email to Lukas

By Ezzet, in Star Wars: Destiny

Thought i share an email i sent yesterday to FFG. I now this wont change anything and i know some of you might disagree with the content. But im usually not one to speak up and this is the first time i ever written to a company with concerns. But i felt i just needed to get this off my chest. Its just a card game and i know i couldnt do a better job myself.
To Lukas Litzinger.
Hi!
My native language is swedish so forgive me if my words sometimes comes out wrong. The reason why im sending this message is because i have some heartfelt worries about Star Wars destiny. First of i love the game.
This is my first ccg. I never thought i would buy a ccg. But with the love for your other creations (runebound 3ed), the star wars theme and the going back and forth notion of the game all appealed to me. Ive already collected almost two of everything from the Awakenings set and was looking forward to buy the spirit of the rebellion set. Until i saw some of the spoilers. One of the reasons i love this game is because the back and forth actions and easy gameplay you created and promoted.
Now already in the second set together with some cards from awakenings all that seems to have been destroyed. Now people can start doing many actions in a row and resolve their dice before the opponent can do anything. Dice removal is now out the window and aggro decks that can end the game before it starts. And thats not even considering this was suppose to be an accesible game but now you have to start remebering and counting actions upon actions with ambush on top of that + reys and jango abilities etc etc and wait forever before its your turn again.
If this was your vision from the start then thats okay, but you should have said so then from the start. There is no way ill keep on buying and promote this game to others if this turn into someone doing 7 actions in a row and kill you by turn 2. Why would you make cards like fast hands, force speed and sith holocron to begin with. Let alone for 0 cost. If you dont do enough playtesting im sure there is plenty people willing to help out for free. Thanks for listening to my concerns and i wish you all the best in the future.
Best regards

There are 174 or so cards in the game now. There are about to be over 300 cards in the game.

Are you saying that 5-10 break the game?

You might struggle with the game then (don't mean to come across aggressive).

If Jango was so broken he would be played in every deck every tournament game. He isn't.

If Rey's multiple actions were abusive, she would be in every deck. She isn't

Sith Holocron might be in every blue villain deck, but it isn't broken.

The only card that I see that has negative potential is Hyperspace Jump.

This new Force Speed is nice and has some cool things to it. But I am willingly to bet that it won't break the game.

Playing FFG games for some time I bet they had playtested this game for a long time before it came out.

I understand frustration about seeing cards, but like you said, this is your first CCG, so be patient and let the card pool grow and then comment. Black Lotus was a good card when it came out originally for Magic the Gathering but it has lost its luster

I am just going to comment on this reply because 4-5 cards can break games with 300+ cards. I see that you make a Magic The Gathering reference so you must know a bit about Magic. To get to your black lotus comment, it has lost its luster? Go ask any pro player if they unbanned Black Lotus and made it legal for Standard, Modern, Vintage or Legacy how many of them would play it. I would imagine that they would all play it. To make another Magic reference. Who remembers CawBlade? That deck was in a well established set of rotations and 4-5 cards broke that whole system. Jace The Mind Sculptor, Sword of Feast and Famine and Stoneforge Mystic were in every deck with Squadron Hawks that destroyed Standard. So yes 4-5 cards can destroy a 300 card game or even a 700+ card game.

Now do I think a couple of these new cards will break the game, no I don't. The difference between this game and Magic is that there are colors and factions. Unlike magic if you like Blue you don't just play the best cards, you pick your faction first then add the strong cards you want which may in fact not be the most powerful in that color. I think that is what is going to balance this game people will like Heroes or Villains and will play the faction that they like and attempt to make it the best they can even if it isn't tier 1. You also have to rely on dice rolls, if you are anything like me you will miss your special rolls a lot more then you will hit them.

2 hours ago, Ezzet said:

This is my first ccg.

Ok....so its your first CCG, that has only second expansion and yet you write to game designer to basically tell them they f$%@ed up? Hmmmm....

And please give me 7 action combo.

The OP has a point. They're not saying that the new cards are broken, just stating that the new cards are promoting a play style that eliminates the back and forth play and decision making that appeals to many of the players.

This game had some pretty simple mechanics. If I were a designer, my boundaries to protect those mechanics would be to limit recursion, limit multiple action loops, and control the amount of mill/resource denial - keeping those viable styles but not at the cost of play experience.

