Help for new Players?

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nihilium
nihilium Posts: 242
edited December 2013 in MPQ Tips and Guides
Uhm... Im looking for some advices for a new player, because Im totally not sure what is a good idea and what isnt right now o.o

I mean for ppl who just started the game, or played for 2-3 says.

Which Characters are worth investing in in the beginning and which arent?
Whats the best way to get some more covers.. and what are not so good ways?
And grand mistakes that would be great to know to avoid before you do them? o.o

And if stupid ppl were looking to get a modern hawkeye cover just because they love it so very much... any realistics tips how to do that? o.o
*pokes the tournament and the way too stong opponents that are left*

I really love this game, but currently Im honestly feeling lost :3

Edit:
Currently I have
Iron Man (Model 35) & Storm (Modern) both around lvl 12.. and I have kinda a lot Black Widow (Modern) Covers, but am unsure if investing in her is worth it.
To fill out some blanks I also have a Captain America and a Venom ... to somehow get 3ppl in a team v.v

Comments

  • nihilium wrote:
    Which Characters are worth investing in in the beginning and which arent?
    I've kept all the characters I've found, and used thier covers to raise their skills, but I save ISO-8 and only level the characters I'm using.
    1* Iron Man and Modern Storm are both good, and you'll probably get a lot of covers for them. For a third character, choose whoever you like - they all have good points really.
    nihilium wrote:
    Whats the best way to get some more covers.. and what are not so good ways?
    The PvE campaign is the best way to get covers at the start. Play through that and repeat the missions to get all the rewards you want.
    Don't spend your HP on covers until you have opened up all the cover slots you will need - you don't want covers to expire in "Rewards" because you don't have the cover slots for them.
    nihilium wrote:
    And grand mistakes that would be great to know to avoid before you do them? o.o
    Be aware that the maximum skill level is 13, so if a character has three skills, you cannot raise them all to 5.
    Think very carefully before you raise Venom's Symbiote Snare to level 5 - it gets much more expensive.
    nihilium wrote:
    And if stupid ppl were looking to get a modern hawkeye cover just because they love it so very much... any realistics tips how to do that? o.o
    Wait. You'll be able to compete in tournaments eventually. And you might be lucky and get one from cover tokens sometime.
  • nihilium wrote:
    Which Characters are worth investing in in the beginning and which arent?

    I feel that the four main heroes you get early on (IM35, M Storm, M Black Widow, C Hawkeye) are all worth leveling, if only for PvE -- using just those four you can get through nearly the entire PvE campaign without too much difficulty.

    There's a lot of people who hate Hawkeye, and he's certainly the weakest of the four, but for PvE he's very strong with two abilities that destroy countdowns. You won't get anyone else that's better for some time (Captain America; nominally Bag-Man, but I cannot recommend putting any ISO into him).

    nihilium wrote:
    Whats the best way to get some more covers.. and what are not so good ways?
    And grand mistakes that would be great to know to avoid before you do them? o.o

    Best way is to play PvE and jump into PvP for the first couple levels of participation and rank awards -- even with your low level characters you'll be matched against others with low level characters, so getting to at least the 50 point reward shouldn't be too difficult.

    Only mistake you can make, really, is to not realize that 3 power characters max out at a total of 13 covers -- you can go 5/5/3 or 4/5/4 or any variation thereof, but you cannot have all 3 powers at 5/5/5 -- look into the Character Discussion forum for suggestions on which to max. For 2 power characters this isn't an issue.
    nihilium wrote:
    Iron Man (Model 35) & Storm (Modern) both around lvl 12.. and I have kinda a lot Black Widow (Modern) Covers, but am unsure if investing in her is worth it.
    To fill out some blanks I also have a Captain America and a Venom ... to somehow get 3ppl in a team v.v

    Modern Black Widow is probably the strongest 1* character, even though she maxes out at 40. Her stun at skill 5 is one of the best in the game (only Spidey has a better one as a 3*). She's useful in both PvP and PvE, at least until you get more powerful characters for PvP.

