SlopranoDark said:
Greetings m'lords and ladies!
Allow me to ask the question what do you think of Stormfall now and Stormfall in the past? What are changes you liked or disliked? What do you think that should change in Stormfall right now and what shouldn't have changed back in the days?
Post your opinions & feedback here and see what others think!
Maybe one update you disliked wasn't that bad after all? 
Some rules before we start:
- A friendly tone and positive feedback is important to keep it calm. Critique is fine, as long as it does not fall out of control!
- Do not act rude to people whom have different opinions that yours! Discuss about it, in a nice way.
- Build your opinion up with arguments, it's important to make a powerful statement!
- The official forum & game rules apply here as well, don't forget that!
- The rules of civility might be a useful guideline for the above standing point too.
I'm looking forward onto your replies!
The game has always had a pay to win aspect to it, but it feels like the explosion of items, buffs/debuffs, etc have turned the game into a giant cash grab.
I think the dragon stone, hero, and fortress are nice additions. However, I do not like how 2/3 of them seem to lock the better stuff behind a pay wall. The fortress gives no bonus for your defenders. The only real "advantage" defenders have is there is a limit on how much off can be sent to attack. That helps leagues with enough coiners, since they can stack so much def there that even those who could downgrade it don't due to how much off it would cost. The end result is most fortresses got rushed to one of the safe points and then sit undefended. Heros seemed like a nice addition; do bgs, get gear for your hero and make your troops stronger. However, the rare items almost always drop in a chest that needs a key to open. That locks the most desirable equip items behind a pay wall...and to add insult to injury, that chest replaces the equipment item you should have gotten. Its like a giant middle finger from the devs, not only do you have to pay to open the chest, but that chest also replaces the free item you should have gotten (at the very least meaning the theft of several moon coins).
The new items almost all are pay only. The end result being an ever increasing amount of content locked behind a pay wall. I have seen some show up as tournament rewards, but aside from league tournaments (where the coiner's efforts help the whole league get nicer rewards), most of those items are out of reach...or I should say, the amount of troops I'd lose to earn them far overshadows the benefit from the item.
The old Stormfall, tournaments were not so frequent. They felt like real events. There was actually time to get stuff built up so you could play in them and the rewards felt worthwhile. Now, there is a never ending cycle of tournaments, most with rewards that have been massively nerfed compared to the old events. Normal warlocks or normal demons as your reward choice instead of eldrich necros and eldrich golems. To be honest, the never ending flood of tournaments has caused me to ignore them altogether. When I earn rewards, its a result of my normal playing, not of making any real effort to participate.
I also found the attempts to liven up tournaments fell flat. The Capture the Flag was entirely dependent on being online at the right time. It felt like a new beacon drop, except it involved hitting mostly empty fortresses instead of expanding territory. The "heats" (special August events?) seem like just a way to encourage the tops to spend ever more money while leaving average players in the cold.
The explosion of cash only stuff and all these packs (remember when you didn't get troops for buying sapphires?) seem to have created a new type of noob as well. I've seen so many attacks where it looks for all the world like the guy just bought every pack available and threw it at someone. Spies, defense, unsupported legendaries...guess that proves that wallet can't replace brains? It probably shouldn't annoy me, but I find the constant bombardment of these offers and the idiocy of some players who obviously buy it all while understanding nothing gets on my nerves. I guess Plarium doesn't want smart players; they prefer them rich and dumb.
Overall, while there are some nice things that have been added, I liked the gameplay in the old Stormfall better than the gameplay in the newer Stormfall. It feels like the increasing amount of things locked behind a paywall is driving average players away from the game and is leaving behind giant networks of alts (that used to be real players) that now slave away to grant unfair advantage (such as huge out of league defense at player castle) to those who inherited the castles after the players quit.
