TinyCo Reddit AMA

TinyCo Reddit AMA Recap:

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(Answered by TinyRocio)
Will daredevil be a redhead like the comics or based on Charlie Cox?
	Daredevil will be a redhead! :)

How many characters are going to be in the next event?
	There will be 7 recruitable characters, and a few more villains!

Do any of you play pokemon go if so whats the rarest pokemon found at tiny co offices :P?
	A large chunk of our office plays Pokemon Go (as we're all pretty avid gamers)! I think the rarest so far has been a Dragonite, but only one person caught it.

Will pepper ever return as a recruit for those who missed her event?
	Pepper will be returning to the Academy at some point in the future!

When is the Hell's Kitchen event likely to begin?
	The Daredevil event will be starting this week. I'm afraid we can't disclose what time or date yet!
Editor's Note: Fug

Will you implement cross platform between iOS and Android. I play on my iphone via wifi but would like to move back and forth for when I'm in the go. If others games can do it, what stops you guys from doing it
	We are actively working on this! One solution we are looking into right now is to allow Facebook connecting to allow cross-platform saving. We will continue to look into this though. :)

Do you even listen to all the complaints we send in in-game, on reddit and on facebook about how we want a LARGE break between events because they become annoying? :\ Doesn't feel like it.
	I do compile any and all complaints that support receives, as well as include links to relevant Reddit threads. That kind of decision making is out of my hands, sorry for the confusion there!

What are your upcoming event ideas?
	We can't disclose a whole lot about our upcoming events, but we are definitely having a Halloween event, as well as considering major Marvel releases in our event planning.

How long till the Hells Kitchen event run for?
	We intend for the event to be roughly the length of our regular special events (like Civil War or Guardians).

How do you shrink the bobbleheads? Lol
	The feature hasn't been implemented yet! Part of the update was to help us implement the feature (once we have the smaller bobbles ready).

Will we get an article on Marvel.com about the Hell's Kitchen event? If so, when?
	Yes! The interview has been done and it will be coming out this week. :)

Will we be getting any social features like to visits other schools?
	We definitely have some ideas for this on our radar and have taken a lot of ideas that you all have posted into consideration as well!

Are there plans to open up the final 3 slots on the job board?
	While we did have the 7th slot available in the game initially, as the team continues to work on the main game content they are planning out when it is best to introduce those three slots.
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(Answered by TinyEric- Senior Product Manager)
What are the coins that drop from the villain cages for?
	Freeing Hawkeye.

	#freehawkeye

	. . . .

	KIDDING. Some things are meant to be revealed in due time. Nick Fury's secret stash of Helicarrier tech augments is one of them. 	#whaaaaaaaaaaat

	#freehawkeye


Will premium characters ever receive any additional costumes/storylines, etc. or are they just one and done?
	This question is my question (internally on the team).
	We are constantly trying to figure out how to provide continuing value to premium characters. We absolutely intend to have future parts of the game which will reward those players with premium characters. New outfits and storylines are part of this conversation.
	To be super upfront, one barrier we have to offering additional costumes on premium characters is that it artificially limits how many of that costume we can offer to as many players as possible.
	Think about it like this - I have a limited set of resources. I can have the art team work on a costume for Vision (which only some people own) or Wasp (which every body owns). Which one is going to be a better return on the art team's time? Probably the Wasp one.
	That being said, if enough people are interested in costumes for premium characters, and we felt like the return on investment was there, we would put it in the pipeline.

Let's get the unfortunate question out of the way: Prize Boxes
Are we going to be seeing any / many of these in the Hell's Kitchen event? We've already had one with the costume box and I don't know what purchases were like, but people have been vocally upset about it.
	Totally reasonable question.
	Straight up, you will see more Prize Boxes / Crates in Daredevil and in future events.
	In an ideal world, we could give all fans all their favorite characters and outfits for nominal cost. But that's not the reality. We recognize that a feature like Prize Boxes will be unpopular with the vast majority of players who are F2P or light P2P. And certainly the more awesome the content, the more vocal the unpopularity.
	However, if a person is willing to spend a good chunk of change in our game, I believe that player should get really really awesome stuff. Prize Boxes are considered optional content, and nothing in a Prize Box is ever intended to be necessary to enjoy a Special Event or mini-event. But we try to design the contents of the premium box (and I believe should) to offer the player a significant amount of value, even if some of the items in the box aren't what the player is targeting.

