She-Hulk Heavy Speed Bug Fix [Title Edited for Clarity]

This is absolutely terrible. People ranked her for that reason only. She had a unique ability that’s absolutely not op, but of course Kabam has to nerf her...

Comments

LeNoirFaineant

Tell me, Kabam: How in the world am I supposed to know if a champion works as intended or not?
You can ask them, if you’re afraid to ask them that’s a good indicator it is unintended.

Nope. Asking them won't do it. People asked about AA and were told specifically that it wasn't a bug...until it was.
Yup. Here’s the explanation for that one. I’ll add hap crappens, (this means noone’s perfect even if you believe they are.)

“Hey Everybody,

I'm sorry to report that a moderator gave you incorrect information when this was first reported. We know how important it is for us to be sure that we are giving you the most accurate information that we possibly can.

This was a bug, and although it was a long standing one, it doesn't mean that we didn't have to fix it. Archangel’s Stun was not acting like every other stun in the game.

The issue with having a Stun that does not act like a debuff is that it was causing a lot of problems, and with more new content and modes being added, this was becoming a bigger and bigger problem. Archangel was not only able to bypass Stun Immune nodes, but his stun would bypass other Champions abilities, like Agent Venom's Tenacity or Black Panther (Civil War)'s Reflect Stun, as well as not interact with Masteries like Willpower.

With this interaction becoming more and more prevalent in different game modes, we started seeing more of these problems come up, and this bug was one that became more of a priority.

We don’t have any plans to distribute Rank Down tickets as this is resolving a bug and not changing an intended fundamental Champion mechanic in a significant way.”

And its not like the bad information was a rogue moderator. The issue was reported in the bug thread, a moderator said it would be looked into, and the thread was labelled "under investigation." Then the moderator came back and announced that it was not a bug, and closed the thread labeling it "not a bug." Presumably the moderator was reporting the findings of the game team, so it was more than just "a moderator gave you incorrect information."
I don’t think you remember the originating thread about AA’s stun. Let’s review it. BRB.

Ok back. Nope not what you remember. The moderator just responded without marking it under investigation nor coming back. It was an off the hip response.

Check for yourself.
https://forums.playcontestofchampions.com/en/discussion/comment/252890#Comment_252890

Check yourself.

*wrong link
Fair enough. Scratch that part of the narrative. Doesn't change the point though.
Was the point that asking offers no assurances? Yeah it doesn’t 100% however it’s the best you’re going to get.

Here’s the question now. And this isn’t a slight it’s being used for comparative purpose. You’ve admittedly been incorrect in your assertions, should people treat you as they do Kabam and trust anything you ever say?

If my assertions are to my customers and they cause people to buy things from me based on the misinformation, after which I admit my error but say I won't offer compensation since it was an honest mistake, then yes. They probably shouldn't trust me after that.

DTMelodicMetal

This was not a mechanic of this Champion, and was not mentioned as one. All Champions have the same speed and cadence to their Attacks, and no Champion should be able to combo into a Heavy attack with 100% reliability.

Over time players become aware that different champions have different frames and speeds of animations to their attacks. When you use Quake you have to adjust how quick you alternate between using evade/dexterity and charging heavy attacks depending on who you are fighting. Against MODOK, you alternate these two things faster because MODOK’s light attacks animations are faster than most champions. Against Spider-Man Classic, you alternate evade/dexterity and charging heavy attacks slower because Spidey’s basic strikes animations are slower than average.

The above example also applies to other champions like Proxima Midnight and Doctor Voodoo. Intercepting strategies get tweaked against different champions because certain champions’ medium attacks have faster animations than other champions. Additionally, certain champions’ medium attacks make contact earlier than other champions’ medium attacks. Venom, Thanos, and Unstoppable Colossus are champions’ whose medium attack animations are faster than average. Corvus Glaive, Warlock, and Sentinel are champions whose medium attack animations make contact later than average.

DickSlug - one of the most knowledgeable members of the MCOC community - has previously explained these things as products of MCOC’s unity engine game mechanics (see below). His explanation of MCOC hitboxes is invaluable when learning how to take your MCOC skills to higher levels.

My bad in advance if my interpretation of Miike’s and DickSlug’s writings are off:

https://www.reddit.com/r/ContestOfChampions/comments/5lnvcj/hit_detection_explained/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app

https://www.reddit.com/r/ContestOfChampions/comments/5lj2l1/whiffing_explained_with_pictures/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app

DNA3000

Last point, and one that troubles me: it feels deeply out of touch for the team to drop this into the changelog unceremoniously and without any dialogue or explanation.

