Meet Broken Circle Studios - Developer Blog (6/2/22)

teky

Change can be a beautiful thing, just don’t let greed become a factor which becomes the death of so many things that have had a good thing going. Everybody deserves a chance tho and from what it sounds like, it seems possible to be even something greater! GODSPEED ^_~ 

Seph1roth5

Maybe if we're going to get a flood of 3*s, group them up.  So if we get say...a new 3* (one of thanos' goons), for the deadpool or pve where they're required, let us be able to use 3* thanos or the new guy/gal.

Would be a negligible change for people who have everything, and would help mix it up a bit.  Instead of required Iron Man 3*, just team cap!

fight4thedream

ThaRoadWarrior said:

fight4thedream said:

Hello James,

[...]

Finally, if I may ask one more question, will the reintroduction of 3* characters mean they will be variants of the new 5* release or a totally separate character?  For example, when 5* Dr. Strange was released they also released a 3* version of him. Ideally, for the sake of variety, I hope they will be separate characters but thematically relevant to each other.  For example, a 5* Spiral co-released with a 3* Longshot.  

[...]
A true believer,
fight4thedream

In the twilight days of 3* releases when we were seeing 3/5 concurrents before, I seem to recall the rationale given was that they wanted young rosters to have access to the characters they liked also, which is why they were the same character at different tiers, and some of the 5*s at that time like Doc Ock seemed to be "catch up" versions. I'm curious also if that is still the driver for this decision.

While that certainly was the reason given at the time, I am hoping the new dev team will take a different approach.  As it is, a lot of players have already voiced their displeasure at this change; making a 3* copy of a 5* character certainly won't help their case. It will only add to the list of complaints against the change. For starters, the 3* version's PvP event will lock out the 5* version which certainly won't appeal to players who take the time to acquire the 5* version of the character.  Furthermore, the power set of such pairs tends to be very similar. I won't deny there are some significant differences despite the similarities among a few of these pairs, but I think there are better ways to implement the return of 3* characters. 

Setting aside the slot price issue and token dilution problems this change will cause (both important issues), in terms of gameplay and design the dev team should be focused on how to make 3* relevant to players at all levels of play.  This is perhaps most difficult for players who run mainly 5* teams since most 5* characters can crush 3* level characters without breaking a sweat. This is why I think if they are going to do a simultaneous release of 5* and 3* characters, it would be best for them to do something thematically interesting.

What I mean is the 5* and 3* characters should be thematically linked as allies, teammates or enemies.  Thematic allies and teammates would have abilities that complement each other while enemies would actually hinder one or the other.

For example:

Allies: 5* Nova and 3* Darkhawk released together
5* Nova (Richard Rider)  --------------> 3* Darkhawk (Christoper Powell) 
Red/Yellow/Black                                            Black/Purple/Blue

I won't go into a full power breakdown but let's imagine 5* Nova powers work best with strike tiles on the board. 3* Darkhawk has a passive that creates 2 strike tiles when an enemy takes 800 damage and another passive that generates black AP when there are 5 or more strike tiles on the board. 

Enemies: 5* Omega Red  and 3* Agent Zero released together
5* Omega Red (Classic)  --------> 3* Agent Zero (Christoph Nord)
Red/Black/Blue                                 Yellow/Purple/Black

Let's assume Omega Red has a self-healing ability that absorbs an enemies HP. Agent Zero has a cheap 3 AP Yellow ability "Corrosive Blast" that reverses the healing ability of a target. Once hit, the target enemy character's healing ability does damage to the character instead of heals. 

Hopefully you get the idea.

I think if they are going to bring back 3*, it should be with an eye on how they can help support and flesh out variety in play at all tier levels.  There are still many characters a lot of players would love to see, so I think it would be best to not simply provide another version of the same character as they did previously with Dr. Strange, Gambit and Archangel.

I would be happy to see Shocker, Boomerang, Night Thrasher, Toad, White Rabbit, Eye-boy and so on in the game and I am hoping this pivot to 3*s will help make that happen. 

