The loss of PvE scaling... good and bad...

MMCskippy

I'm trying to be somewhat positive about removing scaling from PVE, but when I look at the leader board in Security Clearance 7, it's filled with people who have their 4* rosters 70%+ developed and champed and are working on their 5* roster.

Then comes in little ole me who started playing 6 months ago before scaling was removed from PVE...

When I started, I got the very important advice of "Play the highest clearance you can for the best rewards and let the scaling sort things out." That worked great. I could place in t50 quite a bit.

Then, scaling was removed.

The sheet volume of sandbaggers in SL7 is staggering. If you have a developed 4* roster, you can start clearing 45 minutes after I start and finish before I get all my clears in. You can also start 45 minutes later than I do to start your final clears and still finish.

Is this what the game team intended?

The removal of scaling did a big thing for a new player: It made me feel like my time spent in game wasn't adding up to the right amount of rewards. If some slacker whale can come in with their fully champed 5* line up and win my security level with a quarter of my effort, the guy that's still spending (me) gets discouraged and changes his playing habits accordingly.

Quite simply, I can't spend fast enough to compete for top end rewards in the current system. In the scaling based system, if I spent to get my clear time down, I was rewarded with a t50 or maybe even a t20 spot.

I've t50'd once or twice in the new system, but only because the right combo of characters were boosted during the event, so I could get my initial clear time under and hour.

Now, I'm focusing on what nodes to clear and when I need to clear them to make sure I stay in t100, but I don't even consider spending on refreshes in PVE events. I could spend 1000 coins to clear, but it won't net me a t50 spot unless I clear in under an hour.

There needs to be a way to reward players who are still building their rosters to compete with sandbaggers that drop clearance levels to get t10 rewards.

MMCskippy

I may be in an alliance that's too good for me, but I stay in CL7 so I can get the extra points for the 5* node.

I will say that's the one good thing about removing scaling: Not being terrified of how horrible your match ups are when you have 5*'s in your roster.

Calnexin

Sandbagging is the organic response to the changes they've made.  I'd fall into your category of 70%+ developed 4* roster, and CL7 is and always has been my main.  It's because it provides the best ROI.  I can clear it in 30 min less than 8 or 9, and still reap similar rewards. 

I only go up if I know I've got a lot of surplus time on my hands, because if the time required exceeds my time available, I don't just lose out on the difference in CL rewards, I lose out entirely on whatever I didn't reach - and realistically, the CP at the end of progression is the primary target.

Is it what was intended?  I'm guessing no, but it's what we got.  If the placement rewards are important, you're pretty much out of luck until they change it, or you game the system and jump into a fresh slacker bracket.  The heaviest competition always is in the first sub, because it's when the people who have any shot of taking 1st can guarantee optimal start time.  Slacker brackets are risky because you might end up 999th in your bracket while trying to get in the top10.

//Removed Profanity -Brigby

MMCskippy

I hope there's some type of middle ground here...

The top of CL7's Venom Bomb event in my slice has a level 455 Spidey in their roster with 7 5*s fully covered and champed.

These are guys that should be hanging in CL8 or CL9 but they're sniping rewards in lower levels.

In the top 20, about 75% of people placing have fully covered and/or champed 5*s at the top of their line up. Surprisingly, that ratio didn't change in the t10, but this furthers my argument that there are way too many sandbaggers in CL7.

It appears you can place t20 pretty easy with the right champed 4* teams (seems reasonable to me), but these guys floating down with a nice and fat 5* roster are like 8th graders that steal kindergartener's candy.

Sm0keyJ0e

 I will go cl9 when I have the required boosted 5*. But I don't have any of the latest champed, and fighting level 515 toons with 2 5* and basically a one-cover loaner is no fun. I'm guessing other well rounded rosters feel similarly, but this is to be expected if the devs continue to boost the latest 5* at a 60% clip. I know that's not the example above but I would check some of those other 5* rosters.

Also it needs to be noted--before the change MOST of my alliance (high end players) didn't play PVE at all. The ones that did only did so casually. The old system was extremely broken for high end rosters and was horribly un-fun. Nowadays, my ENTIRE alliance plays PVE. I'm guessing this extends beyond my alli and others that used to either play very casually or PVP-only have found new fun in the PVE events.

Lastly, and this has been covered ad nauseam in other threads, the latest PVP changes have made it mostly unplayable and un-fun, so many have switched their time from PVP events to the less grind-y, lower level CL events.

Intended? Probably not. But as mentioned that's the hand D3/Demi has dealt us. 

