Healing Compromise [With D3 Q&A]

Unknown · July 2014

_RiO_ wrote:

Kiya-Elle wrote:

I'm lucky in that I have no responsibilities besides my two dogs and my husband so I have the free time to play when I feel like it, I'm also a bit of an insomniac. Games like MPQ help keep me sane when I'm wide awake at 3am.

Those personal conditions means you are not subjected to the original play-time handicap I posed. At 40 days you're also pretty far away from the more painful progression periods of the game and are still pretty much cruising easy street. No offense, but your personal story fails to provide a compelling counter example.

Yeah, I didn't want to ruin the mood but looks a safe bet the same player will turn up 3-4 weeks ahead crying about insane levels in the PVE and getting killed in 2 games -- unless took the wise route and left somewhat before.

The game is seriously slanted for the starters poor guys think it gets easier as they develop the roster -- just as we fools did, and what is natural in other games.

Unknown · July 2014

The real problem of true healing? That all it did was switch which characters are most powerful. Before OBW changed play patterns: Now Daken, Patch and Magneto change play patterns. It also makes having a bunch of heroes in similar levels superior to having a few very high level ones and a lot of lower level ones, crushing people in the 3* transition.

So it's not as if the goals were necessarily bad, but that the implementation was extremely shortsighted.

Unknown · July 2014

pasa_ wrote:

Yeah, I didn't want to ruin the mood but looks a safe bet the same player will turn up 3-4 weeks ahead crying about insane levels in the PVE and getting killed in 2 games -- unless took the wise route and left somewhat before.

The game is seriously slanted for the starters poor guys think it gets easier as they develop the roster -- just as we fools did, and what is natural in other games.

If the game gets that hard then I'll play for progression rewards, farm for Iso to train up what I have, enjoy watching my heroes die a lot and seeing how well they can do. Placing well in the events is nice but I'll enjoy playing the game whatever happens. I had a great time trying out various combinations of what I have against the hard simulator nodes with little expectation that I would actually manage to beat any of them.

_RiO_ wrote:

Those personal conditions means you are not subjected to the original play-time handicap I posed.

You are right, I didn't read your quoted line in context - that's what I get for skim reading threads, I apologise.

hurcules · July 2014

Kiya-Elle wrote:

I'm lucky in that I have no responsibilities besides my two dogs and my husband so I have the free time to play when I feel like it, I'm also a bit of an insomniac. Games like MPQ help keep me sane when I'm wide awake at 3am.

I've spent about £40 altogether - I bought the Avengers Battle Kit during the Steam summer sale and I've paid a few £ here and there for HP to expand my roster and some Iso to train up one hero because I felt too lazy at the time to farm for it.

Lucky you. I'm guessing you are fellow UK player (the £££ gave it away

). Your insomnia is perfect for those ungodly PvE finishing times. Although I'm not sure how sustainable your sleeping habit is.

Unknown · July 2014

hurcules wrote:

Lucky you. I'm guessing you are fellow UK player (the £££ gave it away ). Your insomnia is perfect for those ungodly PvE finishing times. Although I'm not sure how sustainable your sleeping habit is.

I messed up my sleeping pattern working 18 hour night+day shifts in my 20's - that was nearly 20 years ago. I'm not playing 24/7, I still have a life

but yes it helps a lot that I'm usually awake for the timing of that final push.

Unknown · July 2014

they are just pushing too hard to make us stop playing

Unknown · July 2014

I love the true healing. It made characters like Wolverine feel more like I'm using Wolverine. I hope he doesn't get nerfed. I also feel like it allows me to play less time and still have a chance. Expecting me to play 5 hours a day is too much.

I would also like to say, please stop nerfing the characters, we invest time, and many times money to get our heroes were we want them to be. It feels like the rug was pulled out from under us. I'm not saying don't change the characters, there a subtle difference here. If you take a character from being ranked #1 in most character rakings and then suddenly he's ranked #16 (spider-man) development did a bad job. Worse nothing about spider-man feels like I'm playing with spider-man.

