New features

The other thing that really gets me, is that we aren’t able to collect obol during an off season, we only get the daily log in chances, unless we have divines that give them out. The only reason I have a chance this go around, albeit a slim one, is that I have a store from the last round after I got Zeus. With the new increased difficulty level there’s no feasible way to achieve the divine with just your daily log in obol and the few drachma you pick up along the way.

If they want to insist on keeping it this way, they really need to give out 15 obol to start out, and a slightly higher number that we can store. Cause otherwise it really screws people over who want to collect fragments for the god without having to pay for the useless pony.

Sharing this in a second forum just because.

I've now used up all of my saved Obols, and with them, I won 1 game out of 15. The last one. And I think 10 of those 14 losses were at win chances of 80% or higher (usually much higher). I'm definitely not any kind of Ascent genius, but when I was a total beginner to the gamemode and had no clue or strategy when I arrived halfway through Zeus, I still won more games than that.
I'm still getting runs of 3 or 4 rooms in a row where I do not get offered any energy, and it's resulting in losses. Most of my starting cards are usually 2 or 3 stars, and while I'm beginning to get offered a few 5 star cards before the middle of the second threshold, I often can't take them because I'm struggling for energy and have no choice but to pick that when it comes out. The Ascent always felt hard to me, but now it feels truly malicious.

I was going to keep playing this season and then drop it because I did sink so many saved Obols into it, and I wanted to build up even a small net of fragments for the 4 side divines. But now I don't want the devs to think I'm enjoying this, so I will stop here.

Obols are proving pretty useless so I've just used a Drachma and already on the first threshold I was having to use all three of my five star cards to pass each round. There still aren't enough energy cards to make up for having to do that so I still lost on the second threshold due to all three of my cards having no energy. Previously, losing with a Drachma was pretty uncommon, but losing this early on is ridiculous.

I'm an intermittent player and sometimes I have long periods of inactivity but I do occasionally get pulled back in by the Ascent. Considering how long a single round takes, I'll probably stop bothering with it altogether. Unfortunately they already knew we wouldn't like this change before it was implemented and I don't expect they'll change anything back. Also since the Ascent divines are relatively useless, I can't see how this will incentivise players to spend more passes on it.

What they really mean is that the overall cost to get a divine from the ascent was considerably lower than what it would theoretically cost in an offer or as a luck item. They did the same thing years ago when people would kill over and over just to get the passes for sending horses to heaven.
I didn’t play it a ton but it surprised me how much time people had to have spent to acquire a half dozen divines. It is a rather boring and frustrating game.

I don't actually think they *want* to kill Ascent per se, I think it's a way to squeeze money out of the very small number of die-hard players who WILL stick around no matter what cause it's the only reason they play Howrse. If it's already "too unpopular" to be worthy of keeping the same way then I don't see any way this would entice more people. I think they're aware it's an unpopular mode that sucks, but basically need to turn it into an even more unpopular mode that sucks even MORE in order to keep the lights on.

That said, it truly DOES suck now. Even worse than it originally did.

Me: Loses lvl 2 >90%

Also me: Beats Nyx top lvl at 21%!?!?

Still quite a boring experience. I gave it a try just to see if anything has changed and nope. I think the three week break is a poor decision as the only thing I see coming from it is less and less players remembering it exists.

The memory of losing at 90% chances still burns in my mind so I won't be picking the ascent back up

Nothing makes me want to quit trying the ascent more than using a drachma and only getting 5 Nyx fragments

And once again the devs actively take as many steps as possible to refuse to interact with any users (or interact with any criticism whatsoever) on their literal own site announcement.

The whole event feels like a waste of time when the divines are absolutely useless. I don't need more lawn ornaments, I want divines that act like actual divines.

This is dismal. Regularly losing levels at over 96%. It’s not fun anymore, it’s just disappointing

Okay howrse. Tell me how we have "the ability to win fragments from the Greek God bosses more easily than before" when before if the average player did 1 drachma round and 6 obol rounds they would have 150 frags for the boss (using the drachma as a win, and 2/6 obols as wins as the average obol winrate was around 30%) and now a player with a LOT of experience playing this with a previous obol winrate of 60% can use 6 obols, and 1 drachma and only have....100 nyx frags.
In the past, I would've had probably 200 if not 250-300 nyx frags. I can guarantee you it is not easier. YES, the frags are spread out more. But you cannot get to them easier than before. Stop lying to yourself and to your playerbase.

How is this meant to ENTICE player to play when it's harder and less fun!?!?

Back with another update for everyone. Finally made it to the top and beat Nyx for thr first time. Used a Drachma. Impossible to get to the top with Obol’s even when you start with a 5*, a 4* and a 3* card. Used 14 Obol’s with no success. Drachma seems barely doable but I was fighting for my life the whole way

So, I got Nyx, but I'm not happy at all with how it went. Usually, I would be at 300+ fragments on each divine by the time I got the boss, but I'm not even at half of that this time on any of them. I don't know if I will continue going forward, it's just way too stressful and brings in very little reward for the amount it now costs to get anywhere.

