Surprisingly… I enjoy the new PvP. It was a tough love at the start, with “WHERE IS MY CASUAL PVP, GIVE IT BACK, NOW” at the start, through “srsly? 1000 or more battles to get on top of the 30-people bubble? dead content, sorry…” (when there were no heroes on the enemy team), through “I get it, you want stuff to get hard, but that’s kind of extreme, don’t you think, dear devs?” (when enemies in blood frenzy bonus areas started to steamroll me and 1-turn-losses became commonplace)… removing Wand+Stella (although I started to think that it wasn’t Stella that was the key problem, it is the Wand that made the problem possible) led me to the where I am now.
Currently I’m at the stage where I enjoy most areas in PvP, I enjoy playing alternating between regions, and not playing one and the same team over and over. I still miss casual PvP - for the days when I just want to mindlessly smash some enemies - and no, explore is not good for the zen mode, with the number of pop-ups there. You can’t just click “next battle” over and over, without interruption. And no, central spire isn’t like the old casual PvP. I also miss the ability to set our own defences - even though improvements were clearly made to match-making, I still see nearly identical teams over and over again - they might not appear in the exact shape and form in the 3 that are offered at any given time, but the same teams are offered on next 3, and on next 3, and on next 3. It wasn’t perfect in old PvP, but at least there was greater variety, we didn’t have that one mythic that 99% of players are using. And it’s not just about Stella (now Diamantina) - each restriction has its “mythic flavour of the week” and it’s tiring after a while. Oh, and having a way to switch between our teams WITHIN our regions would also go a LOOOONG way to make PvP nicer. Rebuilding teams is too tedious
That said, I separate the “joy of playing” from “acquiring rewards from PvP” - that’s a different story. I wish there was less RNG involved in everything related to that: the 30-people bubbles are
either very calm, or on some weeks I see so many global LB frequent flyers among my 30 people that I give up trying for top3 for the week on Tuesday morning. I’m uneasy about the drop rate of souls for immortals and the time frame for upgrading even one to full (shiny keys and troops vibe… do we need a shiny token & immortal souls gnome…?). I’m uneasy about 800k total VP to be earned every 11 weeks (and, really, what on earth should I do that for? For 5 gold marks for one, maybe two weeks and then back to lowest rank? why would I want do kill myself for mayyyyyybe 50 gold marks in total? this makes zero sense.) The drop rate of icons doesn’t seem all that high to make a big dent in the required total VP, the headstart will likely be negligible.
So, there’s me at this point. We will see if I change my mind after the new PvP season starts.
Interesting. Can you explain why you think the new pvp is less boring?
I ask because maybe the experience is different for different people.
For me, I now see less variance in enemy teams. Aka I’m fighting the same enemies more often, albeit those same enemy teams are within areas. When the new system first dropped and we were facing random enemies, I did find THAT a lot less boring. But this? This just feels like old pvp broken down into areas and made more tedious. Maybe I’m just missing something?
Old pvp WAS boring. I totally agree there. Then again, it was all but completely skippable. I know I don’t remember much complaining about how boring pvp was. So I’m guessing people didn’t care?
I judge it this way… If they removed all of the rewards from this pvp and just left it with the gold, glory, trophies, would I want to play it?
Yes they did not care. End-level players hardly ever did PVP. It was newer players who did it because they needed pets. Older players already had enough pets, so did not bother anymore.
it is only since Gold Marks and linked Book rewards were introduced that end-level players returned to the mode. Perhaps that is why there is more complaining now.
I have no problems (as there are no game modes that I actively dislike or hate) playing some PvP for some rewards that I’d like to have but, if playing for the sake of playing, I must admit that currently PvP sits around there in the company with Journey (albeit not that low in the pecking order).
It has nothing to do with win/loss rates (unlike some other players that I’ve heard muttering) - I’m winning the same 95-ish percent of games, my win rate has not plummeted after any of the changes, my loss rate hasn’t skyrocketed to 30% or whatnot other unbelievable number, I’ve never lost (at least as far as I recall) more than two (2) games in a row.
It has also nothing to with me being a stupid idiot and absolutely refusing to use Wand of Stars and Stellarix and Takshaka.
