Discussion: The Traveling Merchant Event

CELTIC CROSS

Guest
well i have to say..with all the worlds i have played and enough money that i am ashamed to admit...this is my last day playing this game...i managed to get to 950 on the road..and ended up at 840...with 40 minutes to play the set up was impossable to win...thanks to all for the game..
 

DeletedUser122673

Guest
The rewards vs. Premium Points paid for the chests is too high. If it were closer to 50-100PP, it'd be a lot more worth it. I'd probably open a lot more chests. We should be able to open 3 chests simultaneously as they are earned instead of just having one chest pending while two chests just sit there.

The Large Chest should really have several items that you have a chance to get that allow you to permanently get a bonus in your villages like Effective Workers, Improved Stables, Weapons Master, or large bonus medals like +20% stables/barracks recruitment or +30% resource production bonuses.
The Medium Chest should have several items that you have a chance to get that allow you to have temporary effects like +10% attack/defense boosts, construction bonuses, stables/barracks bonuses, etc.
The Small Chest should have several items that you have a chance to get that give you less important temporary effects like +10% haul increase, 15% faster Barbarian attack increase, or 5% increased recruitment.

Not saying it has to be those specific ones, but this is the only event so far that I'm not willing to spend the PP on as the chances of getting a good reward are slim. A lot of the medals that are in the game are medals that I have plenty of or ones I really won't need for a long time. The Halloween event had some amazing rewards for a smaller amount of PP and you had the chance of getting free items as a result (doubler/free opener). I definitely spent a bit of PP on those just for the chance to get the boosters for recruitment.

The event gameplay, though, is fine. You just have to strategize a little bit. It gives you something to do every few hours, at least.

That's just me, though. I'm sure others probably have a different opinion.
 

Math Debator

Non-stop Poster
Reaction score
62
I agree with the above post in terms of the PP cost... considering you don't actually get to pick what item you get, but rather have to go through a roulette where it could be something really good or something relatively 'useless' or with minimal impact... spending 200pp to end up with scout boosters or a few hour recruitment bonus in one specific building is not really worth the cost...

What frustrates me the most is that they force you to spend PP to insta-clear out chests in order to get new ones. Your troops can gain experience from winning 20 battles in a day, but you can only open 8 small chests or just under 5 medium chests in a day. If you don't think the rewards/probability is worthwhile for a chest, you cannot simply discard it and open a slot up to get something you may actually want (or even want to spend PP on). I would be more inclined to pay the 40pp/hour unlock cost (though I think it should be reduced) if I could discard unwanton chests and only spend time/money on opening chests that are -really- good. Change that and you greatly improve this event, even if you keep the same PP rates to try and bleed our wallets dry
 

Deleted User - 10770065

Guest
Please please please don't ever bring this horrible event back to the game.

I'd rather eat glass than play this event. It's a pure frustrating RNG fest and the only time you can win in the later stages of the game is if basically all your units get high rolls and they all get low rolls.

Scrap the entire event or create more balance or a mechanic where I can actually affect the outcome of the "battle".
 

samuel4699

Non-stop Poster
Reaction score
364
Please please please don't ever bring this horrible event back to the game.

I'd rather eat glass than play this event. It's a pure frustrating RNG fest and the only time you can win in the later stages of the game is if basically all your units get high rolls and they all get low rolls.

Scrap the entire event or create more balance or a mechanic where I can actually affect the outcome of the "battle".
dont listen to this guy, he's a real hater
 

Kiwi2011

Guest
Wtf more mindless rubbish .
At least if you try something to generate interest make it intellectual intensive and stop pandering to the simpletons . Travelling merchant ? Let those with the stupidest strategy win, wow way to go.
 

