Boss Rush Event: Info & Rewards *Updated

The Viceroy Returns

Aside from the obvious "here's another event you're supposed to lose" reactions that everyone has, it's actually more disappointing than that.

When deciding what a "fair" scaling is for anything in this game, what factors are they using?

Their definition of challenging is clearly off the mark by several magnitudes. But it has been every single time they've released something new, or tried to refactor something.
All of those PVE structure tests for example. Every single one of them were too high. Even the current PVE setup is too high for many, and unless you've got a high level OML, or a Charlie's Angles Winfinite team, you'll be burning through Health packs like crazy given how many clears you have to do in one sitting to get good ranking.

It's more than a simple matter of "test better".
I could have told you that facing off against 3 level 500+ bosses one after the other would be too hard, even with a champ OML. It doesn't even pass the eye test for any developer that should intimately know their content and feature set. At some level, it's either not understanding their own game, understanding it and purposefully setting it to be harder and more frustrating than the 8-bit NES TMNT, or it's something else...

Unfortunately the freemium aspect of this game plays a huge part in this. Scaling/Difficulty decisions (as well as progression and pretty much every other feature that isn't artistic) are not purely design driven.
Not many freemium games get it right. Some of the few that do are Hearthstone, League of Legends, and a few other MOBA's.
They need to walk that ever so fine line of being engaging & challenging without feeling like it's a Health Pack money grab.

But most of the time, difficulty in this game it feels exactly like that.

BassMuffinFIve

Came back to the game for S.H.I.E.L.D levels. Well done. Clearance levels for PVE. Well done.

Have played every anniversary. They continue to screw up. Every. Tinykitty. Time. Why should I keep playing this game Demiurge? Are you going to step up your game anytime soon? Please let us know so I can abandon ship if not.

You only get so many breaks...

ZeiramMR

The Viceroy Returns wrote:

It's more than a simple matter of "test better".
I could have told you that facing off against 3 level 500+ bosses one after the other would be too hard, even with a champ OML. It doesn't even pass the eye test for any developer that should intimately know their content and feature set. At some level, it's either not understanding their own game, understanding it and purposefully setting it to be harder and more frustrating than the 8-bit NES TMNT, or it's something else...

Bad analogy, I can actually complete NES Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

winter37

I'm really happy with a lot of the changes and work the devs have made ad put in recently to make the game more enjoyable. But this event scales way too quickly. With a fully champed 3* and several champed 4*s, it's literally impossible for me to win a boss fight by Round 4.

AE_Fios

As usual...

10/10 idea

2/10 Execution

-100/10 Communication

Have fun spending that anniversary sale money!

sinnerjfl

Just hit round 6... Yup, Phoenix is Galactus run 1 all over again.

She will murder you if she gets one turn in. Seriously, an ability that adds 5 red on the board
and triggers with 9 red present? Do you even realize how ridiculously hard it is to have less than 4 of any color on the board?

Also, Green Goblin healing 8000 health with a 5 AP move was a fantastic idea. It can take so frigging long to down him that meanwhile
he gathers all the AP the 2 other bosses will slam you with, genius!

Tinykitty your tinykitty event, what a celebration once again!

broll

mpqr7 wrote:

Boss rush would be great if it were two easier bosses, with the third being very tough. So then you could save up your AP by fighting the first two bosses, and then you could unleash all your major attacks on the final, deadly boss.

But instead, if you save your AP and avoid doing attacks on the first two bosses, they will just kill you. And even if you miraculously win, you barely make any points toward progression, plus you still need to use 3 healthpacks, so it's a bit frustrating.

I like this idea.

The Viceroy Returns

ZeiramMR wrote:

The Viceroy Returns wrote:

It's more than a simple matter of "test better".
I could have told you that facing off against 3 level 500+ bosses one after the other would be too hard, even with a champ OML. It doesn't even pass the eye test for any developer that should intimately know their content and feature set. At some level, it's either not understanding their own game, understanding it and purposefully setting it to be harder and more frustrating than the 8-bit NES TMNT, or it's something else...

Bad analogy, I can actually complete NES Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

Ok fine.
NES Battletoads hard.
Better?

GrumpySmurf1002

Not really a help for everyone, but I've been able to plow through round 6 so far with Surfer (for me 452, newly rage champed)- Switch - Fist.

