Upcoming Patch R60 Discussion

LordWill

SunCrusher wrote:

Hey Will,

Don't know if you're still hanging around the thread, but if it's possible, I would like to ask a question and my question is this:

Where I really appreciate the effort gone into rebalancing and funbalancing the game, I also feel like the game is in a greater state of flux than a greater state of stability.

I understand the purpose (well, okay, generally understand because obviously, I can't understand something that you guys are considering for the future but haven't expressed to us) of buffs and nerfs and gameplay tweaks and the like, but... why so many and why so often?

I guess what I'm asking is, what can a player expect when it comes to 'stability' with this game?

Should I be expecting that all of my favorite characters are going to get tweaked at some point?

Is there any kind of a general guideline or summary that you can give us regarding what to expect for the near and not-so-near future?

Thank you in advance,
SunCrusher

P.S: I'm so curious I just have to ask; why swap out Magneto's Purple? He and Psylocke are literally the most 'Purple' characters I know of regarding the original X-Men characters.

Any game will go through changes and require tweaking here and there. If you have played MMO's at all then you know its an ever changing environment and balancing will never cease.

However I think as some have pointed out and I tend to agree is D3/Demiurge has not done a good job of selling the future. It's pretty much the attitude of take it as it is or leave it, we don't really care either way. Instead of giving people something to look forward to other than, "Hey we have some really cool stuff we are working on but we can't tell you what it is..."

I don't really understand this mentality. If I am going to drop money on the game, I'd kinda like to know where things are going. What are the plans? In most games they do a "State of the Game" type of post to show where things are at and what's coming in the future. It gives players a reason of maybe sticking it out for those new cool features and additions to the game.

Perhaps with a dedicated CM maybe this would happen but it just seems like Demiurge Al should be making that post. I would think they would have a vested interest in painting a rosy colored future for all of us.

The other issue is at least from what I have seen and experienced is they really don't have a good solid plan of where they are going or how to get there. It seems a lot of the patches have just been stop gaps for bad game design. It's like they painted themselves in a corner without any thought of End Game issues. If they knew they would have 50 characters or even 100 and that the odds dilution would be an issue, thats bad planning. Did no one ever ask the question of what happens when you have that many characters in the game? This is just one example, I could go on and on of how they have had to jimmy rig patches to fix issues that THEY made because of poor planning.

So yea if it seems like they are reactive instead of proactive, you are totally correct. So it gives the appearance they don't really know what they are doing or where they are going...which in turns makes the game feel unstable. They have a small enough team that they cannot use the excuse that the right hand doesn't know what the left is doing.

The best way I have learned to deal with this is just to lower my expectations of them to the point that nothing can surprise me. At least this way I am less disappointed with their decisions.

Unknown

GrumpySmurf1002 wrote:

DuffManOhYeah wrote:

It's almost 9/5. Does that mean that the forced update will be released during the MIDDLE of a major pvp/pve event? Lots of people will not be happy. Early starters will be exploiting the Patchneto teams in pvp/pve while the late starters won't be able to.

The late starters have known the change is imminent. If they didn't take advantage of Patchneto early, that's their fault, not a mid-event launches fault.

Everyone has known, but with the immediate forced update, I will likely be cut off from both PvP and PvE until the end of the subs tonight. If it happens 6 hours from now, it will have minimal impact to me as I will have finished PvP and put up an 8 hour shield and run a couple of extra passes at essential nodes on PvE to enjoy family time on a Friday evening. If it happens now, I will likely miss my minimum score for my alliance in PvP and miss enough PvE points to take the Beast reward out of range.

If the change had gone in yesterday, there would have been no real impact. It is the stupidity of forcing a patch through during the last 12 hours of both a PvP and 2 PvE subs that is bothersome and shows amazing lack of foresight and care about the players of the game.

_RiO_

SunCrusher wrote:

I guess what I'm asking is, what can a player expect when it comes to 'stability' with this game?

You should expect zero stability.

In one of the articles on Venturebeat that talked about MPQ's business model, Demiurge disclosed that they are actively venturing to keep the game as unstable as possible to ensure players cannot set up a 'safe haven' of cut&dry known-to-work strategies. They do this to keep everyone on their toes and keep everyone uncertain of success, under the assumption that forcing everyone out of their comfort-zone helps drive additional sales on HP for boosts, health-packs, shields, covers and ISO for leveling up; basically anything that can buy a player an increased sense of security.

(This would probably also be why this type of question is almost always met by D3P/Demiurge with a stone wall of silence or a very evasive non-justification or non-explanation; the answer isn't exactly PR-friendly.)

Unknown

_RiO_ wrote:

SunCrusher wrote:

I guess what I'm asking is, what can a player expect when it comes to 'stability' with this game?

You should expect zero stability.

