Marvel Puzzle Quest

[dunkem]

When you cashed in, was Black spidey just a one cover or do they at least give you a cover for each color?

I've got a She-Thor cover I'm sitting on in my inventory until time's up but I don't know if I'll sell her off to save roster space.

I've been playing with Modern Hawkeye 2* lately with Magneto. Those criticals after a 5 match are pretty devastating along with his red and Blue. Downside though is Hawkeye's hit points kind of suck and he shares all of Magneto's colors.

[Toddzilla]

just one, like the others

[dunkem]

I figured so. Thought there may have been a distant possibility of them giving you the character with more than one like you might when you rank high on a PVP.

Seems like adding these 3*/4* does increase the scaling though. My top 3 aren't very high leveled, but seem like I'm gettng matched up again heavier hitters. Maybe those 1 cover 3*/4* are considered "stronger" than leveled up covered 2*....

Looks like there's about 13 regulars in T.R.O.U.T. mobile. Hopefully a spot opens up for you.

[Shoveler]

Figured out how to join an alliance.. didn't realize I had to actually do a daily for that option to show up.

If you end up with extra spots in the alliance I would be happy to join, but right now there is no rush.. I'm still going through the prologue and figuring out how to effectively put together a one star team.

[SackAttack]

Originally Posted by dunkem

Looks like there's about 13 regulars in T.R.O.U.T. mobile. Hopefully a spot opens up for you.

Alliances are actually the same regardless of what you play. You might be on mobile, I'm on Steam, but T.R.O.U.T. is T.R.O.U.T. either way.

I don't do a lot of pruning (okay, any) on T.R.O.U.T. because that's strictly an FOFC thing. S.Q.U.I.D. I run a tighter ship on activity because, well, nobody on FOFC joined, so I made it a public alliance.

Originally Posted by Shoveler

Figured out how to join an alliance.. didn't realize I had to actually do a daily for that option to show up.

If you end up with extra spots in the alliance I would be happy to join, but right now there is no rush.. I'm still going through the prologue and figuring out how to effectively put together a one star team.

The alliance tab won't show up until PVE events and not just the prologue show up for you. Is that what you meant by daily?

[Shoveler]

Originally Posted by SackAttack

Alliances are actually the same regardless of what you play. You might be on mobile, I'm on Steam, but T.R.O.U.T. is T.R.O.U.T. either way.

I don't do a lot of pruning (okay, any) on T.R.O.U.T. because that's strictly an FOFC thing. S.Q.U.I.D. I run a tighter ship on activity because, well, nobody on FOFC joined, so I made it a public alliance.



The alliance tab won't show up until PVE events and not just the prologue show up for you. Is that what you meant by daily?

Yes, when I did the first dead pool daily I was asked to submit a username and such and the alliance tab showed up. Until then I wasn't sure where to go to find all of that.

It sounds like trout is not going to have any openings.. I may look at squid, although to be honest I'm not really sure what the benefit is of joining an alliance.

Doesn't really matter.. I'm really terrible at this game and only using it to kill time here and there.

[dunkem]

Wasn't sure how the cross platform thing worked since I think you mentioned you had two separate rosters on mobile and steam. Good to know.

Alliances are good for extra stuff. We do well, we get more stuff. I'm thinking unless we have a full 20 active, we won't ever get real good rewards via the alliance. Sill good to have ANY alliance to get bonuses on the daily SHIELD drops.

Since scaling supposedly relies on top 3 heroes, I'm wondering if I should level up those three or go for more depth. I hate burning through all my life packs so I've been rotating some of my other heroes to give injured ones a break. I've got kind of a Magneto/Storm/Hawkeye/Ares rotation going. Thor occasionally, but he's sometimes a little slow to get going.

I see now how one stars were only good to get over the initial hump. These days, I only use them for deadpool and if I want to just save my big boys from damage against easier opponents. They're just not versatile enough to create synergistic combos at higher levels even if they're powered up.

[SackAttack]

Originally Posted by Shoveler

Yes, when I did the first dead pool daily I was asked to submit a username and such and the alliance tab showed up. Until then I wasn't sure where to go to find all of that.

It sounds like trout is not going to have any openings.. I may look at squid, although to be honest I'm not really sure what the benefit is of joining an alliance.

Doesn't really matter.. I'm really terrible at this game and only using it to kill time here and there.

T.R.O.U.T. occasionally does have openings. people drop out here and there. but there are a few FOFCers who haven't logged in in multiple months and I really don't know what to do about them, so I've kind of put my head in the sand and pretended they don't exist.

Benefits of alliance depends on how active/focused the alliance is. S.Q.U.I.D. is mainly 200 extra ISO/day since my rule there is "log in and play SOMETHING daily." It's my alt account, so I don't feel comfortable setting minimums for PVE/PVP since I wouldn't be able to commit to those myself.

If you get an alliance that's both active and focused, you can earn extra event rewards in PVE and PVP events. "Alliance rewards."

Originally Posted by dunkem

Wasn't sure how the cross platform thing worked since I think you mentioned you had two separate rosters on mobile and steam. Good to know.

I do have separate accounts on separate platforms! But it's all the same ecosystem. My mobile and Steam accounts were both in T.R.O.U.T. for a short while, but the mobile left to make room for an FOFCer and started a new alliance, S.Q.U.I.D.

Alliances are good for extra stuff. We do well, we get more stuff. I'm thinking unless we have a full 20 active, we won't ever get real good rewards via the alliance. Sill good to have ANY alliance to get bonuses on the daily SHIELD drops.

Not just active, but highly active. S.Q.U.I.D. has 20 daily players, but we don't get much from alliance rewards because we're all lower-level players and nobody grinds for top placement (except maybe one or two guys) in those events.

