(4.3) Deployments Discussion

[rexturtle1120]

Hey Hey! Skullgirls mobile’s official twitter account has teased at what deployments will look like. It appears that deployments are groups of up to 3 fighters that you can send out for say, 15 minutes, to go on missions. After the mission is over the fighters will come back with rewards! That’s neat.

small above text says “CRIMSON TIDE- The Anti Skullgirls Lab is requesting a ‘discreet’ clean-up crew for (and I quote) ‘Blood. Blood everywhere’ Sounds like we’ll need some volunteers with strong stomachs...”

I’ll update this post as we get more updates and as time goes on. What do you think of deployments?

 

[BigChiChi]

It's nice, personally I would rather have more characters origins story.

 

[rexturtle1120]

This is all very interesting. Someone on Twitter compared deployments to a similar system in fallout shelter. However in fallout shelter you have to worry about the health of those characters. I’m wondering if that same system will be implemented or if it will just be a waiting period. I mean I get that this will get players to come back to the game after a couple hours but, what will keep this system from being an easily abused way to get rewards with no downsides. Your always gonna get the reward, there’s seemingly no chance of failure. Whatever the extra experience is still nice. Even if I’ll be missing 3 out of my 400 fighters

 

[tiffany butterfly]

this is good. more options for exp source.

 

[Lililira]

It's been stated that you can't use a fighter on offense while they're on a Deployment, but I wonder if it affects/interferes with Defense teams?

Also, it looks like specific rarities are required for the more rewarding deployments.

 

[Hall☆weenQueen]

I'm assuming this is the "idle gameplay" thing the devs hinted at in their roadmap for the years changes-- how exciting! I would be worried about not being able to use the fighters I send away though... would it matter how strong/ what tier they are? I feel like it would have to since a maxed gold surely wouldn't bring the same rewards as a diamond. I have zero experience with idle gaming so please bear with me. All in all, it looks like it'll be a great addition to the game and I can't wait for more details!

 

[Disasterrr19]

As far as I understood, the most profitable one takes 16 hours and requires you to use a Gold variant. So you can send your Xeno on a mission and then later face a Rift node that you can't clear without Xeno cheese. Obviously, it would not be a problem for long-time players with vast collections, but for such players the rewards are also not that huge. I mean, 75 K XP can be easily done in 5 minutes by clearing Peacock Master Boss.

I, however, wonder if you indeed can fail the deployment. Would there be a minimum FS threshold or something like this?

 

[Rudølf]

The idea in general is reaaaally beneficial to a lot of players in my opinion.. SGMobile is a game relying solely on lots and lots and lots and lots of grinding, which can wear out the not-so-very-gamer person over time. Deployments is pretty much an opposite feature of this.

It's nice to see we're straying away from it a bit. Grinding wouldn't be as deadpan as it would be before. c:

 

[Veeko]

I would say this is gonna be a nice little bit of added functionality. Sure, it won’t be a huge deal for older players and it doesn’t really come with any risks/drawbacks, but they could always change that once they’ve tested the waters with it? I’m not gonna complain about free resources either way tbh.

 

[Diony]

So, the dupes has some value now

 

[rexturtle1120]

So it looks like you always get experience but might not always get a reward. I like this system now that I know it won’t be abused. I’m also glad to see that Molly seems to be in charge of deployments. I really like her and I’m glad she gets more dialogue.

 

[Robokit]

I'm a bit disappointed that Deployments is a stand-alone feature with its own missions and a daily quota, because I'd rather it be a function to automate dailies, fights in story mode, or even early streaks in PF. But I do see how that can be abused to farm resources.

One issue that is concerning is whether or how much the equipment and the skill tree status of characters sent on deployments factor into the chance of success of a mission. If we have to properly gear them up before sending them off, I'd say it may not be worth the trouble considering the size of the rewards and that fact that we still don't have an efficient equip/unequip mechanism.

 

[Dusty00]

Also disappointed with deployment. While it’s a nice bonus with free rewards, it adds even more playing time to the game. It could’ve been so much better if this replaces the need to do daily. I was really hoping you’d make it so that you deploy say 20 characters for 12 hours and in return you get say 70% of the coins and moves you’d get from doing master level daily. I’d rather spend 1-2 hrs time practicing combos, doing PvP instead of doing daily.

I’ve said for over two years now that the game just keeps getting more new stuff that takes up time while there’s been very little thus far in streamlining and fixing existing, outdated game modes that have become meaningless chores. Quality playing experience > quantity of game modes in my book any day.

Devs I love you guys but when will we ever see more QoL patches? You shouldn’t have released diamond tier characters without also having a concurrent plan of adjusting daily and PF that were originally designed for gold tier characters. These game modes are outdated, present no challenge, and require too much time daily. Adding master origin and story mode is a great start but I hope the momentum can pick up again. I wouldn’t mind not getting any new game features and content in 2021 if you could spend the year to go back to the drawing board and streamline existing content.

Okay I’ll stop the rant now and go back to appreciating the hard work you guys put in to give us new features. On its own deployment as presented this far is really well thought out and can be a big boost for early players getting into the game. It almost replaces the old “daily relic” and “take a break” concept where players actually have to do some planning instead of tap & claim rewards. 75K isn’t much for mid/end game players but for early players that’s a huge boost in progress, which is important for player retention. Extra relics are also helpful to help early players expand their collection or use towards evolving characters.

