Anything on deck for attacks while in match?

The Bob The

Afrocigar wrote:

Just spent about an hour or so at the 6hr mark trying to hit 1k and losing 83, 100, 93, while being 43 away from 1k

So, what's the plan for the 4* transition? Seems like things are spiraling down here. 5*'s are great, i have a 3 cover SS that could be screwing me in PVP & PVE

LINE. LINE is the plan.

The Bob The

DayvBang wrote:

I think it would be a very good change for player experience if they added/subtracted the points from your win, checked for progress rewards, and then added/subtracted any points from defense for people attacking you during the match.

This suggestion is the best suggestion. It lets you progress while avoiding the lack of challenge issue that Aesthetocyst points out. You can still get busted down, but it provides better incentive to strive without dimishing the need to think about defense.

jobob

I get that this is PVP and that shield hopping and getting hit is part of the fun for some players.

That said, most PVP games give you a bit of a break when you die, even if it's just a few seconds that you flash invisibly.

There's got to be some middle ground between the gameplay mechanic of "OMG gotta shield hop and win as FAST as possible" and removing the PVP element altogether.

What about a "respawn timer" that shields your points for a minute or two after you get hit? You can still play, people can still attack you and get points, and you can still lose points... You just aren't losing 100+ points in a couple minutes.

san

Phraeg wrote:

Actually you don't need to find points higher than yours. You can shield hop fine vs lower points and weaker rosters than your own. Why fight a 50 point match at 990 when all you need is a ten pointer?

This is true, but the reason yo do so is to

a) guarantee your points - that 30 pt user may have been reduced to 5 while you're in a match (unlikely, but possible)

b) gain higher rewards - many users go to 1k then stop. An extra 30 pts can be the difference between top 100 and top 50, or top 50 and top 10, and the rewards are different

c) if you're shield hopping, the presumption is that you don't care for health of your roster, so you don't need to conserve. You just need to win, that's all. And it's not that hard to win if you don't care for points. Use some boosts and it's quick either way

The one exception to this is that sometimes users put up a dummy team. These are usually high-end users with high-end points (65-75) who will place a bunch of 2* dupes to make it easier for their mates to hop. When you see such a user, hit for sure, BUT, PLEASE wait a bit while they shield. They are being kind to you, so be kind to them!

bdksni1

Most of the answers the op is looking for (after all it looks like he wants to succeed in pvp) are easily found on that magical place called LINE.
If you want to perform better my best advice is to install the app and start digging, plenty of good people there who can help With great advice
there are many good strategies to break 1k with or without #hopping, you just have to look in the right places..

mutimloh

Afrocigar wrote:

Why isn't Mr Fantastic or Invisible Woman valid? Yeah they balanced IW, but she's still mostly useless.

They aren't valid because Marvel is trying to kill interest in the FF to get the movie rights... muahahaha!!

jobob

bdksni1 wrote:

Most of the answers the op is looking for (after all it looks like he wants to succeed in pvp) are easily found on that magical place called LINE.

I don't know about LINE... what is it exactly?

The Bob The

jobob wrote:

bdksni1 wrote:

Most of the answers the op is looking for (after all it looks like he wants to succeed in pvp) are easily found on that magical place called LINE.

I don't know about LINE... what is it exactly?

It's a free mobile chat app. Players use it for recruitment/joining alliances (see this jimstarooney post) and coordinating their play, among other things.

Cypr3ss

OneLastGambit wrote:

I think the answer to this question is rather simple - you know you will be attacked mid match a 50 point match gives you a greater chance of still having enough points after the inevitable barrage of defeats while you're finishing your match to still have enough to carry you over the threshold once your match concludes.

