PVP is a disaster now, unless you have champed 5*

Marvel Puzzle Quest MPQ General Discussion
1

I hope that there are some serious adjustments that are going to be made to PVP, because right now most people in my alliance have stopped enjoying it, and that includes me. The only people who are having a good experience are people with champed 5*. Everyone else is miserable.

Even people with mid-range 5*, level 360-405, are suffering. They can’t even float at 500 or even 300 points without getting hit down.

For me, as a 4* player, I am seeing harder opponents right out of the gate than I used to. Maybe because all the lower roster players are starting to quit PVP, or maybe because of some change in mmr. Then once I get to 600, all I see are mirror images of my own roster, hard teams that are worth 30-40 points. It’s like the last 150 points in sim, when you’re getting close to 2000, but this time you have to keep going another 600 points if you’re going to get the top progression reward. In sim it’s an adrenaline filled challenge, but it’s only for 150 points that you have to do it. Doing it for 600 points, however, in regular PVP, is crazy. It’s tedious, it’s too hard, it’s in no way fun.

On top of that, I can’t q the same diversity of opponents that I used to. I would see many non-champed 3* teams on my climb before these changes, and I only had to hit them once (I hate hitting teams multiple times), so I wasn’t beating up on them too bad. They could still climb and reach rewards, and I got to feel like my champed 4* rosters were strong and like I had progressed in the game.

Now, I see a much lower diversity in my opponents, making this game more boring. I’m guessing it’s because the lower rosters are stalling out much earlier in their climbs, leaving me with much harder and less diverse opponents for the rest of my climb. My team feels much weaker than it did previously, which isn’t fun, and I see much less variety in my opponents, which isn’t fun, either. I’m still not double-tapping weak teams, but I know many people are, out of desperation for points.

Either the points lost after you get hit has to be severely reduced, so it’s easier for people to climb, or else cupcakes need to be brought back, because this really isn’t very fun for the vast majority of us. Maybe CL10 will fix this with good enough rewards that not reaching 1200 isn’t an issue if you fail to hit it, but even if it does, the diminished diversity of opponents and the increased feeling of weakness won’t go away. Just by itself, increasing progression rewards is not going to be enough to make this fun again.

2

I was never a big PVP player but I can tell there is a major shakeup in PVP since the removal of cupcakes and not knowing your defensive team. Normally I can hit around 700 with some effort but last night during the Luke Cage PVP I reached 575 for the CP and then NOTHING.. only 1 player had 1200 points while everyone else was stuck around 600 in the T100. I could not find a match over 30pts. Strangely there were no 5* characters over 4 covers, just players with champed 4hor. I was also only attacked twice the entire event and I ranked 47 with 627 pts. I haven’t ranked in T100 in quite sometime. Either I was placed in an easy bracket or most vets stopped playing.

Regardless, I am perfectly content with 575 being my goal for 10CP, that is likely why everyone was around that 600. The added HP from 25 to 50 also helps if I decide to start shielding again to stay within the T100 but those elite tokens make me not care about placement because now I’ll get a minimum of 3 2*'s for championing. It is interesting that one side of the fence hates the changes while the other side applauds them.

3

I’m a 4* player myself and I don’t agree with that.

My best 5s have 6 covers, so not even close to getting one maxed. I have currently 9 champed 4s. I had no trouble floating in either IF or Cage PVP. I more or less easily reached the 4* progression.

It’s true that you mostly face teams that look like your own but that has been the case for ages. Once I reached 900 or so the teams changed and most opponents had champed 5*. But since I hardly ever go past the 4* progression I don’t mind that much. What I certainly do like is the 575p cp progression, a nice boost for me.

4

“You are meant to lose” was almost a year ago

PVP is now “You are meant to question why you are playing and go find something better to do”

PVE has already become “You are meant to grind insanely quickly to miss out on a placement by 1 point because we put a new release live knowing a large portion of players where suffering terrible lag”

And that’s the state of the game we play heading into Anniversary 3.

You don’t have to be insane to play MPQ but it certainly helps because as much as we all moan we still play so they will keep doing what they are doing.

