My take on WOW, CCP, and Necropolis
johnlaw3742
Member Posts: 187 ★★
My take on WOW, CCP, and Necropolis
(Yes, I know it's a long post. Mods you can merge into a larger thread if you feel appropriate)
TL;DR:
WOW - I agree with the player backlash
CCP Challenges - I do not agree with player backlash
In both cases, I think Kabam could make some tweaks
Full Post
Context
I am Valiant , playing since 2018, with a 7+ million rating (top 250). I have completed all permanent content and Carina's Challenges in the game prior to Necropolis and halfway through it. I consider myself an above average player, with many players much better than me out there, although there are some fights the "best" players struggle with that I can do handily. Maybe it's like that for others too, I am not sure.
For reference: all runs below were fully boosted with 30% Green boosts and various other boosts, and most, if not all, had strikers
Necropolis -
I tried Necropolis at the Vancouver meetup and I was very scared after the first test fight against I think Diablo, but after Brian Grant ranked up and ascended his max sig 6* R5 Ægon, I did the same and the paths have been doable for me - I have completed 3 paths with Ægon, Proxima, Wiccan, Shuri and Heimdall. This is the first time that new content that has been released that I was able to do along with the other players without too much struggle. (For Context, I just finished Abyss of Legends a few months ago). I don't keep an exact count of resources used but I did each Necropolis path in about 100-150 revives or equivalent, or about 6,000 units. I didn't feel like there was any "roadblocks" and I was never really too frustrated - it was very fun - maybe slightly too easy (than Kabam wanted) with Ægon. This was my first time using Ægon consistently and I feel like I am better player for it now.
CCP Challenges
Easy
I did Lagacy's challenges within the first day or 2 with my 5* R5 Max sig, un-ascended Stark Spidey. The paths were easy and I had to use only a handful of revives for the Kang bosses. It was a very fun challenge and didn't cost a lot. I haven't played Starky in a long while and this reminded me why he was one of my favorite champs (not even counting the Blade trinity synergy with Ghost Rider)
Medium
I just completed KarateMike's Classic Avengers and Baron Zemo challenges. These also took me about 150 revives or equivalent, or about 6,000 units on each path and that is with:
Avengers: 7* R2 Sig 40 Iron Man, 7* R1 Sig 20 Hawkeye, 6 * R5 Black Widow, 6* R4 Thor and Ant-Man
Baron Zemo - 6* R5 Max Sig, 5* R5 Max Sig, 4* R5 Max Sig, 3* R4 Max Sig, 2* Rank 3, Sig about 10.
Both challenges were fun for me, and even the scary fight (Sasquatch) was a breeze for Ant-Man. Not quite as easy for me with Baron Zemo, but doable. Even the 5* and 4* Zemo's put in a lot of work! I was surprised! Now I am better prepared to Zemo him in BGs, a dance club, or maybe one of the next Nercro runs.
If you watched KarateMike's stream, you know he did these in MANY less revives than me, but I had fun and had team revives to burn (I buy all the UC, Cav and TB EQ 1,000 unit offers).
I like that his challenges were all team based so that I didn't have to waste the team revives and that is why I did these challenges now even though they are permanent.
Hard
Fintech's challenges seem the hardest and somewhat Team based with 3 slots each. I have a lot of Romance Team Revives and Potions left but there's no way I can do it now, especially with WOW. My single champion resources are depleted after WOW. That is what Kabam said, after all, and they were right. I had a lot of stuff in my inventory I saved for a rainy day, and this was it. I am now ranking up my Mojo's, Tigra's and Jabari's and saving resources to prepare to do this late next month. I don't know how to play Tigra well, and I don't like Jabari, but that's good - if it wasn't for Fintech (all hail the winner of the meetup), then I probably never would learn and who knows maybe I will learn to like!
WOW
Just seeing Unstoppable with a Gamma objective made me think of She Hulk. I ascended my 6* R5 Max Sig She-Hulk. I spent probably 5,000 units to get this guy down just once and maybe 4-5 full energy refills in attempts. I am no MSD soloing with a 2* over here. What is funny is that my very first try I got him down to about 60-70% but he just regens so much that most of the next fights ended with him having more health. I wanted to take a break but because the boosts would expire, I found myself pushing even when I wasn't at my best and couldn't totally focus This fight was frustrating and while it cost me about the same amount of units as the others above, it was not fun, it was frustrating and felt like some of the older fights in this game that made me want to quit the game (Act 6.2 Champion, Act 6 Grandmaster, and Act 7 Gwenmaster). Also the fact that its only limited time, makes it feel even worse that I am not going to be able to fully complete all the objectives.
