New Mission Difficulty Test: Enemy of the State *Updated

whycantwesyncpc

The Herald wrote:

whycantwesyncpc wrote:

Seriously wrote:

You have to wonder how many health packs their selling to those determined to get into the top 10/50.

I know I ran out just trying to get the recruit token from the last node. I give up, it's scaled past what my roster can handle and playing the same stupid **** over and over isn't fun for me.

I'm at 8/9 on the last wave.

BECAUSE OF COURSE THE TOKEN IS LAST.

Struggling with it, THINK I can take it with all damage boost if I'm careful. Just waiting for health packs to regenerate

Update: The token that took so long, and was a massive struggle?
2* cover.
Wasn't worth it.
I'm unlikely to spend money on this game again any time soon. I'm not giving anyone money if this is honestly what they think is "fun".

I decided to give it one last try before I went to bed. Boosted all my characters, got a lucky board and barely got by. My reward? A standard token. Why the hell is that even a reward for the last node? What the hell is wrong with the devs that they think this **** makes any sense let alone is actually fun. I swear everytime they try to make a change it's pure to try and make me hate this game.

loslupus77

Just finished last hard node on Hell's Kitchen for 7th time against level 394 enemies featuring Gorgon with 40k+ health and Konran whose Meteor Hammer does 20k damage to be rewarded with... crit boosts. Yeah, better rewards for everybody during this test. Actually, I do like that nodes feature more better rewards but rather than increasing the amount of rewards from 7 to 9, devs should just have dropped 70 iso and crit boosts from rewards. Then we would have manageable number of nodes with useful rewards. The scaling on hard nodes goes up so absurdly fast. I think I started Gorgon-node with about level 170 enemies and by sixth time they were 394. Doesn't sound very fair to me. Especially in a node (the same could be said about the whole sub) with red feeding ninja-pinjas for Wolverine and Gorgon.

Overall the scaling for the event has been weird. I assume about three clears per node is enough to get the max progression rewards. And those first three times are somewhat easy but after that the scaling in hard nodes becomes ridiculous. You better hope that you get all good rewards in time because getting that cp on 9th try is going to require some luck and/or health packs. The scaling on trivial and essential nodes is essentially trivial; even the essential nodes are tolerable on 9th time if you are that unlucky.

The time requirements to play this event have been horrible as well (of course no-one forcing me to play to this game). Sure there's no timer hassling things, but wave battles in hard nodes can take over 10 minutes and that is just too much (especially if the reward for that is useless crit boost). I somehow respect all those people who have grinded each node to green marks in each sub. But at the same time, I urge you to get a real life and/or your medication in order; you must be seeing some other rewards for that kind of commitment. All I see is the same placement rewards as previously.

mrPuzzleQuester

So I lucked into a noob bracket for this one after skipping the last two events. Because it was the weekend and I had the time, I diligently cleared the first two subs and placed first in each. I'm currently in second for the event with about 90K+ and just a few more clears for max progression.

With all that said I'm going to take it easy for the rest of the event, give up a shot at top 10 and farm iso for an hour or two each sub for the rest of the way. The amount of time that it takes to get through the waves is just awful and a huge waste of my free time - that's more indicative to the EotS event itself but it's compounded by the scailing jumps and the 11 clears it takes to "complete" a node.

The new system probably makes more sense in a regular event and will be much more tolerable without the wave nodes. As much as I want the 4* covers it's just too much to play even in a noob bracket where speed is less of a factor. Slogging through 300 + lvl waves is just not fun and too much like a chore.

PeterGibbons316

PeterGibbons316 wrote:

wymtime wrote:

PeterGibbons316 wrote:

wymtime wrote:

if you get first in this event I say bravo that is an insane amount of nodes to clear even. Why do the devs think this is a good idea? How many clears does the average person play?

You talk about what it takes to be the one person that plays more than all others, and then in the very next sentence compare that level of play to the average person.

