PVP with XForce

Unknown

Paintsville wrote:

MikeHock wrote:

Today is day 400 for me and I rarely get past 700. Then again, I don't even try anymore since I don't care to lose points and my rank. I've never shield hopped or purchased covers and I do not spend any money on the game (spent 5 bucks on hero points for roster slots in the beginning). I don't have Hero Points to shield with every event, especially since they release new characters every 8 freakin' days now. I took off 2-3 months during the spring/summer, logging in once per day for my daily bonus. Even before I took a break from MPQ, I think I only came close to 900 or first place once. Just because someone is on day 400 doesn't mean that they have the top team. Sure I have 10-15 3*'s above level 100, but are you really scared by my top team of XForce 155 & a maxed out Punisher and Grey Widow Black suit? No Sentry, no lazy Thor, no Lazy Daken, no Hood with 5 Blue covers, no Fury, no 4* Thor.

One upon a time,

I was challenged to a race. "12 laps" said my foe. I nodded and the race began. I was doing ok, until midway through the race. I decided to just walk 2 or 3 laps. My foe continued to push on, extending his lead. As he lapped me for the first time, I thought about all the reasons I decided to walk instead of run. "Maybe I will try to run the race again", I said to myself. I started running again, but by this time I was really far behind. So I spent the rest of my time thinking of ways to blame everything else, except myself of course.

The End

Excuse me!? Where did I blame anything on anyone? All I did was reply to someone asking about how a level 400 person doesn't have a lot of maxed 3* characters.

Unknown

GrumpySmurf1002 wrote:

OnesOwnGrief wrote:

raziel777 wrote:

OnesOwnGrief wrote:

Translate: I exploited Sentry to get my own broken X-Force so I can still score high and rest can go tinikitty themselves

I have no shame in admitting that but it doesn't change fact that I was able to put up higher scores than those people hitting this supposed wall of 166 at 600-700. Not only surpassing that score but doing it with level 125 characters against 166. I didn't even have a 166 until Anniversary week.

Have to agree. I get that there's a wall for 2* rosters (though Mag/Storm can push through it), and understand that's a problem for transitioners.

I don't understand the "4* wall" if you have maxed 3* characters. Most of the high quality 3* characters can win quite easily against XForce. Even with the (surprisingly) limited list given, some combination of Panther/Hulk/Daken should be plenty to beat them.

Bigger question, also as stated, is how you get to day 405 without a usable Thor, Patch, Hood, LCap, etc...

"how you get to day 405 without a usable Thor, Patch, Hood, LCap, etc."

See my post on page 1.

I've got a lazy Cap and lazy Thor around Level 100 NOW, but neither of them have a single yellow cover and they weren't leveled that high until the last month or two. My Patch has a single Red Cover, my Hood has 2 blue covers. The game just isn't enough of a priority for me to grind for hours and hours each day to TRY to score a single cover in each event.

How does this relate to the topic of Xforce in PvP? It doesn't really, but I figured I'd share my point of view and answer some of the questions about someone who is at day 400, but plays casually now. I certainly don't care for the cut throat, ultra competitive direction that game has gone in, but I'm certain it's resulted in a large increase in revenue for D3.

kalex716

Should D3 prioritize and plan who they balance/tweak/nerf based on popular trends and commonly used hero's by data mined from the playerbase?

If so, would it surprise anyone if Xforce got a balancing pass?

Would it surprise anyone if IWoman got a balancing pass as well?

I know the discussion hasn't moved in this direction yet, but somehow, i think thats really the underlying issue here.

GrumpySmurf1002

MikeHock wrote:

How does this relate to the topic of Xforce in PvP? It doesn't really, but I figured I'd share my point of view and answer some of the questions about someone who is at day 400, but plays casually now. I certainly don't care for the cut throat, ultra competitive direction that game has gone in, but I'm certain it's resulted in a large increase in revenue for D3.

That's obviously your decision, and works for you. I understand a casual player not necessarily having the roster (although I would also argue that taking 3 months off does not make you a 405 day player, just one that has 405 days of daily rewards)

If one does care about the competitiveness (at least enough to complain they can't get past 600), for day 405, then that player should probably have achieved a reasonable roster now. Ditto the concept of shielding, if you're not shielding, then you're not competitive, so being able to cross 600/700 doesn't matter much, you're not staying there.

And all of that still obscures the fact that some combination of Panther/Hulk/Daken/GSBW should still be enough to kill a 270-270 team, and definitely pass 600-700 because 270/270 is not 100% of the opponent base at that level.

GrumpySmurf1002

kalex716 wrote:

Should D3 prioritize and plan who they balance/tweak/nerf based on popular trends and commonly used hero's by data mined from the playerbase?
If so, would it surprise anyone if Xforce got a balancing pass?
Would it surprise anyone if IWoman got a balancing pass as well?
.

