Gremlins, Inc. will turn five years old in just four months, and we're happy to keep developing the game further by adding new features and new content – as well as re-balancing the existing mechanics.
Later this month, we will release the Summer Update. We'd like to share with you today the new content and the changes that we plan to make, in order to get your feedback. Please share your thoughts with us right here, or on the forums, or on the game's Discord server!
NEW CARDS
Some changes are invisible, such as optimisation of the server code. Some changes take a long time, such as looking for the alternative to the Singapore server cluster that would provide faster connection to players from Japan and from China. But some changes are much more obvious, such as new cards that arrive to the game with every major update!
Charity
Location: Bank
Cost: FREE
Move points: 3
Type: regular
Get: Income -10, -ːmaliceː5.
"A charitable donation: the means of securing a discount for future bribes.” – from the gremlin vocabulary.
Reason: the idea of a card that allows using income as a resource that can be spent on something else (in this case: ːmaliceː reduction) was in our heads for quite some time and now it made its way into the game.
Cold deck
Location: Casino
Cost: free
Move points: 4
Type: secret
Get: +ːmaliceː2
Special rule: Look at 6 new cards. You can swap any of them with any cards on your hand. You can play another Casino card in this turn.
All cards in this deck are different, no matter from which side you look at them.
Reason: we want to "boost" the Casino a bit more with a card that can be played in multiple ways: just for hand management; as a part of a prepared combo where you already have 2 Casino cards when you visit the location; or as a part of a lucky combo in which you find your second Casino card at the top of the deck.
RE–BALANCING CHANGES
As you may know, when we developed Gremlins, Inc. in 2013-2015, we put little thought into tools and architecture that would allow us to quickly mod the game. Later, we were busy adding major features and game content. And only this year we finally put serious thought and effort into making the game really moddable.
The first part of the moddability project is done by now: our own team is able to quickly modify every card in the deck, in addition to the composition of the deck itself. This finally (finally!) allows us to listen to the community feedback and quickly implement changes that make the most sense every month, together with the change of the ranked session rules.
We start with re-balancing of 17 cards. The changes are described below in detail. These changes are based on the data of how the cards are used in the game across more than 60,000 recently played sessions, as well as on the community feedback and discussions on the game's forums and its Discord server.
We would also like to express our gratitude to our Pillars of Community players, whose feedback and recommendations were extremely helpful during the process of re-balancing.
Election Campaign
Reason: we want to weaken the impact of this card and to make it more useful for movement. At the same time, the card is now cheaper.
Riskomatic-30
Reason: we want to make this card a bit more effective, since in its current state it doesn't see as much play as we would like it to have.
Contraband
Reason: we want to make moving with this card less punishing. The card, while very useful in some circumstances, has a very situational effect. In its current state it often becomes a burden that players have no reason to play, but also don't want to use to move because of the cost. We'd like to change that.
Coup d'etat
Reason: to reduce the number of situations where this card is played completely unexpectedly. Considering how impactful this card is, it shouldn't happen for free, and completely "out of the blue".
Judgement Day
Reason: we want to reduce the impact of this card. Without the extra turn, it still produces a significant outcome.
Undercutting the Competition
Reason: we want to make the card a bit more punishing for those who play it, as it currently gets a lot of play despite its criminal status and a relatively high cost of 3 votes.
An Artifact
Reason: we want to adjust the deck that grew much bigger with all the recent updates, and at this point contains many more cards that can be played at the Plant during one session.
A Bag of Money
Reason: we want to reduce the impact of this card as it gets a lot of play. As more cards have been added to the game that give additional votes, this card can take a little nerf that would make it less popular.
Jurors for hire
Reason: we want to make this card more efficient as it isn't played as often as we'd like it to be played.
Robbery!
Reason: we want to reduce the impact of this card, which is currently so high that players almost always keep it on hand in order to get the money – despite its criminal status.
The Evil Statue
Reason: we want to make this card more attractive for being used to move. As a free card with a powerful effect, it is played for action quite often, and the buff should change that a bit.
Misappropriation
Reason: we want to reduce the impact of this card, and to slightly increase the punishment for playing it for action – because in its current state this is one of the most played cards in the game.
Toxic Waste
Reason: we want to make it easier for players to get rid of this card from their hand, so this would happen more often and the card wouldn't be kept on hand until played for action.
Diablerie
Reason: we want to make it easier for players to get rid of this card from their hand, so this would happen more often and the card wouldn't be kept on hand until played for action.
A Prank
Reason: we want to to reduce the impact of this card, which is so strong already that even the complete removal of the bonus probably won't change its popularity too much. But we decided to start with the reduction of the bonus first, and to see if a further nerf is needed.
A Quest from Dariol
Reason: we want to make this card a bit more popular, and have it played more often.
The Common Fund
Reason: we want to give this card a slightly negative effect to compensate for the fact that the player also receives a free score point.
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We expect that the overall impact of these changes will improve the balance of the game, and will add a fresh flavour to some of the already-familiar cards that can now be used more efficiently. Thank you for staying with us, and we look forward to many more years of playing Gremlins, Inc.!