Ayra Update: Where do you stand?

[eclipse]

When it turns into a shouting match over a definition, it's an issue.

What can be objectively said is that Ayra has more stat points than the average infantry unit.  But do those extra stat points really matter?

[Johann]

25 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

Then exactly what was the point of posting?

You don't walk into Congress during whatever the hell they do there (still convinced they don't do anything, but that's not the point), stand on the podium, suggest that everyone get along, and leave. And then you say "not my problem" when security apprehends you.

Unless I'm violating forum rules, I can jump into any conversation I feel like and say whatever the hell I want. The whole power creep definition argument is silly and you should feel silly for engaging it for so long, and so aggressively to boot.

[Arcanite]

3 minutes ago, eclipse said:

But do those extra stat points really matter?

Not really lol

Looking at her stats... I'm pretty sure they just said "Meh we'll give her 5 extra def". She'd be the same pretty much.... it'd just be easier for swords to kill her with -5 Def.

 

 

I think they just want to make the new units good. I mean what do we want, all the new units to be good or at least better than the others, or just more Seliphs? lol
This whole fuss over what is and isn't powercreep is pointless. Some units are just better than others~ Like literally, there are units in this game that look like they were made to suck *looks at Oboro*

Ayra can't run brave sword, and Ayra also doesn't run DC. maybe Ayra is better to use than brave sword units.... but different units are used for different situations. 

 

No with regards to how she was introduced, yeah it was a surprise, yeah she is on a banner with 2 old units. It was literally made to lure people in to pull for her, get stuck, and spend money. It doesn't take a spoon for brains to figure out that Ayra is probably coming again in the future, and she'll probably have other new people with her that might be just as OP. I am content with my Lyn as my barely decent player phase infantry sword user.

[Rezzy]

I'm going to just drop the Power Creep discussion entirely and move onto another aspect.

I know part of the reason they added Ayra in a different banner was for the bonus units.  We've had 8 bonus units in the previous banners, but is there any real reason we can only have 8 bonus units?  In Arena, we've had a variable number of bonus units, so not why use this opportunity to expand it?

We could have added Seliph and Julia as Bonus units.  They're in the "story" for the Tempest, so why not?  Then we can have Seliph, Sigurd, Deidre, Tailtiu, and Ayra as 40% units, with Ayra in the original FE4 Banner, then get Julia, Arvis, Arden, Eldigan, and Lachesis as 20% units, with Seliph, Julia, Eldigan, and Lachesis as the Tempest Banner.  THat way, they don't have to have a 2 units banner, and they don't spring Ayra on us in a surprise banner.

[eclipse]

4 minutes ago, Arcanite said:

Not really lol

Looking at her stats... I'm pretty sure they just said "Meh we'll give her 5 extra def". She'd be the same pretty much.... it'd just be easier for swords to kill her with -5 Def.

Hmmm.

Looking at her raw stats, 33 Atk isn't that great for Brave builds IMO.  She might be able to run one if she's +Atk, but there's better options IMO (+Atk Gray/Laslow/Ogma).  I'm glad her kit revolves around her Speed, since it helps to move her away from "Brave or bust".

[Arcanite]

12 minutes ago, Rezzy said:

We've had 8 bonus units in the previous banners, but is there any real reason we can only have 8 bonus units?  In Arena, we've had a variable number of bonus units, so not why use this opportunity to expand it?

With reference to this last TT, since the units were introduced so fast, you could either use Arvis or Arden for free, which is a 3 or 4 star unless you spend 20k or a 4 star that you later get at 5 star for 30k points respectively. Some people might have had Eldigan. People.... probably sent home all their Lachesis' though (I did LOL)

OR

Use one of the flashy new units we just got. Sigurd with extra bst himself, and the ability to eat magic! Drdre the blade buff killer and rein tank, or TILTyou with the magical power of blarblade herself, she already has her best weapon, oh and look, drive speed!

It's just to lure people to spend money.... to get a better unit.
The less bonus units there are, the less likely people will have, the more likely people will want to pull for them. If there were 6 bonus units in each bonus bracket it probably wouldn't tempt people as much, assuming not all 6 are new or were released fairly recently or are on a banner with other scrubs (i.e. Ayra and Ike (PoR TT))

Specifically with the last TT*
The first one had units that people probably had already, iirc the second and third had units that were released recently but I can't remember the banners for those ones. Mini TT had units people had already, for sure. PoR was... kind of a mix. People were likely to have Ike though because Hero Fest was not too long ago before that iirc, then there were the newer units.