Since scaling supposedly relies on top 3 heroes, I'm wondering if I should level up those three or go for more depth. I hate burning through all my life packs so I've been rotating some of my other heroes to give injured ones a break. I've got kind of a Magneto/Storm/Hawkeye/Ares rotation going. Thor occasionally, but he's sometimes a little slow to get going.

Depth is a good thing, because if you level your top 3 and the others don't keep up, you'll actually burn through MORE health packs - the rest of the roster won't be able to handle the scaling that your top 3 generate. But that's, admittedly, more of a 3*+ thing than a 2* thing.

I see now how one stars were only good to get over the initial hump. These days, I only use them for deadpool and if I want to just save my big boys from damage against easier opponents. They're just not versatile enough to create synergistic combos at higher levels even if they're powered up.

Yeah, part of the problem is that a few of them have only two powers. And part of the problem is that, well, they're meant to get you through the prologue. That's it. The only really useful powered-up 1* is Spidey. His powerset really is what the 3* Spidey should have been.

[thesloppy]

I haven't been on for a while, so I'll drop out so someone can take my spot.

[Shoveler]

i joined squid as androl.. sounds like the right alliance

[Toddzilla]

grrr

[SackAttack]

Originally Posted by thesloppy

I haven't been on for a while, so I'll drop out so someone can take my spot.

Originally Posted by Toddzilla

grrr

Why grr? I thought this is what you were waiting for, Todd!

Originally Posted by Shoveler

i joined squid as androl.. sounds like the right alliance

Low pressure doesn't mean no pressure. Stay active, and communicate if you're going to be absent. I don't need to know the specifics, but I do need to hear something like "Hey, I'm going to be out of the pocket for a week" so I know what kind of timetable we're working with. If I get notifications that a player just hasn't been around in 2 weeks, I go pruning.

[Shoveler]

So right now I am trying to rank up as high as possible in the daily stuff, usually can get between 10th and 40th, just dont have some of the required covers to do all of the missions that are available, and while the first few are easy, they seem to get progressively hard enough that they put my decent covers out of commission for an extended amount of time.

Definitely can tell this is cash shop game, I have more covers than I have room for characters. I'm sitting on 9 right now and it's possible I'll get enough in game currency to unlock 3 more slots, but quite a few of those are going to get recycled when they near their expiration date.

Not sure at this point if I'm holding on to lame covers or not so I figured I would list off what I have at this point and see if anyone has ideas or suggestions.

Vision 3* 1/1/1 Level 45 - So far I like how he is setup, and being the amped up cover for the current daily missions doesn't hurt.
Iron Man 1* 5/3/5 Level 40
Loki 3* 0/0/1 Level 40
Steve Rogers 3* 1/0/0 Level 40
Storm 3* (Mohawk) 0/0/1 Level 40
The Hood 3* 1/0/0 Level 40
Juggernaut 1* 3/5 Level 30
Captain Marvel 2* 4/1/2 Level 25
Venom 1* 4/2 Level 20
Thor 2* (Marvel Now!) 1/1/1 Level 18
Spider-Man 1* (Original) 2/2/3 Level 16
Black Widow 1* (Modern) 4/5 Level 15
Storm 1* (Modern) Level 1 - I believe I read on this forum that this one is sort of blah and could probably be recycled to free up a slot. She ended up just getting dumped in there when I had slots open and drew her cover.

Currently in Queue

Human Torch 2* Level 15
Storm 2* (Classic) Level 15 x2
Yelena Belova 1* x3
Bullseye 2* x2
Magneto 2* (Marvel Now!)

I'm trying to level up the 1* and 2* covers at a somewhat equal pace. My current thinking is that spiderman and venom would be a decent combo and I'm curious if there is a 3rd 1/2* cover that also adds web tiles to the board that does not cover the same colors of course.

Also, I keep drawing more iron-man covers, the model 35 version. I have his power maxed out, is there any reason to recruit him again and set him up differently? I'm guessing the answer is no.

[SackAttack]

Originally Posted by Shoveler

So right now I am trying to rank up as high as possible in the daily stuff, usually can get between 10th and 40th, just dont have some of the required covers to do all of the missions that are available, and while the first few are easy, they seem to get progressively hard enough that they put my decent covers out of commission for an extended amount of time.

Definitely can tell this is cash shop game, I have more covers than I have room for characters. I'm sitting on 9 right now and it's possible I'll get enough in game currency to unlock 3 more slots, but quite a few of those are going to get recycled when they near their expiration date.

Not sure at this point if I'm holding on to lame covers or not so I figured I would list off what I have at this point and see if anyone has ideas or suggestions.

Vision 3* 1/1/1 Level 45 - So far I like how he is setup, and being the amped up cover for the current daily missions doesn't hurt.
Iron Man 1* 5/3/5 Level 40
Loki 3* 0/0/1 Level 40
Steve Rogers 3* 1/0/0 Level 40
Storm 3* (Mohawk) 0/0/1 Level 40
The Hood 3* 1/0/0 Level 40
Juggernaut 1* 3/5 Level 30
Captain Marvel 2* 4/1/2 Level 25
Venom 1* 4/2 Level 20
Thor 2* (Marvel Now!) 1/1/1 Level 18
Spider-Man 1* (Original) 2/2/3 Level 16
Black Widow 1* (Modern) 4/5 Level 15
Storm 1* (Modern) Level 1 - I believe I read on this forum that this one is sort of blah and could probably be recycled to free up a slot. She ended up just getting dumped in there when I had slots open and drew her cover.

Currently in Queue

Human Torch 2* Level 15
Storm 2* (Classic) Level 15 x2
Yelena Belova 1* x3
Bullseye 2* x2
Magneto 2* (Marvel Now!)

I'm trying to level up the 1* and 2* covers at a somewhat equal pace. My current thinking is that spiderman and venom would be a decent combo and I'm curious if there is a 3rd 1/2* cover that also adds web tiles to the board that does not cover the same colors of course.

