This Week in PvP - Passing the Torch

[Nicko]

Hey all,

I don't have much to comment on this week because - frankly - I wasn't there. I farmed SQ enough to get the G UR, but that was about it and haven't touched the game in four days. My apologies to Troopers but if I'm to stay at all involved at all in this game I needed a break.

And it was very much needed.

So on that note - I'm going to be following the trend of going "casual". At this point I'm not exactly sure what that means. I'll go back to playing my Troopers, because that's a few clicks of a button, and try to play enough PvP matches to do two things

1) Reset at 1900
2) Reset my mind to view this game as just that - a game - and not a preoccupation.

That may change - whether it change in a few days - a week - or a month. I certainly have that competitive streak and am hoping taking it down a notch will prevent burnout and return with a new fire. I think I'll at least be able to do free SoW. If not I'll do what others have done - move on and say that was a great ride.

So my point in starting a PvP thread with a bunch of yada yada yada about myself is I've been generally writing these threads - with the exception of a summer break - and that's going to stop. I skipped last week and many thanks to Askora for taking the torch and running with it. I think they've been a really great "water cooler" for people to discuss the arena and lets be honest - despite new offerings like BNW - this game has become about the arena.

I would nominate Mjmxiii, Askora, or Slauki (if he really wants to hone those English skills) - but I guess that's for everyone to work out amongst themselves.

Thanks and see you (just a little less) in the arena!

[Silentknight]

Well fuck me! Not u 2??? Been my experience that casual does not end well! Hope ur different! Besides hockey started, gotta do somethin while watchin the game. Gunna miss ur posts...BIG TIME!!!
Won't ruin ur thread with a bunch of negativity, let's just say top 25 with zero refills is pathetic! Ur not the only one not playin!

[T-Man]

That sucks Niko, but understandable. I find myself being very disinterested in the arena until Friday night/Saturday. It's a chore to play actually. Especially with the bugs, game freezes, server errors, etc.

Definitely miss your post around here.

[GotN]

Same feelings here so totally understand you Nicko! This game has never been worse to play! Decided for myself to change some things that keep me playing with at least a little fun. That’s what you already mentioned, playing PvP only for minimum of 1.9 k pts at reset, hunting a little for ICs and over this setting a fun defense cool to watch and easy to beat. Don’t care bout rankings, points or 0 % defense rate and worked quite well for me 😜 this week game here froze in pvp mostly after I already won a fight or fight didn’t even start, every time counted as loss for me. Wrote several reports to support, but didn’t get a satisfying answer so far.

Nevertheless, congrats for podium to zamasu, caretakerii & Frankie. Don’t know if points have ever been that low, what says everything. Hope this will very soon be better again so finally

!!!!!!! FIX THIS GAME NF !!!!!!!!

[Askora]

First, congrats to Zamasu for top spot, and to Caretaker and Frankie for rounding out the podium.

Major bummer to see the thread start the way it did. I understand the feelings Nicko, and with much less time under my belt. You're basically the father of this thread, which has been a great water cooler for the week's end. I'm honored to be one of the people suggested to continue the tradition. That said, hopefully someone else takes up the challenge. I may still start one at times, but I think there are others who are better suited.

I'd noticed that Nicko seemed to be far less active in arena. Still think you need to take eternal at least once. I've considered doing that, even though with so many top players gone or casual play it seems like it would be a hollow victory. Since I've switched play style somewhat it has helped. So, hopefully you'll find some motivation again at least long enough for eternal and another Wrath. :D Hopefully find some humor in that. My guess is trooper (And the dupe solution) isn't coming until December when the trooper figure gets released. Hopefully at least get night city by then as the new toons seem to be part of that.

Sorry for the wall of text, but I'm wordy like that.

Cheers!

[Kamuz24z]

Good to know that you’re doing well man is the first time that I seen 4 days of inactivity from you now I wonder what all the guys copying your defenses are going to do thinking is not something they like to do -just enjoy going casual this game don’t require every day practice to keep your skills sharp

[Chaosego888]

No better time to take a break than now Nicko. Arena is a joke right now, not even going to waste my time talking about it. Maybe when you get back, the game will be playable and you can chase down that long overdue Eternal. Congratulations to zamasu for a much deserved Eternal this week.

[Blacksteel]

I know many of us can relate to what you mention Nicko and when it becomes a chore it's good to create some space and take a look at how it became that.
It's nice to see that you are well and you know the game will be there any week that you feel like playing it or taking a challenge.
And that's the idea, to enjoy it for whatever reason.
To put long hours and fight bugs as if it was a feature is not really fun (at least not for me) and only worth it up to a certain point.
This is a nice game we have troopers which are amazing and this is all great you know, but it's still a game, so enjoy it as you go... from here to eternity :).

