Missing heroic pve (or an excuse to use new 4s)

DubbaHuss
DubbaHuss Posts: 110 Tile Toppler
in MPQ General Discussion
I really wish we had more restricted roster events again, especially those that restrict the use of 5s and throttle back the scaling a bit. 5 star progression is still pretty slow, and most veteran players that have at least 2 or 3 champed have no incentive to slow down matches using 4s that are substantially underpowered in comparison. As nice as it can be as a diversion occasionally to try out a Boosted 4 star with your favorite 5s, I'd submit that most players at 5 star level would rather use a team of all 5s to defeat highly scaled enemies and keep up the pace of competitive play. The result is a whole new batch of interesting characters that we're disincentivized to really unbox and experience. 

Heroic pve was the only place where we could shed the mundane and go outside the comfort zone. I'm not suggesting it return in its previous form exactly, I'm sure those events likely saw less participation overall. I don't presume to know the answer, but I think it's an issue that deprives the game of one it's strongest assets, taking advantage of a deep wide ranging roster instead of routinely mixing and matching what few 5s you've managed to scrounge together. 

Comments

  • Daiches
    Daiches Posts: 1,252 Chairperson of the Boards
    edited May 2017
    The casuals don't like it, so we lost that game mode.
    Complaints fell on deaf ears. Many good suggestions and alternatives were presented. No dice.

    but hope springs eternal.
  • Azoth658
    Azoth658 Posts: 348 Mover and Shaker
    When scaling is tied to shield clearance level then you can just drop a clearance level so the enemies aren't as tough ;)
  • Bowgentle
    Bowgentle Posts: 7,926 Chairperson of the Boards
    edited May 2017
    Azoth658 said:
    When scaling is tied to shield clearance level then you can just drop a clearance level so the enemies aren't as tough ;)


    That's 100% not how it's going to work.

    No way are THESE developers giving 5* players an easy route to dominate PVE by giving them the option of "easy mode" levels.

    If they've shown ONE thing over the years it's that they're obsessed with creating an "even ground" for everyone, which usually means making life as hellish as possible for veterans and high level players to give everyone else the illusion of being able to compete.

  • Starfury
    Starfury Posts: 719 Critical Contributor
    Well, the whole "PvE is where everyone is fighting on even ground" line is usually the first response when people complain about PvP being a **** experience for low level rosters.

    In opinion, both systems are tiny kittens.
  • JablesMc
    JablesMc Posts: 235 Tile Toppler
    One of the best suggestions I've seen around this issue, is to tie higher SCLs to more limited rosters, so that(theoretically) by the time it becomes an option, you should have a roster diverse enough to not only support it, but make limited usability enjoyable.
  • Jaedenkaal
    Jaedenkaal Posts: 3,357 Chairperson of the Boards
    Daiches said:
    The casuals don't like it, so we lost that game mode.
    Complaints fell on deaf ears. Many good suggestions and alternatives were presented. No dice.

    but hope springs eternal.
    Are you kidding me? Loads of vets were on this forum screaming every time a heroic story came around because they couldn't use their 5*s or their best champed 4*s or whatever. They were positive that their scaling was screwed because their champed Rhulk and Jean were locked out and the only included 4* was Bag Lady, and sure, 4* Venom was boosted, but you couldn't use him 1/3 of the time because 1* Venom was in the other missions... and the list went on.

    This was not a casual-driven change. It -might- be a dilution-driven change.
  • orbitalint
    orbitalint Posts: 511 Critical Contributor
    Jaedenkaal said:
    Daiches said:
    The casuals don't like it, so we lost that game mode.
    Complaints fell on deaf ears. Many good suggestions and alternatives were presented. No dice.

    but hope springs eternal.
    Are you kidding me? Loads of vets were on this forum screaming every time a heroic story came around because they couldn't use their 5*s or their best champed 4*s or whatever. They were positive that their scaling was screwed because their champed Rhulk and Jean were locked out and the only included 4* was Bag Lady, and sure, 4* Venom was boosted, but you couldn't use him 1/3 of the time because 1* Venom was in the other missions... and the list went on.

    This was not a casual-driven change. It -might- be a dilution-driven change.
    First, no one ever complained that they couldn't use 4* Venom... He's terrible.

    Second, refer to point 1. :smile:
  • Daiches
    Daiches Posts: 1,252 Chairperson of the Boards
    Jaedenkaal said:
    Daiches said:
    The casuals don't like it, so we lost that game mode.
    Complaints fell on deaf ears. Many good suggestions and alternatives were presented. No dice.

    but hope springs eternal.
    Are you kidding me? Loads of vets were on this forum screaming every time a heroic story came around because they couldn't use their 5*s or their best champed 4*s or whatever. They were positive that their scaling was screwed because their champed Rhulk and Jean were locked out and the only included 4* was Bag Lady, and sure, 4* Venom was boosted, but you couldn't use him 1/3 of the time because 1* Venom was in the other missions... and the list went on.

    This was not a casual-driven change. It -might- be a dilution-driven change.

    Boosted lists are bigger these days. And scaling is determined in Heroics by available characters. So that's not an issue. And they removed character lock outs. 

