October 5th 2022
Max. attendants: ~ 84 people
Audio Recording:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YF2dfWZXF32MqrO6VGIoHEYVtrRup0XV/view?usp=sharing
GU official notes
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1PPnXkUFQRRXQCB6AjxwLo5rhzgaVQpkCkcdJksvj058/edit?usp=sharing
The topics on the agenda were
- Addressing Use of Gods Unchained API
- Forging Inefficiency
- Sealed Mode / Direct Challenge Open Mode
- Clear Display of Wins/ Losses
- Minting Welcome Set Cards Purchase
For more details, see the official Discord
https://discord.com/channels/457152051239976961/991050088262541362/1027308673439125514
General notes
CoM is cool, will continue. Stuff is being done, stuff takes time; Wrapping up this development cycle, kind of waiting for upcoming meetings to decide what will be prioritized for the next cycle, so no commitments on new stuff or implementing previously discussed / accepted improvements.
There were still some audio issues. They seemed specific to Justin(JH) and Clay(CC); while other people were speaking there weren’t any problems. Also the sound failings seem to me related to a poor internet connection. I would like to suggest JH use a headset with a microphone so it stays at all times at a fixed distance, thus avoiding sudden changes in volume from moving around relative to the computer.
The meeting overall was focused and well organized. It was a bit lacking in decisions and advancements on previously discussed topics, seemingly hanging on prioritizations being decided during the next weeks.
Although it is not the business of the community to know the internal workings of the company, some more insight and transparency into what is being worked on at the moment, in particular related to Sealed Mode, would be greatly appreciated.
I appreciated the detailed insight on why some things are not ready yet and factors that govern the design of some game aspects, like the MMR system for example.
0. AOB (any other business)
CoM has the support of the GU team and will continue going forward, with improvements.
Introduction of Daniel Paez (https://twitter.com/Papalicious), the new Executive Producer for GU.
GU team interested in feedback on LV, pack mechanics and Cosmic Shift. (should we expect new discussion threads in the CoM Discord area?)
1. 6m15s Addressing Use of Gods Unchained API
The GU team does not recommend the use of these endpoints, they were created for internal use, can be changed without notice. (implied they will not be taken down)
The GU team reserves the right to take action if something is being used to harm the players or the company.
The GU team is actively looking into this topic and will make decisions to be included in next roadmap iteration.
Cautionfun points out existing access to player's Workshops via API endpoints and that is unfair because some people may have the technical skills to get this information while most probably don’t, creating unfair advantages, particularly in tournaments. On the other hand, some endpoints are useful for community projects to develop. So it would be better to have some control over which endpoints are publicly available. JH takes this back to the team to see if priority can be raised to address the issue.
Cautionfun reiterates the suggestion of displaying player IDs on the client, also to eliminate unfair advantages stemming for the higher difficulty of finding out the opponent’s deck list if they obscure their name with ??? or non-latin characters.
CC made a point on tournament fairness, where a short fix would be to require open decklists from participants.
2. 13m Forging inefficiency
- Arash explains the current system results from a compromise to get the feature out faster. There are two improvements in the works - directly fusing to shine of choice in 1 step and/but also create the tools to identify special cards with additional metadata (those used in a winning match in a tournament for example) and save them from being blindly burned in the forge. Also the team wants to bring the entire forging process within the launcher – this is harder and will take more time – so most likely the first improvement will be direct fusing to any shine.
See for example https://blog.godsunchained.com/2020/01/01/parallel-powers-free-to-play-the-genesis-set/ the paragraph under the marketplace guide video.
See also the Evolution system, for example explained here https://www.reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/dmgpo4/gods_unchained_introducing_the_evolution_system/
- 16m55s AgentK suggests optimizing animations (to make the process faster) and to skip the need to select cards manually; also suggests official macro to automate clicks as a temporary improvement. Arash cautions about security concerns related to an official macro tool; also considers the current animations for 1 card are OK, but forging many cards (there will be bulk forging??) would have a different / simplified type of animation and settings to be toggled on/off.
3. 24m10s Sealed mode
CC explains team is working on the tooling for game modes in general, which also includes an update to the launcher. First game mode is a ‘casual queue’. Internal testing expected towards the end of the month and possibly PTR soon after that.
After this, a ‘limited format is high on the list’, Sealed is one of the options but this is a complex mode to implement with many interactions with several game systems. It will also require significant improvements over the solution available in the PTR in 2019, to avoid abuses like people creating wallets specifically to dominate that format.
IMO, there could a release of a simple version without all the protections AND without rewards and then iterate on that.
Direct Challenge open mode / no restrictions (previously suggested by @CopperPitch) comes with technical challenges and instability; resolving these would significantly compete for resources with other features and dealing unforeseen new issues from card interactions that don’t normally occur.
GU team asks the community for ideas about other ways to play – ideas for new game modes, in particular for new players.
Check this: https://twitter.com/F_Agrante/status/1578066971488387072?s=20&t=0ZCYDP03qVebL38NT68NXQ
- @CopperPitch asks about Battle Royale mode and nobody remembers what it was about, because they were not in the GU team when this was presented; and after that it seems this was never discussed again.
For a little more context, I was able to dig up this page: https://blockchaingaming.world/2019/01/08/triple-a-blockchain-game-gods-unchained/
“Other game modes include Battle Royale, which see multiple players fighting to see how can be the last man standing using a 15 card deck.”
- Many of the new game modes will bring more utility for the $GODS token.
4. 35m40s Clear display of wins and losses
There is currently an internal discussion on how to improve both the UI and the matchmaking. Changes will be coming out in stages.
GU team is looking at overhauling matchmaking using Open Match (maybe this https://openmatch.dev/site/ ?) - improving queue logic, allowing to introduce changes faster and for example preventing re-queuing into the same person consecutively.
GU team is exploring how to redo the ranking system altogether, including a clearer mechanic to replace the shield. This is a larger project and will not be coming out in the near term, but could be in the roadmap for the next dev cycle.
While we have the current system, players can use this URL https://game-legacy.prod.prod.godsunchained.com/user/{playerID}/rank to get a better idea where they stand. If win_points > 100, you rank up; if loss_points > 100 you either break the shield or de-rank. A win is +- 10 points; a loss is +- 25 points. Safety line is how many win_points you need to have for the shield to protect against de-ranking.
- Explanation about MMR drawbacks, starting at 38m15s
5. 46m50s Minting Welcome Set cards
– JH says the proposed solution makes sense and just needs to get into the development queue.
