**WINTER OF WOE - BONUS OBJECTIVE POINT**
As previously announced, the team will be distributing an additional point toward milestones to anyone who completed the Absorbing Man fight in the first step of the Winter of Woe.
This point will be distributed at a later time as it requires the team to pull and analyze data.
The timeline has not been set, but work has started.
There is currently an issue where some Alliances are are unable to find a match in Alliance Wars, or are receiving Byes without getting the benefits of the Win. We will be adjusting the Season Points of the Alliances that are affected within the coming weeks, and will be working to compensate them for their missed Per War rewards as well.

Additionally, we are working to address an issue where new Members of an Alliance are unable to place Defenders for the next War after joining. We are working to address this, but it will require a future update.

Defender Diversity one of the best thing kabam has made

2

Comments

  • FraggyFraggy Posts: 6
    edited September 2017
    quoted post removed by moderation

    You are right. But its not just about it being hard. It would be great if it could be different than AQ. In older version you were taking same path fighting same champs over and over again, kind of like AQ. My point was just to have diversity so that it feels little different every time. May be I chose wrong words in my previous comment and used wrong examples for champions.
    Post edited by TenebrousTenebrific on
  • PhantomPhantom Posts: 228
    edited September 2017
    Diversity needs to go, it's a trash addition to the game. It's like [removed by moderation] they gave us stickers, who ever has crappier stickers wins because the better stickers are too common. I'm fine with defender kills gone, it's diversity that is completely ruining war. The nodes are stupidly easy, I don't find a challenge at all. War should be about percentage and that is it. Your telling me you deserve to win if u have a high defender rating if we're both at 100%? Like what? Telling me the number of your defenders ratings added up affects how a war works? Huh? Diversity is a way for kabam not to nerf md and champions, this is why the forums are terrible. Noobs don't like the idea of being told to get better.

    Their taking the value out of their own good champs. Why would you lower the price of your top-selling products? Worst. Business. Move. Ever.
    Post edited by TenebrousTenebrific on
  • UnsaferBinkie7UnsaferBinkie7 Posts: 658 ★★
    It truly is the worst business move, I didn't join aw to have a 1 day alliance quest bro.
  • Fraggy wrote: »
    Of course I get flagged for telling the truth, I swear this game has gone downhill since 12.0. If you cannot fight 3 night crawlers in a row... don't complain about it, better your self, he's an easy defender. Magik has her weaknesses, md has its counters. What kind of game is this? Kabam keeps making things useless because people don't want to put in the work, practice. It's not that hard man.

    You are right. But its not just about it being hard. It would be great if it could be different than AQ. In older version you were taking same path fighting same champs over and over again, kind of like AQ. My point was just to have diversity so that it feels little different every time. May be I chose wrong words in my previous comment and used wrong examples for champions.

    That sort of diversity is laudable, and I think it is a worthy goal to pursue. However, it can't be achieved through any monkeying around with points because fundamentally speaking players want to do the best they can do, and when you attempt to do the best you can do you tend to optimize your efforts. That leads to equilibrium states where the players place the best possible defenders the same way every time.

    Why do they place the same defenders the same way every time? Because the problem is exactly the same every time. You see the same map with the same nodes and your alliance tends to have the same champions at its disposal for placement. Across different alliances of similar tier the problem tends to be viewed in a similar way with similar access to similar resources. So you tend to see alliances gravitate to the same solution to the same problem.

    There is only one way to change that: don't allow players to solve the same problem every time. Either the map has to be different every time or the nodes have to be different every time or some other element of the tactical situation must be different every time. And there is one best way to ensure that players are always confronted with a different situation every time: leave it up to the other players to engineer the situation. That's the whole point of PvP. Player verses player.

    Right now the alliance places defenders based on an identical situation every time. There is another side to the war: the attacking side. If we allowed the attackers to modify the map or the nodes in some way that was unknown to the defending alliance, they could not possibly know what the optimal way to place defenders was. The situation would be different every time. And if they placed too predictably, the opposing alliance could take advantage of that by deliberately making map changes that would place them at a disadvantage. The need to react to the other side is what creates true diversity of experience. You wouldn't see the same thing every time because alliances that placed defenders the same way every time would eventually be punished for that by sophisticated opponents that set traps for that consistency.

