A new outlook on MPQ and it's positive.

KrazyKeylime

MPQ has always had a heavy hand with the nerf stick and it is all because of poor design and development that caused the issue in the first place.

Since true healing, oh no everyone is using OBW on their team lets gut the healing system when it was cause because they made a single, lone 2* healer and everyone wanted to stop using health packs.

spidey @ 4 can perma-stun until the board fails, not @ 5!!! but @ 4 release him anyway, oh he is too broken nerf him to oblivion. this game is seeing one idiotic change after another created by their own stupidity and lack of play testing.

Sentry character designed to deal damage quickly but with a cost of team damage, people use this character for what he was made for and shield hop, lets not buff other character to compensate for this type of game play, oh wait here come Doc OC with abilities that may help oh wait 11 and 12 how does that help against a boosted 11 ? Nerf sentry to oblivion.

Make new mystique released did they bother to play test and see on wow there is a potential for insane amounts of AP generation from a character interaction maybe we should tweak it before bringing it out nope, later we will bring out the nerfs.

All this is done to maintain their own breakneck speed of character release that we asked to slow down.

They created xforce and 4 thor to rein supreme i say let them, but i would of liked to see buffs to other 4* to compensate. elecktra, starlord, and fury, they need a buffs so bad. It will give them a run for their money and we will see more diversity at the top, but until then they are stuck in the stupid garbage tier 4*s. And no surprise they were passed up again. lately MPQ can't do anything right xforce rips people a part and 4thor needs that one shot cause that is all she gots . The IF situation just was horrible on MPQ's part nerfing a character 1 week out really? that said his strike tile put Elektra's to shame.
to justify this it is said that it is all done in the name of fun, i'm sorry i had fun when i can play at my own pace with regular healing, granted i was not grinding so hard for rewards but even the 8 hour refreshers and DDQ seem too little too late. I am taking another break from MPQ but i hope you start working with the MPQ community not against them causing more and more of the community to fall away.

KrazyKeylime

atomzed wrote:

Truthfully, i think it is very difficult for D3 to sieve through the posts and make sense of it. As an outsider, i will not know what the forummites wants me to do. Should i nerf before release, soon after release, or very late after release? I can't tell.

I also would like to remind people about the Hood change. Many, many people were upset about the change to Hood Twin Pistol such that it doesn't gain AP. I remember vividly that even people like Locked were protesting angrily over it. But after a few weeks of playing, many people come to realization that the change wasn't that bad. In fact, some may feel that the change is good!

why not ask them? shocking polls can be used for something

ya but the hood change it was not the ability everyone got the hood for and it is only a 3*, not the 4* meta queen. more money more problems

franckynight

atomzed wrote:

In any other game, this kind of balancing is part of the life-cycle of the game, but MPQ is built on very specific model. A model which forces the player to invest ginormous amount of time and/or money to actually achieve an ever-moving goal. Not only was 4thor very desirable, she was also incredibly difficult to get. In a game that doesn't have a shred of an endgame, managing to get this character was a milestone of the highest importance, the crown of a brilliant carrier. The fun was in getting her and having her. Which brings us to...

I just wanted to point something out for those who are raging now (not specifically targetting you Grosnours, just that your post provides a good way to raise the point).

- 4thor: Nerfed after 6 months of release.
- Iron Fist: Nerfed within 2 weeks of release.
- Xaiver: Nerfed before release.

So in this 2 weeks alone, we have nerf that was done very early (Xavier), early (Iron Fist) and late (4thor).

In both 3 cases, there was a lot of rage about the nerfs. Many people are angry about Xavier being nerf before release. Many people are angry about Iron Fist being nerfed so fast after release. And yet even more people are upset about 4thor being nerfed after so long....

Truthfully, i think it is very difficult for D3 to sieve through the posts and make sense of it. As an outsider, i will not know what the forummites wants me to do. Should i nerf before release, soon after release, or very late after release? I can't tell.

I also would like to remind people about the Hood change. Many, many people were upset about the change to Hood Twin Pistol such that it doesn't gain AP. I remember vividly that even people like Locked were protesting angrily over it. But after a few weeks of playing, many people come to realization that the change wasn't that bad. In fact, some may feel that the change is good!

