Farming 4*

ThaRoadWarrior

4* rule of thumb was around 60% champed when I transitioned. I’d recommend just committing to latest now with Shang-Chi available if you are trying to move up. He is easily the best starter 5 since apocalypse

shardwick

Tony_Foot said:

TheEyeDoctorsWife said:

The so called reward factory is extremely overrated by collectionist farm boys . You can win and place top 100 with little effort , I’m satisfied with that level of play .

So called reward factory? Collectionist farm boys? 

You love throwing barbs at people who don't agree with you way of thinking. It's quite simple, if you are not farming 3/4* you are missing out on a huge amount of free awards. I don't play at anything like a high level but still wouldn't turn my nose up at an extremely quick method for me to either hoard to 300 or as others do keep pulling and make sure they champ them all. Such a high percentage of my LT's and CP comes from champion rewards and so very little comes from placement. Yet I'm sitting on over 1200 pulls available. It's very short sighted to dismiss that farm as over rated.

Not to mention that not everyone that plays the game will be able to get t100 in cl 10, but everyone can farm and generate a ton of resources even if they don't get the best placement. 

entrailbucket

Sekilicious said:

ThaRoadWarrior said:

I know there is some advice from the old days that said you must champ everyone at every tier before moving up, and that can feel like people trying to hold you back or gatekeeper you from higher tier play to a certain type of personality. I didn’t like hearing that, so I set out to build my roster back to front as I mentioned in a previous post. Ultimately after I got my 2s and 3s all rerostered and champed and I realized that having the patience to play that way probably would have gotten me further faster, but I eventually got there.

I wonder if it is still considered optimal to champ all 4*s before moving to the 5* tier. It probably is from a rewards standpoint. Maybe I will pull exclusively from LL once Gamora enters to see if I can champ them going forward without having half champed though with ~70% fully covered and waiting iso. 

This would very much depend on who you're talking to.  I haven't seen anyone recommend championing all characters in a long time.  If your goal is to be competitive/win stuff, the conventional wisdom is that you should go from nothing to 550 meta characters as quickly as possible. 

This involves powerleveling the meta characters at each tier and largely ignoring everyone else, except rostering them for essentials.  These players would advise you to pour resources only into championing the best characters and then to use them exclusively.  Extra covers for the bad characters can be saved or sold for iso as needed.

That's the "conventional wisdom" among the player tier I'm in (and they all think I'm crazy).  You can easily check out their rosters -- look at the top 10 of your cl10 PvE and PvP brackets.

Phumade

Sekilicious said:

ThaRoadWarrior said:

I know there is some advice from the old days that said you must champ everyone at every tier before moving up, and that can feel like people trying to hold you back or gatekeeper you from higher tier play to a certain type of personality. I didn’t like hearing that, so I set out to build my roster back to front as I mentioned in a previous post. Ultimately after I got my 2s and 3s all rerostered and champed and I realized that having the patience to play that way probably would have gotten me further faster, but I eventually got there.

I wonder if it is still considered optimal to champ all 4*s before moving to the 5* tier. It probably is from a rewards standpoint. Maybe I will pull exclusively from LL once Gamora enters to see if I can champ them going forward without having half champed though with ~70% fully covered and waiting iso. 

As time as passed that bar has lowered a bit.  You could make the jump now with 60% of the 4* champed.  The real dividing line is when your iso positive.  (in this context,  I mean you can afford to level up all your 4* and can afford to insta level new 4* champs.  Its really about understanding your flow of resources.  Once you know you can roster and level 4* as as they come, then you can start thinking about the 5* tier and how to champ every 5* as they are released.

Sekilicious

ThaRoadWarrior said:

4* rule of thumb was around 60% champed when I transitioned. I’d recommend just committing to latest now with Shang-Chi available if you are trying to move up. He is easily the best starter 5 since apocalypse

Yeah that is the plan. I already have Kitty covered but have been spending iso on hookers and porn instead of her. I’m pretty comfortably getting progression in SCL10 so not in a rush. If I manage to cover SC I will be more inclined to make the jump to single 5* MMR.

entrailbucket said:

Sekilicious said:

ThaRoadWarrior said:

I know there is some advice from the old days that said you must champ everyone at every tier before moving up, and that can feel like people trying to hold you back or gatekeeper you from higher tier play to a certain type of personality. I didn’t like hearing that, so I set out to build my roster back to front as I mentioned in a previous post. Ultimately after I got my 2s and 3s all rerostered and champed and I realized that having the patience to play that way probably would have gotten me further faster, but I eventually got there.