Also, I keep drawing more iron-man covers, the model 35 version. I have his power maxed out, is there any reason to recruit him again and set him up differently? I'm guessing the answer is no.

1) you have more 1* than you realistically need. I would probably drop Storm (1). Maybe Black Widow (1). In fact, if you have Storm (3), definitely drop (1). The (3) variant has basically the same powerset with minor changes.

I would encourage rostering Magneto (2) and Storm (2), because those two can help accelerate a 3* transition in DDQ, but they're certainly not the only duo capable of doing that.

Don't bother with Yelena Belova. Bullseye (2) is cool, but his black skill is way too expensive. I rostered the 3* Bullseye but I've never gone back to re-add the 2*.

Iron Man (1) is not going to get enough use longer-term to justify a dupe. 5/3/5 is good enough.

Venom's use of web tiles got nerfed a bit a while ago. He still does solid damage if you can pull off Devour, but it's not the instakill it used to be.

[Katon]

SackAttack about covers it, really, but I'll walk through my take tier by tier.

Long-term, you want enough 1*s to reliably do that DDQ node, which a maxed Juggernaut or Iron Man can do (though Iron Man might sometimes be an opponent on that node? I use Juggs, so I don't remember), and any further 1*s are just helpful until you have a good 2* stable because of the massively lower level cap. I'd keep Iron Man and Juggernaut because they're decent characters and you've leveled them, and maybe Black Widow because her stuff's level-independent and you don't have another good purple, but you're really at the point of diminishing returns on putting in more ISO at this tier. Yelena's terrible, don't roster her, and Storm is redundant with her 3* version.

For 2*s, Magneto and Storm are a very nice DDQ combo, since his purple feeds her blue and his red and her green both pick up stray purple/blue, but it sounds like with forthcoming additions and maybe a Storm cut you can pick up all the 2*s currently in your queue. If you have to prioritize, I'd rank Stormneto first and then Bullseye higher than Torch both because you have more colors and because Bullseye's purple passive is less redundant with your other 2*s than Torch's actives.

3*: You're still at the stage of taking what you can get, not much to say here.

[Shoveler]

thanks guys.. will make a few roster adjustments.

[SackAttack]

Originally Posted by Katon

SackAttack about covers it, really, but I'll walk through my take tier by tier.

Long-term, you want enough 1*s to reliably do that DDQ node, which a maxed Juggernaut or Iron Man can do (though Iron Man might sometimes be an opponent on that node?

With the changes to DDQ, it may be possible for any of the 1* to be opponents on that node. Previously, the ones that'd get locked out were ones with 2* variants, so characters like Juggernaut, Venom, and Iron Man were great because they'd never get locked out. With it being more random, those guys might show up now? Haven't seen them yet.


[/quote]For 2*s, Magneto and Storm are a very nice DDQ combo, since his purple feeds her blue and his red and her green both pick up stray purple/blue, but it sounds like with forthcoming additions and maybe a Storm cut you can pick up all the 2*s currently in your queue. If you have to prioritize, I'd rank Stormneto first and then Bullseye higher than Torch both because you have more colors and because Bullseye's purple passive is less redundant with your other 2*s than Torch's actives.[/quote]

Torch is a nice damage dealer for a 2*, but red/green is a really common combo for damage dealers, yeah. Thor and Ares both use that, off the top of my head.

[Shoveler]

Another question. If I share the bonuses via facebook, does that spam the fact that I am playing this game on my page, or the pages of others that I share with?

[Toddzilla]

I just applied to join T.R.O.U.T. as "Olaf3000"

[Shoveler]

Another question -- For new players with low roster capacity, does it make sense to recycle the 3 and 4* covers that we get from the daily story missions when we only have 1 power in that cover?

After today's rewards I have 2 of the three covers that are powered up for the next story mission, but I have no roster space for them. My 1 & 2* characters are slowly getting advanced for the DDQ, but I am not there yet, and I'm also not to the point where I can pull any 3* covers or above from the DDQ (outside of the single taco token deal I get each day which I suppose has a low probability of pulling above a 2*).

I hate to do it, but I'm considering dumping deadpool and The Thing both 4* with one power each to make room for characters I will actually use at this point. I don't see how hanging on to either of those helps me in the short term.

Does this make sense? The alternative is to donate a kidney to afford roster slots every week which I really do not want to do.

[Umbrella]

Just my opinion, but I would definitely get rid of any 4* you have at this stage. You can use the iso to level up your others. Honestly, you could get by DDQ first stage with a fully powered Juggs or Iron Man, so if you are hurting for roster spots, you could start getting rid of 1*.

The 3* is a little trickier. Once you get to the point where you can beat the BE consistently, that is your quickest way to level up 3*. However, with the new champion mechanic, your 2* characters can get pretty strong, and feed your 3* as well. Ultimately, you will want a strong roster of 2* to build your 3*, then a strong 3* to build 4*, etc.

If you keep plugging away, you will get hero points without paying. You can get them through daily, DDQ occasionally, and if you can finish high in PvE, they often come as a reward.

[Shoveler]

Trying to pull together a second set of effective 2*'s for the story missions so that I'm not burning through my heals so quickly. Right now my main trio is Storm, Hawkeye, Magneto.. Wolverine and Daken work very well together, and I've been trying out various other covers for a third there... Any suggestion that pairs well with those two? Hoping for a 2* solution obviously, my 3* options are limited.

[Katon]

2* characters I can think off offhand:

- Human Torch's black would synergize well with the pair of them - it dumps a lot of strong attack tiles (which benefits from the strike tiles they pile up) at the expense of blue/yellow/purple AP (two colors out of three, that team doesn't use). His green also benefits from the strike tiles, though the red is hurt a bit because you want red strikes to stick around. Still, Wolverine's red is his best active, so that isn't a big deal. Torch is always a bit fragile, so if you can get the other two to tank for him he'll be happy.