That's the whole point. You make the maximum amount of points available outside the reach from the average player.....because NOT EVERYONE IS MEANT TO EARN THAT REWARD. It's meant for ONE person to earn it.

This is pretty much what PvE has always been - a place to reward players tiered by time spent playing a particular event - where beginners and vets can compete together. It seems backward, but from all the complaints I have been hearing on the quantity of play required it sounds like they nailed it.

I got top 10 in the Hawkeye PVE and didn't play nearly as hard or as much as this new PVE test feels like will be required.

My question is how do the devs want us to play this test. With what they have done there has to be some grander vision. My first reaction is it is requiring more play time to place well, and a final clear that is truly insane since you have to make 80 clears in one sitting to garuntee placement. If I am wrong I am wrong please enlighten me as to the vision D3 has for PVE?

You and everyone else. We are all playing the same game, and just because people were clearing optimally under the last system doesn't mean they will continue to do so under the new system. The only thing that would require you to play more for the same placement is other people playing - not the system itself.

I can't speak for D3, but my belief is that they don't want everyone finishing every node. They are replacing placement being determined by how well you can adhere to a schedule to placement being determined by total time playing during an event. Yeah sure the absolute top spot couldbe determined by your ability to play to a schedule on the last day, but I think they are counting on not even having more than a handful of people that even clear everything throughout the entire event.

Event is still a couple days from ending, but it looks like I was mostly right here. My bracket currently only has 2 people that have cleared every single node since the start. I joined when it flipped, played for over 4 hours straight, and took 2nd in the first sub - just to see what the experience was like. It was tough, but I finished without burning through all 10 of my health packs, using any boosts, or much more than a couple TUs here and there. I have a 454 Phoenix, a 405 OML that's locked out, and my next highest was typically one of the boosted 4*s (often JG which I can't use with Phoenix), so my scaling was about as bad as you could get......but I still got through it. The guy that beat me has a PvE roster - a champed JG (Teen Jean), all seven 5*s at 255, then every single 3* champed, then 4*s come in around level 100 or so - it's a really impressive roster.

On the first sub there were more than 10 people that cleared everything (all I could see), same for 2nd sub, and so far only 4 people have finished this 3rd sub that ends in about 8 hours. The commitment is so great that not everyone is finishing, and only a handful are playing optimally through the entire event. This IMO is good PvE design. Don't get me wrong, it sucks to be the guy that grinds for 5 hours to be stuck in 3rd place and not be able to improve from there, and I still agree that a system that simply gives everyone that finishes every node all the top prizes makes a hell of a lot more sense than placement in PvE, but I digress.

What bothers me about this format is release events. The total time you will have to play to place the same as in the previous system will be greater, and this is something I was wrong about before. The mentality under the old system was that you could "do your best" and hope that was good enough. In this new system you know EXACTLY what will be good enough, and it's incredibly hard to put the device down and quit a sub event when there are still unfinished nodes out there. Release events will drive perfect play from a lot more people (note the difference between perfect here and what was previously referred to as "optimal"), and consequently placing high enough to earn a new release character will require a lot more effort. That sucks, but personally I'll likely benefit because I often have 4 hours to play consecutively and could conceivably finish much higher than usual since I am NOT able to play at usual 8h intervals as currently required. Still - it will be more effort than we are all used to for the same rewards - never a good thing for the community.

