A couple upcoming changes to PvP events

Unknown

Imo, shields only help you get 2 4-stars rather than 1. #1 in my bracket did not use shields. So again, paying adheres to the model of merely faster progression rather than being OP.

Unknown

They definitely tweaked the matchmaking some more because I never saw anyone with more than 1000 points in my matchup selection, ever.

Right now you still have the same issue in that people who somehow broke away are at least relatively safe. If anything, at least your direct opponents tend to be shielded. I know for sure virtually everyone in my matchup selection was not shielded since I attacked every one of them and their score changed every time I did (and half of the time they retaliated immediately). Too much of your progress depends on whether the players you're matched up with are shielded or not, and currently shields are too expensive so that case where nobody is shielded is very common. You basically have to be matched up with someone who is rich. Otherwise all you're doing is trading points back and forth.

Unknown

Nemek wrote:

Derethus wrote:

Nemek wrote:

Yeah, progression rewards are still infinitely easier than they were a month ago. We went something like 3 months with the top progression reward gotten MAYBE a handful of times (Polkio is the only one I've heard of, but there may be others.)

Today, there were at least a dozen, probably closer to 30+ people who got the top rewards. That doesn't seem like a bad number at all. There were even people in the 2900+ range for points.

The only thing with this tournament is that the 'annoying' factor was upped with the -50 point losses. That's countered slightly by all of the +50 point gains I got, too. But, I can see it being incredibly frustrating, nonetheless.

I think my biggest issue right now is how pay-to-win it is. Shikamaru shielded his way to the 2400 progression reward and, in the process, got 1st in my bracket. He spent a ton to basically get 2 4* covers. But it gives me the feeling that the only way to win in this game is to spend 1.5-2k HP in shields. Otherwise you're stuck with the same rotation of 3* covers that you'll max relatively quickly.

Shikamaru probably spent way more than he needed to. I was able to get to 2400 without using shields. Then threw on an 8 hour shield to go to sleep. Came back this morning and took first. 200 HP spent, 2 4* covers, 3 new 3* covers. Even if I hadn't used a single shield, I'd probably be top 5, regardless (and still got the progression reward.)

Granted, my fortune was won on the backs of people like Shikamaru. But, I'm just saying that you don't NEED shields to get high progression rewards. I did spend 2 straight hours going from 500 to 2400 from 12am-2am, though.

It depends on how lucky you were with getting hit and how lucky you are with finding matches and getting hit. I never saw anyone that gave 50 points when I was playing I saw one person at 46 with I was sub 300, but after I passed 500 I think the max I saw was 37.

I know Jozier was trying to get some of the higher rewards, but he was one of the unlucky ones that got hit for more than he gained with every match.

You can get the high progression rewards if you're lucky. Otherwise, be prepared to spend a lot of HP.

ihearthawthats wrote:

Imo, shields only help you get 2 4-stars rather than 1. #1 in my bracket did not use shields. So again, paying adheres to the model of merely faster progression rather than being OP.

Depends on your bracket. I wasn't going to shield my way to the 2400 progression, and #1 did, so no way I can beat him.

I suppose if you join near the end of the tournament you could get #1 without shields. At that point they might as well make these tournaments only 3 hours though.

Unknown

I started Rage and Ruin after the PvE was over. 1164 won my bracket. I got 14th (622). Tardiness prevails.

Unknown

ihearthawthats wrote:

Imo, shields only help you get 2 4-stars rather than 1. #1 in my bracket did not use shields. So again, paying adheres to the model of merely faster progression rather than being OP.

Shields don't change the actual ranking themselves because you can clearly see who is shielded and who is not in your bracket, so if there's some kind of magic strategy to place first, you can obviously see it too and just copy it too.

While overall the implementation is sound, right now you need excessive playing to escape the 1000 range, unless you happened to be matched up with other guys who are shielded as well. There definitely seems to be comparatively less hits from guys way below you compared to the last tournament (I certainly never saw anyone way above 1000 to attack, and the vast majority of my hits were from guys on my matchup list), so your biggest source of being hit is still those 10 guys you see on your matchup. If those guys aren't shielded, all you're doing is trading points back and forth. The only time I made any progress was when one of those 10 guys happened to be shielded. Once that guy drops off the matchup list it's back to the same 10 guys mutually beating each other up over and over again.

