The Hunt: Jan 21 - 26

Unknown

Got to 22k and my Squirrel Girl last night - I"ll probably only repeat essentials from here on out, unless I get bored. I want the tokens each sub, since all the boosted are people I need at least one cover for, but, other than that, I'll probably take it pretty easy.

thanos8587

Ben Grimm wrote:

Got to 22k and my Squirrel Girl last night - I"ll probably only repeat essentials from here on out, unless I get bored. I want the tokens each sub, since all the boosted are people I need at least one cover for, but, other than that, I'll probably take it pretty easy.

same here with progression. now theres only 3 1/2 days left in the event

id love to keep top 50 but this is so boring and florida is coming around again. uuggggghhhhhh. if this were 2 1/2 hour refresh id have pulled my eyes out.

JVReal

I've noticed that the feeling of the AI gaining "Cascades" is exaggerated by the sheer volume of attacks they are allowed to make because of the low AP cost.
When they get even a small cascade and get 6 green, 6 red, 5 blue or 4-7 purple, you end up with Rags using Red, generating green, Using Green, generating red and green matches, chemical reaction, gravity warp (wrap?), then stun by venom, {your turn... do nothing because you're stunned} ... repeat. It feels like an endless cascade but it's more a result of the AI being allowed to spam their low cost, high damage attacks. The cost of their attacks should scale relative to the damage that they produce.

I got SG's yellow cover last night from progression, even with 1 cover, it's very useful with this spam happy crew. I used it a couple of times in one fight and it did a lot to nullify much of the spam damage from Rags, softened chemical reaction a bit, but not much.
Remember to use it LAST (because it ends your turn) AND switch over to a fresh enemy with greater than 80% health before using it to get the higher strength protect tiles!

Trisul

The repeatable node in main is a good showcase for why SG's yellow and purple are her best abilities.

Unknown

So.
This:
http://imgur.com/hpoQJb1

Is my top10.

The guy in 8th has a lvl200 xforce, and the guy in 10th has a 250. That is the total number of characters over lvl166 in the top10. Half these people have no characters over lvl100.

Im a pve rat. This is not how it usually goes. This is not normal. Scaling has driven people with good rosters from this top10.

Trisul

5 out of my top 10 have 166s.

Unknown

ark123 wrote:

Im a pve rat. This is not how it usually goes. This is not normal. Scaling has driven people with good rosters from this top10.

I think Lazy Thor rewards are contributing - if you're not willing to go for top 2, there's not much reason for most experienced players to push for high placement. For a tenth of the effort needed for top ten, you can probably still get a token every sub and take it easy for five days.

Unknown

Ben Grimm wrote:

ark123 wrote:

Im a pve rat. This is not how it usually goes. This is not normal. Scaling has driven people with good rosters from this top10.

I think Lazy Thor rewards are contributing - if you're not willing to go for top 2, there's not much reason for most experienced players to push for high placement. For a tenth of the effort needed for top ten, you can probably still get a token every sub and take it easy for five days.

Your lips to my bracket's ears. I need a yellow Thor but weekend play time is always a struggle for me. The more people that take it easy, the happier I will be as I try to maintain top 10

Unknown

ark123 wrote:

So.
This:
http://imgur.com/hpoQJb1

Is my top10.

The guy in 8th has a lvl200 xforce, and the guy in 10th has a 250. That is the total number of characters over lvl166 in the top10. Half these people have no characters over lvl100.

Im a pve rat. This is not how it usually goes. This is not normal. Scaling has driven people with good rosters from this top10.

That's roughly how my top 10 looks like, but I think it's because scaling is too low, not too high. I've been boosting on every fight and beating them just fine, but I'm noticing the guys with the level 100s are simply beating them faster based on the scoreboard movement. Probably going to stop wasting boosts at this rate.

Ebolamonkey84

Phantron wrote:

ark123 wrote:

So.
This:
http://imgur.com/hpoQJb1

Is my top10.

