MPQ Community Video - March - Character Updates

MarvelDestiny

Lerysh wrote:

MarvelDestiny wrote:

Raffoon wrote:

I spent almost 100 dollars of my hard earned money to go from a 1/1/1 Thor to a 4/2/4 Thor 2 weeks before these changes were announced.

So that means:

A: I feel ripped off, because the character I devoted all that money to just got completely demolished

B:I am currently playing, at 4 covers, with an identical version of Power Surge as what I may some day hope to achieve again once I find that 5th cover. I can tell you that my 4 cover version (3 turn stun, 5 tiles) is NOWHERE CLOSE to the Power Surges that are used on me by fully covered characters. This is not a balance to the character, it's a gutting. Why not bring up the other 4 stars slightly in power to match Xforce and Thor, rather than kicking everyone that bought Thor in the nuts?

I have to agree. I've also put $100+ into the game and all these nerfs make me EXTREMELY unwilling to invest further. I want to support the devs but I don't want to throw my money away.

This is basically why I think their new policy should cover all purchases within 30 days of a change, not just on characters released within 30 days of the change. If you want to give up the character after a change and bought covers/leveled him or her within 30 days of the change, HP and ISO back. If they can do it for Iron Fist, I don't see why they can't for all changed characters back 30 days.

Yes, I agree. A refund that returns all iso/HP invested into a newly nerfed character would make changes equitable, but no more palatable.

Although most of the new changes don't affect my roster, they affect how I will play and invest in the game in the future. Who's next? Can I count on the strategies I use today to be effective tomorrow? Will that awesome 3* or 4* I just picked up be worth the time I invest to power him/her up? As an example, I am a 2-3 star transitional player and am on day 142, in 7 days I pick up my first X-force cover. Now that I know the devs consider him overpowered I have to wonder if I should be excited at all. The entire flavor of the game has been corrupted.

Additionally, I agree with most of the posts in this thread: the devs have little or no working knowledge of how the game is played. Based on the video and Will's responses thus far, the staff at Demiurge direct the game's development through statistical analysis and molding the characters to conform to a narrow balance of power. I further assume based on Will's comments that this is a new approach or has been recently refined in some new way. I absolutely agree and concede that objective measures are necessary to define and regulate the game. That said, the way your audience plays the game and engages with your staff should be at least as important. The numbers are only the first step.

Having outliers is not only natural but necessary. They are the nuggets and easter eggs. They give the game flavor and are the handholds allowing players to struggle ever upwards. If every character has to be equal to every other character (especially in their own class) the game flattens out and becomes colorless.

Devs, you have to agree that you went overboard with these changes. I can't comment on 4* Thor, I only have one cover; I only have a few covers for Iron Fist and haven't used him much (I have plans though, heheh) so can't comment but given player feedback since he was released can accept that his black was overpowered; Magneto, however, is not a game-changing character, even the MagnetoStorm combo is neither overpowered nor infinite; Rags was never a desirable character and is even less so now; Mystique never seemed overpowered to me but if her and Magneto were able to pull off infinite loops then I stand behind your change. BUT...You don't have to chop off a limb at the trunk to prune a couple branches.

Unknown

KrazyKeylime wrote:

what if smite's missing damage was added to power surge

Can we please please please make this happen? Pretty please? If Power Surge did ~3k damage at 5 covers for 9 AP that would A) solidify Thor as a bruiser, all her powers do some kind of damage and 2) make up for her loss of damage due to charge tiles going missing.

All credit to KrazyKeylime for the idea. It's a very good one.

Demiurge_Will

I'm going to be deep in data files today and won't be nearly as present on the forums today as I was on Friday, but I want y'all to know that I've been reading everything here (and in a bunch of the related threads). Thank you for the constructive criticism and all the insights into how you're thinking about and perceiving balance. One of the big lessons for me is that we need to figure out how to balance the need to tune to the center (in order to avoid rapid power inflation) with the fact that players are evaluating the strength of every power and character against the most powerful alternative. I really appreciate the time you've spent engaging with me and each other, and I'm hopeful that the team here can use the information you've shared to make the game better.

Raffoon

Thanks for reading and letting us know that you are, Will. This does give me hope for the future.

Obviously, when we complain it's because we care about the game and want it to be better. So, of course, great job making a game that causes such response from the players.

That said, I've supported the game in the past (multiple Starks), and I just can't do it any more. Despite only having 600 HP left, I've completely passed on the 30% sale that just ended. A big part of me wanted to pick up another Stark Salary and then buy some Xavier or Star-Lord covers, but after this latest round of changes I just can't feel OK putting money into a character that could get it's power reduced so drastically at a moment's notice.

