Take the Fury Road, bank the ISO, or buy the farm?

auralgami

I'm in the 3*->4* transition. I just champed IMHB, which is my only 4* champ. Champing IMHB was a no-brainer.

I just now got my 13th cover for Nick Fury, and I can scrounge up the ISO to level/champ him. But it will cost me 288586 to level him. This seems like a lot for a 4* that I keep hearing is weak, only okay, and not terribly game-changing apart from his blue power.

My next closest 4*s are:

X-Force Wolvie at 209 and 11 covers Ant Man at 70 and 10 covers 4Thor at 169 and 9 covers Rulk at 106 and 8 covers Jean at 168 and 7 covers

I could put 68K into Wolvie or 150K into Ant Man or 58K into Rulk. 4Thor and Jean are as high as they can be given their covers.

It could take awhile for any of them, and the highest cover -- X-Force -- is (I keep hearing) also like Fury -- middling and not game changing anymore.

I have champed most of my 3*s. All have max covers, but I have not level/champed: Human Torch, Punisher, Daredevil, Gamora, Colossus, Ragnorok, Sentry, Psylocke, Spider-Man, Beast. They range in level from 120 to 70. Apart from Colossus and Gamora, I don't seem to get too many covers for these guys, and I just sell them when I do. I do happen to have 3 Gamora covers sitting around now.

I opened two LTs today. I got Chulk (ugh) and a 14th Fury cover. Of course I did.

So, now, I have some choices. They are:

1) Level and Champ Fury. Now I would have 2 4* characters and his 14th cover doesn't go to waste.

2) Hold on to the ISO, saving it for 4Thor, Ant Man, Rulk, or Jean as I get covers. Spend ISO as needed here and there.

3) Champ the rest of the 3*s (as I can) and continue to farm 2*.

Option 3 combines an achievable goal (champ all 3*s!) with a plan (use 2* and 3* rewards to eventually fund 4* and 5* land) but it isn't really moving forward, except in building long-term resources.

Option 1 feels like doing something, but the cost is very high for a reward that's average at best. I feel like I would use Fury because he's there, but once someone better comes along, he'll be yesterday's news.

Option 2 is doing nothing and waiting, for the most part.

Thoughts?

sinnerjfl

Iso being scarce, I would not champ Nick Fury, he truly his bottom mid-tier. It's not that he's bad or anything, he's quite good for PVE albeit all of his powers are slow. PVP wise, I'm not sure I'd even run him when he's boosted.

From your max covered 3*'s, I'd champ Beast for certain, he's good at creating special tiles and his green is a more than a decent AOE.
Champ Daredevil too, his stun is pretty good among 3*'s, red's ok but it's a trap so.
Gamora is also another one I'd champ, not the greatest character or anything but she's fun.

Seems your 4*'s arent quite ready and since you only have one champed at the moment, I'd wait for another good 4* to be max-covered
(Thor, Rulk & Jean are all worth it)

Or just keep stockpiling iso, it's not a bad move at all.

fmftint

When in doubt, keep saving.

Huatimus

Champ Beast -> Get covers for Jean
Champ Jean(eventually) -> JeanBuster which should last you till 5* transition.

spectator

Champ fury. You're no where near ready with your other 4* and 3* will go stale even faster than 4*. Fury slow? Try im40 into demolition. Not so slow anymore

ClydeFrog76

I've started levelling my Fury out of pure boredom. He's the only 4* I've got decently covered (5/4/3) other than Baglady, and if I wait for my other 4*s to reach a similar level I'll be sitting here stroking a long grey beard.

The Viceroy Returns

Based on your title, I bet you felt like this when finally champing your IMHB:

But for real advice, as others have said, if your queue doesn't have a cover for a character that is cover maxed and about to expire (meaning a "14th cover"), save save save. This way you can try and mitigate wasting covers for characters that are cover maxed but not champed, so you have to "waste it" by selling it.

This is true for champing 3 stars and 4 stars. In the 3 star roster progression tier, most of them are worth champing. Sentry is terrible though.
In the 4 star progression tier, there are about 5 or 6 characters that are truly not worth it. Off the top of my head, Totally Terrible Hulk, Mr. Fantastic, Starlord, Spider Gwen (her Yellow is hands down the worst 4 star power in the entire game), & probably Elektra. Prof X also if you want a usable Charlie's Angles winfinite team. Otherwise most 4 stars are for the long term investment, if nothing else for their champ level rewards. Generally, you want to try and champ the traditional top 5 = IMHB, Iceman, Jean Grey, Red Hulk, 4Clops. Then as many as you can manage in the tier after that, like Xpool, Thing, Ghost Rider come to mind.
I actually haven't seen an updated ranking in a good while for many months, so I don't know how good the last 9 to 10 4 star characters fair. Most don't have enough covers of them to know how good they are, or if they even are. Hell, my Eddie Venom and Miles Morlaes are still not close to cover maxed, and it's been 8 or so months since their release.

I'm currently under the gun to champ my Xpool cause I have a cover that will expire in 10 or so days.
Once that is done I will save ISO until it happens again.