The guy in 8th has a lvl200 xforce, and the guy in 10th has a 250. That is the total number of characters over lvl166 in the top10. Half these people have no characters over lvl100.

Im a pve rat. This is not how it usually goes. This is not normal. Scaling has driven people with good rosters from this top10.

That's roughly how my top 10 looks like, but I think it's because scaling is too low, not too high. I've been boosting on every fight and beating them just fine, but I'm noticing the guys with the level 100s are simply beating them faster based on the scoreboard movement. Probably going to stop wasting boosts at this rate.

In my top 10, 8 of us have at least one maxed 3* and four of us have at least one 4* over 166.

The only anomaly is shytface, who has GT and Fury at 74, OBW at 67, and no one else higher than 55.

simonsez

ark123 wrote:

This is not normal. Scaling has driven people with good rosters from this top10.

And to think I didn't even get one up-vote when I hypothesized in the 8hr refresh thread, "We see the same thing every PvE. Weak rosters flood the leaderboard, and eventually, most get scaled out. Now, with fewer passes, they probably won't get scaled out."

Unknown

I think it's easier to just look say top 3 scores of top 3 alliances and see what their roster look like. Here's what I got, including pages of heroes:

WE ARE GROOT
2 166s, 3 pages of heroes (40 heroes)
no one higher than 102, 4 pages
1 120, rest no higher than 111, 4 pages

Teddybabes
4 153s, 5 pages
no one higher than 131, 4 pages
no one higher than 130, 4 pages

DMZ MOB PVE
lots of 166s, 5 pages
1 120, IW at 106, rest 2*, 3 pages (39 heroes)
1 146, some 100-130 range, rest 2*, 4 pages

Anyone with 4 pages of heroes has at least 42 heroes. This is pretty consistent profile for the top PvE event for events like this. This isn't some kind of accident and anyone with 40 heroes isn't some kind of transition guy unless transition guy normally has enough HP to buy 40 roster slots. The rosters is built in a very deliberate way that takes advantage of the unfairness in scaling. Now, the higher the overall scaling the less advantageous this is, but this is simply because the highest scaling guys can't get anyone higher than 395. If it was possible to go above 395 then you'd probably expect Simulator Hard to have level 500+ enemies and that'd again favor the lower scaling guy if they could get that high.

Unknown

simonsez wrote:

ark123 wrote:

This is not normal. Scaling has driven people with good rosters from this top10.

And to think I didn't even get one up-vote when I hypothesized in the 8hr refresh thread, "We see the same thing every PvE. Weak rosters flood the leaderboard, and eventually, most get scaled out. Now, with fewer passes, they probably won't get scaled out."

The refresh rate doesn't really matter. What matters is the rate the nodes go up and it's impossible to tell this ahead of time. For some reason the levels seem even lower than normal, because normally Savage Land should hit at least 300+ and it's currently not doing that, and lower than expected scaling always favor the weak rosters.

simonsez

Phantron wrote:

The refresh rate doesn't really matter. What matters is the rate the nodes go up

I never trusted them to change the scaling rate, which is why the refresh rate matters.

Phantron wrote:

For some reason the levels seem even lower than normal

Ummm... maybe it's because they didn't change the scaling rate and people are only playing once every 8 hours.

Phantron wrote:

lower than expected scaling always favor the weak rosters.

... which was my point to begin with.

Unknown

simonsez wrote:

Phantron wrote:

The refresh rate doesn't really matter. What matters is the rate the nodes go up

I never trusted them to change the scaling rate, which is why the refresh rate matters.

Phantron wrote:

For some reason the levels seem even lower than normal

Ummm... maybe it's because they didn't change the scaling rate and people are only playing once every 8 hours.

Phantron wrote:

lower than expected scaling always favor the weak rosters.

... which was my point to begin with.

If it was just the old scaling rules unchanged the nodes wouldn't even get past 200. I'm guessing they increased the initial scaling but left the scaling per clear the same as well, so while the nodes start out higher (quite a few start at higher than 200), they also never get anywhere close to 300 let alone 395 like they used to.

