A new way to release a character idea.

wymtime

So D3 has released a lot of new characters lately and it is always the same way. PVE then PVP, then next season in the heroic packs. With the release of 4* Thor we got to test her out in lightning rounds which was epic and cool. Here is my suggestion on how to release new characters, which will also slow down the flood of new characters.
#1 place the new character as an enemy in PVE not the prize. This will do 2 things. It will play test the character at max level to make sure they are not over powered or under powered. It will make PVE more interesting because even on an old PVE we will want to see what the new character can do.
#2 Have this character be a loaner in the next lightning rounds. this lets us play the new character and see what they can do. It also makes us want the character at the higher level and again play test the character for you.
#3 now make your PVE release. While the PVE is going on you can make any small adjustments you want to the characters so if you see a mechanic you thought was cool but is a fail in actual gameplay (ahem Beast's powers) you can adjust them. The players will now have seen what the character can do and will be more excited (hopefully) to get them.
#4 Release in PVP then have them be essential in PVE
This will make a new character release be 3 PVE cycles instead of 2 which will make it easier for the player base to generate the HP for slots as well as getting some real in game testing of the character to see how they will play.

simonsez

I like the idea of playtesting, but I'm very skeptical that any suggested changes would happen any time soon. I mean, everyone immediately hollered that Beast's blue was broken on day 1, and the only response so far has been crickets. The real problem is that they aren't prioritizing fixes high enough for them to happen in a reasonable time frame. Until that changes, redoing the release schedule won't make any difference.

woopie

simonsez wrote:

I like the idea of playtesting, but I'm very skeptical that any suggested changes would happen any time soon. I mean, everyone immediately hollered that Beast's blue was broken on day 1, and the only response so far has been crickets. The real problem is that they aren't prioritizing fixes high enough for them to happen in a reasonable time frame. Until that changes, redoing the release schedule won't make any difference.

Agreed, they just seem to release a character and forget about them regardless of how much people are complaining. I haven't seen them move fast on anything so I doubt the tweaks and changes can be made as quickly as the OP is suggesting.

Good thoughts though and definitely better than what we have now

Xiltyn

I like and dislike the idea of having them be essential after they are given as PvP rewards. I like it because that would mean I never have to do another PvE (so tired of them). However, I dislike it because usually the PvP following their rewards is the featured event for them. So you have two simultaneous events requiring the same character. Granted PvP gives you the option of a loaner, but I prefer using my own as I usually have more than one cover.

wymtime

woopie wrote:

simonsez wrote:

I like the idea of playtesting, but I'm very skeptical that any suggested changes would happen any time soon. I mean, everyone immediately hollered that Beast's blue was broken on day 1, and the only response so far has been crickets. The real problem is that they aren't prioritizing fixes high enough for them to happen in a reasonable time frame. Until that changes, redoing the release schedule won't make any difference.

Agreed, they just seem to release a character and forget about them regardless of how much people are complaining. I haven't seen them move fast on anything so I doubt the tweaks and changes can be made as quickly as the OP is suggesting.

Good thoughts though and definitely better than what we have now

They probably won't be able to change a character completely, but they would be able to see if a character is OP or just way too weak to be playable. Right now it feels like they wait 6 months+ to adjust a character. With a system like this the Dev's would need to look to make the character as playable as possible from the release. I feel the Dev's like to give a character a chance to get leveled and used before seriously considering an adjustment. A release tweet might be a small increase/decrease in damage, or making sure all the bugs are worked out. It would be a bonus if they could switch the code on beasts blue to random instead of the set 4, but I don't know if they could switch so fast. My process would bring the bugs in a character out faster and give the Dev's the opportunity before full release to make the character better, but also slow down the release of new characters. I also wanted to suggest something that would still work within the game the way it is today.

Unknown

I think this is a nice idea. The concept of iterative improvement of a character is a good one: Dev's develop a character, it goes through internal testing, then gets trialled in a public setting, minor adjustments (if needed) are made before public release.

In practice, I don't think this would ever happen. My impression of the Dev team is that they are not large enough to have any dedicated support for existing characters/balancing. They periodically set time to do some changes (see the most recent and , before that the change, and before that the and change), which is when they do their specific focus on balancing characters. The next round of balancing they seems to be allocated to Sentry, to reduce his essential nature in top-level PvP.

I would advocate that D3 asks the community, through the forums (and facebook) what their main balance concerns are in the weeks/month before they do these rounds of balancing.

Unknown

Interesting about playtesting, but don't expect D3P to make sure you don't have to spend anything to max the character since they are making money out of new characters.

Making the character essential in the next PvE can lead people to buy additional covers to make it viable.

The latest characters are appealing at first because they are cool characters in the Marvel universe. But unless some are featured and buffed, they are quite useless.

Blade is nothing special in the end, and I have doubts about Mystique. She's sophisticated playwise, which is fun, but she is useless.