What SR is it where it's no longer beneficial to farm 1* covers?

Melovingu1
Melovingu1 Posts: 63 Match Maker
in MPQ General Discussion
Basically each 1* cover is worth either 10 xp to your Shield Rank or 100 ISO.  If you see how much ISO your next Shield Rank is and what percentage of your progress towards that rank 10 xp is, you can figure out if it's more valuable to sell it or farm it 
(Apparently under SR 165 you should farm)

I might not be smarter than a 5th Grader: This Iz the answer l got N/my alliance, but 2/me and the way I wazz taught. 1* covers R/only worth 100 iso's. There's no need to dupe a 1* > Wazz l taught wrong 👍👎! SR 148 > 1367 days 2/date!
https://mpq.gamependium.com/rosters/MelovingMpq/
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Comments

  • Jwallyr
    Jwallyr Posts: 165 Tile Toppler
    Not following your 2nd half at all, but yes, some people like to do a "1star farm" up to the point where the Iso reward for the next tier divided by 10 XP (the amount you get for training a 1star) is less than 10.

    Example from my alt: at rank 11 I'll get 3000 Iso, which takes 150 XP to achieve.
    3000/150 = 20, aka I get 20 Iso per 1 XP.

    By comparison, selling each cover (and foregoing that 10 xp) directly returns 100 Iso, or 10 Iso returned per XP foregone.

    So, the point at which it stops being Iso positive is whenever the reward from the next tier divided by the XP required to get there falls below 10. This is going to be a very high SHIELD rank (I'm not there yet at rank 125 on my main).


    That all being said, the reality is that you are not actually increasing your Iso by speeding up your SHIELD rank-ups, you are just getting to those milestones slightly faster than you otherwise would anyway, so assuming you do ever get to the SHIELD rank at which you would dip below 10 Iso per experience anyway, you will reach a point where your 1star farming hasn't really gotten you anywhere.

    Additionally, ranking up faster than you otherwise would means that you will accelerate the pace at which you become "locked out" of lower PvP SCLs, which can make it hard to get the best placement awards at those low levels.

    Since the 4star tier and up is where Iso really becomes a problem (before going away entirely at post-Iso) I decided a while ago that there's not a lot of value for the time and roster slots required to manage a one-star farm. YMMV.
  • Pongie
    Pongie Posts: 1,411 Chairperson of the Boards
    Shield rank 168 is the level where you gain 87500 iso for 8750 xp. This is the break even level and farming 1* no longer earn more iso. Which level you stop before this depends if you still want to earn a few more percentages by farming, or stop and free up the roster slots. 
  • grenadier
    grenadier Posts: 137 Tile Toppler
    Thanks for the analysis on this.  I had stopped farming 1* a while ago, and I'm at SCL 95.  Somehow I had a gut feeling it wasn't worth the effort, but if the math says it is marginally better to keep farming, I might as well do it  till I need the slots, I guess.
  • PiMacleod
    PiMacleod Posts: 1,770 Chairperson of the Boards
    Hmm... I hate it when math proves something right, and I'm not following suit.  I'm around shield rank 140, and have never farmed 1*s.

    I'll think about it.  I'm not sure i wanna buy more slots just for this.   I have a few extra, but they are for making 2* and 3* farms easy (and to be auto-ready for new characters).
  • wymtime
    wymtime Posts: 3,758 Chairperson of the Boards
    Well I never farmed 1* and am at SR 167 and only have 6.6 million iso.  Overall you don’t really need to farm 1*.  2* you farm for the champ rewards squeezing some XP out of 1* is just a lot of work.
  • DAZ0273
    DAZ0273 Posts: 10,101 Chairperson of the Boards
    Funny I was just thinking about this the other day as I had a 1* Juggernaut as a placeholder for a slot that was waiting for 5* Cap Marvel and thought about farming it. That slot has gone now and this thread has convinced me that it isn't worth doing.
  • Pongie
    Pongie Posts: 1,411 Chairperson of the Boards
    Dormammu said:
    If you are farming (at any star tier) to gain ISO, you're doing it wrong. You are losing ISO in the long term by not gaining the sell-back ISO value of the cover and instead trading it for XP... which you'd eventually get anyway. In essence, every time you use a 1-star cover to farm XP you're throwing away 100 ISO.
    It's only considered throwing away ISO when you view shield rank as a finite level. At the moment it is capped at 200, but for most players, this may as well be infinite. ie, by the time you hit 200, the capped may be increased to 300. I dont know many who have reached the the cap. I;m not saying they dont exists, but the general population are far from hitting the limit.
  • Dormammu
    Dormammu Posts: 3,531 Chairperson of the Boards
    Pongie said:
    It's only considered throwing away ISO when you view shield rank as a finite level.
    I'd consider it a waste as soon as I hit my next SHIELD level, which I manage to do every 2-3 weeks (SL 131 currently). Farming 1-stars might help me reduce the gap between level ups by a day, possibly two, but then I've reduced my ISO gains by whatever I lost not selling those 1-star covers.

    It's a price paid for obtaining the level reward a bit sooner, finite or not. It's like taking out a loan. You can get a lump sum sooner, but it's a sum you'd earn eventually anyway (by the fact that you eventually pay it back with your earnings). In this case, the interest is the ISO value of those covers you're selling.
  • HoundofShadow
    HoundofShadow Posts: 8,004 Chairperson of the Boards
    I recommend farming 1* covers after you hit Shield Rank 65 because SCL 6 PvP is the easiest way to get top 5 with just 800-900 scores.

    Once you hit PvP SCL 7 and above, 800-900 will net you a top 50 at best.
  • Kahmon
    Kahmon Posts: 625 Critical Contributor
    If you need to reach a higher shield level to qualify for better rewards then farming 1*s makes sense.
    If you are doing it for the iso then you are better off selling 1*s rather than using them to farm exp.
    Shield level is capped at 200. Assuming this will be raised is playing the game as you hope it to be, not how it is.

