structural 5* problems

Marvel Puzzle Quest MPQ General Discussion
1

People have spent a lot of time complainig about the obviously unfair outcomes of purely rng character building. And that’s a great topic for discussion and hopefully something that demiurge will address soon.

But I want to address a different 5* problem that can be summed up with a simple question:

Does anyone care about Black Suit Spiderman?

Nothing against spidey in particular, the same could be said of silver surfer. And I suspect that 5*cap will be in the same category soon.

These characters are fine, I guess. And as 5s they are clearly more powerful than any 3 or 4* on their own. But they basically have zero impact on the game (except diluting player odds). They are useful only if you have no better 5*, and serve no purpose at all soon as they are replaced.

GG and OML are awesome. Phoenix has her uses and IM46 looks like he will too. All of those characters have a role in the game. If you get covers for them, they are either immediately helpful, or an early step towards building something great in the long term.

But if I pulled a BSS cover tomorrow i would be irritated. All he does is extend the amount of time it will take me to get the covers i really want. He would just be treading water (same with surfer). This is sort of true with weak 3s and 4s too. But the game mitigates the problem with featured PvP events, weekly boosts, ddq, and essential nodes. Sentry sucks, but by keeping him around I at least get some value. Same with 4*s (to a lesser extent since they still aren’t featured in pvp after release). But BSS gets me nothing. He will never be an essential character, will never be featured in pvp, and will only be boosted in wierd off-season PvP events. And I will never ever use him if I have GG/OML/Phoenix/IM46.

Unless each 5* can magically be made exactly as useful as every other one, this problem will just get worse. Why keep releasing new characters that add absolutely no value?

2

I have him leveled and over 1/2 covered, and will say 100%, i love using him (feel free to ask my alliance , i talk about him quite a bit).

Highest match damage of any 5*
Free invis that cannot be matched away, that makes his blue a big hit.
Awesome animations, and fun mechanics
neuters OML strikes.
has 2 stuns.

So, i use him in PVE more right now, until i can snag those last couple covers, or magic up some iso to push him over the 400 mark. But he can make life much easier, but mostly, i just love throwing cars at things and flying around the screen.

Bring an MBW team up, and stockpile blue, try it..

3

Cynical answer: To give the buyers clubs and mega whales with already maxed OML’s and GG’s something new to brute force the rng into getting with a massive infusion of cash.

4

I care more about Spidey than I care about Silver Surfer.

Yeah, he kicked some ass when he first came out and destroyed those 4s singlehandedly. But now the rest of the 5 tier makes him look like garbage. I have 10 covers for him and I still can’t be bothered to level him past 300.

It’s kind of amazing that the balance of the 5*s is so out of whack.

5

I feel like Spidey is probably great once you are firmly entrenched in 5* territory since he’ll counter OML’s monster strike tiles.

Someone who is actually in 5* territory can feel free to correct me, though.

6

Isn’t this just the current problem with the 4* tier in microcosm? There are only a few worthwhile characters in each tier and the rest may as well not exist for all the impact they have.

7

More or less, but at least weaker 4s still unlock essential nodes in pve and ddq and are frequently boosted. The devs have also made some comments about adding 4 PvP events to the rotations.

But if you don’t have bss or as on your team, then it really doesn’t matter at all. You still have full access to all content, and since the meta is completely OML + GG + Phoenix right now, there is no cost.

8

Every 5* is great with enough covers. I’ve leveled up my OML, but I haven’t leveled up any of the other 5s yet, not until they have enough covers to be useful… generally somewhere in the mid-300s for most, 400+ for SS. If I were to level up a second 5 at this point, I’d probably be stuck in MMR hell (even worse than it is now), but with one of my 5*s not actually being that great.

I’d love to level some up to make PVE faster, but it’s not worth it yet.

So that may take another year or two to get another one to that point, but I’ll keep playing and waiting… I guess..

9

Here is a very unpopular opinion, and something way too many people seem to miss completely.

This is a game, you should be having fun..

There i said it, even if we are supposed to lose, i am going to have fun doing it. I don’t care what anyone thinks about any character that is released, if it is fun, or amusing in some way, i will find a way to use it.

Starlord? Love using him, it makes he laugh.
Cho? Love using him, mostly to irk people who hate it, so in my head when a max 5* sees a retal with Cho, and is like WTF… that makes me laugh.
Silver Surfer? He was the first 5* and yes the power creep has kind of passed him, but he is by no means weak.. and 3 active skills, means you get animations, black holes, all sorts of fun stuff to do while matching 3(or more). Spidey is the same way, just fun. Sure OML is awesome, but dear god does he get boring, sure he makes things easier.. but 1 in 30 fights (pve or pvp) you transform him (which is really enjoyable), so mostly he is just standing there.. yaaawn (but very useful).