They posted their numbers viewtopic.php?f=7&t=18414&hilit=stats

IW may get another look to bring her up to the 4* characters, but XForce isn't among most used. As in that link and Sentry's numbers, it's the difference between "most used for top end competitive PvP" and "most used by the other 95-99% of the player base that doesn't care about top end competitive PvP"

I'll keep repeating this: unless XForce actually disrupts basic game mechanics (creates infinite turns, trivializes matched to <1 minute), they're not going to touch him. That's further emphasized by their comments that they don't really want to invest time/manpower in existing characters to begin with, making it even more unlikely they're going to edit those characters for a 2nd time (laughably, IW was 'buffed' once already.)

kalex716

GrumpySmurf1002 wrote:

kalex716 wrote:

Should D3 prioritize and plan who they balance/tweak/nerf based on popular trends and commonly used hero's by data mined from the playerbase?
If so, would it surprise anyone if Xforce got a balancing pass?
Would it surprise anyone if IWoman got a balancing pass as well?
.

They posted their numbers viewtopic.php?f=7&t=18414&hilit=stats

IW may get another look to bring her up to the 4* characters, but XForce isn't among most used. As in that link and Sentry's numbers, it's the difference between "most used for top end competitive PvP" and "most used by the other 95-99% of the player base that doesn't care about top end competitive PvP"

I'll keep repeating this: unless XForce actually disrupts basic game mechanics (creates infinite turns, trivializes matched to <1 minute), they're not going to touch him. That's further emphasized by their comments that they don't really want to invest time/manpower in existing characters to begin with, making it even more unlikely they're going to edit those characters for a 2nd time (laughably, IW was 'buffed' once already.)

So it would surprise you if Xforce did get another pass then?

Lidolas

I think people don't understand ranking systems or true bell curves. I'm late Gen X/early Gen Y and when teachers talked about 'curving' a grading scale, they usually meant adding 10-20 points to every test, so most people would get C's or more. An example of a true curve puts 10% of people in the top category, 20% at B range, 40% at C range, 20% at D and 10% fail. This is how I see the MPQ ranking system.

You, as a player, do not deserve top 10/25/50/100. Just because you play, any number of hours, does not give you the right to certain rewards. You are not special. (It may be hard to hear, but it is true) You are one out of hundreds of thousands of people competing in a game. In a bracket, there are 499 other people playing. Do you honestly think that you are better at/play more/deserve more than 450/475/490 of them? I know I don't. I have proven to myself that given enough matches/time I can score top 10 and sometimes even #1. But I don't often have that time and almost never have the desire to play that much to get those rewards. And I'm OK with that. There are some dedicated (read crazy/insane/nuts/wacko) players who love getting top spots, even if they don't 'need' the rewards. They 'deserve' those rewards because they work the hardest/spend the most.

This is a game. There are many pieces and rules in this game. The more complicated a game, the more subject it is to manipulation. Find out how to manipulate the system, and you could find yourself near the top. Or, you could enjoy the game for the match 3, the Marvel connection, the alliance camaraderie, etc and chose real life over the game most days.

Unknown

Lidolas wrote:

I think people don't understand ranking systems or true bell curves. I'm late Gen X/early Gen Y and when teachers talked about 'curving' a grading scale, they usually meant adding 10-20 points to every test, so most people would get C's or more. An example of a true curve puts 10% of people in the top category, 20% at B range, 40% at C range, 20% at D and 10% fail. This is how I see the MPQ ranking system.

You, as a player, do not deserve top 10/25/50/100. Just because you play, any number of hours, does not give you the right to certain rewards. You are not special. (It may be hard to hear, but it is true) You are one out of hundreds of thousands of people competing in a game. In a bracket, there are 499 other people playing. Do you honestly think that you are better at/play more/deserve more than 450/475/490 of them? I know I don't. I have proven to myself that given enough matches/time I can score top 10 and sometimes even #1. But I don't often have that time and almost never have the desire to play that much to get those rewards. And I'm OK with that. There are some dedicated (read crazy/insane/nuts/wacko) players who love getting top spots, even if they don't 'need' the rewards. They 'deserve' those rewards because they work the hardest/spend the most.

This is a game. There are many pieces and rules in this game. The more complicated a game, the more subject it is to manipulation. Find out how to manipulate the system, and you could find yourself near the top. Or, you could enjoy the game for the match 3, the Marvel connection, the alliance camaraderie, etc and chose real life over the game most days.

Based on the forum activity I don't think people will be satisfied until 50% of the population finish in the top 10 and 25% of the population finish in top 1.