Ppl are upset not so much about the changes but because they feel cheated..if i bought a good and it became damaged because Its not functionnal or not working as advertised, in a normal world, i will have my money back or a fair compensation..In mpq world, Im stuck with my damaged good with no other option that keeping it cause Its "fun".. Gt costs 25k hp to instant max (100$).. I invested 10k hp (70$ ) to cover max her and i will get back what.. 2000 hp.. (15$) That is the mere définition of swindling

ayatorahxephon

atomzed wrote:

Grosnours wrote:

Sadly it's been six month now that 4thor is out. Six full month, more than enough time to notice that the character was imbalanced to start with, more than enough time to see new character with charged tile appear, more than enough time to predict what will happen if more characters with charged tile appear.
If we would have been talking about a Punisher or even a Patch-level character this all could have been understandable, but 4thor is a very specific case. She has entirely changed the game. For 6 month, she reigned supreme with XForce and redefined the entire meta of the game. She was the most sought after character (XForce being here since the beginning his covers were easier to get), the most coveted one.
Reactions to this change are not only understandable, they were predictable and entirely justified. Why ?

In any other game, this kind of balancing is part of the life-cycle of the game, but MPQ is built on very specific model. A model which forces the player to invest ginormous amount of time and/or money to actually achieve an ever-moving goal. Not only was 4thor very desirable, she was also incredibly difficult to get. In a game that doesn't have a shred of an endgame, managing to get this character was a milestone of the highest importance, the crown of a brilliant carrier. The fun was in getting her and having her. Which brings us to...

I just wanted to point something out for those who are raging now (not specifically targetting you Grosnours, just that your post provides a good way to raise the point).

- 4thor: Nerfed after 6 months of release.
- Iron Fist: Nerfed within 2 weeks of release.
- Xaiver: Nerfed before release.

So in this 2 weeks alone, we have nerf that was done very early (Xavier), early (Iron Fist) and late (4thor).

In both 3 cases, there was a lot of rage about the nerfs. Many people are angry about Xavier being nerf before release. Many people are angry about Iron Fist being nerfed so fast after release. And yet even more people are upset about 4thor being nerfed after so long....

Truthfully, i think it is very difficult for D3 to sieve through the posts and make sense of it. As an outsider, i will not know what the forummites wants me to do. Should i nerf before release, soon after release, or very late after release? I can't tell.

I also would like to remind people about the Hood change. Many, many people were upset about the change to Hood Twin Pistol such that it doesn't gain AP. I remember vividly that even people like Locked were protesting angrily over it. But after a few weeks of playing, many people come to realization that the change wasn't that bad. In fact, some may feel that the change is good!

People complaining about Xavier? Well since there is not even a person owning him now it will be just be small deal. IF? At least they just took 2 tiles away from him and still playable!!
AFAIK People whom are angry are those of Thor! 6 months and people invested through efforts and money and they overnerf her to a mediocre level!! She is a legendary for goodness sake.. 3 stun and 7-8 charge tiles I can accept but down to only 5 charge tiles? What are they smoking? Yeah right as if it would be a problem introducing more charge tiles producing characters.. it's just a way of saying.. we are gonna tone down your legendary character that you invested so much to make way for few incoming characters which you need to invest even more to open up new slots and leveling/ training them. In the end you are still paying more with your time/money
19 AP just for a 3 turn stun and 8 charge tiles with 7k damage??? Really??

Unknown

atomzed wrote:

Phaserhawk wrote:

That means they do care about the game, they do care about the longevity and they want everyone to have a good experience.
Phaser

I have come to this conclusion very early in this game. They are especially concern about balance, and they really want to ensure that there is no broken combo.

In many other F2P mobile games I have played, it's all about releasing newer and more OP characters than the previous one..needless to say, going down that rabbit hole of only releasing more OP or buffing characters will eventually kills the game.

I do question their decision making competence at times.... But I believe the main intent is to make the game better.

If they cared about the longevity of their game...

