Talk me out of becoming a "wallet warrior"

Unknown

As a 2 to 3 star transitioner I know I'm supposed to take my lumps and go through the "paying my dues" period but it's starting to get irritating. This season was particularly brutal. I set what I thought was a modest goal of 800pts in PVP for non popular 3 stars like Storm or Captain Marvel. Nope once I hit maybe 400 to 500 I get the crud kicked out of me. My equilibrium point seems to be 200 to 300 pts. which seems low even for a transitioner. To make things worse whatever tokens I earn in the events turn out to be 2 stars. I only pulled GSBW and LCap from the 10 pack. Thank goodness for DDQ and the lucky 3 stars from the standard packs. I'm also working PVE to at least grab whatever progression awards I can get.

I was thinking maybe next payday I should just get a Stark salary and just buy 16 covers for "the big four". I have an IF 1/3/1, Cyc 1/1/3, Cage 4/1/1, KK 2/2/3. If I buy 4 covers for each maybe that could make me a little bit better and put my transition in high gear. I'm also scared to do this because I just know with my luck they'll get nerfed and /or they'll have a big HP sale once I spend some hard earned cash.

What do you guys think? Am I being too impatient? Should I just tough it out for another few months?

Unknown

nooooo's theorem: If you use the phrase "next payday", you do not have money to spend on a F2P game.

snlf25

Covers will come. This is not a game of immediate gratification. Get your 4k point 10 pack every season, if you are having bad luck with tokens start hoarding, spend a couple bucks here and there to add roster slots if you need to. Play DDQ every day and you will get a better roster.

Lee T

If collecting is not a drive and if you have the disposable income, why not.

If collecting is important for you then you shouldn't. When I researched how F2P this game really was I stumbled upon a post by a guy who had spent a ton of money buying covers. Ironically he almost stopped playing, because what drove him to play was the collection he so craved.

I did spend money on this game, but I spent it all on roster slot. i have yet to buy a cover because it's more fun for me to earn it the long way (which thanks to DDQ is not that long anyway).

jffdougan

I went through what you're describing for a season or two as they were messing with PVP matchmaking and scoring. then, all of a sudden, this season I'm regularly breaking 500. I've only got Patch at level 166 and LThor at 153, but a bunch of others at 140. I broke 650 once, during one of the ID4 events, and it took me 15 health packs to do it.

Then again, I spend HP to shield once in a blue moon.

Unknown

they will nerf whatever characters u plan to buy, only buy roster slots

atomzed

raisinbman wrote:

they will nerf whatever characters u plan to buy, only buy roster slots

If I buy covers for Bagman, will they begin to nerf Bagman?

morph3us

How many days are you at, Stooge?

Personally, I think we're all in this game to have fun playing it. If it's going to enhance your enjoyment to start kicking butt with some fully covered 3*s, then I think you should do it.

I would say, wait for a sale, though.

nwman

If spending money will save you time, and this time is worth more than the money you spend then it is for sure worth it.

But things in this game are expensive, covers are a decent route, but beware you might get exactly the covers you need right after you buy them.

With that said, it might be worth spending to raise up those guys 1 cover under each cover you intend to level to, that way you can still "win" those final covers, and have that satisfaction.

If you want 5/5/3 buy to 4/4/2 for example... I know the 5th cover is the payday cover, but maybe go to 4 and see what the next pve, or pvp reward is first, because sometimes you buy the 5th and the very next event has it as progression.

Unknown

I agree with nwman and morph3us. If spending makes the game play more enjoyable for you, then by all means. I personally feel that the weekly boosted characters actually hurt the 2* to 3* transitioners in PVP and I can sympathize with that feeling of helplessness. You should still fare pretty well in PVE since you should not be chug into the same bracket as the vets.

Vhailorx

mpqstooge:

Spending or not is a choice that you will have to make based on your comfort with the expense. So don't listen to people here with respect to whether/how much to spend. Do whatever you are comfortable with.

That said, if you DO want to spend money on the game, you have probably selected the top 4 3*s to target. Unfortunately, I doubt that "just" a stark salary will get you what you want, since you would also need iso to level those characters afterwards. and in any event, 4 covers for each of those characters still won't make them well-covered, so their utility will remain limited.

