PVE Scaling Testing - Enemy Of The State (03/17/16)

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  • slidecage
    slidecage Posts: 3,069 Chairperson of the Boards
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    Without reading past the first page of the thread, a couple of things.

    First, major kudos for communicating this in advance with explanations. This is the sort of thing we've been clamoring for.

    Second, I'm cautiously optimistic that this will be better for almost everyone. Basically, everyone that isn't trying for first. Since I've deprioritized PvE this season, I think this will work out pretty well. Absolutely, for those with 9-5 jobs, this will be a god-send. For those aiming for first, it's definitely going to be painful.

    I am far from sure this event is a good test-bed, though. Being a week long, and having tons of wave nodes, it's far from a typical event, so I have my doubts about how useful any data gleaned will be.

    of course people who hate how pve is set up now will be all for it. why not change PVP the same way then. Better yet if you want to do this just kill PVE and make Gaunlet 100% and watch you game die
  • Pylgrim
    Pylgrim Posts: 2,296 Chairperson of the Boards
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    I think there's still a chance for this test to do well in the long term. If these measures indeed improve overall happiness of the more casual player (somewhere between 90% and 99% of the players in a bracket) at the cost of making the seekers of top 10 rewards miserable, it would be foolish to scrap them just to make happier the other 1%-10%. Then, the one thing to do is to rather scrap precisely what makes those players unhappy, that is those precious 4* covers given as rewards for placement, and give them as progression rewards instead. Or find other outlets to inject those very needed 4* covers, preferably in a higher rate than the current "16 for each 1000 players".
  • SnowcaTT
    SnowcaTT Posts: 3,486 Chairperson of the Boards
    edited March 2016
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    Crowl wrote:
    Polares wrote:
    In fact my question for the devs now is how can I provide some data that will make them scrap all these changes and go back to the design phase? Do just 2-4 clears and abandon the event and not play more? What should I do?

    Here's hoping that they do not draw too many conclusions from the amount of people playing this event and will seek more direct feedback from here or via another ingame survey.

    The only number they'll look at is does this PVE draw more sales (tokens, health packs, whatever) than previous PVE's.

    If folks really want these changes to go away, not only don't run it, but show your displeasure in other ways.
  • Polares
    Polares Posts: 2,643 Chairperson of the Boards
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    Pylgrim wrote:
    I think there's still a chance for this test to do well in the long term. If these measures indeed improve overall happiness of the more casual player (somewhere between 90% and 99% of the players in a bracket) at the cost of making the seekers of top 10 rewards miserable, it would be foolish to scrap them just to make happier the other 1%-10%. Then, the one thing to do is to rather scrap precisely what makes those players unhappy, that is those precious 4* covers given as rewards for placement, and give them as progression rewards instead. Or find other outlets to inject those very needed 4* covers, preferably in a higher rate than the current "16 for each 1000 players".

    Thing is, you can fix PvE without alienating anybody!!! Why do they need to screw the people that plays the most the game ?!?!?!?

    Again, don't make the points of the nodes regenerate!!!! Leave them at 10-20% of the value and let the people that wants to grind, grind those nodes whenever they want !!! And fix scaling, don't make the easy nodes hard.

    PS: And I don't think casual players are going to like that difficulty is now much higher for the same rewards.
  • JVReal
    JVReal Posts: 1,884 Chairperson of the Boards
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    I have a couple of thoughts here.

    They again put way too many changes into 1 super long event. The title says Scaling Test... but they changed the entire way PVE runs. So if the scaling part fails... they will see it as a failure of the entire change lineup?

    The changes in how the PVE is run sounds wonderful to me and 99% of the player base. The biggest gripes (and rightly so if you are seeking top 10) seem to come from people who are fall into the 1% that define "placement" as top 10 or better. For me, placement = Top 100, so we'll see how that ranks with this new system setup.

    The scaling changes... theoretically the main purpose of this convoluted test... already sound not so good, and I haven't started the event.

    I understand the thought. 1 cover Silver Surfer is level 255. If you go by level, he's over leveled for his benefit. If you go by covers he's undercovered to be considered useful. If you go by covers, my 5/3/5 Carnage will appear stronger than he is, since he isn't leveled because of Iso shortage, same with IW, HulkBuster, in fact, I have several nearly cover maxed 4* that are nowhere near level maxed, and NONE that are actually 270.

