Matchmaking & Leagues
After closely reviewing the gameplay during the first season, it's clear that some changes to the matchmaking system are necessary. The hope was that the current system, which matches just based on players' ratings, would naturally sort and match players with similar level cards after some time.
While that has happened for the most part, there are still a significant number of cases where a player with very high level cards has a low rating and gets matched against players with much lower level cards. That does not provide a fun experience for anyone.
To address this issue, starting in Season 2 we will be implementing a system where players must earn the ability to use higher level cards by increasing their rating through gameplay. Each League (Novice, Bronze, Silver, Gold, Diamond, and Champion) will have a limitation on the max level of cards that can be used by players in that league. The details are as follows:
- Novice League (0 - 99 rating)
- All Summoners & Monsters have a max level of 1
- Bronze League (100 - 999 rating)
- Max Common Summoner Level: 3
- Max Rare Summoner Level: 2
- Max Epic Summoner Level: 2
- Max Legendary Summoner Level: 1
- Silver League (1000 - 1899 rating)
- Max Common Summoner Level: 5
- Max Rare Summoner Level: 4
- Max Epic Summoner Level: 3
- Max Legendary Summoner Level: 2
- Gold League (1900 - 2799 rating)
- Max Common Summoner Level: 8
- Max Rare Summoner Level: 6
- Max Epic Summoner Level: 5
- Max Legendary Summoner Level: 3
- Diamond & Champion Leagues (2800+ rating)
- No limit
Please note that if you have cards that are higher level than the limit based on your league, you may still use them in battles; however, their level will be reduced to the max allowed as listed above. This works in the same way as how Monster card levels are currently limited by the level of the Summoner used.
To take an example, if a player with all max level cards is just playing for the first time and is in Novice League with a rating of 0, their cards will all be level 1 in their battles. As soon as they reach Bronze league, then the level of their Summoners will be limited as listed above, and the level of their Monsters will be limited by the Summoner level as indicated in the card stats based on the rarity of the Summoner chosen.
As soon as a player reaches the next league, the next level of cards will be unlocked and remain unlocked for the remainder of the current season, even if the player falls in rating back into the previous league.
Lastly, the matchmaking algorithm will be adjusted to only match up players currently in the same league as each other.
We are aware that there are currently no Common rarity Summoners in the game; however, we still thought their level limits should be listed here as some may be added to the game in the future.
We know that was a lot to digest, but the concept is pretty simple - we limit the level of cards that may be used in each league to help ensure that players do not get matched against opponents with significantly higher level cards. This concept is similar to that used in games like Clash Royale where you unlock new cards that can be used as you move up the ladder. Here, instead of unlocking new cards, you unlock the ability to use your cards at higher levels.
Further Rewarding League Play
We'll be awarding 300 SBD for the top ten players this season as well as the pack rewards. We're grateful to have so many people playing and we want to make sure you're all fighting for the highest position possible.
1st - 100 SBD
2nd - 70 SBD
3rd - 40 SBD
4th - 25 SBD
5th - 15 SBD
6-10th - 10 SBD each
Balance Changes
As we have stated numerous times, the first couple of months after the game's launch will involve some regular balance changes via adjustments to card stats, abilities, and gameplay mechanics. After the first couple of months, we will try to avoid adjusting any cards going forward; however, the balance and fun of the game is our top priority and we will make adjustments at any time if something is clearly causing a negative gameplay experience.
The following is the first round of changes that we are planning to implement at the end of the first season of live play in a few days. These changes came from some analysis of the over 100,000 Steem Monsters games played to date, in addition to feedback from the player community (which we greatly appreciate).
Abilities
- Weakness - We plan to remove the Melee attack debuff portion, so it will only reduce the Health of enemy Monsters by 1 point. This was too powerful, particularly at lower levels and combined with Zintar Mortalis as the Summoner.
Monsters
Magic attack Monsters, combined with Alric as the Summoner, were far too overpowered at lower levels of play. We hope that making the Medusa and Mischievous Mermaid cards a little easier to kill will help address that:
- Medusa - Reduce health, particularly at lower levels.
- Mischievous Mermaid - Reduce health, particularly at lower levels.
