Trial By Combat - Oct 20 - 22 - Season VII

Unknown

I desperately, desperately need a Blue Hood. He's at 4/0/2 right now and Blue is basically the reason to use him. Everyone talks about how it can change the game.

I've got a high-level sentry and I'm going to throw HP at this until I get a top 25 rank, by gum. Because I NEED it.

Unknown

Many of us in our alliance have decided to be a little more casual this season (which just means we'll probably go for 900-1100 instead of 1300+, and T25/50 alliance instead of shooting for T10), and have a bit more fun with the PvPs this season.

I don't need and the Wednesday end times are bad for me, so probably just an 8-hour with whatever points I can grab in the morning before work. Decided to just have fun with this a bit more, so yesterday I ran some teams for a while instead of just hammering everything with maxed . It was quite fun. Made it past 500 with those, then threw out buffed to 165 alongside level 1 and for the last fight before heading off last night. Came back today to a whopping... -18. Lots of hits, but apparently some wins as well. Then a hit for +30, then 4 for -37, and then a bunch more after that.
Tons of retals to play through now.

gambl0r312

unco_dan wrote:

jeez. the difference that a shield makes. i've seen slarti from chaos league in my bracket fall from around 1200 on the cusp of 1300 all the way down to mid 700s. i'm guessing that slarti's shield expired and that s/he forgot to re-shield. sucks!

slarti mentioned in our chat that he picked up his Fury cover and was going to remain Un-shielded, so hit him if you got him before all his pts are sucked away! (early climber!)

reckless442

Anyone having a problem with She-Hulk using settlement to convert Sentry's sacrifice tile before she gets 9 AP? I've had it happen twice in this event. The first time I was suspicious because I had not seen the AI collect 9 blues, but I verified the second time before doing sacrifice that the AI didn't have 9 blue. Yet it still converted my tile.

gambl0r312

reckless442 wrote:

Anyone having a problem with She-Hulk using settlement to convert Sentry's sacrifice tile before she gets 9 AP? I've had it happen twice in this event. The first time I was suspicious because I had not seen the AI collect 9 blues, but I verified the second time before doing sacrifice that the AI didn't have 9 blue. Yet it still converted my tile.

a Recording of this would be excellent evidence of the AP bug that happens, so that the devs would have something concrete to go by...

Unknown

reckless442 wrote:

Anyone having a problem with She-Hulk using settlement to convert Sentry's sacrifice tile before she gets 9 AP? I've had it happen twice in this event. The first time I was suspicious because I had not seen the AI collect 9 blues, but I verified the second time before doing sacrifice that the AI didn't have 9 blue. Yet it still converted my tile.

yea, it's happened to me a few times and a couple times it ended in losses for me. ugh. like immediately after i cast sacrifice, in comes settlement and there goes my win.

also, venting some frustration at the zombies who keep coming up right after i break shield to keep me from getting across 1300. no attacks for the entire duration while i'm shielded, the moment i break, attacked again. i guess this evens out having won 4 in a row earlier during a shield hop. there are no moral victories in this game...

ZeroKarma

j12601 wrote:

Many of us in our alliance have decided to be a little more casual this season (which just means we'll probably go for 900-1100 instead of 1300+, and T25/50 alliance instead of shooting for T10), and have a bit more fun with the PvPs this season.

I don't need and the Wednesday end times are bad for me, so probably just an 8-hour with whatever points I can grab in the morning before work. Decided to just have fun with this a bit more, so yesterday I ran some teams for a while instead of just hammering everything with maxed . It was quite fun. Made it past 500 with those, then threw out buffed to 165 alongside level 1 and for the last fight before heading off last night. Came back today to a whopping... -18. Lots of hits, but apparently some wins as well. Then a hit for +30, then 4 for -37, and then a bunch more after that.
Tons of retals to play through now.

I saw you sitting there with the 165 and 2 1's and thought to myself...."It's a trap, don't do it"

ScrubJay

Being that Sentry is one of only 2 166's I have, sustained pushing already isn't happening and now half of my matches result in wipes when even the loaner she Hulk gets 9 blue. I had to resort to using boosts to get a a measly 750 before I shielded. That's usually enough for top 25 in my brackets at least.

Unknown

ZeroKarma wrote:

j12601 wrote:

Many of us in our alliance have decided to be a little more casual this season (which just means we'll probably go for 900-1100 instead of 1300+, and T25/50 alliance instead of shooting for T10), and have a bit more fun with the PvPs this season.

I don't need and the Wednesday end times are bad for me, so probably just an 8-hour with whatever points I can grab in the morning before work. Decided to just have fun with this a bit more, so yesterday I ran some teams for a while instead of just hammering everything with maxed . It was quite fun. Made it past 500 with those, then threw out buffed to 165 alongside level 1 and for the last fight before heading off last night. Came back today to a whopping... -18. Lots of hits, but apparently some wins as well. Then a hit for +30, then 4 for -37, and then a bunch more after that.
Tons of retals to play through now.

