Should CL10 pve be renamed CL Thorokoye?

SnowcaTT

HoundofShadow said:

I think he feels that lower level rosters shouldn't beat higher rosters in terms of speed clearing PvEs. Generally speaking, this is true if we look at all the available 5*.

However, out of 43 5* characters, up to 3 stands out: Okoye, iHulk and Apocalypse. I think they defy the belief where "level is everything". Besides level, skills and synergies play some part too. Even though it is a match-3 game, for challenging matches, what tiles to match require a little bit of skills.

Stand out where....PVE? Because Thanos is a CL9 stand-out, and Thor is a CL10 stand-out.

PVP? Because Okoye (before iHulk) was fading away quickly.

The other two are basically too new to know for sure. I only see iHulk with Okoye currently, I assume we'll see him with Apocalypse but again...too early to know.

I've argued Grunth's point forever: why are little tiny 5*'s beating my larger ones. I have 550 Okoye, and 450 Kitty was beating me in PVP, now 450 BRB beats me in PVP. Hopefully some day I'll have an Okoye partner that will help me out. It's a bit early to know, but maybe one is coming!

I've also seen small kitty's beating me when it was cl9 PVE: I have a hard time understanding how Kitty at the very least (and BRB/PX as well) are not on your list of stand-outs.

If "any" large 5* should beat "any" small 5* in PVE, some of them 5*'s will need huge skill boosts - Banner and Wasp and Carol and others I never ever fire their abilities.

Or perhaps CL-10 PVE difficulty could be yanked way down (allowing for 'not the best/fastest' teams to compete) and perhaps the 5* essential could have a God-Boost for PVE: it would allow rosters like Grunth's to use their deep bench of high-level characters, and it should allow him to speed through PVE faster than those with just a few big 5*'s (like myself) or those with the 'right' small 5*'s.

PiMacleod

....yuck, i can't believe I'm doing this... but here I go...

Saying one character at a level much lower than the other shouldn't win in the fight, is the SAME argument people have about Bishop (a 4*) greatly hampering their 5* play.

This is the same argument -- the only difference is the characters and levels being mentioned are higher.  You MIGHT be able to argue that this higher-level/tier argument also (probably) includes more spent RL cash... but I don't think that should be a factor, personally.  That's a choice of the player to do, whereas the characters/powers/power creep/etc are a choice made by the devs.

Not saying I support one argument over the other, mind you.  I personally hate that Bishop always makes me stop and think "okay, well, I can't use THAT entire set of people... gotta build around that ONE enemy", so you might figure where my allegiance lies there.  But I digress -- I just move on, and keep playing the cards I'm dealt.

HoundofShadow

Oops. I could have made the context clearer. The context is about clearing quickly in PvE SCL 10.

I didn't include Thor because this guy is in his own tier and most would have already known the awesomeness of Thor. 

As for Okoye, she's able to make most characters even better in their own ways. It's just that her default partner has been Thor for a long time due to their synergy and speed of clearing nodes. Most other 5* characters have limited partners or don't have the kind of partner coverage that Okoye has.

I didn't know you and Grunth have been debating this way back. 

I think it's difficult to solve this challenge that he has. I would say that I have no issue with teams with great synergy beating higher level teams faster. I guess I'm conditioned to seeing this kind of stuff growing up.

bluewolf

Vhailorx said:

grunth13 said:

HoundofShadow said:

I saw this somewhere before but I don't know how true it is: for players who get covers of 5* characters who are already at 550, they can swap it for other covers or their choice. If it is true, maybe he can wait for those special Legend stores where it features those 550 characters that he has to re-build a baby championed Thor. If not, he can see which support he can use to help Okoye tanks more colour(s) over Thor.

I don't think Okoye will get nerfed even though she is powerful, and she gets even more OP because of Thor. Over the history of MPQ, free ap generation is considered a broken ability, and 5 free ap per turn plus potential matches from tile destruction is OP. But, nerf either one and we'll have havoc again.

Only if it's in the latest... because i have 11 550s, every cover I get for them need to be used in a dupe.  Also,  levels should matter no matter when the character was came out.   A 460 level should not beat a 550 level.   It shouldn't be preferred.   Maybe 1 out of 10 times,  not 9 out of 10.  That's what I'm saying.   And it's not like I don't have newer characters at 550.  Hell,  I have px, storm,  kitty,  iceman and hela.   All of them came way after okoye, but none of them are in the same boat as okoye for cl10 pve, even when they are 90 levels higher. 

