MPQ What's New July (Updated 7/20/22)

HoundofShadow

I disagree with that. The reason why players go into a particular alliance is because they share a common goal. Going full progression is one of the common goals, but it's not a goal shared by every alliances.

Heroic is meant to be challenging. If Heroic is not challenging for new players, then it means veteran players would be sleepwalking through Heroics. 

The developers provided loaners for all players and it has been proven that 2* or 3* players can use those loaners to hit up to Round 6. 

Why should we lower the standard of Heroic and turn it into a cakewalk for this "majority" of players? If the dev were to design an event just to make the lowest common denominator happy, I'll would recommend them to play Candy Crush instead.

AlexR

You don't need to make it a cake walk. But you also gain nothing by making it something that a lot of players hate. We need a compromise between giving us/the veteran players a challenge and not losing the newer players in the dust. That's counter-productive for the game. We can do better than repeating the same problem that got Heroics retired years ago. 

Making Heroic events optional would absolutely be one way to approach such a compromise; alliance events just... aren't optional by their very nature.

HoundofShadow

I guess it depends on what kind of alliances you are in. Majority of players are in alliances that play casually. By that, I meant playing a few matches or zero match in pvp, or scoring a few thousand points in pves or not even a single score in pve. This is your majority. They won't even bother about alliance event.

The one that you are talking about  is hardly the majority. They are the minority where they want to sleepwalk through boss events, get two 5* covers and rest after 48 hours, or the only characters they know how to use are Polaris/Hulkoye.

Players need to quit their completionist attitude because this is the source of misery. If players don't want to compete because of the difficulty, the commander should be understanding and allow that player to take a break instead of booting them. An alternative is to bring back old boss event and change all 5* cover back to LT.

AlexR

As you might imagine, I strongly disagree with your stance.

At this point however I'm getting the impression you're very set in your opinion and don't wish to discuss alternatives. I don't find that productive; the last trial run has shown a lot of upset people on multiple platforms. I'm interested in finding a solution that still works for us as longterm players and keeps Heroics around and doesn't result in the forum+reddit exploding with frustrated people being upset at the game.

What I'm not interested in is trying to convince you that there is a problem with it in the first place. If the reaction to the last trial didn't convince you, surely nothing I say now will. So let's shelf the argument, I guess.

HoundofShadow

You need to understand the demographic of those players in reddits/forums. Those players are largely your min-max players or players who have been given the advice to chase only meta characters like Dr Strange, Polaris, Shang Chi BRB etc. These groups are the majority in forums but the minority out of the entire playerbase.

If you really are interested in solving the challenge that Heroics bring, those veteran players need to stop asking new players to focus on only meta characters. They need to teach them different type of synergies.

I'm been to reddit and any new player asking about non-meta characters will get the typical "don't bother with them until you champed the meta like Polaris/Juggernaut" etc first. Some players in reddit who insist on focusing on non-meta and playing MPQ non-optimally get downvoted or get looked down on by those "expert players".

The reason why they are frustrated is because they've been trained to play for speed and any characters that don't achieve that is a waste of time. Therefore, the only synergy they know is match strike tiles to multiply strike tiles with Polaris and you win the match easily.

These compromises don't solve the real problem and the real problem, I repeat, is those min-max players, including new players who participate in forums, have been trained to play for speed. The only synergy they know is those that revolves meta character. Go against "convetional wisdom" and you risk getting downvoted or be treated like a noob. Ask them about synergy about Mysterio and they'll tell you he's trash. It's waste to champ him or favourite him.

Bad

It seems things have changed and players will adapt accordingly. 
Right now there aren't  better rewards than 2 new 5* covers. So all players on the alliance are needed to play and right on the event starting. So pve running at the same time isn't a desirable thing unless players wouldn't need other players helping to score, a feature really hard to accomplish imo.
And about heroocs, if devs continue giving good loaners, it's doable, so players still could continue with their meta tactics based on speed as the majority of the game still is based on speed. 

TheEyeDoctorsWife

HoundofShadow said:

You need to understand the demographic of those players in reddits/forums. Those players are largely your min-max players or players who have been given the advice to chase only meta characters like Dr Strange, Polaris, Shang Chi BRB etc. These groups are the majority in forums but the minority out of the entire playerbase.

If you really are interested in solving the challenge that Heroics bring, those veteran players need to stop asking new players to focus on only meta characters. They need to teach them different type of synergies.

