(Discussion) Only Recent 5*s as essentials so far! Make people spend more or just the most fair way?

Devorer

Until now we have only seen the lastest 4 5*s as essentials (correct?) in star lord new spidey 5* doc oc and now daredevil.

So is this the most fair way so far as everyone playing scl 7+ should have at least played while star lord was still in the latest legends, so that everyone had the chance to get those characters at at least 5%+ chance to pull them or is it the developers way of enticing people to spend more money to get the latest stuff needed and/or make hoarders blow their CP/LT reserve to be able to play competitively in events?

While it may be more difficult to get a specific one out of the non-latest-legends needed for an event i think most people playing scl7+ have more of the older ones than the newer ones. at least that is the case for my alliance. and we finish pve top 100 more than 90% of the time i would say.

So what are your ideas on the issue? Cash grab or fairness or just coincidental lack of thought by developers?

please discuss

broll

I'm hoping they will rotate through them all otherwise this just makes the game much more difficult for all non-whales.  I don't have a problem with having the 5* node, I don't even have a problem with having latest in it occasionally, but they need to have the older ones too.

Bowgentle

They stated numerous times that they don't want people to hoard.

It's 100% an anti-hoarding measure.

broll

Bowgentle said:

They stated numerous times that they don't want people to hoard.

It's 100% an anti-hoarding measure.

I really don't understand that mentality.  If they don't want people to hoard it's 100% in their power to stop it.  Don't have tokens at all and instead have RNG give out random covers instead of tokens or have token auto open on receipt.  As long as people have the option there will be hoarding, period.

Magic

It does change a bit the approach to 5* releases. I intend to make sure I pick up at least 1 cover using the specific store (that is at best 250 CP on average but should be easier to get, especially if I consider that we get some tokens to the store during event anyway). This hits the hoard a bit but not that much.

For Rogue event I dropped to SCL6. For Webbed - I will just play for progression as I usually do. Placement doesn't worry me. But the 5* node was helping in fight for progression (do it 6 times and you don't have to "green" check most of the difficult nodes - 4 clears are enough).

I am glad that they've got the "newest" 5* out of the way quick. Now they should go back to Silver Surfer.

DAZ0273

This in conjunction with the required older 4* X-men in S.H.I.E.L.D Training does seem to be trying to encourage spending of both LT's for current 5* and CP for those 3 classics and older 5*.

As to whether it is fair or not, it is hard to say. So far I have had 50% of the 5* (Star Lord & Spidey) but now these are out of the way (barring me getting lucky with a DD cover from my unopened 2 LT's) it is looking at a much more favourable 11 out of 14 characters upcoming, so in the long run the older characters will more than balance out for future events for most SCL7 rosters (and above) I would imagine.

Edited: That will of course become 11 out of 15 characters presumably shortly...

Nick441234

Personally, I dont feel its fair. I recently opened 1000cp worth of latest tokens in an attempt to get Silver Surfer from the Cosmic Store. I got 4 Starlord's and that was it. In a system where theres no reliable way to get covers for 5*s, it cant possibly be fair having 5* nodes. 

tiomono

Yes it's "fair". Yes it's probably meant to encourage sales. Yes it deters hoarding.

 Does it stop hoarding? No. Hoarding is a choice. A choice that's hurts you right now to benefit you later.

Is rng annoying? Extremely. Is it unethical, or unfair? No.

It does not matter what the devs do, some portion of the playerbase will be furious. Is that fair? Definitely not.

Orion

So what if they had started this with Surfer?   At this point, Surfer is WAY harder to get than Daredevil if you don't have any 5*s.  Sure, the older players have him, but then the newer people would complain.  It really doesn't matter what the devs do, someone is going to complain about it.

And the reason why a lot of people are hoarding right now is because Doc Ock is so bad.  If he were good, then everybody would have had covers for these 3 Latest 5*s.  

rixmith

With Star Lord they did put up the Cosmic store so the odds of pulling one were as good (or poor) as pulling from latest. If they run a weekly store that features the next 3 required 5*'s we'd at least have a chance to acquire a cover before they were essential. Without something like that getting a particular Classic 5* is pretty hopeless.

DAZ0273

rixmith said:

With Star Lord they did put up the Cosmic store so the odds of pulling one were as good (or poor) as pulling from latest. If they run a weekly store that features the next 3 required 5*'s we'd at least have a chance to acquire a cover before they were essential. Without something like that getting a particular Classic 5* is pretty hopeless.

If you follow this logically and consider those chosen follow a plan by the devs then it leads to this - The first six 5* Essentials should be Spider-Man, Daredevil & Doc Ock (3 latest) + Star Lord, Silver Surfer & Thanos (Cosmic store). So next one will probably Green Goblin or something...

broll

rixmith said:

With Star Lord they did put up the Cosmic store so the odds of pulling one were as good (or poor) as pulling from latest. If they run a weekly store that features the next 3 required 5*'s we'd at least have a chance to acquire a cover before they were essential. Without something like that getting a particular Classic 5* is pretty hopeless.

