Affiliations

[Lou_Wolfskin]

Is it just me or do quite some affiliations hang on a single character making them work together?

Say what you want about the Companions of the Hall, but i feel that their team combo providing something from each for all is actually the best example of how this should work.

Meanwhile we have stuff like Wafflecrew who only get a bonus from Paultin, or even the newest addition with Alyndra who's the only one to actually make the Heroes of the Planes a team.

Or even teams like Acquisition Incorporated who have no team combo and seem even confused in themselves (Jim buffs for mages but non other in the team is a mage).

Anyone else a bit miffed by stuff like this?

[SevenBlueSeven]

Wafflecrew used to have Diath. Then the champion was changed to Xander. Just do a simple search of these forums to learn about that and why that Affiliation has three instead of four members.

Miffed? No. Slightly confused? Yes.

[Noeh23]

Aerios (or whatever they are called work quite well together)
Dark Order has something for everyone
basically some affiliations mean more than others ...
not a big deal

[Count_Dandyman]

For most teams they focus on the first few members working as individuals and usually go back and either put the synergy on later members (like Paultin) or patch the earlier members to add in a shared synergy (Companions, Heroes of Aeoris and Dark Order)

[muljostpho]

Originally posted by Count_Dandyman:

For most teams they focus on the first few members working as individuals and usually go back and either put the synergy on later members (like Paultin) or patch the earlier members to add in a shared synergy (Companions, Heroes of Aeoris and Dark Order)

They'll handle things however they want to, of course. But it seems to me that for team synergies to have any real relevance they really ought to have been considering them up front in their planning and design instead of treating it as an afterthought.

Perhaps the game could have even gone for an even more drastically different approach from the event format of Crusaders of the Lost Idols than what they ended up using here. I mean, for example, imagine if the Champions event format had been to add the new objectives as permanent additions within whichever permanent campaign each of them might fit best within, and to also focus more on fitting new non-event character unlocks into the game all throughout the core pathways of each campaign. "Event" content would be marked as something separate from the core pathway, and maybe the game plays around with the difficulty scaling features so that this optional content is significantly amped up in difficulty if attempted out-of-season without paying in some sort of unlock similar to the time gate feature, or only slightly amped up in difficulty if attempted out-of-season within the terms of that time gate style unlock, or kept on easy mode if attempted in-season. Try to plan out event and non-event new character releases so that as much of an entire synergy team as possible gets released as close together with their teammates as possible, both in terms of when they come out and where they can be found physically on the campaign map.

Perhaps another idea that could be proposed might be that race synergies and class synergies could have been things as well, instead of only developing team synergies. So each member of any specific team / affiliation has some ability that interacts with their own team's synergy, and each member of any specific race (edit: or a group of races like Ashara's bond options) has some ability that interacts with their own race's synergy, and each member of any specific class has some ability that interacts with their own class's synergy. That way the entire idea of building a formation around synergy effects is more open-ended to entirely different mixes of characters.

But this game is the way it is. Maybe the devs can file ideas like these away for consideration in some new game later on.

[Soteria]

I know they've said that they're wary of making group synergies so strong that using someone in a group feels mandatory. I think they've gone too far the other way--where it doesn't seem worth trying to use a group.

[Lou_Wolfskin]

Originally posted by SevenBlueSeven:

Wafflecrew used to have Diath. Then the champion was changed to Xander. Just do a simple search of these forums to learn about that and why that Affiliation has three instead of four members.

Miffed? No. Slightly confused? Yes.

I'm fully aware of the Diath debacle, although i'm not sure he had a specific skill for the Wafflecrew.
That being said, Diath being changed has nothing to do with my original problem in itself.

[OldGamer]

Some groups are just better than others when it comes to their relationship in their game(s) (or the books/comics - where ever that champion has come from), in which CNE call synergy (unless this is a British DnD thing, we call them "relations" in our games in the 80s/90s at least)

Also, just to note, some champions haven't got their group yet. That is why you can know what is coming next. A certain someone, who recently joined CNE workforce, I am sure their character will be coming to idle champs. (in the same group as Alyndra I think too)

[Konachibi]

Originally posted by Lou_Wolfskin:

Originally posted by SevenBlueSeven:

Wafflecrew used to have Diath. Then the champion was changed to Xander. Just do a simple search of these forums to learn about that and why that Affiliation has three instead of four members.

Miffed? No. Slightly confused? Yes.

I'm fully aware of the Diath debacle, although i'm not sure he had a specific skill for the Wafflecrew.
That being said, Diath being changed has nothing to do with my original problem in itself.