Even though I was able to get through the first sub with no problems I still think the scaling is nutso. 3rd sub I found myself facing a goon-fed Wolverine at level 431...AFTER 4 waves of ninjas that leave attack tiles that if unchecked will hit for about 4k each turn. The 5-wave IF node was pretty crazy too, and I'm sure there is more ridiculousness to come. I don't think that 5* rosters should be penalized as much as 4* rosters which shouldn't be penalized as much as 3* rosters - not because I'm a 5* player, and not because I think you should be rewarded for progress instead of penalized (which I do believe). If you have a 2* roster and get one 3* and max him your scaling gets all screwed up until you create a diverse 3* roster to address it. Same for 4*s, but boy does it take a lot longer, and it's a lot harder to stall progress for scaling purposes. In the 5* tier there is no balancing that can happen. You are completely and 100% limited to the covers that you pull based entirely on luck. I had 17 Phoenix covers before I hit 7 SS. Imagine how different my experience would be if I had 17 SS covers and only 7 Phoenix? We shouldn't be penalized for our luck through scaling. Yes, I could have waited to level my Phoenix just like the 4* and 3* PvE players do (the dude that beat me in that first sub does actually have 10 Phoenix covers), but I would have been waiting for over 6 months now, and waiting for what? There are only seven 5*s, and how well do they really play together? How much balance can you really get at that tier? I understand penalizing for unbalanced rosters, but that same degree of penalty should not be there when that balance really can't be achieved, and/or can only be achieved with well over 6 months of pretty aggressive play.

Wave nodes have no place here either since I believe you can fail after the first wave and lose out on full points for that node.....and never get them back. So if you want to even have a shot at the top spot you had better bring your A-game to that wave node.....all 15 times you play it. One of the things I have always liked about PvE was the ability to try out new characters and combos. Early on in that IF wave node I used SWitch/SS, and tried to see how many black holes I could get on the board at one time. My best was 5. That was fun, but the intensity scaled up to 11 pretty quick and I had to get back to my Fistbuster A-team to make sure I didn't wipe on it.

So overall I'm in favor of this system over the previous - there are more rewards for the time spent playing and it allows me a better shot at higher placement for release events - but I do think some improvements can be made, in particular the 5* scaling.

GrumpySmurf1002

PeterGibbons316 wrote:

Event is still a couple days from ending, but it looks like I was mostly right here. My bracket currently only has 2 people that have cleared every single node since the start. I joined when it flipped, played for over 4 hours straight, and took 2nd in the first sub - just to see what the experience was like. It was tough, but I finished without burning through all 10 of my health packs, using any boosts, or much more than a couple TUs here and there. I have a 454 Phoenix, a 405 OML that's locked out, and my next highest was typically one of the boosted 4*s (often JG which I can't use with Phoenix), so my scaling was about as bad as you could get......but I still got through it. The guy that beat me has a PvE roster - a champed JG (Teen Jean), all seven 5*s at 255, then every single 3* champed, then 4*s come in around level 100 or so - it's a really impressive roster.

On the first sub there were more than 10 people that cleared everything (all I could see), same for 2nd sub, and so far only 4 people have finished this 3rd sub that ends in about 8 hours. The commitment is so great that not everyone is finishing, and only a handful are playing optimally through the entire event. This IMO is good PvE design. Don't get me wrong, it sucks to be the guy that grinds for 5 hours to be stuck in 3rd place and not be able to improve from there, and I still agree that a system that simply gives everyone that finishes every node all the top prizes makes a hell of a lot more sense than placement in PvE, but I digress.

FWIW, my bracket had at least 38 that cleared the first round and at least 18 that did the second (that's as far as I can see, finishing 34th and 14th). I'm guessing the number that actually cleared them both is at least double that. I'm expecting a chunk of them to finish sub 3 as well.

Square-Chopper

Final Feedback (I know it's not done, but I am):

25CP achieved for max progression and I'm out. Like I said before, if this is what a progression only system ends up looking like, I can live with it. If it remains competitive with this format, no thanks.

High End scaling is absolutely ridiculous and makes me regret every minute and every dollar I've put into this game.

Side Note: I believe I've decided to never play EotS again regardless of what the rewards are.

bbtrpt1

My story so far:

I don't have to work this week so I figured, what the heck, lets go all in!

I am a solid 3 -> 4 star transitioner. I have all but 8 3stars champed and have 5-8 4stars with 9+ covers between levels 130 and 175 (JG, HB, XFW each have 13 covers). I also have 5 5stars still at 255 with a cover or two except OML who is irrelevant for this PvE anyways. My highest char for this event is a boosted IF at lvl 283.