BoyWonder1914

Don't mean to sound pessimistic, but you can't really escape this issue, and there probably isn't really any solution for it. This issue exists because ranking in PVE is about speed, and always has been. Even with them releasing clearance levels that give more appropriate rewards for higher level rosters, there will ALWAYS be a crowd of people who prefer speedier clears for quality of life reasons. This crowd of people is fine with giving up those rewards, even if they don't make t10, because needing to spend less time on this game is a reward of its own.

On the other hand, even if they brought back roster-based scaling, you'd still have a crowd of people jumping down ranks for the sake of a better chance at t10, because they know they'll be up against less developed rosters. The only thing you can really do is keep improving your roster, so that you can increase your own clear times. As a 3-star or 3-4* transitioner, you'll always lose out to 4-star rosters. Develop your 4-star roster, you'll always lose out Lv 300+ rosters who always have their 4s boosted to insane levels, and soft-capped Thanos. With where you're at in the game, it's just something that's not going to go away. 

On the bright side for you, it's MUCH easier to break into the 4-star tier and make some meaningful progress than it is for 5-stars, and the current meta of the game is still at the 4-star level. If you focus on champing the top-tier 4-star characters you'll see very noticeable improvements in your ability to compete. Even if you are a free-to-play person who may have challenges time to time rostering people, it's a completely reachable goal to have a reasonably competitive roster at the 4-star level.

Vhailorx

Boywonder:

There are at least two ways that demi cpuld address the issue of 5* rosters dipping down:

(1) make the higher tier rewards so compelling that top 10 in cl7 wasnt much better than top 200 in cl9.  (The 4* cover for top 50 in cl9 is a step in this direct but not nearly enough.)

(2) lock out players from lower CLs as they level up their roster.  (There are LOTS of potential complications and drawbacks here, so the lockouts would need to be calibrated carefully).

But neither of these seem especially likely.

Tc: it does suck that you seem to be affected negativelt in the short term by this change.  But the good news is that you can progress your roster and will eventually benefit from this change (cold comfort now, but a real long-term benefit).  Under the old scaling system the detriments got worse and worse as your roster got better.  Which seems like a poor incentive structure for a long term roster building game.

[Deleted User]

If youve been playing 6 months you really shouldnt be at a position of roster strength to be finishing in the top 5%.

Trying to buy your way through is simply foolish and also misses out on one of the fundamental pleasures of the game.

..building your roster.  

Developing organically is a great experience.  Discovering the joys of a new character/tier is great.  Whats the rush?

animaniactoo

Honestly, I'm about 50% of the way through the 4* Tier, I used to play in SCL 8 and now I almost always play in SCL 7. I have no champed or even close to fully covered 5*s and I won't start leveling them until I'm a hell of a lot further along in finishing out the 4* Tier.

I'm not playing down in 7 because I'm sniping for better rewards. I'm playing down here because this works with the amount of TIME I have available or want to give this game (or frankly any other) on a daily basis. Especially since the 5* essential was added - that's when I actively dropped where I play regularly.

I do play a couple of other games daily - one that pre-dated this one, and another one I've recently picked up. Neither of them requires the same amount of ACTIVE time that MPQ does to play even just PVE and DDQ.

So, are these my optimal rewards? For the game, no. For my life? Oh yeah. Hell yeah. and twice on forget Sundays every other day of the week too.

I get that it sucks for newer players who are still building their rosters and I'm sorry for that. But this is what I've got to work with so that's what I'm doing. I suspect many of the other players who are punching below their weight are down here not just for the bracket placement possibilities but also because it frees up some time to go fight in PVP, etc.

What this means for you: I'd step back and go fight in SCL 6. I don't plan on moving back up to SCL 8 until such time as I'm clearing 7 in about 75% or less of the time I'm doing now.

7 may theoretically offer the best rewards for you, but 6 is where you can likely actually get better rewards through better placement. System is what the system is. Previously I'd advocated locking out playing with 5*s if you drop down so far below where you can play, but I don't think that's valid now with the 5* essential node. I think it's time to revisit what SR (which really doesn't always equate well to roster build) is minimum level to unlock each SCL. As of right now, I think the cutoff is way lower than it should be.

animaniactoo

To be clear - Pre SCL scaling, my roster had gotten to a point that it was taking me about 4 hours a day just to do 6 clears and DDQ and I was really close to giving up the game over it. Because it was essentially eating up just about ALL of my free time and it was starting to really interfere in my life and how I was trying to handle the time conflicts.

