so.. rank is nice and all.. but it doesn't rly give much to us does it, just the ability to choose a more op (their sopposed to be equal right.. funny how that never works out..) hero..
so ehm maybe there could be other advantages to rank, pls give us your thoughts!
In my opinion the higher rank heroes should be, if not equal, then at least better (like they are atm). This way new player starts the progress from first heroes and easier difficulties and after gaining some levels can step into the harder modes, where the new heroes reduce the difficulty-step for the next level (more clearing power/utility/cc). I think it works same way with the achievements and it's good.
It would be ideal if hardest mode would be undoable for rank 1 without achievements and on the other hand lvl30+ would benefit very little from the easiest modes. Maybe some of the custom items could be tied up with rank, for example armor statue, upgrade center, mercenary hq, etc..?
What if building-speed was bonded with rank? That would make sure that progress was helpful and much needed before harder modes. Might work, might not
i see your point, however i can#t agree with "high rank heroes must be op" that will render all other heroes useless.
you would never have a reason to use other heroes that way..
if you have only 1 hero that is feasible to use at ypour rank then there#s no point in having different heroes at all, could just give u 5xRank to allstats or sth and call it a day. that would be no fun tho would it?!
I think you guys should honestly put a Level Restriction on Higher Difficulty OR perhaps you gain more EXP for Surviving Higher Difficulty so its more reward and / or more Forgiving to players who are new and are playing with other players who are veterans.
surviving higher difficulties does infact give a LOT more exp. so being too strict here would mean that low lvl ppl will have needlessly hard time leveling up.
also we would have to decide what to do if some ppl are rank 70 and some are rank 3. those games happen.. it might be very difficult or even impossible to come up with a correct anwser.
also having no rank does not 100% mean we are dealing with a noob, maybe he just forgot to enter his load code (or if its that mandatory prompt in the beginning he did not get a chance to do it!)
hmm it might still be worth it tho, technical issues are solvable usually.
First of all, rank isn't everything other than to increase your gaming experience. I don't really like the level restriction, for one to select the mode he/she likes, simply go to red. Experienced players should not be "that" picky about gaming difficulties unless you are doing eternia runs. Anyone can find something to do even on easy mode. I can make new account and rank from 1 to 70 in 7 games by using old bug and endless waves. Increased mana point regeneration is good enough other than to unlock heroes. Maybe more "level" achievement items would satisfy some people. I don't think more lumber for higher rank at start is a good idea since players shouldn't rely on it to be higher rank.
@Waffle(est): Yea, I didn't mean that higher rank heroes should be overpowered compared to the "lower" ones, but just that rather not the other way around at least. that they should be same level if not little better. I think the heros keep getting better the higher the unlock-rank goes and as a player, I'd expect to get something better, even little better, after 10-20-xx? games. Hours of losing, winning, frustration and success.
While ranking up, player should pretty much get familiar with heroes and I think shadow sniper is still one of the best carry, if not the best, even a decent clearing spell. Rank 5? When higher rank heroes give more clearing with Aoe nukes and aura that helps against hordes, which are are stronger and tankier if not played easier modes anymore
Yea those things happen when you forget your load code for your ranks and stuff, but the more i'm playing the game the more i realize that there are a lot of players who are new who could barely play to learn cause most games these days been Mad + and even if its on normal I've watched them fail real hard. The lack of knowledge doesn't mean the game should punish them this badly for attempting to learn. There is no clear cut answer to " Solve " These problems, It more or less boils down to the players individually rather then a overall community
surviving higher difficulties does infact give a LOT more exp. so being too strict here would mean that low lvl ppl will have needlessly hard time leveling up.
also we would have to decide what to do if some ppl are rank 70 and some are rank 3. those games happen.. it might be very difficult or even impossible to come up with a correct anwser.
also having no rank does not 100% mean we are dealing with a noob, maybe he just forgot to enter his load code (or if its that mandatory prompt in the beginning he did not get a chance to do it!)
hmm it might still be worth it tho, technical issues are solvable usually.