The Ascent change.
Its ridiculously hard and so crystal clear it's rigged to get us to buy a ton of passes, to get a horse that does absolutely nothing, except comps.
Never was a fan of the Ascent - the new change has only made me dislike it even more.

I find it impossible to get frags for the other divines now. I want Samurai, but in order to even live through to the final round, I have to go on the easier paths so I don't lose right away.

Even then, when I did go on the easier path, I lost with 92%. So what's the actual point

Yeah, Ascent itself is no longer fun and enjoyable to play.

That, plus decreasing the amount of frags we earn? I can't see myself playing unless it's for a divine I already have >900 fragments for... I doubt these changes will do anything except decrease the number of people playing, and likely the amount of passes spent - what's the point of buying obols or drachmas when you can spend the same amount with far less effort in a luck item with a bit of patience?

Side note, I think the rate of wins/losses at each percent is accurate. I calculated how often I failed vs how often I won >90% and it was pretty much what I'd expect. However, I didn't have a ton of data to work with so I could be wrong. I think people just notice the one time they fail above 90% and tend to forget about the last 9+ times they won because it's what they expected and not notable. Even with a 20% chance, that's still a one in five chance to win, which is unusual but not extremely rare.

Nyx is pretty but shes not pretty like Hera. I like pretty horses but too much work. I will try but still dont see me getting any new ones except Apollo. I have 100 for hestia but that probably wont help. When Artemis comes i might be able to pick up fragments for the 4 on offer.

Not interested in playing when can't seem to win no matter what. 97% And lose

If it's not broke why fix it! Every time get a update something doesn't work..

Greek Gods win rate:
Zeus - 41% obol winrate, 100% Drachma, 51% overall
Dionysus - 37% obol winrate, 97% Drachma, 50% overall
Hera - 40% obol winrate, 95% Drachma, 52% overall
Ares - 42% obol winrate, 95% Drachma, 50% overall
Aphrodite - 41% obol winrate, 91% Drachma, 53% overall
Hermes - 51% obol winrate, 100% Drachma, 60% overall
Demeter - 49% obol winrate, 92% Drachma, 57% overall
Poseidon - 39% obol winrate, 96% Drachma, 50% overall
Artemis - 44% obol winrate, 92% Drachma, 53% overall
Apollo - 39% obol winrate, 94% Drachma, 50% overall
Hestia - 40% obol winrate, 94% Drachma, 51% overall
Hephaestus - 33% obol winrate, 93% Drachma, 47% overall
Athena - Did not play


Nyx:
10% obol winrate, 71% Drachma, 36% overall

Honestly, the new changes are awful. In no way is this any better than before. Yes, I got Nyx. It was a struggle. I need Orpheus but have zero motivation to play. Nor will I dump passes into obol/Drachma runs only to lose. And the chance of walking away with zero fragments is way too high.


Unfortunately, howrse doesn’t go by the “if it’s not broke don’t fix it” they go by the “if it’s not broke we’ll break it.” Just look at the glaringly obvious trophy revamp. Not only are the new trophies ugly but they ruined various aspects of the game especially for the coat collectors / rare coat sellers / Anyone that relied on sales for pass income. Another change that was completely unnecessary but still went forward despite negative player feedback

I just spent passes on a obol and ended up not getting any fragments from it, as it's been made so difficult that there is a high chance you won't even reach the first set of fragments. I feel like I've well and truly been ripped off with that. You took my passes and gave me nothing in return. If you are going to keep this, please at least move the first fragments to the first level on purchased obols and drachmas so you at least get something for your passes.

I will admit, I'm playing Ascent more than usual right now since Nyx fragments are the prize for clearing the final room in each threshold. What kept me from playing in the past was the Divines offered at the moment. I have a decent Divine collection already so when fragments of a divine I already had was offered, I wouldn't play because it was impossible to get around when those fragments were in the last room. With Nyx fragments in the last rooms, its easier to bypass the fragments I don't want, so I can take the easier route more often to (usually) get SOME Nyx fragments every round.

So far I have played 8 games(7:1 obol:drachma), lost all of them, but I've made it beyond threshold 1 5 times. Do I ever expect to reach the final room ? No. I have only won 7(out of 300+ games total) so I wouldn't call myself particularly good at this game mode or have such lofty expectations. I also havn't really noticed a degree of difficulty change, but that's just me.

I decided - against my better judgement - to continue playing because I've already poured a bunch of my saved Obols and Drachmas into this season, and I would like to try and build a buffer of fragments for the side gods.
Now that I have tried out some Drachmas, I have to say, the energy distribution is abysmal. I am continuously going rounds and rounds without being offered any energy. Even when I have gone multiple rounds without being offered energy, still manage to pass a round, but no longer have any energy left on any of my cards, it still offers me a bunch of bonuses instead of energy, so of course I go into the next round with 0% chance of winning. It's worse for this than Obols.
I am now on 1 win out of 19 Obols, and 1 win out of 11 Drachmas. It feels terrible and if nothing is changed before next season, I don't care what divines they're putting on, I'm not playing. And I'm absolutely not spending passes. I might have, if this were like the previous Ascent, to try and get some of the side divines. Not now.