I have decided to stop spending I’m a below average spender at around $50 a month. I’m single with lots of disposable income so I can easily afford to spend more but not until I see changes. I know Kabam Mike says there are things in the works, and I know new content and changes take a long time to put into effect, but give us a plan and an idea in where the game is headed. I personally would like at least one of the following changes
Change AW, make it less tedious
Make new unique fun nodes for act 7. Make the nodes not to where only 3 champs are effective, but make it so many champs are effective and we can play with whoever is the most fun
Massive rework. I know this would take a long time to happen, bu give us a rework of champs like venompool, miles morales, groot and iron patriot at the same time.
If nodes in act 7 are like act 6, make it easier for us to pull the champs needed, for example giving us nexus crystals to be purchased with shards. This does not mean throw more offers at us that cost money and units. This needs to be equally available to free to play players
I know not all these ideas are realistic but this is what I personally would like to see in the game before I start spending again
the best content Kabam have put in this game to date has been Variant 4
the requirement to use champs from all Star rating levels was excellent and they need more it.
Except it was so easy that almost everyone with a decent roster can explore it.
That's the whole point, and it's the number one reason people aren't happy with the Gates. It makes the content not for everyone. Everyone and their dog got through Uncollected. It's not even a challenge now. All people need to do is look up some YouTube and they can do it within a matter of months of starting the game. It's also worth pointing out that Seatin makes content that caters to a certain demographic learning how to get through content, and that's most likely a motivating factor for the stance against Gates. However, it's not meant for the average Roster. (I don't even want to get into 2*s in Book 2.)
There would have been nothing wrong with kabam making 2* viable in Book 2. In fact it would have been entirely consistent with their constant claims of wanting summoners to use more of their rosters and not just in arenas or niche content like variants
I don't agree with that line of thinking at all. Progression-wise, I don't expect to use lower Champs in progressively higher Story content. While I will agree that the Gates between Act 5 and Act 6 are extreme, I don't see going backwards as something that logically happens. There are many ways to create content for lower, unused Champs. This isn't one of them that I see. To be perfectly honest, it leaves me scratching my head.
Ahh but your vision is too narrow kabam could and probably should have installed progression gates based on roster size. For example a summoner would have to be level 60, have completed (not explored) acts 1-6, have (x) amount of 5* champs and (x) amount of 6* champs before accessing Book 2. They could even take it further and say the PI of your 5* and above roster must be (x) amount. This would ensure players would have progressed far enough to tackle more difficult content while preventing the average player from accessing content meant for end game players.
A very serious buff to rewards would motivate players to progress their roster rather than focus on ranking up a handful of champs to complete content. It also prevents those who are lucky with RNG and those who throw thousands at cav crystals from accessing content too early because even if you get champs you still would have to rank them up plus progress through other content first. Kabam already has a broad progression gate on incursions as well as the monthly AQ.
A progression gate would also give kabam the freedom to start over with Book 2 allowing sufficiently experienced players to use more of their rosters without the worry that new or average players would access it and progress too fast.
There's still going to be a certain amount of waiting for specific Champs. That's part of the RNG structure. I'm sure making it 2* oriented means everyone has everything they need, but there's no logical reason to regress to using 2*s in it. The game is one that's based on RNG. It's been that way for 5 and a half years. The second we start discussing removing that element, we start talking about deconstructing the entire game itself and designing a new one.
Again your thinking is too narrow. If kabam allowed players to use their 1/2/3/4* champs across the first 3/4 chapters Of book 2 while offering rewards meant to build their 5/6* rosters for the latter chapters it would help to combat the RNG. Kabam could easily create node combinations that would make the game challenging even using 1-4* champs variant 4 proved this. Just because the story progresses doesn’t mean kabam has to trap itself in an insane upward spiral of difficulty. Besides what’s the point of forcing players to hold on to their lower star champs on the off chance they’ll have a use for them once or twice a year? Why continue to have them in rewards?
You don't think 3-4 Chapters which use 1-4* Champs and give 6* Rewards is a bit too much? Asking for something along the lines of using Champs on the shelf is reasonable. 4 Chapters of it is pretty much pushing it.
V4 you use lesser rarities and gain 6* shards and rank up gems so
I don't know why people keep comparing Variant to Story. Variant is a special type of content and it isn't even in the same wheelhouse. There may be some ideas that can be used in Story, but the two are mutually exclusive and not at all a reflection of each other.
What exactly do you mean by that? I genuinely don't follow.
Variant 4 is endgame oriented content designed for lower rarity champs. In the confines of suggesting act 7 to work similarly it makes all the sense to refer back to variant 4 to point out the validity of the suggestion.
They don't need to be the same type of content to compare them in this context.
The danger rooms essentially provided the baseline design concept for variant 4 and they had nothing to do with neither variant content nor story content.
Variant was a throwback to an EQ previously released. It's a standalone piece of content that may be designed with End-Game, but it's still a standalone that can be designed more freely. Story has its own continuity and line of progression and Rewards to consider. It's built up over Chapters and Acts, and not as liberally designed as Variants. People may enjoy Variants. That doesn't mean everything can be just like them.
the best content Kabam have put in this game to date has been Variant 4
the requirement to use champs from all Star rating levels was excellent and they need more it.
Except it was so easy that almost everyone with a decent roster can explore it.
That's the whole point, and it's the number one reason people aren't happy with the Gates. It makes the content not for everyone. Everyone and their dog got through Uncollected. It's not even a challenge now. All people need to do is look up some YouTube and they can do it within a matter of months of starting the game. It's also worth pointing out that Seatin makes content that caters to a certain demographic learning how to get through content, and that's most likely a motivating factor for the stance against Gates. However, it's not meant for the average Roster. (I don't even want to get into 2*s in Book 2.)
There would have been nothing wrong with kabam making 2* viable in Book 2. In fact it would have been entirely consistent with their constant claims of wanting summoners to use more of their rosters and not just in arenas or niche content like variants
I don't agree with that line of thinking at all. Progression-wise, I don't expect to use lower Champs in progressively higher Story content. While I will agree that the Gates between Act 5 and Act 6 are extreme, I don't see going backwards as something that logically happens. There are many ways to create content for lower, unused Champs. This isn't one of them that I see. To be perfectly honest, it leaves me scratching my head.
Ahh but your vision is too narrow kabam could and probably should have installed progression gates based on roster size. For example a summoner would have to be level 60, have completed (not explored) acts 1-6, have (x) amount of 5* champs and (x) amount of 6* champs before accessing Book 2. They could even take it further and say the PI of your 5* and above roster must be (x) amount. This would ensure players would have progressed far enough to tackle more difficult content while preventing the average player from accessing content meant for end game players.
A very serious buff to rewards would motivate players to progress their roster rather than focus on ranking up a handful of champs to complete content. It also prevents those who are lucky with RNG and those who throw thousands at cav crystals from accessing content too early because even if you get champs you still would have to rank them up plus progress through other content first. Kabam already has a broad progression gate on incursions as well as the monthly AQ.
A progression gate would also give kabam the freedom to start over with Book 2 allowing sufficiently experienced players to use more of their rosters without the worry that new or average players would access it and progress too fast.
There's still going to be a certain amount of waiting for specific Champs. That's part of the RNG structure. I'm sure making it 2* oriented means everyone has everything they need, but there's no logical reason to regress to using 2*s in it. The game is one that's based on RNG. It's been that way for 5 and a half years. The second we start discussing removing that element, we start talking about deconstructing the entire game itself and designing a new one.
Again your thinking is too narrow. If kabam allowed players to use their 1/2/3/4* champs across the first 3/4 chapters Of book 2 while offering rewards meant to build their 5/6* rosters for the latter chapters it would help to combat the RNG. Kabam could easily create node combinations that would make the game challenging even using 1-4* champs variant 4 proved this. Just because the story progresses doesn’t mean kabam has to trap itself in an insane upward spiral of difficulty. Besides what’s the point of forcing players to hold on to their lower star champs on the off chance they’ll have a use for them once or twice a year? Why continue to have them in rewards?
You don't think 3-4 Chapters which use 1-4* Champs and give 6* Rewards is a bit too much? Asking for something along the lines of using Champs on the shelf is reasonable. 4 Chapters of it is pretty much pushing it.
V4 you use lesser rarities and gain 6* shards and rank up gems so
I don't know why people keep comparing Variant to Story. Variant is a special type of content and it isn't even in the same wheelhouse. There may be some ideas that can be used in Story, but the two are mutually exclusive and not at all a reflection of each other.
What exactly do you mean by that? I genuinely don't follow.
Variant 4 is endgame oriented content designed for lower rarity champs. In the confines of suggesting act 7 to work similarly it makes all the sense to refer back to variant 4 to point out the validity of the suggestion.
They don't need to be the same type of content to compare them in this context.
The danger rooms essentially provided the baseline design concept for variant 4 and they had nothing to do with neither variant content nor story content.
Variant was a throwback to an EQ previously released. It's a standalone piece of content that may be designed with End-Game, but it's still a standalone that can be designed more freely. Story has its own continuity and line of progression and Rewards to consider. It's built up over Chapters and Acts, and not as liberally designed as Variants. People may enjoy Variants. That doesn't mean everything can be just like them.
Everything should be like variants as they're arguably the most fun and generally best content in the game. The line of progression is broken act6 made sure of that.
the best content Kabam have put in this game to date has been Variant 4
the requirement to use champs from all Star rating levels was excellent and they need more it.
Except it was so easy that almost everyone with a decent roster can explore it.
That's the whole point, and it's the number one reason people aren't happy with the Gates. It makes the content not for everyone. Everyone and their dog got through Uncollected. It's not even a challenge now. All people need to do is look up some YouTube and they can do it within a matter of months of starting the game. It's also worth pointing out that Seatin makes content that caters to a certain demographic learning how to get through content, and that's most likely a motivating factor for the stance against Gates. However, it's not meant for the average Roster. (I don't even want to get into 2*s in Book 2.)
