Another Arena season, another boring set of factions

[jtiggelm]

1. The game Terra Mystica is more enjoyable, fun, and pleasing with the 14 original factions only. (I find this to be true, so will always vote in favor of it for arena.)
2. The game is more accessible to newer players with only the 14 original factions. (I don't necessarily agree with this, and more to the point I don't care much about it, as I think people should just play what they find fun, but there are people who vote based on this theory.)
3. The game should not include the "fan factions" because they are in an iterative design process and are still subject to change before official publication. (I wouldn't include them under any circumstances ever, so I don't consider this point, but a lot of folks do).

I agree with all of those points.

I would be open to adding fan factions later provided I could get some sense of how to play them before that point. So far, that does not appear to be possible very well in a way I like.

Also, I am not fond of the landscapes, so I am ignoring this arena season.

My overall feeling is that there are too many options now, and that it is hard to find players that want a similar game.

[MaddenMan]

I'm a new player to this game, my problem isn't adding "fan factions" it's when I hit ELO 100 and queued up for an arena game it's been over an hour and nobody playing.

[BaseSig]

Fan factions are going to be an official release from the publisher at some point, but they still very much are in playtesting and not a finalized form. Given they can and have changed suddenly, and that this impact turn based games that are playing with now changed factions, they should remain out of arena until they become finalized.

You are in the minority. Several people who use “original release” argument have also said other things to indicate that they don’t want fan factions in arena even once they’re finalized.

How much play testing is needed? There have been thousands and thousands of games. Is there any timeline?

I would like to see fast simple solutions. 2 separate arenas. Asking them not to make any changes to the ff until after the season is over also seems very easy and reasonable.

The timeline now is wait several seasons for the announcement of finalization. Then wait another season so that swing voters get the chance to vote. Then realize the 3-5% of voters who now accept fan factions had no impact. Then we are back to square one. Doesn’t seem very optimistic for people who want ff.

The fan factions are unbalanced right now, even moreso than the original factions. Just did a league with them and they completely warp the game. Wyrm can 4 town in last round easily due to their SH. Goblins can open SA + TE (3 favor tiles round 1 is nuts), Enlightened can win network and do well on cults even with grey on base map (against players with >450 ELO). And those are just some examples of factions I believe to be stronger than darklings and cultists. Chash Dallas is very bad on the opposite end of the spectrum and needs some work to be competitive. Having factions change in the middle of a competitive format is not good, and if you've been involved in some playtesting on arena before, you'd know any changes in the middle of a turn based game completely breaks the game leaving it in an unfinishable state.

Once they are published and in a finalized form, I'd be for having a season with them. Until then, they need to stay away from Arena.

[ChiefPointThief]

Fan factions are going to be an official release from the publisher at some point, but they still very much are in playtesting and not a finalized form. Given they can and have changed suddenly, and that this impact turn based games that are playing with now changed factions, they should remain out of arena until they become finalized.

You are in the minority. Several people who use “original release” argument have also said other things to indicate that they don’t want fan factions in arena even once they’re finalized.

How much play testing is needed? There have been thousands and thousands of games. Is there any timeline?

I would like to see fast simple solutions. 2 separate arenas. Asking them not to make any changes to the ff until after the season is over also seems very easy and reasonable.

The timeline now is wait several seasons for the announcement of finalization. Then wait another season so that swing voters get the chance to vote. Then realize the 3-5% of voters who now accept fan factions had no impact. Then we are back to square one. Doesn’t seem very optimistic for people who want ff.

The fan factions are unbalanced right now, even moreso than the original factions. Just did a league with them and they completely warp the game. Wyrm can 4 town in last round easily due to their SH. Goblins can open SA + TE (3 favor tiles round 1 is nuts), Enlightened can win network and do well on cults even with grey on base map (against players with >450 ELO). And those are just some examples of factions I believe to be stronger than darklings and cultists. Chash Dallas is very bad on the opposite end of the spectrum and needs some work to be competitive. Having factions change in the middle of a competitive format is not good, and if you've been involved in some playtesting on arena before, you'd know any changes in the middle of a turn based game completely breaks the game leaving it in an unfinishable state.

Once they are published and in a finalized form, I'd be for having a season with them. Until then, they need to stay away from Arena.

If balance is such a main issue for competitive play then why are F&I factions never allowed? This season even F&I scoring was taken away. Both were created to help with balancing issues.

"3 favor tiles round 1 is nuts". Chaos magicians can get 4 favor tiles way easier than goblins can get 3. Also I haven't seen the SA + TE open but assume it is possible if everything goes their way. You need 12 workers and 24 coins to achieve this and even if so does that guarantee victory? The numbers showed that they were losing the vast majority of their games so goblins got a buff for stronghold to cost 2 less coins. I haven't seen numbers after the buff but I would be surprised if they rose to the top off of that one change.

I do agree with you that enlightened are strong but there are several ways to combat them and that goes back to my point of fan factions being good for the game because it adds more counter picks.