Old Mastery Back Again

My feedback on the "new" mastery is pretty negative. No updates to the old UI and we have to skip it again, every-single-time. Also, the stats do count again from now on, so basically experienced players have to do the same stuff again.

Good job.

 

No way?! Existing progress doesn’t count again?

Where did you see that?

 

I'm not sure why this is news. Sam on the roadmap stream said "my expectation would be no" when asked if you get credit for stuff you've already done. Later, Mike told Sam "Challenges don't count progress so far, but are being built this time so they don't unnecessarily punish you."
Skip to 18 minutes in:

 

Tried it.

I definitely see that. Of course, it is less terrible for a veteran player like me to do 3 new services compared to acquire 20 new levels, starting from level 300.
But this solution is just so underwhelming. "Drive 8km and do 3 services" -> Route mastered.
Still waiting to see the goals for tier 2, but really more effort should be put into this.

And for the love of God, make the mastery screen disappear from startup. Makes no sense. Or at least add "always skip" option.

 

Frankly though, this is why ‘Mastery’ fell flat on its arse the first time around. If they’re anything like me, most people that bought TSW2 played the ‘core’ routes when they bought the game, and have moved on to either new DLC or their old favourites. I can’t imagine many will want to go back and replay the same stuff again from scratch to gain what sound like some fairly uninspiring additions.

The only thing I’d be interested in is the scenery, but I’m certainly not starting a route from the beginning again to get it. Even if I wanted to, I’d have to create a new profile because of the way the stupid points system works. By the time you’ve played a route for any length of time gaining points towards mastery is an absolute chore and takes far longer than it does to start with a new profile. Of course people didn’t want to do that (why would they?) which is why, as I said, it fell flat. That and the fact that it didn’t record progress correctly.

There’s some really good stuff in this game but Mastery doesn’t fall into that category. People fed all this back in abundance the first time around but it doesn’t sound like any of it was taken on board (including needing to click or key press past the mastery screen parked in the loading process).

 

Thing is hightower, it looks like the rewards for Mastery are mostly route-dependent. So (for example I don't go on Sand Patch much so) I won't care about the rewards on Sand Patch and so probably won't bother looking for "mastery" of it. So that's not a problem I think?
Whereas maybe I do like NTP, so I play it a bit more, get some rewards that I then see on the route.

 

The rewards for doing the challenges do seem as uninspiring additions. Decals for livery designer is cool but to be honest I don't use it simply because i'm not a fan of repainting trains nor would I have the time to do that so to me at least that's pointless. The new scenery rewards are cool but can be flat for people who don't care about extra scenery. I think other rewards for doing challenges and earning enough action points is to get one dlc locomotive of your choice for a particular route you own or even if you earn enough action points, you can buy a dlc route although that might be a bit of a stretch considering how dtg are

 

I agree. The issue, for example, is that you play NTP so have progressed that route and are likely at the point that to gain points is a much more arduous process than it was when you started out fresh. Everything you’ve done previously doesn’t count, so to get the benefits in anything like a sensible timeframe you’d either have to start again with a new profile (playing the same stuff you’ve likely gone through at least twice already) or play it 24/7 for the next 2 months (I jest but you get the point).

It’s got the makings of a nice idea but if it’s anything like last time (which it sounds like it is) then it’s very poorly executed.

 

In my opinion, mastery should've been implemented when the game came out

 

Exactly. Introducing it retrospectively and not counting past progress just repeats the same mistakes made last time, and will doom it to being an ‘also-ran’ feature that will be forgotten about in no time at all sadly. History repeats itself.

 

I have no problem repeating for some small reward the things that I did for pure enjoyment the first time.

Not a complaint, but an observation -- It does seem to me that "Mastery" is something of a misnomer in as much as all I need do to demonstrate "Mastery" is do a few things that I could already do with ease on my very first day in the game. But then English isn't my native language.

 

Ah, but luckily my hard drive crashed quite recently. Until I made the connection, I'd thought that DTG must have reset the scoring at some point. I shrugged at this and wasn't that bothered as I'd not massively into the challenges anyway.
(I now realise that my progress was reset because the data is stored locally I think, and I created a new windows profile for various reasons)
I was watching the stream that Cameron links to above and when Sam said about progress resetting for Mastery, I made a plan not to spend too long on any one route until it came in. I hadn't realised that points were part of Mastery though.

 

Is this explained in more detail somewhere? What do we have to do to get the decals?

 

I agree especially for console

 

You’re the exception that proves the rule then

 

Mastery in TSW2020 didn’t work for me. Very little of what I did was tracked so I only ever unlocked one diorama and no scenery. This time round, I don’t really want the prizes. I might log in to DTL and see what it tracks just for feedback for DTG. I’m all heart, me.

 

Looking on my profile page, it seems to say "All in one night" requires running 3 scenarios/timetables (in the same night?). Winter Express is driving 30 miles on the same route. These are both shown under "Limited Time - Winter Event" "Tier 1".

 

Mastery in tsw2020 didn't work at all for me either in tsw2020 which was odd but I really didn't care about it to be honest

 

I actually thought/think it was a pretty neat idea with potential, and I was one of the few for whom it did record progress properly. Unfortunately it was poorly implemented and clunky, and it was a big mistake not to include past progress (which essentially penalised existing players)

I haven’t seen it yet for TSW2, but it sounds like not much has changed. I hope that’s not the case.

 

Is there a guide to the livery designer coming out soon? I keep going into it and keep messing it up so have lost some interest in it if I’m honest

 

Sorry guys, but this is just taking it to a new low. These labels aren’t even relevant to the train, and is something I’d expect to find inside the train carriage...

 

Not much has really changed from what i've seen

 

What the heck? I don't think those labels are on any ice3 or ice3m train in real life

 

Oh good God no.

