Diminishing Returns on Random Rewards


Pathfinder Adventure Card Society


Our group is set to tackle 0-3B this week, and the random reward presents a bit of a brow-scruncher for me.

At the beginning of the Season, the random pulls were quite likely to offer the chance for an improvement over the B-Basic cards your starting deck was composed of. As you get into the higher-level adventures (3B, 3D, 4B…), though, all those Bs you upgraded out are back in your Class Deck box, and get shuffled into your random pulls.

The chances of a high-level reward for a high-level scenario actually diminish as you go along. That doesn't seem right.

My appeal to the goddess of OP is this: how about adding a set indicator requirement to later random rewards? As in, "Each character chooses weapon or spell and gains a random card of that type (minimum set indicator number 1)."

Thoughts?


I agree this is a problem, and your suggestion makes sense.

Shadow Lodge 4/5 *** Venture-Captain, Michigan—Mt. Pleasant

Hmm... I guess I had assumed that you'd do the same thing to your character deck box as you did to the game box by removing basics/elites, but after checking it just mentions game box.


I feel like RotR had some "gain a random non-basic, non-elite card of that type" rewards in later scenarios - perhaps that's something we'll see at level 5 and 6?

Grand Lodge

Agreed. Random rewards past Adventure 3 are almost useless for everyone at our tables.

As an example, We're starting Adventure 4 tonight, and I haven't taken a weapon upgrade for my Kyra since we started. There's exactly ONE viable weapon upgrade for her before Adventure 5, so the odds of me picking that Flaming Scimitar when I have to include all of the cards from B-4 are ridiculous.

Perhaps add a sentence to:

Guide to Pathfinder Society Adventure Card Game Guild Organized Play, page 7 wrote:
If you are rewarded with a card from the box, you will instead take a random card of the same type from your Class Deck box. The card you take cannot have an adventure deck number higher than that of the scenario you completed.

that reads something like:

Quote:
You may continue picking random cards until the card's adventure deck number is at least 2 lower than that of the scenario you completed.

Sovereign Court

I don't know that that's the best fix Knight.

We definitely need a fix for higher adventures having less chance of bad gear, but I don't think guaranteeing the ability for 2 below is it. Sometimes an adventurer just finds bad gear, it happens. It just shouldn't be happening as often as it does. I think it'd be better off as a simple change to future rewards.

Instead of a random card, make it a random non basic non elite, or include elites and basics but the reward specifies Adventure X or higher. Or even allow the player to hand pick a card of a type specified by the reward (or occasionally maybe two types the player can choose from). Throwing rewards like these into the mix would definitely help a lot, and still adds some chance of finding generic armor #12 occasionally.

4/5 ****

Rumor has it, there's already a fix in the works for this problem. I'd keep my eyes peeled on Adventure 5.

No promises though.


I would suggest a bigger pool of loot cards, and an 'each player may only keep one'. So for example, a scenario would reward 8 loot cards and there is a party of 4. Each player may select only 1 loot card from the pool of 8 cards.


Not having played in OP, I really hated random rewards by the end of RoRL. In our 2 character party that was a sure way of turning over a nice Potion of Gracefulness, Short Sword +1, Frost Ray, and so on...

Do you guys feel that being able to choose an upgrade at the end of each session helps, or does it average out to about the same as a regular game? In regular play I've had more than my share of 0 upgrade scenarios, but also some great 2+ card ones. Don't know if that ends up being around 1 upgrade per scenario anyway, and the OP just codifies it.

Paizo Employee Chief Technical Officer

Dave Riley wrote:
Not having played in OP, I really hated random rewards by the end of RoRL. In our 2 character party that was a sure way of turning over a nice Potion of Gracefulness, Short Sword +1, Frost Ray, and so on...

In regular (non-OP) play, I agree that the value of random rewards is indeed a downward slope, but in my experience, it's tied not to your progress through the AP, but to your progress through each adventure. My group tends to be happier with random rewards given during the first couple scenarios after a new adventure deck is added, as we're more likely to draw cards from the new deck that we hadn't encountered yet. Late in the adventure, though, odds are much better that we've previously acquired (and not kept) the cards we draw.

4/5

Pathfinder Maps, Pathfinder Accessories Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Charter Superscriber; Starfinder Charter Superscriber

Am I getting this right, in OP play, if a reward says "draw a random card of that type from the box" it means from the class deck box, not the base set box?


Yes. That is correct.

Grand Lodge

I was under the impression when the lower cards were removed from the base set you could do that as well to your class deck. If that isn't how this works I'm glad my group is behind and we haven't reached this point yet.

