Alex & Adam - Getting +1 Wit for Kills: Why it's a really poor change to Outwitters

[RandyDogz]

I feel there is a big difference between unpredictable and random, both being thrown around here alot. Random has no part in a game like this, and the wit for kill is not random. But it is adding unpredictability.

What I think it's doing is breaking the set plays we've all learned. Before this change, I could usuallly predict pretty accurately what my opponents best response would be, and was often thinking 4-6 turns in advance. Now I'm finding I can't do this, and need to re-evaluate the board pretty much every turn.

I think it makes the game more forgiving and dynamic. I don't think it's so dramatic that the game needs to be entirely relearned by current players. I'm not sure which approach is better from a pure strategic perspective, but neither feels 'broken' or 'wrong' to me.

That being said, I don't know if any of this will make a difference in making the game more popular for new players (if that is the desired outcome of this change). The current game is a lot of fun, and its not till you've advance to a certain level until you start to notice its quirks. ie I don't think any aspect of the current game is turning off new players. Heck, even FTA wasn't apparent enough to me in the beginning to notice.

Sorry if this is getting off topic, but I think its relevant...

I think the biggest barrier for new players is no offline mode. I know the AI concerns, so at this point just adding some preset arrangements and goals would at least give new players the opportunity to properly test drive the game. ie damage the base within 3 turns, defend your base for 10 turns, kill an opposing special, etc. I think Hero Academy had something like this, and helped to gauge whether I liked it enough to expend the effort to learn the game (I couldn't stand the game after a few async matches cause I couldn't get into the flow of the game, offline ultimately confirmed it lol - but could of gone the other way). Throw gamecentre achievements on top, and I think you'll see alot of people getting into this without even scratching the surface on the depth of the online component. Evolve this to user created content (ie design and upload their own scenarios) and you'll even better engage your players.

Right now I'm sure there's a lot of people who like it but can't handle the async aspect and quit before really getting into the game. The other benefit of looking at offline options is that most current players probably couldn't care less, so you're not going to alienate anyone.