There would have been nothing wrong with kabam making 2* viable in Book 2. In fact it would have been entirely consistent with their constant claims of wanting summoners to use more of their rosters and not just in arenas or niche content like variants
I don't agree with that line of thinking at all. Progression-wise, I don't expect to use lower Champs in progressively higher Story content. While I will agree that the Gates between Act 5 and Act 6 are extreme, I don't see going backwards as something that logically happens. There are many ways to create content for lower, unused Champs. This isn't one of them that I see. To be perfectly honest, it leaves me scratching my head.
Ahh but your vision is too narrow kabam could and probably should have installed progression gates based on roster size. For example a summoner would have to be level 60, have completed (not explored) acts 1-6, have (x) amount of 5* champs and (x) amount of 6* champs before accessing Book 2. They could even take it further and say the PI of your 5* and above roster must be (x) amount. This would ensure players would have progressed far enough to tackle more difficult content while preventing the average player from accessing content meant for end game players.
A very serious buff to rewards would motivate players to progress their roster rather than focus on ranking up a handful of champs to complete content. It also prevents those who are lucky with RNG and those who throw thousands at cav crystals from accessing content too early because even if you get champs you still would have to rank them up plus progress through other content first. Kabam already has a broad progression gate on incursions as well as the monthly AQ.
A progression gate would also give kabam the freedom to start over with Book 2 allowing sufficiently experienced players to use more of their rosters without the worry that new or average players would access it and progress too fast.
There's still going to be a certain amount of waiting for specific Champs. That's part of the RNG structure. I'm sure making it 2* oriented means everyone has everything they need, but there's no logical reason to regress to using 2*s in it. The game is one that's based on RNG. It's been that way for 5 and a half years. The second we start discussing removing that element, we start talking about deconstructing the entire game itself and designing a new one.
Again your thinking is too narrow. If kabam allowed players to use their 1/2/3/4* champs across the first 3/4 chapters Of book 2 while offering rewards meant to build their 5/6* rosters for the latter chapters it would help to combat the RNG. Kabam could easily create node combinations that would make the game challenging even using 1-4* champs variant 4 proved this. Just because the story progresses doesn’t mean kabam has to trap itself in an insane upward spiral of difficulty. Besides what’s the point of forcing players to hold on to their lower star champs on the off chance they’ll have a use for them once or twice a year? Why continue to have them in rewards?
You don't think 3-4 Chapters which use 1-4* Champs and give 6* Rewards is a bit too much? Asking for something along the lines of using Champs on the shelf is reasonable. 4 Chapters of it is pretty much pushing it.
V4 you use lesser rarities and gain 6* shards and rank up gems so
I don't know why people keep comparing Variant to Story. Variant is a special type of content and it isn't even in the same wheelhouse. There may be some ideas that can be used in Story, but the two are mutually exclusive and not at all a reflection of each other.
What exactly do you mean by that? I genuinely don't follow.
Variant 4 is endgame oriented content designed for lower rarity champs. In the confines of suggesting act 7 to work similarly it makes all the sense to refer back to variant 4 to point out the validity of the suggestion.
They don't need to be the same type of content to compare them in this context.
The danger rooms essentially provided the baseline design concept for variant 4 and they had nothing to do with neither variant content nor story content.
Variant was a throwback to an EQ previously released. It's a standalone piece of content that may be designed with End-Game, but it's still a standalone that can be designed more freely. Story has its own continuity and line of progression and Rewards to consider. It's built up over Chapters and Acts, and not as liberally designed as Variants. People may enjoy Variants. That doesn't mean everything can be just like them.
No one is even saying that... It's about the baseline concept of content.
"Like variant 4" is short for "sharing certain aspects of variant 4". In it's core, variants, story content, monthly content, all of them are a map with nodes and enemies.
Just as danger rooms and variant 4 are completely different pieces of content but share inherit base design aspects, act 5 and act 6 are essentially the same type of content , but are wildly different in their design.
There's way more similarities between act 6 and variants as there are between act 5 and act 6.
We're talking gameplay design, not the reason a certain piece of content has to even be in the game.
We're talking about the next level of story content in Book 2. I agree that there is room for elements of the same parts to make it interesting, but 4 Chapters of 1-4*s, as per what began this debate, is not realistic. They're not the same content. People keep comparing them on the basis of the Rewards, but they have very different design goals.
One topic I keep seeing coming up is fun. This shouldn’t feel like work or stress. The fun aspect is gone. Except for 6.4.6 boss act six is a non fun stressful dumpster fire.
I had so much fun in act five figuring out with a limited roster. And two years later with an awsome roster I don’t want to clear act six because it’s not fun.
Yea admittedly, I am at that stage. Completed act 6, 100% 6.1 and 6.2 and started exploring 6.3 and I see stuff like the can't stop won't stop, thunderstruck, acid wash, and I have zero motivation at the moment to do it at all. It's not impossible to get it done, but it's just not fun to do so at all.
the best content Kabam have put in this game to date has been Variant 4
the requirement to use champs from all Star rating levels was excellent and they need more it.
Except it was so easy that almost everyone with a decent roster can explore it.
That's the whole point, and it's the number one reason people aren't happy with the Gates. It makes the content not for everyone. Everyone and their dog got through Uncollected. It's not even a challenge now. All people need to do is look up some YouTube and they can do it within a matter of months of starting the game. It's also worth pointing out that Seatin makes content that caters to a certain demographic learning how to get through content, and that's most likely a motivating factor for the stance against Gates. However, it's not meant for the average Roster. (I don't even want to get into 2*s in Book 2.)
There would have been nothing wrong with kabam making 2* viable in Book 2. In fact it would have been entirely consistent with their constant claims of wanting summoners to use more of their rosters and not just in arenas or niche content like variants
I don't agree with that line of thinking at all. Progression-wise, I don't expect to use lower Champs in progressively higher Story content. While I will agree that the Gates between Act 5 and Act 6 are extreme, I don't see going backwards as something that logically happens. There are many ways to create content for lower, unused Champs. This isn't one of them that I see. To be perfectly honest, it leaves me scratching my head.
Ahh but your vision is too narrow kabam could and probably should have installed progression gates based on roster size. For example a summoner would have to be level 60, have completed (not explored) acts 1-6, have (x) amount of 5* champs and (x) amount of 6* champs before accessing Book 2. They could even take it further and say the PI of your 5* and above roster must be (x) amount. This would ensure players would have progressed far enough to tackle more difficult content while preventing the average player from accessing content meant for end game players.
A very serious buff to rewards would motivate players to progress their roster rather than focus on ranking up a handful of champs to complete content. It also prevents those who are lucky with RNG and those who throw thousands at cav crystals from accessing content too early because even if you get champs you still would have to rank them up plus progress through other content first. Kabam already has a broad progression gate on incursions as well as the monthly AQ.
A progression gate would also give kabam the freedom to start over with Book 2 allowing sufficiently experienced players to use more of their rosters without the worry that new or average players would access it and progress too fast.
There's still going to be a certain amount of waiting for specific Champs. That's part of the RNG structure. I'm sure making it 2* oriented means everyone has everything they need, but there's no logical reason to regress to using 2*s in it. The game is one that's based on RNG. It's been that way for 5 and a half years. The second we start discussing removing that element, we start talking about deconstructing the entire game itself and designing a new one.
Again your thinking is too narrow. If kabam allowed players to use their 1/2/3/4* champs across the first 3/4 chapters Of book 2 while offering rewards meant to build their 5/6* rosters for the latter chapters it would help to combat the RNG. Kabam could easily create node combinations that would make the game challenging even using 1-4* champs variant 4 proved this. Just because the story progresses doesn’t mean kabam has to trap itself in an insane upward spiral of difficulty. Besides what’s the point of forcing players to hold on to their lower star champs on the off chance they’ll have a use for them once or twice a year? Why continue to have them in rewards?
You don't think 3-4 Chapters which use 1-4* Champs and give 6* Rewards is a bit too much? Asking for something along the lines of using Champs on the shelf is reasonable. 4 Chapters of it is pretty much pushing it.
V4 you use lesser rarities and gain 6* shards and rank up gems so
I don't know why people keep comparing Variant to Story. Variant is a special type of content and it isn't even in the same wheelhouse. There may be some ideas that can be used in Story, but the two are mutually exclusive and not at all a reflection of each other.
What exactly do you mean by that? I genuinely don't follow.
Variant 4 is endgame oriented content designed for lower rarity champs. In the confines of suggesting act 7 to work similarly it makes all the sense to refer back to variant 4 to point out the validity of the suggestion.
They don't need to be the same type of content to compare them in this context.
The danger rooms essentially provided the baseline design concept for variant 4 and they had nothing to do with neither variant content nor story content.
Variant was a throwback to an EQ previously released. It's a standalone piece of content that may be designed with End-Game, but it's still a standalone that can be designed more freely. Story has its own continuity and line of progression and Rewards to consider. It's built up over Chapters and Acts, and not as liberally designed as Variants. People may enjoy Variants. That doesn't mean everything can be just like them.
No one is even saying that... It's about the baseline concept of content.
"Like variant 4" is short for "sharing certain aspects of variant 4". In it's core, variants, story content, monthly content, all of them are a map with nodes and enemies.
Just as danger rooms and variant 4 are completely different pieces of content but share inherit base design aspects, act 5 and act 6 are essentially the same type of content , but are wildly different in their design.
There's way more similarities between act 6 and variants as there are between act 5 and act 6.
We're talking gameplay design, not the reason a certain piece of content has to even be in the game.
We're talking about the next level of story content in Book 2. I agree that there is room for elements of the same parts to make it interesting, but 4 Chapters of 1-4*s, as per what began this debate, is not realistic. They're not the same content. People keep comparing them on the basis of the Rewards, but they have very different design goals.
I still don't understand what you mean.
The grandmaster in 6.4. is designed in a way that does not fit any other part of act 6 or any other story content for that matter.
There is no either or here, I don't understand where you got that idea. Not even the variants are 100% comparable amongst each other.
Every piece of content is in it's foundation content. The goals it has (story progression or stand alone content) are irrelevant to it's baseline gameplay design.