    "Smoothing" out the levels seems to imply no more easy levels... which sucks since that allows you to use 90% of your roster because you are saving your better roster for the harder fights. Harder from the start is just a terrible idea. When using an analogy to smoothing a drywall seam, you are going from a very thin layer to thick and back to thin to fill in the gap and make it appear as if there is no seam. Making all the levels Hard and up (even though you say "Trivial" in text) is putting a glob on the seam and Not feathering it, or trying to do it with a 3" blade.

    I also want to take a moment to redefine people's vocabulary. "Placement" means achieving a place on the ranking board. "Placement" does not mean "Top 10"... "Top 10 Placement" means Top 10 Placement.

    "Forcing us" involves the company actually making you play their game despite your vehemently being opposed to do so, not giving you the option to not do it.

    "Need" does not translate to digital comic book covers.

    I question their testing this out on a 7 day event... if the scaling test fails from the start... people will not continue with sucky scaling for 7 days.

    Of all the changes listed in the OP, the scaling is my only concern, and it was allegedly the real reason for the tested event. Do not let the failed scaling (from the sounds of it) impact your decision on the rest of the changes which are good for 99% of the playing population.
  • TheOncomingStorm
    TheOncomingStorm Posts: 489 Mover and Shaker
    edited March 2016
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    "David wrote:
    Moore"]Hello everyone,

    Beginning tomorrow (Thursday, March 17, 2016) we will be testing out some new scaling adjustments during the Enemy of the State event.

    Here’s word from Anthony at Demiurge:

    Mission Difficulty Adjustment Test

    We will be running a one-event test for the mission difficulty adjustment feature for the story event Enemy of the State this Thursday. We are making a big change to the difficulty and how missions re-play. The main things we are trying to accomplish with this change are improving how mission difficulty is calculated and making missions more about completing challenging-but-fun missions rather than playing missions quickly, at set times during the day.

    Mission Difficulty
    The first thing I want to talk about is how the difficulty of the missions are changing. Previously, the system presented you with opponents based on your characters’ levels. There was a couple of quirks with this system. In some circumstances, it could be disadvantageous to level characters, or to add a high-level character to your roster. Now, the game will take into account both your heroes’ power levels and heroes’ levels into account when establishing the difficulty of the mission.

    Playing When You Want to Play
    The next big change we are introducing is how missions are re-played. Previously, after beating a mission, the strictly optimal strategy was to wait 8 hours and play it again. We wanted to update the system to give you more freedom about when you play the game.

    In the test event, missions will be worth the same amount of points the first six times you play it. Missions get harder each of these times. Once a mission is beaten six times, the difficulty stops increasing.

    After that, each time you beat a mission, it will be worth less points, similar to the old system. The amount of times it takes for a mission to be restored to full points after one play is 24 hours (up from 8). A mission can be beat 5 times (down from 6) until you reach the minimum amount of points a mission is worth, 20 points (up from 1). Our goal with this change is to make Story events more about beating challenging missions rather than having to beat missions quickly at set intervals during the day.

    What’s Next?
    The event after Enemy of the State will return to the original difficulty system. We will be looking at how people did and listen to what everyone is saying about it. Once we are comfortable with our findings, we will touch base with everyone again and let everyone know how it went and what we are planning on doing in the future.

    We’re all pretty excited about the new changes and hope you enjoy them as well. As part of a thank-you for helping us with testing this system, we will be rewarding users who participate in it. Just for playing in the event, you will get three extra Enemy of the State tokens. If you place in the top 50 of your leaderboard you will also receive 10 Command Points. These will be gifted to everyone that participated the day after the event ends.