HailMary

MikeHock wrote:

How does this relate to the topic of Xforce in PvP? It doesn't really, but I figured I'd share my point of view and answer some of the questions about someone who is at day 400, but plays casually now. I certainly don't care for the cut throat, ultra competitive direction that game has gone in, but I'm certain it's resulted in a large increase in revenue for D3.

You're functionally at Day 320ish, and a non-competitive, semi-casual 320 at that. That's fine, but let's not pretend that that's an "I'm Day 400" the way most forumites would interpret such a statement as.

The OP apparently wants to be competitive, but just wants everyone else to be less competitive.

Also, you overlooked this part:

OnesOwnGrief wrote:

Storm/MN Magneto teams can hit 600-700. I see them all the time in my climb at those numbers. No explanation can be given as to why anyone with decent leveled 3*s can't hit above that.

Someone (like the OP) who feels competitive enough to whine about competition and has multiple maxed mid-high-tier 3*s has no business complaining about a wall at 600-700. We've got a guy in our alliance who refused to use Sentry on principle, doesn't use XF, and regularly tops 1100.

Afrocigar

Nice to see different perspectives, I don't want easy competition, just fair. I understand the guys that worked hard to achieve their rosters not wanting a change because they put the effort in, that's fine. I still don't understand why I see 270 Thorina, 270 Xforce, 166 Hood. How is that competitive for them to fight against my roster?

I hear you guys saying I should be playing progressively harder opponents, I just don't see how me fighting 270's do either team justice.

Just trying to have a discussion, I wasn't looking for the eddiemon types getting riled up.

Afrocigar

OnesOwnGrief wrote:

I'm more baffled at the fact a person can be at day 405 and not be able to hit higher than 600-700.

I'm now at 406. Well that's the truth, maybe I'm just not as good as you, but that's where I am. I believe I'm around 754 on the current PVP and shielded. Most likely that's where I'm going to stay because the teams I will face are all 270's.

Again, how is that a valid competition. Really what I want to know is if that's the way the game is intended to be played. Is it designed for me to hit a plateau until I develop a covered 4*?

HailMary

Afrocigar wrote:

Nice to see different perspectives, I don't want easy competition, just fair. I understand the guys that worked hard to achieve their rosters not wanting a change because they put the effort in, that's fine. I still don't understand why I see 270 Thorina, 270 Xforce, 166 Hood. How is that competitive for them to fight against my roster?

I hear you guys saying I should be playing progressively harder opponents, I just don't see how me fighting 270's do either team justice.

You keep vaguely hand-waving about "fair" and "justice." I sympathize with the plight of current transitioners (MMR walls, ever-growing token pools, increased Aliance competition, roster slot costs, oy vey). I see no reason to sympathize with your complaints whatsoever.

How is it "competitive" (you mean "challenging") for a triple-max H4X team to fight whatever you're fielding? It's not, really. People don't drop nearly a million Iso (and various amounts of HP) on that team just to twiddle their thumbs at 700. Fighting your roster is not their end goal.

P.S. - I have neither XF maxed nor GT at usable covers.

MarvelMan

Personally, I view a large part of the transitions (which is partially the disucssion here) as a result of everyone fighting for the same rewards. The people who can fight for the top rewards keeps getting inflated, while no change to those rewards occurs. It pushes those who havent reached that point lower and lower, especially if you are not a more than casual player.

Unknown

HailMary wrote:

Afrocigar wrote:

Nice to see different perspectives, I don't want easy competition, just fair. I understand the guys that worked hard to achieve their rosters not wanting a change because they put the effort in, that's fine. I still don't understand why I see 270 Thorina, 270 Xforce, 166 Hood. How is that competitive for them to fight against my roster?

I hear you guys saying I should be playing progressively harder opponents, I just don't see how me fighting 270's do either team justice.

You keep vaguely hand-waving about "fair" and "justice." I sympathize with the plight of current transitioners (MMR walls, ever-growing token pools, increased Aliance competition, roster slot costs, oy vey). I see no reason to sympathize with your complaints whatsoever.

How is it "competitive" (you mean "challenging") for a triple-max H4X team to fight whatever you're fielding? It's not, really. People don't drop nearly a million Iso (and various amounts of HP) on that team just to twiddle their thumbs at 700. Fighting your roster is not their end goal.

P.S. - I have neither XF maxed nor GT at usable covers.

Facing Xforce/Hood/Lame Thor when you are transitioning is impossible, that's right.

With the time slices, skip tax brings you most of the time the same opponents. So if his MMR is not good, he has little chance to score higher, we have to admit that HM.

It's the same as crazy scaling in PvE.

HailMary

arktos1971 wrote:

So if his MMR is not good, he has little chance to score higher, we have to admit that HM.

It's the same as crazy scaling in PvE.

