Defensive equipment is lacking

Awe I get it now, someone is beating you now, LOL and blaming it on items able to purchase.

 

This guy had a valid point in his original post (though I must admit I did not read the later ones). Kano did nothing to address that. Your post does nothing to help out the resolution.

Your point, albeit petty, can be applied to many other aspects of the game. For example, kano made some changes to "undead players" range, which means absolutely nothing to me and probably many others. Why? Because I allocate my skill points with enough intelligence to never need that change. But a few others who were not able to do that because of their own mismanagement applaud kano for bailing them out.

Compare that to the original poster, who is making a valid point, which goes ignored by kano in terms of actual action / resolution. Sorry, but he is one up on you.

 

wow lol dude, youre putting way too much into a very small issue....back burner is exactly where this belongs....they can take as long as they feel in my opinion, there are a plethora of other issues big and small id much rather see them working on. tiiiiiiiiiiime is on my side...yes it is

 

ahaha you took the words right out of my head matt...time is the great equalizer in all games...level up, add to attack and defense and when a good limited item comes along then purchase it...in the 5 months youve been waiting im sure you can accumulate enough fps to buy it....and you can save all the technical crap i could care less about...i made it simple

 

Hardly ignored, we acknowledged it was something that we need to address and we're taking the steps to do so. It's unlikely that the next run of items will benefit from this change, but Limiteds after that will.

 

Good, you've made a decision. What is it?

Pavlov's Dog. It's about how to train animals, but it works with people, too. Reward good behavior. Punish poor behavior. Simple. Good behavior gets repeated. Bad behavior stops.

So I'm using Pavlov's Dog in this thread, for instance. I'm hammering on Kano's bad behavior. Punishing it. Embarrassing it. until they actually stop being horrid, and actually tell us what's being done. There are times when you want to stay silent and "Watch and see." that's when you've got lots of brownie points built up with players, and lots of trust. But when the detritus hits the spinning blades and your trust is gone, you can't afford to play that game, because you may make a mistake in correcting the situation, which destroys trust further.

But Kano is using Pavlov's Dog with us, too. We are being punished for bad behavior.

Specifically, when a set does not sell, it halves its quantity every day or so, where a popular set is replaced. By forcing people that hate their product to wait even longer for a desirable product, they are trying to train us to buy crap.

Which is why I am hammering Icicles. Delete them. Now. Show us the new equipment, or tell us what it is, so we can trust you again. I'll post the truly embarrassing sales figures on Icicles again tonight. Are you seriously going to punish us for not buying your mistake with the halving method, now that I'm pointing out that it's a terrible idea for you to apply Pavlov's Dog, when there is no bad behavior, just your own mistake? Punishing neutral behavior only gets you growls and fangs.

 

The decision is exactly what we've been saying it will be since you began this thread and that we'll rework our upcoming Limited items to get more Defensive-stat oriented Limited into the rotation. I don't have the specific number or the ETA for the next set that will be Defensively biased but once I do I can update this thread. Currently the next Limited Quantity set looks like it will be comprised of balanced items, specifically 243/243 Weapons and Armor and a 255/255 Vehicle.

The Icicle set most likely will not be removed prematurely because we have a runway for these items and there isn't a lot of wiggle-room in our content pipeline for removing and substituting item sets on a whim.

Update: I've been informed that we've shuffled some sets around and the next set will be Attack-heavy for Weapons/Armor with a Defense heavy vehicle and not the balanced set I posted about previously.

 

Maybe read the posts before commenting. Cherry-picking one tiny part of what Kreistor has been saying and coming to an absurd conclusion based on it is just... wrong.

ZS isn't all that reliant on items. Unless a player is buying tons of them, it doesn't make too much of a difference when fighting. Even so, the balanced or balanced but slightly skewed items almost never sell, on any of the servers, and they trick you into thinking they are popular by reducing the numbers by a very noticeable and obvious amount. Random set hasn't sold anything in two days, then BAM, exactly 50 of each has sold? Shenanigans!

Go back and read all his comments, and get a bigger picture of what is being said here. This is one of the only times I have seen Kano respond almost directly with a resolution about anything that wasn't slated to happen already or isn't considered 'broken'.

Props to Kano for actually responding to this thread. Now go back and respond to all the other players desperately seeking acknowledgement for their ideas. Even if you don't like them, saying something is better than leaving it in limbo.

 

And now you see why I was prompting for numbers, Mitch. Because had it stayed at balanced, I would have been screaming like a freakin' banshee. A fourth balanced set running would have been exactly what I was forewarning could become an additional aggravation, with Kano again ignoring customer feedback and dumping low demand crud on us like we're just supposed to like whatever happens to feed the designer's ego, which I am obviously stomping on with Ice Cleats. Well, if I bought one pair, I could, but that will never happen. I highly recommend you get this guy into a room, and get an explanation of what is in his head, because he clearly does not understand the needs of the community.

