New Feature - Champions 2.0 (Live with R287)

entrailbucket

@GrimSkald said:

@Bad said:

@ThaRoadWarrior said:

(i'm going to stop hyperbolizing 550s at this stage personally, since that's not my reality for some years for sure).

...

Are you going to fight the few ascended 3* you could see in a pvp in your MMR or just skip it? Probably the last option.

Actually, probably yes. Very few 3 stars have game-breaking powers or scale particularly well. I'll beat up (3)Hulks 5 stars all day -- sure they'll spam out green tiles but their powers kind of suck. Sure if IM40 gets out his yellow it could suck when the other toon blasts me, but 2 turn CDs that late in the game aren't going to be that threatening.

I think people are right to be concerned about a few of the better 4 stars (like Polaris or America Chavez,) but in general 5 star powers are just plain better.

Just pointing out -- we don't have any idea what 3* Hulk will look like/scale to as a 5*. They did specifically say that he won't just be higher-level version of 3* Hulk, like the ones that show up in PvE currently.

meadowsweet

@ThaRoadWarrior said:
Since ones and twos aren’t directly shardable, I wonder if a 3* character will be fastest to 550?

@entrailbucket said:
I think all of us are spending WAY too much time worrying about taking 1* and 2* to 550, and not nearly enough time thinking about what 550 Polaris or America Chavez will look like. Those guys are significantly more achievable and (probably) significantly more useful.

Tier: Number of Characters x Covers to Level 550
5★: 87 Characters x 113 Covers = 9,831 Total
4★: 143 x 526 = 75,218
3★: 59 x 952 = 56,168
2★: 14 x 1,404 = 19,656
1★: 3 x 1,508 + 5 x 1,460 = 11,824

While it's true that 3★ characters have shards, that's just not going to be sufficient to overcome the current math of the game:

1) Lower-tier tokens / covers are far more common (2★ are actually most common, since you can only receive 1★ covers from Standard Tokens)
2) There are far more upper-tier characters than lower - 3★ outnumber 2★ by 4:1 and 1★ by 7:1
3) The 3★-5★ tiers are all growing by one additional character every four weeks, while 1★ & 2★ remain static

GENxSLADE

I am both scared and excited. This is BIG and could make or break the game for a lot of people. You all are bold for this gamble and I assume you really thought this through.

Personally I embrace change and would love to ascend a few characters. I recently hit max champ on a few 4* and could benefit from them ascending. Cough America Chavez.

But I'm very interested in seeing how this shakes up the Meta. A wild Ascended 5* Juggs will be fun to see lol.

Ultrace

Out of curiosity, anyone know the best way to get Standard Hero Packs for an SCL10 player? They're not frequently in the rewards brackets, and that's going to be the best way for me to start my journey towards 1Spidey5.

meadowsweet

@KGB said:
Unless you want to ascend a WHOLE bunch of characters in parallel, you won't need to buy a lot of slots.
The only time you'll need more than 1 more slot is when ascending multiple characters at a time

@MoosePrime said:
You shouldn't need more than 5 slots.
1 - maxed 4* ascending to 5*
2 - maxed 3* ascending to 4* to consume to ascend the maxed 4*
3 - maxed 2* ascending to 3* to consume to ascend the maxed 3*
4 - maxed 1* ascending to 2* to consume to ascend the maxed 2*
5 - maxed 1* to consume to ascend the other maxed 1*

Let's say you're trying to take all 311 current characters to the 5★ tier. Each 5★ only requires a single roster slot.

Each 4★ needs a second roster slot, but only for the period of time you're collecting covers 114 - 126 (the first 113 go into your Max Champ, and after 126 you Bind & Ascend.)

But the fifty-nine 3★ get a little trickier. There's the original 113 Max Champ, a temporary duplicate for covers 114 - 126, then Bind & Ascend to 4★ and spend 300 covers Max Champing them. But now you have to start another 3★ - this requires two roster slots for the next 113 covers, and three slots for the 13 covers after that, then you Bind & Ascend the three of them up to 5★.

You'll need up to four slots for the fourteen 2★ and up to five slots for the eight 1★ characters. So in the absolute worst case scenario, where you're in the middle of the process for all characters, you would need 646 Total Roster Slots.

5★: 87 Characters x 1 Slot = 87 Total
4★: 143 x 2 = 286
3★: 59 x 3 = 177
2★: 14 x 4 = 56
1★: 8 x 5 = 40

Now, in reality, no one would ever find themselves in this situation, where they're 1 cover away from 5★ ascension on every character in the game. But you will need to (temporarily) dedicate dozens of roster slots to the 1★ - 3★ duplicates while you have all of them in various stages of the process - it's going to take weeks per character at the very least, more likely months given the "exchange rates" to level up at the higher levels. Or you can alternate between characters while continuing to farm or sell extra covers. But that's just going to slow down your overall 5★ Ascension goal.

GrimSkald

@liminal_lad said:
Advice question. I have a 2 star Thor I could ascend Monday. Given that he’s functionally a carbon copy of 3 star Thor, would the rewards be better or worse between farming and ascending?

It probably will be subtly different in its numbers, maybe a little less or a little more, but it will probably be similar.