 

[ZeoW]

I share a lot of the same opinions. I wished deployments can make dailies so much easier. But I do think the current version that is mostly geared for the newer players are much needed for the game itself. I only started enjoying the game after playing religiously for three months till I evolved my first Diamond and it's been great ever since. However, not a lot of newer players have the same amount of time and too much grinding can be a big turn off for newer players. I also complain about the mindless grinding in PF and how crazy the cutoffs are now, but most newer players don't even get the chance to compete at all and they're the ones who needs that first Gold character the most. The deployments are a great feature, but have very little impact to those of us with 20+ Diamonds already. It's simply not our turn yet, I do trust the devs will deliver QoL for us but until then, seems like we'll have to grind just a bit longer.

 

[Rudølf]

Three posts above astounded me. Now I agree with them:

PLEASE MAKE DEPLOYMENTS DO STUFF FOR US!!!

 

[Art3mes]

"A bird in the hand is better than two in the bushes".

 

[Hall☆weenQueen]

Looking at the system closer and seeing its criticisms does really put this into perspective. If idle gaming is meant to reduce grinding then this isn't really accomplishing its goal very well. It sounds like you could get more from other places and this is something on the side to get a little extra stuff here and there. A lot of us were probably hoping for something a little more... revolutionary. Especially after asking for something like this for so long. In fact, I'm surprised they decided to put deployments out in this update instead of the next one but whatever.
My point is, this isnt exactly as helpful as I think a lot of us hoped. It'll be almost like take a break relics, you get something, yes, but is it really going to be super helpful? Nah. I'm of the opinion there is too much grinding in this game, and mindless grinding doesn't exactly make playing fun. We hoped this would help fix it, and I guess we can only tell once it's out but I doubt it'll put much of a dent in anyone's progress. Especially since you have to give up good fighters to achieve these rewards.

 

[rexturtle1120]

Looking at the system closer and seeing its criticisms does really put this into perspective. If idle gaming is meant to reduce grinding then this isn't really accomplishing its goal very well. It sounds like you could get more from other places and this is something on the side to get a little extra stuff here and there. A lot of us were probably hoping for something a little more... revolutionary. Especially after asking for something like this for so long. In fact, I'm surprised they decided to put deployments out in this update instead of the next one but whatever.
My point is, this isnt exactly as helpful as I think a lot of us hoped. It'll be almost like take a break relics, you get something, yes, but is it really going to be super helpful? Nah. I'm of the opinion there is too much grinding in this game, and mindless grinding doesn't exactly make playing fun. We hoped this would help fix it, and I guess we can only tell once it's out but I doubt it'll put much of a dent in anyone's progress. Especially since you have to give up good fighters to achieve these rewards.

I agree with you, it’s a nice that it’s being added, but it’s not fixing some of the bigger problems. You here the phrase all the time “well what’s your idea?”, and while I certainly can’t speak for the developers, I wonder if they sometimes think that.

Using the prize fight system as an example, I feel that we need a post clearly explaining how it could be fixed or redesigned to work in today’s Skullgirls mobile, something where the devs ask a few longtime members of the forums to discuss and come up with. Solution that they think would work. There might already be a post like this, but I doubt it address all the problems we continue to face in this age of Skullgirls Mobile. I don’t know, and I say that a lot ‘cause it’s true. How can we really eliminate excessive grinding for example, is there really a way?

 

[Dusty00]

I agree with you, it’s a nice that it’s being added, but it’s not fixing some of the bigger problems. You here the phrase all the time “well what’s your idea?”, and while I certainly can’t speak for the developers, I wonder if they sometimes think that.

Using the prize fight system as an example, I feel that we need a post clearly explaining how it could be fixed or redesigned to work in today’s Skullgirls mobile, something where the devs ask a few longtime members of the forums to discuss and come up with. Solution that they think would work. There might already be a post like this, but I doubt it address all the problems we continue to face in this age of Skullgirls Mobile. I don’t know, and I say that a lot ‘cause it’s true. How can we really eliminate excessive grinding for example, is there really a way?

There are so many options out there to reduce grinding as many other newer gatcha games have already figured it out. It’s not like SGM was original with the core gatcha mechanics from the beginning. The fighting aspect is original for sure, but level up, evolution, character tier, elemental system, equipping moves, all of these have long been standards for just about every gatcha game out there. Deployment and accolades are also just standard systems that most games have too.

It really comes down to whether the intention is to fix something or to make something new. I don’t know exactly how each company operates but I suspect that in game development it’s easier to get funding for creating a new feature than to fix something that’s not completely broken. Imagine the investors who don’t play or even know the game at all - why would they spend money to redo something? They don’t see what we see and experience what we experience. It’s all a matter of perspective. Our burn out from grinding can be easily written off as “well they can take a break or quit. We just need to get more new players in to generate income.”

That said, our devs love us and listen to us over time. They have their hands tied with a small team and ambitious goals. I can imagine them arguing for us and having these discussions. It might just not be realistic or practical to realize our wishes even if they wanted to.

 

[Hall☆weenQueen]

Mini update on this from someone who has been watching the SGM Twitter veeeery closely: it looks like they'll be adding a feature in which you can speed up deployments if you want. This isn't anything new, most games have some sort of system where you can speed up wait times with a little payment. The example they gave was 7 theo for 10 minutes. I have a feeling it will he higher the more time is on the clock. I really only see the whales truly using this since a lot of us know how precious theo is and just wait. Do you guys think you'd use it?