This assumes you can find a match worth 50 points, which is a problem i had in the earths mightiest pvp. Maybe i was in the wrong slice, maybe its a combo of being in the top 10 with most everyone shielded and MMR, but I couldn't get a match worth 40 points never mind 50. Most frustrating as the player at #2 rank was unshielded at just over 1k points, but seemed to be running a 5* team, so he just never showed up as a possible match. Then when I finally find a 40 point match, win and it was actually worth 19, take the next 30ish point match that comes up, cause i'm in a hurry! And drop >100 during that fight... it really is frustrating. Maybe Line or other out of game communication is required, but that's more effort than I'm willing to put into a match-3 game. I use out of game comms for other games, with actual pvp.

Regards,
Cypr3ss.

Jarvind

Cypr3ss wrote:

OneLastGambit wrote:

I think the answer to this question is rather simple - you know you will be attacked mid match a 50 point match gives you a greater chance of still having enough points after the inevitable barrage of defeats while you're finishing your match to still have enough to carry you over the threshold once your match concludes.

This assumes you can find a match worth 50 points, which is a problem i had in the earths mightiest pvp. Maybe i was in the wrong slice, maybe its a combo of being in the top 10 with most everyone shielded and MMR, but I couldn't get a match worth 40 points never mind 50. Most frustrating as the player at #2 rank was unshielded at just over 1k points, but seemed to be running a 5* team, so he just never showed up as a possible match. Then when I finally find a 40 point match, win and it was actually worth 19, take the next 30ish point match that comes up, cause i'm in a hurry! And drop >100 during that fight... it really is frustrating. Maybe Line or other out of game communication is required, but that's more effort than I'm willing to put into a match-3 game. I use out of game comms for other games, with actual pvp.

Regards,
Cypr3ss.

That was just a lousy PVP for scoring. I was in slice 1, which is usually pretty high-scoring, and a score of 1001 put me at #7 in the last 3 hours, though I'm sure I'll slide back to 11 or 12 by the end.

I assume it's because it's an offseason event so the only people playing are the ones that need a black Kingpin cover.

The Viceroy Returns

The Bob The wrote:

It's a free mobile chat app. Players use it for recruitment/joining alliances (see this jimstarooney post) and coordinating their play, among other things.

Even though it's already been said other places many times over, I'll say it again:

The fact that 4* transitioning players (which is me BTW) are suggested to use an out of game program to consistently hit 1K shows how fundamentally broken PVP is.

IMO, the best thing they could do to solve this is have retaliations NOT take away points. There are plenty of other mobile async PVP games out there setup like this that don't take away points on retaliations and they seem to work fine.

I've hit 1K ONCE, and that was like 2+ months ago. The other 3 or so times I've tried, I've had the exact same results as the OP = I get to about 870, and every time I come back from a fight I've lost at least 30+ points, sometimes multiple losses, often settling back down to around 780 or so.

I have no PVP viable 4 star characters. I've decided to pretty much ignore high end PVP cause I'm sick of seeing nothing but Fistbusters and Jeanbusters (and more recently IceRulks and ThingPools), I can beat only these teams about half the time (due to cascades, board setup, boosted characters available, etc.), or it will take way too much time to beat. And if I do manage a win, my team is so damaged it cost 3 health packs. So now I pretty much sandbag every PVP right at the end, and hit top 100 with a score of around 550 or so. I get about 150 HP give or take, and it's much less stress & frustration that way.

I'd rather be masochistic and grind PVE for Legendaries and the paltry CP, which is where I spend most of my time with this game.

Kjeldbjerg

Do not base anything on off season events. They are a different animal altogehter and points are dry for almost anyone

boldfacedfemme

The Bob The wrote:

DayvBang wrote:

I think it would be a very good change for player experience if they added/subtracted the points from your win, checked for progress rewards, and then added/subtracted any points from defense for people attacking you during the match.

This suggestion is the best suggestion. It lets you progress while avoiding the lack of challenge issue that Aesthetocyst points out. You can still get busted down, but it provides better incentive to strive without dimishing the need to think about defense.

Seconded. This seems to be the best solution without affecting the main mechanics of pvp.

Jack0fAllGames

What I'm getting from this thread is:

A) People don't want to use the in-game resource (shields) to protect their points.

They also don't want to use out-of-game resources to help them reach higher scores before needing to use first shield.

