TOPIC: Pay-to-Win?

I wonder if this could be better addressed in the coaching room (as if they don't have enough to worry about already).

What level do you guys want to run at? OK, Normal mode it is. Keep in mind that many of you will die in the dungeon unless you have EITHER brought some tokens OR you have good strategy and teamwork. If that's not OK with you please consider running non-lethal mode.

Non-lethal seems very under-used given how much people complain about being killed. My interpretation of the difficulties:

Non-Lethal: I just want to have fun and not die and experience the whole dungeon

Normal: I very well may die unless I created some sort of token build ahead of time OR unless I have a team I can work well with

Hardcore: Unless I have a solid build (say rare-level) and/or great teamwork I'm probably going to die.

Nightmare: Unless I have a solid build (UR-level) and/or great teamwork I'm probably going to die.

If somebody wants to play Normal difficulty and not die with a random pick-up group then yes they may need to invest a little in tokens. I don't see this as "pay to win". You are already paying $52+ to play the game (an experience already subsidized by many of us through our token purchases). You can play on non-lethal. Or you can bring a good team. Or you can spend say $25 on tokens.

I don't see the big deal here, but in the conversation there were 3-4 people saying "pay to win, no way not for me".

We do a pair of 'sealed deck' runs every year for at least 4 years. (meaning just the 1 token pack provided with the ticket) Besides being my favorite runs, the group always gets to room 7, and I do not remember anyone not being alive for room 7, but there may be an exception I'm not remembering. Success in room 7 is probably about 50%, but we all participated in the whole dungeon, so it is very possible with limited tokens on Normal level.

I count a win as everyone having fun, and we win every year.

I guess I would agree with you Kirk that at the "normal" difficulty, the power creep and demand for high value tokens is not profound.

With regard to the medusa room, you guys were lucky. My group all had mirrors and the twerp DM told us they would not work. Why, you may ask. He would not say, but I assume it was because we were too powerful. What a load of BS.

Needless to say, despite the occasional twerp DM, excessive power creep, and ever growing costs, we are intending to continue to play TD for the foreseeable future. We have a great group and we enjoy the game and each other's company.

Disbeeleaf wrote: Needless to say, despite the occasional twerp DM, excessive power creep, and ever growing costs, we are intending to continue to play TD for the foreseeable future. We have a great group and we enjoy the game and each other's company.

Yeah, I want to add that despite those issues, our little group has gotten MORE invested in the community and can't wait for next year. And that twerp led me to be a GM. And I had the BEST TIME last year!!

I personally hope to get to play with more of you guys, I'd really like to try to group up with some of you to make lasting adventure parties, and all that. I don't mean to imply that feeling like buying tokens helps me is a bad thing. It's okay. I'm enjoying hunting for the pieces I need, bartering and trading. It's a cool thing to do until the next dungeon.

Maybe that's off-topic, but there it is. :>

I feel the average new True Dungeon player would feel "winning" would be defined as "being alive at the end of Room 7 in a combat-oriented dungeon or being alive up until the puzzle in Room 7 kills you regardless of any tokens or saves made".

Given that definition, True Dungeon is very much "Pay to Win". Yes, I MAY open a Mithral Coin of Fate in my pack I could immediately redeem for whatever token I need to live through the dungeon, but that is as realistic as saying "Magic is not pay to win, because you might get lucky and open a top-tier meta deck in the first few packs you buy". Yes, it is a possibility, but it is not the least bit probable. And yes, you can meet that definition of winning using no tokens, not even the 10 pack they give you in the run, but using tokens increases your probability of success. No one can argue with that. No matter how bad you are at sliding on Normal, if you have a Horn of Blasting, you can completely circumvent that and still deal damage. Even if the DM has absurdly lucky rolls and constantly rolls 20s to hit, having damage reducing tokens and HP boosting tokens will increase how many hits it takes to kill you. Or actually factor in probability: the DM rolls a regular random distribution, if you have legendary armor on Normal, you'll almost never take damage and should have a higher chance of living through room 7.

I am confident every gamer has a different threshold of how many percentage points for the likelihood of success can be gained by spending more money. I am sure no one will try to say a game where the difference between someone spending no additional money on tokens and one who does is a 1% change in the probability of winning that game would argue that game is pay to win. I feel almost everyone would if the percentage change was 99%. But maybe for True Dungeon, lets say it changes your chance of living to the end by 20%? Is that pay to win? To some, it certainly is. To others, not so much. And to make matters even muddier, determining that exact percentage is pretty grey and varies from DM to DM. For the unmodifiable DC 10 roll with the Gorgon, that's a 50% change in success if you had Scroll Stone to Flesh, to me that most certainly would have been a pay to win experience.