Unknown

Koolbiird wrote:

I started Rage and Ruin after the PvE was over. 1164 won my bracket. I got 14th (622). Tardiness prevails.

There needs to be some incentive to playing early, otherwise the majority of the playerbase won't play until the last 3-8 hours. It screws over the ones that starts early and puts a lot of stress on the servers at the end.

turul

Derethus wrote:

Koolbiird wrote:

I started Rage and Ruin after the PvE was over. 1164 won my bracket. I got 14th (622). Tardiness prevails.

There needs to be some incentive to playing early, otherwise the majority of the playerbase won't play until the last 3-8 hours. It screws over the ones that starts early and puts a lot of stress on the servers at the end.

The incentive of playing early is, that the majority of the playerbase won't play until the last 3-8 hours

Unknown

The incentive is the extra 4-star, however, requires shield usage most likely. Perhaps they can give 1 free shield to the early birds.

Unknown

Derethus wrote:

Koolbiird wrote:

I started Rage and Ruin after the PvE was over. 1164 won my bracket. I got 14th (622). Tardiness prevails.

There needs to be some incentive to playing early, otherwise the majority of the playerbase won't play until the last 3-8 hours. It screws over the ones that starts early and puts a lot of stress on the servers at the end.

This touranment does end at 9am, so it's likely pretty favorable for anyone who can get in some last minute playing. I can't imagine pulling this off on a touranment ending in prime time, because you'd still be hammered by everyone else who is thinking the same thing.

Unknown

ihearthawthats wrote:

The incentive is the extra 4-star, however, requires shield usage most likely. Perhaps they can give 1 free shield to the early birds.

There should be a 50% discount to all shields with more than 2 days left in a tournament and a 25% discount with more than 1 day left in the tournament.

Right now the shields don't work out because most people can't come close to where you'd start having an incentive to use shields. In particular, if you don't need the covers at 1200/1600, that's a chasm of 1000-2400 that you have to blindly take it on faith that your shields + playing time will somehow cover.

Unknown

turul wrote:

Derethus wrote:

Koolbiird wrote:

I started Rage and Ruin after the PvE was over. 1164 won my bracket. I got 14th (622). Tardiness prevails.

There needs to be some incentive to playing early, otherwise the majority of the playerbase won't play until the last 3-8 hours. It screws over the ones that starts early and puts a lot of stress on the servers at the end.

The incentive of playing early is, that the majority of the playerbase won't play until the last 3-8 hours

Which is counterbalanced by not be able to find good opponents.

ihearthawthats wrote:

The incentive is the extra 4-star, however, requires shield usage most likely. Perhaps they can give 1 free shield to the early birds.

You have to get lucky or spend a lot on shields to get the extra 4-star. If you're not in a hurry, you might as well join in the last 3 hours in the next time the same 4* is in the ranking rewards instead of progression. At this point I just need green IW and green 4* Wolvie, and then I'd rather slowly build the HP to level them that way than try for progression.

Unknown

I have been that guy that plays from the start and the onslaught is endless. 2 days of playing just to get to the same place I was in the previous day. I'm understanding the nature of things now. 3hrs before tourney end is prime real estate. I'm obviously not gonna win, but my bracket is ALWAYS low and it seems I'm under the radar until I hit 700+ and the Raging Tempest begins.

Unknown

Yeah I like to start tournaments relatively early, because I actually enjoy playing the game. But the grindfest and the inability to gain any traction detracts from that fun. Especially when I can get smacked for 50 points by tons of people, but can't find a match for more than 30 points to save my life.

Towards the end when my points were dropping, I found one person with 40+ points available. The problem was that it was the same person, over and over. Static MMR is just as bad as not getting good points. It's just not FUN to see the same 7-8 names. I like having to take down different teams. But if I'm fighting the same guy over and over it's just a repetitive pattern.

Unknown

jozier wrote:

Yeah I like to start tournaments relatively early, because I actually enjoy playing the game. But the grindfest and the inability to gain any traction detracts from that fun. Especially when I can get smacked for 50 points by tons of people, but can't find a match for more than 30 points to save my life.

Towards the end when my points were dropping, I found one person with 40+ points available. The problem was that it was the same person, over and over. Static MMR is just as bad as not getting good points. It's just not FUN to see the same 7-8 names. I like having to take down different teams. But if I'm fighting the same guy over and over it's just a repetitive pattern.

