Radical PvP Revamp

TheWerebison

I know, I know, so many threads about this kind of stuff right now. But, as this is the suggestions forum, I am gonna throw my ideas out in the open. So, here is my thoughts about what needs to be done.

Remove shield.

What?! I know, right? Remove shield? I sound like Normal Osborn (hurr hurr).

A while back, TotalBiscuit did a first impression of this game. His primary criticism at the time (if I remember correctly) was that he was a major fan of the Puzzle Quest series, and he didn't like having to wait for his characters to heal themselves back up. He wanted to be able to jump back in for another rematch. At the time, I didn't care (I had a very small roster), but I understood what he was saying, having played PQ 1 and 2 myself. Now that I have a larger roster of high level characters, I'm starting to feel the real pain.

Here's the thing. Shields are used out of fear in this game (unless you're Cap). You need to get a good amount of points in order to get the progression or the rank rewards, and ya just can't do that if people are taking them from you. Add to this the fact that the healing packs are finite. You get 5 full heals, and then you are either stuck hoping you won't get attacked, or shielding yourself, or buying more health packs.

My advice: Put a bit more Puzzle Quest back into the game. Get rid of the shields, and the health packs. Let people start every battle fresh.

Now, I know you guys still need to make money, and I believe it will still come to you. And there should still be some sort of lockout mechanic to PvP. Maybe if a character you are using gets knocked out, you cannot use him or her for 8 hours. Or even the rest of that particular tournament! You can still use him/her in any other tournament going on, until he/she gets knocked out in that one. Perhaps change the health packs to a single revive pack that respawns every 5 hours or so.

IMO, this would improve the overall mood about the other changes made to PvP. Longer matches make it harder on all players. Let me point out a few things that this would improve.

1) There are many good Puzzle Quest players who are capable of getting through a fight without losing a party member, but NOBODY is good enough that they can get through a fight without taking some damage, and that adds up to a point where you can't play anymore until you get more health packs. You want people to be able to play your game.
2) Character heals would have meaning again. I don't know about the majority of players, but I find temporary healing abilities absolutely useless, and they are always the "3" in any of my "5/5/3" builds. But if you could heal to keep your players alive during that fight, knowing they'd be alive again for the next one, that has value.
3) It will increase team variety and character use, for when our favorite characters get knocked out
4) Veterans (i.e. the people leaving and not willing to give you money anymore) will get the MOST out of this change, because they have the larger rosters. Newcomers will not get a significant benefit out of this, but hopefully it will teach them to play better, and give them a goal to reach toward, such as acquiring new characters, which can be a good source of income. And maybe there can be a scaling thing for them, where their one revive pack takes less time to respawn, or something. Just off the top of my head.

Also, let people start every story mode mission fresh, while I think about it. And I'm talking about the ACTUAL story mode, the one that's always there and isn't timed. It has literally no bearing on any ranking system and should be allowed to be played at people's leisure.

I think I've said everything I meant to. I'll add stuff if I can think of anything. I honestly don't expect such a change to be implemented, and would appreciate feedback on my idea, but IMO it would increase goodwill towards the devs and the game.

TheWerebison

I kind of realize, after re-reading, that is is more an argument to get rid of health packs. Maybe shields can still have a place. Perhaps I just wanted to make the Norman Osborn joke.

Arondite

If they do away with character health, they'll just implement Energy in it's place.

I think we can all agree that Health Packs are less a burden / better for the players than Energy is.

TheWerebison

Arondite wrote:

If they do away with character health, they'll just implement Energy in it's place.

I think we can all agree that Health Packs are less a burden / better for the players than Energy is.

Yeah, changing to energy would be atrocious. Mostly just trying to get them to change from a "mobile game" mentality to a "Puzzle Quest" mentality.

Also, I think if they went to energy, SO MANY more people would leave.