5-Star Featured Crystal Change Discussion Thread

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ViperKingV

Hubris_hater wrote: »

Bobbie_Drake wrote: »

With 120k shards saved up now since the 2nd iceman opening I realize I should be able to dupe blade with the gem but after that my chances of getting a hero I really want have decreased from 20-25% to about 4%.

Blade featured crystal is still the same mate, so you should be good

Bobbie Drake is making the point that most players (Whether they pull Blade or not) will still need to fill their 5* Rosters. The new crystal has at most 2 or 3 champs that most players would consider a viable option for the upcoming 6* Content. (And you will need to dupe them too). The Basic Crystal has around an 8% chance of dropping a useful champion.
The only chance we have at getting a new champ will cost $10 per spin with under 1% chance of a 5* featured champion.
When Mike and Adora announced the plan for 6* Champions they assured us that we would have enough time, and the resources required, to build up our. 5* rosters.by replacing the featured crystal with whatever name you want to give the new crystal, Kabam has Reduced the likelihood that players who only have 1 or 2 good champs Will be ready to face harder content for a while.

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DrZola

DNA3000 wrote: »

DrZola wrote: »

Mmx1991 wrote: »

Regen
Immunity
Power control
Ability Accuracy Reduction
Damage Dealers

These are the qualities we look for in champs for AQ and AW offense.

This is a valid point and responsive to @DNA3000 above.

I don't agree it responds to the point I made in the post I believe you are referencing. The point I made was that players were not making statements or asking questions that the devs are in a reasonable position to respond to. But this post (specifically the first half you are quoting) essentially states that there are much better champions for various purposes than the ones the devs curated for the first crystal. @Kabam Miike already responded to this assertion. He said that the intent of the crystal was not, and was never specified to be intended to, include the best champions. He said that the intent of curation was to exclude the worst champions, as they datamined them to be. So when you point out there are better champions, the response is "yes there are." There's nothing more they can say about that beyond what @Kabam Miike said.

Having said that, and not being privvy to Kabam's datamining, I decided to write out the champions I would have deleted as being the bottom of performance to respond to @linux and it does give me pause. There are fewer "squibs" in the curated list than there are in the basic crystal on a percentage basis. But I'm not sure there are enough fewer to justify the featured crystal shard cost. What I think the bottom is and what Kabam has datamined the bottom to be is of course almost certainly different, but it does raise questions for me about precisely which metrics Kabam is focusing on when it comes to underperformance or effectiveness.

I do now have a question that Kabam should be able to answer. Without giving away the actual data, I would like to know how many champions were deemed "not effective" or "less effective" and thus excluded from the curated list. @Kabam Miike is that a question that Kabam can answer? Out of the 84 or so basic champions that could have been added to the new featured, how many are NOT going to be added given the current state of the game (i.e. I assume Red Hulk and Luke Cage were two of the champions excluded, although they could become eligible after they are changed as a result of the beta test changes coming up).

You miss my point. I believe you commented that the complaints were not helpful to the devs. I embraced the point MMX made— that there are certain attributes most players look for in attackers in AQ and AW. He listed several of those.

His is a constructive point. I simply went down his list to show that the list of 18 champs currently in the featured was deficient in relation to the attributes he identified.

So, carrying it to the next step, if the game team were to look at those attributes and try to provide a pool of 18 that possessed more/better versions of those attributes, then that would arguably be a positive step in response to the constructive point made by MMX.

Dr. Zola

AnotherPool wrote: »

If you are player, will you spend your precious shards on this craaaaaaaap?

You know, the truth is I'm saving for Blade. I won't likely have any shards to buy this crystal either way. By the time I save up enough to decide whether to go basic or featured, I will be choosing between basic and the next iteration of this crystal. So the current contents of the crystal are actually irrelevant to me, and probably to most of the players in my position.

Since the next iteration won't contain any of these champions, its a very hypothetical decision right now as to whether this crystal will be a viable option in May.

This is just insane and ridiculous, if you can't see now, you will see from your game statistics in May and realize how stupid this change is.

I always wonder why people say things like this. You are hanging your credibility on a wild guess about something you know almost nothing about, namely the behavior of other people, and challenging the one group of people who will know if you were right or wrong, and in exactly what way. That's like betting me what my own favorite color is.

You know how many players were certain that this game was doomed after 12.0 and we would all know it soon enough? All of them were about as wrong as wrong gets.

This crystal isn't going to sell as much as the last featured, because the last featured is Blade. I doubt *any* crystal is going to outsell Blade. Heck I would bet Blade will outstrip Iceman, and the Iceman crystal has a damn song about it.