    By not farming 1*s you will eventually reach 200 and have gotten millions of iso by selling off your 1*s.
    By farming 1*s you get there sooner, but at the cost off all the iso you missed out on.
  • crackninja
    crackninja Posts: 444 Mover and Shaker
    Kahmon said:
    If you need to reach a higher shield level to qualify for better rewards then farming 1*s makes sense.
    If you are doing it for the iso then you are better off selling 1*s rather than using them to farm exp.
    Shield level is capped at 200. Assuming this will be raised is playing the game as you hope it to be, not how it is.

    By not farming 1*s you will eventually reach 200 and have gotten millions of iso by selling off your 1*s.
    By farming 1*s you get there sooner, but at the cost off all the iso you missed out on.
    On the other hand, by the time you reach 200, you won't need that lost iso anyway.  I'm at 149 and am iso positive.  Of course they may always change something in the future to give us something to spend it on.
  • jamesh
    jamesh Posts: 1,600 Chairperson of the Boards
    Kahmon said:
    If you need to reach a higher shield level to qualify for better rewards then farming 1*s makes sense.
    If you are doing it for the iso then you are better off selling 1*s rather than using them to farm exp.
    Shield level is capped at 200. Assuming this will be raised is playing the game as you hope it to be, not how it is.

    By not farming 1*s you will eventually reach 200 and have gotten millions of iso by selling off your 1*s.
    By farming 1*s you get there sooner, but at the cost off all the iso you missed out on.
    Every time a non-negligible amount of players have hit the level cap, it has been extended.  And in previous cases, it turned out the game was keeping track of experience past the level cap and let people collect their rewards immediately.  So it is just a case of delayed rewards (as is selling 1* covers with the aim of reducing experience gain).
    It is also worth noting that 10,000 iso today is more valuable than 10,000 iso in a year.  It could mean the difference between having a useful character available now rather than later.  That time with the character provides value in and of itself.
  • CT1888
    CT1888 Posts: 1,201 Chairperson of the Boards
    It also depends when the time taken  to apply those covers is no longer worth the diminishing returns when you get to the stage that you are getting a couple of iso extra per cover, you are probably better off playing an extra couple of lightning round matches as of well take less time.... 
  • Warbringa
    Warbringa Posts: 1,299 Chairperson of the Boards
    edited April 2019
    CT1888 said:
    It also depends when the time taken  to apply those covers is no longer worth the diminishing returns when you get to the stage that you are getting a couple of iso extra per cover, you are probably better off playing an extra couple of lightning round matches as of well take less time.... 
    It is true that in theory 1* farm won't net you more iso than just selling but in reality it does.  My view is give me that greater iso (through the SR iso) now rather than later because I might not be playing this game until SR 168 or the game might not be around by the time I would get there. The time to manage a one star farm is a few seconds.  You simply train or sell a 1* character and reroster the 1*.  I don't understand people saying it is a time waste. There are much larger time wastes in this game with far less benefits.
  • CT1888
    CT1888 Posts: 1,201 Chairperson of the Boards
    Warbringa said:
    CT1888 said:
    It also depends when the time taken  to apply those covers is no longer worth the diminishing returns when you get to the stage that you are getting a couple of iso extra per cover, you are probably better off playing an extra couple of lightning round matches as of well take less time.... 
    It is true that in theory 1* farm won't net you more iso than just selling but in reality it does.  My view is give me that greater iso (through the SR iso) now rather than later because I might not be playing this game until SR 168 or the game might not be around by the time I would get there. The time to manage a one star farm is a few seconds.  You simply train or sell a 1* character and reroster the 1*.  I don't understand people saying it is a time waste. There are much larger time wastes in this game with far less benefits.
    I get you, I ran a 1* farm for a while, but I jacked it in ages back (still not hit 168) when it reached a point I felt it just wasn't worth my time. When you are only making a couple of iso per cover, those seconds add up, and you'd be better hitting sell all spending the time on a lightning round match instead. 
  • Rod5
    Rod5 Posts: 587 Critical Contributor
    Melovingu1 said:

    (Apparently under SR 165 you should farm)
    Unless you realise this game is enough of a time-suck already and that life is too short for that sort of nonsense.
  • Melovingu1
    Melovingu1 Posts: 63 Match Maker
    edited April 2019
    I know there's a lot of different ideas out there about who-when-how,long. Alot of great minds gave me wat they thought wazz best. An l appreciate you'll takin time out to debate the issue.
    I currently live N/Scl8 pve azz a T10 player mostly & Scl7 pvp @ 900 4*cover target! My SR iz 149 & Sacrificed 1371 days. A T50 Alliance. Sometimes it nice to get some fresh minds on a subject. Thxs 2/All & 2/all Thxs. 
    https://mpq.gamependium.com/rosters/MelovingMpq/
  • Mark70
    Mark70 Posts: 24 Just Dropped In
    The farm is a bit worse than anyone has realized, there is no XP award after the first time you rouster a character.  So one of the 10 or 13 covers farmed earnes nothing. Time for more math.
  • jamesh
    jamesh Posts: 1,600 Chairperson of the Boards
    Mark70 said:
    The farm is a bit worse than anyone has realized, there is no XP award after the first time you rouster a character.  So one of the 10 or 13 covers farmed earnes nothing. Time for more math.
    You'll get 100 iso for selling a level 1 character. So while you might not receive any XP for rostering that cover, you can gain back the iso you would have received for selling the cover in the future.
    And for 1* characters with three powers, you can continuously gain XP without selling the character by using covers to retrain.

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