I also attempted Robots and Sinister Six but they did not go well - although I did better after finally defeating Abs man. I don't think I am going to make these objectives in time.
Conclusion
It took me a lot of inventory items and many romance revives and potions to complete everything so far. I feel like that was intentional, in a good way, whether Kabam planned each path (except Lagacy's challenge) to cost me about the same amount. You see, I could have waited many months or years then completed Necro paths and Carina's Challenges with more stored resources but then the rewards would be less valuable. It look buying literally every Valentine's Day offer to get this done. Now not everyone can spend that much, but also not everyone has the time. I don't have or want to spend the time mastering this game with 2*s. I am also not the biggest whale but I spend a lot - and more and more as I get nearer to the top. I think its a good balance for me. And when Kabam says time isn't a relevant resource in the economy, they mean for them... your time doesn't make them any money. So unless you want to watch a 30 second ad after every arena.... )
I think the rewards are great - I just cant decide between 2 Starkys and 1 of each Spidey (sorry Massacre). And 2* Baron Zemo is great because I didn't have him yet, and is also part of the synergy!
Suggestions
Abyss - Add a 6* Ultron Classic or another new trophy champ to the exploration rewards and send everyone who already explored one. That way it could regain some relevance today.
Necro - a little too easy with Ægon than what Kabam had probably planned, but its fun, and the Road to the Crypt was fun too. I wonder what WOW would have been like if it has the same? Maybe Kabam can share some WOW numbers and do a little something similar to Necro here, in hindsight. I also wonder if anyone spend more units than me.
WOW - I get what Kabam was trying to do but its just way too hard. Maybe stages like the bosses where his regen cant go above a certain amount, or maybe reduce the regen a tad bit. At the rate it is now, I wont be able to complete the other two objectives and that doesn't feel good for me, so I get what the players are saying here too.
CCP Challenges - they are fine in my opinion, but I think Kabam should have probably locked these to only to Valiant players - it would give people another incentive to get to that level and frankly if you are Valiant, you probably have a large roster with a lot of rank ups that you do just so the resources don't expire, and are good enough at the game where you would not complain about them. (I think the more that Kabam can do to tailor content and offers to a progression level helps). Like non Valiant's shouldn't even see it in the game, because even seeing something you can't do, can cause some anxiety and the backlash like what has been going on.
(Yes, I know it's a long post. Mods you can merge into a larger thread if you feel appropriate)
TL;DR:
WOW - I agree with the player backlash
CCP Challenges - I do not agree with player backlash
In both cases, I think Kabam could make some tweaks
Full Post
Context
I am Valiant , playing since 2018, with a 7+ million rating (top 250). I have completed all permanent content and Carina's Challenges in the game prior to Necropolis and halfway through it. I consider myself an above average player, with many players much better than me out there, although there are some fights the "best" players struggle with that I can do handily. Maybe it's like that for others too, I am not sure.
For reference: all runs below were fully boosted with 30% Green boosts and various other boosts, and most, if not all, had strikers
Necropolis -
I tried Necropolis at the Vancouver meetup and I was very scared after the first test fight against I think Diablo, but after Brian Grant ranked up and ascended his max sig 6* R5 Ægon, I did the same and the paths have been doable for me - I have completed 3 paths with Ægon, Proxima, Wiccan, Shuri and Heimdall. This is the first time that new content that has been released that I was able to do along with the other players without too much struggle. (For Context, I just finished Abyss of Legends a few months ago). I don't keep an exact count of resources used but I did each Necropolis path in about 100-150 revives or equivalent, or about 6,000 units. I didn't feel like there was any "roadblocks" and I was never really too frustrated - it was very fun - maybe slightly too easy (than Kabam wanted) with Ægon. This was my first time using Ægon consistently and I feel like I am better player for it now.
CCP Challenges
Easy
I did Lagacy's challenges within the first day or 2 with my 5* R5 Max sig, un-ascended Stark Spidey. The paths were easy and I had to use only a handful of revives for the Kang bosses. It was a very fun challenge and didn't cost a lot. I haven't played Starky in a long while and this reminded me why he was one of my favorite champs (not even counting the Blade trinity synergy with Ghost Rider)
Medium
I just completed KarateMike's Classic Avengers and Baron Zemo challenges. These also took me about 150 revives or equivalent, or about 6,000 units on each path and that is with:
Avengers: 7* R2 Sig 40 Iron Man, 7* R1 Sig 20 Hawkeye, 6 * R5 Black Widow, 6* R4 Thor and Ant-Man
Baron Zemo - 6* R5 Max Sig, 5* R5 Max Sig, 4* R5 Max Sig, 3* R4 Max Sig, 2* Rank 3, Sig about 10.