As a general guideline, if (Att/Def > 2) then the set is attack heavy. If (Att/Def < 0.5) then the set is Def heavy. everything else counts as balanced. If your stat designer thinks differently, direct him to use that simple formula, because it's not his standard as a designer that matters: it's ours as the customers.

As I pointed out at the very beginning, Icicles and Pulverizers were balanced, not Attack heavy or Defense Heavy. The aborted balanced set would have sold horribly, too. Even at best, people would buy one of the three items, to replace their worst balanced item in a personal slot. The demand is in the extremes right now, because there has been no supply there. Balanced has been oversupplied, so demand is low to non-existent. Three weeks since even the most recent Attack heavy set means it will have more demand than the last cycle of items. BTW, in case Attack Heavy doesn't make sense to you, 319 or less Attack on a weapon is not Attack Heavy. You may have an internal definition that disagrees, but our opinion is what counts. I'm disappointed that it's only a vehicle, since I am in need of Weapon Def more than Vehicle Def, but I do need both. Oh, and in case you're missing this, vehicles get higher stats, so if this set does not have 340+ Def, I ain't buying. And you will be hearing from me. So, would you like to reveal the stats on the next set? You obviously need the feedback. Brutally obviously, you are completely dropping the ball on this one.

"we have a runway for these items and there isn't a lot of wiggle-room in our content pipeline for removing and substituting item sets on a whim."

This isn't a whim. It's a mistake you had two weeks to deal with. You could have changed the stats on the set after Icicles. Nothing forces them to stay the same, if no one owns them yet. There's no correlation between art and stats. Cleats aren't Defensive: they're spikes you jam into someone's face when you kick them, and they don't stop bullets or knives, or anything else from killing you. Maybe someone has a weird perspective on this stuff which makes some perverted sense, but without an explanation, from this side? It's random. In the same way, the next set (the balanced one) could have had all its stats completely rewritten to exactly what I was indicating had high demand, because of long term low supply. You couldn't change Icicles because FB had it when I reported it, and someone would have one, that is, if you weren't willing to reverse the transactions and put icicles back up with improved stats.

However, this still does not explain the resistance to deleting Icicles at the first Halving date. Good sets sell out before the Halving date, so you schedule for set replacement for that date. Since you are scheduled for set replacement on the Halving date on the assumption of sell out, deleting will not mess with your existing wiggle room on art production. So, delete them on the first halving date please: another 5 days is torturous.

if you need wiggle room on the data entry side to support emergencies, then stop scheduling your programmers 100%, and add some time each week for unpredicted emergency issues. As I said, we did exactly that to become responsive to errors reported by our customers. I and the other Support guy decided between us which emergencies were worth our 20% time per week, and so we got big issues dealt with, without impacting scheduled deliveries. You can do this, too. If the time doesn't get used, the coders start beating deadlines. How is that bad?

Thank you Kurai and others for that kind defense. But, he's not entirely wrong, just wrong about why I want it.

Obviously, Jaderlund is not on AG/Kong, has not discussed me with anyone, and has no clue what my play style is. Absolutely everyone knows me there. At least, it's obvious to anyone on AG/Kong. I'm the highest level AG player on the server, and have been for several months. And I am hated.

AG joined Kong after 200 days of play; consequently, at all levels we face players with playtime related Achievement-based SP's to boost their stats, which we can't catch up on via Achievements. Since I would always be at a disadvantage, I decided to level up fast and hard, and place myself amongst the highest Kong players, the supposed toughest, because when you compare relatively, it's no different from lower down the level ladder. The tough guys at low level are the same as the tough guys at high, so may as well go big or go home, right? SP's from levels are the same as from Achievements, so I'd catch up in SP's the only way I could. In 200 days, I am now the 16th highest level player on AG/Kong. No one is a problem for me for long, since I simply out-level them, but someone else always replaces them.

Defending myself is trivial. It's called Ambushes. Since my stats can't compare, I have to play differently. I am loathed for that style. But I built as almost entirely offense: I can Fight and win against many that seek to try me, but not all... yet. Killing is sometimes a defense in itself. So, by this standard, no, I don't need Def items. However...

The consequence of low Def is lower level players thinking it's a good idea to get in my face. They can't kill me: my Health is too high: they're just annoying. Def Stats on my equipment are a high ratio of my Fight Def. Consequently, having completed my Attack set to an adequate point, I am now building my Def set. But I can't. The items do not exist, and have not in months. Kano's randomly generated set stats are messing with my very long term game plan in a way that I could never have foreseen, especially with the evidence from powerful Attack sets and my own possession of an item from the last identifiable powerful Def set that seems to promote teh idea tha Attack and Def items should balance out stat-wise. Which is why, in the first post, I asked if the algorithm for stat selection had changed to no longer produce Def heavy items.

