Dev Diary: The Future of Quests

Summoners!

Part 1 of our Roadmap is live! Head over to our blog to read thoughts on the past, present, and future of Quests in Marvel Contest of Champions! Our team goes over what we've learned from the Book 2 Act 1 Beta Test and how we'll be moving forward revisions to Act 6 and the Champion Boss Fight, and much more! Read all about it on our Blog! Click here!

As we mention in the post, we'd like to hear from you, our players, on what your Act 6 Pain Points with certain bosses were. We have some of our own plans and targets in the works, but they’re still early on and we don’t want to limit the possibilities by talking specifics just yet.

We're going to set up a player focus group with a selection of 20-30 Summoners from across The Battlerealm and work with them to do some discovery surrounding what made some of the more troubling fights problematic. We're looking for players that have attempted Act 6 and can identify areas in which they felt they faced a challenge that was more difficult than they expected.

Apply to be part of the Act 6 Pain Point Player Focus Group here.

Comments

GroundedWisdom

I just read it but I think I missed when they said the 6.1,2,3,4 attack values were being nerfed. Can anyone help me?

All Attack Values will be reduced by 40-60%.

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airmundo

The changes are great! Really good to see they listened on improvements needed.

As most are already mentioning though, what happens to those of us that did 100% act 6 with attack values way above tier from what they will soon be? That’s a lot more revives and pots used then it will take in the future so it definitely warrants asking for something. And if I don’t get crystals or revives/pots, even a legendary title for clearing it pre-Nerf would be nice 😂

Last bit, I didn’t see anything on abyss. This challenge is 100% a cash grab and I think there’s small tweaks that could make it better. For example, instead of making champs go unblockable & unstoppable after a certain amount of hits, why not just unblockable? It’s still a tough challenge at that point but at least makes it do able for skilled players to not just quit the fight when it turns impossible. Food for thought.

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Cliffordcan

New content (that actually has release dates) looks exciting. A lot of words for a few tidbits in information was very annoying tho.

Super annoying that Act 6 and 7 related content has no dates or time frames, the longer this takes the more stagnated the game will get.

Damn, that is a big nerf to Act 6. Like huge. I honestly think compensation should be huge as well.

I'm thinking:
4 T5C
12 T2A
4 12.5% T5CC crystals
1 50% T5CC crystal
1 12.5% Selector
1 6* R1>2 Gem
50,000 5* Shards
25,000 6* Shards

That or literally 10,000 Units.

Pali32

Any idea when these changes of act 6 are going to in effect Any date or time idea

Panchulon21

So I’m glad you guy have addressed but am I the only one who feels unimpressed? The wording is great, the suspense for all was cool but even though the words are there I don’t feel any satisfaction from the announcements today.

Act 6: thank you for lowering the attack values. That’s amazing and needed. Thanks again. But a date wasn’t given? So right now it’s just another suspenseful wait. The nodes being looked at, that’s cool but at least give us a few examples of what your idea are like “mysterio acid wash, we are going to change that to do you even bleed with blah blah”.

Champion fight; solid changes, I 100% this but glad to see this for the guys who can’t or were even afraid to touch it. Really good changes.

Book 2: happy to see this and an actual date given! Perfect. Getting dates is what excites me.

Cavalier: that’ll be fun and can’t wait.

Boss rush: that’ll be fun, need to see the nodes before I get excited.

War: this is where the disappointed kicks in. The p4 rewards and below are so bad. You guys upped everything for the top spenders in the game but for the guys who spend a little or are free to play (a lot are in p4 or below) this does almost nothing. The disparity between p3 and p4 is so minimal in difficulty but huge in rewards is crazy. The t5b is fine but 5k 6 star compared to 10? That’s crazy. At least give us 7500.

I don’t even want to get started on the nodes, tactics.

KnightZero

New content (that actually has release dates) looks exciting. A lot of words for a few tidbits in information was very annoying tho.

Super annoying that Act 6 and 7 related content has no dates or time frames, the longer this takes the more stagnated the game will get.

Damn, that is a big nerf to Act 6. Like huge. I honestly think compensation should be huge as well.

I'm thinking:
4 T5C
12 T2A
4 12.5% T5CC crystals
1 50% T5CC crystal
1 12.5% Selector
1 6* R1>2 Gem
50,000 5* Shards
25,000 6* Shards

That or literally 10,000 Units.