For me, it's not that there's balance and nerfing occurring. It's that the nerfs always seem to hit too hard. I don't even have any ISO in Sentry, but when was the last time you saw him played at all? I mean.... at least Cmags ended up being playable with Xforce still, but pretty much every other nerf has been an over-correction that leaves players with something worth far less than they had before. The 30 day policy is great, but that doesn't help with Thor at all.

GrimSkald

Demiurge_Will wrote:

I'm going to be deep in data files today and won't be nearly as present on the forums today as I was on Friday, but I want y'all to know that I've been reading everything here (and in a bunch of the related threads). Thank you for the constructive criticism and all the insights into how you're thinking about and perceiving balance. One of the big lessons for me is that we need to figure out how to balance the need to tune to the center (in order to avoid rapid power inflation) with the fact that players are evaluating the strength of every power and character against the most powerful alternative. I really appreciate the time you've spent engaging with me and each other, and I'm hopeful that the team here can use the information you've shared to make the game better.

For what it's worth, I really liked how you explained the reasoning behind the changes in the video. I don't necessarily agree with all of your reasoning (Mystique in particular,) but I do appreciate that you explained it. Speaking for myself - I think the following:

Mystique as she stands is slightly underpowered - with the nerf I think she'll be more underpowered (it's not a drastic change, but it's an all-negative one.) I really would have liked to have seen it with a slight boost to something else.

The change to Marvel Now! Magneto definitely damange his usefulness but it's an interesting change. Honestly, if you improved his blue it would make for a much more interesting character.

I don't have a usable Lady Thor (2/2/2,) my gut said that her blue needed a nerf, don't know about the red, and the yellow was underpowered even as it was.

Iron Fist needed that nerf badly, and is probably still a great character. Hopefully he won't need another, we'll see.

Polares

Demiurge_Will wrote:

I'm going to be deep in data files today and won't be nearly as present on the forums today as I was on Friday, but I want y'all to know that I've been reading everything here (and in a bunch of the related threads). Thank you for the constructive criticism and all the insights into how you're thinking about and perceiving balance. One of the big lessons for me is that we need to figure out how to balance the need to tune to the center (in order to avoid rapid power inflation) with the fact that players are evaluating the strength of every power and character against the most powerful alternative. I really appreciate the time you've spent engaging with me and each other, and I'm hopeful that the team here can use the information you've shared to make the game better.

What I think you devs seem to not get is that you nerf chars too much. I get that 4hor is too powerful, I get that there is a possibility to get infinite turns with Mags and Mystique, but the problem is always the same. You have a char that is too powerfull, say for example Spidey, sentry or 4hor then you nerf him (everybody agrees they were too powerful), but here comes the problem, after the nerf they are completly ruined. Nobody uses Spidey stuns anymore (too expensive), nobody uses world rupture anymore (too expensive, too slow), and now 4hor is going to be used much much less (too expensive combo for the result you get).

We agree some chars need nerfing, but you always nerf them too much, to the point were nobody uses them anymore.

PS: Everybody agrees a good nerf for 4hor would be 7 or 8 power tiles, but you nerf her to 5 !!! Less than half of what she generated before. This is clearly too much, I don't understand how you can not see that... (and you nerf her stun too, why?!?!!?!)

Unknown

Demiurge_Will wrote:

I'm going to be deep in data files today and won't be nearly as present on the forums today as I was on Friday, but I want y'all to know that I've been reading everything here (and in a bunch of the related threads). Thank you for the constructive criticism and all the insights into how you're thinking about and perceiving balance. One of the big lessons for me is that we need to figure out how to balance the need to tune to the center (in order to avoid rapid power inflation) with the fact that players are evaluating the strength of every power and character against the most powerful alternative. I really appreciate the time you've spent engaging with me and each other, and I'm hopeful that the team here can use the information you've shared to make the game better.

OMG this makes me so happy to hear you have no idea. Thank you Will, and everyone at Demiurge, for giving us a voice here and listening to concerns. Whatever you wind up doing at least I feel you will do it having heard our opinions.

GrumpySmurf1002

Polares wrote:

Demiurge_Will wrote:

I'm going to be deep in data files today and won't be nearly as present on the forums today as I was on Friday, but I want y'all to know that I've been reading everything here (and in a bunch of the related threads). Thank you for the constructive criticism and all the insights into how you're thinking about and perceiving balance. One of the big lessons for me is that we need to figure out how to balance the need to tune to the center (in order to avoid rapid power inflation) with the fact that players are evaluating the strength of every power and character against the most powerful alternative. I really appreciate the time you've spent engaging with me and each other, and I'm hopeful that the team here can use the information you've shared to make the game better.