Sharkley (Zack) wrote: My personal feeling of 'win' was getting to participate in the whole dungeon.

Cool, now that we have defined parameters, we can discuss specifics.

Sharkley (Zack) wrote: My question comes down to "Do I need to buy tokens for that to occur?"

My general answer is: on normal mode (and NL as well, but that's a given), no. The key word is "need". Normal mode is designed to be played with just the tokens you get in the free 10-pack. There is no guarantee of survival, but it is possible. If everyone in the group plays smartly (the team cooperates, is organized, pays attention, etc.) you improve your odds of survival immensely. Conversely, if the group doesn't cooperate, is disorganized, and nobody listens to the DM, the odds of being able to participate in the entire dungeon plummet. No amount of über tokens can overcome jackassery.

I am in no way suggesting one's odds don't improve with the purchasing of tokens--they absolutely do. I'm just saying that on normal mode, additional purchases are not required.

I am in no way suggesting you will always make it to the last room. You could have a string of bad luck, a series of bad slides, or a tornado of brain farts. Feces occurs. But buying tokens is no guarantee of survival.

Sharkley (Zack) wrote: It's my perception that a monster had an ability to petrify a whole party in two rounds, which could have been prevented by buying tokens.

Had the players acted differently, their characters might have survived. The actress portraying the medusa was deliberately trying to get players to look at her. I can tell you from personal experience, you didn't have to look at her.

One experience in one dungeon on one run does not a general rule make. Sure, having purchased tokens would have aided in your survival that one time, but that could be said about almost all rooms. If you had eaten a Spotted Green Mushroom in this year's Into the Underdark you would not have hallucinated and your party might not have died due to friendly fire. In 2013 when fighting The Guardian, maybe the party would not have died from Magic Missile attacks if they all had Ioun Stone Violet Prisms. Do I need to go on? ("NO!" they all screamed.)

Furthermore, did you know you were going to face a medusa? Did you know you were going to face a hallucination-inducing mushroom man? Did you know you would be facing a Magic Missile spewing construct? There are hundreds of corner-case remedy tokens available, but most players do not go through the dungeon with 80 pounds of tokens strapped to their back on the off chance they might encounter something requiring that obscure token. Most of the normal mode players get to see the end of the adventure without any additional tokens.

You had a bad run of luck. That sucks. I'm genuinely sorry you did not enjoy your experience. That does not mean there is a blanket rule in TD that on normal mode additional token purchases are required.

Sharkley (Zack) wrote: I just don't think it's safe to say that 6 people in my party all should have had something in their free bags

I didn't say you should have had any of the previously mentioned items. I said you could have had them. I realize you didn't. That does not mean there is a blanket rule in TD that on normal mode additional token purchases are required.

Sharkley (Zack) wrote: I admit this particular example is jaded because I didn't get to roll my save and the DM didn't check our saves on the card (so +save tokens wouldn't have done anything for me), so this is a little on the frustration-emotional end for me

I fully understand and sympathize with you. That said, poor DMing is a separate issue. The DM absolutely should have checked your saves. That s/he didn't is not cool! However, that occasionally there are crappy player experiences caused by crappy DMing (or coaching) does not mean there is a blanket rule in TD that on normal mode additional token purchases are required.

Sharkley (Zack) wrote: I mean, in this situation, where I didn't draw them, what could I do differently?

Not looking at the medusa was one option. I wasn't with you at the time, so it's difficult for me to speculate on what else may have occurred that could have been done differently.

Sharkley (Zack) wrote: (Edit: By the way, I love the eyes-closed idea, but doesn't help the 2 guys that got petrified for walking into the room , hehe )

When you walked in that room, there was a screen upon which the shadow of the medusa could be seen. The medusa was not supposed to be able to petrify anyone until she emerged from behind the screen and started making eye contact. So either you're mis-remembering the beginning of the room or the DM was not running the room according to the description in the module.

Sharkley (Zack) wrote: Please take this as thoughtful only, I do want to understand and I'd like it if I'm wrong about this.

I think your understandably unfavorable emotional reaction to one specific event is making you think the barrel is full of rotten apples because the one apple you tasted had a worm in it.

TLDR: As a general rule, on normal difficulty, additional tokens are certainly helpful, but are not required to ensure your survival.

I have run in a group that has done sealed runs the last three years. The only issue we had was the end of Viper's Pit, where we lost 4 party members due to petrification and then the rest of us were killed in the last room, in three rounds. We were more frustrated by that than the petrification.