I don’t ascribe that to sneakiness; I just don’t get it.

That's easy: tunnel vision. It seemed like a minor change to the person making it, and they were just wrong, and no one else critically reviewed it. It happens. Remember a team didn't do this, a person did. And if it wasn't reviewed as thoroughly as it should have been, again it was a person that failed to do that. And individuals make mistakes that we often assume a team shouldn't make collectively.

The larger issue is that the changelog should be the last in a long line of bug management processes. It is asking too much for the changelog to fully document everything about the lifecycle of a bug's discovery, analysis, discussion, and remediation. If the changelog was part of a larger better process, then the changelog itself wouldn't be necessarily problematic.

One more thing: I don't know the ins and outs of Kabam's development process specifically, but in my experience different parts of a game like this are often worked on by different people and there's a glitch I've seen affect more than one dev team. Things like animations are often worked on by different people than things like mechanical content - what we'd call things like abilities and effects. That makes sense because the work and the skills required are often radically different. But there's a tendency to think of the abilities and effects as being one thing that determines what "happens" in the game, and the animations and sequences as being a different more superficial kind of thing. That's *usually* true, but there's often an overlap where how an entity moves can critically affect what they can do, and this game is no exception. If there's a "cultural instinct" to assume that animations are cosmetic and abilities are consequential, a bug fix in the animation section of the game might not get the critical review attention it deserves. I've seen this mistake happen on a scale that would make the She-Hulk change look miniscule by comparison.

SparkAlot

Really don't understand why Kabam is hiding from people what champs have "bugs" and need to be fixed.

If Kabam KNOWS about it, and they PLAN on "fixing" them at some point in the future, they should tell people that.

Otherwise, it is a giant bait & switch tactic.

Aleor

So you know how laws can't be applied to smth that happened before they were set? And laws say about limits set. Whatever is not forbidden is allowed. Nothing before that silly patch note was forbidding heavy chain. And even more, when opponent is above a bar of power, you can't chain or safely. So it's nowhere close to OP.
How about war machine sp1? It never stated you can't dex it. Will it be fixed? I also can't dex 100% agent venom sp2 and falcon sp2. Venoms sp2 seem to have more range and one dex isn't enough. A lot of examples.
Please do what's fare, leave miss shrek as she was all the time

Cam77778888

Yes if your champ is not doing as advertised in the description. Kabam has reserved the right to just change the description. As is the case with SS. Either way the player is left at the disadvantage

CoatHang3r

Tell me, Kabam: How in the world am I supposed to know if a champion works as intended or not?
You can ask them, if you’re afraid to ask them that’s a good indicator it is unintended.

Nope. Asking them won't do it. People asked about AA and were told specifically that it wasn't a bug...until it was.
Yup. Here’s the explanation for that one. I’ll add hap crappens, (this means noone’s perfect even if you believe they are.)

“Hey Everybody,

I'm sorry to report that a moderator gave you incorrect information when this was first reported. We know how important it is for us to be sure that we are giving you the most accurate information that we possibly can.

This was a bug, and although it was a long standing one, it doesn't mean that we didn't have to fix it. Archangel’s Stun was not acting like every other stun in the game.

The issue with having a Stun that does not act like a debuff is that it was causing a lot of problems, and with more new content and modes being added, this was becoming a bigger and bigger problem. Archangel was not only able to bypass Stun Immune nodes, but his stun would bypass other Champions abilities, like Agent Venom's Tenacity or Black Panther (Civil War)'s Reflect Stun, as well as not interact with Masteries like Willpower.

With this interaction becoming more and more prevalent in different game modes, we started seeing more of these problems come up, and this bug was one that became more of a priority.

We don’t have any plans to distribute Rank Down tickets as this is resolving a bug and not changing an intended fundamental Champion mechanic in a significant way.”

And its not like the bad information was a rogue moderator. The issue was reported in the bug thread, a moderator said it would be looked into, and the thread was labelled "under investigation." Then the moderator came back and announced that it was not a bug, and closed the thread labeling it "not a bug." Presumably the moderator was reporting the findings of the game team, so it was more than just "a moderator gave you incorrect information."
I don’t think you remember the originating thread about AA’s stun. Let’s review it. BRB.

Ok back. Nope not what you remember. The moderator just responded without marking it under investigation nor coming back. It was an off the hip response.

Check for yourself.
https://forums.playcontestofchampions.com/en/discussion/comment/252890#Comment_252890

Check yourself.

*wrong link
Fair enough. Scratch that part of the narrative. Doesn't change the point though.
Was the point that asking offers no assurances? Yeah it doesn’t 100% however it’s the best you’re going to get.