The Spirit of the Forest is a bit TOO legendary and completely shuts down enemy teams in certain situations.
- Spirit of the Forest - Remove the Dodge ability so it will be a bit easier to hit.
The poor Cyclops is in need of a little love. He is always picked last for the Steem Monster Team in gym class...and then he throws a giant rock at your head. Hopefully this change will give him a home in some Teams going forward.
- Cyclops - Add Shield ability and adjusted some other stats to compensate.
The tanking options in the Life Splinter were lacking, so we're planning to beef them up a bit.
- Silvershield Knight - Increase Health and decrease Melee attack.
- Silvershield Paladin - Increase Health and decrease Melee attack.
The Lord of Darkness wasn't quite as Legendary as he should be...Gandalf shouldn't be able to beat him that easily!
- Lord of Darkness - Increased health as he increases in level.
A number of people pointed out that a few cards had no stat increases between certain levels. This was an oversight on our part, so the cards will be slightly adjusted to ensure that each additional level brings some added benefit.
- Golblin Sorcerer - Increase the speed at some levels so that it has a stat increase at each level.
- Swamp Thing - Adjust health so that it has a stat increase at each level.
- Enchanted Pixie - Decrease Speed by 1 at Level 6 so that it has a stat increase at each level.
Thanks For A Great First Season!
We want to thank all of our players and supporters who have contributed so much to the game so far. The first season was really just about getting the game out there and making sure the technology and blockchain integration works on a larger scale. It was all the more interesting releasing this so soon after HF20, but despite that, for the most part it has gone off without a hitch!
We hope that the changes above will make the game a bit more balanced at all levels of play, however we will continue to analyze the games and listen to player feedback and make additional adjustments as necessary.
Also adding to the changes are the Kickstarter and Fundition exclusive cards which will be released to our backers within the next few days. The goal is that those cards will be competitive and fun to play, but not over-powered, so we will be keeping a close eye on them as well as they start to enter the battlefield.
Lastly, from a development standpoint, now that the game is up and running and working nicely, our focus is shifting to rewarding our players! We recently released Leagues which offer increasing rewards based on the highest rating achieved by each player at the end of each season, as well as daily quests which allow players to earn a free pack each day! Finally, we're working on Tournaments, which will add thousands of dollars worth of rewards to our most skilled players at all levels every week!
Thank you again for your support, and we look forward to seeing you on the battlefield!
Steem Monsters Contact Info
Official Account: @steemmonsters
Website: https://steemmonsters.com
Discord: https://discord.gg/CAFJRjY
No more dodge on Spirit of the Forest is a good change. Prior, the Goblin Sorcerer was really the only one who could take her out reliably. Now, there will be other viable counters to her being the "anchor" of the team.
Thank you for the generous prize pool, and transparent, easy to understand changes.
I love the fact that in order to progress to a top tier player, you now must know the abilities and stats of the cards at all levels, instead of powering through with maxed cards.
I say this as an individual with a lot invested into the game (I have almost two max sets of alpha cards!) - and this will make the early league much more entertaining.
There's a lot to love about Steem Monsters, and we're still only just getting started!
I read your comment.
Good
This is a cool game!!
Very interesting to read.
I have found another unlogic stat when comapring two mosters, Feral Spirit and Elven Cutthroat:
Both cards need mana = 3, both have the sneak ability, but Feral Spirit has much better stats. Or is that your intention because one can use the neutral Elven Cutthroat in more different teams?
Apart from that while playing I had some ideas (maybe good/implementable, maybe not):
When playing I sometimes think "Now it would be some fun to send my opponent a message or just greet him." Will that be possible in future?
Will it be possible to challenge certain players/friends?
Will it be possible (or is it already possible, and I am just not aware of it?) to buy several cards at once in the market or must I really buy 150 Haunted Spiders one by one if I need a Haunted Spider at max level? :)
Thanks for your answers!
This means if you want to start next season in
P.s. I'm a big fan of any system that helps level the playing field.
I'm looking forward to there no longer being matches that put maxed teams against non-maxed. I'm also a fan of making people work their way up a ladder and gain skills as they go instead of just stumble through with maxed cards.
