Simulator Basics part 2: Electric Boogaloo (Mar 21-30)

Unknown

Can't do anymore here I think. Did the top row of nodes once, yesterday morning. Come back to find everything is Deadly level. Not sure what is going on but it sure isn't fun.

Back to the One Star event for me.

Unknown

Bowgentle wrote:

Jeremychen wrote:

All you insane people can go grind down 230s to 1 pt then and enjoy continuing to swim in the sea of 230s the next event too.

I'm pretty sure that most people with high level rosters play like me - I don't grind, and I don't swim in 230s, despite winning the last two subs plus the last couple of PVEs.
We just time our refreshes to maximize rubberbanding and concentrate on the high value nodes - that's usually enough for a top finish.

Really, the better your roster, the less need to grind.

I haven't had any major scaling issues since Thick As Thieves.

Pointed at Midlevel rosters. Remember all I was saying was stop using boosts and start leveling to 141 instead.
Its the guys with spideys+mid rosters that can't deal with the waves of 230, and its entirely their own fault since the game sees you finishing with full hp, its gonna assume the last fight was too much of a cakewalk n increase levels accordingly.

Unknown

Eddiemon wrote:

Or they would go broke and the game most of us love would no longer exist.

The same studio did put some other titles on the field without foul play just fun. And didn't go broke. It's really not that easy to go broke if you have a product people actually love and creates them fun.

Eddiemon wrote:

Take a look at how many people have chimed in in support of your game being mean and unfair rants and how we need to go back to the days where all that mattered was how much time you spent playing. Those days sucked, and a game that requires 10 hours a day play to succeed is unsustainable. The first Hulk had no scaling and was a horrible soul destroying grind.

On the forum it's by far a minority opinion, most comments loved the old Hulk and preferred it over any of the latest **** events with scaling.

I dunno if 10 hours was actually required or not but any time I spent playing those days felt like joy. These times around that is pretty rare find.
You still have to spend lot of time to get anywhere. The game count might be lower but that is hardly a sensible measure. And the grind is still required all the same. Can I win just defeating every battle one time? No. Do I need to repeat some battles I really hate? Very likely.

Eddiemon wrote:

Most people are approving using their wallets. You are the loud minority, not the majority. The Devs and everyone else aren't going to change just because you want the game to be different to what it is. Most people like being able to compete on 2-3 hours played a day.

There you may be right certainly. And I have no problem really with people like you who think it is good and pay up too.

I only go out against those with discrepancy in things told and done.

Eddiemon wrote:

Your strong desire to triple that time because you are unwilling to pay for a game but have more time than anyone else isn't compelling to most players, and it really isn't a business case the developers can get behind either.

Dunno where you get that idea really. The game could be improved in many ways and need not be a time sink at all. And plenty of good suggestions floated around covering both details and the big picture. Just to refer the most basic stuff: increased difficulty should be bound with increased gains.

Is that really that hard to grok? How unfair it feels, and it is to just get harder time for better performance in the past? Without any kind of compensation? That with every bit of progress you gain mandatory handiacap?

In normal strategy and RPG games you develop yourself to get easier time. And you get it. Here you're granted harder time instead.

Unknown

Eddiemon wrote:

pasa_ wrote:

Eddiemon wrote:

You can buy covers for Spider-Man. That removes most of the luck from the equation. You can get a guaranteed one from hero lightning rounds.

You can not. Hero LR don't give covers at all, only drop 3-2-1 c.tokens. Which surely drop some hero cover but you're up to luck to get those desired from the RNG.

No you can BUY a guaranteed cover of each hero type in the hero rounds pack. And you only need one of each colour to BUY the rest. The RNG is meant to be challenging to those who want everything for free.

In the quote you talk about LR not the pack. With the pack indeed you get a guaranteed S. cover but still up to RNG to get the color you desire.

(in contrast for villains you can actually get the desired covers guaranteed by reaching the proper place)

Unknown

Jeremychen wrote:

Pointed at Midlevel rosters. Remember all I was saying was stop using boosts and start leveling to 141 instead.
Its the guys with spideys+mid rosters that can't deal with the waves of 230, and its entirely their own fault since the game sees you finishing with full hp, its gonna assume the last fight was too much of a cakewalk n increase levels accordingly.