OTOH there's really no reason not to roster another Thor, level him to max champ, then combine the two for 50 3* levels. Other than taking up a roster slot, anyway, but if you're farming the character already, all it does is tie up a bit more resources

ZeiramMR

@Ultrace said:
Out of curiosity, anyone know the best way to get Standard Hero Packs for an SCL10 player? They're not frequently in the rewards brackets, and that's going to be the best way for me to start my journey towards 1Spidey5.

Lightning Rounds. Join when it starts, beat the starter teams and you'll at least get one after the second fight (plus any 1 or 2 star covers for fight rewards)

Blackstone

@meadowsweet said:

@ThaRoadWarrior said:
Since ones and twos aren’t directly shardable, I wonder if a 3* character will be fastest to 550?

@entrailbucket said:
I think all of us are spending WAY too much time worrying about taking 1* and 2* to 550, and not nearly enough time thinking about what 550 Polaris or America Chavez will look like. Those guys are significantly more achievable and (probably) significantly more useful.

Tier: Number of Characters x Covers to Level 550
5★: 87 Characters x 113 Covers = 9,831 Total
4★: 143 x 526 = 75,218
3★: 59 x 952 = 56,168
2★: 14 x 1,404 = 19,656
1★: 3 x 1,508 + 5 x 1,460 = 11,824

While it's true that 3★ characters have shards, that's just not going to be sufficient to overcome the current math of the game:

1) Lower-tier tokens / covers are far more common (2★ are actually most common, since you can only receive 1★ covers from Standard Tokens)
2) There are far more upper-tier characters than lower - 3★ outnumber 2★ by 4:1 and 1★ by 7:1
3) The 3★-5★ tiers are all growing by one additional character every four weeks, while 1★ & 2★ remain static

Can you explain your math....I know you did a break down earlier but I'm missing something.

Why does it take over 500 covers to max a 4?
2 maxxed 4s is 226 covers plus 100 to champ the 5. That's 326... Where are the other 200 coming from?

ZeiramMR

I'm intrigued but I don't think this will be that disruptive to me since I'm closer to the casual side of the axis these days than a hard-core player. (I've just been playing since near the beginning which has helped my farming).

Looking at my roster, my only 4* champs that could be ascended at the time of the update are Medusa, and Devil Dinosaur once he is available. I'm just going to work on the 1-stars and some key characters from tiers 2 and 3 as a starting point, and continue focus on my cover gaps in the 5-star realm.

ZeiramMR

@Blackstone said:

@meadowsweet said:

@ThaRoadWarrior said:
Since ones and twos aren’t directly shardable, I wonder if a 3* character will be fastest to 550?

@entrailbucket said:
I think all of us are spending WAY too much time worrying about taking 1* and 2* to 550, and not nearly enough time thinking about what 550 Polaris or America Chavez will look like. Those guys are significantly more achievable and (probably) significantly more useful.

Tier: Number of Characters x Covers to Level 550
5★: 87 Characters x 113 Covers = 9,831 Total
4★: 143 x 526 = 75,218
3★: 59 x 952 = 56,168
2★: 14 x 1,404 = 19,656
1★: 3 x 1,508 + 5 x 1,460 = 11,824

While it's true that 3★ characters have shards, that's just not going to be sufficient to overcome the current math of the game:

1) Lower-tier tokens / covers are far more common (2★ are actually most common, since you can only receive 1★ covers from Standard Tokens)
2) There are far more upper-tier characters than lower - 3★ outnumber 2★ by 4:1 and 1★ by 7:1
3) The 3★-5★ tiers are all growing by one additional character every four weeks, while 1★ & 2★ remain static

Can you explain your math....I know you did a break down earlier but I'm missing something.

Why does it take over 500 covers to max a 4?
2 maxxed 4s is 226 covers plus 100 to champ the 5. That's 326... Where are the other 200 coming from?

Not meadowsweet, but you are forgetting that once the 4-star is ascended, it takes four covers for a champ level as a 5-star.

113+13 + (4*100) = 526

Or if you prefer two maxed 4-star champion versions to start with, you'd be at level 475 and need 75 * 4 covers to go.

ThaRoadWarrior

@Blackstone said:

@meadowsweet said:

@ThaRoadWarrior said:
Since ones and twos aren’t directly shardable, I wonder if a 3* character will be fastest to 550?

@entrailbucket said:
I think all of us are spending WAY too much time worrying about taking 1* and 2* to 550, and not nearly enough time thinking about what 550 Polaris or America Chavez will look like. Those guys are significantly more achievable and (probably) significantly more useful.

Tier: Number of Characters x Covers to Level 550
5★: 87 Characters x 113 Covers = 9,831 Total
4★: 143 x 526 = 75,218
3★: 59 x 952 = 56,168
2★: 14 x 1,404 = 19,656
1★: 3 x 1,508 + 5 x 1,460 = 11,824

While it's true that 3★ characters have shards, that's just not going to be sufficient to overcome the current math of the game:

1) Lower-tier tokens / covers are far more common (2★ are actually most common, since you can only receive 1★ covers from Standard Tokens)
2) There are far more upper-tier characters than lower - 3★ outnumber 2★ by 4:1 and 1★ by 7:1
3) The 3★-5★ tiers are all growing by one additional character every four weeks, while 1★ & 2★ remain static

Can you explain your math....I know you did a break down earlier but I'm missing something.