	The feedback on the price point is perfectly valid, and we'll consider it going forward.
	One factor for the player to keep in mind is that if you owned none of the prior outfits, you would be getting a great deal on most of them, since they were priced considerably higher on initial release. So while some players may have considered the price point too high, others could have gotten a lot of valuable content at a discount. Pricing is always imperfect when you have a fixed value for varying degrees of sensitivity.

Regarding event design philosophy:
During Spider event (and MODOK event, to a lesser extent) we’ve seen a shift in the game’s design philosophy. In earlier events, players could get almost everything from the events without buying anything, as long as they’re dedicated. (tl;dr- Earlier events it felt like you didn't have to spend much or any at all to be able to "unlock" everything, while later events have felt that you have to spend a lot just to finish it in a satisfactory manner)

	Really strong question. First, I would challenge your premise that there's a shift in the design philosophy of "everything F2P is attainable with dedication". Some of our earliest events included content that was overtly challenging to earn without using shards. Abomination A-Bomb and Surfer Tony are good examples of this. Furthermore, we've never intended any content release to be obtained by doing things such as exploits or lack of sleep, what some people might term "dedication."
	We've also always had some set of things that were premium only in releases - usually we try to attach some game economy benefit to them. For example, the terminals in the Pepper Potts mini-event. I just don't think it's true that a player could "almost everything" in every content release without spending some shards.
	That being said, we do believe that players who support our game with their money should have easier access than non-payers to a few things. This is why we try very hard to provide value to our premium characters and buildings and decorations beyond their aesthetic appeal. We believe a payer should be rewarded with more than just the hero or building they've bought directly.
	Naturally, this will mean that some of the end of event achievements (such as Surfer Tony, or A.I.M. Robo-Saur) will be much more attainable by those players who purchase premium content.
	I will also say that while we always try our best with our event economy design, we do make mistakes, and when we can, we try and help out players in those situations (for example, some non-premium crates we've released mid-event). A big reason for this is that we strongly believe that new and innovative mechanics are important to providing game value to all our players; the downside is that we don't have some cookie cutter template that we can reuse over and over again while making sure the board guy doesn't get unchained from his desk. Without such a template, we sometimes end up with results that differ from our models.
	We also do pay attention to the feedback we get here and in other forms (like my wife every night during Spider-Man Act 2 when she says Venom was too hard). So please continue to post your feedback here and let us know how we are doing.

Do you guys intend to expand the character finder to look like an actual yearbook? with info on the characters Marvel Handbook style, and also can we get the look we are using on the character finder instead of all the characters having their first stage look as their picture
	Good question. We are looking into how we can expand the character finder both in terms of scope and look.
	In terms of the portrait, I will say that one issue with letting players choose the look is that there's a large set of system complexity that would come with allowing players to choose which look (e.g., outfits vs different ranks vs other options). In a perfect world with infinite resources, we would tackle this complexity with relish, but given our resourcing needs, this type of customization is lower on the priority totem pole.

How come F2P event storylines are only available during the event itself? Considering how crucial using these characters get to accomplishing the next task in the event, you have to choose either advancing their story or advancing the event. The story is my favorite part of the game, but I haven't really been able to follow any of them since halfway through Civil War.
	Awesome question. I agree that we could do a better job of allowing players to both experience the story of the heroes you've recruited during Special Events while also still being useful for event progression. We're actually going over different ways to make this more achievable this for non-premium characters right now for Daredevil.
	Premium characters should already have their storylines persist after events end.

Would it be possible for you to explain what the senior product manager does in terms of your role within this game?
	Sure! A product manager is in charge of defining and implementing the direction and scope of the game as a product (as opposed to a game qua game). You can think of it as a cross between a game designer, a data analyst, a business developer, a user interface designer, a QA worker, a project manager, and a player advocate.

There was a 6 month gap between release and the new story update. Will there be a shorter time in between this one and the next story update?
	Great question. We do have a new story update in the works with more land and new heroes. We're working on making sure that it gets released as soon as practicable. As for timeframe, I personally want it to be shorter than the time between launch and Gamma zone, but can make no promises.