If I was a conspiracy minded person, I would think the devs deliberately made the first new featured subpar, specifically because they knew there was going to be a slump either way, because everyone would be depleted of 5* shards after the Blade crystal. The time to make a valuable featured crystal is in May after everyone has saved up again, not concurrent with Blade. If I was a conspiracy minded person, I might think that. Plus, people are influenced by trends, not points. If the first featured was great, it would be the standard all others were measured by, and anything less than that would be judged harshly. If the first featured was mediocre, and the next was better, people would be more inclined to think better days were ahead.

Its funny how people think Kabam is manipulative, but they never seem to think Kabam is manipulative in ways designed to make people think they are getting more than they are. They always think Kabam is manipulative in ways designed to make people work harder to get the same thing. The former is always the better, and more profitable, trick.

DrZola wrote: »

You miss my point. I believe you commented that the complaints were not helpful to the devs.

I never specifically made that comment, and if at any point I implied it that was not my intent. What I said was that in the context of transparency and dialog, if the players want the devs to be responsive, the players need to make statements or ask question that can reasonably be responded to.

If players want to suggest that the crystal would be better received if the devs changed the focus from excluding the worst to including the best, that's entirely their prerogative. But that's formulating a suggestion, not requesting a dialog specifically and outside the bounds of the post I made in this context.

Gargamesh

DNA3000 wrote: »

AnotherPool wrote: »

If you are player, will you spend your precious shards on this craaaaaaaap?

You know how many players were certain that this game was doomed after 12.0 and we would all know it soon enough? All of them were about as wrong as wrong gets.

Dude, I don't know what game you are talking about but mcoc needed and was fixed big time after 12.0 and some player, like me, never really came back. I went from hardcore gamer whale to if the Kabam HQ burns down I'll bring popcorn.
These days I'm playing occasionally only and the reason for that is because patch 12.0 proved how Kabam gives a flying f*ck about their community.
And that's ok, takes two for a deal...and I'm free to walk away, which I did. So don't pretend 12.0 didn't effect the game, the community, the company...12.0 had a huge impact, as you can tell by how Kabam freaked and tried to save their sh*t...all of a sudden they even started communicating things with us

DNA3000 wrote: »

DrZola wrote: »

You miss my point. I believe you commented that the complaints were not helpful to the devs.

I never specifically made that comment, and if at any point I implied it that was not my intent. What I said was that in the context of transparency and dialog, if the players want the devs to be responsive, the players need to make statements or ask question that can reasonably be responded to.

If players want to suggest that the crystal would be better received if the devs changed the focus from excluding the worst to including the best, that's entirely their prerogative. But that's formulating a suggestion, not requesting a dialog specifically and outside the bounds of the post I made in this context.

It's definitely a suggestion, but for me, that's where the grey area comes in because I don't know what specifically they look at for effectiveness. You've listed some good points that they would look at. The bit that comes to my mind is the comment in the Post about Players not always agreeing, but they are making an effort to exclude those that perform poorly. I suspect they look at these in an individual sense as well as overall. I think the general consensus is that they don't need to mine data to see how a Champ performs. I think the reality is there are more aspects looked at than raw Damage. I agree with your points.
For me, the tricky part about suggesting what aspects to look at is that they already have their own process, and it verges on voting for the Champs that are included, which as was stated, is what the point of relying on their own statistics is somewhat avoiding. It's not about popularity so much as it is making an effort to exclude the lower end of the spectrum. I agree with you on that.
I suspect that there is a varied range of Champs included, apart from the actual new Champs that are the Featured. I don't believe this is a biased process either way, "God" Vs. "Garbage". It's just a range. I think that's where the disagreement may lie with Players because I don't see the Crystal being filled with the most efficient only.

Gargamesh wrote: »

DNA3000 wrote: »

AnotherPool wrote: »

If you are player, will you spend your precious shards on this craaaaaaaap?

You know how many players were certain that this game was doomed after 12.0 and we would all know it soon enough? All of them were about as wrong as wrong gets.