Their Conclusion: pvp must broken

Jack0fAllGames

I guess my snark didn't come through well enough.

Or Aes is just trying to be nicer than me.

Unknown

Jack0fAllGames wrote:

What I'm getting from this thread is:

A) People don't want to use the in-game resource (shields) to protect their points.

They also don't want to use out-of-game resources to help them reach higher scores before needing to use first shield.

Their Conclusion: pvp must broken

I think the in-game resource people don't want to use is , mostly.

Because if you had enough , you could probably climb as high as you'd want regardless of roster. Especially if you use boosts to make your matches go faster.

And, well. That feels pretty pay-to-win, far moreso then any other aspect of the game, at least.

Trying to get around that (not using boosts and trying to do more then one match per shield) is rather risky, especially if you're a user more starved then somebody who considers 2500 for a cover to be an actual possible investment they can make.

For now, it's just "Place I can try to get 50 per event on, top 100 and/or an extra 50 if I'm lucky" for me.

Jack0fAllGames

colwag wrote:

Jack0fAllGames wrote:

What I'm getting from this thread is:

A) People don't want to use the in-game resource (shields) to protect their points.

They also don't want to use out-of-game resources to help them reach higher scores before needing to use first shield.

Their Conclusion: pvp must broken

I think the in-game resource people don't want to use is , mostly.

Because if you had enough , you could probably climb as high as you'd want regardless of roster. Especially if you use boosts to make your matches go faster.

And, well. That feels pretty pay-to-win, far moreso then any other aspect of the game, at least.

Trying to get around that (not using boosts and trying to do more then one match per shield) is rather risky, especially if you're a user more starved then somebody who considers 2500 for a cover to be an actual possible investment they can make.

For now, it's just "Place I can try to get 50 per event on, top 100 and/or an extra 50 if I'm lucky" for me.

Being pay-to-win is a good point, but only with regard to ranking. This discussion seems to be about hitting progression rewards.

The Viceroy Returns

aesthetocyst wrote:

What I'm getting from this thread is:

A) [Some] People don't want to use the in-game resource (shields) to protect their points.

They also don't want to use out-of-game resources to help them reach higher scores after [use of first shield].

Conclusion: [Higher levels of] pvp [as it exists now] is [not suitable for all people]

To address Point A:
I don't like to use HC on Shields because it's not any type of guarantee that it will help me reach 1K progression (or beyond). You're basically gambling, hoping that you timed when you shield hop. If you don't time it right, you're usually screwed out of 1K progression and often in even worse shape than you were in before you shielded. Or, you have to use even more HC on successive shields to try ans salvage where you were before your first shield.
If it actually DID protect my points in a more permanent way I'd use them more often. But it TEMPORARILY protects my points. You're paying for a short-term reprieve. That where why my suggestion of "Retaliations shouldn't subtract points" was coming from. They'd never do it though, cause then their cash cow of HC for Shields would go away overnight. They'd have to get creative to find a way to replicate what the HC investment provided, like a consumable that gave a % bonus to your points for the next X fights or something like that.
It's similar to the "Skip tax" implementation. Initially a skip was always going to be a -10, and victories where going to reward more ISO on average. Instead they flipped it to its current form, so instead of always being a negative, it's often a bonus you don't get (for the first 3 skips anyway). The under the hood numbers are more or less the same they claim, but the feeling for the Player is much different.

For me, as shields stand right now they feel more like throwing away HC than anything else. It's entirely possible I just don't know how to shield hop too. The few times I've tried as soon as my first fight is over I get beat down by the hordes of fistbusters, jeanbusters, etc. It's just not worth the HC.

I'd rather save my HC for something that IS tangible, like roster spots for characters. Seeing as mine cost 1K per slot, I have to keep ahead of the crazy fast new character release schedule they have been on for the past 8 months or so by saving as much HC as I possibly can. My Alliance is of no help for high end rewards, so I can't expect to get any from there either.
I would contemplate using them to upgrade a specific power, but 2500 HC for a 4 Star character's power is more than steep. I have only ever purchased a specific power twice, and that was probably almost a year ago = The Hood's 5th Blue to complete him, and 3 star Magneto's Purple (yes, it was THAT long ago!)