5

I’m a 4* player, I call myself transitioning since I only have 6 champed 4* and no really playable 5*.

I’ve hit 900+ the last 2 PVP’s under the new format, received 3* cover, 4* covers, and 10 CP. That is leaps and bounds better than what I was getting before.

Before I was struggling to hit 900, and still didn’t get a 4* cover or CP. It seems to be working for me, my roster and my play-style. I do understand that it doesn’t fit everyone, but to say it is a disaster unless you have champed 5* is not true.

You may need a champed 5* to hit 1200 and achieve the high scores that are still up there around 3K… but not to hit the 900 sweet-spot. We’ll see how it goes in the next one when 4Thor isn’t boosted.

6

PvP was fine for me without 5* champs, but I’m not anywhere near that bracket, since I’m just starting the 3* → 4* transition. Points did not seem to be as high as I’m used to in slice 4, but I’m willing to sit back and see if this is a general trend, or just an outlier because the system has changed recently.

If it is a general problem, then I’m not super worried. D3 has been earning my trust lately that they’re capable of seeing problems and addressing them.

7

I agree and am in a similar position to you in roster strength (13 4* champions of varying quality characters). While I do see more 25 point matches at higher scores, it is not to a frequency to reach the doom & gloom of some posters in other threads.

8

Well I hit 800 points for just the 4th time in my career in Sticks & Stones. The Cage cover was nice, and I finished in 26th (by 5 measly points; slice 5) for a pair of Psylocke covers and two Elites that returned only a pair of 2* for my champ farm.

Having a 12-cover Lady Thor helped, mind you (she’s now my first 4* champ). I doubt I could’ve done it otherwise. There didn’t seem to be enough (unshielded) points left in the shard to push to 900, and I was taking some hits already that delayed my reaching 800.

But, hey. My first time running a heavy-hitting 4* in a PVP. I’ll see what she can do with Psylocke.

I haven’t finished that high in placement, I think, ever. Feels kinda good for once.

9

I’m still forming an opinion on the updated PvP but I will say that I am less angry now that I get 10 CP at 575.

10

The 10 Cp lower down is a good wee bonus, and I’ve probably found 900 in this format easier than 1000 in the previous format with similar boosted characters. I’ve got Thor boosted, so it makes everything straight forward, and I may have hit more 25-30 pointers on the way, but it felt like less hits on me.
That said, I get the feeling that less people are playing as hard. Our alliance has gone from 200-180 normally in events to 150.

11

Really, this isn’t anything that wasn’t predicted all over the forums. It was blatantly obvious this would hurt, with anyone transitioning 3->4* the most affected. I don’t think it’s quite that bad however.

I have a mid-range 5* (OML 375) and 15 champ 4s, including Thor/X23/AM this week. I floated at 600 for about 18 hours, I was hit once for 30ish. In Fist I was floating significantly less (maybe 2 hours?) but still was untouched at 600.

I do agree that I’m seeing less 3* champ rosters between 0-600 than I used to, but I’m figuring that’s a result of the trickle down effect of scoring being down.

As far as 600+ only seeing mirrors, that’s always been the case, or at least has been for me. ‘Queue hell’ is very real, it always would take me the longest to go from 600 to 800. The problem now is that it no longer opens up much after that, because the desserts are gone. That makes it tough to find good targets above 900, but it’s not impossible and it should get easier as players adjust and (hopefully) the devs adjust as well.

The upper end is definitely trying to continue to help the middle guys, but there’s still a lot of trial and error in figuring out how weak “significantly weaker” really is.

12

4* PVP needs to be a thing. Even at level 300+ top tier 3* like Luke Cage and Iron Fist are ants compared to boosted 4*.

13

I’m not really sure what my status is 4* transitioner maybe? I’ve got 6 4* champs and a couple of usable but low level 5*.

During fist PvP I easily hit 950 with plenty of targets and zero hits, and I didn’t shield at all.

I entered event at 1 day and 16 hours to go in s1. Climbed to 300 then left it until just in Dr a day to go climbed to 650 and left it till less than an hour to go and went all the way to 950 ZERO hits. I actually started to question if anyone was playing.