    Addition info:

    * Mission Difficulty Change (commonly referred to as scaling)
    o Mission difficulty
      - We have changed the way the game determines which level enemies you should go against to be more accurate. Instead of basing difficulty solely on heroes’ levels, it takes your heroes’ power levels into account as well. - Previously, missions increased in difficulty based on your performance within the event. Mission difficulty is now set at the start of the event and does not change for the duration of the event. - In the old system, some players saw a big jump in difficulty between the easier missions in a chapter and the harder ones. That's been smoothed out. - Players at higher levels will begin to see enemies higher than 395. - As your roster gets stronger, you'll see enemies that are relatively easier. (Their levels will still increase, but more slowly than yours do.) - The amount of Power levels an opponent has is based on their level.
        · Opponents at base level or under will only have a single power level for each of their powers. This scales up to the max level which is 13 power levels. · Opponents shouldn’t have more than 13 Power levels at any point.


      o Missions increase in difficulty after beating them
        - After completing a mission, a screen is shown showing how many levels the enemy has gained. - Each mission will increase in difficulty six times. - Typically, Join Forces missions do not increase in difficulty.
      o The amount of points a mission is worth
        - The amount of points you earn while playing a mission no longer changes based on other players’ scores. (This was commonly referred to as rubber banding.) - The first six times you beat a Mission will be worth the same amount of points. - After the seventh time you beat a mission, it will be worth less points.
          · Each time you beat the mission after the seventh completion will increase the time it takes to receive full points by 24 hours · The amount of times it takes for a mission to reach the minimum amount of points it is worth is five times (down from six times)
          - The minimum amount of points a mission is worth is now 20 (increased from 1). - Typically, Join Forces missions decrease in points immediately after playing it once.”

        1) this a great improvement. Playing your own schedule has been requested forever.

        2) Scaling is an improvement if and only if the increased difficulty is based on a controlled amount, not a variable. Meaning incremental scaling to test skills is good, while scaling based on how well players did on the previous level of difficulty (damage taken) is bad. Players should not receive extra penalties for passing the level of difficulty they were supposed to pass.

        Ex. Node has set increases of 20 levels each time a node is beat is fair and fun. Node that increases by 20, then 50, then 40 based on how player beats each node is punitive and not fun.

        3) A huge "fun" obstacle remains. Players need to be able to use their entire roster. They cannot be forced to use only their best few characters because scaling is based on their top end of their roster. Each node's base scaling should be calculated using only the characters selected for that node attempt.

        This game has an incredibly diverse character base that the development team has devoted a large amount of resources on. The question still remains, when will players new allowed to use more of them aside from the dictations of weekly buffs?

        TL;DR: Great work on improving time consumption and schedule flexibility. MPQ has always had problems with scaling. There had always been a chasm between what the development team has considered fun and fair, and what players have had to overcome for rewards at the expense of an experience that seems more like work than leisure. Therfore, I don't expect scaling to be fixed, although it won't be due to a lack of effort; it'll be due to a continued lack of understanding.

        I've done the math. To my surprise, mpq got the scaling mostly right, but time requirement very wrong.

        The changes actually require much more time to play optimally. Now there are 2 grinds (one in the beginning and one at the end) except they're against more higher scaled nodes and there are no longer any trivial nodes. Players hate grinding and rewards not on par for time required.

        So on the time issue, unfortunately, the cure is worse than the disease.

        On the other hand, I do think scaling would be actually correct if players didn't have to grind at the end against the highest scaling of each node. So, mpq is very close here.

        (The problem with scaling remains it's based on entire roster, not who players pick to use for a node. Hence, players have to use their best and highest leveled characters for every node. This is not fun and most characters will not see fights. However, this is a separate issue, not a tweak, so it won't affect how I judge these set of changes.)

        If mpq would simply limit each sub to only beating a node 6 times before the node locked and made the rewards progressive, I honestly think we'd have the pve players have been wanting since its inception.

        I feel hopeful because I can see how close mpq is to getting pve right. I'm skeptical because deep in my heart, I believe they will prioritize giving fewer covers over player game experience. I understand that for pvp because that is the basis of that event. I just wish they would borrow a page from many other games and make pve a true pve.
      • wymtime
        wymtime Posts: 3,757 Chairperson of the Boards
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        Pylgrim wrote:
        I think there's still a chance for this test to do well in the long term. If these measures indeed improve overall happiness of the more casual player (somewhere between 90% and 99% of the players in a bracket) at the cost of making the seekers of top 10 rewards miserable, it would be foolish to scrap them just to make happier the other 1%-10%. Then, the one thing to do is to rather scrap precisely what makes those players unhappy, that is those precious 4* covers given as rewards for placement, and give them as progression rewards instead. Or find other outlets to inject those very needed 4* covers, preferably in a higher rate than the current "16 for each 1000 players".
        It can be a useful test my concerns are about the initial scaling. Right now my hard mode giving the CP in simulator is at 230 and the node for 1500 ISO is at 293. Now it looks like I will be facing over 300 from the start. Also the easy nodes will go from trying out my under leveled 4* to facing battles of teams stronger then my 3*. I almost feel like they should run the simulator back to back so players can give better feedback on the scaling and changes.
        From the devs mind a 7 day event gives more data though and it also gives data on survival nodes. Which is important. I think it will be brutal but I will play and aim to give feedback without too much emotion.
      • BlackSheep101
        BlackSheep101 Posts: 2,025 Chairperson of the Boards
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        I do like that they attempted to demystify these changes as much as possible, and already pledged that this is a one time test for EotS. I also like that I don't have to pick a slice that lets me play right at the time a sub opens.