... they wouldn't release a new character every two weeks.
... they wouldn't release iconic characters with 0 backstory.
... they would develop real story content, real survival mode, real single-player mode.
... they would invest time and effort into carefully playtesting and balancing the characters they release.

They do none of the above, which forces one to conclude that there is no long-term vision.

Unknown

atomzed wrote:

I just wanted to point something out for those who are raging now (not specifically targetting you Grosnours, just that your post provides a good way to raise the point).

- 4thor: Nerfed after 6 months of release.
- Iron Fist: Nerfed within 2 weeks of release.
- Xaiver: Nerfed before release.

So in this 2 weeks alone, we have nerf that was done very early (Xavier), early (Iron Fist) and late (4thor).

In both 3 cases, there was a lot of rage about the nerfs. Many people are angry about Xavier being nerf before release. Many people are angry about Iron Fist being nerfed so fast after release. And yet even more people are upset about 4thor being nerfed after so long....

Truthfully, i think it is very difficult for D3 to sieve through the posts and make sense of it. As an outsider, i will not know what the forummites wants me to do. Should i nerf before release, soon after release, or very late after release? I can't tell.

I also would like to remind people about the Hood change. Many, many people were upset about the change to Hood Twin Pistol such that it doesn't gain AP. I remember vividly that even people like Locked were protesting angrily over it. But after a few weeks of playing, many people come to realization that the change wasn't that bad. In fact, some may feel that the change is good!

I think the main difference between those 3 nerfs isn't the timing but the functional impact.

Xavier was never a good character in a 4* meta with LITERALLY zero 4* special tile generators (Elektra doesn't count since there are never any good strikes to steal and her steal is on the same colour you need for Xavier to start buffing them) BUT he was going to be abusable with winfinite. Now he's not so he is something of a trophy character. I doubt ppl are angry about it at all, just disappointed that another opportunity to add a character that is actually worth aiming for has gone begging (again).

IF was obviously overpowered and the scale of nerfing him is a reduction in his highly overpowered ability to a level most ppl would say is still good (not fine, or average but GOOD). They also didn't go around nerfing all his other powers even though certain ppl were gnashing and wailing about his passive. There are some ppl with a VERY LEGITIMATE reason to be angry because they may have spent actual genuine real money specifically on covers for him. There was no warning he was VERY QUICKLY getting nerfed and it's not a consumer's job to somehow know that he is too good and will obviously be quickly changed... just look at Sentry for a precedent on how heroes are handled normally. They have every right to be annoyed that they have not been offered a FULL refund on their purchase, even if it's an HP refund rather than a cash refund. It is a very anti-consumer practice. Also bear in mind although *I* think he is still good post nerf other ppl may disagree and genuinely would never have spent resources on him in his post nerf state

As for Thor ppl are, again rightly angry that they spent money and she got nerfed. Not because of such close proximity as IF (although it will be for some ppl I imagine) but the scale of the change DRASTICALLY alters her function. It isn't a tweak and her use is massively different, whether you believe she is still good or not. She has gone from a fast enough to be useful, high damage character who you can use to win matches quickly in PvP AND a stun locking + accelerating hero who could deal with stupidly scaled PvE content to becomaing an average at best, arguably slow damage dealer in PvP and a hero with almost no acceleration (just calculate the odds of 5 charge tiles being matchable at all, let alone in any great number) who cannot stunlock anyone in PvE and will do little to clear over scaled content.

In essence she is a completely different character who just happens to have the same name and art. It's like I sell you a ferrari, come back later and swap it for a fiesta engine then say "it' looks the same, it still has a ferrari badge.... it's a ferrari right? Stop complaining"

IMO the change is sufficiently drastic (in as far as what function the hero is able to perform in the game) that a full refund on spent HP and ISO is entirely reasonable AND no... the fact SOME PPL got lots of use out of her is irrelevant because there was NOTHING in the game at the time they spent HP/ISO/cash on her that said "warning.... may no longer perform ANY of the functions you are purchasing her specifically to fill in the future... consider this more of a rental than a purchase.... just without the rental agreement or any form of discount compared to all your other purchases which are permanent.... not that we will tell you which are and which aren't..... YOU SHOULD JUST KNOW and some ppl on the forum will come and tell you you should have just known, so it must be a thing. "

