Scaling Tied To S.H.I.E.L.D. Clearance Levels (5/25/17)

jamesh

Starfury said:

MissChinch said:

If sandbagging SCLs is a problem, Broll is correct, they need to look at the gap between placement rewards between these levels...   make the gap bigger to incentivize people to play higher SCLs.

I mean flat within a given SCL. Top 10 would need to be too close to top 200.

You can't have a big step between SCLs and still keep meaningful differences within those SCLs. Otherwise you'd end up with SCL 8 awarding tens of thousands of iso and throwing around 4 and 5* covers.

From the placement rewards side, I think the incentives to play at higher clearance levels are fine at the very top end.

For example, the reward for placing first in CL7 is three 4* covers and 4.5k Iso, which you can get for placing top 5 in CL8.  Similarly placing first in CL6 gives the same reward as placing top 10 in CL7.  You get similar effects as you move further out: you can get most of the prizes for placing top 50 in CL7 by placing top 200 in CL8.

Given that increasing your ranking in an event can require exponentially more work, not having to compete as hard is a strong benefit to moving up a clearance level.

I think things break down is that many people value the progression rewards over placement.  For most clearance levels, you need to be placing top 10 or top 20 for the placement rewards to be comparable to what you get for progression.

I'm not sure what the best way to solve this is.  For a start, they'd need to make placement rewards relevant to more than 1 or 2% of the player base.  Maybe adjusting the progression rewards was an attempt at this, but I think more changes would be needed.

beyonderbub

Playing Dp vs MPQ now in CL 8.5, opponents are level 354 in the hardest non essential node. Have all the boosteds champed except the newest 4*s. I don't use 5*s. It's been a breeze. Looking to finish top 10. Waiting to see if next PVE will be a comparable experience. 

Alsmir

veny said:

Alsmir said:

Bowgentle said:

Alsmir said:

So what is happenoing? Did we start 2017 with the new motto "Support the whales at all cost, screw anyone else."?

Vaulting, HfH, now this?

I'm definitely out of CL8. Can't do more than CL7 under the new system. I'm forec to do 5 clears instead of 4 for the same rewards, but now I can forget about any placement rewards as well.

I'm so desperately trying to find logic in the recent changes, but all I see is greed. Surely whales and vets are happy, but everyone else is being told to leave at the same time.

After they spent the last two years trying their best to alienate vets with insane scaling, punishment for leveling their characters and other great stuff I consider this change a small step in the right direction.

Your life must be real hard, when you can collect 4* covers and 25 cp from PvP.

Nice try Alsmir - it is almost impossible for most players to get above 700 points in PvP - tried that many times - after 700-800 points competitors are attacking so frequently you simply cant get points faster than lose them...
Feel free to prove me wrong with printscreen of you reaching 4* + 25CP from PVP progress

So you can't get more than 700 points? Just like any 3* or weaker roster.
And it's hard for you to get placement? Just like any 3* or weaker roster.
But suddenly PvE get's much easier for you while offering same rewards? Just like... oh wait...

veny

Alsmir said:

veny said:

Alsmir said:

Bowgentle said:

Alsmir said:

So what is happenoing? Did we start 2017 with the new motto "Support the whales at all cost, screw anyone else."?

Vaulting, HfH, now this?

I'm definitely out of CL8. Can't do more than CL7 under the new system. I'm forec to do 5 clears instead of 4 for the same rewards, but now I can forget about any placement rewards as well.

I'm so desperately trying to find logic in the recent changes, but all I see is greed. Surely whales and vets are happy, but everyone else is being told to leave at the same time.

After they spent the last two years trying their best to alienate vets with insane scaling, punishment for leveling their characters and other great stuff I consider this change a small step in the right direction.

Your life must be real hard, when you can collect 4* covers and 25 cp from PvP.

Nice try Alsmir - it is almost impossible for most players to get above 700 points in PvP - tried that many times - after 700-800 points competitors are attacking so frequently you simply cant get points faster than lose them...
Feel free to prove me wrong with printscreen of you reaching 4* + 25CP from PVP progress

So you can't get more than 700 points? Just like any 3* or weaker roster.
And it's hard for you to get placement? Just like any 3* or weaker roster.
But suddenly PvE get's much easier for you while offering same rewards? Just like... oh wait...

You clearly dont know what are you talking about - the better roster, the worse your chances in PvP.
I have 15+ promoted 4*s and no, i am not able to get past 800 points against maxed 5*s who steals my points faster than i can get back (hell, even 3*s are able to beat 4* AI when you are the one who choses the heroes you pick).
PvE becomes much more difficult while rewards remained almost unchanged - just check levels of characters now and before. If they became easier for you, you are a whale who is far ahead from me, propably in 4-5* transition.
Or you are talking about SC Levels 1-7, because level 8 is way more difficult that it used to be.
Simple proof - look around how many players are chosing level 7 PvE over level 8. 

