Operation Pay Harder: A Debrief

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  • Shadow
    Shadow Posts: 155
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    gamar wrote:
    Speaking as someone whose alliance is currently 114 for the season and therefore a candidate to be affected by the unlikely scenario that "instant alliance creation" will reshuffle the top 150 and not just the top 20 (for someone in the 90th place alliance it would take less time and effort to just score more freaking points in PVP than coordinate alliance shenanigans) if you're that concerned about it you should be joining a much more hardcore alliance than "barely top 100"

    Actually, this view isn't entirely correct. My alliance has been in the top 25 for seasons since the very first one and we haven't placed outside of top 50 alliances for any single PvP in a very long time. We also don't fall out of top 50 even in the off season. However, for Hollowpoint Kiss, we dropped out of top 50. The reason was simple. Our top players were in the wrong bracket and could not find worthwhile targets after a certain point range. So, this change does affect top rate alliances quite a fair bit and not just the barely top 100.

    Now, for Heavy Metal, all our key players are in the 4th bracket since that is where the points are supposed to be found. So, the message seems to be that if you do not care about the score, you are free to join any time bracket you like. But if you want to score well, then sorry but you do not have a choice in choosing a bracket to your convenience.

    The quick fix to this which should be able to be done within the season itself assuming that the variable end times is here to stay for this season is to simply open up cross-bracket attacking.
  • xKOBALTx
    xKOBALTx Posts: 299 Mover and Shaker
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    Must we insist that transitioning / new players ALSO don't get top 10 until their roster is high enough to compete in the higher brackets?
    Ummm, yes? Honestly, how do you think those of us who are at that stage got there?
  • Shadow
    Shadow Posts: 155
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    D3 won't change time sharding as an event mechanism. What they are VERY LIKELY to do is allow people to attack people outside of their time shard. That is still a sticky wicket because that means players who are literally finished can be attacked which may cause CHAOS on the servers. How many of you have noticed that shields run even after an event ends? The server keeps your status for that. Attacking someone off a shield who is done is quite likely a programming nightmare (seems pretty obvious if one stops to think about it).

    Simple solution - shield all the players whose brackets have completed so they don't lose any points. Not that hard to program.
  • It gets harder and harder for each generation of new players are there are always more and more people with better rosters to compete with.

    Making it a bit easier to get a few 3* covers is ok because the real deal is tons of ISO, a lot of HP (which new players run short only with rosters slots) and those pesky 4* covers that really matter (xforce and fury now, thoress soon).

    Without this kind of thing the new players are bound to never grow up, because it takes a lot to get better when everyone else is better and you cant even touch them to try start climbing.
  • Spoit
    Spoit Posts: 3,441 Chairperson of the Boards
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    gamar wrote:
    It's kind of a moot point since even before the end time thing d3p was "gently nudging" players so "don't give developing players a handicap" was never an option on the table...
    You want a gentle nudge? I joined this bracket at 78th place at 1. It's now 8:20 and it's only at 307 people. I joined at that time every other week and it was full in well under an how. Gently nudge this sharding. (there are already 5 RO/x-men/AoS people in the top 10, and that's well before most people even start to climb)
  • I mean.


    Deep down every single one of us knows that shuffling players around after a pvp event is going on is kinda ****. Clearly it leads to weird situations where the placement of alliances have nothing to do with how an alliance did as a whole.
  • lokiagentofhotness
    lokiagentofhotness Posts: 192 Tile Toppler
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    xKOBALTx wrote:
    Must we insist that transitioning / new players ALSO don't get top 10 until their roster is high enough to compete in the higher brackets?
    Ummm, yes? Honestly, how do you think those of us who are at that stage got there?

    No.
  • mohio
    mohio Posts: 1,690 Chairperson of the Boards
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    I don't exactly understand where all this argument is coming from. The way I see it the veterans who are upset with the way it's working for them simply want the feature to actually work for them. As it is, they (we?) have to choose between basically playing 2 totally different games. There's the "business as usual" time zone (4 previously, who knows for this one), where scores go through the roof and sharding is seemingly at an all-time high. Then there are the "stuck in molasses" time zones which might be more convenient for someone's schedule, but consist of trudging through 25 point matches from 600 to 1000 and 20 point matches after that. And that's only if you're willing to shield starting at 800 cause the attacks are gonna roll in sooner with fewer high point targets available for everyone else climbing. Since there are fewer high scoring people it will be a little easier to place well, but on balance this game mode seems a lot less fun.