    No matter how you change scoring, you end up with a static equation with one solution. If you want dynamic wars, you have to add a dynamic element to defense placement. Giving each side an independent say in how defense works and allowing alliances to change that every war adds that dynamism.

    Anything else is much harder and much less likely to succeed. And any change to scoring alone is absolutely mathematically guaranteed to fail to accomplish this.
  • UnsaferBinkie7UnsaferBinkie7 Posts: 658 ★★
    @DNA3000 I love that aw idea with the different nodes each time, that'd make war so much more interesting. If I were you, I'd make a thread about it to being more attention to it. Us placement officers are gonna be so giddy :). .... but of course diversity just needs to go man.
  • UnsaferBinkie7UnsaferBinkie7 Posts: 658 ★★
    @DNA3000 I love that aw idea with the different nodes each time, that'd make war so much more interesting. If I were you, I'd make a thread about it to being more attention to it. Us placement officers are gonna be so giddy :). .... but of course diversity just needs to go man.

    Bring* :|
  • A_Noob_Is1A_Noob_Is1 Posts: 762 ★★
    Either way both wars are boring....
  • UnsaferBinkie7UnsaferBinkie7 Posts: 658 ★★
    A_Noob_Is1 wrote: »
    Either way both wars are boring....

    Agreed, new war is even more boring.
  • @DNA3000 I love that aw idea with the different nodes each time, that'd make war so much more interesting. If I were you, I'd make a thread about it to being more attention to it. Us placement officers are gonna be so giddy :). .... but of course diversity just needs to go man.

    I made a suggestion in the main thread regarding this idea. The basic gist of the idea was that alliances would be allowed to pick a small set of global debuffs that would be placed on the map. When you place defenders you don't know what the other side is picking. The debuffs would be focused on either class or specific abilities and would be stackable.

    So let's say you could pick five debuffs that would be applied to the defenders. One set of debuffs would be a -10% power gain for a specific class. You could pick all five debuffs as being the same one: debuff mystic. You'd end up with -50% power gain for all mystic champs on the map. But all other champs would remain at full strength. If you do this you could significantly disincentivize placing mystic champs. Alliances would respond by placing fewer mystic and more other champs. That would cause alliances to then spread out the debuffs.

    This is still a one-dimensional problem, but it allows for a move-countermove. You diversify the debuffs so that there's more than one dimension to the problem. Make debuffs that reduce defensive ability accuracy, or bleed damage, or doubles the effects of armor breaks. Give alliances a spectrum of debuffs to apply that will target certain kinds of champions, and let them fight it out to see what the best defenders are when the opposing alliance uses the best debuffs. You will likely get many different kinds of strategies and sometimes you are going to do just the right thing to neutralize the enemy and sometimes you will do something that doesn't hurt the enemy at all because they placed an unconventional defense you were not expecting.

    You would need AW experts to help design and test the best set of debuffs that would affect war strongly enough to make it viable, without it being too strong and dominate wars. You want them to be something where if you pick the right debuffs you could hand the enemy a disadvantage and if you pick the wrong debuffs you could hand the enemy an advantage and there's no one right solution. That would add a significant amount of diversity to AW matches in my opinion.
  • TempestTempest Posts: 295
    We're overcomplicating things here, I think. The goal was to encourage 1) different defenders so it won't be a Magik / Mordo / nc / spidey / dorm gear every war 2) players to fight battles and not hold back because they fear losing points to defender kills.

    The answer to number 1 was defender diversity which in itself is not a terrible thing but has flaws. The map is now too easy. Solution: Strengthen nodes a bit and hide champion class. Balance out the points system so that it's not so heavily weighted on diversity.