4/5

Pathfinder Maps, Pathfinder Accessories Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Charter Superscriber; Starfinder Charter Superscriber

Thanks, Hawkmoon


Vic Wertz wrote:
In regular (non-OP) play, I agree that the value of random rewards is indeed a downward slope, but in my experience, it's tied not to your progress through the AP, but to your progress through each adventure. My group tends to be happier with random rewards given during the first couple scenarios after a new adventure deck is added, as we're more likely to draw cards from the new deck that we hadn't encountered yet. Late in the adventure, though, odds are much better that we've previously acquired (and not kept) the cards we draw.

Fully agree Vic. Our experience with a 5 players party having done RORL twice and being in AP5 of S&S : yes sometimes you get a Potion as a reward... and nobody is upset. It's a fun game anyway. At the end of a scenario, more than half of the time my deck stays unchanged because both what I have acquired during the scenario and the reward is not worth exchanging with cards in my deck. Which is OK. We are here for the story, not the reward (*).

Some French Baron wrote:
(*) OK I'm French, we participate in the Olympics for the fun, not to compete and that's why we never win... That's hard to grasp in a competitive NorthAm world, but you'll have a hard time changing us :-).

Please don't make it a video game for pre-teens who are only into it for collecting the best combo that can kill the game in one move (and complain after that's it is too easy and you need to have Tiamat as a AP2 monster, and then that you need to create a Holy +10 Bane-All Returning-Healing-Storing-Autorecharging-Autoreloading Sword because any loot short than that won't improve their decks, and then that Tiamat should be AP1 because now that they have the sword, it's too easy).

My point : avoid the arms race. Adventurers don't always get a better sword after defeating each villain, and that's OK. If I set aside Loot cards, we did finish RORL with an average 2 cards of each level in our hands, and the rest being 0 level. And that was way more fun than having the full AP-6 only megacombo.

I remember following endless threads on Regeneration-like cards combos... that we never even encountered. Cool, that means I'll still have things to discover next time I play RORL.

Please do not make getting better rewards easier. Please. :-)


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The main focus of this thread is rewards in Organized Play, not the standard game. Pulling a random reward in Organized Play is worth less and less as you progress, for the reasons mentioned, primarily that unlike the standard game, you're not removing Basics and Elites from your class deck.

Establishing a floor for the level of the random reward you receive in Organized Play would be a reasonable rule change.

After adventure 3, Organized Play is harder than the standard game, because most 1 and B banes are removed in one fell swoop; although admittedly, the boon drops do improve dramatically at the same time.


Johnny Chronicle wrote:

Our group is set to tackle 0-3B this week, and the random reward presents a bit of a brow-scruncher for me.

At the beginning of the Season, the random pulls were quite likely to offer the chance for an improvement over the B-Basic cards your starting deck was composed of. As you get into the higher-level adventures (3B, 3D, 4B…), though, all those Bs you upgraded out are back in your Class Deck box, and get shuffled into your random pulls.

The chances of a high-level reward for a high-level scenario actually diminish as you go along. That doesn't seem right.

My appeal to the goddess of OP is this: how about adding a set indicator requirement to later random rewards? As in, "Each character chooses weapon or spell and gains a random card of that type (minimum set indicator number 1)."

Thoughts?

I think your interpreting the random pulls wrong. While yes in the beginning your pool of cards is definitely upgrades, I think you're incorrectly placing cards back in the deck box to be counted as pulls. They should be marked off the sheet as obtained and available to build the deck from once obtained and not placed in the pool of cards to pull randoms from when upgrading with a reward.

Example: I'm playing the rogue deck I got for my first random weapon deck upgrade the Animal Bane +1 Dagger which if I recall is adventure deck 1. the weapon B I replaced doesn't go back in to the pool of weapons I draw from for random upgrades since I already earned the card. it's always available to choose when constructing my deck. So when I get the random weapon draw from a scenario deck 3, those B level cards aren't as available.

I do think you have a good idea though that if I'm pulling a card from a level 3, there should be a lower limit to what I can be in the available pool.


elcoderdude wrote:

The main focus of this thread is rewards in Organized Play, not the standard game. Pulling a random reward in Organized Play is worth less and less as you progress, for the reasons mentioned, primarily that unlike the standard game, you're not removing Basics and Elites from your class deck.

Establishing a floor for the level of the random reward you receive in Organized Play would be a reasonable rule change.

