Gargantos Heroic Boss Event Impressions

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  • Eirikr56
    Eirikr56 Posts: 31 Just Dropped In
    edited June 2022
    Still get dominated by this event. Will Not get personal or alliance rewards. I have spent on this game and put time into this game and it doesn't matter. I want an apology and a guarantee this will never happen again.

    Unless you had a couple key characters champed you we are set up to fail. Boss event is the wrong time to try this little experiment. This may be the beginning of the end of the game if people making decisions don't listen.
  • Daredevil217
    Daredevil217 Posts: 3,999 Chairperson of the Boards
    HoundofShadow said:
    From now on, just make two modes for non-boss Heroic:  normal and insane (Heroic) mode. Normal gives LT and Heroic give 5* Cover. I think the ex-dev did something similar: Places of Power.

    https://forums.d3go.com/discussion/75524/new-event-places-of-power-updated-10-11-18

    If the new dev really want to make it three modes, it could give out Mighty/LT/5* Covers as the top prize.

    This should solve most of the problems like being forced to use limited characters/not being allowed to use own characters.

    The problem it won't be able to solve is:

    1) veterans/newer players who want to play normal mode but expect to get rewards from Insane/Heroic mode.

    2) Alliances who use their newer players as bargaining chips or for sympathy points. For example, they are forced to kick out the new players, or how new players are being punished because of restrictions, or how the entire alliance is being punished because they want to help new players etc.


    I believe in "You are as strong as your weakest link." and "Rome wasn't built in a day." And this is what Alliance event is all about. 
    The two game modes would fix that second point though. Make the boss hits worth the same amount of points for individual and the alliance, regardless of the difficulty chosen. Just if you choose “easy mode”, you yourself get weaker individual and alliance progression rewards. But your alliance mate who is going at it with a restricted roster gets the 5* covers for both individual and alliance rewards. But the main thing is the points on the boss are the same regardless of difficulty. Now how difficult that is to code? No idea. 

    Tarelgeth said:
    I'd love to see challenges that you have to work around.  "Select a team of six characters for use in this event - they can't be used for other things and can't use Health Packs until the event ends." "Your team can't gain purple or blue AP".  "No characters with Red powers".

    But not "here, only use these three".  That's not a puzzle to solve, that's just a, well, you've got those three, you just use them.  If you had them and they're leveled, you win.  If they weren't leveled or you didn't have them, you won't.  Not really very puzzly.
    I’ve seen this point posted elsewhere. The reality is that whatever parameters they set, people are going to find a meta and power through with it regardless. Puzzle gauntlet is the exception because the win conditions differ every match. In an event where the win conditions are the same, you’ll use your best available and spam it (no different than here). 

    When Apoc was new 4* Cyke/Jean/Wolvie were popular to meet the win conditions (Cyke gets AP/ Jean removes specials)/ Logan removes the insta kill black tiles). Once a person stumbled on this team they weren’t switching it up until something better/more efficient came along (ie just overwhelm him with nukes). Apoc is probably the most puzzley boss we have, but once you “solve the puzzle” you’re roster is kind of “locked in”. 

    Restricting the rosters are a way to mix it up and provide a bit more of a challenge/thought. Everyone is saying Agent Venom and Scorp are the “meta” of the available options and I never used either for a single match.  I heard people say Gobby was the only 5* of value this event, and though I tried him early, he was kind of dead weight so I swapped him out. For me it was Daken, Yelena and Brock. Maybe all considered “meh” but they put in work. Brock spams enemy protects has the yellow nuke. Daken is my healing tank who does most the damage via his repeaters and turning Brock’s protects into strikes. Yelena is the silent queen- suppressing AP, adding more strikes and spamming that purple. I used all three of their green abilities depending on the situation. That’s good synergy imo. 
  • Tarelgeth
    Tarelgeth Posts: 67 Match Maker
    Daredevil217 said:
    HoundofShadow said:
    From now on, just make two modes for non-boss Heroic:  normal and insane (Heroic) mode. Normal gives LT and Heroic give 5* Cover. I think the ex-dev did something similar: Places of Power.

    https://forums.d3go.com/discussion/75524/new-event-places-of-power-updated-10-11-18

    If the new dev really want to make it three modes, it could give out Mighty/LT/5* Covers as the top prize.

    This should solve most of the problems like being forced to use limited characters/not being allowed to use own characters.

