Generally astounded with the disappointing roll-out
Vhailorx
Posts: 6,085 Chairperson of the Boards
I try to be pretty even-handed when it comes to commenting on this game. I try to praise the devs when they make player-friendly or balance-minded changes (for example, the original roll out of DDQ was fantastic for us players). And I try to point out when I think they are being too unfriendly to the player (for example, I think the monetization model in this game is too aggressive, especially the prices for ISO, 4* covers, and putting legendary tokens only in the 40 packs).
But it's really hard to find good things to say about today.
(1) the server crash: honestly, I don't have a problem with this. Yes it sucks when it happens, and yes they should have better load balancing. But it's not like MPQ is the only game that networking hiccups when new events roll out. Big events mean more traffic. And it's not usually worth paying for the capacity to handle maximum spike traffic. better to just weather any network problems peak times and build a robust infrastructure that can handle normal traffic without problems. This was an improvement over ultron, though still predictably irritating.
(2) Anniversary tokens suck. Last year the anniversary tokens were awesome. At a time when total gold cover odds were something like 18%, the anniversaries offered around 40% gold covers. Including a 10% chance of Dino (15% in 10 packs). They also offered noticeably better odds of 3* pulls than contemporary regular heroics. Anniversary2 tokens have worse odds of 3*s and worse odds of 4*s (other than Dino) than do modern heroic tokens. Unless I have overlooked something, they have higher odds of 2*s than current heroic tokens! Even accounting for Dino and the HP/ISO rewards they are actively worse than heroic tokens for players trying to build their 3* or 4* roster. And the odds of pulling a Dino are 3 times worse. Why would demiurge possibly do this? These anniversary tokens aren't just worse than last year's, they are arguably worse than regular heroics. Unbelievable.
(3) Galactus Hungers has terrible rewards (other than 4* Cyclops). Ultron had 3x 25HP rewards in each 8-hour cycle, plus 3x event tokens. It was possible (With some luck and serious grinding) to collect a really useful amount of tokens and HP. Galactus does not offer anything other than modest ISO rewards and standard tokens (except for the main node, which has a single event token reward and no HP). Additionally, each round of ultron offered 6 fixed cover prizes. 3 from the top progs, and 3 from the final 3 rounds. Galactus offers 3, plus a legendary token and some event tokens. Galactus event tokens suck. In ultron, the prize packs had better than standard odds of pulling useful prizes, and the featured character (Switch in run 1 and IMHB in run 2) had a significantly bumped drop rate. I think the rate for IMHB was over 2%. Galactus tokens offer a .8% chance at JG and a .6% chance at cyclops.
(4) Galactus' difficulty curve seems broken. Rounds 1-2 were kinda fun. Rounds 3 and 4 seemed a bit more challenging. Round 5 is basically insta-death on round 7 for sure, and possible as early as the beginning of round 4 if Galactus gets lucky tile placement. This one is a bit early to call, but it seems like Ultron 2 all over again in terms of difficulty. Who designed this system? Who playtested it and thought that this difficulty curve was reasonable? Are players expected to use full AP boosts for each and every battle from Round 5 on (ie 5 or 6 times every 8 hours for 3 days?). I will admit that this complaint is a bit premature until we see the rest of the rounds. But so far it seems more than a bit absurd.
(5) There was very little communication from the devs ahead of time. They announced that the event was coming. They only gave any specific information about the format of the event in response to a player-created thread here on the forums. I feel that, for all its technical problems, the devs did a great job of explaining the ultron event before it started, so we players probably could have offered a moderately accurate description of it before we started playing. We got much much less information about this galactus event.
(6) No lightning rounds as far as we can tell. The 20-person rounds that introduced us to 4* thor were perhaps the #1 anniversary highlight last year. Why no return? why not unveil 5*s in those lightning rounds, so we could all play around with well covered SS or OML to whet our appetites?
As I said in one comment above, it is still early, so there is time to fix some or all of these issues. To date, however, the anniversary has been terribly disappointing.
Edited (poorly) for spelling and grammar
But it's really hard to find good things to say about today.
(1) the server crash: honestly, I don't have a problem with this. Yes it sucks when it happens, and yes they should have better load balancing. But it's not like MPQ is the only game that networking hiccups when new events roll out. Big events mean more traffic. And it's not usually worth paying for the capacity to handle maximum spike traffic. better to just weather any network problems peak times and build a robust infrastructure that can handle normal traffic without problems. This was an improvement over ultron, though still predictably irritating.
