The New Feature we really wanted

Punisher5784

I was away on vacation when Bonus Heroes was implemented which is why you did not hear my feedback on it. Many players already expressed their opinions about Bonus Heroes so there’s no need for me to add to it, however if you’re interested I added my thoughts at the bottom of this post under the spoiler. The point of this post is to bring forth the attention of the feature a majority of us have been seeking.. a way to avoid the dreaded 6th cover of an ability.

After learning about how Bonus Heroes would work, I wanted to ensure I could cover my MoonKnight and Kate Bishop before they are removed from tokens. I opened about 40 LTs. Disappointingly I pulled 3 Spider-woman black (5/5/2); 2 MoonKnight black (5/4/3); 2 Kate black (2/5/1); and 3 Captain Marvel black (5/5/2 – BUT I champed Peggy to give me an LT that yielded a Green cover.. phew!).. weird they all happen to be Black but the point is I am stuck with 7 (almost 10) dups that I cannot use. Under the old system I likely would not have opened this many dups because the 4* pool was large. What is irritating about these dups is the fact that 4* Captain Marvel was my sole Bonus Hero and the 3 bonus covers were black. How exactly is the Bonus Hero system supposed to help when it yields covers of abilities already at 5? My older 4*s: Ice-Man, Thing, X-23, PunMax, Deadpool, Ghostrider, etc. are close to fully covered (9-11 covers) but they have an ability at 5. I am afraid to waste my Bonus Hero on them because I could potentially receive a 6th cover. Now I have to hope and pray the covers I need will become obtainable in PVE/PVP progression one day. A majority of our complaints for the past 3 years is the unforgiving 6th cover and instead of seeing a system that helps with it, we instead receive a system that grants us more 6th covers!

This can be alleviated by implementing a Colorless system but unfortunately the devs cannot figure out a way to do this since the recent “tests” with Chulk and Howard yielded covers players already have at 5. However, another approach could be to use the existing Power Shift system. It currently allows us to select an ability to downgrade when we already have 13 covers but they can expand on it to allow us to move the 6th cover to different ability. For example, when we receive the 6th cover, the Power Shift pop-up should ask us where they can apply the dup cover. This would eliminate so many complaints with this game’s RNG system! I made a mock Power Shift of how it would work below.

What are your thoughts on this? Let’s discuss the system we really wanted and needed for 2017.



My thoughts on Bonus Heroes:

First and foremost, I am disappointed that we barely received a notice of this change. Although I was the player that “spoiled” this feature by posting a picture, there was no reason to immediately make the change. Fortunately it did not affect me as I had opened my hoard prior to the release and many of my older 4* should be able to complete their Crash of the Titans, but for the players that had a huge hoard was likely affected because now they cannot finish covering their older 4*s. How was that fair? There are systems in place that require a specific 4*: DDQ’s Behemoth Burrito and Crash of the Titans but most importantly the 4* Essential in PVE. How are new players supposed to progress if they have even less of a chance now to earn the older 4*s? If I did not have all the 4*’s, I likely would have retired (again!). Vaulting is the worst aspect of Bonus Heroes. I understand their intentions of shortening the pool to allow us to cover new characters faster but I do not understand why the new 4*’s could not be under the Latest tokens and the older 4*’s under Classics. That makes the most sense. They could at least allow you to choose which 4*’s you want in your tokens. It is even more annoying that the 2* droprate did not decrease in Heroics and the 5* droprate did not increase in LTs, despite this change. We’re sick of 2*’s and we want 5*’s.. plain and simple. I don’t expect you to give them away but this change is not helpful. Right now Bonus Heroes is basically an RNG system within an RNG system.

My other worry is that everyone will have the same Champed 4*’s now. Pretty soon PVP will be overrun but champed Peggys, Medusas, and Captain Marvels. Although I was able to happily champ my Peggy, I busted my butt trying to earn her covers for the past 6 months, now everyone will be able to easily champ her. How do I know this will happen? Because I just pulled 6 Captain Marvel covers to champ her.. quickest 4* I ever champed. The challenge of PVP is having a champed 4* that very few players have, especially when boosted, now it’s going to be the same opponents over-and-over again. I thought this was something the devs wanted to avoid?! I completely understand why many players feel this nerfed championing of older characters. What is the point when you'll barely ever earn additional covers for them and can simply continue to grow your 1-3 new character champs. My Captain Marvel is 272.. she will be in tokens for quite sometime. I am curious how the devs will address this but I can imagine they will eventually nerf Peggy since everyone will use her.

These are my thoughts on Bonus Heroes off the top of my head. Feel free to comment below but I would prefer to keep this discussion on a new system to address the 6th cover. Thanks everyone.

Punisher5784

I also wanted to point out that if the devs are afraid this system will make covering characters "too easy" then they can apply the upgraded Power Shift to a specific Shield Rank such as 70. Give players a reason to want to level up their SHIELD Rank. Personally, I stopped fully clearing PVE nodes if I did not have to because the SHIELD Rank has not meant much beyond the big Iso reward per Rank. For instance, Bonus Heroes was surprisingly very low at Rank 8 and currently the highest "feature" that SHIELD Rank grants us is Clearance Level 8 is rank 52, which was extremely disappointing. If you aren't going to release Clearance Level 9 or 10 soon then give the high ranking players a feature we can ultimately utilize that will keep us happy and motivated. Players at rank 70+ either invest a lot of money and/or invest a lot of time, while players below will fight to level up more for a feature like this.

