PVE and Scaling

Marvel Puzzle Quest MPQ General Discussion
1

PVE is a fair battleground and should stay as one.

PVP and its variants, Lightning Rounds, Shield Simulator etc, has certain mechanics (eg 166 walls) that are structured for only advanced rosters to reach the high end prizes. No qualms about that, a mature roster should be rewarded for the effort to build it, and PVP is the place for that.

PVE on the other hand has been, and I believe the developers intended it to be, the fair hunting ground for rosters of all shapes and sizes to compete on equal footing. Where else are the young rosters to get into the game if they are already locked out of PVP from day1? And the mechanism to achieve this equalizing effect is scaling. Regardless of your roster size or depth, scaling will pull you back by varying degrees so that everyone is in line in terms of difficulty. In theory at least. Now we do not know for sure how scaling is formulated, and there are already different takes on how scaling is done and what it means to them. So here is my take, warts and all. If you have a valid counter argument, let’s hear it, substantiation with evidence optional but preferred. If you just feel like downvoting, go right ahead.

Scaling as percentage proportion:
I am of the opinion that a scaling index is determined for every roster, and the factors may include one or more of: roster size, roster depth, highest level, average level, past performances etc. After this number is derived, scaling is then incremental as a percentage depending on how many times you clear the node. So for example your index is L100, then you start off facing enemies at 80%, so L80, then L100, then L120, so on. This means that for a 2* squad of say L94 to meet enemies of L300 (300%), a L166 squad should be expecting to meet enemies of L498 to be of comparable difficulty. But this clearly does not happen thanks to the level cap at L395. So I find it ironic that some 3* veterans claim lower rosters are enjoying reduced scaling when on the contrary the level cap is to their advantage instead.

Scaling as a linear increment:
Some are of the opinion that a L166 facing a L395 is an increment of 229 levels, so it should be equivalent to a L94 facing 94+229= L323. Personally it sounds as convincing as if I were to tell a 1* “you should be able to take your L1 team up against that L230 team with as much difficulty as a L166 taking on a L395”. Not convincing at all.

1* scaling:
Most if not all of us has been through this phase, that first few PVE cakewalk that lets you waltz to the T10 rankings with some low level covers and one essential character. All the 3* used to be 1* themselves and had taken full advantage of this in their time. But this does not last of course, and soon scaling starts pulling you back in line. So it is rather odd to hear of people complaining of low level roster sightings at the top ranks. “Yes I have been there and fully enjoyed it before, but no, nobody after me should have the right to do that”. Come on..

Rocket & Groot PVE:
Grindfest aside, I find this PVE to have had some thought put into it by the developers. 3 subs, each of very different feels. Because it probably was meant that way.
Sub1 was probably suited for 1* teams. Hood blocks out your powers, so it comes down a lot to pure match3 damage, and that suits the 1* roster just nice.
Sub2 was probably suited for 2* teams. Storm+Magneto+MHawkeye are able to take down every one of those nodes with minimum fuss.
Sub3 (and most points heavy one) was clearly suited for maxed rosters, in particularly if you have XForce or Blade. Black focused, steal, surgical, boom. No 1* or 2* characters could counter black as well as those two.
So this PVE probably had something for everyone(in the right timezone), but most people tend to only focus on what of the game is not tailored for themselves, which kind of blinded them of how much thought went into designing this event.

Now if the scaling mechanism is working as intended, the whole rankings table should have a good mix of 1*, 2* and 3* teams scattered across. Because it is supposed to be a fair battleground right? So I am rather bemused by veteran comments of being irked to find some 2*/1* peasant rubbing shoulders with their 4* royalty at the top ranks. To complain that the system is fair… what else is there to ask for? Still think that PVE scaling is tipped towards low rosters? Take a look at the top personal/alliance ranks in R&G.

TLDR: PVE should be a fair battle ground, indiscriminate of roster, and I am in support of any equalizing tool to achieve that, even if it is scaling.

Edit: Additional question for everyone. If you somehow lost your account and had to start from scratch today, how different would your perspective be?

2

I don’t have an issue with PVE scaling, the issue I have is that they have made it a competitive. Remove the rankings, put all rewards on progression

3

As much as I hate scaling it’s hard to deny the fact that players of all skill levels are doing well in these events.

In my alliance alone…

  • A 1* to 2* transitioner took 1st place (having only joined the game 2 weeks ago)
  • A tenured *** player took 1st place.
  • At least one 2* to 3* transitioner placed top 10

These points alone suggest that the format is surprisingly fair in terms of difficulty. There was no clear indication that this PvE was easy for any of these player types either. It’s not like our new player breezed through clears spending 0 health packs while the rest struggled.

It sucks when I face level 395 nodes with 95% of my roster being worthless and having to use one or more ISO +ap boosts per battle…but as an established tenured player I HAVE those resources to spend. The new player doesn’t.

So yeah. PvE’s are relatively fair due to scaling.
Easily the most fair part of this game when it comes down to it.

4

For standard PvEs, I don’t think a 1* player has any business being competitive in it. Why? Because they don’t need the 3* covers! This should be an introductory phase to the game where they progress naturally to 2s and then 3s. It’s not like theres a paywall to 2* land, so they shouldn’t be able to get these covers that they can’t even use.