Qubort

MMCskippy said:

I'm trying to be somewhat positive about removing scaling from PVE, but when I look at the leader board in Security Clearance 7, it's filled with people who have their 4* rosters 70%+ developed and champed and are working on their 5* roster.

Then comes in little ole me who started playing 6 months ago before scaling was removed from PVE...

When I started, I got the very important advice of "Play the highest clearance you can for the best rewards and let the scaling sort things out." That worked great. I could place in t50 quite a bit.

Then, scaling was removed.

The sheet volume of sandbaggers in SL7 is staggering. If you have a developed 4* roster, you can start clearing 45 minutes after I start and finish before I get all my clears in. You can also start 45 minutes later than I do to start your final clears and still finish.

Is this what the game team intended?

The removal of scaling did a big thing for a new player: It made me feel like my time spent in game wasn't adding up to the right amount of rewards. If some slacker whale can come in with their fully champed 5* line up and win my security level with a quarter of my effort, the guy that's still spending (me) gets discouraged and changes his playing habits accordingly.

Quite simply, I can't spend fast enough to compete for top end rewards in the current system. In the scaling based system, if I spent to get my clear time down, I was rewarded with a t50 or maybe even a t20 spot.

I've t50'd once or twice in the new system, but only because the right combo of characters were boosted during the event, so I could get my initial clear time under and hour.

Now, I'm focusing on what nodes to clear and when I need to clear them to make sure I stay in t100, but I don't even consider spending on refreshes in PVE events. I could spend 1000 coins to clear, but it won't net me a t50 spot unless I clear in under an hour.

There needs to be a way to reward players who are still building their rosters to compete with sandbaggers that drop clearance levels to get t10 rewards.

I'll never understand this argument. People with stronger rosters and can clear faster earn better rewards as they should.

Your complaint is after 6 months you can't beat out someone that has 4 years put into the game. I've never seen someone do 7 clears and not get T100 with ease so you can easily build your roster. You'll get to a point you won't care who's boosted opposed to relying on it.

Qubort

Calnexin said:

Sandbagging is the organic response to the changes they've made.  I'd fall into your category of 70%+ developed 4* roster, and CL7 is and always has been my main.  It's because it provides the best ROI.  I can clear it in 30 min less than 8 or 9, and still reap similar rewards. 

I only go up if I know I've got a lot of surplus time on my hands, because if the time required exceeds my time available, I don't just lose out on the difference in CL rewards, I lose out entirely on whatever I didn't reach - and realistically, the CP at the end of progression is the primary target.

Is it what was intended?  I'm guessing no, but it's what we got.  If the placement rewards are important, you're pretty much SOL until they change it, or you game the system and jump into a fresh slacker bracket.  The heaviest competition always is in the first sub, because it's when the people who have any shot of taking 1st can guarantee optimal start time.  Slacker brackets are risky because you might end up 999th in your bracket while trying to get in the top10.

That's not always true, especially with less flips. There's usually a bunch of top folks drooling for a flip. T100 would be easier but T10 can be harder depending who is waiting for the flip 

Qubort

MMCskippy said:

I hope there's some type of middle ground here...

The top of CL7's Venom Bomb event in my slice has a level 455 Spidey in their roster with 7 5*s fully covered and champed.

These are guys that should be hanging in CL8 or CL9 but they're sniping rewards in lower levels.

In the top 20, about 75% of people placing have fully covered and/or champed 5*s at the top of their line up. Surprisingly, that ratio didn't change in the t10, but this furthers my argument that there are way too many sandbaggers in CL7.

It appears you can place t20 pretty easy with the right champed 4* teams (seems reasonable to me), but these guys floating down with a nice and fat 5* roster are like 8th graders that steal kindergartener's candy.

It's a competitive game, if the kindergartners want top end candy, they'll need to earn it against top end 8th graders.  

aa25

animaniactoo said:

:snip:

I do play a couple of other games daily - one that pre-dated this one, and another one I've recently picked up. Neither of them requires the same amount of ACTIVE time that MPQ does to play even just PVE and DDQ.

:snip:

I reach the same conclusion as well. The time requirement to make a progress in MPQ is spinning out of control now. I managed to keep it at 3-4h per day (hybrid player) and I still feel like it is way too long for just a minimal step forward.

Vhailorx

aa25 said:

animaniactoo said:

:snip:

I do play a couple of other games daily - one that pre-dated this one, and another one I've recently picked up. Neither of them requires the same amount of ACTIVE time that MPQ does to play even just PVE and DDQ.