I farmed on mad myself when i was low level but thats when i learned HOW to actually deal with the mad difficulty. Fortress survival has a rather harsh learning curve and difficulty spike compared to MOST other Blizzard games currently out.
Perhaps a Milestone reward for reaching a certain rank? Like at Rank 10 get some kind of Saveable item to start with or ever 5 - 10 ranks. Idk, I'm not a game designer but from most Mobile game i've played and currently play they got daily rewards for logging in ( Playing Fortress in this case ) They got rewards for reaching this level or stage of the game etc and yea you guys have rewards for those who beat the hardest of the hard but those are people who KNOWS how to play the game. Dx
perhaps we should add some mechanism to make it easier for noobs..? like maybe give low rank ppls survivor some nice support aura or sth to make it easiert for them..
(notice this needs finesse to avoid people abusing it by inviting some random noob to their base for a free bonus.. tho i guess its not rly bad, would least make ppl be bit more friendly to noobs )
Trying to educate newer members is always a challenge, as it's difficult to explain the different mechanics necessary to succeed during actual game play, and normally they won't go running to the forums for help. One of the ways we could work around this is to have some bases have key things already set up.
As an example, one base could have a set of walls and repairs+repair bots so that a newer player could look at it and see how they should set their walls up.
Another base could have a lumber area already established, with some mills in that area and an alchemist included with the base.
There are some people who would use these bases, even if they aren't the newer players that they are intended for, but I believe that is acceptable. As long as we just have a few examples for newer players to look at, I think that may be enough for them to learn the basics. But I must emphasize that under no circumstances should a full base be provided for any player.
I feel like... for those who have never played fs before and want to see what the game is about, those bonus mentioned are quite meaningless. I have played lots of different games on Warcraft, and I believe that we/experienced player just have to tell beginners to observe/learn from replay/check youtube/go to forum/use single player mode to learn and explore/etc...instead of giving them all the reward or bonus such as aura and damage reduction. If they really are willing to learn a new game, not much can stop them. Bonus and reward will impact people not to load code/rank higher, it can also break some standards of contests. For those who have never played a certain game before, conquering the easiest mode or simply finish a whole game is all they want and need, and it's not likely for most games to be accomplished/defeated within a few games, so why make fs special? At the moment, you don't really need much to win easy mode already...towers are op enough for easy to mad mode. If one really want to explore a game, he/she will put some effort to explore and analyze the game especially when fs can be played in single player mode. If the game has no challenge (make easy mode even easier), or gaps among different difficulties are too big, it will only make people that are attracted to FS more frustrating, but I can still understand if we make easy mode even easier for whatever the concerns are. Why don't people think about how they enjoyed fs at the first place? I wanted to play a new game, and fs came to my sight, I explored it by myself, didn't know what I was doing just like any other game I haven't played before, I took my time to see how people played, we don't get kicked out of the game after builders were dead, I took my time to see replay, although I couldn't tell if those players I observed were pro or not, at least I could learn how to even start a game. It took me almost 10 games before I realized that I could play in single player mode. I liked the game without much achievement, start item, and even heroes 5 years ago. I liked the old introduction animation at the beginning for noobs, although it caused some problems for people with ...not-so-good computers. It's a netiquette for red not to be afk, and for players to ask and answer about mode unless you don't care. If you see someone failed hard, it would be nice to talk to them, ask them if they are new, if they are willing to learn, but you cannot keep those who don't want to learn the game no matter how you entertain them. I cannot emphasize this enough, you need far less effort that you think you need to keep whoever want to play fs. Even when people play lots of mad or impossible mode on ENT games recently, what attracts players won't change, not all the players are blind.
@Krehara: temple of doom and the bank bases are available like you have suggested. I was actually thinking about we can have an "obvious non-claimable base" with a few most common lumber settings such as 4x4, 5x5, and ones along the wall with repair bots as neutral units and none of the player units can land in that area...the desolated(?) base at the bottom next to the tree base may be a good base for the idea...