After adventure 3, Organized Play is harder than the standard game, because most 1 and B banes are removed in one fell swoop; although admittedly, the boon drops do improve dramatically at the same time.

I agree with this. The point of Organized play shouldn't be replay the scenarios with the intent failing the scenario and just spending the 30 turns farming the locations for boons so you can upgrade. Since things get harder when the base set is asked to remove a bunch of cards, it would be harder for people with a few upgrades to be able to complete the next set of scenarios with out the farm. Maybe this is only a problem for the moment because we don't have a lot of different scenarios we can use to get upgrade rewards with out "replay"


drgnmstr44 wrote:
I think your interpreting the random pulls wrong.

Really? Well, right back atcha, sir!

drgnmstr44 wrote:
While yes in the beginning your pool of cards is definitely upgrades, I think you're incorrectly placing cards back in the deck box to be counted as pulls. They should be marked off the sheet as obtained and available to build the deck from once obtained and not placed in the pool of cards to pull randoms from when upgrading with a reward.

I haven't seen anything in the rulebook or OP Guide that would indicate this is correct. If you have, please quote it. It would be great to be incorrect about this.

drgnmstr44 wrote:
Example: I'm playing the rogue deck I got for my first random weapon deck upgrade the Animal Bane +1 Dagger which if I recall is adventure deck 1. the weapon B I replaced doesn't go back in to the pool of weapons I draw from for random upgrades since I already earned the card. it's always available to choose when constructing my deck. So when I get the random weapon draw from a scenario deck 3, those B level cards aren't as available.

Again, with apologies if you can quote something that supports this, I think you're way off base here. If you want that AB Dagger, it REPLACES a weapon in your deck. The replaced weapon does not stick around in some kind of "card limbo" for you to switch in and out whenever you like. The rules make no mention of using a character sheet to track everything you've ever obtained. What's in your deck is in your deck, and everything else lives in the box, including replaced cards.

drgnmstr44 wrote:
I do think you have a good idea though that if I'm pulling a card from a level 3, there should be a lower limit to what I can be in the available pool.

Thanks.


yes you are right....

Grand Lodge

drgnmstr44, Johnny is correct. There is no poll to build from. As you pick an upgrade from your class deck, you return the replaced card back in the box (as stated in the guide pg. 7). No where in the guide (or rulebook) does it mention that the cards previously obtained (or originally in your deck) are available to rebuild during the time after a scenario when you can rebuild your deck.

The cards do not have memories. As you are upgrading your deck on your sheet, you're erasing the prior card from it.

Sovereign Court

There is a thread here somewhere, Vic specifically clarified that those replaced cards are not "unlocked". They go back to the box and are treated as if you'd never had them, just another card in the box.


Andrew L Klein wrote:
There is a thread here somewhere, Vic specifically clarified that those replaced cards are not "unlocked". They go back to the box and are treated as if you'd never had them, just another card in the box.

Link to that thread.


Ok that post you linked is interesting, however it's not quoting rules either. I did pull my guild to organized play out and it does seem to state that I'm wrong. (page 7 of the guide).

However this brings up something I have to question. If we are not meant to have a history of items acquired, then why is a check list for the character decks included with the PDFs of the characters in the class deck? Seeing that in there makes me think we should have a history of things earned. Otherwise, Johnny is correct in that scenario rewards for random pulls from the box become worse and worse of a way to upgrade and a terrible reward. Do you get better odds at getting an upgrade that way vs randomness of locations, sure. But for a reward from level 3 and up, it's a hard pill to swallow.

Another thought here, without a pool to build from, if you banish a card from your deck to the box, you'd have to replace it in the beginning of the next scenario with a basic card, which effectively can really hurt the player. I would have thought that the inclusion of a check off list would mean track you earned rewards and you can use those to fill spots in the deck for the missing cards. Having to rebuild from basic or level 1 kind of means that there are certain things I will never take because they get banished due to lack of a skill for that character, making them completely worthless.

Given what I found this morning, I like the idea that random pulls should have a minimum limit as well as a max limit.

Sovereign Court

That link doesn't quote rules, no, but it's from Vic. There's maybe 2 (if even) other people on these forums with more authority to say how the game works. That mixed with the fact that it's never indicated anywhere that you have "unlocked" cards to build your deck with.

The point of the checklist is to track what is currently in your deck. What if you want to play a second Cleric? You have to tear apart the first, and I doubt you're going to remember every single card in the deck you just tore down. Just like with the base game.

Unless it's specified somewhere, OP rules are the same as the base game.