Dude, I don't know what game you are talking about but mcoc needed and was fixed big time after 12.0 and some player, like me, never really came back. I went from hardcore gamer whale to if the Kabam HQ burns down I'll bring popcorn.
These days I'm playing occasionally only and the reason for that is because patch 12.0 proved how Kabam gives a flying f*ck about their community.
And that's ok, takes two for a deal...and I'm free to walk away, which I did. So don't pretend 12.0 didn't effect the game, the community, the company...12.0 had a huge impact, as you can tell by how Kabam freaked and tried to save their sh*t...all of a sudden they even started communicating things with us

Dude, I don't know which post you are talking about but nowhere did I say that 12.0 didn't change the game, or the way Kabam operates the game or deals with the community. What I said was lots of players said MCOC was doomed after 12.0 was released, and they did so after 12.0.1 was released, and 12.1 was released, after 13.0 was released, and while I was one of the players that actively worked hard to get changes made after 12.0 was released a large number of people were still unhappy even after all of the responses Kabam made.

And while 12.0 cost them players, they are still one of the highest revenue mobile games around, in spite of the fact that players continue to predict their inevitable doom after every single thing that happens that they don't like.

DrZola

DNA3000 wrote: »

DrZola wrote: »

You miss my point. I believe you commented that the complaints were not helpful to the devs.

I never specifically made that comment, and if at any point I implied it that was not my intent. What I said was that in the context of transparency and dialog, if the players want the devs to be responsive, the players need to make statements or ask question that can reasonably be responded to.

If players want to suggest that the crystal would be better received if the devs changed the focus from excluding the worst to including the best, that's entirely their prerogative. But that's formulating a suggestion, not requesting a dialog specifically and outside the bounds of the post I made in this context.

And in my opinion that type of comment can be (and should be) responded to by the devs—to wit, why not put a more balanced set of champs in the featured crystal based on attributes x, y and z? There’s allegedly a lot of thought that went into which champs were included—how about a little insight into what the brain trust thought was important and why?

Further, I made no suggestion that only the best champs be included; rather, I noted that the few champs in the 18 weren’t close to being best in class on any of the attributes Mmx listed (which I did sign onto as being a reasonable set to consider when deciding which champs to include).

Ultimately, if they want us to believe they’ve done a lot of rigorous analysis of their empirical data, they need to do a lot more than have Miike standing around attesting to the wonders of New Xavier School Cyke. Even noobs don’t believe that.

Dr. Zola

DrZola wrote: »

DNA3000 wrote: »

DrZola wrote: »

You miss my point. I believe you commented that the complaints were not helpful to the devs.

I never specifically made that comment, and if at any point I implied it that was not my intent. What I said was that in the context of transparency and dialog, if the players want the devs to be responsive, the players need to make statements or ask question that can reasonably be responded to.

If players want to suggest that the crystal would be better received if the devs changed the focus from excluding the worst to including the best, that's entirely their prerogative. But that's formulating a suggestion, not requesting a dialog specifically and outside the bounds of the post I made in this context.

And in my opinion that type of comment can be (and should be) responded to by the devs—to wit, why not put a more balanced set of champs in the featured crystal based on attributes x, y and z? There’s allegedly a lot of thought that went into which champs were included—how about a little insight into what the brain trust thought was important and why?

Further, I made no suggestion that only the best champs be included; rather, I noted that the few champs in the 18 weren’t close to being best in class on any of the attributes Mmx listed (which I did sign onto as being a reasonable set to consider when deciding which champs to include).

Ultimately, if they want us to believe they’ve done a lot of rigorous analysis of their empirical data, they need to do a lot more than have Miike standing around attesting to the wonders of New Xavier School Cyke. Even noobs don’t believe that.

Dr. Zola

At no time did Kabam say they chose the champions to be anything in particular, nor did they claim they did any analysis to determine what the performance of the champions in the crystal even is. They only said they intended to reduce or eliminate the chance of getting champions the players were not effective with. Which is why I asked how many were excluded. If they eliminated the bottom 10%, nothing stops these champions from being the bottom 89%. That would be entirely consistent with their statements to date. If the expectation is higher, like no one wants the bottom half of champions, so far Kabam has made no statement excluding that as a possibility so far. Perhaps they should, but at the moment they have not.

As to the question "why not?" Nobody answers that question. Its a trap, and you know it. No one can justify why not to a hostile crowd.

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DrZola

“We are using empirical data based on Champion performance in Alliance Quests and Alliance Wars to decide which Champions will be added to the Crystal. This means that while Player perception of the Champions may not always align, we are trying to avoid poor performing Champions...”

“It's important to note that this list could still potentially change a little before the release, but the selected Champions are based on empirical data showing their effectiveness as 5-Star Champions in both Alliance Quests and Alliance Wars.”

“I didn't say most used, but they are among the most effective. Cyclops actually scores very high on this list. There is a smaller group of players that use him, but they use him VERY effectively.”

