Spend vs. Invest ISO-8.

[Deleted User]

This is the big question.

When you're a young player every new level you add is an investment. And any 3* champ is an investment.  Levelling characters up at early stages open up ways to progress further, hence giving you a lot in return.
Same goes for when you're standing before the decision to move into the 4* realm. My first 4* characters, Red Hulk and Carol, truly opened up new layers in the game for me, they convinced me to try the higher clearance levels which gave a lot in return.

I'm now standing in the middle of the 4* realm, half of them are champed, half of them ain't, and I'm feeling that it doesn't really benefit me to champ the rest. I mean Sandman, Winter Soldier, Kingpin etc. They'll not open up new possibilities in the game more than making the Crash of the Titans a bit easier but that 1 Legendary Token / year each 4* character wins isn't a good carrot. And  sure they give me champion rewards but these are hardly not good in proportion to the 370.000 ISO-8's they demand. Maybe when they reach the super-high champion levels but what won't happen for 2 years if I have calculated correctly.

It feels as I'm playing to spend rather than invest now and will keep spending now until there is nothing left to spend on. And that takes a bit of the spark away. I just wanted to ventilate but if would be fun to see a discussion around this.

fmftint

Someone once said,  even bad characters give good champ rewards, champ all

Quebbster

mexus said:

fmftint said:

Someone once said,  even bad characters give good champ rewards, champ all

Yeah that's one way to look at it, but as I said the champion rewards aren't really in proportion to the ISO "investment", at least not when calculating the 50 first champion-level rewards (and to reach higher than that looks more and more distant for every new character they release since it lowers the odds / character)

This is how it feels:
Spend a lot of ISO to get a poopy dude champed (one that I'll never really use or need) in order to gain 40K ISO and some tokens from him over the next year to come.

Legendary tokens and CP is the only way to progress to the fivestar tier. The more fourstar champions you have, the more goodies you get. I certainly don't regret champing everyone I have been able to. I get plenty of ISO though.

stewbacca

even poopy characters become amazing when champed high enough... 

Dormammu

What's happening, mexus, is that you've peeled back the curtain and looked at the game for what it is: a constant dangling carrot with no purpose or meaning behind anything. If you get the carrot, a new one gets strung up for you to chase until ultimately you lose interest.

Beer40

I'm in a similar spot to you. Here's what I've done. I'm currently taking all my 13 cover characters to 175, just in case I do decide to champ them. ISO is back ended, but its still less than if they were at 70. I'm also taking all the latest 12 that I know I'll want to champ (all but Lockjaw, in fact) as high as they'll go. 

This gives me the option to increase the levels of the latest 12 as covers come in (I do this because I expect I'll have the ability to champion them all) while hording the surplus ISO in case I get the cover I need to champ one of my 175s. Also, if I choose to flip it up and level any 5*s, I can use the ISO for that. Most likely tho, I will just level the Latest 12 and sit on the rest of the ISO.

I'm saving LL and CP for when DD leaves the LL. 

I'm hoping to catch a sweet spot where I can champion 3 more 5* and champion most of the latest 12 at that point. 

The under covered Classics I have left over (which are a few) are going to remain right where they're at in terms of ISO. I'm ok with that because its a group I don't care about. Maybe one day I'll level them, but they take least priority.

I'm not saying this is a good plan by any means, but any time I try to plan, the game takes a turn on me. So this is what I'm currently working on. It may or may not be right for you. 

Jarvind

Having recently crowned my 52nd 4* champ with #53 not far off, I can tell you that it is a huge relief to be able to pull Legendaries without worrying about half the covers going to waste. I pulled 161 Latests when Gambit hit, and the champ rewards alone gave me about 3k HP,  60k ISO, and enough CP and tokens for another 19 Latest pulls. Plus, y'know, my whole roster got stronger, which is cool too. 

I only had to sell two Lockjaws and two Yondus. Having pulled 100+ token hoards before and having to sell 30+ covers, I will say that this one was immensely more satisfying. 

smkspy

Dormammu said:

What's happening, mexus, is that you've peeled back the curtain and looked at the game for what it is: a constant dangling carrot with no purpose or meaning behind anything. If you get the carrot, a new one gets strung up for you to chase until ultimately you lose interest.

