Arena Grinding More Effective than AW/AQ?

Is there anyone out there who thinks arena grinding is more effective at improving your roster than playing with say a Gold 1 Ally who runs 5x5?

I've considered doing an alliance that runs say 2x5 and just focus on arena grinding, event quest and story mode. Would this be a mistake while trying to build my 5 and 6* roster? I currently only have 26, 5* and 2, 6*. Thanks in advance!

Comments

Rockypantherx

Arena won’t give you any of the catalysts needed to rank up champs, so a high rated AQ alliance helps with that. AW is really good for shards and a win in gold 1 is better than 11-25% in the basic arena. Arena is great though and I use it as a top up

Zuko_ILC

It will definitely improve your roster size not sure what you currently run but you should get enough rank up material and glory help your squad out.

Bonesjunior

Rockypantherx wrote: »

Arena won’t give you any of the catalysts needed to rank up champs, so a high rated AQ alliance helps with that. AW is really good for shards and a win in gold 1 is better than 11-25% in the basic arena. Arena is great though and I use it as a top up

My biggest concern is just how crazy far I'm away from even being able to grind a 4* featured champ and currently I can't r3 any of my 4* to grind arena due to having to save my gold and ISO for more attackers and defenders for War/AQ. Right now it takes me close to the full 3 days to hit 4 mil just in the basic arena. So guess that's my dilemma. I would like to get to the point of where I could actually get a 5* champ sometime say this year from arena without having to scratch my eyeballs out.

Prathap

Bonesjunior wrote: »

Rockypantherx wrote: »

Arena won’t give you any of the catalysts needed to rank up champs, so a high rated AQ alliance helps with that. AW is really good for shards and a win in gold 1 is better than 11-25% in the basic arena. Arena is great though and I use it as a top up

My biggest concern is just how crazy far I'm away from even being able to grind a 4* featured champ and currently I can't r3 any of my 4* to grind arena due to having to save my gold and ISO for more attackers and defenders for War/AQ. Right now it takes me close to the full 3 days to hit 4 mil just in the basic arena. So guess that's my dilemma. I would like to get to the point of where I could actually get a 5* champ sometime say this year from arena without having to scratch my eyeballs out.

I would say just go for 4-4.5 mil in featured 4* arena, just to get those 800 4* shards.... You can get one 4* crystal every week roughly and if you are lucky 5* shards for duping a 4*.... You'll save lot of time as well...

Bonesjunior

Prathap wrote: »

Bonesjunior wrote: »

Rockypantherx wrote: »

Arena won’t give you any of the catalysts needed to rank up champs, so a high rated AQ alliance helps with that. AW is really good for shards and a win in gold 1 is better than 11-25% in the basic arena. Arena is great though and I use it as a top up

My biggest concern is just how crazy far I'm away from even being able to grind a 4* featured champ and currently I can't r3 any of my 4* to grind arena due to having to save my gold and ISO for more attackers and defenders for War/AQ. Right now it takes me close to the full 3 days to hit 4 mil just in the basic arena. So guess that's my dilemma. I would like to get to the point of where I could actually get a 5* champ sometime say this year from arena without having to scratch my eyeballs out.

I would say just go for 4-4.5 mil in featured 4* arena, just to get those 800 4* shards.... You can get one 4* crystal every week roughly and if you are lucky 5* shards for duping a 4*.... You'll save lot of time as well...

Good suggestion. Guess I'll start focusing on ranking up all my 5* to r3 so I can get the infinite streak. Right now they are all at least r2 except like 6-7 of them. My 4* need to be at least what rank?

Gamer

Bonesjunior wrote: »

Prathap wrote: »

Bonesjunior wrote: »

Rockypantherx wrote: »

Arena won’t give you any of the catalysts needed to rank up champs, so a high rated AQ alliance helps with that. AW is really good for shards and a win in gold 1 is better than 11-25% in the basic arena. Arena is great though and I use it as a top up

My biggest concern is just how crazy far I'm away from even being able to grind a 4* featured champ and currently I can't r3 any of my 4* to grind arena due to having to save my gold and ISO for more attackers and defenders for War/AQ. Right now it takes me close to the full 3 days to hit 4 mil just in the basic arena. So guess that's my dilemma. I would like to get to the point of where I could actually get a 5* champ sometime say this year from arena without having to scratch my eyeballs out.

I would say just go for 4-4.5 mil in featured 4* arena, just to get those 800 4* shards.... You can get one 4* crystal every week roughly and if you are lucky 5* shards for duping a 4*.... You'll save lot of time as well...

