Hi everyone!
Here are the answers to November's Dev Q&A! We will provide the QA form for December in a couple of weeks, but with the Holiday in mind, there will be a small delay in getting those questions answered.
In the meantime, get ready to end the year with a ton of MPQ activities!
November 2023 Answers
Feels a little like this has run its course by now. A lot of "we'd love to, but", "it's on the list" and "maybe after we manage to build the new tools". Still, thank you for taking the time.
@Bowgentle said: Feels a little like this has run its course by now. A lot of "we'd love to, but", "it's on the list" and "maybe after we manage to build the new tools". Still, thank you for taking the time.
That's a fair point. But how do we get progress updates on tooling changes if we don't ask? Plus there will be some other stuff coming that we might want to ask about. Supports in PvP? Champions 3.0? Theme of 2024? I guess if nobody had any questions to ask, then fair enough but 34 people did last time.
My question was completely skipped which sucks because it wasn’t a “when are we getting this” or “please give us that”, but rather a legit question on the rationale behind a game choice (I posted here and did the google form too).
@Scofie said: @Bowgentle said: Feels a little like this has run its course by now. A lot of "we'd love to, but", "it's on the list" and "maybe after we manage to build the new tools". Still, thank you for taking the time. That's a fair point. But how do we get progress updates on tooling changes if we don't ask? Plus there will be some other stuff coming that we might want to ask about. Supports in PvP? Champions 3.0? Theme of 2024? I guess if nobody had any questions to ask, then fair enough but 34 people did last time.
@Scofie said:
Sure, but I can tell you the answers already. Supports in PVP? Coming Q1, undergoing QA, details coming 3 days before the rollout. Champions 3.0? Still evaluating 2.0, not easy to do with the current tools, but never say never! Theme of 24? We have big things planned, stay tuned!
The correct answer for “supports in PvP?” is always “6 months from now”.
There is not one single player out there who wants it. Just some that can talk themselves into “maybe it won’t be so bad”.
The only reason to add it is to increase pressure to chase Supports, hence monetize them more effectively.
I want supports in PvP.
I want supports in PvP and anything else that could either derail or spice this game up.
Me too. I'm dying to have my R5 Carols Communicator healing up BrB to save on health packs.
I suspect the only players who don't want supports are the highly competitive ones looking for T5 placement in events and season. Everyone else who just grinds wins or 1000 points doesn't care what does or doesn't get fired on turn 1.
KGB
Well, remember that they've also said that supports won't show up in PvP until they get rebalanced, and who knows what that means.
They would have to rebalance them somehow since they've also said they would be defensive as well. Others have pointed out how with supports you can easily have turn 1 or turn 0 wins/losses if AP gain triggers, and many supports have greater than 50% odds of that.
Even if you're just chasing wins it won't be fun if yours doesn't trigger and the AI's does and you're eating powers.
Everyone has a Power Stone with a 9.19% chance of free power firing when a match is made - once per turn. Mthor cascades anyone? Free power odds go way up to occur with all her shenanigans when she fires her powers and has enough AP, with more matches. I mean i guess you can skip all the Mthor teams but then you're screwing up the vaunted data which determines nerfing too.
You'll be using a lot more health packs, wasting a lot more time with losses/retreats with defensive supports. Even if points are not important to you.
I absolutely get that PVP isn't great but adding supports - especially defense - is not the way as they are currently designed.
If they did offense only I guess it would make winning easier so you could get PVP over with faster with wins.
@bluewolf said: They would have to rebalance them somehow since they've also said they would be defensive as well. Others have pointed out how with supports you can easily have turn 1 or turn 0 wins/losses if AP gain triggers, and many supports have greater than 50% odds of that. Even if you're just chasing wins it won't be fun if yours doesn't trigger and the AI's does and you're eating powers.
@bluewolf said: They would have to rebalance them somehow since they've also said they would be defensive as well. Others have pointed out how with supports you can easily have turn 1 or turn 0 wins/losses if AP gain triggers, and many supports have greater than 50% odds of that.
When you take a defensive loss you have no idea if it was a turn 0, turn 1 or turn 100 loss. All you see is the point loss. So why does it matter how defensive losses occur. The fact anyone cares about that means some players (ie those trying for T5 in events/season) obsess about their defensive team. For anyone grinding or playing to 1000 it doesn't matter at all.
As for the AI getting their AP and me not, I'm more than OK with retreating and trying again. Costs a small bit of health (way less than eating any power) and a few points. Since I am playing to 25 wins/1000 points I don't really care about retreats (as a FYI, I probably retreat 4-5 times during my normal PvP events because I'd rather eat a small loss of health than a big nuke that makes me use a health pack). With Carols Communicator healing me for 2K+ a turn I may be way ahead with supports on the battles I do win.