Here’s the question now. And this isn’t a slight it’s being used for comparative purpose. You’ve admittedly been incorrect in your assertions, should people treat you as they do Kabam and trust anything you ever say?
If my assertions are to my customers and they cause people to buy things from me based on the misinformation, after which I admit my error but say I won't offer compensation since it was an honest mistake, then yes. They probably shouldn't trust me after that.

Makes total sense, If you failed to inform your customers that the product is subject to change and all sales are final. Are you saying you have familiarity with running multi million dollar mmo mobile games?

The longer this goes on the more it sounds like people subscribe to Bush on trust (rather than the original).

"There's an old saying in Tennessee I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee--that says, fool me once, shame on--shame on you. Fool me-- you can't get fooled again."

Worknprogress

Just saw quake's description as well ,it doesnt say anywhere she can hold Heavy or charge heavy for any extended duration. like hela or kamala she should also throw heavy automaticaly after charging for few seconds??? redskull's ability clearly states he can hold heavy for extended duration

It says she evades basic attacks when concussion is placed. Guess what places concussion

Zuro

Just saw quake's description as well ,it doesnt say anywhere she can hold Heavy or charge heavy for any extended duration. like hela or kamala she should also throw heavy automaticaly after charging for few seconds??? redskull's ability clearly states he can hold heavy for extended duration
It says she evades basic attacks when concussion is placed. Guess what places concussion

You missed the point he is saying where in the description does it say quake can hold a heavy for a infinite amount of time

HighOnPCP

As the Title says I got forced to download an Update today and there was no way around it. Wouldn't even let me login without upgrading. I took She-Hulk up to R4 earlier today just so I can 100% 6.2.6 before they ruin her on SEPTEMBER 4TH! Went into 6.2 and quickly realized that the Heavy chain doesn't work anymore. This is unacceptable. You KNOW for a fact that everybody hated this "fix" already but you didn't even have the decency to at least keep your word on when the "fix" is going live. Thanks for spitting in our faces like that, really feel appreciated as a long time player of your game

Eb0ny-O-M4w

What happened?
This last "forced" android update, which isn't the 24.2 update, already nerfed she-hulk. I was in the middle of the 6.2.6 quest and about to fight The Champion boss when this hits me on surprise.

This wasn't stated on the description. It only said it would be fixed in the 24.2 update which is about to drop in a week, yet you did it earlier and forced the update upon us.

Here I was rushing to get this quest done before shewould get nerf, which plenty of time left. And now I mind as well quit since there is no way to beat the quest now.

How about the items spent to do this quest, just to get my champions champion in the middle of it with no notice of it?

unknown

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DrZola

Last point, and one that troubles me: it feels deeply out of touch for the team to drop this into the changelog unceremoniously and without any dialogue or explanation.

I don’t ascribe that to sneakiness; I just don’t get it.
That's easy: tunnel vision. It seemed like a minor change to the person making it, and they were just wrong, and no one else critically reviewed it. It happens. Remember a team didn't do this, a person did. And if it wasn't reviewed as thoroughly as it should have been, again it was a person that failed to do that. And individuals make mistakes that we often assume a team shouldn't make collectively.

The larger issue is that the changelog should be the last in a long line of bug management processes. It is asking too much for the changelog to fully document everything about the lifecycle of a bug's discovery, analysis, discussion, and remediation. If the changelog was part of a larger better process, then the changelog itself wouldn't be necessarily problematic.

One more thing: I don't know the ins and outs of Kabam's development process specifically, but in my experience different parts of a game like this are often worked on by different people and there's a glitch I've seen affect more than one dev team. Things like animations are often worked on by different people than things like mechanical content - what we'd call things like abilities and effects. That makes sense because the work and the skills required are often radically different. But there's a tendency to think of the abilities and effects as being one thing that determines what "happens" in the game, and the animations and sequences as being a different more superficial kind of thing. That's *usually* true, but there's often an overlap where how an entity moves can critically affect what they can do, and this game is no exception. If there's a "cultural instinct" to assume that animations are cosmetic and abilities are consequential, a bug fix in the animation section of the game might not get the critical review attention it deserves. I've seen this mistake happen on a scale that would make the She-Hulk change look miniscule by comparison.

I confess I don’t code for video games.

Most of what you say seems legit and not unlike many large projects I’ve worked on. With a committee approach, sometimes things get lost (or added) in process. Every single decision doesn’t have to percolate all the way to the highest levels, which means lower levels might make decisions that have critical implications.