In general, I think the most efficient way to use money to increase your progress speed is to drop $20-50 on HP and immediately buy as many roster slots as you can get. That way you will never have to sell a 3* or 4*, and can gradually build up your entire roster (if you are forced to sell 1/2 of the 3* covers you get for lack of roster space, it will take you much much longer to build a roster, and there is some risk that you will keep drawing the covers you previously sold and never get more covers for the 3*s you kept).

acquiring covers will still take time, maybe even months, but you will eventually get 10+ covers for a few decent 3*s. That is when things will really take off as you can start competing a bit more easily.

Unfortunately, I don't know that many vets can give you more specific advice about ideal target levels in pvp for a 2* roster because pvp has changed so drastically since I last used a 2* roster regularly. So I have no idea if 400-500 is low or not. In general, I would recommend either entering brackets late and climbing as high as you can as fast as you can and looking for better placement, or entering early, climbing to your equilibrium point, letting everyone heal up, and then making a 10 healthpack rush with less than 3 hours left in the event. Use a 3-hour shield when you run out of health packs.

Also, your 2* roster should be quite viable in PVE, so be sure to join a top 100-pve alliance to make sure you get the extra 3* cover. they will start to add up faster than you might think.

Tannen

If you're that irritated with the system, go ahead spend some cash. Having said that, spending becomes a slippery slope, and it's much easier to justify spending cash consecutive times than it is the first. As people have said above, the things you buy will almost certainly either drop for you the day after you purchase them, or they'll be nerfed. Don't stress when it happens, just be aware that it will happen.

Some things that might want to consider -

- What slice do you join to pvp?
-- Sometimes picking "popular" slices is a god idea, as the points that your team gives will be lower than the juicy, juicy 70+ pointers at the top -- if there are enough people in there.

- When do you join that slice?
-- Caveat to the top consideration. If you join the slice right at the start, you'll be the only person in there and thus everyone's target. Joining later will give you more breathing room as there are more teams (hopefully more tempting) in there for people to hit.

- When do you play that slice?
-- The last eight hours of your slice is the most important time for that slice. Full stop. This is when the slice is full of high point targets and thus is the most active time for that slice. If you get too high during this time, you'll be eaten. It can be a good time to start playing, as people are looking for high level targets. It also has the benefit of possibly putting you in a new slice, which would get you a better run at the high-level prizes. This can also work well if you enter in the last hour / 45 mins of the slice, but you'll have to be quite aggressive with your point gain at that time.



- What team do you run?
-- Running max level, buffed 2*s (esp ares/thor, widow/storm, wolv/daken) will be far more effective a deterrent than running under-covered 3*s. Even more so if those 3*s are under-levelled for the covers that they have. I was running max widow/wolv + thor/storm when I started my 3* transition (ares wasn't released yet), while I concede that I've been out of the 2* game for a long time, they were the only 2*s needed to really start pushing 3*s.

- When to swap.
-- Caveat to what team, know when your 3*s are ready to swap in as replacements for your 2*. That'll be around the time that they have 10 covers, and are at least level 110. Anything under that will look VERY tasty.



- Iso.
-- Are you doing DPDQ every day for iso? Are you entering Lightning Rounds for Iso? Use that iso to max the 2*s that you have and to start building the 3*s that you have up. If you're still iso starved, consider just joining pvp for covers / iso (ie don't go for progression rewards and don't worry about losing points, just play "easy matches" for the covers/iso rewards).

And if you knew all of the above and thus don't care for the unsolicited, general pvp advice, all good.

Cheers,
- T

jimstarooney

mpqstooge wrote:

As a 2 to 3 star transitioner I know I'm supposed to take my lumps and go through the "paying my dues" period but it's starting to get irritating. This season was particularly brutal. I set what I thought was a modest goal of 800pts in PVP for non popular 3 stars like Storm or Captain Marvel. Nope once I hit maybe 400 to 500 I get the crud kicked out of me. My equilibrium point seems to be 200 to 300 pts. which seems low even for a transitioner. To make things worse whatever tokens I earn in the events turn out to be 2 stars. I only pulled GSBW and LCap from the 10 pack. Thank goodness for DDQ and the lucky 3 stars from the standard packs. I'm also working PVE to at least grab whatever progression awards I can get.