Unknown

Really looks weird to see the refresh timer at 1d2hr...

simonsez

JVReal wrote:

When they get even a small cascade and get 6 green, 6 red, 5 blue or 4-7 purple, you end up with Rags using Red, generating green, Using Green, generating red and green matches, chemical reaction, gravity warp (wrap?), then stun by venom, {your turn... do nothing because you're stunned} ... repeat.

You're right, but what gets me is that if I ever try to use Rags, Daken and whomever, none of that stuff ever happens for me.

GrumpySmurf1002

Phantron wrote:

Anyone with 4 pages of heroes has at least 42 heroes. This is pretty consistent profile for the top PvE event for events like this. This isn't some kind of accident and anyone with 40 heroes isn't some kind of transition guy unless transition guy normally has enough HP to buy 40 roster slots. The rosters is built in a very deliberate way that takes advantage of the unfairness in scaling. Now, the higher the overall scaling the less advantageous this is, but this is simply because the highest scaling guys can't get anyone higher than 395. If it was possible to go above 395 then you'd probably expect Simulator Hard to have level 500+ enemies and that'd again favor the lower scaling guy if they could get that high.

FWIW, this is how I dealt with the transition, 40+ heroes, 25-30 all leveled to 94 before I saved enough Iso to move to PvP. I could definitely see an advantage in a PvE exclusive alliance to purposeful underleveling.

PvE is more managable, and that comes mostly from having almost anyone on the roster being able to take a fight. Scaling is under control enough that using mHawkeye or Johnny Storm wasn't a big deal, and full covered guys like FatThor still pack a punch at 94. So you don't run into health pack problems. Your A and B teams can die and you can still build an effective C and D compared to the scaling.

You still have to work your butt off to place well, but that's rarely an issue if you have the motivation.

Unknown

GrumpySmurf1002 wrote:

Phantron wrote:

Anyone with 4 pages of heroes has at least 42 heroes. This is pretty consistent profile for the top PvE event for events like this. This isn't some kind of accident and anyone with 40 heroes isn't some kind of transition guy unless transition guy normally has enough HP to buy 40 roster slots. The rosters is built in a very deliberate way that takes advantage of the unfairness in scaling. Now, the higher the overall scaling the less advantageous this is, but this is simply because the highest scaling guys can't get anyone higher than 395. If it was possible to go above 395 then you'd probably expect Simulator Hard to have level 500+ enemies and that'd again favor the lower scaling guy if they could get that high.

FWIW, this is how I dealt with the transition, 40+ heroes, 25-30 all leveled to 94 before I saved enough Iso to move to PvP. I could definitely see an advantage in a PvE exclusive alliance to purposeful underleveling.

PvE is more managable, and that comes mostly from having almost anyone on the roster being able to take a fight. Scaling is under control enough that using mHawkeye or Johnny Storm wasn't a big deal, and full covered guys like FatThor still pack a punch at 94. So you don't run into health pack problems. Your A and B teams can die and you can still build an effective C and D compared to the scaling.

You still have to work your butt off to place well, but that's rarely an issue if you have the motivation.

These aren't some random 2/3/3 at level 94 either. They're generally max covered 3* and sometimes 4* at a very low level, and it has to be like that because scaling isn't so trivial that you can expect to run a 3/3/3 3* and get anywhere and there is a limitation to how far the 2*s can get you without the 3* powerhouses.

Unknown

Ben Grimm wrote:

ark123 wrote:

Im a pve rat. This is not how it usually goes. This is not normal. Scaling has driven people with good rosters from this top10.

I think Lazy Thor rewards are contributing - if you're not willing to go for top 2, there's not much reason for most experienced players to push for high placement. For a tenth of the effort needed for top ten, you can probably still get a token every sub and take it easy for five days.

I am trying this out. I am going to only play the last hour of savage land and see how high this get me in the sub. Anything passed 22K points is just to help the alliance score not because I need Lazy Thor covers.