What we (think) we know about MS events

[Lheeli]

As we enter the last weekend of the MS event, I thought I'd share the data I have collected over the last week. Simply put, I've recorded the start times of every event I could and put them into a spreadsheet (attached). From that data, there are a bunch of observations that become clear, and I share them here in hopes they help your gaming experience. It must be noted that my dataset is relatively small, so take most of this with a grain of salt.

 

Location (high confidence with these observations): 

• Events pop in 15 specific zones: Steel Canyon, Cap, St Marts, Imperial City, Nerva, Port Oakes, Neutropolis, Nova, PI, GV, Talos, KR, FF, Sharshead, and Skyway.

• There appears to be a no-spawn zones around hospitals (call it 100m), including hospital rooftops.
• Mobs appear not to spawn in the air.

 

Duration (high confidence):

• Events last 20 minutes.

 

Frequency (medium confidence):

• Each zone appears to have a cooldown that lasts approx. 200 minutes plus or minus 30 minutes.
• Zones do not repeat until all 15 zones have hosted an event. We call all 15 zones a "cycle".
• Each zone appears to be on an independent timer.
• Nevertheless there appears to be a "grouping" phenomenon where a set of zones will pop in close proximity to each other. The data suggests three such groupings constituting a "beginning" "middle" and "end", though that could just be coincidence.
• There does not appear to be a minimal "lull" timer between events or between cycles.

 

Hope these observations help your leagues, and if you have additional data please send it my way!!

 

Cheers,

 

Calamity (Torch)

Book 4.xlsx

Edited Friday at 01:33 PM by Lheeli

[Snarky]

No badges and no need for 50s that way 

 

so me… es ist egal.  (German for does not matter)

[Hedgefund]

I'm going to copy/paste a Discord post I made to show Mapserver XP vs regular:

 

Quote

I see folks saying mapserver offers 10x xp but that doesn't seem to be the case. I took a level 50 character with no rested XP, defeated a couple of different types of minions (council galaxy in a mission and CoT Possessed Scientist in zone) and got the following:

 

[01:35] You gain 2,779 experience and 1,945 influence.

[01:35] You received 500 Physical Incarnate experience for your Destiny slot.

 

I defeated a mapserver minion, far far from the crowd so please don't tell me there were other sources of damage and got this:

[01:43] You gain 8,094 experience and 5,664 infamy.

[01:43] You received 5,000 Physical Incarnate experience for

 

That ain't 10x, at least for regular xp. It IS 10x for incarnate xp. No doubt, that's more xp, not 10x though.

 

I replicated this several times and got exactly the same results.

 

Here are some expected questions:

Did I have debt? No.

Did I have rested xp?  As stated above, no.

Did I fight an enemy with a higher level? As stated above, no.

Did I have an xp boost from Seed of Hamidon?  No.

 

[Lheeli]

6 minutes ago, Hedgefund said:

I'm going to copy/paste a Discord post I made to show Mapserver XP vs regular:

 

 

I replicated this several times and got exactly the same results.

 

Here are some expected questions:

Did I have debt? No.

Did I have rested xp?  As stated above, no.

Did I fight an enemy with a higher level? As stated above, no.

Did I have an xp boost from Seed of Hamidon?  No.

 

Thanks for that data!

 

Another question I've been pondering is whether multiple leagues in the same zone impact XP rate -- have no data on that yet.

 

Relatedly, I wonder -- were you in a league or solo gathering that data? Does it matter?

Edited Friday at 02:59 PM by Lheeli

[Hedgefund]

I was solo, I made all efforts to eliminate anything that could affect xp earned.

 

It's not leagues that affect rewards, rather it's teams.  Team 1 and team 2 from the same league are competing for rewards just as if they were in different leagues.  For simplicity let's just say there are 2 teams in a league and team 1 does 80% of the damage and team 2 does 20%, then team 1 will get 80% of the xp, which will then be doled out to team members the usual way, team 2 will get 20%.

 

I've seen people complain about poor rewards and no doubt that's a consequence of being on a low damage team, especially as we get further into the event and people start leeching and using low level characters and multi-boxing.

[Frozen Burn]

13 minutes ago, Hedgefund said:

I'm going to copy/paste a Discord post I made to show Mapserver XP vs regular:

 

 

I replicated this several times and got exactly the same results.

 

Here are some expected questions:

Did I have debt? No.

Did I have rested xp?  As stated above, no.

Did I fight an enemy with a higher level? As stated above, no.

Did I have an xp boost from Seed of Hamidon?  No.

 

 

Awesome.  So it looks like regular XP is approx 3x and Incarnate XP is 10x.   👍

[Lheeli]

3 minutes ago, Hedgefund said:

I was solo, I made all efforts to eliminate anything that could affect xp earned.