Please note I am quite specifically not saying she is trash or useless because that is an entirely subjective statement and leads to pointless unending arguments. I also understand that saying she no longer fills either of the 2 roles ppl almost certainly bought her for (third I guess might be high health which she retains but most ppl would agree health is far less important than damage because damage is VERY high compared to health in this game) is open to interpretation to some degree but 19 AP for 7.6k damage and minimal acceleration is something you can easily compare to 3* hero powers on heroes who are NOT considered as fast damage dealers (the 3 turn stun is also there for 19AP but is not damage and doesn't make you win faster unless you're stunning the last enemy hero and therefore saving 3 turns of them making a match).

I don't think the messages are mixed at all and I don't think the company ppl have given their money to has shown particularly good business practices towards their consumers in 2 of the 3 cases (I only see Xavier as a missed opportunity, so nothing to lambast anyone about).

atomzed

gobstopper wrote:

If they cared about the longevity of their game...

... they wouldn't release a new character every two weeks.
... they wouldn't release iconic characters with 0 backstory.
... they would develop real story content, real survival mode, real single-player mode.
... they would invest time and effort into carefully playtesting and balancing the characters they release.

They do none of the above, which forces one to conclude that there is no long-term vision.

You have a right to draw your conclusions. Since you believe this, it will really be best not to spend money on the game anymore...

For me, I don't feel tat way because of my past experience with other mobile games. D3 has been reasonable in their decisions... So until I lose confidence, I will be supporting them.

simonsez

bonfire01 wrote:

I also understand that saying she no longer fills either of the 2 roles ppl almost certainly bought her for (third I guess might be high health which she retains but most ppl would agree health is far less important than damage because damage is VERY high compared to health in this game) is open to interpretation to some degree but 19 AP for 7.6k damage and minimal acceleration is something you can easily compare to 3* hero powers on heroes who are NOT considered as fast damage dealers (the 3 turn stun is also there for 19AP but is not damage and doesn't make you win faster unless you're stunning the last enemy hero and therefore saving 3 turns of them making a match).

(emphasis mine)
Very well said, and does a much clearer job than I was doing when trying to explain why she's no longer top tier.

SnowcaTT

I think X-Force will be seeing his power reigned in

I know this is prefaced with "my speculation", but the entire thing is prefaced with "I spoke to the man in red"....

But it's pretty obvious as well. The only reason they couldn't nerf X-force and 4hor at the same time is they would have lost even more of their playerbase - they need to spread out the rage. Apparently the 4*'s are supposed to be "trophy" rewards, not much better (if better at all) than 3*'s. That's the message I'll get when X-force gets the nerf, and I do expect it.

If that's what they want to do, fine - but stop releasing them as PVE releases completely then, please. Leave them as top PVP and season rewards as the "PVP chops trophy case" I guess. I don't think anyone will be buying 4* covers anymore after the GT nerf, but after an X-force nerf you probably won't be able to get anyone to touch purchasing these with a ten foot pole.

Also: MMR needs to consider them as 166's for both PVP and PVE. If 4*'s aren't going to make PVP or PVE life any easier (since they are no better than 3*'s), they need to be considered like they are: glorified three-stars.

Edit also (the more I think about it): There also needs to be something done about PVP. Without shield hops (which I have never done, mind you) the end of these is going to be more of a bloodbath than it is now, since absolutely any decent team will be able to beat any other one. It will be the whole "can 166 reach 1K" thread again, but -everyone- is in that 166 range now.

kensterr

Demiurge_Miles wrote:

We didn't nerf Rangarok, we made him different. Honestly, try him with his new power and see what you think. Don't just judge him based on how the AI plays him.

You aren't giving out free Rags covers yet, so we can't try him with his new powers.

Demiurge_Miles wrote:

These changes aren't out yet and I know they seem terrible, but wait till you get to play with the characters. I promise you we've thought this through. Magneto is still fun, Mystique is still fun, Iron Fist is still fun, Thor is still fun.

