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Limit fizzles to 2 in a row...

AuthorMessage
Survivor
Jun 01, 2008
8
Kilajula wrote:
Please know that I do respect your posts greatly. There are many testers who post here, and do so brilliantly. In my opinion you are at the top. I always make a point to look out for one of your posts. I learn a lot. Our discussions may get heated at times, but it's never a personal issue.

This really knocked me off. I thought we were some kind of cat and dog who will never manage to understand each other too well and don't like each other too much ;)

But I, too, do not intend any argument we have as a personal issue. It's the matter that's important to me, and things like honesty and fairness. I'm not up to attack someone personally. And I, too, respect you for your thoughts, your dedication (you're certainly the top in this regards ;) ) and your excellent writing abilities.

Survivor
Jul 16, 2008
17
RipperMcGee wrote:
Just like the title says - it can be maddening to fizzle three times in a row, especially if you waste your best cards with them. If it bugs me as an adult, keep in mind how frustrating it must be to a kid...



i am a main of storm currently and it is very annoying to fizzle many times in a row b/c 1 time a played a whole battle without one hit against a boss(very annoying)

Survivor
Jul 19, 2008
4
Yes it is quite frustrating when spells fizzle. I had a storm wizard last time too, but this is the way to make the schools balance. Storm/fire needs a weakness, and this is it.

Explorer
Aug 25, 2008
52
Alternate suggestion:

How about a small Accuracy boost for every power pip we have, which is NOT used up on the card in question? Say, 5%?

So if you cast an 80% accurate spell that costs 2 pips, and have 4 pips showing ... +10% accuracy, for 90%.

Same spell, with 6 pips showing? +20% accuracy, for 100%.

That right there would eventually break any "fizzle chain" you were suffering from.

Survivor
May 23, 2008
4
RipperMcGee wrote:
Just like the title says - it can be maddening to fizzle three times in a row, especially if you waste your best cards with them. If it bugs me as an adult, keep in mind how frustrating it must be to a kid...


I'm going to say "no". Fizzles are what makes easy fights dangerous, and dangerous fights scary. Without them I'd rarely lose unless fighting someone way tougher that I should, I which case I would probably lose all the time.

Survivor
Jul 19, 2008
4
The fizzle rates are fine as it is. I am very sure the developers know what they are doing. They are not little children :p

Survivor
Aug 13, 2008
4
Once I used a LIFE spell and it fizzled 3 times in row even sprite. My opponent used STORM spells and they worked perfectly. even without a 10%+ increase in precision. It is annoying to have that happen to me. I could have won if my spells haven't fizzled 3 times in a row.

Survivor
Aug 13, 2008
4
Once I fizzled 6 times in a row and didn't hit the boss at all and he kept on draining my health and i died

Hero
Sep 08, 2008
712
Yea, fizzle rate is frustrating. I have fizzled three times in a row on my Vampire spell. Death spells have 85% accuracy.

Keep in mind, you save all your pips, use those pips to heal or shield if necessary.

I have suggested in a previous post about slightly boosting certain stats depending on the different schools upon fizzles.

While only Storm would get a 1% accuracy boost after each fizzle, only Life would get a 1% damage boost to spells after each fizzle. Fire for example would get a +2% defense bonus, or something.

While the boosts are not very drastic, it is easier on someone's mind knowing that they received some certain boost in exchange of a life-threatening fizzle.

Survivor
Sep 28, 2008
8
RipperMcGee wrote:
Just like the title says - it can be maddening to fizzle three times in a row, especially if you waste your best cards with them. If it bugs me as an adult, keep in mind how frustrating it must be to a kid...

I disagree. Challenges are what make games fun, and with the possibility of fizzing many times in a row, and with the low chance that it is, makes the game more challenging (only slightly). Also, the deaths are easy to recover from by simply doing a mini-game or collecting mana orbs. I'm a kid and I don't find the fizzles frustrating, just an inconvenience.

Survivor
Sep 28, 2008
8
RipperMcGee wrote:

This simply isn't true. Each card, each round is calculated independently of each other. If I have any 80% card, then it's 80% each time I cast it (4 out of 5 successful will be successful, on average). The fact that a previous card fizzled isn't considered when the next card 'to hit' is calculated.