I saw you sitting there with the 165 and 2 1's and thought to myself...."It's a trap, don't do it"

I'm still getting hit by some 94 teams, so I guess people still have that team queued up. It wasn't so much a trap as just something fun to do. I battled back against a bunch of them, getting up to higher than I was off the retals, but ultimately ended up skipping more than 50 of them, so people definitely took advantage of it, which was neat. I'm wondering if all of the defensive wins were people not noticing Shulk's level at all and hitting FIGHT right away when they spotted the level 1s. Someone in alliance chat pondered if people seeing it thought "Why would someone only level Shulk?".

Definitely a fun thing to do, and may try that more this season since unless it's covers I really need, I might as well entertain myself a bit.

ThatOneGuyjp189512

Alright forumites! i(jp189512) successfully saved my seed team all the way to my current score of 1655, i hit my seed team to make that the team everyone sees(level 45 patch, 10 MBW and loaner She-Hulk) and i will be going out in about half hour from this message(10pm PST to be approximate) so if you see me feel free to hit me! help me not have to tank next PVP....i hope my points help all that hit me!

Unknown

**** this tourney sideways with a rusty spoon

I finally have a usable 166 Sentry, a viable Hood (that's going to be respecced to 3/5/5 at the end), I figured out I was in good shape to play with the cool guys the shield-hopping game(I still need 1G and 2B to complete my XForce and I wouldn't have minded a Fury on the side). Oh boy how I was wrong.

Played 7 matches boosted, two went smoothly, the other 5 on average were like this (it was either Sentry/Hood or XForce/Hood):

- No green match in sight, proceed to a yellow match;
- My yellow match preps the board for a green match for the AI that gets promptly snatched and that may or may not also generate a cascade;
- No green match in sight for the next 3 turns, while the AI keeps producing green out of thin air
- Against Sentry, get one or two world rupture in the face; Against Xforce get a surgical strike AND a X-force in the face;
- If by chance I manage to use my World rupture, the subsequent Sacrifice tile gets converted by She-Hulk. (1 out of the 3 times this happened I have a strong suspect the AI didn't even have enough AP)
- My remains get sweeped around by the opponent team.

I'm going to sadly get my two black Hood covers at the end and try again next time, but let me say this:

CURSE YOU RNG!!!

Unknown

Kappei wrote:

tinykitty this tourney sideways with a rusty spoon

I finally have a usable 166 Sentry, a viable Hood (that's going to be respecced to 3/5/5 at the end), I figured out I was in good shape to play with the cool guys the shield-hopping game(I still need 1G and 2B to complete my XForce and I wouldn't have minded a Fury on the side). Oh boy how I was wrong.

Played 7 matches boosted, two went smoothly, the other 5 on average were like this (it was either Sentry/Hood or XForce/Hood):

- No green match in sight, proceed to a yellow match;
- My yellow match preps the board for a green match for the AI that gets promptly snatched and that may or may not also generate a cascade;
- No green match in sight for the next 3 turns, while the AI keeps producing green out of thin air
- Against Sentry, get one or two world rupture in the face; Against Xforce get a surgical strike AND a X-force in the face;
- If by chance I manage to use my World rupture, the subsequent Sacrifice tile gets converted by She-Hulk. (1 out of the 3 times this happened I have a strong suspect the AI didn't even have enough AP)
- My remains get sweeped around by the opponent team.

I'm going to sadly get my two black Hood covers at the end and try again next time, but let me say this:

CURSE YOU RNG!!!

yea that settlement thing was highly suspect.

and does anyone else feel like the AI is more likely to cascade you when you boost heavily? like it KNOWS you're trying to gain an advantage? i feel like whenever i get into shield hopping territory the board becomes a continual chaotic flow of 4-5 matches regardless of whether or not a cascade ensues. and i'm saying that this can either work for you or against you...

IlDuderino

unco_dan wrote:

Kappei wrote:

tinykitty this tourney sideways with a rusty spoon

I finally have a usable 166 Sentry, a viable Hood (that's going to be respecced to 3/5/5 at the end), I figured out I was in good shape to play with the cool guys the shield-hopping game(I still need 1G and 2B to complete my XForce and I wouldn't have minded a Fury on the side). Oh boy how I was wrong.

Played 7 matches boosted, two went smoothly, the other 5 on average were like this (it was either Sentry/Hood or XForce/Hood):

- No green match in sight, proceed to a yellow match;
- My yellow match preps the board for a green match for the AI that gets promptly snatched and that may or may not also generate a cascade;
- No green match in sight for the next 3 turns, while the AI keeps producing green out of thin air
- Against Sentry, get one or two world rupture in the face; Against Xforce get a surgical strike AND a X-force in the face;
- If by chance I manage to use my World rupture, the subsequent Sacrifice tile gets converted by She-Hulk. (1 out of the 3 times this happened I have a strong suspect the AI didn't even have enough AP)
- My remains get sweeped around by the opponent team.

I'm going to sadly get my two black Hood covers at the end and try again next time, but let me say this:

CURSE YOU RNG!!!

yea that settlement thing was highly suspect.

and does anyone else feel like the AI is more likely to cascade you when you boost heavily? like it KNOWS you're trying to gain an advantage? i feel like whenever i get into shield hopping territory the board becomes a continual chaotic flow of 4-5 matches regardless of whether or not a cascade ensues. and i'm saying that this can either work for you or against you...