 

It's not leagues that affect rewards, rather it's teams.  Team 1 and team 2 from the same league are competing for rewards just as if they were in different leagues.  For simplicity let's just say there are 2 teams in a league and team 1 does 80% of the damage and team 2 does 20%, then team 1 will get 80% of the xp, which will then be doled out to team members the usual way, team 2 will get 20%.

 

I've seen people complain about poor rewards and no doubt that's a consequence of being on a low damage team, especially as we get further into the event and people start leeching and using low level characters and multi-boxing.

 

Thanks!

 

I didn't include this earlier, and I haven't done specific data collection myself, but I am reasonably confident that XP is impacted by the notoriety settings of the team leader. We've had multiple reports that changing from 0/0 to +4/x8 makes a significant difference to team xp. I'll try to collect data on that if I can.

[Frozen Burn]

1 minute ago, Hedgefund said:

I was solo, I made all efforts to eliminate anything that could affect xp earned.

 

It's not leagues that affect rewards, rather it's teams.  Team 1 and team 2 from the same league are competing for rewards just as if they were in different leagues.  For simplicity let's just say there are 2 teams in a league and team 1 does 80% of the damage and team 2 does 20%, then team 1 will get 80% of the xp, which will then be doled out to team members the usual way, team 2 will get 20%.

 

I've seen people complain about poor rewards and no doubt that's a consequence of being on a low damage team, especially as we get further into the event and people start leeching and using low level characters and multi-boxing.

 

^^^THIS!

 

Most people do not realize that Open World Leagues are different than Instanced Leagues (like in iTrials).  Open World Leagues, your team is competing with other teams in the same league for rewards.  The only benefit is for being in an open world league is the ease of communication and coordinating efforts.  So, it's critical that league leaders balance teams out when forming them so that all participants get roughly an equal chance / share.

 

You also have to be within a certain distance of the kills to get the rewards as well - you may get defeat credit towards badges - but to get the XP, Inf, drop rewards, you have to be "close" (and I do not know that distance number).  For example, I was on a Lusca league, I died and went to hosp, and they defeated the tentacle while I was there and got no xp, inf, or my reward merits even though I was on the team / league.

 

 

[Frozen Burn]

15 minutes ago, Lheeli said:

 

Thanks!

 

I didn't include this earlier, and I haven't done specific data collection myself, but I am reasonably confident that XP is impacted by the notoriety settings of the team leader. We've had multiple reports that changing from 0/0 to +4/x8 makes a significant difference to team xp. I'll try to collect data on that if I can.

 

I have heard this rumor floating around and I will wager this is a false perception.  It is not supposed to work like that.

Notariety has no impact on the open world or the events.  Spawns are levelless and always spawn even con no matter your level or whether you SK'd up or Ex'd down.  So, the +4 does not matter.  As for team size, even spawning is based on number of people in an area.  You can be solo working an event set to x8 team size and still only get your 2-3 minion spawns instead of an entire 16 mob group with bosses like you would in a mission.  Only by having other characters around you (not even have to be on your team) do you get increased #s and then eventually boss level, EB level, and GM level spawns.

 

If by chance notariety is beefing up spawns, then this is a bug.  A true bug with the event.  Although, this is the Mapserver event which is all about bugs, so... maybe that is "working as intended."  😄  

Edited Friday at 03:29 PM by Frozen Burn

[Lheeli]

5 minutes ago, Frozen Burn said:

 

I have heard this rumor floating around and I will wager this is a false perception.  It is not supposed to work like that.

Notariety has no impact on the open world or the events.  Spawns are levelless and always spawn even con no matter your level or whether you SK'd up or Ex'd down.  So, the +4 does not matter.  As for team size, even spawning is based on number of people in an area.  You can be solo working an event set to x8 team size and still only get your 2-3 minion spawns instead of an entire 16 mob group with bosses like you would in a mission.  

 

If by chance notariety is beefing up spawns, then this is a bug.  A true bug with the event.  Although, this is the Mapserver event which is all about bugs, so... maybe that is "working as intended."  😄  

 

Data in either direction will be helpful here -- I was under the same impression as you, but we've had multiple instances where a team lead changes their notoriety and immediately people in the team reported a change. But we need concrete data to either confirm or deny; I'll try to collect some when I get home from work.

 

[Super Atom]

genuinely shocked there wasn't a badge for defeating MS called Disconnected

[Lheeli]

26 minutes ago, Super Atom said:

genuinely shocked there wasn't a badge for defeating MS called Disconnected

Right? At this point I think they should change the GM to a literal giant red herring, though that may be too obvious. 😃

[Akisan]

4 hours ago, Super Atom said:

genuinely shocked there wasn't a badge for defeating MS called Disconnected

 

Not to give the Devs any (bad) ideas, but that sounds like something for next year (alongside a small chance that defeating the MS immediately causes a "Lost Connection to Mapserver" crash, rolled randomly for each player defeating it)

[High_Beam]

- No Badges.

