Versus "Progression"

Addaran

aesthetocyst said:

RayElwood said:

Amen to this thread. I agree 100% that the points based system does not at all feel like progression while the wins based system made me feel like I was progressing! I am in the same boat that I play in fits and spurts because I have a full time job and family. Taking 12 hours off in the points system can absolutely kill me with the progression rewards. Therefore, I have a point that I hit in PVP at which point I leave the event and never look back. The wins system let me take time off without feeling like I was losing out. At the same time, I played more because I felt like I was reliably earning rewards and not slogging past numbers that I had already hit before I got sent back.

Then the points game is perfect for you Ray, as the shields enable you to take breaks (of up to 3-, 8-, or 24hrs, as frequently as every 8hrs!) and play in burst of only a couple min each. On the whole it's quite a time saver, once you get the hang of scheduling the game around your life. Or the other way 'round. Or both?

It might make sense for higher to use HP to shield to get better rewards. But where i'm at, HP is the most valuable currency. So it's not worth it.

Also, isn't there a cooldown for shields? So you can't actually stay protected always.


Also, what about if you're on call, or something happen during your match ( kids, work, emergency, game crashing, etc) then you lose progression like if you lost. Win based, it doesn't matter if you had to quit a match, you're not worst off. Or even if you make error and attack a team that's too strong. 

shartattack

It might make sense for higher to use HP to shield to get better rewards. But where i'm at, HP is the most valuable currency. So it's not worth it.

Also, isn't there a cooldown for shields? So you can't actually stay protected always.


Also, what about if you're on call, or something happen during your match ( kids, work, emergency, game crashing, etc) then you lose progression like if you lost. Win based, it doesn't matter if you had to quit a match, you're not worst off. Or even if you make error and attack a team that's too strong. 

man, you would have hated video games in the 80s.  "You died."   "What, I have to go all the way back to the beginning? But i progressed to level 7?"

aesthetocyst

RayElwood said: ... As if players like me have enough gold to keep spending on those....

Say wot, Ray?

[checks in game]

Store is still open, you can just buy more when you run out! HPs aren't like BitCoin, they aren't limited, you don't have to 'mine' them.

Addaran said: ... 1) Also, isn't there a cooldown for shields? So you can't actually stay protected always.

2) Also, what about if you're on call, or something happen during your match ( kids, work, emergency, game crashing, etc) then you lose progression like if you lost. Win based, it doesn't matter if you had to quit a match, you're not worst off. Or even if you make error and attack a team that's too strong. 

1. Yes, you can stay shielded continually, by alternating between shields of various durations. You can shield all event long. Contact a pvp vet for guidance.

2. "Schedule life around game; game around life." I'm quite sure I just posted that. Nothing reinforces peace of mind like the constant knowledge that you're on the clock, the permanent dread of impending disaster.

Try it sometime!

Bowgentle

Addaran said:

aesthetocyst said:

RayElwood said:

Amen to this thread. I agree 100% that the points based system does not at all feel like progression while the wins based system made me feel like I was progressing! I am in the same boat that I play in fits and spurts because I have a full time job and family. Taking 12 hours off in the points system can absolutely kill me with the progression rewards. Therefore, I have a point that I hit in PVP at which point I leave the event and never look back. The wins system let me take time off without feeling like I was losing out. At the same time, I played more because I felt like I was reliably earning rewards and not slogging past numbers that I had already hit before I got sent back.

Then the points game is perfect for you Ray, as the shields enable you to take breaks (of up to 3-, 8-, or 24hrs, as frequently as every 8hrs!) and play in burst of only a couple min each. On the whole it's quite a time saver, once you get the hang of scheduling the game around your life. Or the other way 'round. Or both?

It might make sense for higher to use HP to shield to get better rewards. But where i'm at, HP is the most valuable currency. So it's not worth it.

Also, isn't there a cooldown for shields? So you can't actually stay protected always.


Also, what about if you're on call, or something happen during your match ( kids, work, emergency, game crashing, etc) then you lose progression like if you lost. Win based, it doesn't matter if you had to quit a match, you're not worst off. Or even if you make error and attack a team that's too strong. 