If you are going to "nerf" a character don't do it. Balance him, he should stay at about the same power level not shoot down like a rocket. I'd much rather have had spider-man lose his stun ability altogether for something new and exciting that made me want to play EVEN MORE, not make him so that I just wish I hadn't spent the time to level him up.

yogi_ · July 2014

Demiurge_Will wrote:

For one thing, the terms aren't necessarily clear or useful. A buff for one character/ability/mechanic/strategy is a nerf for everything else in the game, and vice versa. Any change can be interpreted as a buff or a nerf. Team healing not lasting between missions? Clearly a nerf, right? To Black Widow (Original), Spider-Man (Classic), and those poor long-suffering hot-dog vendors, you bet. But it's also a buff to health packs, Protect tile generation abilities, strategic play (vs. volume play), stun, users that play in typical mobile patterns (vs. those that play all at once), characters with self-heal, and so on. And it's a nerf to a bunch of other tangentially related things as well.

A few weeks ago, I dissected this statement and some people commented that they did not agree and that the "true healing" change was indeed a buff to these other things.

Now that some time has passed, I would be interested to know (genuinely), if the same people have been more actively using the below factors in a way that has buffed / enhanced their gameplay experience:

* health packs,
* protect tile generation abilities,
* strategic play (vs. volume play),
* stun,
* users that play in typical mobile patterns (vs. those that play all at once),
* characters with self-heal

Thanks!

atomzed · July 2014

yogi_ wrote:

A few weeks ago, I dissected this statement and some people commented that they did not agree and that the "true healing" change was indeed a buff to these other things.

Now that some time has passed, I would be interested to know (genuinely), if the same people have been more actively using the below factors in a way that has buffed / enhanced their gameplay experience:

* health packs,
* protect tile generation abilities,
* strategic play (vs. volume play),
* stun,
* users that play in typical mobile patterns (vs. those that play all at once),
* characters with self-heal

Thanks!

First off, I will state that I like the true healing change.

Reasons why I like it:
- I become more conscious about conserving health and maximising health packs. Before the change, I will go to prologue heal before every battle. Now I have to make a calculated risk on entering the battle with less than full health.
- I have been facing less OBW, thank god for that.
- roster diversity was tested in the Balance of power pvp. That really allowed me to test out different kind of roster in order to lengthen playing time
- I haven't been playing pve, but I noticed that the scores gap between players are less now, because there are less grinding I assume

pmorcs · July 2014

I am tentatively happy with it. Points follow, both pro and con:

1. I never used prologue healing to start with, I've got better things to do with my life. So that was irrelevant to me.

2. I feel like the change removed a bit of depth from the game. Healing in-match was an interesting and valid dimension to gameplay, and one that I enjoyed. It gave me a feeling of extra control and mastery to be able to defeat my enemies and regain my health before leaving the match. It was also nice to be able to keep playing, of course. .. .. I think they could have preserved in-match healing somehow, to avoid losing that aspect of gameplay. Possibly by adding more healing skills to different characters?

3. However, I did resent the feeling that I usually needed to bring a healer along. Especially in the pvp scenarios where you are forced to use the current flavor of the day, if you have to bring a healer, and let's face it, her name was OBW more often than not, you're really just left with one choice for the other character. So I found that restricting and I'm glad it's gone.

4. I am big on roster diversity and have been leveling all my characters very slowly, together, as much as possible. I've played for 279 days according to my phone, but I started before resupplies even existed, so it's longer than that -- and I'm still one level short of having my first maxed 3*. I think this aspect has proven wildly successful; pvp seems to have become far more diverse.

5. With a diverse roster and 5 "free" health packs, I'm usually done playing by the time I run out of heals.

6. What kind of sense does it make for an "anti-gravity device" to heal people? It makes much more sense that it could generate some kind of protective force-field or something, which is more in line with what fake healing now does. I wish they'd just renamed it.

