Yet another wall got added to the game!

Carnage_78

After a burst of optimism at the beginning of the event, I now think that this multiple boosted characters might be a mistake that will only make the transition even longer.

I've experienced quite a struggle during this event. I am all for roster diversity as I myself keep a diversified one on hand but for a transitioner like me with just a few maxed that I rely on to break through the wall of maxed , I found myself stuck in yet another wall created on top of all the other ones that already existed. The 3 boosted character wall!

I could not break through with only one or two boosted characters that were not maxed all the way. To me that new wall came around where the old one use to be so near the 550 - 600 mark. I was just beginning to be strong enough to get over that wall to perform well in any event but now a new layer of concrete just got poured on top of it & I am stranded on the wrong side of it.

Yes, once in a while I might have the right combination of characters which was the source of my optimism earlier on but I now think that most of the time I will be once again sitting on the outside looking in.

I was happy to get my transition achieved a season or so ago but now I am looking at yet another transition if these changes become permanent.

Chirus

I suspect many more will join your ranks soon after X force is crippled into being completely unusable (Devs here can't gauge how to make slight adjustments, only obliterating into obsolescence). At which point those of us who mostly focused on X force and nothing else (I also only have 3 or 4 166 toons), will be stuck trying to figure out how to keep up. I'll probably lose my place in my alliance because I won't be able to compete anymore. Once that happens, I'll probably just stop playing the game. It's the inevitable resolution of this trend. I'm sad about it, but I'm preparing my heart for it now.

A little caveat is that those who are most welcome to this change are those who already have a pretty beefy roster of 166 toons. They are also the guys who have every popular 4 star maxed and would hold an advantage in any weather. Since I'm not one of those guys...I completely empathize with your struggle. lol

Unknown

Trying to divine the dev's thought process, and it seems like they thought something like "If we only nerf 4Thor slightly and she is still one of the top 2 most powerful then we haven't actually changed anything at all everyone will still use the same teams ad nauseum even if we lower their power slightly, so we have to do more than slightly we have to bring her down to where more attractive options exist..."

notamutant

Carnage_78 wrote:

After a burst of optimism at the beginning of the event, I now think that this multiple boosted characters might be a mistake that will only make the transition even longer.

I've experienced quite a struggle during this event. I am all for roster diversity as I myself keep a diversified one on hand but for a transitioner like me with just a few maxed that I rely on to break through the wall of maxed , I found myself stuck in yet another wall created on top of all the other ones that already existed. The 3 boosted character wall!

I could not break through with only one or two boosted characters that were not maxed all the way. To me that new wall came around where the old one use to be so near the 550 - 600 mark. I was just beginning to be strong enough to get over that wall to perform well in any event but now a new layer of concrete just got poured on top of it & I am stranded on the wrong side of it.

Yes, once in a while I might have the right combination of characters which was the source of my optimism earlier on but I now think that most of the time I will be once again sitting on the outside looking in.

I was happy to get my transition achieved a season or so ago but now I am looking at yet another transition if these changes become permanent.

I used only three characters the entire event: Patch, HT, and Loki. They were all level 127. I got to 765 points with just one 3 hour shield.

Chirus

Cryptobrancus wrote:

Trying to divine the dev's thought process, and it seems like they thought something like "If we only nerf 4Thor slightly and she is still one of the top 2 most powerful then we haven't actually changed anything at all everyone will still use the same teams ad nauseum even if we lower their power slightly, so we have to do more than slightly we have to bring her down to where more attractive options exist..."

While that thought process may seem logical, it would actually be more fluid if 4 star thor wasn't a 4 star toon. If their aim was to diversify the options for top tier players, the more reasonable approach would be to add more 4 stars into the mix that are equally competitive with the current 4 star prowess, not nerf the existing one into 3 star level (arguably worse than some of the better ones even). If their algorithm has 3 stars as the standard with which to compare all toons of all levels, they may as well simply wipe out the 4 star tier entirely since it's a complete waste of iso investment (since 4 stars, in theory should always outperform 3 stars, thus always need to be nerfed disproportionately into awkwardly iso and hp-expensive, but 3 star territory)

MarvelMan

notamutant wrote:

I used only three characters the entire event: Patch, HT, and Loki. They were all level 127. I got to 765 points with just one 3 hour shield.

So low diversity, which is what I heard from alliance mates and tended to see myself. Although I did see LThor swapped in for Loki a decent amount.

What was your placement?

Carnage_78

notamutant wrote:

I used only three characters the entire event: Patch, HT, and Loki. They were all level 127. I got to 765 points with just one 3 hour shield.

Which was exactly my point...at the wall everyone was using a combination of three of the boosted & if you did not have three yourself then you were stuck there unable to move past that wall.

You got through to higher points because you had three of them yourself while others like me would've gone through in normal events with our go to team of but this time got stuck at the wall simply because I did not have the right ones boosted up.

Unknown

I too ran into this wall and struggled to stay over 550.

I have 6 3* at 166 but Patch was the only one that was buffed up for this event. All the other buffed up characters I have, but they were either under leveled or under covered.