    The problem it won't be able to solve is:

    1) veterans/newer players who want to play normal mode but expect to get rewards from Insane/Heroic mode.

    2) Alliances who use their newer players as bargaining chips or for sympathy points. For example, they are forced to kick out the new players, or how new players are being punished because of restrictions, or how the entire alliance is being punished because they want to help new players etc.


    I believe in "You are as strong as your weakest link." and "Rome wasn't built in a day." And this is what Alliance event is all about. 
    The two game modes would fix that second point though. Make the boss hits worth the same amount of points for individual and the alliance, regardless of the difficulty chosen. Just if you choose “easy mode”, you yourself get weaker individual and alliance progression rewards. But your alliance mate who is going at it with a restricted roster gets the 5* covers for both individual and alliance rewards. But the main thing is the points on the boss are the same regardless of difficulty. Now how difficult that is to code? No idea. 

    Tarelgeth said:
    I'd love to see challenges that you have to work around.  "Select a team of six characters for use in this event - they can't be used for other things and can't use Health Packs until the event ends." "Your team can't gain purple or blue AP".  "No characters with Red powers".

    But not "here, only use these three".  That's not a puzzle to solve, that's just a, well, you've got those three, you just use them.  If you had them and they're leveled, you win.  If they weren't leveled or you didn't have them, you won't.  Not really very puzzly.
    I’ve seen this point posted elsewhere. The reality is that whatever parameters they set, people are going to find a meta and power through with it regardless. Puzzle gauntlet is the exception because the win conditions differ every match. In an event where the win conditions are the same, you’ll use your best available and spam it (no different than here). 

    When Apoc was new 4* Cyke/Jean/Wolvie were popular to meet the win conditions (Cyke gets AP/ Jean removes specials)/ Logan removes the insta kill black tiles). Once a person stumbled on this team they weren’t switching it up until something better/more efficient came along (ie just overwhelm him with nukes). Apoc is probably the most puzzley boss we have, but once you “solve the puzzle” you’re roster is kind of “locked in”. 

    Restricting the rosters are a way to mix it up and provide a bit more of a challenge/thought. Everyone is saying Agent Venom and Scorp are the “meta” of the available options and I never used either for a single match.  I heard people say Gobby was the only 5* of value this event, and though I tried him early, he was kind of dead weight so I swapped him out. For me it was Daken, Yelena and Brock. Maybe all considered “meh” but they put in work. Brock spams enemy protects has the yellow nuke. Daken is my healing tank who does most the damage via his repeaters and turning Brock’s protects into strikes. Yelena is the silent queen- suppressing AP, adding more strikes and spamming that purple. I used all three of their green abilities depending on the situation. That’s good synergy imo. 
    Of course people are going to find the meta for that event.  The point is *finding* it, not being artificially restricted to it by a roster that offers no alternatives.
  • Bad
    Bad Posts: 3,146 Chairperson of the Boards
    We got those precious 5*s, so now I have time to try the dreaded gargantos without losing points to my team.
    At round 7 the loaners can't possibly win. I thought another boost for them would be fair, being a so restricted event, but it didn't come. So I tried with 2 loaners and the good ol' bullseye level 252 (anyone could possibly have a 3* character at level 250 isn't it).
    Round 8, 2 loaners.
    https://youtu.be/jQ4yZS8rMyY
  • Tarelgeth
    Tarelgeth Posts: 67 Match Maker
    I love it.
  • HoundofShadow
    HoundofShadow Posts: 8,004 Chairperson of the Boards
    edited June 2022
    It doesn't solve the problem of:

    PvE/Boss events are stale and need a shakeup.

    This is the shakeup players in the for-camp are looking at.

    I hope the dev implement Heroic in some of the regular pve because T1-T10 placements in scl 10 definitely need some shakeup.
  • Rod5
    Rod5 Posts: 587 Critical Contributor
    edited June 2022
    Well fwiw I thought it was fun - easier for me to say as I’ve been playing a long time and have all the old chars champed, but so long as the side nodes don’t scale ridiculously I think it’s a really positive way forward and an easy way to beat the monotony of defaulting to meta characters (which lets face it most of us do). 

    On the flip-side, I don’t think it could get much harder than dark Avengers as a Heroic theme, so understand why some have struggled. Would just encourage those to think a bit more about the battles, use appropriate supports and don’t just rely on brute force. 