My question: why can't paying players opt in for ads? They're unobtrusive and I've yet to meet a player who doesn't want the option to see them.
	Insider baseball time: ads are a hard thing in mobile gaming product-wise unless you're a game like Words With Friends that has millions of impressions an hour. We spend a lot of time and thought on how to best make this feature optimal for players, and I will be the first to admit we're not there yet. I can tell you changes are in the works and we will continue to iterate on how we surface ads as we balance player happiness and business needs. We want to make it work and I'm confident that we will, but it's not going to happen overnight.

My two biggest concerns are the lack of benefits for long time players, and the increasing difficulty for F2P players. I think others will cover the second so I would like to mainly focus on the first.
	I like your question because it's as long as some of my answers.
	I actually agree with you that we can do a better job giving long-time players more benefits.
For example coin drops seem to actually decrease at higher levels,
	This is currently true for players beyond level 36, and we are actively discussing how to address this concern.
event characters and characters unlocked late in the story see minimal use on the mission board and for attention in story,
	We agree that this is a problem and we're actively working on a solution for the mission board that should be in the game soon.
he optional ads for shards dissapear when money is spent,
	You can check out my answer here: https://www.reddit.com/r/avengersacademygame/comments/4z8rgc/welcome_to_tinycos_first_reddit_ama_ask_me/d6tyhjr
premium charachters can be difficult to level up during and after the event
	This is something we continually return to and want to figure out a better way of handling.
The best way I see to address this would be a free daily login system (not a paid one like the Hawkeye statue)
	We haven't fully fleshed out what this will look like, but we do intend on doing a daily login system that gives you some sort of rewards eventually.
and the use of more of the late unlock and event characters in the story and mission board.
	See above. We also have plans on trying to create a more robust set of features for elder players, and we're currently trying to slot them on the roadmap alongside our event schedule and story releases. So I can tell you that providing a better game experience for our elder players is a top priority and we're working on how to best deliver those improvements.

Why do people at level 36 have a reduced coin drop rate when it could be tied to quest completion instead?
	Quest progression is a worse marker of advancement for our design purposes than Academy level. That being said, we're thinking about this feedback and how to act on it.

Would you please add back the actions for Madame Hydra's Classroom and Drax's Cage? We REALLY would those buildings to be usable, rather than just decorations, and we'd particularly like to see those characters use them on the missionboard.
	This is totes a bug and we will fix it after this AMA.

My campus is so crowded! And with many students I would like to kick out. Will there ever be away to "hide" some of our recruited students? (Looking at you, half ranked up Eddie Brock)
	We are actively working on a way to make it so that players have a great and engaging way to handle their campus filled with all the awesome heroes they've recruited. Personally, I'm not satisfied with just "hiding" heroes; I would like the team to put out something that provides both interesting gameplay and additional content. But we have a limited set of resources and it's a hard problem to solve. But I can tell you that this is my favorite design problem to noodle on while I desperately hold board guy away from the "increase mission dismiss timer to 3 days" button. I honestly don't know why we built that thing and why we put it so close to his supply of Hawkeye shaped cookies.

Will the other five parts of the tribute statue also be dropping shards? Also, will it continue to drop shards after all six have been collected?
	Each additional tribute will have a shard drop rate and time table associated to it upon purchase. After you acquire the sixth tribute, it will drop shards according to that tribute's schedule, and then stop dropping shards. The completed tribute will be a lasting reminder of all the free shards you got from your wise decision to decorate the Academy with such a pretty statue.
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Answers by AllenWarner (Lead Narrative Designer)

Is Phil Coulson the third character that was mentioned by Allen Warner as being part of the story update or is it someone else still coming?
	Someone else is coming. The new Marvel.com interview will spill the beans.

Is there a process for deciding what characters to include? If so, could you tell us a bit about it?
	We have an approved roster of characters to include. For the main story and each event, I use that list to take the first shot at what characters to include, and in what order. I pass that to Marvel Games and people on the team at TinyCo, and we go through it until everyone agrees on the approach. For some events like Guardians, it's pretty obvious who to include, although there was some wiggle room with Nebula and Yondu. For others, it's about looking at the calendar year as a whole, and trying to find the right mix of characters to address classic comic groupings, diversity, different power sets, high-profile to lesser known characters, supporting major Marvel releases, etc. On one hand, it's amazing because I'm like the kid in the candy store choosing from all of these incredible characters. On the other hand, it can be difficult because people have so many different opinions, and you want to make everyone happy. I'm pretty confident that by the end of the year, the majority of players will be very satisfied with our overall roster, and there is still so much cool stuff coming in 2017.

