New to farming

Dormammu

I am a player with 16 champed 4-stars, all the 3-stars champed, and before today I was sitting on every 2-star max-champed (except Bagman, who is champed but only lvl 102). After some prodding advice from my alliance commander I finally became a farmer.

I decided to sell four 2-stars and began a crop of Cap, Torch, Cmags, and Wolvie. I also planted some Ares and Carol Danvers, though I kept my max-champed versions of those for daily DDQ use (my go-to team for the 2-star DDQ nodes is Ares/Carol/Storm).

I figure I'll stagger my rows of crops so that not all my 2-stars are at the same stage of growth, putting undo strain on my supply of ISO fertilizer. I'll wait to start growing some Thor, Moonstone, Daken, and Bullseye until the crops I planted today start generating champ levels.

Having started this whole process, I'm curious how others run their farms and would love to hear from my fellow forumites if they have any specific ways they manage their 2-stars.

smkspy

The resources are great, but it can get tedious balancing out rechamping your 2s and champing your 4s. 

turbomoose

I have been farming for about a year now, it's a great way of building up ISO and those lovely hero points 

as as we get so many elite tokens there's a constant stream of covers 

I sell maxed 2* characters as soon as I get a single cover for that character to replace them as I find ddq so easy and I always have at least three characters who are champed so that is usually enough to win ddq

jamesh

Don't bother trying to space out when you sell and restart characters: just because you sell two characters at the same time doesn't mean they'll reach level 144 again together.  It is highly unlikely for you to get covers for each character at exactly the same rate.

As far as when to sell them go, I start saving covers for a character once it hits 144, and then sell it after two weeks or when I get a usable set of 13 covers, which ever comes first (it's usually the 2 weeks though).  I'll then upgrade the new version as high as it will go so I don't get too tempted to spend the iso elsewhere.  After that, just hope to get the covers needed to champ them, and hold onto any others for up to 2 weeks before selling.

I know some people start building duplicates earlier to try and avoid selling covers, but I'm not sure it is worth the hassle.

Phumade

Don't worry about trying to stagger them.  RNG will take care of that for you. Having a few extra slots so you can carry a few 144s at all times is a real convenience, but thats a luxury depending on your situation.  It all just boils down to monitoring the sneak peak thread so you when which 2* are coming up and what events they are in.

shardwick

For me right now the biggest factors are when a 2* will be an essential in a pve event or behemoth burrito so if I have two at max, and I really need some iso, then I will try and look ahead as far as possible, at least two weeks, to see if it's safe to sell them. Let this be your 2* Farmer's Almanac.
https://mpq.gamependium.com/ddq/

So let's say that your Storm is at 144. Collect her covers for two weeks and then when the first is about to expire sell the 144, this is assuming that she won't be needed anytime soon, and then roster her again. In that two weeks you will almost always get at least nine covers. So right off the bat she's almost good to go again but you keep collecting covers and get her fully covered. I then keep collecting covers for probably another two weeks because iso is super scarce and I need it for my 4*s and then I will champ the 2* again.

Also, Storm is almost never used in behemoth burrito as an essential 2*. Actually, her next time up is September 11th, over a month away, and I'm sure after that it'll probably be another three weeks at least before she's an essential after that so for her as long as you don't need her in an event it's almost always safe to sell her. Mags doesn't get a lot of love either so it's safe to sell him too.

Nick441234

They'll end up staggered without even trying after a couple of cycles. People likes Ares and Storm, for me at least, come in bucket loads whereas Wolverine is a very slow grower.

Its definitely worth doing though as you build up great resources from it. Though, unlike some of the people above, I prefer to wait until I can champion a replacement before selling the max champ.  

Pessi

I just make sure I have minimally 3x2*champed at any one time. DDQ is trivial and if you do suffer bad board syndrome you have all day for them to heal up. I normally sell a 144 champ and instantly champion the next 2* with the proceeds.

I've also never had an issue recently using under leveled and under covered 2* in essential nodes.

 

mpqr7

I generally sell a max-champed 2* as soon as I pull another cover of that character. Sell the max-champed, recruit the first cover. The one thing I do is check whether that 2* character is needed for the next pve. I don't need that character to be high-leveled, but it helps a little bit. If worst comes to worst and it's not championed during its PVE, it's no big deal.

Right now, I happen to have all of my characters championed, so I'm waiting a little bit before selling my max-champed wolverine and rebuilding him. But once his queued covers are about to run out of time, I'll sell him and start with the covers.



Also, I have a 3* champ farm as well. I have around 5 max-champed 3*s. I'm saving them until I have a second max-champed 3* of that same character, and then I'll sell the first one.