Mercalla

I think it's important to slice out the change to recent 12 4*'s only in the legendary token pool from the implementation of the bonus hero feature. I don't think anyone can be unhappy with bonus heroes and favorites if the legendary pools remained the same, right? Edit: this comment was directed toward your hidden section of your post, the review of BH part.

That said, your solution is awesome and I really hope it gets a serious look from the devs.

GurlBYE

Punisher5784 wrote:

I also wanted to point out that if the devs are afraid this system will make covering characters "too easy" then they can apply the upgraded Power Shift to a specific Shield Rank such as 70. Give players a reason to want to level up their SHIELD Rank. Personally, I stopped fully clearing PVE nodes if I did not have to because the SHIELD Rank has not meant much beyond the big Iso reward per Rank. For instance, Bonus Heroes was surprisingly very low at Rank 8 and currently the highest "feature" that SHIELD Rank grants us is Clearance Level 8 is rank 52, which was extremely disappointing. If you aren't going to release Clearance Level 9 or 10 soon then give the high ranking players a feature we can ultimately utilize that will keep us happy and motivated. Players at rank 70+ either invest a lot of money and/or invest a lot of time, while players below will fight to level up more for a feature like this.

There's little point in locking it behind a shield number so high, as it's basically still leaving a majority of the player base out.

I have a really odd feeling the upper shield levels would be wastelands of like 10 top alliances butting heads with each other all automatically getting top 200 placement, with some emptier brackets with people just getting loaded up with covers.

At the point per cover ratio, and knowing my own shield rank. I would Absolutely not spend to get to 70. The amount it would cost from CL8 to there is something I couldn't even begin to fathom paying, just for the ability to be able to actually use the rewards I win.

Just a pop of insight from someone in early 4 transition.

Dayv

This is exactly the same as what I proposed over a year ago, but I'm not going to merge this thread because I still think it's the perfect fix. Maybe yours will be the straw that breaks the camel's back. viewtopic.php?f=8&t=37571

GurlBYE

As for the solution it's great.

I've been wondering for a while now why we couldn't use the cover + resources and make an "exchange" of sorts.

(say 10 Cp + a 5 cover, or 5 CP + a 4 Cover, some HP + a 3 cover) to switch its color. I've already beat RNG, just let me get a prize I can actually use and switch its color, by paying you in resources, that I can still earn/buy that way, there's still some money to be made. Which is enticing considering some people spend money to get those draws from CP etc to begin with)

Your idea would be great but I feel like there'd probably need to be some sort of exchange for them to see the idea as worthy.

DeNappa

Although I still want this, I just realized that if this really becomes a thing, I will probably begging for more ISO once again because it'll be easier to maxcovers my characters

Hendross

. . . .

Jaedenkaal

Ever since championing was released as a feature it has been extremely awkward that the color of the first 13 covers per character matters and the color of the remaining 100 doesn't matter at all. Especially since starting at about the 2* tier, a character with fewer than ~10 covers might as well have 1 cover for the amount of impact they'll have on your roster (that was my personal experience from pre-championing. I can't imagine it's any better now). The interesting game-play decisions that we would have had to make based on the covers we acquired and in what order have similarly disappeared after that point.

I suspect one of the technical hurdles they would have to overcome to implement a colourless cover system involves the level limits; a 3* character with a 5/0/0 cover distribution has a level cap of 89, but that same character respec'd to 4/1/0 has a level cap of only 78. Obviously an overhaul of the level cap/ability scaling system could be done but it's a lot more work than simply adding a below-max-level respec UI.

Borstock

I don't like the idea of colorless covers or making it so easy to fully cover a hero. They could solve two problems with one stone by making the iso sell price of a 4* cover a little higher. I haven't thought it through, but it would make selling those covers less painful by addressing the iso shortage at the same time.

Again, haven't thought it through. Not sure about all the problems with this idea.

Punisher5784

DayvBang wrote:

This is exactly the same as what I proposed over a year ago, but I'm not going to merge this thread because I still think it's the perfect fix. Maybe yours will be the straw that breaks the camel's back. viewtopic.php?f=8&t=37571

Well to be fair I believe I was retired when you posted this last year haha. This system is definitely needed now more than ever. Hopefully this does get noticed.

Jaedenkaal

Adding a 4th (7th, I guess) color of cover, though, that lets you train any of the 3 powers, seems like it might be less complicated than overhauling the whole leveling system (assuming it wouldn't also require an overhaul of the leveling system. Even something that seems simple like power scaling is extremely tightly tied to the very old system where characters could have 25 covers in each power and capped at 50 covers)

Daredevil217

Borstock wrote:

I don't like the idea of colorless covers or making it so easy to fully cover a hero. They could solve two problems with one stone by making the iso sell price of a 4* cover a little higher. I haven't thought it through, but it would make selling those covers less painful by addressing the iso shortage at the same time.