Would you ever consider having Loki free Cap from his 8 hour dance marathon mind control missions, or at least let him also dance the swing, fox-trot, ect.? I just... I am so genuinely concerned for Cap at this point. He danced 24 hours straight last week. Someone help him.
	Cap will at least get some new moves. He owes someone a dance.

Is Tigra wearing real fur?
	Definitely faux fur. Or maybe it's from the last person who got in her way. I'll ask.

in both the comics and movies, cap is portrayed as not only a super soldier but also an artist. will we be seeing this side of cap anytime soon?
	Definitely. We've always wanted to have an Art Class as part of the Academy. That's still the plan, and Cap will have actions there.

Hello, I would like to know if the helmet that we received in the first task from im. Will be explored in more detail. Will we have more options on getting previous characters and uniforms.
	Yes. That helmet is your first and best clue to what Fury is hiding, and how the timefog came into existence.

Which has been your favorite character to design for?
	Helping to come up with the reimagined youthful approach to all of the characters is always fun. Gamora, Winter Soldier, And Vision were some of my favorites. And of course our art and animation teams always take the ideas and make them amazing.

Will Jessica Jones be wearing her Jewel costume?
	Yes. It won't be her primary look, but it will be included. I think it's cool as part of her Super Hero journey narrative that she gives a classic Super Hero outfit and behavior a shot, but eventually realizes she just has to be herself.

Will Steve ever have an action that reflects his personality and character history, rather than seeming as someone who's just a jock?
	Just in case you missed it above, we'll be adding an Art Class, and Cap will definitely be taking part. I actually think Cap and Tony like each other a lot. They're definitely not enemies. They're both stubborn, they both like to lead the show, and they have opposing views on the best way to accomplish things, so they bicker and argue a lot, but they also always find a way to work together in the end. Tony always likes to get a reaction from everyone, and he knows how to get under Cap's skin, so he has fun pushing his buttons. Cap gets annoyed, but he likes and respects Tony. Tony cracks on Cap, but he likes and respects him too. They both can dish it out, and they both can take it. And they'll probably keep getting in arguments right before they save the day.

Is there any chance we might see the Young Avengers somewhere down the road? I'd love to see my favorite team see some love in-game!
	Yes.

Will Daredevil have a yellow costume variant
	Can't say yet, but he'll definitely have a costume variant.

With the Doctor Strange movie coming soon will there be a Doctor Strange Event?
	That makes a lot of sense. I also really, really like Doctor Strange.

Do you plan on adding Mockingbird as a playable character?
	Yes. I've seen her designs, and our art team did their usual incredible job with her.

Who are your favourite Marvel characters not yet represented in-game, and what are the chances of seeing them even referentially?
	A lot of my all-time favorites are coming in the Daredevil event, including Daredevil, Elektra, Luke Cage, and Punisher. By the end of the year, I'll have gotten to write a huge chunk of the characters I've loved since I was a kid, and I'm always super thankful for that. I'll also keep the references and easter eggs coming. I have too much fun with those.

which characters have been the most fun to write? and which (if any) have been difficult?
	Some of the most fun for various reasons have been Tony, Wasp, Loki, Ms. Marvel, all of the Guardians, Sif, Thor, Winter Soldier, Spider-Man, Doc Ock, Spider-Gwen, Electro, Mysterio, Carnage, and a bunch of others. Some of the hardest were probably the "villains" that initially seemed irredeemable. I'm a big believer that there are very few true villains in this universe where characters are younger, and haven't done some of the terrible things they've done in other continuities, so everyone deserves an opportunity to fix their mistakes and become better people. With characters like Zemo, Crossbones, Madame Hydra, and M.O.D.O.K., it took me some time to figure out exactly how they'd find their way to heroism, and how to make them as immediately likable, relatable, and sympathetic as possible.

