PVP Supports: Feedback Thread

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  • DAZ0273
    DAZ0273 Posts: 10,273 Chairperson of the Boards

    @KGB said:

    @entrailbucket said:

    @ArchusMonk said:

    @entrailbucket said:

    @ArchusMonk said:

    @entrailbucket said:

    @ArchusMonk said:

    @entrailbucket said:

    @ArchusMonk said:

    @entrailbucket said:

    @ArchusMonk said:

    @entrailbucket said:
    @ArchusMonk your previous posts made it sound like you were a newish 4* player struggling to win PvP fights against teams that were many levels ahead of you.

    Now you reveal that you're a 550 player with m'Thor fully maxed out? You are not "punching up" at anyone! You are the .0001%. Other players "punch up" at YOU. You can trivially win any fight against any team. I know this, because other players with your exact roster frequently destroy my 672s. They win these fights in a minute or two, regularly and consistently.

    I didn’t imply anything, but if you consider us peers, then why is our experience so different? Why am I seeing a wider variety of potential opponents while you are not? Why am I not seeing the instant win teams that are seeing or using that are ruining PVP for you but improving it for me?

    No idea. What potential opponents are you seeing? It could be down to differences in time slice or start times.

    More importantly, what fights are you skipping that you think you can't win? I'm not kidding -- I frequently run a million HP worth of boosted guys, and take defensive losses, fast, to unboosted 550 m'Thor/x.

    It varies from event to event depending on what I’m running, but for the last PVP, I absolutely avoided any YJ for reasons I noted above. I generally tried to avoid double boosted unless they were the 1a5’s because of the large health pools. I targeted just about any pair of unboosted that I could find, and this PVP they were easy to find. To me, my baby boosted were faster to kill with than 550 Jane 545 Riri. I would have attacked non-YJ double boosted teams if I’d had to, but it never came to that, so I don’t know how quickly I could have beaten them.

    I play in s2, in the last two hours. I play there because it's exciting. Many of the other slices make it easy to score a ton without even trying. In s2, especially at the end, it tests your skill.

    I ran lvl630 Yellowjacket and lvl645 Ronan last event (plus 3->5 Deadpool at 500+), and took double digit losses to unboosted m'Thor teams. I normally engage in multiple retal wars over the course of an event, and I can usually win a bit faster than those guys, but generally just 2 wins to their 1. I don't understand why you're avoiding fights you can win in less than 2 minutes -- other players with your roster are doing this trivially.

    There is not now, and has never been (in 10+ years), a team I'd skip because I didn't think I could win. I take fights based on opponent points and opponent names. Most PvP players are playing the same way.

    I’m not avoiding teams because I can’t win. I’ve been pretty consistent that speed is most important to me, so I’m avoiding fights with the potential to go long. I don’t time my fights strictly, but my goal is for a fight to last 1 minute or less. Taking 2 minutes to chew through the health pools of 2x 672 holds little interest to me. If I play differently than the majority, I’m perfectly fine with that.

    On the last page you talked about getting fights that were unwinnable. You talked about dumping points to get fights you could actually win, and how supports are good because they allow you to "punch up" against stronger rosters.

    Are we really talking about a difference of one minute per fight here??? We're going to completely throw away player agency, fundamentally change the nature of the game for everyone, massively increase randomness, and enable player turn0 wins and AI turn 1 losses, for an average change of one minute or less per fight? And that's a good thing?

    I gave my whole PVP history there. Those are things I did historically. I haven’t had to dump points in awhile. I did have to do it for one of the 2* release events when I was trying to get to 50 wins for the tokens and the boost list was unfavorable. That was probably the only time in the last 18 months or so.