In one of the articles on Venturebeat that talked about MPQ's business model, Demiurge disclosed that they are actively venturing to keep the game as unstable as possible to ensure players cannot set up a 'safe haven' of cut&dry known-to-work strategies. They do this to keep everyone on their toes and keep everyone uncertain of success, under the assumption that forcing everyone out of their comfort-zone helps drive additional sales on HP for boosts, health-packs, shields, covers and ISO for leveling up; basically anything that can buy a player an increased sense of security.

(This would probably also be why this type of question is almost always met by D3P/Demiurge with a stone wall of silence or a very evasive non-justification or non-explanation; the answer isn't exactly PR-friendly.)

Wow. You just made me hate these devs. But why am I even slightly surprised by this?

Trisul

Typhon13 wrote:

Wow. You just made me hate these devs. But why am I even slightly surprised by this?

To be fair, I'd say almost all F2P developers have this sale-driven-gameplay strategy to some degree. Most just don't talk about it (bad PR, like _RiO_ said). I don't really blame them for that philosophy since they do need to make money, and the model has been proven financially successful.

IMO, MPQ doesn't balance their IAP values optimally between profitability and preserving good gameplay, but that's just my opinion and I have no stats or metrics to really say that what they are doing is right/wrong.

It's unfortunate, but not every developer can afford to give priority to the gameplay itself. I wish they took the LoL/Dota2 approach, but those games appear to be the exception, not the rule.

Unknown

Trisul wrote:

Typhon13 wrote:

Wow. You just made me hate these devs. But why am I even slightly surprised by this?

To be fair, I'd say almost all F2P developers have this sale-driven-gameplay strategy to some degree. Most just don't talk about it (bad PR, like _RiO_ said). I don't really blame them for that philosophy since they do need to make money, and the model has been proven financially successful.

IMO, MPQ doesn't balance their IAP values optimally between profitability and preserving good gameplay, but that's just my opinion and I have no stats or metrics to really say that what they are doing is right/wrong.

It's unfortunate, but not every developer can afford to give priority to the gameplay itself. I wish they took the LoL/Dota2 approach, but those games appaer to be the exception, not the rule.

I agree that this is their livelihood and need to make money, but for them to say that they intentionally change the game to decrease your chances of winning and removing or drastically changing advantages you have gained with your own time and effort is a **** move, and if people have paid for these advantages it's glorified theft.

Unknown

Typhon13 wrote:

I agree that this is their livelihood and need to make money, but for them to say that they intentionally change the game to decrease your chances of winning and removing or drastically changing advantages you have gained with your own time and effort is a **** move, and if people have paid for these advantages it's glorified theft.

That isn't what they're saying at all. They're saying they try to prevent the game from getting stale by making sure there's no stable "best" strategy

Whether they're failing at that (hint: they are) is another thing altogether

Trisul

gamar wrote:

That isn't what they're saying at all. They're saying they try to prevent the game from getting stale by making sure there's no stable "best" strategy

Whether they're failing at that (hint: they are) is another thing altogether

I agree that it's been unbalanced for a long time, though the nerfs to CMags (and hopefully soon, Sentry) are a good start.

GrumpySmurf1002

gamar wrote:

They're saying they try to prevent the game from getting stale by making sure there's no stable "best" strategy
Whether they're failing at that (hint: they are) is another thing altogether

They are failing only because there's no easily stopping boosted Sentry/Daken.

Unknown

Has anyone mentioned that there are now multiple abilities that take out entire colors and used together might do really crazy board mechanics?

Mags new red and x-force's new black when used together take the board from a mix of 7 colors to only 5 + whatever drops in, a well placed technopathic strike could maybe even wipe a 3rd color off the board which would leave the remaining 4 rich to say the least

Unknown

Cryptobrancus wrote:

Has anyone mentioned that there are now multiple abilities that take out entire colors and used together might do really crazy board mechanics?

Mags new red and x-force's new black when used together take the board from a mix of 7 colors to only 5 + whatever drops in, a well placed technopathic strike could maybe even wipe a 3rd color off the board which would leave the remaining 4 rich to say the least

Well, these board will tend to correct themselves pretty quickly since having that many tiles will usually lead to a massive cascade. Such abilities also go well with Dormammu's Aid. However with Magneto nerfed there's no way to get multiple attempts to cash in on this new opportunity it can be risky. Yes, you get the first dibs on it, but if you can't figure out where the miracle cascade is, you'll usually be on the receiving end of one.

Unknown

Trisul wrote:

Typhon13 wrote:

Wow. You just made me hate these devs. But why am I even slightly surprised by this?

To be fair, I'd say almost all F2P developers have this sale-driven-gameplay strategy to some degree. Most just don't talk about it (bad PR, like _RiO_ said). I don't really blame them for that philosophy since they do need to make money, and the model has been proven financially successful.

IMO, MPQ doesn't balance their IAP values optimally between profitability and preserving good gameplay, but that's just my opinion and I have no stats or metrics to really say that what they are doing is right/wrong.

It's unfortunate, but not every developer can afford to give priority to the gameplay itself. I wish they took the LoL/Dota2 approach, but those games appear to be the exception, not the rule.

