Experiment 3: New Release 4* to Ascended 5* timeline

KGB

@WhiteBomber said:

@BriMan2222 said:

@Domitronas said:
3Hunter4 now at 370, started a dupe which is currently at 2/2/2. The numbers don't look great so far:( If anyone is wondering why I even bother with her, the only reason is that I hope her purple stays at 3AP/165% match damage boost even at 5*. Ofc there's no way to check that before commiting months worth of shards to it. Fun.

Dupe Shaw at 355, getting close to ascending!

There was someone running a 550 3a5 hunter last pvp. Yes, purple is still 3ap and 165% match damage boost. We're not supposed to name other players, but if you search for the alliance "VariantsOfTime" in game they are a commander with pretty much every character in the game at 550.

Super helpful, thank you. Also, their name is kinda hilarious. Also also, that account has to be worth 1 Billion US Dollars

I just peeked at the account myself. When you have dual Moonstones (and other 2s) at 550 you know you hoarded a LOT of tokens over the years because even if you had a whole bunch of 144s when ascension happened there is no way to get to 550, let alone 2 550s without massive hoards of tokens.

It's a very impressive roster and yet as George Carlin once said, they still ain't in the club because they only have a couple of Stones and none beyond R3.

KGB

ThaRoadWarrior

Yeah I’m definitely not in “the club,” only stones I have are the freebies they’ve given away. But my power stone is at least 4* with 550 shards. I’ve had it parked on that since favorite went live.

ThaRoadWarrior

Ok, hit 370 today on my primary Shaw.

Started this thread 113 days ago, so on average I guess that works out to one cover a day somehow? Didn’t feel like it was that frequent. Probably would have been sooner had I been playing at my normal volume these past two weeks or so.

Switch is at 322.

rainkingucd

@ThaRoadWarrior said:
Ok, hit 370 today on my primary Shaw.

Started this thread 113 days ago, so on average I guess that works out to one cover a day somehow? Didn’t feel like it was that frequent. Probably would have been sooner had I been playing at my normal volume these past two weeks or so.

Switch is at 322.

He was still featured a couple of times so some events would get you ~3.5 covers in the middle of normal pull rates

ThaRoadWarrior

Yeah for sure, I mean the numbers are what they are, i just didnt “feel” it happening.

St_Bernadus

Decided I would max my dupe Shaw just to see how long that takes. Currently at lvl 317.

Aunt May dupe at lvl 185, definitely was slow to get on that train.

ThaRoadWarrior

My own Shaw dupe is 1/1/1. I don’t think I’ll max mine out, I want to move on to M’Baku, currently at 318.

JoeHandle

Dupe Shaw is already past 330, zipping right along!

Iron May is also up to 330, chugging along. Will be nice to push another 3 soon.

M'Baku .... is so far from maxchamping, much less ascending, not happening anytime soon.

Domitronas

On the 24th of April I wrote that my Shaw was at 314, today I finally got my dupe to 370 and ascended, now a proud owner of a 475 5haw. In the 108 days since I was able to get 169 covers which averages out to about 1.56 covers a day. By no means am I F2P and would probably consider myself a medium or high-medium spender and this is definitely not the goal post for F2P players.

As a side note my 3Hunter dupe is at 180, and the 4* is at 370.

Probably going to start working on Wiccan next. With the supports enabled in PvP it should be easy to get Demiurge going early on, wondering what that would look like. Also I wonder if his matches trigger Onslaught's TU destruction passive?

ThaRoadWarrior

It does not, I just tested it in simulator. I do think Wiccan has good potential though.

rainkingucd

I like ascended Wiccan. Aside from supports, the higher 5* match damage allows his passive AP gen to proc more consistently. It also means he is always tanking so I run him 5/5/3 to keep his health up and use him as AP support for other characters rather than his green power

rainkingucd

My dupe Shaw is around 320. Not sure where I plan on going now: ascend directly or wait. I am not sure who will be my new focus but one thing is clear: the pull rates on 4* are so much faster than 3*.

I did hit a milestone this week: my 3* target since November of last year, Goose, has now hit the max 4* status. ~9 months to max / max a 3* and get it all the way to max 4*. It took me nearly 4 months to get her from scratch (he he) to a 4*; I'm hoping to cut that down a bit and will likely not max max the next round.

Oddly enough, it was a double milestone: Goose and 1* Spider-Man both hit max 4* status the same week.

ThaRoadWarrior

My dupe shaw is 2/2/3, scarlet witch is level 326. I'm thinking I may clean up a few 4* dupes that are a few covers from complete before I park on M'Baku since I have more than a few clogging up roster space. Not like I'm swimming in iso to champ them though.