Yes, I have problems with some aggressive players that seem to think I should be soft. No, I don't need Def sets to deal with them. I would like Def sets to deal with minor annoyances, as is fitting for a minor stat boost.

 

we ALL get what hes saying, matt just simplified it into a funnier smartass version of what hes asking for and the nice forum friend that i am went along with it. we got what he was saying after his initial post, we just think hes being a bit fb dramatic in here is all

 

Totally agree

 

I wouldn't say the degradation of a game is a laughing matter, but point taken.

 

Most games I've played with themes and design similar to MW, have all shared a tendency to make it slightly more difficult to obtain defensive-equipment as opposed to the numerically equal attack-equipment.
I've always assumed that this is by design - think about it: It forces players to think a little... to use other elements of the game to help with a good defense. It forces gung-ho attack types to use some of the more limited resources, such as SP, to help with defense... or to spend more game-$ and crafting time... or - maybe - to temper their aggression a small bit, realizing that a powerful attacker, by design, cannot also be the best defender.
One person's Karma is another's mathematics.

Since one thing's proficiency is at the other's expense, it would seem that equality would function just as well in those respects. However:
By slightly favoring attack over defense, it serves to drive the game: Losing is more motivating than winning, when it comes to buying FP-items, or hustling SP, leveling up, etc.;
This design also better fuels the hitlist and fight-retaliation, as well as the motivation to recruit allies, improve syndicates, etc., thanks to human nature.
All these things tend to make the influence "chain-reactive" as well - although too heavy an imbalance would tend to be discouraging altogether... a great deal of thought has gone into perfecting and maintaining this design; it's not by chance.

[HR][/HR]

EDITORIAL:

This reminds me of a peculiarity I've noticed, unique to this game:
It seems general policy for a hitlisted player to go back and attack... to death, if possible... everyone that's hit them while on the list - regardless of whether they won or lost the attack, or whether roughly equal in level/strength, or many thousands of levels their junior (wouldn't one appreciate some easy wins?).

In any similar game I've played, the hitlisted usually save their anger, and retaliation, for the person who put them on the list (and perhaps their allies/syndicate).
Not a big deal, really - but I'd still like to understand the rationale. At least it fuels more fighting?

 

thanks slayer the voice of reason is here haha you hit the nail right on the head....having a somewhat balanced build in either direction is the best way to build in these games to succeed or at least accel in every aspect of it and theyve done plenty to try and nudge everyone along in that direction...there are those that realize it and adapt and flourish and those that ignore it and eventually hit a wall somewhere along the high line and take a long time to fix or lose interest and concentrate on other games or platforms. in a sense, who are we to question the creators and their reasoning? its their creation and im damn sure theyll do whatever they feel is best for the game whether or not we feel its good or bad. at least they listen to our feedback and make changes accordingly when able to do so which is more than i can say for most gaming companies. and as for the reasoning behind the retaliation...just because....ill kill a friend after they catch my bounty and we'll laugh about it later...io get a kill in my stats column whether its a level 100 or a level 10k

 

Do you even play ZS? I swear, the only posts I ever see from you are knocking down other people's ideas or coming up with some completely irrational comment. ZS plays different than the other games.

We don't all play the same way. I have 1 defence/7500 attack, and it works just fine for me. These games aren't meant to be balanced, it makes no bloody difference what your build is. I have another ZS account with 100 attack and 2500 defence, and he works just fine too. Levels easily and can't be beat by anyone in level range. I can beat every single person on the server just fine, and don't care if they can beat me. Defence is useless to me.

I am not interested in being a balanced build, which by its very nature can't beat everyone in level range and can't defend against everyone in level range, as there simply isn't enough skill points to go around to make yourself that strong. I find balanced to be weak and have no interest in it. ZS is rife with players like this. We are not all balanced, and even if we were, balanced items are NOT an ideal purchase. Having a full set of attack and a full set of defensive gear is the ideal set-up for balanced players. I have hit no walls and level comfortably.

If balanced was so desirable and the way to do it, then balanced items would actually sell, which they don't. All attack/defence items sell out within 3-7 days, whereas balanced items last weeks, with Kano having to reduce the quantity to keep it somewhat in-line with the release of Limited Quantity items on the other servers.

I don't see why you are trying to justify the use of balanced items when that is not what this thread is about, it is about Kano ignoring the clearly underselling balanced items, and not releasing the big sellers.

Again, do you even play ZS? If not, you don't know the mechanics and the desire for all attack or all defence items.

 

Well, that's plainly false, DSA. All you have to do is read Mitch.