Both challenges were fun for me, and even the scary fight (Sasquatch) was a breeze for Ant-Man. Not quite as easy for me with Baron Zemo, but doable. Even the 5* and 4* Zemo's put in a lot of work! I was surprised! Now I am better prepared to Zemo him in BGs, a dance club, or maybe one of the next Nercro runs.
If you watched KarateMike's stream, you know he did these in MANY less revives than me, but I had fun and had team revives to burn (I buy all the UC, Cav and TB EQ 1,000 unit offers).
I like that his challenges were all team based so that I didn't have to waste the team revives and that is why I did these challenges now even though they are permanent.
Hard
Fintech's challenges seem the hardest and somewhat Team based with 3 slots each. I have a lot of Romance Team Revives and Potions left but there's no way I can do it now, especially with WOW. My single champion resources are depleted after WOW. That is what Kabam said, after all, and they were right. I had a lot of stuff in my inventory I saved for a rainy day, and this was it. I am now ranking up my Mojo's, Tigra's and Jabari's and saving resources to prepare to do this late next month. I don't know how to play Tigra well, and I don't like Jabari, but that's good - if it wasn't for Fintech (all hail the winner of the meetup), then I probably never would learn and who knows maybe I will learn to like!
WOW
Just seeing Unstoppable with a Gamma objective made me think of She Hulk. I ascended my 6* R5 Max Sig She-Hulk. I spent probably 5,000 units to get this guy down just once and maybe 4-5 full energy refills in attempts. I am no MSD soloing with a 2* over here. What is funny is that my very first try I got him down to about 60-70% but he just regens so much that most of the next fights ended with him having more health. I wanted to take a break but because the boosts would expire, I found myself pushing even when I wasn't at my best and couldn't totally focus This fight was frustrating and while it cost me about the same amount of units as the others above, it was not fun, it was frustrating and felt like some of the older fights in this game that made me want to quit the game (Act 6.2 Champion, Act 6 Grandmaster, and Act 7 Gwenmaster). Also the fact that its only limited time, makes it feel even worse that I am not going to be able to fully complete all the objectives.
I also attempted Robots and Sinister Six but they did not go well - although I did better after finally defeating Abs man. I don't think I am going to make these objectives in time.
Conclusion
It took me a lot of inventory items and many romance revives and potions to complete everything so far. I feel like that was intentional, in a good way, whether Kabam planned each path (except Lagacy's challenge) to cost me about the same amount. You see, I could have waited many months or years then completed Necro paths and Carina's Challenges with more stored resources but then the rewards would be less valuable. It look buying literally every Valentine's Day offer to get this done. Now not everyone can spend that much, but also not everyone has the time. I don't have or want to spend the time mastering this game with 2*s. I am also not the biggest whale but I spend a lot - and more and more as I get nearer to the top. I think its a good balance for me. And when Kabam says time isn't a relevant resource in the economy, they mean for them... your time doesn't make them any money. So unless you want to watch a 30 second ad after every arena.... )
I think the rewards are great - I just cant decide between 2 Starkys and 1 of each Spidey (sorry Massacre). And 2* Baron Zemo is great because I didn't have him yet, and is also part of the synergy!
Suggestions
Abyss - Add a 6* Ultron Classic or another new trophy champ to the exploration rewards and send everyone who already explored one. That way it could regain some relevance today.
Necro - a little too easy with Ægon than what Kabam had probably planned, but its fun, and the Road to the Crypt was fun too. I wonder what WOW would have been like if it has the same? Maybe Kabam can share some WOW numbers and do a little something similar to Necro here, in hindsight. I also wonder if anyone spend more units than me.
WOW - I get what Kabam was trying to do but its just way too hard. Maybe stages like the bosses where his regen cant go above a certain amount, or maybe reduce the regen a tad bit. At the rate it is now, I wont be able to complete the other two objectives and that doesn't feel good for me, so I get what the players are saying here too.