- Thor's yellow works very well with Daken, and as an AOE his green draws extra benefits from strike tiles. He's also got enough health that, if he's the only member of the team without true healing, they can go for a good while.

I can't think of any 2*s offhand who have two genuinely good abilities in colors that Wolverine/Daken don't use, so one new active color + a decent green for when you don't feel like using Wolverine's version is the general standard I'm aiming at.

[SackAttack]

Originally Posted by Shoveler

Another question. If I share the bonuses via facebook, does that spam the fact that I am playing this game on my page, or the pages of others that I share with?

Good question. Most of my play is on Steam and I haven't gotten a 'share the bonus' prompt on mobile in forever, anyway.

Originally Posted by Toddzilla

I just applied to join T.R.O.U.T. as "Olaf3000"

I don't see your application pending. Either it bounced because we're full, or you joined another alliance.

Originally Posted by Shoveler

Another question -- For new players with low roster capacity, does it make sense to recycle the 3 and 4* covers that we get from the daily story missions when we only have 1 power in that cover?

3* I would recycle if you aren't ready for them; the nature of DDQ means that you'll eventually be able to build a 3* roster almost entirely from that alone, if you're patient enough.

4* is trickier, but the advice I would give there is to keep any 4* covers for characters who have covers in the daily drop. There aren't THAT many of those right now; Wolverine (4), Nick Fury, Invisible Woman, She-Thor, Elektra and Star-Lord are the ones I'm aware of. I recycled a She-Thor cover before I hit her daily drop, and I regret having done that. I could use the extra power level. Now, that advice applies if you intend to roster any of those six long-term. You're going to get three covers of each of those 4* from the daily drop, so any Nick Fury cover you get incidental to that, for example, puts you ahead of the game.

4* who aren't those characters, if you're still in early days, can probably safely be recycled if you're committed to the free-to-play path.

After today's rewards I have 2 of the three covers that are powered up for the next story mission, but I have no roster space for them. My 1 & 2* characters are slowly getting advanced for the DDQ, but I am not there yet, and I'm also not to the point where I can pull any 3* covers or above from the DDQ (outside of the single taco token deal I get each day which I suppose has a low probability of pulling above a 2*).

I hate to do it, but I'm considering dumping deadpool and The Thing both 4* with one power each to make room for characters I will actually use at this point. I don't see how hanging on to either of those helps me in the short term.

Does this make sense? The alternative is to donate a kidney to afford roster slots every week which I really do not want to do.

Yeah, in the short term I would probably do that. Neither of those two are in the daily drop in the first two years' worth of daily rewards, so by the time they'd even show up there's a non-zero chance you might have re-rostered and covered them anyway.

Taco odds have changed; you used to have a percentage chance to pull any cover of the featured five 3* per cycle, if memory serves. These days, You have a 24/300 shot at pulling a 3*, which is 8%, I think, but it's specific covers. Each of the five featured have five covers each (but RNG means it could be 5 yellow for Captain Marvel and what you need/want are red/black, say) and then there are nine additional covers which are random 3* powers. But yeah, your focus should be on adding 3* as you get them so that you can get two tacos/day. That'll double your chances of pulling Hero Points from those tacos (however low your chances might be to start with), and those pulls will help you start to be able to afford the roster slots for 4* characters.

Originally Posted by Umbrella

Just my opinion, but I would definitely get rid of any 4* you have at this stage. You can use the iso to level up your others. Honestly, you could get by DDQ first stage with a fully powered Juggs or Iron Man, so if you are hurting for roster spots, you could start getting rid of 1*.

Yeah, if you're to the point where you're adding 3*, and you're not willing to spend for roster slots, the place to trim the fat is your 1* roster. I spent the longest time with just Iron Man representing that tier, but sprung for a roster slot for the 1* Spidey, who's actually pretty damned useful.

The 3* is a little trickier. Once you get to the point where you can beat the BE consistently, that is your quickest way to level up 3*. However, with the new champion mechanic, your 2* characters can get pretty strong, and feed your 3* as well. Ultimately, you will want a strong roster of 2* to build your 3*, then a strong 3* to build 4*, etc.

If you keep plugging away, you will get hero points without paying. You can get them through daily, DDQ occasionally, and if you can finish high in PvE, they often come as a reward.

The new champion mechanic makes nearly the entire taco vault useful on some level. You can feed your champion 2*, which pays off in command points, 3* covers, and hero points. You can get 3* covers. You can get 4* covers or legendary tokens. You can get hero points or ISO. You can get...health packs? Which could be useful depending on how/when you play. But, yeah, you're going to need a strong 2* trio to start clearing the BE consistently, and getting that cover will help you build your 3* roster. There still isn't a "great" transition to the 4* game at that point unless you're a dedicated PVPer (I'm not) or willing to devote yourself to the PVE grind (I've done it in the past, but I'm having trouble finding a shard that lets me do that with my current job).

Originally Posted by Shoveler

Trying to pull together a second set of effective 2*'s for the story missions so that I'm not burning through my heals so quickly. Right now my main trio is Storm, Hawkeye, Magneto.. Wolverine and Daken work very well together, and I've been trying out various other covers for a third there... Any suggestion that pairs well with those two? Hoping for a 2* solution obviously, my 3* options are limited.

Magneto/Storm is a great pair. Hawkeye/Thor is another.

[dunkem]

If I'm willing to roll the dice on a 4 out of 6 color lineup, I sometimes like the Hawkeye/Magneto/Storm lineup. Once you hit the purples, it's pretty much over by making a five match of blues triggering not only Storm's Wind Storm, but Hawkeye's Speed shots. Downside is a board with too many yellow/blacks that'll kill you.

Magneto/Storm/Ares still lacks black but Ares is relatively quick (vs. someone strong, but slower like Thor). He usually buys me time and takes one of the enemy out if the pink/blues aren't showing up.

