Objectives - a discussion
dot_ditto
Member Posts: 1,442 ★★★★
With all the "hubbub" of the objectives in the last month, I wanted to share my thoughts on the matter, and try to get an idea-sharing discussion to perhaps help Kabam out with future objectives. 
First off, before we can address how to fix things, we need to identify what went wrong with previous objectives. If you have any thoughts/opinions, please add them, I definitely am not claiming I understand everything in this regard, and welcome the discussion. If the discussion of this can create more interesting, and fun objectives, I think it's a win for everyone.
Ok, so the #1 thing I feel is wrong with current objectives, is the repetition involved. There's too many of them, and it becomes too repetitive. "Do x of anything", regardless of how simple, gets REALLY boring after about 10 times. And after about 30, it's downright depressing!! So any objectives, I feel, should be limited to small amounts of repetitions ... 1 or 2, really, max 5.
Instructions and fights just encourage a searching for "easy duels" or "easy, low energy targets". And this is understandable .. people are trying to complete other things, and to do that, they need their energy to do that. So if an objectives comes along, which pulls people away from what they are trying to do (ie clear MEQ content, or story content, for example), it can come across as a bit frustrating, distracting, or tedious. (Especially when added to the above point, and you have to do it 50+ times!! O.o )
So I think those are 2 of the bigger points, and I'd like to put forward an idea that helps address those points. First off along these lines, I wanted to put a short compliment towards the Carina's challenges. For the sole reason, they actually address both of these points:
- 1 iteration only
- VERY challenging (ie not trivial).
Now, I personally have not yet even attempted even 1 of Carina's challenges - their difficulty level is way over my head!! LOL
However, the difficulty aside, if we focus on the STRUCTURE of them, I think they are an absolute win.
They have low repetition .. you don't have to GRIND them ...
They are not trivial .. you can't just search for an easy duel, and smash them out in your lunch break ... you have to think/plan and prepare for them.
They're .. "different" .. they're interesting ...
And that's the direction I really feel objectives should take. (perhaps not THAT difficult), but yes, make them somewhat "challenging" ...
So ... some other examples of objectives I think could work well enough (with various levels of difficulty, from simpler ones, to more complex, in no particular order):
- without using a champion which uses the miss, evade or invulnerable mechanics, take no damage in a fight against an opponent of equal or greater PI. (note regeneration won't help .. if you take dmg, you take dmg, even if you heal up, you still took dmg) (yes, you'll have to disable suicides for this - or use a robot ) (difficulty: moderate - it tests your ability to not rely on parry, and either bait heavies/specials or intercept)
- Win a fight vs an opponent of equal or greater PI without using a special attack. (difficulty easy ... this one's pretty straight forward)
- Using a team consisting only of 3* Avengers (ie Iron Man, Hawkeye, Black Widow, Thor, etc), defeat Thanos in Act 3.4.6 (difficulty moderate to easy - it's not too hard, although it'll take a bit of energy and time to do)
... etc.
So the point here is to make the objectives somewhat interesting/challenging (or thematic) ... either by defining specific team comps, or tactics or coming up with some "creative" option for fights (not just the simple/restrictive - defeat with killing blow as special 1). Any limiting factor (like using 6* Storm, Kitty or Iceman) is not good, as it punishes those who haven't gotten lucky with pulling champions. Using broad tags (ie #Mutants, #X-men, etc) works much better .. and trying to avoid specific star levels. Even though I indicated 3* above, I feel specifying "vs equal or greater PI" is much better .. you can use a 2* if you want, vs a 1k target .. or if you prefer to use a 6*, you'll need to go after a bigger, 10k or 20k target .
Whatever the objectives are, try to leave some choices in the hands of the players. The exceptions of course, are more specific setups, such as my #Avengers vs Thanos fight ... those "can" work, if structured properly, however, those types should be less common.
If you do limit choices, however, make sure to keep it broader by either targeting lower stars (ie 2 and 3 stars are easiest to come by) .. or by just indicating equal or greater PI.