    Aside from maybe Spider-verse, any other selection will give some stronger characters to use and maybe ensure a wider appeal. 
  • DAZ0273
    DAZ0273 Posts: 10,356 Chairperson of the Boards
    TheRiddler said:
    Something that I think everybody should also consider is that the opinions on this forum represent considerably less than 1% of the fan base for this game.
    You get the polarized views from both sides. The same way with reviews of products online. You see people that either loved the product or people that feel they got totally screwed.
    And perhaps everybody should try to see it from the other side.
    People with larger rosters should ask themselves how much fun they would be having if they were using loaners and 3 stars the entire event. The majority of people that play this game don't have champ 5s or the entirety of 4s champed. And not everybody complaining has a limited roster. There are people out there that have champ 5s and good 4-star rosters that just don't have Yelena, Agent Venom and Scorpion. That is what happens when you only allow 6 out of 196 characters from the 4/5 tier.
    And people with smaller/newer rosters should also understand that for long-time players its nice to see a change of pace. And that this event isn't nearly as hard for them because they have the rosters to do it.
    But that was how it was for many of us when Heroics were around originally (but without the  loaners!) People seem to be thinking that longer term players were birthed into this game with a champed 4* roster.
  • DAZ0273
    DAZ0273 Posts: 10,356 Chairperson of the Boards
    HoundofShadow said:
    From now on, just make two modes for non-boss Heroic:  normal and insane (Heroic) mode. Normal gives LT and Heroic give 5* Cover. I think the ex-dev did something similar: Places of Power.

    https://forums.d3go.com/discussion/75524/new-event-places-of-power-updated-10-11-18

    If the new dev really want to make it three modes, it could give out Mighty/LT/5* Covers as the top prize.

    This should solve most of the problems like being forced to use limited characters/not being allowed to use own characters.

    The problem it won't be able to solve is:

    1) veterans/newer players who want to play normal mode but expect to get rewards from Insane/Heroic mode.

    2) Alliances who use their newer players as bargaining chips or for sympathy points. For example, they are forced to kick out the new players, or how new players are being punished because of restrictions, or how the entire alliance is being punished because they want to help new players etc.


    I believe in "You are as strong as your weakest link." and "Rome wasn't built in a day." And this is what Alliance event is all about. 
    Oh no, Places of Power is not the example you want to use. Ha ha, the pitchforks will actually be on fire!
  • Vhailorx
    Vhailorx Posts: 6,085 Chairperson of the Boards
    Bad said:
    We got those precious 5*s, so now I have time to try the dreaded gargantos without losing points to my team.
    At round 7 the loaners can't possibly win. I thought another boost for them would be fair, being a so restricted event, but it didn't come. So I tried with 2 loaners and the good ol' bullseye level 252 (anyone could possibly have a 3* character at level 250 isn't it).
    Round 8, 2 loaners.
    https://youtu.be/jQ4yZS8rMyY

    Nice video, though I think you got a bit lucky with the board. I imagine the loaner could win, especially with good supports, but the win rate would be quite low, which is bad alliance scoring. 

    In practice, I think most rosters with filled out 3* rosters  should be able to handle the boss fights with a little luck/skill and boosts. The real problem for them will be the side nodes, which are up over level 400 by Sunday and can pose a real challenge to the wimpy 2*/3* DA lineup.

    Having scorpion makes a huge impact on the side nodes as his purple is custom built for that kind of challenge, and agent venom is great for the boss as even at a baby champ level of 270, his black when boosted will do about 1/2 of round 8 garg's health pool for just 5 ap.

    I think having those two champed is probably the dividing line between "this event was a nice change of pace, even if it was a real challenge," and "I broke my phone hurling it against a wall and don't want to think about MPQ for a month."
  • Bad
    Bad Posts: 3,146 Chairperson of the Boards
    Vhailorx said:

    Nice video, though I think you got a bit lucky with the board. I imagine the loaner could win, especially with good supports, but the win rate would be quite low, which is bad alliance scoring. 

    In practice, I think most rosters with filled out 3* rosters  should be able to handle the boss fights with a little luck/skill and boosts. The real problem for them will be the side nodes, which are up over level 400 by Sunday and can pose a real challenge to the wimpy 2*/3* DA lineup.