Congrats to Zamasu, Caretakerii & Frankie well done!.

[gmac]

Hi there,

Congrats to Zamasu and the others on the podium!

Nicko, about you going casual...

All I have to say is that I totally understand it. In the end the game is all about Arena, you're right, and there is no incentive for us to push as hard as we can. Bugs, bad rewards and now the total exposure of our offenses... makes no sense to go crazy about it.

Having said that, I do like a lot last grinding events (blue/gunner buzz, gunner chopper, blue Valkyrie), gave us something to aim for and explored different aspects of the game. (sacrifice, arena, LoL, gold) This is good. I kind of switch my focus from Arena to farming... lol. It's fun and more relaxed way to go about the game.

Anyway, I hope you find it in you the will to play again, especially if the game gets better. Until then, you'll be missed, A LOT. Wish you luck.

Oh and yeah, but get one Eternal first! We all want t see that!

Cheers
gmac

[JJJ428]

I still do not see why exposing the attack team is a big deal. It tells us what characters are being used for our specific defense. Plus let me go through my defense list, Look that guy used the prisioner let me copy that oh wait don't have him, Hey this person used a wrath let me copy his attack team oh wait can't do that either. I guess it only helps the real end gamers and top of the arena people who all use the same defense but even then I figure most people are good enough they can figure out the best offense possible anyway.

So again I ask what really is the big deal seeing what attacked you I don't think I looked at one offense and thought man I should copy their idea.

[gmac]

I still do not see why exposing the attack team is a big deal. It tells us what characters are being used for our specific defense. Plus let me go through my defense list, Look that guy used the prisioner let me copy that oh wait don't have him, Hey this person used a wrath let me copy his attack team oh wait can't do that either. I guess it only helps the real end gamers and top of the arena people who all use the same defense but even then I figure most people are good enough they can figure out the best offense possible anyway.

So again I ask what really is the big deal seeing what attacked you I don't think I looked at one offense and thought man I should copy their idea.

Hey JJJ

Putting a good offense system together it's a matter of finding out how to win as fast as you can. And for that you need to get creative, you need to invest time and test stuff for hours. No point doing that to try to find and edge if others will be able to just see and copy it.

This might be an issue only for people who are super competitive in Arena, but all of them (I think) have agreed this was a bad decision.

And another thing, people like Nicko and HomemLivre, guys who put great defenses one after the other, they'll tell you that knowing how you get attacked makes little difference helping figure out a good defense. It's about understanding current meta and doing lots of tests.

I used to think like you, and info on how we get attacked might be good, but they should be put in a group, like most used toons, win rates etc. Current system only exposes others offences.

cheers
gmac

[Kamuz24z]

I still do not see why exposing the attack team is a big deal. It tells us what characters are being used for our specific defense. Plus let me go through my defense list, Look that guy used the prisioner let me copy that oh wait don't have him, Hey this person used a wrath let me copy his attack team oh wait can't do that either. I guess it only helps the real end gamers and top of the arena people who all use the same defense but even then I figure most people are good enough they can figure out the best offense possible anyway.

So again I ask what really is the big deal seeing what attacked you I don't think I looked at one offense and thought man I should copy their idea.

You’ll understand when you are in a race against Gmac, Carlos, Jofer etc those are incredibly fast players and their defenses are nothing special so the only thing that will set you apart is your speed some players have called this guys cheaters because of the amount of points they gain so fast I’m sure their attack teams will be copy by those who were defeated by these guys, just like people copying nicko’s defenses every time mediocre players like the new feature i haven’t seen any competitive player ask the same question

[JJJ428]

I guess I just don't see it as helpful info because not everyone has same characters also each defense is different and now that we have the ability to quickly cycle through 3 offensive teams the one team that is used against my defense might not be your team that helps you speed through as many defenses as possible. Granted I am no where near the gamer Jofer or Gmac is so maybe I am just not getting it but I just see it as worthless information instead of something that needs to be addressed vs the 100's of bugs I think the focus should be on.

The reason I say that is because I saw people complaining about seeing attack teams in the update thread and to me fixing the bugs is a much higher priority then worrying where I can or can not see what attacked me. I do want to thank you guys for explaining it to me but I think something that only has a negative impact against the top 50 or so players shouldn't be considered that bad. Though like the rest of you I agree that the arena is pretty much the only thing going on for most end game players.

[T-Man]

Forgot...

Congrats Zamasu, and the rest of the podium.

I also think it just isn't right to expose attack teams.

