Although you raise some understandable points, I don’t really see this as being something that many people can say if they aren’t in 2* land, which I figure that you are. I assume this because I can’t really see you running at team with Daken or Bullseye and getting anywhere decent if you were up against 3*'s. You mention having some 3*'s, but you don’t say what level they are, so I figure they aren’t that high. Please correct me if I’m wrong.
I don’t see team variety being as easy to achieve with 3* teams because of the ISO cost to level them up to a competitive level. We’ll see if this leveling change helps with this matter.
It’s not even about doing “better,” it’s about playing the game the way you want to.
My Mom plays this game. She’s a little old lady who plays for a couple hours in the afternoon when it gets too hot for gardening. She’s never done better than 80th in an event and likely never will. But somewhere along the line Demuirge said “F*** this 2 hour block session bull****.” True Healing means she gets about 15-30 minutes a day before she’s out of characters and health packs.
In this game, and in any game, there’s going to be an advantage for the people that commit more time and/or more money. And there’s going to be a few people that have an abundance of both. You can’t stop it and there’s no use complaining about it. But the True Healing change means that an average, casual player can’t play the game the way they want to any more and I don’t think that’s fair to the players and customers.
It’s not about prologue healing, it’s about in-match healing providing more longevity, allowing her to play in block sessions rather than spurts. For those hardcore players that will play off and on all day, true healing might not be such a bad thing, but for a non-competitive casual player who just wants to smash some blocks for an hour straight, the game is essentially ruined.
I never got around to getting Spidey past 50, and once I got three 141s I stopped playing with OBW so I wasn’t too hurt by the change. I infact love it. I don’t have to wait that long for my 3*s to fight now. Hell Hulk heals in under 4 hours. That’s insane considering that before the True Healing patch it was 14 hours.
Mind you I also liked the Spidey Balance. He was a strong support character who had great healing and protect tile making. However he is now probably the worst 3* character now since his only highlight is the protect tiles. Daredevil is actually somewhat fun to play with.
RockMonster, you hit the nail on the head. It’s not just that prologue healing was taken out, but also that in-match healing was as well, so you can’t heal in PvP and you can’t heal in PVE either, which is why this change sucks so much, especially for those in 2* land.
It would make the game even for everyone if it wasn’t for one tiny, tiny detail you are overlooking –
If you have the hard cash it is possible to buy health packs.
Result, completely uneven playing field with those willing to 'pay-to-win- way out in front.
First of all is Farmville a competitive game? One where placings and rankings matter in order to win stuff? If not then the comparison is ridiculous.
I am gobsmacked by you definition of what makes a ‘committed’ player! I cant play during the day cause of work, I used to play in the evenings for 4-5 hrs sometimes while watching telly and inbetween eating dinner and doing other stuff. And you consider that to be less committed than someone who plays one or two matches spread throughout the day just cause he has some time to kill and figures he may as well get a match in? Really? Beyond belief.
I am perfectly ok with someone who pays or plays more doing better than me but not when the game makes it that paying is the only way to do better for me.
Even without that it’s far from even as long as whoever plays spread out through the whole day can benefit from 40 health packs and 6-10 full character regens, while playing the same amount of time in 2 sessions allows a QUARTER of that and in 1 session half or the previous. That is tremendous difference to those fitting the MPQ-dictated schedule or willing to bend to it.
It’s NOT edge created by putting in more work, more effort. Not about more skill or strategy. Just simply about being around able to drop in and play moments spread round the clock.
My actual playing time has decreased significantly over the past week, due to the healing change, with what the developers have decided to do.
I’m not going to sweat it. Stopped giving them money and there are always other games to play out there that will get my cash. But if I am playing less then the natural assumption is that the game isn’t as good. But in a weird way it seems this is exactly what they want to happen.
PvP has gotten more diverse in the teams you see… I rotate more characters and use health packs wiser…
Overall, I like the healing nerf. To newer folks or the ones that used OBW as a crutch, I can see it as a kick in the teeth as it may limit their play time to start… but as you develop a roster (and hopefully with the level shift).. people will get more play time in with what they have.
it may limit their play time to start…so they get less ISO and fewer covers…taking even longer to level up characters…which will lead to frustration and rampant quitting by players below the 3* curve.