Second post. to see what they have started doing, what you need to do is look at what Kano has been trying to do. IN the recent Shadow set, the Shadowshot (weapon) was 328/149 and the Shadowsight 149/328 (Gear) after L4 upgrades. Exactly the same stats. The vehicle in this case (which I didn't buy, being already vehicle heavy) was Attack oriented. that trend has been in place since they started mixing Att and Def in the same set. BTW, that was the last set with a Def-heavy item, if you care to go back and find out how long that was. And it's why i am not asking for more Def heavy gear, just weapons and armor.

Further, Att+Def keeps increasing, steadily without a random factor. Mudflation is an old term for it. It's slow, but constant. Obviously, that's to give players a reason to buy new equipment to replace old, since long term players will eventually cap on equipment, so only better than old will sell to them.

I asked Mitch at the start if there was a new algorithm for equipment (specifically, I was wondering if they were trying to promote offense over defense, so there was no hope that sets with stats I missed would be reissued), and the answer does not seem to be yes. If it was, that would have ended this entire conversation.

So while what you suggest might be true in other games (but is totally unverifiable), in this game, there is significant counter-evidence to your theory.

Sales of Icicles on AG/Kong so far? Totals are 20 grenades, 15 Cleats, and 9 vehicles. What a complete waste of the artist's efforts.

 

[UZK] Demonik1
Level 1260 Lawyer...started a few months back and apparently you havent read every thread ive posted in. and as i said before, balanced builds are the best way to have success at every aspect of these games and on vc im mostly attack so dont try and talk like youre "schooling" me and i have no idea what im talking about. i know more about these games than most. i dont pretend to know everything but im smart enough to see the obvious as apparently you are not, thats not my fault or problem. we'll just have to agree to disagree. the forums are for opinions, you have yours and i have mine...its just that simple

edit...and trust me, i DO know the desire for the all att/def items as i am stocked in both on my vc acct and eventually will be in zs as well. it takes time to get enough of both and it will happen. its called patience...try some

 

lol, you contradict yourself. Wonderful. Points invalidated.

 

please, explain how i contradicted myself lol this should be good

 

First off, this is a ZS forum. Stop referencing VC. The two games play different. It is not ZS. Despite having similar GUIs and a small range of similar mechanics, they play very differently.

"and as i said before, balanced builds are the best way to have success at every aspect of these games"
"and trust me, i DO know the desire for the all att/def items"
Balanced builds are the best, yet you don't use one. So I guess you will be hitting your wall pretty soon then? Or maybe you just enjoy making the "wrong" build, and getting frustrated later trying to "correct" it. So

"at least they listen to our feedback and make changes accordingly when able to do so which is more than i can say for most gaming companies."
Yeah, right. They listen to us all the time... Maybe you just haven't played that many games. I have dealt with many of the big gaming companies. Kano has a very tenuous link with their customers/players. The devs don't actually interact with us. We have forum moderators passing messages to devs, who may listen or may not. Who knows. There is no level of transparency.

".having a somewhat balanced build in either direction is the best way to build in these games to succeed or at least accel in every aspect of it and theyve done plenty to try and nudge everyone along in that direction"
Blatant lie. They have not attempted to suggest any build is the right one. Ever.

"who are we to question the creators and their reasoning?"
I am a customer, that's who. Damn right I will question something I paid them for.

"apparently you havent read every thread ive posted in"
Never said I did.

"i dont pretend to know everything but im smart enough to see the obvious as apparently you are not"
"its called patience...try some"
Passive-aggressive much?

".ill kill a friend after they catch my bounty and we'll laugh about it later...io get a kill in my stats column whether its a level 100 or a level 10k"
Totally irrelevant.

"so dont try and talk like youre "schooling" me "
This is a ZS forum.

"the forums are for opinions, you have yours and i have mine...its just that simple"
*cough*

Fixing this "issue" takes almost no effort on Kano's part. All they have to do is change some numbers. Sure, additional planning and design may need to be done, but it would have to be done already.

Basically you contradicted yourself by first agreeing with Kreistor, then back pedaling, claiming that Kano can do what they want, and then saying balanced builds are the only way to go, yet you don't actually use one. Releasing new attack or defense specific items does not invalidate previous items, it adds a couple skill points to it, that's it. The previous items are still relevant. 5-6 months between attack/defensive items is ridiculous. So two or maybe three times a year I get a shot at purchasing a nice, high SP defense item, which sells out in a week or less, yet the balanced items remain available for 10 months out of the year.

I don't really see what's wrong with recycling weapons. Cycle through your five types SP distributed gear, fine, but then go back to the all attack or all defense items they had just had. It will still sell, just fine. Frankly I think they purposely leave the crappy balanced items on there because they know they don't sell, and that gives them more time to work on other stuff, such as new LQ items, while the demand for the actually useful items gets ignored. I have not purchased a weapon in so long, besides a crate or two, because there isn't anything that is useful. This endless line of balanced or near balanced items that DO NOT sell is getting frustrating.