1) Big Huge Games has a history of strategy games and started developing DomiNations in 2013 with 10 people, releasing it in 2015 after prototyping and a soft launch period. 2) Early events in DomiNations from 2013-2015 were simple automated timers with meaningless rewards and caused server issues. The first live events in 2016 focused on stability and building the event system. 3) By 2017 they had refined their event tools and processes, adding preview periods, sales, and automation to generate repeatable revenue generating events in a controlled way while engaging players long term.

1. 2 Years of Lessons
Josh Kermond, Executive Producer @ BHG
July 31, 2017

2. Overview
1. History of BHG & DomiNations
2. 3 Phases of Events
3. Event Advice

3. History of Big Huge Games 2.0
● Team background: Civ, Rise of Nations, FrontierVille
● 2013: Baltimore Studio Apocalypse and new studio
● “Big bets on innovative mechanics in proven genres”
● Biggest successes have been set in human history
● Clear vision for a F2P mobile strategy game about
World History

4. History of DomiNations
● Began in April 2013 with 10 people
● 1 solid year of prototyping + 8 months of development
● 6 months of Soft Launch (October – March)
● Worldwide launch: April, 2015
● Asia launch: August, 2015
● China Launch: Next Month, 2017 (fingers-crossed!)

5. Event Phases of DomiNations
Phase 1 - Development to Soft Launch to Asia Launch
Phase 2 - Building Events and Tools
Phase 3 - Running repeatable, revenue generating Events!

6. Phase 1
2013 - 2015

7. “Automatic” Events
● Timed Goals
● Leagues

8. “Events” 1.0

11. “Automatic” Events
1. Pointless timers
2. Meaningless or non-existent rewards
3. Drive little to no engagement

14. Server issues
Server issues
Server issues
Server issues

15. “Events” 1.0
● Wildlife Wednesday
● Stags Unleashed
“We ran Stag Unleashed event
injecting an additional 120M
crowns into the economy.”

16. ~120,000,000
crowns were
given from
stags
compared to
~10,000,000
the weekend
prior.

17. Stability is Key
● Don’t run events if your players can’t participate or
won’t “feel” the benefits.

18. Server Outage
Server Outage
Oil Boom!
Revenue Decline

19. “Events” 1.0

20. Crown “Sales”
● Not a discounted price
● 5-30% bonus crowns
included with each
purchase
● Higher the price point,
the bigger the bonus

22. Phase 2
2016 - Stability & Events

23. Live Events in DomiNations
● Client Updates
● Config Events
● Crown Sales
● Event System Events

24. Config Event Setup
1. Design/Product comes up with an idea
2. Game data changes pushed to version control
3. Game config files built and QA’d
4. Updated on cloud -> clients
5. In-game & social messaging
6. Review performance and repeat

27. General Blitz Details
1. Castle upgrades discounted 50%
2. General upgrades to level 20 discounted 25%

28. General Blitz Results

29. General Blitz Results

30. General Blitz Results

31. Town Defense Details

32. Town Defense Results

35. TD1 TD2

37. Event System
● Rewards for specific behaviors
○ Destroy Towers
○ Kill Defenders
○ Win Stars
● Rewards and Difficulty Scales
● Unique Top tier Rewards
● Server driven, admin tool

38. Event System Phases
1. Preview
a. 2 Days
2. Event
a. 7 Days
3. Claim Period
a. 2 Days

39. Preview Period

40. Preview Period

41. Preview Period

43. Preview Period is Important

44. Events are “Sales”

45. Mark of the Assassin Performance

46. Mark of the Assassin Performance

47. Generic Event System Results
1. Engages players
2. Controlled way to introduce overpowered
units/buildings
3. Error prone! Plenty of mistakes with tools
4. Hard to balance, even with game data

50. Phase 3
2017 - Refine, Expand, Automate

51. Surfacing Improvements

52. Surfacing Improvements

53. Surfacing Improvements

54. Items Sales
Troops & Building Sales
Event System troops that
Are purchasable for USD

55. C.E.S.P.E.R. & SA.L.P.E.R.
● Config Event System Processor and Error Reporter
● SAles Processor and Error Reporter

56. C.E.S.P.E.R.

57. C.E.S.P.E.R.

60. Summer for the Ages
● Everything On!
● Announced and runs all at once
○ Goes from last week
through September
● Push players through the ages,
ahead of the next Age update!

61. Event Advice

62. Event Advice*
1. Build to your team’s and game’s strengths
2. Identify pain points, build tools and automation to fix
3. Consider the long term, but keep iterating forward
4. 6 months of content at launch!
5. Look at market leaders, when you launch in 6 months
that will be the new standard
*Once you’ve got a stable game.

63. Thanks!
Questions?