I was thinking maybe next payday I should just get a Stark salary and just buy 16 covers for "the big four". I have an IF 1/3/1, Cyc 1/1/3, Cage 4/1/1, KK 2/2/3. If I buy 4 covers for each maybe that could make me a little bit better and put my transition in high gear. I'm also scared to do this because I just know with my luck they'll get nerfed and /or they'll have a big HP sale once I spend some hard earned cash.

What do you guys think? Am I being too impatient? Should I just tough it out for another few months?

You will still get kicked down unless any of those big 4 are buffed for the week but u will transition faster.in this game if u havent got patience or $$$$ then u not goin to enjoy

Unknown

mpqstooge wrote:

I was thinking maybe next payday I should just get a Stark salary and just buy 16 covers for "the big four". I have an IF 1/3/1, Cyc 1/1/3, Cage 4/1/1, KK 2/2/3. If I buy 4 covers for each maybe that could make me a little bit better and put my transition in high gear.

If you want to spend to speed up your transition, do NOT buy 4 covers for each of these. At 9- 10 covers they will be playable but if I see underlvled (and undercovered) 3's it just screams "hit me" to me. Instead, I would advice you to buy 8 covers for IF and 7 (possibly 6, I think Cage is coming up in the ddq soonish) for Cage to max them. They are super effective and do not need a third character to kick **** in pvp or pve. In the sentry pvp, I used Cage and If (along with my unlvled sentry) to get all the way to 1000. It did take me two shields though, since using a lvl70 featured character also makes your team a tempting target. Every time I would go over 800 the attacks would start coming in, so I used my first shield at 880, waited until the attacks slowed to a crawl, unshielded, got to 945, shielded again and played one last game right before the slice ended to get to the 1k progression.

That said, I was in your position a while ago and decided to slog it out, because I know myself and I would not enjoy getting powerful characters I did not "earn" through playing.

Zen808

Here's something else to think about if you're going to spend money. iTunes and Google Play gift cards are always going on sale somewhere. 10% off is pretty common (at least for iTunes), and a lot of times I can find 15% off or BOGO 25% off. Obvious places like Best Buy and Target, but also Office Max/Depot occasionally. A couple of times got 20% at Safeway of all places.

Also, Anniversary is coming up. I can't imagine that they wouldn't run an HP sale for that. Stack the savings.

getterwing

Vhailorx wrote:

mpqstooge:

That said, if you DO want to spend money on the game, you have probably selected the top 4 3*s to target. Unfortunately, I doubt that "just" a stark salary will get you what you want, since you would also need iso to level those characters afterwards. and in any event, 4 covers for each of those characters still won't make them well-covered, so their utility will remain limited.

In general, I think the most efficient way to use money to increase your progress speed is to drop $20-50 on HP and immediately buy as many roster slots as you can get. That way you will never have to sell a 3* or 4*, and can gradually build up your entire roster (if you are forced to sell 1/2 of the 3* covers you get for lack of roster space, it will take you much much longer to build a roster, and there is some risk that you will keep drawing the covers you previously sold and never get more covers for the 3*s you kept).

excellent advice.

I am currently in level 94 (** and *** ). I would say that 300 point in PVP is quite low. I usually get around 500 point in PVP with my level 94 teams(mostly **), sometimes get to around 700 and even 800 if the featured characters is not popular and I have good covers of s/he.

advice for low level players(like myself): when the PVP start, fight the low level seed teams to earn the easy points, then wait 1 day and earn some more PVP, but don't get into top 100 to avoid being attacked by other players. then wait until half day before the PVP end, and start playing and gain as many points as you can.

IlDuderino

After six months of grinding back in the day to cover Punisher and almost cover Thor I bit the bullet and bought enough HP to max Thor and Daken - brilliant investment as I had a rainbow team and the cover rewards rolled in after.

It will all come in time, but I was impatient and the rewards really paid off as I could join a top alliance for more HP and cover rewards.

Also it's nice to support the devs. I have spent a lot on the game but the amount per hour played is not high.

