Early Access to Official Launch Preparations

Early Access Archive Early Access Official News
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Hello Adventurers,

With the World Wide release of Puzzle Quest 3 just on the horizon, we will be adding some new spaces here on the Community Forum for the incoming new players.
As our passionate early access players, I am so excited for you to welcome these new community members to Puzzle Quest 3!

To help guide new players into the Puzzle Quest 3 Community Forum, we will be moving existing threads from Early Access into an Archived Section, where you can continue any ongoing feedback or discussions from while the game was in Early Access. All these threads will remain accessible and viewable in their new section.

This will allow any bugs or feedback shared from World Wide Launch onwards to be reported separately from those in Early Access and gives us a more accurate view of what is being experienced in v1 in comparison to anything we are currently investigating from Early Access as well as a fresh space for new and existing players to participate in and create new discussions regarding the game post launch.

Everything will be moved to the new Early Access section during business hours on Monday 28th of February East Coast Australia time.

We’re looking forward to hearing about all your new adventures in v1.0 to make Puzzle Quest 3 the best game experience it can be!

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So you are saying that I should wait for these new forums to continue asking why XP was nerfed by 75% and that the Quest Pass weekly quest for levels is simply undoable for anyone with significant Citadel Levels?

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All that pesky feedback that was ignored throughout Early Access is just making the place look untidy.

This way we can lift the rug, sweep the problems underneath it so the new arrivals don’t see it.

Then when the new players make comments like:
“Why is there so little storage?”
“Why do I earn so little XP / level so slowly?”
“Why is loot/salvage so crap?”
“Why is coop so broken?”
“Why is there nothing for kingdoms to do?”

The team can reply with “thanks for pointing that out. There are no threads like that cough so we can pass this on to the devs”. Then business as usual resumes where the problem is ignored for months.

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Hold on to your butts.

And let’s go forward. It’s been an interesting experience.

Y’all remember 50 mana ray of frost?

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Since the launch on Steam is into Early Access, where do you expect them to post their thoughts on the game?

Should they be posting them in Early Access section, since the game is in Early Access?

Or should they be posting them in the new section since the game is simultaneously NOT in Early Access any more?

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The XP changes in Early Access are only relevant to Early Access accounts as the game is balanced for accounts starting in v1 on Worldwide launch, for the official game release version. So this would still be a relic of Early Access only relevant to accounts created during Early Access. If you were to create a new account after the official launch tomorrow and find that the experience gain is too low, in regards to your account in the post launch version, then it would be relevant outside the Early Access.

The Weekly Quests would still be relevant for post launch as it’s relevant post launch as well and to players who started during the official launch.

Steam users can post in the main forum or anywhere else they want to post for the official launch version. The Early Access on Steam is there so that we can tackle any issues or friction specifically related to playing the game on a PC or via Steam, so the Early Access there is mostly for User experience when playing the game via Steam/with the mouse or anything else that might crop up on PC/Steam. All their balancing and other feedback is relevant to the official launch version as that is the version they’ll be starting their accounts on.

Basically, anyone new to the forums who is creating their account post launch, should be posting in the main section.

The Early Access section is basically an archive that the further into the live release we get the less it will be used, simply because those topics are now only relevant to the Early Access phase before the official launch happened.

Obviously everyone is free to post anywhere, if a mod notices something should definitely be in one section or the other, they’ll move it and leave a comment to explain why it was moved, just like any usual forum moderation that happens, to keep things tidy and make sure everyone can find what they’re looking for.

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Is mobile (EA) and Steam crossplay/linked accounts a thing?
Can I now play on Steam and/or Mobile (like I can with GoW) or do I have to choose between:
keep on mobile to retain progress or to re-start on Steam?

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We have crossplay for Steam/iOS/Android.
You just need to go into your account settings to register your email and make a password so you can load it up on your new device.

They’re all on the same game version so you can move accross seamlessly.

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I feel like you are combatting my snark with gibberish.

This is so exhausting. Let me state it plainly: The fact is a 75% xp nerf is a huge deal and you lot just decided to not to talk about it. Now you pugilistically refer to it as “balance” as if that explains the reasoning.

Additionally, you have a component of the game (Weekly Quest for gaining 3 levels in the Quest Pass) that is undoable by many existing players (who really do exist on March 1 for v1). Instead of acknowledging a clear disconnect (“balance” matters for existing players too), you give me hogwash about what is a Early Access vs post launch issue. What, so now its on me to have to post this issue again in v1 forums to have you actually address it? That’s ok, I’m getting used to having to do the job of actually making an effort to communicate things.

