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They should change their mind and keep back issues till end of the year, at least. So we have time to finish it

I play as long as Im having fun, if i can't ascend my favorite new champions, and get outmatched because whales have ascended R5s, then Im not having fun, and then I'll end up just logging in and doing the daily quest. So, I hope Kabam listens to us and finds a solution. What makes the game fun is people, that we are not playing alone, and who will whales flex on if all low-spenders and ftp quit the game?

i didn't read most of this thread and only skimmed a few videos about it. also skipped most of the stream so my info is very limited.

that said this looks very demotivating. not being able to ascend for a year and having to face decks that are 15-20% (?) stronger just because they spent thousands on a champion and you didn't isn't fun. whales always had a 3 or so month lead in most areas but i don't think we've ever seen a difference this big in the game yet and that's a big pivot that's never been seen before.

we had no know that ascension was going to be this restrictive because it's basically 8 stars. it feels that we have less agency with ascension because like 8s, kabam would have released small batches of champs that not everyone likes.

8s would have been better tbh.

At this point in time, I just want some of what they are smoking in Kabam HQ, seems like they are all smoking something awesome everyday

Update: I just saw a video of USAFA, member of CCP and ranked number 3 worldwide in the banquet 2025, also said this absolutely sucks . so if whales don't like this, who does then?

If they decide to keep this boneheaded decision, then I probably won’t be here in 2027

The problem is a lot of people are comparing 7* Ascension to 6* Ascension. But 7* Ascension is not really intended to do what 6* Ascension does. It isn't even replicating what rank ups do alone - at least not in one critical aspect. Really, 7* Ascension is replacing the act of adding a whole new rarity. In other words, 7* Ascension is replacing 8* champs.

7* Ascension is not really very complicated. At least, it isn't any more complicated than the act of acquiring and then ranking up 7* champs. First you have to pull the champ. Until you pull the 7* version of the champ specifically, you can't do anything else. Once you have it, you have two different things you can do with it. You can awaken it and then increase its sig level. And you can rank it up and level it up. Each requires different resources. To awaken a champ you have two choices. You can randomly pull the champ a second time - dup it, in other words. Or you can use an awakening gem. And then you can add signature levels with sig stones, or you can gain 20 sig levels every time you dup it again. To rank the champ up you need a set of different catalysts. You generally need some alpha cats, some basic cats, and some class-specific cats. You also need to level them up to max level before you can rank them up to the next rank using ISO and gold. Or you can use a rank. up gem.

If I were to dump all of that at once on a new player, it would seem as complicated or more complicated than ascension. But Ascension has many of the same features, because it has to. To Ascend a champ you first have to collect an ascension token specific to that champ. That is analogous to pulling or duping a 7* champ. You also need ascension resources, much like you need catalysts to rank a champ up. Those resources change for each rank, and generally increase in amounts the higher you go, just like rank ups. Some of those resources are class-specific, and some are more generic, just like catalysts.

There are 11 levels of ascension, just like there are, say, 6 ranks of 7* rank up. Since the power level increase for one level of ascension appears to be slightly less than what you get with one rank up, 11 ascension levels roughly corresponds to about 5 rank ups. That's comparable to the 5 ranks that 6* champs have, and isn't all that unusual in that context.

The reason why Ascension appears to have the same requirements as champion acquisition, awakening, and rank/level up combined, just mixed up in different ways, is precisely because 7* Ascension is a substitute for introducing 8* rarity. The reason it is being used this way is because there's a lot of discontent when new rarities are introduced because of the feeling of having to start over. 7* Ascension allows players to preserve some of the investment they've made in their 7* rosters - in particular signature levels. If they had just rolled out 8* rarity, players who pull new 8* champs would get them at rank 1 level 1 unawakened and have to start investing in those champs all over again. Now, they will be pulling 7* Ascension tokens and essentially bringing those champs up to 8* rarity power levels.

Why not just allow 7* Ascension to work like 6* Ascension? Because there's a reason new rarities get introduced in the first place, and the properties of new rarities - resetting the chase for champs in particular - are essential. They can choose to substitute something else for a new rarity. But they cannot eliminate the properties new rarities have that are the entire reason they get added in the first place.

Or to put it another way, you can replace 8* rarity with 7* Ascension, but many of the "problems" of 8* rarity aren't avoidable. For example, when a new rarity comes out, some players get those champs first. Spenders in particular always get more opportunities quicker. That's not a problem to solve. That's simply the benefit spenders are given by design. You can't take that away without threatening the long term economic viability of the game.

The complexity of Ascension is more a matter of players getting info dumped. It is no more complicated than traditional champion acquisition, rank ups and signature ability management. But it is also no less complicated because it has to be, because 7* Ascension has to contain most of the same hurdles as a new rarity would, because those same hurdles that are problematic for some are also essential to how the game supports itself, both economically and in terms of in-game progression balance.

If you don't like 7* Ascension, that's fine. You're free to advocate against it. But the alternative is 8* rarity, with all that implies. It isn't a streamlined ascension system. It isn't a system where everyone can ascend whatever they want. If you don't have to chase specific tokens, if there isn't a strong monetization path, if it doesn't have the same overall structure, then 7* ascension no longer satisfies the requirements of rarity reset, and that forces the devs to introduce 8* rarity. You should be comparing 7* Ascension to a complete rarity reset, not to the status quo. Consider the alternative before you try to bring down Ascension. To be honest, I would be fine either way.

For years I've been saying, when people complain about new rarities, that any system that replaces new rarities will have to include pretty much every aspect of new rarities people don't like, because new rarities don't have those issues by accident, they have them by design. Setting the complexity aside, pretty much everything people are complaining about when it comes to Ascension are things people complain about every time Kabam introduces a new rarity. It only seems worse because it is different, but it isn't really.

@Kabam (Osaurus) Rex please hear our feedback here, we all want the game to survive for at least a few more years. It’d be a miracle if MCOC lasted till 2034