5* champ covers and rng inequity

Vhailorx

5* champ covers are a good addition to the game.  But they would be even better if they didn't arbitrarily disadvantage some players.

I didn't quite manage to cover gladiaThor before he left the latest pool.  But thankfully the covers fell 2/4/5 for me.  So I am in good shape whenever he gets a 4* feeder (fingers crossed for my level 300 lady thor, rather than my 1/2/2 valkyrie!).  This is the system working as intended. 

But my archangel is a totally different story.  He is currently 5/1/2.  Assuming I don't cover him in the next few weeks, I am likely to waste a cover when he gets a 4* feeder (I am very glad this is only a risk for my AA and not thor!).  And some players have 5/5/1 5*s that will leave them even worse off.

I get that rng progression is an intentional design choice, and that the slow roster development and inefficiency is a benefit for d3/demi.  But too much rng is bad because it punishes players and discourages long term investment.

Why not offer a minor fix here and provide cover swaps for players that receive unusable 5* covers from 4* feeders?  That should be a fairly easy to check fact pattern for cs. It would make everyone feel a lot better about the champ covers.  And it would also never result in more than 2 cover swaps being given out for any given character (because someone with a 5/5/0 character would only need 2 swaps and a level 320 4* feeder to champ any 5*], so it doesn't seem likely to really blow the curve off player progression.

Calnexin

I'm sure every player would get behind that idea, but you've already answered your own question.  RNG maladies are what make money.  The game economy doesn't work without some level of waste.  Gotta balance those books!

Personally, I'd love it if there were some option to swap.  I've got a 5/5/2 Hawkeye and Kate Bishop at Lv 279.  My options are to waste two 5* champ rewards, trade 36 classic pulls for that once cover I need, or find a Leprechaun.

Jrlrma

Im sure a vet can answer this but i still havent figured out how cover waste for 5*s in particular make the devs money since you cant buy LTs/Cp outside of arbitrary ways such as buying out a vault or heroic 40-packs and big hp bundles. 

Rod5

Jrlrma said:

Im sure a vet can answer this but i still havent figured out how cover waste for 5*s in particular make the devs money since you cant buy LTs/Cp outside of arbitrary ways such as buying out a vault or heroic 40-packs and big hp bundles. 

Its pretty simple. If you get whichever colour you want, then you will need to pull fewer covers than if you don’t - CP can be earned in-game, but can also be bought, so...

PenniesForEveryone

It's especially unfair to newer players.  If you have a 360+ XFW when he is announced as the OML feeder your 5/5/1 doesn't care.  You add your two yellows, champ, and then immediately apply the excess black and red covers.  But a player just starting out doesn't get all 6 covers at once, they get them one at a time - certainly more than 2 weeks apart.  So the blacks and reds are useless until that final yellow comes in.

Bowgentle

PenniesForEveryone said:

It's especially unfair to newer players.  If you have a 360+ XFW when he is announced as the OML feeder your 5/5/1 doesn't care.  You add your two yellows, champ, and then immediately apply the excess black and red covers.  But a player just starting out doesn't get all 6 covers at once, they get them one at a time - certainly more than 2 weeks apart.  So the blacks and reds are useless until that final yellow comes in.

How likely is it that a newer player has a 5/5/X OML, though?

HoundofShadow

Probably 1.5 to 2 years later... And that won't be considered newer player. It's called Veteran.

Even if they change it to colourless cover, it still doesn't solve covers wastage problem because you will face another problem: Iso-8. How do we solve Iso-8 problem? Reduce the amount of iso-8 spent to level up 5* or increase the amount of iso-8 gain. What happens after you have finished championing all 5*? You have tons of iso-8. How do we solve problems of players who have tons of iso-8 with nothing to spend on? Players will ask to convert it to something else: HP, CP or red iso-8. The point is, players will keep asking for more until they decided that they have reached the end. Everyone has good luck and bad luck. Live with it. 

To your problem: Spend 720CP  x 2 and you are done. Where there's a will, there's a way.

bluewolf

Jrlrma said:

Im sure a vet can answer this but i still havent figured out how cover waste for 5*s in particular make the devs money since you cant buy LTs/Cp outside of arbitrary ways such as buying out a vault or heroic 40-packs and big hp bundles. 