Awakenings already jumped those first two boundaries. SoR runs with that theme, rather than reigning back in. I've played enough that I've gotten over my distaste of Jango, and I don't think I'll really fear cards like Fast Hands. It seems to be an acceptable way to get around die removal. Much like a Force Strike or It's a Trap. A once per turn use that still has some form of luck involved. Rey is the true issue in my mind. All other action acceleration has, at least, a soft counter or luck element. Rey doesn't and Force Speed makes that even worse. Rey may not make the best decks out there. But, watching your opponent take several actions in a row with no interrupt mechanic is very much a negative play experience. After SoR and Force Speed, that's going to be more consistent and the end result will be more damage in the same action window. It's just not fun and shouldn't have had a place in the game.

Edited by gokubb

I have played Han/Rey more than any other deck, somewhere over 60 games with it not to mention the games I've played against it.

If you have played with or against the deck you should realize the back and forth with your opponents still exist in games involving H/R. Stacking a few actions together during your turn doesn't prevent most of the round from being a back and forth dice mitigating mind game with your opponent. I have never found action stacking to ruin the integrity of the game, only enhance my enjoyment, even when my opponent uses it against me.

l'm sorry you don't like the direction the game is going. I have been in your shoes before and dropped games I had already invested hundreds of dollars in because I didn't like the way things were going. It wasn't an easy decision for me but ended up being the correct thing to do every time. All the games have continued to be successful they just weren't offering the play experience I was looking for anymore, which is fine.

Personally, I don't have any issues with the cards I've seen spoiled, but will ultimately reserve my final judgment for after I've tested them once SoR has been released.

Magic went through a lot of growing pains in its early years. There were lessons learned, and things changed for the better. The comparison here isn't completely without merit; if Black Lotus hadn't dominated early constructed play, WotC might have been slow to change the rules accordingly. In fact, the Black Lotus / Channel / Fireball combo was directly responsible for the shift to an individual maximum of four cards and the institution of a better mulligan rule.

The sky isn't falling, but that doesn't mean our feedback is meaningless.

3 hours ago, Vitalis said:

Ok....so its your first CCG, that has only second expansion and yet you write to game designer to basically tell them they f$%@ed up? Hmmmm....

And please give me 7 action combo.

The OPs point was they liked the 1 action a piece back and forth. With the few exceptions of Jango, Rey, and some Ambush cards this was the norm. Now with things like Speed, Fast Hands, and a few others its becoming done lots and your opponents has no time to react. Can that work? Yes it can, that can happen in Magic. But Magic has an answer for people being able to do mutiple things a turn, Instants. If the game goes to a hyper speed style it will NEED a Instant/Interupt mechanic.

34 minutes ago, WonderWAAAGH said:

Magic went through a lot of growing pains in its early years. There were lessons learned, and things changed for the better. The comparison here isn't completely without merit; if Black Lotus hadn't dominated early constructed play, WotC might have been slow to change the rules accordingly. In fact, the Black Lotus / Channel / Fireball combo was directly responsible for the shift to an individual maximum of four cards and the institution of a better mulligan rule.

The sky isn't falling, but that doesn't mean our feedback is meaningless.

Yep. Heard the stories of the, I believe playtesting, where Garfield or some others working with him was playing a like 20 Lotus, 20 Channel, 20 Fireball deck or somthing like that.

14 hours ago, Rogue 4 said:

There are 174 or so cards in the game now. There are about to be over 300 cards in the game.

Are you saying that 5-10 break the game?

You might struggle with the game then (don't mean to come across aggressive).

If Jango was so broken he would be played in every deck every tournament game. He isn't.

If Rey's multiple actions were abusive, she would be in every deck. She isn't

Sith Holocron might be in every blue villain deck, but it isn't broken.

The only card that I see that has negative potential is Hyperspace Jump.

This new Force Speed is nice and has some cool things to it. But I am willingly to bet that it won't break the game.

Playing FFG games for some time I bet they had playtested this game for a long time before it came out.

I understand frustration about seeing cards, but like you said, this is your first CCG, so be patient and let the card pool grow and then comment. Black Lotus was a good card when it came out originally for Magic the Gathering but it has lost its luster

1 card can break a game, i seen it happen

13 hours ago, Vitalis said:

Ok....so its your first CCG, that has only second expansion and yet you write to game designer to basically tell them they f$%@ed up? Hmmmm....

And please give me 7 action combo.

your putting words in his mouth, he never said they messed up, and he is entitled to give feedback despite how long he has played.

