Upcoming Feature: S.H.I.E.L.D. Clearance Level 10

IceIX

Merriam Webster defines ‘Soon’ as 'Without undue time lapse.' But what does that really mean? I have no idea, but I do know that "Coming Soon" means this week if you are talking about SCL 10!

That’s right! Shield Clearance Level (SCL) 10 is on its way here, starting with the Ragnarok Versus Event on 2/6 and the Story Event, Meet Rocket & Groot, on 2/9! The Shard updates to Comic Packs have paved the way for an update that brings a newer, more difficult mode for players that are itching for harder fights and better rewards. 

 

Mighty Tokens from nodes, 5-Star Shards from progression and more are available via SCL 10. But it doesn’t stop there! We also took this opportunity to update the previous tiers of rewards to make them richer for players in those tiers too. This means that you don't need high level 5-Stars on your roster to reap the benefits of this update!

Now, the overall rewards changes are too numerous to realistically list; There are differences in 3 day Events, 7 day Events, rewards for differently timed subs in each of those, solo Story Events, Versus Events, Versus Season Rewards, etc. So instead of a-couple-dozen-megabyte-sized Excel sheets of values crammed into a post, we’ll highlight a few points to show off what we’re looking at. Let’s start off with the big one: SCL 10 rewards.

As you can see, SCL 10 will be getting 5-Star Shards and more 4-Star covers than SCL 9 got before, as well as a large amount of Mighty and Heroic Tokens as you go through the Event. CP gains from Node clearing is also increased, with a total of 5 available on each sub, as opposed to the 4 from SCL 9.

Meanwhile, over on the Versus end of things

Again, we can see that the rewards overall will be putting out more CP than SCL 9, quite a few more Mighty Tokens, 5-Star Shards, and more 4-Star Covers and Shards.

For comparison, here are the 3 Day Story Event SCL 7 Placement rewards at current and updated.

Even at SCL 7, you’re going to be getting more 4-Star Covers and Shards, better and more numerous tokens, and even Mighty Tokens where there weren’t any before. At SCL 8, this even starts growing into 5-Star Shards for placement! Versus Events also pick up on this same trajectory, with more and better Covers and Shards throughout. 

 

SCL 7 is the starting point for 5-Stars, with top placements in Versus events snagging 25 5-Star Shards per event. So even at lower SCLs, players get a chance to push their rosters into the future, as they continue to work towards more power in the tier they’re at.

Adding Shards to Event rewards is a large pillar in the overall Shards feature, and we are excited for players to get to experience it. We have spent a long time balancing the updates across Story and Versus events alike to make sure that they have the largest impact for the entire player base. With that being said, we are particularly curious as to what everyone has to say about SCL 10. We encourage people who want to try out something new to give it a shot and let us know. We will be listening intently to feedback over the next few events. Competing in SCL 10 is the highest achievement in the game and we want to make sure the players that participate in it find it a rewarding experience. After all, simulations and predictions of player behavior are awesome, but simulations rarely match up perfectly with things when they’re in the wild. So feedback here, especially with gameplay experience, is definitely appreciated.

Edit 1:

Got a couple requests for the SCL 10 Versus Season Rewards, here are those.

bluewolf

@IceIX

Can you please provide enemy levels for SCL10?  And it looks like some different nodes or something are coming?

EDIT:  And what Shield Rank does a player have to be, to be able to play in SCL10?

Thanks!

LifeofAgony

Is there an alliance rewards update as well?

nycjonny

@IceIX it would be great to know how pvp season rewards are being updated for cl10. Thank you. 

IceIX

Test version of Infinite Pursuit, but this shows the current level scaling for SCL 10.



The shot in the original post is for a new Challenge Node available only in SCL 10. These nodes give additional rewards, but at current don't add points to the overall event scoring. We're still finalizing the rewards for these nodes to the last minute, but current expectations are things like Mighty Tokens and CP.