Kiwi2011

Guest
Maybe next time the games will be random with an actual chance to achieve something this is just wolf of n sheeps clothing and so overwhelmingly stacked in the ‘houses’ favour
This is one of the many reasons I won’t pay money for this game another being that the feeling that feedback isn’t answered sufficiently leaving the concerns of being ignored
Wow no reply? My point exactly this game will get money out of
My
Cold dead hands because they don’t even answer their own feedback forum. You suck if you think not responding to you own feedback will improve your business
 

JawJaw

Awesomest CM Ever
Reaction score
2,210
Not answering =/= not reading; I do not see the point in responding and potentially derail the point of a feedback thread. Note that what we are looking for is so called "natural" feedback. This is feedback that comes out naturally and is mentioned by players like you without provoking it (by us). As soon as we start responding to feedback, the discussion will derail to responding to that response, and other valuable "natural" feedback will go lost and we'll never hear about it.

Therefore, we'll only ever respond if there's a point that needs clarifying or when a question is asked. We will not respond to statements (which we do appreciate, for the record!) as that might bring focus of the topic to that discussion instead of gathering the kind of feedback we are looking for (non-provoked natural feedback). In other words: the feedback you posted here without it being an answer on someone else (including myself) is the feedback we want and it is more valuable than the feedback that might follow as an answer on this post (or a post that would have been an answer to your feedback).

Note that after each event, we gather the feedback from all markets and send it to the game developers, product manager and game designer for review; They will then make improvements based on the most mentioned concerns. This is why we don't want to influence the discussion in one direction/about a specific subject, but want to find out the concerns that are in the community, without us pointing attention to specific things.

I understand that this might sound weird, but it simply is the case and in the end is also the best way to make improvements :) Thanks again!
 

Math Debator

Non-stop Poster
Reaction score
62
Not answering =/= not reading; I do not see the point in responding and potentially derail the point of a feedback thread. Note that what we are looking for is so called "natural" feedback. This is feedback that comes out naturally and is mentioned by players like you without provoking it (by us). As soon as we start responding to feedback, the discussion will derail to responding to that response, and other valuable "natural" feedback will go lost and we'll never hear about it.

Therefore, we'll only ever respond if there's a point that needs clarifying or when a question is asked. We will not respond to statements (which we do appreciate, for the record!) as that might bring focus of the topic to that discussion instead of gathering the kind of feedback we are looking for (non-provoked natural feedback). In other words: the feedback you posted here without it being an answer on someone else (including myself) is the feedback we want and it is more valuable than the feedback that might follow as an answer on this post (or a post that would have been an answer to your feedback).

Note that after each event, we gather the feedback from all markets and send it to the game developers, product manager and game designer for review; They will then make improvements based on the most mentioned concerns. This is why we don't want to influence the discussion in one direction/about a specific subject, but want to find out the concerns that are in the community, without us pointing attention to specific things.

I understand that this might sound weird, but it simply is the case and in the end is also the best way to make improvements :) Thanks again!

Just a thought, as a middle ground to keep a visible presence... what about "Liking" a feedback comment after it is read? Obviously would need some way of making sure people don't misconstrue your 'like' as agreeing with everything they espoused, but at least it would let them feel like their concerns are being listened to, rather than full comm silence?
 

JawJaw

Awesomest CM Ever
Reaction score
2,210
Just a thought, as a middle ground to keep a visible presence... what about "Liking" a feedback comment after it is read? Obviously would need some way of making sure people don't misconstrue your 'like' as agreeing with everything they espoused, but at least it would let them feel like their concerns are being listened to, rather than full comm silence?

Thanks! That is a valuable point we will try to keep into account :)
 

Mintyfresh

Skilled Soldier 18 & Master Commander 21 & 22
Reaction score
4,382
Not answering =/= not reading; I do not see the point in responding and potentially derail the point of a feedback thread. Note that what we are looking for is so called "natural" feedback. This is feedback that comes out naturally and is mentioned by players like you without provoking it (by us). As soon as we start responding to feedback, the discussion will derail to responding to that response, and other valuable "natural" feedback will go lost and we'll never hear about it.