    The answer to number 2 was removal of defender kills. The flaw is that the alliance that is most willing to spend on items to 100% the map wins. Solution: bring back defender kills but only kills over 30 award points , or make it so the first death of each attacking champ doesn't count and only revives cost points for the attacker. We need defender kills, it just makes the game better. Otherwise why are we ranking up defenders? They are going to die anyway because of weak nodes, and strong ones don't award your ally points even if they kill 50 enemies.
  • UnsaferBinkie7UnsaferBinkie7 Posts: 658 ★★
    @DNA3000 I like that, man. Really nice suggestion, would make war a hell of lot more interesting(less boring lol).
  • UnsaferBinkie7UnsaferBinkie7 Posts: 658 ★★
    edited September 2017
    Tempest wrote: »
    We're overcomplicating things here, I think. The goal was to encourage 1) different defenders so it won't be a Magik / Mordo / nc / spidey / dorm gear every war 2) players to fight battles and not hold back because they fear losing points to defender kills.

    The answer to number 1 was defender diversity which in itself is not a terrible thing but has flaws. The map is now too easy. Solution: Strengthen nodes a bit and hide champion class. Balance out the points system so that it's not so heavily weighted on diversity.

    The answer to number 2 was removal of defender kills. The flaw is that the alliance that is most willing to spend on items to 100% the map wins. Solution: bring back defender kills but only kills over 30 award points , or make it so the first death of each attacking champ doesn't count and only revives cost points for the attacker. We need defender kills, it just makes the game better. Otherwise why are we ranking up defenders? They are going to die anyway because of weak nodes, and strong ones don't award your ally points even if they kill 50 enemies.

    The way that diversity is put is truly boring, and makes our dope defenders that we ranked before the change useless since most of the wins in high tiers is by diversity. Diversity should be something like if you place a champ that isn't in your bg already it gives your defenders a crit boost or something... basically a synergy or something like depending on the champs and all. Not literally making us not want to place our 4/55 and 5/50 magiks more than one time. This isn't benefiting us (end game players), it's more for the players who lack to common sense and skills.
    New nodes? Cool. But they're too easy.
    New map? Cool I guess? This map I personally don't like, but me and the others who agree with me will get used to it.

    This is game changing, it isn't fair. Is basically the same thing as before, instead of our joe fix it type of champs being unused regularly it's the god tier defenders who are being used less.

    It's unfair that if you want to win a war in tier 1, you better place only 1 magik or one mordo or one dormammu per bg because you want to stop players from complaining about there being too many of the same champs.... if that's the damn case then let's not put like 3 damn psylocks and AA'S in map 5 lol. It's pretty disrespectful to us.
  • UnsaferBinkie7UnsaferBinkie7 Posts: 658 ★★
    @Tempest and like I said before, the goal is literally to kill those champs off. There's no suggestion, it's literally diversity or you lose. As I've said, it should've been a little mini extra thing like a synergy or something not a complete game changing affect that ruins the difficulty aw can have. Aw is too easy right now, diversity is just completely ruining any fun war had. I'd say this calls for atleast one rank down ticket of each star (5*-3*). It just isn't fair for our main defenders to be thrown out the way so my 4* luke cage can take over my dormammu in defense. It isn't a suggestion or a choice, it's obviously forced.
  • Tempest wrote: »
    We're overcomplicating things here, I think. The goal was to encourage 1) different defenders so it won't be a Magik / Mordo / nc / spidey / dorm gear every war 2) players to fight battles and not hold back because they fear losing points to defender kills.

    The answer to number 1 was defender diversity which in itself is not a terrible thing but has flaws. The map is now too easy. Solution: Strengthen nodes a bit and hide champion class. Balance out the points system so that it's not so heavily weighted on diversity.

    That oversimplifies the situation to the point of being incorrect. It would be unfair to characterize the current situation as "everyone is happy with defender diversity they just think the maps are too easy to fight." That is one symptom but not the only symptom of the problem. You're discounting the fact that the list of major complaints that players have lodged against the system so far include:

    1. The new diversity scores are creating a new optimal defense placement that is just as restrictive as the old system, if not more restrictive. Players were originally asked to place the strongest defenders they possessed. Now they are being told specifically what to place to maximize diversity and rating points. If you have a 4/40 Luke Cage and you place that, you eliminate the ability for someone with a 5/50 Luke Cage to place that and get more rating points. The new meta is worse than the old meta.
    2. The new "diverse" placement is just as monotonous as the old one, because it is less interesting. It is worthless to be surprised at what the other side places if no one cares anymore about what is being placed from a combat perspective.
    3. The new system eliminates the ability for players to compete on the basis of defensive strength. This weakens the sense of competition in an alliance event that is supposed to be a direct head to head competition.
    4. Diversity and rating points create a sense of predetermined outcome where the point advantage, while not known, is "baked into" the fight before either side fights any battles. If one side cannot overcome that initial point disadvantage they will inevitably lose.
    The answer to number 2 was removal of defender kills. The flaw is that the alliance that is most willing to spend on items to 100% the map wins. Solution: bring back defender kills but only kills over 30 award points , or make it so the first death of each attacking champ doesn't count and only revives cost points for the attacker. We need defender kills, it just makes the game better. Otherwise why are we ranking up defenders? They are going to die anyway because of weak nodes, and strong ones don't award your ally points even if they kill 50 enemies.

    I can agree with this element, insofar as I suggested it when 15.0 released (changing defender kill points to attacker revive points).

    I should point out that I don't believe your statement of the devs' goals is correct. I don't think diversity and defender kills are two separate goals. They are actually the same goal phrased differently. I believe the actual unstated goal is "increase the likelihood that attacking alliances finish the map." To do this, they specifically tackled four separate problems that specifically reduce the likelihood of alliances finishing the map on attack. One: if there are problematic champions that are most likely to generate a large number of kills, alliances shouldn't face too many of them. Two: if there are problematic nodes that are the source of a disproportionate amount of defender kills, those nodes should be softened or removed. Three: if a player gets into trouble on a path, there should be a possibility for another player to assist them on that path. Four: if a player dies fighting a node, they should not be discouraged from trying to kill it a second time with a different attacker because each death is costing his or her alliance critical victory points.

    The four changes in AW in 15.0:

    1. You are penalized for placing more than one of any champ.
    2. Nodes such as thorns and slashed tires were eliminated.
    3. Maps were redesigned to increase the amount of cross over in paths.
    4. Defender kill points were removed.

    These are not four different problems. These are four changes used to solve one problem: alliances giving up on attack.
  • TempestTempest Posts: 295
    @DNA3000 good points. I especially agree with part 1 point 4 about predetermined outcomes, but couldn't that be at least alleviated by my suggestion of reworking the point scoring system? It does require a ridiculous amount of alliance coordination so the guy with 5/50 Luke cage places over the guy with 4/40 one (or not, because maybe it's better for the 4/40 guy to place if he has no stronger champs) but that is a separate problem, I'm not sure if this is a good thing (increase alliance communications) or bad thing. There is potential for more strategy with diversity, but the nodes have to make sense first or it's just the garbage it is now. Right now it doesn't matter who you have at what node, people plow through everything easily. I'm not sure the old system of a thousand nightcrawlers and magiks was a good thing either, though I can agree this wasn't the most elegant solution.

    I see your perspective on dev goals and find the points you listed at the end interesting.. Though I don't agree with the dev on this. You want to encourage people to play and not give up the fight with unused champs, but the overarching goal should not be to make alliances complete the map. The whole point is that you are trying to prevent the enemy from finishing the map!! It should not be every war both opponents finish 100% and then it comes down to nitpicking on diversity.. That makes no sense..


  • RagamugginGunnerRagamugginGunner Posts: 2,210 ★★★★★
    Imran wrote: »
    All blaming kabam for defender diversity! But, with diversity u can use more champ. We use unnecessary champ just in arena. Now, we can use different champ in aw too. Also for this aw fight seems like easy. Now, aw not fill up with spiderman, jugg, nc, iceman, magic. It's a great move by kabam I think.

    I really hope this is sarcastic.
  • ImmortalImmortal Posts: 323 ★★
    There are many good suggestions in this thread!

    For me, if suicides are going to boost ratings, then recoil should not reduce hp from activation. It makes AW all about just surviving long enough for the AI to kill themselves with their own specials.