Good suggestion. Guess I'll start focusing on ranking up all my 5* to r3 so I can get the infinite streak. Right now they are all at least r2 except like 6-7 of them. My 4* need to be at least what rank?

Rank4 if it the 4 stars fer arean. If I’m rebemer maybe rank3. Not sure.

DNA3000

Rockypantherx wrote: »

Arena won’t give you any of the catalysts needed to rank up champs, so a high rated AQ alliance helps with that. AW is really good for shards and a win in gold 1 is better than 11-25% in the basic arena. Arena is great though and I use it as a top up

Arena is a good source of T1A and T4B. Past that point it currently sucks for T4CC; AQ is better for generating those, Map 5 or Map 6 in particular.

DNA3000

Bonesjunior wrote: »

Rockypantherx wrote: »

Arena won’t give you any of the catalysts needed to rank up champs, so a high rated AQ alliance helps with that. AW is really good for shards and a win in gold 1 is better than 11-25% in the basic arena. Arena is great though and I use it as a top up

My biggest concern is just how crazy far I'm away from even being able to grind a 4* featured champ and currently I can't r3 any of my 4* to grind arena due to having to save my gold and ISO for more attackers and defenders for War/AQ. Right now it takes me close to the full 3 days to hit 4 mil just in the basic arena. So guess that's my dilemma. I would like to get to the point of where I could actually get a 5* champ sometime say this year from arena without having to scratch my eyeballs out.

Based on what you're saying you can do, my recommendation would be to change your effort around a little. You're pushing maximum effort to get to 4 million in the basic arena which generally gets you the 4* basic and 300 5* shards. Doing just one million in the 5* featured arena will get you 200 5* shards just for reaching the minimum bottom tier rank reward, plus the first two milestone rewards. Then you switch to the basic arena and try to do 1.7 million points. That pretty much guarantees you the 11-25% reward which is 500 4* shards and 200 5* shards.

You've put up 2.7 million, which is actually easier than doing 2.7 in just the basic (you score points slightly faster in the 5* featured with the same teams). You have one quarter of a 4* crystal and 400 5* shards.

Now you switch again and try to get as far as possible in the 4* featured. You probably won't get far, but you'll get milestone rewards and the bottom rank rewards. Work towards being able to score two million in there, it won't be easy at first, but eventually you'll start getting the 11-30% reward which is another 400 4* and 200 5* shards.

Spreading out this way will maximize your milestone rewards, which include battlechips, gold, and units, plus your 5* shards, and you will still be earning 4* shards towards 4* champs.

DNA3000

Exception: if the basic 4* champ is one that's been around for a very long time or is not a high desired champ, and you don't have it, then focus all your attention in that one arena to get it. The logic is that if you don't have the basic 4* you should always try to get it, because once you have it all future pulls of it generate dup rewards which include ISO and 5* shards. But if you already have it, duping a 4* champ in the *basic* arena doesn't generate those rewards so it isn't as worth it (you just get another sig level for basic dups).

MMCskippy

I'm trying to break my need to pay Kabam to play this game and I've found that arena helps more than 5x5 in AQ.

If you haven't finished Act 4 or Act 5, I think using arena is a great idea. The rewards from those acts are really nice for the effort. The issue with doing them while you're running 5x5 in AQ and burning a butt load of units on rigged AW nodes is that you don't have units for items to finish doable content.

My roster has 30 5* champs. I don't have enough meat to grind for featured champs either but that's more than enough meat to clear t4b and alpha arenas quick.

For alpha and t4b:
1. I get to a 2.5 multiplier with 4* or 3* champs. Either will work.
2. I switch to 5* champs and run them from lowest pi to highest pi. This gets me to Kang/Thanos teams at streak 11 or 12.
3. I only run 5* teams in the AM and PM until I clear the arena milestones. This keeps my 3* and 4* champs available to grind other arenas.

For regular arenas:

1. Grind all arenas to their minimum rank rewards. (This gives you shards for each arena.)
2. If I need the 4* basic, I grind for them, otherwise I grind out all milestones. Once I hit all milestones, I use 4*s in the 4* featured or 5* featured wherever I'm closest to the next milestone. All milestones nets you 135 credits and takes about a 50 streak give or take.
3. If there isn't a t4b arena or an alpha cat arena, I grind my 5* champs in the 4* featured arena. I only have time to run through my 5*s twice a day but this nets me 2-3 million in featured. Right now, I have a 42 steak in 4* basic and I'm just over 2,000,000. 75 credits and counting this arena.
4. Getting to rank rewards in the featured 5* arena needs some patience, but it can be done. This grind isn't for credits, it's for the 5* shards. 200 5* shards twice a week is ok for a few arena rounds.
5. Hit all milestones in 3* arena. This is 65 credits and 800 3* shards and 100 4* shards.