Of course bad things can happen on a hop.
You could have a shield break and go from 2600 to 600.
It happens, to everyone.
That's what makes PVP exciting.
There's nothing more fun than seeing someone climb from 600 back to 2000 again after a shield break, in an hour.
Or laughing with someone for taking the wrong Thanos on a hop.
That is why we use LINE.
That's what keeps us here after 4 years.

The act of actually playing is boring. It's the social interaction that keeps us engaged.

CT1888

For me, points based progression is better than win based because I find it more fun. I've always enjoyed it, even when I was trying to claw my way to 300 with 2*s while the whales and the vets ran XFW/GT teams. The up and down is what differentiates it from story mode. The buzz of breaking through a new points threshold, or scrapping for the desperately wanted 4*cover gave the best highs the game has offered me. Even getting smashed back while attempting to hit 900 added something  for me.

There are flaws in Versus, and my thoughts were about how to improve the experience, and create a curve to give prizes and get people engaged, because the reward structure is am anachronistic joke. The pace of rewards wasn't the problem for me, it was it became a turgid grind fest if I wanted to reach the 4* reward; separating progression from placement sacked the fun out of it. If they had put the CP back into win based the way it was implemented, I would have likely quit pvp, as in top 10 at least I could have a shot at it if I bracket sniped.

Jwallyr said:

So you're kind of sideways responding to one of the issues going on here- and that is that the wins-based system seems to clearly be better in a lot of ways for a lot of players, but that the pace of rewards became a problem for some players, particularly at the high end of play. For instance:

"It took too many wins to get the rewards" => If this is somehow a particular problem at high end play, then reduce the number of wins to get to the next tiers of rewards. There's no inherent advantage to point-based "progression" over win-based progression, but the choice of threshold for earning rewards could vary.

"They took CP out when going to win-based progression" => Why can't they put the CP back in? If they don't want it to be easy, require lots of wins for it maybe, but that's a SUPER easy problem to solve.

Ultimately the only plausible explanation I've heard for points-based progression being better is that you can't lose ground on number of wins, so there's no need for players to buy shields => there's no reason for players to buy HP with real money for shields. I consider this more a feature than a bug, but the game's management might not agree. That's a very different question than whether it's good for the players, though.

Wumpushunter

You have my axe (totally agree with you)

RayElwood

I would never have complained about the old system except for the simple fact that they showed us a system that some of us greatly prefer. Then they took it away... now I'll never look at the point system the same way.

Addaran

man, you would have hated video games in the 80s.  "You died."   "What, I have to go all the way back to the beginning? But i progressed to level 7?"

Back then i was a kid, didn't have a job, responsability or a gf. Also, back then, we weren't connected like we are now. You had to leave the phone free for others, couldn't talk/chat with everyone like we do now.

1. Yes, you can stay shielded continually, by alternating between shields of various durations. You can shield all event long. Contact a pvp vet for guidance.

Good to know. Maybe when i'll actually be able to afford HP i'll check into it.


RayElwood said:

I would never have complained about the old system except for the simple fact that they showed us a system that some of us greatly prefer. Then they took it away... now I'll never look at the point system the same way.

Yeah, before i didn't complain about PVP, i just didn't bother at all. Except lightning rounds for the first token and the first sakaar event where killing 1-2 seed teams meant an elite token.

Wumpushunter

I liked the new system because it didnt really matter that I was hit by people using level 300+ people against my 200 characters. i already had my wins locked in, my rewards were mine. Now the MMR and its stupid code will basically let people with 3 years in game destroy me all day long. There is no way anyone can do well in PVP at the moment but whales and vets.

j0nats

honestly, if you got the time to slog through 40 win pvp events,  then grinding pve (i mean green checking, not tapping) would be a lot better and yield more rewards.  guaranteed 3 n  4* covers, tokens and cp easy from placement n progression

clears take a little more than an hour, one in the morning and one in the evening.

dunno why you guys need to fix something that has honestly i think been  working as intended. 

most online games (i.e wow, ragnarok, etc) require you to 'grind' and level up before tackling others in pvp.  this is the same concept being applied here.   build ur roster via pve, then try pvp when ur ready.

broll

shartattack said:

It might make sense for higher to use HP to shield to get better rewards. But where i'm at, HP is the most valuable currency. So it's not worth it.