I do champion farming because it's a great way to win extra CP (as well as LTs when you do it with 3*s). CP and LTs are all I care about these days! The other prizes are nice as well (tokens, covers, hp, etc).

Blindman13

I find it difficult to remain patient when I have covers in my queue, so I will typically sell the level 144 as soon as I pull the next cover.  I am usually working on champing a 4* to save a cover, so I use the ISO for that and slowly level my 2's as I can and as I get covers for them.  
This method forces me to vary who I use on DDQ (I prefer Hawkeye/Storm/Mags), so things stay interesting there.
Even if the PVE essential node requires a 2* that I only have 1 cover for, I have a strong enough roster that I can still get through it.

I currently have a 144 Captain America, and I am trying to hold his covers in queue, to see how that works, but my 13th Prof X will expire first, so if I need the ISO to champ him, I will sell Cap and roster the covers I have.

broll

I used to sell my 2*s then replace them after the fact.  However this has led to almost missing out on a Behemoth Burrito (not having the required 2*) and occasional cover waste (when I RNG doesn't give you the right amount to rebuild 13 in 2 weeks).  So what I'm trying now is when I champ one, I apply the L95 for the heroic, then I use the next 13 covers to immediately build a replacement.  Any 6th covers before 13 are then applied to champ.  Once I hit 13 on the dup, I'll start leveling the champ in earnest.  Once it hits 144 I'll immediately sell and re-champ.  

I'm only in the first few days of this new way so not quite sure how it will work yet.

Jarvind

While I'm building up a champed 2*, I simultaneously build another copy so that it's fresh for championing as soon as a 144 is sold. That way if the next copy hits a 5/5/1 build I can just use the first two colors as champ levels while I wait for the right color to roll around.

If I'm not currently scrambling to champ somebody and have a decent amount of ISO saved up (100k or more) I'll also level the next one to 65 or so - it doesn't cost a ton, and it means I can sell and rechamp at a small net gain of ISO later on when I need it.

When somebody hits 144, I'll usually sit on them until I have a cover or two ready to apply to the next clone. If I'm hurting for ISO I'll keep them around until either I get to around 50k or covers are about to expire.

Like mpqr7, I'm also working on a 3* farm - I've got twelve of them maxed out with dupes on the rise. I'm waiting until the dupes are maxed to sell, as a maxed out 3* is actually really strong in their featured PVP. Maxed Steve had 40k+ health with his shield dealing over 10k last time he rolled around. Probably not worth it for 5* players, but in 4* land it makes a big difference.

Calnexin

My process manages itself.  I don't bother to retain max-champs, I just use the same slot to cycle.  The covers are staggered randomly, creating a scenario in which at any given time I usually have 2-4 undercovered, 1-2 fully covered awaiting Iso, and 6-9 in various champ levels.  When they reach 144, I wait until I have the next cover, sell, and re-roster.

I've never found myself without a full complement of 2* champs to handle DDQ, and if I've got one undercovered for an essential they never tank, so they still serve their purpose.  The only times I've ever been inconvenienced by non-champ 2* are when they get hit with an AoE in an essential node and I have to spend a health pack on them to finish my clears.

There is a small danger of losing covers to color bias.  My Daken is currently at 11 covers in a 5/4/2 situation with seven blue in queue.  I've gotten backed up before, but this will be the first time I've actually passed the 14 day threshold to fully cover and will have to sell at least one due to expiration.  I may just create a dupe rather than sell, which will be easy enough to ditch after sale of the max champ.

Dormammu

Farming 3-stars is not something I've had to face yet, but I'm inching closer. My IM40 is in the 250s. I don't think I could bring myself to sell a max-champed 3-star because when they're boosted they're still really useful to me. Creating dupes and leveling them would be really expensive in both ISO and HP for roster slots so I don't think that'll be an option either. I have no idea what I'm going to do.

broll

Most people don't immediately sell of 3* maxes but instead create a dup and wait to sell it until their dup get's a certain level (like 250-266).  I might be OK to sell some low preforming 3*s right away like Sentry or Psylock, but outside of that it's usually making a dup.  I'm early on in that as well.  I only have 2 dups right now D3adpool and IM40.

Orion

Since I have all of the 4*s and 3*s champed, I don't worry about needing covered 2*s around.  So when a 2* hits 144, as soon as I get another cover, then I'll sell the 144 and replace it with the single cover.  As I get more covers for the 2*, I'll try to keep him soft-capped so I don't need a ton of ISO all at once to champ him.  I don't worry about getting a 6th cover for a particular color, since it's extremely rare to not be able to fully cover a 2* in the 2 weeks before an extra cover would expire.

animaniactoo

I'm new to farming, but I've figured out a path that works for *me* now vs what may work for somebody else. Mostly, it has to do with my ISO allocation and procrastination/feeling like I'm "wasting" ISO on pouring it back into the 2* when my 4* tier needs love.

