5* have been out for 3 months

lukewin

link goes to post

IceIX wrote:

Vhailorx wrote:

This seems like a bit of an over-reaction. Yes, 60k is a massive number. and if people would have that amount on Sept. 10, then it would effectively obliterate the meta.

But that's not going to happen. Clearly demiurge wants it to take a very long time for anyone to cover a 5*. If it starts happening significantly faster than they expect, then they will make changes accordingly (either dropping the health levels, boosting 4*s, or cutting the 5* distribution rate).

It's definitely a calculated risk that could have serious negative repercussions on the game, and will definitely completely reshape the meta. But it's also not something that will happen immediately. They will have some time to react.

Pretty much exactly this. We've got contingency plans in place in case quite a few things that we're not expecting to have happen happen, such as the above. So if things do go pear shaped, we've got ways we want to deal with that. Obviously, we don't *want* to pull out any of the "Break Glass" scenario folders.

IceIX saying "Pretty much exactly this." doesn't leave much wiggle room to deny that his opinions are in line with what is in Vhailorx's post. Is 3 months in line with Demiurge's definition of a very long time for anyone to cover a 5*? The health of 5* was already dropped by 20%, so a step has been taken. I hope there are other contingency plans that are lined up and that the plans are included in the upcoming changes.

Would love to hear how long Demiurge and D3 Go! thought it would take to cover a 5* since they don't expect players to cover a 4* in 3 months time.

Dragon_Nexus

There are a handful of mega whales who have several 5*s, but they definitely do not represent the typical MPQ player I would imagine.

I can't see them doing anything to change them up too much at this stage, the average player is still earning them super slowly. The one change they needed to impliment, namely altering the scaling so people with 2* or early 3* rosters aren't screwed by finding a lucky 5*, is apparently on the way.

puppychow

Dragon_Nexus wrote:

The one change they needed to impliment, namely altering the scaling so people with 2* or early 3* rosters aren't screwed by finding a lucky 5*, is apparently on the way.

Don't hold your breath.

Raffoon

They need to make the distribution less random. When I can open 70-80 tokens and get 3 5*s while someone else opens the same amount and gets 12 5*s, that doesn't really encourage competitive play.

LordXberk

Raffoon wrote:

They need to make the distribution less random. When I can open 70-80 tokens and get 3 5*s while someone else opens the same amount and gets 12 5*s, that doesn't really encourage competitive play.

Agreed 100%. I'm 1 for 55 in opening Legendary Tokens. One can argue that it hasn't hurt me that badly since I'm still in the 4* transition and have pulled only 1 duplicate 4* cover (blue Mr. ****), but it will soon start to sting and ultimately hurts me down the road.

lukewin

Wouldn't surprise me if the rise in points required to get the PVE LT was a way to slow down people earning LT / 5*. From IceIX's LINE Q&A, LTs were going to replace 1st place in PVP and top 2 in PVE. I sent him a PM on Sep 22 asking if those plans had been scrapped. I was hoping the tokens would be put in, so I would have less incentive to Top 2 PVEs, but he replied the next day that the plans weren't scrapped, but placed on hold to see how current swaps/additions of LTs did. Over 2 months later, 1st and top 2 never got swapped for LTs so I have to assume that they thought enough (or more than enough) LTs were going out.

RWTDBurn

Raffoon wrote:

They need to make the distribution less random. When I can open 70-80 tokens and get 3 5*s while someone else opens the same amount and gets 12 5*s, that doesn't really encourage competitive play.

Agreed. By my count I've opened 72 Legendary Tokens and have only received 3 5*s (full disclosure: I got my 4th SS cover by the day 730 daily resupply reward). I reach 1300+ in every PvP event and the legendary token progression reward in most of the PvE events yet I'm falling further and further behind the arms race and there is nothing I can do about it thanks to my **** luck. I really don't have any options here. My luck sucks, plain and simple but it's becoming a constant source of frustration as I've gone about 35 legendary tokens straight without pulling a 5* and have been close to rage quitting once or twice. If my **** luck continues and the big alliances start using 5*s through all events then I'll be forced to quit the game. As it is, I have no chance to catch them regardless of how many hours I play. My alliance whales a fair amount of Stark Salaries (including myself) but the Legendary Tokens from CP still have my curse on them and draw nothing but 4*s. If the big alliances start using their 5*s throughout the entire PvP event next season preventing me from reaching 1300+ and my ridiculously **** luck continues then next season will be my last. I don't want to quit but if getting 5*s continues to rely completely on luck (which is something I would appear to be extremely low on) then I'll be left with little choice.