    So much hyperbole from you. I’m not winning in 1 turn (other than the team I mentioned) and I had some turn one losses prior to supports so that’s nothing new. Most of my fights are at least a couple rounds back and forth. There’s no “easy mode” just quick mode? Loss of player agency? Exaggerate much? You can still choose which teams to run, what supports to use, and which opponents to face. I’ve given multiple examples of teams I’ve used this season. I’ve asked, but you still haven’t given me a single example of the super team that is so good it can win in turn0 or 1, and all the big rosters are using it, so everyone has to use it, thus losing their agency. I’m seeing more variety not less. Please tell me what this super team is so I can start using it. Please!

    I won multiple fights against full 5* teams turn 1 with Colossus (fantasticar) and 2->5 Nightcrawler (purple infinity stone). Before that I won fights turn0 with 1->5 Spiderman and Juggernaut. I lost fights to that team as well. This week I'm winning fights with Yellowjacket (infinity stone+ free green supports).

    I've lost plenty of fights on offense to m'Thor + Riri (free green supports).

    Well there you go. I already admitted 1s5 spidey boost week was turn 1-able. I thoroughly enjoyed that week. You didn’t. Agree to disagree. Few people have 2a5 NC, and I don’t know that I saw it once while colossus was boosted, so that’s not a team that is destroying player agency. I also ran YJ this week, and it was fast but certainly not a killer team. Plenty of people ran 2x boosted or 2x unboosted 550’s last event, so player agency was saved! Still not seeing loss of agency. Sorry try again. Also, just to be clear, it’s worse than you think. 1 minute fights were my goal pre-support. That’s still my goal, but now it’s much easier to achieve AND again I’m seeing a wider variety of opponents to choose from, so I’m spending less time selecting opponents. I actively avoid the last 3 hours of an event because there are a lot of folks with big rosters throwing their weight around, so my experience might be different if I tried to play then. If you enjoy it, more power to you. Again, agency! Choice! Options!

    When fighting peers, games should be won or lost based on choices made during the game, not choices you make before it even starts. Otherwise, why does the match-3 part even exist?

    Sun Tzu would vehemently disagree with this idea. :)

    KGB

    That also screws over Batman!

  • entrailbucket
    entrailbucket Posts: 5,820 Chairperson of the Boards

    @Tony_Foot said:

    @entrailbucket said:

    I'm beginning to suspect that some players aren't very good at the match-3 part of the game, and that may have something to do with their opinions.

    Someone with a lvl500 m'Thor + decent supports should be facerolling literally anything in the game. I know this, because players with characters in that range are facerolling my ridiculous teams! If it's not possible, how are they doing it?

    Is it not possible for you to make your point without sly digs? Just because your team is getting beat by lower teams doesn't mean it's a consistent team to use with low health pack or damage taken. You have no idea how bad their team was hurt from beating your team.

    I just didn't get the consistent results using riri and mthor even with good green supports. It's not exactly a tough team to understands how to use, but I didn't find it particularly fast or felt I would consistently get good results like I can with Shang and Halfthor and supports.

    Is it right to state anyone else is not good at the match 3 part of the game when people spend to get an advantage? I mean why would a good player even need to do that if they are so superb at match 3 and knowing the game like the back of their hand?

    Spending money (and roster strength in general) has absolutely no correlation to in-game skill. Some of the biggest whales, historically, were pretty horrifically bad at the game, and plenty of low-spending/free to play players are great at it.

  • KGB
    KGB Posts: 3,235 Chairperson of the Boards
    edited 16 July 2024, 18:20

    @entrailbucket said:

    @Tony_Foot said:

    @entrailbucket said:

    I'm beginning to suspect that some players aren't very good at the match-3 part of the game, and that may have something to do with their opinions.

    Someone with a lvl500 m'Thor + decent supports should be facerolling literally anything in the game. I know this, because players with characters in that range are facerolling my ridiculous teams! If it's not possible, how are they doing it?

    Is it not possible for you to make your point without sly digs? Just because your team is getting beat by lower teams doesn't mean it's a consistent team to use with low health pack or damage taken. You have no idea how bad their team was hurt from beating your team.