I guess it is a mix of let's make TTs with units people have already and would like to pull or new units that people might not have to rake us in ca$h

22 minutes ago, Rezzy said:

We could have added Seliph and Julia as Bonus units.  They're in the "story" for the Tempest, so why not?  Then we can have Seliph, Sigurd, Deidre, Tailtiu, and Ayra as 40% units, with Ayra in the original FE4 Banner, then get Julia, Arvis, Arden, Eldigan, and Lachesis as 20% units, with Seliph, Julia, Eldigan, and Lachesis as the Tempest Banner.  THat way, they don't have to have a 2 units banner, and they don't spring Ayra on us in a surprise banner.

I think IS doesn't particularly care that everyone has a 40% bonus unit. They are called Bonus Units after all. They just want to make it playable but still have the ability to somehow make money off it by tempting people to pull~ Hence Ayra alone on one banner, AND taking a slot on the 40% bonus squad, AND being on a banner with 2 other scr00bs

 

"Money is the root of all evil" never had this much meaning

[Rezzy]

20 minutes ago, Arcanite said:

With reference to this last TT, since the units were introduced so fast, you could either use Arvis or Arden for free, which is a 3 or 4 star unless you spend 20k or a 4 star that you later get at 5 star for 30k points respectively. Some people might have had Eldigan. People.... probably sent home all their Lachesis' though (I did LOL)

OR

Use one of the flashy new units we just got. Sigurd with extra bst himself, and the ability to eat magic! Drdre the blade buff killer and rein tank, or TILTyou with the magical power of blarblade herself, she already has her best weapon, oh and look, drive speed!

It's just to lure people to spend money.... to get a better unit.
The less bonus units there are, the less likely people will have, the more likely people will want to pull for them. If there were 6 bonus units in each bonus bracket it probably wouldn't tempt people as much, assuming not all 6 are new or were released fairly recently or are on a banner with other scrubs (i.e. Ayra and Ike (PoR TT))

Specifically with the last TT*
The first one had units that people probably had already, iirc the second and third had units that were released recently but I can't remember the banners for those ones. Mini TT had units people had already, for sure. PoR was... kind of a mix. People were likely to have Ike though because Hero Fest was not too long ago before that iirc, then there were the newer units.

I guess it is a mix of let's make TTs with units people have already and would like to pull or new units that people might not have to rake us in ca$h

I think IS doesn't particularly care that everyone has a 40% bonus unit. They are called Bonus Units after all. They just want to make it playable but still have the ability to somehow make money off it by tempting people to pull~ Hence Ayra alone on one banner, AND taking a slot on the 40% bonus squad, AND being on a banner with 2 other scr00bs

 

"Money is the root of all evil" never had this much meaning

It is "Love of money is the root of all evil."

I understand why they did what they did, but my suggestion is showing that that is not the only way it could have played out.

[Ice Dragon]

39 minutes ago, Rezzy said:

EDIT: I've watched and researched the Extra Credit videos, and was actually one who posted one.  I believe Ayra fits by that definition, because the curve is not the absolute ceiling.  Some units are below, some are above.  But we are again getting into definitions there.  Once people begin swearing at each other, I'm backing out, since the debate is no longer productive.

The problem is that Ayra is actually below or, at best, on the power curve.

Why? The power curve is the plot of strength against cost (of deploying the unit, not of obtaining the unit). The cost of using any unit is virtually the same regardless of the unit: 1 slot on your team. In particular, there is no restriction on things like the number of 5-stars or the number of armors or the number of filled skill slots on your team.

(For examples of games that have varying cost, Fate/Grand Order gives your team a maximum "capacity" where higher-rarity characters use more of the team's capacity, thus restricting the number of 5-star characters and 5-star equips you can use. Units in StarCraft have the resources required to deploy the unit in enough numbers, the resources sunk in the tech tree, and the time investment in micromanaging your units to be sufficiently effective. MMORPGs typically have the most applicable cost as "you need to be above level x". The effort spent obtaining characters, gear, etc. should generally not be counted for RPGs because "you're going to get it anyways if you want it," unless grinding for gear is the entire point of the game and none of it is locked behind specific requirements.)

