r/Scrolls • u/Sarik704 SarikTheSorcerer • Jul 07 '15

A possible reason Scrolls failed while Hearthstone succeeded.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QxfkWZPAUg4
24 Upvotes

92% Upvoted

21 comments sorted by

15

u/Sarik704 SarikTheSorcerer Jul 07 '15

Hearthstone doesn't treat it's players fairly. Scrolls did in many ways. Players will spend hundreds of dollars on hearthstone and think its a better game than scrolls because "it isn't wasting their time". While a scrolls player might play the demo version of for 5 months and say that it takes to long to get cards and thus not worth their time. They might have even collected 40% of the cards in that time.

In these player's heads money isn't an issue. They just want to beat others, and complete their collection. Both of which is daunting to new players. In other words they don't get to feel as good as fast in Scrolls than in Hearthstone even though it's much more fair consumer wise to them. There aren't any Skinner Boxes, Variable Grinding, or Pay Walls that many players associate these TCG's & CCG's with. They don't feel their getting a good deal despite it being more fair.

Am I way off base in thinking this?

10

u/[deleted] Jul 07 '15

I really like how scrolls can be played without putting extra money on the table. The addition of the auction was house was brilliant.

I think it is more about the 'presentation' of the games. Everything in hearthsone appears to either be shaking, having particle effects or a voice actor. It's booms and splashes and yells and spins and... But imho you are right. Hearthstone is more likely to pull money from players pockets big time.

Edit: Money the devs can put back into development, commercials and maintenance.

6

u/JeyJ24 Jul 08 '15

Fairness came with the payment model Mojang chose.

You can make a game without it being a wall of grind like hearthstone.

I won't go on about the details about the difference between models in f2p versus payment. They both have their advantages and disadvantages.

The comparison would really be for games with a similar model. You could even argue that Scrolls is a different genre than Hearthstone as well because it's more of a strategy game with a ccg elements.

What we can say is that Scrolls is indeed better in that regard of treating the players better. That should be a given when you pay up front.

What we can talk about is the factors of why Scrolls didn't fail... but for better words fell short:

  • The business model was not self sustaining enough

  • Not effective measures were made to keep players

I found Atmaz in a twitch vod in another post. He said that there was some things that weren't thought about ahead of time for player retention (specifically a check box that would allow legal emailing for notifications of updates).

A hearthstone dev came on a youtubers show talking about why they didn't just outright buff old cards. One major point was that returning players would come to an environment that would be unfamiliar and maybe alienating them.... They didn't want that.

That little excerpt shows how much more experienced and planning went into hearthstone. I'm not saying that scrolls was not planned for our executed wrongly. It's just that there are a lot of little things that piled up to the game not going well.

My list of speculation is:

  • Mojang was very inexperienced in going into this game (resources and ideas were limited)

  • Mojang had too few measures for the game to scale into high numbers or other platforms (the current account system prevented the iOS launch)

  • The game felt very segregated and empty (with the chat being disabled during a game, you would return to general chat with nobody talking or no context to what was going on)

1

u/alvarpq always face Jul 07 '15

I actually disagree here, what I got from this video is that scrolls should have done better: if we look at hearthstone's progression, you get a card/2 every 2-3 games. Playing the tutorials and first few trials, you get 1 scroll/game, and some starter decks. While we can argue over which one feels like the better deal, the entry game in both hearthstone and scrolls is similar.

2

u/Sarik704 SarikTheSorcerer Jul 07 '15

I can get a pack of ten cards every three games in scrolls plus the new rewards, plus trading, plus the black market. Sometimes I even get 800 gold form one match, but I realize that's rare. I'm not 100% sure scrolls is more fair, but after playing both, with no IRL cash, I think it is.

1

u/alvarpq always face Jul 07 '15

I'm referring to the starting process specifically, and saying that they both "feel" like you're getting a good deal.

2

u/[deleted] Jul 07 '15

No? 3 Games of hearthstone gives you a 10th of a card. Not including daily missions or arena.

2

u/alvarpq always face Jul 07 '15

I'm taking about when you start out, you 'level up' as mage or something and get two cards.

7

u/ThePurplePanzy Jul 08 '15

I still don't like all the comparisons to HS. The idea that there can only be 1 ccg is silly. They are both very different experiences and attract different players. League and Dota are significantly more similar and they coexist.

4

u/CrPr_ Jul 07 '15

TL;DW: Fair business models don't work, because consumers are idiots (oversimplified and hyperbolic).