Also, isn't there a cooldown for shields? So you can't actually stay protected always.


Also, what about if you're on call, or something happen during your match ( kids, work, emergency, game crashing, etc) then you lose progression like if you lost. Win based, it doesn't matter if you had to quit a match, you're not worst off. Or even if you make error and attack a team that's too strong. 

man, you would have hated video games in the 80s.  "You died."   "What, I have to go all the way back to the beginning? But i progressed to level 7?"

and now modern games don't do that (even Dark Souls doesn't do that).  Honestly the reason so many of them did back then was:
1.  Limitations in technology.
2.  Many of them where arcade games (or ports of) that they wanted you to feed quarters into over and over, the original micro transactions...

Games have evolved, are you saying this game should hold to the standards of 80s games?  Maybe we should downgrade the graphics to big blocky pixels and have players go to the store to get cartridges for every patch....

Jwallyr

j0nats said:

honestly, if you got the time to slog through 40 win pvp events,  then grinding pve (i mean green checking, not tapping) would be a lot better and yield more rewards.  guaranteed 3 n  4* covers, tokens and cp easy from placement n progression

clears take a little more than an hour, one in the morning and one in the evening.

dunno why you guys need to fix something that has honestly i think been  working as intended. 

most online games (i.e wow, ragnarok, etc) require you to 'grind' and level up before tackling others in pvp.  this is the same concept being applied here.   build ur roster via pve, then try pvp when ur ready.

Is there some kind of cutoff that prevents me from doing BOTH PvE AND PvP? I've been doing Story mode (schedule permitting) about as aggressively as I possibly can since the point at which I decided to care, and I'm not sure there's any relevance beyond bringing Story mode into this discussion other than pointing out that the Progression rewards for Story mode actually 1) make sense and 2) allow a majority of participating players to conceivably earn all the rewards for that category, while Points "progression" in PvP does neither. Both also have a Placement scheme, which rewards players that are able to compete (in clear time/persistence in Story mode or competitive wins in Versus).

So if you're supposed to "grind" up to a certain point in Story mode before even venturing into Versus mode, what's the point of CLs? When am I "high enough" to participate in Versus mode? I'm running primarily a 2 and 3* team, reliably beating most full 3* combinations and many 3* with 4* dips, but because I'm having matches made against 5*s in Versus, there's no reward for my time investment on points. Are less than solid 4* rosters supposed to be gated from Versus mode entirely? That seems like a pretty glaring design flaw.

Crnch73

So I'm on the fence here. I have 34 champed 4s, no usable 5s yet, and all 3s champed. And yet, unless I am willing to really work at pvp (spend lots on shields, shield hop multiple times, really time my playing), I still rarely get to 900 points in the points system. I think I've hit it 7 times in 2.5 years of playing. Now, that is a "me" problem, as I want to save my hero points. But even when playing as best I can, it still is a 50-50 chance at best for me to get 900 points. My MMR has been a mess for over a year. I was coming in (in the past) with zero 4 star Champs, so I was using 3 star Champs. Not a terrible team when boosted, but I was seeing 4 and 5 star Champs, most of the 4s were boosted. I was being hit by (and forced to hit) rosters way above me, I stood no chance. Now, I fight 2 boosted 4* Champs every match, or 5 star champs, often times when I only have one boosted 4... it's still a slog. I honestly don't care about losing points and having to rebuild, but the competition and mmr makes losing points very easy and winning points really hard.

With win based? It was boring. 40 wins is ridiculous... takes super long, I was not getting hit on defense at all, since one win was not worth beating my team but needing a health pack afterwards. I got the 40 wins once, took forever, and had somewhere like 1500 points. My previous high was 925, so that's just dumb. 

They either need a middle ground, or they finally need to figure out how to fix mmr so that you are truly in a more fair fight. I'm ok if the fight is slightly tilted in the favor of the attacker... but it seems like after 800 points, it becomes a nightmare. Luckily... it's just a game and real life goes on even if the game pisses you off 

j0nats

Jwallyr said:

j0nats said:

honestly, if you got the time to slog through 40 win pvp events,  then grinding pve (i mean green checking, not tapping) would be a lot better and yield more rewards.  guaranteed 3 n  4* covers, tokens and cp easy from placement n progression

clears take a little more than an hour, one in the morning and one in the evening.

dunno why you guys need to fix something that has honestly i think been  working as intended. 

most online games (i.e wow, ragnarok, etc) require you to 'grind' and level up before tackling others in pvp.  this is the same concept being applied here.   build ur roster via pve, then try pvp when ur ready.

