LOCO Future

8/6/2019 LOCO Future

1/16

LOCO and its future

Here we are now With LOCO and its slowly declining playerbase. In my mind something needs to be done

to many of the things going on here and hopefully fairly fast. LOCO has a potential to be a huge success

outside of Korea and its not something that impossible to achieve.

So here let me present some issues that I have with the current state of LOCO and also something little

about Alaplaya and the community and how they could weigh in to make LOCO a better game for all of us.

Anyway this is just a foolish noobs last attempt to get this game on the right track This can also be

considered my last post on the forums as I really have no wish to post anything there anymore at its current

state. Hope you have fun reading if you care and fun trolling/flaming if you dont

ContentMatching system

Intrusion, Leaving and Punishments

Hero swapping

Knockback

Shields

Hero selection

PWF (team matching)

Tutorial/Game videos

Forums and Alaplaya

Bugs and DanalExtras

Balance

Conclusion


2/16

Matching system

Matching system should be made alike to what it is in HoN. Im not saying this because of being someone

who likes HoN or plays it a lot (I dont), but I think that they succeeded well in creating their matching

system. This would basically mean that when you join a matching game, it would start an x/10 counter and

you could stay in the general chat talking to people while waiting for a game to start.

Also the way how auto-balancing system works would need to be revamped as it currently works by

KD -> LP -> Grade. This is specially poor after Burning tower got introduced as people are able to kill

themselves xx times before the game starts to get extra gold and worsen their KD. That being said, I'm also

against Grade being that much of a deciding factor because of people making alts. So this would be my

opinion, which might seem poor to some and would also require a ladder LP reset. Make it purely based on

LP! Shocking eh... Its ladder matching for gods sake, LP should matter, not other stats.

Purely LP based system might be fairly poor for few weeks, but I think thats not something that would

much differ from the current system. After that the matches should be fairly even. This would also mean

that because the teams would be balanced LP wise, there would be no huge LP losses or gains from playing

"unbalanced games".

Also to make it interesting, there should be a LP decay/reset every 1-3 months (seasons) with prizes (Not

necessarily AP prizes, just a cute little crown etc something purely cosmetic that would show that you were

in ladder top 10 last month would be enough).


3/16

Intrusion, Leaving and Punishments

I feel like intrusion system is nice, but it should not be alone without reconnect option. First the player whodisconnected should be given 2 minutes to get back to the game (2 is just an example). After 2 minutes the

game would become intrudable and free for everyone.

Let me again make a reference to Hon, which I think has partly a nice system in use considering players who

blatantly leave the games. There if you have a certain percentage of left games from your total amount of

games, you will not be able to play matching until that percentage has dropped low enough.

Now I realize that this kind of system might be a bit too harsh in LOCO (mainly because of the lack of

players). Even so I really think that the current system with a sadface after x amount of games left is not

working to get rid of people who leave games. You can leave 3-4 times until you get it, then play few CoG

games and games against computer and you will be with a happy face again, ready to leave another 3-4

times. Here are few options that I think would work well...

Making it so that they cant start playing a new game until the old one is finished... Closing them out of matching system completely for some time after a left game... Closing them out of matching system completely until a certain amount of friendly (not

CoG/computer) games is played...

For this system to work, we would need to have the reconnect system in place as most of the people who

disconnect are able to get back to the game within 2 minutes.

Now about the people who intrude, I really dont see a point with people getting draws from lost intrusion

games as there is no reason for that statistic to even exist. That being said I dont think they should get wins

from won intrusion games either.

Best choice here would be to remove draws and add a "intruded games won" statistic. Then only add

points to that if player wins the game while not giving him anything statistics wise if he loses.

Also I would suggest changing the "friendly game list" name to "game list"...

Then we could change the way intrusions are done as the current system is a bit poor. In my mind we

should just have a button in the Games list that we could press and see all the games where intrusion was

possible all the time, matching games included.

This way people who arent called from guilds/teams might also get a chance to join the games when some

nice person decides to leave.


4/16

Hero swapping

In friendly games it should stay as it is, since the games are friendly and there really arent any downsideswith the hero swapping because players might just be trying new strategies and styles...

With matching I think it is a bit different. In my opinion it should be limited to 1 hero change per game,

within a certain amount of time (lets say 10 minutes) and after that the option would be disabled. Specially

in FoC its senseless that strong PvP heroes that are not able to farm fast in the beginning start by Laair and

get 100-150 kills by 15 minutes and change to carry.

I'm not totally against it, but I certainly think that there should be a time limit which would still make it

effective, but no overly strong.

The problem with this would be though, that the player would have to die to change heroes. So to make it

easier we could have an option from HQ for example where you could pick to change your hero before 10

minute mark and then it would make you invulnerable and unable to move for 30 seconds and after that

change the hero.


