Always-On Issues and Compensation

Unknown

I think the latest issues with the PvE AvU event underscore the problem with always-on games. I think there's a better solution. Namely updating the game so that the copy players have in their hands can run without having to connect to the servers.

Whoa, wait, what about rankings and getting the rewards you need?

Well, your phone or pc (if you're playing on Steam) would need to check in to the servers as often as possible. So when there IS a signal, it checks in, updates servers with your score, and so on. SO if you have ten hours left in an event and you're going to an event where you have zero reception, you can still play, buff your score, then update the servers when you get out.

What are the implications if there is a general server outage?

If there is a recognized server outage, the servers can be overridden to check every player's final score. The game will lock at the designated time on each player's device and hold that score, and the servers will accept check-ins for the next twelve hours after reconnecting, and THEN final rewards are opened up and disbursed.

As for compensation, I'm seeing a lot of requests for straight-up covers when we all know that we'll likely just get tokens. And tokens are a guessing game. So how about the following:

Take one cover from each event that was impacted: Captain America, Black Panther, Quicksilver, and Scarlet Witch, and offer a choice to each player: pick one, pick two, whatever devs are okay with. Should also offer a fifth option of tokens, i.e. 5 Ultron tokens or Taco tokens, etc. I think that's the best way to address everybody's concerns. Make the players happy, they keep playing and keep supporting the game.

Most importantly, removing the always-on component (which has always been my least-favorite element of the game) would make these issues non-existent.

blinktag

I agree that "always on" is one of my least favorite aspects of the game.

However, from a competition security perspective, it does prevent (or at least make more difficult) local tampering of stored data for nefarious purposes.

Surely, there is some sort of local encryption that could be used to mitigate (e.g., public/private key, where the encryption on the phone was one-way, do be decoded at the server), but that only covers finished games and doesn't necessarily prevent leveraging heals, ISOs, token usage, etc.

(For example, one super easy hack with a full offline mode would be to backup, open a token, restore from backup... How would scenarios like this be prevented in a fully offline mode?)

So yes, I hate it, and I wish MPW would limit the necessity of connectivity (and the bandwidth usage!), but I also see a practical reason to have it, to some extent.

Unknown

Tokens will keep. So honestly I'm okay with leaving that as something that would need to have a connection to complete.

Honestly, I'm computer literate, but I've no idea how one would even do that. Coding, hacking, et al, not my strong suit.

I'm sure there are plenty of security measures that would make the game tamper-resistant. Note. I didn't say -proof... we humans are clever, and we prefer to use our cleverness for nefarious or, in this case, pointless purposes.