I wonder if it is still considered optimal to champ all 4*s before moving to the 5* tier. It probably is from a rewards standpoint. Maybe I will pull exclusively from LL once Gamora enters to see if I can champ them going forward without having half champed though with ~70% fully covered and waiting iso. 

This would very much depend on who you're talking to.  I haven't seen anyone recommend championing all characters in a long time.  If your goal is to be competitive/win stuff, the conventional wisdom is that you should go from nothing to 550 meta characters as quickly as possible. 

This involves powerleveling the meta characters at each tier and largely ignoring everyone else, except rostering them for essentials.  These players would advise you to pour resources only into championing the best characters and then to use them exclusively.  Extra covers for the bad characters can be saved or sold for iso as needed.

That's the "conventional wisdom" among the player tier I'm in (and they all think I'm crazy).  You can easily check out their rosters -- look at the top 10 of your cl10 PvE and PvP brackets.

Funny people say that. The majority of rosters I look at at that level have most to all characters baby champed at least, with a couple meta in the 500’s to 550’s. But I certainly haven’t looked at all or even a reliable sample.

Phumade said:

Sekilicious said:

ThaRoadWarrior said:

I know there is some advice from the old days that said you must champ everyone at every tier before moving up, and that can feel like people trying to hold you back or gatekeeper you from higher tier play to a certain type of personality. I didn’t like hearing that, so I set out to build my roster back to front as I mentioned in a previous post. Ultimately after I got my 2s and 3s all rerostered and champed and I realized that having the patience to play that way probably would have gotten me further faster, but I eventually got there.

I wonder if it is still considered optimal to champ all 4*s before moving to the 5* tier. It probably is from a rewards standpoint. Maybe I will pull exclusively from LL once Gamora enters to see if I can champ them going forward without having half champed though with ~70% fully covered and waiting iso. 

As time as passed that bar has lowered a bit.  You could make the jump now with 60% of the 4* champed.  The real dividing line is when your iso positive.  (in this context,  I mean you can afford to level up all your 4* and can afford to insta level new 4* champs.  Its really about understanding your flow of resources.  Once you know you can roster and level 4* as as they come, then you can start thinking about the 5* tier and how to champ every 5* as they are released.

It might be a couple years before I get the 18 million iso to champ the 51 covered 4*s I have to get to that stage. Not including the ones that are close. I only have 15 with less than 10 covers anymore. If I can’t cover SC I will just hoard and try to get the meta characters. 

ThaRoadWarrior

Being iso positive isn’t at all critical, I’m still not what I would call iso positive. Maybe iso neutral. The real key is having a critical mass of champs to keep the cp and LTs flowing allowing you to stay current. You needed around 2.5 Latest pulls per day average to stay current in latest pre-shard. It may be less now that they are in progression and so much more reliable than bonus heroes for tracking purposes.

Sekilicious

ThaRoadWarrior said:

Being iso positive isn’t at all critical, I’m still not what I would call iso positive. Maybe iso neutral. The real key is having a critical mass of champs to keep the cp and LTs flowing allowing you to stay current. You needed around 2.5 Latest pulls per day average to stay current in latest pre-shard. It may be less now that they are in progression and so much more reliable than bonus heroes for tracking purposes.

Sweet. I’ve been at 2.5 for a while now. Maybe higher now but I might have just been on a lucky streak since mid-October. That is good news indeed.

ThaRoadWarrior

That’s what it was in the 4/4/5 release days; maybe shards balance things out here in the 4/5/4/5 era? I haven’t done a calculation in a long time, and now that I’m splitting pulls again my data may be less relevant.

Phumade

ThaRoadWarrior said:

Being iso positive isn’t at all critical, I’m still not what I would call iso positive. Maybe iso neutral. The real key is having a critical mass of champs to keep the cp and LTs flowing allowing you to stay current. You needed around 2.5 Latest pulls per day average to stay current in latest pre-shard. It may be less now that they are in progression and so much more reliable than bonus heroes for tracking purposes.

I would say that being iso positive is the main key that lets you keep up with the release flow.  As has been stated earlier,  its the 4* champ rewards that drop the lts/cps and covers (I would guess that most of the big players see far more rewards (lt/cp/5* shards) from their champ farms than actual placements.  You can certain move early into the 5* tier and focus on a preferred character  but if the choice is between iso leveling 5* or iso leveling 4*, always level up the 4* to unlock the champ reward trees vs leveling the 5* to enable easier matches.  This is the main reason, I don't even bother leveling chars unless they are ready to be champed.