Therefore, we'll only ever respond if there's a point that needs clarifying or when a question is asked. We will not respond to statements (which we do appreciate, for the record!) as that might bring focus of the topic to that discussion instead of gathering the kind of feedback we are looking for (non-provoked natural feedback). In other words: the feedback you posted here without it being an answer on someone else (including myself) is the feedback we want and it is more valuable than the feedback that might follow as an answer on this post (or a post that would have been an answer to your feedback).

Note that after each event, we gather the feedback from all markets and send it to the game developers, product manager and game designer for review; They will then make improvements based on the most mentioned concerns. This is why we don't want to influence the discussion in one direction/about a specific subject, but want to find out the concerns that are in the community, without us pointing attention to specific things.

I understand that this might sound weird, but it simply is the case and in the end is also the best way to make improvements :) Thanks again!

What a load of tripe JawJaw. Its ridiculous how it took you a few days to come up with a convenient excuse to justify your lack of involvement in the process that you're supposed to be in charge of facilitating. Also pretty laughable how you're still titled community management and not community crowd control because thats what your job role actually is

How do we even know that you send off feedback to the developers? I mean the event was run earlier in the year, literally everyone complained about it. Dont think anyone had anything remotely positive to say about it and yet its back again exactly identical to how it was before just a few months later with the exception of the 'run away' button. Is that your idea of an improvement based on mentioned concerns? They're clearly not interested in responding to anything the players say (assuming the idea of getting feedback is not a sham in the first place). If they're not going to you know actually use the player feedback then why dont we get told why? Whats the point in all of this if its only a 1-way invisible street between us and these mythical developers/product managers/game designers.

Dont even get me started on the ideas forum either.
 

Michael Corleone.

Guest
What a load of tripe JawJaw. Its ridiculous how it took you a few days to come up with a convenient excuse to justify your lack of involvement in the process that you're supposed to be in charge of facilitating. Also pretty laughable how you're still titled community management and not community crowd control because thats what your job role actually is

How do we even know that you send off feedback to the developers? I mean the event was run earlier in the year, literally everyone complained about it. Dont think anyone had anything remotely positive to say about it and yet its back again exactly identical to how it was before just a few months later with the exception of the 'run away' button. Is that your idea of an improvement based on mentioned concerns? They're clearly not interested in responding to anything the players say (assuming the idea of getting feedback is not a sham in the first place). If they're not going to you know actually use the player feedback then why dont we get told why? Whats the point in all of this if its only a 1-way invisible street between us and these mythical developers/product managers/game designers.

Dont even get me started on the ideas forum either.
Jawjaw should just be real with the community here and tell em that Inno does not care to make any improvements towards the game, and they are just collecting whatever money they can out of the morons that pay money for this game these days. id actually have more respect for jawjaw if he were being real w us
 

Purely

Non-stop Poster
Reaction score
21
This event was terrible, only way to get anything from it is to spend loads of pp, and to be honest it´s also imballanced and badly thought, give us pp and get nothing in return, not even little fun or item...

Think tribalwars staff is losing their focus even more, messing up the gamplay and trying to get as much money from the few players left actually playing the game.

Wonder why this game is dying with all this pp taking over....

For god sakes find a better model that gets more players to spend lower amounts of money, getting few players to spend alot is no good for the long run.
 

JawJaw

Awesomest CM Ever
Reaction score
2,210
merchant_banner_600_75_px.jpg


Dear players,

the traveling merchant Midas is back and again in need of your help! Your job will be to guard him during his travels, and make sure he reaches his destination.

Midas will will start his journey on May 16 at 14:00 and be on his way for 4 days. His journey will end on May 20 at 14:00.


Improvements
Since the last time you met Midas we implemented some improvements to the event.