Yep, I was thinking something similar this morning. Are most of us so concerned with roster progression and rewards that further progression than just sitting back and enjoy playing the game?

There will always be that next character to level and next tier to move up into, but is that now the sole selling point of the game? 

Maybe it's because I'm at the tail end of 4 star champ trek and my 3s are all nearing 266, so I'm not really interested in going for that next carrot of 5 star land. I think new content would go a lot longer towards keeping the game healthy and fresh more than that next new carrot, even bringing back old events like heroics and mini events on a regular basis help accomplish this.

But hey, 5 star Thor is coming, then 5 star hulk...chase chase chase. Mah progression!!!

Beer40

BlackBoltRocks said:

@mexus not everyone heh. I'm enjoying my foray into 5* land. Granted, Surfer and Thanos is a great combo, but yeah. The only real PITA is how long it takes to hoard CP and LT for a crack at the 3 Latest 5*, compared to covermaxing and champing a 4*.

Totally agree with this. I've got one of the "lesser" 5* (Starlord) if you take the advice of the Forum. I probably do, but what I've seen is that I can beat any other single champ 5* team in my range (only difficult one is BB because I'm fueling him too...haven't taken on a Gambit yet, since he's boosted currently). That's all that matters, IMO.

I think a lot of Forum opinion on 5* is great, because these people know, but at the same time they're mostly speaking from a competitive standpoint as well. You've got to be able to separate their competitive advice (excellent) with their opinion.

Do you want to WIN BIG in 5* land? Listen to the vets. They know. Trust their advice.
Do you want to play in 5* land and can accept being a fish in an ocean of sharks? Jump in, its fun.

Straycat

Yea, the main investment for weaker champs is not their individual champ rewards, but the overall security of less wasted LT pulls. But I still think there is value to having more boosted 4* champs to play with

DAZ0273

This game is an addiction that has big highs and then slogging lows.

I just yesterday bought a HFH deal on C4rol's black so that I could max cover her and I invested the iso to bring her to 250 (didn't have enough to go to 270). I've been waiting for that cover a long time, so it felt good. I have 10 or so days to get her to 270 + champ iso so not to lose the 4* on the vine. Oh and I spent 40CP trying to pull a black C4rol, where I hit the dupe yellow cover and decided to go the H4H route.

All that and I'm not even yet at where I want to be. Her black is at 3 covers, so she is still nowhere near at her peak abilities.

All so I can have a champed C4rol just to match everybody else champed C4rol, until she is made irrelevant by the next meta breaking 4*. So she probably isn't going to make a massive difference but it is progress so I'm told and it will be nice to join the C4rol club.

It's insanity really but it seems to be what we do.

Orion

Carol is good, but a boosted Sandman is WAY better than an unboosted Carol.  You want to be able to get to the point in both PvP and PvE where you're always playing with boosted 4*s.  And the best way to do that is to champ as many as you can.  The 4* tier requires the most ISO investment.  I know it seems like an impossible task, but with the increase in ISO flow in the last year, it's entirely possible to champ every 4*.  So go ahead and do it.

Daredevil217

DAZ0273 said:

This game is an addiction that has big highs and then slogging lows.

I just yesterday bought a HFH deal on C4rol's black so that I could max cover her and I invested the iso to bring her to 250 (didn't have enough to go to 270). I've been waiting for that cover a long time, so it felt good. I have 10 or so days to get her to 270 + champ iso so not to lose the 4* on the vine. Oh and I spent 40CP trying to pull a black C4rol, where I hit the dupe yellow cover and decided to go the H4H route.

All that and I'm not even yet at where I want to be. Her black is at 3 covers, so she is still nowhere near at her peak abilities.

All so I can have a champed C4rol just to match everybody else champed C4rol, until she is made irrelevant by the next meta breaking 4*. So she probably isn't going to make a massive difference but it is progress so I'm told and it will be nice to join the C4rol club.

It's insanity really but it seems to be what we do.