What I think you devs seem to not get is that you nerf chars too much. I get that 4hor is too powerful, I get that there is a possibility to get infinite turns with Mags and Mystique, but the problem is always the same. You have a char that is too powerfull, say for example Spidey, sentry or 4hor then you nerf him (everybody agrees they were too powerful), but here comes the problem, after the nerf they are completly ruined. Nobody uses Spidey stuns anymore (too expensive), nobody uses world rupture anymore (too expensive, too slow), and now 4hor is going to be used much much less (too expensive combo for the result you get).

We agree some chars need nerfing, but you always nerf them too much, to the point were nobody uses them anymore.

PS: Everybody agrees a good nerf for 4hor would be 7 or 8 power tiles, but you nerf her to 5 !!! Less than half of what she generated before. This is clearly too much, I don't understand how you can not see that... (and you nerf her stun too, why?!?!!?!)

Reading between the lines, their balance changes (read: nerfs) have traditionally been made to level around a presumed average. That's why they've always felt brutal; taking a character from top tier to middle tier (or below) will hurt.

Whereas they're now at least considering a balance towards the higher end of the distribution. It might lead to an overall power shift upwards, but it should lead to less Beast and more Cyclops down the line, with other characters brought up at least close to similar levels.

MarvelDestiny

GrumpySmurf1002 wrote:

Polares wrote:

Demiurge_Will wrote:

I'm going to be deep in data files today and won't be nearly as present on the forums today as I was on Friday, but I want y'all to know that I've been reading everything here (and in a bunch of the related threads). Thank you for the constructive criticism and all the insights into how you're thinking about and perceiving balance. One of the big lessons for me is that we need to figure out how to balance the need to tune to the center (in order to avoid rapid power inflation) with the fact that players are evaluating the strength of every power and character against the most powerful alternative. I really appreciate the time you've spent engaging with me and each other, and I'm hopeful that the team here can use the information you've shared to make the game better.

What I think you devs seem to not get is that you nerf chars too much. I get that 4hor is too powerful, I get that there is a possibility to get infinite turns with Mags and Mystique, but the problem is always the same. You have a char that is too powerfull, say for example Spidey, sentry or 4hor then you nerf him (everybody agrees they were too powerful), but here comes the problem, after the nerf they are completly ruined. Nobody uses Spidey stuns anymore (too expensive), nobody uses world rupture anymore (too expensive, too slow), and now 4hor is going to be used much much less (too expensive combo for the result you get).

We agree some chars need nerfing, but you always nerf them too much, to the point were nobody uses them anymore.

PS: Everybody agrees a good nerf for 4hor would be 7 or 8 power tiles, but you nerf her to 5 !!! Less than half of what she generated before. This is clearly too much, I don't understand how you can not see that... (and you nerf her stun too, why?!?!!?!)

Reading between the lines, their balance changes (read: nerfs) have traditionally been made to level around a presumed average. That's why they've always felt brutal; taking a character from top tier to middle tier (or below) will hurt.

Whereas they're now at least considering a balance towards the higher end of the distribution. It might lead to an overall power shift upwards, but it should lead to less Beast and more Cyclops down the line, with other characters brought up at least close to similar levels.

I agree with you and sincerely hope you are right, but it's doubtful. The devs have already stated that they are more committed to releasing new characters on a bi-weekly or monthly schedule and nerfing them as needed later than they are in buffing broken characters.

Some focus should be put into the Beasts and Doc Ocks.

MarvelDestiny

Demiurge_Will wrote:

I'm going to be deep in data files today and won't be nearly as present on the forums today as I was on Friday, but I want y'all to know that I've been reading everything here (and in a bunch of the related threads). Thank you for the constructive criticism and all the insights into how you're thinking about and perceiving balance. One of the big lessons for me is that we need to figure out how to balance the need to tune to the center (in order to avoid rapid power inflation) with the fact that players are evaluating the strength of every power and character against the most powerful alternative. I really appreciate the time you've spent engaging with me and each other, and I'm hopeful that the team here can use the information you've shared to make the game better.

Thank you for this, Will. It's nice to know you're listening AND considering our input; that we are not just ranting into the abyss.

I look forward to hearing back.

Aidonis

Man I dunno. Pushing Mystique into 5 match territory to get off a very board dependent ability seems like too much to me. The range of 5 match powers are all pretty baller, Infiltration not so much. This is the range of Thunder Strike, Star-Spangled Avenger, even 2* Mags Magnetic Flux hits hard and returns ap. Infiltration just doesn't seem to stack up to me. With the proper board, I'm sure it will be superb, but on a color deficient board, it will totally suck for what it takes to use it. Again the 5 match abilities are supposed to be good, I guess we will see how the eye test goes.