  • We added a button to "Run away!" in the battle screen. This allows you to immediately end a battle. Fleeing from the battle will count it as lost, including all the negative effects.
  • We added a hint that informs about the inability to find additional chests when all chest slots are full.
  • We added the information about the fact that mercenaries can only gain experience for the first 20 battles a day to several places in the event interface.
  • The higher milestone rewards are now a bit easier to reach (required distance was reduced).
Defeating the raiders

During this event you have to defend the merchant Midas by battling incoming groups of raiders with your band of mercenaries. Each on of them has different strengths and weaknesses.

The raiders you encounter are randomly chosen from a pool of varying units with different offensive and defensive values. In each encounter you will have to use your men wisely, to be victorious.

merchant_units_450px.png


The battle will happen in turns. At the bottom of the battle screen you will see which unit will attack when. When one unit attacks another it will reduce the defensive value by a randomly chosen value within it's attacking power. Once a unit's defensive value is reduced to zero it is knocked out. But don't worry if your mercenary gets knocked out. He will be available again in the next battle.
At the bottom of the screen you can find a bar displaying the order in which the units will attack.The active unit is displayed by having a bigger icon. To attack a unit, simply click on it. An arrow will show you which unit was attacked and a number will display the damage it took. To speed up the animations and safe some precious time, you will find an option at the very bottom of the battle screen.

Should you get the feeling you wont be able to win a battle you will find a button to "Run away!" in the battle screen. This allows you to immediately end a battle. But that this means that the battle will count as lost, including all the negative effects.

Upon successfully defeating the raiders your caravan will move on and your mercenaries gain experience to eventually become stronger. Their offensive and defensive abilities improve but it is also more likely that they will encounter more daring opponent along the way. Only keep in mind that your mercenaries, while they can fight more often, can only gain experience from 20 battles per day. Chests on the other hand, will always include additional experience for your mercenaries.

trump2_turnorder.png


Opening chests
When all the raiders' units are defeated you will be rewarded with a chest. These can contain several items. To see what can potentially inside, you only need to click on the chest. Opening the chests will take some time, and you can only carry three. If you have reached the maximum of chests you will not find any new ones until a slot has opened up. So make sure to unlock them regularly!

trump2_merchantroad.png

The merchant Midas will also reward you with additional rewards the closer you get to his destination. You can see the possible rewards displayed at the top. But keep in mind that only successful battles bring you closer to your destination! If you loose or run from a battle you will loose some of the distance you already traveled.


We hope you enjoy our event and wish you good on your journey ahead!
We are also looking forward to your feedback, which you can provide in this thread.
Your Tribal Wars Team
 

Kiwi2011

Guest
You know
It’s illegal to falsely advertise a game as random even in forums there
is no aspect of random on this game, enemy hits top mark 90% of time you hit lowest 90% of
Time so I’d suggest the lies are removed before
Some bright spark decides
To
Make money from this game
 

DeletedUser123154

Guest
thats funny, I am playing on cz servers of TW and this event is happening right now there. everything what you reported in this thread in 2018 is still the same, literally nothing has changed and this event is still terrible, probably the worst event ever... every player I know is annoyed and zero people are enjoying this stupid trash. I found it funny, tw team is acting like "thanks for your valuable suggestions" but in facts its pointless to bother complaing coz they dont care at all.
 

DeletedUser120220

Guest
As @JawJaw mentioned there has been a lack proper feedback to improve events on I will give some structured feedback on why there is not a single player I know in my tribe on either of the two worlds I play who enjoys this event.

The idea of having these kinds of fights which gain xp and distance travelled is fine, however the main issue is how frustrating the mechanics of this event are as well as how underpowered the rewards are compared to other events.

Everyone wants to get the 40% res packets from the 800km distance travelled reward, if only winning battles it would take 32 battles to get there sadly the amount of frustrating losses drive that number up way higher.
The combat is very simple, I can see the developers thought of how picking out what units hit what targets for maximum damage per cycle of turns could be an interesting game mechanic for this event, sadly the number of times a player actually experiencing a feeling of "outplaying" the AI is rare even when trying to.
Due to the number of fights players have to grind to get the 800km travelled as well as how boring the fights are after you've done 10 fights causes players to mostly just hit the target the most to the right as that target has the highest offensive capabilities as well as the least health so the easiest to take out which makes it the best target 9/10 times.
There being barely any strategy in choosing targets makes the fights boring, especially when you have to do a 100 fights to get to the 40% res pack.