    Save your Hero Points (HP) for cover slots. They get ridiculously expensive now. You'll eventually reach the point where you can use them for leveling powers or buying cover packs, but until you have enough cover slots for every character -- just use them for that.
  • Spoit
    Spoit Posts: 3,441 Chairperson of the Boards
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    Push through the PvE campaign until you can get the Thor from one of the later juggernaut missions and Classic storm covers from venom
  • Zathrus wrote:
    Save your Hero Points (HP) for cover slots.

    This is the single most important piece of advice. Don't go buying covers until you've been playing long enough to know exactly what you want/need.

    You can get tons of recruit tokens from PvE and dipping your toes into the tournaments (like when the lightning rounds come around mid-week) try and do 2-3 matches to get to 50 points for the recruit token in each one. You will collect lots of characters that way. When you see hero points listed as a mission reward, keeping doing that mission until you receive those. Then you can use them to buy more spaces for characters so you don't have to delete the ones you get with the tokens.
  • Transition to 2-stars as early as you can.

    Despite 1-stars being capped at level 40/50 and 2-stars being capped at level 69/85, 2-stars are cheaper to train because the game has whack scaling.

    To go from lvl 20 -> 21 for example:
    1-star costs 480 (50 cap)
    2-star costs 372 (85 cap)
    3-star costs 225 (125 cap)

    These add up over time. I don't have examples for 40/69/141 caps, but basically the lower your cap, the more expensive per lvl to train and the higher the cheaper. At least I think that's how it works, otherwise it's just separated by star level alone.

    This makes training 1-stars quite ineffective unless you plan to use them for specific events in which they are boosted or required.
  • To add to all the other advice here:

    Your best bet at a 1-star team is Iron Man Model 35, Modern Black Widow, Modern Storm. Very well-rounded team that uses all colors.

    Your best bet at a 2-star team is Thor, Classic Storm, Whoever (Astonishing X-Men Wolverine is fine, especially if you focus on developing his green ability and let Thor use your red AP for damage). All 3 of these characters are available as rewards in prologue missions. I agree with the suggestion of trying to collect 2-star covers ASAP, particularly Thor and Classic Storm, since they are the best 2-star characters in the game and still very viable in PVP.

    Consider friending lots of people on Facebook who play this game. Or, if you don't want to use your personal FB account, create a separate FB account just for MPQ friends (but be warned that FB may think your new account is fake, especially if you rapidly add a ton of new people within 1-2 days). Attach whichever FB account you decide to use to your game so that you can share, and be shared, extra ISO and other rewards...it will help your leveling progress a lot.

    Keep in mind that leveling your characters comes from spending ISO, *not* from repeated play sessions. i.e. If you play a match, your guys don't "earn" any XP. Instead, you will win a small amount of ISO you can spend to level up your guys.

    Once you crack open the Venom mission in the prologue, you will probably find yourself coming back to it repeatedly to have Classic Spider-Man (which the game gives you for free in certain battles) heal your other team members to full. Aside from Classic Spider-Man, very few other characters have the ability to heal themselves (the Wolverine variants have some kind of self-regeneration, and the new Original Black Widow also has a team heal). Aside from those abilities, there is currently no other way to heal your guys other than waiting for their health to slowly regenerate in real time, or using heal items, which replenish every 30 minutes or so. If you're competing in a long-term event such as a multi-day tourney, it may make sense for you to use your heal items regularly because of the way heal replenishes work...once you are back up to 5 heals, you will not replenish any more, so for those long-term events of 24 hours or more, it may make sense to use them regularly so that you can replenish more later.
  • Best tip I have is to understand who will be "HIT" the next turn. It is whoever made the last matching color on your turn. It really depends on which gem your finger is on and the original match. For example...if multiple matches can be made from one move...the move that your finger is on will make that hero be in front the next turn and take a hit. You can keep weaker hurt characters in the back if you know the enemy has an ability that will deal alot of damage. Sorry if this sounds complicated. If someone else can help clear this mechanic up that would be great.
  • I'm sure you have picked up on this already but just in case. Every character has 2 or 3 strong colors (usually corresponding to the colors that their skills use) and whomever has the largest number in your team of 3 has their symbol on the tiles and they are the ones that make the match. The numbers are not actually whole numbers but rather have hidden decimal places so 2 characters that both match blue with a listed strength of 10, one is likely 10.5 and the other 10.8, the 10.8 character will always match blue. To check, replay a very easy prologue mission (I always do the first Dr. Doom) with your character lineup and you can then check which characters are matching which colors.
    Best tip I have is to understand who will be "HIT" the next turn. It is whoever made the last matching color on your turn.