    I just didn't get the consistent results using riri and mthor even with good green supports. It's not exactly a tough team to understands how to use, but I didn't find it particularly fast or felt I would consistently get good results like I can with Shang and Halfthor and supports.

    Is it right to state anyone else is not good at the match 3 part of the game when people spend to get an advantage? I mean why would a good player even need to do that if they are so superb at match 3 and knowing the game like the back of their hand?

    Spending money (and roster strength in general) has absolutely no correlation to in-game skill. Some of the biggest whales, historically, were pretty horrifically bad at the game, and plenty of low-spending/free to play players are great at it.

    Correct. It's strategy (roster management/team&support&boost selection/enemy matchup etc) vs tactics (in game gem matching/firing powers&combos/collecting AP etc).

    As Sun Tzu said, all battles are won (strategy) before they are fought (tactics). It may take longer if your tactics aren't great and it might even be possible to lose on occasion, but if your strategy is good, you are going to win.

    KGB

  • entrailbucket
    entrailbucket Posts: 5,820 Chairperson of the Boards

    @KGB said:

    @entrailbucket said:

    @Tony_Foot said:

    @entrailbucket said:

    I'm beginning to suspect that some players aren't very good at the match-3 part of the game, and that may have something to do with their opinions.

    Someone with a lvl500 m'Thor + decent supports should be facerolling literally anything in the game. I know this, because players with characters in that range are facerolling my ridiculous teams! If it's not possible, how are they doing it?

    Is it not possible for you to make your point without sly digs? Just because your team is getting beat by lower teams doesn't mean it's a consistent team to use with low health pack or damage taken. You have no idea how bad their team was hurt from beating your team.

    I just didn't get the consistent results using riri and mthor even with good green supports. It's not exactly a tough team to understands how to use, but I didn't find it particularly fast or felt I would consistently get good results like I can with Shang and Halfthor and supports.

    Is it right to state anyone else is not good at the match 3 part of the game when people spend to get an advantage? I mean why would a good player even need to do that if they are so superb at match 3 and knowing the game like the back of their hand?

    Spending money (and roster strength in general) has absolutely no correlation to in-game skill. Some of the biggest whales, historically, were pretty horrifically bad at the game, and plenty of low-spending/free to play players are great at it.

    Correct. It's strategy (roster management/team&support&boost selection/enemy matchup etc) vs tactics (in game gem matching/firing powers&combos/collecting AP etc).

    As Sun Tzu said, all battles are won (strategy) before they are fought (tactics). It may take longer if your tactics aren't great and it might even be possible to lose on occasion, but if your strategy is good, you are going to win.

    KGB

    That guy sure didn't know much when I was sniping him the other day!

    But seriously, I think that's a great summation of how I feel about this change. Before supports, and before the category of characters that I'd classify as "autoplay," tactics (to use your metaphor) mattered, and they mattered a ton. You couldn't buy your way to winning, and you couldn't hoard your way to winning. Roster was a bar you had to clear to compete, but once you cleared that bar your tactics determined how well you did. Plenty of players who tried to buy their way to the top failed because they couldn't play. Plenty of players with subpar rosters could still win.

    Supports, combined with certain characters, have de-emphasised the tactical component even further. I guess that's where these new devs have been heading for awhile, but I think we lose something important as a result.

  • DAZ0273
    DAZ0273 Posts: 10,273 Chairperson of the Boards

    What does "couldn't play" mean? Were they physically incapable of swiping their screen to make 3 same colour tiles line up? Did they have some sort of condition where instead of pressing a flashing button to make super powers happen they instead hit the pause and retreat button? Could they even load the game?

    This sounds like something that needs investigating - is this an MPQ thing only? I think this might need some sort of warning put on the game - "MPQ may result in an inability to swipe". An inability to swipe on a game some play on the toilet could be disastrous.