Entirely their own fault is a little bit of a stretch. If IceX hadn't posted that some days ago nobody would even know why he get's that insane scaling. There are probably even more factors we don't know. And everybody that's not using this forum is even more in the dark on how it works.

Unknown

Bowgentle wrote:

I haven't had any major scaling issues since Thick As Thieves.

For the record I didn't get insane leveling either lately.

But I keep seeing it more than unfair that people fight for the same points and prizes but facing wildly different foes.

Just like MMR in PVP: in all rating-based tournaments in the world you have serious benefits from the high MMR and related stronger opponents. Not here, this game restricts to handicaps without even a hint of gain.

Unknown

Jeremychen wrote:

Pointed at Midlevel rosters. Remember all I was saying was stop using boosts and start leveling to 141 instead.
Its the guys with spideys+mid rosters that can't deal with the waves of 230, and its entirely their own fault since the game sees you finishing with full hp, its gonna assume the last fight was too much of a cakewalk n increase levels accordingly.

And I keep pointing out it is obviously the fault of the game and its braindead developers with the idea. That unlike other strategy games you must get penalty for finding the optimal play instead of enjoying the benefits.

Unknown

With rubberbanding don't you get more rewards for increased difficulty?
You wait longer to have maximum rubberbanding values, in turn the levels go up due to community clearance scaling.
Thus you clear early, fights easier but you get less points as your near or are the pack leader.
You clear later, harder fights at higher levels but you get more points due to how far away you are from the leader.
Increased rewards are there, being you save the time grinding down repeatedly but the fight is generally of a higher level.

Unknown

Main bracket positions are firming up. I spent 10 hours in first. Someone just passed me after clearing their morning refreshes. I have not done mine yet.

Lord Catsington clearly poses no threat to me, yet he vexes me just the same. Curse you, Catsington. You were born effortlessly noble and shall remain that way, while I shall strive and sweat and still never be more than a rakish dandy.

Unknown

Have I expressed how much I despise getting 20 ISO when I have 2-3 open rewards? I did 6 missions with 3 of 4 rewards open and I received 20 ISO 5 out of 6 times. I guess this is one way they implement "scaling"; by making sure you don't get all 4 rewards quickly. It's one of the most frustrating things about this game.

The should have Nelsons "Meh-heh" from the simpsons accompany the 20 ISO

Unknown

20 Iso?

_RiO_

Eddiemon wrote:

pasa_ wrote:

Eddiemon wrote:

You can buy covers for Spider-Man. That removes most of the luck from the equation. You can get a guaranteed one from hero lightning rounds.

You can not. Hero LR don't give covers at all, only drop 3-2-1 c.tokens. Which surely drop some hero cover but you're up to luck to get those desired from the RNG.

No you can BUY a guaranteed cover of each hero type in the hero rounds pack. And you only need one of each colour to BUY the rest. The RNG is meant to be challenging to those who want everything for free.

Right. Because the stupidly high amount of HP to first get the required blue cover for Spiderman and then to level it, is ofcourse super-easy to come by, because you have a team that can win against all those tough opponents and that enables you to score top of the bill at event placements, making you take home all those nice HP rewards.
Oh no wait... I'm thinking of someone that actually owns a leveled Spiderman already. Sorry!

The day D3 nerf's Spiderman's blue skill is the day scaling will also be fixed. Without Spidey's stun lock cycle to fall back on, the people that abuse his stun to cheat their way through otherwise unwinnable fights will finally start losing or giving up and in turn the net aggregated community losses will actually rise to ensure that enemy levels will be scaled back.

As is, the rampant Spidey abuse from a small circle of high level players makes this game's PvE events straight-up pay-to-win for everyone else. You either buy into Spidey or you're going to find yourself stuck in mid-tier forever.

Unknown

_RiO_ wrote:

The day D3 nerf's Spiderman's blue skill is the day scaling will also be fixed. Without Spidey's stun lock cycle to fall back on, the people that abuse his stun to cheat their way through otherwise unwinnable fights will finally start losing or giving up and in turn the net aggregated community losses will actually rise to ensure that enemy levels will be scaled back.

