User blog:Chad Pattan/Are They Trying To Make VC Great Again?

Greetings all. I'm a shade early from my promised quarterly, but enough has changed to make it worth the early update. I think.

Let's see where we're at. I have sorted things around.

Get Rid of "Fever Time" in AUB (Fixed)
This wasn't done, but they did improve it and addressed a concern I had. First, Fever Time is now exclusive to you, not (ab)usable by the team. Your Fever does not benefit anyone else but you. Why's this good? Because it encourages participation and competition within the Alliance as well. If you take up the Bingo spaces that give stars, you're going to stand out as MVP and thus get bonus rings. You also now get a bonus for being the best defender, which is a complaint I had. Now there's disincentive to just throw a garbage defender team out there.

Add More Alliance Titles With More Variety (Done)
This was actually done.

Bring Back Unlimited Proc UR Cards (Done)
Cards like Saucemeister are a throwback to the good old days of summoning where you could get unlimited procs. This is a step in the right direction and frankly, even though she's unlimited, it's not game breaking due to the power creep that's been happening - but it helps those who might be newer to the game and trying to deal with Elemental Hall.

Add More Building Types and Expansion Areas (Done)
They actually did this! I was shocked. And I don't like the new type for upgrading LR cards, not just because they're prohibitively expensive, but that in order to max those out, you are basically forced to pay gems to upgrade your castle so you can hold more resources - that or build a bunch of Airports which costs gems. Either way, it's a cash grab.

Add a UR To The Worship (Done)
They did it! A full refresh AND a UR card. Not only that, they actually creatively integrated it into the regular Worship mechanic for newbies. This is excellent.

Make Ultimate Summon a "UR Chance +5% Every" Summon (Alternate)
Not done. Actually, Ultimate Summon was rendered useless by the creation of the "Guaranteed UR Summon". I did ask for such a summon, but forcing you to collect an obscene number of Archwitch Cores to do it is a joke. They should have just enhanced Ultimate Summon like I described rather than tying it to witch kills.

Release the Fabled Soldier Arcana (Alternate)
Not done. Instead, MyNet just bumped up the soldier counts for new cards. UR Relena has stats like a HUR and LR Wise Oracle is like 2x a GUR.

Fix the Summon Probability (Alternate)
All they did here is display the probability so you know what you're dealing with, and adding probability multipliers every blue moon. I don't have an issue with this except on the LR summon. x2 per is way too low considering how rare those tickets are and that you can't buy them anyway.

Real Strategy, Not Artificial Difficulty (Somewhat Done)
This one's a headache. There's "strategy" but it's embedded in basically nerfing your skills and procs to try and frustrate you into paying for overpowered cards. Reminds me of what Million Arthur eventually devolved into. The idea of a "Super FAW" with obscene ATK and DEF forcing you to max yours out to stop her, yet being subjected to constant nullification, it's enough to frustrate newer players and discourage continuing the game.

Fix the Drop Rates for FAW/LAW (Tossup)
Okay, so people keep swearing it's been fixed. I disagree. And I assume it's just due to how long I've been playing.

I killed Ganache 120 times. I got one random drop and one friendship drop.

LAW doesn't even drop at all, and the encounter rates are garbage. It took me over 90 attempts to find one today. That's ABSOLUTELY not the way it was. Arpa was flashing up every time you turned around - I actually had to duck her just so I could finish Herb Wing. That's how it should be.

Get Rid of All Caps (Not Done)
Not done.

Allow Access to Old Event Maps (Not Done)
Not done.

Bring Back the Anytime AUB (Not Done)
Not done.

Bring Back the Anytime Step Up Summon With Items (Not Done)
Not done. What's worse, they're abusing it. Everything is now either a Box or Step Up Summon with very little incentive for either. The other single summons are gone. Bad.

Retire 90% of the Current N Cards and Demote 80% of the Current R Cards to N (Not Done)
<p style="font-weight:normal;">Not done. In fact it seems like I'm getting more N cards than ever before.

Update the Rewards in the Minigames and Add More Minigame Types (Not Done)
<p style="font-weight:normal;">Not done.

Continue Adding Regular Campaign Maps and Storylines (Not Done)
<p style="font-weight:normal;">Nope, not done. Why do this? First of all, the story is what drew early birds in. Second, the story is the only thing now lacking compared to games like Grand Sphere. Get back on the story track and VC becomes better than the rest.

Get Rid of the Blur Delay/Transition On Everything (Not Done)
<p style="font-weight:normal;">Nope, not done.

Release Past Ranking Reward Cards Into Summon (Not Done)
<p style="font-weight:normal;">Not done. Do you know why I think this is a good idea? Because in the past, rank rewards weren't nearly as good as they have now become. They're more a "trophy" - many useless skills - but the artwork is the key. The game has an artwork collage that many players will never truly be able to fill up because of this gap.

Enable Card Trading (Not Done)
<p style="font-weight:normal;">Nope. Not done. Don't see it happening, unfortunately, especially not with the LR. A shame as I do believe it would encourage newer player retention.

Let Us Select What Art We Want to Display (Not Done)
<p style="font-weight:normal;">Nope. Not done. Still not sure why.

The Only Things That Should Go To Presents are Overflow Drops and Ranking Rewards (Not Done)
<p style="font-weight:normal;">Not Done. I now am having presents get expired on a weekly basis, though they're just R cards.

Exclude Any Slime Cards, Metal Cards and Items From N Card Delete (Not Done)
<p style="font-weight:normal;">Nope, not done.

Allow Purchase of the ATK+ and DEF+ Arcana (Not Done)
<p style="font-weight:normal;">Not done.