    Anyway my point is, we're not clamoring to beat up a bunch of 2* and transitioning rosters for easy points or easy placement, we're simply wanting this new end time feature to work as well for us as you are saying it works for you. Let us play the same game we love no matter what time zone we pick instead of having such drastically different experiences depending on which end time was chosen.
  • Raekwen
    Raekwen Posts: 113 Tile Toppler
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    It's amazing how shortsighted transitioning players are these days. Was I ever this bad? I would hope not. For people to think that's it's "fair" for them to receive equal rewards for a fraction of the time/money/etc. the rest of us put in is baffling. There is a hierarchy for a reason. I mean, I've given examples, but do you think this way in the rest of your life? Is it cool with you if a new guy gets hired at your work, puts in a quarter of the hours you do, then gets a raise to make the same amount as you? I just don't get it..

    You know how I got my roster the jump start it needed to start scoring high enough to compete? I bought Thor covers (before Sentry was out). I rarely buy covers, but I knew it was an investment that was worth it to get where I needed to be. And not surprisingly, it worked. You want to get over the hump? Well, I would've previously said buy Sentry, but now I guess buy X-Force once you have three covers (which are handed out from daily rewards.) Most of us probably bought some covers to make it past that stage. You can sit and complain how hard it is for you, which some of you seem content to do, or you can bite the bullet, actually spend some money and invest in the game you enjoy playing. Boom! Problem solved.
  • Phaserhawk wrote:
    one simple fix is to not allow changes to alliances at certain times. Once a PvP starts I would suggest a 24 hour window to adjust alliance lineups and then you are locked in. Being able to jump back and forth here and there, this has to stop, it's why they don't allow it in any major sport, it's called the trade deadline, you implement this and it instantly stops the manipulation. Then you can start working on sharding and MMR.

    Thank you for proposing a sensible solution rather than simply bashing others.
    I don't disagree with the time slot idea, simply the way it was implemented. I think your idea would be acceptable to a larger group of people than many of the others that have been submitted.
  • Spoit
    Spoit Posts: 3,441 Chairperson of the Boards
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    Spoit wrote:
    gamar wrote:
    It's kind of a moot point since even before the end time thing d3p was "gently nudging" players so "don't give developing players a handicap" was never an option on the table...
    You want a gentle nudge? I joined this bracket at 78th place at 1. It's now 8:20 and it's only at 307 people. I joined at that time every other week and it was full in well under an how. Gently nudge this sharding. (there are already 5 RO/x-men/AoS people in the top 10, and that's well before most people even start to climb)
    3 hours later, and it's added all of...3 people. I don't think think this nudging could be any more gentle
  • Flare808
    Flare808 Posts: 266
    edited November 2014
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    Shadow wrote:
    Actually, this view isn't entirely correct. My alliance has been in the top 25 for seasons since the very first one and we haven't placed outside of top 50 alliances for any single PvP in a very long time. We also don't fall out of top 50 even in the off season. However, for Hollowpoint Kiss, we dropped out of top 50. The reason was simple. Our top players were in the wrong bracket and could not find worthwhile targets after a certain point range. So, this change does affect top rate alliances quite a fair bit and not just the barely top 100.

    Now, for Heavy Metal, all our key players are in the 4th bracket since that is where the points are supposed to be found. So, the message seems to be that if you do not care about the score, you are free to join any time bracket you like. But if you want to score well, then sorry but you do not have a choice in choosing a bracket to your convenience.

    (Comment based on current system) There is no message D3 is sending with having 5 identical shards available. They do not have control over where their players decide to play and did not force the top alliances to shard 4. You have complete control over which shard you play in. Like you said, if you want to score well, you end up with the high scorers, but that is a personal decision that each person/alliance makes on their own. I'm not saying this system is flawless or right, just pointing out that D3 isn't intentionally funneling all the top scorers together just to screw with you.
    Shadow wrote:
    The quick fix to this which should be able to be done within the season itself assuming that the variable end times is here to stay for this season is to simply open up cross-bracket attacking.

    While this seems to be a popular opinion, this would end up stacking the last bracket more than anything. There would be a competitive advantage to waiting for the last shard versus any of the first 4.

    Here's a couple issues with cross-shard attacks:

    1. Shard 1 will suck- No scores from any other players means these people will have to grind out 20-25 point wins to gain points. The rest of the shards will be able to target Shard 1 for 30-40 points as they climb.

