New Arena: problems and suggestions for fixing

[Clovos_RovioSweden]

@mvnla2
We don’t have unlimited gems & spells on our live accounts. You will not be fighting any cheating dev accounts in the live game. Only devs who are using their live accounts. The only difference from these accounts is that they might have tried the new patch earlier.

I’ve connected my live account to my personal Facebook account. PM me yours and I’ll add you :-)

[AndalayBay]

@andalaybay
Yes buying a game upfront is what we would’ve had if the mobile market would have stayed as it did when the first Angry Birds was released. However, free-to-play has taken over the market and its no longer an option to keep a game company running with upfront purchases anymore. Users don’t want to pay money to try games anymore.

@clovos, I would agree except that Angry Birds has always had free versions for people to try. That’s exactly how I started with the original Angry Birds. I played the free version and then I bought it.

The truth of the matter is that you make more money out of the free-to-play versions with in-app purchases. People don’t track how much they are spending and with the new arena layout, they will purchase stupid amounts on gems so they can win. You guys aren’t stupid. You know exactly the mechanics you need in order to remain profitable. I’m just one of those who don’t like those mechanics. I’ve never spent a cent on AB2 and I never will. When it gets too upsetting, and I find the new mechanics very stressful, not fun, I will remove the game and move on.

[Brandon Davis]

@clovos

So you’re “Silver” that keeps tailing me in second place lol?

[ger_ych]

Please stop adding 20 levels every 2 weeks. Even the older AB games don’t get this much “updates”. It discourages newer players from trying the game. Imagine a newbie seeing 400 levels to conquer. Adding levels every 2 or 3 months gap is more encourageable.

[Anonymous]

Well, well, well. Things just got interesting now.

I have just discovered two whopping “strategies” that can be used in the arena for a huge advantage over other players. Normally they wouldn’t be so bad but when used together they are absolutely game breaking.

I am not using these exploits to my advantage because I am not a cheater. However, many people definitely know about them so I will be using them very sparingly to keep it even.

Now this is where it gets interesting. These exploits will NOT be revealed to anybody until the arena gets the changes it needs. Not even Rovio will know about this until things get fixed.

I will say this though: Everybody says that players are getting huge amounts of stars by paying lots of money. Not true.

[Dopey]

At least one of these have been discussed in this forum. If the grind of playing the Arena isn’t tedious enough for you, there’s a trick to choose opponents that will all lose by more than 5 stars, every time. I really gave the Arena a good try during the latest tournament, and got silver in a gold tournament without spending any money, and not really trying hard to beat the guy who finished first. The exploit makes the experience very disinteresting.

I thought I’d still play the single player levels, until I realized that finishing with three stars is inevitable now, if you finish at all. The point in staying with single player was to continue with the three star streak stretching to level 1, but there’s no sense of accomplishment in that anymore either. With one stroke the devs managed to kill both the game modes in AB2. I liked both modes as they were, but now I like neither.

So I’m gone from AB2 now, for good. I’ve tried to remain a fan of Rovio games, but unfortunately the company seems hell bent on turning originally fun games not fun at all in pursuit of more in-app purchase revenue. This just seems really silly to me, because how many people will really play a not fun game even for free? It happened with AB seasons (paid version) AB friends and now AB2. I’m not opposed to in-app purchases in a game, but I’m quite certain success in that model comes from offering more fun in exchange for money in an already fun experience.

[dmsral]

The leader in my arena right now is Bomb#64757 with 16000 stars. Bug or hack?

[MVNLA2]

@all — Thread topic changed at request of Clovos

@Clovos, @bankler — Another thing that needs fixing:
Before scores had multipliers for your birds’ ranks, being given a free spell to replace one of your cards was generally a good thing. Now it is generally a bad thing, especially if your birds are at higher ranks.

[Brandon Davis]

It’s pretty annoying how you face somebody who clearly seems to be playing a different match as the scoring is vastly different even when you clear a room with a single bird and yet they still bested you that round, pretty obvious especially when said room is the very first room. This is very unbalanced and needs attention before more people leave this game including me.

[MVNLA2]

@clovos @bankler — How are the opponents games chosen for recording? Do you only record games that they won? How do you pick opponents? I have 1 bird at 7 and the rest at 6, yet I get opponents with 3 at 7, or even 3 at 8.

[Clovos_RovioSweden]

@brandon-davis
Haha maybe I am, you will never know ;)!
As I’ve said before your opponent is not clearing the rooms in the same phase as you are. The opponent is synced with bird throws rather than rooms.

@dmsral
I will investigate this further. Thanks for the notice!

@mvnla2
What do you mean? Spells have never replaced your cards?

Matchmaking is based on your birds total level. Regarding what we record I pretty sure we record every match played. There can be some kind of anti cheat filter. I’m might need to ask my colleague about this to get you a correct answer.