    Ratings from boosts should also not be considered part of the rating. There's no new contents or interesting contents that's simultaneously available ingame for us to have fun with the boosts that cost as 1400 units for the bundles.
  • Tempest wrote: »
    I see your perspective on dev goals and find the points you listed at the end interesting.. Though I don't agree with the dev on this. You want to encourage people to play and not give up the fight with unused champs, but the overarching goal should not be to make alliances complete the map. The whole point is that you are trying to prevent the enemy from finishing the map!! It should not be every war both opponents finish 100% and then it comes down to nitpicking on diversity.. That makes no sense..

    I believe this is a fundamental problem with the approach the devs are taking. If AW is to be competitive, it must allow one side to try to stop the other side from completing the map. But the devs (I believe) are perceiving the inability to complete the map as a problem. If you think about it, it doesn't matter how they solve that problem. However they solve it, the act of doing so would be nullifying a specific reason why people play AW. I think that's why modifying scoring is unlikely to help no matter how you do it. If it doesn't accomplish the goal of making it easier to finish the map the devs will just change it again. If it does accomplish that goal the players will ultimately feel their competitive options have been removed or neutralized.

    I think this impasse is something that should be resolved openly, and not hidden in implementation details without explanation. In other words, I can fiddle with the scoring in such a way that it does become easier for alliances to complete the map, and I can nevertheless claim it doesn't impair competition. But the players will only accept that if I'm an especially good liar, because those two things can't be simultaneously true.
  • FAL7ENFAL7EN Posts: 297
    I love AW diversity Kabam! Keep up the good work team!!
  • UnsaferBinkie7UnsaferBinkie7 Posts: 658 ★★
    The mystic problem lol. There's counters to everything and temp counters. All kabam has to do is stop the way dexterity works right now with mystic dispersion. That's all, but people really think is ridiculous outrage is gonna happen. If you can't handle this piece of content, then you're not ready for it, practice. Nobody asked or diversity, this is kabam's lazy way of making your magik useless because the constant noob complaining is too much for them. Pathetic.
  • Jkw634Jkw634 Posts: 283 ★★
    Unless the people saying we love war diversity are high ranking group with a diverse champs they will be crying once everyone gets settled in diversity and they have no chance of winning when all groups place 150 different champs. 100 percent easy maps and lose because of defender rating. As a 10 million alliance we have adapted quick made excel spreadsheets and beating higher alliances based off of diversity but being outclassed defensive wise.
  • UnsaferBinkie7UnsaferBinkie7 Posts: 658 ★★
    Yes! I love the flags you diversity lovers give me. Shows me the low percentage of people who actually like it too.
  • GroundedWisdomGroundedWisdom Posts: 36,189 ★★★★★
    Jkw634 wrote: »
    Unless the people saying we love war diversity are high ranking group with a diverse champs they will be crying once everyone gets settled in diversity and they have no chance of winning when all groups place 150 different champs. 100 percent easy maps and lose because of defender rating. As a 10 million alliance we have adapted quick made excel spreadsheets and beating higher alliances based off of diversity but being outclassed defensive wise.

    Which brings us to one of my theories. Defender Rating as a significant metric is one of the mechanics balancing the Matches, in my opinion. It will take some time to balance and we will still see some overpowered Matches in the interim. Eventually, Tiers will be more in-range with the Ratings of Allies. Defender Rating is a reflection of Ally Rating, which is a reflection of Account Rating. Essentially, growth will occur when growth occurs in the game from Ranking and progressing, as the microcosm affects the macrocosm. Layman's Terms: The Matches will be more in tune with our Rating and we will advance in War the same way we advance in the game. By growing our Accounts.
  • ImranImran Posts: 587 ★★★
    Millybear wrote: »
    Imran wrote: »
    All blaming kabam for defender diversity! But, with diversity u can use more champ. We use unnecessary champ just in arena. Now, we can use different champ in aw too. Also for this aw fight seems like easy. Now, aw not fill up with spiderman, jugg, nc, iceman, magic. It's a great move by kabam I think.