I just want to say that, think more before any changes are made if the rank bonuses are to help noobs to survive, or bonuses cannot make noobs to improve much. Otherwise, make easy mode easier would help more than rank bonus. Mana regeneration and hero unlock are good enough the way it is. To me, all the extra items are for players in "advanced" stage to further enjoy the game. Those items are like condiments to provide a bit more variation to the game. But the main theme of FS remains the same. I still enjoy playing easy and normal mode when I really want to play a game.
hmm having a completely non-claimable model base near the centre would be nice i think, with like a pro setup too, then people can know to copy that.
also in the past 5 years the learning curve has gotten a LOT steeper.
5 years ago you didnt have a hero, but that also means you could and DID get all the damage you needed out of towers, nowadays u need to manage your hero well to survive and also need to buy expensive items for him to kill end of game bosses..
you COULD try to kill with towers (and most people still have at least a cuple for the slow and such effects) but if you use towers as your main source of damage then you will cripple your lumber because of the worker being distracted and also the space used (unless you use a large base thus putting you under an even more intense pressure to provide the lumber to keep your walls from crumbling)
5 years ago i once got like 4k lumber produced by end of the game and that was EPIC, it was so much i didnt know what to do with it. and that was it. nowadays gold walls cost 5g in stead of 2, there's like 5 more tiers rto walls and upgrades and they are super expensive..
and you need to get all of it from your lumbering setup (lvl7 mills rly for 95% of it) creep bounty only helps a tiny bit in the very beginning of the game and has gotten ever more marginalised, you cant afford to do shit even in midgame anymore with kill bounty. its less than 0.1% of your income by the end. and this is why games are oftren soo booring nowadays u just make lumber and upgrade walls and u win.. and u do that for 50 minutes... how the fuck do ppl play this game to reach rank 50?! (well i'm one of those freaks but still u get what i mean.. something has to be done.. this needs another topic tho maybe)
One issue I have with such an aura is that it still doesn't teach new players anything. Even with a -20% damage aura, a clueless player will fail on easy.
Meanwhile, a more experienced player bringing a noob into their base would benefit tremendously, to the point where even nightmare difficulty might not be challenging for them.
It also eliminates the most difficult challenge that our top players pull off in order to impress the community... which is to play NM+air+invis+x4 bosses at rank one with no benefits.
Lastly, if a player saves and loads their code, they could get past rank 10 without ever actually beating the game, in which case they lose their buff and still lack the ability to be successful.
To grow our player base, it's necessary to instill knowledge in those who come into the game. Giving them some kind of buff to help them fumble about, then removing that buff when it may be the only thing that lets them accomplish anything, isn't going to help them very much. We must seek out clear ways to educate through gameplay, since we don't have the capability of giving people a tutorial.
Instead of buffs which would be removed once outranked, encouraging people to keep their rank low, how about a cumulative collection of bonuses? Say, a reward at every 10 ranks. Something like...
Rank 10-Start with 5 lumber
Rank 20-Start with a super mana potion
Rank 30-Start with 10 lumber
Rank 40-Free vision wards
Rank 50-Start with 15 lumber
Rank 60-Start with a repair badge
Rank 70-Start with 20 Lumber
So, with this system the game would get a *little* easier for people as they ranked up. At 70, you would be starting with 20 lumber, a repair badge, vision wards, and a mana potion. None of that is at all game breaking, but they are all useful little things to have.
And mv1990, I actually hadn't noticed the wall setup in the bank. I tend to favor small bases, and normally won't even take the time to look at a large base unless me and another player are going to run together. However, with the temple of boom, there's still nothing to indicate that the repairs should be used to build lumber mills.
On a side note, perhaps we should set in game message+pings to draw low ranked players attention to these bases in the first 2-3 minutes of the game, if they haven't loaded a code above rank 3 or so?
When higher rank heroes give more clearing with Aoe nukes and aura that helps against hordes, which are are stronger and tankier if not played easier modes anymore 
)
