This is kinda gentle way to say: we are no longer willing to give a free cover for a new 4* on release to an esstablished playerbase.
Maria Hill, huh? shrugs shoulders. As another poster pointed out she seems to be the new Sentry in terms of AI play, gonna be funny watching enemy Maria’s exploding, especially if you can then steal the strike tiles next turn!
For the eagle eyed Devs amongst us they would have noticed that the players had already sussed a lack of Shield Training was on the cards if they read the Sneak peek thread. Oh. Oops. As if any Dev go there, lol! I always thought Shield Training never really.was what it pretended to be but why kill it totally? Not being able to try out new characters is counter productive for both Devs and playerbase in terms of creating interest to chase them. Sure we will get Maria’s PvP but there is pressure there not to lose battles whereas ST was a free practice. Taking all of these resources is not cool but I won’t miss the 209 chase but that would have been easy to address, the shards idea by KGB for example is a great solution.
The moral is - don’t complain about free stuff or it gets taken away. Just focus complaints on Bishop instead.
I would also add that how can we realistically provide feedback about this? Maybe if the Devs post the 3 characters that would have been required then players can let them know how many would have got the cover and how many would not. Beyond that we will never know the impact. I assume the x number of players that always have the required character are reasonably static, for everybody else there is no way of knowing!
So feedback: If the required characters were anybody apart from Karnak, Wolfsbane or Talos, I would have got the cover.
So…somebody on Line and I did as well tested Kate Bishop’s Looking for trouble where she was invisible with Wasp/IW…and guess what it did when the timer went off… she took damage. You might want to confirm that this is a true statement that Hill will not take damage because what is currently in game does not validate your statement. @IceIX
If shield training were still here I think required 4* would have been Spider-Man 2099 northstar or talos as they are the 3 in the friends vault
so Karnak would probably not have been required
I still don’t understand why they needed to remove it completely
It’s not a gentle way to say it, it’s a disingenuous way to say it because they are hiding behind a flimsy excuse. It’s fairly insulting to the intelligence of their players, IMO.
Also, 4* tier is dead. Maria Hill looks pretty meh (at best), but even if she were good, there is no place in the game for more 4s. That tier is full and continued 4 development is basically a waste of everyone’s time/money.
With her black power’s drawback so big, she should have at least a passive that can help in negating the drawback like ability to increase countdown timer since the the only character that can do that for your own countdown is Bagman which is a 2*. Seems like a waste opportunity.
Regarding the removal of Shield Training for reevaluation, if they want data for for the lack of one, they can just look at the data before the introduction of Shield Training (smiley face) 
There is no need to totally remove it.
This just solidifies my “I dont really care about the new shiny” mentality (Maria doesnt even shine though). I am glad to not have the pressure of needing characters at 209 to one free cover for a new one. But taking away more resources is just not cool.
Discussion about whether her invisibility can let her avoid essentially lethal self-damage (because she’s going to take 10% just from match damage unless she tanks nothing at all) aside, my hot take is: could have been a 3* character and she’d still be mid-tier.
Removal of Shield Training just seems spiteful. Continued removal of resources is greedy. I spend an embarrassing amount on this game, but I’m about to stop. Incentives better get much better if you want customers to stick around.
Hot Take : I’m pretty sure I don’t have to wait for Shield Training not to happen for me to know it affects me in a negative way. No matter what, I now lose tokens, ISO and a stress free untimed MPQ format. It’s not even the four star cover that bothers me. It’s the loss of trying the new character and rewards. No need for me to wait to know that this is a negative thing overall.
For no shield training it is going back to the way it used to be a couple of years ago. It does affect me negatively in the sense I like to do slice 3 PVE over the weekend and slice 2 during the week. I used shield trying to let me do my clears but now I will have to wait. Not a huge deal but the impact it will have on me.
for Maria Hill it looks like blue is her most consistent power. Doing damage and turning invisible are positive powers in any tier. Turning invisible will be less valuable if you are a 5* player as Maria will rarely tank colors.
her Purple is trap dependent. The positive is the trap will fire regardless of who matches it. The issue with trap tiles is they do not fire unless matched so line clearing match 4/5 do not trigger traps. Ever since they changed traps to no longer trigger on match 4’s they have been significantly weaker. This means this ability is more below average.
black: this power is just awful doing 90% damage to her base health. This is just a health pack needing to be used. It will be fine for the AI to use, but terrible for players. The only time I might use this power is with Kitty when using the loner Maria Hill in PVP to give Kitty more tiles to buff. As a percentage this is the most self inflicting damage any character has ever had. I understand you can match it away but overall is the risk really worth the reward? In my opinion the answer is no.
@IceIX While everyone else complains about the lack of S.H.I.E.L.D. Training (myself included), I’d like to at least thank you for acknowledging that it’s gone and telling us. It would’ve been much easier on you if you’d just ignored it and not mentioned it.
If we, as a player base, complain that there’s not enough communication, we should at least acknowledge when we get it, even if it’s negative.
The sad thing: while pretend to take care off community feedback, D3 showed that they dont listen to the community.
Shield Training was a nice way to obtain an extra cover for the newest character, the complains were about that you included the last released character to the shield training, which not many players had at 10 covers because they had like 2-3 featured events. The impression was created, that you have to pull on shitty vaults and spend money to get the character to level 209.
To “erase” the shield training, was a huge mistake, because you could done it so much better if you just take the character that was released earlier and with more events (ex.: Modok, Wolfsbane, Karolina…)
It obviously has nothing to do with the stated reasons. They aren’t even trying to hide the cash grab monetizing any longer. Weekly bundle to combat dilution, tokens and hp for what you lost in progression now on sale, 5* shard directly purchasable with cash daily.
How about giving a little while you take away so much? The game is starting to feel like a chore.
Adding my voice to the rest saying this was not it, chief.
Bring back Shield Training and make it more viable for players to get that chance at a cover of a new character. Remember how you want players to acquire covers so that they have to use HP on roster slots, so that they dump money into your game? REMEMBER THAT PART?
If by “changed release cadence” you’re talking about a switch to 5/4/5/4/5, I’ll probably be done with this game. Keeping up with and champing 5* releases is the thing I most look forward to. Take the ability to do that away or make it prohibitively difficult and my interest plummets.
@IceIX Will the best of intentions tooltip or CD tile tooltip specify how much damage it will deal? Assuming I go through this much effort for a few strike tiles, it would be REALLY nice to know if she’ll survive the CD without having to get out a calculator and hope I’m rounding the same way as the game.
Indeed… Other SHIELD compatriots..
Coulson: Hmm, why is Maria screaming and running directly toward the enemy? I know, she must have some kind of crafty scheme they’ll never see coming! I’ll help her make it happen quicker! Let me just spend 2 Team-Up and…
Maria: Explodes
Quake: Hmm, why is Maria screaming and running directly toward the enemy? I know, she must have some kind of crafty scheme they’ll never see coming!Technically, I’m suppose to be helping the Inhumans now, but I can still help. I’ll just shake the ground a bit to make sure her tile can’t be matched!
Maria: Explodes
Nick Fury: Hmm, why is Maria screaming and running directly toward the enemy? She must think she has some kind of crafty scheme they’ll never see coming. She keeps leaving behind these cheap trap tiles and using up all the PINK AP. Shame really… I’ll just use up all the BLUE AP and show her what real traps can do
Maria: Explodes
Mister Sinister: What is this? Did the devs merely copy paste my AP color attributes and make a female trap making clone that I can toss into the line of fire? Behold!
Maria: Explodes