Yeah, I was wondering about the Taco vaults as well as other rewards recently. I've been getting nothing but 2*... and since I had to make some choices by selling my Daken/Wolverines, I'm hate getting them for tacos. Some people love the Daken combo, but he takes too long for me since I want to kill off the opponent by losing as little damage as possible.

This game is time consuming... I feel like I'm on a neverending chase for Hero points so I don't lose cards I picked up especially with PVE requiring particular characters to complete the node. PVE is an all day task to cover all the nodes to get in the top 100.. and PVP is tough with matchmaking the way it is and last minute bombardments in the final hour or so.

[Umbrella]

My go to 2* lineup is Thor/Magneto/Black Widow. Black Widow's blue power is amazing, and Magneto's purple fills her blue. Thor rounds out for color. The only downside is no black coverage. But the blue keeps everyone alive, and keeps those big hitting timers from going off.

[Umbrella]

After months, I have finally managed to get my first 3* champion. I don't know how you folks that have several of them do it. It took me forever just to get one.

[ntndeacon]

I've started to play this recently. I am still working on the prologue.

[SackAttack]

Originally Posted by Umbrella

After months, I have finally managed to get my first 3* champion. I don't know how you folks that have several of them do it. It took me forever just to get one.

I spent a lot of time leveling my heroes evenly up to about 130 or so. At that point, it takes around 2 weeks to 166 if *all* I do is DDQ. Less than that if I can hit lightning rounds and PVE. So with my big bads all at 130, I've been spending two weeks at a time raising them to champion. I also had a stash of ISO I'd been sitting on when champions first became a thing, so I don't know if the timeline matches up exactly.

[dunkem]

I haven't been able to champion 3* because of the cards not really the ISO. It's like collecting regular Magic or sports cards I guess.. You work hard and pick up some new "good" packs and all you get are duplicates or scrubs. I got a whole pile of ISO to level them up, but the cards are capping me.

Someday... I'll be like Umbrella and reach the promised land of 3* championville. I play everything every week but I just draw crappy from the pool I guess.

Great to have another MPQ player ntndeacon. Those goons Prologue seems challenging at first, but as you build, it'll get easier. They should call this game MPG... Marvle Puzzle Grind..

[SackAttack]

Originally Posted by dunkem

I haven't been able to champion 3* because of the cards not really the ISO. It's like collecting regular Magic or sports cards I guess.. You work hard and pick up some new "good" packs and all you get are duplicates or scrubs. I got a whole pile of ISO to level them up, but the cards are capping me.

Keep at it in DDQ. You've got about half the 3* rostered, and having champion 2* Magneto, 2* Storm and 2* Captain Marvel gives you a team that can take down the Big Enchilada as long as RNG doesn't totally screw you on who you face (if a BE on a given day has board movers for all four waves, that shit gets tough).

Tacos will occasionally yield 3* covers, and the Big Enchilada is a cover for each one you complete. Looks to me like you're solidly in the 2*->3* transition right now; once you're at the point where you have most or all of the 3* rostered, you will see your progress towards 3* champions begin to accelerate.

[SackAttack]

Originally Posted by Umbrella

After months, I have finally managed to get my first 3* champion. I don't know how you folks that have several of them do it. It took me forever just to get one.

Let me know how champion Hulk works out for you. I've been resisting championing my Hulk (he's chilling around either 125 or 130) because the higher level he gets, the more damage he has to soak for Anger to go off. I'd be curious to know if taking him to champion level affects that for you at all.

[Umbrella]

Originally Posted by SackAttack

Let me know how champion Hulk works out for you. I've been resisting championing my Hulk (he's chilling around either 125 or 130) because the higher level he gets, the more damage he has to soak for Anger to go off. I'd be curious to know if taking him to champion level affects that for you at all.

Hmm, I didn't think about that. I use him for BE every day, and so far, Anger is still going off, especially today with the f'in ninjas followed by ultrons followed by symbiotes. Brutal.

If it turns out to be a problem with firing, I'll just reduce it to 3, and increase Smash.

[Umbrella]

Originally Posted by dunkem

I haven't been able to champion 3* because of the cards not really the ISO. It's like collecting regular Magic or sports cards I guess.. You work hard and pick up some new "good" packs and all you get are duplicates or scrubs. I got a whole pile of ISO to level them up, but the cards are capping me.

Someday... I'll be like Umbrella and reach the promised land of 3* championville. I play everything every week but I just draw crappy from the pool I guess.

Great to have another MPQ player ntndeacon. Those goons Prologue seems challenging at first, but as you build, it'll get easier. They should call this game MPG... Marvle Puzzle Grind..

I was in the same boat as you not too long ago. I was swimming in ISO, with nowhere to use it. However, once you get those late covers on 3* (getting you above 10 or so), you'll spend a LOT of ISO to level up. Right now, I need probably about 75K of ISO to get everyone to their levels.

[SackAttack]

Originally Posted by Umbrella

I was in the same boat as you not too long ago. I was swimming in ISO, with nowhere to use it. However, once you get those late covers on 3* (getting you above 10 or so), you'll spend a LOT of ISO to level up. Right now, I need probably about 75K of ISO to get everyone to their levels.

Level 120 or so is where costs take off yeah. So, yeah, that 9th or 10th cover.

[ntndeacon]

I got my first 3*person... blade.

[AnalBumCover]

Big Enchilada is especially difficult this morning.

[SirFozzie]

I have 165K ISO :P

[AnalBumCover]

Wow. It took numerous tries and switching of teams around, but I finally beat today's BE with 3*s Thor, Hulk and Dr Doom.

Thor went down at the beginning of the 4th wave, but he was able to throw in a "Call the Storm" right before falling to shake up the opponent. I stuck it out to the end with Hulk and Doom down to about 1000 remaining each.

This is one match where I really had to pause and think about my next move.

