> > > I just noticed that almost exactly half the Monster Arena participants this time around have lost *all four* preliminary battles so far. HALF of them. Why is that???

The figure was similar at the beginning of tournament 1. The results page for it doesn't look like that now, because I think a lot of people abandoned early losing accounts and created second and third accounts instead.

That said, it does seem to be a little more difficult this time around. I was convinced I was going to lose match #5 -- I just couldn't get the numbers to work out right. I won it after all, but it was a costly victory.

Starting with tournament 3, I'm going to have the opponents start out easier, but increase in difficulty at a more rapid rate, such that match #7 in tournament 3 will be of roughly equal difficulty as match #7 in tournaments 1-2. The difference won't be huge, but it will hopefully be enough to keep more players in the game.

> One thing I've noticed... people actually buy permanent goodies on equipment other than the best ones... I would think that would end up being a waste of money, but I'm obviously missing something here, so... heh.

Probably what you're missing is that cheap upgrades can wind up saving you the service charge for trading them back in. If an extra point of strength means you kill an enemy in one fewer blow, that probably means you'll sustain less damage from that enemy hitting you an extra time or two. Hence, less of a medical bill. Since that point of strength is permanent, it can be used over several rounds at no extra charge.

More dramatically, if it makes the difference between winning or losing a battle, that's a difference in 100 gold, give or take, which more than covers the few pennies loss at trade-in time.

Reluctance to purchase upgrades (or, worse, not realizing it's possible to purchase upgrades) seems to be one of the biggest reasons players at the bottom of the chart are at the bottom of the chart. Browsing those teams, I see a lot of expensive weapons without any upgrades. The high-level base weapons are incredibly expensive, not at all worth their base powers: the point at which they become more economical than upgraded lower weapons isn't until after you've applied some upgrades. So if all you can afford is a base high-level item, well, that might legitimately be part of a longer-range plan, but either way you'll be performing non-optimally in that night's battle.