5

One thing I saw mentioned is that scaling heavily relies on your most leveled character. Which means people who focus on 2x3* rather than spreading levels out gradually may have easier time in PvP but get murdered with scaling having only 2 chars avaible for mid and late nodes. Might or might not be problem. PvE seemingly caters to ‘wide even roster’ rather than ‘highest pair you can muster’, I seen some people taking it so far to have entire lvl70-80 roster with max covered 2*, 3* and 4s so they can have lower scaling than even ‘normal’ 2 teams yet have pretty much unlimited options how to approach nodes.

6

I’m bummed out by the PVE scaling, with an under-covered roster I was unable to read any of the story of the new episode, since the nodes went from around level 55 for the first two to around level 160 for the third to fourth from last, making those last three or four unplayable for me. Would have been nice to play them, and see that story.

7

My major problems with scaling are that: (1) it punishes people for repeating nodes even though that is necessary to place high; (2) assumes from the speed of matches and lack of damage that scaling must increase; (3) conversely, does not lower when you die or take massive damage; and (4) also goes up if community members succeed in the nodes, which may not reflect your experience. The second and third points are my biggest pet peeves. Once you reach a certain level, most of your characters can be killed through a single use of an AP power or a goon countdown going off, so you have to do everything possible to prevent that from happening. That means using boosts or taking steps to deprive the enemy of AP, which doesn’t mean the battle is easy. With Doom/Mystique, if either got off their black, I was pretty much doomed. So I had to go in boosted to avoid those attacks, but that only accelerated scaling even more. Boosting also was necessary to shorten the length of matches, particularly at the end, when getting the most matches done in the time allotted is key to placement.

Fundamentally, I think it is fair to ask the question of why nodes should increase in difficulty after an event or sub-event begins. If you can beat the node at the level set, then you beat them.

8

It is ironic. A mechanism that punishes players for playing well and rewards players that play poorly. Shouldn’t it be the opposite?

9

The problem with scaling is that not all character tiers are equally powerful. A level 134 2* has basically the same match damage as a level 166 3*, who has nearly identical match damage as a level 270 4*. For the sake of argument we’ll say scaling is 100% of your roster, that means you’d see 94 vs 94, 166 vs 166, and 270 vs 270. However, putting their effective level back you basically end up having 94 (116) vs 94, 166 vs 166, and 270 (170-180) vs 270. It’s even worse when you consider it’s usually possible to have multiple 2* that gets the +40 while the 3* only gets +30 (and each level is worth less per level compared to 2*) and less of a chance that each of them is useful because there are way more 3s and the selection process appears to be random. Yes there is a 3 that gets +90, but a lot of time this guy ends up being a deadweight against enemies that are already level 200+ for the strong roster since he’s far too behind in level to do anything useful, even tanking, while the 2* starts with low enough characters that at least their token 3* can take some hits. With most of the broken 3* abilities cleaned up you don’t necessarily even have an advantage in character power for 3*/4s. That is, in Balance of Power the strongest characters are not always the 3 (or even often) when there’s no level advantage, and scaling basically gets rid of the level advantage.

The scaling should be an increase to the roster to not an increase to the enemy. The enemy should be always a constant level (and can be very high). A Combined Arms type modifier can be applied to all events. Actually, all Heroic event already sort of work like this, as your entire roster of usable character receives a disproportional level buff in an attempt to make the lower tier characters more competitive. Otherwise, there’s no point to boost the level of any of the non featured heroic characters since scaling would take care of it.

10

Sub1: AP feed to a nuke
Sub2: AP feed to a nuke
Sub3: AP feed to a nuke, a hefty DoT, or ‘why not both?’

Not seeing the difference. Nothing special about this event, still the same old, same old: using AP feeding to quicky build up to a curb-stomp to mask over the AI’s stupidity and unsustainability at high-level play.
Lower level rosters have an ‘easier’ time because of the fact that damage increases exponentially while hitpoints increase more or less linearly, i.e., relatively speaking the AI will hit you much harder as your levels increase. This is to the point where the same blows traded that could easily wipe out a 3*, would - when scaled down to pure 1* difficulty levels - only take about three-quarters of a 1*'s health. This is made worse by the fact that the PvE opponents are mostly goons or 2s which have much more pronounced scaling curves than 3s to boot, making the off-balance ratio between the AI’s capacity for damage and your team’s health even worse.

11

With all due respect, there are great guides advising the recommended way to progress in this game, there should however be more than one prescribed way to play however you like to. I think everyone should have a fair crack at PVE rewards. Why? Because they need the new character to play the essentials of the next PVE, so as to earn more Iso and event tokens that leads to… more 2* covers. So it’s not too far from the prescribed way after all, another means to the same end.

12

I am of the opinion that no one “needs” 2* rewards anymore. What everyone needs is ISO. There is no 1* to 2* transition anymore. Days 1-30 will most likely get you most of the covers. Everyone pretty much comes out of the gate needing 3* because there is nothing else to fight for. The early game was ruined when they made 2* drop like rain. You could delete the whole 1* roster and new players would barely stumble.

So looking at it this way, everyone needs 3* characters as soon as possible. Sucks, but true.