The episode got me thinking about the possibility of adding a "sandbox mode" to HS, in which players are able to alter fundamental aspects of the game, such as starting HP, number/copies of cards on deck, mana given per turn, etc. This would make the HS experience closer to some fun aspects of Magic the Gathering, where the playerbase can come up with fun new ways to play (only Commons, 100 different cards, etc), in paralel to the competitive scene, which still goes on.
This could be a way to lessen frustration with ranked ladder, which I see as less of a problem with ladder itself, which should reward competitive and tournment-focused players, but more as a problem of causal people having to play ladder because there is almost no option to that ("Casual" and "Arena" are nowhere near that).
From a developer's point of view, there are two main concerns I see:
a) UI and development
I am sure, as the guys from EC stated, that folks on Blizz have at least part of this coded for their test envinroment, but it is not as simple to just ship it to us as a final product. This is even more complicated if you have to factor in the mobile experience.
Maybe some concessions can be made on this point, like making the creation a sandbox ruleset exclusive to computers. I, as a mainlly cellphone player would find it less fun, but ok, we can survive.
b) Player-base management
I have played almost only Wild since January, and depending on the part of the month, some upper ranks have too few players to keep the sistem running. I´ve heard stories of a rank 1 or 2 player queing against a rank 12 due to lack of "worthy opponents". Having too much of the playerbase swithcing to hundreds of different play modes can cause delay in matching games.
That said, I think a sandbox mode could increase the enjoyment of many players and is something that Blizzard should look into, even if it takes a lot of development to implement. What do you guys think? What kind of crazy rulles would you like to play WS by??
I was watching last week´s episode of Extra Credits on youtube, about de-gamefication:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gbHizMGL3vc
The episode got me thinking about the possibility of adding a "sandbox mode" to HS, in which players are able to alter fundamental aspects of the game, such as starting HP, number/copies of cards on deck, mana given per turn, etc. This would make the HS experience closer to some fun aspects of Magic the Gathering, where the playerbase can come up with fun new ways to play (only Commons, 100 different cards, etc), in paralel to the competitive scene, which still goes on.
This could be a way to lessen frustration with ranked ladder, which I see as less of a problem with ladder itself, which should reward competitive and tournment-focused players, but more as a problem of causal people having to play ladder because there is almost no option to that ("Casual" and "Arena" are nowhere near that).
From a developer's point of view, there are two main concerns I see:
a) UI and development
I am sure, as the guys from EC stated, that folks on Blizz have at least part of this coded for their test envinroment, but it is not as simple to just ship it to us as a final product. This is even more complicated if you have to factor in the mobile experience.
Maybe some concessions can be made on this point, like making the creation a sandbox ruleset exclusive to computers. I, as a mainlly cellphone player would find it less fun, but ok, we can survive.
b) Player-base management
I have played almost only Wild since January, and depending on the part of the month, some upper ranks have too few players to keep the sistem running. I´ve heard stories of a rank 1 or 2 player queing against a rank 12 due to lack of "worthy opponents". Having too much of the playerbase swithcing to hundreds of different play modes can cause delay in matching games.
That said, I think a sandbox mode could increase the enjoyment of many players and is something that Blizzard should look into, even if it takes a lot of development to implement. What do you guys think? What kind of crazy rulles would you like to play WS by??