Halloween month events - a retrospect
So I wanted to write this on Thursday but I’ve been busy. Hopefully it’s not too late! I’ve been thinking- we have a weekly PVP thread; it might be nice to also do a discussion thread for big event months as a whole. Just take everything in and see what was nice and what wasn’t. Hence, in this thread I’m going to look at the individual events this month, as well as taking a look at flow of events as a whole.
Hearts, Skulls and Gold Event with Gunner Undead Rescuer
A nice easy way to start off Halloween month. Not intensive at all, which allows for a nice breather from the Demon Arena event the week before. Though I imagine the people with a smaller backlog of Gold may have liked it less.
Personal rating: 3.5/5
Corrupt Ox Cultist Fragment Event
Yeah, yeah, another one of these. Not so much for the endgame people I realize. Still, there are a lot of great 4* Assassins out there and NF seemed to pick the most boring of them all. Good fit for Halloween though (though Death Dog and Assassin Troll could fit the Halloween style too IMO).
Personal rating: 2.5/5
Fear Friday 13th
Probably the best event of the month. That prohibitive SoT cost is one of the biggest ramps to visiting BNW a lot, so it was nice that you could play Garden of Fear for free for a day. Not only that, but the free entry allowed a lot of people to experiment with playing the higher levels on auto, which is a fantastic catalyst for developing a strategy for this level. Sure I lost like 5 times that day, but SoT was free so I could try again easy, losing nothing but time. Plus I’m glad NF did something for Friday the 13th in October. Excellent idea. I would love to see a ‘Life lundi’ or ‘Dismay dinsdag/donderdag’ in the future. Would be a great asset for the community.
Personal rating: 5/5
Pumpkin Sacrificial Slaughter Event
My personal highlight. Possibly the best Sacrifice event NF has ever done. I’ve never done so many Tier 6es in so short a time. I burned through my entire stock in the Book of Souls (save for 2 Trickster Souls I’m keeping back) and it was awesome. I got so many toons I was missing: all Valkyries and Demon Gangmembers save for the Warriors, the last 2 CotD I was missing, and the Legendary Soul redeemed itself in my eyes by giving me my first ever Samurai Eddie. Looking forward to a possible Wickerdeer Sacrificial Slaughter already!
Personal rating: 5/5
Dark Rituals Event
An improved version of the Demon Gang Arena Event in my eyes. For one, the Arena wasn’t a crash-ridden mess, which made it less frustrating to play. Getting fragments for losses and draws also helped. While I wasn’t the biggest fan of getting Ritual Souls alongside the Sentinel Priestess because you don’t get enough of them to get a new character (unless you went at it like Slauki did), it makes a lot of sense from a business perspective. That said, if the next Arena event had a higher chance of 50 drops for the exclusive soul (a la Gunner Chopper and Sentinel Mayan Priestess), I would greatly appreciate it because holy crap grinding for her with nothing but 5 and 10 drops was grueling.
A note on the Ritual Soul: perhaps it’s worth it reviewing the dropchance of special characters in that thing. I bought 70 (plus 5 or so from the Arena event), and I got only two Priestesses out of it. Sure, the dupes are good fuel for Sacrifices, but 2 new characters from 70 Souls is a bit… underwhelming.
Personal rating: 3.5/5
Hallowed Be Thy Game Event
Ending Halloween month with a new Eddie was a solid idea on paper, I will say that. Making the Halloween Souls available in ways other than plain Ironite spending right after the Ritual Souls was also solid. I was still really low on XP Shards from the Pumpkin event so I spent the week grinding LoL to culminate in a big Sacrifice on the last day of the event. After reading how horrible the drops were though, I elected to wait with the Sacrifice for another time. My 13 Halloween Souls had nice drops at least: 2 FotD and an AoP. All dupes, but great value for Sacrifice. While I would have liked to see the Fear of the Dark level back I do understand the technical issues holding that back. A shame, hopefully next year works out better. I’m also not convinced on Hallowed Eddie. I don’t really see a simple beer mascot joining the ranks of the 5* with Cyborg and Aces High. In terms of lore & feel I would have suggested to keep him at 3* or 4* (at the risk of overcrowding the pool with Soldier, Tailgunner, and Navigator). Prisoner as an increased drop is already way cool. Hallowed could have been nicer as a thing for the collection like Coalgiver.
Personal rating: 2/5
Overall
This month has had a few ups and downs in terms of events, but there’s one problem with them: their order. The three most intensive events (Pumpkins, Fear Friday, Dark Rituals) had barely a day in between them. It was pretty exhausting. Next time I’d suggest doing something like the Ox Cultist and Gunner Undead Rescuer in between events of this caliber so everyone has time to catch their breath. It will also help prevent burnout, which I believe is in everyone’s best interest. In general, I think a week of no events every so often would go a long way in holding off people’s burnouts.
The final problem in order was with Hallowed Be Thy Game. In terms of business perspective I’d put the event that would make the most people the happiest last, so people come away with good memories. Now, the Hallowed Event has negatively colored everyone’s perception of Halloween month because it was last. Were it placed elsewhere it would have simply been a bad apple, and ignored more.
Finally, while I do understand NF’s concerns regarding making it too easy for people to snag Hallowed or Prisoner from the Halloween Soul, for a soul that seems even more special and rare than the Ritual/BNW/Gang/etc. Soul, it’s a bit strange that drops appeared to be so disappointing for most. Perhaps an increased chance of premiums (like Anniversary event that aren’t necessarily Hallowed/FotD/Prisoner could have been a possibility. Not to mention, feedback loops are a very big problem: if the soul drops are bad and people complain, then you’re going to have less people buy them as they’ll be disillusioned with all the bad pulls they heard about. That has to be bad for business; certainly stopped me from Sacrificing stuff last Thursday.
If you have anything else to comment on, agree/disagree, add stuff, I’d love to hear it!