I waited for S1 to flip twice before joining. I was still able to completely clear the 1st sub and ended up 16th I believe in my bracket. Scaling did't seem to be too ridiculous and I was optimistic.

Finished the 2nd sub and placed 3rd. Same for the 3rd sub. Burned through all health packs in the 3rd sub but did finish later that night after using another 7-8 health packs. Scaling for the 3rd sub starting getting very bad and I had to use Winfinite for the 7th through 9th clears for the final two nodes.

I am now in the 4th sub and have hit a wall. The last node with Wolvie, Gorgon, and the guy who feeds red turned Deadly after the 3rd clear. By the 5th clear they are all 100+ levels higher than my highest char, IF. The node before that is not that far behind. The scaling has ramped up well over 200 levels!!! My teams featuring combos of IF, HB, JG, Daken, IM40 and KK can't keep up, they are done. I got lucky with Winfinite for one clear, but only after a very lucky board. For the other tries, Wolvie gets his adamantium slash off after four turns and I'm done.

With the current scaling, it will be impossible for me to clear this sub unless I buy a bunch of health packs / boosts which I am not going to do. I don't even want to think about the next two days after it ramps up some more with those Gorgon waves.

I am a 550+ day player who probably has spent around $200 total since I started playing. I don't really do PvP other than finishing Sim and getting enough points for the Heroic 10-pack each season. PvE has been my main thing, but if this is the future of PvE then I don't see how I will be able to keep up without pouring some serious money in.

You would think I was the type of player that the devs would want to keep. I am actually foolish enough to put the time in for this test, but can't finish due to the ramped up scaling (40 to 50 levels per clear). This test is not the answer. To echo many others, the time required and scaling issues make this not fun at all. I am up for a challenge but this is ridiculous!

It is clear that the developers do not play this game. Either that or they are sadistic, lol!

TxMoose

I'd be interested in seeing what this test looks like in a 'normal' pve. like unstable or brotherhood or something. the increase in scaling, locked out OML, and the many wave nodes are really skewing the time requirement aspect. this slog is not fun at all, but with the extra rewards, I'm more interested in non-feeder, non-wave nodes. some are obviously playing and performing well. my performance went from ~15th-40th to...50th-70th, so I'm not digging it.

an1979

I'm in the event only for CP and token grab.
But one thing is very very consistent - those prizes tend to be the last one you get...
I wonder if it is not by design - as to make (*coug*force*cough*) us participate

So direct question to developers:

What are THE ODDS set at?
Are they like my experience tell me something like (e.x. 48h day, 15 clears node)
1. ~7% for
2. ~7% for
3. ~7% for
4. ~7% for
5. ~7% for
6. ~7% for
7. ~7% for
8. ~7% for
9. ~7% for
10. ~7% for
11. ~7% for
12. ~7% for standard token
13. ~7% for
14. below 1% for
15. below 1% for

mckauhu

I got pretty much fed up in this test now that got IronFist. Sure, I try to hoard as much iso8 as possible but not playing anymore like crazy for it...

Alsmir

During weekend it was really bad but managable as long as you have nothing better to do, but if you have a job are you supposed to just commit all your free time to this event?

Ducky

Finished first 2 subs in 3rd place. Finishing this sub as late as possible to see how many maxed pts. Will report back.

udonomefoo

DuckyV wrote:

Finished first 2 subs in 3rd place. Finishing this sub as late as possible to see how many maxed pts. Will report back.

Thanks, I was going to post a new thread asking for what the lowest max points rank someone has seen is. I saw a response, might have been this thread that said 52. Looks like I was way off in my estimates of how many people would put in the time to do full clears.

PeterGibbons316

udonomefoo wrote:

DuckyV wrote:

Finished first 2 subs in 3rd place. Finishing this sub as late as possible to see how many maxed pts. Will report back.

Thanks, I was going to post a new thread asking for what the lowest max points rank someone has seen is. I saw a response, might have been this thread that said 52. Looks like I was way off in my estimates of how many people would put in the time to do full clears.

