Thick as Thieves progression rewards

DFiPL

Somebody help me understand why it's a good idea to lock people out from the progression rewards by having any kind of real progression require that you have a newly introduced cover that only a handful of people were able to earn in the last event.

I don't have a Kamala Khan cover so no chance I'm going to reach 65k, but if past experience when these sort of lockouts occur is anything to go by I probably don't even have a chance of reaching the event token or the hero points.

I'm playing the event because I'm Pavlovian but I really don't see what the benefit for me is here. My power boost and stockpile boosts are both maxed out, my Captain America (Modern) and Human Torch (Johnny Storm) are both fully covered, and without the essential character I have no real shot at a decent finish, let alone the higher end progression rewards.

Makes me think I'd be better off giving this event a miss and playing something else.

dkffiv

DFiPL wrote:

Somebody help me understand why it's a good idea to lock people out from the progression rewards by having any kind of real progression require that you have a newly introduced cover that only a handful of people were able to earn in the last event.

I don't have a MissStretchyPants cover so no chance I'm going to reach 65k, but if past experience when these sort of lockouts occur is anything to go by I probably don't even have a chance of reaching the event token or the hero points.

I'm playing the event because I'm Pavlovian but I really don't see what the benefit for me is here. My power boost and stockpile boosts are both maxed out, my BoyScout (Modern) and MrHatesRain (Johnny MohawkSoldSeparately) are both fully covered, and without the essential character I have no real shot at a decent finish, let alone the higher end progression rewards.

Makes me think I'd be better off giving this event a miss and playing something else.

As I recall they did this last Halloween for Blade. Event before was for 2* Marvel which everyone skipped because they didn't need a 2*. Lots of negative feedback (and I think the following event was Gauntlet so you didn't even get a Blade cover for progression). Its been almost 6 months so they figured people forgot.

The cynical response is they expect you to buy cover packs until you get a Kamala so you can do the essentials.

DFiPL

That's cute. I hope they're prepared for disappointment. I'm not a "whale" by any means, but I do spend money on the game when I'm having fun.

I'm not going to spend money when I feel like there's an "or else" implicit, though.

Unknown

dkffiv wrote:

DFiPL wrote:

Somebody help me understand why it's a good idea to lock people out from the progression rewards by having any kind of real progression require that you have a newly introduced cover that only a handful of people were able to earn in the last event.

I don't have a MissStretchyPants cover so no chance I'm going to reach 65k, but if past experience when these sort of lockouts occur is anything to go by I probably don't even have a chance of reaching the event token or the hero points.

I'm playing the event because I'm Pavlovian but I really don't see what the benefit for me is here. My power boost and stockpile boosts are both maxed out, my BoyScout (Modern) and MrHatesRain (Johnny MohawkSoldSeparately) are both fully covered, and without the essential character I have no real shot at a decent finish, let alone the higher end progression rewards.

Makes me think I'd be better off giving this event a miss and playing something else.

As I recall they did this last Halloween for SparklyVampKiller. Event before was for 2* Marvel which everyone skipped because they didn't need a 2*. Lots of negative feedback (and I think the following event was Gauntlet so you didn't even get a SparklyVampKiller cover for progression). Its been almost 6 months so they figured people forgot.

The cynical response is they expect you to buy cover packs until you get a MissStretchyPants so you can do the essentials.

Remember when 4* Thor was the essential in the PvE that introduced Rocket?

Seriously don't make a new character essential for a new character. **** is wrong with you d3p

Unknown

DFiPL wrote:

Somebody help me understand why it's a good idea to lock people out from the progression rewards by having any kind of real progression require that you have a newly introduced cover that only a handful of people were able to earn in the last event.

I don't have a MissStretchyPants cover so no chance I'm going to reach 65k, but if past experience when these sort of lockouts occur is anything to go by I probably don't even have a chance of reaching the event token or the hero points.

I'm playing the event because I'm Pavlovian but I really don't see what the benefit for me is here. My power boost and stockpile boosts are both maxed out, my BoyScout (Modern) and MrHatesRain (Johnny MohawkSoldSeparately) are both fully covered, and without the essential character I have no real shot at a decent finish, let alone the higher end progression rewards.