See what i am getting at? Game = Fun. There are no real rewards, no cash, no cars, no tv’s, so this is a for fun game, no actual stakes.. enjoy your time playing it, do silly things to make yourself laugh.

Who cares how good or bad a char is.. don’t like it, don’t use it. Who cares what anyone else thinks about a char, if you like it, use it. Every char that comes out is useful, whether in pve or pvp, 2* or 5*, if you like the moveset or just the char itself, use it, if not, what does it matter.

ok, thats all from me.

10

I will admit that for ddq and pve, I switch up some of my characters when possible. I can only use IF so many times. I’ve started trying out Beast, Rags, Elektra, Bullseye etc.. someone has to use them at some point!

11

I would love to have fun with different combos of characters, but in the current meta, that’s just not possible.

I have Star Lord and TA Hulk cover-maxed, but there’s no way I’ll ever bring them up to level 270. I just don’t have the ISO. The developers made the ISO shortage on purpose so you have to pick and choose who to level. So everyone levels up the same powerful characters. And the crazy scaling means that you have to bring your A-game to every single fight. So even if I wanted to use the “fun” underleveled guys, I can’t.

The same applies to the 5* tier as well. I wouldn’t mind leveling up SS or BSS and try them out, but I can’t waste the ISO. I know SS isn’t good enough and there are better options.

So yeah, it’s difficult to have fun when the game’s mechanics forces you to use the same few characters over and over again. And when certain characters are so bad that you can’t afford to waste your precious resources on them.

12

I have a 1-cover BSSM and I bring him to all seed and trivial nodes. His match damage is just ridiculous and he tanks for Iron Fist, another linchpin of that kind of nodes. And he rainbows with OML, who makes those fights even more trivial. I’m grateful that with the few covers I got for those two, my grinds became just a tad quicker and less boring.

13

To me, Black Suit Spiderman is the one you pair up with Phoenix or Wolverine Patch to eliminate the drawback of giving the enemy strike tiles. Mostly Phoenix, since once you get enough covers to completely eliminate enemy strike tile damage, you’re in a place that Patch probably doesn’t belong. Most characters have their uses, and it’s not like he’s just a 5 star support.

14

Yeah the second level of luck you need when pulling 5s, I have already talked about that in the past. First pulling a 5, then pulling a good 5. RNG is everything in this game right now.

You post is a very unpopular opinion because it implies some things that are not exactly true :S

First, there is a big problem regarding iso. I would enjoy this game so much more if I could level all the 4s I wanted to. As long as I can’t then I will just level the good ones.

Which brings me to the second problem, I just care for the covers of the good chars. If I am not going to be able to level all the chars I want then why do I need their covers? (a part than for DDQ4) One cover for the essential nodes would help me almost the same. And that point is even worse for 5s! Spidey is not that bad, I think he is the 4th 5 right now, but he may be better than Cap, and his only problem is that he is going to dilute the covers of OML and Phoenix, but I think he is good enough. SS on the other hand is super lame, yeah his animations are cool, but having more covers from him than OML or Phoenix is not cool AT ALL. He is worse than the big 4s, until you have 5 in red and 420 level he is just dead weight (leveling him is just going to raise your scaling for nothing).

And then the third problem, getting the good latest 4s like Nova, Quake, Punisher specially is also really slow right now. 90 days for a full rotation in PvP is way too much. So again we depend TOO MUCH in the pulls of the legendary tokens. If I get Punisher/Nova covers great, any champed cover ok, if I get any other maxed, not champed 4 then I am screwed.

And I am still having fun, but which 5s/4s I pull influence a lot my ‘happiness in the game’.

PS: I think you need to remember that you have been quite lucky with both OML and GG (I think you have around 11 OML covers and 6 GGs already! so extremely lucky with your pulls), that is something that helps you a lot to have fun in this game. Now think somebody who has 10 SS and 3 OMLs, and who has to do double the amount of work you do to get to 1300. It is easier having fun when you have the best char in the game well covered.
PS: Oh and Hi, we are in the same Hulk slice icon_e_wink.gif
(this is why I know how many covers you have icon_razz.gif
)

15

You now what is not very fun for most people? Losing and feeling impotent.

Maybe you’re not like that and you care more about quirky characters and funny animations, but you should recognize that there are different ways of “having fun”.