I have played Wizard101 for years now with multiple wizards to level 100 and beyond. I recently made a new account to start over fresh and this most recent Beastmoon hunt is the first one I have put a significant amount of time into. I finished the event progress bar and stocked up one reagents to farm seeds until the next event. From this experience I have some feed back on the feel and balance of the event. Please enjoy and give me your feedback on my feedback. Please forgive the book
General Balance/Feel:
The game mode is interesting and fun but has some flaws that make it feel unfun/unwinnable at times. Having different forms is cool because it gives players the ability to pick their own preferred play style and feel proud when they increase the forms level or tier. However, many of the forms feel impractical and under powered which I believe is brought on by the setup of the game mode.
Beastmoon forms that are damage focused (the storm wolf, storm krok, and fire ninja pig for example) are, or at least feel, significantly more powerful then those which are utility based (Like the myth draconian, healers, or balance forms).
My hypothesis is that the time to defeat (TTD) in the hunts is what causes this unbalance. Time to defeat is the theoretical amount of time it would take to eliminate a player from a duel. In regular player vs environment gameplay (PVE) the time to defeat a player is high, which means it takes several rounds on average to drop a player's heath to zero. When you start a mob/boss fight in PVE the amount of health a player has as well as their resistance means that it is unlikely that the mobs will be able to defeat you in the first two rounds. In contrast, the Beastmoon Hunts feature forms with significantly reduced health (relative to the rest of the game and spell damage) and no natural resistance. Therefore, the time to defeat a player during a hunt is based almost exclusively on how much health they have and how much damage their enemy can throw at them.
In the simplest terms, because players have low health & no resistance and beastmoon forms are able to do a lot of burst damage (non-DOT) in the first few rounds (with bonus pips), utility and long term strategy fall to the way side. The ability to remove a player from a duel in the first or second round renders utility useless in most duels because the benefit of simply preventing a player from casting spells and removing the combat slot from play (because fleeing locks the slot in the dueling circle) is simply more effective in most scenarios.
In a 2v2 scenario, the team that eliminates an enemy player first has a huge advantage. If all players join the duel at the same time and can chose a spell on the first turn then the team that has the most burst damage wins. That team will be able to remove an enemy player from the duel within the first round and will almost certainly win the duel. This feels really unfun to play against. It makes Beastmoon forms that are not damage based feel useless in most fights other then 4v4, because the utility they provide is too weak to mitigate the pure damage output of other forms. And, sense almost all duels are 2v2 or 3v3 utility based forms feel under powered and like the player is not having impact on the game.
How Could This Be Fixed There are several "Dials" in the hunts that can be used to balance the game mode and make it feel more engaging for support style players. Here are some brief ideas: 1. Reduce combat pips for some forms that can do too much damage the first few rounds of a duel. Doing this would make it so players have time to defend themselves and utilize utility before being annihilated by damage. (Think about it as increasing the time players have to respond to another players move- especially when that other players move could remove them from combat in the first few seconds) 2. Make utility stronger or more easier to use. Right now it feels like the utility some forms have is simply not able to keep up with raw damage output. One example is the way armor works. Amour is universal which means it has to fall between the highest and lowest damage outputs to be balanced. If it is too high, then some low damage spells simply tickle it whereas if it is too low then high damage spells do the same. Perhaps it would be better if armor was percentage based rather then pure subtraction? 3. Reduce the amount of utility forms have and give more damage options. This would definitly make those other forms feel stronger but it could also remove the uniqueness of each school/form and it would lower TTD even more! 4. Make healing feel more powerful and effective at canceling burst damage. 5. Increase the number of players allowed in a duel so there can be more slots for utility based forms.
Other Feedback and Quality of Life Stuffs
A way to see how much Lunari we have within our character page would be neat. I think it would be less confusing if a player is always on the blue team from their prospective. Playing matches back to back can be confusing when you keep swapping back and forth between red and blue. There would still be different teams of course, but a player would always be blue and the enemy would always be red. Can we have a tab to see what our forms deck and battle card situation is while we are in a hunt? Sometimes I forget what some spells do or I want to check which battle cards I have without needing to run all the way back to spawn. Some of the AI for summoned minions feels off. The Mythic Construct minion (for myth draconian) is well known for just giving pips to itself nonstop A crafting table for Beastmoon seeds would be awesome. That way, if there is no event going on (I.E. there is no quick travel button) and I wanna craft some more seeds I do not need to run to the Arena just to craft them. Have the game remember what Realm I am in after I leave a hunt.
I think it is a great addition to the game and I hope to see more iteration on it in the future!
While I am here, wanted to say that I am also super excited to see what you do in the next round of spell audits. The last audit was handled almost perfectly and the game really needed a brush up. As someone who has played this game for almost 10 years, I am really thankful to see you have plans to continue adding content. I am on the edge of my seat to see what new spells come from the next world.
General Balance/Feel
How Could This Be Fixed
A way to see how much Lunari we have within our character page would be neat.