Now really good players can be the king of their own little league and some day be inspired to slowly level up cards perhaps through their winning ways.
I'm also a fan of giving people expectations of who they'll be playing against and an idea of how well they're doing in their own sphere of influence.
Is there any way to buy starter pack without using steem connect?
steem keychain, a browser extension for google chrome. It works beautifully.
When I click pay with vessel, it's stuck on..
"Steem Monsters is waiting for the blockchain to confirm your transaction. This may take up to 2 minutes"
Oh never mind, vessel is a wallet I would need to install. It would be nice to be able to just send steem to an address, like with the other crypto options.
Try steem keychain. It's as simple as possible.
But that would require me to use my private key lol Ive lost 4.5 btc to a hack this year
OMG I just tried keychain, it says
The current website is trying to send a transfer request to the Steem Keychain browser extension for account @cyberblock using the active key, which has not been added to the wallet.
sounds like you need to add your active key. At the start I would suggest adding your keys by putting your master password in. It doesn't save your master password. It just uses it to generate the different keys. It's open source so you can verify what I just said.
I like the new changes but....
Why adding sbd rewards to top 10 players?
This game is mostly pay to win, the top 10 players have already max level cards and get 30 boosters packs. Why add more rewards to already "fat" players? I think those money could be distributed in some way to lower league players..in some way
It is a reward for the players who maxed out. The fat players made the coffer fat, so a little rain up top seems perfectly reasonable. Especially when to finish top 10 you would have had to spend more then the whole bonus prize pool.
Yes that's true...."to finish in top 10 you would have to spend more" it's exactly the pay to win mechanics, that should be limited as much as we can to make people with less money to enjoy the game. 30 booster packs rewards is 50 SBD worth "prize" at least, adding another 40 because you "spent more" it's a nonsense. Some players can't get out first leagues because they don't have money to upgrade cards. I don't really care because I'm almost in champion league but still I think there should be a way to make new player progression more linear
Completely agree. Im not a fan of the sbd distribution to top 10. You want to lift up the poorer players so they dont leave, so they can compete. Rewarding with packs is fine, but id rather use that sbd to pay for packs for someone that played a lot, isnt a bot and is stuck under a 1000 rating.
They have set this game up very well. Crying because they are rewarding the top 10 players with STEEM when the top players have contributed the most to Steemmonsters and have ensured its success in its ability to fund tournaments etc is obnoxious.
Great decks should cost a lot of time or money. Otherwise card values will crash if everyone just gets great cards for playing a lot.
Well i'm not cryng, i have my 20 free packs for this season. I'm just worried about the game as whole. We are in 2018 and pay to win mechanic showed to be a total fail since 10 years ago. It's ok to give extra reward to top 10, but I think there should be something more to involve -not rich- people to play this game. The card value thing is another big deal: it's true that more cards = value crash, that's why the game should shift a bit away from pay to win to something more skill based. Right now thare are really few teams that are op in almost every situations, especially when cards are maxed out
You can not compare this to freemium games because they are not the same. Cards having and retaining value because of provable scarcity makes this different then your normal video game.
Also pay to win means that you can only win if you pay no matter how much time you put in. This is obviously not the case here.
Also, there can not be benefits for having more then 1 account, so giving free cards just for playing would create that problem.
I share this sentiment! Maybe provide sbd awards to winners of lower leagues as well?
I see it the same, absolutely agree
I believe you guys already did a great job and it is fascinating how good the balances worked already...
The little dissbalances I was blogging about seem to be nicely adressed by you.
Excellent job! THX a lot!
I remember your name, you already beat me twice I think! :)
sorry for that.. ;-) accept my upvote as apology.. ;-)
jeah.. last days helped my life team to finally get some traction...
.. so with the planed changes should be doing a bit better...
:-)
Don't forget that we're also helping folks with quests this week too. One lucky winner is getting a beta gold foil legendary! 1 quest completed = 1 entry.
Yeah nice
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Awesome!
I was happy with one legendary and one rare in my little booster pack!
