Today's Update Patch Notes

[Lyrian]

@Kafka

I suspect that maybe we might need to have more education in game about the different places to earn shards, relics and chest rewards in general?

You’re close to the target on this one, Kafka. To a point it is an education issue.

Framing around Anrandad’s feedback as a context point,

skirmish easy mode, challenge: very hard, my gear score: 487, enemy score:770

my level: 30,

@Kafka

at level 30 your expected Gear Score is around 1000

This problem has existed since Day 1 of Early Access. IMO, the vast majority of players (especially casual players) do not see the concept of Gear Score as important in this game.

Quoting myself from another thread from earlier this week,

@Lyrian

You are positing that because your level equals that of the encounter, that the fight should be an even match. The game does not use this metric in determining the difficulty of an encounter.

Level in PQ3 means almost nothing. From Level 1-50, leveling up grants a small amount of stats to the player for each level. Post level 50, level only determines the number of points that can be allocated in the Citadel.

In this game, “level” is effectively determined by Gear Score. Enemy encounters are balanced on the power curve for expected gear levels at a given point in the game.

The core-most problem here is that players look at the concept of level in terms of a standard RPG/JRPG. Player level generally is the most meaningful factor in whether an encounter is won or lost.

So, looking at Anrandad’s argument here, the likely source of confusion is:

Player - I’m level 30 and the game tells me that the opponents are level 30, so why is every match seemingly impossible to complete?

How the game “sees” the match - Player has a 487 Gear Score, opponents have a 770 gear score on Easy mode. Match rates as “Very Hard”, and the player will likely lose because they are vastly undergeared.

The game really does not communicate to the player that the most effective way to address difficulty issues in the game is by improving gear. There’s a early tutorial with Eveline about evolving gear with a low-level hammer, but it is too early in the game to players to realize that Eveline can convert relics to effectively ascend gear to Rare and Epic fairly cheaply.

IMO, there needs to be a higher level tutorial with that educates players about shifting relics to needed relics and upgrading relics to higher tiers to ascend gear. Also, players need to be educated that higher rarities of gear generate greater power increases than lower levels of gear, which are needed at higher encounter levels. A player might know that an Uncommon 15 weapon has a damage rating of 204 and a Rare 25 weapon has a damage rating of 744, but do they know that by the time they reach encounters in level 30-35 range, that they are balanced around a Epic 35 weapon with a damage rating of 2052 (and also need armor/resistance levels high enough to take a few hits at this damage level)?