Richard Garfield - "Luck in Games"

[Ares]

I just watched this (it's long, I know, but interesting).

This guy is the creator of MTG. It's about luck in games:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=av5Hf7uOu-o

One quote in particular seemed relevant to Pangaea:
"Their experience was, that as time passed they needed less and less luck in the game as players wanted to rely on skill more" (paraphrased).

[Boern]

Good stuff, thanks.

I remember reading about a study regarding the topic a while back. If I recall right, it was about Civilization IV, where when entering a battle, you are shown your odds for winning that particular battle. The study showed that players would feel extremely frustrated and felt like the AI was cheating if they lost a battle where the odds were, even if only slightly, in their favour. "Hey wtf, I had 60% chance to win and I lost? Awh hell no cheating AI, I'ma reload and redo...". Winning a battle against the odds was thought to be because of the player's amazing strategical skills, of course. Yah right.

So in Civilization V, the developers said f it and completely removed the luck factor in battles. Now they basically show that if you attack this unit, you will lose this much of your strength and the enemy will lose this much of his strength. No luck involved at all. And indeed, it is much more enjoyable to play without the friggin bad luck ruining all my games, AAAAAAHHHHH! Sorry, but I still can't play XCOM without ripping my hair out because of the luck based hitting system.

[Biao]

Good speech overall.

I guess im one of the guys that hate luck in a game... Although most games have luck in it, in one way or another.

[Mox]

Sorry, but I still can't play XCOM without ripping my hair out because of the luck based hitting system.

This angers me still as well, XCOM is a great game if it weren't for the brutal hit/miss ratio (I mean, enemy standing next to you and you have an 98% hit ratio and you miss consecutive times in a row)

[Johnny Walac]

Sorry, but I still can't play XCOM without ripping my hair out because of the luck based hitting system.

This angers me still as well, XCOM is a great game if it weren't for the brutal hit/miss ratio (I mean, enemy standing next to you and you have an 98% hit ratio and you miss consecutive times in a row)

Pangaea basicly got a luck based hitting system, which I dislike. Ideal would be 100% hit chance with max skill but lower damage. So the players would need some movement skills in order to survive in PvP. Doubt this will work on Pangaea though, maybe.

Edit: It would work though. One would just lower the damage until it matches the current average damage.

[Glarundis]

Pangaea basicly got a luck based hitting system, which I dislike. Ideal would be 100% hit chance with max skill but lower damage. So the players would need some movement skills in order to survive in PvP. Doubt this will work on Pangaea though, maybe.

yes please. or atleast make sure that if you're going towards a guy, you have a VERY high chance of hitting him.

but how to balance it?even if we lower the dmg, it's harder than just doing that quick of a fix, i think