New Feature: Bonus Heroes! *Updated (3/1/17)

kidicarus

killercool wrote:

kidicarus wrote:

How about this:

keep tokens as they are. ie 12 newest 4*s and the curated 20 3*s

BUT change the way bonus heroes operate so that you still get a bonus chance for a favourite hero and also to include that hero as a possible non bonus draw.

So, if you wanted to favourite HB, you'd get the a 1:14 chance of pulling from 12+1=13 4*s and an additional bonus 1:20/1:12 chance of pulling HB.

Newbies get to razor focus on covering from a select pool of heroes as decided by D3

Vets get to "choose your own adventure" by choosing to dilute the pool by as many favourites as they want. Favourite an additional 28 heroes, you dilute your pool of 4*s so that you have an even chance of pulling 40 4*s and a slight bias of pulling your favourited 28 heroes as bonus pulls.

Best part is, you never have to pull another bag lady or non-agent venom if you don't want to. Personally I have 44/47 4* champs and would focus on covering new heroes at the start of the season and then diluting my pool of heroes once I have new heroes covered.

I think this ignores the biggest issue with vaulting, as it only works for one (or a very small number) of the vaulted 4*s. If you favorite all (or most) of the vaulted 4*s the chance of pulling one of the vaulted 4*s is vanishingly small compared to the latest 12. This largely invalidates the 4* champion system. It also means you get a flood of new 4* covers that people will not have sufficient ios-8 to level before they have to start selling off excess covers, whereas before there was a balance of older covers to feed your champs and new covers to diversify your roster.

I think that the majority of people are happy to allow D3 a significant amount of time to work out how to untangle the mess that has been created with the current vaulting model, but it would be nice if D3 were able to provide some sort of statement of intent in the mean time to let us know what their goals are.

One of the biggest complaints I hear is the - oh great another 4* I can't use for another year. Getting new covers is a good thing. Not getting old covers is what most people are upset about.

Maybe you're not getting what I'm getting at but what I just suggested allows a player to affect his odds directly rather than just leaving it to the bonus draw.

With 45 heroes in the 4* pool, under the old system you have a 0.33% in heroics or 1.89% in legendary tokens of getting a 4* hero of your choice.

In the current implementation, new heroes have a flat rate of 1.25% in heroics or 7.08% chance in legendaries while you have 0% chance of getting your 4* classic hero in a regular draw and 100% in 5% of your 4* pulls which is 0.75% in heroics or 4.25% in legendary draws and it's is plain to see that you will be flooded with new heroes and if you only want 1 hero ever - which is no one - it's great odds for that favourited hero and bad odds for everyone else.

My suggestion with starring a hero(es) would result in the following bad math:-

For ONE ol' skool character, Heroics tokens (since pool is now 13 heroes) = 1.15% regular draw + additional 0.75% bonus draw, legendary tokens = 6.5% regular draw + 4.25% bonus draw -

For starring 33 ol' skool characters Heroic tokens (since pool is now 45 heroes) = 0.33% regular draw + additional 0.022% bonus draw, legendary tokens = 1.89% regular draw + (4.25%/33)=0.12% bonus draw. This is pretty similar to the old rates.

So if you do decide to star ol skool and new heroes - the only difference would be the diluted bonus draw. Therefore my suggestion would not result in a rush of new characters if every hero were starred.

Anyway there have been so many suggestions and mine is just one of many.

Magic

The complaint about not getting new covers fast enough was not really that big around the forum (prior to the change). People were all the time complaining only because some of the new ones (Peggy, Medusa, Carol) were gamechanging. Nobody was complaining about not getting enough Agent Venom covers.

Yet with slightly above average play (so top 50 for PvE, 900 points in PvP, top10-50 in new releases) i have covered the current "new" 12 very decently. To such a degree that I already have to sell covers for them as I lack ISO to level them. So my hoarding is in full swing. Even bloody Coulson (not yet in packs) is already at 6 covers and I didn't try very hard. No - getting new covers was never that much of an issue (even if it seemed like it on the surface).

The real problem is lack of ISO. Or the timer on the covers in the queue. Remove the timer and people will roll with you for another couple of years.

Ram51

Jaedenkaal wrote:

Given how much players seem to really want that pool of old 4* characters in tokens it could even make sense to raise the value of a classic token back up to 25cp.

I'm all up for increasing the price of classic LTs to 25cp if they also introduce a vault for old 4*. Like, one season you have only the first 13 4* characters available, then next season the 2nd batch of 13 4*. Then have it alternate every season.

nickaraxnos

I have read lot of solutions and problems can come with each.
Tried to see the problem from both sides. As a player and as a dev.
This is what i came up with.

1) Legendary Token with the latest covers and Bonus Heroes as is now but with 10% chance. Make that at a price of 30 cp. Why? Because with the new ddq old players with big rosters can get extra 2cp every day so they can afford the extra 5cp plus they won;t hoard too much. They obviously can be happy with the extra chance of getting a Bonus Hero of their choice plus the extra cost will separate them from other players

2) Classic Token with everything else WITHOUT Bonus Hero. Make that at price of 15-18 cp. Why? Because new players find it difficult to collect cp. It will be a good way to make the transition from 3* to 4* characters. Transitioning is more important than having new heroes. Old ones are capable to compete with new ones and they will still be a step behind older players. Think its fair.