Grand Lodge

The checklist has two functions. First it shows you what is contained in the class deck for your character. It shows what you have coming up for upgrades. Second, it helps track your current deck for your character. Like Andrew said, if you happen to have two different clerics running out of the same class deck box, you need a way to track those cards.

You'll see that in this thread and others, people aren't pleased about the idea that random picks (with all the lower cards available) is something that we don't enjoy.


I suppose that makes sense, Andrew. It gives me couple concerns I'll discuss in a separate thread later so as not to derail this topic further.

On topic, I like the idea but where should the lower limit fall? I was thinking maybe scenario level minus 2. So for scenarios in part 3 the range would be 1 to 3 available for random pulls. It limits the available cards but still doesn't guarantee you get a level 3 card.

Sovereign Court

I think occasionally fully randoms are fine, but I do like that things have been added like the recent reward that allowed you an ally of your choice up to your current adventure. Minimum level randoms would be good, but I like that sometimes it's just random, no minimum, nothing. Sometimes all you found in that cave is a busted up rusted short sword. Just not in every single cave :)

Pathfinder ACG Designer

(designer brain dump)
The feedback I've been seeing everywhere indicates that random rewards should be occasional, rather than the norm. My internal modeling indicates that I need to mix random and choose-your-own rewards to keep scenario rewards attractive. Or we can turn down the utility of deck upgrades to improve the attractiveness of scenario rewards.
(/brain dump)


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Or, would it be possible to tweak the random rewards? For instance, give
a non-basic, non-elite random X" in later adventures, sort of like how it was in later RotR adventures (not sure if it was 5 or 6). Or could a rule be put in place to remove Basic or Elite cards from the class deck along with the box? Even if not at the same rate, removing Basic or Elite cards that are 3 lower than the current adventure would seem valuable.


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Tanis O'Connor wrote:
Or we can turn down the utility of deck upgrades ...

Please don't! I'm in adventure 3 with one OP character and in adventure 4 with another. I take a deck upgrade in less than half the scenarios I play. I'm finding it difficult to upgrade my deck (soon I may fall out of the legal-replay zone.)

Perhaps my groups just aren't skilled at boon-farming.


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Possibly - my group does decently well at it, in that we are heavy scouters (Radillo has 3 scouting spells and I have a per-turn scouting ability that synergizes well with Meliski's encounter the bottom ability)

Tanis, I think part of the problem is that there's a significant chance that your "random reward" won't be a reward at all. And people really hate being told they would get a reward and then not get one. Unlike in the base game, they can't even pass it onto somebody else who could likely use it.

I mean, isn't that the same reason those types of rewards tend to disappear from the higher level scenarios? Because at Adventure 4, you're most likely fairly tuned and any random stuff is very likely to become worthless?

Also, tuning down the utility of deck upgrades may be an idea, but there's already complaints that the deck upgrades aren't useful because half of them (or 90% of them) are not useful for your character and you have to take incredibly suboptimal choices if you wanted to run a character up to the max on some deck slots. I suppose you'd adjust the difficulty accordingly, then people would complain about the die roll being too big a determinant on whether or not you pass a check.

Wow, I'm sorry Tanis, I just realized how hard your job was.

My experience has been that while I haven't maxed out on deck upgrades yet, I have somewhat maxed out on deck upgrades 1 below my adventure level (I could use more blessings). I don't think I'm the typical experience however, but it may be the experience of a party who's used to these types of games.

Paizo Employee Chief Technical Officer

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zeroth_hour wrote:
My experience has been that while I haven't maxed out on deck upgrades yet, I have somewhat maxed out on deck upgrades 1 below my adventure level (I could use more blessings). I don't think I'm the typical experience however, but it may be the experience of a party who's used to these types of games.

My gut says that's right about where we want you to be.

Liberty's Edge 4/5 5/55/5 **

Pathfinder Battles Case Subscriber; Pathfinder Maps, Pathfinder Accessories Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Charter Superscriber; Starfinder Charter Superscriber
Hawkmoon269 wrote:
Yes. That is correct.

Wow, I have been getting that wrong.

I thought you drew a random card from the Base Set box and you choose a any card that matches that adventure set number from your class deck.

Liberty's Edge 4/5 5/55/5 **

Pathfinder Battles Case Subscriber; Pathfinder Maps, Pathfinder Accessories Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Charter Superscriber; Starfinder Charter Superscriber

I see my confusion....

This is from the Guide.

"If you are rewarded with a card from the box, you will instead take a random card of the same type from your Class Deck box. The card you take cannot have an adventure deck number higher than that of the scenario you completed."