    2. Shard 2 overlaps with Shard 1 for a majority of the PvP, meaning the scores will even out between the two shards. But Shard 1 ends early and Shard 2 has X hours to increase their scores further. This will mean average scores from Shard 2 will beat out Shard 1, and the pattern will continue through Shard 5

    3. Later shards have less competition to worry about as they shield hop. Shard 1 has to deal with the entire player base being able to target them. Shard 5 will have an uninterrupted 3 hours where they can only be hit by their own shard. (Not the same as Shard 1 getting a 3 hour head start being alone)

    4. These advantages will lead to all of the top scorers being forced to the last shard. A high scorer wouldn't willingly expose them self to more danger than they need to. Shard 5 is appealing because like I said earlier, there are less people targeting them.

    5. Bringing it back to the current thread, all the high scorers would be stuck in Shard 5 to be able to at least try to combat end of PvP shenanigans.

    EDIT: For example-

    Say the high scorers take on Shard 1 and push 2000. Shard 2, 3, 4, 5 all get their shots in for all those juicy 50 pointers. Those points will trickle through all of the other Shards. The high scorers will inevitably take an unshielded no matter how fast or careful their hops are because of the frequency of hits. Not appealing.

    OR

    High scorers just wait for the last shard. Most of their climb to 1300+ will be with the other shards active, but during crunch time, the last 3 hours, all other shards would be done.
  • reckless442
    reckless442 Posts: 532 Critical Contributor
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    Spoit wrote:
    Spoit wrote:
    gamar wrote:
    It's kind of a moot point since even before the end time thing d3p was "gently nudging" players so "don't give developing players a handicap" was never an option on the table...
    You want a gentle nudge? I joined this bracket at 78th place at 1. It's now 8:20 and it's only at 307 people. I joined at that time every other week and it was full in well under an how. Gently nudge this sharding. (there are already 5 RO/x-men/AoS people in the top 10, and that's well before most people even start to climb)
    3 hours later, and it's added all of...3 people. I don't think think this nudging could be any more gentle
    I just joined shard 4. Got added to the same bracket at no. 392. The leader has 1087 points already.
  • While I'm OK and I understand vet's issues with this change, we should establish a middle ground and agree that the time slots have to stay.

    Having said that, the rest of the issues can be worked out. Honestly though, why the hell do you people want to find targets past 1900 points? I read most of vets posts and the most burning issue is hitting those 2k scores. What vets don't understand at this point, is that while they manage to have super high season scores for no actual reason, the rest of the players suffer in the #90-#99 rank range to get one cover for the sake of the slow as #*&@ progress!

    Seriously, you vets should ask for those 2k scores to be limited and not be available. You should be the first ones to do it because you are paying for them. Asking the devs to make it easier for you to go to scores that where never directly intended in the game is kind of absurd to me. And what is more absurd is making it the #1 problem of this change. I think this change is saving you money if it is harder to reach 2k points because guess what, 1300 is the top progression reward. You, top players have brought this upon yourselves with being so competitive with each other that you burn your wallets like there's no tomorrow.

    I liked what an earlier poster said, that if a minority of people gather together and try to abuse the system, they likely get punished for it rather than have the game shifted towards their needs.

    The issue of alliance hopping on the other hand is easy to deal with. Like previous posters already said, just lock people in alliances during an event.

    It looks like US players miss the rest of the world on PVP because they could hop over them during the time we where sleeping. Here's an idea then. If you want the time slots to be gone, let's make the event times EU based. You can still have your 2k scores but this time you lose your sleep. Sounds fair to me!
  • Badlands wrote:
    To change the game to suit the tiny minority of "high performers" is wrong. Time shards work for the majority of players, I got a reasonable score 800+ in Hollowpoint and I didn't have to wake at 4am to do it. Also in my experience when small groups of players in an Online game conspire to make the experience worse for everyone else they get banned, so I'd proceed with caution on this.

    We didn't conspire to make the system worse, but to simply bring some issues to light. It seems this happened.
    Time shards work for the majority of players
    To change the game to suit the tiny minority of "high performers" is wrong.

    The idea of letting minorities have an effective Voice is wrong? Especially when they are willing to put their money where their mouth is to make their voices heard?
    No, it's not about being rich or pampered. By definition, only a select few can be at the top. Therefore, T10 players are a minority.
    I'm glad that this system works for you. I support your right and ability to express your opinion. It just seems like you are trying to suppress a minority opinion. Like our opinions are less valid than yours.

    Then you threw out a generic threat for if we tried to object to what we disagree with again.
    Also in my experience when small groups of players in an Online game conspire to make the experience worse for everyone else they get banned, so I'd proceed with caution on this.