Switch green to collect colors in a pinch, black holes everywhere. Gamma Siphon (for OML) and Called Shot (for PHX) TU's to help. 100% match damage.

Ridiculous that the answer to the ridiculous scaling is 3* batteries, but is what it is. Old Moonknight Logan is really the biggest problem since you can't hide.

DrStrange-616

I can't grasp the thinking behind the event design. I think it turned out exactly as they wanted, but I can't figure out why they wanted it this way.

Does anyone have any ideas on what the theory behind the design was? And how it would be a celebration event worth of the anniversary? I'm sure it's no surprise that the community would react the way they did, so why would they want that? I can't puzzle it out. Heh. See what I did there? But seriously, what's the intent here do you think?

metallion

dasquish wrote:

First off, AWESOME poster. They should use it for advertising. Second, might as well get to editing. Galactus does show up later. I hear it's super fun.

Damn why did you have to tell me?? It's OK I found room for him beside his friend Ultron

aesthetocyst

metallion wrote:

Hey guys, I'm late to the party. Lemme leave this here before I go get some good sleep rather than attempting this tinykitty.



Hopefully Big G hasn't and wont't make an appearance, or I'll need to update this again, was lazy to scroll through 20 pages to check

Awesome poster! Great concept and competently executed.

But yes, Galactus will weigh in. If anyone live to see it

I think it's fine as-is, good job giving all the others the Galactus Hard Stare. You've referenced Galactus, created a great in-joke. Galactus is the one casting all the shadows! (just saw the edit .... go back to the original!)

Tiger_Wong

Nightglider1 wrote:

Tiger Wong wrote:

Well guys, I think I've found a team that can push you through round 4 & 5. Here's who I used.....

3* 4/4/5
5/4/4
3/5/5

All at lvl 176

I should change the covers a bit but we'll get to that later.

Im40 is the battery but a very important one. Don't use his red or blue unless it's a finisher. Keep the board free beforehand so the yellow can get off.

She-Hulk is the hitter, the drainer, and the healer at the same time. Use her red when the field doesn't have im40's yellow. The damage is eh, but what's important is the board shake. You're gonna be facing characters that have fortified tiles and CD tiles (GG and Cap) so her red can bring them down and/or destroy/match them on that turn or the next turn. Use her green A LOT. Drain the **** out of Cap, GG, IM46, Hulk, etc. they can't do anything without AP. And this keeps the healing going because you're gonna get hit, you're gonna get cascades against you and the occasional power against you. When the boss' AP is down to all 2 or less, only then should you use KK's green. Save her blue for those enemy tiles. You won't use IM's blue. It's for her to steal.

KK's is key to fuel Shulks green, keep im40's yellow from matching during its countdown, and to prevent boss matches of their main colors. Her green should only be used to either finish off a TEAM (not just a boss) and only if you have 24 green.

When the team is together, everything flows and your health will fall but be regained. You can't afford to lose character but if you must, let IM take the fall. Shulk + KK can survive better than any other combination.

I'm gonna switch the covers to get more health from healing and have Shulk do more damage with her red.

Unfortunately, the initial board state determines how quickly you can get an engine like this running.

You're wrong. The initial board is irrelevant because you don't need a lot of AP to get started.

Im40's is only 6 AP and two turns to stay out.
Shulk's is only 6 and her is only 9
KK keeps the health up and her is only 8

You only have 1 character at the start to deny their colors while getting started. Round 4 & 5, you start vs GG. It's not hard at all to deny him while getting yellow and green and then drain what he gets.

Arimis_Thorn

Chronicler wrote:

Update: I have faced the round 6 team challenge and I have come out victorious.

My team (boosted levels shown):
Kingpin 372
Cho 368
Cyclops 274

Nope.

Not really a help for everyone, but I've been able to plow through round 6 so far with Surfer (for me 452, newly rage champed)- Switch - Fist.

Switch green to collect colors in a pinch, black holes everywhere. Gamma Siphon (for OML) and Called Shot (for PHX) TU's to help. 100% match damage.

Nope

Philly484

I fully get the intention of how this was supposed to be done, but the fact remains the scaling is so off it makes this event not fun. If it completely comes down to not letting one of the bosses get a turn that is very hard to do, dependent on chance of how your board sets you up when u first start. i like many other vets have the expansive roster that I thought I would be able to do this, but wow getting one shot just because the AI gets it first turn is ridiculous.

