A conversation about scheduled play

AaronTheLuigi

I'm going to come clean: I was an active player (on Steam) from October 2014 to April of this year before burnout kicked in. At the time, I had only spent $50 during a sale for , and had a 2-3 transition roster, but with real-life obligations (work, schooling, etc.) becoming more prevalent I had to skip a few seasons of play and leave my alliance. As of this post I still do Deadpool's Daily but don't participate in any events.

It's almost been 4 months and I still feel as burnt out as I did in April. New characters I have no shot of obtaining outside of throwing my bank account at token pulls continue to pass me by, as well as big changes to PvP scoring and revamped PvE event nodes. Lurking on the forums I find people converse in a mix of how the new progressions make covers at the 1000 point level easy to obtain for 166 rosters and people who are fed up with working for 1 cover of a that will in all likelihood stay at 1 cover for months on end.

As I ponder this rift however I can't help but feel something else that has largely flown outside of forum posts should be brought up. (At least recent posts I can find; this may very will be an existing topic and if it is please let me know.) The structure of events in the first place. Each event runs for set times (both the slices and the event as a whole.) To succeed in the Teenage Riot PvP running right now, you'd have to play around this weekend's obligations. To obtain the new you're going to need optimal, timed play sessions through the course of the upcoming rerun of The Hunt. If you only want to (optimally) play when you feel like playing your options are limited to the Story Mode, Deadpool's Daily Quest, and if a Season is active, the S.H.I.E.L.D. Simulator.

I don't abhor this game's event structure, the game itself or the concept of effort, and my intention is not to demand a change. What I would like to do is discuss the fundamental rules of timed events and whether or not there should be changes in said rules. Off the top of my head I find no other game which schedules most of their levels, quests or missions like Marvel Puzzle Quest (I could be wrong; you all may know some.) Many freemium games have a regeneration mechanic like MPQ but you generally can play on your free time. In MPQ, while it is possible to play Story/Versus events whenever you're free, the rewards are generally fractions of what one could obtain by playing with the schedule. I'd like to hear your opinions on the subject and any potential improvements/defenses of the current system. Also, in case the next Q&A is still a ways in the future maybe a developer or two could chime in about why they structured the events in this fashion.

Linkster79

It's the nature of the game and at least now it is a tad more friendly with being able to pick from a selection of event end times (I still shudder at 5am event end times for every other versus and every single new character story event). I only really do Deadpools Daily missions and maybe a few versus events per season for the Heroic 10 pack and even a 2* transition player should be able to get about 400 points per versus event with minimal time. Same with story events and with non optimal play anyone a few months in should he able to get all progression rewards.

Numerous suggestions have been made in the past to cater for those of us who would like a more casual and non competitive environment. I myself suggested that all the current story events could go into to what was the Prologue section with increased difficulty and rewards.

MarvelMan

Even DPDQ is kind of schedule based. Yeah, you get 24 hours to do it but if you have a busy day....

The Gauntlet is one of the favorite PVE events in part because the schedule can be set by the player (even more so without comm scaling). And the recent Antman PVE was great for that as well. I like having game schedule based competitions, but building events in like that seems the way to go.

GurlBYE

The scheduled play is a big issue. When you don't have a roster for pvp, don't have enough hero points to slot the 1 cover of whatever character you'll earn in pve and you're burned out on the same node. You kinda just open the game up do the daily and head out.

The game doesn't at all incentive-ize you to do more then click it on once a day and do the level 1/1/1 prologue mission a lot of days. (it's so bad I do it for the deadpool points instead of the heres a boost, daily rewards half the time)
Everyone seems to get horse-blinders the second they fully cover a character of a new tier so they don't notice it.

Boommike

Haven't seen BenGrimm in this neck of the woods in a while, but i bet he'd be all over this thread. He was one of the first i remember hearing from in regards to wanting to play on his time, not d3's.

Unknown

It's a self-motivated game. Play as much as you like or have time for. But someone who sits & grinds all day is gonna place better than someone who can't/doesn't.

GurlBYE

downsouthman1 wrote:

It's a self-motivated game. Play as much as you like or have time for. But someone who sits & grinds all day is gonna place better than someone who can't/doesn't.

That's entirely false.

If you play as much as you like or have time for you won't be rewarded for playing and winning. you play on the schedule (even pve refreshes) or you don't get rewarded for your input.

It's entirely opposite of grinding all day.

Unknown

GurlBYE wrote:

downsouthman1 wrote:

It's a self-motivated game. Play as much as you like or have time for. But someone who sits & grinds all day is gonna place better than someone who can't/doesn't.

That's entirely false.

If you play as much as you like or have time for you won't be rewarded for playing and winning. you play on the schedule (even pve refreshes) or you don't get rewarded for your input.

It's entirely opposite of grinding all day.

You can grind all night or you can grind all day, but it is the only way you can play. If you want the rewards you talk about. This game is a time eater.

To clarify, it also works on PvE if instead of only playing the 8-hour refreshes, you grind down the nodes.

wymtime

For the timing I think that PVP timing with shields is a lot tougher with work then PVE. In PVE as long as you are able to do clears around 8 hrs and then make a push at you chosen end time (which should be a good time for you to grind) you can place well. In PVP if you want to place well top 10 or top 5 you not only have to be willing to spend HP. Up you have to have really good timing with shields, and shield hopping. That means when your shield is getting ready to expire you better be available to play. If you are not available say good bye to your points. I generally only hit 1000 points becuase to hop more than once would force me to interrupt my work day. Unfortunatly I made th decision to support my family, pay for my mortgage and other bills then try and hit 1300 points in MPQ.