I haven't done accounting for this method, but if the battle chip gods are on your side, you can grow a credit pile to complete content. Throw the credit pile at Act 5, Reap rewards, Level up champs.

Grinding arena gets you lots of milestone rewards which really add up over time.

We grind 5x3 in AQ and I get enough glory to buy a t4b and decide what I spend the remaining 1,000 glory on. I've been dumping it into t2a shards lately.

Doing this has helped me get some of the newer champs that have been running through the 4* basic arena (I'll be grinding for Ghost once next arena cycle). Some champs I've grinded for recently have been Corvus, IMIW, CapIW, Domino and Masacre. I missed Wasp and I'm bummed about it but I was sick that week.

Once you get out of the AQ/AW rat race, you can develop a roster that makes you happy.

This is my 2 cents...

Bonesjunior

DNA3000 wrote: »

Bonesjunior wrote: »

Rockypantherx wrote: »

Arena won’t give you any of the catalysts needed to rank up champs, so a high rated AQ alliance helps with that. AW is really good for shards and a win in gold 1 is better than 11-25% in the basic arena. Arena is great though and I use it as a top up

My biggest concern is just how crazy far I'm away from even being able to grind a 4* featured champ and currently I can't r3 any of my 4* to grind arena due to having to save my gold and ISO for more attackers and defenders for War/AQ. Right now it takes me close to the full 3 days to hit 4 mil just in the basic arena. So guess that's my dilemma. I would like to get to the point of where I could actually get a 5* champ sometime say this year from arena without having to scratch my eyeballs out.

Based on what you're saying you can do, my recommendation would be to change your effort around a little. You're pushing maximum effort to get to 4 million in the basic arena which generally gets you the 4* basic and 300 5* shards. Doing just one million in the 5* featured arena will get you 200 5* shards just for reaching the minimum bottom tier rank reward, plus the first two milestone rewards. Then you switch to the basic arena and try to do 1.7 million points. That pretty much guarantees you the 11-25% reward which is 500 4* shards and 200 5* shards.

You've put up 2.7 million, which is actually easier than doing 2.7 in just the basic (you score points slightly faster in the 5* featured with the same teams). You have one quarter of a 4* crystal and 400 5* shards.

Now you switch again and try to get as far as possible in the 4* featured. You probably won't get far, but you'll get milestone rewards and the bottom rank rewards. Work towards being able to score two million in there, it won't be easy at first, but eventually you'll start getting the 11-30% reward which is another 400 4* and 200 5* shards.

Spreading out this way will maximize your milestone rewards, which include battlechips, gold, and units, plus your 5* shards, and you will still be earning 4* shards towards 4* champs.

Thanks for the insightful message. Should I focus on getting all my 4* to r3 first or start getting all my 5* to r2?

Bonesjunior

MMCskippy wrote: »

I'm trying to break my need to pay Kabam to play this game and I've found that arena helps more than 5x5 in AQ.

If you haven't finished Act 4 or Act 5, I think using arena is a great idea. The rewards from those acts are really nice for the effort. The issue with doing them while you're running 5x5 in AQ and burning a butt load of units on rigged AW nodes is that you don't have units for items to finish doable content.

My roster has 30 5* champs. I don't have enough meat to grind for featured champs either but that's more than enough meat to clear t4b and alpha arenas quick.

For alpha and t4b:
1. I get to a 2.5 multiplier with 4* or 3* champs. Either will work.
2. I switch to 5* champs and run them from lowest pi to highest pi. This gets me to Kang/Thanos teams at streak 11 or 12.
3. I only run 5* teams in the AM and PM until I clear the arena milestones. This keeps my 3* and 4* champs available to grind other arenas.

For regular arenas:

1. Grind all arenas to their minimum rank rewards. (This gives you shards for each arena.)
2. If I need the 4* basic, I grind for them, otherwise I grind out all milestones. Once I hit all milestones, I use 4*s in the 4* featured or 5* featured wherever I'm closest to the next milestone. All milestones nets you 135 credits and takes about a 50 streak give or take.
3. If there isn't a t4b arena or an alpha cat arena, I grind my 5* champs in the 4* featured arena. I only have time to run through my 5*s twice a day but this nets me 2-3 million in featured. Right now, I have a 42 steak in 4* basic and I'm just over 2,000,000. 75 credits and counting this arena.
4. Getting to rank rewards in the featured 5* arena needs some patience, but it can be done. This grind isn't for credits, it's for the 5* shards. 200 5* shards twice a week is ok for a few arena rounds.
5. Hit all milestones in 3* arena. This is 65 credits and 800 3* shards and 100 4* shards.

