but assume they’ve disappeared and we are just fighting player’s recorded ghosts now?

[AggieGuy]

Another new tournament, another one where within a few hours, one player is over 500 stars (in this case over 700 with over 100 all 1st place wins and zero 2nd or 3rd) and two others are right behind with 532 and 477.  No way to get that many stars in a few hours without cheating.

And as CappyP5240 pointed out, it is all but impossible to win anymore.  Either an invincible/unreachable micropig does you in, or the mystery points brigade suddenly goes up at the very end by some ungodly amount.  Best one was yesterday, I was at 9m (thanks to a stupid buried micropig) but my opponent was only at 4m so I assumed I had this in hand.  Oh no, with his last two birds, he went to 24m.  Just now had one go from 8m to 15m with 1 bird.  Both players had flock power around 15 less than me, but can score anywhere from double to triple what I do, without spells.  That is male bovine excrement.  They really have made the arena all but impossible.

And why in the heck have I been forced to play on the exact same levels 5 tries in a row?

[CaptSternn]

I feel for you guys in those groups with busy players. I have been in apathy groups for a long time now, months. Only once or twice have I settled for the silver medal in this period. I found myself in 3rd place this morning. 1st had 18 stars, 2nd had 9. I have already passed them just in playing a couple of hours this afternoon.

But even so, the arena just isn’t where it is at any more. The arena rewards are no longer worth grinding away all week because there is so much to be had in other parts of the game. The arena is good for getting the rare chests. Hit the right card just once or twice during the week and get 200 gems, 1,000 gems or even 500 pearls. That puts the end of the week awards to shame. I also get rare chests on some trail levels.

Now we have the Feats rewards. Getting stuff just for playing, doing things we would be doing anyway. There are only a couple of things I see in the Feats that would mean spending, opening legendary chests and completing all of the daily quests.

But, if for some reason you don’t find it fun to play any longer, there is no point in sticking with it.

I think the really big issue now is the Facebook problem. How could Rovio miss that mess? Doesn’t affect me because no Facebook, but it is really going to affect a whole lot of people that I know. That needs to be addressed right away.

 

[Katydid]

It’s being added by Rovio unless you submit help tickets. Then you have to send them a list items they request. I decided to heck with it. I plan on deleting AB-2  it has more then just a Facebook problem. I purchased the glasses and a set of hats only to find half of glasses gone the next day. That with the random closing down is too much!

 

[cognitive]

So, is anyone else experiencing the super competitive at the bottom arena last week and this?

Both instances the top half is apathy and the bottom half is ivy league admissions competition…