        Trivial nodes becoming much less trivial sounds less pleasing. Early reports are that the nodes start off pretty difficult.

        I'm happy that they're trying stuff and are willing to do one-off trial runs. The overwhelmingly negative response here before the event even opens was depressingly predictable. I am going to give the event a shot and then form an opinion on the long term impact of making this change permanent.
      • Reminator
        Reminator Posts: 13
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        I very much like the idea of this system. It's sort of a coincidence that this new test change is coming up as I was just getting tired of the play every 8 hours schpiel. Sometimes it just can't happen. Life happens, and you can't hit nodes optimally. I was trying to think of a new way in which you could do PvE, and this I believe is just perfect. Make it about whether or not you can complete the nodes, rather than, can you complete it and how many times can you complete it in such in such time. Thank you, thank you, thank you! I haven't tried it out yet, but I'm inclined to believe that I'm going to like this new system.
      • pheregas
        pheregas Posts: 1,721 Chairperson of the Boards
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        I have to agree with previous posters that taking the competition out of PVE would be nice.

        My initial impressions... Trying to take the grind out by not having point reductions is GREAT (except that we are all still competing against each other).

        Having initial scaling is GREAT! (except that OMG the levels increase by 20 between each win. Based on the GR essential, which is already up to 271 after two wins, I would estimate that after 5 wins, the enemy will be up at 330. Heaven help anyone who doesn't get lucky with the CP.)

        The intro levels scaled up too fast! Taking 4000-5000 damage per red tile/adamantium slash in the first node is not cool.
      • Stax the Foyer
        Stax the Foyer Posts: 941 Critical Contributor
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        Malcrof wrote:
        I am 100% on board with this (viewtopic.php?f=20&t=34281 for reference of the old EoTS scores)

        Now, as a non-competitive PVE player, i think the changes look amazing, progression will be loads easier to hit, pve overall for ME, will be less time consuming, as i am only in it for the iso and cp. I see where this could be frustrating for competitive PVE players, but only time will tell on that.

        It won't be easier to hit progression.

        If you think it'll be easier to hit progression, you're doing math wrong.
      • Stax the Foyer
        Stax the Foyer Posts: 941 Critical Contributor
        edited March 2016
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        I like that you're thinking about ways to revamp PvE. I really like the stated goals. I love the communication.

        But I can't, for the life of me, understand how the execution was intended to address those goals. Nearly everyone looking at the implementation has immediately realized that this will make things worse.

        I'd like to give you playtesting feedback, but not when trivial nodes with corresponding awards have this kind of scaling. Not in a seven-day PvE where my best character is locked out. Not with caltrops.

        Not. With. Caltrops.

        hqdefault_zpsjbaxkvaj.jpg

        I'm going to clean the garage instead.
      • snlf25
        snlf25 Posts: 947 Critical Contributor
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        SHEILD Base, final node Nowhere to Run. Mine started off with enemies at level 203, I beat it without a lot of difficulty, enemies went up to level 221. Huge jump. I beat it again right away and their levels jumped to 241. Seems like scaling is more difficult and more punitive than before at a glance.

        I find this really distressing as PvE was my last reliable go to for CP to improve my roster. If you have to hit a node 7 times to get your cp you'll be fighting enemies something like 200 levels tougher than you fought the first time you cleared the node? Could make grinding for the 25CP progression unattainable too.

        I like the system but less punitive difficulty increases are in order.
      • nwman
        nwman Posts: 331 Mover and Shaker
        edited March 2016
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        Well w a 5 star roster the pve clear took forever, of course eots w waves does that but it took twice as long I'd say. Only had to use 2 health packs and that was just bad luck plus no oml I think.