To address Point B:
"Out of game resources"? That could describe these forums, but they don't come close to the magnitude something like Line does. Describing both as such is using a broad brush.
Simply put, using Line is colluding with a small subset of players to game the system and gain an advantage against players that don't use it. It's a reason why I've mostly written off high end competitive PVP. I have a hard enough time as a 4 star transitioner as it is than also having to deal with the possibility that some players are using outside help of who knows what that I don't even know about. Sure I know of Line, but what else is out there? You know what they say, it's not the roach you see, it's the army of roaches you DON'T SEE.

"PVP is broken":
Well, if it weren't (or at least elements of it weren't), would the subset of the player base that uses Line need to use it?
I get that most PVP in freemium games devolve into Pay 2 Win, but since this is at least half of what this game offers, it's an issue. I think most would agree that there are MANY elements of how PVP is implemented that could be vastly improved, such as the original topic of this post for example. It's very easy to grow numb to issues that we see so often that we get used to them and don't even see them anymore. PVP could be a better experience overall for sure.

TxMoose

The Viceroy Returns wrote:

To address Point B:
"Out of game resources"? That could describe these forums, but they don't come close to the magnitude something like Line does. Describing both as such is using a broad brush.
Simply put, using Line is colluding with a small subset of players to game the system and gain an advantage against players that don't use it. It's a reason why I've mostly written off high end competitive PVP. I have a hard enough time as a 4 star transitioner as it is than also having to deal with the possibility that some players are using outside help of who knows what that I don't even know about. Sure I know of Line, but what else is out there? You know what they say, it's not the roach you see, it's the army of roaches you DON'T SEE.

"PVP is broken":
Well, if it weren't (or at least elements of it weren't), would the subset of the player base that uses Line need to use it?
I get that most PVP in freemium games devolve into Pay 2 Win, but since this is at least half of what this game offers, it's an issue. I think most would agree that there are MANY elements of how PVP is implemented that could be vastly improved, such as the original topic of this post for example. It's very easy to grow numb to issues that we see so often that we get used to them and don't even see them anymore. PVP could be a better experience overall for sure.

one note regarding line. you don't HAVE to use line to play high end pvp. I don't use line. I scored 15,400 last season and 1463 in earth's mightiest and finished 8th in my bracket. I don't use line. I'm in a t15 alliance. I don't use line. I hit 9 CCs in 3 hops last event (earth's mightiest). I don't use line. you don't need line to perform. don't blame it.

note: if I used line it would likely save me some iso and might boost my scoring some, but to what end? is 15,400 not enough for season?

The Viceroy Returns

TxMoose wrote:

one note regarding line. you don't HAVE to use line to play high end pvp. I don't use line. I scored 15,400 last season and 1463 in earth's mightiest and finished 8th in my bracket. I don't use line. I'm in a t15 alliance. I don't use line. I hit 9 CCs in 3 hops last event (earth's mightiest). I don't use line. you don't need line to perform. don't blame it.

note: if I used line it would likely save me some iso and might boost my scoring some, but to what end? is 15,400 not enough for season?

I'm not suggesting one needs Line to perform well. It's the way how it's spoken of as The One True Way to try and deal with the 4 star transition in PVP bothers me, that people have to resort to using an out of game app to try and get around the shortcomings of the system.
It's so bad some posters respond to legitimate PVP questions with nothing more than the equivalent of "Do you even Line bro?"

However, Players sure as hell need a max Hulkbuster and/or Jean Grey to consistently get 1K or 1.3K with little resources required.
You have them both. I have neither.
It's really as simple as that.
So, in some way it's easy for you to say "I don't use Line" when you have those two characters. I don't use it now, have no desire to, and sure as hell won't use it whenever I get either of those two characters close to usable.

But it's all about the journey, right?