The "new" pve

cardoor

alphabeta wrote:

cardoor wrote:

Lukoil wrote:

If you play 7 straight grinds in either system you will place high. The new system allows for more flexibility of when you play the 7.

Nope. In new system you must do 6 straight clears as fast as possible and then grind at the end of the sub with highest difficulty in ALL nodes.

That is apples and oranges. We are talking about 7 clears (aka grinds) and only 7 clears and where that would rank you.

Edit: as an afterthought, I would be willing to bet that stats show that very few people ever do more than 7 clears (which is probably why they used 7 as the number of clears with rewards attached).

Everyone t20 or above in the hunt is doing more than 7 clears per node in my slice alone - 7 clears leaves approx. 1800 points on the table under current system and on new system will leave closer to 6k vs optimal

Only the top 10 did in the test (in my slice).

I would be interested in knowing if anyone has ever scored high enough in the current system to deplete the points you could earn after 7 clears in the new system (even if you typically made the 6th clear toward the end of a sub in the new system).

cardoor

OJSP wrote:

cardoor wrote:

I would be interested in knowing if anyone has ever scored high enough in the current system to deplete the points you could earn after 7 clears in the new system (even if you typically made the 6th clear toward the end of a sub in the new system).

I'm not sure what you're trying to get here.. but I cleared the 3rd sub of Unstable Iso-8 optimally until all the nodes only give out 20 points. There were plenty of goon nodes to make the grinding tolerable. I can't remember whether I did the same for the 48 hours sub, but I think I only played it so I got the 250 HP from the top10 placement reward. Due to rubber banding, I was actually overtaking a lot of players. Leaving the nodes untouched for a good 40-42 hours gave me a lot of points. If the game didn't do a stealth update/lose the connection to the server before I ground the 3 essential nodes in that sub, I would've come 1st.

I think in the first sub, I cleared the nodes 5 times at the beginning and did the 6th and 7th clears in the last 40 minutes of the sub. I was initially just going to play for the red ticks in all nodes, but once I realised rubber banding was on, I changed my tactic.

In the end, I came 4th. Rubber banding really skewed the result of that event.

Thanks

How about this? The timer does not start until 3 hours before the end of the event and only starts on the 8th clear (not 7th)? After 7 clears all matches are worth 0 points until 3 hours before the sub ends (where they start at full points again).

That would allow the majority who will never do 7 clears to effectively have no timer and then allow the competitive to basically compete like they already do (in the last 3 hours or so).

cardoor

OJSP wrote:

cardoor wrote:

How about this? The timer does not start until 3 hours before the end of the event and only starts on the 8th clear (not 7th)? After 7 clears all matches are worth 0 points until 3 hours before the sub ends (where they start at full points again).

That would allow the majority who will never do 7 clears to effectively have no timer and then allow the competitive to basically compete like they already do (in the last 3 hours or so).

That would be potentially mean playing the game non-stop for 6 hours. I'll skip Story mode from then on as a sign of protest and play only Versus mode. Eventually I might just play casually to get all the red ticks (unless the last reward is a Critical Boost)

For the new characters.. I'll probably join a bracket in the last 10 minutes and gamble (never did bracket sniping ever,.. but I'd start doing it).

Huh? Why, would you need to play 6 hours straight?

cardoor

OJSP wrote:

cardoor wrote:

Huh? Why, would you need to play 6 hours straight?

With my scaling, it would take me 3 hours to do the 5 clears for each node at the beginning of each sub. Deadpool vs MPQ will probably take longer due to the number and type of nodes.. Enemy of the States, with the Survival nodes take even longer. Venom Bomb with Carnage, Venom and the Symbiotes.. forget about it. Combining that with the grind from the previous sub, with your proposed last 3 hours only timer: 6 hours is a modest estimate. In reality, to grind everything to 20 would take one and a half times longer than the first 5 clears.

You would no longer need to do the clears at the beginning of the sub. You would have 21 hours before the timer starts (or 45 in a 48hr sub).

Edit: sorry, just saw your addendum. Must have been right when I posted

Slarow

hamsup_sotong wrote:

honestly guys 3 clears fully refreshed. . is not that hard. .

as long as your first clear at the beginning of the sub..
You literally have 23 hrs to do 2 clears...

as long as they're spaced more than 8 hrs apart

cheers hamsup

"It's not that hard" and "play three times spaced out during every 24 hour period" are two different things for many people. They may be the same for you, but those of us who often times only have one time during the day to play, or can play sporatically at unpredictable times, were much better off in the new system.

Skygazing

Eddiemon wrote:

They left rubberbanding turned on which meant we scored far far better than we should have. They got no reliable progression data from this test.

Progression in the first test was admitted to be too difficult to reach, so they made it easier to hit. Direct quote from that thread: "We’ll be testing the new system again in the Unstable Iso-8 Story event with some changes. We’ve lowered mission difficulty, and made it easier to earn progression rewards." Regardless of how they made it easier to hit, they made a conscious decision to make it easier. Which was my point.