3) Make a ddq once a week with only 4* required characters that will give as a reward a colorless cover. Now old players that will be getting a lot of duplicates can be happy and the devs won't give too much

4) About the iso problem. An easy fix is to give us the opportunity to reset every week the prologue stories. Let's say we pay 300hp and get a reset. Easy and fast iso, some hp and few 2* for more hp from farming

5) After the introduction of elite tokens, heroic is no more heroic. I can get 3* from elite easier than i can get them from heroic. So remove 2* from heroic. Leave the Bonus Hero for everyone at the same percentage as now (5%). With no 2* this actually get bigger than now and give the opportunity to those who buy only classics to have every now ant then some free covers and for those who buy latest to have even more chances

Crowl

Please can people stop making suggestions for a token that excludes the latest 12 4*, that is a horrible plan as even people who might prefer to prioritise the older ones still need to collect the newer ones too.

Magic

Crowl wrote:

Please can people stop making suggestions for a token that excludes the latest 12 4*, that is a horrible plan as even people who might prefer to prioritise the older ones still need to collect the newer ones too.

I wholeheartedly agree with you. The idea to remove the latest 4* from the Classical LT pulls might sound appealing to devs and was voiced by many. I don't like it as well.

nickaraxnos

Crowl wrote:

Please can people stop making suggestions for a token that excludes the latest 12 4*, that is a horrible plan as even people who might prefer to prioritise the older ones still need to collect the newer ones too.

You will be able to have them when they ll stop being new. We cant have everything. If you want them from the start you gonna pay more with increase chances to get free covers. Where is the problem?

Crnch73

I stand by my statements from earlier:

1) we need to rotate additional characters into the pool from the vault. Do it every season, every 2 weeks, every event... whatever. But placing the focus on 12 characters out of a pool of 45-ish? c'mon now

2) update heroic tokens because they are pretty worthless. If the token isn't purple, I normally feel no emotion because they're all basically 2* anyways

3) BH's need to have higher drop rates. Going on 49 LT's pulled without a single 4* BH, and I have still only gotten 2 BH's total since the release. Both were obv 3*, so yippee

In reality, the vaulting idea is actually ok, because the pool is too diluted. It just needs to rotate better, not permanently lock characters away. Tokens are mostly jokes at this point, I get the bare minimum most times. And BH's are unicorns to me, I have only heard of them basically... I don't get to see them. This hurts development and hurts champion levels

Nellobee

Hey Bright/chthulu- you guys have now had a few days to discuss the vaulting uproar. You presumably have either made the determination to keep vaulting for the time being or to make changes to the current system.
So, which is it?

Warbringa

I appreciate that the development team appears to be looking into options with regards to vaulting and has provided communication.

alphabeta

Unfortunately I think unstickying this thread says it all - they are listening to how unhappy people are and quietly hoping we will ignore fact they have just moved on

So glad my VIP comes up for renewal tomorrow - small I know but only practical step to show how I won't be supporting the game going forward till they reverse the decision

Crowl

nickaraxnos wrote:

Crowl wrote:

Please can people stop making suggestions for a token that excludes the latest 12 4*, that is a horrible plan as even people who might prefer to prioritise the older ones still need to collect the newer ones too.

You will be able to have them when they ll stop being new. We cant have everything. If you want them from the start you gonna pay more with increase chances to get free covers. Where is the problem?

There is simply no need to include such a restriction on new 4* characters at this point if the life of this game, if for some bizarre reason somebody was trying to build up the value of a more expensive token then it should be done by other means such as the previously mentioned increase in bonus chance not by walling off a chunk of the 2nd tier of characters.

Nellobee

alphabeta wrote:

Unfortunately I think unstickying this thread says it all - they are listening to how unhappy people are and quietly hoping we will ignore fact they have just moved on

So glad my VIP comes up for renewal tomorrow - small I know but only practical step to show how I won't be supporting the game going forward till they reverse the decision

I hope not. But I'll sticky it via post spam if I have to-this deserves a response with more information than "we are discussing it."

GurlBYE

Stax the Foyer wrote:

Punter1 wrote:

Just listened to the Puzzle Warriors interview on the bonus heroes.

What I think is more telling is the small discussion around 5* in Vaults. They don't quite know how to put the 5* into vaults as they don't know how to price the vaults from the economics of the game as it stands. I think they're in the same boat with the vaulting.

Everything in the game has a value that's relative to other things. This is stating the obvious.

Right now, the economics of a Classic vs Latest token are that you pay a 5CP premium to get a chance at the latest 5*. The 4* pool available for 20CP was essentially consistent underneath that premium as you had the same pool in both.