    Your reasons have no valid point anymore. Veterans complaining about missing characters are likely veteran casuals though. Length of play does not correspond with strength of roster.
  • JackTenrec
    JackTenrec Posts: 808 Critical Contributor
    orbitalint said:

    First, no one ever complained that they couldn't use 4* Venom... He's terrible.
    Eddie Brock, certainly. Agent Venom hits quickly and hard enough that I've found uses for him in PvE, even unboosted.
  • BoyWonder1914
    BoyWonder1914 Posts: 884 Critical Contributor
    I complained about Heroics only when I was still building my 3-star roster, and mirror-matches weren't allowed. I complained because my roster was under-developed, and I was sometimes locked out of using my higher quality teams, in exchange for a handful of new that the event forced you to use. Health pack usage increased a lot, and more often than not I was stuck using 4s that weren't covered well if at all, and that sort of trumped any excitement that came with the prospect of using a new team I hadn't before. 

    However once I finished my 3s and moved into the 4-star transition, I wouldn't have minded them at all. I'm up to 17 4-star champs now, and still feel like I'm bumbling my way through the best team compositions, experimenting as well. Kinda like Behemoth Burrito, I like being forced to use teams I would NEVER think about otherwise. I imagine there's a LOT more people that are in my previous boat though, so this probably won't be making a comeback. 
  • Dauthi
    Dauthi Posts: 995 Critical Contributor
    This is another fallout from vaulting. Since 4 stars can never compete with 5 stars, the obvious route is to go to 5 star. However doing so also condemns you to only using that one or 2 5 star characters, unless you don't mind handicappng yourself.

    Even if Demiurge fixes this, they have successfully halted everyones progress on their old stars for months. Who knows how far my Hulkbuster or Iceman would be by now.
  • JablesMc
    JablesMc Posts: 235 Tile Toppler
    BoyWonder1914 said:
    I complained about Heroics only when I was still building my 3-star roster, and mirror-matches weren't allowed. I complained because my roster was under-developed, and I was sometimes locked out of using my higher quality teams, in exchange for a handful of new that the event forced you to use. Health pack usage increased a lot, and more often than not I was stuck using 4s that weren't covered well if at all, and that sort of trumped any excitement that came with the prospect of using a new team I hadn't before. 

    However once I finished my 3s and moved into the 4-star transition, I wouldn't have minded them at all. I'm up to 17 4-star champs now, and still feel like I'm bumbling my way through the best team compositions, experimenting as well. Kinda like Behemoth Burrito, I like being forced to use teams I would NEVER think about otherwise. I imagine there's a LOT more people that are in my previous boat though, so this probably won't be making a comeback. 


    This post sums up exactly how I feel about Heroics.

    In recent history, a limited roster would have been much more enjoyable, whereas while I was building my 3* it was a severely limiting handicap most of the time.

  • GrimSkald
    GrimSkald Posts: 2,698 Chairperson of the Boards
    Jaedenkaal said:
    Dauthi said:
    Even if Demiurge fixes this, they have successfully halted everyones progress on their old stars for months. Who knows how far my Hulkbuster or Iceman would be by now.

    Probably 1 level higher each. Maybe 2. Unless you've made either of them your BH, at which point they're probably higher than they would have been.

    We can be scientific about this, actually.  I track my token pulls in general.  For Legendary tokens, I actually keep a log (I started when a guy here did a sampling, and I saw no reason to stop - it's useful data.)  I marked down when the new system went into place (on 3/1 in the early afternoon.)  Let me see how many Legendary Tokens I pulled since then...

    Exactly 250. This includes actual LTs, Event LTs, and Legendary Pulls (either Latest or Classic) with CP.  When the system went into place, there were 45 4*s.  Two have been added since, let's split the difference and add one.

    250/46 is 5.43.  So on average just over 5 levels per character.  That's not nothing, but it's not a lot either.  I'm also not quite at the top end for LT pulls, but I'm pretty darn high.  For other players it will be less, possibly a lot less.

    The flip side to that is I've set 3-5 4*s as my Bonus Heroes.  IMHB has been one of those for most, though not all, this time (I was chasing LTs for a while, so I set all my 4*s who are at XX9 (e.g. 279, 289, etc,) as my BH.)  Since the Bonus Hero system was implemented, I've drawn 7 IMHBs.  A comparable amount, if not more, than what I would have drawn under the old system.

    TL;DR I don't see Vaulting as a problem anymore.  I may make this it's own post, actually.  Hmmm.

  • MissChinch
    MissChinch Posts: 509 Critical Contributor

    I recall a deafening hatred for heroics before they were opened up, from all levels of players...  But for the last few months of heroics with restricted rosters my roster was finally deep enough to have all the available options and they became my favorite events...

    ISO and covers are coming at a MUCH higher rate, and have been for a while, so I would like to see heroics re-introduced....  If there was a better track record concerning delivering bugs to production I'd push to implement a ban on selecting the same character you're up against for fights, like it used to be.

    IF re-introduced I'd expect another wave of complaints re: vaulting.  With only a fraction of the 3* tier and a fraction of the 4* tier available to be pulled I'd expect much whining...  cant really overstate that...  and can't really blame people for it... 

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