Introducing the All-New Cover Exchange System!

Timemachinego

@entrailbucket said:
Sure, but what about players who had no idea the "old system" even existed (because it wasn't documented in game, or on the forum, or even officially acknowledged anywhere)?

It wasn't "available to all" -- that's the point, and that's the problem I've had with this since Day 1. If it was documented and publicized, that'd be a different story. This was kept secret, and only shared with folks who were in the know.

That's a fair take, it should have been openly stated somewhere (everywhere!) so folks could get in on it. It is common enough knowledge though that those of us who take the time to try and help out new players did our best to let everyone know. Almost all of the mechanics that high/end-game players know and rely on are entirely unknown and unexplained to the general player and require us to explain, so on THAT front, it was just business as usual. It also took a much more driven than typical player to even ever be in a situation that they COULD take advantage of that knowledge, but I'm sure somewhere out there is a non-social player who actually saved up 1.2k+ LL pulls for whatever reason that could have benefited.

DyingLegend

Wow, this is terrible.

It seems like they are finding new and exciting ways to target resources lately. They hit the lower classes and now they are coming for the whales.

Bold move, let's see how it plays out. I will not be utilizing this new system because I need roster slots for all the ascended characters.

After I get ISO if course. Glad to see that economy has been ignored. What's next, introducing ISO exchange with some ridiculous parameters.

revskip

@entrailbucket said:

@Timemachinego said:

@WhiteBomber said:
This could have been a cool feature if not for the cost. It feels very clearly like a way to tax the people abusing the CS swaps, which is fine by me since that seemed like a silly thing to do to begin with. The costs are way off though, they could have taxed the rich and still gave those with smaller rosters a good way to level their favorites without being so harsh.

On the flipside, the vaults are also so bad lately that this almost feels like an on par way to spend your HP.

I'd love it if you could explain how the old system was "abuse". It was certainly hard on the CS team, so building a system in like this COULD be awesome if it weren't for the built in costs, but nothing about that old system actually hurt anyone. Players that were able to 550 every new 5* character day 1 will still be able to accomplish that over the time that character is in LL, it's just going to take more micro-management. If anything, the old policy helped players like me who came in to the game "late" (4 1/2 years now) have some sort of catch-up mechanic.

My read is that if they cut (or at least heavily slash) the costs and allow swaps within LL this would be a huge plus for everyone involved, but for some boneheaded reason they designed it in a way that is actively punitive to anyone that makes use of it.

It hurt me. This is a competitive game. Every mode is a competition.
Anything that helps one player necessarily hurts everyone else.

Guarantee the swappers don't show up on leaderboards in PvE, and can't attack me or clog up my queues in PvP, and I'll agree that it doesn't hurt anyone.

Not sure about PvE since I'm not tuned in to what slice you play and what bracket flip but I accidently joined slice 2 once last season. The people using CS cover swaps aren't playing there. Or at least not in any meaningful numbers. They are in the scoring slices 1 & 4.

I saw maybe 5 or 6 rosters total in that slice with rosters that were maxed. The top 10 was littered with teams that didn't have a single max champ. The person who took #1 with 1.4k points was one of the few and they floated until the last 3 hours or so. It was a really boring event for me with no real danger and I my roster only has six 5* max champs total. No one was using optimized supports and nearly everyone was running some combination of mThor + someone, usually polaris/shang.

@DyingLegend said:
Wow, this is terrible.

It seems like they are finding new and exciting ways to target resources lately. They hit the lower classes and now they are coming for the whales.

This won't hurt whales. Spenders will spend. If anything this will help whales.

The folks it hurts the most are the free to play folks and smaller spenders who hoard resources and the top of the top end folks who have used the CS loophole to max every 550 as it comes out a little cheaper.

TFrame

Hey! Thanks for working on the iso desert problem you exacerbated when you introduced ascension, which you promised to address when you introduced ascension.

Oh, wait, no, you still haven't done that - or the 50,000,000 other things you've been saying you were working on for the past few years but instead added supports to pvp and now whatever the hell this is.

Say it again, everyone, "never say never"

p.s. Stupid stuff like this is why I stopped spending and now barely log in to the game anymore.

entrailbucket

@DyingLegend said:
Wow, this is terrible.

It seems like they are finding new and exciting ways to target resources lately. They hit the lower classes and now they are coming for the whales.

Bold move, let's see how it plays out. I will not be utilizing this new system because I need roster slots for all the ascended characters.

After I get ISO if course. Glad to see that economy has been ignored. What's next, introducing ISO exchange with some ridiculous parameters.

This helps the actual whales, by hurting their non/low-spending competition. It will probably also convince a bunch of those folks to start spending.