    This is not quite correct. If you match green with character 1 and the result of that match sets off a chain of red matched by character 2 and another blue match by character 3, the person that will take the next hit from the enemy will be character 1 and not 3. If there is a chain (or multi match - see below) the person making the first match is the one that jumps to the front afterwards.
    It really depends on which gem your finger is on and the original match. For example...if multiple matches can be made from one move...the move that your finger is on will make that hero be in front the next turn and take a hit. You can keep weaker hurt characters in the back if you know the enemy has an ability that will deal alot of damage. Sorry if this sounds complicated. If someone else can help clear this mechanic up that would be great.

    You have it right here.
  • nihilium wrote:
    And if stupid ppl were looking to get a modern hawkeye cover just because they love it so very much... any realistics tips how to do that?

    He's not difficult to get. If you want to get him into play right away and max out his abilities you could spend some real money - he's obtained pretty frequently by going to the Recruit Heroes section and pulling from the Heroic rewards. Right now there's a good chance of pulling him from the Reinforced rewards pack, which should run for the rest of the week.

    If spending real money to buy some HP (the gold coins) isn't an option, do what you can to obtain some recruit tokens by playing in the single-player section or by pulling them from tournament awards.

    And using Modern Hawkeye isn't stupid, he can be extremely dangerous when used with a little strategy and teamed with the right people.
  • nihilium
    nihilium Posts: 242
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    OMG, you are all so very nice, thank you very much for all those helpfull answers ^///^

    Here 2 new questions I came about:

    How about Characters like Venom, Bag Man or Juggernaut, that I really dont like overly much and dont find too usefull or just really dont want to use.
    Is it OK to sell of those covers and use the spots for other characters, or will I end up regretting it in the end? (Like example in other tournaments).

    And I dont own a facebook account (bad bad me).
    What exactly would I win by making one just to link it to the game? I saw all the Iso I had to throw away, but is there more..? :3
  • nihilium wrote:
    How about Characters like Venom, Bag Man or Juggernaut, that I really dont like overly much and dont find too usefull or just really dont want to use. Is it OK to sell of those covers and use the spots for other characters, or will I end up regretting it in the end? (Like example in other tournaments).

    And I dont own a facebook account (bad bad me). What exactly would I win by making one just to link it to the game? I saw all the Iso I had to throw away, but is there more..? :3

    I would save Venom, he can be extremely useful. His Devour skill can make certain PvE missions (like when you fight Ragnarok at the end) much easier, even if he's only level 1. When coupled with Spider-Man (who can put ridiculous amounts of web tiles on the board for Venom to use) he's downright nasty. Juggernaut makes a great tank who ends up with a ridiculous amount of hit points for a one-star character, but there are other options. A lot of people save all the characters they get and use covers to increase their skills, but never level them. If you can afford to buy more cover slots, it's probably a good idea to save all you can. If nothing else, you might want them in the future for a specific tournament. That being said, I've sold all of my Classic Hawkeye, Bag Man, Dark Avengers Black Widow, and Dark Avengers Hawkeye covers for iso and don't regret it.