What makes this event severely frustrating is the way fights are lost, you can make the best possible choices 5 games in a row and lose all 5.
For example, this is a game where I have made 0 moves and already lost:
b06b364cebb72bbb8ff6874bbb270a2e.png

These occurrences of unwinnable fights are actually quite frequent.
From my experience the AI usually outlevels the player (unless spending a lot of PP) and with the AI moves being randomised with maybe a bit of a preference for the higher targets (untested but that is how it feels), games won and lost are decided on the draw of the amount of AI attacks coming out before your own and sometimes the AI targetting the least favorable target for the AI causing the player to win, barely ever it's the player himself winning the fight with an outplay or anything simular which makes the whole fighting part of this event extremely boring and a meaningless grind.

The rewards:
Simply said, the rewards suck compared to other events. This is an event where you can't choose your own rewards like in other events so you'd assume the number of powerful items overall would be higher than in events where you pick your own rewards in a world where events are balanced, yet this event players barely get any decent items.
Most chests have 1 decent item, which is the 5% chance one while some also have the 10% chance item being useful.`
With the event being 96 hours long and assuming i open the same amount of big/medium/small chest right on the second when possible, this is an average of 5 hours per chest which would be 19 chests over the course of the event total. 5% on a top item means about 1 in 20 chests have such an item which means 1 top item for most players during the entire event and 2 decent items as well.
This is way lower than in any other event I have played, it almost feels unrewarding to even put in the time to play this event because the rewards feel mostly unrewarding, the combat is boring and all other events are a lot better for getting actual rewards.

The PP spending:
Usually, PP gets players a ton of extra useful items.
In this event, Inno chose to have players pay 40pp per hour of runtime of the chest when the instant opening is triggered, so 120pp for a small chest, 200 for a medium and 320 for a big chest.
In the last event (which was overpowered), 320pp got someone with a medium favourable recipe a triple rare item, so for example a 30% res pack, closest comparable with the best reward in a big chest. Where in the last event 320pp got you a guaranteed top item, in this event it gets the player a 5% chance at a top item, making this event 20 times worse to spend pp on than last one.
Actually, the difference is even bigger, for that 320pp in the last event the player could choose which item he wanted while he has to rely on RNG what item is the top item in his chest for this event.'

Conclusion:
The addition of the fast battle speed and running away is great but also shows the developers understand the problems with the event being the huge grinding aspect and the unwinnable battles right off the bat however they decided to re-release this event with bandaid fixes instead of actually fixing the event itself which is sad.
Previously players have stated that the event was boring and it has been brought out with the same issues in the combat which made the event itself boring.
If the rewards weren't hugely underpowered, players would be more interested in actually timing opening chests when they come available and get more xp that way and have the smaller level difference take away some of the frustration maybe? but a better fix would be to majorly overhaul the event itself or just scrap it imo.
 

Anonymous...

Guest
I've also been looking at how the rolls went for both player and AI, just to try and understand if the RNG gods have decided that I have angered them in some way, and have placed a black cloud over my head. After reviewing the rolls the AI hit versus the rolls I hit, we have a mathematical issue, as the AI will consistently hit within the top 50% of their rolls around 45% of the time, versus player will hit within the same top 50% of their roll roughly 35% of the time. I could understand it being me having just a bad day, as my RNG luck has always been downright terrible, but when the percentages remain consistent across all days for myself, as well as my coplayers, with very little deviation from the baseline, it tells me that this was set up to prevent success. Yes, I understand that it has to be difficult to complete the travel, but this is a game, not a casino in Vegas, which would actually have slightly better odds of paying out at this rate.
 
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