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Thanks for the update @steemmonsters @yabapmatt and @aggroed ! What about people who are new like my son who joined but cant play long because he runs out of resource credits !? im sure many new players are having the same problems unless they deposit a bunch of money into steem power. Will this issue change any time soon for the newbies!? Thanks!👍✌💕
@karenmckersie for the moment steem monsters is delegating SP to those players who need it. Please reach out to us on discord and let us know your son's account name and we will delegate him enough SP to keep playing.
That's great thanks @yabapmatt , my son @mmckersie did get some delegation from crystalhuman for around 3.00 and 90 days, but he still runs out . He's ok now and has it built up more after waiting a couple days to play and not upvoting anyone , so hopefully it's ok now before the games start. Thanks again 👍😊👌
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We have just delegated some additional SP to his account from Steem Monsters, so he should be able to play and upvote more now. Please reach out if there is anything else we can help with!
Oh wow that's awesome thanks @yabapmatt 😊👍 I will let him know , he will be very happy it I'm sure!😁
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Or you could have delegated a little yourself. ;-)
I have never delegated before , plus Im all ready having to power down since being laid off work to survive and pay rent. I did pay for his starter pack and also gifted some cards to get him started. This was not just about my son , its about the survival of steem monsters if they want the game to last with new people joining from outside of Steemit , and being able to play. People wont stay long or have their friends join the game if they cant play for long without depositing money into their steem accounts. This is why yabapmatt is helping out all the new players. 👍✌
Minnowbooster.net has some awesome deals right now too! :) You can get at least 20SP for 24 weeks at a rate of about 1.6 STEEM. Less time = more SP so, you could get 40 SP for roughly the same price and half the lease time. (only 12 weeks) For 5 STEEM you can rent enough SP to make sure you have RC to play SM and still be able to comment/upvote once in a while without draining you too much..
Thats good to know, thanks a bunch for the information @crystalhuman !👍✌💁
My pleasure, you probably already know this but you can also rent from blocktrades.us :)
Sounds like great updates to me! I'm glad that you are not afraid of altering the power, or even nerfing cards. Having cards nerfed is a lot better than having a constant power creep as times goes on.
this is an awesome game, it makes steem much more fun.,
I'm liking the new season.. Having all of the abilities taken away from the cards has turned it into a straight up slug it out fest.. Damn amusing!
My guess is that a well done magic damage based team will likely be the top decks winning, but not sure yet.
Love the game guys! For anyone unsure of what SteemMonsters is I've written a review about the game below:
SteemMonsters Game Review
Keep up the great work on this project. Finally got my first gold card the other day and was pretty excited.. My decks are starting to kick ass. :D
Steemmonsters has such a bright future! Thanks for your hard work!
Agree that the magic ability is way over powered with that summoner, especially in this current format of no abilities...
Also not much of a fan of this format. No abilities on monsters makes the battles pretty stale in my opinion. I suggest no abilities of Summoners as well for this format.
A small request, hopefully easy to implement: can we get the decks saved on the blockchain? It's always frustrating to loose a saved deck...
I like the measures to make the game balanced and fair also to players with low level cards, and that there are ways for us to get more packs without having to buy them, such as the league rewards and the newly-introduced daily quests (which were a pleasant surprise to me)!
And now we have these adjustments. I like them! (though I admit I'm guilty of using the Alric + Medusa + Mermaid combo :P ) I've had a lot of trouble facing teams with the Zintar + Undead Priest (Weaken) combo, and higher levels. The levels being automatically adjusted in the leagues sounds like an interesting way to balance things out. Just yesterday I lost to the same person twice in a row whose cards were all max level, while my highest level card was a level 3 Common card.
Speaking of twice in a row, I've always thought it's strange whenever I get matched against the same person twice in a row. If we decide to battle with the same teams right away after our battle ended and get matched against each other again, the result will most likely be the same (unless one of us gets very lucky and some randomly decided factor like hits and misses completely changes the tide of battle), so just by checking our opponent we are practically sure whether we're going to win or lose. It takes some of the fun away, I think...
Good idea on the tiers and well nerfs kind of helps to balance it out.