5/16

Knockback

Basically the system itself is good and just, but I think there is at least 1 huge thing that needs to be

changed.

If you think about what could really knock you back

Hit from a mace can certainly know you down easily Swing of a two-handed sword might be strong enough Certainly a hit with a sledgehammer Polearm? Why not One-handed swords? Im sorry but those are for slicing and cutting, not knockbacking

And here is the biggest problem with knockback for now. One-handed swords really are not something that

should be able to knock back heroes like that, especially since they are so much faster usually.

This would really work well in balancing dual wield Atins, Stellas and Octavians lategame gameplay, which is

really scaringly strong with knockback. Yet I dont feel like this would nerf them too much as knockback is

only really a great extra for those heroes, not a necessity.

These little sticks

should knock you back?

Yeah right.


6/16

Shields

I think that a large change is in order here as shields really dont have a meaningful role in LOCO at the

moment.

At first we need to get stats added to them, Physical defense and Magical defense, just like in all other

armors.

Also I think the block system we currently have is a fairly poor addition so it could be changed in a way or

another. Because the blocking system is such a lackluster and no one really uses it much, shields just end up

hanging there while you keep using maces as Irene for knockback.

These would be the few options in my mind:

Keep it as it is (sad) Change it some way to be able to block some part of skills damage Make it an usable effect

Heres a bit more about the possible usable effect. For example lets call it shield protection which is an

activated effect that lasts 2 seconds and mitigates 50% of damage. This would come with a 1 minute

cooldown to keep tanks from spamming it. It would give them some short time damage resistance for huge

bursts, they are tanks after all.


7/16

Hero selection

There are 2 things that I would really love to see in the hero selection screen.

Hero difficulty Skills

It would really be nice for new players to see if the general difficulty of playing well with a hero would be

easy or hard. This might make people less likely start with foxes and VMBs etc. and more likely with Minity

and Randy or something else with a lot easier basic difficulty. Respectively this would lower the retention

rate already as they would not be quitting so fast after picking a hero that would be really hard for a new

player to play with.

As for having skills showing there, I dont really know any good reason why not. Just by having a little graph

showing what stats the character has is not really enough to give players information about what kind of

hero he is choosing.

It should also be made absolutely clear to them that even though they pick a hero now, it does not mean

that its the one they have to keep playing in the future and that they can easily make more heroes on the

account.


8/16

PWF (team matching)

I might get lots of flame for this, but I really dont think that there is a place for 2-player PWF in solo

matching. If you wish to play with a random friend, then make a friendly game and play there. I think LOCO

should deviate away from the fact that friendly games are somehow lesser than matching games. Of course

this would also require the matching to become completely LP based as otherwise KD would be abused to

get to the side of your friends. (LP cant be abused so easily since if you win with your friend, your LP rises)

Also when I talk about any kind of matching, please remember the "no lobby system from earlier as I think

thats really one of the key changes which need to happen.

Now lets talk about 3v3 and 5v5 team games. I think the system should be completely changed to make it

more appealing for people to start playing as currently its really just a function that almost no one activelyuses.

You should be able to register teams for team matching and playing with those premade teams instead of

randomly inviting people to play. After you would register a 3v3 or 5v5 team (team name, etc.) it would be

possible to just press a button to put that team into matching search... Then for other teams it would show

in a team matching window that there is a team searching for a game without saying anything more about

which team it is.

Also players should not be receiving some personal team points, but the actual teams should be placed in a

team ladder and directly receive the points of the played games. Then every 1-3 months the team ladderwould be reset and the teams would receive a reward (look solo ladder), keep their teams W/L stats and

start again.

For the future I really dont think that you would need the 1 guild 3 teams system at all. The Current

teams could be removed and Players could join a guild and form up to X amount of team matching teams.

Currently teams just pretty much function as place for people to talk and nothing more so some kind of

other system could be made for those needs.

Also would be nice to get separate W/L scores and K/D scored for friendly games and matching games. This

would help in making it realized that friendly games are not some useless random games where peoples

K/D does not even get recorded.


9/16

Tutorial/Game videos

First of all, I wont go too much into what kind of tutorial we should have since the forum is full of those

suggestions. After the tutorial though, there should be a voluntary Lobby tutorial in the main screen to

explain all little things.

New lobby tutorialo Just a voluntary clickable button that starts a text tutorialo Boxes with arrows appearing and showing what everything doeso Need to show how the shop works (special prod etc.)o Encourage players to play novice map (PLAY THIS )o Video Room? Whats that? Most people dont even know.o Missions, how do you do them?

We also need to get some more content to the Video Room, something that will actually make new players

realize what kind of game this is and how to play properly before they bang their heads against a wall and

quit without ever realizing what were they even playing.

