When is it time for 6-stars?

OneLastGambit

We don't need 6*. 5* was a huge mistake and I think the devs are actually aware of that. 

Instead it would make far more sense to level all the tiers and simply make each character different rather than better. Its a while ago now but I'm pretty sure the original intent with 5* was to give them classes. This would still work. 
Assualt class have high match damage , low health and will heal. 
Heavy would be high power damage high health but be slow. 

You get the idea. The game needs to be more tactical and less of an arms race. It'll breathe life into the game and everyone's roster 

RedLion

Okay, I like opening the can of worms...Cue the intellectual exercise music...

What if the current characters were reorganized into 7 or 8 tiers? Sure, you can call them 7 stars if you want to. Gambit and Thor and maybe a couple of the other best 5*’s go top tier...Peggy moves up to tier five, Elektra down to tier three (and two). Archangel down, im40 up, etc. 

What happens then? Each tier is far less diluted (for the next 2 years anyway). It acknowledges power creep without creating more of it. It lets the devs control the rarity of the best characters (shudder). And, in the future, when people complain about Kraven, the devs don’t have to rebalance him, they can just move him down into a more common tier. 

I’m not even sure all characters in the same tier have to have similar stats or ISO requirements. It wouldn’t be that weird to see Peggy and Surfer hanging out in the same tier. Certainly no bigger a power gap than what exists between Yelena and 1* Spidey.

Just think of all the new tokens...

crackninja

I would like to see 6*'s that altered conditions dramatically, not just more powerful characters.

kk3thess

Instead of talking about 6*, we should be talking about how 4* are increasing in numbers without any minimum increase of chances at getting them. 

Lopan15

They could maybe add more 2 and 3 star characters, then make the required nodes somewhat like DDQ.  Required 2 star node you can only use 2 star characters and same for the 3* node.  Maybe make one node per sub like the BOP where you have to use one 2, 3, and 4 or for lower SCL a 1, 2, and 3.  They would have to tweak the enemy levels of course.  this would add clearing/grinding time so probably not viable, but I think it would be fun for me.

Nick9819

Never..

Nick9819

Isn't the higher match damage every new 5* enough?

JHawkInc

Dormammu said:

JHawkInc said:
The game is not designed for 6's, and in order for them to exist, the entire game would have to be rebuilt from the ground up.

Um, why? There was a time when 5-stars didn't exist. The game didn't need to be completely rebuilt for their inclusion.

Because 5*s were designed from the ground up to be end-game content, unlike any other level before them.

They were designed to be usable at 1 cover (where 3's and 4's need 8-10 to be really effective), and they start off a tier above where they "should." 3's have minimum, maximum, and max champ levels of 40, 166, 266. 4's are just above that, 70, 270, 370. It'd be nice if 5's were similar, going for a 100, 350, 450 or something. But no, they start at 255, and hit 450 before you champ them.

The reality is that they skipped the logical placement of 5* characters, went up to the next tier, and slapped a 5* on that instead. It works for creating truly powerful end-game content but failed to provide the foundation necessary to build up further. Beyond that, I shouldn't really have to explain all of the ways that 5*s are different than other tiers (rarity, power, influence on the game, etc). Players would quit if they had to spend ages creeping their way to the 5* tier only to find themselves irrelevant because 6*s existed.

broll said:

JHawkInc said:

https://forums.d3go.com/discussion/70968/q-a-with-demiurge-will-answers-from-demiurge-will-begin-on-p-2/p2

There are no plans currently in the works for 6* characters, and we've heard a clear consensus among our players that they don't want them.

That said, I personally believe we'll need MPQ 2.0 before we need 6*s. The game is not designed for 6's, and in order for them to exist, the entire game would have to be rebuilt from the ground up.

Besides, the sheer number of characters Marvel has at its disposal points towards lateral growth over vertical growth anyways. Lateral growth won't reach ludicrous levels until people stop asking the question "Where the hell is Hank/Namor/Kitty/RedSkull/Sabertooth/Mysterio/AdamWarlock/etc?"

To be fair.  This was said about SCL 8 or 9 a few weeks before it came out.  I take anything they say as far as what they aren't working on with a grain of salt.  If we they don't want us to know about it, they tell us it's not being worked on, right or wrong.

As far as when it's time, IMO it's slightly past time, but I know I'm in the minority there.

Also adding more 2*s and 3*s is the complete wrong direction IMO.  

No they didn't. I don't know how to address that other than to say it flat out isnt' true. No one ever talked about adding new SCLs (either wanting more or being skeptical of them adding more, or when they would be added, from both players and devs) the way people talk about 6*s. It's not even apples and oranges. More like... apples and stock brokerage. I wouldn't even consider it significant enough to mention, honestly. It'd be like comparing talk of colorless covers to talk of champing 1*s. One of those things gets mentioned multiple times a week, the other almost never.