Why does it take over 500 covers to max a 4?
2 maxxed 4s is 226 covers plus 100 to champ the 5. That's 326... Where are the other 200 coming from?

are you taking the "exchange rate" into account here? once you ascend, it takes as many covers to add a level as that character's saved cover exchange rate moving forward.

Blackstone

I missed the four covers per level exchange rate... Which I guess makes sense for rarity sake.

Thanks...I knew is missing something, just didn't know what it was.

Afallen1

This seems like the coolest completely useless thing ever. When I first read it I was insanely excited. Then I remembered that most of my characters are fully covered but I never have the iso to level them. So unless they massively increase the amount of iso we get I will never use this. I really hope they do because I would love to take advantage of this feature.

StitchyImp

Wait...let's say I bind 2 3* Psylockes and ascend to a 4* like in the posts example but then I want to make her a 5*. If I'm reading the ascension tree right....I would need to recruit two more 3* Psylocks, bind them into a 4*, then bind that new 4* to the one I already have to ascend to 5*....

That means I would need a total of 4 Psylocks. So theoretically my 1 new 5* Psylock roster slot would technically cost 4800 coins....

A 5* slot now costs 4800 coins not to mention the ISO all of which would be more than just recruiting a 5* rarity character...

Coins and ISO will need to grow proportionate to the game otherwise this just feels like a way to get people to pay more.

Please tell me I'm wrong!

Punter1

Roster slots are forever - so you don't spend the 4800 HP on that one slot alone, but add to you overall slot count for more farms as you ascend and bind characters. At most you need 3 slots to make a 3* into 5*. 1 as 4* and 2 more 3s as to make your 2nd 4. You are out ISO to champ 4x 3*s

Or just don't and ignore the ascension stuff on 3* + rarity. It's a loooong slog with the number of covers needed and likely only maybe useful for a couple of characters.

Ascending 1s and 2s has value due to the better rewards in the higher champ tiers. Debatable if it's worth it for 3 & 4s

Ultrace

@StitchyImp said:
Wait...let's say I bind 2 3* Psylockes and ascend to a 4* like in the posts example but then I want to make her a 5*. If I'm reading the ascension tree right....I would need to recruit two more 3* Psylocks, bind them into a 4*, then bind that new 4* to the one I already have to ascend to 5*....

That means I would need a total of 4 Psylocks. So theoretically my 1 new 5* Psylock roster slot would technically cost 4800 coins....

A 5* slot now costs 4800 coins not to mention the ISO all of which would be more than just recruiting a 5* rarity character...

Coins and ISO will need to grow proportionate to the game otherwise this just feels like a way to get people to pay more.

Please tell me I'm wrong!

You're not wrong, but you would only be out those coins temporarily. Once you bind the Psylockes, they disappear from the roster and free up the slots you had to purchase. So, you do need to buy more slots to do this, but the slots aren't permanently used up. After you're done with Psylocke, you could use the empty slots to start the ascension process for another character.

allen_koholic

Dunno if this has been asked or answered anywhere…

Shards are unique only to the character, right? Not character and rarity? Right? Did I read that right?

So let’s say I ascend my Hood all the way to 5star, can I then roster a second Hood at 3star, favorite him, then get Hood shards from standard tokens that I can use towards his 5?

ThaRoadWarrior

@allen_koholic said:
Dunno if this has been asked or answered anywhere…

Shards are unique only to the character, right? Not character and rarity? Right? Did I read that right?

So let’s say I ascend my Hood all the way to 5star, can I then roster a second Hood at 3star, favorite him, then get Hood shards from standard tokens that I can use towards his 5?

Yes, this was explicitly answered earlier

Warbringa

While I see the interest in why this excites some people, I feel it isn't a very practical option for most players and may lead to lots of bigger issues:

1.) This is a character roster slot killer. You need to keep multiple copied versions to ascend each tier it seems. So going up 1 tier is not terrible, multiple tiers is a lot of roster space if you are looking at multiple characters.
2.) It may be iso friendly for those who struggle for iso but for the same number of covers/shards, you could have champed and resold the character multiple times? I think the farm is a more valuable long-term tool to players looking to play for longevity vs. trying to ascended characters. Advanced players normally don't struggle with iso and sometime HP. However if you give up farming for ascension will that change?
3.) This will certainly break some parts of the game, especially PvP. We already know that some players hate Balance of Power for example, but I know this is a bit different. They will be making changes its sounds to Ascended characters? What happens if the changes make the character not as good as their earlier version?
4.) The rich will get richer since they will have the resources to take advantage of this right away whereas most rosters will not.
5.) It may help diversify the meta or it may make it worse by making it so if you don't have a 5* Polaris (or insert ascended character here) you can't compete (just an example, don't know if Polaris would be the game breaker!)

ThaRoadWarrior

What are the sell rates for ascended characters? Same as a natural born character of the same tier?