It doesn't have to be considered. It is a matter of probability. If there is a 20% chance for it to fizzle, then there is a 4% (0.2 * 0.2) chance for it to fizzle twice in a row, then 0.8% (0.2 * 0.2 * 0.2), and so on. Think about it. What's the chance for a meteor to hit earth. Fair chance, huh? Now think about the chance for it to hit in the exact same spot. Not so likely anymore? It's the same case. The chance for another meteor to hit that same spot will be dramatically decreased, and the chance for you to fizzle twice in a row gets dropped greatly as well.

Survivor
Aug 27, 2008
24
Wow, statistics argument!

Both arguments are right. Assuming that WOOO does not fudge the data, a 80% casting chance means that it has a 20% of fizzling. This does not change the more times you cast it. If you flip a coin, it has a 50% chance of coming up heads. If you flip it 20 times, there is a 50% chance it comes up heads on the 20th time. If you have gotten tails the first 19 times, your chance of it coming up heads is 50%. Now, if you asked what the chances are that you flip a coin twice and it came up heads both times, it is .5 times .5 or .25, which is 25%. Three heads in a row are .5x.5x.5, or .125 or 12.5%. The odds of a 85% spell fizzling three times in a row is .15x.15x.15 or .003375 or 0.34% chance (thirty-four out of a thousand times). Unlikely, but possible considering how many times you cast a spell. But on any ONE cast of that same spell, it has a 15% chance of not working.

If a family has three children and ALL of them boys, assuming that there is a 50% chance of having a boy, what are the odds that the fourth child is going to be a boy? Is it;
a. .5 times .5 times .5 times .5 or 6.25%; or
b. 50%

The answer is a. The odds of them having a fifth boy is 50%. The odds of them having a sixth boy are 50%. The semantic difference is if you asked what the odds are that a family would have four children and have them all be boys, the answer would be a, or 6.25%. 6.25% of all 4 children families have all boys. 6.25% of all 4-spell combos (at 50% each) will be all fizzles OR all successes (since it is 50%). Las Vegas has become what it is because of the gambler's fallacy which, according to Wikipedia "is the false belief that if deviations from expected behavior are observed in repeated independent trials of some random process then these deviations are likely to be evened out by opposite deviations in the future". In the end, the house wins. :)

The way I figure it, if a spell has 70% of working, you can count on it fizzling three times out of seven, right? Those three times sure can come in a row! They always happen at the absolute wrong time though, don't they?! I have cast a 70% spell ten times and have it worked each time and if you think about that, what are the odds of that happening? (2.8%, by the way)

WOW! This game could be SUCH a great math tool for kids, couldn't it? I can't tell you the amount of time I have spent trying to figure out if I needed that last curse or not to knock out Oakheart :)

Hero
Sep 08, 2008
712
By the way, I like how you put it all in mathematical terms. You guys have explained it very well.

With this I am simply confirming what the previous posts had stated. A certain fizzle rate applies individually to all individual spells being cast.

But in a SENSE, in a non-mathematical and non-scientifical (is that a word?) way, in our mind, the fact that eventually a spell is going to land, no matter how low the fizzle rate, becomes greater and greater. Eventually a spell WILL hit the target, and that is likely, in our head, to increase the more we fizzle.

For example, take Wild bolt. I pretty much fizzle with Wild bolt, well, 90% of the time, but the more I cast Wild bolt, and the more I fizzle with it, in a SENSE the success rate will become higher, because eventually, the spell will HIT. And when it does, I love it!

So, while truths of this world are based on mathematical and scientific facts, there is our mind, what we FEEL in our heads. The world of the human mind does not necessarily coincide with the hard core reality of the real world, and the human mind perceives and thinks differentely depending on one's different views of perspective.

Like the feeling that a pot of water that we put on the stove seems to take a whole lot less time to come to a boil if we never watched it. Or how time seems to move faster when we have more fun, and seems to stand still when we dont.