Sure. Because everyone else had to as well, and some of them couldn't and gave up. It gave my balanced roster a massive advantage over people who had been deliberately underlevelling their characters to rig the old system.

This is absolutely ridiculous. The new scaling was actually more of an issue for people with higher-leveled characters. One of the most frequent complaints I've seen is from people with very developed rosters complaining that because of the insane scaling they were unable to beat nodes without relying completely on their most overpowered team, and how boring it was to be forced into using that same team over and over again. And those people who underlevel seemed to actually be doing just as well as before (3-4 appearing in t10), at least in the bracket I was in. There's also the issue of rewards which you didn't even acknowledge, because for the life of me I can't see where you find enjoyment in fighting massively overlevelled enemies for 70 ISO and crit boosts.

It was painless because you did full clears every 8 hours and then ground at the end. But you have to do the full clears every 8 hours to get 200% of the full clear amount and then hit some extra nodes at the end to hit progression. If 2 hours into the sub I clear every node 5 times I am not making the progression target at the end. That's what 'playing when I want' means.

That's not at all what I did. For the first two subs I played a full clear at some point, then another at a later point in the day. Yes there were more than 8 hours between the two but that was when I could and also felt like playing again. I honestly don't know the exact math, but I feel like if you cleared every single node 5 times per sub, even without waiting for any recharge, you could still do it. Also what you're talking about is a way larger time commitment which has a direct impact on the "play when you want" mentality. Yeah there's no recharge so you can hit those nodes whenever, but because of the stupid scaling and the lack of trivial nodes you're at least the doubling the amount of time it would take to do that in the current system.

Plus "play when I want" still doesn't even apply to the new system if you want to hit progression, because subs still exist and if you decide you don't want to play during one or more of them, there's a good chance you won't be making progression.

I normally only play for progression anyhow, and seeing as I can't do the 8 hour dance unless it's a weekend I generally can't even make a run at that.

I really don't see how the "8 hour dance" is so difficult to manage. Clear once in the morning, once in the evening, then grind a bit at the end. You don't have to pull off three perfectly timed clears to hit progression.

There have been plenty who enjoyed it but those who dislike it are shoutier. Plus this forum tends to attract 'elites' who turn it into an echo chamber for their views. The people who are most vehemently against the new system are those who placed well in the old system - they could revolve their lives around the 8 hour schedule and it gave them a distinct advantage over those whose lives precluded that level of commitment.

I had posted a more detailed comment about this in the original thread, but I still don't agree that the new system really benefits anyone. You say it's easier to hit progression but in the 1st test it was way, way harder, and in the 2nd it was only easy because they deliberately made it easier. Playing when you want won't get you better placement, and if you actually want to place, you're locked into an even more ridiculous play schedule than before. The placement for the new system is determined by who can play the most without getting burnt out, and has the flexibility to plan their schedule around it. It makes things more difficult for everyone.

Now I am not saying that everyone against the new system is in that camp, they just appear to be the loudest. And this forum is comprised of more top 10 finisher players than casual players. So while D3 may read what is said on here, where they really look is at the play statistics over the total population. What we say isn't necessarily trivial, but if someone is yelling that they are quitting the game while playing an extra 20 minutes per day, which is D3 going to weigh more heavily.

Yes, the people who are most committed to the game are by and large the ones who are here. And yes, D3 looks more at overall statistics vs what is posted here. But the audience here is still important because many of them are the ones who actually spend money on the game. The casual player audience you talk about are the ones who really don't care much about the system because they aren't that invested, aren't making top placement, and aren't spending much money.

There is constant complaining about how 5* draws are totally unfair, and yet I have seen some of the megawhale rosters and I know they are listening more to the dollars coming in than the griping on here. Which is how it should be if we want the game to continue. They are listening more to teh behaviours than the anonymous ranting on an internet forum.

I actually don't understand what you're getting at here. Many of the "megawhales" you talk about are here on this forum (and also complaining), which by your logic means D3 doesn't care much for their opinions. But they're the ones spending the money which means D3 should be listening to them.

And lastly, I feel the need to make something clear. I 100% support the idea of a "play when you want" system. But this new system does not fit that philosophy, and in fact no timer/placement system can or will.

Eddiemon

Lukoil wrote:

Nope. In new system you must do 6 straight clears as fast as possible and then grind at the end of the sub with highest difficulty in ALL nodes.

I never grasped why this is so.

With a 24 hour refresh it shouldn't matter how quickly you clear in a 24 hour node, you're not getting extra points.

alphabeta

Eddiemon wrote:

Lukoil wrote:

Nope. In new system you must do 6 straight clears as fast as possible and then grind at the end of the sub with highest difficulty in ALL nodes.

I never grasped why this is so.

With a 24 hour refresh it shouldn't matter how quickly you clear in a 24 hour node, you're not getting extra points.

Yes you are - as soon as the refresh timer starts points start building back up - so if I do the 6 clears to start the timer in 2 hours its got 22 hours of refresh to build back up point - yes it won't get back to full but will be a damn sight more than those who only give it 10 hours to refresh say. Then when I start my grind I've got more point available to go after and burn right past you.