    To be honest, I've played a bit more with that team and the win ratio is about 60%, but even when I lost I could score more than the 70% of the points he gives on round 8, and only losing the health pack for my bullseye.
    On the side nodes the loaners could help, specially as a meat shield, and the speed needed to beat them obviously depends on the third character you use. There are no miracles, a good champed 4* like scorpion or agent venom effectively will speed up the process.
    Still if they don't escalate as they will do on 3 hours I think it's quite doable.

    But the important thing from my pov is that any type of roster had it's chance on this event.
  • jredd
    jredd Posts: 1,387 Chairperson of the Boards
    edited June 2022
    i have yelena, daken and goblin champed so i just rode them the whole way. i could see how it'd be frustrating though. not related to this event specifically, but this game was stale as you know what. at least things are happening to change it up, even if they are not executed ideally. 

    PS: it was pretty cool that they adjusted things mid event though. the new guys are already coming up milhouse in my books.
  • Theghouse
    Theghouse Posts: 349 Mover and Shaker
    HoundofShadow said:
    It doesn't solve the problem of:

    PvE/Boss events are stale and need a shakeup.

    This is the shakeup players in the for-camp are looking at.

    I hope the dev implement Heroic in some of the regular pve because T1-T10 placements in scl 10 definitely need some shakeup.
    How does it not solve that problem?  I don't understand mindsets like yours.  

    You've asking the devs to change the game so that you can get more of a challenge and use more of your roster because you say "the events are stale". You realize that you could have, at any point in time, limited yourself to using only this subset or any other subset of characters to use more of your characters and give yourself more of a challenge then using metas.  So what have you done for every boss event prior to this? Used your metas to fly through the event, and then come to the forum to complain that the events are not letting you use more of your roster or providing more of a challenge?

    You don't want to use more of your roster just because you are interested in using more of your roster. Of course the ability to use more of your roster already exists by simply selecting DIFFERENT CHARACTERS of your own free will.  Especially on boss events, there is absolutely no drawback to using as much of your "unused" roster as you fancy because you are literally competing with no one else.  So how did this heroic style remove any "stale"-ness to a boss event that you did not already have the ability to do yourself?

    But the last line of your comment says it all.

    You want your approach to the game, champing each character regardless of their utility level in PVE or PVP strategy, to reward you more than those who have taken competitive approaches to the game that you have decided not to take.

    And it's the same conversation that was had over in the boosted 5* PVP thread.  You love the boost because it gives you "more variety".  Of course you could have been using your own selection of characters all along.  But you don't just want to use your unused characters. The boost allows you to use those unused characters, elevated to ridiculous levels, to trivially defeat even meta unboosted teams with a 120+ level advantage.  If you wanted to use more of your roster but still have a challenge, I suggested boosted 5* levels affect MMR.  Of course the boost levels would still allow you to have 20+ levels advantage on unboosted 550s.  But you and others were not interested in the idea of being put in 550 MMR if you field a team of boosted 5* above 550... Because then you lose the ability to stomp on other players with a massive advantage that only rewards players like you who have had not only made the decision to champ every character, but have had the resources, time, and years of keeping up with the game since the early stages of 5* introduction to be able to do so.

    There is no reason why milestones cannot address the problem you have invented of needing more challenge and more use of your many champs on your roster not just by selecting different characters outside the meta of your own accord, but because you need the devs to either force or incentivize you to.

    If the devs really looked at the milestone idea, they could potentially introduce rewards for the extra "heroic" challenges on each event that rival top placement rewards.  So then, you could have players motivated by speed for placement rewards, and players motivated by milestone challenges to earn similar level rewards.  Naturally, most players would not realistically be in the running to earn heroic challenge rewards while keeping themselves in position for t10 placement.

    The only thing a milestone based solution doesn't do is force other players to have every single character built to a usable level or suffer the consequences.  So of course it doesn't fit the mindset of "I want the devs to change the game to reward my specific style of play and punish players who have different playstyles that I don't like and haven't played as long as I have"
  • Pwuz_
    Pwuz_ Posts: 1,214 Chairperson of the Boards
    One of the other factors that seem to be ignored here is that the Old Heroic events were Not based on a particular Affiliation like Dark Avengers, X-men, whatever.  They were a seemingly random selection of characters (at least 2 of which were the rewards from the prior event), and in most cases had some variety in terms of their active colors.

    I do remember the complaints in one Heroic Event that one color was a Passive not an Active ability; but for the life of me I can’t recall what specific event nor which characters were permitted.