But I find your first paragraph implausible. Why?

Because there’s almost certainly a process for triaging bug fixes, which is what we’ve been told, more or less, in these forums. It seems odd to think that coders just take a look at the list of known and unknown issues and pick a random bug to fix without someone deciding the ones that take priority over others. And if chaining heavies at the end of a combo was a big game issue, this would likely have been a global fix, not a champ-specific one.

Perhaps I’m wrong and there are a bunch of siloed programmers sitting in cubicles, tossing code into the game without any oversight. There have been times the game feels like that might be what happens.

Like I said, I’m not a coder, which may be why I still don’t get it.

Dr. Zola

CFree

Post a video.

CFree

And ranking when you now a nerf is coming is ... not intelligent.

DrZola

This was not a mechanic of this Champion, and was not mentioned as one. All Champions have the same speed and cadence to their Attacks, and no Champion should be able to combo into a Heavy attack with 100% reliability.
Over time players become aware that different champions have different frames and speeds of animations to their attacks. When you use Quake you have to adjust how quick you alternate between using evade/dexterity and charging heavy attacks depending on who you are fighting. Against MODOK, you alternate these two things faster because MODOK’s light attacks animations are faster than most champions. Against Spider-Man Classic, you alternate evade/dexterity and charging heavy attacks slower because Spidey’s basic strikes animations are slower than average.

The above example also applies to other champions like Proxima Midnight and Doctor Voodoo. Intercepting strategies get tweaked against different champions because certain champions’ medium attacks have faster animations than other champions. Additionally, certain champions’ medium attacks make contact earlier than other champions’ medium attacks. Venom, Thanos, and Unstoppable Colossus are champions’ whose medium attack animations are faster than average. Corvus Glaive, Warlock, and Sentinel are champions whose medium attack animations make contact later than average.

DickSlug - one of the most knowledgeable members of the MCOC community - has previously explained these things as products of MCOC’s unity engine game mechanics (see below). His explanation of MCOC hitboxes is invaluable when learning how to take your MCOC skills to higher levels.

My bad in advance if my interpretation of Miike’s and DickSlug’s writings are off:

https://www.reddit.com/r/ContestOfChampions/comments/5lnvcj/hit_detection_explained/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app

https://www.reddit.com/r/ContestOfChampions/comments/5lj2l1/whiffing_explained_with_pictures/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app

This is really good. And DickSlug doesn’t get nearly enough credit for the support he’s given the community. Thanks @DTMelodicMetal

Dr. Zola

CFree

Just saw quake's description as well ,it doesnt say anywhere she can hold Heavy or charge heavy for any extended duration. like hela or kamala she should also throw heavy automaticaly after charging for few seconds??? redskull's ability clearly states he can hold heavy for extended duration

Strengths

Power Gain Nodes – Skilled players are going to be able to take advantage of her Heavy Attack custom charging effect. She can charge her Heavy Attacks for as long as she wants and while charging, the opponent’s first Basic Attack are going to be Evaded because of the Concussion. This is great against Power nodes in AvA!

JosephPoerio

This is insane.

BigPoppaCBONE

I don't see why there need to be any changes at all. Using She-hulk wasn't like god mode, waltzing through fights throughout the contest. She made a hard fight easier, not easy, with the perfect storm of abilities for that fight. So what? Wah, a champ you just revamped is seen as valuable for some content. Be smart and sell her crystal instead of making her weaker and throw an SYG on the next boss if you're so scared. This is a knee-jerk overreaction to a very minor situation. Thanks to said knee-jerk reaction, your customers are mad at you because you've also set a terrible precedent now. What will you do when the next Big Boss is demonstrably easier to beat with a specific combination of champ and strategy? Where does it stop?

Sheesh, you could have sold an Anti-Champion crystal featuring She-hulk and other champs with a tiny chance of a Thanos and made who-knows how much more than you think you're losing. No vision at all.

tjgiggles

You stated a timetable for this change - not sticking to the timeline further illustrates how poor your communication is.

This suggests that your data noticed a rush of players going 6.2.6 champion using her style. Adjusting her kit is up to you, but readjusting your timeline for the adjustment clearly shows that you are targeting players progression with the rationale of the change.

Players ranked this champion specifically for this encounter and should have at least be granted a week to work on it, as was communicated.

All we ask for from you is better communication.

_Kill_Switch_

Noticed it too.

Eb0ny-O-M4w

Found this as well in the middle of a run in 6.2.6 ... Guess they won't give the items wasted now

DNA3000

But I find your first paragraph implausible. Why?

