There's always lots of talk when a new featured crystal drops, and whether it's a 6* pool or a 5* pool there is always tons of speculation about which champion from those pools are going to be the lucky few selected for future months overhaul/moderate/tune up. But how accurate are these predictions? And how often do these crystals actually predict buffs?
In today's episode, that's what I'm going to look at.
I began by constructing a timeline of when each featured crystal dropped, and when each buff was announced. That meant I could find out, at the time of the crystal dropping, which champions in the pool had already been buffed, and which champions at the time were unbuffed but would go on to get a buff in the future.
I'll begin with the 5* featured:
As you can see, moving left to right we have the year and month of a certain buff, which champions were buffed in that month, the date the crystal dropped, which champions in that pool had been buffed in the past, and which champions in that pool did not have a buff at the time - but were buffed in future. This last column is the most interesting one evidently, so we will mainly focus on that one.
Let's break it down crystal by crystal.
7th of OctoberThis crystal predicted 3 buffs in total. It predicted Angela 5 months later in March, Mr Fantastic 7 months later in May and Guillotine 12 months later in October.
To clarify something here, 12 months is almost definitely too long for her to have been placed in this crystal with the knowledge that her buff was in the works - we know that buffs take a month to a few months to work on, as per Kabam John's QandA. However, it's not impossible that which champions are in featured pools could play a role in being selected for a buff.
12th of JanuaryThis crystal predicted 4 buffs. Yellowjacket, terrax and moleman 1 month later in February, and Gamora 8 months later in September.
20th of AprilThis crystal predicted 3 buffs. Diablo and Ronin 3 months later in July and Nebula 7 months later in November.
27th of JulyThis crystal predicted 1 buff. Thor Ragnarok 3 months later in October.
2nd NovemberAs no buffs have been announced yet since the crystal dropped, we don't know who will be predicted from here.
Overview Not counting the last crystal, since it dropped last week, this crystal predicted 11 buffs in 4 crystals, or 2.75 buffs per crystal. The timeline for the buffs were:
1 month: 3
3 months: 3
5 months: 1
7 months: 2
8 months: 1
12 months: 1
So usually, there are about 3 buffs from each 5* featured pool that can be predicted. And 2 of those buffs will likely be in the next 7 months.
But how does the 6* featured crystal stack up? Is that more reliable for predicting?
It turns out, no probably not. This really surprised me when I put it together, like, 6* are way more important than 5* so doesn't it stand to reason that a six star crystal would be better at predicting future buffs. Especially since you might pull those bad champions and hope for a buff if you miss in the featured crystal. But apparently not.
As you can see, this sheet looks a little bare compared to the 5* featured one. And we can pretty much discount Mr Fantastic unfortunately, since he was actually predicted in October by the 5* featured pool, then he was in the 6* featured in December, then buffed in May.
In any case, breaking it down crystal by crystal.
15th of DecemberThis crystal predicted 1 buff, Mr Fantastic 5 months later in May (as mentioned, kind of predicted already)
23rd of MarchThis crystal predicted 2 buffs, Crossbones and Howard the duck 1 month later in April.
29th of JuneThis crystal predicted 0 buffs. However, we are 6 months down the line from June now, and there have been a couple predictions 7 or 8 months later. So if I had to guess, I'd predict someone from this pool in the next couple of months.
6th of OctoberThis crystal predicted 2 buffs, Karnak and Nebula 1 month later in November.
OverviewThis crystal predicted 5 buffs in 4 crystals, or 1.25 buffs per crystal. The timeline for the buffs were:
1 month: 4
5 months: 1
This crystal really just doesn't have enough proper data to make an accurate prediction, but the best guess is that if a crystal drops it has a 50/50 chance that there will be a buff in the next month.
ConclusionThe 6* featured isn't the best source of accurate predictions. 5 buffs compared to the 11 buffs of the 5* featured crystal, it just seems like the 5* pool is a better way to guess future buffs. However, seeing as we only get 2 buffs a month, and 1 crystal every 3 months this is by no means enough data to make any sort of accurate conclusion. I am in no way saying this conclusively, I just wanted to have a look at the patterns and see if anything could be made of it.
And after he says all that, makes a prediction anyway....
PredictionsBecause they're fun, and I want to see if I'm right. I'm gonna make a few predictions based on what I've seen.
I think that for the 6* featured, we will see one (or maybe, just maybe 2) champ(s) from the 29th of June pool get a buff in the next few months. More specifically, that's Deadpool X Force, OG Hulk or Mr Sinister. Black Widow and Joe Fixit are other champions in that pool who deserve buffs, but OG Widow is less common, and Joe Fixit lost the community vote, so I don't think it'll be them.
I also think that in the next featured 6* pool in January, we may see a couple champs who will get buffed in February. Obviously we don't know the pool yet so can't comment.
For the 5* featured, I think the 27th of July crystal still has a couple buffs to reveal themselves. The candidates here are Cyclops Blue team, Mordo, Rogue, Sentry and The Champion. Two unlikely possibilities are Sparky and Vision AoU, but Sparky is pretty good now even if a tune up would be awesome for him, and AoU is less available. If I had to guess, I would say Rogue and Sentry are the two here, and I think if this crystal has more buffs to show, odds are they'll show up between now and March next year.
And lastly, this months 5* featured hasn't had any buffs predicted yet. So I believe there's 3 lurking in here. The champs we are looking at are Drax, OG Hulk, Proxima, Luke Cage, Green Goblin, Mephisto, Rocket and Taskmaster. There are a lot of other options here, so narrowing it down is hard. The ones I think are less likely for buffs are Joe Fixit (as mentioned before), Storm OG (due to horseman) and squirrel girl, I just can't see Kabam buffing her right now.
Of the champs I mentioned first, I think OG Hulk has a really good chance of being buffed in the next few months. Kabam John in his QandA said they were looking into getting new art for "True OG Champs", and since Hulk was in the 6* featured as well, I feel like he is a pretty good guess. As for the other two, your guess is genuinely as good as mine. Basing this off nothing other than that, I feel like Proxima would get an amazing tune up or moderate, and Drax has to be in line for an overhaul at some point. And again, I expect we would see these buffs by (early) June next year.
Clearly, this is all operating with the proviso that the decision of who to put in the pool is at all based on who John and Dorosh decide to buff, if not, then this is a pretty fruitless enterprise. In any case, what do you think based on these pools of champs? Any predictions you guys want to throw in to the ring?