The only time I advise NOT to save is if a 4DDQ matchup comes up, and your featured 4 star character is decently covered but needs about 5 or 10 levels to ensure a win. Good news is this only really has to be done once, as the 4DDQ matchup doesn't ever change. So once your rostered 4 star character can beat it, you should be able to beat it every time that matchup appears.
I've found that most 4DDQ matchups can be won in a few tries using appropriate +AP boosts with a 8 to 9 covered character at about Level 160 to 170 or so. Cover distribution does matter though; a 1 5 1 Mr. Fan or any of the characters that can go invisible without that power have no chance.

MrCrowley

I am in the same camp as the OP.

I have champed XF-wolvie and IMHB, the rest of my 4s are not fully covered apart from IW which I wont level.

Also I have champed around half the 3s (the good ones).

I am working on soft capping my teen JG, at lvl 220 atm. She sits at 12 covers.

I would recommend waiting for a good 4s to get to full covers or full covers -1 before committing the ISO.
Getting all 3s to lvl 120-125 is a good idea, but I would not champ those that are not useful combos.
Definitely getting IM40, IF and SW champed is a priority if you have not already done that, as they are good combos with much anything.

I think a good strategy is to save up ISO and also sometimes to save cp. Getting the last cover with saved cp on my JG is the next plan.
The last cover can be very problematic if you have something like 5-2-5 build, which means you have to hit exactly the correct cover.

I would not spend ISO if you can rank well enough now in events to gather CP and good flow of ISO.
Getting another 3s maxed is not likely to help with that much, even though there is a temptation to do so.

I play PVP and with some shielding I am able to grab 1.3k prizes from shard 4.
Occasionally I play PVE and also from there my roster is good enough for some 25cp progress rewards.
As long as I can grab those I feel like I can progress.

Wolarsen

OPTION 2!
I would not put ISO on Fury; 300k is a big load of it, and you will miss it when you grab covers of a better char. (If you would not have any champed 4* it could be an interesting option, but having that wonderful IMHB just park Fury, he is big enough to win DPD already)

Champ Beast, he is not too bad and you will get JGrey covers with him.

Polares

Save the iso, sell Fury.

Champing Fury is going to cost you A LOT of iso, and it is not going to help you in your current step of the game. What it is even worse, he will probably screw a little bit more with your MMR and PvE scaling, so I would level him to 220 so you can use him whenever you want and save the iso for your next 4.

Ant man is not super great but it is a much better inversion than Fury or XForce. Dont champ XForce either.

Try to concentrate in:
IMHB, Jean, Iceman, Rhulk, Cyclops, xpool, thing, Punisher, Nova, Kate, Peggy, 4hor (and Kingpin, Carnage, Antman, x23, Miles and Gwen can be also be useful).

PS: I might have forgotten some other good 4, but those are the ones that matter (still undecided with MoonK and WinterS)

metallion

3*s wise, don't bother champing them all unless you have a completionist mindset like me. None of them are probably going to see any playtime beyond essentials and featured PVP. At the most, just go for those that give the top 4*s for champ rewards (Sentry for Rhulk, Beast for Jean), then the rest depends on how much you value them.

4*s wise, don't bother with XFW. He's not worth it anymore, I always start arguing with my alliance mates when they start talking about how XFW is still a good character, no idea what they're thinking. And nope, don't bother with Fury also. He's not bad, it always feels pretty awesome when I get more than 1 trap tile matched away, but there are much better options out there, and considering the ISO needed it's not worth it.

As others have mentioned, hoarding is your best bet till you get more covers for the better 4*s.

Fightmastermpq

Huatimus wrote:

Champ Beast -> Get covers for Jean
Champ Jean(eventually) -> JeanBuster which should last you till 5* transition.

I hear this kind of advice all the time and it's just so bad. I champed something like fifteen 3*s the day the champ feature went live and I have yet to earn even a second cover for a single 4* character from champ rewards. OP still needs SIX JG covers to max her, that Beast is going to be dead weight for a LONG time trying to earn just two of the six he needs. The ISO would be much better spent on a character that will actually make his roster more competitive.

Honestly, in the current 5* meta Ant-Man might not be a terrible choice. Being able to steal OML/Phx strike tiles could allow you to bring down some much bigger teams than other traditional 4* combos. Champing all the 3s is nice, but it won't make you much more competitive. I say work extra hard towards those Ant-Man/Rulk/JG covers when they show up as rewards and just champ whichever one gets to 13 first. If you have 5 blue on your Ant-Man maybe level him and try him out - or wait until he is boosted to see what he would play like if you leveled him. Take this with a grain of salt though as my Ant-Man is only level 100 and is never used.

mpqr7

Never buy iso

madsalad

I have an alliance-mate who swears by Fury. I don't have him champed so I cannot add one way or the other. I do have XFW champed and I will say DO NOT champ him. He is so far down the chain of usable/decent 4*s. He is completely overshadowed by OML and the iso you put into him would be much better used somewhere else.

I would also say if you have a decent stable of champed 3*s to not bother with the rest. I have the top tier 3*s champed, and a few mid tier, and most others I left at 120 or below. The iso that could go into them is better off in 4* or 5* territory. Beast is on my mid to low tier. He was actually one of the last 3*s I decided to champ.