You say a 460 should not be a 550.  But context matters. we all regularly best level 650 opponents with < 500 teams in pve.  Some do it with 4* rosters. 

Clearly there is more in play here than raw levels.  Personally I think the problem with cl10 is that there are so few good damage boosters in the game.  Basically just okoye, kitty (+ strikes), and a few less practical options (DD purple etc).  Pre-apoc, no level 450 character could really come close to 50k damage with a single cast, and even apoc needs a little prep work to drop an 80k black or 50k red. So for cl10, where opponents can get to 300+k health, is no approprié that the efficient damage boosters play up.

Poccy's black doesn't get to 80k.  At least not at 450.

His black procs as match dmg and the yellow won't help him.  Also, the yellows don't stack (just one single boost of 8784 with 5 covers for a 450 - 5856 at 3 yellow - although 5 red and 5 black seem like the way to go for me, I dunno.)

He WILL get to 46188 at 450 with 4 protects out.

Running him 5/5/3 will give 27,526 with a repeater out.

Vhailorx

grunth13 said:

Vhailorx said:

grunth13 said:

HoundofShadow said:

I saw this somewhere before but I don't know how true it is: for players who get covers of 5* characters who are already at 550, they can swap it for other covers or their choice. If it is true, maybe he can wait for those special Legend stores where it features those 550 characters that he has to re-build a baby championed Thor. If not, he can see which support he can use to help Okoye tanks more colour(s) over Thor.

I don't think Okoye will get nerfed even though she is powerful, and she gets even more OP because of Thor. Over the history of MPQ, free ap generation is considered a broken ability, and 5 free ap per turn plus potential matches from tile destruction is OP. But, nerf either one and we'll have havoc again.

Only if it's in the latest... because i have 11 550s, every cover I get for them need to be used in a dupe.  Also,  levels should matter no matter when the character was came out.   A 460 level should not beat a 550 level.   It shouldn't be preferred.   Maybe 1 out of 10 times,  not 9 out of 10.  That's what I'm saying.   And it's not like I don't have newer characters at 550.  Hell,  I have px, storm,  kitty,  iceman and hela.   All of them came way after okoye, but none of them are in the same boat as okoye for cl10 pve, even when they are 90 levels higher. 

You say a 460 should not be a 550.  But context matters. we all regularly best level 650 opponents with < 500 teams in pve.  Some do it with 4* rosters. 

Clearly there is more in play here than raw levels.  Personally I think the problem with cl10 is that there are so few good damage boosters in the game.  Basically just okoye, kitty (+ strikes), and a few less practical options (DD purple etc).  Pre-apoc, no level 450 character could really come close to 50k damage with a single cast, and even apoc needs a little prep work to drop an 80k black or 50k red. So for cl10, where opponents can get to 300+k health, is no approprié that the efficient damage boosters play up.

You are right,  I do it regularly beat an ai team with my 550s vs 650s, but the 460s are beating that same 650 team faster.   As for 4 stars beating it,  yes,  there are gimmick teams and i have those too, but those guys aren't finishing faster than a 650.  The point isn't if they should beat the ai, but if a 460 roster should be faster than a 550 roster against the same team because their okoye was larger than their thor.   Remember,  thor came out first,  i 550d him over a year before okoye came out. That automatically makes my thor okoye incompatible until i get my okoye close to 550.  As for everyone that says i should just make a dupe thor... we have already hashed on these forums how crazy the luck would have to be for me to pull 13 thor in perfect color distribution. 

(1) thor came out ~November of 2017, tied to Ragnarok. Okoye was tied to BP and came out ~March of 2018 (she was the third tie in for that movie, after shuri and from bp).  No one had him at 550 a year before okoye released.  I think they were only 1 5* release away from being in the same LT pool for 6 weeks (it was thor --> archangel --> JJ --> okoye, right?).