[Umbrella]

Originally Posted by ntndeacon

I got my first 3*person... blade.

I love Blade. Once you get some additional covers for him, and the right board, he can make quick work of the enemy.

[Umbrella]

Originally Posted by AnalBumCover

Big Enchilada is especially difficult this morning.

It was pretty tough, but OBW/Magneto really shine. Use OBW's Espionage to steal purples, which in turn sets up Magneto's Polarity Shift to gain blue and feed OBW's Anti-Gravity to heal and extend the timers. She's leveled up to the point of healing >1000 health with no timers, so it's pretty tough to knock me out of a fight, unless the board just sucks.

[dunkem]

Yeah, OBW is essential in all BE's for me. I usually use her with Storm and Thor. As long as the blues are there, OBW just buys me time to rack up the greens. Once at like 25 greens or so, set off storm, generates other colors, use some of thor's yellows to replenish greens and keep storing up the colors until the last round where I unleash her windstorm or Thor's other colors. I sometimes like the goon rounds in the beginning because it lets me build colors. Symbiotes suck because of their damn strike/attack tiles... tempts me to blow the greens from storm, but healing is the better option for me or I'm going to cut it close in the end round.

Another key for me is that purple from OBW ... can't let the other side sit on any big colors or they unleash in the last round. With OBW and storm's low health, it doesn't take much if you're in the front at the wrong time.

Finally nailed my last Quicksilver! I can champion him now, but not sure if I want to have him so high and mess with scaling. Then again, I had that hesitancy at the 2* champion level and just said screw it.

Bloody Hulk... love and hate him.. I always forget to count the greens on the board with Smash..

[SackAttack]

Originally Posted by dunkem

Yeah, OBW is essential in all BE's for me. I usually use her with Storm and Thor. As long as the blues are there, OBW just buys me time to rack up the greens. Once at like 25 greens or so, set off storm, generates other colors, use some of thor's yellows to replenish greens and keep storing up the colors until the last round where I unleash her windstorm or Thor's other colors. I sometimes like the goon rounds in the beginning because it lets me build colors. Symbiotes suck because of their damn strike/attack tiles... tempts me to blow the greens from storm, but healing is the better option for me or I'm going to cut it close in the end round.

Another key for me is that purple from OBW ... can't let the other side sit on any big colors or they unleash in the last round. With OBW and storm's low health, it doesn't take much if you're in the front at the wrong time.

Finally nailed my last Quicksilver! I can champion him now, but not sure if I want to have him so high and mess with scaling. Then again, I had that hesitancy at the 2* champion level and just said screw it.

Bloody Hulk... love and hate him.. I always forget to count the greens on the board with Smash..

At the 3* level, a new champion won't mess with you TOO badly. that's a 166 + (say) 94 + 94, if you've been soft-capping. That would be an average opponent level of 118 for the intermediate nodes. Not a backbreaker.

It's when you hit a 4* champion or a 5* basic character with an otherwise underdeveloped roster that you really feel the pain.

[Toddzilla]

I still have major difficulty beating the BE on the regs. I'm using 2* Storm and 2* Hawkeye and #3 has been rotating (Black Spiderman (not Miles), 3*Hulk, 3* Daredevil both over 140). I know i need a 3rd that works well with the other 2* champions, but I don't know who to use.

[AnalBumCover]

My regular team for BE has been 2*Magneto, 2*Captain Marvel, and 2*Storm (in order from left to right).

But the last two BE's have been too tough for this team that I've needed to switch around a bit.

I'm having loads of fun with 2*Mags, 3*Quicksilver, 2*OBW, with a focus on matching blues and purples. Mags' purple creates blue matches which feed OBW's Anti-Gravity Device (heal + timer extender). A secondary effect to this is QS's Supersonic which creates locks when matching blues and detonates when there are more than 4 locks.

The only problem is if you don't get a lot of purples and blues early on, QS is pretty much idle.

[SackAttack]

Originally Posted by Toddzilla

I still have major difficulty beating the BE on the regs. I'm using 2* Storm and 2* Hawkeye and #3 has been rotating (Black Spiderman (not Miles), 3*Hulk, 3* Daredevil both over 140). I know i need a 3rd that works well with the other 2* champions, but I don't know who to use.

I like Hawkeye, but the problem with him is that he's squishy so you neeeeeeeeed to be able to drop crit tiles to proc his speed shot. He was part of my BE team for a while until daedalus pointed me to the 2* team of Magneto, Captain Marvel and Storm that AnalBumCover mentions below. I know there are other 2* teams that do well, but that one was the most reliable for me while my 3* roster was growing.

Originally Posted by AnalBumCover

My regular team for BE has been 2*Magneto, 2*Captain Marvel, and 2*Storm (in order from left to right).

But the last two BE's have been too tough for this team that I've needed to switch around a bit.

You know? the Stormneto combo is actually pretty versatile. What you need to make it work when you run into the ouchy BE (Iron Fist + sentries yesterday for example) is a black/yellow user who can absorb more punishment than 2* Captain Marvel can. Colossus works there, as does Cyclops. 2* Magneto, 3* Cyclops, 2* Storm has actually become my go-to BE team these days. Although I had some success over the weekend with 2* Magneto, 3* Captain America, 2* Storm as well. No black coverage there, but Cap is a damage sponge, and Magneto's Polarity Shift feeds Cap's red and Storm's blue. The lack of black coverage didn't hurt me.

[dunkem]

The last BE with the sentry gunner guys that spam the field with special tiles are the only problems I run into with my Black Widow team. I made it though, but I had to weather the first round barrage and let Widow recoup my HPs for future rounds. I've tried non-black widow teams but I find that the gradual health point reduction and opponent color building just sets me up for a big wipe out in the last round where there are usually 3 non-goon/symbiote stand still guys who will set their powers off.