It is true that generally it's Paultin is the only one of the Waffle Crew that buffs specifically the Waffle Crew, and no one else in Waffle Crew has that bonus. Generally they're the only ones that have the issue of having a buff only provided by one champion, other affiliations tend to have individual buffs that blend together (like Noeh23 mentioned).

That being said, having Diath forcefully removed due to unfounded accusations, and then not returned after the man himself proved his innocence (with receipts) has greatly weakened them as a group in this, since individually each member of the Waffle Crew is pretty strong, but putting them all together just made them even better. Technically Diath/Xander and Strix have a synergy, since Diath/Xander's Childlike Wonder increases his Streetwise for every wizard or sorceress adjacent to him, and Strix is a sorceress.

Personally I think Diath should be returned to the players who had him before the scandal, at the very least as a skin for Xander, so they can choose to use it or not. I'm a supporter of Jared and think what was done to him was incredibly unfair, and having Wotc and CNE yeet him out without a word and without waiting to hear the facts first was really scummy. Seeing Xander where once there was Diath always leaves a sour taste in my mouth, and I tend to refuse to use Xander in my formations purely because seeing him annoys me.

[Count_Dandyman]

Originally posted by muljostpho:

Perhaps another idea that could be proposed might be that race synergies and class synergies could have been things as well, instead of only developing team synergies. So each member of any specific team / affiliation has some ability that interacts with their own team's synergy, and each member of any specific race (edit: or a group of races like Ashara's bond options) has some ability that interacts with their own race's synergy, and each member of any specific class has some ability that interacts with their own class's synergy. That way the entire idea of building a formation around synergy effects is more open-ended to entirely different mixes of characters.

But this game is the way it is. Maybe the devs can file ideas like these away for consideration in some new game later on.

Race, alignment, stat and class synergies are already a thing though and the whole reason synergies are as flexible, small and not something every character is built around is to permit a more open-ended mix of characters that can work together without forcing just the same few combos and heavily handicapping those that don't have the full set.

[OldGamer]

Originally posted by Kønachibi:

Originally posted by Lou_Wolfskin:

I'm fully aware of the Diath debacle, although i'm not sure he had a specific skill for the Wafflecrew.
That being said, Diath being changed has nothing to do with my original problem in itself.

It is true that generally it's Paultin is the only one of the Waffle Crew that buffs specifically the Waffle Crew, and no one else in Waffle Crew has that bonus. Generally they're the only ones that have the issue of having a buff only provided by one champion, other affiliations tend to have individual buffs that blend together (like Noeh23 mentioned).

That being said, having Diath forcefully removed due to unfounded accusations, and then not returned after the man himself proved his innocence (with receipts) has greatly weakened them as a group in this, since individually each member of the Waffle Crew is pretty strong, but putting them all together just made them even better. Technically Diath/Xander and Strix have a synergy, since Diath/Xander's Childlike Wonder increases his Streetwise for every wizard or sorceress adjacent to him, and Strix is a sorceress.

Personally I think Diath should be returned to the players who had him before the scandal, at the very least as a skin for Xander, so they can choose to use it or not. I'm a supporter of Jared and think what was done to him was incredibly unfair, and having Wotc and CNC yeet him out without a word and without waiting to hear the facts first was really scummy.

I think being young in this world now is not an option. He was young and naive.

Then again, I said this before, the difference between a British entertainment company and North American one is the size of the Atlantic ocean when it comes to PR guff ups. We would have just changed the actor. (example of this was Dr Who's Colin Baker who they quickly shuffled off and spoke nothing about what he supposedly did ever again.)

[Konachibi]

Originally posted by OldGamer:

I think being young in this world now is not an option. He was young and naive.

Then again, I said this before, the difference between a British entertainment company and North American one is the size of the Atlantic ocean when it comes to PR guff ups. We would have just changed the actor. (example of this was Dr Who's Colin Baker who they quickly shuffled off and spoke nothing about what he supposedly did ever again.)

He was naive, but it's also naive to immediately believe what's being spread around without any proof, which is what WOTC and CNE did, and now we don't have Diath, the Waffle Crew synergy in Idle Champions is 1 short of a full buff, and Dice Camera Action's Waffle Crew adventure in Ravenloft was permenantly ended because of that.

If you think the Colin Baker analogue is a good one, here's another one for you. It was discovered post-filming during a James Bond movie that one of the women in it was actually a transgender. They didn't cancel the showing of the film, nor the sales of it, but it was made available knowledge for all other film companies at the time and her career was ended right there out of pure discrimination, something that nowadays would have people up in arms.