Legends! Love the game but u are debuffing my spirit of the forest, noooo haha
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Great update, totally agree some of the cards were overpowering like the spirit of the forest 🤣
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One of the most impossible battles ever 🤣😂😅
Yay, another test for a bot. Sorry about this. Enjoy the upvote though.
Same observation. But thanks for the update!
Excellent update and I’m happy you’ll be amending some cards, although I did really enjoy the strength of Medusa and the mermaid 😊 excited for tournament play! Also love the daily ability to win a pack. Thanks for changing the league play standards as well- good move!
Con Medusa y sirena lvl 2 se podia llegar a calificacion 1500 facilmente, cosa que con otro equipo era muy dificil, que bueno que se hagan estos reajustes
Im not appreciating the medusa and mermaid nerf, but you are right. Haha.
Everything else is on point though id like to see a backrow boost for fire splinter at lower levels.
I actually wondered during these days if for balancing would it be possible to put a cap on the cards, even if they were higher level, in order to play with a certain summoner level... and .now I see it is! Seems a great way towards an even more enjoyable gaming experience! Curious for second season, you are.doing an awesome work!
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No more love for the AoL?
Perhaps a 1 magic attack at higher levels?
I don't agree Medusa and Mischievous are too good. Without them water teams will pretty suck :P
They'll probably just nerf them at lower levels. I hope anyway.
Hey I would love to get you listed on http://superdapps.com , a global directory of blockchain decentralized applications (DApps) for All blockchain platforms in multiple languages. Please contact me at [email protected].
Kudos to SM dev team, keep up the awesome works!
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You got a 90.78% upvote from @upmewhale courtesy of @steemmonsters!
Earn 100% earning payout by delegating SP to @upmewhale. Visit http://www.upmewhale.com for details!
Thank You I got a GOLD Crustacean King in my Bonus BETA Pack tonight that I got for Completing Todays Quest.............@steemmonsters
** Succession & Support Plan - Is there one? **
To the Devs, yaba and aggroed, you guys are doing fantastic work. I have found you both to be honest, inclusive, hardworking and transparent.
But working in a hospital brings me to the reality that sometimes things happen to people (knock on wood you both keep your health for many many years).
Q. Is there a succession and support plan in place to continue the great work if one or both of you cannot continue?
SteemMonsters seems to be just that - a monster that will continue to grow and succeed. The future is exciting - just wondering what is place to keep it secure.
Thank you :)
Greatttttt ‘ love you guys !
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Thank you so much for the amazing game that they donated to us !!!
So cool that your team put so much energy to improve the game. Great idea to balance the cards and put restrictions on each arena level.
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Nice work steem monster team. It seems lots of good feedback is blooming
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Bit shit that you're changing the stats after we've bought the cards? lol
You may have missed some of the comments in previous posts that if the game is unbalanced it becomes unfun and people stop playing and the cards devalue. Especially while we're in the first rounds of public fighting we're going to be adjusting card values to ensure it's fun to play and balanced. Cards may get a little buff or nerf, which can move their value, but all cards will value better if the gameplay is balanced overall.
Hi, @steemmonsters!
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thanks for the update brother! :)
Congratulations @steemmonsters!
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Hi @steemmonsters I need help to pas the quest. Who do i need to fight with? I really don't understand, when i use Marlic inferno I don't get fights neither in practice or rank..png)
What is your quest (which splinter), @everydaycoach? Everyone get random quests, so I can help you if you tell me which quest it is.
Death splinter, rising dead
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Use Zintar Mortalis for the Death splinter :)
I find it interesting how taking breaks is strategic....
For example if you get ass whipped there's no point going straight back in as you'll possibly end up with the same opponent.
Also I'm feeling that NOT playing too many matches at the beginning of a new season is a good strategy for not getting yr ass kicked by people who just come back down a level after the reset!
Now's probably a good time to be caning battles... as the season draws to an end.
Great game!
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Awesome news! Steemmonsters Rule!
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So stoked for season 2!
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It's great to see these updates. However, wouldn't the top 15 players benefit/profit from it the most? It's pay to win after all...
These updates are much help full for all peoples.
I want to increase for Silvershield Knight but I don't want to reduce of damage from that monster. No one is using life splinter in high level match. This splinter is underdog splinter among all.