One man's meat is another man's poison.

kensterr

bonfire01 wrote:

In essence she is a completely different character who just happens to have the same name and art. It's like I sell you a ferrari, come back later and swap it for a fiesta engine then say "it' looks the same, it still has a ferrari badge.... it's a ferrari right? Stop complaining"

I wanted to post this in the nerf Thoress thread, but this is thread is good enough since you brought up this subject matter.

Those who asked for and got the nerf... It's like this. They bought a supercar that has 1000 horsepower. They liked it so much that they bought it in many different colors so that they can drive the same car but different color everyday. Other people save up their money and want to buy that supercar as well.

But then some of the owners who already has the supercar goes back to the manufacturer and say "It's too powerful!". "Speed Kills!". They asked the manufacturer to reduce the horses on the car. And because they are the loudest of the bunch and the richest (they can buy many more), the manufacturer gives in and reduce it to a 500 horsepowered car. Yay!

GuntherBlobel

franckynight wrote:

Ppl are upset not so much about the changes but because they feel cheated..if i bought a good and it became damaged because Its not functionnal or not working as advertised, in a normal world, i will have my money back or a fair compensation..In mpq world, Im stuck with my damaged good with no other option that keeping it cause Its "fun".. Gt costs 25k hp to instant max (100$).. I invested 10k hp (70$ ) to cover max her and i will get back what.. 2000 hp.. (15$) That is the mere définition of swindling

You are entitled to your feelings. In fact, I thought exactly ^this^ back when Ragnarok was nerfed. I felt really bad for anyone who would pay >$50 for a single character in mobile game, just to have it change on them. But, MPQ was my first F2P game and I'd never known anything like it. It's been a long time since then. MPQ hasn't changed and the entire games industry has moved to be like MPQ. For over a year now, I've been very aware that in-game purchases are subject to change for ANY reason. Worse, because people want to win, highly sought covers are most certainly unbalanced. Because of this, I've been very careful about purchases, because I've been playing a long time and I know better. You've been playing a long time too. This not just MPQ, but the vast majority of the mobile games market. Players need to wise up for their own good.

The next time you feel the impulse to buy or spend 10K HP, I suggest you read the MPQ EULA to sober yourself up. It works for me.

MPQ EULA wrote:

"We can manage, regulate, control, modify or eliminate virtual currency and/or virtual goods, including the price thereof, at our discretion, and will have no liability to you or any third party for any of such actions."
http://www.d3p.us/EULA/MarvelPuzzleQuest/

EDIT: Made the post shorter.

Unknown

GuntherBlobel wrote:

franckynight wrote:

atomzed wrote:

In any other game, this kind of balancing is part of the life-cycle of the game, but MPQ is built on very specific model. A model which forces the player to invest ginormous amount of time and/or money to actually achieve an ever-moving goal. Not only was 4thor very desirable, she was also incredibly difficult to get. In a game that doesn't have a shred of an endgame, managing to get this character was a milestone of the highest importance, the crown of a brilliant carrier. The fun was in getting her and having her. Which brings us to...

I just wanted to point something out for those who are raging now (not specifically targetting you Grosnours, just that your post provides a good way to raise the point).

- 4thor: Nerfed after 6 months of release.
- Iron Fist: Nerfed within 2 weeks of release.
- Xaiver: Nerfed before release.

So in this 2 weeks alone, we have nerf that was done very early (Xavier), early (Iron Fist) and late (4thor).

In both 3 cases, there was a lot of rage about the nerfs. Many people are angry about Xavier being nerf before release. Many people are angry about Iron Fist being nerfed so fast after release. And yet even more people are upset about 4thor being nerfed after so long....

Truthfully, i think it is very difficult for D3 to sieve through the posts and make sense of it. As an outsider, i will not know what the forummites wants me to do. Should i nerf before release, soon after release, or very late after release? I can't tell.