But I read the next line and missed the first

"For example, if you just completed a scenario in adventure 2, and the scenario reward was a random item from the box, you would instead take an item with an adventure deck number no higher than 2 from your Class Deck."

The example does not quite read right. It makes it sound like draw a random item from the box, but instead of adding that you take an item from you deck that matches or is lower then the adventure deck. There should be the word random here:

"You would instead take an random item with an adventure deck number no higher than 2 from your Class Deck"

Sovereign Court RPG Superstar 2011 Top 32

drgnmstr44 wrote:


Another thought here, without a pool to build from, if you banish a card from your deck to the box, you'd have to replace it in the beginning of the next scenario with a basic card, which effectively can really hurt the player. I would have thought that the inclusion of a check off list would mean track you earned rewards and you can use those to fill spots in the deck for the missing cards. Having to rebuild from basic or level 1 kind of means that there are certain things I will never take because they get banished due to lack of a skill for that character, making them completely worthless.

I noticed this back when the upgrade rules were first made available. However, now that I've played a character to the end of adventure 2, I will say that I'm beginning to get fewer actually useful upgrades anyway, so the idea of having to use one to replace a banished card is not so bad when otherwise I would take nothing.

My situation may be unusual since it took me something like 6 attempts to beat the first scenario so I got a lot of upgrades right off the bat.

2/5 *

I'm encountering this problem as well. In addition to the problem already mentioned, most of the cards in the class deck box aren't suitable for my character. So it makes it even less likely that I'll draw something I'd use.

It makes more sense that we'd draw a card from the adventure deck box, and use the set # of the drawn card to pick something from our class deck box. We're not guaranteed an upgrade, but it's more likely.

I'm not sure how other people are doing in OP, but it's quite often in scenarios that I don't get any reward... and I could use them! And other times it's feast or famine, and I can only pick 1 upgrade. This is solo, don't know how it plays in larger groups.

Grand Lodge

Jason S wrote:

I'm encountering this problem as well. In addition to the problem already mentioned, most of the cards in the class deck box aren't suitable for my character. So it makes it even less likely that I'll draw something I'd use.

It makes more sense that we'd draw a card from the adventure deck box, and use the set # of the drawn card to pick something from our class deck box. We're not guaranteed an upgrade, but it's more likely.

I'm not sure how other people are doing in OP, but it's quite often in scenarios that I don't get any reward... and I could use them! And other times it's feast or famine, and I can only pick 1 upgrade. This is solo, don't know how it plays in larger groups.

At this point, when my players see the reward is a random this or that, they pretty much ignore the reward. The chance of pulling something they need versus just upgrading from the cards we gather is very slim. I'm truly hoping that the reward system makes some significant changes for Season 1.

Sovereign Court

Hopefully having 3 characters per deck now means those changes won't have to be as significant.

Sczarni 4/5

Theryon Stormrune wrote:
Jason S wrote:

I'm encountering this problem as well. In addition to the problem already mentioned, most of the cards in the class deck box aren't suitable for my character. So it makes it even less likely that I'll draw something I'd use.

It makes more sense that we'd draw a card from the adventure deck box, and use the set # of the drawn card to pick something from our class deck box. We're not guaranteed an upgrade, but it's more likely.

I'm not sure how other people are doing in OP, but it's quite often in scenarios that I don't get any reward... and I could use them! And other times it's feast or famine, and I can only pick 1 upgrade. This is solo, don't know how it plays in larger groups.

At this point, when my players see the reward is a random this or that, they pretty much ignore the reward. The chance of pulling something they need versus just upgrading from the cards we gather is very slim. I'm truly hoping that the reward system makes some significant changes for Season 1.

Indeed actually last time we played an adventure at game day with a random reward, only one person even bothered to try drawing for it, and they didn't keep it, which is unfortunately becoming the norm. It pretty much reads to the groups in the 4s and 5s as if the scenario said- hey no reward, but maybe you get a deck upgrade for playing the scenario. Especially since about 75% of the cards are geared for one of the other character cards in the box... or in some cases just in the box because reasons.

My suggestion for this? Make the random reward drawn from only the cards of that type within the box, of the adventure deck number and those with numbers up to two lower. Make a guide to org play note on how random rewards are done, and you no longer have the problem of being at 5 and getting a random reward with 90% of the available rewards being B or 1 cards, (I know there are more of these cards for the initial deckbuilding, a lot more than any other option... but we ALWAYS seem to draw them on a random reward...)

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