Malcrof

I ave spent money in this game, loads of roster slots, but also some token packs.. why? because i love the gambling feature in the token packs.. that thrill of seeing a gold icon and wonder "oo what did i win!"

The only direct covers i buy are either final to finish a char, or a 5th cover in an ability.. may make an exception soon, my 4/3/1 Black Panther is beginning to irk me in that i have sold 7 or 8 blue covers for him, yet can never get a black one...(and no, not going to bring blue to 5 just to level, would rather take the 500 iso since i know what build i want)

I vote if you spend money on something other than roster slots, go with token packs.

But with the Anniversary coming up, and the ensuing events and very very nice tokens that will come with it.. i would wait until then.

TxMoose

I spent to kickstart my transition - bought 3 each on loki and thor which took me from not being able to finish t100, to finishing t100. later bought my 5th red on cap for the imhb event where without caps 5-red, would have been really hard to get the hb. so I'm ok with buying, but I have to agree with nooooooooo that the comment about 'next pay day' really probably means you shouldn't be spending that much on a mobile game. if you do buy, I think it only makes sense if it will significantly improve your performance. I would get a key pair to 166 and then others to 140 - that is when you can really start to perform. however, unless you have iso to level them, I wouldn't buy anyway because a covered pair at 120 or 140 is just a ripe target for anything above 500 or so - and buying iso is only for the superwhales.

PeterGibbons316

Malcrof wrote:

I vote if you spend money on something other than roster slots, go with token packs.

I strongly disagree with this. The draw rate is too low, and the character pool too large for this to make sense. If you are wanting to be more competitive in the game, then you need to target certain covers on certain characters, and not leave it up to chance.

Don't get me wrong, I have bought tokens in the past, and I like to gamble on single discounted tokens (50 for the Independence Day Vault was a great deal IMO), but if you aren't wanting to be regularly spending money on the game then you probably shouldn't be buying token packs.


I'll second the comments on ISO too - if you don't have enough ISO to take your 3* characters to 166 you might as well save your money*. Take some time to build up the ISO that you need, and THEN spend the money on the covers. Who knows - you might happen to earn some of the covers you would have paid for in that time.

*I suppose under-leveled 3*s can be effective in PvE, but so can a full roster of 2* characters - if you are going to spend money, it should be to become more competitive in PvP.

JVReal

I'm F2P, been playing since October.

I avoided PVP at first and focused on PVE. When my 2* were maxed and I started transitioning to 3*, I would only get to about 300 in PVP before hitting a wall of characters I couldn't beat. That is fine, it gets you an event token and if you do about 300 in each PVP and push to 1K in Shield Simulator you should have no problem hitting the 4K for the 10 pack for the season... it will take you right up to the end that way... but once you hit that, you know you can push a little further next Season. I did find that as an early transitioner, I did find easier teams to beat and hit my 300 points by joining early. When I joined later, there were more people, but also bigger teams.

Pushing to a little over 300 each PVP allowed me to also play my normal grind in PVE since it didn't take too many health packs to hit 300.

Next Season go for 500 each PVP, and you will begin to get the feel for where you are at, who you can beat, and how far you can push with the Health Packs you have.

If you spend HP, as was said before, Roster Slots, Roster Slots, Roster Slots... you will have your 3* in your inventory for a long time building up. Also once you start getting a bit higher in PVP, and you want to have higher Season score so you can merc yourself out at the end of the season to a decent Alliance (and if they like you they might ask you to stick around) you may want to spend a little bit on shields. This is when I switched to starting PVP late, so I can do one big climb between 2-7 hours before PVP slice ends and then shield when i'm out of health packs or when I start getting hit faster than I can climb. If you hit 800 and have your cover, you can throw an 8 hour shield and stay till the end... or you can throw a 3 hour and try to shield hop a little bit later.

Once you are in a good alliance, and hitting 800 regularly, and you now have more required covers for DDQ, your progress will speed up dramatically... you may even decide that PVE is just not for you anymore unless the rewards are a new character or the elusive cover you haven't been able to get anywhere.

I've never bought a cover, but from what people here on the forums say, only buy the covers you need, when it's the elusive last one to spec your vital character out.