        My leaderboard leader has a player has 1 level 100 2 stars and some lvl 70 uncovered 4 stars and down. A couple cover 2s at 50 and under and it seems he can clear 1.5 X faster than me at least.

        This is opposite to the as your roster gets stronger the game gets easier statement.

        Bring back the trivial nodes, and tone down the difficulty across the board, the time requirement is too much. I will not play this new pve.

        Nodes were 360 essentials except wave was less. Then 360 370 easy and 370 and 390 hards and all went up 10 after a clear. The first was probably hard enough as is if we don't get trivial 3 nodes.
      • pheregas
        pheregas Posts: 1,721 Chairperson of the Boards
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        Finished the first sub completely, replaying the GR essential twice (just to see how scaling would be affected).

        All in all. Not fun. Some notes/feedback:

        1) It took me twice as long to complete as before.

        2) I used twice as many health packs as before.

        3) Based on difficulty increase, it is no longer worth it to farm the "trivial" nodes. They take far too long and award far too little points for their effort.

        4) The only node worth repeating are the CP top node and essential nodes. (and I'm worried that they will be so over-scaled by that point that I won't be able to finish them.)

        5) My championed 3*s are going to rot on my bench if this system continues. They simply do not have enough hit points to take a hit. I could only use my Championed 4*s and they almost fell towards the last node. A level 299 2* Wolverine is ridiculous with a healer and red feeder. Got hit for ~6,000 damage in the THIRD TURN.

        6) Since the nodes take so much longer to complete, the "play whenever you like" mentality doesn't work, since a node took me over 10 minutes, which makes me trepidatious to even starting a node since I may not have time to finish it with kids/work/life. And blocking out an hour or more to play is not easy. The previous 8 hour wait was nice since it gave my health packs time to regenerate and pounding out a full clear in 30 minutes was not all that bad. The real problem was the grind after the third clear. But I could control that depending on how much I really cared about the placement prizes. As it stands with this test, placement prizes may be all I get without getting all the progression prizes.

        7) I fear that this will be the first time since the introduction of Command Points that I will not receive the top progression prize.

        *Just for reference, here is my team: http://mpq.gamependium.com/rosters/Pheregas/ I only used boosted Xpool, Hulkbuster, Jean Grey, or Thoress in the upper nodes. It was after the third node that I realized Scarlett Witch didn't do enough damage, nor have enough hit points to be useful. I did not try boosted Blade as my champed 4*s were above him in level (and probably damage/hit points.)
      • sc0ville
        sc0ville Posts: 115 Tile Toppler
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        Seriously echoing everyone that said: "Thank you for the communication regarding this change, the player base enthusiastically appreciates it"

        As for everything else - As someone who is very competitive in pvp, and already plays this game too much, These changes seem absolutely terrible. It's easy to see that in order to play this new system "perfectly" you're easily looking at playtime increasing someone in the ballpark of 40-50% more per day. That's insane, and can't possibly be your intention.

        The advantages of this new system are -
        not having to play every 8 hours exactly on the clock
        a more "fair" scaling system"

        In exchange for those two boons we're paying -
        a tremendous increase in the amount of time necessary to play "perfectly" both in overall playtime and also the duration of individual sessions.
        in the old system you had three 25 minute clears and one 2-3 hour grind (depending on how competitive you planned on being). In this new system you have at minimum a 3-4 hour grind to both start & finish the sub.
        Perfect play appears like it will require a play session of 5-6 continuous hours of play. That can't possibly be the intention here.

        Players have a lot of issues with the current pve system and while we appreciate that you guys are trying to alleviate the "Playing on a schedule" issue, this is not the right way to do it.
      • cyineedsn
        cyineedsn Posts: 361 Mover and Shaker
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        Malcrof wrote:
        I am 100% on board with this (viewtopic.php?f=20&t=34281 for reference of the old EoTS scores)

        Now, as a non-competitive PVE player, i think the changes look amazing, progression will be loads easier to hit, pve overall for ME, will be less time consuming, as i am only in it for the iso and cp. I see where this could be frustrating for competitive PVE players, but only time will tell on that.

        It won't be easier to hit progression.