    Are you suggesting that in the future, we should only complain but not attempt to take action against it? For fear of getting banned? That would make us like you in the old system, ... helpless, hoping for change, and wishing somebody would do something to make things better. At least we did something. Now we are getting vilified for it. WooHoo!
  • Spoit
    Spoit Posts: 3,441 Chairperson of the Boards
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    Spoit wrote:
    Spoit wrote:
    gamar wrote:
    It's kind of a moot point since even before the end time thing d3p was "gently nudging" players so "don't give developing players a handicap" was never an option on the table...
    You want a gentle nudge? I joined this bracket at 78th place at 1. It's now 8:20 and it's only at 307 people. I joined at that time every other week and it was full in well under an how. Gently nudge this sharding. (there are already 5 RO/x-men/AoS people in the top 10, and that's well before most people even start to climb)
    3 hours later, and it's added all of...3 people. I don't think think this nudging could be any more gentle
    I just joined shard 4. Got added to the same bracket at no. 392. The leader has 1087 points already.
    I guess it wasn't updating when I wiped the node, yeah it added like 100 during that hour I guess. It's approaching 12 hours and it's still not full though, which is a hell of a nudge
  • reckless442
    reckless442 Posts: 532 Critical Contributor
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    Okin107 wrote:
    While I'm OK and I understand vet's issues with this change, we should establish a middle ground and agree that the time slots have to stay.

    Having said that, the rest of the issues can be worked out. Honestly though, why the hell do you people want to find targets past 1900 points? I read most of vets posts and the most burning issue is hitting those 2k scores. What vets don't understand at this point, is that while they manage to have super high season scores for no actual reason, the rest of the players suffer in the #90-#99 rank range to get one cover for the sake of the slow as #*&@ progress!

    Seriously, you vets should ask for those 2k scores to be limited and not be available. You should be the first ones to do it because you are paying for them. Asking the devs to make it easier for you to go to scores that where never directly intended in the game is kind of absurd to me. And what is more absurd is making it the #1 problem of this change. I think this change is saving you money if it is harder to reach 2k points because guess what, 1300 is the top progression reward. You, top players have brought this upon yourselves with being so competitive with each other that you burn your wallets like there's no tomorrow.

    I liked what an earlier poster said, that if a minority of people gather together and try to abuse the system, they likely get punished for it rather than have the game shifted towards their needs.

    The issue of alliance hopping on the other hand is easy to deal with. Like previous posters already said, just lock people in alliances during an event.

    It looks like US players miss the rest of the world on PVP because they could hop over them during the time we where sleeping. Here's an idea then. If you want the time slots to be gone, let's make the event times EU based. You can still have your 2k scores but this time you lose your sleep. Sounds fair to me!
    I can't speak for everyone, but I think I can fairly say that most vets have no interest in hitting 2000. We want to hit the progressions, get top-5 rewards, and help our alliances get top alliance results. For S.H.I.E.L.D, we have never had minimums and don't kick people out for low scores. Instead, we compensate for a member's RL issues, but that means some of us have to push high if we want the alliance to stay top-10 and receive the 5000 ISO alliance reward. But as more alliances have high scorers, it has become increasingly competitive, and that pushes players to go even higher.

    OPH went as high as it did because we wanted to ensure out point was made even if other alliances did swaps to try to match us. We didn't think we would have garnered the same attention if we didn't win.

    As for locking players into alliances, that wouldn't work because you do have the problem of players who slack off or have RL issues. Having 19 members miss rewards because one member didn't participate is going to create a lot of anger and will causes alliances to collapse as high scoring players search for greener pastures.
  • Bowgentle
    Bowgentle Posts: 7,926 Chairperson of the Boards
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    Jeez people.

    Let's get season scores out of the way: Nobody from the current T50 alliances are in any danger of missing out on the Thoress cover for T100 alliances, which is the only thing worth fighting for.
    The rest of the season score only matters for pride - nobody should really care about a 10 pack which most likely translates to 2500 ISO.

    Now, let's see:
    Before sharding: Complete toss-up to get sharded into a death bracket where 1300+ didn't get you T10 when new covers were at stake, or people were out to prove something.
    Chance to score 1300+ yourself: Very good, on one shield.
    Now: Pick a shard with an unfriendly end time for the US (eg 10 PM CET) and you have an about 80% chance to _not_ get a death bracket. Yet to be seen how this will play out with new covers at stake.
    Chance to score 1300+: Nearly zero, unless you plan to hop from 1050 for 12 points a pop, because points run out at 1000+.
    So no, this isn't about not being able to hit 2000 and having to settle for 1600 instead, it's about not reaching the prog reward at 1100 unless you hop to it.

