PvE is seriously broken, listen to your players and fix it.

Frigs

Alright so I'm a reletively new player and I peruse the forums quite frequently, now not because it helps me with advice from seasoned pros like I originally came here, but rather I find it thouroughly entertaining how much the players of this game complain about it. Now I am not here to shame said complainers, I actually agree with a lot of them and can see that if something is not done soon to fix the bulk of the major issues surrounding the game it wont be long before the servers are taken down due to the lack of support. Now the devs and moderators here can simply turn their nose to what I'm saying and look at thier bank accounts while laughing about how I dont know what I'm talking about, but I can assure you that if something doesnt change soon you wont be laughing for very much longer.

First things first, PvE is such a mess. Beginners place ahead of seasoned vets in events, level scaling ensures you get destroyed no matter how awesome you have built your roster, regenerating available points on an 8 hour schedule requires a grueling experience in order to grind out an event and maintain a top finish. Its all stupid, but perhaps the absolute dumbest thing is the level scaling.

When you start playing MPQ you're like "oh sweet, I just got a 4* captain america with my heroic token!", NOPE! add that little bugger to your team of 1* Jugs, Storm and spiderman and you find now you get your butt handed to you damn near every match and cant even consider playing the final nodes of an event. THERE IS SOMETHING SERIOUSLY WRONG WITH THIS! The whole point of trying to get stronger and better characters is supposed to result in you being more successful in the game, but here we just get punished to a degree that we are now worse off with having better characters. Does this make any sense to anybody? Does it make sense to the devs? Im genuinely curious as to how this process was concieved and who honestly thought this was going to makes this game more enjoyable. Its like going to the supermarket and having the chance to win either a $5 steak or a $30 steak, only the $30 steak taste like fish and will tear your guts up, while the $5 steak is tender and completely satisfying. Why even strive for something nicer when you will ultimately be punished for it? Why even get rid of your 1* characters if leveling up in the game is just going to make it harder for you.

Take for instance my personal experience with this civil war event, in both events I spent all my available command points on the cw legendary tokens, in the first one I managed to pull a 5* cap and in this current one on my last pull I got the 5* Iron man, pretty sweet right? NO! Now I'm contemplating getting rid of them because only having one cover for each with a 3*/4* roster has made things far more difficult than I really appreciate. What is wrong with this picture? How could I be so excited to pull these characters one moment and then think of them as poison the next? Is that what the devs are going for when someone spends money to try to improve their roster? Because right now it seems absolutely foolish to spend a single dime on this game only to make it more difficult for myself. Why would anybody in their right mind do that?

The level scaling is just downright stupid and I have yet to hear anyone say anything like "Isnt level scaling awesome?!" or "Holy ****, I cant wait to level up my Thor to see how much harder this game is going to get!!!". To the contrary I have only seen that it is universally loathed by the very community that supports you, which is essentially the only reason you exist. It defeats the whole purpose of leveling up and expanding to a better roster and instead of taking steps forward we are simply digging a larger hole for ourselves. Level scaling in a game like this is completely unnecessary and it needs to be eliminated. There are a multitude of ways to eliminate the scaling while still implementing a challenging and rewarding experience for both new players AND seasoned vets, while at the same time giving people a more justified reason to dump actual money into the game. The devs are aware that PvE is broken, hence the recent wave of testing new formats and although they seem to be addressing another area of weakness for PvE its not what should be at the top of their list right now. There is however a very simple fix to both the level scaling AND the amount of time required to place well in events, along with making it rewarding to those that have spent the most time/money on the game while giving new players a legitimate reason to put in that same amount of effort/time/money.

Here's the structure, 7-10 nodes per event, each with a max of 3 possible clears with a level of difficulty that is consistently increasing with rewards that properly represent the challenge you complete, looking something like this....

Node 1: enemies level 1-15 rewards: critical boost, 70 iso, standard recruit token
Node 2: enemies level 15-30 rewards: power boost, 140 iso, 1* cover
Node 3: enemies level 30-50 rewards: power boost, 250 iso, standard recruit token
Node 4: enemies level 50-75 rewards: power boost, 500 iso, 2* cover
Node 5: enemies level 75-100 rewards: 1 cp,750 iso, heroic token
Node 6: enemies level 100-150 rewards: 25 hp, 1,000 iso, 3* cover
Node 7: enemies level 150-210 rewards: 3 cp, 1,500 iso, vault token
Node 8: enemies level 210-300 rewards: 50 hp, 2,500 iso 4* cover
Node 9: enemies level 300-450 rewards: 5 cp, 3,000 iso, legendary token
Node 10: enemies level 550 rewards: 100 hp, 5,000 iso, 5* cover

You then make the other colored covers available as progression rewards. 1 in the player progression rewards and the other as an alliance progression reward. Then you give another 3* cover for a top placement and another 4* for a top alliance placement. There needs to be alliance progression rewards, something that puts more of an emphasis on working together, something that would make those 7 cp for spending $100 more enticing and rewarding.