ThaRoadWarrior

This feels like an improvement to both modes, but definitely a huge win for PVP players moving the cp down to 1k points and bumping the amount to 18. The progression cp reduction in story *seems* to have been shifted to node based increases? Right now there is 40cp total in the main tree in SCL 9, with this I'm seeing 34. HP seems down though...will we start feeling a roster slot crunch? This also looks like 2x 4*s from progression now, 1 cover and 1 shard-based?

Pretty hype for 5* shards in progression, that's half a cover per story basically?

Cheetah1982

Is there any hope of updating the tiers to balance competition. I’m of the very strong opinion players with champed 5 star characters should not be allowed to join SCL 7.

ElReyFelix

Are the 5* shards and 4* shards available as progression rewards those of the featured characters for the events? 

Also, you said that SCL 9 previously had 4 cp available from each sub from node clearing, but I believe it had 5 CP available from each sub. Is it still going to be 5 CP in SCL 10?

MoonKnight

This seems like a rather large boost in prizes for progression and placement. @IceIX Are the shards rewarded for pre-set characters per event like the covers are now, or are they shards for the favorites characters on your roster?

If they are for your favorites, there is a way to actually gain direct 5* progression via shards, which is most welcome.

trat73

Looks awesome. Will it still be 4 clears of each node to reach max progression in PVE?

IceIX

Cheetah1982 said:

Is there any hope of updating the tiers to balance competition. I’m of the very strong opinion players with champed 5 star characters should not be allowed to join SCL 7.

With SCL 10's release, the same 3 tier entry will exist. So players that can play 7-9 right now and are strong enough for 10 will be shifted to playing in 8-10.

thedarkphoenix

This will be an interesting shift to the meta as the increased health pools are gonna knock thanos down, but probably move kitty up

JHawkInc

I'm curious about character rotation for these new covers/shards. Broadly speaking, Progression covers are for the current Essential characters, and Placement covers are for Essential characters for the next event. Will the same hold true to Shards? Will this mean more shards for newer characters, since they are featured more often in the rotation? Could help veteran players continue to cover newer characters if they're willing to play at the SCL10 difficulty level.

I'm also interested in seeing Season rewards as well. I think they're one of the oldest reward tables that hasn't been updated over time. PVE got adjusted to make all events more on par, and to update to 5 node clears hitting max rewards, and both PVE and PVP were updated for Red ISO, but Season rewards haven't been touched in ages.

thedarkphoenix

Overall at a quick glance this looks really good, some slight trade off's here and there but a big plus over all.

It almost seems beneficial to the players without a "alternative motive"

UNC_Samurai

DarthDeVo

I'm not sure, but this *might* be one of the signs of the apocalypse. 😋

Just kidding! Looking forward to getting some of them 5* shards. This might be the year I manage to get all my unchamped 5*s finished, or at least really close. 

EDIT: Enemies up to 650? 😳 That's uh... that's gonna be a bitter pill to swallow sometimes, methinks.

bowla33

Considering what looks like a massive step up in difficulty, why wasn't the placement LT extended down to T10? 

IceIX

JHawkInc said:

I'm also interested in seeing Season rewards as well. I think they're one of the oldest reward tables that hasn't been updated over time. PVE got adjusted to make all events more on par, and to update to 5 node clears hitting max rewards, and both PVE and PVP were updated for Red ISO, but Season rewards haven't been touched in ages.

Season rewards have also been updated. I'll see about pulling those charts down tomorrow when I'm back in the office. I remember many many Mighty Tokens at SCL10 as well as a 5-Star Infinity Stone support, but couldn't list off the rewards off the top of my head.

Phumade

I am very curious about how the first run through the various events go.  3 rounds of 630 royal family is gonna be an issue.  400k health pools will be challenging

DarthDeVo

Phumade said:

I am very curious about how the first run through the various events go.  3 rounds of 630 royal family is gonna be an issue.  400k health pools will be challenging

Yeah... not looking forward to 45 minute to an hour long clears. 😕

HoundofShadow

Have we reached the End Game?

The rewards are generous, especially those 5* shards. 

Thank you for the update and I'm looking forward to the changes.