Except for the fact that it makes actually developing that roster even more difficult.
The healing change stinks as someone who was already struggling greatly against mmr and teams that outlevel me by a long shot. With obw it was terrible. Now? Even more so.
Not allowed to downvote the OP. Can vote up but not down? Yeah that kinda makes green posts a bit disingenuous.
I’m actually enjoying the change, and I abused the hell out of Spiderman and OBW. The real way to have extended play times now without a regen character is protect tiles, so Spiderman is still useful to me. I just got my 5th purple cover and am in the process of bringing him up to 141 (132 atm). That being said, I rarely, if ever use his yellow. The best times to use it are during a second match with a slightly beat up team to bring them to almost full. Any damage they take is absorbed by the burst healing, so in essence you aren’t losing any health. I always have LThor on my team, so the yellow goes to killing the other team 99% of the time since that is a better use.
The true healing change along with the modified reward structure is allowing me to collect 3* covers more efficiently than before since I don’t need to worry about placing top 10 to get 2 covers or top 50 to get 1 cover. I’ve been landing in top 25 by playing once every little bit. I always balance my health pack usage with the regen, don’t get attacked nearly as often, and the last 3 hours aren’t nearly as cutthroat as they used to be. Before this change, I would get hammered and lose 100-200 points during a battle or two during that time. Now if I lose 60 points, I’m shocked.
It’s not about Farmville or being competitive or not competitive. It’s about the gaming model the developers are choosing to follow. They want to be successful, which for a gaming company, means being the profitable. The most successful game in the industry? Candy Crush. I think it’s a stupid game. Yet it has a similar mechanic of limited play time, and it’s the most successful/profitable mobile game by far. If they’re changes result in masses of players not playing anymore, then they’ll lose profit and try to make changes to reverse that. They’re currently monitoring how the changes affect everything from playing habits to spending to activity, and they’ll make changes accordingly.
Would most players love being able to play without ever needing to heal? Sure. But the unintended consequence would be that the competitions would be a grind. People have complained in the distant and recent past that this game is too much of a grind. Guess what? It’s not as much of a grind anymore. OBW healing put it somewhere in the middle. Still felt like a grind for some, while others thought it wasn’t. Now with the healing change, many people think the game is less fun, but far fewer think it’s a grind anymore.
As to players playing throughout the day being more committed, I’d say yes. Someone who plays five 1-hour sessions is more committed than someone who plays one 5-hour session. Both have the same total play hours, but the former inconvenienced themselves more.
As to the tension between “playing the way I want” vs “playing the way they want”, I think it’s perfectly within the game-makers rights to have a way they think they’re game should be played. They surely didn’t intend for a large chunk of the player base to play with the exact same two characters over and over. (THAT’S what I’d call a grind. It’s who can get in more OBW/Thor matches than someone else.)
You can still play for a long time, just have to develop other characters. And no, that’s not really slower. Many players do the entire 2* development up until several maxed 85’s with no healing at all. (Plus covers drop like candy.)
In end, it only comes down to a couple things. If people don’t like the game, they’ll stop playing and stop spending money. Then the devs will make adjustments or the game will die. But when changes are made in a game, you either adjust or you don’t. Healing was one of the more advantageous strategies that people were milking. It’s no longer possible. So find another advantageous strategy.
In a game with real-world timers, why shouldn’t people who go out of their way to play more strategically be more successful? If people are willing to bend their schedules for a game, shouldn’t they have an advantage? I’d love to have the time to compete in one of the top alliances. But I’ve decided I don’t want to spend that much time on the game and not be at the mercy of certain levels of scheduling and communication, so I took a place in a top 50 alliance instead of a top 10 one. I have no qualms that I don’t compete with scores from the top 10 alliances, because I’ve decided how much real-world commitment I want to put in.
