Dear Ludia: Update 2.9 Edition

I didn't want to have to write one of these again yet here we are. It's been 8 months since my last open letter and your response to us on the forum, which included the following statement: 

December 21, 2020

Today we’d like to address the article written by GamePress regarding the recent happenings of Jurassic World Alive.

The team acknowledges and regrets the errors that have been seen in the recent release notes. We understand your frustration and this is not up to the quality you expect, nor that we strive to exceed. Moving forward, the team will bring greater focus on making sure that future release notes are accurate and a true reflection of the intended changes for the new update. On top of this, the team will be taking steps to improve the creature sections included with the release notes. We would like to add that from now on, creature battle balancing will occur to existing creatures in the game in every other update. (New creatures will still be added).

We also acknowledge the shortcomings with communications and will be taking measures to improve in this matter moving forward.

There will be lots of work to do, and we pledge that we will continue to gather the community’s feedback in order to improve the Jurassic World Alive experience for players both in and out of the game. Not all changes may be immediate, but we assure you we are listening.

So have things improved in those 8 months? I will admit that release notes have gotten slightly better. There are still some issues with things being incorrect or left out, but the comparison of creature stats is helpful when seeing what is being done to a creature. It also seems that more explanation is trying to be made when major changes happen to creatures (like resilient in 2.9 but we'll come back to that). You said it would take time for many of these changes to happen and that you are listening. We have given you time, we have given you feedback, but you still don't seem to be listening,

The Log-In Issue

Let's start with the log-in issue people are currently experiencing. There are people that haven't been able to log into the game since Wednesday of last week. It's been FIVE entire days without being able to raid, collect resources, hunt, battle, use sanctuary items, and they weren't even able to play in the tournament this weekend. This is a MAJOR issue and while you did make an announcement about it on Friday, we heard nothing again until Monday morning. That makes us think it wasn't being worked on this weekend. If it was being worked on, updates or communication letting us know it was being worked on would have made a big difference. I understand that it's often difficult to communicate everything, but at least a daily update of something is better than the nothing we have received so far. The player base is angry and frustrated (and rightfully so). I don't think they need to take it out on the mods or the support staff on the forum, but we need something from you telling us that it's being worked on. 

And when it does get fixed. What kind of compensation can people expect. This is everything that people have missed out on since the issue began last week:
 

• 18 attempts at exclusive rares Nasuto and Marsupial Lion, or attempts at Entelodon
• 9 attempts at exclusive epics Bumpy, Titanoboa and Allo2 
• 1 attempt at Legendary Carbotoceratops, Alloraptor and Dilophoboa
• 15-30 Hadros Lux dna
• 15-30 Gorgotrebax dna
• 15-30 HydraBoa dna
• 15-30 Haast Maximus dna
• 15-30 Refrenantem dna
• 15-30 Ceramagnus dna
• 15-30 Mortem Rex dna
• Approx 48 Scorpious dna
• Approx 320 Megalonyx dna
• Approx 145 Rex dna
• Orange drops x 6
  • 90k coins
  • 240 cash
  • 24 food
  • 24 toys
• Green drops x6
  • 45k coins
  • 60 cash
  • 12 food
  • 12 toys
  • 36 Speed
  • 36 Health
  • 36 Attack
• Daily dna
  • 600 Antarctopelta 
  • Dbi x 6
    • 24 x Speed
    • 24 x Health
    • 24 x Attack
  • 36x interactions
• Battle strikes Wednesday--Monday 
• Bumpy emote in store
• Medium Therapod scent in-store.
• Coolbox coins and fips x3
  • 7.5k coins
  • 15 Food
  • 15 Toys
  • 15 Interacts 
• 6 days dna requests in-game. Including 1x epic request on Sunday 
• 380 cash from links 
• Tourney entry points (varying dependent on starting point)
• 1000 bonus alliance points for 10 kills
• Coins tourney reward 
• 6 days of hunting and battling in the arena

This is a HUGE list and it just keeps growing by the day. We are giving you this list so you (and the player base) will see that 100 HC in-game is not going to suffice for compensation. And this doesn't just affect the people that are currently locked out of the game. Alliances have people that couldn't play in the tournament, can't contribute to weekly missions so the entire alliance is hurt by this as well. Please assure us that proper compensation will be made so those that are still locked out don't walk away completely from this issue (as many already have)

The Lack of a Boost Reset

So let's move on to the other issue. The announcement that there would NOT be a boost reset or shuffle event for Patch 2.9. Admittedly, the community is a little more divided on this issue if you read the forums, but according to a poll we ran on the GamePress server, a vast majority of people we surveyed think we deserve one. 

I know the GamePress Discord server doesn't represent the entire community, but over 2,000 felt it was important enough to vote on. 

I don't believe this ask for a boost reset or shuffle event is unwarranted. I konw these events aren't supposed to be that common, but you changed an entire class system. In the release notes, you specifically say that the Resilient Class can overpower a battle so you decided to change that.

Resilient creatures have the potential to overly dominate the battlefield because they have access to slowing behaviours, which can take over the time-based battle system. In order to make this class more balanced with others, we replaced the slowing behaviours in Resilient class abilities with vulnerability-inducing behaviours. This makes sure that Resilient creatures remain a foil to Cunning creatures and also still pose a threat to Fierce creatures, but are not predominant in the overall class meta-game.

In patch 2.8, there were 66 creatures with Resilient abilties and there have been some added in 2.9. This is more than just a couple of creatures being changed. This isn't even about "nerfs" or "buffs". This is the entire meta and battle system changing and with that could be a change in how things are boosted. Even non-resilient creatures might need to be boosted differently so they can better counter the resilient class they were originally built for. 

If a major meta change, class change, or complete overhaul of a specfic class of creatures occurs, then I believe we deserve the ability to use our resources differently to adapt to this change. We can't do that right now and many people are "stuck" with creatures or builds that aren't ideal for them.

The community is constantly asking for a chance to have a diverse meta. I think 2.9 was one of the best chances we had to make that happen (except for Testacornibus but that's a different issue entirely). Before it was announced that a boost reset or shuffle event was not happening, I was playing with my potential team for 2.9. I couldn't decide on everything I wanted to run as I actually had too many options. I think there are potentials to have an extremely diverse meta with different creatures if people actually had the ability to move resources around.  

I still don't think the class system is "balanced" and I honestly don't know how to "fix it". I personally think we need more classes or have more diverse creatures within a specific class. Some sort of guaranteed boost refund on 1-2 creatures (as an example) every patch would also be a huge thing for the community. If we knew we could have the ability to change at least 1 or 2 creatures for free no matter what changes happen, make us more willing to spend resources now to build the team we want. Huge, major, meta changes (like 2.0) could have a full boost shuffle or reset even, but please communicate with us better on what the plans are for these.

What are we the players asking for? 

All of these problems and issue go back to our core complaint: communication. I know you can't tell us everything and it's impossible to predict issues that arise, but we want real and true communication about the issues. Give us daily updates on things that are taking multiple days to fix. Tell us well in advance for any plans (or lack of plans) for things suchs as boost resets or shuffles. If possible, give us insight on what the reasoning is behind some of the changes that are made in the game. You say you are listening and taking our feedback seriously, but we still don't see it. Communication won't fix the in-game issues, but it will at least be a step in the right direction towards building some sort of relationship and trust back with the community. Because, unfortunately, the issues with patch 2.9 have completely broken down any small amount of trust the community had built up.