Also for the future would be nice to get some kind of Game Guide/Tutorial video making event/competition.

This would get some great material for the new players and also something to post on other game/MOBA

related forums to get more people to try LOCO. Really we can face it that majority of LOCO players are

people who have tried MOBA games before, liked them and wanted to try what it feels like in 3rd

person.

Video room could also be used in showing the best of the player made tutorials/game videos to reach most

of the newer players who are not yet familiar with the forums.


10/16

Forums and Alaplaya

Ah the forums Our little troll infested heaven I bet all the new players feel nothing but warmth and

happiness when they come there to look for information etc.

This is most likely what they will find upon entering

3 Topics about token effects (QQ) 3 Topics about people saying they have had enough 3 Topics about how much LOCO sucks 3 Topics about how much balance etc. sucks 3 Topics about how buggy game LOCO is 10 Suggestion topics next to the suggestion thread X amount of people shouting Aile in their every post or just trolling all the threads

So do you people really think that this is the way to either make Danal or Alaplaya or anyone do anything

for you? Sure it may be nice to have your name seen a lot in the forums or your QQ threads commented a

lot, but is it really the best thing you could be doing? Anyway the point is, that you should all start acting

like the game could still be saved from the destruction its currently headed.

Now this is for Alaplaya and what should be done

Actually HIRE someone to deal with the players in LOCO Scrap the old suggestion threads while getting a collection of good suggestions from them Make a new one that everyone WILL USE (suggestion topics will get removed) Have the hired person keep a watch on it and comment peoples suggestion and explain them why

they are good or bad and why they should or should not be done

After each month collect the best suggestions, Show users what they are and send to Danal. Even ifthey could not give a rats ass, then you have at least done all you can and players would know it

Make 1 thread for bugs in general section and remove the bug section (no one visits it). Have thehired person watch it and keep commenting with the users about what are sent to Danal and the

status of things.

This is a bit off-topic here, but the hired person should stay ingame while he is working. Alwayshaving someone there where people can turn to will make forums cleaner and them happier, even

if solution is not always found.

Force people to post their THIS SUCKS posts in the suggestion thread with solutions to theproblems. All other topics like that removed.

Acquire some memo from Danal every 2 months saying what they think about the suggestions andwhy in their mind they should not be implemented.

All in all, complete forum cleanup and then close monitoring to keep it cleanI can highlight this enough They should actually HIRE someone to do these kinds of things to make sure

that they get done properly and with good care every day. I cant believe that it would not be cost effective.


11/16

Bugs and Danal

Oh Danal, Danal, Danal For some reason they have not realized that when you break something, you have

to fix it first before piling more crap on top of it. Im sure that they have a tight schedule they are following,

but then its the fault of the people who made it without leaving any time for fixing bugs. Nonetheless that

is not an excuse to keep releasing stuff that has not been properly tested and doing nothing when

problems are found out.

Im sure the line We cannot reproduce is familiar to most of the people who have been following the

forums for a longer period of time. I really just cant understand how they are unable to reproduce simple

things when the explanations are being sent to them with screenshots and videos. Also what I have noticed

in few occasions is that they fix something, it returns after a while and they will never look at it again. This

for example has happened with Randy and Partizan and some others. Now after having played Partizan for

a while, I can safely say that Im noticing the chain root bug raising its ugly head again from the mud.

Now what should be done about this?

Really the best option I can think of is halting the development of the game for a month and fully

concentrating on fixing all the bugs. Just by having a working launcher LOCO would gain so many more

players and the no rewards bug is kind of a joke, even for Danal.

Other than that Danal should put some effort into its communication with Alaplaya and the LOCO players

here outside ofKorea. Since its a widely known fact that Korean LOCO is mostly dead, most of the actual

players are here and in Russia. Knowing that, the communication between the players here and them allthe way in Korea is very important. If they only start listening what Korean players (the few) think, things

will really go down the drain.


12/16

Extras

These things arent really the priority now, but they would all be nice little additions for the future...

Guilds page (showing all the guilds and their amount of members etc.) Ladder ranking pages into the game Making the actual guild page more useful Being able to change the hero placement in your Manage Hero window Being able to permanently change the places of your AP items in the AP inventory (currently they

go back to random places when you close once...)

Having ingame tool to report spammers/players Finally getting the replay system Messenger showing those online at the top of the list

Theres nothing too important in here, but still nice little things to make LOCO a bit user friendly.

Well, 1 more thing that I just have to say

Get the event team properly running and start having a monthly tournament day. Even just a monthly 8

player tournament with top 4 teams staying for next month and bottom 4 getting replaced would be

enough. Then have small prizes (Nothing big needed, Its not always about stuff/AP) and have the games

streamed/casted. Just a best of one format should be fine for all games so it would not have to last for a

very long time. Even if you had to give some money (read: AP) for few streamers etc. to keep it running, I

cant see how itwould not give a huge positive publicity for LOCO. Specially now since theres really

nothing competitive in LOCO (Yeah the current tournament not counted).