You must be new....whales do exactly that every day.    Temporary alliances are set up as “buy clubs” where 20 players buy $99.99 of resources and each one gets 140 CP as a result.  And lots of them buy 40 packs for the LT with the HP they buy.

itstime1234

bluewolf said:

Jrlrma said:

Im sure a vet can answer this but i still havent figured out how cover waste for 5*s in particular make the devs money since you cant buy LTs/Cp outside of arbitrary ways such as buying out a vault or heroic 40-packs and big hp bundles. 

You must be new....whales do exactly that every day.    Temporary alliances are set up as “buy clubs” where 20 players buy $99.99 of resources and each one gets 140 CP as a result.  And lots of them buy 40 packs for the LT with the HP they buy.

Except Whales almost always stick to latest packs and therefore don't have to worry about wasted 5* covers.

Hadronic

I also have a 2/4/5 gladiaThor. Now cause of this thread I fully expect his feeder to award covers in reverse order. Thanks

PenniesForEveryone

Bowgentle said:

PenniesForEveryone said:

It's especially unfair to newer players.  If you have a 360+ XFW when he is announced as the OML feeder your 5/5/1 doesn't care.  You add your two yellows, champ, and then immediately apply the excess black and red covers.  But a player just starting out doesn't get all 6 covers at once, they get them one at a time - certainly more than 2 weeks apart.  So the blacks and reds are useless until that final yellow comes in.

How likely is it that a newer player has a 5/5/X OML, though?

How likely?  This is an RNG thread, there's no room for talks of probability here, sir.

Jrlrma

Rod5 said:

Jrlrma said:

Im sure a vet can answer this but i still havent figured out how cover waste for 5*s in particular make the devs money since you cant buy LTs/Cp outside of arbitrary ways such as buying out a vault or heroic 40-packs and big hp bundles. 

Its pretty simple. If you get whichever colour you want, then you will need to pull fewer covers than if you don’t - CP can be earned in-game, but can also be bought, so...

Yeah it can be “bought” at the rate of 7cp for $100. 

Which is an insane price that only a small fraction of the base is willing to spend. Even in a buy club 140cp for $100 is ridiculous. If the devs are relying on these transactions for sustainability the game is in real trouble. 

Bowgentle

Jrlrma said:

Rod5 said:

Jrlrma said:

Im sure a vet can answer this but i still havent figured out how cover waste for 5*s in particular make the devs money since you cant buy LTs/Cp outside of arbitrary ways such as buying out a vault or heroic 40-packs and big hp bundles. 

Its pretty simple. If you get whichever colour you want, then you will need to pull fewer covers than if you don’t - CP can be earned in-game, but can also be bought, so...

Yeah it can be “bought” at the rate of 7cp for $100. 

Which is an insane price that only a small fraction of the base is willing to spend. Even in a buy club 140cp for $100 is ridiculous. If the devs are relying on these transactions for sustainability the game is in real trouble. 

They haven't changed anything since they made CP buyable, which was over two years ago.
I'd say it's pretty sustainable.

HoundofShadow

I'm sure the $100 also includes 20,000 Hero Points or am I seeing different things?

bluewolf

HoundofShadow said:

I'm sure the $100 also includes 20,000 Hero Points or am I seeing different things?

Of course, unless you buy iso instead.

The pricing in game is designed to encourage play without making it obvious that whaling is the best choice.  Small purchases pay off quite a bit with pve play and intercepts. VIP is 1/10 of the mentioned $100 outlay but provides, over the course of 28 days, 2 Latest pulls vs 6.8.  But VIP also requires actually playing for the benefits.

The game gets a lot of casual play attention due to the license and the fact that its match-3, so there are a lot of places for casual players to spend a little.

Honestly, if CP was somehow cheaper, it would be bad because 5’s would become a lot more common and feel like less of an achievement.

Dogface

Anything that can be bought with money, either directly or indirectly, is not an achievement in my book.

AXP_isme

Dogface said:

Anything that can be bought with money, either directly or indirectly, is not an achievement in my book.

Did you pay for that book?