Rather them give units than what you said. I agree that the attack value reduction is quite a bit and a lot of units would have been saved on revives, but the compensation you've written is too much imo.

Kabam Miike

@Kabam Miike can we please get confirmation act 6 compensation doesn’t have a time limit

There is no information on Act 6 compensation yet, at all. But I can say that we are going to treat it differently than the one for Acts 1 and 2., There might have to be different tiers, or it may be something completely different. There is no information yet.

doctorb

2 things I wish they had addressed:
First, we should be able to do more than 1 quest at a time as long as we dont use the same heroes.
Second, for the really long fights, how about letting us save our progress and complete it later.
Seeing a great player like Seatin play for hours just to finish 1 pathway in AoL is kind of discouraging.

Any opinions?

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StevieManWonder

@Kabam Miike can we please get confirmation act 6 compensation doesn’t have a time limit
There is no information on Act 6 compensation yet, at all. But I can say that we are going to treat it differently than the one for Acts 1 and 2., There might have to be different tiers, or it may be something completely different. There is no information yet.

Thank you for answering this and being transparent about it!

Thanks_D19

The first cavalier difficulty tests are arriving the next two months and are called Canadian and Herald difficulty? I thought the first cavalier test arrived this month, wasn’t it called epic difficulty? *insert Seinfeld music here*

CizzleCK

This reads really promising. Hearing a theme from the comments on compensation and the 3 month note. Any help here @Kabam Miike ? Will there be a 3-month warning or similar? I only have a couple paths to go, and I'd really like to try to complete it before the 3-month cutoff to be eligible for the compensation. Understanding a date would help me figure out how much time I have to attack it.

GroundedWisdom

Its a sales pitch not a fix. We need timelines not promises.
"Trust but verify"
-Ronald Reagan

I agree with you 100%. Plus, anything can sound good on paper, but when it comes to actual gameplay, is a different story. Just like people thought Anihilus and Emma Frost were going to be top 5 champions based on what was read. Then they actually played them, and a different story. Granted, Emma is not bad by any means, just not the second coming of Scarlet Witch like people thought.

It's a roadmap. Just an outline. They can't give specifics if they're not locked in yet. To be fair, I doubt many of us were expecting an ignition this fast.

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Erza_Scarlet

I don't want to wait until end of the year to explore act 6...

Broken

@Kabam Miike can you explain how to explore new cavaliar difficulty ? mean who beat the 6.4 grandmaster can explore 100% cavaliar difficulty ?

ItsDamien

Its a sales pitch not a fix. We need timelines not promises.
"Trust but verify"
-Ronald Reagan

I agree with you 100%. Plus, anything can sound good on paper, but when it comes to actual gameplay, is a different story. Just like people thought Anihilus and Emma Frost were going to be top 5 champions based on what was read. Then they actually played them, and a different story. Granted, Emma is not bad by any means, just not the second coming of Scarlet Witch like people thought.
It's a roadmap. Just an outline. They can't give specifics if they're not locked in yet. To be fair, I doubt many of us were expecting an ignition this fast.

A road map without clear deadlines. Outside of the Cav difficulty, nothing has been set in stone, and that is a big failing on their part of planning. They built up expectations for this blog post and couldn't even deliver dates during that time.

GroundedWisdom

@Kabam Miike can you explain how to explore new cavaliar difficulty ? mean who beat the 6.4 grandmaster can explore 100% cavaliar difficulty ?

I think they're essentially saying it's something to grow into, some may not be able to at first. The same way Uncollected was when it came out.

Cliffordcan

New content (that actually has release dates) looks exciting. A lot of words for a few tidbits in information was very annoying tho.

Super annoying that Act 6 and 7 related content has no dates or time frames, the longer this takes the more stagnated the game will get.

Damn, that is a big nerf to Act 6. Like huge. I honestly think compensation should be huge as well.

I'm thinking:
4 T5C
12 T2A
4 12.5% T5CC crystals
1 50% T5CC crystal
1 12.5% Selector
1 6* R1>2 Gem
50,000 5* Shards
25,000 6* Shards

That or literally 10,000 Units.
Rather them give units than what you said. I agree that the attack value reduction is quite a bit and a lot of units would have been saved on revives, but the compensation you've written is too much imo.

Have you 100% Act 6? Tell me how these changes will not lower Exploration by 10K units? I blew 2000 units and a decent stash on the first try of No Retreat Champion, then had to go back in and used more units. That is at least 2500 units I wasted on one fight in ALL of Act 6.