At the beginning of the event I was almost certain that I could hit 1k for xforce but once I got to the wall I started seeing nothing but buffed up Lokis/Thors/Patches along with the usual Xforce.

At the end of the event, I finished with 650+ but only because I was able to hulk bomb some good sized targets before the end of the event.

I feel like the rest of the weeks is going to be more of the same for me in pvp because of the characters that I have and have not been able to work on.

If they decide to make this a permanent thing I will have to change the direction that I was gonna go. I felt confident with the 166s that I had and was going to start focusing more on xforce but I might just have to start focusing on getting more 3* to lvl 166.

I don't dislike this little experiment, I just happened to draw the wrong characters for it.

Chirus

HeWantsRevenge wrote:

If they decide to make this a permanent thing I will have to change the direction that I was gonna go. I felt confident with the 166s that I had and was going to start focusing more on xforce but I might just have to start focusing on getting more 3* to lvl 166.

I used to have this system where I would spend 1 or 2 levels on x force and the rest on 3 star characters. I just can't justify not spending anything into XF when he is the only character that can reasonably compete toe to toe against any buffed or non-buffed toon. But having a cushy 3 star roster isn't bad either. If he's not fully covered, then maybe. But if he's close to getting 5 green and 5 black (maybe 4 of each?) I would still invest iso into him every event.

Unknown

I used Lvl 200 Xforce/lvl 150 Iron Fist/lvl 107(Boosted) Human Torch the entire PVP. I hit 801 without any shields, and only used +3 black/green after 600 points. It's def possible to get past the wall Id say without boosted characters, I was facing higher level teams made up of HT/Thor/Loki/Patch. I do find myself cursing whoever decided to boost Ares to 170, Rampage ruins your health in a heartbeat then it's health pack city, population this guy.

Unknown

The funniest thing is I had the same thought earlier today.

I was thinking there used to be a wall of X-Force and 4or when you got past 700. Now, there is an equivalent wall beginning all the way down at 550. Except now the wall is much, much worse.

The reason. People used to see a variety of team comps up until around 700. Not any more. You see the same ones over and over, just much earlier. It gets worse. Loki and Hood are balanced only because they have lower health. Guess what, much higher health, they are no longer balanced.

Unknown

Attonp wrote:

I used Lvl 200 Xforce/lvl 150 Iron Fist/lvl 107(Boosted) Human Torch the entire PVP. I hit 801 without any shields, and only used +3 black/green after 600 points. It's def possible to get past the wall Id say without boosted characters, I was facing higher level teams made up of HT/Thor/Loki/Patch. I do find myself cursing whoever decided to boost Ares to 170, Rampage ruins your health in a heartbeat then it's health pack city, population this guy.

I have to agree that I feel the main culprit was Ares. I was stuck doing 15 hours worth of work each day (including commute), so I didn't push as far as I normally do....but a decent part of that was because I didn't want to. Rolled with Xforce + Torch + Mags/Hood (both regular 166s). 10K Ares meant that even when I was fighting to quickly rack up my green/black AP I would still get hit by at least 1 of his abilities before I could take him down. Poopy board with less than exciting matches? There were times where I'd walk into a fight with Xforce and Hood fully healed, then would walk out with each of them clinging to like 2k in health (Torch was all over the place given sometimes he was the loaner and sometimes he was mine).

I was so bored of running into Ares or seeing him as a potential match that I finally just got too disinterested to keep pushing. I'll deal with him if it's worth 30+ points, but when I'm getting long strings of 20-23s? Eff that noise, I have paint to watch dry instead.

fmftint

I keep seeing people complain about Ares, my experience must have been very different. I didn't eat a single Onslaught or Rampage, HT would cast Flame Jet as soon as 5 green were gathered, leaving 1 or 0 green to tick on the next turn or matching it away the very same turn

Unknown

Chirus wrote:

HeWantsRevenge wrote:

If they decide to make this a permanent thing I will have to change the direction that I was gonna go. I felt confident with the 166s that I had and was going to start focusing more on xforce but I might just have to start focusing on getting more 3* to lvl 166.

I used to have this system where I would spend 1 or 2 levels on x force and the rest on 3 star characters. I just can't justify not spending anything into XF when he is the only character that can reasonably compete toe to toe against any buffed or non-buffed toon. But having a cushy 3 star roster isn't bad either. If he's not fully covered, then maybe. But if he's close to getting 5 green and 5 black (maybe 4 of each?) I would still invest iso into him every event.

That sounds like a good idea. I'll consider doing that. My 2/3/4 lvl 117 XForce is nothing to write home about so I think I can level my guys up to 166 while slowly building xforce up.

Unknown

This actually helps people in the 3 to 4 star transition. The OP just got a team of three 3 stars a season ago. Most people stuck in the 3 to 4 star transition, like myself, have had a solid team of 3 stars for months. I have like 10+ maxed 3 stars, with a lot of others leveled but not maxed, while I don't have any maxed 4 stars.