Again, that's evident just from comparing 6.4. to the grandmaster fight.
Comparing one Boss Fight is not the same as designing the entire Story to mimic a fun, little piece of content.
Hey guys, please remember to keep things Civil. This is not the place for arguments. There's a lot of great feedback in here, and we don't want it to be lost in arguments.
Who cares if seatin leaves the game? I mean really guys is he such a key component? No big deal when COwhale left huh? Don't know who else to send your money too to help but those $200 worth of crystals every week? Send it to me. I'll make a video so you can get your fix. My laugh is no where near as annoying. Burn out happens. It's just a game. Let em go in peace.. oh God please let em go..
I don't, at least no more or less than I care about anyone else leaving the game. And in fact I stated that when it comes to the specifics, most of Seatin's problems are of his own making, as are many of the problems of the highest spending and playing players. Fundamentally, much of Seatin's problem is that he has everything and he's done everything and now there's nothing to look forward to. Whatever the game does to content, difficulty, or rewards, players like Seatin will get there much faster than everyone else, and there's nothing the game can do to directly cater to them when it comes to that.
But his video and this thread opened the door to an opportunity to discuss a larger problem that I think has been brewing for a while, and that affects a much larger class of players than just the tiny minority of top tier players. It is something I've been tangentially chipping at since maybe just after I12, certainly by I14 in the context of Alliance War, and was definitely on my mind when I posted my "How to make Challenges Interesting" thread. No matter where you are in the game, no matter how much you spend, and no matter how much rewards the game piles onto you, at the end of the day the game can't bribe you to play. It can't give you more rewards to make up for punishing or boring challenges. Because if the game keeps giving you more and more rewards, eventually we all become Seatin.
*Before* we all become Seatin, we have to ask what the game can give us that can slow down the day when we all have everything and have done everything and have nothing to look forward to. And the way to extend the longevity of the game is by making sure that the content is challenging in an entertaining way, so the game play itself is significantly rewarding, and by making sure that the more unique and challenging the content the player faces, the less disappointing the rewards become. There's a finite amount of content in the game and a finite amount of rewards in the game that are meaningful. The game has to make sure that it focuses the most rewarding rewards in the most important places.
The most important lesson I think is not that we're all Seatin and we all have his problems. It certainly isn't that we should all be afraid of losing him as a player. No one player matters all that much. I think it is that most of us shouldn't want to get to where Seatin is, and that's a place where we have everything and have done everything and there's nothing left. The game CANNOT just keep piling more content and more rewards and more content and more rewards in an upward spiral, because players like Seatin consume them way too fast. The only way to make players like Seatin happy is to make sure the game he's playing is entertaining for its own sake, because we can't bribe him with rewards.
But we should be doing that for everyone. Because the player who stalls out at 5.1 is no different than Seatin. If we think that the person who stalls out at 5.1 just needs to "get gud" but Seatin's problems are different, then I think this was all a complete waste of time. At the end of the day, Book 2's difficulty only matters to a tiny fraction of players. Even Act 6's difficulty only matters to a small percentage of players. But the problem that ESF's friend had, that's a problem that affects everyone from beginners to Seatin and above. Tackle that one, and everyone benefits.
Kabam knows what they need to do and now they need the time, unfortunately time is not on their side. It's sad to see when the element you cant control aren't on your side,
the best content Kabam have put in this game to date has been Variant 4
the requirement to use champs from all Star rating levels was excellent and they need more it.
Except it was so easy that almost everyone with a decent roster can explore it.
That's the whole point, and it's the number one reason people aren't happy with the Gates. It makes the content not for everyone. Everyone and their dog got through Uncollected. It's not even a challenge now. All people need to do is look up some YouTube and they can do it within a matter of months of starting the game. It's also worth pointing out that Seatin makes content that caters to a certain demographic learning how to get through content, and that's most likely a motivating factor for the stance against Gates. However, it's not meant for the average Roster. (I don't even want to get into 2*s in Book 2.)
There would have been nothing wrong with kabam making 2* viable in Book 2. In fact it would have been entirely consistent with their constant claims of wanting summoners to use more of their rosters and not just in arenas or niche content like variants
I don't agree with that line of thinking at all. Progression-wise, I don't expect to use lower Champs in progressively higher Story content. While I will agree that the Gates between Act 5 and Act 6 are extreme, I don't see going backwards as something that logically happens. There are many ways to create content for lower, unused Champs. This isn't one of them that I see. To be perfectly honest, it leaves me scratching my head.
Ahh but your vision is too narrow kabam could and probably should have installed progression gates based on roster size. For example a summoner would have to be level 60, have completed (not explored) acts 1-6, have (x) amount of 5* champs and (x) amount of 6* champs before accessing Book 2. They could even take it further and say the PI of your 5* and above roster must be (x) amount. This would ensure players would have progressed far enough to tackle more difficult content while preventing the average player from accessing content meant for end game players.
A very serious buff to rewards would motivate players to progress their roster rather than focus on ranking up a handful of champs to complete content. It also prevents those who are lucky with RNG and those who throw thousands at cav crystals from accessing content too early because even if you get champs you still would have to rank them up plus progress through other content first. Kabam already has a broad progression gate on incursions as well as the monthly AQ.
A progression gate would also give kabam the freedom to start over with Book 2 allowing sufficiently experienced players to use more of their rosters without the worry that new or average players would access it and progress too fast.
There's still going to be a certain amount of waiting for specific Champs. That's part of the RNG structure. I'm sure making it 2* oriented means everyone has everything they need, but there's no logical reason to regress to using 2*s in it. The game is one that's based on RNG. It's been that way for 5 and a half years. The second we start discussing removing that element, we start talking about deconstructing the entire game itself and designing a new one.
Again your thinking is too narrow. If kabam allowed players to use their 1/2/3/4* champs across the first 3/4 chapters Of book 2 while offering rewards meant to build their 5/6* rosters for the latter chapters it would help to combat the RNG. Kabam could easily create node combinations that would make the game challenging even using 1-4* champs variant 4 proved this. Just because the story progresses doesn’t mean kabam has to trap itself in an insane upward spiral of difficulty. Besides what’s the point of forcing players to hold on to their lower star champs on the off chance they’ll have a use for them once or twice a year? Why continue to have them in rewards?
You don't think 3-4 Chapters which use 1-4* Champs and give 6* Rewards is a bit too much? Asking for something along the lines of using Champs on the shelf is reasonable. 4 Chapters of it is pretty much pushing it.
V4 you use lesser rarities and gain 6* shards and rank up gems so
I don't know why people keep comparing Variant to Story. Variant is a special type of content and it isn't even in the same wheelhouse. There may be some ideas that can be used in Story, but the two are mutually exclusive and not at all a reflection of each other.
What exactly do you mean by that? I genuinely don't follow.
Variant 4 is endgame oriented content designed for lower rarity champs. In the confines of suggesting act 7 to work similarly it makes all the sense to refer back to variant 4 to point out the validity of the suggestion.
They don't need to be the same type of content to compare them in this context.
The danger rooms essentially provided the baseline design concept for variant 4 and they had nothing to do with neither variant content nor story content.
Variant was a throwback to an EQ previously released. It's a standalone piece of content that may be designed with End-Game, but it's still a standalone that can be designed more freely. Story has its own continuity and line of progression and Rewards to consider. It's built up over Chapters and Acts, and not as liberally designed as Variants. People may enjoy Variants. That doesn't mean everything can be just like them.
No one is even saying that... It's about the baseline concept of content.
"Like variant 4" is short for "sharing certain aspects of variant 4". In it's core, variants, story content, monthly content, all of them are a map with nodes and enemies.
Just as danger rooms and variant 4 are completely different pieces of content but share inherit base design aspects, act 5 and act 6 are essentially the same type of content , but are wildly different in their design.
There's way more similarities between act 6 and variants as there are between act 5 and act 6.
We're talking gameplay design, not the reason a certain piece of content has to even be in the game.
We're talking about the next level of story content in Book 2. I agree that there is room for elements of the same parts to make it interesting, but 4 Chapters of 1-4*s, as per what began this debate, is not realistic. They're not the same content. People keep comparing them on the basis of the Rewards, but they have very different design goals.
I still don't understand what you mean.
The grandmaster in 6.4. is designed in a way that does not fit any other part of act 6 or any other story content for that matter.
There is no either or here, I don't understand where you got that idea. Not even the variants are 100% comparable amongst each other.
Every piece of content is in it's foundation content. The goals it has (story progression or stand alone content) are irrelevant to it's baseline gameplay design.
Again, that's evident just from comparing 6.4. to the grandmaster fight.
Comparing one Boss Fight is not the same as designing the entire Story to mimic a fun, little piece of content.
Once again you’re missing the point and moving the goal posts. You’re the only one talking about storylines everyone else is talking about game play/design and gaming experience. All quests. Be It story, EQ, variant, time limited side quests Even AQ and AW share the same basic concept. A map, paths, nodes and a final boss. The Real difference between them is the experience. That experience is based on champs a player can use, difficulty, and rewards no one cares about the storylines.
We’re saying that compared to other quests variants, particularly variant 4, offered the most fun gaming experience it is by far the most balanced in terms of roster viability, difficulty, and rewards. Why Kabam chose not to emulate and build upon the success of variant 4 based on the overwhelming positive community reaction and apply it across other content is beyond me.
Thanks for the feedback. Please remember to keep your conversations civil though. Any attacks on each other or volatile comments will be deleted. As an open Forum, disagreements will occur, but that doesn't give license to break the forum rules.
As for the subject at hand, everybody is welcome to their own opinions, and there's a lot of great feedback in that video, and in your responses. Building new content in this game is not easy, nor is it quick. We're always looking at what you guys have to say, and where possible, we plan it into our roadmaps down the line. We planned on giving you guys a glimpse of what's on the horizon in a week or two, but I can see about moving that up.