My 2* Magneto/2* storm and a non-black widow might survive if pinks or blues are there, but without it either, I take too much damage to last at the end. In pursuing the blues, storm usually takes the front too... and it just takes one power to knock her out.

I like Cap.. I dunno about you guys, but I just find it a chore to 1) get him enough AP's to use his shield and 2) keep using his shield every two or three rounds. Guess I'm more of a "five block" kind of player... which makes Quicksilver the perfect guy for me along with Hawkeye. Quicksilver's ability to switch out any tile is like having a critical tile for cheap.

I championed Quicksilver. He's a bitch now since his green is crazy cheap when you have locked tiles and blacks cause damage as well as creates five match situations for me. Just gotta see if he screws me in future PVE's now. Already, some PVE's nodes are at like level 220.

Speaking of PVE, what is the optimal strategy for maximizing points? I HATE the full point countdown.... In a 24 hour period, and 8 hour countdown, is it... finish one, wait, finish one, wait, and the nail the other five at once? Spread em out evenly and eat less than full points? Knock em all out whenever you can?

[SackAttack]

Originally Posted by dunkem

The last BE with the sentry gunner guys that spam the field with special tiles are the only problems I run into with my Black Widow team.

ALL of the sentries spam the field with special tiles. The Gunners, if you let too many build up, will turn some of them into critical tiles. Fighters will eat chunks of the board if you don't let enough special tiles accumulate, and flyers will eat those special tiles to heal the entire team. But all sentries have a chance to create special tiles when there's any board shake.

I made it though, but I had to weather the first round barrage and let Widow recoup my HPs for future rounds. I've tried non-black widow teams but I find that the gradual health point reduction and opponent color building just sets me up for a big wipe out in the last round where there are usually 3 non-goon/symbiote stand still guys who will set their powers off.

This is where you need either big damage or a stunner or both. My typical strategy is to try to accumulate enough blue AP to get to that wave and have Storm stun two of the three. If I'm lucky, the third is weak enough that two of her Wind Storms (she's nearing max champion level) will wipe out the third and then I can mop up. Big damage helps, too, if the board has been starved of blue. Maybe Storm doesn't have enough blue AP to stun everybody, but Cyclops comes in and starts wrecking stuff. It's not as predictable as it used to be, where it was goons/board movers/goons/board movers and the play was to pile up AP in waves 1 and 3 to unleash hell in waves 2 and 4, but the general framework is still effective. You just sometimes take damage from board movers in waves 1/3 now, and sometimes you'll have BE where waves 1-3 are goons and the only board movers are in wave 4.

My 2* Magneto/2* storm and a non-black widow might survive if pinks or blues are there, but without it either, I take too much damage to last at the end. In pursuing the blues, storm usually takes the front too... and it just takes one power to knock her out.

That's why you bring beef for your third. At the 2* level, Captain Marvel can give you rainbow coverage (her black/yellow powers) and be a damage sponge to keep Magneto and Storm from eating it. Once you start building a strong 3* roster, your options open up some.

There are other 2* options for beef with the Stormneto team, but you'll sacrifice full rainbow coverage.

I like Cap.. I dunno about you guys, but I just find it a chore to 1) get him enough AP's to use his shield and 2) keep using his shield every two or three rounds.

The thing is, once you accelerate Cap's red shield, he fucks shit up. Like, you may find it a chore to keep throwing it back out there, but it's a one-shot kill for just about any enemy you'll face in the BE before wave 4. My 3* Cap, with 11 champion levels, does 4135 damage with his red shield. There aren't a lot of goons who can take one of those to the face and live to talk about it, and it's a significant bite out of the ass of just about any non-goon prior to wave 4. At wave 4, you might see boosted Juggernaut at 11k health, in which case you have work to do, but prior to that, if you've got the red and blue shields going, the board movers aren't going to be able to touch you.

I championed Quicksilver. He's a bitch now since his green is crazy cheap when you have locked tiles and blacks cause damage as well as creates five match situations for me. Just gotta see if he screws me in future PVE's now. Already, some PVE's nodes are at like level 220.

Well, just to put it in perspective: the hardest repeatable node for me in my current sub of the ISO-8 brotherhood is level 242, and that's with 12 champion 3* and a pair of 1-cover 5*.

That's why I'm saying there isn't a ton of difference between a roster with 3* champions and one without if you've been keeping your roster reasonably well-leveled. If you had a 166 and a bunch of level 40 cats, you'd be screwed. A 166 with Hulk at 140, and then another dozen characters between 111 and 138? You're going to be reliant on weekly boosts for a little while (hoping that your best characters are boosted so you have a greater spread of people to use with Quicksilver), and you're going to want to bootstrap those characters up to the 130-140 range as soon as is practicable, but you're a long way from "screwed." And as you bootstrap those guys you're going to notice that you'll get more effective in PVE but that the difficulty you face going forward just won't change much from where it's at now.

Speaking of PVE, what is the optimal strategy for maximizing points? I HATE the full point countdown.... In a 24 hour period, and 8 hour countdown, is it... finish one, wait, finish one, wait, and the nail the other five at once? Spread em out evenly and eat less than full points? Knock em all out whenever you can?

Here's the thing. They're testing some shit with PVE so you might have noticed that the "optimal strategy" has been bouncing around. In an event like the current one, with the refreshes, maximizing points boils down to:

Step 1) clear the sub as fast as you can. Wait 8 hours.
Step 2) Clear the refresh as fast as you can. Wait 8 hours.
Step 3) Clear the refresh as fast as you can. Wait ___ hours.
Step 4) Start grinding down the nodes before the sub ends.

If it's a 48-hour sub, you wait until the end of the second day to do your grind-down and otherwise stick to 8-hour clears.