Nobody ever quits this game, and once players get a taste of the top, they fight hard to stay there.

meadowsweet

I have two thoughts:
1. This is probably the appropriate long-term solution to the "problem".
2. Unfortunately, the change arrives far too late, after elite players had long-settled into a well-established workaround strategy, so the news is received as an unwelcome rug pull. (Just like several past major game changes.)

When players spend hundreds / thousands of hours / dollars playing the game one way, following the rules and building their rosters towards one goal, only to have the rules of the game change mid-way through their investment, it's going to create anger and hurt feelings.

Champions, Retroactive Feeders, Shards, Ascension, and now Cover Swaps... players get upset because their past play may have been the exact opposite of what you should have done under the brand-new rule changes, or because an advantage other players used to get is now closed to them just as they are about to reap the benefits, or the new players coming up behind them have been given a rubber band to catch up to them, or because they weren't even aware of the unwritten rules until the loophole was closed to them.

I would ask the developers to do a better job brainstorming through the best & worst case scenarios and any loopholes or edge cases before you roll out any major changes - this should have been addressed years ago, when Champing was rolled out (admittedly, before this current regime.) And when unanticipated issues arise, you should deal with them swiftly. Waiting for years, knowing the status quo is unsustainable, letting it fester, and setting false expectations with the player base is how we end up in situations like this.

GrimSkald

So I'm a bit confused. The previous policy is that you could swap covers from any character in Latest that you completely maxed out to any other character in latest, 1 to 1, no extra charge. This is an in-game service that ... doesn't let you swap Latest characters at all? That was my initial read, but reading it again it looks like you can swap an excess Latest cover, but cannot get a Latest cover in exchange.

If the former is the case, that's awful, you're basically dooming people to stop pulling Latest or let covers die on the vine... but if the latter is the case... eh? Sure, I was looking forward to rolling out my hoard to max out Agatha and level up Namor and Mephisto, but I can always stop when I've maxed out Agatha. Or if I feel relatively flush with HP let some go on my older 5*s.

Omegased

@GrimSkald said:
So I'm a bit confused. The previous policy is that you could swap covers from any character in Latest that you completely maxed out to any other character in latest, 1 to 1, no extra charge. This is an in-game service that ... doesn't let you swap Latest characters at all? That was my initial read, but reading it again it looks like you can swap an excess Latest cover, but cannot get a Latest cover in exchange.

If the former is the case, that's awful, you're basically dooming people to stop pulling Latest or let covers die on the vine... but if the latter is the case... eh? Sure, I was looking forward to rolling out my hoard to max out Agatha and level up Namor and Mephisto, but I can always stop when I've maxed out Agatha. Or if I feel relatively flush with HP let some go on my older 5*s.

You gotta think, if they're so flush with CP, they're having excess after getting all 3 latest to 550

Daredevil217

I wouldn’t have a problem with this if the cost was not so high. The game essentially becomes pay to win at my level now. 75 to swap a 1*? Get the heck out with that mess.

I think I’m going to pull for Nova/Witch/Devil. Probably will over-pull and 550 some classics as well before the heavy hero point tax kicks in next week. Once I’m out of resources, and the game gets boring I don’t know how much longer I’ll last. I just can’t do pay to win. And being stuck using the same characters will be tough as well. I won’t feel bad or bitter though. This game has given me so much. But if I don’t like the direction it’s going in and am no longer having fun, I have no problems saying “thanks for the memories”. I’ve done this at jobs and in relationships. We have people who claim to “love” the game who are clearly bitter/resentful. It’s super weird. I’d dip before that happens because I want to look back on my time fondly, not have this new regime change color what was a really fun run the last 9 years.

Funny thing is, I just spent $25 today on the game and wouldn’t have had I of known this. I’m certainly not spending anymore moving forward. I was free to play for literal years, but started spending to support the game because I never felt like I HAD to in order to keep up. So I would do these purchases more and more often as a way to say thank you. It never felt predatory until now. Oh well. MPQ was a rare gem of a game that outlasted pretty much all other mobile games and I think
It was because you could compete in ways other than being bled dry (well that and the Marvel license lol). I liked Broken Circle at first. They took some huge swings/risks, which I respect, but believe it or not, this is the ONLY mobile game I play for a reason. If it becomes like every other game where I feel pressured to spend, then I feel the fate of the game will be like those others as well. Then again the number of folks this impacts negatively (550 swappers) is probably super minimal. And I’m sure they wouldn’t miss my paltry dollars or miss me as a customer. Even my biggest contribution to the community (the ranking guide) kind of died.