Any kind of publicity LOCO gets outside of its own playerbase is good. If people from other games see

interesting casted games, they will also like to try the game on their own. Its all really about how widely we

can get LOCO shown to people who dont yet know about it.


13/16

Balance

Finally we are here, the dreaded comments about the balance in LOCO. Ill be talking a bit about the tokens

and skills of every hero, more for those that I know better. Balance has always been an issue that divides

peoples opinions greatly. Currently I would say that LOCO is fairly balanced, not counting few changes that

could and should be made.

Lets beginso we can get the Flaming going. Ill start with the heroes that I think are mostly balanced and

need no big changes.

Kilmor

I would not really change anything since he can be a strong hero when played correctly, but even so wont

really ever become overpowered if playing against equally skilled opponents.

Irene

She does her job well, which is to be able to take lots of damage, heal and disable opponents a bit. I would

really say that currently she is the most balanced hero in LOCO.

Merino

All in all he is a very balanced hero. He has very strong supporting abilities (Sheep, Golden Bell) but to

counter that if opponents focus him first, wont survive for long.

Gengou

Would say he is currently balanced, just requires some practice to play well in higher level.

Nosferatu

With his burst can do huge amount of damage in a small time, but becomes less and less powerful as the

game goes further. His movement speed counters the burst damage pretty well so he isnt an ideal ganker

because wont be able to catch the opponents after they dodge the stun with immunity. Balanced.

Randy Rozz

All in all I would say that randy is a fairly balanced hero. I wouldnt start changing his attack ra nge since that

one of the few things he has going for himself. If there is 1 thing that might deserve a nerf, it would be

snipe cooldown. I would not honestly mind it being raised to 15-20 seconds.


14/16


15/16

Octavian

Octavian can really become a beast in the late game if he is using Gods Anger. Im not certain if he was

ever meant to wield 2 one-handed swords, but taking the Knockback away from them would again be

crucial. Also I would decrease the damage he does when ultimate is on by x% total, not just against

structures.

Hibachi

Her Kidney Shot ability should show better to the enemies. Just little flashing bubbles are not enough and

teams without Ventrilo/TS communication are in unneeded trouble as they dont know when to remove it

in team fights. Also Clone damage to Bosses should be disabled as its borderline abuse to take bosses

down with it in few seconds.

Stella

Here again the one-handed swords knockback removal would do wonders. Currently seeing how both of

her token swords give 5/6 % attack speed and Fever Dance 36%, frequency of the knockbacks grows too

high. Also I think that Holy Sword Dance should last a bit less time since making her skill immune for 12

seconds really seems too much.

Ellan

And finally we are here, addressing the current joke of LOCO (well partly at least). Let me ask you

something

What do you get when you add 60% armor reduce, spinning attack skill just like Atin, fastest movement

speed in the game and possibility to get 60% ranged damage reduction? Thats right kids, you get Ellan

1-2 of those things should get changed in one way of another. I dont mean some huge nerfs, but lowering

ranged damage reduction and armor reduce by 10% both would be a good start to see if it would change

anything. This would basically mean Rush Of The Monarch giving 15/30% reduction instead of 20/40% and

Armor Crash reducing opponents physical defence by 12,5/25/37,5/50% instead of 15/30/45/60%.

Kalimah

Hes a way too new hero to be talking balance wise, so lets just forget him for now.

Anyways, thats pretty much it about hero balance issues in LOCO. Of course there are other little things

that should get tweaked, but nothing that hugely stands out.


16/16

Conclusion

As a conclusion I would like to say, that LOCO is an amazing game that has started going down and down on

the charts after closed beta. Slowly but surely the playerbase is declining because of the bugs and Danals

lack of care they give towards fixing their own mistakes.

This would be the current graph of LOCO

And this where we need to go in the future

Only way to really achieve this is for Danal to actually start listening to the players as they are the ones

playing the game. If the developer keeps saying that content is everything and who cares if we break the

game while doing it, something is very very wrong.

Currently LOCO has a huge oppourtunity to make it big in EU/US since most of the MOBA players are

waiting for DOTA 2. LoL and HoN arent grasping peoples attention like they used to so if LOCO can get a

decent competitive gaming scene going and lessen the amount of bugs, then its easily possibly to get the

playerbase grow exponentially.

That being said, I doubt much is going to change for the good as Danal has its own schedule to follow and

not much can be done about it. A noob like me can always hope though that some kind of positive changes

might someday be made.

Anyways, nothing more from me, flame away

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LOCO Future