We're always working to come up with new and interesting things for you all to do in-game, and deliver a constant stream of new content every month. We're also always looking at ways we can improve the existing content for everybody. We've worked on a bunch of Quality of Life stuff, some of which has already come out, and some of which is coming pretty soon (Battlegroup assignments at last!)
Less than a month ago we launched Incursions, one of the craziest, most ambitious projects that we'd ever undertaken. That took 8 to10 months from concept to release, depending on when we decide the start of that concept phase is. The reaction to that was great, and it's motivated us to look around for other areas of improvement, but identifying what we want to do, and then going through an ideation period, planning, building, testing, etc., takes a lot of time. It also takes a specific set of skills. We can't ask one of our designers to build a new game-mode, no less than we could ask a member of the Community team to model and texture a new Champion. I wish we could move faster, but we can't. It's physically impossible, and even more difficult given the current world situation.
I see a lot of conversations about Book 2 Act 1 Chapter 1 (Act 7), and one of our Quest Designers will be making a post for our Beta Testers on the feedback so far in a day or 2. But Act 7 has already seen changes made to it while it's still in Beta testing. We've reduced the Attack Boost twice, and that's only to address one pain point. We know there are others, and we appreciate all of the (constructive) feedback that we've received. The point of a Beta Test is to identify these pain points before the content is live in a test environment so that we can improve the final product and have it in its best shape possible.
Alliance Quest and Alliance War are 2 very important parts of this game. We know there are a lot of opinions about them, and we sure as hell are not ignoring them. We just don't have anything to say on them at this time. You'll see an update to Alliance Quests in the next couple of months that include an update to Rewards, AQ Modifiers, and Mini-Bosses. AW will see a small refresh soon as well, but that doesn't mean we're not already thinking about our next big change.
Just because we haven't made the specific change you want, doesn't mean that we haven't discussed it, or looked at the actual root cause. What the issue looks like on the surface isn't always what it is at the root. There's also so many of you, with different priorities and concerns. Just look through this thread and see the spectrum of different ideas and asks. Many of them contradict each other, and many have no appeal to somebody else. Even the video that was posted and the OP's comments are VERY different.
Again, we welcome the feedback, and we're going to discuss it. In fact, I'm going to make sure we discuss this all today. I probably won't have anything to come back with, but I can promise that I will make these points known.
Find a little odd that you started one of your posts stating to all keep the conversation civil, when from what I can see that has been the case. It feels like an attempt to discredit concerns/feedback. There's no questions it is a hard job to balance things and Incursions are fun (but not much to get from it as rewards goes), however I'm not sure what you mean about contradictions. True that there are many different ideas out there, but there's plenty of agreement, so why we don't focus on that. As many, was disheartened to play Act. 7. Likewise I don't know anyone who enjoyed Act 6 (well to be far 6.2 and forward). No player, no youtuber we all enjoy watching. Nobody! Got stuck due to lack of helpful champs who could address specific nodes for months. Still working on completion of 6.4. So when I see a mini boss like Sabretooth is beyond disappointing. From what I can tell only Red Guardian can deal with that node. The idea of creating specific nodes, which can only be addressed with an upcoming champ is very limiting and puts a wall on player progression. You are forcing players to obtain a new champ, rather than give content to be enjoyed. It reminds me of the drama we have a few weeks ago with BWCV/Morningstar nefs/fix related to the Champion boss months after lots of players invested in these champs. There were videos out there for months showing them as a feasible option. As they would no longer be an option, a new champ was release to address that very issue.
It feels to me all complaints about Act 6 is relevant to Act 7, but one step further in the wrong direction. Kabam's staff better start playing their content... of course I understand that is the whole idea of a Beta, but when the same complaints are valid for your upcoming content I am not sure what else to say, when our feedback is ignored.
Most of us have the groundhog day feeling. Hitting a wall for not having an specific champ or not enjoying the content, rinse and repeat AQ and AW. Trying to keep guild mates excited/active in the game is beyond old. Finding replacements is a separate job. I personally no longer get excited opening crystals... I have been told I get Kabammed. There's still a passion for this game, however it feels like the community frustration is at new heights. We hope Kabam can rethink their ideas of player progression by giving us enough tools to keep going and excited with the progress. As reported Act 6 is nowhere close to a fun time. If you keep missing the mark, people will end up finding another place to have fun... and that will be sad. I have been in an alliance for 5 years. There's camaraderie and friendships that lasted for years. People seem to be burning out left and right.
Some quick thoughts: 1) Act 7, as I understand is suppose to be book 2, Act 1. Knowing that people really enjoyed Variant 4 why don't you start book 2 with similar idea? Have a hard content which can only be used by 3 stars for instance. Most players would have a number of choices to use, followed by 4 stars and etc. It seems to be a new beginning so, going back to use seems appropriated;2) Little control of champs you obtain; (I have been playing for 5 years and have yet to obtain a 6 star worth ranking 2)3) Relevant rewards: for instance if you are Cavalier the majority of daily, 3 days events are irrelevant. I imagine there were a reason as to why the have been set up like that, but they have been outdated for a long time.4) Additional mastery points for end game content. 5) Older end game content such as LOL has outdated rewards. The content is still hard, however there's no incentive to people work on that now. If my luck remains horrible with 6 star champs, I'm afraid with the ideal of limiting the use of only 6 stars for future content. As of now they are used only for arena. Limiting to 2, 3 and 4 stars, is a limitation on how powerful players' champs can be in a quest. On the other hand limiting content to 6 stars that will limit or stop progression altogether.
the best content Kabam have put in this game to date has been Variant 4
the requirement to use champs from all Star rating levels was excellent and they need more it.
Except it was so easy that almost everyone with a decent roster can explore it.
That's the whole point, and it's the number one reason people aren't happy with the Gates. It makes the content not for everyone. Everyone and their dog got through Uncollected. It's not even a challenge now. All people need to do is look up some YouTube and they can do it within a matter of months of starting the game. It's also worth pointing out that Seatin makes content that caters to a certain demographic learning how to get through content, and that's most likely a motivating factor for the stance against Gates. However, it's not meant for the average Roster. (I don't even want to get into 2*s in Book 2.)
There would have been nothing wrong with kabam making 2* viable in Book 2. In fact it would have been entirely consistent with their constant claims of wanting summoners to use more of their rosters and not just in arenas or niche content like variants
I don't agree with that line of thinking at all. Progression-wise, I don't expect to use lower Champs in progressively higher Story content. While I will agree that the Gates between Act 5 and Act 6 are extreme, I don't see going backwards as something that logically happens. There are many ways to create content for lower, unused Champs. This isn't one of them that I see. To be perfectly honest, it leaves me scratching my head.
Ahh but your vision is too narrow kabam could and probably should have installed progression gates based on roster size. For example a summoner would have to be level 60, have completed (not explored) acts 1-6, have (x) amount of 5* champs and (x) amount of 6* champs before accessing Book 2. They could even take it further and say the PI of your 5* and above roster must be (x) amount. This would ensure players would have progressed far enough to tackle more difficult content while preventing the average player from accessing content meant for end game players.
A very serious buff to rewards would motivate players to progress their roster rather than focus on ranking up a handful of champs to complete content. It also prevents those who are lucky with RNG and those who throw thousands at cav crystals from accessing content too early because even if you get champs you still would have to rank them up plus progress through other content first. Kabam already has a broad progression gate on incursions as well as the monthly AQ.
A progression gate would also give kabam the freedom to start over with Book 2 allowing sufficiently experienced players to use more of their rosters without the worry that new or average players would access it and progress too fast.
There's still going to be a certain amount of waiting for specific Champs. That's part of the RNG structure. I'm sure making it 2* oriented means everyone has everything they need, but there's no logical reason to regress to using 2*s in it. The game is one that's based on RNG. It's been that way for 5 and a half years. The second we start discussing removing that element, we start talking about deconstructing the entire game itself and designing a new one.
Again your thinking is too narrow. If kabam allowed players to use their 1/2/3/4* champs across the first 3/4 chapters Of book 2 while offering rewards meant to build their 5/6* rosters for the latter chapters it would help to combat the RNG. Kabam could easily create node combinations that would make the game challenging even using 1-4* champs variant 4 proved this. Just because the story progresses doesn’t mean kabam has to trap itself in an insane upward spiral of difficulty. Besides what’s the point of forcing players to hold on to their lower star champs on the off chance they’ll have a use for them once or twice a year? Why continue to have them in rewards?
You don't think 3-4 Chapters which use 1-4* Champs and give 6* Rewards is a bit too much? Asking for something along the lines of using Champs on the shelf is reasonable. 4 Chapters of it is pretty much pushing it.
V4 you use lesser rarities and gain 6* shards and rank up gems so
I don't know why people keep comparing Variant to Story. Variant is a special type of content and it isn't even in the same wheelhouse. There may be some ideas that can be used in Story, but the two are mutually exclusive and not at all a reflection of each other.
What exactly do you mean by that? I genuinely don't follow.
Variant 4 is endgame oriented content designed for lower rarity champs. In the confines of suggesting act 7 to work similarly it makes all the sense to refer back to variant 4 to point out the validity of the suggestion.
They don't need to be the same type of content to compare them in this context.
The danger rooms essentially provided the baseline design concept for variant 4 and they had nothing to do with neither variant content nor story content.
Variant was a throwback to an EQ previously released. It's a standalone piece of content that may be designed with End-Game, but it's still a standalone that can be designed more freely. Story has its own continuity and line of progression and Rewards to consider. It's built up over Chapters and Acts, and not as liberally designed as Variants. People may enjoy Variants. That doesn't mean everything can be just like them.
No one is even saying that... It's about the baseline concept of content.
"Like variant 4" is short for "sharing certain aspects of variant 4". In it's core, variants, story content, monthly content, all of them are a map with nodes and enemies.
Just as danger rooms and variant 4 are completely different pieces of content but share inherit base design aspects, act 5 and act 6 are essentially the same type of content , but are wildly different in their design.
There's way more similarities between act 6 and variants as there are between act 5 and act 6.
We're talking gameplay design, not the reason a certain piece of content has to even be in the game.