[ptor]

Originally posted by OldGamer:

which CNE call synergy (unless this is a British DnD thing, we call them "relations" in our games in the 80s/90s at least)

Synergy is a generic term for an interaction or cooperation that produces a whole that is greater than the simple sum of its parts (a bit like combo), while relation does not imply that ("I know them" is a relation, "we work well together" is a synergic relation)

[OldGamer]

Originally posted by Kønachibi:

Originally posted by OldGamer:

I think being young in this world now is not an option. He was young and naive.

Then again, I said this before, the difference between a British entertainment company and North American one is the size of the Atlantic ocean when it comes to PR guff ups. We would have just changed the actor. (example of this was Dr Who's Colin Baker who they quickly shuffled off and spoke nothing about what he supposedly did ever again.)

He was naive, but it's also naive to immediately believe what's being spread around without any proof, which is what WOTC and CNE did, and now we don't have Diath, the Waffle Crew synergy in Idle Champions is 1 short of a full buff, and Dice Camera Action's Waffle Crew adventure in Ravenloft was permenantly ended because of that.

If you think the Colin Baker analogue is a good one, here's another one for you. It was discovered post-filming during a James Bond movie that one of the women in it was actually a transgender. They didn't cancel the showing of the film, nor the sales of it, but it was made available knowledge for all other film companies at the time and her career was ended right there out of pure discrimination, something that nowadays would have people up in arms.

Oh Tula. To be fair, the reason why, was she lied to the producers. If you know anything about James Bond you know he's a womaniser (not in a bad sense, well not used to be anyway...), gentleman and chivalrous. Basically he was meant to portray the "ideal british gentleman" at the time (think Sean Connery, Michael Cane etc).

This being said, they did throw Tula badly to the wastes but that is show business, unfortunately. (also she made PLENTY of money due to the scandal - so much so, half of my work colleagues/mates (at the time) thought it was planned outage in an era where homosexuality and things of that nature was "coming out" (oh the pun).)But I do believe British companies tend to side on the facts rather than public hearsay, even though that is increasingly getting smaller and everyone is really going for this trend. (and it is a trend - I have been alive long enough to see cycles of trends and agendas come and go)

In the courts over here by the way, if anything is said about an ongoing investigation on social media it can be thrown out of court for potential "hearsay" and basically "sorcery", its called something different now, like "influencing the directive of justice" or something like that. That is because we have 12 to 15 normal people "judging" (Jurors) a verdict alongside the court officials and judge of course. These are elected randomly to go to court and even then are randomly selected at the court. You can be called up for service and never even sit in the court or get to judge a case.
America we know is different as the Simpson case and Malone cases show (or very recently with their own former president).
But always you get some debacle happen even with our hearsay law. One man, got acquitted due to social media and went on to do -something very naughty here- three more times. But at other times, they have been a victim themselves of mob mentality.
As we know people love to jump on to things.

[Konachibi]

Originally posted by OldGamer:

In the courts over here by the way, if anything is said about an ongoing investigation on social media it can be thrown out of court for potential "hearsay" and basically "sorcery", its called something different now, like "influencing the directive of justice" or something like that. That is because we have 12 to 15 normal people "judging" (Jurors) a verdict alongside the court officials and judge of course. These are elected randomly to go to court and even then are randomly selected at the court. You can be called up for service and never even sit in the court or get to judge a case.
America we know is different as the Simpson case and Malone cases show (or very recently with their own former president).
But always you get some debacle happen even with our hearsay law. One man, got acquitted due to social media and went on to do -something very naughty here- three more times. But at other times, they have been a victim themselves of mob mentality.
As we know people love to jump on to things.

As a fellow Brit that has done their jury duty, I could have told you beforehand that I'm aware of how our system works, which would have saved you a lot of time in having to type that.

[OldGamer]

Originally posted by Kønachibi:

Originally posted by OldGamer:

In the courts over here by the way, if anything is said about an ongoing investigation on social media it can be thrown out of court for potential "hearsay" and basically "sorcery", its called something different now, like "influencing the directive of justice" or something like that. That is because we have 12 to 15 normal people "judging" (Jurors) a verdict alongside the court officials and judge of course. These are elected randomly to go to court and even then are randomly selected at the court. You can be called up for service and never even sit in the court or get to judge a case.
America we know is different as the Simpson case and Malone cases show (or very recently with their own former president).
But always you get some debacle happen even with our hearsay law. One man, got acquitted due to social media and went on to do -something very naughty here- three more times. But at other times, they have been a victim themselves of mob mentality.
As we know people love to jump on to things.

As a fellow Brit that has done their jury duty, I could have told you beforehand that I'm aware of how our system works, which would have saved you a lot of time in having to type that. :cinnamon2:

I needed the exercise :)