Again, haven't thought it through. Not sure about all the problems with this idea.

Yeah I go back and forth on this myself. Pulling a token is like playing a lotto ticket. Sometimes you lose. I don't want the game to be TOO easy.

I like the paying a cost to change idea slightly more.

However, I wouldn't be outraged at the powershift or colorless covers ideas at the same time.

That said I co-sign all of the OP's issues with vaulting (that I am outraged about).

ZeiramMR

I will note that your proposed system makes whaling a character from scratch via CP possible with any 3 pending covers instead of needing an initial cover of each color. Can't speak to whether that falls in the preferred method of whaling, though, as it seems to me that buying debut PVP tokens or special 5* tokens like Red Room is the cheapest way to whale.

mohio

Daredevil217 wrote:

Borstock wrote:

I don't like the idea of colorless covers or making it so easy to fully cover a hero. They could solve two problems with one stone by making the iso sell price of a 4* cover a little higher. I haven't thought it through, but it would make selling those covers less painful by addressing the iso shortage at the same time.

Again, haven't thought it through. Not sure about all the problems with this idea.

Yeah I go back and forth on this myself. Pulling a token is like playing a lotto ticket. Sometimes you lose. I don't want the game to be TOO easy.

When I pull an elite token, I really want that 3* cover. When I pull a heroic, I really want that 3* cover (and oh boy does it feel great to get a 4*!). When I pull a LT, I pray to RNGesus for purple. In all of these cases I "lose" far more than i "win". I forget the exact numbers, but it's something like 67% 2* in elite and heroic, obviously we all know it's 85% 4* in LTs. Yeah, I "lose" quite often. So, when I do get that "win", I want it to feel great. That's why I championed all of my 3*, now any 3* pull is pure rewards gravy. It's why I'm trying to champion all my 4*. But still you can get stuck with 5 in one ability and still not have them cover maxed. I pulled at least 10 or 11 MK green covers (thus wasting 5-6) before finally getting that 13th cover to allow me to champion him. The problem is exacerbated in the 5* tier. Those purple covers pop up so infrequently that for one to end up being a 6th (or 7th, 8th, etc.) in a given color is such a gut punch. You go from elation of seeing that 5* pull (yes! finally beat the odds!) to complete despair as you realize it's just going to be a small pile of iso in a couple weeks barring insane levels of luck. I don't think the developers want this, and trust me, you don't either.

As for the guy you quoted, not to rehash what I just said, but the sting of pulling those dupe 5* cannot be overcome with iso. Once upon a time 3* and 4* covers could be sold for small amounts of hp. They got rid of this (and upped how much iso they were worth) presumably to deter vets with already maxed characters from farming extra covers for the hp rewards. Now that championing is a thing and everyone wants every cover they can get their hands on, maybe it's time to revisit selling covers for more than just iso. Perhaps a 4* could earn a small amount of cp, and a 5* could earn quite a bit larger amount of cp?

hodayathink

If I were D3/Demi, I'd probably go with adding a cost to change color covers instead of actually instituting colorless covers. Many people talk about being HP positive and not having much to spend it on, imagine if you could change the color of a cover for a 4* for 100 or 200 HP? How many people would jump on that, not just for 11/12/13th covers, but maybe even earlier to try to make the build more useful as they progress?

TLCstormz

Where was it ever officially said that Colorless would make things "too easy"?

That's definitely not the go to response, nowadays.

Borstock

hodayathink wrote:

If I were D3/Demi, I'd probably go with adding a cost to change color covers instead of actually instituting colorless covers. Many people talk about being HP positive and not having much to spend it on, imagine if you could change the color of a cover for a 4* for 100 or 200 HP? How many people would jump on that, not just for 11/12/13th covers, but maybe even earlier to try to make the build more useful as they progress?

It would have to be way more than 100 HP. It'd probably have to be 1k. Champ rewards unlocked, especially with the new vaulting system, are HUGE.

TeamStewie

How about when you have 13 covers for someone all the extra ones just don't expire?

Stax the Foyer

ZeiramMR wrote:

I will note that your proposed system makes whaling a character from scratch via CP possible with any 3 pending covers instead of needing an initial cover of each color. Can't speak to whether that falls in the preferred method of whaling, though, as it seems to me that buying debut PVP tokens or special 5* tokens like Red Room is the cheapest way to whale.

Nobody whales a character from 3 covers. Not since the CP change. PvP tokens or brute force only.

ZeiramMR

Stax the Foyer wrote:

ZeiramMR wrote:

I will note that your proposed system makes whaling a character from scratch via CP possible with any 3 pending covers instead of needing an initial cover of each color. Can't speak to whether that falls in the preferred method of whaling, though, as it seems to me that buying debut PVP tokens or special 5* tokens like Red Room is the cheapest way to whale.

Nobody whales a character from 3 covers. Not since the CP change. PvP tokens or brute force only.

That's kind of what I figured.