The Hulk Event Discussion Thread

Unknown

morgh wrote:

The scaling of anything available to "the general population" is quickly getting out of hand... only the BP missions remain playable ;/ this sucks as hell - with a 79 thor, 75 oBW and 51 BP anything over 120-140 level is unbeatable ;<
(and yes - I refuse to boost - have constantly 0 ISO since I am leveling stuff... been playing for like 40 days now :S)

I've been wondering... do devs actually even read the things that people write? The vast majority is so fed up with broken scaling that it's no longer funny, and yet they keep on pushing it onto us without any tweaks to make it reasonable... the 'community' scaling is atrocious... my own scaling should be based on my own progress - not of 1999 other people in my bracket...

In my opinion, the scaling for this event is much better than the past two or three events, and there have been changes event-to-event. However, I agree that it's not yet in a good place.

There is an upside to the unplayable nodes due to scaling, though, as the devs have said in the past. If all of the nodes were easy for everyone, then the only way to compete against other people would be to grind every node down to zero every refresh. Some people have the time and patience to do that, and nobody else would have any chance to compete with them. Since the devs want the game to be reasonably accessible to casual players, they've implemented scaling and rubberbanding to diminish the necessity of lengthy grinding.

That's the reasoning, anyway, and it's a tough balance to strike. Even the best balance is still going to run into players that want to put more time into the game, and see that time more meaningfully rewarded, and other players who want to still be competitive while having more time outside the game. (Going too far in *either* direction is very bad for business.)

All that said, I think IceIX ought to be paid more to spend more time posting on the boards, because when it comes to customer service, more communication is nearly always better.

kensterr

Just out of curiousity does the scaling work on a personal + community level?

If personal PVE wins do somewhat contribute to higher levels in next event, does the system also take into account whether I used boosts or not? I feel like I should be losing more PVE matches cos while the previous event before HULK was manageable without using too many boosts, this one is progressively getting harder for me.

Unknown

Think its just combination of over leveled DAs. There was more loaned high level character and mob fights on the brotherhood while this one, only ones i see so far is the 2 115 hulk ones on the main map.

Unknown

kensterr wrote:

Just out of curiousity does the scaling work on a personal + community level?

If personal PVE wins do somewhat contribute to higher levels in next event, does the system also take into account whether I used boosts or not? I feel like I should be losing more PVE matches cos while the previous event before HULK was manageable without using too many boosts, this one is progressively getting harder for me.

I *think* scaling is both personal and community. (It is certainly community-based; there is probably a personal scaling factor as well.) Losses were taken into account in previous events--you could lower the level of encounters in the ISO-8 Brotherhood event by tanking--but as far as I can tell, that doesn't work in this event.

I don't think boosts are taken into account, but I have no way of knowing for sure; that's just my guess.

Unknown

The scaling in this event is actually pretty good if you remove all the 'opponent never takes a turn again' mechanisms. The Black Panther/Punisher fights are quite doable without resorting to any broken mechanisms because it's lower level than the main bracket. The main missions are still a 'bring Spiderman' deal but you can get most of your points just on the Black Panther/Punisher missions.

HailMary

morgh wrote:

with a 79 thor, 75 oBW and 51 BP anything over 120-140 level is unbeatable ;<
(and yes - I refuse to boost - have constantly 0 ISO since I am leveling stuff... been playing for like 40 days now :S)

I'm at around the same point in total playtime, and really, boosting can definitely help you progress faster. It might not help in a Big Picture way in Hulk PvE, since we're talking about net point totals in the 100K range, but I'd save some Iso for the occasional boost. If a couple of boosts can make the difference between top 100 and top 20 in a sub, the relatively trivial Iso cost is totally worth it for that HP.

Also, I'm running L77 Thor, L53 OBW, 2-cover BP/3-cover Punisher, and while I've found myself doing only the BP mission in Bolivia (because I waited till after the 24-hour mark to enter it), I'm still in the top 200. That's with just two incomplete refreshes per sub.

As a mid-level player, I find the scaling + rubberbanding to be significantly better in New Hulk than in Brotherhood or Simulator. Sure, it'd be more fun to win more diverse fights (my boost-assisted team just got obliterated by a L107 Moonstone-led team, so there ends my current refresh run) instead of 4 runs for each feasible mission, but it's hardly necessary for point accrual.