(2) it's not 460s clearing cl10 faster than 550s.  It's very specific characters clearing faster than other characters.  Some characters are better at certain things than others.  And cl 10 definitely emphasizes efficient damage output, which is why okoye and kitty dominate there.  It is definitely a problem for certain players that sub-500 okoyes are better for cl10 than, say, 550 Carnages. But I think it would only be a game-wide problem if a 460 okoye were faster than a 550 okoye (ie the bad old days of softcapping).  I do think the game needs to offer players more, better ways to boost damage up to the levels needed for cl10.  That would mitigate the problem of kitty/okoye dominating high end pve so much (gamora would still be dominant however).

(3) You don't need 13 perfectly-distributed Thor covers.  For purposes of fast clearing pve you just need 2500 Thor shards.  That's ~835 LT pulls, less bonus shards, direct $ or HP purchases, and event rewards.  It will likely take you until 2021 (unless you already have a 300 pull hoard you are about to drop on apocalypse), but it's not nearly as daunting a task as it would have been at this time last year.

Pongie

HoundofShadow said:

Oops. I could have made the context clearer. The context is about clearing quickly in PvE SCL 10.

I didn't include Thor because this guy is in his own tier and most would have already known the awesomeness of Thor. 

As for Okoye, she's able to make most characters even better in their own ways. It's just that her default partner has been Thor for a long time due to their synergy and speed of clearing nodes. Most other 5* characters have limited partners or don't have the kind of partner coverage that Okoye has.

I didn't know you and Grunth have been debating this way back. 

I think it's difficult to solve this challenge that he has. I would say that I have no issue with teams with great synergy beating higher level teams faster. I guess I'm conditioned to seeing this kind of stuff growing up.

Seriously consider ihulk as okoye new partner for pve. Mine is only 2/1/5 and already is a beast. He’s just as fast as thanos through the easy nodes, 1 match team up and next turn there’s always enough green to trigger aoe for the win. For other nodes, if against goons, can bring in dr strange. If not bring rhulk (is also boosted this event), generates green and provide another source of aoe without even collecting green (can chase purple if no teamups or yellow). Can’t imagine how quick ihulk will be with okoye at 550, mine is only 455.

Vins2

Vhailorx said:

(1) thor came out ~November of 2017, tied to Ragnarok. Okoye was tied to BP and came out ~March of 2018 (she was the third time in for that movie, after shuri and from bp).  No one had him at 550 a year before okoye released.  I think they were only 1 5* release away from being in the same LT pool for 6 weeks (it was thor --> archangel --> JJ --> okoye, right?).

Off the top of my head, Ghostrider was in there too.  But having a 550 thor for a YEAR before Okoye came out doesn't math out. 

HoundofShadow

I fought that team a few times in Shield Simulator and it's difficult not to eat his AOE a few times, unless I bring Quake or BRB to reduce the damage taken.

At level 550, it's 2856 per team up ap. You get extra 85680 damage at 30ap. I would imagine them blazing through the challenge nodes, even at 10-15 teamup ap. 

DeNappa

grunth13 said:

HoundofShadow said:

I saw this somewhere before but I don't know how true it is: for players who get covers of 5* characters who are already at 550, they can swap it for other covers or their choice. If it is true, maybe he can wait for those special Legend stores where it features those 550 characters that he has to re-build a baby championed Thor. If not, he can see which support he can use to help Okoye tanks more colour(s) over Thor.

I don't think Okoye will get nerfed even though she is powerful, and she gets even more OP because of Thor. Over the history of MPQ, free ap generation is considered a broken ability, and 5 free ap per turn plus potential matches from tile destruction is OP. But, nerf either one and we'll have havoc again.

Only if it's in the latest... because i have 11 550s, every cover I get for them need to be used in a dupe.  Also,  levels should matter no matter when the character was came out.   A 460 level should not beat a 550 level.   It shouldn't be preferred.   Maybe 1 out of 10 times,  not 9 out of 10.  That's what I'm saying.   And it's not like I don't have newer characters at 550.  Hell,  I have px, storm,  kitty,  iceman and hela.   All of them came way after okoye, but none of them are in the same boat as okoye for cl10 pve, even when they are 90 levels higher. 

(emphasis mine) 

I disagree. That is where strategy / tactics come in play. The 5* champs I have are in the baby champ range (highest around lvl 460 probably). Should I be losing 9 out of 10 matches when I play SCL10 PVE nodes because the enemy team is scaled up to level 650?

grunth13

DeNappa said:

grunth13 said:

HoundofShadow said:

I saw this somewhere before but I don't know how true it is: for players who get covers of 5* characters who are already at 550, they can swap it for other covers or their choice. If it is true, maybe he can wait for those special Legend stores where it features those 550 characters that he has to re-build a baby championed Thor. If not, he can see which support he can use to help Okoye tanks more colour(s) over Thor.