        If you think it'll be easier to hit progression, you're doing math wrong.

        I felt the same way as Malcrof too. I thought that having freedom to attack fullpoint values nodes at my leisure would make life alot easier as far as hitting max progression.

        After playing one clear, it seems alot more likely that the removal of trivial nodes and scaling up after clears is going to make it even more painful and grindy to get max progression than before.

        I'm glad that they finally got in there and got rid of those trivial nodes that I hated (said no one ever.)
      • Uthgarprime
        Uthgarprime Posts: 202 Tile Toppler
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        This change is even worse than I had predicted, lets start the ai even higher level than before and ramp it up even more. It's like some bean counter has a matrix that says we need to sell this many health packs, and gave the order to implement something that would make the players take more hits. They have taken anything that is casual about the game and made it that much harder. Plus they are still punishing people for succeeding and you get nothing better for fighting harder enemies. Everything in this game does not have to be a grind, there are plenty of opportunities to play hard ai for those that enjoy that. I don't mind a few hard ones as part of the event, that makes sense, but they all don't need to be harder. Now if you were going to increase the reward proportianally with the increase in difficulty that might be another story.
        Another free to play game I like is World of Tanks. They don't punish you for succeeding, they reward you with better tanks, what a concept. In World of Warcraft if you want to play hard nodes you can go do end game raiding, but guess what, as it gets harder, you get better rewards. I know that is an amazing concept for this company. Also I am not punished for doing well, the raid doesn't have bad guys 20 levels higher each time I play them. its like I earned the right to curb stomp some bad guys. When I am ready for a new challenge I go to the next raid. This change is the exact opposite of what people have been asking for, and it will only drive casuals aways. Contrary to what the matrix says you do need casual players. World of Tanks has millions of players all over the world, they understand they need those players so the paying customer has someone to play. You drive out all the casuals all you will have left is the hardcore guys and they can't all get the top prizes if they are the only ones playing. Where as now they have multiple slices so that more of them can get high end rewards. If the casuals leave there will be less of those slices. I know I repeated myself there, I just wanted to say the same thing twice in a different way.
      • scottee
        scottee Posts: 1,609 Chairperson of the Boards
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        People are looking at this too theoretically.

        This is intended to scale out 99% of players. The difficulty increases each clear, hopefully to the point that most people become unable or unwilling to keep grinding. All but the top 1% are never going to make it to "ideally" grind down to 20 points at the end of each sub.

        I will bet most players will not make it the initial 6 full point clears, meaning for the majority of players, your placement will depend on ability to beat hard nodes. Not on how willing you are to grind.

        This is exactly what they want, and this should be what most top rosters should want. Those with better/deeper rosters will place better. Play more efficiently and walk out with more health, and you place higher. The timing and speed you play by will have 95% less effect than it did before. (save of course except for the top 10ers)
      • snlf25
        snlf25 Posts: 947 Critical Contributor
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        cyineedsn wrote:
        Malcrof wrote:
        I am 100% on board with this (viewtopic.php?f=20&t=34281 for reference of the old EoTS scores)

        Now, as a non-competitive PVE player, i think the changes look amazing, progression will be loads easier to hit, pve overall for ME, will be less time consuming, as i am only in it for the iso and cp. I see where this could be frustrating for competitive PVE players, but only time will tell on that.

        It won't be easier to hit progression.

        If you think it'll be easier to hit progression, you're doing math wrong.

        I felt the same way as Malcrof too. I thought that having freedom to attack fullpoint values nodes at my leisure would make life alot easier as far as hitting max progression.

        After playing one clear, it seems alot more likely that the removal of trivial nodes and scaling up after clears is going to make it even more painful and grindy to get max progression than before.

        I'm glad that they finally got in there and got rid of those trivial nodes that I hated (said no one ever.)

        Grinding trivials down to dust was my main way of earning iso outside of DDQ and Lightning Rounds.


        Nobody really wanted this type of thing to happen, we just wanted you to turn down the extremely unfair personal scaling that you cranked after you gut rid of the incredibly unfair community scaling. This kind of system only favors those that are willing to play literally all day. The system could work in a situation where PvE is actually PvE and not a different style of disguised PvP. If this had been the system in place for the Quake introduction event people would have died like the Korean guys who keeled over at their computers playing Starcraft back in the day.