They're attempting to keep that same rule in place in the current tokens. The 20CP (ignoring the 5CP latest 5* premium) you pay gets you a chance at the same pool of 4* regardless of which token you buy. As soon as that's changed then the value proposition of the 20CP is modified. If you change it to allow picking of certain 4* as has been suggested, should you be paying an additional premium CP? If you change the pool of 4*, should there be a discount on the older 4*, or should there be another premium on the latest 4*, turning a LL token into 30CP?

Playing Devils Advocate a little with this as I'm not suggesting a different solution, just posing the thoughts as to exactly why it's not as simple for them in the wider economics of the game to have a different pool of 4* offered for that flat 20CP.

One reason that the economics in the game are getting out of whack is due to the release rate of 4*s in a 5* world. From the perspective of heroic tokens and ranking rewards, 4*s are essentially being treated as though they were as valuable as they were before the release of 5*s. There have been some changes, but not anywhere near the sea change that we saw with 3*s a long time ago with the DDQ release and other changes. (Incidentally, ISO costs reflect that skewed priority as well).

That's why 4* dilution is such a big problem. Because the game structure (both rewards and ISO costs) hasn't kept up with the massive increase in 4*s, or with their relative decrease in importance. This vaulting change is a band-aid fix for the underlying issue, which is the constant release of 4* characters without supporting 4* content, treating the 4* tier like it's the top tier when everyone is looking to move past it to 5*s.

The fix to dilution should have been a significant increase in overall 4* rates, from both tokens and rewards. A big jump would be disruptive in the moment, but it would just be catching up to the present state of the game. That still needs to happen. Open up the floodgates for 4* covers the way they did with 3*s more than two years ago and let the game evolve.

^ he more or less put the spot light on whats going on to be fair.

whycantwesyncpc

Nellobee wrote:

alphabeta wrote:

Unfortunately I think unstickying this thread says it all - they are listening to how unhappy people are and quietly hoping we will ignore fact they have just moved on

So glad my VIP comes up for renewal tomorrow - small I know but only practical step to show how I won't be supporting the game going forward till they reverse the decision

I hope not. But I'll sticky it via post spam if I have to-this deserves a response with more information than "we are discussing it."

"We are discussing it" sounds better then "We are going to ignore you until everyone complaining either gives up complaining or leaves" If you've been around here for some time how much confidence do you have in them at this point?

Ayasugi-san

We can still hope, right? I mean, they walked back on vaulting before, right??

Daredevil217

Crowl wrote:

Please can people stop making suggestions for a token that excludes the latest 12 4*, that is a horrible plan as even people who might prefer to prioritise the older ones still need to collect the newer ones too.

Wait...

When it comes to older characters: one "might prefer" to get them.

When it comes to newer characters: one "needs" to get them.

That's not really accurate. Either you need them all or you don't really need any. None are more important than any others as all have events, get boosted, are essential, etc.

The thing I don't understand is you're okay with 35 characters being completely shut out of ALL tokens but are not okay with ONE set of tokens not having 12 of them?

Crowl

Daredevil217 wrote:

Crowl wrote:

Please can people stop making suggestions for a token that excludes the latest 12 4*, that is a horrible plan as even people who might prefer to prioritise the older ones still need to collect the newer ones too.

Wait...

When it comes to older characters: one "might prefer" to get them.

When it comes to newer characters: one "needs" to get them.

That's not really accurate. Either you need them all or you don't really need any. None are more important than any others as all have events, get boosted, are essential, etc.

The thing I don't understand is you're okay with 35 characters being completely shut out of ALL tokens but are not okay with ONE set of tokens not having 12 of them?

Perhaps you should read back, I am against either LT excluding the majority of characters and have offered up suggestions such as two sets of each token (one with latest 12 and a proper one with all of them), a token where you have the latest 12 plus can add as many as you like to be included in the regular draws and not merely the bonus ones, a token where you just choose the ones to exclude or a token that vaults half of the older 4*s and rotates the vaulted group each season. I honestly don't care what solution they pick just so long as they do something to reverse the horrible damage they have to the idea of developing a broad roster of champions.

In none of my posts have I voiced my support for vaulting and even in your misreading of the above post, my wording is intentional because if you have a champed character then you might prefer that one, but if you do not have a new character at all then you do need that one.

kyo28

alphabeta wrote:

Unfortunately I think unstickying this thread says it all - they are listening to how unhappy people are and quietly hoping we will ignore fact they have just moved on

So glad my VIP comes up for renewal tomorrow - small I know but only practical step to show how I won't be supporting the game going forward till they reverse the decision

This.
Two things:
1. I'm not spending a single cent on this game anymore until a fix has been thought up and I would hope that everyone unhappy with the vaulting do the same
2. I'll keep posting in this thread until a fix has been introduced (or at least more feedback) so the thread keeps popping up.

Nick441234

I'm drawing so many more 5* characters since this change, which of course to a lot of you veterans, would be a great thing. However, I dont want them. I dont want my game ruined by 5* scaling so this change is becoming more and more annoying for me.