    Did they brainwashed you??!! :#

    Kabam doesn't need that. It's just my personal opinion. Now, I don't need to rank up specific champ for alliance request to make a invisible defender. We have now our free choice, which I like most. We are in good communication that's why we can put different 50 defender in each bg and winning war. With diversity now alliance war now become more team effort. Everyone need to communicate perfectly so that no one put wrong defender.
  • VandalSavageVandalSavage Posts: 267 ★★
    Imran wrote: »
    All blaming kabam for defender diversity! But, with diversity u can use more champ. We use unnecessary champ just in arena. Now, we can use different champ in aw too. Also for this aw fight seems like easy. Now, aw not fill up with spiderman, jugg, nc, iceman, magic. It's a great move by kabam I think.

    All alliances could had used any different champs in previous alliance wars (AW) too. They chose not to.

    The only difference now is that people get additional points if they did choose to use different champs. People don't want to openly say it but certain people of a particular mindset equate this to the PC brigade where certain people get bonus points for being of a certain color. To quote someone from the forum:
    I guess the new system takes a leaf from the political correct brigade where diversity is worth more than the right person for the job ....
    (Sept 14, http://forums.playcontestofchampions.com/en/discussion/comment/129161#Comment_129161)

    If they lose in AW (and assume both sides 100% the map and everyone used unique heroes), it was because of "diversity" and not due to the opponent having a higher defender rating.

    Moreover, to maximize points, alliances have to work together more closely than before at least initially until everyone in the ally knows their role. Some don't want to spend the time, easier to whine while others continue to play as if the scoring system didn't even change (which is easier to do if the ally only plays one battle group).

    Then there's the mindset of certain people that once they climbed up the ladder, they topple it over to prevent others from following. In the early days of AW, there was the constant crying that it is just another "money grab". Sure, there were rumblings of seeing the tired old heroes over and over again. But it was a money grab because of all those boosted nodes with certain ones getting more hate than others. There weren't too many alliances that can post a line up of rank 5/50s 4-stars and juiced up 5-stars that were then powered up with nodes. 4/40s 4-stars were pretty much the norm for the top 50 or 100 ally and those were the ones people had to beat to climb the ladder.

    Fast forward to today, they now have a bunch of rank 5/50 4-stars and high ranked 5-stars thanks to their winnings from AQ. Any ally still with 4/40s would find it difficult to go far. The veteran player didn't have such obstacles during the early days. Today, these obstacles exist -- even tier 12 alliances have 5/50 4-stars. The ladder has fallen over.

  • Sky_kittySky_kitty Posts: 245
    Well...ally with 400+ defender kills lost to ally with 80 defender kills. All for diversity. Diversity is a good idea but not used like this. I don't wanna bring kamala,she hulk and other champions like that in defence and i am not puttimg them even on r2 for sure . War became a joke.we are losing against much lower alliances because of diversity. This week we didn't played war at all because it became soooo boring and numbing. I have a feeling this is much better for lower alliances. Something needs to change,war like this is no fun.
  • UnsaferBinkie7UnsaferBinkie7 Posts: 658 ★★
    edited September 2017
    Imran wrote: »
    Millybear wrote: »
    Imran wrote: »
    All blaming kabam for defender diversity! But, with diversity u can use more champ. We use unnecessary champ just in arena. Now, we can use different champ in aw too. Also for this aw fight seems like easy. Now, aw not fill up with spiderman, jugg, nc, iceman, magic. It's a great move by kabam I think.

    Did they brainwashed you??!! :#

    Kabam doesn't need that. It's just my personal opinion. Now, I don't need to rank up specific champ for alliance request to make a invisible defender. We have now our free choice, which I like most. We are in good communication that's why we can put different 50 defender in each bg and winning war. With diversity now alliance war now become more team effort. Everyone need to communicate perfectly so that no one put wrong defender.

    Free choice? Lol its all about diversity dude. Before the change you could place whatever champ you wanted without a penalty. Now you can't place the same champion twice just so you can place your luke cage or gamora. This isn't a free choice, this is forces if you want to win a war out here. It's a terrible way to bring diversity in this game mode, and of course people like you love it because you can't fight a night crawler because he's too "hard". Like cmon man gtfo.
This discussion has been closed.