Carol will never be obsolete.  She does way too many things with the AP generation, passive AOE damage, and tile strengthening (not to mention the nuke, strike generation, and CD acceleration).  I still have her as the #1 4* on my list.

That said, the meta in 4-land has already shifted to Grockmora.

As for the OP, I am absolutely on a mission to champ all 4s.  I agree that the lack of wasted pulls, more boosted options, and champ rewards all make it a worthwhile investment (for me).  Plus, once you do it, you never have to look back.  I'm champing faster than they are released and I just champed number 36 this morning (Devil Dino).  I also just generally enjoy the game and love finding fun new combos and characters to play with even if they aren't game breaking.  Wins-based is really allowing for more fun combos to shine as I am seeing more than just dual boosted 4s in events.  Also, with speed being less of a factor you can enjoy a match using slower characters.

Milk Jugz

Champ them all, you'll find surprising utility with some of the lesser ones. I try to find different fun combinations from the boost list each week- this week is Wasp, Drax, and Chulk. Fun team to play and I'm chewing up CL9 TaT with them, though I do use my 5* for the 5ess node. When I want to compete for top 10 I just play my 5s, but most events I'm happy with top 20-50, so I get some use out of those 4s I champed. I'm going to finish the tier and would be done but I took a break and champed a few 5s first, as soon as DD and Banner are done I'll be back on the 4* tier. Want them all champed!!!!

corytutor

There's definitely a hierarchy to toons within their respective tiers and its good to aim for those top toonsfirst, but its also not good to jump tiers with the previous being incomplete. 

Chasing fives means pulling lots of 4s. They can be worth much more than iso. The cp and legendaries alone make it worth champing them if you are looking to have a strong 5* deck in the future. 

Chasing 5s can be slow. So if you have all 2s and 3s champed like you should, then its either spend on 5s or 4s. Unless those 5s are 10 covers or more its an iso waste. So you might as well crank out the 4s until you have a trio of champ ready 5s

ammenell

i don't really care about progress.
max pun is fully covered, as are another half dozen 4*. around 25 are champed. 
i have a bunch of 5*s which I couldn't care less about. 
i have something to play when pooping and on my way home from work.
for free. exactly what I want. 

DAZ0273

Daredevil217 said:

DAZ0273 said:

This game is an addiction that has big highs and then slogging lows.

I just yesterday bought a HFH deal on C4rol's black so that I could max cover her and I invested the iso to bring her to 250 (didn't have enough to go to 270). I've been waiting for that cover a long time, so it felt good. I have 10 or so days to get her to 270 + champ iso so not to lose the 4* on the vine. Oh and I spent 40CP trying to pull a black C4rol, where I hit the dupe yellow cover and decided to go the H4H route.

All that and I'm not even yet at where I want to be. Her black is at 3 covers, so she is still nowhere near at her peak abilities.

All so I can have a champed C4rol just to match everybody else champed C4rol, until she is made irrelevant by the next meta breaking 4*. So she probably isn't going to make a massive difference but it is progress so I'm told and it will be nice to join the C4rol club.

It's insanity really but it seems to be what we do.

Carol will never be obsolete.  She does way too many things with the AP generation, passive AOE damage, and tile strengthening (not to mention the nuke, strike generation, and CD acceleration).  I still have her as the #1 4* on my list.

That said, the meta in 4-land has already shifted to Grockmora.

As for the OP, I am absolutely on a mission to champ all 4s.  I agree that the lack of wasted pulls, more boosted options, and champ rewards all make it a worthwhile investment (for me).  Plus, once you do it, you never have to look back.  I'm champing faster than they are released and I just champed number 36 this morning (Devil Dino).  I also just generally enjoy the game and love finding fun new combos and characters to play with even if they aren't game breaking.  Wins-based is really allowing for more fun combos to shine as I am seeing more than just dual boosted 4s in events.  Also, with speed being less of a factor you can enjoy a match using slower characters.

Well it will be nice to be dishing it out rather than on the receiving end once she is champed and re-specced.

And yes, R4G & Gamora were everywhere last PvP but I was able to take them on and beat them with my boosted champed Wasp and wider champed 4* roster, so another reason to have a wide a roster as possible.