:snip:

I reach the same conclusion as well. The time requirement to make a progress in MPQ is spinning out of control now. I managed to keep it at 3-4h per day (hybrid player) and I still feel like it is way too long for just a minimal step forward.

For perspective, let's all take a moment to consider how crazy it is to say that you "managed to keep [mpq down to] 3-4h per day."  that's an insane amount of time to spend on any game.  What are we all doing?!

animaniactoo

Vhailorx said:

aa25 said:

animaniactoo said:

:snip:

I do play a couple of other games daily - one that pre-dated this one, and another one I've recently picked up. Neither of them requires the same amount of ACTIVE time that MPQ does to play even just PVE and DDQ.

:snip:

I reach the same conclusion as well. The time requirement to make a progress in MPQ is spinning out of control now. I managed to keep it at 3-4h per day (hybrid player) and I still feel like it is way too long for just a minimal step forward.

For perspective, let's all take a moment to consider how crazy it is to say that you "managed to keep [mpq down to] 3-4h per day."  that's an insane amount of time to spend on any game.  What are we all doing?!

And that is all of my point. I've pretty much given up PVP because I'm playing the other newer game with my sister and it takes a lot of startup capital in terms of time and energy. In the meantime, even the trade-off of ~2 hours (due to playing down in 7) being spent on MPQ - on a MOBILE game to play daily? It's a little nutzoid. Just a wee tad.

And that was even before my sister and I sat there last night for 3 hours doing something completely ridic for the new game and she said "You know this is crackers, right?" "Yup" "But at least I feel like I'm not in it alone when we're doing it together".

That, ladies and gents - is the true point of the minor benefits you get from being in an alliance. 

beyonderbub

I'm "sandbagging" in SCL 7 because it suits my time constraints in balancing alliance requirements for PVP and PVE with my Real Life obligations. Before the recent PVP changes, I would always be in SCL 8 or 9. Now that PVP requires so much more time for a baby 5* roster to hit progression AND hit an alliance minimum, I see that I can adjust by going to a lower PVE SCL, bang out 4x grinds (initial 4x clear of each node at opening of sub event) in 40 minutes or less, bang out end grinds (that's the 3x clear at the end of sub events) in 20 minutes or less and place in Top 10 or better without losing any ground to my competition in terms of resource rewards and covers. Also this playstyle also rewards me with CP for top 1-3 finish in subevents which I'm currently not getting from not being able to place consistently in T10 in new PVP structure. Sorry to the OP but we've all been there and found a way to cope by adjusting or just lowering expectations.

TLDR: Blame it all on the new PVP system of wins for progression. We've all had to do ugly things in order to make MPQ ends meet. 

Vhailorx

Animaniactaco:  agree on alliances, they are about maintaining engagement by leveraging the social nature of humans.  "I really don't want to grind tonight, but i don't want to let my alliance down!"

TranscendGod

Set your 3* bonus hero to Thanos until champ maxed. Set your 4* bonus hero to Rocket and Groot. Then work on other GotG characters (3* first since you'll finish them more easily). Consider using command points to finish R&G if you don't have him champed.

With R&G/Thanos + GotG character teams, you should be able to compete reasonably well in cl7.

aa25

Vhailorx said:

aa25 said:

animaniactoo said:

:snip:

I do play a couple of other games daily - one that pre-dated this one, and another one I've recently picked up. Neither of them requires the same amount of ACTIVE time that MPQ does to play even just PVE and DDQ.

:snip:

I reach the same conclusion as well. The time requirement to make a progress in MPQ is spinning out of control now. I managed to keep it at 3-4h per day (hybrid player) and I still feel like it is way too long for just a minimal step forward.

For perspective, let's all take a moment to consider how crazy it is to say that you "managed to keep [mpq down to] 3-4h per day."  that's an insane amount of time to spend on any game.  What are we all doing?!

Breaking it down:
Open PvE sub: 45 mins average
Close PvE sub: 45 mins average
PvP to get that 40 wins: My average per match is 3 mins, 40 wins = 120 mins in 2.5 days = 48 mins per day.

You're right, I did exaggerate when I said 3-4h a day. But the above numbers do mean something, especially how bad things have become lately, and I'm thinking about cutting in down someway somehow.

Edit: Typos.

beyonderbub

"PvP to get that 40 wins: My average per match is 3 mins, 40 wins = 120 mins in 2.5 days = 48 mins per day."

That's if you win all 40 matches. Add more time if all you have to face are Gam-bolt teams without your own. With new 5*s getting a 90 level boost for their first month out, I would expect  less folks being able to pull 40 straight wins without a few losses stretching out that time commited variable.