Makes me think I'd be better off giving this event a miss and playing something else.

I'm PRETTY sure this isn't true. An alliance mate hit the Blade cover for Brotherhood with no blade, and then used that cover to do essentials in the last 2 subs for top 150. I'm betting the same would hold here. Progression rewards are there for the people who put the time in to get them.

Not to mention the PvP awarding KK will be happening very very soon, probably Friday.

Also, ha ha Johnny MohawkSoldSeparately

Unknown

I can't think of an event besides Simulator Basic where it's remotely difficult to hit the progression task if you were playing during the whole event, unless you simply can't beat at least half of the nodes and even then it's questionable. And if you're asking the question 'how can I possibly compete without the essential character'? Well, if you didn't make T100 in the last event what makes you think thing it's suddenly going to change now? Especially for a more prestigious character and far harsher requirement at T50?

Zen808

IIRC, the 4* Intro PVEs are trivially easy to hit the progressions, because the wackos... Er, I mean, the hardcore guys tend to drive the scores super high, and the rubberband along with it.

DFiPL

Lerysh wrote:

DFiPL wrote:

Somebody help me understand why it's a good idea to lock people out from the progression rewards by having any kind of real progression require that you have a newly introduced cover that only a handful of people were able to earn in the last event.

I don't have a MissStretchyPants cover so no chance I'm going to reach 65k, but if past experience when these sort of lockouts occur is anything to go by I probably don't even have a chance of reaching the event token or the hero points.

I'm playing the event because I'm Pavlovian but I really don't see what the benefit for me is here. My power boost and stockpile boosts are both maxed out, my BoyScout (Modern) and MrHatesRain (Johnny MohawkSoldSeparately) are both fully covered, and without the essential character I have no real shot at a decent finish, let alone the higher end progression rewards.

Makes me think I'd be better off giving this event a miss and playing something else.

I'm PRETTY sure this isn't true. An alliance mate hit the SparklyVampKiller cover for Brotherhood with no SparklyVampKiller, and then used that cover to do essentials in the last 2 subs for top 150. I'm betting the same would hold here. Progression rewards are there for the people who put the time in to get them.

Except frequently most of the points are loaded into the 'essential' nodes. I saw this last event with Blade (whom I had going in and was able to get the progression for). The essential nodes were often worth 800-900 at full points, while the 'base' nodes were worth 100 or so. Good luck getting to 65k when the only nodes you can play are the ones that give you a pittance in event points. At 6d12h for event length, I need 10k points per 24h period (and 5k in the final 12) to get there. Family Reunion runs 18h, so I'd need 15k total from that to stay on pace. Now tell me how I'm supposed to get the 14300 or so I still need from the node when I'm at 640 currently and my available options are: 90 (4h51 remaining on cooldown), 116 (5h6m), 143 (5h) 223 (5h13m), 370 (lost that one once thanks to Stark's Freon Beam). Do you see a path to 9300 points there in the next 31 hours? Do you think any amount of obsessive no-sleep/no-shower/no-life play is going to get me close to 15k by the end of Family Reunion?

No? Then kindly get out of here with "Progression rewards are there for the people who put the time in to get them." I chase them in every PVE I tackle. I don't worry about ranking rewards, but I do put in the time to chase progression rewards. And there is no path from where I am to where I want to be in this event because the devs are so focused on making Kamala Khan desirable that they're essentially locking out anybody who didn't finish top 150 in the previous event. Or, to be fair, anybody who isn't prepared to spend $2/pull at 2% odds to maybe get one from a TaT cover pack (or $20/80 for the bigger packs at 4% odds).

That changes it from "put the time in" to "put the money in." So...yeah. I'm better off playing something else right now, because the devs have decided that if I'm not willing to spend until I get a cover, and if I wasn't able to finish top 150 in the last event, there shouldn't be anything here for me except for 70/100/200/standard tokens in the sub-events my roster can handle. Thanks, guys.