If that was part of their plan you'd think they'd have announced it.  It doesn't really drive people throwing money at a store when they don't know why it's urgent to get it.  That being said, this might be part of their longer term plan and that Cosmic store was a test of how it would sell without the 5* nodes so they can compare and see if it's driving sales.

Jarvind

Orion said:

 It really doesn't matter what the devs do, someone is going to complain about it.

QFT

I'm not thrilled that they're doing recent releases first, since like most, I'm waiting for Ock to leave packs before I open my LTs and CP. That said, once he does, I think I will probably be done with hoarding for a while. My main reason for it was not wasting 4* covers, but I've got the whole tier champed save for some of the latest ones and a comfortable ISO reserve, so it makes more sense at this point to just pull as I go. So I'll likely have at least one cover on future releases, giving me the option to struggle for placement if I really want to.

All of that said, I don't really care for the most part since I rarely bother with placement in PVE. The grinding cyborgs make it an absolute chore, and an extra cover or two doesn't justify taking an extra 45-60 minutes out of my day to do extra clears at exactly the right time. I'm pushing hard for Rogue, because oh my god you guys Rogue, but after that I'll go back to doing progression and treating whatever placement rewards I get as gravy.

babinro

Focusing on latest legends was the most fair way to approach essentials. 

Imagine if you started the game in early 2017.  Do you think those players who started 'late' will have a reasonable shot at getting a single Black Bolt cover in the classic pool?

Of course not.  With the character dilution in classics it would be completely alienating to a pretty significant portion of the player base to use any of the older classics as required characters.

It makes perfect sense to focus on latest where the 3 characters are grouped together and everyone has a chance to pull them within a somewhat reasonable time frame.

Mind you none of this really matters because you have to assume D3 is moving on to classics to screw over all newer players so no matter which approach you take this was going to make people bitter.

For the record I hope the next two essentials are SS and Thanos from the cosmic store since that would make the most sense.   From there I guess you just cycle through classics until a new latest is introduced.

Magic

One more thought. They are being aggressive in trying to force players to open up the hoard. First the 25CP store with Thanos in it. Now this.

I get that D3 doesn't like hoarding. I don't like it as well (speaking from the 200-pulls worth of pile eager to open when the opportunity shines). But they have created the system when it's advisable to hoard.

Anyway - something is brewing. Maybe it's the 25% on the store (rather 20% at best as 25% pushed many people to blow up the hoards). They want to implement it when the overall number of stored CP/Tokens is lower. 

BoyWonder1914

I'm personally having a hard time seeing the problem with them being latest. I'd rather it be someone that you have increased odds on pulling, than someone you can only reasonably expect from the ever-elusive 5-star Bonus Hero pull. Which is more advantageous for the newer player; an older 5-star that according to the forums "most people should have by now", or a newer 5-star character that has a special store that newer player players can spend their likely low reserve of CP on? 

Personally speaking I have all the 5s, and a nice CP stockpile to pull whoever I'm missing, so it really just comes down to who I feel the most comfortable fighting with at 3 covers or less. 
 

broll

@BoyWonder1914
That's a fair point.  I wasn't a fan, I missed Spidey and was gonna miss Ock, but decided to crack open my hoard and got all 3 latest pretty easily.  Wish I'd done it for Spidey now, but oh well.  I have all the 5*s now and that's what's important.

It doesn't seem like this is going to be a enough to stop me from hoarding.  But I will likely try harder on solo vaults or do some early pulls on latest each time a newbie shows up.

Phumade

Personally,  I think they wanted some baseline data on how people would play if they have a weak or undercovered 5*.

Regardless, this or gambit is the last new 5* that they have accessible.  We'll see what happens after this event.  If it goes back to a newish 5*, thats a different issue than if they go back to Silver surfer.

smkspy

All my 5s are at 255, so no matter the covers most are just useless past the 4th clear. Only hope seems to have the right boosted 4s and luck that most of the time that node is just goons.

Though I fear the eventual Ultron goon node.

The rockett

The question is how quick will the force you to use a new 5* for pve. While still in their own vault?  When they hit latest?  How long are they in latest?  I don't like this for a few reasons. 

1.   When they started DPD, they didn't start it with the newest.  They started with the oldest. 
2. When a new 4* is released their Crash of Titans event isn't until they come around pve rewards for a 2nd time.  This has been the standard. 
3. Why did they start with Star Lord?  Due to the Cosmic Vault?  Is it because a lot of players decided to really hoard due to SL/Doc Ock being very weak and they know this?  

We know some of these answers but just seems some information would be good to hear. 

Punisher5784

Perhaps they are gearing up to give us more ways to earn 5* covers.