    And sorry reckless, but no, you can't sit at 800 unshielded. You're visible to everyone and their dog from 700 onwards, so even with my maxed XFood I'll get sniped from people at 300 for 40 points if I decide to go unshielded for the final 8 hours. So, yes, us Euros had to use 8 hr shields regardless of score.

    In the last two PVPs I made T5.
    Unshielded for the first one, with a score of 963, with one 3h shield and 1049 for the second one. Both because I was able to watch my bracket the last 8 hours and plan accordingly - something which I haven't been able to in PVP in forever. Making T5 twice with a grand total of 75 HP spent is a win in my book.

    For the record: I have scored 1100+ in every PVP during the last 7 seasons.

    Is the time slice solution perfect? Of course not, there are a lot of things to fix.
    Is time slicing good for the players? Of course it is. I now have a _choice_ about how I want to play PVP instead of automatically being lumped into brackets with someone who goes to 1700+. Those were my brackets for the last 5 seasons.

    Slicing needs work, but really, you need to have a pretty narrow view AND be based in the US to fail to see the good sides of it.
  • ZenMonkey wrote:
    Hi Everyone,

    This issue isn't about the 1 percent, it effects everyone. You may just not have noticed it yet because most have been joining the standard time slot out of habit. If you pick the wrong slot

    1)Progression rewards become a lot more expensive or impossible to reach for many
    2)Alliance rankings are hurt. I have been in alliances struggling for 100 before, it usually consists of a few players that can score high and help carry the team to victory. If any of these players pick the wrong slot kiss top 100 goodbye. you can argue all day about not needing a high score. I don't score high for my personal rewards I do it for the alliance. The alliance is the only thing keeping me in the game.

    As for the statement session placement doesn't matter..... Well then seasons don't matter...... But they exist and they are a part of the game. If they don't matter they should be removed, until then this feature goes directly against a fundamental game design.

    You can't develop a feature in a void and once again it just demonstrates what's wrong with the game, It's schizophrenic.

    They introduce seasons then they make game changing changes during a season totally invalidating rankings.
    They nurf characters to encourage a varied roster then they release sentry
    They give us alliances with ranked rewards then they split alliances up with different time shards.


    How splitting alliances up is a good thing is beyond me but hey I guess I'm an out of touch 1 percenter icon_e_smile.gif


    Lastly I just want to give a shout out to X-men. They are often villainized but they have always played nicely with me. You guys are insane but I love you, this wasn't about beating you but to make a statement against a feature that may kill the game for me.

    Zen, I completely agree.
    The only problem is that your preaching about how points matter, ...
    to people that points don't matter to.
    We are a minority. And history tells us that minorities have no rights. Therefore, our opinions do not matter and according to several people on here, our opinions SHOULDN'T matter.
    Change is difficult, isn't it? Try to do something to help and get threatened and vilified. I actually had somebody threaten to get me banned if I continued to "cause the game to be more difficult for the rest of the majority"? I think he missed the point, bro.
  • I can't speak for everyone, but I think I can fairly say that most vets have no interest in hitting 2000. We want to hit the progressions, get top-5 rewards, and help our alliances get top alliance results. For S.H.I.E.L.D, we have never had minimums and don't kick people out for low scores. Instead, we compensate for a member's RL issues, but that means some of us have to push high if we want the alliance to stay top-10 and receive the 5000 ISO alliance reward. But as more alliances have high scorers, it has become increasingly competitive, and that pushes players to go even higher.

    OPH went as high as it did because we wanted to ensure out point was made even if other alliances did swaps to try to match us. We didn't think we would have garnered the same attention if we didn't win.

    As for locking players into alliances, that wouldn't work because you do have the problem of players who slack off or have RL issues. Having 19 members miss rewards because one member didn't participate is going to create a lot of anger and will causes alliances to collapse as high scoring players search for greener pastures.

    From what you describe and from what I read in this thread and forums in general, the real issue is MMR and not time slots. Similar to you not finding targets at a certain high point range, middle range has the same issue with "The Wall". So while you want them but can't find them, we have them but can't milk them.

    What this change has done, is exaggerate MMR issues and make them more visible. Point awards along with matchmaking need a huge re-work. For the sake of everyone in this game, this needs to be addressed. But I don't think that alliance hopping and bad MMR are the product of the time slots change. Time slots only increased people's attention to them. MMR was bad since forever, but now with the time slot brackets I'm glad that the vets decided to jump in the conversation.

    Don't blame time slots, blame the really bad MMR and sharding for this mayhem.