  • BriMan2222
    BriMan2222 Posts: 1,285 Chairperson of the Boards
    edited 16 July 2024, 18:50

    Have you lost your ability to swipe or match 3 after being prescribed medications? If so you may be entitled to compensation.

  • Colognoisseur
    Colognoisseur Posts: 806 Critical Contributor

    I’ve enjoyed having supports enabled for PvP. I have played PvP for 50 wins since it was added as a way to full progression. For me supports make that go a bit faster. I enjoy playing the game enough to want to win 50 times. Supports have made it slightly easier. The biggest difference is I am getting more blues which tells me if my supports process when I am attacked there is more opportunity for the AI to win.
    My bottom line is I’ve enjoyed using them and would like them to continue.

    If there is going to be a middle ground I think I’d like to see a single support enabled for one character in the battle. It would perhaps make for a choice between free ap or annoying effect.

  • entrailbucket
    entrailbucket Posts: 5,820 Chairperson of the Boards

    @DAZ0273 said:
    What does "couldn't play" mean? Were they physically incapable of swiping their screen to make 3 same colour tiles line up? Did they have some sort of condition where instead of pressing a flashing button to make super powers happen they instead hit the pause and retreat button? Could they even load the game?

    This sounds like something that needs investigating - is this an MPQ thing only? I think this might need some sort of warning put on the game - "MPQ may result in an inability to swipe". An inability to swipe on a game some play on the toilet could be disastrous.

    I don't know! If I go through my history, I've got pages upon pages of screenshots of huge whales wiping to my teams, though. My alliance always prided ourselves on antagonizing the big spenders or the hackers, and we almost always won against them.

    If roster was the only thing that mattered, none of them would ever have lost a fight -- and they'd be able to beat us far faster than we could beat them. That often wasn't the case.

  • itsuka7
    itsuka7 Posts: 112 Tile Toppler

    I am a 5* player with a handful of 500+ 5*. I am one of those players that enters an event at the start, tries to get to 12 or 25 wins as quickly as possible, and doesn’t care about points, ranking or being hit. With the introduction of supports, I have played more, like playing for 50 wins instead (depending on who is boosted and if they have great support options). Some combinations are really fun to play, and then I continue beyond my minimum (which used to be 12 wins, but I’ve adjusted to 25 now).

    My preference is to keep the supports in. I can see a possible situation however where a support meta will just block any casual wins - in that case I prefer them removed from defense. I think the balance should make it possible for every player to be able to get to 25 wins or so with a little time, challenge and effort.

  • DAZ0273
    DAZ0273 Posts: 10,273 Chairperson of the Boards

    @entrailbucket said:

    @DAZ0273 said:
    What does "couldn't play" mean? Were they physically incapable of swiping their screen to make 3 same colour tiles line up? Did they have some sort of condition where instead of pressing a flashing button to make super powers happen they instead hit the pause and retreat button? Could they even load the game?

    This sounds like something that needs investigating - is this an MPQ thing only? I think this might need some sort of warning put on the game - "MPQ may result in an inability to swipe". An inability to swipe on a game some play on the toilet could be disastrous.

    I don't know! If I go through my history, I've got pages upon pages of screenshots of huge whales wiping to my teams, though. My alliance always prided ourselves on antagonizing the big spenders or the hackers, and we almost always won against them.

    If roster was the only thing that mattered, none of them would ever have lost a fight -- and they'd be able to beat us far faster than we could beat them. That often wasn't the case.

    I think the one thing the Devs can take from this topic is this. Devs - please instigate some extra match 3 training. Maybe for the useless Whales give them some Match 3 tokens when they buy a Stark? Crazy we are taking about Supports when this terrible condition exists.

  • Borstock
    Borstock Posts: 2,733 Chairperson of the Boards

    Is it really so difficult to imagine that there are players trying to compete who are bad at strategic manipulations of the board? Or are just very slow? Or that maybe they are fast, but they don't pay attention as they try to make matches as quickly as possible? Or they play boosted characters they assume must be the best but they are slow teams?