They could still even implement their level scaling with this system just keeping withing a set range. This would allow players to advance in the game at a realistic pace, allow players to justify spending money on the game and reward those that have put in countless hours and dollars. Take for instance, I have placed 1st and 2nd in PvE events, beating players that have played for years and have a MUCH better roster, that should not be happening, I'm a new player and should have to earn my stripes before beating somebody who has played for years and has amassed a far superior roster. That guy absolutely deserves the top rewards more than me, but if I have a chance to slowly make that climb to one day compete with him then it is far more satisfying knowing that I worked hard and actually earned it.

The level scaling is ruining the game, and it ruined the civil war event to a degree that I am almost certain MPQ lost a large chunk of its most loyal players. Which is sad considering the cw event was supposed to be a celebration, a time to give a little something back to the community for a big event, and instead veteran players were punished for having good rosters and new players were not even given a chance to play most of the event because they didn't have the required characters to play all the nodes and had to wait 8 hours for a shot at maybe being able to play the next ones. I'm not entirely sure who is making all of the decisions which have resulted in this game being more frustrating than fun, but I give you fair warning that if things don't change soon you will soon find that people are going to abandon this game in floods and they will never come back. As much as people love marvel and 3 match puzzle games they will find another game that is actually fun and rewarding, they will leave to go play that game and then forever tell people how horrible MPQ is. You can take my advice, or you can delete my post and consider me an idiot, but the writing is on the wall and so many people are lashing out in anger trying to get you to listen. So if you decide to ignore the very people who make you what you are, well then that's on you and I will have zero sympathy for you as I watch your game bury itself into oblivion.

edit: content removed
Please remember to keep it civil and refrain from posting direct insults about anyone. Which includes the devs.

wirius

You might want to get this moved to "Suggestions". They've stated that's where they go to read player feedback, and as a passionate newer player, your feedback will probably be valued.

acescracked

Interesting suggestions. Maybe the developers will take a gander at your suggestions. Btw, another post suggests PvP is broken too. Help us out with that also?

Frigs wrote:

... it wont be long before the servers are taken down due to the lack of support.

... but I can assure you that if something doesnt change soon you wont be laughing for very much longer.

... I watch your game bury itself into oblivion.

About the doomsaying above. I'm on day 868 which is far too long to be playing a mobile game but I digress. Since the first day I've played there have been regular doomsayers like yourself posting predictions of the end of MPQ. Maybe you'll be the first MPQ Nostradamus to be correct!

Mawtful

They are fixing it, that's what the PvE tests are for.

Mercalla

Ya, same problems here. I am around 45 days played and loved the first 30 days. Until I pulled a 5 star and I can't break into the top 100 anymore. Anyone have a link where the devs share info about the scaling fix coming? Just a time estimate would be very helpful

We_are_Venom

It is bizarre that leveling is a severe disadvantage. If we don't level characters we are put into newb brackets forever, where it's really easy to get covers and get CP. It's only when we level that the game turns and become hard to do even trivial nodes.

Mercalla

so far in current pve event, normal level nodes are rank 160+ opponents vs my 255 OML with 1 black cover and 2 recently champed 2stars not 100 yet. I win about half the time, drain my health packs and can't finish within 24 hours. Even the easy labeled nodes I lose 20 percent, 1 out of 5 attempts. They are 110 to 140 level opponents. Torn on if I should sell the 5 star

Keegan

Mercalla wrote:

so far in current pve event, normal level nodes are rank 160+ opponents vs my 255 OML with 1 black cover and 2 recently champed 2stars not 100 yet. I win about half the time, drain my health packs and can't finish within 24 hours. Even the easy labeled nodes I lose 20 percent, 1 out of 5 attempts. They are 110 to 140 level opponents. Torn on if I should sell the 5 star

Your node difficulty will drop by at least fifty levels without that five star. Your roster is not ready to have a toon over 150 levels above what you have.

Alsmir

Oh, so that's how I achieved top 20 with 1-star characters, got one 4* and my PvE progression died. I was thinking that pulling top 100 in current PvE event will be easy and I'm struggling to stay in top 400.

Smudge

We_are_Venom wrote:

It is bizarre that leveling is a severe disadvantage. If we don't level characters we are put into newb brackets forever, where it's really easy to get covers and get CP. It's only when we level that the game turns and become hard to do even trivial nodes.

I promise I'm not always trying to be "that guy" on you! That being said, leveling characters isn't what puts you into veteran brackets in PvE or PvP. Your noob/vet bracket status is based on how well you've been performing in recent events.