I don't think Okoye will get nerfed even though she is powerful, and she gets even more OP because of Thor. Over the history of MPQ, free ap generation is considered a broken ability, and 5 free ap per turn plus potential matches from tile destruction is OP. But, nerf either one and we'll have havoc again.

Only if it's in the latest... because i have 11 550s, every cover I get for them need to be used in a dupe.  Also,  levels should matter no matter when the character was came out.   A 460 level should not beat a 550 level.   It shouldn't be preferred.   Maybe 1 out of 10 times,  not 9 out of 10.  That's what I'm saying.   And it's not like I don't have newer characters at 550.  Hell,  I have px, storm,  kitty,  iceman and hela.   All of them came way after okoye, but none of them are in the same boat as okoye for cl10 pve, even when they are 90 levels higher. 

(emphasis mine) 

I disagree. That is where strategy / tactics come in play. The 5* champs I have are in the baby champ range (highest around lvl 460 probably). Should I be losing 9 out of 10 matches when I play SCL10 PVE nodes because the enemy team is scaled up to level 650?

I said you should not be beating my time 9 out of 10 times,  i don't care if you beat the enemy.   If all I needed was a 460 okoye and 450 thor,  then having the diversity of my roster means nothing in pve.

Dogface

I'm surprised that you hadn't already figured that out. Diversity means nothing, having the meta does. Though the meta might shift somewhat depending on the enemies you face. 

Mayo

A good placed bw1 stun and i see many confident meta teams fall pretty fast (at least at my level) . Can a lower level player be able to beat a highest level meta rival team? Yes, if the ai can why not another player? What a boring game would be to just brute force wins by maxing up meta characters.

Cheers! 

DeNappa

grunth13 said:

DeNappa said:

grunth13 said:

HoundofShadow said:

I saw this somewhere before but I don't know how true it is: for players who get covers of 5* characters who are already at 550, they can swap it for other covers or their choice. If it is true, maybe he can wait for those special Legend stores where it features those 550 characters that he has to re-build a baby championed Thor. If not, he can see which support he can use to help Okoye tanks more colour(s) over Thor.

I don't think Okoye will get nerfed even though she is powerful, and she gets even more OP because of Thor. Over the history of MPQ, free ap generation is considered a broken ability, and 5 free ap per turn plus potential matches from tile destruction is OP. But, nerf either one and we'll have havoc again.

Only if it's in the latest... because i have 11 550s, every cover I get for them need to be used in a dupe.  Also,  levels should matter no matter when the character was came out.   A 460 level should not beat a 550 level.   It shouldn't be preferred.   Maybe 1 out of 10 times,  not 9 out of 10.  That's what I'm saying.   And it's not like I don't have newer characters at 550.  Hell,  I have px, storm,  kitty,  iceman and hela.   All of them came way after okoye, but none of them are in the same boat as okoye for cl10 pve, even when they are 90 levels higher. 

(emphasis mine) 

I disagree. That is where strategy / tactics come in play. The 5* champs I have are in the baby champ range (highest around lvl 460 probably). Should I be losing 9 out of 10 matches when I play SCL10 PVE nodes because the enemy team is scaled up to level 650?

I said you should not be beating my time 9 out of 10 times,  i don't care if you beat the enemy.   If all I needed was a 460 okoye and 450 thor,  then having the diversity of my roster means nothing in pve.

Oh, I think I misunderstood. I thought you were talking about the matches itself. Thanks for clarifying.

Vhailorx

grunth13 said:

DeNappa said:

grunth13 said:

HoundofShadow said:

I saw this somewhere before but I don't know how true it is: for players who get covers of 5* characters who are already at 550, they can swap it for other covers or their choice. If it is true, maybe he can wait for those special Legend stores where it features those 550 characters that he has to re-build a baby championed Thor. If not, he can see which support he can use to help Okoye tanks more colour(s) over Thor.

I don't think Okoye will get nerfed even though she is powerful, and she gets even more OP because of Thor. Over the history of MPQ, free ap generation is considered a broken ability, and 5 free ap per turn plus potential matches from tile destruction is OP. But, nerf either one and we'll have havoc again.

