Game-Life-Balance

So… How do you manage you Game-Life-Balance?

I reckon there are lot of players that have a very busy life… A full-time job, a family, other responsibilities… And who are playing this game as a recreational tool…

But at the same time, this game can be very demanding and time consuming! Of course, nobody is forcing people to play and there is not a single mandatory element in this game. But the game designers do a good job making you WANT to play as much as possible… Dopamine is real!

So, while I currently really enjoy this game, at times I find myself being in-game too much… So I set up some guidelines for myself, such as:

- No active alliance
- EQ only TB and Paragon Gauntlet
- max. 10 rounds of arena per day
- 3 rounds of BG every other day
- No (more) spending

Stuff like this helps me limit the grind, because otherwise one could easily spend all day in-game because there is just so much stuff! (Which of course is nice, but you get what I mean…)

Still, currently I am catching up on exploration of 8.1 and 8.2, which is also time consuming. Once I’m done, 8.4 will probably be around the corner which I will want to do in order to get Valiant, so the grind continues…

So how do you approach the game? Especially with a full “life” outside it?

Comments

XFREEDOMX

This is how I approach the game.
1) It's just a mobile game I play for some fun when I have spare time to kill.

G-Hun-Gear

This is how I approach the game.
1) It's just a mobile game I play for some fun when I have spare time to kill.

That sounds like a healthy approach… If you manage to stick to that, you may be in the minority, though….

I see people talking about reaching all milestones in the basic AND the featured arena, plus some milestones in the 4* and the catalyst arena (for the units)… Doing all difficulties in EQ (also for the units). Then reaching Gladiator’s Circuit in Battle Grounds, competing 4 days a week in AQ, also AW, doing all paths of the necropolis, including farming revives for it, and more… not even talking about arena grinds for ranked rewards, like featured champs etc…

That’s a lot! Of course I assume these summoners may have less responsibilities in real life, but still…

PT_99

I usually let my bro named credit card play for me.

captain_rogers

In some of my boring and depressed leave days, I usually spend or rather waste a lotta time on game and forums, But usually, when I'm in my college, I won't play much (I do run aq and arenas sometimes), And don't check forums much.

Doctorwho13

No complexity on my end. I just cut my playing time.

Icy000

i play for 6/7 hours a day

klobberintyme

Autoplay several accounts on several devices, lead a non-competitive alli that does boss clear AQ on my schedule, physically play when i darn well feel like it, and buy what i feel like with within my $2k/month entertainment budget = 30 non-consecutive daily minutes physically played on average.
It's a diversion, but i love Marvel ip.

Anyone spending more than 5 hrs a day on this ought to be streaming so they can at least write off a gaming chair or new phone/ipad.

GrO_ot78

1. No ally for 2 years.
2. Only play through UC - Cav EQ, explore TB and PG. I’ll do SQ if its decent rewards.
3. Arena: 450k in 4*, 20M + 6,5M in 6* arena, gets me the 6-10% rewards, sometimes the 1-5% if its a 💩 champ. (63 x R3+ and 15 x 7*s).

Glassback

Not going to lie, full time job, 2 kids and trying to still maintain competition weightlifting, I get chased by my alliance three times a day to complete map 8. There’s a reason I got “hard carry” in the accolades…

There is something about the game where the longer you’ve played the more you feel
You need to play.

I manage to draw the line at arena, between EQ, SQ, AW and AW plus exploring act 8, it’s like a full time job managing this.

Love it though.

Kingering_King

It’s an addiction. Period.

姥爷保号

Stay away from games and live a healthy life

Theholyplunger

I lead a semi-retired ally. My job has a bit of mindless downtime, so I'll pop out a few quest fights here and there. When I'm home, it's generally after my kids go to bed. But most fights in this game can be done in 5 mins or less, so there's always a bathroom break to clear your fight in AW/AQ, or just take a moment during the day to run a BG match. Content -wise, I personally try to clear it as soon as I have a block of time so I can be efficient with my usage. But after 8 years...it's basically a part of my daily life...MCOC and coffee every morning lol

SaltE_Wenis69

After Necro explo in a week or so im just going to start doing solely the deathless challenge things and explore tb difficulty with the gauntlet. Even though I lack r5s and r2, I dont find the bg store that rewarding so unless its tied to a challenge ill just ignore it

DNA3000

This is how I approach the game.
1) It's just a mobile game I play for some fun when I have spare time to kill.
That sounds like a healthy approach… If you manage to stick to that, you may be in the minority, though….