How is using an ability in the game cheating? Why is Spiderman stunning a guy somehow different from Hood leeching off all of his AP or Patch burning him down? I will admit that it is currently more effective (or maybe, to put it more accurately, more reliably effective) than other methods for fighting high level opponents. But he's a part of the game. If that's a part of the game you think is broken, okay--the devs dropped the ball with that one.

But the outrage over his presence is something I don't understand. Are you upset because he's having a negative impact on scaling? Why not be outraged over the scaling system?

Eddiemon

_RiO_ wrote:

Right. Because the stupidly high amount of HP to first get the required blue cover for Spiderman and then to level it, is ofcourse super-easy to come by, because you have a team that can win against all those tough opponents and that enables you to score top of the bill at event placements, making you take home all those nice HP rewards.
Oh no wait... I'm thinking of someone that actually owns a leveled Spiderman already. Sorry!

No I used the word buy, as in spend money. The more you go on the more I realise you are a free to play zealot who feels that people who fund the game should be held back because you are really important.

The day D3 nerf's Spiderman's blue skill is the day scaling will also be fixed. Without Spidey's stun lock cycle to fall back on, the people that abuse his stun to cheat their way through otherwise unwinnable fights will finally start losing or giving up and in turn the net aggregated community losses will actually rise to ensure that enemy levels will be scaled back.

I can't believe anyone could believe the rubbish you spout. Here you claim spidey users are ramping it up for everyone...

As is, the rampant Spidey abuse from a small circle of high level players makes this game's PvE events straight-up pay-to-win

..and here you claim it is a small circle.

Well is it a statistically significant group of players, enough to affect scaling or a small circle? It cannot be both at the same time as you like to argue.

_RiO_

Moon 17 wrote:

_RiO_ wrote:

The day D3 nerf's Spiderman's blue skill is the day scaling will also be fixed. Without Spidey's stun lock cycle to fall back on, the people that abuse his stun to cheat their way through otherwise unwinnable fights will finally start losing or giving up and in turn the net aggregated community losses will actually rise to ensure that enemy levels will be scaled back.

How is using an ability in the game cheating? Why is Spiderman stunning a guy somehow different from Hood leeching off all of his AP or Patch burning him down? I will admit that it is currently more effective (or maybe, to put it more accurately, more reliably effective) than other methods for fighting high level opponents. But he's a part of the game. If that's a part of the game you think is broken, okay--the devs dropped the ball with that one.

But the outrage over his presence is something I don't understand. Are you upset because he's having a negative impact on scaling? Why not be outraged over the scaling system?

I'm outraged at all of it collectively, if anything.

I'm outraged at the present state of the scaling system, because it is an unbalanced mess that cannot be fixed by fine-tuning as long as blatant loopholes like Spidey-wins racking up the community levels exist.

I'm outraged at Spiderman being essentially a 'free pass' on any fight, considering 2 AP to start him up can easily be gotten from a boost if you really need to.

I'm outraged at the fact that high-tier, veteran players that have gotten Spiderman since long before the scaling started thwarting any effort at full on transitioning into 3-stars, now have the audacity to casually mention "oh just use Spiderman" to dismiss any claims that the system is broken, when it is infact the very use of said character's OP stun skill creating a loophole that is breaking the system.

mags1587

Stunning the enemy is (and should be, IMO) a valid game mechanic -- just as AP stealing and damage abilities are. I have Spiderman, I like using him, but I would agree that his stun and healing are overpowered right now and need to be adjusted. Still, I enjoy playing the game with the ability to stun. Stun abilities and other non-damage abilities like AP steal make the game a lot more interesting for me. I would hate to see them disappear entirely.

Scaling has gotten better, but it still has issues. I seriously doubt nerfing Spiderman will fix all of the issues with scaling, though. Nerf Spiderman and players will just find something else that the developers haven't taken into account.

Personally I think there need to be stricter ranges on the nodes. I think some nodes (lower point nodes) should never go above Trivial for the player. Others could have a range from Easy - Normal. Others could go from Normal - Hard and then a few that go up to the max. That way the player never feels like he's locked out of an event, even if the biggest point gains come from the hardest nodes.