Because there’s almost certainly a process for triaging bug fixes, which is what we’ve been told, more or less, in these forums. It seems odd to think that coders just take a look at the list of known and unknown issues and pick a random bug to fix without someone deciding the ones that take priority over others. And if chaining heavies at the end of a combo was a big game issue, this would likely have been a global fix, not a champ-specific one.

And notice it wasn't a global fix or announced as one. All the announcement says is: She-Hulk: Fixed an issue where she could Combo into a Heavy Attack.

The announcement reads like this was a little tweak to She Hulk. Which it might have been to the person who worked on it.

CFree

Is this an android update? Haven’t seen anything for iOS yet.

Ordalca

Yes, Android got an update, and the old version wouldn't let them play until they updated the app.

tjgiggles

You stated a timetable for this change - not sticking to the timeline further illustrates how poor your communication is.

This suggests that your data noticed a rush of players going 6.2.6 champion using her style. Adjusting her kit is up to you, but readjusting your timeline for the adjustment clearly shows that you are targeting players progression with the rationale of the change.

Players ranked this champion specifically for this encounter and should have at least be granted a week to work on it, as was communicated.

All we ask for from you is better communication.

Post was moved, just to clear any confusion I am referring to the forced update of the issue that was pushed today when they stated this update would be in the Sept 4th update.

Eb0ny-O-M4w

In the changelog thread: https://forums.playcontestofchampions.com/en/discussion/11/marvel-contest-of-champions-changelog#latest

"Version 24.1.6 will begin to roll out to Users. It will be released to all Players over the coming days.

It will update the game to a newer version of our Development Platform, and does not contain any player facing changes."

This update was forced upon us today. The part where it says "does not contain any player facing changes" is now proved wrong, since there is an issue where you introduced a change that was planned for the next update (next week) in it, difficulting the gameplay earlier for the players

jnikolas92

i fail to understand why the appropriate resolution to this issue is taking so long?
it's completely clear that compensation to rectify how summoners were affected negatively is the only appropriate way to move forward.
i'm hoping the team decides to do right by us and let us recoup our burned resources so we can move forward.

DNA3000

DickSlug - one of the most knowledgeable members of the MCOC community - has previously explained these things as products of MCOC’s unity engine game mechanics (see below). His explanation of MCOC hitboxes is invaluable when learning how to take your MCOC skills to higher levels.

My bad in advance if my interpretation of Miike’s and DickSlug’s writings are off:

https://www.reddit.com/r/ContestOfChampions/comments/5lnvcj/hit_detection_explained/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app

https://www.reddit.com/r/ContestOfChampions/comments/5lj2l1/whiffing_explained_with_pictures/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app

Those articles discussed hit boxes, and a peculiarity to how Unity combines collision detection and frame rate synchronization. If for some reason you can't render frames fast enough to be real time, you have two options: slow down or skip frames. Unity skips frames (at least it does in the version MCOC uses according to DS) and because it doesn't interpolate collisions it can actually fail to render the moment when two things collide, and thus not even know they collided.

I don't think that's relevant here. This is more of a rhythm thing. I'm not an expert on Unity, but I know the basics of attack chaining in combat games. When I'm attacking with standard attacks the AI can't attack back with standard attacks, or combat wouldn't work. There are mechanics that basically say that when I execute a light attack there's a period of time during which the target can't actively control movement, and when the target can't activate attacks (these two things are often different: you can often move at times when you can't activate attacks). Our ability to chain attacks together up to a point but no farther is baked into how the attacks work: if we follow attack X with attack Y fast enough, there's no moment in time when the opponent can counterattack. But if we're too slow and we leave a gap in between X and Y, the AI can sneak an attack in the middle. When we use our second medium we ourselves are unable to attack for a window of time, and that window is long enough that the AI "escapes" his temporary inability to attack, and can attack back. This is what eventually truncates our attacks.

I suspect that the combination of all of these effects and how they interact with each other is referred to internally at Kabam as "cadence." And every champion probably is supposed to honor the same cadence rules: two mediums force a pause in the chain, as does four lights. This allows the AI to attack back. You have to hold a heavy to "charge" it for some minimum length of time, and I'm guessing this hold time is supposed to be longer than the "suppression" you place on your target when using light and medium attacks. This prevents sticking a heavy at the end of a combo sequence without the AI having an opportunity to attack back. This is probably also a "cadence" rule. But it's apparently also a rule the game isn't following, and thus the players have no way to know it exists.

I don't think DS has ever dug into these specific mechanics, but even if he did he could only figure out what the game does, not what rules the developers are supposedly following when they use those action primitives.

unknown

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