Will there be a Agents of SHIELD Event?
	Seems very likely. There are still a lot of cool Agents who haven't been introduced.

Will other current(or future) faculty members ever be playable? Ares(who seems to fit the age group), and looks like he isn't "fully upgraded".
	I would expect that at some point Ares, Fury, Odin, and Pym will all be playable. I've already seen the level 3 Fury design, and it will blow your Marvel mind.

Is there a character that you would love to bring to Avengers Academy but for whatever reason you haven't had a chance to fit them in anywhere? If so who?
	Devil Dinosaur. Because he's literally hard to fit in anywhere.

Any plans to bring Eternals into the game(Ikaris, Sersi, Makkari,etc)? they haven't been used in games at all, or maybe at least Hyperion(who is also an Eternal), and alongside him the Squadron Supreme/Sinister?
	I can't say very much about unannounced characters, but I'll say that nothing is impossible, and that if a character is ever explicitly named in the game, they are definitely on the way. This includes Captain Marvel, Kate Bishop, Ultron, Thanos, She-Hulk, Peggy Carter, America Chavez, Beta Ray Bill, Heimdall, and more.

I'm a deaf gamer and wondered if Echo would make an appearence or get mentioned in Hell's Kitchen, and how would you adapt to incorporate a deaf character in terms of communication as a writer?
	Echo won't make an appearance, but will get mentioned. Hawkeye will also be hearing impaired in the game, and I loved how they handled his hearing loss in Matt Fraction's Hawkeye run in the comics, so I'd like to try something similar in the game when we get to his story

Does the News Anchor have a name?
	No. When I first knew we were going to do newscasts, I thought about using an established Marvel newscaster, but decided to go with our own creation. I'm open to suggestions. My only request is that she have one of those classic alliterative Marvel names like Peter Parker, Bruce Banner, Kamala Khan, etc.

Would you ever consider adding event characters into the main storyline?
	Event characters will show up in main storyline dialogue as well as dialogue outside of their event. They won't be required to do actions because that would block players who never got that character.

What character do you most enjoy creating dialogue for?
I personally love what you did with Wasp and you actually made me care about the character despite previously disregarding her.
	Thanks! I have a lot of fun writing everyone, but Wasp is my favorite. I love her combo of being this really excitable and fun-loving person who's badass at the same time. She's an original Avenger who doesn't get featured as much as some of the others, so I was excited to get to put my spin on her. Characters who speak their mind with no filter are the most enjoyable to write for me. She's the queen of those characters, and I always look forward to seeing how she'll interact with every new recruit.

Will we be recruiting any villains in this event? If so, who? In case you can't tell, I love the villains.
	No recruitable villains this time. Lots of anti-heroes.

Will the Hulk have a Bruce Banner costume?
	It's possible. Complicated from an animation perspective, but definitely possible.

Will we ever see scientist supreme or A.I.M. again in the story? Possibly a scientist supreme cage?
	I think so. If anyone deserves a cage, it's him.

Do you take more inspiration from the comics or movies when designing characters.
	Both, but mostly the comics.

Are either the helicarrier or the raft finally going to be used for this event? They have been sitting there unused for far too long
	Not for this event, but they will be used.

since the AMA announcement mentioned Thor and Loki's sibling rivalry, can we expect Thor's storyline to be similar to the movies with him eventually learning more humility and compassion?
	I actually think Thor loves Loki more than anyone. He's his brother, and he sees it as his job to take care of him. He's a little oblivious because he's always excited about the next adventure, but he loves his brother.

are you planning on releasing more zones besides the ones that we see on the map?
	Yes

Do you support Cap or Iron Man in the whole civil war people vs robots debate?
	To me, there's no right or wrong answer, and that's why it's a neverending argument between Cap and Tony. I'm sure Ultron will have an opinion.

Can you give Cosmo more dialogue please? I love that guy.
	Yes. Me too. We should make him recruitable...

Which comics are you guys currently reading? Would be interested to know which kind of stories you like the most and why!
	I usually follow some of my favorite writers to whatever books they're writing. North, Snyder, Simone, Remender, Fraction, and a bunch of other people. I also try to keep up on everything Marvel, and buy every book with a David Nakayama cover like everyone should.