If his PVP MMR is not good, he fixes it. Mid-transition teams have little chance to score higher. The OP has maxed BP, Patch, and UDaken.

Unknown

The 'why does the uber guys take everything' is a rather ironic question. Of course there's no real need for the guy with everything to continue to do well in PvP or PvE. But you're basically saying the game should entice the guy who has everything to quit so he won't be hogging the prizes, and that's just not a very good idea. And no you can't just make tiered brackets or whatever (which is already done in some extent) because the rewards won't work. Suppose we can perfectly identify how good everyone is at PvP/PvE and group people into say 1* to 4* brackets. Well, by definition the worst player in the 4* tier is better than the best player in the 3* tier. That means if the prize for finishing #500 in the 4* tier isn't as good as the prize for finishing #1 in the 3* tier, then the worst player in the 4* tier should find a way to tank because he'd be favored to win the 3* bracket. But of course if we made it fair then that'd mean the worst player of the top tier would get 4 Thor 4* covers for finishing last in his tier for this to even make sense and then people would say how this is just rich getting richer, even though that guy is indeed heavily favored to win the 3* tier that offers 4 Thor 4* covers if he dropped down a tier. Oh and then of course the second worst player in the 4* tier would be inclined to tank too and then the whole system falls apart.

AXP_isme

I keep pushing this idea in the hope it gains some traction. Why not have different choices of rewards in PvP where you don't just choose your end time but also the predominant reward type. The forum is full of threads about not enough ISO or HP for roster slots and transitioners moan about vets taking all the covers even when they don't need them. If people could choose to compete for HP or ISO or 4* covers or... and you were competing with other people fighting for the same rewards they should, by and large, be rosters in a similar position. You just need to make sure that the ISO/HP/cover rewards were higher than the amount you earn currently so it creates the right incentive and it doesn't break the alliance ranking set-up.

That way you get more rewards that you want and you should find that the new bracketing brings together people with more similar rosters and maybe even addresses the 166/270 wall.

I'm firmly of the opinion that people who want to p2w should be allowed to win and vets should be rewarded for the amount of time that they've sunk into the game. I just think people should be able to get more of what they want and be able to compete for it in different ways.

I'm sure people will argue that the stratification in the end time bracketing will be nothing compared to the impact this would have on season scores but wouldn't it just add another element of strategy. Maybe stomping n00bs in a 2* cover tournament would get you the most season points but you would be giving up the rewards you would get from a different bracket. When you see that kind of trade offs it's just adding more dimensions of complexity which offers a different gameplay experience for different players.

Just a thought...

Unknown

HailMary wrote:

MikeHock wrote:

How does this relate to the topic of Xforce in PvP? It doesn't really, but I figured I'd share my point of view and answer some of the questions about someone who is at day 400, but plays casually now. I certainly don't care for the cut throat, ultra competitive direction that game has gone in, but I'm certain it's resulted in a large increase in revenue for D3.

You're functionally at Day 320ish, and a non-competitive, semi-casual 320 at that. That's fine, but let's not pretend that that's an "I'm Day 400" the way most forumites would interpret such a statement as.

The OP apparently wants to be competitive, but just wants everyone else to be less competitive.

Also, you overlooked this part:

OnesOwnGrief wrote:

Storm/MN Magneto teams can hit 600-700. I see them all the time in my climb at those numbers. No explanation can be given as to why anyone with decent leveled 3*s can't hit above that.

Someone (like the OP) who feels competitive enough to whine about competition and has multiple maxed mid-high-tier 3*s has no business complaining about a wall at 600-700. We've got a guy in our alliance who refused to use Sentry on principle, doesn't use XF, and regularly tops 1100.

I agree with most of what you've said, but my posts were in response to those who asked how someone on day 400 could not have a roster with several 3*s. There was no intention to mislead or pretend. I doubt that everyone who is up to day 400 has played hardcore all 400 days and I did start this game before they implemented the daily reward.

Afrocigar

HailMary wrote:

MikeHock wrote:

The OP apparently wants to be competitive, but just wants everyone else to be less competitive.
.

Not true. Again, I just don't see why I'm thrown in with guys that have fully covered 4*'s

esoxnepa

Raekwen wrote:

Sure, we'll go battle it out for the good rewards, and you can be in a shard with other transitioners for much lesser rewards. Sound fair?

Actually, yes. I think there should be an "Advanced" bracket. It should offer better prizes than 3* covers, so that those with completed 3* rosters are tempted enough to leave the lower brackets to those who need the 3* covers. So the the "Advanced" bracket should offer more chances at 4*s and and some wildcard 3* tokens, or something else tempting.

Then those that need the 3* cover can slug it out for that, and those of you who do not, have something more rewarding to you to battle over.