This means the characters on the power curve graph all basically exist in a single vertical line. This does, however, mean that the power curve intersects the vertical line at a completely arbitrary point, but it makes sense from a logical perspective that the power curve intersects in the middle of the top-most blob of characters that aren't "oppressive" (which I take to just mean Reinhardt and Lyn at this point). If you make this point out to be around Horse Emblem (or a bit lower at Flier Emblem, Armor Emblem, and some Litrblade users), that puts Ayra below the curve. I can't argue for a good enough reason to put the power curve below the top-tier melee infantry units because melee infantry already has a significant number of disadvantages, which at best puts Ayra on the curve and not above it.

[Rezzy]

1 minute ago, Ice Dragon said:

The problem is that Ayra is actually below or, at best, on the power curve.

Why? The power curve is the plot of strength against cost (of deploying the unit, not of obtaining the unit). The cost of using any unit is virtually the same regardless of the unit: 1 slot on your team. In particular, there is no restriction on things like the number of 5-stars or the number of armors or the number of filled skill slots on your team.

(For examples of games that have varying cost, Fate/Grand Order gives your team a maximum "capacity" where higher-rarity characters use more of the team's capacity, thus restricting the number of 5-star characters and 5-star equips you can use. Units in StarCraft have the resources required to deploy the unit in enough numbers, the resources sunk in the tech tree, and the time investment in micromanaging your units to be sufficiently effective. MMORPGs typically have the most applicable cost as "you need to be above level x". The effort spent obtaining characters, gear, etc. should generally not be counted for RPGs because "you're going to get it anyways if you want it," unless grinding for gear is the entire point of the game and none of it is locked behind specific requirements.)

This means the characters on the power curve graph all basically exist in a single vertical line. This does, however, mean that the power curve intersects the vertical line at a completely arbitrary point, but it makes sense from a logical perspective that the power curve intersects in the middle of the top-most blob of characters that aren't "oppressive" (which I take to just mean Reinhardt and Lyn at this point). If you make this point out to be around Horse Emblem (or a bit lower at Flier Emblem, Armor Emblem, and some Litrblade users), that puts Ayra below the curve. I can't argue for a good enough reason to put the power curve below the top-tier melee infantry units because melee infantry already has a significant number of disadvantages, which at best puts Ayra on the curve and not above it.

We're just going to have to agree to disagree.  There's too much vitriol on this side of the discussion that is going to push this over to get the thread locked.  I just don't want you to think I'm ignoring you.

[Arcanite]

Just now, Rezzy said:

It is "Love of money is the root of all evil."

why can't you just let it go

It still stands, at least heh

1 minute ago, Rezzy said:

I understand why they did what they did, but my suggestion is showing that that is not the only way it could have played out.

Your suggestion isn't tempting enough, unfortunately. 5 units in each bracket is too much freedom! IS would never give us such a convenience! 

[Rezzy]

1 minute ago, Arcanite said:

why can't you just let it go

 

Because then, I'd be evil.

[eclipse]

1 minute ago, Arcanite said:

Your suggestion isn't tempting enough, unfortunately. 5 units in each bracket is too much freedom! IS would never give us such a convenience! 

Arena has 10 units.  Why can't TT be half of that?

(it's a great idea IMO)

[Arcanite]

Just now, eclipse said:

Arena has 10 units.  Why can't TT be half of that?

(it's a great idea IMO)

Because Arena is different. It is around forever, there are tiers to separate performance, and the rewards are constant... it was made as a reliable source to get coins, feathers, and a nice drip of orbs

TT is timed and the rewards are gone FOREVER, until they come back some other time in a mini TT somewhere down the line. It was made to be limited. 2 weeks is quite a bit of time to get things done, but if you want to get all rewards you need 7.1k a day. Considering you can make 4k-ish in your first 2 runs a day on TT, with a 40% that isnt too much

That gets cut down by 1k with no bonus unit, meaning you only have 3k within your first 2 runs, not to mention your runs after that are not going to progress as fast either

20% is 3.6k I think. Not too bad. you lose 400-ish, and it's a tad slower.

The point is, the time limit pushes you to want a 40% for ease of getting rewards slightly faster. Though since the arena is made as a reliable and constant source of food, so to speak, they make it easy by having 2 of those units be from the constant rotated hero battles (Olivia Hana Subaki etc.), 1 of the Askr Trio, 2 random units from who knows where, and 1 GHB unit in addition to the 4 banner units.