I think Mags will be ok, perhaps you'll see some 5 3 5 builds on 2* Thor for MM spamming. Possibly even a speed team of him and Cyclops. Again the eye test will tell the tale.

I have no comment on Thor as she is most likely 2 years away from me. 410 days in and my Xforce is 2 3 3.

I'd be curious to hear what they think the longevity for this game is. With the current reward structure, if you aren't a dedicated player in a dedicated alliance, you're looking at years to max things out, which to me is absurd.

Unknown

While I don't like the new mmags nerf, I find he still is dependent with storm as I've made it to "Global Domination" without any maxed 2* characters thanks to the original stormneto. Couldn't you wait until after the gauntlet tournament! Ughh

Anyways, I did follow your advice in playing the suggested wolvie or 2* Thor combo, and I felt many times I was coming out short! It takes a lot of rounds to get wolvie's admantium slash red to work even with this nerf! It gets to the point that I'd rather use mmags red over wolvie and especially over 2* Thor because my build for him is of the 3/5/5 route.

Stormneto is still somewhat alive if the board is in your favor. However, if the board is not and there is only two purple tiles far apart, then I'm screwed.

Mystique never got to try the winfinite combos because I'm somewhat new to the game and I don't have much covers for her anyways. Is there any reason to keep her now or is she just waste of roster space?

As a newbie transistioning towards being and intermediate level player, I love the nerf you did on 4* Thor because she is now not threatening to play against. I used to skip her in the simulator event, amd now I can survive thanks to her new nerf not cluttering the board with those pesky charge tiles. I'm facing her now and I've beat her twice thanks to her new nerf! I do feel sorry to those that spent s lot of money on 4* Thor.

Unknown

@Rowie, try MNM, Hawkeye, Thor - Purple and Yellow for crits make Hawkeye extremely happy and Red and Green AoE.

DD-The-Mighty

Having played it I cannot agree. The mystique changes don't work well. Her speed was her biggest asset, and was offset by her very low health. Adding the extra match to her blue has drastically crippled her ability to get to her other moves. slowing not just her board control but her ability to get her AP stealing on the board before she is half dead or the match is over. Either restore its tile change numbers/buff them or keep the current number and restore its 3-match rate. or-- longshot-- adjust her health the compensate. As she stands she is a subpar support character.

Loftus

I would never complain about any changes as i don't pay for covers. I earn what i earn and if it's changed then that's fine with me. It's the best free gaming experience i've had on mobile and i can't see a time in the near future where i won't enjoy playing.

Just one quick point to make on one of the changes:

I think the magneto nerf has inadvertently nerfed two other 2 characters too hard. My main 2 team is wolverine, OBW and captain marvel. They're incredibly balanced, can deal great damage, can manipulate the board, neutralize opponnents and heal as required.

My second team was 2 magneto, hawkeye and storm. It was incredibly high damage but squishy. Each match was essentially a race to get to purples before the other team would put some hurting on me. It worked because the assurance was that if you get those purples you're going to be doing some serious damage to the enemy team and quite a big stun. Greens were useful for ap gaining and board clearing while slowly accumulating reds to unleash a lot of pain on the other team.

The big issue with the change is that not only has magneto been nerfed, but now i'm finding hawkeye and storm a lot less useful as a result. Hawkeye is only really worth it if you can bank on crits (good against goons but very far from certain against characters) and storm obviously all comes down to her blue ability. With the speed of wind storm now gone and no guarantee of crits for hawk it means that you have a relatively slow, incredibly squishy team all of a sudden.

Don't get me wrong 2 storm will still have her uses but i think she's actually been hit harder by the nerf than magneto was. Storm is now a slow, squishy character who i'm finding it tough to actually use. I might be alone in thinking this and she might well pair up with other characters well that i haven't tried yet, but just thought i would share my instant reaction.

abilities costing 11 and 12, one of the worst passives in the game and one of the lowest health pools don't give me much incentive to use her unfortunately.

I don't actually mind the magneto change itself, he still has the chance to create a crit and the reds being added is nice. I don't have mystique so can't comment on their synergy, but i do think something has to be done to make 2 storm worth using again.

Polares

Well, the devs said wait until you have played with the new versions and now I have played with the new 4hor and I have to say that she is now just good, as I athought, she has lost her spark, and now other chars are far better (the list is long XForce, 3* Thor, BP, IF, Captain America, Cyclops, Luke Cage, Fury, DevilDino, Hood, Loki and Daken are clearly better and some others are better for some type of event like ProfX, Falcon or Blade). Her only advantage is her number of hps. She will still be used as a tank.