Unknown

They can't do much. There was a $500 buy alliance the other day. They are raking it in from whales. Buy alliances are all over the place. People are spending too much for nerfs.

They could at least do something about the rampant cheating. Obviously a group of people have figured out a way to get fives without earning or paying, but not so many as to get immediately boxed.

Orion

I think we're already starting to see the effects of 5*s in the game. The leader of my bracket in the Hulk PvE has 12 cover OML and SS, so no one can catch him. In the last few lightning rounds I've been in, virtually the entire top 10 had 2 high-covered 5*s.

Linkster79

I would think the 5* release has been an massive success from a business perspective. There are whole alliances full of big spenders who a raking in command points and opening the gap between themselves and the mid to low spenders. Players are seeing just how much those big spenders are dominating versus leaderboards. The mid to low spenders now have 3 options, spend more, spend the same but consign themselves to the fact they will not be catching up anytime soon or to give up entirely.

tanis3303

Linkster79 wrote:

The mid to low spenders now have 3 options, spend more, spend the same but consign themselves to the fact they will not be catching up anytime soon or to give up entirely.

AKA (as I like to call it anyway) the F2P/Mobile game death knell. I've seen it happen to a LOT of mobile apps, but usually much faster than this one...so kudos for the 2 years we got before it went this way, that's rare! But if the pattern holds from what I've seen in the past in other games, the lucky pullers, the whales and most of all the mega-whales will buy themselves out. They'll create a league all their own with their unbeatable teams, and have nothing to do with them but fight themselves because everyone else will see the futility of it and give up for greener pastures. Then they'll get bored with that, begin carrying a grudge vs the game and the devs for all their dollars spent adding up to exactly kitty, and they'll begrudgingly leave too...it sucks, because I really don't want to stop playing; I like this game, I love Marvel and I like collecting things...but I'm not willing to spend my life savings, nor fight others that are, just to do it.

IMO, the game was simply not ready for a new tier of play when 5* characters were introduced. But even that itself wasn't a huge deal had they not monetized them. Making them purchasable, no matter how astronomical the cost, was a huge mistake...but I think it's too late to back up now, too many have dropped too much $$$ into it...

monsterjoe77

LordXberk wrote:

Raffoon wrote:

They need to make the distribution less random. When I can open 70-80 tokens and get 3 5*s while someone else opens the same amount and gets 12 5*s, that doesn't really encourage competitive play.

Agreed 100%. I'm 1 for 55 in opening Legendary Tokens. One can argue that it hasn't hurt me that badly since I'm still in the 4* transition and have pulled only 1 duplicate 4* cover (blue Mr. ****), but it will soon start to sting and ultimately hurts me down the road.

i have yet to open a legendary...but have pulled two dupes. something definitely needs to be done...

Mawtful

It's probably really hard to design/code/implement any changes when you're counting all that money.

I don't think anything's planned for January, but there will need to be some new 5*'s soon. Let's imagine that they release at the end of the month, rather than the start, and then we could very well get Jan, Feb, March releases. In which case, I'd expect some changes in April. Maybe the buffs to 4*'s.

RWTDBurn

I know they have to be raking in the money from this so I don't expect a change to be made anytime soon. That being said, they could implement a change that after 15 4* pulls in a row from legendary tokens you have a 100% chance of drawing a 5* on your next one. This wouldn't really change their odds much nor would it suddenly increase the number of players getting highly covered 5*s but it would at least prevent the players with really **** luck from getting completely screwed over.

Unknown

Raffoon wrote:

They need to make the distribution less random. When I can open 70-80 tokens and get 3 5*s while someone else opens the same amount and gets 12 5*s, that doesn't really encourage competitive play.