(2) Anniversary tokens suck. Last year the anniversary tokens were awesome. At a time when total gold cover odds were something like 18%, the anniversaries offered around 40% gold covers. Including a 10% chance of Dino (15% in 10 packs). They also offered noticeably better odds of 3* pulls than contemporary regular heroics. Anniversary2 tokens have worse odds of 3*s and worse odds of 4*s (other than Dino) than do modern heroic tokens. Unless I have overlooked something, they have higher odds of 2*s than current heroic tokens! Even accounting for Dino and the HP/ISO rewards they are actively worse than heroic tokens for players trying to build their 3* or 4* roster. And the odds of pulling a Dino are 3 times worse. Why would demiurge possibly do this? These anniversary tokens aren't just worse than last year's, they are arguably worse than regular heroics. Unbelievable.
(3) Galactus Hungers has terrible rewards (other than 4* Cyclops). Ultron had 3x 25HP rewards in each 8-hour cycle, plus 3x event tokens. It was possible (With some luck and serious grinding) to collect a really useful amount of tokens and HP. Galactus does not offer anything other than modest ISO rewards and standard tokens (except for the main node, which has a single event token reward and no HP). Additionally, each round of ultron offered 6 fixed cover prizes. 3 from the top progs, and 3 from the final 3 rounds. Galactus offers 3, plus a legendary token and some event tokens. Galactus event tokens suck. In ultron, the prize packs had better than standard odds of pulling useful prizes, and the featured character (Switch in run 1 and IMHB in run 2) had a significantly bumped drop rate. I think the rate for IMHB was over 2%. Galactus tokens offer a .8% chance at JG and a .6% chance at cyclops.
(4) Galactus' difficulty curve seems broken. Rounds 1-2 were kinda fun. Rounds 3 and 4 seemed a bit more challenging. Round 5 is basically insta-death on round 7 for sure, and possible as early as the beginning of round 4 if Galactus gets lucky tile placement. This one is a bit early to call, but it seems like Ultron 2 all over again in terms of difficulty. Who designed this system? Who playtested it and thought that this difficulty curve was reasonable? Are players expected to use full AP boosts for each and every battle from Round 5 on (ie 5 or 6 times every 8 hours for 3 days?). I will admit that this complaint is a bit premature until we see the rest of the rounds. But so far it seems more than a bit absurd.
(5) There was very little communication from the devs ahead of time. They announced that the event was coming. They only gave any specific information about the format of the event in response to a player-created thread here on the forums. I feel that, for all its technical problems, the devs did a great job of explaining the ultron event before it started, so we players probably could have offered a moderately accurate description of it before we started playing. We got much much less information about this galactus event.
(6) No lightning rounds as far as we can tell. The 20-person rounds that introduced us to 4* thor were perhaps the #1 anniversary highlight last year. Why no return? why not unveil 5*s in those lightning rounds, so we could all play around with well covered SS or OML to whet our appetites?
As I said in one comment above, it is still early, so there is time to fix some or all of these issues. To date, however, the anniversary has been terribly disappointing.
Edited (poorly) for spelling and grammar
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Comments
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Not shocking . Surprised this many people under 17 congregate.0
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At this point I think it must be intentional. They must want us to have less fun so that we will spend time playing the MtG puzzle quest when it comes out or buy the console version of mpq.
I just can't imagine them screwing the pooch like this on every level and souring the positive experience we had last year by accident.0 -
I agree with all of your points, Vhailorx, including the caveats. This was a very good summary. I think the jury's still out a bit on the difficulty curve; there might be strategies that haven't come to light yet.
To me #2, the Anniversary Tokens sucking, is the most egregious flaw. It's a trap for newbies that could potentially waste a lot of money for people who can't tell that these tokens are simply not worth the price. That's just evil. You have to assume that most of the player base does not read these forums, but goes only by the information presented to them through the application on their phone. To them these things are expensive poison.
I'd add another entry (7) to this list: The manner in which the developers tinkered with Galactus's abilities right up until the last minute based on players working out strategies publicly on the forum.... Well, that's just cheesy. I understand that letting something out the door with a quick "I win" button would be a bad experience, but the onus is really on the developers to find those holes ahead of time, not to just hack in patches as the players start reasoning things out. It seems a breach of trust.