Clovos

[Brandon Davis]

That’s not balanced dude. Random rooms with random opponents who have other/random rooms?

[Clovos_RovioSweden]

@brandon-davis
They have the same room sequence as you do. I said that they are not keeping the same phase. What I mean is that the opponent throw their cards relative to your throws. But the opponent during that recording may not have been finishing hes/hers rooms with the same amount of birds as you did. So their turns is not based on what room you are in. Its what room they are in during that throw. And I’ve explained before that the opponent can throw more than one card in the beginning to even out the card amount compare to yours.
That means that if the opponent have cleared their first room by their first throw they can have more score than your first throw even if you cleared your first room with it.

Lets say that you have 7 cards when you start and your opponent have 7 cards + 1 spell.

You throw your first bird and clear your room. The opponent will throw 2 cards to always try to have the same amount of cards left in hes hand to make the end more exciting.

The opponents score after one card throw is the score he has before hes next throw.

It’s not about balance (remember that the opponent score is recorded from another players round) its about how its represented. And it can be quite complex to explain.
This may be changed in the future to make it more clear to the player. We want to make it as exciting as possible throughout the whole session of curse and not only in the end.

Clovos

[Anonymous]

@partshade Correct. Also Mighty Eagle spell is better than every bird and spell because it does big destruction and clears the wave without needing extra cards: Popping pigs and collpasing all the buildings.

[Dopey]

@clovos Thanks for the explanation, I think that fully clarifies how the system works. The new system is still a horribly bad idea, but you’ve done a good job explaining it to us.

[Brandon Davis]

Ah. Now it makes more sense. And yes, agreed on making it more clear to the players. Thanks for clearing that up.

[MVNLA2]

@clovos — If you don’t choose any spells, you might still be given a free one while you play. In that case it counts as one of your cards. Thus it replaces a bird that would have a large multiplier if all your birds are high rank.

In your response to brandon-davie above, you say that your opponent is playing the same series of rooms as you are? If so, this is news. Last time this was discussed, you needed to check this after the holidays. Would like to know if the rooms are identical, or just from the some series / level. We know that when you play a regular level again and again, the details of each room, the types of birds, and probably their number, change.

BTW — I think I sort of understand how the opponents score is now displayed, and I don’t like it at all. I would like to know exactly how many birds my opponent has flung and what room they are on. I would prefer their score to be displayed after they clear the same (preferably identical) room as you have. Also, the opponent generally continues to throw cards at a faster pace than you do, because he always runs out of cards before you do. Sometimes when you still have more than 3 left, even if he started with several more than you.

[Yellow©abby]

Major Problem today in the Arena! I had Advanced to to the fourth stage/room by having three strikes in a row. I was doing great until the fourth stage. When I got to the fourth stage all forms of attack would knock things down but the Pigs would NOT die and the balloons, wood, rocks, and ice would not break. I used up all remaining 6 or 7 birds but the pigs did not die. Even Bomb with a direct hit could not kill the pigs. I had many repeated head shots that did score points but the birds would not die. One bird hand at least 5 head shot as Matilda bounced around and repeatedly hitting all the pigs but they of course did not die.

[Clovos_RovioSweden]

@mvnla2
I just found out today, sorry for not making an announcement. Here it is:
The room sequences you are playing are the same as the opponent. It can now be considered as fact :-)

I do actually agree with you with my personal opinion. I would also want control on what room the opponent is at. Bird/Card details is already there when your opponent makes a move. But its presentation could be better timed. Currently you usually focus on the destruction rather than the opponents card.

I will see if we can do something to make the GUI better on these parts for a future update!

Clovos

[Clovos_RovioSweden]

@mvnla2
Regarding the bird back being a spell, this is actually true. I’ve not considered that. I will bring it forward! Thanks for the notice.

Clovos

[MVNLA2]

@clovos — Thanks for clearing up part of the room sequence. Are the rooms identical or just similar in the way the rooms change each time you play a given regular level?

[Clovos_RovioSweden]

@yellowcabby

Thanks for the report! I’m sorry that you’ve experienced this. We will look out for more of these reports and see if we can reproduce it. If you have any more information how it occurred or any suspects of what happened please share it. It’s often very hard to reproduce such a bug.

@bankler we have an indestructible terminator pig on the loose. Might need some investigation.

Clovos

[Clovos_RovioSweden]

@mvnla2
They are identical. Same towers, same pigs.

[Green Whacker]

@clovos

Same lineup of bird cards? (which I doubt)

[Clovos_RovioSweden]

@dragonofheart73
The draw pile is randomized so not in the same order. starting amount is the same as long as you’ve unlocked all birds. However, spells are a personal choice and are additional cards which is also in your draw pile. And the bird back function return a random bird of all the birds you’ve thrown since you’ve started.