I'm been to reddit and any new player asking about non-meta characters will get the typical "don't bother with them until you champed the meta like Polaris/Juggernaut" etc first. Some players in reddit who insist on focusing on non-meta and playing MPQ non-optimally get downvoted or get looked down on by those "expert players".

The reason why they are frustrated is because they've been trained to play for speed and any characters that don't achieve that is a waste of time. Therefore, the only synergy they know is match strike tiles to multiply strike tiles with Polaris and you win the match easily.

These compromises don't solve the real problem and the real problem, I repeat, is those min-max players, including new players who participate in forums, have been trained to play for speed. The only synergy they know is those that revolves meta character. Go against "convetional wisdom" and you risk getting downvoted or be treated like a noob. Ask them about synergy about Mysterio and they'll tell you he's trash. It's waste to champ him or favourite him.

I agree 100% with your recent posts . It’s refreshing to read someone capable of independent thought . The late Entrailbucket would be proud.

Timemachinego

Can we stop doing data pushes during PVE grind times? Ya'll just **** me out of a t5 finish, wasting hours spent for several days now. There's a nice space from 3>5am est that's least **** to do those, thanks. Specifically, for the least **** of people possible, aim for 4:35am est.

I like and support everything else you're all doing here, let's be more careful about these times going forward please?

Timemachinego

HoundofShadow said:

These compromises don't solve the real problem and the real problem, I repeat, is those min-max players, including new players who participate in forums, have been trained to play for speed. The only synergy they know is those that revolves meta character. Go against "convetional wisdom" and you risk getting downvoted or be treated like a noob. Ask them about synergy about Mysterio and they'll tell you he's trash. It's waste to champ him or favourite him.

That's because the entire reward structure of this game is based on speed! we're not giving "bad advice", we're giving the best advice we can! You will ALWAYS have players figuring out better ways to do this or that if you're a decent game! I'm falling out of love with our speed game but it's the only important metric we have right now so it's up to the new devs to change that.

AlexR

I'm been to reddit and any new player aksing about non-meta characters will get the typical "don't bother with them until you champed the meta like Polaris/Juggernaut" etc first.

I... kinda hate having to defend this because I'm definitely a proponent of "people use Polaris wayyy too much". I agree with you that people are way over-focused on meta and ignore everything else and I don't like it either.

But. Buuuuut. Problem is, you need to give this advice to 3* players. The 3* players need to start somewhere when they're going through transition. And if you don't prioritise the meta first, you will be at a massive disadvantage. 

I love me some variety. Personally, I self-restrict from using Polaris in PvP; too boring. However, imagine if the first 4stars a 3* player champed are 4* Kingpin, Winter Soldier and Puck. Can you honestly tell me that if those three were your only options as a 4* player that you wouldn't struggle in PvP against meta teams? You are a 3/4* player in transition, you don't have the 4* partners that make these characters efficient through synergy like Coulson/W4sp for Bucky or 4* Cyclops for Kingpin yet. You'd just be stuck with a bunch of mediocre 4* with no support. That's not going to help the 3* player that is asking for advice. Better to advise a 3* player to beeline to solid options first before characters that require specific team set-ups. The meta works great for giving people that first solid foundation.

The people that stump me are those who only use the meta even though they have a solid roster. For no other reason than that they can't be bothered with anything else. And then they complain about being bored with only using meta (but continue doing so), even though it's perfectly within their power to make their own challenge, their own restrictions, their own team explorations. You don't actually need heroic events forcing the issue to use different characters, but you wouldn't know it from the way people talk sometimes. :P Though that's generally more a problem with 4/5* players than new players. 

Poor Mysterio. They're missing out; Mysterio/Miles/web tile spamer is very fun. Wished someone could find me a team for Emma Frost that comes anywhere close to being as good and efficient as Mysterio/Miles.

The reason why they are frustrated is because they've been trained to play for speed and any characters that don't achieve that is a waste of time.

I'm... not sure tbh. No matter which game you pick, there's usually a meta and most people will play the meta. I don't get the appeal, but since you find it over and over and over again in various games, I don't think it's a MPQ-specific issue per se.