As for MThor, if turn 0 AP makes her OP then she can get a nerf. It seems we had a recent thread about that very topic so it should be no surprise if it gets revisited and it turns out she needs one
P.S. Anyway, it's all speculation till it happens. They could still make PvP only supports or simply add PvP powers to existing supports that are different than their PvE counterparts (toned down, or as I suggested long ago, 1 single perk on offense and 1 single different perk when on defense).
Why would you retreat in PvP if you're only playing to 25 or 1000? Can't you just Dr. Thor and Shang it? I rarely use healthpacks with that team because Shang heals himself and tanks early.
@bigjojo04 [Official Forums] Question: With Champions 2.0 now in full swing, any chance saved covers could be added to 1* characters so we won’t have to sit on covers we can’t apply to ascended champ levels yet? Answer: It's an issue at this very moment, yes. But with the rest of the characters rolling out soon, it'll cease to be one. The tech involved in intial championing and saving covers is a little wonky, and we're not sure the work in working out all the kinks and edge cases would be worth it when it would become a non-issue in less than 90 days max.
@bigjojo04 [Official Forums] Question: With Champions 2.0 now in full swing, any chance saved covers could be added to 1* characters so we won’t have to sit on covers we can’t apply to ascended champ levels yet?
Answer: It's an issue at this very moment, yes. But with the rest of the characters rolling out soon, it'll cease to be one. The tech involved in intial championing and saving covers is a little wonky, and we're not sure the work in working out all the kinks and edge cases would be worth it when it would become a non-issue in less than 90 days max.
I think you guys misunderstood the question here. Whenever a player gets 6 of one color in a cover, they can only apply the first 5 to a character before it champs. The 6th is left hanging. On a 2* you can save it until you get the covers you need to champ, and I think most people have had bad RNG runs where they get 10-15 of one color. With 1*s those covers potentially go to waste. That won't go away when everything is ascendable.
It's actually worse with 1*s since you need to max out 2 copies before you can ascend and start applying any covers for champ levels.
Imo supports in pvp just will enable a wider experience. Also it could bring back old meta characters such apocalypse (who would eat Mthor any day of the week, with SS at the beginning), and of course combos like kang HE and ironman/ gargantos HE and ironman, and SC.
Lol old meta like apoc. My blues would beg to differ.
Lol I haven't seen apoc in ages.
@Daredevil217 said: My question was completely skipped which sucks because it wasn’t a “when are we getting this” or “please give us that”, but rather a legit question on the rationale behind a game choice (I posted here and did the google form too).
Yes it's completely obvious they cherry pick the questions. You can go through the questions post and find a number of tough or critical questions completely avoided every month since they started.
@bluewolf said:
Even if you're just chasing wins it won't be fun if yours doesn't trigger and the AI's does and you're eating powers. ... If they did offense only I guess it would make winning easier so you could get PVP over with faster with wins.
I just fundamentally disagree that games become more fun in proportion to how reliably and quickly the player wins.
The fastest way to "get PVP over with" is not to play it, but I really don't think that view of what's desirable places MPQ at the right end of the chore<->fun spectrum.
Games have a mix of player skill and chance - chess is all skill & zero chance, poker has high levels of both, and snakes & ladders is purely random.
We'll each have our preference from amongst these but all are games people play for fun and a large part of the fun arises from the possibility of losing.
Making MPQ a game where neither skill nor chance ever prevents or even delays victory is tantamount to removing it from the category of fun activities altogether and lining it up alongside something like peeling potatoes where the heartfelt desire of anyone who has had much involvement with it is for someone to make a machine to do it for them.
(With due apologies to those fans of food prep who would rightly point out that peeling spuds involves more skill and allows for a degree of meditative contemplation.)
@Theghouse said: @Daredevil217 said: My question was completely skipped which sucks because it wasn’t a “when are we getting this” or “please give us that”, but rather a legit question on the rationale behind a game choice (I posted here and did the google form too). Yes it's completely obvious they cherry pick the questions. You can go through the questions post and find a number of tough or critical questions completely avoided every month since they started.
@Theghouse said:
I get why they skip some. They are clearly “leading” questions meant to get the developers in a “gotcha” moment where they can pounce on them as soon as they answer. I can see how mine could be interpreted that way I guess but it really wasn’t meant to be.
Mine was a question that players really don’t have an answer to and I’ve heard it cited both ways. Whether or not the “cover tax” was intentional or an oversight on max/max characters. It feels like it was unintentional based on the way the system was described initially, but the fact that it hasn’t been addressed makes me think maybe it was intentional. Or a third option, is that it wasn’t intended but it’s not breaking the game so they’re leaving it as is. I just thought since players really don’t know the answer it’d be cool to get some developer insight into the “why” behind something rather than:
“When is X coming?” “Can we have Y in the game?”
And getting the same responses every month.
“Soon!” “That’s a really interesting idea, Somethnt for us to consider” “That’s not something we”re considering right now” “Never say never!”