I agree with the idea that 'winning' can mean different things to different people. I want to live to the last room and make a good showing against the 'boss'.

I will read this thread later, I need to get to work. I will mention that on my on shift at true dungeon this year I had two groups of new players come into my room all dead. I spun this for them, and one group took me up on another combat, and one decided to hear the story and leave.

I ran through all the basic dungeons this year as a player as well. The only one the group agreed was possible on the basic pack with the rules we knew was Sable Puzzle, and that is the one we had he most fun on.

Surviving to the last room and having a good time are both win conditions, but your player may only care about one of those, and if they don't like the one they're handed, they didn't get either.

Druegar wrote:

Sharkley (Zack) wrote: I'm sorry, I disagree, and I have a situation to back this belief up.
This is my 2014 example.

I disagree, have facts to back that up, and feel no compulsion to apologize.

• Scroll Stone to Flesh was re-printed in 2014. You could have received one in your free bag. You did not have to pay to get one.

You get two uncommons in your pack, and there were 40 uncommons in the 2014 collection. That's only a 5% chance to get one, and a less than 50% chance that anyone in the room opens one. If nobody sees it (or the one person that does doesn't show it to the rest of the room), then a new player wouldn't even know the token exists.

You could have succeeded on your petrification save. It was only DC 10 on Normal mode.

So a 50% chance of instant death? Remember, new players don't necessarily know how saves work, so they might hear "DC 10" and assume that means you have to roll above 10 on the die or it's game over man. Or maybe most people are smarter than me and can figure it out on their own - I dunno. I've never really played D&D, so maybe it's just something that everyone knows, but I really feel like it should be explained *somewhere*. After GenCon in 2014, I even checked every TD rulebook and reference I could find and couldn't find it spelled out anywhere how you calculate your save.

In fact, I still don't know whether ties count - I can't figure out whether "DC 10" means you need to roll 10 or higher or 11 or higher (after modifiers), which means I still don't know whether or not I was actually supposed to turn to stone in the dungeon. (I rolled a 5, and had a natural +5 to that save.)

But yes, that encounter definitely drove people away from the game forever. I talked to a couple friends who had fought the Medusa on Thursday (before I saw that dungeon), and all they had too say was complaints about how a single die roll killed them and there was nothing they could do about the 50-50 chance. None of the ways to mitigate the roll (save bonuses, specific uncommon/rare tokens) are obvious to a first-timer who doesn't spend weeks on the forum memorizing every little detail about the game.

After typing all that out, I just realized something...players aren't supposed to calculate their own saves, are they? I think I got the wrong impression after that DM handed me the die and said "Save against DC 10" that one time.

SO non-lethal doesn't get pushed as much as it should is the moral of the story. Coaches are so pressed for time to get all the tokens in order especially with late comers that they don't have the time to sort out the party and determine if they are making the "wrong" choice on difficulty.

I can only speak for myself, but I try and carve out a bit of time to discuss challenge rating in TD and I usually start buy just asking if there is anyone that would be super mad if they died in room 2 and couldn't do anything for the rest of the run.
Some folks just want the story mode and that is perfectly fine, other people want the risk of death. I do chuckle when folks want the risk of death then get very mad when it happens even after being warned.

I get being mad when you've been cheated and sadly it does come up with DMs from time to time. TD takes steps every year to reduce that from happening and overall the game play has improved year over year.


Like I said in my original post, the Pay-To-Win comment will ultimately boil down to a single bad experience or misunderstanding.

Druegar wrote: Scroll Stone to Flesh was re-printed in 2014. You could have received one in your free bag. You did not have to pay to get one.

Allen John wrote: You get two uncommons in your pack, and there were 40 uncommons in the 2014 collection. That's only a 5% chance to get one, and a less than 50% chance that anyone in the room opens one.

I didn't say you would get one, I said you could have gotten one.

Druegar wrote: You could have succeeded on your petrification save. It was only DC 10 on Normal mode.

Allen John wrote: So a 50% chance of instant death?

No, a 50% chance to avoid being petrified. Petrification is not the same thing as death. The former is significantly easier to recover from than the latter.

Allen John wrote: I still don't know whether ties count

DC acts just like AC. It is the number you need to hit/roll. E.g., if you roll a 10 vs. a DC 10 Fort save, you succeed.

Allen John wrote: players aren't supposed to calculate their own saves, are they?

Coaches tally all your save bonuses and record them on the party card. The only time a player would need to modify the recorded number(s) is if they use a token or effect that temporarily changes their saves.