Recent changes, like lowering 4 star progression rewards to 1000, plus this multiple boosted 3 star change, I think will only serve to help those who have highly diverse 3 star rosters. In other words, just because it doesn't help people who just got to the 3 star level doesn't mean it's not helping people transition, especially those who have been stuck for a long time.

Just wanted to throw a different perspective out there for you guys.

SnowcaTT

I only had two 166's before this event (including hood), and put two more (Lthor/Loki) up for this event. Seeing that combo pretty much everywhere, I expect we'll see plenty of Patch/Loki in the Daken event as well.

I think this wall would look very different if the boosted characters were Daredevil/Squirrel Girl/Psylock....not so many people would have these already bumped to 166. They chose some of probably the most common characters that folks have maxed.

Unknown

Garlow112 wrote:

I have to agree that I feel the main culprit was Ares. I was stuck doing 15 hours worth of work each day (including commute), so I didn't push as far as I normally do....but a decent part of that was because I didn't want to. Rolled with Xforce + Torch + Mags/Hood (both regular 166s). 10K Ares meant that even when I was fighting to quickly rack up my green/black AP I would still get hit by at least 1 of his abilities before I could take him down. Poopy board with less than exciting matches? There were times where I'd walk into a fight with Xforce and Hood fully healed, then would walk out with each of them clinging to like 2k in health (Torch was all over the place given sometimes he was the loaner and sometimes he was mine).

I was so bored of running into Ares or seeing him as a potential match that I finally just got too disinterested to keep pushing. I'll deal with him if it's worth 30+ points, but when I'm getting long strings of 20-23s? Eff that noise, I have paint to watch dry instead.

People using a high-level X-Force complaining about running into a boosted Ares every time. Oh the irony...

Wonko33

So OP is saying that he can't beat and pass the scores of people who have better rosters than he does. Isn't that the way it should be?

If you have only a few 3* all you should get is top 100 max, people with more good characters get top 50, people with well rounded 3* roster get top 25 and so on. If you can't hit top 100 , experiment with time shards and try changing the time you join pvp. With my phone roster, very few 3* and none maxed, I join with 30-15 left and always get top 50.

At that rate, each week you get 3 3* covers from PvP, 7 from daily Tacos, that's progress.

Chirus

Wonko33 wrote:

So OP is saying that he can't beat and pass the scores of people who have better rosters than he does. Isn't that the way it should be?

If you have only a few 3* all you should get is top 100 max, people with more good characters get top 50, people with well rounded 3* roster get top 25 and so on. If you can't hit top 100 , experiment with time shards and try changing the time you join pvp. With my phone roster, very few 3* and none maxed, I join with 30-15 left and always get top 50.

At that rate, each week you get 3 3* covers from PvP, 7 from daily Tacos, that's progress.

I think that the original intent of this post isn't a complaint that someone with a few 3 star toons can't beat the top tier players anymore. In fact, I don't think he claimed he was ever able to do that in the first place (certainly not with just 600 points). It's just an observational post that what was originally intended to help the 3* to x force transitioners ended up making the game harder. I haven't tried for 1 k yet, but I imagine I would get more hits now than I did previously, and I own a maxed x force, maxed 3 star thor, and 160 loki. This applies pretty universally I think.

I'm willing to bet that there are more people who are transitioning towards a maxed x force and transitioning towards an extensive 3 star roster than there are players who already have met both of those criteria. This means that on average, a majority of players will come across a new "wall" which the original poster mentioned. This results in even worse placement than previously, and an even more difficult time gathering the covers you need. Of course the minority will be those who have those few characters maxed, and I do think those would be in the minority.

To be honest though, I'm not sure what the result of this mechanic would be towards 3 star to x force transitioners. The stratification of who gets what place will definitely shift, and I can even imagine higher points becoming more difficult to get when more people now have the firepower to hit top tier players. But I don't know if this really affects placement that much. Probably will affect progression rewards and who can get them. But I imagine placement rewards of the general population will be roughly the same. But I dunno. I need stats for that.

Bowgentle

What I don't understand is - why would anyone still want to transition to 4* chars?

After the nerf to Thor, and the impending nerf to Xforce (we all know it's coming), what's the point?

This buff to 3* chars clearly shows the devs want people to put ISO into anyone but the 4* chars.

The advice I'd give to someone is forget about Xforce for now, max some useful 3* chars instead.
Concentrate on the useful chars of the weekly buffed list, ride those chars to placement in PVP.
Forget 4*s, they're not worth it at this point in the game.

Yes, if Xforce is buffed (until the nerf) it'll hurt, but other 4*s? Meh. I used my maxed Fury for about 4 fights in Torch, then swapped him out because he was tanking way too many colours.

Wonko33

I think the whole "wall" conversation is a bit tedious. It's a trendy word here but all it describes is that you get to a point where people who have more points (hence worth more than 20 for your match) , have better rosters and are hard/impossible to beat. Well duh, you reached the level your roster can achieve, maybe it's not reasonable to hope to get 900 1000 progressions with this roster. Get your 1 cover for top 100, your daily tacos and keep grinding, we all did it