Bad

I've said many times that this game's content is about 80/70% based on speed. 
I don't have anything against a speed game. It gives mental reflexes, it's an ok brain training. For that reason I will continue playing it.
However it's monotonous and repetitive and restricts 80% of the other characters in game. 
And being this one a gacha game, that's a major issue. Example:
Ok, now as a commited player I'm going to do something really good, I'm going to use non meta characters. I look at my 250 characters roster and I pick 3 at random. I will  take some time for to read what are doing those 3 unused characters, and I will do my best as a seasoned player for to clear pve nodes with them. Okay. What happens then? Soon it happens what it must happen: you are destroyed. 
So you are taking your time playing well those unused characters and in exchange you are loosing healthpacks, a lot of time, and the possibility of getting extra rewards on rank.
Translated: you are acting possibly like one of the greatest fools on the galaxy. 
No, it's needed heroic event or more content not focused on speed for the player can enjoy their rostered characters. 

DAZ0273

Maybe some perspective to the Heroic event is that the last one was the Dark Avengers, an aged subset of characters with limited 4* options and was clearly an experiment. Presumably this won't be the case if the next event is Heroic. As soon as we have an Avengers, X-men or GotG theme then the firepower will be back to regular levels although I do hope they still lock out some of those character too so that we don't have too many choices, otherwise what is the point?

DAZ0273

AlexR said:

I'm been to reddit and any new player aksing about non-meta characters will get the typical "don't bother with them until you champed the meta like Polaris/Juggernaut" etc first.

I... kinda hate having to defend this because I'm definitely a proponent of "people use Polaris wayyy too much". I agree with you that people are way over-focused on meta and ignore everything else and I don't like it either.

But. Buuuuut. Problem is, you need to give this advice to 3* players. The 3* players need to start somewhere when they're going through transition. And if you don't prioritise the meta first, you will be at a massive disadvantage. 

I love me some variety. Personally, I self-restrict from using Polaris in PvP; too boring. However, imagine if the first 4stars a 3* player champed are 4* Kingpin, Winter Soldier and Puck. Can you honestly tell me that if those three were your only options as a 4* player that you wouldn't struggle in PvP against meta teams? You are a 3/4* player in transition, you don't have the 4* partners that make these characters efficient through synergy like Coulson/W4sp for Bucky or 4* Cyclops for Kingpin yet. You'd just be stuck with a bunch of mediocre 4* with no support. That's not going to help the 3* player that is asking for advice. Better to advise a 3* player to beeline to solid options first before characters that require specific team set-ups. The meta works great for giving people that first solid foundation.

The people that stump me are those who only use the meta even though they have a solid roster. For no other reason than that they can't be bothered with anything else. And then they complain about being bored with only using meta (but continue doing so), even though it's perfectly within their power to make their own challenge, their own restrictions, their own team explorations. You don't actually need heroic events forcing the issue to use different characters, but you wouldn't know it from the way people talk sometimes. :P Though that's generally more a problem with 4/5* players than new players. 

Poor Mysterio. They're missing out; Mysterio/Miles/web tile spamer is very fun. Wished someone could find me a team for Emma Frost that comes anywhere close to being as good and efficient as Mysterio/Miles.

The reason why they are frustrated is because they've been trained to play for speed and any characters that don't achieve that is a waste of time.

I'm... not sure tbh. No matter which game you pick, there's usually a meta and most people will play the meta. I don't get the appeal, but since you find it over and over and over again in various games, I don't think it's a MPQ-specific issue per se.

Ha ha, my first 3 champed 4* were X-Force Wolverine (after his nerf), Luke Cage and Mordo (before his re-work)! Good times!

DAZ0273

Boost placeholder turns out to be Heimdall.

Boosted Crystal will not be fun.

Bowgentle

DAZ0273 said:

Boost placeholder turns out to be Heimdall.

Boosted Crystal will not be fun.

Better than boosted Colossus, for sure.

HoundofShadow

With win-based pvp rewards being so achievable at such a low number of wins, you don't need to rely on only meta to get the rewards. Likewise in pves for new players, you don't need Polaris to win the nodes. Asking players to go ahead with Polaris and bypassing almost all other non-meta characters is not good for these players because they won't know how to play strategically. Also, the advice about ignoring the other characters are terrible because they won't be able to recognise different type of synergy that are not obvious to them.

Majority of players don't even play for T10  and full progression > top placements. So, I don't see any disadvantage unless you want to pull the "speed" or "time" card. You can make full progression without meta characters. 

Those players should just teach new players other synergies in conjunction with meta characters. This will give them well rounded skill to deal with any challenge the dev throw at them in the future. Instead of **** on other non-meta characters and dissuading players from even trying out non-meta characters, why not encourage them to try out and see synergy from different angles?

