Here's Why Galactus Is a Big Deal

Clanseigh

I've been spending a lot of time reading the posts in the forum, talking with my alliance in Line, and thinking about my relationship with this game. I think we all know about the problems with the event, so I'm hoping I can avoid a rehash of all the "What's wrong with the Galactus event" posts. Instead, I wanted to step back further and see if there's context that explains just how bad this is.

Sorry for the long post.

I just got 250 Iso on today's resupply--Day 426 for me, and I've not missed a single day since I started. I've got an almost complete optimally covered set of 3* characters (with the exception of Bullseye, I'm only one cover away from Punisher, Scarlet Witch, and a couple others). I'm up to 16 optimally covered at 166, with everybody else at least 110 and half a dozen around 130-150. I have three cover maxed 4*--XFW, Fury, and IW. My next highest is sitting at about six or seven covers, and I've got about seven with just a single cover.

I've never finished 1000 in PvP, largely because I've never found the rhythm, but also because of a few other things--work schedule is erratic to the point the timing is difficult to nail down, analysis paralysis in getting it figured out, and a general sense of not being prepared to jump into the deep end. My focus going into the anniversary event was to finish covering my 3* and then jump into the 4* progression with both feet, bad beats, learning opportunities, and coming up short until I figure it out be damned.

I'm not a whale and I'm not in a T50 or T25 alliance (though we did hit T50 in Iso Brotherhood), but I'm definitely more than just a casual player. I haven't spent a ton of money, but if I got back all the money I've spent in the last 426 days, I could at least buy a PS4, maybe two.

I write all this to give you an idea of the type of player I represent. I don't know if I'm an average player (as far as D3's bottom line goes) or not, but there it is. Take it for what it's worth.

We opened the flood gates of 4* characters earlier this year. I'll get a cover during the release event about half the time, which sets me up to at least compete in the next event with the new required character. As often as not, my inability to dedicate the time to grind leaves me at a disadvantage for the next one. That's not the fault of D3, but it's the reality of the situation. I have fun with the game as it is.

Through the last few months, the reply to a lot of our "What are we doing to address (insert small but significant improvement opportunity here)?" questions were met with "We're aware of this, but we're focusing on new gameplay and new things for our Anniversary," hyping it up every step of the way.

The last event before Anniversary was Iso Brotherhood. I hit legendary progression (I had hit all of them before, but I didn't open this one after finding out about the scaling effect Silver Surfer would have on my roster) and took a break--I'd rather stop for a while than get burned out on the Anniversary event.

Next up, the HP sale. We haven't seen one since February, so I jumped right on a chance to drop $100 for the Stark Salary. Then comes Galactus and Anniversary tokens. I actually watched them both appear in the token menu--the game was open and I was waiting for them. I started with the 50 HP anniversary token and got 600 HP back. What a great way to start an awesome weekend! This will cover the sale tokens through the rest of the event!

Then I got started. The first node was easy--I cleared all the minion nodes with IF and Patch supporting featured in between absolutely slaughters of Galactus with IF/Patch/Daken. What a great way to start the event!

I had to wait for a couple more hits before round two got underway, but it didn't. I was locked out. Then "Com Link Disrupted." Uh-oh...

Then I remembered that they were going to be staffed this weekend to address any unforeseen problems, so we're in good hands.

Once I got back in, I actually looked at the awful token odds. Strange... This doesn't feel festive. Oh well. It's not my party, I don't get to change the entertainment.

Now my eight-hour cool down hits and we're about done with the fourth round. It's a bit tougher, but manageable. We hit round five before I ran out of Galactus hits and... Wow.

Just wow.

Thirty hours later, we get the "We know the servers went down" message. We also got a "Hey, there's been a disconnect here. You weren't supposed to win."

I know we all have a pretty good idea about the disconnect--the event didn't live up to the hype, and a lot of us (myself included) feel like the event was misrepresented from the outset.

Here's the disconnect that I see.

The game isn't fun anymore. It's become a full-on grind. The grind is broken up in increments, and if you miss one, you're behind. We had the week-long grind of Iso Brotherhood right before this. I think a TON of the player base anticipated a fun weekend. Competitive to be sure, and definitely challenging, but at least a little relaxed and celebratory. OF COURSE it's supposed to be challenging to get three four-star covers. Only the T10 in a bracket of 1000 get three on a four-star release, so what did we expect? Six free covers for Cyclops and Hulk?