What's the lol/dota approach? It's been awhile since I played either, but they do nerfs with no buybacks too

Of course it's a little easier to swallow because they have a billion characters but the nerfing/buffing policy is the same as d3p, isn't it ?

Spoit

LordWill wrote:

SunCrusher wrote:

Hey Will,

Don't know if you're still hanging around the thread, but if it's possible, I would like to ask a question and my question is this:

Where I really appreciate the effort gone into rebalancing and funbalancing the game, I also feel like the game is in a greater state of flux than a greater state of stability.

I understand the purpose (well, okay, generally understand because obviously, I can't understand something that you guys are considering for the future but haven't expressed to us) of buffs and nerfs and gameplay tweaks and the like, but... why so many and why so often?

I guess what I'm asking is, what can a player expect when it comes to 'stability' with this game?

Should I be expecting that all of my favorite characters are going to get tweaked at some point?

Is there any kind of a general guideline or summary that you can give us regarding what to expect for the near and not-so-near future?

Thank you in advance,
SunCrusher

P.S: I'm so curious I just have to ask; why swap out Magneto's Purple? He and Psylocke are literally the most 'Purple' characters I know of regarding the original X-Men characters.

Any game will go through changes and require tweaking here and there. If you have played MMO's at all then you know its an ever changing environment and balancing will never cease.

However I think as some have pointed out and I tend to agree is D3/Demiurge has not done a good job of selling the future. It's pretty much the attitude of take it as it is or leave it, we don't really care either way. Instead of giving people something to look forward to other than, "Hey we have some really cool stuff we are working on but we can't tell you what it is..."

I don't really understand this mentality. If I am going to drop money on the game, I'd kinda like to know where things are going. What are the plans? In most games they do a "State of the Game" type of post to show where things are at and what's coming in the future. It gives players a reason of maybe sticking it out for those new cool features and additions to the game.

Perhaps with a dedicated CM maybe this would happen but it just seems like Demiurge Al should be making that post. I would think they would have a vested interest in painting a rosy colored future for all of us.

The other issue is at least from what I have seen and experienced is they really don't have a good solid plan of where they are going or how to get there. It seems a lot of the patches have just been stop gaps for bad game design. It's like they painted themselves in a corner without any thought of End Game issues. If they knew they would have 50 characters or even 100 and that the odds dilution would be an issue, thats bad planning. Did no one ever ask the question of what happens when you have that many characters in the game? This is just one example, I could go on and on of how they have had to jimmy rig patches to fix issues that THEY made because of poor planning.

So yea if it seems like they are reactive instead of proactive, you are totally correct. So it gives the appearance they don't really know what they are doing or where they are going...which in turns makes the game feel unstable. They have a small enough team that they cannot use the excuse that the right hand doesn't know what the left is doing.

The best way I have learned to deal with this is just to lower my expectations of them to the point that nothing can surprise me. At least this way I am less disappointed with their decisions.

This too will pass

MaxCavalera

No later than 9/5! This thing getting pushed through or what? I rather it not happen sooner then later and in case it makes things go kablewy.

Trisul

gamar wrote:

What's the lol/dota approach? It's been awhile since I played either, but they do nerfs with no buybacks too

Of course it's a little easier to swallow because they have a billion characters but the nerfing/buffing policy is the same as d3p, isn't it ?

I was referring to their monetization policies. AFAIK, they both have relatively low conversion rates on a per-user basis, but remain quite profitable due to their massive player bases.

LordWill

Spoit wrote:

This too will pass

Preach it brother!

Unknown

cMags is being changed because he's overpowered to a point where he actually creates a different game altogether, where the best players are the ones that can string the most 3 blues in a T shape together. ANYONE who has a magneto with 5 blue and says it feels like it's anywhere near the power level of ANY other character in the game is outright lying. It's straight up broken. So instead of making the blue much more expensive (which creates the famous "Now it's the worst character ever" effect that rag still suffers from), they remade him.

Unknown

Would be nice if they made an announcement that it was being pushed back. I imagine many people are standing next to wifi waiting since they can't update over their cellular connection since this is supposedly being forced on everyone as soon as it goes through.

Unknown

Lakestone just updated informing of slight delay

Unknown

ark123 wrote:

cMags is being changed because he's overpowered to a point where he actually creates a different game altogether, where the best players are the ones that can string the most 3 blues in a T shape together. ANYONE who has a magneto with 5 blue and says it feels like it's anywhere near the power level of ANY other character in the game is outright lying. It's straight up broken. So instead of making the blue much more expensive (which creates the famous "Now it's the worst character ever" effect that rag still suffers from), they remade him.

Blue didn't have to be much more expensive. 8 or 9 would be fine, still can match 5 but requires at least 1 extra match in between, still overwrites tiles, still makes protects. And if what you are saying is true, why did they change his purple? Why did they change the color of his blue instead of just changing his strength from yellow to purple? And sentry+boosts comes damn close to cmags, but if you mean any character purely by themselves I'll give you that one.