The Simulator - Dec 30 - Jan 7

Moon Roach

Wolveroach is in slice 1, and with doing only the essentials is Normal is nudging top 10. In Hard I'm just doing Simulator 3, which is as far as his roster managed to get. It's goons at level 138, and not too tricky to do. And sometimes I have a go at the essentials, and there I'm easily keeping top 20.

Overall Wolveroach is just outside top 50 with 54425. I see you, Atomzed, at #4 with 88467.

Moon Roach is easily retaining top 10 in both Normal and Hard with just essential clears, and last time I checked was #8 overall.

It's quiet. Too quiet.

Unknown

Spoit wrote:

raisinbman wrote:

So it seems like folks are either out celebrating the American New Year or have just resigned their place in sim. Since I've never seen MPQ players actually take a holiday I'll assume it's the latter.

My Sim-Hard placement hasn't budged for 5-6 hours, and my Sim-Normal placement has only improved. I'll settle for top 50 on this garbagio.

Sim Normal wasn't hard but 2*Mag takes a beating. Sim Hard I didn't even bother finishing except for the 2k Iso, I refuse to fight a 200+ 3*Magneto who can prob 1shot my team, the essentials scaled too much - there's too much bulky characters(Hulk, Rag, Groot, She-Hulk) to use any cheap tricks like Stormneto, and Sentry-bombing takes too long/is too fragile now. Luckily that goon only node is good points and that Falcon node is basically a goon node. I'd do the Elektra essential if I had more refreshes to place better.

Yeah about that....have fun with the last pair of subs

I recognize that sentry will become essential once it rotates, but that's a whole different conversation - once he does, he'll have a level/HP boost.

Just more often then not, the CPU seems to put sentry in a position where he dies/will kill himself from his powers in some of the more demanding nodes, IE - I don't have alot of options.

ZeiramMR

I'm doing okay so far, but fighting a cold meant I didn't stay up until the end of the first subs getting a better placement. Still managed a Top 50 for Hard, at least.

Hopefully I can get in better overall position over these remaining subs.

Tarheelmax

GrumpySmurf1002 wrote:

raisinbman wrote:

So it seems like folks are either out celebrating the American New Year or have just resigned their place in sim. Since I've never seen MPQ players actually take a holiday I'll assume it's the latter.

My Sim-Hard placement hasn't budged for 5-6 hours, and my Sim-Normal placement has only improved. I'll settle for top 50 on this garbagio.

Sim Normal wasn't hard but 2*Mag takes a beating. Sim Hard I didn't even bother finishing except for the 2k Iso, I refuse to fight a 200+ 3*Magneto who can prob 1shot my team, the essentials scaled too much - there's too much bulky characters(Hulk, Rag, Groot, She-Hulk) to use any cheap tricks like Stormneto, and Sentry-bombing takes too long/is too fragile now. Luckily that goon only node is good points and that Falcon node is basically a goon node. I'd do the Elektra essential if I had more refreshes to place better.

In 7 hours I've opened a 10k lead in the hard sub (doing my final clears for the night). It literally looks like everyone did one pass and said 'tinykitty this.'

I dunno if it's just because it's the odd slice (#3 6am est/6pm est) but after having heavy competition in the first set, I'm almost 20k up in 3rd now.

Oh, and cStorm. You had a good run. But mMags has a new best friend, and it's 5-blue mystique.

I'm still around Grumpy, but as a new player, I'm missing Mystique. So I wasn't expecting to place top 10 in either this time. Yet somehow, I'm easily in second place on hard by only clearing the nodes on the left. Crazy.

Also, I enjoyed fighting it out with you on the first subs, I dropped to third in the hard sim because i took 1 minute too long to beat the goons at the end, but I'll take the 5 tokens overall.

Unknown

I like the style of this event. The difficulty of the nodes makes it resemble more of a puzzle game, rather than grindfest/scheduling and life tradeoff. Wish there were more like it and Gauntlet.

Unknown

I'm still doing most of the easy nodes (so going between first and third place, generally), but on hard I'm doing 2-3 nodes a clear on average, and not even the essentials (which would be a lot quicker and involve the same amount of skill if the game just flipped a coin to tell you whether you get a bad board and lose or a good board and win), and keeping third place there, second overall.

This is incredibly boring. And player engagement appears to have fallen off a cliff. Playing this many nodes would usually not have me top 50.

Unknown

Ben Grimm wrote:

I'm still doing most of the easy nodes (so going between first and third place, generally), but on hard I'm doing 2-3 nodes a clear on average, and not even the essentials (which would be a lot quicker and involve the same amount of skill if the game just flipped a coin to tell you whether you get a bad board and lose or a good board and win), and keeping third place there, second overall.

This is incredibly boring. And player engagement appears to have fallen off a cliff. Playing this many nodes would usually not have me top 50.

I would argue that this is pve done right, or I would rather have the majority of events like this. The normal subs give players an outlet, if they insist on playing endless hours.

The good boards and bad boards are inherent in the match 3 style game. Everyone is treated the same way, the good boards let you punch above your weight class, and the bad boards make it a challenge, that you can retreat from and wait out.
The variance, in experience, keeps it from being repetitive and I'd argue is what gives people a gambling high and is the secret sauce of this addictive genre.


Edit: Just so I don't look like I'm hugging their nuts, I hate character rotation, cover drop rates and roster slot costs.

simonsez

Kriegerbot wrote:

Everyone is treated the same way

You'd be right, if scaling weren't so horrendously broken. And yes, this is the biased viewpoint from someone stuck with 395s, while alliance-mates with fairly similar rosters are looking at nodes in the 200s.