Survivor
Aug 27, 2008
24
Well put. The difference between math and what we feel is what makes SO much money from the lottery and gambling in general. "Just that one more time and I KNOW it will pay off" is a very human reaction, just watch slot machines and people playing blackjack. Mathematically, your chance of having that spell work the tenth time you cast it is the same as the first time :) I am just as mad as anyone when my Vampire fizzles twice in a row (base 85% accuracy)...that should NOT happen. Sure the odds are not real big but do ANYTHING enough times and no matter how small the odds, it WILL happen.

With your gonzo damage storm spell, it is not a bad idea to cast it because the investment is not large. 2 pips is not that much and if it doesn't work you are just out 2 points of mana and you are no worse off than if you passed that turn. Now look at my balance wizard with Spectral Blast. 33% chance of it coming out fire, ice, or storm. THREE times this morning it came up ice! Not only does ice do the least amount of damage, the boss was ice so he had a high resistance. 4 pips for about 200 points. THAT wasted 4 pips and I had to start all over again. You spell does not waste anything but mana if it does not work (other than taking up a slot in your deck and hand.

Survivor
Sep 28, 2008
8
If you were to fizzle a spell with an 80% chance of success 3 times, the chance of that would be 0.8% (0.2*0.2*0.2). The fourth time you cast the spell there would be a much greater chance for it to be successful based on the unlikeliness of the consecutive event chances even though the individual percentage chance of it being successful would still be 80%.

Hero
Sep 08, 2008
712
I agree that Wild bolt is a very nice spell. I keep four copies in my deck, actually knowing that I'll end up charging a pip and passing a turn most of the time. Unexpectedly, when the bolt does hit, it makes for a very nice turn of events.

As for what you said about Spectral Blast, that is the beauty of balance though. Elemental blade and elemental trap works for anything you can throw at mobs, and those elemental buffs and debuffs are especially beautiful when it comes to the spell Hydra.

Also, while 100% of all my offensive spells are thunder, I have a very difficult time fighting a highly resistant thunder mob without drawing my prisms first. With balance, you are always able to damage mobs resistant to one of the balance elements, thanks to the multiple schools that balance spells have.

Since I am storm, I would have to invest in too different schools just to get fire and ice spells, ontop of that use points in balance for the traps and blades. And ontop of that, skip out on the healing spells from the life school.

I actually never voted because, while I do get frustrated at multiple fizzles, I am not sure whether limiting fizzles to two in a row is entirely justifyable.

Survivor
Sep 06, 2008
5
i have fizzled life spells 5 times in a row in one fight i was like OMG!

Survivor
Feb 18, 2009
5
if you really dont want to fizzle choose life school and pick balence as your second they weak but you dont fizzle as much :)

Survivor
Aug 07, 2008
20
Fizzle is there to balance the game , If the fizzle was to lowered down , then most likely they will be nerf and boost in every Magic class.

I'm against changing it .Its part of the game , play it , learn how to counter the fizzle etc...

to a side note: I fizzled 5 time in a row in Ranked PvP match(Kane Drakestrider Death ) I still won at the end .fizzle adds alot of balancing to the game take it out or limit it out will might just break the balance of the game.

Survivor
Dec 31, 2008
41
By the same notion, then cap the number of successful spells that can go off before you have to fizzle.

Yes, it is fustrating when you fizzle, I play ice/storm and I played through one match where I fizzled all of my Kraken's and Ice Wyvrens. I was getting my but handed to me because I fizzled four times in a row and four seperate times in the match. Still, I've also watch enemies not be able to land an attack to save their life and I've had triton fail on me once in the fifteen twenty times I've cast him. It is all chance and probabilty.

If you want to hedge your bet, then make the treasure cards. They sell bonuses to accuracy, put your kill cards in your treasure deck, or you can go play a more accurate school and sacrfice alot of damage.

Balance play means if your going to throw a truck at someone, then you need a chance to miss. Given that Kraken, 4 pips, has a higher uppered damage then my Ice Collusus, 6 pips, it is fair that my card hits more often.