Is there some kind of cutoff that prevents me from doing BOTH PvE AND PvP? I've been doing Story mode (schedule permitting) about as aggressively as I possibly can since the point at which I decided to care, and I'm not sure there's any relevance beyond bringing Story mode into this discussion other than pointing out that the Progression rewards for Story mode actually 1) make sense and 2) allow a majority of participating players to conceivably earn all the rewards for that category, while Points "progression" in PvP does neither. Both also have a Placement scheme, which rewards players that are able to compete (in clear time/persistence in Story mode or competitive wins in Versus).

So if you're supposed to "grind" up to a certain point in Story mode before even venturing into Versus mode, what's the point of CLs? When am I "high enough" to participate in Versus mode? I'm running primarily a 2 and 3* team, reliably beating most full 3* combinations and many 3* with 4* dips, but because I'm having matches made against 5*s in Versus, there's no reward for my time investment on points. Are less than solid 4* rosters supposed to be gated from Versus mode entirely? That seems like a pretty glaring design flaw.

1) there is no 'cutoff'.  you can try to compete but definitely cant reasonably expect to win or go far without putting in the time and resources to build your roster (again just like any other RPG).  

2) not sure how your queing 5*s with a 2/3* roster but m pretty sure those guys arent making a lot of pts, nor are they really taking pts away from u.


3) and i would say yes, less than solid 4* rosters should definitely be gated from top level pvp (i.e 900 to 1200 range).   but i can assure you 575 is easy peasy.   which, isnt bad considering 20 cp or 2 events gives u a guaranteed 4, bring you ever closer to the said 'solid' roster.

tldr version, if you wanna play high level pvp, you gotta earn it.  those guys youre seeing with big rosters, they put in hours and hours into thiis game, some spending serious $$$.  and quite a number doing both.  theyve earned it

WelcomeDeath

OJSP said

aesthetocyst said:

He almost certainly does not mean champed 5*s. New accounts have 5* covers. My alt has four 5*s, total of 5 covers between'em! And that account sees lots of incomplete 4*s and 5*s on its qs.

They have pretty high health and of course high match damage, making them immediately useful to 2* rosters. As hamhandedly promised by the devs, in a statement that was misinterpreted by more advanced players.

I appreciate that. Just like those 2* players with a lvl 270 5* I used to hit while climbing when I was still using my 3*s or 4*s when 5*s were first introduced. So, I am aware of how they could struggle to play Versus. This is an old thread from 2015, 5* Characters effects on PVP/PVE , a couple of months after Silver Surfer and Phoenix were released.

It's used to come up as a debate: "should I keep or sell my 5*s?" and it cropped up from time to time. For some reason, the topic seems to come up a lot less often now. 

That's not a thing at all anymore.  It's been at least a year since they changed the formula for mmr. It used to be just based on levels.  Now it's still levels but it's weighted for how many covers you have, so this issue doesn't occur anymore.  They remain hidden from 4* guys as they should.

Smart80

What I don't understand is how "progression" rewards can rationally be based on a score that fluctuates up and down, with hidden equilibrium points that essentially cap the achievable rewards, or why I would want to play any more than the absolute minimum number of games with which I can feel satisfied in such a system.

/rant

you dont like playing the game?

Jwallyr

j0nats said:

tldr version, if you wanna play high level pvp, you gotta earn it.  those guys youre seeing with big rosters, they put in hours and hours into thiis game, some spending serious $$$.  and quite a number doing both.  theyve earned it

I'm not saying I wanna play "high level pvp", I'm saying I want to be successful >>in progression rewards<< (i.e. the closest thing to "casual rewards" in the lowest CLs of PvP.