We're talking about the next level of story content in Book 2. I agree that there is room for elements of the same parts to make it interesting, but 4 Chapters of 1-4*s, as per what began this debate, is not realistic. They're not the same content. People keep comparing them on the basis of the Rewards, but they have very different design goals.
Again ignoring the precedent for lower star champs in the early chapters set in Book 1. Again ignoring that a progression in story does not mean that there has to be a progression in difficulty the way kabam has introduced act 7 in the beta. A challenging and fun experience can be made with lower star champs that can justify end game rewards. You’re either Lack imagination and are too closed minded to the idea or simply unwilling to admit that you are wrong
Another thing coming to mind is the lack of 5* sig stones. I think we're at a stage in this game where those should not be in an overabundance, but shoyld definitely flow in more naturally.
I do not think they should be handed out without a limit or something, but here are a few possible solutions:
- Add 5* sig stone crystals (preferably generic stones) to the glory and/or loyalty store. -> this would provide us with an additional means of getting them while forcing us to choose between them and other ressources
- Add them to the daily/three day events. -> this should probably be more a part of a complete revamp of those. They are not up to date in my eyes, I mean the highest milestone of those daily events still provide 4* sig stones. Tiering them to our progression level might be a good start.
- Increase the amount of 5* sig stones from monthly content. -> really straightforward. At the stage we are right now you could very well double or even tripple the amount of sig stones rewarded by the monthly uc eq
- Introduce sig stone proving grounds. -> probably a bit more complicated, but also really straight forward. Even being able to net in just a single 5* sig stone crystal per day would already be an improvement, that's how dire the shortage is in my eyes.
There are probably other ways this could be done and by no means do I expect them to just be handed out all willy nilly.
But let's put this into perspective:
Without a single sig stone deal it took me well over a year to get my cap iw from sig 1 to sig 195. I did not invest a single science sig stone into another champ and I never naturally duped him. As it is now I'm looking forward to getting my doom to sig 200 in maybe 2022.
5* champs are still extremely relevant, but that's just one side of the story. Most content expects us to have a wide range of 5* champs. But with many champs relying on their sig abilities this feels like an arbitrary roadblock.
I am absolutely okay with the availability of 5* ag's by the way. But they already provide enough of a roadblock. Having them be rare is enough to keep us from exploding our rosters completely, we don't need an artificial shortage of sig levels as well.
I've been asking for that for over a year lol. They made too much money selling them for the Prestige Wars. Maybe now that six stars are starting to dominate prestige they'll let us peons start getting them more.
the best content Kabam have put in this game to date has been Variant 4
the requirement to use champs from all Star rating levels was excellent and they need more it.
Except it was so easy that almost everyone with a decent roster can explore it.
That's the whole point, and it's the number one reason people aren't happy with the Gates. It makes the content not for everyone. Everyone and their dog got through Uncollected. It's not even a challenge now. All people need to do is look up some YouTube and they can do it within a matter of months of starting the game. It's also worth pointing out that Seatin makes content that caters to a certain demographic learning how to get through content, and that's most likely a motivating factor for the stance against Gates. However, it's not meant for the average Roster. (I don't even want to get into 2*s in Book 2.)
There would have been nothing wrong with kabam making 2* viable in Book 2. In fact it would have been entirely consistent with their constant claims of wanting summoners to use more of their rosters and not just in arenas or niche content like variants
I don't agree with that line of thinking at all. Progression-wise, I don't expect to use lower Champs in progressively higher Story content. While I will agree that the Gates between Act 5 and Act 6 are extreme, I don't see going backwards as something that logically happens. There are many ways to create content for lower, unused Champs. This isn't one of them that I see. To be perfectly honest, it leaves me scratching my head.
Ahh but your vision is too narrow kabam could and probably should have installed progression gates based on roster size. For example a summoner would have to be level 60, have completed (not explored) acts 1-6, have (x) amount of 5* champs and (x) amount of 6* champs before accessing Book 2. They could even take it further and say the PI of your 5* and above roster must be (x) amount. This would ensure players would have progressed far enough to tackle more difficult content while preventing the average player from accessing content meant for end game players.
A very serious buff to rewards would motivate players to progress their roster rather than focus on ranking up a handful of champs to complete content. It also prevents those who are lucky with RNG and those who throw thousands at cav crystals from accessing content too early because even if you get champs you still would have to rank them up plus progress through other content first. Kabam already has a broad progression gate on incursions as well as the monthly AQ.
A progression gate would also give kabam the freedom to start over with Book 2 allowing sufficiently experienced players to use more of their rosters without the worry that new or average players would access it and progress too fast.
There's still going to be a certain amount of waiting for specific Champs. That's part of the RNG structure. I'm sure making it 2* oriented means everyone has everything they need, but there's no logical reason to regress to using 2*s in it. The game is one that's based on RNG. It's been that way for 5 and a half years. The second we start discussing removing that element, we start talking about deconstructing the entire game itself and designing a new one.
Again your thinking is too narrow. If kabam allowed players to use their 1/2/3/4* champs across the first 3/4 chapters Of book 2 while offering rewards meant to build their 5/6* rosters for the latter chapters it would help to combat the RNG. Kabam could easily create node combinations that would make the game challenging even using 1-4* champs variant 4 proved this. Just because the story progresses doesn’t mean kabam has to trap itself in an insane upward spiral of difficulty. Besides what’s the point of forcing players to hold on to their lower star champs on the off chance they’ll have a use for them once or twice a year? Why continue to have them in rewards?
You don't think 3-4 Chapters which use 1-4* Champs and give 6* Rewards is a bit too much? Asking for something along the lines of using Champs on the shelf is reasonable. 4 Chapters of it is pretty much pushing it.
V4 you use lesser rarities and gain 6* shards and rank up gems so
I don't know why people keep comparing Variant to Story. Variant is a special type of content and it isn't even in the same wheelhouse. There may be some ideas that can be used in Story, but the two are mutually exclusive and not at all a reflection of each other.
What exactly do you mean by that? I genuinely don't follow.
Variant 4 is endgame oriented content designed for lower rarity champs. In the confines of suggesting act 7 to work similarly it makes all the sense to refer back to variant 4 to point out the validity of the suggestion.
They don't need to be the same type of content to compare them in this context.
The danger rooms essentially provided the baseline design concept for variant 4 and they had nothing to do with neither variant content nor story content.
Variant was a throwback to an EQ previously released. It's a standalone piece of content that may be designed with End-Game, but it's still a standalone that can be designed more freely. Story has its own continuity and line of progression and Rewards to consider. It's built up over Chapters and Acts, and not as liberally designed as Variants. People may enjoy Variants. That doesn't mean everything can be just like them.
No one is even saying that... It's about the baseline concept of content.
"Like variant 4" is short for "sharing certain aspects of variant 4". In it's core, variants, story content, monthly content, all of them are a map with nodes and enemies.
Just as danger rooms and variant 4 are completely different pieces of content but share inherit base design aspects, act 5 and act 6 are essentially the same type of content , but are wildly different in their design.
There's way more similarities between act 6 and variants as there are between act 5 and act 6.
We're talking gameplay design, not the reason a certain piece of content has to even be in the game.
We're talking about the next level of story content in Book 2. I agree that there is room for elements of the same parts to make it interesting, but 4 Chapters of 1-4*s, as per what began this debate, is not realistic. They're not the same content. People keep comparing them on the basis of the Rewards, but they have very different design goals.
Again ignoring the precedent for lower star champs in the early chapters set in Book 1. Again ignoring that a progression in story does not mean that there has to be a progression in difficulty the way kabam has introduced act 7 in the beta. A challenging and fun experience can be made with lower star champs that can justify end game rewards. You’re either Lack imagination and are too closed minded to the idea or simply unwilling to admit that you are wrong
Considering Book 2 is accessed by completing Act 6, it's nonsensical to restart the same as Book 1, with lower requirements, and still have End-Game Rewards. They've also said themselves that 5 and 6*s will be the focus of Book 2. Whether or not that's on the table is up to them. I already said that I agree a certain amount of ease into the Book would make sense. Right here is where we have a fundamental flaw in these discussions. Expectations exceed what's reasonable. I suggested certain Paths. Now the expectation is becoming making the entire Book a la Variant. I do not agree that it should be completely designed with the same concept. Elements could be worked in. It's still meant to be a step up from Act 6 in some respects. I'm not closed-minded or lacking imagination. In fact, my imagination gave a suggestion on how to integrate elements of it into the current schematic. I just don't agree that it's feasible or reasonable to make it JUST LIKE Variant. TL:DR - It shouldn't be THAT easy.
Another thing coming to mind is the lack of 5* sig stones. I think we're at a stage in this game where those should not be in an overabundance, but shoyld definitely flow in more naturally.
I do not think they should be handed out without a limit or something, but here are a few possible solutions:
- Add 5* sig stone crystals (preferably generic stones) to the glory and/or loyalty store. -> this would provide us with an additional means of getting them while forcing us to choose between them and other ressources
- Add them to the daily/three day events. -> this should probably be more a part of a complete revamp of those. They are not up to date in my eyes, I mean the highest milestone of those daily events still provide 4* sig stones. Tiering them to our progression level might be a good start.
- Increase the amount of 5* sig stones from monthly content. -> really straightforward. At the stage we are right now you could very well double or even tripple the amount of sig stones rewarded by the monthly uc eq
- Introduce sig stone proving grounds. -> probably a bit more complicated, but also really straight forward. Even being able to net in just a single 5* sig stone crystal per day would already be an improvement, that's how dire the shortage is in my eyes.
There are probably other ways this could be done and by no means do I expect them to just be handed out all willy nilly.
But let's put this into perspective:
Without a single sig stone deal it took me well over a year to get my cap iw from sig 1 to sig 195. I did not invest a single science sig stone into another champ and I never naturally duped him. As it is now I'm looking forward to getting my doom to sig 200 in maybe 2022.
5* champs are still extremely relevant, but that's just one side of the story. Most content expects us to have a wide range of 5* champs. But with many champs relying on their sig abilities this feels like an arbitrary roadblock.