    If I wasn't active on the forums and talking to my alliance mates, I never would've figured out on my own that Emma/May nonsense. All of a sudden, my stud awesome team was getting crushed in the speed department, practically overnight.

  • DAZ0273
    DAZ0273 Posts: 10,273 Chairperson of the Boards

    @Borstock said:
    Is it really so difficult to imagine that there are players trying to compete who are bad at strategic manipulations of the board? Or are just very slow? Or that maybe they are fast, but they don't pay attention as they try to make matches as quickly as possible? Or they play boosted characters they assume must be the best but they are slow teams?

    If I wasn't active on the forums and talking to my alliance mates, I never would've figured out on my own that Emma/May nonsense. All of a sudden, my stud awesome team was getting crushed in the speed department, practically overnight.

    What and they can't improve with practice? And yet they still pour hundreds into a game they are not improving at? I don't even know what anyone is arguing now, this has become surreal!

  • WhiteBomber
    WhiteBomber Posts: 352 Mover and Shaker
    edited 16 July 2024, 20:36

    @DAZ0273 said:

    @Borstock said:
    Is it really so difficult to imagine that there are players trying to compete who are bad at strategic manipulations of the board? Or are just very slow? Or that maybe they are fast, but they don't pay attention as they try to make matches as quickly as possible? Or they play boosted characters they assume must be the best but they are slow teams?

    If I wasn't active on the forums and talking to my alliance mates, I never would've figured out on my own that Emma/May nonsense. All of a sudden, my stud awesome team was getting crushed in the speed department, practically overnight.

    What and they can't improve with practice? And yet they still pour hundreds into a game they are not improving at? I don't even know what anyone is arguing now, this has become surreal!

    I believe this was more of an "agreement" amongst everyone that (in this moment) supports are fun and a welcome addition to PVP, at least, that was my takeaway.

  • Godzillafan67
    Godzillafan67 Posts: 596 Critical Contributor

    I lost my baby, beefy Juggernaut on turn 0 (the AI's turn after I played but before it matched any candy pieces). What happened?



  • entrailbucket
    entrailbucket Posts: 5,820 Chairperson of the Boards

    @Godzillafan67 you're doing it wrong. The consensus here seems to be that you should always skip teams like this, regardless of point value, because they might present a challenge, or worse, cost you a health pack.

  • WhiteBomber
    WhiteBomber Posts: 352 Mover and Shaker
    edited 16 July 2024, 23:34

    @Godzillafan67 said:
    I lost my baby, beefy Juggernaut on turn 0 (the AI's turn after I played but before it matched any candy pieces). What happened?

    Judging by those green supports, they both provided, that fat Yellajacket threw his green turn 1 and it was buffed by the amazing Iron May.

    Some unfortunate luck. I like to imagine only one of those supports triggering every few matches and the AI throwing Ladypus terrible green instead.

  • revskip
    revskip Posts: 1,010 Chairperson of the Boards

    @WhiteBomber said:

    @Godzillafan67 said:
    I lost my baby, beefy Juggernaut on turn 0 (the AI's turn after I played but before it matched any candy pieces). What happened?

    Judging by those green supports, they both provided, that fat Yellajacket threw his green turn 1 and it was buffed by the amazing Iron May.

    Some unfortunate luck. I like to imagine only one of those supports triggering every few matches and the AI throwing Ladypus terrible green instead.

    A lot of my matches in this PvP had exactly that dynamic. I'm sure their win rate was awesome but they were essentially cupcake matches because the AI would use Lady Ock's powers instead of Yellowjacket or Riri or Ronan. And since few had her champed or were using the loaner to save on healthpacks it was easy to leave her in the back and watch her drain away giant pools of green or blue AP. Made for a fun but quick climb.