    These types of extreme roster restrictions would be a lot more fun if they were Balance of Power style in that the 1*, 2*, & 3* characters had larger boosts so a mix of different tiered characters would all be viable.

    I did also really like the idea Theghouse floated of OPTIONAL bonus Quests to encourage us to naturally play towards these types of challenges.

    It’s been AGES since the Quest Tab had anything besides the Milestones & Daily Quests.

    Just something like “Beat Gargantos using a team of ONLY Dark Avengers (X) Times” with like 8 versions and increased rewards would effectively cause a lot of us to choose to play that way.  At that point, just make one Required character any Dark Avenger.  Nice and easy.  No Muss, No Fuss.
  • HoundofShadow
    HoundofShadow Posts: 8,004 Chairperson of the Boards
    @Theghouse regarding 5* boost in pvp, you remembered the wrong person. I was actually theorising about removing boost because I believe that there are more variety in the game, compared to 1 year ago. I also suggested rotating 4 5* boost, 2 5* boost and zero 5* boost. As for putting myself into 550 mmr, I've no problem with that because I do play against 550 roster boostered to 672, and mmr throws organic 550 roster against me as well for some reasons, and I do play against them if they are worth the points.

    As for Heroic, you got it wrong. Back then, when players were suggesting heroic or restrictive characters usage due to how those characters were left untouched, I countered them by saying, if a player wants to use a certain (slow) character, they would use it voluntarily right now and they don't need to wait for the dev to force them to use it.  Come to think of it, whatever you said, mostly, is what I replied to them.

    What I've done is actually bringing up feedbacks I've seen frequently in the forum. Heroics and character restrictions are something many players wanted due to how stale gameplay are. It's true that gameplay is quite stale. Obviously, and maybe unfortunately, this request is significant enough for the dev to bring it back. Optimistically speaking, the benefit of such limitation is that it fosters or encourages more creativity compared to the almost open concept that we have in your standardised pve.  

    That's the thing about feedbacks. It can never make all players happy. There will be players who hate/dislike whatever the other camp suggests. At the end of the day, the dev has to weigh the pros and cons of each feedback, and decide what to do next. With each subsequent rollout, the dev will make changes and refine the events as time goes by. The dev has already made promises to actualise those feedbacks into this game.

    As for milestone rewards, they've said they are working on something already and I think it's similar to what you suggested.

    Lastly, about shaking up scl 10 T1-10 placements, I'm sure all these expert players are bored of zero competition and bored of playing musical chairs, and they'll definitely welcome challenges from 4* and other baby champed 5* players. I'm confident that they'll agree with my suggestion to throw in Heroic to regular pves. 
  • Theghouse
    Theghouse Posts: 349 Mover and Shaker
    Hound, that's all great extra information. I'm really interested in your answers to my questions though which were absent from your reply.

    1. So what have you done for every boss event prior to this? Used your metas to fly through the event, and then come to the forum to complain that the events are not letting you use more of your roster or providing more of a challenge?

    2. how did this heroic style remove any "stale"-ness to a boss event that you did not already have the ability to do yourself?

    And a multipart question that was not explicitly asked but is certainly at the heart of my posts: 

    If this event had no heroic restrictions, just dark avengers as the required characters for the side nodes and the same boost list:
    3A) would you have used the same teams you used on the side nodes, or would you have mixed in other characters?
    3B) would you have used the same teams you used against the boss node (which has no required), or would you have mixed in other characters?
    3C) if there were event milestones which rewarded using the boosted characters as much as possible, how would that change your answers to 3A and 3B?

  • LavaManLee
    LavaManLee Posts: 1,468 Chairperson of the Boards
    HoundofShadow said:
    Lastly, about shaking up scl 10 T1-10 placements, I'm sure all these expert players are bored of zero competition and bored of playing musical chairs, and they'll definitely welcome challenges from 4* and other baby champed 5* players. I'm confident that they'll agree with my suggestion to throw in Heroic to regular pves. 
    I 100% disagree with this.  I am not one of the SCL 10 T1-10 players (usually T50-100) but why would those players currently placing T1-10 want others to be possibly be there with them?  That makes zero sense.  Who says they are bored?  Just because you think so doesn't mean that they are bored.  Why on earth would they NOT want their current rewards?  Honestly makes no sense.

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