13 hours ago, gokubb said:

The OP has a point. They're not saying that the new cards are broken, just stating that the new cards are promoting a play style that eliminates the back and forth play and decision making that appeals to many of the players.

This game had some pretty simple mechanics. If I were a designer, my boundaries to protect those mechanics would be to limit recursion, limit multiple action loops, and control the amount of mill/resource denial - keeping those viable styles but not at the cost of play experience.

Awakenings already jumped those first two boundaries. SoR runs with that theme, rather than reigning back in. I've played enough that I've gotten over my distaste of Jango, and I don't think I'll really fear cards like Fast Hands. It seems to be an acceptable way to get around die removal. Much like a Force Strike or It's a Trap. A once per turn use that still has some form of luck involved. Rey is the true issue in my mind. All other action acceleration has, at least, a soft counter or luck element. Rey doesn't and Force Speed makes that even worse. Rey may not make the best decks out there. But, watching your opponent take several actions in a row with no interrupt mechanic is very much a negative play experience. After SoR and Force Speed, that's going to be more consistent and the end result will be more damage in the same action window. It's just not fun and shouldn't have had a place in the game.

your not allowed to disagree with there god, ffg is perfect and does no wrong :P

36 minutes ago, soviet prince said:

1 card can break a game, i seen it happen

your putting words in his mouth, he never said they messed up, and he is entitled to give feedback despite how long he has played.

your not allowed to disagree with there god, ffg is perfect and does no wrong :P

Force speed on Jango sounds good to me. Sith Holocron negating play restrictions, may be worth taking a blue character with Jango now.

16 hours ago, Vitalis said:

And please give me 7 action combo.

Well with SoR you could, on turn 2, if you have 3 resources or have infamous in play:

Han/Rey:

1. Force speed on rey

2. Holdout blaster on rey

3. Roll rey

4. Resolve force speed special

5. Play infamous (or already have it out)

6. Exhaust infamous, play fast hands on Han

7. Roll Han

8. Fast hands to resolve a dice.

Not a very efficient use of actions, but certainly do-able.

You could also get 7 on turn 1 by playing 2 force speeds and a holdout blaster on rey(and rolling at least 1 special).

Again though, not necessarily to great effect. And of course you need the correct cards in hand and dice to come up right.

I don't think the OP was necessarily saying cards are broken, but i can kinda see why they feel that we're 2 waves in and one of the premises of the game is already being violated with a big stick.

With Force Speed on Rey and Falcon on table.

Infamous a Fast Hands on Rey. 2 actions left.

Roll Rey. 1 action left

Fast Hands resolve Force Speed special. 3 actions left

Roll Falcon, Roll Maz, resolve 2 dice. Claim to Hyperloop.

Nice, I can Hyperloop nearly every turn without my opponent having any window to act. And, I get to resolve two damage die before doing so. Great play experience.

If you don't roll the Special on Rey's Force Speed, you still get to just Hyperloop at the most convenient moment. But every time you roll a Force Speed special on Rey and have any card to ambush onto her in hand, you have a turn and two die resolution without any window for opponent to do anything.

Can i reserve judgement until I have played a few games with cards from the new set.

I played a game last night where my opponent got a whole mess of Force Throws in play. In our post game chat, he mentioned how he disliked some of the cards I was playing and I pointed out that his Force Throw was a great card, as it affected my thoughts and tactics during our games. So I can't help but think, do I just look at the game as a challenge to not just find those fun to play cards and combinations, but to also play against them and overcome them?

Right now this is one card in a 170 card puzzle, which fits into our Destiny 176 piece puzzle and I just don't know how it fits in to the 346 card puzzle that we have.

3 hours ago, gokubb said:

With Force Speed on Rey and Falcon on table.

Put up a deck and I'll try it out, happy to play test the idea and see what happens. However, I am not too sure if 2 characters, though you do have 13 points to throw in another, Finn or Chewie?) with lowish health can be kept on the table while you set it all up.

Sure, once it is set up it seems like you may have found Darth Vader's Evil Twin.