@DNA3000 I’m not sure how you read these quotes and conclude they intended to only eliminate the champs we think are bad and didn’t intend them to be anything in particular. As for analysis, it’s pretty clear Miike wants to hang his hat on empirical data the team looked at to make their determination.

Also, saying champs are “among the most effective” or “score very high” based on empirical data isn’t just throwing some champs in the pool. A plain reading of these quotes indicates the team was trying to do something other than just weed out some bad champs—so I’m not really sure how you arrived at your alternative conclusion.

Dr. Zola

The answer is, they're looking at more than one specific demographic.

Mmx1991

Kabam Miike wrote: »

“I didn't say most used, but they are among the most effective. Cyclops actually scores very high on this list. There is a smaller group of players that use him, but they use him VERY effectively.”

They are among "the most effective".

Most meaning the top 51%?

If you ask 1000 people what most means they'll probably say top 20% or top 10%.

The answer is, they're looking at more than one specific demographic.

Mmx1991 wrote: »

Kabam Miike wrote: »

“I didn't say most used, but they are among the most effective. Cyclops actually scores very high on this list. There is a smaller group of players that use him, but they use him VERY effectively.”

They are among "the most effective".

Most meaning the top 51%?

If you ask 1000 people what most means they'll probably say top 20% or top 10%.

Among the small number that use him, they use him effectively. Meaning the cross-section that uses him, uses him well. That's the point I was making about a variety of demographics. The Crystal is not aimed at the Top Players, or any specific demographic, really. It's a mixture of all, at least from what I've gathered. It's been explained that the point was not to fill it with the "best", but to avoid the worst performing. There are different levels of Players, and different demographics. A fair cross-section looks at a variety, not just the top.

ShadowDroid91

Leave it to kabbam to push the thresholds of dissapointment...

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Axo4545 wrote: »

GroundedWisdom wrote: »

The answer is, they're looking at more than one specific demographic.

Mmx1991 wrote: »

Kabam Miike wrote: »

“I didn't say most used, but they are among the most effective. Cyclops actually scores very high on this list. There is a smaller group of players that use him, but they use him VERY effectively.”

They are among "the most effective".

Most meaning the top 51%?

If you ask 1000 people what most means they'll probably say top 20% or top 10%.

Among the small number that use him, they use him effectively. Meaning the cross-section that uses him, uses him well. That's the point I was making about a variety of demographics. The Crystal is not aimed at the Top Players, or any specific demographic, really. It's a mixture of all, at least from what I've gathered. It's been explained that the point was not to fill it with the "best", but to avoid the worst performing. There are different levels of Players, and different demographics. A fair cross-section looks at a variety, not just the top.

So going with your logic then there shouldn't be any worst performing champs because I'm sure that there is a cross-section of players that use a specific champ effectively for every champ in the game. Your logic not mine.

That's a stretch. I said they look at more demographics than the top, and their effort is to try and exclude the poor performing ones based on their findings. The definition of the worst can vary from Player bracket to Player bracket. The data doesn't have an opinion.

As DNA pointed out in another Thread, I suspect the same data is connected to the Champ revisions, so over time, this will be a good thing in general.

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Mmx1991

Their data mining and interpretation is clearly distorted and inaccurate.

You can look at figures as much as you like, but in the real world the majority of those champs offer little utility and what little utility they offer is outshined by many other champs in the game.

Most are not effective tools, and not even close to being VERY EFFECTIVE tools.

Mmx1991

GroundedWisdom wrote: »

The answer is, they're looking at more than one specific demographic.

Mmx1991 wrote: »

Kabam Miike wrote: »

“I didn't say most used, but they are among the most effective. Cyclops actually scores very high on this list. There is a smaller group of players that use him, but they use him VERY effectively.”

They are among "the most effective".

Most meaning the top 51%?

If you ask 1000 people what most means they'll probably say top 20% or top 10%.

Among the small number that use him, they use him effectively. Meaning the cross-section that uses him, uses him well. That's the point I was making about a variety of demographics. The Crystal is not aimed at the Top Players, or any specific demographic, really. It's a mixture of all, at least from what I've gathered. It's been explained that the point was not to fill it with the "best", but to avoid the worst performing. There are different levels of Players, and different demographics. A fair cross-section looks at a variety, not just the top.

Let me re-quote it.

"I didn't say most used, but they are among the most effective."

Most of them are definitely NOT among "the most effective". Not even close. His wording is clearly comparing them to other similar tools in the MCOC toolbox (regen, power control, ability accuracy reduction etc...) and most of these champs get significantly outperformed by better performing tools. So they are not among the most effective.