Only if it's in the latest... because i have 11 550s, every cover I get for them need to be used in a dupe.  Also,  levels should matter no matter when the character was came out.   A 460 level should not beat a 550 level.   It shouldn't be preferred.   Maybe 1 out of 10 times,  not 9 out of 10.  That's what I'm saying.   And it's not like I don't have newer characters at 550.  Hell,  I have px, storm,  kitty,  iceman and hela.   All of them came way after okoye, but none of them are in the same boat as okoye for cl10 pve, even when they are 90 levels higher. 

(emphasis mine) 

I disagree. That is where strategy / tactics come in play. The 5* champs I have are in the baby champ range (highest around lvl 460 probably). Should I be losing 9 out of 10 matches when I play SCL10 PVE nodes because the enemy team is scaled up to level 650?

I said you should not be beating my time 9 out of 10 times,  i don't care if you beat the enemy.   If all I needed was a 460 okoye and 450 thor,  then having the diversity of my roster means nothing in pve.

Umm, welcome to MPQ.  It's been that way since about October 2013.  I don't mean to be rude, but having the best characters has basically always been essential for top pve/PVP performance in mpq.  I'm just a little surprised to see a LONG time vet like you caught so flat-footed by that fact, grunth.

If roster diversity mattered, then demi wouldn't have to force it with essential nodes, featured PVP events, and weekly boost lists. . .

HoundofShadow

The only way I see that happening is these five characters get nerfed or get locked out in PvEs:

Thor, Okoye, Kitty, iHulk and Apocalypse.

Since it's virtually impossible for that to happen, you have to accept that this is the reality of what meta means: Most Effective Tactics Available. 

fight4thedream

HoundofShadow said:

The only way I see that happening is these five characters get nerfed or get locked out in PvEs:

Thor, Okoye, Kitty, iHulk and Apocalypse.

Since it's virtually impossible for that to happen, you have to accept that this is the reality of what meta means: Most Effective Tactics Available. 

No, you are mistaking the symptoms for the actual problem. Nerf them, and players will simply move on to whoever else is most efficient. (For CL10, most likely Jessica Jones, Hawkeye and Worthy Cap would become the go-to team or some similar variation).

The actual problem is that for almost all battles the win conditions are the same: down the enemy team as quickly as possible through battle damage. The notable exception being the battle with Kaecilius and none of those you listed except maybe Thor are good options in that battle.

So the solution is pretty clear: diversify the win criteria for battles. 

Have win conditions that require stunning the enemy team to win or your characters have to be invisible in order to inflict damage. Have challenges that simply require your team survive 10 rounds, emphasizing defensive tactics. Or simply AP race challenges, where your team has to collect 30 blue AP faster than the enemy team. 

By doing this, it gives value to characters whose skill set is not focused on damage or damage boosting. 

Now obviously, that is easier said than done but it's not impossible to implement. For example, the Kaecilius battle is now featured in the Lost in Time event as a normal battle node so there is precedence for unique challenges in PvE.  If they ever do try to expand the win criteria they will have to be careful about how many clears are necessary as I imagine some would take a lot more time than your typical battle. 

But I think it would go a long way to reward rosters with greater depth and add value to characters who are not considered meta.  

Vhailorx

I agree with fight4.  The dominance is certain teams is a symptom, not the actual problem.  If we didn't have to grind 50+ matches a day as fast as possible on schedule, then the fastest damage output would not be the only viable option

Kaecilius, boss apocalypse, boss Doc oc, and boss venom are basically the only matches in mpq right now with modified win conditions.  More specialized mechanics like that would promote diversity. Of course, if you only add special mechanics or otherwise make matches longer, but still require many dozens of matches a day, you will just make the quality of life worse for everyone (see the general qol frustration with cl10).

HoundofShadow

I agree with implementing different kind of win conditions and it'd be fun. I'm not sure if anyone remembers the contest held in the forum a couple of years back that involves getting the most points by placing critical tiles and special tiles etc.

I think the main concern of his is that players with lower level roster shouldn't be clearing PvEs faster than him. His 550 characters have been beaten by level >460 Thorokoye. While that suggestion will allow character usage diversity, I don't think it will solve his concern. That's where the suggestion of nerfing those 5 characters comes from. Without those 5 characters, 460-500 rosters are less likely to beat his 550 rosters.