The critical point is to realize that being iso positive for your play tier is what allows you to have the critical mass of champs.

Let me put it another way to make it clearer. 
1.  Pretend that we are back before shield rank iso bonus and  that champ rewards didn't drop iso.  Only rely on placement/progression rewards and selling covers for roster development and iso.  
2.  Pretend your a 5* whale with all chars/and all tiers champed.  So your effectively at the highest tier of game

Now your effectively giving up access to champ iso rewards and the shield rank iso advancement bonus.   And rely solely on placement/progression and covers sales to meet your iso needs.

You will see just how fast your roster gets stale and how crippled your roster becomes as you become forced to rely on only placement/progression iso and cover sales for 4*/5*roster development.  

Luckily for all of us, the bar for Iso positive play (which inherently considers your champ rewards, shield rank bonus in addition to placement/prog rewards)  is actually quite low and gets progressively lower as each tier gets fully developed. 

Of course, if I had to start from scratch.  the bar for iso positive play would be ridiculously  high.  but as a fully developed 5* roster, my actual iso needs to keep up with release schedule of 4/5 per season and recycled 2*/3*/4* 
is easily met by the reward tree and shield advancement.
.

ThaRoadWarrior

I have 46 5* champs, and it takes me 12 days to scrounge the iso for a new one when I get one covered. All the rest are sitting at 255 for the most part. I have everyone but Blob (waiting on iso) and Ikaris (just came out) champed at the 4* tier. Iso doesn’t get you covers out of Latest or Classic directly, you need the cp and LTs from champs to do that. My point is that once you have a critical mass of 4*s champed, let’s all agree that its 60% of the tier, you can start chasing up to the 5* tier of you want. But you’ll be making decisions on where your iso goes for a long time after that. When I started chasing 5*s and champed Ghost Rider, I’d just champ whichever 4* had the most saved covers when I got the iso until I had a champable 5*, then I’d save up for that instead. By alternating like that I eventually champed all the 4s, but I definitely was keeping up without being iso positive and would say I still am. 

entrailbucket

I remembered why I associate farming with a massive expense.  It's because I'm, like, really, really old.

When they announced champions (2016, maybe?) I was already post-iso, with every 3* at 166 and every 4* at 270 (5* existed then but they were much harder to get, so I don't remember if I had anybody at 450).

Because they all started at the same level, they all maxed out at around the same time.  The 3* all hit 266 within a few weeks of each other, so I had to lay out for all the extra slots at once, and level them all up basically at once.  That killed my entire iso stash and I wasn't post-iso for a long time again after that.

Then, later, all the older 4* hit 370 around the same time, and setting up that farm was like a 6-month project.

TheEyeDoctorsWife

Sekilicious said:

ThaRoadWarrior said:

Being iso positive isn’t at all critical, I’m still not what I would call iso positive. Maybe iso neutral. The real key is having a critical mass of champs to keep the cp and LTs flowing allowing you to stay current. You needed around 2.5 Latest pulls per day average to stay current in latest pre-shard. It may be less now that they are in progression and so much more reliable than bonus heroes for tracking purposes.

Sweet. I’ve been at 2.5 for a while now. Maybe higher now but I might have just been on a lucky streak since mid-October. That is good news indeed.

I average about 1.2 pulls a day which with a fortunate RNG of 15% or higher I can champ a LT before it leaves ( 10 covers plus shards in PvE) . All metas champed and everything since Yelena release ( when I became SCL 10 eligible) at least 11/13.  That’s with minimal play and top 100 placement, and a monthly VIP expense. I can win 44 of the 50 challenge nodes I’ve played four times . I consider that acceptable progress for 34 months playing with my only goal to win in battle .  

Phumade

ThaRoadWarrior said:

 My point is that once you have a critical mass of 4*s champed, let’s all agree that its 60% of the tier, you can start chasing up to the 5* tier of you want. But you’ll be making decisions on where your iso goes for a long time after that. 

The simple act that you have to decide on which 4* gets champed and at what time is the key point.  Currently the consequences of choosing to iso level a 5* over a 4* is mainly nonexistent and that is a good thing for all players.  But that was not always true in the game.

you've been in the game long enough to remember the days before saved covers.  Then it made a real difference in which order you champed chars because you ran the risk of expiring covers.  So Iso rates and the order in which you champed had real consequences.