I don’t know that it’s going to be as bad as I’m thinking it will. Remains to be seen and I don’t want to overreact. But if it is, I know where the door is. Not my business. They can run it any way they please and following a more tried and true cash grab/predatory/pay to win model makes sense because it’s the industry standard. I just know it’s not what I loved about this game. There’s a lot to like about this concept in theory (give CS a break, available to everyone and not just those “in the know”, helps with dilution, etc). It’s just the cost is way too high. Oh well.

KGB

@GrimSkald said:
So I'm a bit confused. The previous policy is that you could swap covers from any character in Latest that you completely maxed out to any other character in latest, 1 to 1, no extra charge. This is an in-game service that ... doesn't let you swap Latest characters at all? That was my initial read, but reading it again it looks like you can swap an excess Latest cover, but cannot get a Latest cover in exchange.

If the former is the case, that's awful, you're basically dooming people to stop pulling Latest or let covers die on the vine... but if the latter is the case... eh? Sure, I was looking forward to rolling out my hoard to max out Agatha and level up Namor and Mephisto, but I can always stop when I've maxed out Agatha. Or if I feel relatively flush with HP let some go on my older 5*s.

It reads like it's the latter. If you are trying to 550 latest and you get excess covers for one (or more) you can swap to any character not in latest.

While many here are recognizing that 550ing the latest is getting that much harder (or more expensive HP wise) there is the flip side. Now when you do have a 550 and you pull another cover (ie via classics or a special store etc) you are no longer stuck rostering a duplicate. You can spend the 1250 and swap to another 5. So in a way this helps players like Entrailbucket who are drawing classics and have lots of 550s already and would rather get other characters to 550 as opposed to starting duplicates.

KGB

Hammer3001

You know the funny part about the people upset enough to write long tirades about this is that they can JUST NOT USE IT!

bigjojo04

The way I look at this, it mainly affects how whales play. But why should we be rewarding whales for being whales?

justsing

The new cover exchange feature is a great idea, but the costs are ****. Getting rid of free cover swaps for players who have Latest 5*s at 550 and asking them to pay 1250 HP per 5* swap is ridiculous.

I'm not a whale, but I've spent pretty consistently throughout the years. I've enjoyed this game for a long time and have not regretted spending to support the devs. But this move is such a money grab that I don't feel any desire to spend anymore.

entrailbucket

@KGB said:

@GrimSkald said:
So I'm a bit confused. The previous policy is that you could swap covers from any character in Latest that you completely maxed out to any other character in latest, 1 to 1, no extra charge. This is an in-game service that ... doesn't let you swap Latest characters at all? That was my initial read, but reading it again it looks like you can swap an excess Latest cover, but cannot get a Latest cover in exchange.

If the former is the case, that's awful, you're basically dooming people to stop pulling Latest or let covers die on the vine... but if the latter is the case... eh? Sure, I was looking forward to rolling out my hoard to max out Agatha and level up Namor and Mephisto, but I can always stop when I've maxed out Agatha. Or if I feel relatively flush with HP let some go on my older 5*s.

It reads like it's the latter. If you are trying to 550 latest and you get excess covers for one (or more) you can swap to any character not in latest.

While many here are recognizing that 550ing the latest is getting that much harder (or more expensive HP wise) there is the flip side. Now when you do have a 550 and you pull another cover (ie via classics or a special store etc) you are no longer stuck rostering a duplicate. You can spend the 1250 and swap to another 5. So in a way this helps players like Entrailbucket who are drawing classics and have lots of 550s already and would rather get other characters to 550 as opposed to starting duplicates.

KGB

I thought about it, but I'm increasingly convinced that 6* / ascended 5* are coming soon. There are just way too many 550s running around now -- they've been SO generous with 5* covers.

It'd actually make perfect sense to implement this change, and then allow that shortly thereafter.

Carnage1484

@entrailbucket said:

@helix72 said:
Devs: you really need to rethink this. You’re underestimating how much of a negative this will be for a large portion of the spending player base. Mark my words-revenue will drop precipitously, player engagement as well. Don’t do this.

I understand if you want to ease the burden on CS.

I understand if you want to open up cover exchanges to more players and toons of different levels.

But this is not the way to do it. This game is supported by obsessive completionists (like me) who are not going to pay 1250 HP per Wasp cover, despite wanting her at 550 even though she’s horrible. That’s demoralizing.

This will make it harder to 550 new toons.
This will make it more expensive to 550 every toon.

There are better ways to do this that would enhance the game.

Disagree. Big spenders will go back to what they did before. Spending will be an even bigger advantage than it's been (and I bet I know players who will spend the $500 to 550 a 5* from scratch), although it still won't be as big an advantage as it should be. This will result in more revenue (and probably a LOT more revenue).