I also would like to remind people about the Hood change. Many, many people were upset about the change to Hood Twin Pistol such that it doesn't gain AP. I remember vividly that even people like Locked were protesting angrily over it. But after a few weeks of playing, many people come to realization that the change wasn't that bad. In fact, some may feel that the change is good!

Ppl are upset not so much about the changes but because they feel cheated..if i bought a good and it became damaged because Its not functionnal or not working as advertised, in a normal world, i will have my money back or a fair compensation..In mpq world, Im stuck with my damaged good with no other option that keeping it cause Its "fun".. Gt costs 25k hp to instant max (100$).. I invested 10k hp (70$ ) to cover max her and i will get back what.. 2000 hp.. (15$) That is the mere définition of swindling

You are entirely entitled to your feelings. I thought exactly ^this^ back when Ragnarok was nerfed. I felt really bad for anyone who would pay >$50 for a single character in mobile game, just to have it change on them. But, MPQ was my introduction the F2P game. It's been a long time since then. MPQ hasn't changed and the entire games industry has moved to be like MPQ. For over a year now, I've been very aware that in-game purchases are subject to change for ANY reason. Worse, because people want to win, highly sought covers are most certainly unbalanced. Because of this, I've been very careful about purchases, because I've been playing a long time and I know better. You've been playing a long time too.

The next time feel the impulse to buy 10K HP, I suggest you read the MPQ EULA to sober yourself up. It works for me.
"We can manage, regulate, control, modify or eliminate virtual currency and/or virtual goods, including the price thereof, at our discretion, and will have no liability to you or any third party for any of such actions."
http://www.d3p.us/EULA/MarvelPuzzleQuest/

This argument doesn't work. Or rather, it only works in the context of a game that's actively looking to exploit it's costumer base before it burns out.

Valve's Steam had a similar clause that allows them to pull any game they want from anyone's account for any reason. Yet we practically never see them do it because from a business standpoint this would obviously be suicidal. Nobody buys from a vendor that routinely takes back their products.

GuntherBlobel

ark123 wrote:

GuntherBlobel wrote:

The next time feel the impulse to buy 10K HP, I suggest you read the MPQ EULA to sober yourself up. It works for me.
"We can manage, regulate, control, modify or eliminate virtual currency and/or virtual goods, including the price thereof, at our discretion, and will have no liability to you or any third party for any of such actions."
http://www.d3p.us/EULA/MarvelPuzzleQuest/

This argument doesn't work. Or rather, it only works in the context of a game that's actively looking to exploit it's costumer base before it burns out.

Valve's Steam had a similar clause that allows them to pull any game they want from anyone's account for any reason. Yet we practically never see them do it because from a business standpoint this would obviously be suicidal. Nobody buys from a vendor that routinely takes back their products.

Are you telling me that if you made a Venn diagram of people who bought Sentry covers and 4* Thor covers that there'd be no overlap? I suspect the opposite.

I see players making the same mistake with MPQ over and over again... in that regard, I think MPQ is safe. When players do finally ragequit, they sometimes post on the forum about some other Freemium game they are now playing that is better than MPQ. If they spent $1000 on MPQ, why wouldn't they do the same in League of Legends or Clash of the Clans or War of Gems? As much as I dislike the F2P business model, it seems to be working.

If MPQ goes broke, you're right: that's the business owner's mistake. Maybe they implemented Freemium poorly. But if a player feels cheated out of $100's or $1000's of dollars: more and more, I feel like that's the customer's mistake. We, the consumer, need to wise up to the mobile game industry, because Freemium may be here to stay. And this is exactly how it works.

Unknown

I read the OP and I don't understand one thing. Is it possible that the devs never considered the possibility that, at some point, there would be other characters that use the charged tiles when they were creating 4 Thor? If this is the case, then there is something seriously wrong with the brainstorming sessions they have and their character design choices.