HailMary · July 2014

@yogi:

Context: Generally, even when I was avidly prologue healing during the last few days before True Healing, I thought True Healing was a good idea. I thought it was a bit heavy-handed (I would've preferred a healing nerf specifically focused on prologue healing), but was willing to see how it played out. I only ever use OBW in PVE (and for prologue healing, pre-TH), since I have an established L166 roster.

1. Health packs have become more valuable, but it doesn't really "feel" like a buff. I used to prologue heal frequently for PVE. I found that I miss it less than I thought I would (I didn't think I'd miss it terribly to begin with).
2. Never used them.
3. After a bit of consideration, I think my habits have shifted a little towards shorter, more frequent pushes, but not by much at all.
4. I didn't have a iable SPidey before his nerf, so I haven't really used stun since my mid-transition CStorm days.
5. Same as #3.
6. Yes. I've found that I'm actually using Patch outside of Patchneto climbs, and appreciate UDaken's self-healing a lot more, especially at the beginning of a fight to heal up from damage incurred in the previous fight.

Spoit · July 2014

It was okay-ish, since it brought the scores down. But then the Death bracket shards happened, since that made it too easy for people with more roster diversity to place

yogi_ · July 2014

I never really knew about prologue healing for quite some time I was playing and only started doing it a little before it got cut off.

I totally saw its' benefit, though think its removal did have some level of overall game "benefit".

I think what let them down badly was its' execution and then justification (or therefore lack of) and it even further exposed underlying and much deeper game issues - as has been broadly expressed by numerous others elsewhere.

Good to read others experiences though, was broadly in line with what I was thinking would come to pass.

Would a part of me like it to come back? Sure. Is it going to come back? No - and that's cool with me. But would I like to see more broader adjustments across characters? Yes, a lot and this is what I have been pondering in some of my reclassification threads.

DrNitroman · July 2014

yogi_ wrote:

Now that some time has passed, I would be interested to know (genuinely), if the same people have been more actively using the below factors in a way that has buffed / enhanced their gameplay experience:

* health packs,
* protect tile generation abilities,
* strategic play (vs. volume play),
* stun,
* users that play in typical mobile patterns (vs. those that play all at once),
* characters with self-heal

Thanks!

I don't use more health packs but I'm more aware of their value and try to use it when a char is badly wounded to optimize their effects.
I'm a PC player and I tend to play more by periods: i.e. I stop when I have depleted my hp stock. However, scaling and rubberbanding play a role too in my play frequency.
I don't think that I use stun or protect tiles more, I used these abilities before. I always liked to change my strategies from time to time but maybe it's now more valuable alternative strategies?
Sure thing, I can't use more self-heal than before as Patch is probably my favorite character and I use him very regularly, True Healing or not!

I don't know if I am more or less competitive after True Healing change, but I feel more quiet: nobody can play indefinitely now that prologue healing is gone, so there is no point trying to play longer. I use my health packs and my play session is over. that's it.

_RiO_ · July 2014

yogi_ wrote:

Now that some time has passed, I would be interested to know (genuinely), if the same people have been more actively using the below factors in a way that has buffed / enhanced their gameplay experience:

* health packs,
* protect tile generation abilities,
* strategic play (vs. volume play),
* stun,
* users that play in typical mobile patterns (vs. those that play all at once),
* characters with self-heal

Thanks!