But the way optimal resource planning occurs is fundamentally no different now or then.  The sooner your iso earn rate outpaces your cover earn rates simply means that less decisions need to be made.

Let me give you the 5* version of why eliminating the need to make decisions is important. The 5* resource game is all about LT and CP earn rates and whether you need to spend CP to finish a 5* before they leave LL.

I see many people asking about how many pulls it takes to cover a 5* before they enter classics.  That question is simply irrelevant to big 5* players.  They can simply rely on the natural output of being T25 SCL 10 to automatically cover and champ all 5* as they are released.

The need for resource management simply doesn't exist anymore for big 5* players.  I could essentially run my roster blind and just open tokens as they are earned, and everything still gets champed before they leave LL etc.  And lets be honest,  shields and healthpacks are irrelevant now as well.  I can easily afford any combination of boosts/ap/or health to continue a play session.  While play time is still a scarce resource for me, buying in game resources doesn't matter in light of my resource earn rates.  

Ultimately isn't that the ideal state?  Be in a position where questions about iso/hp/LTs/cp simply doesn't matter.  They all get champed by simply applying covers, buying slots, iso level chars as the need arises.  

And let me acknowledge that I do worry about whether I should pump a new 5* to 500 or keep him at 450.  But there are definitely bigger players who don't even worry about that dilemma.  Their natural buy club/play habits ensure that they can pump every new 5* to 500 based on their weekly buy patterns.  So there are always more ways to simplify and optimize gameplay even for 5* rosters.

As a final point.  You always mention how few events you miss out on or how it hasn't hindered your ability for 75wins/ 1200+.  Those aren't meaningful benchmarks to big 5* rosters anymore.  That's already assumed and they only issue is simply 

"Have points developed to point that I can simply play 1 shield or do I need to think about 2 or 3 shield hops and will my real life schedule allow that without disruption."

And trust me their are 5* rosters that can simply start play at any point of the event in any bracket and push for t5/t10 in one play sitting.  No wondering if there are active players with big points etc.  They simply know they have the roster size to keep funneling ap/boosts/shields until they reach T5 etc.

People who front run simply enjoy the core gameplay mechanics and placement challenge of T5 against similarly stacked rosters, etc.  None of them need to play to maintain their Tier.  They could all snipe 3rd bracket and still accomplish the same goals.

As a side note.  I'd love to see more resource constraints and dilemmas for high level players.  I always considered resource management to be a strength of my game and buy clubs, saved covers, shield ranks, shards made roster management way too easy for alot of players.

ThaRoadWarrior

Yeah, I do open everything as I go and stay current, and I’ve always been totally F2P. The way I was describing it earlier is the way I transitioned to 5* play. I’m not saying it’s the best way, just that you don’t HAVE to be iso positive and able to champ any new character immediately to start chasing 5* characters. But you do have to have a broad roster of champs to feed the furnace if you want to get enough pulls to cover a character before they leave latest. That does take a minimum amount of iso to get them champed, but you can go and champ characters later with all their saved covers and shards at a far more leisurely pace now.

I was around before saved covers and shards, and that completely changed the recipe for what you need in order to chase characters. 

HoundofShadow

Isn't making day-to-day decisions part of being humans? I can't imagine being a human without having to make decisions. Everything simply happens and gets executed.

Phumade

HoundofShadow said:

Isn't making day-to-day decisions part of being humans? I can't imagine being a human without having to make decisions. Everything simply happens and gets executed.

Hehe
Thats exactly why I can still afford to play this game.  I don't have to invest time, money or decision making energy.  Its simply show up and match colors according to my real life schedule.  And you'd be totally right to say, I've become quite dumb in terms of understanding how char powers work and interact etc.  I'll be honest and say boost week has made the game harder now.  I have to give some real thought on matchups now.

Fortunately I'm still at the point where I haven't had to put any effort in thinking about whether a char is worth rostering.  But I'm sure that day will come.

At this point its simply about loging into line and chatting with the rooms.  actually doing the matches has sorta taken a backseat,  and I'll wager thats true for alot of other vets.

entrailbucket

Phumade said:

HoundofShadow said:

Isn't making day-to-day decisions part of being humans? I can't imagine being a human without having to make decisions. Everything simply happens and gets executed.