    Get a Facebook account, you're missing out on free iso. I wasn't on Facebook either and made an account just for this game. The amount of gifts has been nerfed a bit, but I probably still get 500-1000 of free Iso a day, as well as boosts, recruit tokens, and covers. There's a Group there (conveniently named Marvel Puzzle Quest) where you can find lots of people who play, or you can find people on the forums here. Plus, linking to FB allows you to 'save' your game if you ever want to play on another device.
  • I would keep as many characters as you possibly can. I deleted some early, then regretted it later. I would also suggest keeping Venom and Juggernaut if possible. Juggernaut is a pain to fight if you level him up, so he's a good choice to put on your team in tournaments. If you have to start making tough choices, LMDs suggestions seem reasonable.
  • nihilium
    nihilium Posts: 242
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    Ohh, thats great o.o
    Being able to save my game is awesome. does it do that by itself or do I have to make backups?

    I made a Facebook Account (Nada de Nada), but what am I now supposed to do with it? o.o
    I got my game linked to it, but thas all I was able to do lol
    Im so sorry, but Im an absolute FB noob x.x
  • nihilium wrote:
    Ohh, thats great o.o
    Being able to save my game is awesome. does it do that by itself or do I have to make backups?

    I made a Facebook Account (Nada de Nada), but what am I now supposed to do with it? o.o
    I got my game linked to it, but thas all I was able to do lol
    Im so sorry, but Im an absolute FB noob x.x

    Once you've linked your game to your Facebook account it'll automatically save it for you, nothing more to do. If you ever decide to play on another device just link MPQ to your FB account from the new device and voila.

    Here is the Marvel Puzzle Quest page on FB: https://www.facebook.com/groups/670704562960855/
    From there you can join and start adding friends to your facebook account to share ISO gifts with. The game handles the exchanges for you, you'll see how it works once you start playing - it's all very easy.
  • One thing I have wondered is what actually chooses your team in tournaments? Does it just take your highest level qualifying characters or last team that was used?
  • abuelo wrote:
    One thing I have wondered is what actually chooses your team in tournaments? Does it just take your highest level qualifying characters or last team that was used?

    Last team that was used in this particular tournament. So if there are two or more simultaneously you can have different defense teams.
  • Mommson wrote:
    abuelo wrote:
    One thing I have wondered is what actually chooses your team in tournaments? Does it just take your highest level qualifying characters or last team that was used?

    Last team that was used in this particular tournament. So if there are two or more simultaneously you can have different defense teams.

    Brilliant, thanks for the quick reply
  • nihilium
    nihilium Posts: 242
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    Hmmm, id really need some help deciding what to do...

    I REALLY need to lvl some of my chars, because they r all so low in lvls. But unfortunatly I dont have many to choose from v.v

    There Are:

    Captain America (Modern)
    atm lvl 30, I have covers to lvl 53

    Black Widow (Modern)
    atm lvl 20, I have covers to max lvl

    Storm (Modern)
    atm lvl 20, I have covers lvl40/45

    Iron Man (Model 35)
    atm lvl 30, I have covers to max lvl

    Problem is, Id much more prefer to lvl chars like thor, but for everything else I dont have enough covers to get them over lvl 20.

    So which of those chars would be the best choice to spend iso on, untill I get more covers for other chars?
    I really like playing with Widow and Storm, but I only use them for skill, never for dmg.. and Im a bit scared that when they r on higher lvls that they will actually end up taking too much dmg while Im fighting with them v.v
  • Spend in IM, BW, and Storm, in roughly that order. You can get more covers for Thor and C Storm in the Prologue, and you should be able to get a C Storm cover out of the Double Shot tournament without too much difficulty (hopefully) -- you should only have to win 3-4 matches.

    Once you get enough covers for the 2*'s then you are much better with them. Widow is still very useful for her stun though.
  • I would save your iso until you get more covers for the 2* characters that are readily available, personally. Your IM, Widow, and Storm are already higher level than mine.