Unknown

I've ben using pun/obw + whatever and not having to use boosts very often. I also have only been doing nodes worth 1k+ and i think this has helped keep scaling low. Sitting at 92k points.

Should i keep leveling my punisher from 122 to 141 or start on my hulk which is currently at 80? Any advice appreciated.

Unknown

Just sitting nice at under 120,000 points. Is there anybody just in the top 1000? what is the cut off point now as it was 90000 earlier?

yogi_

Hi Devs,

For those of us who only have a couple of higher level 2* characters (unbuffed) and the buffed ones lower, level 80 enemies on a puzzle classified as "normal" is not really workable. Particularly when one of the other sub-quests has normal quests of characters around 50.

Thanks.

DD-The-Mighty

The majority of the problems seem to stem from the "competitive" aspect of PVE. Maybe they need to drop it all together. Just roll the placement rewards into progression or the 1-in-4 reward chance.

Same iso gain as now but no more need rubberband to keep up or hike the difficulty to slow down anyone for fear they will outgrind anyone else. essentially a more involved 5-9 day prologue. You have that long to clear as many nodes as you can as many times as you can. The iso you get from "winning" is so minimal its hardly a loss. But that will never happen. -___________-

Polares

TheUnwiseOne wrote:

Just sitting nice at under 120,000 points. Is there anybody just in the top 1000? what is the cut off point now as it was 90000 earlier?

Very interested in knowing this. I am around 125k, I will do a pass in an hour or so, but now I am working so I can't put too much time in it. And I just want to win the Thor covers, I am not interested in the XWolverine.

Unknown

I've found the scaling pretty good. That is until juggernaut appears. How on earth does anybody deal with him without spidey??

Unknown

Tarquos wrote:

I've found the scaling pretty good. That is until juggernaut appears. How on earth does anybody deal with him without spidey??

M.storm + thor + OBW can deal with almost anything. Also use boost.

kensterr

All my subs were high levels until I quit the game and relaunched it. The missions dropped 50-100 levels after the restart. Yay?!

Grinding hard now!

Unknown

DD-The-Mighty wrote:

The majority of the problems seem to stem from the "competitive" aspect of PVE. Maybe they need to drop it all together. Just roll the placement rewards into progression or the 1-in-4 reward chance.

Same iso gain as now but no more need rubberband to keep up or hike the difficulty to slow down anyone for fear they will outgrind anyone else. essentially a more involved 5-9 day prologue. You have that long to clear as many nodes as you can as many times as you can. The iso you get from "winning" is so minimal its hardly a loss. But that will never happen. -___________-

This would be great, solve all the problems with these events and give more Prologue type gaming for those that have been asking for it, me included!

Unknown

I keep oscillating between about 600th place and about 1200th, and I"m only doing a handful of missions per reset at this point (admittedly, a handful of missions is worth around 10k points). That tells me that is dense territory between the two places. With the regular week starting back up, I'm curious to see what that will do to the event.

Polares

With a fast pass just doing the most valuable missions I have done around 10-12k points, and I am sitting at the 19th position in the main event (with 136k points). This week I doubt I will be able to do more than fast passes.

I am very interested in knowing what is the score of the people around 1000th position. It is a real pitty that we can not scrooll up or down in the leaderboard.

Unknown

I haven't really played the past 3 days for various reasons. Did a few missions to catch back up and shot from rank 30000 to around 6000.
Not particularly keen on the Thor reward, so we'll see how I'll end up with minimal play.

Unknown

TheUnwiseOne wrote:

Just sitting nice at under 120,000 points. Is there anybody just in the top 1000? what is the cut off point now as it was 90000 earlier?

I'm currently in 1080th place, with 101954 points. I'll be playing quite a bit at lunchtime today so I'll try to keep an eye on my score and let you know what it is when I break back into the top 1000 (I tend to bounce between 400-1100). There is no way I'm finishing this PvE outside the top 1000, I want my 3 Thor covers.

Edit: 2 quick wins for 1800 points moved me to 103754 points, and 965th place overall. I would guess that 103000 is roughly 1000th place, as it's really tight around this position.

kensterr

113459 points for #434 placement now