EDIT: Look I made a post! I will make another post in launch forums! Gawd I hope I am doing this right!

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Saw you typing so waited to see it first, but absolutely +1 on that.

While the people noticing the drop are coming from EA, surely the amount of XP needed to hit each level will be consistent between EA players and new accounts created in v1.0, so how feasible it is to level up following this XP nerf is still entirely relevant to v1.0 discussion.

Hitting 3 levels per week is already quite a challenge in EA for those with high Citadel levels. XP requirement goes up 2% per citadel level in a straight line, so if nothing is done to that, while XP earned is cut by 75% it means needing to do 4x as many battles to hit that same goal.

Those doing the balancing should already know these figures, but to highlight to other players how much tougher it gets at higher citadel levels here are some reference points.

L0 Citadel needs 1081XP to reach L1, or 3308 XP for three levels.

L50 needs 2909 XP for one level, or 8904 XP for three.

L100 needs 7831 XP for one level, or 23967 XP for three.

L150 needs 21079 XP for one level, or 64510 XP for three.

L200 needs 56736 XP for one level, or 173635 XP for three.
Our highest level kingdom member is already higher than this.

The XP amounts after the nerf amount to 37XP for a max L100 dungeon, and 16XP for a L100 Skirmish. Just how many battles do you think a player should need to do for one level? How many hours / days in the week to do this?

I will of course be happy to do some quick level XP spot checks with other players once v1.0 is officially out and we can see if any balancing of the XP requirements took place. But if the requirements remain to the same formula, but the XP got slashed so heavily it throws a brick wall down on any players trying to progress their citadel levels.

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Wait… what? This doesn’t make any sense. Unless I’m reading it wrong (it happens!) Once launch happens, then all of our accounts will no longer be EA. Also, I’d venture that the experience changes will be even more relevant to non-EA people.

It’s true they won’t automatically know that they are starting with a comparative exp handi-cap. But it won’t take long for them to question the citadel levels of EA players.

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Rule #1: What happens in Early Access stays in Early Access
Rule #2: No talking about Early Access
:laughing:

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If your account was created during Early Access, it’s an Early Access account.

Your game experience has been, and will continue to be, wildly different on that account than it will be for anyone creating an account on the official launch version.

The game you created that Early Access account on 8 months ago is a different game to the one launching tomorrow.

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Pretty sure we are all going to be playing the same game. The “game experience” may differ but it should be the same game. I don’t think this is worded well.

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I worded my response poorly. What I meant was that once the game official launches, we will all be playing the same version of the game. A citadel 100, post launch, is going to be having the same experience in game whether they started in EA or started after launch.

With that in mind, the huge experience nerf is relevant to all. Unless I’m still missing something.

That said, I can actually see the benefit of slowing experience in the earlier levels. I can see how it postpones the brick wall of doom. It can also maybe “buy time” for the developers to get a better balance scheme going. Butt for later levels its basically going to be brick wall of doom in perpetuity?

I’m going to remain optimistic, because I’m stubborn like that. However, changes to game play are absolutely relevant to all players, regardless of when they started.

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haha. I’m in a different movie. For me it’s red pill or blue pill. :joy:

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17

So much this. We won’t be on different servers and isolated. The only different game experiences will be that we are much farther ahead and it took us WAY less time to get there. So yay us, I guess. But it’s still equally relevant no matter when we started. :woman_facepalming:

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Wait, is this really how they get around the “No wipe” promise? Sure, we don’t wipe your accounts, but you will have a permanent 75% exp reduction? Or is this exp reduction only until launch happens? Should have been a simple answer, the fact that it hasn’t been is concerning.

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Short answer you are not wiped. But also… effectively kinda sorta wiped. Enjoy!

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An alternative view is that progression has been “adjusted” and is effectively now slower (MUCH slower)
IF you have the EA advantage of a Level 100+ citadel, yes progress will be slower (as it will be for everyone), but so what?
The only thing that this really seems to impact is the quest for 3 levels - which I think we can all agree was not fun at the best of times
(My current work around - get a new hero slot = 100 gems, use skirmish tickets to get to level 2, delete hero and reuse the new slot to start a new hero and repeat x2)

So in summary, slower progress for everyone is not really a wipe or that impactful
Am I missing something here?