JoeHandle

@ThaRoadWarrior said:
Ok, hit 370 today on my primary Shaw.

Started this thread 113 days ago, so on average I guess that works out to one cover a day somehow? Didn’t feel like it was that frequent. Probably would have been sooner had I been playing at my normal volume these past two weeks or so.

Switch is at 322.

I often reassure others fretting about how long anything in MPQ takes by saying, "Everything gets faster all the time." I say that because it's true, but even after all these years, it can be surprising to be reminded just how true it is.

As of this morning my dupe Shaw is at 358. In 7-10 days he'll top out and I'll ascend him and move on to .... uhhh ... somebody else. Maybe go back to ready golf and just finish whoever's dupe is next closest to 370. Or maybe another project will catch my fancy. Like Sandman. Could be a fun tank as a 5....

Anyway, Shaw has been in game for 147 days (as of today, 8/15/24). So I have collected 214 covers in 147 days, 1.456 covers/day, or 582.3 shards/day. When I think back to how long it took to just cover 4s way back in the early days ... 2014, 2015, 2016 ... mind-boggling.

9 or 10 months ago, I did some tracking and determined that, if I kept a single favorite 4*, the "favoriting" would add 39 covers/mo, 1.3 covers/day, or 520 shards/day. If the character was in rewards or in a vault or boosted odds in tokens, etc, etc, it would be a little more. This rate seemed too good to be true ...

I always have a mixed bag of priorities, and prefer shorter-term goals, so I've never kept a single 4* favorite this long. Shaw has been in game almost 5mos, but new characters can't be favorited, so I have had him as a favorite roughly 4mos. And I've had a few other 4s favorited for various reasons along the way. It's good to see the rate I observed late last year has not only held up, but increased. Everything gets faster all the time!

For me, any randomly selected 4* gains 2 covers/mo. TWO. In a MONTH. That rate has held up since i returned to the game in June 2023. Some 4s gain 3 or 4 in a given month, some only 1, and there's always several that gain NONE. Again, of course, those in rewards, vaults, bonus'd in tokens, etc, gain a little more.

I bring this up because it implies that any given new 4* will take (up to) ~113mos, 9.5yrs, to max+max ascend. A little less time for the flurry of covers from the release cycle and every time they are in rewards, etc. It's good to know just how powerful favoriting is, that it's possible (for me) to warp speed a 4* from start to ascended in 6mos or less. Of course, there almost 150 of them ... not counting the 4 limited ones ... so ascending them all is still a VERY long project....

Last thought in this ramble ... having demonstrated to myself that it's true, favoriting really is that powerful ... and that it gets faster all the time (everything does!) ... maybe I should focus on favoriting useful characters that are farther from ascending, rather than those closest. Token pulls and event rewards will eventually finish off those already close to ascending ... they are the lowest hanging fruit .... if I don't push the new ones, then they won't be ascended for years ... !

ThaRoadWarrior

Sandman is like he was with bigger numbers as a 5*, I can put him in the winners/losers thread later. I just put 4* Blade over so I’ll show him as well. He was a terror in the pre-Rocket 4* days, I’m curious if this will give him some new utility.

For my part, I’m completely F2P, admittedly with a very advanced roster, and my own Shaw progress is about half of yours, a 370 with a dupe sitting at 3/3/4 as of this morning. In the bonus hero days it took me an entire year to get Chavez to max champ chasing Jessica jones covers.

entrailbucket

I'm not sure it's worth bothering with Black King. He's boosted this event and I ran my 5* Ascended version.

I got smoked, continuously, by m'Thor teams. He doesn't appear to do enough to stop her, which is hilarious.

JoeHandle

@entrailbucket said:
I'm not sure it's worth bothering with Black King. He's boosted this event and I ran my 5* Ascended version.

I got smoked, continuously, by m'Thor teams. He doesn't appear to do enough to stop her, which is hilarious.

Pretty standard result from a MPQ "counter" then

ThaRoadWarrior

Is he in the correct party order to eat the charge tiles?

Also it’s pretty fun to spend half a year grinding possible counter to find out they suck actually lol.

entrailbucket

@ThaRoadWarrior said:
Is he in the correct party order to eat the charge tiles?

Also it’s pretty fun to spend half a year grinding possible counter to find out they suck actually lol.

Yes.

Also, every team I fought in the House of X event was Polaris/m'Thor, so he should work even better -- he eats charged tiles and special tiles. I thought maybe they were using Polaris to stun him, so I put the Hellfire Club support on him (if he would be stunned, turn him invisible for that many turns).

No effect whatsoever. I got slammed. He seems to be completely ineffective as a counter for either character.

ThaRoadWarrior

Huh. That sucks