TOPIC: Feedback about Vets from New Player: Driving Someone Else's Car

Fiddy wrote:

MasterED wrote: I agree with not really loaning builds unless they ask. I loan out Rings of Heroism so they can use the other side of the card and Charms of Awakened Synergy. I then ask them what class they want me to play of the last 3. Treasure Enhancers are always available for loan and they rarely say no.

Ed

This is basically what I do for PUGs as well.

How could someone know to ask to borrow a build though unless the person with the build makes it known that they have it available, essentially "offering" to loan it? It seems unlikely that a newer player would just assume that someone has extra token builds to loan.

I also strongly advocate for normalizing EXP gain for the run, and normalizing token based rewards.

Make each run reward the same regardless of difficulty a flat value, outside of the button given. Or heck, if you want to get squirrelly about it, make increases EXP a reward for that year for people who purchased additional tokens at a certain level.

I know it sounds silly but at this point, the reward isn’t the same, and that can also drive decisions and pressure - particularly when tickets at conventions like Gencon are difficult at times to get outside of the sealed runs.

Everyone approaches what ‘being helpful’ means in different ways, but at the end of the day, removing the reward differences removes some of the player driven pressures. I like to ask players if they want some tokens to borrow to fill out their builds, but I think it’s a ‘damned if you do, damned if you don’t’ situation - if you are using high end tokens yourself, and you have a brand new I-have-this-ten-pack-and-nothing-else player, if you play on normal, you will make the game unfun for them (as you essentially nuke the monsters) or it is a bit more challenging but they can’t hit the monster at all/are taking damage they really shouldn’t be taking.

I really thought the ‘asterisk’ the players who agreed to play up but might not be geared for it so they could get free rezzed or some global buff was a fantastic idea to help fit group needs in the ever expanding gap that has been created.

But this all said... I don’t know what the real solution is with party spread and I think that the vets loaning full builds is treating the symptom of a much larger disease that I don’t think has any simple solution.

... other than to be kind to each other and try to make it a good experience for everyone the best you can.

I don't think there is an easy answer to mixed gear parties. The new player experience is better if they get to grow into the game - not drive someone else's car. Experienced players want to use their tokens.

If selling tickets in blocks of 10 is not possible, maybe have one run every hour that has a cap on tokens that can be used. These restricted runs could be locked to no more than 1 UR+ (or what ever feels right here). This would encourage some sorting of the player base as experienced players would avoid the restricted runs, as they would want to use their TEs. I would say the rules should explicitly allow the use of a second UR+ if they get lucky and it is in the 10 pack they get for the run.

Templar wrote: I also strongly advocate for normalizing EXP gain for the run, and normalizing token based rewards.

Make each run reward the same regardless of difficulty a flat value, outside of the button given. Or heck, if you want to get squirrelly about it, make increases EXP a reward for that year for people who purchased additional tokens at a certain level.

I know it sounds silly but at this point, the reward isn’t the same, and that can also drive decisions and pressure - particularly when tickets at conventions like Gencon are difficult at times to get outside of the sealed runs.

Everyone approaches what ‘being helpful’ means in different ways, but at the end of the day, removing the reward differences removes some of the player driven pressures. I like to ask players if they want some tokens to borrow to fill out their builds, but I think it’s a ‘damned if you do, damned if you don’t’ situation - if you are using high end tokens yourself, and you have a brand new I-have-this-ten-pack-and-nothing-else player, if you play on normal, you will make the game unfun for them (as you essentially nuke the monsters) or it is a bit more challenging but they can’t hit the monster at all/are taking damage they really shouldn’t be taking.

I really thought the ‘asterisk’ the players who agreed to play up but might not be geared for it so they could get free rezzed or some global buff was a fantastic idea to help fit group needs in the ever expanding gap that has been created.

But this all said... I don’t know what the real solution is with party spread and I think that the vets loaning full builds is treating the symptom of a much larger disease that I don’t think has any simple solution.

... other than to be kind to each other and try to make it a good experience for everyone the best you can.

I've always been in favor of giving the exact same rewards for all of the difficulty levels, to avoid just these problems. I think it would be best to let players choose their difficulty levels based solely on the challenge they want to face, and not completion tokens or even XP. Like you, I can see giving different difficulty levels different survivor buttons, but I'd prefer everything else to be the same across the board.

+1 for the 10 pack idea

I work with 3-5 pugs a year; they're almost always new players, or maybe on their 2nd or 3rd run. One common thread for all of them - they're challenged by the unknown and the complexity of TD. Loaning a full rack of tokens just makes them susceptible to being overwhelmed. If there's a player with a run or two under their belt, it may be nice to loan a nice weapon; brand new players should only be loaned armor or other tokens that only appear on the party card. A new player given a handful of figurines and other situational tokens may miss out on the overall experience. You can look into a player's eyes and know who can handle extra layers of complexity.