But, everyone is in a different part of their MPQ career so you do what you feel you need to do.

simonsez

Save the ISO, and champ each 3 as they come up in the featured rotation. Fury is nice to have champed, but he wouldn't be a major quality of life improvement.

Hendross

auralgami wrote:

I'm in the 3*->4* transition. I just champed IMHB, which is my only 4* champ. Champing

2) Hold on to the ISO, saving it for 4Thor, Ant Man, Rulk, or Jean as I get covers. Spend ISO as needed here and there.

This. 4Thor is fine if you have IM40. Ignore Antman. Focus on Rulk and Teen Jean

mohio

As someone who championed fury because I had taken him to 240 a way long time ago, so it made sense to, I would agree with those that say he's not a game-changer. That said, I think he's lots of fun to use. Saving up and unleashing a fully powered avengers assemble is awesome, and quite good too. And as you've heard, demolition is a huge nuke, boosted or not. So, will he make a big difference in getting you to 1k or 1300? Probably not. Will he be a fun addition to your team while you collect more covers and iso? Well that's up to you, but probably yes. Now you could just take him to 200 or 220 and use him when boosted so you'll have to decide if that extra 200k iso is worth it.

westnyy2

I agree with many to not max Fury but raise him to 220. He is fun to use but isn't game breaking. I would next focus on the 3's. I firmly believe in no cover goes to waste philosophy. I am rotating my 2's as quickly as possible and every 3 star cover nets me ISO, HP, CP or tokens while making my roster better. It's a long long climb to the top even if you spend. I am fairly content with my influx of ISO from playing PVP, PVE to progression and top 50 and a handful of LR's per week. This coupled with all my champ rewards allows me to max 2 4 stars from scratch (ISO wise not cover) per season.

amusingfoo1

Definitely don't spend on Fury. He's only moderately useful when he's boosted, and not when he isn't. Ditto XFW.

As for your 3*s, I don't think that's a bad idea, in general. Beast, I agree, is pretty good when he's boosted.

But you should mostly be saving for the better 4*s. Polares' list:

Try to concentrate in:
IMHB, Jean, Iceman, Rhulk, Cyclops, xpool, thing, Punisher, Nova, Kate, Peggy, 4hor (and Kingpin, Carnage, Antman, x23, Miles and Gwen can be also be useful).

is quite good. I would add a little bit to it: I don't think XPool and Thing are ones to focus on, unless you do them together. Either one is only ok at the 4* level, though they have obvious and excellent synergy (to those screaming about how good XPool can be: he's invaluable in the 5* transition, but not nearly so much so until then). I wouldn't be strongly considering Thoress either, for the moment, for the simple reason that she doesn't complement your Hulkbuster (they are two of the best "first 4* champion"s out there, though. Iceman being the third). Rulk and Jean are both good complements (Rulk being my preference, at least for PvP), so that's what I'd be thinking about.

Quake is the only one that I would add to Polares' list.

The parenthesized list is all good characters, but also ones that will only be able to carry your team when they're buffed. And when you only have a couple 4* champions, they need to be ones who can carry your team all the time.

To the person who called Gwen's yellow the worst power in 4* land? Three words: "Hot Dog Stand". (Also, while it's a terrible heal, it is an ok accelerator for her red.)

Anyway, just don't be in a rush. Good luck.

Cousin Simpson

Fury was my second 4* champ (after lol XFW), and now with IMHB, XFDP, and Iceman also champed, yeah, I'm not going to be using him much anymore. But he does make a decent TU, I believe.

That said, I think there's something to be said about getting your first 4* champ sooner than later (scaling be damned); IMO, it's easier to champ a 4* WITH a 4* champ.

Sluggo

I am practically in the same boat as you, auralgami. I have a bunch of 3* champs, I just champed my first 4* -- IMHB (followed by X-23) -- and now I'm faced with questions about what to do with upcoming ISO.

In my case, I have a fully-covered XF Wolverine at 165 and a Nick Fury with 11 covers, but I'm not planning to put ISO into either, because my Iceman and Rulk have 10 covers each, and they're absolutely higher priority than those first two.

So my plan is:

- continue to champ an occasional 3* as they come up as rewards in PVE. I'll be swimming in Colossus covers next week, so I might champ him. With 22 3* champs, so that's going to happen less frequently over the next few months, so while I might champ Loki or Doom or Mystique, others like Ragnarok / Sentry / Spidey will go straight to the ISO stockpile.

- Otherwise, I'll be diverting ISO towards Iceman and Rulk in small bits as ISO allows, so when I get my 13th cover, I won't have to break the bank to champ them. Ideally, I'd like to take them from 133 to 200 in the next month, and hope I stumble into a few covers.

In your case, I wouldn't champ Fury at all (or Ant-Man, IMO). I'd sit on the ISO, hope for some Rulk and Jean covers, and see what happens. Maybe you run into a streak of Th4r covers and that becomes an option. Of your remaining 3*s, the only one that jumps out at me is Torch (who I love playing boosted with IM40), but I think stockpiling ISO for the time being is the way to go.