Hehe
Thats exactly why I can still afford to play this game.  I don't have to invest time, money or decision making energy.  Its simply show up and match colors according to my real life schedule.  And you'd be totally right to say, I've become quite dumb in terms of understanding how char powers work and interact etc.  I'll be honest and say boost week has made the game harder now.  I have to give some real thought on matchups now.

Fortunately I'm still at the point where I haven't had to put any effort in thinking about whether a char is worth rostering.  But I'm sure that day will come.

At this point its simply about loging into line and chatting with the rooms.  actually doing the matches has sorta taken a backseat,  and I'll wager thats true for alot of other vets.

See, for exactly one "big" 5* roster (I count!), the boosts have been great.  I've spent years levelling up these terrible characters just to be contrary and I now I get to crush people with them.

I stay on top of latest 5* pretty easily without getting much placement (I might get t100 in PvE these days, and I'm t25 in PvP if I feel like it).  It's the objectively stupid size of my farm and the fact that I get all my legendary pulls at a 20% discount.  I'm not sure what would happen if I still tried for placement but it doesn't seem necessary.


Actually doing the matches is still the fun part!  If it ever stopped being the fun part, I'd be gone.  When they run events that aren't fun for me (like anything unboosted or pick-3) I just don't play them.  I have a job!  I don't need a second job that's a video game.

HoundofShadow

If I were to reach that stage, I would probably quit MPQ. It's like you're simply waiting for other things while others are still chasing.

DAZ0273

Sekilicious said:

ThaRoadWarrior said:

I know there is some advice from the old days that said you must champ everyone at every tier before moving up, and that can feel like people trying to hold you back or gatekeeper you from higher tier play to a certain type of personality. I didn’t like hearing that, so I set out to build my roster back to front as I mentioned in a previous post. Ultimately after I got my 2s and 3s all rerostered and champed and I realized that having the patience to play that way probably would have gotten me further faster, but I eventually got there.

I wonder if it is still considered optimal to champ all 4*s before moving to the 5* tier. It probably is from a rewards standpoint. Maybe I will pull exclusively from LL once Gamora enters to see if I can champ them going forward without having half champed though with ~70% fully covered and waiting iso. 

You definitely don't need to champ all 4's before becoming a 5* player but if you keep playing and rostering you will do it eventually without meaning to. I have everybody champed bar Blob and now Ikaris but it wasn't a big plan, it is just farming has never ever been easier these days with shards flowing and saved covers, champing sort of takes care of itself eventually.

You can get sucked into the "old ways" with this game though - I rarely bother playing the 1* node on DDQ these days but still keep a 1* Spidey on my roster - I haven't really worked out why - in fact I use him more for the apply covers task in  daily quests as I save multiple spare covers on my vine and just move them up and down as needed. In game play terms though he is redundant as I can't be bothered to play the tedious 2*/1* nodes on DDQ.

entrailbucket

DAZ0273 said:

Sekilicious said:

ThaRoadWarrior said:

I know there is some advice from the old days that said you must champ everyone at every tier before moving up, and that can feel like people trying to hold you back or gatekeeper you from higher tier play to a certain type of personality. I didn’t like hearing that, so I set out to build my roster back to front as I mentioned in a previous post. Ultimately after I got my 2s and 3s all rerostered and champed and I realized that having the patience to play that way probably would have gotten me further faster, but I eventually got there.

I wonder if it is still considered optimal to champ all 4*s before moving to the 5* tier. It probably is from a rewards standpoint. Maybe I will pull exclusively from LL once Gamora enters to see if I can champ them going forward without having half champed though with ~70% fully covered and waiting iso. 

You definitely don't need to champ all 4's before becoming a 5* player but if you keep playing and rostering you will do it eventually without meaning to. I have everybody champed bar Blob and now Ikaris but it wasn't a big plan, it is just farming has never ever been easier these days with shards flowing and saved covers, champing sort of takes care of itself eventually.

You can get sucked into the "old ways" with this game though - I rarely bother playing the 1* node on DDQ these days but still keep a 1* Spidey on my roster - I haven't really worked out why - in fact I use him more for the apply covers task in  daily quests as I save multiple spare covers on my vine and just move them up and down as needed. In game play terms though he is redundant as I can't be bothered to play the tedious 2*/1* nodes on DDQ.

Doesn't it bother you to miss out on the DDQ placement rewards?

(DDQ placement rewards are screenshots of the DDQ leaderboard with your name at #1)