This. I want to play this game. I want to play this game for more than the 2 hours at 9 am and 9 pm for pve events and for more than 3 hours at the end of pvp events. I can deal with pve being on a schedule if I could play pvp freely. Clearly, I cannot. They might as well make the game not available except at those times.

Unknown

There needs to be some way to get out of the MMR range of mutual beatdowns. Throughout this tournament, most of the time I was stuck with the same 10 opponents that are all +-200 points of me. They are all active players, all have relatively strong teams and thus capable of beating anyone in this subgroup, and none of them are shielded. All you see is people go up and go down but nobody ever gets anywhere. It doesn't matter how good you are because your opponents are generally just as good as you (nothing wrong with that) so any time you jump ahead those guys pound you instead.

The only time I had any reprieve was when a guy who was shielded somehow showed up on my list (he was definitely not one of the guys I regularly match up with). With the shield costs being as high as they are, very often you get into a case where nobody in your matchup group ever blinks (and shields), but if nobody shields, nobody can ever escape unless you've truly outrageous playing times. Progression becomes a matter of hoping someone in your matchup blinks first, or that you were just lucky enough to be matched up with a guy who is rich enough to afford shields.

Spoit

GameloftNYC wrote:

you guys need to stop sweating the wolverine covers. i mean if you haven't noticed their pattern by now, i'd be amazed.

they introduce a new hero. over the course of the next month, half the events give out the new hero, to the point anybody casually playing can have several covers worth and anybody playing more than that is totally uninterested in the events because they don't need 20+ punisher/hulk/im40 covers.


you're going to be covered (HEHE) in wolverine covers in the next 3 weeks. don't sweat it.

Still waiting for hulk tournies

Unknown

Phantron wrote:

ihearthawthats wrote:

The incentive is the extra 4-star, however, requires shield usage most likely. Perhaps they can give 1 free shield to the early birds.

There should be a 50% discount to all shields with more than 2 days left in a tournament and a 25% discount with more than 1 day left in the tournament.

Right now the shields don't work out because most people can't come close to where you'd start having an incentive to use shields. In particular, if you don't need the covers at 1200/1600, that's a chasm of 1000-2400 that you have to blindly take it on faith that your shields + playing time will somehow cover.

I must say, I think the idea of shield sales would be great. I can only imagine that the cover sales they introduced increased sales.

Unknown

Phantron wrote:

They definitely tweaked the matchmaking some more because I never saw anyone with more than 1000 points in my matchup selection, ever.

Right now you still have the same issue in that people who somehow broke away are at least relatively safe. If anything, at least your direct opponents tend to be shielded. I know for sure virtually everyone in my matchup selection was not shielded since I attacked every one of them and their score changed every time I did (and half of the time they retaliated immediately). Too much of your progress depends on whether the players you're matched up with are shielded or not, and currently shields are too expensive so that case where nobody is shielded is very common. You basically have to be matched up with someone who is rich. Otherwise all you're doing is trading points back and forth.

I didn't see a single 50 pt from down this time, but 47 and around was present.I lost interest completely somewhere between 700--800, got just a single hit for ~30 in the whole last 3 hours. And maybe 5 overall on my early 200-ish points. Possibly due to max ares, I also was picking out lowest, mostly ignoring his company.

Ah, recalling, one 47 match was with maxed spiderman and magneto. Almost decided to go in fot the challenge value, but it was quite early on where I was avoiding risk. Too bad no stashing, I'd have done it for last game to have some actual fun after all the mostly mindless slaughtering.

Unknown

It sounds like the moral of the story is, "if you want progression rewards play early, if you want ranking rewards play late, if you want both, play early be prepared to spend a lot on shields."

Kelbris

I feel like this change was done in part to discourage tanking. You could win 10 matches (for 30 points), lose 6 (for 50 points) and end up right back at where you were with a positive win/loss ratio.

rabscutle wrote:

If I could get a screen cap to post, I could contradict this all. My bracket is 600 points max, with 10th only 200 points behind 1st.

This is working, it just isn't working in every bracket. If someone wants to grind to 1800, it is still possible. Also it is just as likely those people don't care about the ISO tax.

Would love to hear from Will/IceIX what they saw after this weekend across the board, instead of just one bracket at a time.

Easy screenshot is pretty rockin, works great on android and it's free