9 minutes ago, Rezzy said:

Because then, I'd be evil.

...

and here I thought you were already evil

[Ice Dragon]

17 minutes ago, Arcanite said:

Your suggestion isn't tempting enough, unfortunately. 5 units in each bracket is too much freedom! IS would never give us such a convenience! 

Actually, I wouldn't be surprised if some developer mucked up the UI programming and made it annoyingly difficult to make it display more than 8 units. As a software developer, things like this happen a bit more often than I'd like (and then you just have to bang your head against your desk for a bit and tell your boss it'll take an extra week to finish what you're doing because someone else mucked things up for you when they originally implemented the thing a year or two ago).

[Arcanite]

1 minute ago, Ice Dragon said:

Actually, I wouldn't be surprised if some developer mucked up the UI programming and made it annoyingly difficult to make it display more than 8 units. As a software developer, things like this happen a bit more often than I'd like (and then you just have to bang your head against your desk for a bit and tell your boss it'll take an extra week to finish what you're doing because someone else mucked things up for you when they originally implemented the thing a year or two ago).

So you're saying it just may be that since it was a a little difficult, the programmer said "Hey man I know you wanted more than this but it's just not happenin'" So IS and Nintendo said "Screw it, let's give em 8 instead"? 

That seems foolish...

[Rezzy]

1 minute ago, Arcanite said:

So you're saying it just may be that since it was a a little difficult, the programmer said "Hey man I know you wanted more than this but it's just not happenin'" So IS and Nintendo said "Screw it, let's give em 8 instead"? 

That seems foolish...

Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by incompetence.

[Arcanite]

1 minute ago, Rezzy said:

Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by incompetence.

I'd just fire them and ask someone else to do it tbh

[Ice Dragon]

28 minutes ago, Arcanite said:

So you're saying it just may be that since it was a a little difficult, the programmer said "Hey man I know you wanted more than this but it's just not happenin'" So IS and Nintendo said "Screw it, let's give em 8 instead"? 

That seems foolish...

Too much work, not enough gain, go work on more important features.

[BaronKrause]

1 hour ago, Ice Dragon said:

Actually, I wouldn't be surprised if some developer mucked up the UI programming and made it annoyingly difficult to make it display more than 8 units. As a software developer, things like this happen a bit more often than I'd like (and then you just have to bang your head against your desk for a bit and tell your boss it'll take an extra week to finish what you're doing because someone else mucked things up for you when they originally implemented the thing a year or two ago).

I remember a situation exactly like that with world of warcraft, I think the main inventory bag is still not expandable due to it never being originally programed with that in mind. The best short term solution was continuing to increase the additional add on bags capacity. They said they would love to eventually get around to addressing it, but it likely would be too much work to warrant it.

Edited November 8, 2017 by BaronKrause

[LuxSpes]

One thing I want to note in regards to the whole power creep/outclassing issue, but I think it's important to say that even though Ayra outclasses every infantry swords, it's not as bad because she's not powerful enough that I had to adapt to her presence. When Reinhardt and B!Lyn entered the game, their impact on the arena was felt immediately and to not tear your hair while doing an arena run, you need to account for them. And even then, you can counter them using readily available units and skills. Unless B!Lyn is using the Firesweep CA set. Then GG).

And for non-arena stuff, it's pretty much a non-issue since you don't need Ayra, Reinhardt or B!Lyn to beat that content. Sure, using the top units instead of their lesser alternatives will make clearing the content easier, but it's not impossible to use those lesser alternatives.

Until the game forces me to use those powerful units and make using the lesser alternatives impossible, new units outclassing older units is not as problematic as it could be.Heck, people are still able to beat GHBs with free units with no SI, so it's clear that even though IS try to entice people into pulling by making the newest units shinier than the older one, they still balance the content of the game so that not just whales that can +10 those shinier new units can beat it.

That aside though, I feel the way they released Ayra was extremely scummy. I have no problems with her being on a banner, heck, I can even grudgingly accept her being on the TT banner along with Eldigan and Lachesis, but I take major issue with them not announcing her and then dropping her in the game a mere 3 days after the WoHW banner. That for me is the scariest part in all of this.  I'd feel absolutely betrayed to spend my orbs on a RD banner and then have them release someone like Tibarn, Micaiah or RD!Ike on a separate banner 3 days later. 