The nature of random chance being the biggest method currently for progression just flat out stinks regardless of how it's sold to us.
Yes, the odds are posted and whenever you beat them, you feel pretty good, but that's just going to make it even worse for people who aren't beating the odds.

I tracked my legendary pulls until I quit a couple weeks ago. I was at 28 useful pulls out of 64, with a total of 7 5* covers out of that lot. So I was doing well enough and was right around where 10% would get me. I was even doing a little better than that.

But it's still random chance as a means of progression, and that's honestly just not fun to me. If I had gotten all 7 covers in OML and spread out at say 2/3/2, I would have had an excellent character.

Instead I got 4 red OML covers, a red Phoenix, and 2 covers for SS. So, pretty much useless on 5*. No sense in continuing to play a game like that.

lukewin

tanis3303 wrote:

Linkster79 wrote:

The mid to low spenders now have 3 options, spend more, spend the same but consign themselves to the fact they will not be catching up anytime soon or to give up entirely.

AKA (as I like to call it anyway) the F2P/Mobile game death knell. I've seen it happen to a LOT of mobile apps, but usually much faster than this one...so kudos for the 2 years we got before it went this way, that's rare! But if the pattern holds from what I've seen in the past in other games, the lucky pullers, the whales and most of all the mega-whales will buy themselves out. They'll create a league all their own with their unbeatable teams, and have nothing to do with them but fight themselves because everyone else will see the futility of it and give up for greener pastures. Then they'll get bored with that, begin carrying a grudge vs the game and the devs for all their dollars spent adding up to exactly kitty, and they'll begrudgingly leave too...it sucks, because I really don't want to stop playing; I like this game, I love Marvel and I like collecting things...but I'm not willing to spend my life savings, nor fight others that are, just to do it.

IMO, the game was simply not ready for a new tier of play when 5* characters were introduced. But even that itself wasn't a huge deal had they not monetized them. Making them purchasable, no matter how astronomical the cost, was a huge mistake...but I think it's too late to back up now, too many have dropped too much $$$ into it...

Seems like MMR is helping group the 5* players into a league of their own, according to this thread Would've snipped some of your post for length, but I agree with it enough to give it an upvote and to quote it.

tanis3303

lukewin wrote:

Seems like MMR is helping group the 5* players into a league of their own, according to this thread Would've snipped some of your post for length, but I agree with it enough to give it an upvote and to quote it.

Absolutely, and even tho poor Babs has the very definition of a first world problem, it illustrates exactly what I'm talking about, and his feelings about it essentially prove my point...when the 5* guys have nothing left to fight but long, dangerous and probably very frustrating teams of other 5*s, nobody is happy. And that gives the guys that haven't gotten to 5* land yet nothing to look forward to, accelerating their departure...because if it sucks at the top, why bother fighting to get there?

lukewin

Mawtful wrote:

It's probably really hard to design/code/implement any changes when you're counting all that money.

I don't think anything's planned for January, but there will need to be some new 5*'s soon. Let's imagine that they release at the end of the month, rather than the start, and then we could very well get Jan, Feb, March releases. In which case, I'd expect some changes in April. Maybe the buffs to 4*'s.

I hope this isn't the case. Slowing down people from covering 5* by diluting the 5* pool would suck, but it wouldn't be something new, since we've seen how they released 3*, and now 4*. When we hit 40 4*, I wonder if all we'll see are new 5* or if they'll find a new way to generate money.

rawl316

Please visit the bugs section for a development on 5* and legendary tokens.

RWTDBurn

rawl316 wrote:

Please visit the bugs section for a development on 5* and legendary tokens.

It's great to hear that they can trace back people who are using and exploit to get more 5*s. It will be even better when they start getting sandboxed. Unfortunately that doesn't really help the honest gamers that have really **** luck such as myself properly progress in our 5* covers. 3 for 73 now on draws as I continue to get 4* after 4* after 4*.

Konman

Apparently, the introduction of the 5* characters inspired quite a few people to cheat.