However...

Leveling characters *should* result in better overall performance (or at least it gives the perception of progress on your roster, which in turn causes you to perform better due to the positive perception). That would cause you to leap into vet brackets and get punished.

You are absolutely right in that the side effect of leveling your characters is a huge amount of grief in every aspect of the game, especially where scaling is concerned. You do better = veteran brackets = more grind and less enjoyment for rewards. Better leveled characters = ridiculous scaling = punishment for leveling. It's a punishment loop, but it keeps people who are prone to gambling fixes hooked because we might finally happen upon that magical unicorn 4* or 5* cover that will finally help us perform better compared to the punishment we've been seeing.

I appreciate the scaling tests trying to make life easier. I really do. In fact, this most recent test indicates that things are finally trending in the right direction. I think the one variable the developers really need to retool along with everything else they are looking at is the bracketing system. I don't have a good system for how to fix that if they're bull-headedly stuck on keeping story as a competitive mode, but the brackets screw everyone with the new scaling system and definitely need to be adjusted anyway.

slidecage

Mercalla wrote:

Ya, same problems here. I am around 45 days played and loved the first 30 days. Until I pulled a 5 star and I can't break into the top 100 anymore. Anyone have a link where the devs share info about the scaling fix coming? Just a time estimate would be very helpful

scaling has been fix you are now put against others with the same roaster you have. simple pt is your going to have to sell the 5 star

face it PVE is dead no matter what they do


They leave PVE way it is now people will complain but its been this way for 2 years so leave it be

They change PVE into the new 4 times same amount then then drops .. many will leave cause this now forces you to play 2 hours at the start and must be here right at the start or your going to be behind


There is only ONE TRUE way to fix pve and that is make it into BOSS battles BUT scaling it to team size (What will never happen)


been here around 570 days and never had a problem on how pve is run unless they change it to the test. Thought game has became very boring and going to be dropping to pure PVP only.... i can jump into a late braket and grab 1 to 3 covers for 60 mins of play YET it would take 6 to 12 hours in a 3 day pve for the same

Mercalla

Not going to sell him. I love this game because of the collecting and leveling aspect. Selling a very rare card like OML, which from what I can tell is probably the guy most people would pick as their most sought after card, completely destroys why I enjoy this game. I've spent $80 so far opening up roster spots, but not going to drop another penny until something is done to fix PvE. If I lose covers in my queue awaiting a roster opening, then I'm all done with this game. I have one open spot and nobody in my queue, so could be a couple weeks at least.

It's so frustrating to not see any post addressing what is being done to fix PvE and a timeline of when to expect changes. Without that communication, I have extremely low hope that anything will be done.

Mercalla

To clarify, the PvE fix I am looking for is the penalty received when a new player gets a 5* added to their team. The way I understand it, the system looks at your 3 highest level players and determines the level of your opponents. They need to add some additional logic in that formula to account for people with 1 cover 5*'s and 2 recently champed 2*'s that aren't even level 100 yet. I'm getting destroyed by this simplistic calculation to determine enemy levels.

Keegan

Mercalla wrote:

To clarify, the PvE fix I am looking for is the penalty received when a new player gets a 5* added to their team. The way I understand it, the system looks at your 3 highest level players and determines the level of your opponents. They need to add some additional logic in that formula to account for people with 1 cover 5*'s and 2 recently champed 2*'s that aren't even level 100 yet. I'm getting destroyed by this simplistic calculation to determine enemy levels.

It looks at your top 4 characters. So if you have three at level 100 and one at 255, that equals 555. Divide that by 4 and you have 138.75, so your hardest node is likely 140/138/138.

And I agree with you about the single-cover fives, I think most do.

Mercalla

Keegan wrote:

It looks at your top 4 characters. So if you have three at level 100 and one at 255, that equals 555. Divide that by 4 and you have 138.75, so your hardest node is likely 140/138/138.

And I agree with you about the single-cover fives, I think most do.

In the current Story mode, I have 2 nodes with opponents level 110 and the other 140 which are both labeled as 'easy'. While the 2 Normal labeled difficulty nodes are opponents range 155 and 160. Using the top 3 characters would support what I'm seeing, not 4.

Mercalla

The system should downgrade the value of a character level based on the number of covers. A level 255 with one or two covers should be cut in half and valued at just 128.

smkspy

I don't get scaling anymore, in the current pve. I have one medium node of 70 then the next node jumps to 198. I've got a decent roster but seeing that scaling jump makes not want to play because I know the next three just jump higher.

edit: I guess essentials bridge that gap, but should they nodes independent of the node line of progression? What if I don't have the essentials? I get progression penalized because I don't have them?