[XRay]

3 hours ago, LuxSpes said:

That aside though, I feel the way they released Ayra was extremely scummy. I have no problems with her being on a banner, heck, I can even grudgingly accept her being on the TT banner along with Eldigan and Lachesis, but I take major issue with them not announcing her and then dropping her in the game a mere 3 days after the WoHW banner. That for me is the scariest part in all of this.  I'd feel absolutely betrayed to spend my orbs on a RD banner and then have them release someone like Tibarn, Micaiah or RD!Ike on a separate banner 3 days later. 

I never encountered this problem as paying player since I can always just bribe Anna for more Orbs, but what about always keeping a stock of like 100-200 emergency Orbs? I think having 100-200 Orbs should give you a decent chance of sniping at least one unit you want on surprise banner. And as @Arcanite says:

6 hours ago, Arcanite said:

No with regards to how she was introduced, yeah it was a surprise, yeah she is on a banner with 2 old units. It was literally made to lure people in to pull for her, get stuck, and spend money. It doesn't take a spoon for brains to figure out that Ayra is probably coming again in the future, and she'll probably have other new people with her that might be just as OP. I am content with my Lyn as my barely decent player phase infantry sword user.

 

[LuxSpes]

5 hours ago, XRay said:

I never encountered this problem as paying player since I can always just bribe Anna for more Orbs, but what about always keeping a stock of like 100-200 emergency Orbs? I think having 100-200 Orbs should give you a decent chance of sniping at least one unit you want on surprise banner. And as @Arcanite says:

 

That would be ideal, but that'd require me to barely pull from a lot of upcoming banners considering I'm only at 30 orbs. Also, not pulling when I have 100 orbs might require more self-control than I have '>v>

[Ice Dragon]

While I was contemplating things,

15 hours ago, Arcanite said:

It was literally made to lure people in to pull for her, get stuck, and spend money.

↓

14 hours ago, Rezzy said:

Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by incompetence.

Some higher-up on content planning probably fucked up when making the Tempest Trials bonus hero list. And some idiot probably thought it was fine to not need to announce Ayra's upcoming banner. "They'll figure it out."

 

And

15 hours ago, Arcanite said:

It doesn't take a spoon for brains to figure out that Ayra is probably coming again in the future, and she'll probably have other new people with her that might be just as OP.

I wouldn't be surprised if Ayra is on the next Hero Fest.

[Arcanite]

6 hours ago, Ice Dragon said:

Some higher-up on content planning probably fucked up when making the Tempest Trials bonus hero list. And some idiot probably thought it was fine to not need to announce Ayra's upcoming banner. "They'll figure it out."

Considering they  claim to care about what the fans think, and they knowingly realized that the lack of special events made them lose the momentous amount of money that they had towards launch, I think they probably put some thought into what they did. I mean even so, nobody really complains that much with TT bonus units. People complain about how time consuming/hard it is more than anything else. So they just made the bonus units OP with stat boosts, which makes people want to get them even more.

Nintendo and IS wouldn't be "some idiot". One person isn't going to dictate what is going to happen lol (which I'm sure you know). Gacha doesn't run on "yknow what, screw it, let's do this and see what happens" because that isnt going to make them bucks. There's... many things to think about. F2Ps, casuals, whales, fans of which games, fans of which characters, what skills to put, special weapons, and stats and maybe some other things I missed... there's more to it than screw it, so to speak xD
Gacha runs on catering to the F2Ps (keeping them interested in the game) that haven't spent money yet, figuring out how to get them to spend money, and finding a way to keep those who spent already hooked (and of course there's whales).

6 hours ago, Ice Dragon said:

I wouldn't be surprised if Ayra is on the next Hero Fest.

That would make a lot of sense actually~ I agree!.... it's 5 star only units as well too, so perhaps for the others:
Linde/Delthea/Tana
Minerva/Sonya
Innes/Jaffar

Then there's a chance that next her fest is CYL again, which I would be pretty happy for heh

[Ice Dragon]

7 minutes ago, Arcanite said:

Nintendo and IS wouldn't be "some idiot". One person isn't going to dictate what is going to happen lol (which I'm sure you know).

I know full well how many problems one person can cause. One person screws up, three people fail to catch the screw-up, and before anyone knows it, stuff is out the door and OH SHIT happens. It's not really even an issue of incompetence. Just having deadlines around the corner is enough to cause this because even if the screw-up is identified, there's nothing you can do about it because the release has to ship NOW.