Ready to Unlock? What is this?

palenoue

After the last update I noticed a lot of maxed-out characters are showing up in my Upgrade Roster with the label "Ready to Unlock."  I can't figure out what all this is about.

Seph1roth5

Ummm is that new?  I thought I had to sell my maxed out dr. strange to start recruiting anew and getting rewards...

spatenfloot

no it isn't 

Borstock

Seph1roth5 said:

Ummm is that new?  I thought I had to sell my maxed out dr. strange to start recruiting anew and getting rewards...

It isn't. It was just very difficult to find before.

GrimSkald

Borstock said:

Seph1roth5 said:

Ummm is that new?  I thought I had to sell my maxed out dr. strange to start recruiting anew and getting rewards...

It isn't. It was just very difficult to find before.

Before it was an option in the actual character, now it shows up in your roster.

I save the shards anyway until the dupe is nearly done.  Shards make it much easier to finish a character than random covers.  In general I don't apply the shards until I can

a) get the character to 4/4/4

b) have a 5 in one color - at that point I'll make sure the other two are at least 3, then it doesn't really matter where the shards go since a 3/5/5 is finished.

Borstock

GrimSkald said:

Borstock said:

Seph1roth5 said:

Ummm is that new?  I thought I had to sell my maxed out dr. strange to start recruiting anew and getting rewards...

It isn't. It was just very difficult to find before.

Before it was an option in the actual character, now it shows up in your roster.

I save the shards anyway until the dupe is nearly done.  Shards make it much easier to finish a character than random covers.  In general I don't apply the shards until I can

a) get the character to 4/4/4

b) have a 5 in one color - at that point I'll make sure the other two are at least 3, then it doesn't really matter where the shards go since a 3/5/5 is finished.

I don't find cover distribution worrisome now that we have shards and saved covers. Plus, we are talking dupes here. I've never needed the second character for any important reason, so I just throw the shards into a cover as soon as I have enough. If I end up with a crooked distribution, it usually resolves itself pretty quickly.

GrimSkald

Borstock said:

GrimSkald said:

Borstock said:

Seph1roth5 said:

Ummm is that new?  I thought I had to sell my maxed out dr. strange to start recruiting anew and getting rewards...

It isn't. It was just very difficult to find before.

Before it was an option in the actual character, now it shows up in your roster.

I save the shards anyway until the dupe is nearly done.  Shards make it much easier to finish a character than random covers.  In general I don't apply the shards until I can

a) get the character to 4/4/4

b) have a 5 in one color - at that point I'll make sure the other two are at least 3, then it doesn't really matter where the shards go since a 3/5/5 is finished.

I don't find cover distribution worrisome now that we have shards and saved covers. Plus, we are talking dupes here. I've never needed the second character for any important reason, so I just throw the shards into a cover as soon as I have enough. If I end up with a crooked distribution, it usually resolves itself pretty quickly.

That's very true, but I do like to finish the dupe as quickly as possible because I hate to wait for that LT.   It's an esthetic choice - which do you hate more -- having the character "hang out" as level-able in your roster, or risk taking some extra time (probably weeks in the case of a 4*,) for you to reap the same rewards.  It doesn't really matter, but I chose the former.

I think the worst I've ever done with saved covers was something like 10ish, but that was a 2* so no shards.  Daken,I'm pretty sure.  and yes, I eventually pulled the cover I needed, so he immediately went up over 10 levels.

palenoue

Thanks for the answers.  I don't want duplicate characters (have enough trouble keeping up with the ones I have) so I wish I could use those excess shards to buy something.  Like maybe 10 maxed out shards for 1 still growing shard?

krakenoon

@palenoue

You eventually want to tend to your farms, either keeping max champs or not. The rewards for champ levels are a primary source of income for a variety of the game’s currency. It’s not uncommon for players to hold on to a max champed character while leveling another (for a slight edge in the character’s PvP or for max effect/survivability on characters like IM40 or Strang3). Historically, players would get a character up to near max champ and start working on a duplicate, but shards have mostly done away with that.

You are, of course, free to do what you like with your roster but smart management will go a long way toward getting to the next tier of play.

Rhipf

At the very least save up the shards until you get 9999 of them then recruit a new copy of the character and level it up until you run out of shards. At that point you can sell the duplicate and get some more iso-8 & HP out of it. Those 9999 shards should get you to 33 covers for a 3*, 24 covers of a 4* or 19 covers of a 5* which is good enough for a few champ level rewards. 

This method wouldn't be profitable (you would probably lose more iso/HP than you gain) but it could help level other characters for you (either through champ reward shards or covers). This would also mean that those shards over the 9999 cap wouldn't be lost.

krakenoon

To be fair, if all you want to make sure of is champing the replacement, it’s 3900 for a 3* & 5200 for a 4*. I generally wouldn’t suggest saving all the way up to 9999 as it is easy to lose track of favorites & feeders, potentially wasting shards.

Rhipf

Yes, you would need to keep track of the status of other character's shard levels if you followed my suggestion. I am using the extra shards to progress my farmers so I don't usually run into that problem.

Vhailorx

palenoue said:

Thanks for the answers.  I don't want duplicate characters (have enough trouble keeping up with the ones I have) so I wish I could use those excess shards to buy something.  Like maybe 10 maxed out shards for 1 still growing shard?

Then save them!  they are stored value that doesn't expire.  And if you keep playing long enough, you will eventually want to start recruiting duplicates because you  want to start farming 2*, 3*s, and even 4*s. 

But just to be super, extra clear: "Ready to unlock" just means you have enough shards to purchase a cover for that character.  If you don't already have that character on your roster, or if your already rostered character is a max'd out champ, then 'unlocking' also means adding that character to your roster (ie you must have a free roster spot).  I imagine that for newer players, this will be the way they acquire several characters.

MoosePrime

Vhailorx said:

But just to be super, extra clear: "Ready to unlock" just means you have enough shards to purchase a cover for that character.  If you don't already have that character on your roster, or if your already rostered character is a max'd out champ, then 'unlocking' also means adding that character to your roster (ie you must have a free roster spot).

Also if you have a character fully covered, but not yet champed, they will show up as "Ready to Unlock!" if they have enough shards stored.

palenoue

Thanks for the advice, I wouldn't have thought of using them this way.