Will we get an article on Marvel.com about the Hell's Kitchen event? If so, when?
	Yeah, it's already finished, and should be posted very soon.

How big is the team of people working on this game? And do you guys ever plan to introduce silk even though the spiderman event is over. I know there was a bit of a teaser but I was wondering if it was just a teaser and nothing else would come from it.
	Silk will make it into the game. She was the character I most wanted in the Spider-Man event who didn't make the cut. She's great, and she'll make it in sooner or later.

What characters will be recruitable in the upcoming Hell's Kitchen event?
	Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Hellcat, Elektra, Iron Fist, Luke Cage, Punisher.

During the early stages of the game we found Iron Mans mask with a claw mark through it. Why was this in the timefog?
	Only the faculty knows. For now.

Are any characters going to be added to the Academy faculty? For instance, I'd love to see Frigga as a teacher, or have Stan Lee as a janitor like in Ultimate Spider-Man.
	I'd definitely like to add more faculty. They're some of the most fun characters to write. J. Jonah Jameson reminded me how fun it is to add a new faculty member to the mix.

Are you ever going to rerelease old cages? If so can we have a cage event? Also will Nick Fury and Odin ever be released like Pepper Potts was? I would love a Thanos cage in the future!!!!!!
	We're gonna need a bigger cage.

What's the most popular ship game wise in the TinyCo offices?
	Strangely enough, no one talks to me about this very often even though I'm sure they have their favorites. As far as what's been featured in-game, I've probably gotten the most positive feedback for Spider-Man/Spider-Gwen, Falcon/Ms. Marvel, and Thor/Wasp.

Will we ever see Wiccan, Hulkling, Kate Bishop and the rest of the Young Avengers on campus as students?
	Yes.

Who is the mysterious third character which has been talked about in the story update interview?
	Will be announced in the next Marvel.com interview.

Why do Tigra's costumes get further and further from what she looks like in the comics? Her lack of clothes in the comics can be explained as how clothes make her uncomfortable. Beach Wasp doesn't wear much clothes.
	We've tried to consistently add more "gear" to a hero as they level up. It's hard to do with a character who doesn't wear much clothes. I think the coat fits the model vibe, but you can always keep her in her level one look to keep the awesome comic look

	Spider-Ham introduces a very silly type of character into the game, almost cartoon-like. Do you plan to release more "fun/cartoon-silly" characters?
	Definitely possible. I'm a big Pet Avengers fan.

During the spider-event, the sky-cycle investigations were cool because it touched on other parts of the Marvel Universe without us actually going there. I know y'all are big fans of doing this through dialogue, but do you think we could have more 'sky cycle' type things where we find out more about this particular Marvel Universe?
	Yes. I liked it a lot too, and I always want to touch on other locations in the Marvel Universe.

Will Daredevil be wearing his classic bright red costume or will he be wearing a costume based on Netflix or some other variant of it?
	We're fans of the classic bright red, but we try to use the best elements from everything.

I love the (unnamed?) News Caster, any way she could be incorporated more into the game? Maybe in game dialogue during event quest lines or something like that (I could see her wanting to get a scoop on all these alien invasions and Hydra/A.I.M. attacks from Tony or someone).
	Thanks! I love that people love her. She's the voice of the people, and points out some of the absurdity of this superhuman world. I think it's possible that she makes it into the game someday. What should be her ultimate Super Hero look?




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(answers from TinyKate- Lead Community Manager)

Hi guys, do you have any plans to expand your support team? It's very clearly a section of your company that needs work as many many users, including myself, have had a lot of our queries or tickets either improperly answered or outright ignored.
	Hi There! This is a great question. When I joined the team approximately two months ago, this was one of my top priorities. Since then, we have actually expanded the Support team significantly, adding on a number of awesome people! To give you and idea, the team is now twice the size it was when I joined. We are actively working on improving our response times, and the quality of our responses

Which comics are you guys currently reading? Would be interested to know which kind of stories you like the most and why!
	I have a HUGE stack of single issues from the last six months sitting at home waiting to be read. Some of my favorite series:

    Saga (Brian K. Vaughn is my man)
    The Wicked + The Divine
    Pretty Deadly
    Deadly Class
    Bitch Planet
    Sex Criminals
    Coffin Hill
    Buffy the Vampire Slayer
    Angel & Faith

I tend to not read too many super hero comics because there is SO MUCH backstory and canon to catch up on and it is really overwhelming.