I haven't done accounting for this method, but if the battle chip gods are on your side, you can grow a credit pile to complete content. Throw the credit pile at Act 5, Reap rewards, Level up champs.

Grinding arena gets you lots of milestone rewards which really add up over time.

We grind 5x3 in AQ and I get enough glory to buy a t4b and decide what I spend the remaining 1,000 glory on. I've been dumping it into t2a shards lately.

Doing this has helped me get some of the newer champs that have been running through the 4* basic arena (I'll be grinding for Ghost once next arena cycle). Some champs I've grinded for recently have been Corvus, IMIW, CapIW, Domino and Masacre. I missed Wasp and I'm bummed about it but I was sick that week.

Once you get out of the AQ/AW rat race, you can develop a roster that makes you happy.

This is my 2 cents...

Same as my response above. Thanks for the long response. It's really appreciated. I've completed act 5 and 100% chapter 1. Suggestions on what to focus on ranking up 1st? 4* to r3 or 5* to r2?

DNA3000

Bonesjunior wrote: »

DNA3000 wrote: »

Bonesjunior wrote: »

Rockypantherx wrote: »

Arena won’t give you any of the catalysts needed to rank up champs, so a high rated AQ alliance helps with that. AW is really good for shards and a win in gold 1 is better than 11-25% in the basic arena. Arena is great though and I use it as a top up

My biggest concern is just how crazy far I'm away from even being able to grind a 4* featured champ and currently I can't r3 any of my 4* to grind arena due to having to save my gold and ISO for more attackers and defenders for War/AQ. Right now it takes me close to the full 3 days to hit 4 mil just in the basic arena. So guess that's my dilemma. I would like to get to the point of where I could actually get a 5* champ sometime say this year from arena without having to scratch my eyeballs out.

Based on what you're saying you can do, my recommendation would be to change your effort around a little. You're pushing maximum effort to get to 4 million in the basic arena which generally gets you the 4* basic and 300 5* shards. Doing just one million in the 5* featured arena will get you 200 5* shards just for reaching the minimum bottom tier rank reward, plus the first two milestone rewards. Then you switch to the basic arena and try to do 1.7 million points. That pretty much guarantees you the 11-25% reward which is 500 4* shards and 200 5* shards.

You've put up 2.7 million, which is actually easier than doing 2.7 in just the basic (you score points slightly faster in the 5* featured with the same teams). You have one quarter of a 4* crystal and 400 5* shards.

Now you switch again and try to get as far as possible in the 4* featured. You probably won't get far, but you'll get milestone rewards and the bottom rank rewards. Work towards being able to score two million in there, it won't be easy at first, but eventually you'll start getting the 11-30% reward which is another 400 4* and 200 5* shards.

Spreading out this way will maximize your milestone rewards, which include battlechips, gold, and units, plus your 5* shards, and you will still be earning 4* shards towards 4* champs.

Thanks for the insightful message. Should I focus on getting all my 4* to r3 first or start getting all my 5* to r2?

If you plan to be an arena grinder, I would recommend ranking in this order:

Anything you expect to use as a primary AW attacker, if your alliance does AW
Anything that will make full completion of Uncollected difficulty easier, if that's an issue
Anything that will immediately go onto your AQ attack team, if your alliance does AQ

I always recommend doing that first, no matter what. Setting that aside, this is where arena comes into play. 5* champs score way more points than 4* champs in arenas that can use them. The 4* basic cannot. 4* featured and 5* featured can. You want to use full teams of 5* champs in any arena you use them in. Here's the thing: if you have some high rank and some low rank, it can be tricky to use them all. The instinct will be to rank them all up so you can use them. That's not entirely necessary. Let's say you have six 5* champs with roughly 4k PI and three 5* champs with roughly 3k PI. You have two teams of 4k, and one team of 3k. That last team of all 3k champs is unsafe, you could draw a deathmatch. But if instead you make three teams each of which have two 4k champs and one 3k champ, that's generally safe. You will have to fight with that 3k champ in an arena round that you might face a 4k or 5k champ, but as long as you can fight 3k vs 5k, then it is all good.