I am absolutely okay with the availability of 5* ag's by the way. But they already provide enough of a roadblock. Having them be rare is enough to keep us from exploding our rosters completely, we don't need an artificial shortage of sig levels as well.
Easiest way on 5* stones would be to add them to Cav level solo milestones. Instead we get 3* sig stones on milestones with 4* sig stones when we hit rank.
From a profits perspective, it probably makes sense to push players to need champs for specific niches who also require high sig to succeed. From a game enjoyment perspective, perhaps not so much.
Another thing coming to mind is the lack of 5* sig stones. I think we're at a stage in this game where those should not be in an overabundance, but shoyld definitely flow in more naturally.
I do not think they should be handed out without a limit or something, but here are a few possible solutions:
- Add 5* sig stone crystals (preferably generic stones) to the glory and/or loyalty store. -> this would provide us with an additional means of getting them while forcing us to choose between them and other ressources
- Add them to the daily/three day events. -> this should probably be more a part of a complete revamp of those. They are not up to date in my eyes, I mean the highest milestone of those daily events still provide 4* sig stones. Tiering them to our progression level might be a good start.
- Increase the amount of 5* sig stones from monthly content. -> really straightforward. At the stage we are right now you could very well double or even tripple the amount of sig stones rewarded by the monthly uc eq
- Introduce sig stone proving grounds. -> probably a bit more complicated, but also really straight forward. Even being able to net in just a single 5* sig stone crystal per day would already be an improvement, that's how dire the shortage is in my eyes.
There are probably other ways this could be done and by no means do I expect them to just be handed out all willy nilly.
But let's put this into perspective:
Without a single sig stone deal it took me well over a year to get my cap iw from sig 1 to sig 195. I did not invest a single science sig stone into another champ and I never naturally duped him. As it is now I'm looking forward to getting my doom to sig 200 in maybe 2022.
5* champs are still extremely relevant, but that's just one side of the story. Most content expects us to have a wide range of 5* champs. But with many champs relying on their sig abilities this feels like an arbitrary roadblock.
I am absolutely okay with the availability of 5* ag's by the way. But they already provide enough of a roadblock. Having them be rare is enough to keep us from exploding our rosters completely, we don't need an artificial shortage of sig levels as well.
Dude you’re killing it on this thread, I’m agreeing with everything you’re saying so far. So well said. The sig stone issue is so overdue for an update. There is no reason why a cavalier level player should be earning four star sig stones for daily event milestones. Zero.
Further to what I was saying, you're forgetting one aspect of Book 1. It required acquiring Champs to complete it along the way. That's part of the game.
Okay, so there are a lot of posts about the incorporation of lower-tier champs, and I thought I'd share my opinion.
So I totally agree that Kabam should use all aspects a player's roster, including tier and class. Quests could have certain requirements that require 2*s, or 3*s to be on the team, or even gates for certain champions. Remember the extra nodes in variant 3 that were champion specific, and if you used that specific champ, such as Venom, you would gain extra buffs? They could do that. They could make all sorts of crazy nodes that would play on the tier of a champ. They could make nodes that benefit certain classes in a lane.
They already built this wonderful array of champs that can be used. Why make them unusable for content? That's like telling someone to dig a hole with a bunch of screwdrivers. It can be done, but it's going to take time, and it's going to be damn near impossible. Now how about giving them a screwdriver, some tape, and some cardboard? Now the person can create something that can be used creatively. They could make a shovel. They could make something else, anything. The same logic applies to games. If Kabam could somehow take bad champs like Joe Fixit or Abom and combine them with a set of nodes that they would shine in, the game would not only challenge the player, it would make it fun as well. The same thing goes with champion tiers. You have 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6*s, but you only use two out of the six to complete content. What happens to the rest? Kabam have spent so much time working on the rest of the tiers, but just throw them to the side. That's just called a waste of time. If you want your work to be efficient and effective, use all of it. Use all the champion tiers.
Now the main problem would be rewards. How are you going to give someone enough resources to max out their 6*? Are you going to give it to them for completing a quest with 2*s? The answer has to do with difficulty. Are you going to reward a skilled player who can effectively counter challenging nodes and play perfectly or near perfectly with a six star if they completed Act 6? Yes. So then are you going to reward a player who could also do the same, but in a quest made for 2*s, but still requires the same amount of skill, or more, to complete Act 6? Yes, and you should. Just because the quest requires a lower quest doesn't mean it requires less skill. For example, the beginner EQ is low skill and low tier. That's why the rewards are low-tier in nature as well. On the other hand, V4.3.2 is high skill, but low tier. That's why the rewards can be considered high-tier. Now I know that V4 also consists of content for 6 and 5*s, but it still somewhat illustrates my point. High skill content needs to be reflected by high-tier rewards.
Ive been close to quitting for some time. I’m in a P4/map 6 alliance. 1.6 mil rating. Act 6 about 15 paths left for 100% exploration. Lol and all variants done. 1 abyss path down for reference.
Several big issues here:
1. Champion acquirement: the pools are to damn big. Something needs to be done about this. In conjunction with garbage act 6 content being very niche has made this even worse. I’ve got a pretty expansive roster and spend very little $$. I’m sitting on 30 t2a and a ton of other junk. Why? Can’t get 5/6*s worth ranking up. Too many trash champs. After an abyss run I should be happy, not deflated for pulling a Psylocke and ThorJF. Great rewards for my efforts....
Solutions:
A) All 5/6* crystals should be nexus crystals (10k shards) class specific crystals for 10k shards C) pools similar to dungeon crystals for 10k D) arenas should be milestones, not top 150. Something like 50mil the first time through, 30 mil the next time for example. E) Cav crystals. It’s great getting Cav crystals from act 6. Nothing like pulling 3 3*s for clearing content that I couldn’t use anything below a 5*........ how this was allowed by Kabam is mind boggling. Drop the 3*s at the very least and it should be 45% 4*, 40* 5*, 15% 6*
2. AQ: stale, boring content for garbage rewards. I’m in a map 6 alliance. What motivation do we have for map 7? We are all sitting on resources we can’t use and the map 7 crystals are terrible. I think it’s time for crystal shards to be added here, too.
Solutions:
A) 30 MIN TIMERS fix map 7 crystals, take out the t4cc, add t5cc C) add champ crystals. D) revamp the whole stale game mode. Build off incursions. How cool would it be to buff your champs? Maybe spread a few buff nodes on each path, then give a boss hack to the person who drops the mini boss. A nice extra incentive to get people to fight the boss.
3. AW: AW is terrible right now (actually always has been, you’ve never been able to get this content right/fun). Rewards don’t match the cost.
Solutions:
A) Take those season rewards and multiply them by 4 or 5, double or triple the war win/loss rewards. do a better job of these buff modifiers. Flow is still over powered. Don’t you guys analyze the game data? Why did it take a forum post to get this nerfed? Do any of you play end game? If nearly every alliance is running one buff, that should be a warning sign. C) 30 min timers. Huge, easy quality of life improvement for both AQ and AW D) war crystals: how are these still the same from like 2016? It would take like an hour to update these crystals....
4. Monthly quests: monthly quests suck for endgame players. Many don’t even do them anymore. Long overdue for an overhaul.
Anyway. There’s more but some of this would be a good start. I do really enjoy the Incursions overhaul even though the crystals still suck.
Considering Book 2 is accessed by completing Act 6, it's nonsensical to restart the same as Book 1, with lower requirements, and still have End-Game Rewards. They've also said themselves that 5 and 6*s will be the focus of Book 2. Whether or not that's on the table is up to them. I already said that I agree a certain amount of ease into the Book would make sense. Right here is where we have a fundamental flaw in these discussions. Expectations exceed what's reasonable. I suggested certain Paths. Now the expectation is becoming making the entire Book a la Variant. I do not agree that it should be completely designed with the same concept. Elements could be worked in. It's still meant to be a step up from Act 6 in some respects. I'm not closed-minded or lacking imagination. In fact, my imagination gave a suggestion on how to integrate elements of it into the current schematic. I just don't agree that it's feasible or reasonable to make it JUST LIKE Variant. TL:DR - It shouldn't be THAT easy.
I totally agree that it shouldn't be that easy, but Kabam has already made those lower tier champions, so why not incorporate them into the fights? I put out an idea for a quest design earlier. You could have 2*s with boosted attack ratings fighting Act 5-ish champions and bosses. The catch would be that the health of the 2* would not be boosted, and the player would have to rely on intercepts instead of parries. You can increase the challenge without increasing the tier requirements of a champion or the attack ratings of the defenders. I agree that it shouldn't be Variant, but it should reflect the creativity of a Variant.
the best content Kabam have put in this game to date has been Variant 4
the requirement to use champs from all Star rating levels was excellent and they need more it.
Except it was so easy that almost everyone with a decent roster can explore it.
That's the whole point, and it's the number one reason people aren't happy with the Gates. It makes the content not for everyone. Everyone and their dog got through Uncollected. It's not even a challenge now. All people need to do is look up some YouTube and they can do it within a matter of months of starting the game. It's also worth pointing out that Seatin makes content that caters to a certain demographic learning how to get through content, and that's most likely a motivating factor for the stance against Gates. However, it's not meant for the average Roster. (I don't even want to get into 2*s in Book 2.)
There would have been nothing wrong with kabam making 2* viable in Book 2. In fact it would have been entirely consistent with their constant claims of wanting summoners to use more of their rosters and not just in arenas or niche content like variants
I don't agree with that line of thinking at all. Progression-wise, I don't expect to use lower Champs in progressively higher Story content. While I will agree that the Gates between Act 5 and Act 6 are extreme, I don't see going backwards as something that logically happens. There are many ways to create content for lower, unused Champs. This isn't one of them that I see. To be perfectly honest, it leaves me scratching my head.