Unknown

The bigger issue is that by having 2-3 missions that have required characters, it forces all the 'have-nots' of those characters to grind up all the other missions. So, you routinely see a huge disparity in enemy level between the 'public' missions and the 'essential' missions.

It isn't because of Spider-man, it's because the masses are all grinding on fewer levels in an attempt to make up the point differential between them and those that have access to all the missions. That drives up the community scaling of those select events.

I know this, because I was just as guilty of doing it when I didn't have a Black Panther during that Lazy Thor PvE.

Unknown

mags1587 wrote:

Stunning the enemy is (and should be, IMO) a valid game mechanic -- just as AP stealing and damage abilities are. I have Spiderman, I like using him, but I would agree that his stun and healing are overpowered right now and need to be adjusted. Still, I enjoy playing the game with the ability to stun. Stun abilities and other non-damage abilities like AP steal make the game a lot more interesting for me. I would hate to see them disappear entirely.

Scaling has gotten better, but it still has issues. I seriously doubt nerfing Spiderman will fix all of the issues with scaling, though. Nerf Spiderman and players will just find something else that the developers haven't taken into account.

Personally I think there need to be stricter ranges on the nodes. I think some nodes (lower point nodes) should never go above Trivial for the player. Others could have a range from Easy - Normal. Others could go from Normal - Hard and then a few that go up to the max. That way the player never feels like he's locked out of an event, even if the biggest point gains come from the hardest nodes.

While restricting difficulty ranges makes sense, it feels like unnecessary work. What remains the simplest "fix" to scaling is to scale rewards alongside levels.

In no universe does it make sense to continually receive 20 ISO after scraping by a 10-minute battle vs 230s.

Unknown

gobstopper wrote:

mags1587 wrote:

Stunning the enemy is (and should be, IMO) a valid game mechanic -- just as AP stealing and damage abilities are. I have Spiderman, I like using him, but I would agree that his stun and healing are overpowered right now and need to be adjusted. Still, I enjoy playing the game with the ability to stun. Stun abilities and other non-damage abilities like AP steal make the game a lot more interesting for me. I would hate to see them disappear entirely.

Scaling has gotten better, but it still has issues. I seriously doubt nerfing Spiderman will fix all of the issues with scaling, though. Nerf Spiderman and players will just find something else that the developers haven't taken into account.

Personally I think there need to be stricter ranges on the nodes. I think some nodes (lower point nodes) should never go above Trivial for the player. Others could have a range from Easy - Normal. Others could go from Normal - Hard and then a few that go up to the max. That way the player never feels like he's locked out of an event, even if the biggest point gains come from the hardest nodes.

While restricting difficulty ranges makes sense, it feels like unnecessary work. What remains the simplest "fix" to scaling is to scale rewards alongside levels.

That doesn't solve the problem that if you have a level 50 team, you're just completely locked out of the event unless you play before scaling kicks in - no node rewards, no progression rewards, no fun of playing the game, nothing.

Eddiemon

_RiO_ wrote:

I'm outraged at all of it collectively, if anything.

I'm outraged at the present state of the scaling system, because it is an unbalanced mess that cannot be fixed by fine-tuning as long as blatant loopholes like Spidey-wins racking up the community levels exist.

It's ok, it doesn't exist right now. Spidey contributes little to the community levels. You shouldn't get outraged at fictional things.

I'm outraged at Spiderman being essentially a 'free pass' on any fight, considering 2 AP to start him up can easily be gotten from a boost if you really need to.

Hyperbole also will increase your outrage with no beneficial results. I'm not even sure what you think 2 AP achieves. Hey I stunned one character for one round. I win. Or something.

I'm outraged at the fact that high-tier, veteran players that have gotten Spiderman since long before the scaling started thwarting any effort at full on transitioning into 3-stars, now have the audacity to casually mention "oh just use Spiderman" to dismiss any claims that the system is broken, when it is infact the very use of said character's OP stun skill creating a loophole that is breaking the system.

See that hyperbole again will do you an injury. People transition to 3 stars all the time. That hasn't stopped because of scaling. When I look at the leader boards for the current event, only 2 of the top 10 have a 4 or 5 blue spidey. A couple have nothing and most have 1-3 covers in total across all colours.

They don't seem very thwarted.