The entire experience sort of smacks of the developers just running out of time. It seems another two or three weeks of playtesting (and server load testing) would have done them a world of good. Perhaps what's needed here is a group of veteran players willing to submit to an NDA to hack away at these things privately for a week or two before they launch.0 -
Correct me if im wrong.
That kind of means that the double iso is pointless since we have little missions to do after finishing the 8 hour missions0 -
Agree (pretty much) on all counts.
The difficulty would be fine.... if the event was designed, from the ground up, as a "tilting at windmills" exercise. A situation where Galactus has 800,000 health or some other huuuuge number, and there's a 40- or 50-turn ticking time bomb (maybe something like SS's black hole) that goes off with a nuke (but is AP-linked so that drain powers could impact it). Your job is to just throw yourself at Galactus and do as much damage as you can before you're all dead. That would at least be honest and forthright. (Plus, it's actually comics-related, as that was pretty much Adam Warlock's strategy in taking on the fully-Infinity-Gauntleted Thanos....)
This, though.... it's kind of a mishmosh of bad Ultron ideas.
But the tokens are the worst thing. Just insulting.0 -
brisashi wrote:At this point I think it must be intentional. They must want us to have less fun so that we will spend time playing the MtG puzzle quest when it comes out or buy the console version of mpq.
I just can't imagine them screwing the pooch like this on every level and souring the positive experience we had last year by accident.
Whoa whoa whoa whoa. Did you just say theres a.... Magic the Gathering...Puzzle Quest???0 -
Agreed with pretty much everyone...the thing that puzzles/irks me is the whole "We listened to feedback about Ultron and improved." What are they referring to? The only thing I can think of is that the 5 side-nodes are much easier; I'm in round 4 and they are still only like Level 30 enemies. I guess in that regard it makes it much easier for low level players to participate? Only improvement I can see. Otherwise, this comment is an insult; clearly harder than Ultron as a whole, and this around a celebration time is bizarre. Imagine if they released a Gauntlet instead with the only good stuff in the last 5 nodes. I would prefer that over this.
Not that it is much consolation, considering that most people will get wiped pretty quickly against Galactus himself.
Ultron was actually pretty fun in my opinion...you had time to work and strategize and actually put up a fight. Even with higher HP, you could work around it. But this? Most of the time I make it 5-6 turns tops, and there is just no way for me to have dealt enough damage in that time. The cosmic tiles just pile up too quick, no matter what I do.
Not gonna comment on the tokens since everyone else has mentioned that...0 -
The tokens are horrible and the fight is NOT FUN. It took all my health packs away and left me with 10 2* rewards. Happy anniversary to us with a 0% customers happy ratio. well done. And after 4* ddq... typical0
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OP is a spot-on assessment of today's situation.
I'll add one more problem though: absolutely no response from the devs to any of these perfectly sound complaints, stretching across multiple threads.
Clearly there. is. something. wrong... and they'd have to be blind not to be aware of it. I choose not to believe that "they don't care", but tell us something for Odin's sake!0 -
Server outages should never be acceptable. They are leaving money on the table. Google doesn't load only sometimes nor Facebook et al. Hell most X rated sites load all the time and they are giving away free movies?
So being down cause of load is no excuse especially nowadays with distributed/cloud servers and load balancing which has been around forever. There are so many options that this being an excuse yet again means someone should be fired and replaced with someone capable.
But that's the small problem. Who play tested this. No one. Only people making it harder as we came up with ways to win, which is complete tiny kitty as i believe we call it here.
And the tokens? Are they a joke? Anniversary tokens are WORSE than heroics.
Thanks team!0 -
cyineedsn wrote:brisashi wrote:At this point I think it must be intentional. They must want us to have less fun so that we will spend time playing the MtG puzzle quest when it comes out or buy the console version of mpq.
I just can't imagine them screwing the pooch like this on every level and souring the positive experience we had last year by accident.
Whoa whoa whoa whoa. Did you just say theres a.... Magic the Gathering...Puzzle Quest???
HE DID!
http://toucharcade.com/2015/08/30/pax-p ... zle-quest/
But it's going to be F2P
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Here is something everybody should read, consider and let sink in:
odds of pulling a worthless 2* per single pull on your typical, everyday run-o-the mill Heroic Token?
