Hello there, folks! I know this has been a really popular topic lately, but bear with me for just a moment. this will be a long thread. I’d like to start by saying that I appreciate how every single person in this community seems to have some positive, constructive feedback. This post is just for the challenge structure, I’ll see if I can make a follow-up post for my battle pass progression ideas.
I had a difficult time with challenges the other night. I stayed up all night to grind through the entire list, it sapped the joy out of me, and 2 minutes before reset, I discovered the wonderful thing that is capstone challenges. after sitting and stewing for what feels like almost an entire week. i’ve come up with a list of improvements, some to 343/microsoft’s business model, and I hope it’s good enough. Many of these ideas are based on other F2P models.
-first of all, every player needs to receive 1 free challenge swap a day, capping at 5(minimum). That way, players who only can get on for 4-5 rounds a day because of work/life/whatever can log in, get their freebie, don’t have to use it right away, and don’t feel too left behind.
-Tiered challenge reward system, with a tracking counter. 5-10-20+ challenges completed, you should get some kind of reward, that increases in coolness, instead of just one reward for the week. 20 is a good place to put an armor coating, but how many challenges are things like a charm or a nameplate “worth”, exactly? what about the rares and common items? For your all-day players, how many matches do they go through on average per session, per diem? for your average players and your least-attendance players, what are their averages? there should be a tiered-something for everybody. Otherwise, there’s nothing to reward them for the effort and nothing for them to go back to.
-Now, these don’t have to be armor coatings or keychains, or even necessarily armor pieces/vehicle/weapon skins; although that would be nice for the community to see. It can be something as simple as in-game-currency, or challenge swaps, etc. for lower tiers. You can have repeating items week to week, if you want to make sure everyone gets a chance to get them. For players who complete challenges and reach a tier they’ve already received, they’d probably love an alternative reward, even if its a consumable or xp.
-people lately have been upset about paywalls, and offering the ability to earn 50-100 in-game-currency at a time, every 5+ matches, will make them feel much better about it. then people could earn the extra battle pass slot for free, and might be inclined to support the developers. Other solutions to the paywall problem include offering two separate currencies, (one you buy, one your earn) and giving them an equivalent exchange rate… but that’s a topic for another post.
-Dont put a cap on challenges. Or at least, give it a large cap, like 100. Let the players go through as many as they want to go through in a week. That way you keep your serious all-day players happy, and able to do all the progression they want to, and your part-time players who have actual work/life balance feel included.
-Medal-based xp awards. you can go as low as 10xp per medal, starting at the lowest tier (splatter, double kill, etc) and scaling up to 100+ for harder medals.
-On that note, that gives you room to make as many fun challenges as you like! e.g, Earning points for 5 double kills, on top of the xp for those double kill medals? I’m not sure how big your master list is, but if its endlessly repeating on shuffle, the players will have a lot more engaging variety.
-unlock the last challenge slot for everyone, not just battle pass holders. stay tuned for my battle pass ideas… assuming this thread sticks around.
-Include a challenge counter in the score menu (back button) in-match, with live updates, because the engine does live-track progression. If you are intent on including challenges into the gameplay, you might as well make them as accessible as possible. If you have that one player who is adamant on finishing them all in one day, people might lose track of their list or be thinking about BRs, for example, when what they really need is Chopper kills. There’s even the possibility that those kills might be more satisfying, if the players can keep an eye on them!
Hopefully, these ideas will help player engagement, and help everyone feel more fulfilled when playing this game! I understand that there may be some roadblocks when it comes to the in-game-currency ideas, because large publishing companies are worried about de-incentivizing microtransactions. Many of these ideas blend well together with a game that advertised never-expiring seasons.
However, the important part is that it makes the players feel accomplished, confident in their developers, and having fun. You can’t sell copies of a game if it doesn’t feel rewarding to play it.
Anyway yeah, thank for for your time and thank you for reading my idea salad.