I see people talking about reaching all milestones in the basic AND the featured arena, plus some milestones in the 4* and the catalyst arena (for the units)… Doing all difficulties in EQ (also for the units). Then reaching Gladiator’s Circuit in Battle Grounds, competing 4 days a week in AQ, also AW, doing all paths of the necropolis, including farming revives for it, and more… not even talking about arena grinds for ranked rewards, like featured champs etc…

That’s a lot! Of course I assume these summoners may have less responsibilities in real life, but still…

The last time I did just the milestones in the featured arena was back in December when I scored 12,031,947 points in the Onslaught arena. This placed me 14,723 on the leaderboard. That was a pretty popular arena though, at other times I've placed between 5,000 and 8,000th place with similar points.

So on average there's probably less than ten thousand players doing all the featured milestones most of the time. The number of players doing all the featured and the basic must be lower than that. The number of players doing all the milestones in both the featured and the basic and a bunch in the Trials has to be even less than that. Players doing all of that, plus all the EQ difficulties, and pushing to GC, and doing AQ and AW, is probably in the low thousands, if that.

There's probably close to a million people playing the game. The number of people doing all that is the ultra-extreme minority. I was actually one of the people doing all of that most of the time but I decided to back off of arena a bit because that was just too much of a time sink. I had to prioritize what I wanted to do and fit it into my schedule.

Sunstar19

It helps that I decided to scale down for awhile by being in a chill alliance with boss rush on AQ, no fuss on AW or minimum points on BG. MEQ mostly from Uncollected to TB and SQ if there is spare energy and easy fights, format. Arenas mainly for the milestones. Necropolis took a lot of my time and units recently but it was a conscious decision for a personal challenge and it felt great accomplishing it.

It is a game I still enjoy but agree we should be mindful of the time spent on the game given life priorities, which should not be neglected.

G-Hun-Gear

Thank for all the input, ut's interesting to see how the fellow summoners approach the game...

buy what i feel like with within my $2k/month entertainment budget

@klobberintyme That's quite an entertainment budget you have there... In the anonymity of the internet, are you able to disclose what percentage of your total budet that is?

TheShinyDome

Currently I'm in a BG only ally. BGs are my favorite game mode, so I don't have a hard time meeting those expectations. I don't do AQ, I do AW, but with 2 days to attack its easy to clear a lane. I also almost exclusively play while I'm at work (I work nights in a psych hospital and have a lot of down time). This year I'm also not spending any money on the game as I'm going back to school for my masters. So I'll keep playing just at work and not at all the rest of the week.

Cryptoman78

I’ve tried to be in an alliance that is more of the higher end as far as AW and AQ and its way to stressful for me and my schedule. So I decided to make a stress free alliance that runs map 4 and AW is optional. By doing this I have enjoyed the game so much more. I’m able to pick and choose what I want to get done in the game while getting the extra benefit's of being in an alliance.

Rayven5220

I took an 8 month break once (not by choice, but I did) then when I came back to the game just over a year ago I joined a retired alliance and have been there ever since.

I play when I want and do what I want with no expectations. It's stress free and I love it.

JLordVileJ

I barely have any time to play. I go to secondary school and I'm very involved in activities and local groups. Additionally I do singing lessons as well as playing piano at home so I'm just kinda pressed for time. I find myself just sometimes logging in for the calendar and using my energy for auto completing iso fields daily

Also most of my free time I spend on here lol

Usagicassidy

I don't have much else in my life in terms of either entertainment and engagement OR community. So MCOC is a large part of my day, even if it's just twitter and the message boards, cause unfortunantely the game is at a place currently that it's too frustrating for me to be enjoyable (TB 100%, Battlegrounds, Defender AI being things that massively spike my cortisol so I feel like I'm not actually getting anywhere or progressing at all in the game anymore).

Klipp

I can grind arena, monthly eq, side quest and sometimes incursions while I work. So I spend a lot of time in game sure but my personal time I try not to play often. I might do eq, Sq, incursions on my personal time but not much of my time goes to it. Battlegrounds is a little different. I usually spend an hour a day playing battlegrounds. On days off sometimes a rabbit hole happens during gladiator circuit and I may get stuck playing for hours. Eop, necropolis and carina challenges are usually on days off or after work and I try to not do those often. So yes I play 7-8 hours but maybe 1 or 2 of those are on personal time.

InsaneSkull

My routine is Map6 AQ(May be once or twice moving in), AW low tier and EQ, SQ only top 2 difficulty. Rest game modes i don't touch.

SlayerOfGods

I play quite a few other games. I just play MCOC when I feel like it - especially when I want to make content.

Rasilover

I just don't play the game

Loki_Poki1280

Idek how to do so myself ,

I think I take it too seriously, I try to always log in and do AQ, but honestly I don't think I can. I got school to attend and study for.

Someone here said that the longer you play the more we feel inclined to play and that's true. I cant imagine having to leave behind my 7 years of this game. But then again, it's a game. I think it's time to find whats truly important.

I'm really stuck on this, but I do think its time for me to move on. I'll log on as a casual, but as for alliances, I think I'm done. (I think) I really don't wanna let it go.