And aside from that, I still prefer a PvE where the high ranks go to people who are motivated to put in a big effort, not to the people who decide it's worth it to buy rainbow boosts and health packs.

thanos8587

the thing is with gauntlet you have the challenge of difficulty but you are only looking to beat a node one time to move on. there is a feeling of relief when youve wiped a few times and then finally beat it.

this event is all about progression points and therefore you HAVE to beat the nodes repeatedly to accumulate points and its just a complete meat grinder to get a few hundred points and even if you beat the node youre likely too bloodied to do more than a few nodes before youre out of gas and your whole roster is down for 4 hours. theres so little reward for the attempt and youre better off grinding normal every 2 1/2 hours to get the points. makes it a real chore.

SnowcaTT

Kriegerbot wrote:

I like the style of this event. The difficulty of the nodes makes it resemble more of a puzzle game, rather than grindfest/scheduling and life tradeoff. Wish there were more like it and Gauntlet.

I love the Gauntlet - I know it is to difficult for me to beat, but it has no new character or alliance rewards - so I simply don't play it.

I wish more PVE's were like the Gauntlet as well: no pressure to play crazy difficulty.

fmftint

Bottom line, these subs are too long. I don't want to keep working on this sub but I've got to while it's still manageable. Essentials with an underdeveloped Sentry is less appealing than Mystique

Unknown

All the nodes involve Loki may seem pretty random but I can assure you that just hoping you get lucky isn't a good way to beat a high level Loki. Sure whenever he gets lucky you literally have no chance of winning, but even on a normal game for the AI you still have to be on top of your game to overcome the massive advantage Mischief confers to the AI.

Unless you have unreasonable low scaling, nobody is doing more than 4-5 nodes in hard at most. I've been keep track of scores in my bracket and there's no score movement that'd indicate anyone is capable of doing that, at least not on a prolonged basis. The hard nodes should have double the value and twice the refresh time so that you don't have to do them as often. Normal I guess you can leave it alone though I wouldn't mind if this approach is adapted in general.

thanos8587

i did 7 hard nodes first thing when it went live last night, mostly to get the 2000 iso node done. i could only reasonably do 2 of 3 essentials because my 1/1/0 lvl 43 mystique is a whopping buffed lvl 133 with 4300 hp and zero damage. i didnt even bother with mags/spidey/falcon.

now im doing three nodes max (goon, blade and first essential with beast). im sitting at 8. no reason to even try the others as the pita factor isnt worth the increase in blood pressure.

RemoDestroyer

For the 2nd set of subs after the 3rd clear hard sim 4 is at level 259. Is that unreasonable? It is hard but not ridiculously impossible. For the essentials I'm playing a 4/4/2 level 40 Mystique that doesn't get much use.

Unknown

I thought the gauntlet was a good change of pace from the heavy grind events where you have to keep doing them over and over again.

fmftint

RemoDestroyer wrote:

For the 2nd set of subs after the 3rd clear hard sim 4 is at level 259. Is that unreasonable? It is hard but not ridiculously impossible. For the essentials I'm playing a 4/4/2 level 40 Mystique that doesn't get much use.

when you still have +40 hours left on the sub.... YES

over_clocked

Just wanted to tell my bracket buddies (slice 4) that I won't be going for t2, merely want to build up a lead before the dreaded Sentry subs. I cannot imagine myself using any of his powers except as a desperation move.

Unknown

Ben Grimm wrote:

I'm still doing most of the easy nodes (so going between first and third place, generally), but on hard I'm doing 2-3 nodes a clear on average, and not even the essentials (which would be a lot quicker and involve the same amount of skill if the game just flipped a coin to tell you whether you get a bad board and lose or a good board and win), and keeping third place there, second overall.

This is incredibly boring. And player engagement appears to have fallen off a cliff. Playing this many nodes would usually not have me top 50.

I'm doing the same as you Ben (which is probably why you and i keep swapping spots within the subs lol) and i agree im amazed im as high as i am with the small amount of nodes being played. But hey as long as i finish top 10 im not going to complain!

Unknown

So, couple things - I tried Magstique combo even though I only have one blue on Mystique, and its pretty fun. Of course, I was leaning heavily on Mag to give me lots of blue but I ended up getting enough blue to Infiltrate with Mystique twice for every polarity shift. I can only imagine how beautifully it works out with +crit boosts and a properly specced Mystique.

Also, I know everyone else had said this already, but this is looking like one of the least competitive events I've seen in a while(besides some weird PVP brackets). If this were any other event I would be wayyyy behind 150th place.

And I can't agree with wanting more PVE events like THIS. Give me Gauntlet. Give me Weekend PVE events. Give me 24 hour nodes. Do not give me a subevent where I can't actually touch half the things in it.

If you want to challenge me, give me a cerebral challenge(using certain characters, time limits, survival mode, etc), not a LEVEL 9999999 JUGGERNAUT CAN YOU BEAT HIM BEFORE HE MATCHES YOU TO DEATH?????one!!!?!?!?

teef1

Bar5003 wrote:

Ben Grimm wrote:

I'm still doing most of the easy nodes (so going between first and third place, generally), but on hard I'm doing 2-3 nodes a clear on average, and not even the essentials (which would be a lot quicker and involve the same amount of skill if the game just flipped a coin to tell you whether you get a bad board and lose or a good board and win), and keeping third place there, second overall.

This is incredibly boring. And player engagement appears to have fallen off a cliff. Playing this many nodes would usually not have me top 50.

I'm doing the same as you Ben (which is probably why you and i keep swapping spots within the subs lol) and i agree im amazed im as high as i am with the small amount of nodes being played. But hey as long as i finish top 10 im not going to complain!

Wow, two of my fellow top ten bracketmates. I usually only lurk here but had to post when I saw you both writing. I am also playing a few nodes per clear. Mostly essentials. Trying to play consistently, but not going nuts on fights that are too hard. Just not my playstyle.