- Game immersion breaking

- Pointless Powerleveling event

 

Not my bag.  You do you and I will tune out or log out till its over.

[Captain Fabulous]

I've repeatedly heard throughout the event that people shouldn't run AoE stealth powers like Shadow Fall and Steamy Mist because they interfere with spawn sizes. I have no idea if this is true or not (seems unlikely to me) but some people are convinced it is.

It's not a particularly exciting event due to all the lag, but it's a great way to get your incarnate slots unlocked quickly and earn a nice chunk of INF.

[Lheeli]

8 hours ago, Lheeli said:

 

Data in either direction will be helpful here -- I was under the same impression as you, but we've had multiple instances where a team lead changes their notoriety and immediately people in the team reported a change. But we need concrete data to either confirm or deny; I'll try to collect some when I get home from work.

 

Just to follow up, we conclusively determined that notoriety does not matter. XP rate per mob does not change regardless of notoriety settings, nor does whether you are on a team. Also confirm that you actually lose xp per mob on a league because you are competing for a share of xp with other teams.

 

Of course team and league size DOES matter but the precise mechanics of spawn rate and EB spawn rates are beyond the scope of the current study.

Edited Friday at 11:47 PM by Lheeli

[Latex]

6 hours ago, High_Beam said:

- No Badges.

- Game immersion breaking

- Pointless Powerleveling event

 

Not my bag.  You do you and I will tune out or log out till its over.

Thought I might be alone in thinking the same, maybe it's a hot take, idk...

 

The event kinda made me take a short hiatus from levelling/badging/enjoying the games usual content because it's almost impossible to find teams or assemble them, legit thought it was just an April Fools day thing. The benefits of it are too good to pass up, I don't blame people for enjoying it but it sponged players from every other aspect of the game.

[Lunar Ronin]

6 hours ago, Captain Fabulous said:

I've repeatedly heard throughout the event that people shouldn't run AoE stealth powers like Shadow Fall and Steamy Mist because they interfere with spawn sizes. I have no idea if this is true or not (seems unlikely to me) but some people are convinced it is.

It's not a particularly exciting event due to all the lag, but it's a great way to get your incarnate slots unlocked quickly and earn a nice chunk of INF.

 

It's a myth that started back in the live days, although seems to have gained greater prevalence on Homecoming, especially Excelsior.  AoE stealth powers have no impact on spawn sizes.

[Frozen Burn]

6 hours ago, Captain Fabulous said:

I've repeatedly heard throughout the event that people shouldn't run AoE stealth powers like Shadow Fall and Steamy Mist because they interfere with spawn sizes. I have no idea if this is true or not (seems unlikely to me) but some people are convinced it is.

It's not a particularly exciting event due to all the lag, but it's a great way to get your incarnate slots unlocked quickly and earn a nice chunk of INF.

 

This is a total fallacy and misinformation that started ages ago with the Mothership raid.  The event code (and in mothership raids) is ambush code and spawns see through stealth auras and will still spawn / "ambush" accordingly.  Turning off those AOE stealth auras is doing people a disservice as they typically provide Res & Def buffs for the teams.  Mobs see through whatever stealth is there.

[Healix]

I enjoyed it immensely, and thought it was a lot of fun. I like the event more than all the 'details'.

[BjorJlen]

Great data collection OP (and others)! 🙂 Any such efforts are very much appreciated, so thank you for doing the leg work on this.

 

   Now personally I feel that any events that the Dev's add to the game is a blessing for all of us, even if they "might" be immersion breaking. Of course, as this IS a video game, and more and more, people are thinking that we live in a Virtual Universe (ala the Matrix?), that is solely a matter of personal viewpoint. That being said, the event can be a total Lag-fest, so how I approach it is I just play the game normally, and if along my travels I encounter one, I join in (If I am not on a team mind you). This has the benefit of increasing the immersion part for me significantly (not that I really care "too" much about it overall). But I usually do not hunt these down.

   However, I do feel that the Dev's have missed a "slight" opportunity here. The GM does not give a Badge at all, nor does the event itself(?). Not good at all. 😞 Also, after having run this for roughly 3 years now (If not longer), not doing something... anything to elevate at least some of lag generated by this event, is not good at all. For the Dev's and the players both. Yes, I know that much of this lag is based on several factors, such as how many people are in the zone, and even how many League teams have been created (for examples), but that isn't that is creating the lag I am sure.