Ahh but your vision is too narrow kabam could and probably should have installed progression gates based on roster size. For example a summoner would have to be level 60, have completed (not explored) acts 1-6, have (x) amount of 5* champs and (x) amount of 6* champs before accessing Book 2. They could even take it further and say the PI of your 5* and above roster must be (x) amount. This would ensure players would have progressed far enough to tackle more difficult content while preventing the average player from accessing content meant for end game players.
A very serious buff to rewards would motivate players to progress their roster rather than focus on ranking up a handful of champs to complete content. It also prevents those who are lucky with RNG and those who throw thousands at cav crystals from accessing content too early because even if you get champs you still would have to rank them up plus progress through other content first. Kabam already has a broad progression gate on incursions as well as the monthly AQ.
A progression gate would also give kabam the freedom to start over with Book 2 allowing sufficiently experienced players to use more of their rosters without the worry that new or average players would access it and progress too fast.
There's still going to be a certain amount of waiting for specific Champs. That's part of the RNG structure. I'm sure making it 2* oriented means everyone has everything they need, but there's no logical reason to regress to using 2*s in it. The game is one that's based on RNG. It's been that way for 5 and a half years. The second we start discussing removing that element, we start talking about deconstructing the entire game itself and designing a new one.
Again your thinking is too narrow. If kabam allowed players to use their 1/2/3/4* champs across the first 3/4 chapters Of book 2 while offering rewards meant to build their 5/6* rosters for the latter chapters it would help to combat the RNG. Kabam could easily create node combinations that would make the game challenging even using 1-4* champs variant 4 proved this. Just because the story progresses doesn’t mean kabam has to trap itself in an insane upward spiral of difficulty. Besides what’s the point of forcing players to hold on to their lower star champs on the off chance they’ll have a use for them once or twice a year? Why continue to have them in rewards?
You don't think 3-4 Chapters which use 1-4* Champs and give 6* Rewards is a bit too much? Asking for something along the lines of using Champs on the shelf is reasonable. 4 Chapters of it is pretty much pushing it.
V4 you use lesser rarities and gain 6* shards and rank up gems so
I don't know why people keep comparing Variant to Story. Variant is a special type of content and it isn't even in the same wheelhouse. There may be some ideas that can be used in Story, but the two are mutually exclusive and not at all a reflection of each other.
What exactly do you mean by that? I genuinely don't follow.
Variant 4 is endgame oriented content designed for lower rarity champs. In the confines of suggesting act 7 to work similarly it makes all the sense to refer back to variant 4 to point out the validity of the suggestion.
They don't need to be the same type of content to compare them in this context.
The danger rooms essentially provided the baseline design concept for variant 4 and they had nothing to do with neither variant content nor story content.
Variant was a throwback to an EQ previously released. It's a standalone piece of content that may be designed with End-Game, but it's still a standalone that can be designed more freely. Story has its own continuity and line of progression and Rewards to consider. It's built up over Chapters and Acts, and not as liberally designed as Variants. People may enjoy Variants. That doesn't mean everything can be just like them.
No one is even saying that... It's about the baseline concept of content.
"Like variant 4" is short for "sharing certain aspects of variant 4". In it's core, variants, story content, monthly content, all of them are a map with nodes and enemies.
Just as danger rooms and variant 4 are completely different pieces of content but share inherit base design aspects, act 5 and act 6 are essentially the same type of content , but are wildly different in their design.
There's way more similarities between act 6 and variants as there are between act 5 and act 6.
We're talking gameplay design, not the reason a certain piece of content has to even be in the game.
We're talking about the next level of story content in Book 2. I agree that there is room for elements of the same parts to make it interesting, but 4 Chapters of 1-4*s, as per what began this debate, is not realistic. They're not the same content. People keep comparing them on the basis of the Rewards, but they have very different design goals.
Again ignoring the precedent for lower star champs in the early chapters set in Book 1. Again ignoring that a progression in story does not mean that there has to be a progression in difficulty the way kabam has introduced act 7 in the beta. A challenging and fun experience can be made with lower star champs that can justify end game rewards. You’re either Lack imagination and are too closed minded to the idea or simply unwilling to admit that you are wrong
I think it is important to note here that as probably the first person to use the phrase "progressional content" on the forums, the point to calling content "progressional content" is not that it progresses the story and not that it progresses the difficulty. Rather, progressional content is called progressional content because it parallels core game progress. And at the moment, game progress is dictated by three things in game: levels (to a point), progressional titles (past that point), and roster development. The story arc content is progressional content because the content contains either implicit or explicit landmarks to progress. Because roster development is fundamental to progress in this game, progressional content will, for the most part, require rosters that are further "upward" not restricted "downward" to smaller levels. There can be exceptions, but they are just that: exceptions.
The fundamental difference between Variant and the Story arcs is the story arcs must reflect for the most part how rosters progress, which is upward towards higher rarity champions. Content like Variants or the Abyss don't have that requirement, and can make up any restrictions in roster that they want.
The whole reason why 5* and 6* champs are more coveted by players is that they intrinsically stronger than lower rarity champs (in general) and that is only true if you can actually use them that way. That doesn't have to be everywhere, but the one place where that has to be true is in the core progressional content. Because that's the *definition* of progressional content.
To put it another way, if you starting restricting people from using their 5* and 6* rosters in the Story arcs, they would cease to be progressional content. Because you couldn't use your fundamental upward roster growth in it. Then the question would become, what is the core progressional content of the game?
In a perfect world the game would be one long progressional ladder, where completing Act 6 gave you exactly what was necessary to tackle Act 7, then Act 7 would give you exactly what was necessary to tackle Act 8, and so on. But no progressional game is perfect like that (at least no multiplayer one) so there exists non-progressional content to among other things give players a variety of things to do and to pause at one progressional rung of the ladder while they build up the skills and resources to tackle the next rung. The core progressional content is not normally where you make detours in progress, because that's not what it is there for. It is there to drive progress forward. If that is not its primary purpose, it isn't progressional content.
Progressional content doesn't have to get subjectively harder: some games don't do that. But progressional content always pushes progress forward, within the context of that game's progress.
Ive been close to quitting for some time. I’m in a P4/map 6 alliance. 1.6 mil rating. Act 6 about 15 paths left for 100% exploration. Lol and all variants done. 1 abyss path down for reference.
Several big issues here:
1. Champion acquirement: the pools are to damn big. Something needs to be done about this. In conjunction with garbage act 6 content being very niche has made this even worse. I’ve got a pretty expansive roster and spend very little $$. I’m sitting on 30 t2a and a ton of other junk. Why? Can’t get 5/6*s worth ranking up. Too many trash champs. After an abyss run I should be happy, not deflated for pulling a Psylocke and ThorJF. Great rewards for my efforts....
Solutions:
A) All 5/6* crystals should be nexus crystals (10k shards) class specific crystals for 10k shards C) pools similar to dungeon crystals for 10k D) arenas should be milestones, not top 150. Something like 50mil the first time through, 30 mil the next time for example. E) Cav crystals. It’s great getting Cav crystals from act 6. Nothing like pulling 3 3*s for clearing content that I couldn’t use anything below a 5*........ how this was allowed by Kabam is mind boggling. Drop the 3*s at the very least and it should be 45% 4*, 40* 5*, 15% 6*
Crystal pools are a recent problem, so Kabam might have that on their plan for the future.
Now I do agree that we should have some sort of Nexus crystal, and I like your idea of a class specific crystal. However, I don't agree with your prices for those crystals. The regular crystals should stay. The Nexus crystals should at least be the price of a featured, and so should all the other specific crystals you mentioned. The game was built on luck. I feel that altering or changing that luck would require more of a sacrifice, and in this case, a higher cost.
Comments
I’m a below average spender at around $50 a month. I’m single with lots of disposable income so I can easily afford to spend more but not until I see changes. I know Kabam Mike says there are things in the works, and I know new content and changes take a long time to put into effect, but give us a plan and an idea in where the game is headed. I personally would like at least one of the following changes
Change AW, make it less tedious
Make new unique fun nodes for act 7. Make the nodes not to where only 3 champs are effective, but make it so many champs are effective and we can play with whoever is the most fun
Massive rework. I know this would take a long time to happen, bu give us a rework of champs like venompool, miles morales, groot and iron patriot at the same time.
If nodes in act 7 are like act 6, make it easier for us to pull the champs needed, for example giving us nexus crystals to be purchased with shards. This does not mean throw more offers at us that cost money and units. This needs to be equally available to free to play players
I know not all these ideas are realistic but this is what I personally would like to see in the game before I start spending again
Story has its own continuity and line of progression and Rewards to consider. It's built up over Chapters and Acts, and not as liberally designed as Variants.
People may enjoy Variants. That doesn't mean everything can be just like them.
But his video and this thread opened the door to an opportunity to discuss a larger problem that I think has been brewing for a while, and that affects a much larger class of players than just the tiny minority of top tier players. It is something I've been tangentially chipping at since maybe just after I12, certainly by I14 in the context of Alliance War, and was definitely on my mind when I posted my "How to make Challenges Interesting" thread. No matter where you are in the game, no matter how much you spend, and no matter how much rewards the game piles onto you, at the end of the day the game can't bribe you to play. It can't give you more rewards to make up for punishing or boring challenges. Because if the game keeps giving you more and more rewards, eventually we all become Seatin.
*Before* we all become Seatin, we have to ask what the game can give us that can slow down the day when we all have everything and have done everything and have nothing to look forward to. And the way to extend the longevity of the game is by making sure that the content is challenging in an entertaining way, so the game play itself is significantly rewarding, and by making sure that the more unique and challenging the content the player faces, the less disappointing the rewards become. There's a finite amount of content in the game and a finite amount of rewards in the game that are meaningful. The game has to make sure that it focuses the most rewarding rewards in the most important places.
The most important lesson I think is not that we're all Seatin and we all have his problems. It certainly isn't that we should all be afraid of losing him as a player. No one player matters all that much. I think it is that most of us shouldn't want to get to where Seatin is, and that's a place where we have everything and have done everything and there's nothing left. The game CANNOT just keep piling more content and more rewards and more content and more rewards in an upward spiral, because players like Seatin consume them way too fast. The only way to make players like Seatin happy is to make sure the game he's playing is entertaining for its own sake, because we can't bribe him with rewards.