I'm aware that MMR for no defensible reason is completely divorced from CL, and that apparently rewards are badly paced between the CLs as well. These are independent problems that should be fixed. They also have no bearing on whether a fluctuating points total is a rational basis for >>progression<< rewards as a less rewarding avenue for deliberately more casual players.

Like, OBVIOUSLY I'm building my roster. OBVIOUSLY I'm not expecting to be competitive at "high level" PvP. Why is it somehow bizarre or unreasonable for me to expect to be able to achieve solid progression rewards in the lowest CLs of PvP without scheduling my life around shield hopping? Placement already exists to be the intensely competitive reward scheme, so having a second "placement lite" based on points feels like a bait-and-switch.

Jwallyr

Smart80 said:

What I don't understand is how "progression" rewards can rationally be based on a score that fluctuates up and down, with hidden equilibrium points that essentially cap the achievable rewards, or why I would want to play any more than the absolute minimum number of games with which I can feel satisfied in such a system.

/rant

you dont like playing the game?

For itself? Meh, sometimes. After forcing out game after game fighting the tide of points-based progression against players who clearly seem to have much better developed rosters than me? Ha. At least with win-based progression I could strategically pick opponents based on their team composition without worrying about whether it was enough points to be worth bothering. IOW, as an alternative to worrying about placement.

WelcomeDeath

Jwallyr said:

j0nats said:

tldr version, if you wanna play high level pvp, you gotta earn it.  those guys youre seeing with big rosters, they put in hours and hours into thiis game, some spending serious $$$.  and quite a number doing both.  theyve earned it

I'm not saying I wanna play "high level pvp", I'm saying I want to be successful >>in progression rewards<< (i.e. the closest thing to "casual rewards" in the lowest CLs of PvP.

I'm aware that MMR for no defensible reason is completely divorced from CL, and that apparently rewards are badly paced between the CLs as well. These are independent problems that should be fixed. They also have no bearing on whether a fluctuating points total is a rational basis for >>progression<< rewards as a less rewarding avenue for deliberately more casual players.

Like, OBVIOUSLY I'm building my roster. OBVIOUSLY I'm not expecting to be competitive at "high level" PvP. Why is it somehow bizarre or unreasonable for me to expect to be able to achieve solid progression rewards in the lowest CLs of PvP without scheduling my life around shield hopping? Placement already exists to be the intensely competitive reward scheme, so having a second "placement lite" based on points feels like a bait-and-switch.

I have stated elsewhere, progression should be static in pvp.  Same rewards cl1-cl8.  Only placement should differ.  Its already that way in sim.  Cl should just decide the placement rewards you get.  It doesnt make sense otherwise.

bluewolf

Welcome Death said:

Jwallyr said:

j0nats said:

tldr version, if you wanna play high level pvp, you gotta earn it.  those guys youre seeing with big rosters, they put in hours and hours into thiis game, some spending serious $$$.  and quite a number doing both.  theyve earned it

I'm not saying I wanna play "high level pvp", I'm saying I want to be successful >>in progression rewards<< (i.e. the closest thing to "casual rewards" in the lowest CLs of PvP.

I'm aware that MMR for no defensible reason is completely divorced from CL, and that apparently rewards are badly paced between the CLs as well. These are independent problems that should be fixed. They also have no bearing on whether a fluctuating points total is a rational basis for >>progression<< rewards as a less rewarding avenue for deliberately more casual players.

Like, OBVIOUSLY I'm building my roster. OBVIOUSLY I'm not expecting to be competitive at "high level" PvP. Why is it somehow bizarre or unreasonable for me to expect to be able to achieve solid progression rewards in the lowest CLs of PvP without scheduling my life around shield hopping? Placement already exists to be the intensely competitive reward scheme, so having a second "placement lite" based on points feels like a bait-and-switch.

I have stated elsewhere, progression should be static in pvp.  Same rewards cl1-cl8.  Only placement should differ.  Its already that way in sim.  Cl should just decide the placement rewards you get.  It doesnt make sense otherwise.

It would make sense that rewards differ if the score targets differed. Ex:  SCL 2 gives out 2*s, but max progression is 350 or whatever.  (I admit to not being familiar with the SCL 2 rewards).  Obviously that is not our system. But that would at least be somewhat logical.  And I realize:  programming effort would be needed.  But it would seem fairer.