I'll take Brigby's noncommital "PR answers" with a grain of salt, because that's how things need to be communicated sometimes. But when a Dev takes extra time out of his day to engage in a Q&A and gives a straight answer (no 6*s) AND an explanation (they're listening when players say they don't want them), I'm going to take that at face value. 

Calnexin

I don't think the game needs 6*s.  I think the development needs some innovation to make existing tiers relevant.  If there's a reason to keep and power up the 1-4* tiers, they can add to those until they close up shop, so long as the new characters provide new strategies and interesting options.

The problem with the gameplay right now is that there's no reason not to bring your highest star and level characters to 90% of the game modes.  Doing otherwise makes you non-competitive and unnecessarily slows what is already grindy content (due to event recycling and lack of enemy variation).  If you've got a pair of good champ 5* they make the other 154 characters in your roster mostly irrelevant.  Introducing 6* would only exacerbate this.

Making the other tiers relevant, though, would increase engagement.  If there are game modes where you can't use your higher powered characters, or where there are specific rewards or advantages to using lower power characters, people might use them more.  They get more mileage out of the stuff they've already worked/paid for.

Granted, the challenges to this are that
1) New game mode content is a significant programming resource investment
2) It has no direct impact on the bottom line
3) Unless carefully balanced, it throws the game's economy, and likely the monetization that depends on it, totally out of whack.

It's better for the long-term health of the game, IMO.  More reasons to utilize the lateral spread is more engaging than power creep.

TimGunn

i'd say no 6 stars, just keep with the 2 new fours, and 1 new five pattern indefinitely. 

Or completely redo the scaling so that 5 stars are closer to 4 stars and not have that huge leap.

Or start game over as MPQ II.  Existing players get some credit/benefit for their existing rosters.  

Shintok17

TimGunn said:

i'd say no 6 stars, just keep with the 2 new fours, and 1 new five pattern indefinitely. 

Or completely redo the scaling so that 5 stars are closer to 4 stars and not have that huge leap.

Or start game over as MPQ II.  Existing players get some credit/benefit for their existing rosters.  

Great ideas. 

hunky_funky

When we will have separate tokens for 5* only, that will be little first step for a 6* tier. Or if devs start to give them away as a reward in SCL 10. I wouldn't mind if there will be unplayable 6* Stan Lee, somewhere above, as a joke character, just watching and laughing at MPQ universe...
To be honest, I'd better want a normal 5* tier, cause we have a mess now. I'm one cover away from championing Gambit, but still can't get OML his first red!!! I know, it shouldn't be that easy, but still... When the moon is in the Seventh House and Jupiter aligns with Mars maybe we'll get a 6* (I hope not).

JSP869

shardwick said:

No need for 6s. Instead, raise the chances of pulling 2s and 3s from standards, 3s from elites, 3s and 4s from heroics, and 5s from legendaries. Also, update the reward structure for nodes to give out elites on the 5th or 6th clear. If people are complaining about certain 5s being OP then what will they say when like level 1000 characters are in the game?

It makes no sense that Standard Tokens are rewarded to those doing SCL8 & 9. They're little more than Iso fodder at out stage of the game. The tokens from 8 & 9's nodes, and maybe even from 7's, should be Elite Tokens.

Kevmcg

6* are not necessarily the answer, but some method for the whales to stay ahead is. Many of us that are FTP or close to it have caught up where we can reliably place Top5 in both PVE and PVP.  Whales spend a lot of $$$ to collect characters early and stay ahead of the curve. When that advantage goes away, there is less reason to spend, and when the spending dries up, so will the game.

Jabrony_Geoff

I have two words for the author of the opening post....oh please.     

thedarkphoenix

They should just let you champion up characters and every couple hundred levels it goes up a star rating. You could champ a 3 to a 5, and a 5 to a seven. 

Etc etc

Glockoma

This might alleviate some issues- combine 3 and 4 star echelons to create new, expanded level. Rebalance them and then let the 5-stars become the 4-star level. Not sure about match damage adjustments, but it would be nice to have a fat league of 3* events to cycle and have 4-stars be pretty rare to acquire again. 

gibbojab

Star levels are based solely on rarity and chances of pulling a card. The chances of pulling a 6* if it were ever released would be extremely low if the the odds duplicated with current rate of 1:7 for 5* it’d be around 1:49 for 6*. There is no need to create another rarity level when 5* are already difficult enough to obtain. 

NeonBlue

6* would be catering almost exclusively to whales. Do you remember when SS came out and it manhandled the top 4* team at the time by itself? 6* would be exponentially worse following that trend. How would 95% of the playerbase even contend?

When the sea caters exclusively to its biggest whales, no other fish can hope to survive. 

Alfje17

Why not have a 6* tier that are groups: f.ex an X-Men "character" that you can fill up with other X-Men. For every character that you insert into the group, it gets stronger and you can choose one of its abilities to add to the group so you customize your own character.

That way you get rewarded for a large and well-developed roster and the devs can keep bringing out more characters in every tier.