And it has nothing to do with me refusing to use Elementalist as well, especially in outer ring. Yes, I know, with that I’m being not only stupid idiot but also malicious idiot because - according to the information provided by community managers - facing elementalist after elementalist after elementalist after elementalist after elementalist before elementalist after elementalist after elementalist after elementalist after elementalist between elementalist among elementalist after elementalist after elementalist after elementalist in the outer ring is specifically aimed at helping newer accounts because not fighting against elementalist makes the battles harder for them.
Yes, every time I see it, the player in question receives -100 creativity points (that reads - minus one hundred) on their tab.
Funny to see some lamenting how boring and uncreative old PvP was (implying, mayhap, that new PvP is not boring un not uncreative). At a superficial, cursory glance (yeah, we have different regions!) it might indeed seem so…try looking a little closer, though, - it’s just as boring and uncreative now as the old PvP was, in some sense even more so.
Heck, if stars align one can roll through 70% of the PvP map with the same outrageously interesting and unearthly imaginative team!
(And, of course, having wacky bubble system, wacky scoring system - why are higher level players still being punished? -, wacky matchmaking system, wacky holy random lootbox as the newest crown jewel doesn’t exactly help.)_
No. I was grinding it to get gold marks for the dragons, but after getting the same one 3 times in a row and also not getting any mythics from chests for over 12 weeks in spite of playing the game a stupid amount, I’ve concluded the effort to reward ratio in this game is not worth it. I also completely ignore that part of pvp where you grind even more to get some lame buffs, can’t even remember what it’s called.
They could have left the pvp as is imo, or just changed it slightly by eg. having certain restrictions each week in an optional extra mode.
Besides the over complicated loot and currency system, the problem with the current PvP is that nobody cares if they lose defensively. Everyone is using Wand of Stars to attack despite knowing that it is being converted to a worthless weapon on their defending team.
How can anyone be proud of PvP victories against ridiculously lame teams of players who don’t care if they lose they lose?
This isn’t PvP. It’s lame player vs a.i. with idiotic teams. People are only motivated by getting new pets and troops. It’s insulting to our intelligence to think we would get excited about this lame ‘no defenders’ PvP,
Wand of Stars was a mistake.
Stellarix was a mistake
Elementalist’s traits was a mistake.
I used to play PvP a lot, over 100k battles more than 3 years ago and I reckon I had 90+K 6 years ago. I was never a LB chaser or ever cared how many trophies I got, or how long it took to get battles done, or needing to set my watch to endure a game mode. So own pace.
I reckon I didn’t play a single PvP battle for at least 18 of the past 36 months prior to PvP updates.
The whole PvP updates and shenanigans for cash, blatant theft of time. Lol at seasons reset and unattainable FOMO for f2p?
The reason it’s 11 weeks is for quarterly reporting/accounting simplicity, and can sneak 4 x paid passes per year in, plus cover 1-2 week breaks.
There are two major problems i have with the current PvP:
The special gems should just go. It turns everything into (un)lucky games. Which is just annoying as especially with mana potions and dragon gems the games become so much longer for no reason. No more voting for the winning alliance either but who cares anyway. Just give us another day to do Citadel battles instead of voting day.
The progression for the PvP pass and seasonal challenges are just to slow and much. Have grinded my ass of cause of free time with not even being close to complete all challenges but later and others don’t have that luxury. Know it’s still early in the season but can already calculate it’s not going to work.
Just playing to get things done now and hope for the best. Things really need to be toned down so it doesn’t feel as much as a hassle anymore. As currently it’s just a frustrating thing to do.
Fine fine. But knowing how these devs behave i dont want them given any ideas. Its a short jump from removing stellarix because a minority couldnt or wouldnt deal with him to nerfing him. Think people are angry now? Just wait until someone who had 20 dupes before getting stellarix wakes up to find him nerfed!
The issues isnt the troops or elementalist or having defense not matter, its the whole mode as it is right now.
Id love to see those “pvp engagement” numbers kafka bragged about after this week. I did 1000 battles last week. Its midweek now. Ive not around 40. My enthusiasm for this game has been killed
I disagree. They will do whatever they think is best for their bottom line. Theyve become no different than any other greedy gacha dev. Nothing about this pvp update is good for the game.
Imo one day in the near future they will implement a system to limit play in explore/delves etc. An energy system