I am not affected by the 4hor changes since I don't own one. I don't even necessarily disagree with all the changes they made to the characters. It's just that the changes could be more subtle instead of these huge swings of values (like for 4hor's blue and Rag's green). Imo, the fact that charged tiles produce 3x AP may be an issue we'll have to deal with in the future, despite that both teams can benefit from them. I think it would be more balanced if they made the decision to reduce the AP production from charged tiles to 2x, have 4hor's red ability do 500+ damage (similar to XF's black) per tile and drop the blue's tile generation from 12 to 9. With these changes done, I doubt they would even consider nerfing 4hor's yellow (which didn't need a nerf anyway) because the gain from the 2 additional tiles would be marginal.

Unknown

Thread is TL:DR but I wanted to comment on this from the OP.

Phaserhawk wrote:

But Phaser it's 12K for 19AP that's only 630 per AP that's not terrible she's a 4*, your right, but its not really a true 19AP. 19AP implies 6.3 matches. This was more like 2-3 matches due to charged tiles and boosts, which if 3 per match is really 12K for 9 AP which is more like 1333 dmg per AP, that's a bit high.

No, no it isn't. It costs 19 AP, it's damage is rated for 19 AP. I don't care HOW you got those 19 AP, its still 19. And if you are using your charge tiles to feed your smite it's damage potential already goes way way down.

Smite needs a damage boost. Even the dev's thought so, they gave it a paltry one in the announced changes. Go with that instinct and boost it up to a respectable (for a 4*) damage to AP ratio on casting WITHOUT ANY CHARGE TILES (hint, 400 per AP isn't enough). You should be able to figure out how to balance the charge tile damage to the cost of creating the charge tiles to maintain a similar damage to AP ratio.

I get that more charge users are coming (even tho I argued against it for this very reason), that's not a reason to tear the guts out of a particular character.

Pylgrim

Demiurge_Miles wrote:

mjh wrote:

while all that sounds good I think the 4Thor nerf was barely a nerf. I never had a problem with her blue change.

It's MNMags that got hit hard for no reason. He is a critical part of the 2* transition. The little guys are suffering more than the 270 veterans with this change.

Just wanted to jump in here real quick and give a little bit of explanation about the change to Magneto and Mystique. Both of these characters have been part of an infinite turn combo for a while now. These kinds of infinite turn combos tend to be very grindy and slow, so not only do they break the difficulty scale of the game but they are also no fun to play.

I think when people get their hands on the new Magneto they'll find that he's still quite good. You can almost always make a match 5 given two blue tiles in the same quarter of the board and three placed tiles. Not to mention there are no other 2* red generators. Tile placement powers are significantly stronger than they might seem on paper, and this one was way over the top.

As for Mystique, when we originally balanced Mystique we purposely made her Blue slightly more powerful than normal because we weren't entirely sure how well it would work (generating two colors instead of one, would it be reliable, would it be fun?). This change brings her in line with other tile converters. As to why we changed her:

Our game provides lots of powerful combinations of characters, but there's a fine line between powerful and broken. We changed Magneto about as far as we could while maintaining his original feel, but it just wasn't enough to stop the infinite turn combo. So we took a look at Mystique and decided that with a little tweak we could at least slow the momentum of that combo to a point where it's more on the powerful side of the line.

Hopefully this answers some questions. If I can leave you with anything it's this: These changes aren't out yet and I know they seem terrible, but wait till you get to play with the characters. I promise you we've thought this through. Magneto is still fun, Mystique is still fun, Iron Fist is still fun, Thor is still fun.

Very respectfully I disagree with you in a few things, especially the one bolded.

-Mystique has always been on the weak side and I'm pretty sure that your metrics indicate that previous to the combo's discovery she wasn't played much. He blue is ANYTHING but reliable. In fact, for the combo to work and be somewhat faster, you had to use boosts because you actually need to fire her blue twice in a row for a chance of getting enough purple out of it (and it wasn't even a guarantee!) The random tile placement plus the random distribution of two colours means that more often than not you don't get matches right away, and they may not be in the colour you needed (either purple or black). It is nowhere near as reliable as powers like Technopatic Strike or Thunder Strike or Mutant Revolutionary. And yet, it is attached to a super squishy body with slow abilities. Making her blue worse, I believe, has tremendously damaged whatever little playability she had (beyond a niche, obscure and unreliable combo). It smacks of the nerf that made 3* Storm unplayable and I'm positive that your metrics will show that... not that it means much as you seem much happier and quicker about nerfing than about buffing.