Beer40

fmftint said:

SCL should work like boxing, you can fight above your class but not below. No one should be allowed to drop down for easier competition 

Except in boxing, mma, wrestling everyone fights below their weight. Without being too specific, they "cut" weight to get easier (they believe) competition due to a size advantage.

mwc

NMANOZ said:

This is what CL8 should be for the harder nodes (with difficulty increase of 15 levels per completion):

Hard 240 (Max of 300)
Hardest 260 (Max of 320)
4 Star 230 (Max of 290)

This will allow the people on lower levels to be able to compete. Some might say it is low but the current levels would be used for CL9 or 10. It would also discourage people with stronger rosters from dropping to CL7.

This. So much this. Since CL8 came out, I have always been in it. With my current roster (shield rank 77), my scaling maxes out at 318. This proposed change gives me a 42 level increase at minimum, with 82 at maximum. And since it is random now, I'm not going to leave my ability to do 5 missions at harder scaling up to RNG, as it is rough enough on me at my current scaling and other commitments. 

Bright idea. Bad implementation on the top end. Guess I'll be at CL7 for this test.

favabear

Even if the numbers don't work out right now I love that this is being tested. Outside of the excessive grinding, weird scaling dilemmas have been my number one issue with the game. Having SCL tied to difficulty gives some specific benchmarks to hit, allowing for a sense of growth and achievement.


I hope that this pushes the game towards focusing on challenge rather than repetition.

Nick441234

I'm all for the idea, in general. It will stop people being able to choose SCL8 if their roster isn't able to compete. My only complaint is that they've just made the jump in scaling from SCL7 to SCL8 far too steep. 140 levels is not fair on people like me who are stuck somewhere in the middle. 

Crowl

nick_chicane said:

I'm all for the idea, in general. It will stop people being able to choose SCL8 if their roster isn't able to compete. My only complaint is that they've just made the jump in scaling from SCL7 to SCL8 far too steep. 140 levels is not fair on people like me who are stuck somewhere in the middle. 

The problem is that people have been more than able to compete at SCL8 for quite some time and trying to force people back down to a lower one was the totally wrong way to go about this change, it should have come into place with the addition of SCL9 that could have been aimed specifically at 5* rosters.

Platty616

Having to drop down from SCL8 to 6 to cope with these levels. Tried SCL7 for this story, final level, enemies starting at 196 is higher than most of my roster. Not enjoying this change!

MarkersMake

I think they painted themselves into a bit of a corner, but I don't see a better path they could have chosen here. 

First, they updated PvE rewards, so that SCL 7 was a decent option for current SCL 8 players with mid-range rosters. 

Second, they matched the opponent level range with SCL levels 1-7 fairly well. 

Third, they couldn't do the same with SCL 8 because if they had, it would have been opponents at 170-290, and while the 3*-4* players would find that about right, the 5* players would find that utterly trivial and would demolish it. That would hardly be fair either, particularly since PvE placement rewards are still a thing. 

Fourth, they can't introduce SCL 9 and 10 in a test event, because then they would have to take them down and not activate them again until the next test, and people would scream bloody murder about that. And God help them if they were to revise the 9 or 10 reward structure afterwards. 

So they scaled everything more or less properly except for SCL 8, and they made it a test run so that the unfairness of SCL 8 in this one event is minimized. 

It really is making the best of a bad situation, and it does give hope for a positive path forward. I'll play SCL 7 for one event, and see how things go down the road. 

Nick441234

Crowl said:

nick_chicane said:

I'm all for the idea, in general. It will stop people being able to choose SCL8 if their roster isn't able to compete. My only complaint is that they've just made the jump in scaling from SCL7 to SCL8 far too steep. 140 levels is not fair on people like me who are stuck somewhere in the middle. 

The problem is that people have been more than able to compete at SCL8 for quite some time and trying to force people back down to a lower one was the totally wrong way to go about this change, it should have come into place with the addition of SCL9 that could have been aimed specifically at 5* rosters.

That is exactly what I suggested on the previous page. Had SCL9 come with this change and that topping out at 400 then it would have meant that SCL8 could have topped out around 330. That would have still been higher than my current scaling (305), but it would have been far more manageable a change than ramping things up by 95 levels. SCL8 is too hard for me while SCL7 is now too easy. 

Tee

Someone asked back on page one to post the numbers on the event as well as character levels.

Final node, no completions:
https://puu.sh/w4u4o/caa5a54c2f.jpg
Edit: Jumped to 295 after one completion. Strike tiles are 1,197 strength.
Jumped to 305 after that.
And then to 314.
And to 323, which is probably the number most people care about.

Top 5:
https://puu.sh/w4u7Z/6cd7ccbf25.jpg
If it only matters if they've been leveled, then the other four are 229 4*s.

Bowgentle

Tee said:

Someone asked back on page one to post the numbers on the event as well as character levels.