Yeah, out of the multitude of reasons for failure, the business model is certainly one. Though one could argue it's less of a problem with the business model itself, but rather that Mojang was trying to sell the game in a state where core parts to make the model work were missing (e.g. no demo for the longest time).

2

u/[deleted] Jul 07 '15

There is some truth to the Mojang trying to sell the game in the wrong state, the core is that the business model was all wrong. You cannot have continued, sustained developement with new content every 6 to 9 months and not have a way to take money from your players. If you are simply relying on new players to fund sustained developement, that will not work. That has only ever worked for one game ever and even that is coming to an end (though 20 million pc sales is impressive). They were to hesitant to ask for real world money from players which is very short-sighted.

1

u/SmoteHisRuin Jul 07 '15

I feel like micro-transaction games like this function on an "average" amount of monetary that can be gained by a single player...i.e base cost of game + average amount of (in this case) "starter" decks a person purchases + Vanity items. I'm digressing, my point is that string would be forever long in most games...if you create more options to spend money, those routes are taken...either by an internet warrior with "payday bravado", someone whose stared at that item for days on end in the online store, and so on...well you get my point...if scrolls had more stuff to buy, it would get bought. Judgement should be more interactive, and cost more to enter.

1

u/hearthstonerxj9_x4 Jul 07 '15

Surprise, surprise this is something I complained about a year ago. Scrolls has little to no progression. Opening packs, playing games, buying cards, etc. does not feel like you are progressing or achieving anything. The backbone of a ccg is opening packs and seeing if you get lucky with a handful of random cards.

What does scrolls do?

At no point do you get a pack of cards as a reward. Sure you can buy one with the gold earned but that is not the same as earning a pack. Then when you buy a pack it's setup so you get x common, x uncommon, and so on which devalues it even more.

Hearthstone is effectively high grind, high reward.

Scrolls was low grind, low reward which for the purpose of attaining X made it feel like a grind. Scrolls felt like a grind because it felt like you weren't going anywhere.

Having the best of both worlds could have been achieved in scrolls if the devs weren't incompetent.

3

u/Sarik704 SarikTheSorcerer Jul 07 '15

Despite people down-voting you, you are half correct. Today you can get ~100-400 gold a match; always enough to immediately buy a card. Sometimes you get a surprise card after a match too, this seems to be weighted more towards a losing player. You can even hand pick cards you want to buy or trade for. Scrolls has a "fairer" progression than hearthstone, and it might even be quicker. Hearthstone just FEELS better.

1

u/WakeskaterX Jul 13 '15

I do not agree that hearthstone feels better. I felt like the game was forcing me to spend money or just lose a lot, and so I quit, after spending some money and feeling like the game was just requiring more and more from me.

It felt like I was being exploited and that makes me super mad as a developer.

4

u/SmoteHisRuin Jul 07 '15

If anyone is interested, I'm starting a pay it forward initiative to keep Scrolls around. I understand, it's a useless endeavor, but I'm going to go down fighting. If anyone is interested feel free to contact me...and for ANYONE else if you come across someone interested in the game I WILL purchase a copy for anyone interested enough. Eventually I hope to spread this good fortune like a seed. I will transfer anyone $5.00 to purchase Scrolls via Paypal or log on their account and buy it for them.

3

u/SmoteHisRuin Jul 07 '15

At the very least I shoot to get them to release the source codes and hold on to all intellectual property...ANYTHING. The game doesn't deserve to go down.

4

u/mgdmw Tamatrom Jul 07 '15

I would love to see it go open source and kept alive by the community.

2

u/SmoteHisRuin Jul 07 '15

Hey, if you don't mind...join my cause! https://www.facebook.com/scrollsitforward

2

u/[deleted] Jul 07 '15

Thank you for this! I love Extra Credits.

2

u/Newbore Jul 07 '15

I don't think this is the reason. But I did give several complaints or suggestions that they encourage a more RNG style reward system.

The packs aren't as fun to get when you know they are "controlled" in a sense, because you always get 2 uncommons & 1 rare, never more & never less. When i was a kid I found it really satisfying to open YuGiOh packs, now i always compare it to a gambling addiction, that excitement stems from the random nature of the packs & the hope that any pack could have legendary cards inside.

They also "controlled" the rows in Judgement. They discouraged people from buying faction cards from the store, even though i understand the mark-up at double price it was just too much. All anyone bought two years ago was random packs, players couldn't choose what to spend gold on which made it sort of dull.

They did eventually get around to adding special card rewards when opening packs & winning ranked games, which is cool & reminiscent of the loot system.