CCP Challenges - they are fine in my opinion, but I think Kabam should have probably locked these to only to Valiant players - it would give people another incentive to get to that level and frankly if you are Valiant, you probably have a large roster with a lot of rank ups that you do just so the resources don't expire, and are good enough at the game where you would not complain about them. (I think the more that Kabam can do to tailor content and offers to a progression level helps). Like non Valiant's shouldn't even see it in the game, because even seeing something you can't do, can cause some anxiety and the backlash like what has been going on.
5
Comments
The Carina's challenges (excluding lagacy's, but no one is complaining about his) are much more difficult than the WoW absorbing man. I've always said that a good challenge is tough but fair. The absorbing man is a little expensive to retry in terms of energy but you can get a solo as many players on youtube did. Personally I had to spend a few revives with guilly and sandman, and I agree they are a bit too restrictive champion wise, but at least I know that the revives I spent were mostly because I messed up (and a few times abs man being a di**head a throwing specials directly into my block randomly).
But the Carina's challenges are impossible to solo. One of the best players in the world, MSD, spent 20 revives on each EOP challenge and the zemo one and require you to rank up one singular champion that you may not like for way worse rewards. The WoW rewards look to be much better, and necropolis were way better of course.
There isn't a single fight in any of the 6 that absolutely can't be soloed - many of those solos are very very hard to do, for sure - especially many of the EOP fights. But regardless, everything doesn't ALWAYS need to be soloed 🤷🏻♀️
I'm 100% confident that MSD could get it done in under 3 revives if he tried enough times, but, he was just casually playing on stream - it's a bit unfair to him to always hold the highest item use standard over his head, imo
I've been saying, "98% of the fights could be realistically soloed," that's the one that needs a bit of luck if the AI is feeling generous & doesn't toss the SP3 right away
"I spent probably 5,000 units" on WoW??
Having said that, yikes.
Once upon a time, a fair challenge meant "doable at all." Then it meant "doable without spending significantly." Now, it seems to mean "doable by a lot of people without spending anything, even free resources players do not have to pay for." How much longer will it be, I wonder, before side quests are going to be unfair because you have to acquire and spend tickets to enter them. I'm going to spend more side quest tickets this month than MSD spent revives to do a top tier Carina's challenge. I would ask why isn't that even more unfair, but I'm afraid of what the answer will be by 2025.
And I think it's fantastic that you love zemo; I was astounded when I saw you do the first necropolis path with him, but for me I just don't like his playstyle as much. I'm okay with him, but for that reason, I'll never be great with him. I do think it is unfair though to only offer one option for any challenge though (same with the mojo and tigra challenges) and have to rank them up. I don't see why the challenge couldn't be use a team of zemo or x y or and give a few other options or combination of champions. Giving some choice would allow players to rank up champions they like more instead of feeling forced to rank up and use one champion out of 200 they aren't comfortable with for an incredibly difficult challenge.
Also some of those fights do require an unreasonable amount of luck to solo (like the aforementioned vision) and the skill required I believe is an unreasonable ask to have for such a specific champion. I myself am incredibly skilled with a few champs like overseer because I have played them consistently for months in difficult content but it would be unfeasible for me to get to that level with zemo or especially mojo who I actively dislike playing.
It is worth mentioning that the lacklustre rewards are part of the lack of success for these challenges which I know is not the fault of the content creators. But personally I would not have made these challenges without offering materials to take these champions to R5 for the challenge. This is particularly important for the avengers challenge as if you have all those champs as 7 stars or R5 or a couple at r4 it's actually a good challenge, but the high rank up cost in contrast to the meagre rewards just makes it not worth it for most endgame players.
This content is starting to feel more and more like something that should’ve been released before the revive farm nerf (which was still a thing at the time when people used 6* rank 3 for Gauntlet and EOP, to refute Mike’s biggest counter argument on why he thinks the challenge is fair)
But when you have players like Swedeah and KT1 not interested in these challenges (i.e. exactly who they were designed for) I think it is a pretty unequivocal fail. As I said I don't mind spending a few revives on the abs man fight fight if I fail, but to be forced to rank up and use one single champion for a challenge is silly. For example the mojo eop objective just depends on your skill with one single champion (who you may not even like playing - I personally dislike his kit and animations) and how highly he is ranked.
Therefore, I think general pushback to these challenges is completely reasonable. Personally, the avengers challenge shouldn't be too hard for me but I don't envy players who don't have some of those champions, or have them at low rank or simply don't like playing them and thus aren't good with them. This game has 200 champs after all, limiting selection to just ONE seems silly to me, and indeed to most of the community.