DFiPL

Phantron wrote:

I can't think of an event besides Simulator Basic where it's remotely difficult to hit the progression task if you were playing during the whole event, unless you simply can't beat at least half of the nodes and even then it's questionable. And if you're asking the question 'how can I possibly compete without the essential character'? Well, if you didn't make T100 in the last event what makes you think thing it's suddenly going to change now? Especially for a more prestigious character and far harsher requirement at T50?

It's not even necessarily the cover reward at 65000 I'm concerned about. I finished just outside the top 150 for the last event, and because I had Blade, I was able to reach his cover despite only finishing top 200 overall. This is a case of 'here's this character we just introduced who only a handful of you had the opportunity to win and now we're going to make that character essential so that those of you who couldn't earn the cover in the last event aren't going to see much of value this event, either." I don't know. Maybe the next few days are going to have higher point totals for non-essential events and maybe I'm not going to see level 130 characters waiting for me in the first couple of fights.

I'm not optimistic.

NighteyesGrisu

well, top 150 per bracket isn't really 'only a handful' but I get the point that it's bad to require a freshly introduced char for the next pve.

the much bigger issue for me with TaT is that once again it'll be a top50 event (both for individual and alliance rewards). I probably won't bother with that.

Quebbster

gamar wrote:

Remember when 4* Thor was the essential in the PvE that introduced Rocket?

Seriously don't make a new character essential for a new character. **** is wrong with you d3p

I think you mean Gamora, not Rocket. It was the Meet Rocket&Groot PvE, but the first iteration rewarded Thor and the second Gamora.

Unknown

DFiPL wrote:

Phantron wrote:

I can't think of an event besides Simulator Basic where it's remotely difficult to hit the progression task if you were playing during the whole event, unless you simply can't beat at least half of the nodes and even then it's questionable. And if you're asking the question 'how can I possibly compete without the essential character'? Well, if you didn't make T100 in the last event what makes you think thing it's suddenly going to change now? Especially for a more prestigious character and far harsher requirement at T50?

It's not even necessarily the cover reward at 65000 I'm concerned about. I finished just outside the top 150 for the last event, and because I had Blade, I was able to reach his cover despite only finishing top 200 overall. This is a case of 'here's this character we just introduced who only a handful of you had the opportunity to win and now we're going to make that character essential so that those of you who couldn't earn the cover in the last event aren't going to see much of value this event, either." I don't know. Maybe the next few days are going to have higher point totals for non-essential events and maybe I'm not going to see level 130 characters waiting for me in the first couple of fights.

I'm not optimistic.

It's basically been this way forever. PvE is a train you can't hop off. Last cover reward will be both essential and progression reward in next event. Unless it's a 4* in which case it's just Essential.

DFiPL

NighteyesGrisu wrote:

well, top 150 per bracket isn't really 'only a handful' but I get the point that it's bad to require a freshly introduced char for the next pve.

the much bigger issue for me with TaT is that once again it'll be a top50 event (both for individual and alliance rewards). I probably won't bother with that.

It's the top 15% of any given bracket, assuming that each bracket has 1000 players. Looking, it turns out I finished 152 in mine. So I missed that essential cover by two spots because I didn't quite grind enough before going to bed at 5 am. My reward: I don't get to do the essential nodes this time. Lovely.

Boosting the character who was the reward the previous time out, especially if he/she is a new release, I can see. Making that character esssential the next time out is not something I can fully characterize my opinion of without resulting to vulgarity.

DFiPL

Lerysh wrote:

DFiPL wrote:

Phantron wrote:

I can't think of an event besides Simulator Basic where it's remotely difficult to hit the progression task if you were playing during the whole event, unless you simply can't beat at least half of the nodes and even then it's questionable. And if you're asking the question 'how can I possibly compete without the essential character'? Well, if you didn't make T100 in the last event what makes you think thing it's suddenly going to change now? Especially for a more prestigious character and far harsher requirement at T50?