The reason you do it that way: Every clear adds 8 hours to a node's refresh. If it's worth 550 points and you clear it, it will be 8 hours before it's again worth 550 points. If you immediately double-tap, it will be 16 hours before it's worth 550 points again. If you triple-tap, it won't be worth 550 points again in the current sub. If you follow the 8 hour clears, you'll get 550+550+550+whatever you grind it for at the end of the sub. You'll get more from the three full-point clears than you get from the triple-tap, and then you have the grind-down on top of that.

The tests they've been running recently have done away with the countdown for the first handful of clears. So you could sit down at the start of the sub and clear everything a few times at full value, after which point the countdown timer starts and the node is no longer worth full points. They've been toying with variations on that theme. I don't know what "optimal" is going to look like with those yet because we still don't know what the final form of the new PVE is going to be.

[dunkem]

Thanks for the advice Sack. For PVE, just wasn't sure how the math worked out if you'd be better off doing the max, max, grind thing or if you're the same if you did a 4 hour, minor hit,, let it build back a little, 3 hour minor hit, let it build back sort of thing.

I hope they stick to the experiment of no countdown for the first 5 rounds or so... I freaking hate pushing it in the last 8 or whatever's left for the remaining 5 out of 7 rounds in each node. Not like I ever finished one anyways due to the increased difficulty on each repeat

I kind of level up everyone as I can so I'm fairly well rounded save for Quicksilver now. i've seen some of those unbalanced lineups in PVP.... 1 five star Phoenix and whatever else.. which brings me to another question.. How are those points calculated in PVP? It pisses me off when you get to a certain point level, you're up against what appears to be a pretty tough team and they're only giving you 15 points for it. I'll skip em, but it just seems random sometimes. Then on defense, I almost always lose against some teams (probably due to the crappy AI) and chalk up -20 sometimes and - 5 on others.

For 3* Cap, yeah, maybe I'll utilize him more when I'm more fully covered/leveled. When 2* is colored up, as much as I hate placing the shield, it helps a lot if the covers allow you to knock out a special tile.

[SackAttack]

Originally Posted by dunkem

Thanks for the advice Sack. For PVE, just wasn't sure how the math worked out if you'd be better off doing the max, max, grind thing or if you're the same if you did a 4 hour, minor hit,, let it build back a little, 3 hour minor hit, let it build back sort of thing.

Under the 'old' system, which is currently running in ISO-8, you're best off with one clear every 8 hours until the grind-down at the end of the sub. Under the 'new' system it depends on what they ultimately settle on for how many points a ground-down node is worth. Old system, it was only worth 1 once exhausted, so grinding that didn't get you anywhere. The last test they did, the smallest value was 20, so there were people who kept on grinding.

But what it sounds like the new system will be is "you have X clears at full points. Play 'em whenever you want to. After that, you're on a 24h countdown clock and point values reduce." My guess is that how it's going to shake out is that optimum point values there will be clear the sub 4x or whatever the max number of full-point clears is, and then wait until your usual grind-down time to do the grind so that they're as close to max-value as they can be. But that'll be more than I care to do since I don't usually care about placement.

I hope they stick to the experiment of no countdown for the first 5 rounds or so... I freaking hate pushing it in the last 8 or whatever's left for the remaining 5 out of 7 rounds in each node. Not like I ever finished one anyways due to the increased difficulty on each repeat

It sounds like that's where it's headed. The question is the grind because that's what separates people for placement. I'd rather see it go to a straight progression system but it doesn't sound like they want to do that. So the question is how they're going to separate the progression chasers from the placement chasers, and that's what these tests are looking to accomplish. The no-countdown bit will probably be a part of whatever final form PVE takes.

I kind of level up everyone as I can so I'm fairly well rounded save for Quicksilver now. i've seen some of those unbalanced lineups in PVP.... 1 five star Phoenix and whatever else.. which brings me to another question.. How are those points calculated in PVP? It pisses me off when you get to a certain point level, you're up against what appears to be a pretty tough team and they're only giving you 15 points for it. I'll skip em, but it just seems random sometimes. Then on defense, I almost always lose against some teams (probably due to the crappy AI) and chalk up -20 sometimes and - 5 on others.

PVP and PVE are different beasts! Scaling in PVE has a base number of levels for everybody, and then adjusts to each individual player based on roster strength and past performance (though I think that latter means less now than it used to). The people who throw out unbalanced lineups in PVP are probably people who're thinking "sweet, this 1-cover Jean Grey is going to carry me to great finishes because it's level 255!" The folks who have well-covered 5* probably aren't pairing it with 2* partners.

Points in PVP are based on ranking. The opponents' roster strength has nothing to do with it. It's a formula based on how many points you have and how many points they have. The breakeven is 38 points. If a match is worth 38, they have exactly as many points as you do. If the match is worth fewer than 38, they're behind you on the leaderboard. You can hit them if they're only worth 20, but if you defeat somebody, you show up as a revenge opportunity for them in the queue. If you're worth more points than they are, you'll hit them for +18 (say) but you might be worth 60 to them. So if they retaliate and win, you've actually lost points in the bargain. Might be worth it if you're chasing a progression award and you just need a few more points, but if you're after PVP placement, you're better off sticking to fights worth 38 or more points.

For 3* Cap, yeah, maybe I'll utilize him more when I'm more fully covered/leveled. When 2* is colored up, as much as I hate placing the shield, it helps a lot if the covers allow you to knock out a special tile.

Yep. Either Cap, at 3/5/5, is amazingly useful. 3* more so because he does more damage, yeah, but 5 covers in red/blue for either one lets them overwrite ANYTHING. Even, uh, critical tiles. Which, why would you want to? But you can. My favorite PVE team right now is my 5* Green Goblin in the middle, 3* Cap on the left, 3* Scarlet Witch on the right. The key, really, are the wings. I have the 5* Goblin in the middle because it's a yellow cover, and that cover can protect friendly countdowns passively and accelerate them actively.

But I've used the Scarlet Captain duo in 3* teams with Captain Marvel and Colossus to great effect, as well.