-Could you please share with us why 4* Thor's yellow needed a nerf? That was her least-played ability, being already weak and situational.

-Could you please share why Godlike Power is worse than Call the Storm in three ways?:
* Deals half the damage to the character in front (for a paltry increase of 17(!) to everybody else).
* Deals damage to your allies
* Costs the same as Call the Storm, yet he has a much harder time to gather green as Lightning Rod is nowhere near a good green battery as Thunder Strike is.

When you take in account that his red is somewhat worse than Thor's red and his blue, laughably worse than Thunder Strike, you have but a cheap, shoddy knock-off of the God of Thunder.... which Ragnarok is, I get it. However that flavour connection shouldn't affect playability to the point of making a character strictly worse than another, in the same way that we needn't mind the fact that MPQ Black Widow can kick the assess of many super-powered mutants and gods.

Unknown

You are comparing the wrong abillities. Rags cast twice in a row (12 ) generates 8 blue tiles compared to Thunderstrikes 9 green tiles. Rags at 5 covers adds 6 green AP to the board compared to Thor's Mjolnir's Might adding 3 tiles. These powers aren't awful on their face.

Rags is totally awful tho for all the reasons you stated. Costs too much, needs to cost like 10.

Phaserhawk

SnowcaTT wrote:

I think X-Force will be seeing his power reigned in

I know this is prefaced with "my speculation", but the entire thing is prefaced with "I spoke to the man in red"....

But it's pretty obvious as well. The only reason they couldn't nerf X-force and 4hor at the same time is they would have lost even more of their playerbase - they need to spread out the rage. Apparently the 4*'s are supposed to be "trophy" rewards, not much better (if better at all) than 3*'s. That's the message I'll get when X-force gets the nerf, and I do expect it.

If that's what they want to do, fine - but stop releasing them as PVE releases completely then, please. Leave them as top PVP and season rewards as the "PVP chops trophy case" I guess. I don't think anyone will be buying 4* covers anymore after the GT nerf, but after an X-force nerf you probably won't be able to get anyone to touch purchasing these with a ten foot pole.

Also: MMR needs to consider them as 166's for both PVP and PVE. If 4*'s aren't going to make PVP or PVE life any easier (since they are no better than 3*'s), they need to be considered like they are: glorified three-stars.

Edit also (the more I think about it): There also needs to be something done about PVP. Without shield hops (which I have never done, mind you) the end of these is going to be more of a bloodbath than it is now, since absolutely any decent team will be able to beat any other one. It will be the whole "can 166 reach 1K" thread again, but -everyone- is in that 166 range now.

I see what your saying, but think of this. Xforce is stronger than thor and she gets nerfed. That tellast me 2 things. 1. Xforce will get nerfed, 2. If thor got hit first that means there is probably a more immediate need to do so, ( more charged tile characters) that created far more potential game warping than Xforce in the immediate future. Like I said if gambit shows up all purple/black/red and his purple for 8 creates 4-5 charged tiles, but his black steals ap from # of charged tiles, you could start to see why she had to be pulled back first. I strongly feel Xforce gets nerfed in a few months and it won't be a bad thing

Unknown

Demiurge_Miles wrote:

with the characters. I promise you we've thought this through. Magneto is still fun, Mystique is still fun, Iron Fist is still fun, Thor is still fun.

The problem is the nerf against the top tier heroes. The ones who every mpq player wants to have fully covered to have a real shot in pve/pvp.

Ragnarok is still fun ? ( 2 updates already and still a shadow of your old self) NO

Sentry is still fun? NO F. WAY

Spiderman is still fun? NO NO NO NO

Lady Thor will be fun? OF COURSE NOT. She will become more alike as Devil Dinossaur, big health and low power.


The game lost this week many great players because this massive disaster nerf.

Easy money from newbies don´t will guarantee a long term loyalty from this player, Miles. You have to valorize much more who already spend a year playing and putting cash in this game. What im seeing in every update is the D3 desire of making easy money at all costs.