I realize I haven't "solved" everything with this .. but then again, that wasn't the point .. the point is just to start a discussion, which hopefully doesn't fall on deaf ears
First off, before we can address how to fix things, we need to identify what went wrong with previous objectives. If you have any thoughts/opinions, please add them, I definitely am not claiming I understand everything in this regard, and welcome the discussion. If the discussion of this can create more interesting, and fun objectives, I think it's a win for everyone.
Ok, so the #1 thing I feel is wrong with current objectives, is the repetition involved. There's too many of them, and it becomes too repetitive. "Do x of anything", regardless of how simple, gets REALLY boring after about 10 times. And after about 30, it's downright depressing!!
So any objectives, I feel, should be limited to small amounts of repetitions ... 1 or 2, really, max 5. Instructions and fights just encourage a searching for "easy duels" or "easy, low energy targets". And this is understandable .. people are trying to complete other things, and to do that, they need their energy to do that. So if an objectives comes along, which pulls people away from what they are trying to do (ie clear MEQ content, or story content, for example), it can come across as a bit frustrating, distracting, or tedious. (Especially when added to the above point, and you have to do it 50+ times!! O.o )
So I think those are 2 of the bigger points, and I'd like to put forward an idea that helps address those points. First off along these lines, I wanted to put a short compliment towards the Carina's challenges. For the sole reason, they actually address both of these points:
- 1 iteration only
- VERY challenging (ie not trivial).
Now, I personally have not yet even attempted even 1 of Carina's challenges - their difficulty level is way over my head!! LOL
However, the difficulty aside, if we focus on the STRUCTURE of them, I think they are an absolute win.
They have low repetition .. you don't have to GRIND them ...
They are not trivial .. you can't just search for an easy duel, and smash them out in your lunch break ... you have to think/plan and prepare for them.
They're .. "different" .. they're interesting ...
And that's the direction I really feel objectives should take. (perhaps not THAT difficult), but yes, make them somewhat "challenging" ...
So ... some other examples of objectives I think could work well enough (with various levels of difficulty, from simpler ones, to more complex, in no particular order):
- without using a champion which uses the miss, evade or invulnerable mechanics, take no damage in a fight against an opponent of equal or greater PI. (note regeneration won't help .. if you take dmg, you take dmg, even if you heal up, you still took dmg) (yes, you'll have to disable suicides for this - or use a robot
) (difficulty: moderate - it tests your ability to not rely on parry, and either bait heavies/specials or intercept)- Win a fight vs an opponent of equal or greater PI without using a special attack. (difficulty easy ... this one's pretty straight forward)
- Using a team consisting only of 3* Avengers (ie Iron Man, Hawkeye, Black Widow, Thor, etc), defeat Thanos in Act 3.4.6 (difficulty moderate to easy - it's not too hard, although it'll take a bit of energy and time to do)
... etc.
So the point here is to make the objectives somewhat interesting/challenging (or thematic) ... either by defining specific team comps, or tactics or coming up with some "creative" option for fights (not just the simple/restrictive - defeat with killing blow as special 1). Any limiting factor (like using 6* Storm, Kitty or Iceman) is not good, as it punishes those who haven't gotten lucky with pulling champions. Using broad tags (ie #Mutants, #X-men, etc) works much better .. and trying to avoid specific star levels. Even though I indicated 3* above, I feel specifying "vs equal or greater PI" is much better .. you can use a 2* if you want, vs a 1k target .. or if you prefer to use a 6*, you'll need to go after a bigger, 10k or 20k target .
Whatever the objectives are, try to leave some choices in the hands of the players. The exceptions of course, are more specific setups, such as my #Avengers vs Thanos fight ... those "can" work, if structured properly, however, those types should be less common.
If you do limit choices, however, make sure to keep it broader by either targeting lower stars (ie 2 and 3 stars are easiest to come by) .. or by just indicating equal or greater PI.
I realize I haven't "solved" everything with this .. but then again, that wasn't the point .. the point is just to start a discussion, which hopefully doesn't fall on deaf ears
1