I never do rank ups just so the resources don't expire. I'm scraping t6b and t3a everywhere I can in game to keep up with my t6cc acquisition. Just because you spend doesn't mean everyone can.
Idk I like the challenge but I don't like having to rank black widow to r4 at least to be viable, because I know I will never use her again.
Everything else about these challenges have been alreasy said tho so I won't add anymore. Only thing that pains me is seeing the toxicity towards Karatemike.
Carina's has always consisted of "Do X Quest with Y Champ."
Volume 1 was pretty much entirely made up of this format.
Volume 2 had Doc Ock in Act 6, Aegon in ROL, & a lot more.
Volume 3 was essentially just EOP with small pools of thematic tags.
Carina's has always been thematic. Future Carina's Objectives will likely continue to be thematic.
It wouldn't make much sense for the "House Of Zemo" thematic objective to also include Apocalypse, Magneto & Archangel. Just as it wouldn't make much sense for the "One Man Show" thematic objective to feature anyone aside from the self-obsessed Mojo.
A big part of these challenges has always been to shine a light on different Champions in ways players haven't seen before. At this point, I've lost count of how many players have reached out to say to me "your challenges looked ridiculous on paper, but I couldn't believe how well they worked once I actually got in and tried it."
Basically whaled through Necropolis and new Carinas challenges, and believes this is how the average top tier player plays the game.
Reading the revives numbers and Unit spent got me dizzy, and I spend quite a lot my self too, but I can’t in any way justify that’s the normal for even the average Valiant player.
Assuming (similar to OP) I will need the same revives for @Karatemike415 Zemo and Avengers challenge as my average Necropolis path count, that would be 60-70 revives.
And that only if I rank up all these champs to the same rank as OPs (6*r5 Zemo, 7*r2 IM etc.).
Looking at the investment I will need to do, in order to complete these challenges, rewards are at least laughable.
OP congrats if you found fun in spending hundreds of revives and thousands of units in these challenges, but I would take any bet, that your opinion represents a tiny minority within the player base.
My opinion and my approach to these challenges will remain the same:
They will make company to the 4* Labyrinth ones in my Carinas tab for quite a very long time, unless Kabam hands out rank up gems for the champs needed for these, or seriously buff the rewards.
Until then I won’t touch them, because they will only hurt my account, except from my sanity 🙂
So it seems they’ve tried to put valuable rewards in without feeling like they’re necessary to compete. Nobody *needs* a 7 star version of those champions to place high in BGs, or do well in questing or war. But they are still valuable rewards, so it’s a tough needle to thread. I personally can’t wait to do it to get a really cool 7* champ, but I also don’t feel like I’m missing out too much right now by not doing it
Personally I do think some T4A and Titan shards would have been nice to give some extra weight to it, and we just deal with the other type of complaints but I’m just trying to give the other side of what’s a tough decision.
But I'll do you a deal. I'll take all the required champs to r4 or above for the challenges (I have 7 star awakened iron man at r2 just for this) and I'll go full try hard and play to the best of my ability. I did the abyss carina paths in sub 10 revives each. If I can do your avengers and zemo (who I have at R5 already) challenge in under 10 revives each (team counts as 2.5 revives) I will concede that I was wrong about everything and personally donate 100 dollars to you on stream. I'm an honest guy so on God I won't cheat or play badly on purpose and Ill send a screenshot of my team so you can see their ranks and that they are max boosted with the best mastery setup. Sound fair?
And I really don't think the challenges were bad at all, it's following the same structure past Carina's challenges had, and you can definitely do them without spending any real money.
I explored necropolis in a few week thanks to the revive farm, so let's not focus on that.
But I already completed 3 of the CCP challenges, the two from Lagacy and the Tigra one, just because I already had her ranked.
I still have a healthy stash of revives, but I need to rank a lot of champions for the other challenges, and that's part of the fun of this challenges.
I really enjoyed the Tigra challenge, even tho at first I was intimidated by it. I don't have @Fintech ability with tigra, but I managed to do it in around 35 revives, which isn't half bad.
Overall I really enjoyed the set of challenges and hope that @Karatemike415 and @Fintech don't get discouraged after all the bad (and some stupid) comments they've been receiving.
Of course, the AI could AI - so anything could happen.
I respect the offer, however, I don't find it necessary. Instead of playing for money, I'd much rather you go through the quest and focus on all the different strategies & just have as much fun as you can.
This is a game, at the end of the day 🙂