In cage PvP I did largely the same but ended up at 1050 (could have been higher but work got in the way) used 1 3 hour shield and only took 2 hits.

During both my climbs I saw mostly 3* teams until about 850 points when the 4* ones showed up.

For comparison last season I never saw 3* teams at any level and champed 4* was what I got from the start of any event and when I got near 1k my only targets were 5* level 400 teams.

For me this is a massive improvement. Its actually fun and I get decent prizes for my effort. Judging by the average score increase in my alliance I’d say they are finding it similar to myself.

EDIT: I should also add that Thanks to AI deciding defensive teams I’ve seen a bigger variety of teams too, some super weird combinations but it’s nice to see some change.

14

I placed top 30 in the last event and scored 850 points for the first time ever and I have no champed 4* characters so I don’t think it’s too bad really

I like the reward points half way as I am never able to get to 1200

15

Have (one) champed 5* and have to pair it with 4*'s…it doesn’t seem to bad.

However, talking to team-mates that pair two 360 5*'s or one 375 with one buffed 4*…they seem to agree with OP, progression basically became impossible, and they can’t hop fast enough to get to the top anymore, whereas they used to be able to get to 1300 all the time.

I suggested in another post - make it easier for those type of teams by drastically reducing D losses. Make the experience a good one. Go in and win a 60 point match but lose three? That should even out, you shouldn’t be losing more than 20 in matches until you are past 1200 and trying for placement over progression.

16

Its funny cuz yesterday i got my 1st 4* from progression reward… like first EVER. I dont know what they did with PvP, but its not “defeat one, two will defeat you in the meantime” for me anymore. So no, i cant tell PvP is anyhow worse than it was.

17

There is also this. I rarely had the patience/roster/time to hit 1300 every single event - now I’ll get 10CP even if I can’t get that high!

D3 has said they want transition to be slow…this is a way to get it started for 3*'s into 4*'s and to continue when 4*'s start moving into 5*'s. More still needs to be done on that transition front.

Why higher scl levels aren’t open is baffling. Many folks would be getting higher -placement- (and so a few of the progression complaints might go away) if the highest rosters were in a different bracket.

To the float point: I think everyone’s went down, when points went down. The problem with that is the problem I’ve had with PVP since I started playing it: what is the point of playing before the first eight hours if play-time (points) don’t matter? I get D3 sees shields as a cash opportunity - and HP is more abundant now so shields will be easier (at least for those at the top…). But must everyone shield hop the entire event? I think that would be a better prospect if say…you WERE NOT VISIBLE for the first fifteen minutes after breaking your shield. Then you could hop without worrying about losing more points than you gain.

18

People shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that one’s experience will differ GREATLY depending upon which shard you’re in. So comparing rosters and float scores aren’t meaningful without knowing where each person was playing.

And do we REALLY still need 5 shards for PvP? Did we ever??

19

I’m a 4-5 transitioner - 16 champed 4s, one usable and levelled 5 (420 OML).
The changes have made PVP much more difficult for me. In the past, I would climb to 950 or so, ride cupcakes to 1100, and shield. Queue up three more cupcakes while shielded, bake a cupcake of my own to pay it forward, and end a bit above 1300. I would see double 5* teams, or champed 5s, and I would just not hit them. Now, the only teams that have scores high enough to make a hit worthwhile above 1K have champed 5s, as anyone without them gets beaten down pretty fast. I’m still hitting what passes for cupcakes these days, but those teams mostly consist of champed Silver Surfers or Phoenixes, paired with lower level teammates. I’ve still made 1200 both events in the new season, but it’s going from being a diversion to being unpleasant: I get by with MBW team-ups, and have even been using the occasional super-whale.

If the goal was to lower scores, mission accomplished. But the changes didn’t get rid of cupcakes - they just made them more exclusive.

20

I went 6 months straight getting the 1300 cp every single event, now I hit a wall at 900.

I had bad luck with all that cp I earned so no champed 5s. Now my cp earning is cut in half, this is D3 stonewalling my progress. That’s what they wanted, to slow progress because money

I’m giving it until the anniversary, if it’s not changed I’ll happily walk away. (Please don’t change it back, I would rather leave at this point.)