Final node, no completions:
https://puu.sh/w4u4o/caa5a54c2f.jpg
Edit: Jumped to 295 after one completion. Strike tiles are 1,197 strength.
Jumped to 305 after that.

Top 5:
https://puu.sh/w4u7Z/6cd7ccbf25.jpg
If it only matters if they've been leveled, then the other four are 229 4*s.

So no jump of 25 levels after each completion.
Wonder if something got changed at the last moment, or if the provided chart is simply wrong.
Both is equally likely for Demiurge.

SpringSoldier

Tee said:

Someone asked back on page one to post the numbers on the event as well as character levels.

Final node, no completions:
https://puu.sh/w4u4o/caa5a54c2f.jpg
Edit: Jumped to 295 after one completion. Strike tiles are 1,197 strength.
Jumped to 305 after that.

Top 5:
https://puu.sh/w4u7Z/6cd7ccbf25.jpg
If it only matters if they've been leveled, then the other four are 229 4*s.

And how did you do? Did you earn the cp or not? Was this the only nod with this level of difficulty? Thanks!

Bowgentle

SpringSoldier said:

Tee said:

Someone asked back on page one to post the numbers on the event as well as character levels.

Final node, no completions:
https://puu.sh/w4u4o/caa5a54c2f.jpg
Edit: Jumped to 295 after one completion. Strike tiles are 1,197 strength.
Jumped to 305 after that.

Top 5:
https://puu.sh/w4u7Z/6cd7ccbf25.jpg
If it only matters if they've been leveled, then the other four are 229 4*s.

And how did you do? Did you earn the cp or not? Was this the only nod with this level of difficulty? Thanks!

It's the hardest node in the sub.

Magic

I have 30+ 4* champions and no 5* leveled (only one covered max). My bread and butter was SCL7 where I can place in top50 with reasonable amount of playtime (a bit over an hour a day with some exception... goon heavy pve takes less, when rhulk or jean or iceman are boosted it takes less). My enemies top around 330 now and I don't take the 5th or sixth fight against them. It's just too much for me to fight overscaled 2* that high. Boring and takes away health packs.

When new progression was introduced I have tested SCL8 for the extra reward. Got a bit over max progression and finished just outside top 100. So I went back to SCL7 and I am cruising to top50 again (the 3CP are offset by couple of hundreds of extra hero points and ISO).

I very much like this change. The SCL7 will now drop to 30-45 minutes per clear. That will give me time to play a bit more PvP (back in the day I used to make 10k+ in a season, now - closer to 8k as I don't push a lot of events past 650 points).  Or just more time to do whatever I feel like.

The only risk is the beatdown that 5* rosters can have on the SCL7. They will do it in 25-35 minutes. So I might miss out on the top50 that is my goal. If this happens I will re-evaluate. Otherwise - a welcome change. But they might go even lower - to scl6 for the 4* covers from placement. So we will see.

Tee

SpringSoldier said:

Tee said:

Someone asked back on page one to post the numbers on the event as well as character levels.

Final node, no completions:
https://puu.sh/w4u4o/caa5a54c2f.jpg
Edit: Jumped to 295 after one completion. Strike tiles are 1,197 strength.
Jumped to 305 after that.

Top 5:
https://puu.sh/w4u7Z/6cd7ccbf25.jpg
If it only matters if they've been leveled, then the other four are 229 4*s.

And how did you do? Did you earn the cp or not? Was this the only nod with this level of difficulty? Thanks!

I can do it, it will just take a while if I don't want to burn the health packs.
Edit: Nevermind. Strange + Thanos works well.
It wasn't as hard as I thought it would be: https://puu.sh/w4w1X/a0d9a4e9a5.jpg

And here's a screen of the 20k hp muscles with their 16.6k hp Bullseye.
https://puu.sh/w4vyi/7c1f43239f.jpg

adamdivine

I love this change. I can comfortably do cl8, but unless I use the absolute top end of my roster, it takes way to much time (for reference, i usually clear most nodes to 6/6). Now, with the scaling drop in cl7, I can use the top end to clear fast if I'm short on time, or I can use almost all of my roster (sacrificing a little bit of time)  and have more fun again doing my clears. 

KGB

With this new scaling system DG3 should consider turning all clearance levels into a form of Heroic.

SCL1: 1* characters only + the 2,3&4* essential
SCL2-3: 1&2* characters only + the 3&4* essential
SCL4-5: 1-3* characters only + the 4* essential
SCL6-7: 1-4* characters only
SCL8: any characters

Now if you want to drop down to SCL7 you can only use your 4* and below so those champed 5* won't be blowing through nodes that are capped at 270.

It also means if you don't have good boosted 4* characters or want to take a break from high level PvE on an event you can drop to SCL5 or so and just take your 2&3* character teams out again for nostalgia reasons.

KGB