5.5% per 2* character
odds of pulling a worthless 2* per single pull on your premium ought to be special only ever been released into the game twice should be cause for a celebration Anniversary Token?
5.7% per 2* character
That's right. Even though we have significantly more 3* and 4* covers in the game than we did 365 days ago they chose to give you much enhanced odds of pulling worthless prizes.
Poor showing. Very poor.
PS
Galactus Hungers tokens also have a 5.4% per 2* character chance per single pull. Very special indeed.0 -
snlf25 wrote:Here is something everybody should read, consider and let sink in:
odds of pulling a worthless 2* per single pull on your typical, everyday run-o-the mill Heroic Token?
5.5%
odds of pulling a worthless 2* per single pull on your premium ought to be special only ever been released into the game twice should be cause for a celebration Anniversary Token?
5.7%
That's right. Even though we have significantly more 3* and 4* covers in the game than we did 365 days ago they chose to give you much enhanced odds of pulling worthless prizes.
Poor showing. Very poor.
PS
Galactus Hungers tokens also have a 5.4% chance at drawing a 2* per single pull. Very special indeed.
I think you are understating the case snlf25. The odds you are state are per 2* character. so the total odds of pulling a 2* are significantly higher. With 13 2*s in the game (not counting Bagman), that's about a 71.5% chance of a 2* in regular heroics, and a 74.1% chance in anniversary2 tokens.
I recognize that, at a certain point, too much generosity from deimurge in terms of drop rates will reduce their bottom line. But they really have to recognize that 4*s aren't special snowflakes that are too delicate for us players. And they certainly need to make the special, once-a-year event token feel special.0 -
Do'oh, yeah I meant to say per two star character. Oops.0
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I'm in agreement with everyone else. The sever outrages suck but some of my alliance mates were able to get in and beat the first few rounds so we weren't that far behind the curve.
As for the actual galactus battles, I'm surprised at how difficult they are. I'm all for using boosts and finding the right character combos but getting wiped out after 7 moves is kinda ridiculous. My alliance is on round 5 and I can only imagine it getting harder0 -
I am rarely upset by the changes to the game, but Galactus is ridiculous, especially at round 5.
There is no correct strategy to deal with the cosmic tiles. Especially when he gain 3 AP per cosmic tiles! There's no strategy at all.
Just wipe every few turns.
It's just way way way way stupid. My threshold is really high, but there is no quality in the play testers at all.0 -
Couldn't agree more Val. Last years anniversary was a blast. This years event makes me wonder why on Earth I'm still playing.
The tokens suck, but that might not be within the devs realm of control. If the bean counters said to tighten the purse strings, then their hands are tied. What really has me steamed tho, is the thing that IS within their control. Galactus.
What. The. Actual. TinyKitty?!?!?
Did anyone play this before it went live? Who tried this crapfest of a "battle", saw that you wiped in 3-5 turns every single time and said "Yep! Looks good!" There's nothing fun about it. I don't even want to play it, but the alliance needs all the points we can muster, and even then I honestly don't know if we'll even earn a single Cyclops cover for our efforts. And we're a solid team of players! I have a lot of angry words in my brain right now, but none of it is constrictive, so I'll just keep it to myself. I've tried to roll with the punches in this game even when a change is made that I don't like or agree with as it usually works out in the end. But this is just nonsense. Shame on you D3, I hope you lose your shirts over this horse kitty.0 -
I feel like if there were 20 man bracket Lightning Rounds going on since yesterday with double iso, everyone would be a lot happier.
And if they'd made more than 1 post since yesterday at 1.
It really doesn't take that much.0 -
They did not make 1 single post when everyone and their mother was fuming mad over XF VS Cyc DDQ 4* so no reason they should be decent enough to address us now
working as intended, please insert your credit card
Every time i post my count goes up, im now at 18 tokens opened, 18 2 star rewards. I know this is *just my luck* but im also not having fun playing. At all. Yet I press on, hoping and wishing. As I have with many games that died. Year 3 I would be surprised0 -
spot on OP.
If they simply re-skinned last years anniversary event with same rewards and token odds it would've been fine but they somehow managed to make odds worse and bosses harder (impossible IMO) to defeat. Really hard to lower the bar anymore than this.0
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