How best to level up my 5*

HobieCat76

With the new year, it's a new focus in MPQ for me .  For a while, I've been working mainly on my 4* roster. But, now that I have the majority of the 4* champed, I figured it's time that I move on and work on my 5* roster.

I'm hoping to get people's opinions on what the best approach may be for leveling up my 5*.

I have the following 5* fully covered and currently sitting at Level 330::

• Black Bolt
• Jessica Jones
• Loki
• Okoye
• Thanos
• Thor

I have all of the other 5*, except Ghost Rider, at various levels of coverage.

I definitely don't have the patience to just play at status quo until I have enough ISO to champ all of my fully covered 5* at once. Heck, I don't think I have the patience to wait until I have enough ISO to champ just my top 3 all at once. For the record, I'm presuming that my top 3 are Jessica Jones, Okoye, and Thor, but will certainly welcome other opinions.

So, what are people's thoughts on how I should spend my ISO? Should I focus on any particular (set of) 5*? What is a good midterm level I should bring them to before going all out champ? (I've heard 360?) Should I level up any of the 5* that I don't have fully covered (Kitty Pride is one that comes to mind here)?

Any thoughts are appreciated.  Thanks!

frederec

I'm not really into soft-capping.  I say champ them in this order, as you can:

#1 Thor.  No question.

#2 Okoye.  The best support character in the game, and really shines when paired with half health Thor.

#3 Thanos.  His utility in PVE cannot be overstated.

#4 Jessica Jones.  While I enjoy JJ a great deal, she's not quite as useful as the ones above.  However, she is a great team in sim with Thor and Okoye.  She is also a rare 5* that's decent on defense.

#5 Black Bolt.  Can be irritating if you pair him with Okoye, but can be slow and isn't a huge priority.

#6 Loki.  No rush.  He's not terribly, but is drastically outclassed by everything higher on this list.

Dormammu

I would go with Okoye first. She pairs great with several 4-stars and Thor will be effective with her even under-leveled, much more so than the opposite. Then go Thor second. With Okoye, 5Thanos isn't a huge priority in PvE. 3Thanos will serve you better because of the lack of stun on his Court Death. I'd go with either BB or JJ third, and Loki last.

bbigler

Thor & Okoye will greatly improve your PVP performance.  Add JJ for Shield Sim.  Okoye & Thanos will greatly improve your PVE performance.  So, think about the teams you can form for each part of the game.  You could level up Thor, Okoye, Thanos, JJ and Kitty to level 380 without any change to your PVP MMR.  So, if I were you, I would do this in phases, increasing your performance with each phase.

Phase 1: Level Up Okoye to 380, Thor to 360, JJ to 380 and Kitty to 360 - 380.  For PVP, play Thor & Okoye; add JJ for Sim.  For PVE, play Okoye, Medusa, 3*/5*Thanos - OR - Kitty, Grocket, 3*/5*Thanos - OR - Thor, Okoye, Medusa.  Your choice, they're all good teams for fast clearing. 

Phase 2: Champ Okoye and continue with the above teams (Faster wins. Don't worry, PVP will be fine)

Phase 3: Champ Thor and continue with the above teams (attain PVP nirvana with Thorkoye)

Phase 4: Champ Thanos to replace 3*Thanos in PVE (attain PVE nirvana with Okoye-Medusa-Thanos)

Phase 5: Champ Jessica (attain Shield Sim nirvana with Thorokoye+JJ)

Phase 6: Champ Kitty? and find out which PVE team is faster: Gritty-Thanos OR OkoyeDusa-Thanos???  I'd like to find out, but I'm leaning toward Gritty.

Everyone else you could just play around with for fun. 

Dormammu

bbigler said:

Phase 4: Champ Thanos to replace 3*Thanos in PVE (attain PVE nirvana with Okoye-Medusa-Thanos)

I don't have a champed 5Thanos so I'm not sure, but I imagine it's better off to stick with 3Thanos on this team?

frederec

Dormammu said:

bbigler said:

Phase 4: Champ Thanos to replace 3*Thanos in PVE (attain PVE nirvana with Okoye-Medusa-Thanos)

I don't have a champed 5Thanos so I'm not sure, but I imagine it's better off to stick with 3Thanos on this team?

Yeah, if you're running 5* Thanos, it's more common to run rocket or, if you have it, the champed essential 5*.  Okoye doesn't work with 5* Thanos.  I presume in this team the intention is that okoye and medusa are working together to take people out.  That's fine, but I find that team is a little slow and unreliable.  If you get lucky getting team-up ap, it hits crazy hard, but I've had way too many bad boards with that team.

bbigler

@Dormammu A 5* player I knew swore by the Okoye teams I suggested, but you're right, 5*Thanos will stun Okoye before the AOE. So, 3*Thanos is probably better. Okoye beefs up Medusa CD tile damage for a quick kill, then 3*Thanos hits with beefed up damage as well. 

But @frederec is right that matching TU tiles for Okoye is not reliable. So, I believe the ultimate PVE clearing team is Grockitty-5*Thanos. Kitty's damage buffing is gauranteed, which lets you get the quick kill, then Thanos finishes the other 2. The only problems are tile movers and a fragile Grocket. Half of PVE nodes don't have tile movers, but you can protect your strikes with clever matching and fortifying supports when they do. You can run Grocket all the way down to almost dead before using a health pack since it doesn't matter if he dies during the match. 

So, new plan @HobieCat76 only champ 5*Thanos when you have a high level Kitty to pair him with. High being level 390+. Higher the better of course with Kitty

HobieCat76

Thanks @Dormammu @frederec @bbigler !!!

This discussion has helped a lot!  I just leveled up my Kitty Pride a little more (to 330) just so I can play around a bit more with the various Kitty combos.  (As an aside here, I'm currently trying out Gritty+JJ to see if JJ adds more longevity and flexibility to Gritty's innate power. JJ's red adds strikes and/or helps replenishes Grocket strikes that have been removed as the match goes on. Both JJ's and Grocket's strikes strengthens JJ's black. And, JJ's trap tiles cause its usual irritation. I probably won't get a true gauge until the new season starts, but it seems promising.)

I'm now focusing on Okoye. I like the idea of getting her, Thor, and JJ to 360 - 380 before then going full out in champing Okoye.  I like that I'll be continually improving somebody, as opposed to just stockpiling ISO for one big bang.  And, yes, I'll hold off with 5*Thanos till later... hopefully if/when I'm lucky enough to get Kitty fully covered and champed.

frederec

If you have him, try out Kitty, Rocket, and Bishop.  Bishop is pretty nasty on defense, and his extra damage output goes well with Kitty and Rocket.  Also, his blue generation can either build toward Rocket's blue for extra turn-by-turn damage and attack tile generation, or can give you a long stun if you need it.

bbigler

I've tried out many Kitty teams:

Gritty-Medusa: awesome all purpose team, good for bosses too
Gritty-Thanos: Fast PVE clearing
Gritty-Kraven: Anti-Grocket+Gaurdian+Medusa teams
Gritty-Dazzler: Anti-Gritty teams, but Dazzler needs to tank green
Gritty-Carnage: more resilient on defense, but Medusa counters it
Cardusa-Kitty: resilient but slower, Medusa counters it

Teams I haven't tried yet:

Gritty-Valkyrie: trigger bounty every turn for yellow => protects; and get strikes against Grocket/5* champs; and deal extra damage too
Gritty-Bishop: mentioned above
Gritty-XFDP: against grocket/5* champs
Kitty+5*Hawkeye+OML: spam red and blue CD tiles, triggering OML strikes