First stab in the dark here

Battlefield: Emperor's Throne Room

Characters: Hired Gun, eMaz, Rey

Upgrades:

2x Force Speed

2x Fast Hands

2x Hunker Down

2x DL-44

2x Hold-out

2x Cunning

Support:

2x Falcon

2x Infamous

Events

2x Smuggling

2x Hyperspace Jump

2x Long Con

2x Scavenge

2x Draw Attention

2x Don't Get Cocky

2x Electroshock

Speed to get Falcon and Force Speed/Fast Hands on Rey and a Cunning on Maz as quickly as possible. Once set, play an Ambush upgrade on Rey and let the loop begin. Once you have Cunning, you can focus Falcon die for all the damage deck will ever need.

May work better with Chewie. Or maybe a Rebel Trooper to guard away damage until you're setup. Will have to tweak the survivability some, but once you're set, you can probably play the rest of the game without your opponent getting to do anything.

Just curious, how much damage is being given with all these extra actions?

Fast Hands takes an upgrade slot, Force speed takes an upgrade slot. Rey isn't a heavy hitter on her dice, Han is, but Maz isn't. Sure the Falcon is a pain, and Hyperloop is a problem, but again, how much damage is being dished out?

Once Cunning is on Maz, you get to use the Falcon die for 4 damage (if you get a Maz focus). Otherwise you just resolve whatever damage popped up. But the amount of damage per turn is really irrelevant as long as you can do at least some. Once the combo is locked in, your opponent doesn't get a turn, unless your rolls are very unlucky. You roll out at least two characters, resolve at least two dice to try to get some damage, and claim/jump all before opponent gets an action.

5 minutes ago, gokubb said:

Once Cunning is on Maz, you get to use the Falcon die for 4 damage (if you get a Maz focus). Otherwise you just resolve whatever damage popped up. But the amount of damage per turn is really irrelevant as long as you can do at least some. Once the combo is locked in, your opponent doesn't get a turn, unless your rolls are very unlucky. You roll out at least two characters, resolve at least two dice to try to get some damage, and claim/jump all before opponent gets an action.

Of course, the downside is that you rarely get to play the same person more than once. People don't play games that aren't fun. If your combo consistently works, they'll simply say no when you ask for a game.

11 minutes ago, KrisWall said:

Of course, the downside is that you rarely get to play the same person more than once. People don't play games that aren't fun. If your combo consistently works, they'll simply say no when you ask for a game.

For a game with a competitive play component, that is hardly an acceptable solution. People will play these kind of decks if they can win, which I believe they can. If it were just a friendly match and I saw someone drop Falcon with Maz on the table, I'd likely just call it a game and go play something more fun.

Cards that create negative experiences need to be avoided in design. When those cards are found to have made the card pool, they need to be aggressively errata'd. Rey and Maz's abilities open up card interactions that I don't think the designers had foreseen. And Falcon should be changed to 'remove this card from the game after use'.

Edited by gokubb

This nonstop whine is really annoying. How many people here really played some hyperloop deck before? I did and that deck is not even competitive tier 1 and it is hardly somehwere in tier 2.

Hyperloop is not reliable and it definitely will not be reliable with the card pool in SoR. First of all you need the Falcon. Than you need resources to get it in the game (good luck when you do not have Poe), than you need the Hyperspace Jump and than you need the time and skill to not loose on tie braker. Most of the times, you will end in end of turn 2 with someone dead (like Maz), GG. Build the deck, play it against someone who is competitive player and than make judgements. As long as there is not something which really helps to have the combo in opening hand, I really do not care about this deck, it often looses just beacuse you do not draw correct cards. If you want to win the tournaments, you have to win in bad pening hand situations. I draw well win is viable only for something like 3-3, which is not sufficient even for the top cut.

And whine about the Force Speed is also ridiculous. Most of the people on the internet is constantly whining about this game, where only reason behind has to be pure fact, that they do not have much game experience with different decks in competitive meta. It is getting boring already.

Hyperloop isn't top tier right now because it cannot do damage and jump in the same window. Now it can. Sure, if they kill Maz before you find Falcon, Cunning and a HyperJump, then you likely lose. But if you drop that combo you play the rest of the game agnostic to your opponent. After building out this deck, I realized Force Speed isn't even necessary.

Ambush on Rey, Activate Maz, Resolve 2, Jump.

Its a three card combo that requires 7 resources to set up. Not that hard to get out.

37 minutes ago, gokubb said:

Its a three card combo that requires 7 resources to set up. Not that hard to get out.

7 resources is quite a setup.

I've played against it, although it was quite annoying Jango still took it without much of a problem.

3 hours ago, Vijel said:

7 resources is quite a setup.

Give me four turns and I can easily generate 7 resources.