How to increase the fun of Ultron (or future similar events)

hesjingixen

First off, I just want to say that, overall, the Ultron event has been fantastic. Server stability has been a bit iffy, but I have liked the overall format, inclusion of alliance participation, and epic feel of the event. However, server stability aside, I think there are a few ways that the event (or future similar events) could be improved.

1) Scale with alliance. I know, I know, you're going to counter with "but, alliance shenanigans!", and I've thought of that (viewtopic.php?f=8&t=28824). That suggestion aside, a simple thing that locks the scaling once the alliance begins playing would solve that problem. Much like this event, a simple warning message that says something like "Your alliance membership will be locked once you begin this event, please check with your Alliance leader before beginning" would do the trick. Thanks to the current "early display" of PvE events, the alliance would have a day or so of notice before the event begins, so they could get their alliance in order first. I can't think of a good argument AGAINST this that doesn't eventually come down to "but, we wanna do shenanigans!" Keep in mind, I understand that this event is supposed to be hard, so I'm not asking it to scale with the rosters of alliance members, just the SIZE (number of members) of an alliance. Also, to keep the optimal path from being "start your own one member alliance", you could keep a minimal scaling factor of say 4-5 members. That way, DEDICATED 2-3 member alliances could probably still pull it off, but the 1 member alliance strategy wouldn't be optimal.

2) Sentries....Okay, so, if you ask just about any MPQ player what their least favorite IN-GAME thing is, I'd bet 90% of them would say "being stunned", with "having AP stolen" probably a close second. Now, you might wonder why I bring this up, given that Sentries don't actually stun....but don't they? When an enemy turns begins with "Swarm -> cascade -> Swarm -> cascade -> cascade -> Core Meltdown -> cascade -> cascade" and THEN they actually take their turn....that feels a LOT like being stunned. There are several possible solutions to this. The first (and most obvious) being, don't have the sentries make matches. Play them like normal goons. Since this WOULD result in less tiles falling, you could increased the odds of falling tiles being special, so that their overall chance to pull off Core Meltdown or Feed the System remains similar. The other possibility lies with the biggest trouble maker, swarmers. Swarm could only eliminate 2 or 3 tiles instead of 4, to reduce the odds of cascade and/or Core Meltdown/Feed the System could always be "checked" before Swarm goes off, to reduce the odds of chaining Swarms into the others.

In conclusion, I am still very happy with the event, and I hope it runs again, and I particularly hope that this is a glimpse into things to come for MPQ.

Cymmina

We didn't get any "early display" for either of the Ultron events. I don't remember how much notice there was for the first one, but the second one went up 1h 15m before the event started.

Your first point won't help in situations like mine: I was in a full alliance, but 6 people (including the only commander) were inactive.

hesjingixen

Cymmina wrote:

We didn't get any "early display" for either of the Ultron events. I don't remember how much notice there was for the first one, but the second one went up 1h 15m before the event started.

Your first point won't help in situations like mine: I was in a full alliance, but 6 people (including the only commander) were inactive.

Ah, fair enough regarding the notice. I didn't realize that, but given no time slices, that's probably why. I was active in the forums at the time, so I probably didn't pay as much attention to the in-game notification. In that case

3) Give an in-game, 1 day lead time on the event so alliances can get themselves together.

This would also (partially) address your second issue as the other 14 of y'all could have made your own alliance in order to get the most out of the event. Whether or not the event is worth it for y'all to do that is (of course) up to the group, but at least you would have the option.

Pwuz_

hesjingixen wrote:

The other possibility lies with the biggest trouble maker, swarmers. Swarm could only eliminate 2 or 3 tiles instead of 4, to reduce the odds of cascade and/or Core Meltdown/Feed the System could always be "checked" before Swarm goes off, to reduce the odds of chaining Swarms into the others.

I'm not sure that would feel any better. In fact I think that might feel worse! Imagine a scenario in which the Sentries have enough tiles to activate Core Meltdown/Feed the System, now there are fewer tiles on the board...Oh, time for another swarm, now the Sentries move. Not only did you have the same problem, but now all those spawned tiles from the Swarm are on the board for your turn too!

The advantage to the current order of operations is that if you can keep OVER the swarm threshold, you can keep Swarm from going off even if Core Meltdown/Feed the System still do activate. At least those tiles are off the board and not replaced BEFORE your turn, even if it causes the next round to activate swarm.

Heartburn

also the sentries have too much health i was seeing 3-4K starting 6+k ending. given you need to fight 2 waves of them they should start at 1k and scale up to 5K there are no reason for them to be so buff. As it is, it make the ultron and ultron prime welcome relief from the 6+ enemies, each with health 5K+, slog I need to refresh the fights when it should be the other way around. and those 6 enemies per round fights are **** 6x 3.8k vs 3x 5.8 k -6k enemies give me just the 3 please. they need to be paper if you are going to fight six cause there is a second round.

Unknown

This discussion went a different way than I expected when I saw the title...

To increase the fun: how about not stacking 2 overlapping PvEs and 2 overlapping PvPs and DDQ alongside the Ultron? I'm part of a fairly decent high end alliance and burnout and 10hrs worth of daily play are starting to enter the conversation....

But then again, it might be in the master D3P plan...

GothicKratos

ErnDiggity wrote:

This discussion went a different way than I expected when I saw the title...

To increase the fun: how about not stacking 2 overlapping PvEs and 2 overlapping PvPs and DDQ alongside the Ultron? I'm part of a fairly decent high end alliance and burnout and 10hrs worth of daily play are starting to enter the conversation....

But then again, it might be in the master D3P plan...

I feel like this was absolutely the biggest bumbling on their part - even moreso than the server downtime.

Vinmarc43

In the future, one fix for members of alliance that don't play, do this format of event but there is no end timer, this way, the alliance works togheter for the same goal when they can and finding a way to get to the end togheter.
Top 15 members get extra iso/hp, depending on there position, #1 geting the most naturaly.