Act 6 was so bad I boosted through at least 80% of the paths. 50 paths of boosts is 7500 units alone (assuming full boosting of 150 units).

If they don't want to give Shards and Resources they need to be 10,000 units or what that is worth. Not some revives and potions.

Ab_Samad

Amazing guys

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Bwest289

In general, I'm happy with the updates.

V5
Variants are always good as long as they aren't anything like Variant 1. I had no fun with that one and they progressively got better. I hope v5 is consistent with that direction.

Act 6
Obviously there is an outcry for compensation. The changes will be wildly different once live so there should be appropriate compensation for the summoners who completed this content pre-nerf. It also needs to be compensation that doesn't expire. Most people spent ALOT to clear it as-is, so getting a pool of revives or t2A that will ultimately expire wont help. I don't know how you'll do it but the compensation should be substantial for this level of change. I'd expect a community uprising if not, haha.

That said, the changes to the champion are on point. Heres a few others.

6.3.4 (i think) Acid Wash Mysterio is a no-brainer.
6.2.2 Mr. Sinister shouldnt be such a champ dependent fight.
6.1.6 Sym Supreme shouldnt be such a champ dependent fight. Angela or units are about the only option.
The Power Sting lane in 6.4 should have reduced values. There just aren't enough power sting options at this time to have a lane of power sting fights and people shouldnt need to pull a semi-new champ in mr fantastic or a bunch of revives to get through a lane.

Book 2 Chapter 1
One of my main issues in act 6 was that all the t2a in the paths just went to overflow and expired. It was too much of the same resource. I like being rewarded for each path but you gotta switch up the rewards on each path if I can't keep all of my loot indefinitely. I basically lost the majority of those rewards because they went to overflow and expired.

Cavalier Difficulty
Finally! Excited to see what this brings as is the rest of the community. Hopeful the rewards reflect the state of the game for end game players.

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StevieManWonder

New content (that actually has release dates) looks exciting. A lot of words for a few tidbits in information was very annoying tho.

Super annoying that Act 6 and 7 related content has no dates or time frames, the longer this takes the more stagnated the game will get.

Damn, that is a big nerf to Act 6. Like huge. I honestly think compensation should be huge as well.

I'm thinking:
4 T5C
12 T2A
4 12.5% T5CC crystals
1 50% T5CC crystal
1 12.5% Selector
1 6* R1>2 Gem
50,000 5* Shards
25,000 6* Shards

That or literally 10,000 Units.
Rather them give units than what you said. I agree that the attack value reduction is quite a bit and a lot of units would have been saved on revives, but the compensation you've written is too much imo.
Have you 100% Act 6? Tell me how these changes will not lower Exploration by 10K units? I blew 2000 units and a decent stash on the first try of No Retreat Champion, then had to go back in and used more units. That is at least 2500 units I wasted on one fight in ALL of Act 6.

Act 6 was so bad I boosted through at least 80% of the paths. 50 paths of boosts is 7500 units alone (assuming full boosting of 150 units).

If they don't want to give Shards and Resources they need to be 10,000 units or what that is worth. Not some revives and potions.

Agreed. Given how much they are nerfing act 6, the compensation for people who completed it and especially for those like me who explored it needs to be substantial. With these new attack values, Exploration will be a walk in the park compared to original.

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World Eater

Will cavalier difficulty be the same layout as Uncollected and heroic ?
The energy use is a big concern for me.

Overall message seems positive

Menkent

words instead of actions. that’s the message i see. you’ve been crafting this statement for how long?

This is my point! It takes kabam two months to ANNOUNCE that they'll make a focus group to talk about things then come up with possible fixes then roll them out. Two months to decide they need to make a plan for how to come up with a plan to fix the actual problems. Meanwhile, this forum, YouTube, and reddit are full of detailed feedback about "pain points" and detailed solutions for them. But kabam needs a focus group.

H3t3r

So first off.
Act6: The changes being made to the attack values and the champion fights plus other pain points are all very very very appreciated. This actually will entice me to 100% act6 when these changes go live.

Variants: its kinda weird you guys put them on the back burner but im glad to see that they will be coming back and more often.

Boss rush: This is very exciting and I like the concept cant wait for this to come.

Other: As regards to everything else, its also extremely nice to see and this gives me something to look forward and to start playing this game seriously again.