This really needs to be play tested. This like others are saying was like the initial Galactus run, even with boosted champs there is a very rare chance to beat all 3 bosses once you hit round 6+. Phoenix should not be able to use all 3 moves in one turn, and then if you survive use those moves again, the same next turn. Intent of this being fun great, the actuality and what has occurred not so much.

Entropic

Pushed through round 4, though I never managed to win a boss round. For that feat got a 3* Storm cover. I'm not even looking at Round 5. The risk vs reward is very much not in my favor so I'm bailing on the event. Honestly the only reason I made it through 4 was sheer bloodymindedness. For reference I've been playing 2 years and have all 3* max champed, a handful of 4* champed, with the rest only semi-usable, and a couple of good 5* thanks to lucky draws. I was getting routinely annihilated in Round 4. Especially fun to get to the OML to find that he doesn't even have to fire off his living legend, he just starts in that state. Then unloaded all the saved up AP and wiped my whole group before I got a turn.

It would be nice if the dev team quit consistently erring on the side of too hard. I realize it's easier to tone things down, but by the time you do so there is a lot of player goodwill that has been burned through. The BFF event and Boss Rush are fundamentally flawed, and I'm almost certain your testers pointed this out before you went live. Start listening to them.

If nothing else the original Galactus event should have prepared you for the fact that your customers *really* don't like repeated forced failure.
I honestly don't see how that lesson could have been any clearer, but now there is some more data for you.

gmp72

Dear D3,

In view of the universal outrage to this boss event, an event that was clearly not even played through once by anyone at D3, might I suggest the following compensation :

1. Progression rewards for everyone that entered the event.

2. Double ISO for all of next season.

Thank You !

gmp72
DJU

madsalad

Chronicler wrote:

Update: I have faced the round 6 team challenge and I have come out victorious...

So, the trick to round 6 is don't let Phoenix or Surfer take a single turn.

I've found that's the correct strategy for all Boss waves. Don't let boss 2 or boss 3 take a turn.

Borstock

Yeah, round 6, OML's matches are hitting for a minimum of 1k. That's just a plain 3 tile match with no cascade.

How is this meant to be fun?

Nightglider1

Tiger Wong wrote:

Nightglider1 wrote:

Tiger Wong wrote:

Well guys, I think I've found a team that can push you through round 4 & 5. Here's who I used.....

3* 4/4/5
5/4/4
3/5/5

All at lvl 176

I should change the covers a bit but we'll get to that later.

Im40 is the battery but a very important one. Don't use his red or blue unless it's a finisher. Keep the board free beforehand so the yellow can get off.

She-Hulk is the hitter, the drainer, and the healer at the same time. Use her red when the field doesn't have im40's yellow. The damage is eh, but what's important is the board shake. You're gonna be facing characters that have fortified tiles and CD tiles (GG and Cap) so her red can bring them down and/or destroy/match them on that turn or the next turn. Use her green A LOT. Drain the **** out of Cap, GG, IM46, Hulk, etc. they can't do anything without AP. And this keeps the healing going because you're gonna get hit, you're gonna get cascades against you and the occasional power against you. When the boss' AP is down to all 2 or less, only then should you use KK's green. Save her blue for those enemy tiles. You won't use IM's blue. It's for her to steal.

KK's is key to fuel Shulks green, keep im40's yellow from matching during its countdown, and to prevent boss matches of their main colors. Her green should only be used to either finish off a TEAM (not just a boss) and only if you have 24 green.

When the team is together, everything flows and your health will fall but be regained. You can't afford to lose character but if you must, let IM take the fall. Shulk + KK can survive better than any other combination.

I'm gonna switch the covers to get more health from healing and have Shulk do more damage with her red.

Unfortunately, the initial board state determines how quickly you can get an engine like this running.

You're wrong. The initial board is irrelevant because you don't need a lot of AP to get started.

Im40's is only 6 AP and two turns to stay out.
Shulk's is only 6 and her is only 9
KK keeps the health up and her is only 8

You only have 1 character at the start to deny their colors while getting started. Round 4 & 5, you start vs GG. It's not hard at all to deny him while getting yellow and green and then drain what he gets.

Agree to disagree. I don't dispute that this is an excellent team, but sometimes the colors don't land in a favorable way and it can be difficult to get that going in "only" two turns.

Edit: Of course, there are boosts, but that can get pricy after a while.