[mjmxiii]

Thanks for the nomination Nicko, noticed you hadnt been logging in and I cant blame you or anyone that quits logging in. Unfortunately, I am ready to go casual as well. I dropped my hours played a whole bunch lately and have about 20 SoW that have been sitting there for a while. Finished somewhere around rank 1000 last week and have been struggling to send trooper badges. Got them to everyone today but found better things to do yesterday than to replay AMOLAD 40 odd times or fight the same 5 defenses in PvP again. Cant say how tomorrow will go.

After the second try for Eternal I have been trying to find motivation to keep going but its just not there like it used to be. There doesnt seem to be much attention being paid to the people who play the game by the people who run the game and that is deflating. PvP is not a reason to keep playing at the moment. The event-happy mindset of NF is in full effect and they themselves have said that even if they focused on fixing bugs, that it wouldnt make too much of a difference. So they will soldier on and continue delivering a less-than-exceptional product and some will keep playing, some will find a new game and others like me, will move on all together. For now, the struggle is real and it continues, for how much longer is an answer than is still unknown. Till then...

GO KINGS!!!

[HomemLivre]

Congrats Zamasu on your first Eternal!

About thread, its sad to see one of my first troopers say things like that but I must admit that I fully understand you and agree with you. I need to work almost all the saturdays so thats no reason for me to play hard when Im not able to play the last and most important day, so Im casual for a long time... but I still being angry and sad even not playing hard, lots of crashes, freezes, missing buttons...

There's no point to invest time thinking about defenses when the game doesn't help, well, how are we able to build something with so many bugs and this sort of things?

About the attack team new feature, don't even waste my time to say a word about it, just like Gmac and Kamuz reiterated, we have a thread about this with lots of players that dislike that hard and things going to be the same, took just a few days for me to being attack with almost the same team that I used to attack some players, so lets see if people will start to copy my Santas Hell Fighters hahahah
Jokes apart this feature was the worst thing add in this game and kill what I most like to do, create attack and defense teams.

That said I don't know about you, Nicko, but I don't know how much time I will be motivated to play.

Cheers on you, hope that you find your will to have fun and still playing, mate!

[slauki]

glad that you still be around dear nicko, going casual is a very smart move. thank you for your nomination, but i have enough obligations with the my thread, so that really don't want to do an additional weekly task. i might open some threads but i think this should be a community task for us all now. everyone who feel like having to say something regarding last pvp week, should feel free to do it.

the exposure is bad for the top 1% of all pvp players, the rest is benefiting from it, because they can learn how to set up a good offense and defense.
that said for gmac and other top guys this is like giving away their strategy for which they have worked very hard. that's wrong. as i stated before the solution should be quite easy. don't show it for the top 50/top 100/ top whatever guys and expose the attack team of the rest...

and ofc: congrats to zumasu caretaker and frankie, hope he will join the forums soon.

[scott-5496]

First of all congrats to the podium winners and to all the guys slugging it out in the top 50, 25 and 10. It was maybe a slow week but it still requires time and effort to get there. Personally I gave up most of Saturday and enjoyed the sun (which is rare in Scotland at this time of year) and then decided to have a few beers so was just mucking about half drunk and actually for once enjoyed my 30 odd battles with a changing team.

Nicko, I am sad to hear you are going casual, you are a great poster on here and your posts helped me a lot in terms of strategy and creating good teams - your insight will be missed.

You also seem like a cool guy who is pretty measured and even in his views on here - that is always great to see.

Like other here I hope you do not go away and also that one week you get to the top. But, like others the game needs fixed as this last week or two has been a crash fest.

[DaveMurray]

Glad you are fine Nicko, you were gone for a few days and with the crap that happened in Vegas i got worried a bit since you travel a lot for work.
I totally understand your decision of going casual, the game has nothing to offer at the moment, it's just worthless grind and bugged arena only for players able to play on Saturday.
After reading the last update notes i am struggling to keep playing myself. Anyway, your posts are going to be missed but before you go casual what do you say of going Eternal? Everyone wants that. :D

Regarding last week in pvp: buggs, freezes, thorns, infinite extra turns and if you got purple beast you get a top 100 guaranteed without effort.
Gratz to the podium guys and to everyone else that keeps playing to that bugged environment.

P.S. I really don't care about the exposure of my off team and i never look what toons are used to attack me, i only did it the first 2 days, but since so many people complain a solution has to be found. Slauki's proposition is nice.