HoundofShadow

I think one of the reasons for their bringing of 3*/5* back is probably due to casual players complaining about how it's "impossible" to acquire 5* or even 4* characters.  Doing this could alleviate some "pain" for this group of players. I suppose casual players are likely to spend more consistently compared to veteran players. I mean, based on what I see so far, a lot of cash deals don't appeal to veteran players, especially those min-max resources type, or they expect a lot more resources for $20-$30 cash deal compared to younger/casual players. While this could also make this group of players happier, veteran players became unhappier due to roster slot costs. Maybe the team can add HP to shield ranking (beginning from SR 150(?)to defray the cost of additional HPs and then let the players get used to 6000 hp a month. 

Logically, if the dev decides to reduce roster slot cost, they have to get back their "losses" from somewhere else. It could be a reduction of resources or more covers for players.

Chipster22

Maybe have a special introducing event featuring the new 3* and 5* pair with loaners available which allows a player to earn 2k HP?

KGB

HoundofShadow said:

I think one of the reasons for their bringing of 3*/5* back is probably due to casual players complaining about how it's "impossible" to acquire 5* or even 4* characters.

I think it's even simpler than that. Imagine you are a new player to the game and you realize all the new content (4/5*) is only for end game play. There has been nothing new released in the 1/2/3* realm for about 3 years now so new players probably wonder why they are being asked to play with stale characters for a year (or more) before they get to start enjoying new content (about the time they can reasonable cover newly released characters).

Not only that, but so many mechanics have been added to the game in the last 4 years that when you go back and play with 3* characters (Deadpool Daily) you realize how it's lacking characters with those mechanics.

KGB

BriMan2222

The complaints about adding more 3* are vocal here because most of the players who visit the forums are long time players who are in 5 star or 4 star land.  On the flip side when I see posts by the MPQ facebook page one of the most common comments every time they announce a new character is "when are you gonna release a new 3 star?" and on the fb fan pages one of the most common questions new players ask is "are they ever gonna make more 3 stars?"

I think there is a demand by players for new 3 stars, just not here on this forum.

DAZ0273

I have also seen the above on other platforms. What they need to do though is make sure that newly released 3* are good - Dr. Strange/Thanos levels of good. I remember when Strange was released and although I had no chance of getting 5* Strange, 3* Strange was exciting enough to chase. There is also no reasonn they can't do thematically linked 3* based on 4* as they did with 5*DD and 3* Elektra, rather than just an exact 5/3 copy.

HoundofShadow

I saw this request a few times in both forums and it's new players who requested this and veterans being strongly against this. I think they probably have to pay for IP of more unique characters. If both characters are the same, the cost probably isn't too much.


 
Hopefully, the new team isn't here to do a hit and run because it looks like they are going full steam on monetising MPQ. What they wrote triggered all my doggy sense. 

Srheer0

Welcome aboad. Looking forward to seeing what the game looks like September onwards

AlexR

BriMan2222 said:

The complaints about adding more 3* are vocal here because most of the players who visit the forums are long time players who are in 5 star or 4 star land.  On the flip side when I see posts by the MPQ facebook page one of the most common comments every time they announce a new character is "when are you gonna release a new 3 star?" and on the fb fan pages one of the most common questions new players ask is "are they ever gonna make more 3 stars?"

I think there is a demand by players for new 3 stars, just not here on this forum.

The thing is, adding more 3* hurts new players a lot more than it hurts veterans.

New players already need so, so, so many slots to roster the vast amount of characters in the game. Adding more 3* means that it will take them that much longer both to get into and get out of 3* land. 2-3* transition in particular is not that fun (2* not being as fun as 3* and especially 4* ), so prolonging the time it takes you to roster the 3* AND needing more roster slots for the 3* are things that will slow down progression for new players a lot. 

So while I totally get that 4/5* releases aren't exciting for new players, 3* releases are very much a double-edged sword for them too.

ThaRoadWarrior

I think the idea it "hurts" junior players is coming from the perspective that all players are interested in mechanics first regardless of character, and i would bet that isn't really true at the casual level. Even as a 5* player who will use a character I've never heard of if they are good, i still get bummed when characters i DO like (Magneto, Cable, Spider Verse Kingpin, etc) come out and are bad or just not viable. So i can sympathize with those players stuck in the 3* tier wishing they had access to Shuma Gorath or whatever.