So, my current method is that I will have one fully champed version of each character, and one in progress version.

• As soon as that 2nd version gets fully champed, sell the first and pour all that into whoever is waiting in the wings.

• Start building the dup of the one I just sold, until up to 13 covers and wait until somebody is ready to sell to champ them.

That way, I only feel like I've "used" about 10k in re-champing them, since the rest came from a sell-off.

However, this can have some variations depending on need - almost a month ago, I was extremely ISO poor and trying to get the rest of the farm up and running WHILE champing some 4* or another to boot. Part of the urgency for getting the rest of the farm up and running was that I had emptied one of the taco vaults and had a ton of covers that I didn't want to waste when they could be champ levels. I sold off anyone whose dup was above 120 or so and poured that back into champing the others so I could use the covers, and then used the iso and other benefits from those towards the 4*. I managed to do it all by the skin of my teeth.

Those dups are slowly rebuilding so soon I'll be back to my intended target.

3* farming - not there yet. But once there, I expect I'll run it about the same.

ETA: Emptying the Taco Vaults was also the start of my HP overflow. So roster slots are not a problem. I'm being careful with the overflow and figuring out the best ways to maximize my return for spending it, but I figure having a comfortable farm process is one of the best returns I can get.

Daredevil217

broll said:

So what I'm trying now is when I champ one, I apply the L95 for the heroic, then I use the next 13 covers to immediately build a replacement.  Any 6th covers before 13 are then applied to champ.  Once I hit 13 on the dup, I'll start leveling the champ in earnest.  Once it hits 144 I'll immediately sell and re-champ.  

I think I'm going to start doing this. Which isn't too far off from what I do.  I stop adding champ levels, and start building my dupe at around level 131 whereas you do it at level 95.  I like the idea of getting it out of the way early and knowing it'll be there.  My ideal farm has three copies going at once (so I always have everyone max-champed) but I often have to cash out early / obliterate the crops in order to champ a 4.  Like right now I only have two versions of each character because I had to cash out big time recently. 

But ideally:

Toon1: Max-champed
Toon2: Champed (working toward max champ)
Toon3: Cover-maxed and at level 42

Once 2 is max-champed, you can sell 1, and use the iso to champ 3 for the 65k. 2 becomes 1, 3 becomes 2, and you begin building a new 3.  This isn't THAT confusing right!?

I know this is roster slot intensive but I have every character rostered sans a couple 5s, 23k HP and not much to spend it on. This is AFTER already opening up dupe spots for several 2s.  If you can swing it I think it's the ideal ecosystem. Also gives some "break in case of emergency" iso and roster spots if in a crunch.

broll

@Daredevil217

Out of curiosity why do you want/need to have one always at max champ?  I debated doing this at one point too, but I could never rationalized blowing 13 x 2 = 26 rosters slots for the farm when the difference between a L94 2* and L144 2* to actually game play (once you're 3* land or higher) is negligible.

Phumade

broll said:

@Daredevil217

Out of curiosity why do you want/need to have one always at max champ?  I debated doing this at one point too, but I could never rationalized blowing 13 x 2 = 26 rosters slots for the farm when the difference between a L94 2* and L144 2* to actually game play (once you're 3* land or higher) is negligible

Once you become net HP+ in your chosen playstyle, you will realize that 1K slots are minor trivial costs.  Top tier comp players spend their HP in 3 places,  Slots, Shields, Packs.

Even for competitive bakers, their shield hp expenses are fairly consistent event to event so its either spend your surplus hp in slots or packs.

For alot of people the convenience of spending 14k hp (1 time over the life your account) for 14slots far out weighs any benefits that might come from spending that 14k on a 40 pack that yields 30 2*, and a few 3/4*

Daredevil217

Well for one, to me roster slots are NEVER a bad use of Hero Points. I've splurged on a daily deal or vault only to get burned, shielded only to get smacked back down and still not hit my target, and in those instances feel like I flushed HP down the drain.  But I have never regretted buying roster spots as they can always be useful.  I might be using them for my 2* farm but it's not like I can't sell my max champ if I have a greater need for that slot later.

So if I don't see it as waste then why not? Marginally better characters are still better.

Another very very minimal benefit is I find that the 2s have value in their essential nodes (and really just in that one node). Sometimes they will tank 1 or 2 colors when max-boosted and I will have them take a big hit because I'm only using them in that one node (and have dupes). So I've saved the occasional health pack which for me is a big deal.