Another swing, and another miss.

 

A for effort but an F for execution

 

Also just for curious reasons, how in the world is using your cell phone in the ICE not allowed if all DB InterCity Express trains have wifi on all their trains in real life for customers to use and if you may want to play a game on your phone during your journey and how is using headphones not allowed if they won't make any noise if you have them on listening to music on a long journey from Frankfurt to Brussels for example? That wouldn't make any sense.

 

The rewards on offer could be better such as the ones I suggested in the thread. Just a suggestion

 

This new mastery is buged like old one to me.
I play 51km Service on MSB and no progress for Winter Event count on my account.
Or is there any delay for updating the database?
Strange because I can upload railfan screenshot without problem.

 

Perhaps you guys could provide us with something a little more rewarding? Such as a new livery, be it real or fictional, or perhaps a new scenario?

With all due respect, these rewards are pretty lame and give me no incentive to complete the challenges.

 

I have to agree with that. I know dtg put alot of effort but the rewards are just meh. They can be better

 

That's a great idea londonmidland. I think the idea of free routes or locos is a bit optimistic (Mastery is supposed to be a bit of fun and presumably supposed to give some people a reason to come back to the game, another reason to play, but that's it I think).
I do think that the extra scenery tile could be a nice reward but yes, a new livery and/or a new (and presumably more difficult) scenario could be a nice reward. Matt showed a scenario in the new French route last week I think where you had to follow behind a slow moving train and so got more signals against you. (That one will presumably come with the DLC itself, but you hopefully know what I mean).

So yes, I like your idea of a livery and/or a scenario.

Talking of rewards for play, can we have a reward for say driving 50 miles on a route with the safety systems all turned on? OT, but it just occurred to me. Thanks.

 

It would have been a nice way to intertwine new features into old(er) routes. Reach an arbitrary target on Koln - Aachen, so here’s a new scenario for the route featuring dynamic weather, maybe even wet platforms. That sort of thing.

Much more interesting than the livery editor clip art on offer.

 

Well they could still do it, just make it a "tier 3" reward
(although I'd imagine that wet platforms would require some more work on the routes, not sure)

 

I think the idea of a extra scenario would be cool. Much better than a sticker for your train

 

I'm trying to think of how the livery could work. An obvious option for the new French route for example would be a classic SNCF livery, but as we heard in the stream the other day, official liveries can be quite a bit of effort.
Maybe a French-themed livery, or one 'inspired' by a previous SNCF livery?

 

I understand the desire to have liveries or extra scenarios as an unlock but there's a counter argument that these sort of things shouldn't be locked behind a play wall as TSW is a simulator first and foremost that just happens to have "game" features such as collectibles, levelling up and high scores. None of those things are bad although I think the medal & scoring system should be stricter but that's another topic.

Personally, I'd prefer anything related to the driving experience or locos (official liveries, consists, etc) remain unlocked from the get-go. I'm fine with Mastery as is, an optional extra that unlocks very minor cosmetics. I haven't had chance to dive into the new TSW2 Mastery stuff yet but I thought the menu dioramas representing routes in TSW2020 was really cool and enough of an optional reward for fully mastering a route, they had no effect on game play and gave you something refreshing to look at when you spent those few minutes picking something to play.

I won't make use of the livery designer stuff myself as I don't use the designer anyway. The limits of my artistic talent goes as far as drawing stickmen!

 

They can’t put anything as a reward in mastery that would penalise people who cannot claim it for any reason. It would cause trouble if a scenario or livery was only accessible via mastery and mastery failed to work for any reason. Historically mastery has not worked well so the rewards have to remain as interesting but unimportant trinkets otherwise the complaints would get out of hand. Nobody is really going to be that bothered if a market in a carpark can’t be accessed. It would be a completely different story if it was a second livery for someone’s favourite loco.

 

Ok, here in the forum people ask for hundreds of very interesting things to implement in the game and instead they spend their time to make someone that nobody has asked for. Congratulations to all.

 

To be fair, a lot of what people have been asking for is not particularly realistic in terms of cost.

I think new scenarios for a particular loco, for achieving mastery with it, would be a decent reward that wouldn't be unreasonable in terms of development time and costs. Alas, I can already envision the inevitable "why can't I access scenarios that I paid for that aren't advertised in the route description?? DTG are the worst, this game is broken!" posts on the forum...

 

I could see those complaints happening if it wasn't working. If they did added those type of rewards to mastery though, it would make it much better and would probably not be unreasonable development wise

 

the whole idea, and implementation are completely pointless and a waste of time. there is your feedback.

 

Well that's one way to get to the point.

 

So, we've got feedback that Mastery is pointless because the rewards are rubbish, and also feedback that Mastery would be unfair if the rewards weren't pointless.

 

So what is "Core". Everything that came out after tsw 2 release?
Corporate communication 101: never use internal lingo in communication to customers.

I did a timetable run on Munich-Ausburg for the winterevent. Didn't count.

 

Yeah, that makes no sense to me.

Even achievements are pointless in that sense, but I still enjoy "working" towards them. Mastery as a concept is good, gives you a goal in the game. But the effort they made in the UI (0, zero, none) and the choice of the new goals is terrible (drive 1 timetable, seriously?). Oh sorry, drive 1 TimEtAble.

 

"Core" is the three routes that come with the base game, so everybody owns them - that's why Munich-Augsburg doesn't count. But I did a timetable run on the 'core' route from Köln to Aachen, and that didn't count, either.

 

I concur. I ran a RE service with the DB BR 442 from Aachen to Köln but my progress was not tracked.

 

He already did: https://forums.dovetailgames.com/th...-unlocked-include-preserved-collection.32405/