You need to use two Power Surges or one Power Surge and two Smites to really do some damage. Her only advantage is that in the long run, in long matches, she can still do some damage (in Deadpool survival node is where she has been most useful), but PvP is fast so now she is clearly a PvE char.

But he worst of all is that now, because you are collecting red and blue, allmost all power charges created are yellow, AND THIS IS A BIG PROBLEM. With the nerf Power Surge always charges the tiles you don't need because you are collecting the colors you need and then you leave a bigger number of tiles of the color you don't need in the board, before It was biased to this color but because you were creating 12 tiles this was not that important. Now Power Surge doesn't accelerate any of the abilities you need to use. I have used Power Surge more than 20 times and in general it generally creates 3 yellow, 1 blue and 1 red (because I am using Power Surge and Smite). So one Power Surge doesn't help me to get another Smite or Power Surge. And It is going to be the same for 3/5/5 or 5/5/3, it is going to geneate more tiles for the one color where you have 3 covers.

Please Devs, this is clearly too much, I know you are not going to listen, but raise the number to at least 7

Unknown

It was mentioned before in passing, but I want to make it explicit:

Will said that fixing weak characters didn't generate the kind of enthusiasm that the developers hope for...but can that possibly be true? Have the rates of Loki usage really not absolutely skyrocketed since he got his third power? Has Daredevil not seen at least some investment and deployment since his red and blue became awesome? Are we to believe that people don't buy X-Force covers?

And in case my anecdotal words are worth anything: A) I use Loki all the time now; he's been instrumental in some of my most recent Gauntlet-ing. His green is also the only direct cover purchase I've made in the past...8 months, maybe? I had Daredevil fully covered for months before his redesign; after it happened I started using him in DDQ and have since leveled him to max. He was fun and useful and I get a lot of mileage out of him in PvE (although he's still kind of squishy). C) I was on the verge of quitting the game entirely over the summer, but they made X-Force awesome and I happened to have him covered from back when he was terrible. He's fun enough to play that he basically single-handedly stopped me from quitting.

Imagine what stories we would start telling if, upon opening MPQ tomorrow, we found that Invisible Woman was doing something new and innovative in the 4* character tier? A lot of us have her and would love an excuse to develop her.

Edited for power.

Unknown

Lerysh wrote:

@Rowie, try MNM, Hawkeye, Thor - Purple and Yellow for crits make Hawkeye extremely happy and Red and Green AoE.

Thanks for this tip! Now I know who to level up next once i've established my core team of 2* level 94. Here I was thinking Hawkeye wasn't needed since someone told me that, but now you've helped saved him to stay in my roster until I can level him up properly and try your suggestion.

NorthernPolarity

Moon 17 wrote:

It was mentioned before in passing, but I want to make it explicit:

Will said that fixing weak characters didn't generate the kind of enthusiasm that the developers hope for...but can that possibly be true? Have the rates of Loki usage really not absolutely skyrocketed since he got his third power? Has Daredevil not seen at least some investment and deployment since his red and blue became awesome? Are we to believe that people don't buy X-Force covers?

And in case my anecdotal words are worth anything: A) I use Loki all the time now; he's been instrumental in some of my most recent Gauntlet-ing. His green is also the only direct cover purchase I've made in the past...8 months, maybe? I had Daredevil fully covered for months before his redesign; after it happened I started using him in DDQ and have since leveled him to max. He was fun and useful and I get a lot of mileage out of him in PvE (although he's still kind of squishy). C) I was on the verge of quitting the game entirely over the summer, but they made X-Force awesome and I happened to have him covered from back when he was terrible. He's fun enough to play that he basically single-handedly stopped me from quitting.

Imagine what stories we would start telling if, upon opening MPQ tomorrow, we found that Invisible Woman was doing something new and innovative in the 4* character tier? A lot of us have her and would love an excuse to develop her.

Edited for power.

"Enthusiasm" = "People buying cover packs". Loki is great, but since everyone already has him, Demiurge is understandably not seeing as much sales as just releasing a brand new character, which is what the bosses primarily care about.

Unknown

Super bummed about the changes to Magneto, I have a few leveled up 2* characters and a couple playable 3* heroes. I can barely compete using boosts and Magneto with Storm, I have now been robbed of my only strong weapons. I will have to work on another combination to try and reach the better reward tiers. I would not have spent so much effort to level up Magneto if he had the lack of powers he is now limited to.
-feeling ripped off