[Bradata]

Man, the forum becomes very sad lately! At moments I feel like I am reading the obituaries in a news paper! For me the game was crap, the only thing I liked from all this was the forum and now it's going away little by little with every cool member leaving...
As they say, the devs did not read the writings on the wall, there were so many warnings but no one was listening!
And now another cool member is going "casual", we all know what that means! Nicko, you will be missed a lot by me, you have earned my respect from the beginning with all your insights right at the target point.
I am gonna stop right here 'cause I started feeling that I'm writing an obituary myself!
Nicko, my man! Don't go casual, please!

[zamasu]

First, Thanks everyone. It was a busy week for me but not as busy as some other Eternals in the past.

Sorry to hear that you are leaving "this week in PvP" thread Nicko, again lol. Even though I don't post much in the forums, I was always looking forward to read your posts. I don't blame you for going "casual", this game has become more like a chore than just a game for some of us and we need to start cutting back on playing and dealing with bugs.

To be honest I wasn't planning to run for eternal this week, all started because I wanted some iron coins to buy a set of talismans, I took a decent lead (in the 100's) since the beginning of the week, and stayed there until the end. By Thursday night I decided to go for it since I saw nobody trying to catch me. Friday night I went to bed with a 1,500 points lead. and Saturday I didn't play much (Mostly because I got called into work in the morning :confused:), I pretty much just kept my distance by 500 points and watching Bradata (who was second for most of the day on Saturday) or other players for any run. No one seemed interested enough though.

You truly don't understand how hard you have to work for an Eternal until you go for it, and now Every eternal has more of my respect especially those who are able to reach the 8K - 10K mark, that is just pure hard work and dedication.

Now, just because no one has talked much about what happened this week in PvP, let me say some words; PvP is broken as Fuck!

To begin with Thorn and Cyclone shields are so broken, specially the thorns. I used them on my defense but not much on my offence because Thorn v. Thorn is just a nightmare! you never know what is going to happen and the game probably will end up frozen. Damage reflected is way too much and I have not idea but I've seen them even work on characters that have immunity, maybe I am wrong. The best way I found to get around them is to use immunity (when it works) or a magic damage team. Prisioner could be useful too, with his broken passive but I don't have him yet.

And now about prisoner, He is back and in full force! people this week were taking advantage of him and his broken passive, he does not only block passives but also blocks beneficial effects to be acquired, he was a nightmare when he was paired with Thorns and Purple Valkyrie.

Glass/Cannon Teams are back! VHE/AHE + DM + AoF + Wrath. add a set of thorns or two and you pretty much win every match that you win the coin toss. These became a problem because DM or AHE could destroy almost any character with one hit, and even when you managed to survived the first round, you will be left with not characters. And also AoF passive is still broken for I can see.

Matchmaking, the matchmaking code is just plain wrong. I really was facing the same people all week long and it is tiring, and boring. Like I knew the people who were going to be in my next list without even clearing the one I was playing at the time. Something needs to be done about this.

And to be honest, something needs to be done about the Saturday night rush. no matter how big of a gap you get during the week, you really need to play on Saturdays because you will not stop getting attacked. if you want to keep gaining points, you will have to be really fast because you amost get attack once every minute at the end.

Well, these are my thoughts for this week in PvP. This was my first, and probably last Eternal, I don't see myself exchanging 1,000 ironite for 10K iron coins, 5 SS, a 4* dupe, Useless Eternity Fragments (yes, they become useless after you get all 4 Eternals) and a refund of 350 ironites after you spend many hours of your life in arena.

Congrats to Caretakerii and Frankie for second and third place too. Well Done!!

-Zamasu

[Bradata]

Now, just because no one has talked much about what happened this week in PvP, let me say some words; PvP is broken as Fuck!


-Zamasu

I am with you on the "fuck" part! ;)
Wasting 1000 ironites for a lousy reward... not my kind of end game. I did it only because of the high chance to get Skill Shards the week before but when these extra rewards are removed, I don't see a reason to push for the top.
Probably this is the reason so many long time players are leaving.

[zamasu]

I am with you on the "fuck" part! ;)
Wasting 1000 ironites for a lousy reward... not my kind of end game. I did it only because of the high chance to get Skill Shards the week before but when these extra rewards are removed, I don't see a reason to push for the top.
Probably this is the reason so many long time players are leaving.

LOL

Yeah, it is just a waste of ironite and time. I don't think I am doing it again for now. If another event with good rewards I might try again, but it should be harder with all the competition. And yeah every day, I am removing troops that leave the game. I might just go casual too for now, like you said last week, getting Eternal is like truly finishing the game, nothing else to aim for...

[Patrice-1201]

Not you Nicko! You are one of the most respected player out there!!! I feel everything you wrote though. I hope things will improve to get you back and also for us not to leave.

Last week I also did not play much and finished 30th with only 15 battles on Saturday morning.