KGB

AlexR said:

If you want heroic events to be optional (again, I think that's a great idea), imo, they can't be alliance events. Alliance events aren't optional.

Maybe.

IMHO, what they should do is let each player select a difficulty level (like you do with PvE/PvP when you select your shield clearance level). Only the 2 choices are 'Normal' and 'Heroic'. Normal means you can use your entire roster and Heroic means you use only the limited characters for the event. All rewards are exactly the same EXCEPT the last progression and Round 8 rewards. For Heroic those are a 5* cover and for Normal they are 75 5* shards (1/7 of a cover or essentially the value of an LT).

Then everyone can play and contribute in the way the want to.

KGB

ironsmudgie

So do we know for certain that a Heroic event is incoming? 

DAZ0273

Bowgentle said:

DAZ0273 said:

Boost placeholder turns out to be Heimdall.

Boosted Crystal will not be fun.

Better than boosted Colossus, for sure.

Agreed.

Daredevil217

HoundofShadow said:

With win-based pvp rewards being so achievable at such a low number of wins, you don't need to rely on only meta to get the rewards. Likewise in pves for new players, you don't need Polaris to win the nodes. Asking players to go ahead with Polaris and bypassing almost all other non-meta characters is not good for these players because they won't know how to play strategically. Also, the advice about ignoring the other characters are terrible because they won't be able to recognise different type of synergy that are not obvious to them.

Majority of players don't even play for T10  and full progression > top placements. So, I don't see any disadvantage unless you want to pull the "speed" or "time" card. You can make full progression without meta characters. 

Those players should just teach new players other synergies in conjunction with meta characters. This will give them well rounded skill to deal with any challenge the dev throw at them in the future. Instead of **** on other non-meta characters and dissuading players from even trying out non-meta characters, why not encourage them to try out and see synergy from different angles?

You yourself have said many times and even in this thread, “players need to let go of their completionist mindsets”, “players need to stop thinking they have to chase everyone”. But you’re also saying that having new players heavily rely on meta and pouring their resources there is also not good for the game. So, if you think they should be selective and not chase everyone, and also not spend their limited resources on the best characters… you want them to instead chase bad characters?? I’m so confused. 

I feel like you will take whatever position that paints “players” or sometimes “humans” (which I’m pretty sure you qualify as both) negatively for some sort of weird moral gaming high ground.

There are many ways to play and enjoy this game. Yours isn’t the only one. I for one am very competitive and can’t really (or don’t want to rather) turn that off. So speed PVE scratches that itch for me.  Others use PVE to try out fun teams and do progression only. Their way is just as valid if it’s fun for them.

If someone is asking who the better character is between Polaris and Mysterio, there is a clear answer based on objective criteria the game uses.  Mysterio has his uses, Polaris has uses in WAY more situations. So if put to a choice, I’d encourage someone to level Polaris. The player whose favorite character is Mysterio and just wants to play as him regardless of power level, isn’t going online asking for a character ranking. They’re just playing their Mysterio happily. 

The old way of roster building (hoarding for meta 550s) was probably the best way to construct your roster objectively speaking from a competitive standpoint. Players essentially learned a way to beat the system and fast-track themselves to high rewards. I personally don’t like playing that way, but respect that others way of playing is just as valid.

Now, it feels like the developers are really trying to reward roster diversity. God boosts, planned frequent rebalances, and heroic boss events are (imo) their way of saying, the old way of roster building is no longer best practice. No more shortcuts. But this wasn’t always the case and I won’t put down someone who built their roster under the old rules and are now having the rug pulled out from under them so to speak. 

But if someone asked me the best way to build their roster, I’d say that what I’ve always done is seeming to be the way to go now (though it wasn’t always). Chase the meta first. The best characters will always be useful. Faster, better defensively, more viable partners, versatile, etc. I would still tell people to park their bonus shards on Apoc/Shang/Polaris/etc. 

Once champed however, I’d tell the person to stop stacking a bunch of extra levels and instead move on to trying to champ the next best meta character (and I’d plug my handy dandy rankings guide as a rough outline for one persons opinion on relative character strength). Once ALL meta are champed, I’d tell a person to focus resources on near/almost -meta rather than stacking levels on meta. Ultimately, I’d say to champ as many as you can, but go after the better characters first. I’d rather have a 450 Shang-Chi and a 450 Havok (voted most forgotten!) than a 462 Shang-Chi and a 1 cover Havok.  So that would be my advice to a new person but also understand their are many ways to enjoy this game we love.