It's not even necessarily the cover reward at 65000 I'm concerned about. I finished just outside the top 150 for the last event, and because I had Blade, I was able to reach his cover despite only finishing top 200 overall. This is a case of 'here's this character we just introduced who only a handful of you had the opportunity to win and now we're going to make that character essential so that those of you who couldn't earn the cover in the last event aren't going to see much of value this event, either." I don't know. Maybe the next few days are going to have higher point totals for non-essential events and maybe I'm not going to see level 130 characters waiting for me in the first couple of fights.

I'm not optimistic.

It's basically been this way forever. PvE is a train you can't hop off. Last cover reward will be both essential and progression reward in next event. Unless it's a 4* in which case it's just Essential.

"it's been this way forever" doesn't mean "this is the way it should be done." I know that's how it works, I've observed it happen often enough before that if I see someone is a finish reward, I know they're likely to be essential the next time out. MOST of the time that character is established and there have been opportunities to acquire them previously.

This ain't that sort of case, though.

Unknown

Pretty much not true, given the character release schedule lately. At least 50% of PvEs are going to be for new characters, so the other 50% will have those new characters as required characters. They have also expanded access to the new character by putting them in tokens during their release event, plus the increased odds of her in TaT tokens. Then her PvP release which should be happening soon. There's access to covers if you play for them.

I'm with you in saying that it sucks, and I wish every new character could have a release event like Hulk or Sentry so everyone can get 1 cover. Alas, it is not so. BUT, the progression reward should be generally attainable without a Kamala Khan, which seemed to be your point of contention in your OP. And if you placed 152 in the last PvE (with having the essential), odds are not good of placing top 50 for a Kingpin this time, with or without a KK.

DFiPL

Lerysh wrote:

Pretty much not true, given the character release schedule lately. At least 50% of PvEs are going to be for new characters, so the other 50% will have those new characters as required characters. They have also expanded access to the new character by putting them in tokens during their release event, plus the increased odds of her in TaT tokens. Then her PvP release which should be happening soon. There's access to covers if you play for them.

I'm with you in saying that it sucks, and I wish every new character could have a release event like Hulk or Sentry so everyone can get 1 cover. Alas, it is not so. BUT, the progression reward should be generally attainable without a Kamala Khan, which seemed to be your point of contention in your OP. And if you placed 152 in the last PvE (with having the essential), odds are not good of placing top 50 for a Kingpin this time, with or without a KK.

I'm not worried about Kingpin. That's a finish reward, and I don't chase those. I just take the ones I get. I'm talking about progression rewards. There just aren't enough points in the first node for me to have a shot at the 15k I need to stay 'on track' to reach 65k. Never mind the regular event token. And I'm not likely to get event tokens for daily finishes without the essential, so.

Unknown

I can almost guarantee, like 98% positive, that you can make the progression reward by the end of the event without having a Kamala Khan. You just won't make it by the end of sub 2 like the top 10 grinders. Have some faith and pile on the points.

Unknown

You forget that each sub have progressively more points awarded so you don't 'need' to hit 15k mark in first one. And I believe this event also have more nodes open in later subs, but might be wrong.

Xenoberyll

Alliance mates of mine have reached the progression rewards in different PVE events without the doing essential nodes. People with the essential character will have it faster but so far there was still enough points to get to reach the top of reward progression by doing the non essential nodes only.

SnagglePuss

Nivrax wrote:

You forget that each sub have progressively more points awarded so you don't 'need' to hit 15k mark in first one. And I believe this event also have more nodes open in later subs, but might be wrong.

This, points increase per sub. You should make it about 3/4 of the way through without the essential, 1/2 with the esesntial. Just regular clears and not the crazy grind to 0

Top 50... depends on your slice. For ISO, alliance mate scraped 48th with 101k. Would have been top 20 and taken the last sub of in the one i was in.

Unknown

Points per mission increase dramatically in the later subs, so if something is tuned to be require a reasonable amount of total effort to hit, then you'd not expect to be anywhere close to hitting it based on the first day rate since those missions are worth way less than the ones after it. Now that doesn't mean just ignore things and hope you'll pick up 65K in the last 2 days, but there's really nothing to worry about if you're putting in a decent overall effort.