HoundofShadow

By making a 3* version of 5*, they will feel connected to 5* land. Sometimes, it's just a psychological effect. Not every players are here to min-max and rush to 4*/5* land. The number of casual of players are many times more than min-max players. Assuming that these casual players have the same goal as veterans/min-max players are big mistake. It's very obvious that new players and veterans have different goals. 

jsmjsmjsm00

5* players in the forums always somehow know both what is best and what is wanted by 3* and otherwise casual players.

There is only one way to play the game and fun isn't a factor. 

Plus there's like 50 people participating on these forums, they are clearly the majority voice for MPQ right?

So, can yall chill out on telling the new devs how to do their job? This echo chamber of "my way is the right way" is both unwelcoming and restrictive. 

Vhailorx

Yepyep said:

Vhailorx said:

I am leery of a change this significant.  Renewed dev investment is good, but major revisions to an 8- year old economy are not trivial.  There is a lot that could go wrong,  and that is even before we consider the worst possibilities like a pure cash grab or other bad faith actions. 

More releases = more HP pressure.  And if they intend to do an aggressive balance pass,  should we also expect to see nerfs?  who is designing characters now?  I would exist some wildly high variance (both positive and negative) for new characters for the next year at least. 

I am cautiously pessimistic,  but hope to be proven wrong. 

This is absolutely the most insightful, important comment here. The potential for disaster is ... vast.  Hopefully the goal is big change, executed incrementally. [Forgive me, @Vhailorx  for the emphasis changes.]

This comment says that my own earlier comment is the most insightful and important one in the thread. So I think THIS is the most insightful and important comment I have seen so far!

Still catching up on the last couple of days of commentary, but on the whole I still find the community response overly optimistic given the scale of risk that this change seems to entail. That said, there are some decent suggestions in here that could be good fuel for the new devs (even if the specific ideas aren't practical, they still give a good sense of plain points for players).

Vhailorx

HoundofShadow said:

I strongly suspect they've already messed up/with the code. The frequency of cascades has increased considerably in pves. Something feels off.

I really, really hope this is just snark.

Vhailorx

HoundofShadow said:

I'm not sure how you interpret this:

The folks at Demiurge, Broken Circle, and D3 Go! have been working tirelessly for months to align on what’s best for the game and most importantly, its players.

It was also mentioned in reddit that Gargantos was the BCS' first boss event created.

If you think that demi, BCS, or d3 ever considered players' interests the "most important" thing about MPQ then you might need a lesson in modern capitalism. It would lbe a significant liability for any of those 3 entities to promote customer (or worker) interests above those of shareholders. Player interests matter only insofar as happy players are better for the bottom line (though customers that are too happy can also be bad for same).

HoundofShadow

I'm pro-business and I'm aware those are just marketing talks. I think the context was whether the handover was done in a rush or controlled manner.

Vhailorx

HoundofShadow said:

I'm pro-business and I'm aware those are just marketing talks. I think the context was whether the handover was done in a rush or controlled manner.

What does being pro- (or anti-) business have anything to do with this discussion. 

In the context of discussing the handover, you opined that everything had been in process for months (fwiw, I agree with that speculation), and that we had nothing to worry about because the parties had worked "tirelessly" to align the interests of game and "most importantly" the players. 

I don't see any basis to reach that second conclusion, even assuming we could agree on a definition of the game's interests, let alone declare that the handover work had been done "tirelessly."

i would not have a problem with the idea that "players' interests" (however we define them) are the most important consideration to you and me because we are players. But I think you were suggesting that demi/bcs/d3 consider players' interests to the primary consideration for all MPQ decisions and that seems patently ridiculous to me.

HoundofShadow

I'm not sure what's wrong with you but by being pro-business, it means I'm aware making profits are the more important consideration and I'm aware of all these marketing or typical business talks. Do you expect them to tell us that they are thinking about how to squeeze more money out of our wallets? 

The dev said that they have been working with D3 and Demiurge for months, not me. I'm merely pointing out what they said. I think you are overthinking. 

Basically, the question was whether the handover was made in a rush or took some time to work out. I merely quoted the entire sentence of what they said. Do you expect me to edit out 50% of what they said like this:

"The folks at Demiurge, Broken Circle, and D3 Go! have been working tirelessly for months..."