But we should be doing that for everyone. Because the player who stalls out at 5.1 is no different than Seatin. If we think that the person who stalls out at 5.1 just needs to "get gud" but Seatin's problems are different, then I think this was all a complete waste of time. At the end of the day, Book 2's difficulty only matters to a tiny fraction of players. Even Act 6's difficulty only matters to a small percentage of players. But the problem that ESF's friend had, that's a problem that affects everyone from beginners to Seatin and above. Tackle that one, and everyone benefits.
We’re saying that compared to other quests variants, particularly variant 4, offered the most fun gaming experience it is by far the most balanced in terms of roster viability, difficulty, and rewards. Why Kabam chose not to emulate and build upon the success of variant 4 based on the overwhelming positive community reaction and apply it across other content is beyond me.
There's no questions it is a hard job to balance things and Incursions are fun (but not much to get from it as rewards goes), however I'm not sure what you mean about contradictions. True that there are many different ideas out there, but there's plenty of agreement, so why we don't focus on that.
As many, was disheartened to play Act. 7. Likewise I don't know anyone who enjoyed Act 6 (well to be far 6.2 and forward). No player, no youtuber we all enjoy watching. Nobody! Got stuck due to lack of helpful champs who could address specific nodes for months. Still working on completion of 6.4. So when I see a mini boss like Sabretooth is beyond disappointing. From what I can tell only Red Guardian can deal with that node. The idea of creating specific nodes, which can only be addressed with an upcoming champ is very limiting and puts a wall on player progression. You are forcing players to obtain a new champ, rather than give content to be enjoyed. It reminds me of the drama we have a few weeks ago with BWCV/Morningstar nefs/fix related to the Champion boss months after lots of players invested in these champs. There were videos out there for months showing them as a feasible option. As they would no longer be an option, a new champ was release to address that very issue.
It feels to me all complaints about Act 6 is relevant to Act 7, but one step further in the wrong direction. Kabam's staff better start playing their content... of course I understand that is the whole idea of a Beta, but when the same complaints are valid for your upcoming content I am not sure what else to say, when our feedback is ignored.
Most of us have the groundhog day feeling. Hitting a wall for not having an specific champ or not enjoying the content, rinse and repeat AQ and AW. Trying to keep guild mates excited/active in the game is beyond old. Finding replacements is a separate job. I personally no longer get excited opening crystals... I have been told I get Kabammed. There's still a passion for this game, however it feels like the community frustration is at new heights. We hope Kabam can rethink their ideas of player progression by giving us enough tools to keep going and excited with the progress. As reported Act 6 is nowhere close to a fun time. If you keep missing the mark, people will end up finding another place to have fun... and that will be sad. I have been in an alliance for 5 years. There's camaraderie and friendships that lasted for years. People seem to be burning out left and right.
Some quick thoughts:
1) Act 7, as I understand is suppose to be book 2, Act 1. Knowing that people really enjoyed Variant 4 why don't you start book 2 with similar idea? Have a hard content which can only be used by 3 stars for instance. Most players would have a number of choices to use, followed by 4 stars and etc. It seems to be a new beginning so, going back to use seems appropriated;2) Little control of champs you obtain; (I have been playing for 5 years and have yet to obtain a 6 star worth ranking 2)3) Relevant rewards: for instance if you are Cavalier the majority of daily, 3 days events are irrelevant. I imagine there were a reason as to why the have been set up like that, but they have been outdated for a long time.4) Additional mastery points for end game content.
5) Older end game content such as LOL has outdated rewards. The content is still hard, however there's no incentive to people work on that now.
If my luck remains horrible with 6 star champs, I'm afraid with the ideal of limiting the use of only 6 stars for future content. As of now they are used only for arena. Limiting to 2, 3 and 4 stars, is a limitation on how powerful players' champs can be in a quest. On the other hand limiting content to 6 stars that will limit or stop progression altogether.
TL:DR - It shouldn't be THAT easy.
From a profits perspective, it probably makes sense to push players to need champs for specific niches who also require high sig to succeed. From a game enjoyment perspective, perhaps not so much.
Dr. Zola
So I totally agree that Kabam should use all aspects a player's roster, including tier and class. Quests could have certain requirements that require 2*s, or 3*s to be on the team, or even gates for certain champions. Remember the extra nodes in variant 3 that were champion specific, and if you used that specific champ, such as Venom, you would gain extra buffs? They could do that. They could make all sorts of crazy nodes that would play on the tier of a champ. They could make nodes that benefit certain classes in a lane.
They already built this wonderful array of champs that can be used. Why make them unusable for content? That's like telling someone to dig a hole with a bunch of screwdrivers. It can be done, but it's going to take time, and it's going to be damn near impossible. Now how about giving them a screwdriver, some tape, and some cardboard? Now the person can create something that can be used creatively. They could make a shovel. They could make something else, anything. The same logic applies to games. If Kabam could somehow take bad champs like Joe Fixit or Abom and combine them with a set of nodes that they would shine in, the game would not only challenge the player, it would make it fun as well. The same thing goes with champion tiers. You have 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6*s, but you only use two out of the six to complete content. What happens to the rest? Kabam have spent so much time working on the rest of the tiers, but just throw them to the side. That's just called a waste of time. If you want your work to be efficient and effective, use all of it. Use all the champion tiers.
Now the main problem would be rewards. How are you going to give someone enough resources to max out their 6*? Are you going to give it to them for completing a quest with 2*s? The answer has to do with difficulty.
Are you going to reward a skilled player who can effectively counter challenging nodes and play perfectly or near perfectly with a six star if they completed Act 6? Yes.
So then are you going to reward a player who could also do the same, but in a quest made for 2*s, but still requires the same amount of skill, or more, to complete Act 6? Yes, and you should. Just because the quest requires a lower quest doesn't mean it requires less skill. For example, the beginner EQ is low skill and low tier. That's why the rewards are low-tier in nature as well. On the other hand, V4.3.2 is high skill, but low tier. That's why the rewards can be considered high-tier. Now I know that V4 also consists of content for 6 and 5*s, but it still somewhat illustrates my point. High skill content needs to be reflected by high-tier rewards.
Several big issues here:
1. Champion acquirement: the pools are to damn big. Something needs to be done about this. In conjunction with garbage act 6 content being very niche has made this even worse. I’ve got a pretty expansive roster and spend very little $$. I’m sitting on 30 t2a and a ton of other junk. Why? Can’t get 5/6*s worth ranking up. Too many trash champs. After an abyss run I should be happy, not deflated for pulling a Psylocke and ThorJF. Great rewards for my efforts....
Solutions:
A) All 5/6* crystals should be nexus crystals (10k shards)
C) pools similar to dungeon crystals for 10k
D) arenas should be milestones, not top 150. Something like 50mil the first time through, 30 mil the next time for example.
E) Cav crystals. It’s great getting Cav crystals from act 6. Nothing like pulling 3 3*s for clearing content that I couldn’t use anything below a 5*........ how this was allowed by Kabam is mind boggling. Drop the 3*s at the very least and it should be 45% 4*, 40* 5*, 15% 6*
2. AQ: stale, boring content for garbage rewards. I’m in a map 6 alliance. What motivation do we have for map 7? We are all sitting on resources we can’t use and the map 7 crystals are terrible. I think it’s time for crystal shards to be added here, too.
Solutions:
A) 30 MIN TIMERS
C) add champ crystals.
D) revamp the whole stale game mode. Build off incursions. How cool would it be to buff your champs? Maybe spread a few buff nodes on each path, then give a boss hack to the person who drops the mini boss. A nice extra incentive to get people to fight the boss.
3. AW: AW is terrible right now (actually always has been, you’ve never been able to get this content right/fun). Rewards don’t match the cost.
Solutions:
A) Take those season rewards and multiply them by 4 or 5, double or triple the war win/loss rewards.
C) 30 min timers. Huge, easy quality of life improvement for both AQ and AW
D) war crystals: how are these still the same from like 2016? It would take like an hour to update these crystals....
4. Monthly quests: monthly quests suck for endgame players. Many don’t even do them anymore. Long overdue for an overhaul.
Anyway. There’s more but some of this would be a good start. I do really enjoy the Incursions overhaul even though the crystals still suck.
The fundamental difference between Variant and the Story arcs is the story arcs must reflect for the most part how rosters progress, which is upward towards higher rarity champions. Content like Variants or the Abyss don't have that requirement, and can make up any restrictions in roster that they want.
The whole reason why 5* and 6* champs are more coveted by players is that they intrinsically stronger than lower rarity champs (in general) and that is only true if you can actually use them that way. That doesn't have to be everywhere, but the one place where that has to be true is in the core progressional content. Because that's the *definition* of progressional content.
To put it another way, if you starting restricting people from using their 5* and 6* rosters in the Story arcs, they would cease to be progressional content. Because you couldn't use your fundamental upward roster growth in it. Then the question would become, what is the core progressional content of the game?
In a perfect world the game would be one long progressional ladder, where completing Act 6 gave you exactly what was necessary to tackle Act 7, then Act 7 would give you exactly what was necessary to tackle Act 8, and so on. But no progressional game is perfect like that (at least no multiplayer one) so there exists non-progressional content to among other things give players a variety of things to do and to pause at one progressional rung of the ladder while they build up the skills and resources to tackle the next rung. The core progressional content is not normally where you make detours in progress, because that's not what it is there for. It is there to drive progress forward. If that is not its primary purpose, it isn't progressional content.
Progressional content doesn't have to get subjectively harder: some games don't do that. But progressional content always pushes progress forward, within the context of that game's progress.
Now I do agree that we should have some sort of Nexus crystal, and I like your idea of a class specific crystal. However, I don't agree with your prices for those crystals. The regular crystals should stay. The Nexus crystals should at least be the price of a featured, and so should all the other specific crystals you mentioned. The game was built on luck. I feel that altering or changing that luck would require more of a sacrifice, and in this case, a higher cost.