I'm interested to see where it ends up. As it is right now, only 2 people in my bracket have done full clears in all of the first 3 subs.

I missed a couple nodes here and there so my max score is unique from others in my slice - which means that the final sub remains "play at my own pace" which is nice.

Jwhitmire36

Whenever I play this now all I hear in my head is Skid Row - Slave to the Grind!! Am I dating myself??

DrStrange-616

At about the halfway point of the event and here are my thoughts:

First sub: Wow, this is a lot of clears. But it's 48 hours. Okay. It's illogical that they've set up a play when you want system that penalizes you for playing when you want (if you want placement), but, hey, they're inching their way toward progression only. Baby steps! Dang, that was a lot of playing to clear them all, but I did it. Woot! Thank God, it was the weekend and I could just laze around and play this game for hours and hours.

Second sub: Ugh, okay, this is grindy. I'm tired. 9 times through 5 waves? *sigh* Okay. Wow, the difficulty is really ramping up here. I have 2 nodes left with 2 clears of each. They will give me like 250 points. But if I don't grind those I'll lose placement. F it. I don't care. This is not fun anymore.

Third sub: Man, this is a chore. I've got work tomorrow. I'm just going for the CP and tokens. Sheesh. That took forever. I'm ranked 228 in sub with 8 hours to go. Don't care. I could try to work hard to keep my event rank up - currently 47, but MoStorm? Don't care. Waaaay too much work for a cover.

I'm sure I'll play the minimum for the rest of the subs.

If this test doesn't prove to them that placement should go, nothing will.

udonomefoo

DrStrange-616 wrote:

Third sub: Man, this is a chore. I've got work tomorrow. I'm just going for the CP and tokens. Sheesh. That took forever. I'm ranked 228 in sub with 8 hours to go. Don't care. I could try to work hard to keep my event rank up - currently 47, but MoStorm? Don't care. Waaaay too much work for a cover.

I'm sure I'll play the minimum for the rest of the subs.

If this test doesn't prove to them that placement should go, nothing will.

I was sitting just outside t50 last night before the sub flipped and just lost the will to keep grinding. Didn't play a single node after it flipped.

I was just thinking about how I could structure my life today to fit in as much mpq as possible when I realized what I was doing and checked out. I'll play a little for some iso here and there and maybe chase the cp nodes, but that's it.

DreadPirateW

If you wanted me to quit, why didn't you just say so?? You didn't have to go through all of this trouble to make it seem like MY idea!

rbdragon

Now that I'm halfway through this event, I must admit that I kinda like the schedule the way it is - with a couple cavets:

1) This is horrible with wave nodes included as needing the same amount of clears as a regular node. Consider a node at 400+ levels times 5 sometimes and you're looking at over an hour just on one node. That's ridiculous.

2) The tie factor - everyone in the top 10 will have the same score. Heck, everyone in the top 50 - 100 might have the same score depending on the bracket you're in. So why is it considered a fair deal that the one who gets the best prizes this event is the one who has the best schedule on the last day, since the rest of the event is irrelevant, unless you didn't clear everything one day?

2a) If someone missed a single clear on the first 2 days - say they didn't realize the opening node to open the first sub is repeatable, their score will be slightly lower than someone who has cleared everything. So because of this small mistake, they might drop over 100 spots? Seems a bit harsh.

I like the idea of this schedule. I just don't like this particular implementation of it - and this is coming from someone who is currently 4th and has Wednesday afternoon clear to do the final sub optimally.

DeNappa

I want to press this point one more time (again): feeder nodes are a giant F-you to the players. You're essentially giving (in this event) Wolverine a free Adamantium slash every 3 turns. Good luck with that, bro.

Also, if that wasn't bad enough, scaling on the higher nodes is devastating (late 3* roster here). I can hardly finish nodes once I've cleared them 3-4 times. And because the good rewards are hidden by obscurity now even more.... Bleh, I've given up on trying to get the CP or the event token rewards because the nodes are killing whatever teams I bring and/or draining 1-3 health packs per play.