So I can't say exactly what the priority is on ranking 5* champs because it depends on roster, but what you should be aiming for is being able to make as many "safe" teams as possible. If you have six 5* 4k champs and six 5* 3k champs, you can't use them all safely unless you combine them with 4* champs That's doable, but it is a little less time efficient. If you rank up the lowest ones until you can safely make all of your 5* champs (or almost all if it doesn't come out even) into safe teams, that's better for grinding in the long run. If you can make those teams, then it is less of a priority to continue ranking up every single 5*, and that will be hard because you'll run out of T1 alphas. You can then look at ranking up other things, or just saving rank up resources until you pull more champs.

Bonesjunior

DNA3000 wrote: »

Bonesjunior wrote: »

DNA3000 wrote: »

Bonesjunior wrote: »

Rockypantherx wrote: »

Arena won’t give you any of the catalysts needed to rank up champs, so a high rated AQ alliance helps with that. AW is really good for shards and a win in gold 1 is better than 11-25% in the basic arena. Arena is great though and I use it as a top up

My biggest concern is just how crazy far I'm away from even being able to grind a 4* featured champ and currently I can't r3 any of my 4* to grind arena due to having to save my gold and ISO for more attackers and defenders for War/AQ. Right now it takes me close to the full 3 days to hit 4 mil just in the basic arena. So guess that's my dilemma. I would like to get to the point of where I could actually get a 5* champ sometime say this year from arena without having to scratch my eyeballs out.

Based on what you're saying you can do, my recommendation would be to change your effort around a little. You're pushing maximum effort to get to 4 million in the basic arena which generally gets you the 4* basic and 300 5* shards. Doing just one million in the 5* featured arena will get you 200 5* shards just for reaching the minimum bottom tier rank reward, plus the first two milestone rewards. Then you switch to the basic arena and try to do 1.7 million points. That pretty much guarantees you the 11-25% reward which is 500 4* shards and 200 5* shards.

You've put up 2.7 million, which is actually easier than doing 2.7 in just the basic (you score points slightly faster in the 5* featured with the same teams). You have one quarter of a 4* crystal and 400 5* shards.

Now you switch again and try to get as far as possible in the 4* featured. You probably won't get far, but you'll get milestone rewards and the bottom rank rewards. Work towards being able to score two million in there, it won't be easy at first, but eventually you'll start getting the 11-30% reward which is another 400 4* and 200 5* shards.

Spreading out this way will maximize your milestone rewards, which include battlechips, gold, and units, plus your 5* shards, and you will still be earning 4* shards towards 4* champs.

Thanks for the insightful message. Should I focus on getting all my 4* to r3 first or start getting all my 5* to r2?

If you plan to be an arena grinder, I would recommend ranking in this order:

Anything you expect to use as a primary AW attacker, if your alliance does AW
Anything that will make full completion of Uncollected difficulty easier, if that's an issue
Anything that will immediately go onto your AQ attack team, if your alliance does AQ

I always recommend doing that first, no matter what. Setting that aside, this is where arena comes into play. 5* champs score way more points than 4* champs in arenas that can use them. The 4* basic cannot. 4* featured and 5* featured can. You want to use full teams of 5* champs in any arena you use them in. Here's the thing: if you have some high rank and some low rank, it can be tricky to use them all. The instinct will be to rank them all up so you can use them. That's not entirely necessary. Let's say you have six 5* champs with roughly 4k PI and three 5* champs with roughly 3k PI. You have two teams of 4k, and one team of 3k. That last team of all 3k champs is unsafe, you could draw a deathmatch. But if instead you make three teams each of which have two 4k champs and one 3k champ, that's generally safe. You will have to fight with that 3k champ in an arena round that you might face a 4k or 5k champ, but as long as you can fight 3k vs 5k, then it is all good.

So I can't say exactly what the priority is on ranking 5* champs because it depends on roster, but what you should be aiming for is being able to make as many "safe" teams as possible. If you have six 5* 4k champs and six 5* 3k champs, you can't use them all safely unless you combine them with 4* champs That's doable, but it is a little less time efficient. If you rank up the lowest ones until you can safely make all of your 5* champs (or almost all if it doesn't come out even) into safe teams, that's better for grinding in the long run. If you can make those teams, then it is less of a priority to continue ranking up every single 5*, and that will be hard because you'll run out of T1 alphas. You can then look at ranking up other things, or just saving rank up resources until you pull more champs.

My current 5* situation. I plan on taking Gulk and domino up to R4 and most likely Morningstar. I have 12 T2A. I usually 100% UC every month with the help of about 500 units or less.