This affects the free to play/low spending 550 crowd the most, and, well...the game really doesn't need them at all.

Your opinions are usually quite bad and far out there but the ones in this thread are next level terrible.

There wont be many big spenders, this game will be finished.

entrailbucket

@Carnage1484 said:

@entrailbucket said:

@helix72 said:
Devs: you really need to rethink this. You’re underestimating how much of a negative this will be for a large portion of the spending player base. Mark my words-revenue will drop precipitously, player engagement as well. Don’t do this.

I understand if you want to ease the burden on CS.

I understand if you want to open up cover exchanges to more players and toons of different levels.

But this is not the way to do it. This game is supported by obsessive completionists (like me) who are not going to pay 1250 HP per Wasp cover, despite wanting her at 550 even though she’s horrible. That’s demoralizing.

This will make it harder to 550 new toons.
This will make it more expensive to 550 every toon.

There are better ways to do this that would enhance the game.

Disagree. Big spenders will go back to what they did before. Spending will be an even bigger advantage than it's been (and I bet I know players who will spend the $500 to 550 a 5* from scratch), although it still won't be as big an advantage as it should be. This will result in more revenue (and probably a LOT more revenue).

This affects the free to play/low spending 550 crowd the most, and, well...the game really doesn't need them at all.

Your opinions are usually quite bad and far out there but the ones in this thread are next level terrible.

There wont be many big spenders, this game will be finished.

LOL, ok

Theghouse

This change is tinykitty hilarious.

The game economy is so tinykitty broken. 550ing every toon was something reserved for the biggest whales, but the devs messed the economy up with ascension and offers so much they turned 550ing every new released toon into something almost any dedicated player who was already in 550 land could do.

So now to fix their tinykitty mistakes they pull the hardest tinykittying 180 you could possibly imagine, making the new HP tax of 550ing every new released toon the whaliest whale price ever.

Yet the game economy remains completely tinykittied, so 550 players will still be able to 550 every toon. Now they just have to do it on a 3 month hoard-and-break cycle with the latest legendary store rotation. And pretty much all of them will be on the same cycle. So the game will look the way it used to before ascension, where everybody uses the same toons until everybody breaks hoard at the same time and then starts using the new meta team at the same time.

And when a very dominant toon comes along, most of these same players will have the resources to pull immediately, and the saved up HP to pay the swap tax immediately. RNGesus knows that the devs haven't given anywhere else worthwhile to spend HP in a long time anyways.

For a bunch of top players, this will be the last straw, and they'll quit, and revenues will see a drop. The devs will offset that by eliminating 75% of their customer service staff since monthly 550 swaps have assuredly been the overwhelming majority of customer service tickets since ascension rolled out. And the balance of the game will stay exactly as it already is. Everybody ahead of you will stay ahead of you. And sorry to anybody not already in 550 land who wanted to get there but the devs just took away the only real path to catching up which was breaking hoard for swaps.

Jonny1Punch

Here I got so excited thinking we could finally break down our duplicates and apply our own covers manually to ascended characters: a feature we all have wanted for so long that CS will not assist with.

Instead, we get something that no one asked for with a hefty price tag attached.

This will do very little to enhance the quality of life and please the community. Devs please rethink this all very carefully.

Codex

@KGB said:

While many here are recognizing that 550ing the latest is getting that much harder (or more expensive HP wise) there is the flip side. Now when you do have a 550 and you pull another cover (ie via classics or a special store etc) you are no longer stuck rostering a duplicate. You can spend the 1250 and swap to another 5. So in a way this helps players like Entrailbucket who are drawing classics and have lots of 550s already and would rather get other characters to 550 as opposed to starting duplicates.

KGB

I agree this is a problem 550 players. And as a 550 player I still don't see a benefit to spending 1250hp on swapping a latest to a classic or any 5*cover for another. Imo it is still better to roster a duplicate. My initial thinking is to never pull latest legendary, just keep pulling from classic and favorite one of the latest that I want to 550. 4a5 are way better anyway so I see increased growth there.

Codex

@Jonny1Punch said:
Here I got so excited thinking we could finally break down our duplicates and apply our own covers manually to ascended characters: a feature we all have wanted for so long that CS will not assist with.

Instead, we get something that no one asked for with a hefty price tag attached.

This will do very little to enhance the quality of life and please the community. Devs please rethink this all very carefully,

It is too late to rethink. If i pulled all my tokens and cp to get swaps and then on Monday they say they would pause the change. I would be more upset. Why make an announcement with so little notice or very little time to course correct is beyond me. They clearly knew what they were doing by announcing so late in day and at the end of the week.