Team Yeti loans TEs (with no strings attached) as much as possible. 5th level tokens are offered often, and I take cleric or druid as much as possible. Don't bump the level up unless everyone is equipped to hit tougher monsters. Also remember that new players won't have a clue what the levels really mean, so take the lead in making that decision.

There's nothing wrong with scaling down your build to match the rest of the party; alternatively you could stand back in combat until the party gets in trouble - that's why I opt for a healer class - I can still contribute without one-shotting a monster.

I have seen several groups of newer players being handed a full build, then pressured to run hardcore. They stumble through the dungeon trying to remember what all their tokens do. When I ask them if they enjoyed themselves, a full 80% say they were either overwhelmed by the complexity, or couldn't remember much because they were fumbling with their tokens.

Many game systems have come and gone. Those that are still around paid attention to keeping the door open for new players. I belong firmly in the group who feel we should shepherd and welcome new players.

Fiddy wrote:

MasterED wrote: I agree with not really loaning builds unless they ask. I loan out Rings of Heroism so they can use the other side of the card and Charms of Awakened Synergy. I then ask them what class they want me to play of the last 3. Treasure Enhancers are always available for loan and they rarely say no.

Ed

This is basically what I do for PUGs as well.

Same. Also, I choose bard or cleric if they haven't been selected.

I offer the bard Widseth's legendary, if they want, so they can help the party more and also do something rather than just bardsong. I find they the DMs do a great job of saying, "thanks to the bard (and cleric), the fighter hits"

I heard there was a new thing in coach training this year. A party may now run at hardcore or nightmare with up to 4 players individually playing at non-lethal. I assume this is to help prevent newbies from being pushed to run at a harder difficulty and then dying.

But I worry they'd never hit anything then not have any fun. Unless they borrowed a build.

If you loan gear to newbies please make sure it doesn't make the game more complicated for them. A treasure enhancer or weapon is fine. A ring of spell swapping not imo.

Kirk Bauer wrote: I heard there was a new thing in coach training this year. A party may now run at hardcore or nightmare with up to 4 players individually playing at non-lethal. I assume this is to help prevent newbies from being pushed to run at a harder difficulty and then dying.

But I worry they'd never hit anything then not have any fun. Unless they borrowed a build.

If you loan gear to newbies please make sure it doesn't make the game more complicated for them. A treasure enhancer or weapon is fine. A ring of spell swapping not imo.

This is my exact concern. If the new players are playing some classes, it's fine, but if they need a 20 to hit, it sucks for them.

Fiddy wrote:

MasterED wrote: I agree with not really loaning builds unless they ask. I loan out Rings of Heroism so they can use the other side of the card and Charms of Awakened Synergy. I then ask them what class they want me to play of the last 3. Treasure Enhancers are always available for loan and they rarely say no.

Ed

This is basically what I do for PUGs as well.

Pretty much the same here. I almost always get thanked for bumping them to 5th level. I don't have extra TEs, but may loan out some awakened synergy. Anything beyond that is on a case by case basis. With PUGs I will let them pick their classes first and if noone takes cleric, I go with that. As a veteran, I always feel some responsibility to maximize the fun for new players. You don't do that by overwhelming them the first time out.

I had a healing kit to loan out to the 4 / 5 players not with my group on our runs if they wanted - it was:

Linked shirt of healing
Pants of Blisswalk
Ioun Stone Agate orb

Based on responses here, I wasn't expecting anyone to take me up on any of them except for maybe the agate orbs. Boy was I wrong. Every run I loaned out all the shirts, all the ioun stones, and 3(ish) pants. I ended up losing 1 of each over the course of the cons (didn't get collected after coaching), but it was totally worth a few lost rares.

It absolutely does come across as high pressure and can overwhelm the new players.

As a player coach I say with confidence this happens to 2 of my 5 rooms every 2 hours if the group is mixed.

I frequently have to rephrase “I’m loaning them” overtalking as “Soandso is offering...” to make sure the players understand it is their choice and saying no is okay. As with everything, consent is key.

I offer some virtual token “loans” that the players could have easily pulled or traded for if I see the party is going to be too unbalanced (+1 to hit/damage/heal/AC commons) that are generally well received and mitigate that “someone else’s car” feeling.

This year I piggybacked off of the 12 minute warning to finalize token trades to let vets know they needed to stop and at 6 minutes refused them entirely. This was also the first in 4 years of coaching I didn’t end up way behind.

I also blatantly stole the idea from a newer group borrowing TEs that they pool their total extra (after epilogue)and divide evenly when there wasn’t enough to go around (not enough TEs, mixed shared TE combinations, etc.) so no one felt left out or slighted. That was also very well received.

So presentation, consent, muddying the waters, time, and equable distribution of gear and treasure all need to be considered before loaning anything out, in my opinion.