Limiting fizzles will just change the game, suddenly you fire off two or three spells you know will fizzle, like wild shot, (10% accuracy) and then you have a perfect shot the next time. You know you'll hit with your 1000 damage Triton backed with lightning traps, and all the other pain a storm school can bring. Three turns for close to three thousand damage. You'll pass that often just to get the pips, so why not make your accuracy perfect?

The game balance is setup so Storm doesn't just walk over their opponents and give other schools reasons to deal with getting crappy damage, because they know they'll hit.


You play different styles, you can't create perfection in this game, so play to your strengths and every once in awhile threaten your cards not to dare fizzle. Doesn't help but at least you do something as you cross your fingers and hope to see them die.

Survivor
Dec 09, 2008
32
Well, I'm not a math whiz or statistician, or whatever, but I get really disgusted when my spells fizzle six or seven times in a row. I understand that storm has a higher fiz rate, and that's ok. But when my storm wiz fizzles six, seven, even eight times in a row, that's getting a bit above crazy. And all the while I'm getting hit, drained, and dead. I've been having problems with my fire wiz fizzling constantly too. It seems like every battle I've taken her in, I have five or six fizzles in a row. One battle I actually fizzles nine times in a row. I was doing that quest up in Krok that you have to go back and battle the fire elf for something in Firecat Alley. I could not hit that little 150 pointer elf for anything. That's major irritating. And strangely, no matter what wizard I am playing, if I try to use a fire elf card or a fire cat card, 98% of the time it fizzles. And I am talking the treasure cards too. And yet the mobs that I battle seem to only fizzle once or twice a battle if I'm lucky. I'd really like to see a little less fizzle ratio myself.

Defender
Feb 03, 2009
119
Regardless of the fine arguments defending the point that Fizzles should be left alone, the poll shows differently.

I would like to add that a hard cap on Fizzles will create a case of guaranteed spell success. If your first two fizzle, then you will know for certain that your third spell will go off. This is not a good thing to have in a game like this and will ultimately somehow wind up being exploited.

There are plenty of ways to increase your accuracy ingame. Power comes with a price. The Headmaster has spoken anyway so I don't think there is anything to worry about.

Survivor
Jan 04, 2009
22
Wild Bolt has a 10% chance to hit. If every third time the spell is cast it's guaranteed to not fizzle then it becomes a 33% chance to hit. Or 10% twice and 100% the third time. This completely unbalances the spell.

Survivor
Feb 27, 2009
25
There should be an exponentially decreasing probability of successive fizzles, which is how the system is currently setup.

Three points against this:

After two (or three, or seven) fizzles occurred you would be guaranteed to be able to case the next spell. I think that this carries the potential for exploitation.

Fizzles serve as a balance in the current play system.

This occurs so rarely that I doubt it is truly an issue that should be resolved.

Explorer
Jan 18, 2009
70
iop777 wrote:
If you were to fizzle a spell with an 80% chance of success 3 times, the chance of that would be 0.8% (0.2*0.2*0.2). The fourth time you cast the spell there would be a much greater chance for it to be successful based on the unlikeliness of the consecutive event chances even though the individual percentage chance of it being successful would still be 80%.


Ok, time to know down this fallacious argument once and for all.

It is true that at any one moment, the probablility of event Fizzle, denoted P(F) is the same, no matter at what point in time it is taken.

It is also true that the probability of fizzling x times in a row is P(F)^x.

Now, consider the probability P(F)^x. If the event P(F) happens, that justifies one event in the chain. Said justification will remove one required chance of the event F, this producing the chance P(F)^(x-1).

Non-mathematically, the chance of fizzling a spell ten times is, say, some number. But if you fizzle once, that means you justify one of the fizzles, and it's no question whether or not it will fizzle. That means you don't multiply in its probability anymore, because if you did, that means you'd assume you still didn't know wherther or not you fizzled the spell, which isn't true. Now, if you fizzle nine times, that means you justify nine fizzles, and you don't factor in their probabilities. If you did, that means whether or not those nine fizzles happened is still in question, but it isn't. Therefore the chance of the remaining fizzle is just the cahnce of what any fizzle normally is.

All disregarding Headmaster's previous post, which is irrelevant to what I'm trying to argue.

Is that still clear?