I think that suggestion is more likely to be implemented in a new non-timed event, because I don't think they are going to revamp the entire mechanics of normal PvEs. 

Vhailorx

HoundofShadow said:

I agree with implementing different kind of win conditions and it'd be fun. I'm not sure if anyone remembers the contest held in the forum a couple of years back that involves getting the most points by placing critical tiles and special tiles etc.

I think the main concern of his is that players with lower level roster shouldn't be clearing PvEs faster than him. His 550 characters have been beaten by level >460 Thorokoye. While that suggestion will allow character usage diversity, I don't think it will solve his concern. That's where the suggestion of nerfing those 5 characters comes from. Without those 5 characters, 460-500 rosters are less likely to beat his 550 rosters.

I think that suggestion is more likely to be implemented in a new non-timed event, because I don't think they are going to revamp the entire mechanics of normal PvEs. 

But there will always be a fastest option, no matter how many characters get nerfed.  And so long as top placement requires speed, having the fastest option will always be superior to having suboptimal characters at max level.  Nerfing okoye may fix grunth's specific problem, but it would just screw over someone else with a different roster configuration and the underlying problem would remain. 

In this particular instance, I don't think demi will or even should do anything.  It sucks for grunth that s/he invested so heavily in Thor and not in okoye. But that is an extremely edge case.  There may not even be 10 other players in the game with problem because most people with 500+ Thors also have 500+ okoyes.  Grunth's roster has always been a suboptimal resource allocation because thorkoye is a meta team if okoye can tank, but pre-cl10 it didn't matter so much.  Now it does matter, and that is certainly not a lot of fun.  But mpq is designed around profiting from players who make suboptimal resource decisions; it's literally part of the business model. 

IMO the 'right' solution is to shake up the underlying design of pve scoring.  But that's easy for me to say, as I don't have to pay for dev resources. . .

grunth13

Vhailorx said:

grunth13 said:

DeNappa said:

grunth13 said:

HoundofShadow said:

I saw this somewhere before but I don't know how true it is: for players who get covers of 5* characters who are already at 550, they can swap it for other covers or their choice. If it is true, maybe he can wait for those special Legend stores where it features those 550 characters that he has to re-build a baby championed Thor. If not, he can see which support he can use to help Okoye tanks more colour(s) over Thor.

I don't think Okoye will get nerfed even though she is powerful, and she gets even more OP because of Thor. Over the history of MPQ, free ap generation is considered a broken ability, and 5 free ap per turn plus potential matches from tile destruction is OP. But, nerf either one and we'll have havoc again.

Only if it's in the latest... because i have 11 550s, every cover I get for them need to be used in a dupe.  Also,  levels should matter no matter when the character was came out.   A 460 level should not beat a 550 level.   It shouldn't be preferred.   Maybe 1 out of 10 times,  not 9 out of 10.  That's what I'm saying.   And it's not like I don't have newer characters at 550.  Hell,  I have px, storm,  kitty,  iceman and hela.   All of them came way after okoye, but none of them are in the same boat as okoye for cl10 pve, even when they are 90 levels higher. 

(emphasis mine) 

I disagree. That is where strategy / tactics come in play. The 5* champs I have are in the baby champ range (highest around lvl 460 probably). Should I be losing 9 out of 10 matches when I play SCL10 PVE nodes because the enemy team is scaled up to level 650?

I said you should not be beating my time 9 out of 10 times,  i don't care if you beat the enemy.   If all I needed was a 460 okoye and 450 thor,  then having the diversity of my roster means nothing in pve.

Umm, welcome to MPQ.  It's been that way since about October 2013.  I don't mean to be rude, but having the best characters has basically always been essential for top pve/PVP performance in mpq.  I'm just a little surprised to see a LONG time vet like you caught so flat-footed by that fact, grunth.

If roster diversity mattered, then demi wouldn't have to force it with essential nodes, featured PVP events, and weekly boost lists. . .

Flat footed?  Cl10 just came out.   Okoye has been out forever.   Cl9 was a thanos/fodder game for which I have him at 550 for that specific reason.   They sprung cl10 with no warning and made a character that's been in classics for a very long time almost essential for top placement.   That's not flat footed,  that's having the rug pulled out from under me.