I'm really interested in what the game design process looks like.If you could give a general overview of what that looks like, that would be awesome (e.g., team size, general steps to creating a new event, etc.).If you want to focus on only one question:"How long does it take to make an event from scratch?" Obviously, this will vary based on the size of the event.
	Events are brainstormed and planned many MONTHS in advance. For example, Halloween is still two months away and we are already deep in planning mode. We also have an idea of what the rest of the year looks like (and it's gonna be pretty damn cool). Of course along the way events do get tuned and readjusted as needed.

I play another Marvel game, Future Fight, and I think one thing their community staff does very well is explain what upcoming events and sales are, do little contests and games that give a small amount of premium currency to hype up upcoming characters/game modes etc.
	Hi There! This is a really great question. Many of the things you mention are definitely things that we would like to do, and that we have on our roadmap. When I joined the team, a mere two months ago, the first priority however, was to improve the Customer Support side of things. We have hired a number of new folks, and trained them up, and are finally getting to a better place in terms of Support. Once Support is finally running more smoothly, we will be able to focus on more initiatives. This Reddit AMA is a great place to start and we hope to do more things like this in the future! I would also love to do little contests and giveaways, and I think we are headed there!

People are always so energetic and elated to hear this is a feature. Is there any plans to create a quest to show this feature or make it more visible? (On making somewhat hidden features like costume swaps more available for people)
	Great question. There are definitely some features, including this one you mentioned, that are not well known or explained. We definitely know that we need to do a better job of explaining these and are pushing to do this for future features. A quest to do this is a really great suggestion.

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(Answers from TinyIhd)

Is anything going to be done about mission bottlenecking? When there are 4 missions on the board where your toons want to all sit on the same chair for 4 hours it's incredibly frustrating. I understand it's working as design intended, but it's an unpleasant design that only serves to artificially slow progress.
	I think I can chime in on this one as an engineer working on the project. We're actively working on a redesign of the way orders are created and selected, which should result in mission boards with a lot more variety than what's currently there. It's a big change with some subtle and far-reaching effects so we want to make sure it's thoroughly tested and tuned before we release it. There will still be some clashes but there will be much more variety and new characters will appear on the board sooner.

Ever since you guys released the Civil War event for us, you guys have been teasing us with a certain character. This is a character that is near and dear to our hearts all of us as we've watched them on screen many times. This is a character of importance on this subreddit. I'm just asking when we can expect the inevitable. When will TinyCo allow you guys to confirm Aunt May for us?

	I've been pushing to have Aunt May in the game, but I've been told that her actions would be too gruesome, her characterization simply too dark for the light-hearted tone we aim for. Aunt May too OP. Not safe for life

When dating comes, are you guys going to do anything to appeal to the lgbtq playerbase? (And some characters?)
	I'm probably not the person you were thinking to target with this question (I'm an engineer on the project and just kind of chiming in on this AMA) but I thought I would respond because it's an important issue to me personally.
How to do the dating feature "right" turned out to be a much bigger question than we anticipated when we first concocted the idea. People obviously have very strong feelings about what is appropriate for a game of this genre, what is acceptable from a canon perspective, and of course true representation of lgbtq communities is extremely important.
There have been a lot of long discussions here at TinyCo about how to provide a really fun feature, that satisfies our desire for emotional connections between characters of all stripes and persuasions. We've got something planned that we think will hit all the marks, though obviously it's impossible to please everyone 100%.
As for specifically "appealing" to the lgbtq player base, I guess I would just say that it's important to us to represent a fuller spectrum of gender and orientation than you usually see in mass media.

Would you fight a horse sized duck or a duck sized horse?
	I would definitely fight a duck-sized horse, preferably a hundred duck-sized horses, because you can kick those little dudes like soccer balls and I feel like it would be very satisfying.Plus I could tame one and keep it, because I've always wanted a horse but they're a ton of work and also they're huge, and if it was duck-sized I could keep it in my bedroom and love it forever.Also, ducks are already terrifyingly evil when they're the size of a duck, can you imagine facing one the size of a horse??