For what its worth, some data from the 'nay' camp as well:

health packs
Have become a lot more valuable, and not in a good way: I find myself holding back on using them for longer than I did when I had access to in-match healing. I'd rather stretch out the remaining hitpoints on my A-team, let them break down completely (and tank a tiny bit in the process) and then use health-packs to instantly fully revive them from KO, than I would use health packs to regain just a bit of lost health. I generally don't even spend health packs on my B-team, because it only takes 2 or 3 cascades on my A-team to rob me of an evening's worth of play. As a 2*->3* player, I don't even have a C team to speak of.
protect tile generation abilities
On who? 1* Iron Man? 2* Bullseye? Maybe I should set them up in a PvP team with Bagman for the lulz of the additional 'Kick me' sign he has on his back...
strategic play (vs. volume play)
I picked my matches wisely before the 'true healing' change already, to ensure I wasn't cranking up PvP MMR or PvE scaling. This is no different now. It's just become a hell of a lot more risky to try out new strategies and to diversify. I find that more and more I am sticking to what I know works for me.
stun
Using Classic Storm's blue. Usually, I play her and Marvel Now! Magneto combined against high-damage dealers like Ares and Thor. Magneto fuels her blue making it easier to stun them fast and prevent damage. She's squishy as hell, so playing her as part of the final PvP team for a run is not advisable. Other stunners are either underpowered 1* or underleveled 3* characters.
users that play in typical mobile patterns (vs. those that play all at once)
I'm a PC player, thus the nature of the game is to play in extended sessions. The true healing change hit that type of play strategy hard and combined with being a mainly 2* player that is being blocked off at every turn by walls of hit-point draining 3* teams, it is seriously and disproportionally hindering my climb for both progression and placement awards. This needs to be fixed.
(As an aside: I'm also firmly of the opinion that the player should be playing the game, and the game should not be playing the player. D3P/Demiurge can have my middle finger if they think they can force me to dance to their mandated tunes. I can find other games to play.)
characters with self-heal
2* Daken is underpowered. 2* Wolverine can only heal back up when he's below 50% health, up to a rough maximum of 65% health. With his small health pool, that makes his regeneration pretty much useless unless you rely on it to just hang on and pull of a win by the skin of your teeth. 3* Daken, I do not have. 3* Patch is at unusable levels.

So no; I don't rely on them as a means of working around the loss of in-battle healing or prologue healing. Actually it's quite ironic that the first time and only time I resorted to prologue healing was after the true healing change had rolled through. I needed 2* Daken back at full health as he one of the boosted characters and I was out of health-packs. So yeah; kudos to the developers for preventing people from abusing prologue healing. Great job there.

Unknown · July 2014

yogi_ wrote:

Now that some time has passed, I would be interested to know (genuinely), if the same people have been more actively using the below factors in a way that has buffed / enhanced their gameplay experience:

* health packs,
* protect tile generation abilities,
* strategic play (vs. volume play),
* stun,
* users that play in typical mobile patterns (vs. those that play all at once),
* characters with self-heal

* Health packs - probably about the same, though I'm probably letting people take a bit more damage first
* Protect tiles - Not really using them more (or very often), at least not consciously.
* Strategic play - Definitely changed. Tanking has gone from useful to critical. I always tank at the beginning of PVP now, and tank further than I used to.
* Stun - Never used it much; still don't.
* Mobile/all at once: Mainly playing in the evenings, still. I don't have much of a choice if I want to keep my job. I'm stuck doing that, hence the tanking.
* Self-heal: Maybe using a little more, but that may be getting Lazy Daken fully covered more than anything else.

Unknown · July 2014

As a 1-3* transitioning player:
I've only just started building OBW (2-0-0) so wasn't initially affected much by the change. Due to the increased damage in PVE, I have been forced to switch modes PVE to PVP more often while my teams for one event heals. I used to be able to use Classic Storm + Mag Now for 3-4 battles, but over leveled them -> the loaner character doesn't tank well anymore.

I find myself using Wolverine 2* + Daken way more often to conserve health packs. I used to occasionally prologue heal with the spidey/venom levels, but now find myself regen'ing Wolverine 2* in prologue if his life is less than 30% at end of battle.

It's probably a good change, but I'd like to be able to not have to rely on Wolverine + Daken as a long term play solution. Am enjoying not having to fight OBW 4 out of every 5 battles.

Healing Compromise [With D3 Q&A]

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Healing Compromise [With D3 Q&amp;A]

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Healing Compromise [With D3 Q&A]