Here's the rub: The awards for this event are handed out for PROGRESSION, not PLACEMENT. Progression rewards are obtainable. Devs calculate possible points, determine how difficult they want it to be to obtain the rewards, and set the progression expectations. We're all used to getting them. The grind comes in when they're given out for placement.

With placement, you have to beat X% of the rest of the alliances. You have to grind down all the nodes to nothing, knowing that there are at least 10 alliances willing to do the same thing. If you want three covers, you have to do it better than the rest.

What had been hyped as awesome new gameplay with an incredible new boss and amazing rewards has turned into a VERY unpleasant grind-fest instead of a celebration.

On some level, we were all hoping that this would be a break from the months-long grind the release cycle has become. We'd all have a chance to step back and have fun--real live, old fashioned FUN--for a change. We'd be able to catch our breath before Season XX starts.

Instead, we got this.

I'd say the disconnect is much bigger than our expectations for this event. I'd argue that it extends to what the game is as a whole, what our definition of "fun" might be.

My impulse is to quit. To stop playing. To be glad we're a month away from Fallout 4 and a game that I can enjoy for 500 hours for one easy payment of $60 and feel rewarded for progressing instead of feeling like I'm chronically coming up short. At a minimum, my playtime has to change to reflect the reward I'm getting for playing or at least the amount of enjoyment I'm getting.

notamutant

You are just figuring out after over a year that this game is just one big grind? Has there ever been a part of this game that wasn't a grind after the prologue? Whether it is fighting your way up in PvP to get placement or progression awards, whether it is playing PvE every 8 hours in the same nodes in the same stories every day, whether it is doing an Ultron/Galactus boss event with mandatory play every 8 hour period, is there anything in this game ever that hasn't been a grind?

This game is a grind. If you like the core gameplay, it is a sometimes enjoyable grind. If not, it would probably not be enjoyable even without a grind. And for most people, you will fall in between, where the grind is only enjoyable to a point, but you feel like you have to push through it for some unseen future reward, or because of past effort put in in building your roster. If you feel the grind is too much, quit. If not, don't complain about this game being a grind, because there has never been any reason in the past year that should've made you think it wasn't a grind. There are plenty of problems with the game, including the grind, but don't act like this hasn't been the very basis of the game since you started playing.

puppychow

Very nicely written, reasonable explanation from a player perspective. I'm certainly in a similar boat in terms of how I feel about the game at this point. The developers, for whatever reason, seem to take their dedicated, faithful players for granted here. No matter how poorly designed/executed an event becomes for whatever reason, D3 thinks players will stick around. Unfortunately, that is not the case anymore. As a steam player, what I find depressing is looking my Friends List and seeing players log on to play games OTHER than MPQ. These were former players who quit the game along the way for whatever reason. The list continues to increase and it is quite possible that I may join the group myself next year, due to continuing disappointment with D3. My Steam library will hit 900 very soon, and I started playing Hearthstone last month. I certainly have other ways to entertain myself if MPQ is no longer in the picture.

The last round of Galactus Hungers is almost unplayable for me. I am dying every time by turn 2. Some alliance mates have resorted to using a "workaround" to beat big G. If the event was originally designed so that players are "supposed" to lose, then consider it mission accomplished.

Clanseigh

I guess I shouldn't have said grind.

So far, we've determined that it's possible to take down Galactus. Dark Matter has shown us (early, as it is) that top progression is possible as well.

So why all the complaints? Why are so many people announcing this as their breaking point? Should they all also quit or shut up? Is it because it takes a lot of health packs? Is it because we aren't reliably killing him most of the time? Is it the timer? Is it because of the disconnect Ice is talking about? Is it something else entirely?

It doesn't take TOO many health packs. We don't need to kill him most of the time. The timer doesn't keep us from being able to do it. And yeah, there's a disconnect.

Lesson learned. I won't call it a grind. I guess it's easier to assume the pages upon pages of complaints from our fellow forumites on thread after thread can be chalked up to entitled players wanting free covers without having to gri... Work for it.

SuperBatPoohMan

I could honestly say all 20 hated this event.....we complained internally just as much as this forum....

Our other 20 are not pleased...

All our old family (best alliances) didn't either...