State of the Game: January 2013

==State of the Game: January 2013==
Greetings and welcome to 2013, Clash Community!
With 2012 well and truly behind us, we look forward to 2013 and the many changes and ideas we have planned for the year ahead.
It’s that time again! We’ve started putting together the next Clash of the Dragons Council. The current Clash Council has been an important voice this past year, helping to ensure that the goals and desires of the community and the development team are aligned, or are at least en route to the same destination.
We’re looking for passionate and dedicated individuals who want to represent their respective corner of the community. If this sounds like something that you would enjoy, then please review the following thread for requirements, dates, times and expectations:http://www.clashofthedragons.com/for...sh-Council-2-0!
We are very pleased with how the Traveling Merchant has worked out so far, especially during the ‘14 days of Clashmas’. It took a great deal of planning and preparation to ensure every day had two sales that players would enjoy, and the reception has been great and the community feedback has been extremely rewarding.
We did experience a few difficulties that in order for us to address quickly and efficiently required us to bring the game down. However, since this time we have greatly refined the system internally to help ensure this doesn’t happen again.
The design process begins with us sitting down and examining the content we have on the schedule, what sort of events (if any) we are planning to run and any other factors that should be taken into account.
From there we set up a Traveling Merchant schedule to run for a designated period. We then work with our QA department to help ensure the sales are what we want and that there aren’t any pesky bugs (price mismatches, times, etc). The best thing about the Traveling Merchant is the flexibility that comes with the system, timing sales to coincide with events and other things that are taking place and whatnot. We had limited freedom to do this previously by simply introducing the weekly limited offer, but there were far more restrictions than what the Traveling Merchant has.
For improvements, we’re considering the possibility of allowing the Traveling Merchant to sell items at a discounted price separately, as right now whatever price we set for those items normally is how much the Traveling Merchant will sell it for.
We will continue to look into ways to improve the Traveling Merchant in the days ahead and appreciate all of the feedback we’ve received so far.
Our sister game, Legacy of Heroes, introduced an anti-afk mechanic a while back and is something we have been looking to add to Clash for some time now. With the hustle and bustle of the holidays and everything else going on, it was very difficult to get it on the schedule and implemented into Clash.
However, as we enter January 2013, I am happy to announce that we have the anti-afk mechanic planned for implementation for CoTD in the near future. The anti-afk system will function as follows:*If you are forced to autoplay 3 times in Draft, Colosseum, and Duel as a result of being AFK, you will now automatically concede the game.
*If you are forced to autoplay 3 times in Brawls as a result of being AFK, you will now be forced to autoplay till the end of the brawl.
We’ve seen great results in LoH using this system and are extremely excited to get it added into Clash. Look for its addition in the near future!
Something else we are working towards is better accommodations for players in different time zones and different parts of the world. This mostly comes up when we start introducing special, limited time events, that are only available for a brief period of time.
====Draft Events====
We want to continue to have Draft events with limited windows of opportunity, but we’re working to improve how accessible it is for players that can’t be on during certain times.
Currently we’re experimenting with running a draft event during the afternoon (PST) on a weekday and then running the same event during the AM (PST) on a weekend. We’ve seen very promising results from this system so far and you can expect future Draft Events to follow a similar (though not always exact) model as this.
We’ll continue to look into other improvements for Draft Events, but we feel like this is a very good first step.
====Saturday Night Clash====
We want to extend Saturday Night Clash from a 12h event to a 24h event as soon as we are able. This does require a little bit of tech time to implement but we know the community will appreciate this change and are looking forward to it. This will help keep the SNC special while allowing more players to participate in this weekly event.
Recently Felendis, the CEO of 5th Planet Games, created a fantastic thread that addresses a variety of concerns that have been raised by the community.
One of the biggest announcements that came from this thread was improved transparency between players and the development team, and the first great step we’re taking in this direction is a very special New Year’s Resolution. It will be the combined efforts of the community, the Council and the Clash Design team.
The plan is to have a short submission period for Resolutions, some ‘fine tuning’ of the Resolutions, then a community vote. Whatever the community picks, we will resolve to do. This can range from making more premium content accessible to free players, creating more guaranteed value for premium events/purchases, making cards more accessible before they are cycled out, or anything else you feel is the most critical for Clash. -Felendis, CEO
You can find more information in this thread here: http://www.clashofthedragons.com/for...4-My-Apologies
I’d also recommend checking out this post on Page 2 with more details about why we haven’t released Clan vs Clan as of yet as well as answers to other questions: http://www.clashofthedragons.com/for...l=1#post118254
One of the biggest changes that will come to Clash in 2013, will be me handing the reins of Clash over to another stalwart soul. I’ve worked on Clash of the Dragons in some capacity (Community Manager and then on to Project Manager) for over a year now, and I’ve loved every second of it.
You are all extremely passionate gamers and it fills my lil’ chest with pride to have helped bring new features and exciting changes to the game you all so avidly enjoy.
The transition will be gradual and was actually started about 2 months ago. The new PM has been part of every meeting and discussion, and has spent a great deal of time lurking on the forums. Also, I’ll be assisting the new Project Manager for some time, so you won’t be entirely rid of me just yet.
I’ll be present through the entirety of the Clash of the Dragons player Council and am looking forward to meeting more of you in person to discuss the future of Clash.
That’s all for this State of the Game. It’s going to be a busy year, but fruitful for certain.
As always,
Stay Beautiful, Clash Community! 
Category:State of the Game