   I only know this because "I" am comparing it to the Halloween event itself. During the Halloween event, I really don't get any lag at all when participating in a door league, either in PI or KW, where the largest league teams are formed. However, with this even, it can be an incredible lag fest. So there is obviously other game factors "code" wise that is affecting this, and for the Dev's not to have done much at all to at least fix "some" of this lag issue, is a big missed QoL benefit to this game. Yes, there are other priorities, but this has gone on for years... so that can't really be used as an excuse anymore I feel.

   But overall, this IS a cool event, and any data collection that has been done for it, like what @Lheeli has done, is very appreciated. So thank you very much for this. Keep up the great work, K? 😁

[Frozen Burn]

38 minutes ago, BjorJlen said:

Great data collection OP (and others)! 🙂 Any such efforts are very much appreciated, so thank you for doing the leg work on this.

 

   Now personally I feel that any events that the Dev's add to the game is a blessing for all of us, even if they "might" be immersion breaking. Of course, as this IS a video game, and more and more, people are thinking that we live in a Virtual Universe (ala the Matrix?), that is solely a matter of personal viewpoint. That being said, the event can be a total Lag-fest, so how I approach it is I just play the game normally, and if along my travels I encounter one, I join in (If I am not on a team mind you). This has the benefit of increasing the immersion part for me significantly (not that I really care "too" much about it overall). But I usually do not hunt these down.

   However, I do feel that the Dev's have missed a "slight" opportunity here. The GM does not give a Badge at all, nor does the event itself(?). Not good at all. 😞 Also, after having run this for roughly 3 years now (If not longer), not doing something... anything to elevate at least some of lag generated by this event, is not good at all. For the Dev's and the players both. Yes, I know that much of this lag is based on several factors, such as how many people are in the zone, and even how many League teams have been created (for examples), but that isn't that is creating the lag I am sure.

   I only know this because "I" am comparing it to the Halloween event itself. During the Halloween event, I really don't get any lag at all when participating in a door league, either in PI or KW, where the largest league teams are formed. However, with this even, it can be an incredible lag fest. So there is obviously other game factors "code" wise that is affecting this, and for the Dev's not to have done much at all to at least fix "some" of this lag issue, is a big missed QoL benefit to this game. Yes, there are other priorities, but this has gone on for years... so that can't really be used as an excuse anymore I feel.

   But overall, this IS a cool event, and any data collection that has been done for it, like what @Lheeli has done, is very appreciated. So thank you very much for this. Keep up the great work, K? 😁

 

Door knocking in a league for the Halloween Event does not produce anywhere near the same amount of the spawns at one time like an invasion event does.  So comparing it to the MS event, Rikti invasion, Zombie apocalypse, or Nemesis invasion is not an accurate comparison.  You can get heavy lag with all the invasion types, it's just that there are more people who participate in the MS event since it's still relatively new and high XP rewards are really high and draw them in.  The other invasion types are not as heavily participated in anymore like they used to since most people already have the badges they offer.

 

I don't think there is really anything the Devs can do about the lag for the MS event.  The spawns do not produce any extra particles or graphics that would add to it.  It's jut there are SO many people participating in it at one time and you are inherently going to get lag.  

 

The best thing to do is to fight on the outskirts / edge of the league where the lag is minimal and you can still function instead of standing in the middle of the group where the lag is the heaviest.

[tidge]

On 4/11/2025 at 3:09 PM, Hedgefund said:

I've seen people complain about poor rewards and no doubt that's a consequence of being on a low damage team, especially as we get further into the event and people start leeching and using low level characters and multi-boxing.

 

Preach on! I'm sick of folks in open-world invasion leagues claiming they are losing XP during Mapserver because some team leader doesn't have their settings at +4x8. The last two times I saw that specific complaint, those players were on leagues of low-level non-DPS characters just standing around, not making any attacks.

 

A solo player with +4x8 settings open world is NOT going to get more/higher-level spawns from an invasion.

[Bio-Link]

not done it this year, i tend to stay away from anything farming, i just fall asleep, way to boring

[GM Crumpet]

Small leagues get better results. A 2 or 4 team league will do better than a full 6 as the rewards aren't split as much, but it does kind of balance out from the increase of enemies. Double XP boost is actually a +100% so gives x11 XP and no inf not x20. I generally turn the XP boost off at around level 40 as the inf gain is decent at that point. 

 

As per usual open zone events rules notoriety doesn't affect spawns.

 

Multiple leagues in zones will slow everything down. Lag is real.

 

Balanced teams will do better than ones with lots of support. League leaders should ideally sprinkle the range characters evenly as melee and defence suffer from the fact they can't fight to their best advantage. I try to spread Masterminds out if I can. They are often hitting multiple targets so help all team mates. Also try to keep teams even sized.

 

Can't think of anything else 🙂 

Edited yesterday at 07:30 AM by GM Crumpet