I have lost track of the number of times I have been hit by a Supernova on the 2nd or 3rd turn when I have bought boosts and there is no way possible that the AI had that many red

GrumpySmurf1002

I ended up rage quitting this event last night. The AI was doing a better job with my roster on defense than I was on offense.

Think I got back up to about 650-680 in the final push, but man, this event didn't like me.

dr tinykittylove

unco_dan wrote:

Kappei wrote:

tinykitty this tourney
yea that settlement thing was highly suspect.

and does anyone else feel like the AI is more likely to cascade you when you boost heavily? like it KNOWS you're trying to gain an advantage? i feel like whenever i get into shield hopping territory the board becomes a continual chaotic flow of 4-5 matches regardless of whether or not a cascade ensues. and i'm saying that this can either work for you or against you...

Confirmation bias. I've been cascaded like a tinykitty when I don't use boosts (most of the time), then when I boost the ai says good tinykitty did you say you wanted a match5? How about 2? Maybe that's not enough, I'm sure you could do with another 6 red ap in a row and here's a 3-way match5 I'll let you match yourself.

And then 3 minutes after I shield out, an attack drops me by 34 points. I'll just wait and see if my points are still enough for top 25 at the end.

Unknown

I am not sure if Tormis from wrecking cure reads the forums but you seemed to have gotten a bit snipped on your last hop and I am now only 14 points behind you. I noticed that you need X-force black so I will be staying shielded until the end - not like we are going to drop out of top 5 - and I hope that you enjoy the cover.

Unknown

Welp, shielded for duration just past 800 points with the not-so-good defnese team of Patch+Hood. Feel free to hit me if you're willing to risk a defensive BR in your face.

BTW anyone else tired of all these level 200+ Xforces+Hoods? I don't feel safe taking on a high level XForce without my own Hood, and with an enemy Hood in the picture it's just oh so much more annoying...

For those who complain about AI not having enough AP for the abilities they use, maybe make a habit of checking it's AP every so often? I know you probably don't have time to do so while shield-hopping, but still...

This is the advantage of playing on Steam I guess where all AP is constantly visible.

GrumpySmurf1002 wrote:

locked wrote:

Don't respec to 5 black.
5 yellow is much more versatile. Besides, wasn't Sentry announced to be funbalanced soon at the NY Comic Con?
Respeccing just for one character? What about the rest of your roster? cMagneto, X-Force, Patch, lazy Cap, Goddess (soon...), Nick Fury, Deadpool, Punisher, Captain Marvel all like 5 yellow in Hood since they lack active yellows themselves or their yellows are inferior or they benefit a lot from tile destruction/AP gain.
I know that Sentry is a/the top dog of Versus at the moment, and Versus is where the covers are, but I have been hopping just fine with 3 black. And as it has been mentioned by others, a Symbiote Snare Team-Up (farmable in Prologue, 7 TUAP, AoE stun) lets you preserve Sacrifice just as well.

I've been fine with 3 also. My biggest concern is that I feel like Hood's yellow doesn't get launched much, even with other partners, as 15AP is a bunch to acquire. Even if it does accumulate, games' mostly over anyway.

I'll probably just build a 2nd Hood 3/5/5. If the meta changes, I can always re-spec that one.

Hood's yellow has saved my **** many times in PVE, and my Sentry is not good for shield hopping, so 5 yellow is what he stays at

loroku

Even way down on the lower end this event is insane. One way I can tell when an event is particularly competitive is because I lose tons of ranks quickly - without even being attacked! I went down about 100 rank (and PVPs are 500 brackets, might you) in a few minutes without getting attacked once. And I'm not getting retaliated against, either - everyone is just skipping until they find easy teams that will get them up quickly I guess.

I suspect it's so competitive because two of the best characters are on the line - Hood and OBW - and just about anyone can use them. Also Hood's best ability is available at the lowest of the top tiers (because of Sentry black is best for Hood) and everyone knows it, so anyone in the 3* transition wants it. But OBW is also great and all us 2* folks want that, too. Unfortunately I guess my MMR is too high now because I never even saw seed teams - I went straight to level 50+ teams, which I can just barely tackle, and I have to constantly rest to heal. No idea how my MMR got so bad so fast, but I wonder if leveling up my characters actually affects my PVP MMR as well? I went ahead and boosted my two best a little and I wonder if that made me fall into a new class of teams. Or maybe it was actually trying in several LRs? Either way - bleh.

Good luck to all you guys who I won't even see anyway!

Unknown

loroku wrote:

Also Hood's best ability is available at the lowest of the top tiers (because of Sentry black is best for Hood) and everyone knows it

Um, no, Hood's Blue is far and away his best ability. It's useful for EVERY character, including Sentry since it lets you get those 7 Green and 8 Yellow quicker.

loroku

kalirion wrote:

Um, no, Hood's Blue is far and away his best ability. It's useful for EVERY character, including Sentry since it lets you get those 7 Green and 8 Yellow quicker.

Um, no, it's black. That's because black + Sentry = win, win, win. Don't you read the forums? Duh.