Has the Banquet had its moment?

I can’t help but feel a lot of the rewards are lacklustre this year for The Banquet.

Hopefully this stays constructive, I’m not saying it’s all terrible, it just seems compared to previous years, although there are now things like relics & 7*, the overall it just seems it’s gone downhill

The Banquet is the most sought after event I would say, we wait all year; it ties in the celebration of the anniversary, and it seems to have come with a bit of a whimper instead of a bang.

I appreciate things can be obtained for spending nothing, calendars and gifts will arrive, just my opinion, it’s way to late for any changes to be made; but either way keep it constructive if you agree or disagree.

Comments

Colinwhitworth69

Considering that they are essentially giving us a bunch of rewards without having to spend one unit is cool. Are they game breaking? No, but why would they be? They're free.

Are the higher milestones and ranked rewards worth your money? That's a personal call by each player. But keep in mind that there will always -- ALWAYS -- be people who complain about the rewards for something, no matter what they are. Anyway, never spend what you cannot afford. This is a video game played on your mobile phone, not life, not work, not your kids, not your partner. Just a video game.

Chuck_Finley

It was one if not the best event for arena grinders. Now where do we go? I am loathe to burn thousands of units to enter BG’s with no substantive difference in my roster after banquet.

Last year was so much fun because the payoff was there. Multiple 6 star awakening gems added to my inventory this year isn’t going to help my already awakened rank 4 6 stars take down R2 7 stars. I don’t need more awakened Rank 4 6 stars.

Chuck_Finley

Considering that they are essentially giving us a bunch of rewards without having to spend one unit is cool. Are they game breaking? No, but why would they be? They're free.

Are the higher milestones and ranked rewards worth your money? That's a personal call by each player. But keep in mind that there will always -- ALWAYS -- be people who complain about the rewards for something, no matter what they are. Anyway, never spend what you cannot afford. This is a video game played on your mobile phone, not life, not work, not your kids, not your partner. Just a video game.

And there are always people here that will take the other side and diminish any rightful criticism of rewards. So what’s your point?

ahmynuts

All im gonna say is im happy i spent units on what i wanted to pick up on cyber weekend because i would have been REALLY upset had i been hoarding for this

Chuck_Finley

All im gonna say is im happy i spent units on what i wanted to pick up on cyber weekend because i would have been REALLY upset had i been hoarding for this

Well I am in that boat… I hoarded for this. Should have spent some on cyber weekend but I wasn’t overly impressed with those either at the moment. In hindsight, it was a mistake. Pretty much what I do in this game… so the hoarding continues I guess…

SaltE_Wenis69

im glad cyber and banquet are a little trash this year. The gap between whales and FTP didn't get massively increased and the kids running around with r4 6*s as Cavs arent gonna be using 7* r2s to clap nerfed act 6.

Usagicassidy

All im gonna say is im happy i spent units on what i wanted to pick up on cyber weekend because i would have been REALLY upset had i been hoarding for this

It's me, hi, I'm really upset - it's me.

DNA3000

Hopefully this stays constructive, I’m not saying it’s all terrible, it just seems compared to previous years, although there are now things like relics & 7*, the overall it just seems it’s gone downhill

I would say that compared to what is available at the highest tiers of the game - say, master rewards or especially the Necropolis - the Banquet seems less rewarding than it did last year.

But in my opinion that's a good thing. For the vast majority of players banquet rewards are still awesome. For the highest tier players banquet rewards don't seem as competitive with what they can acquire for doing the toughest stuff in the game. But it shouldn't be: for the banquet to be so high that it seems high even for players doing things like Necropolis, they would make things like Necropolis or top tier war seem less rewarding by comparison.

To me, there's something that seems to be just perfect about how things worked out this time around. We have the highest tier of progression UNAMBIGUOUSLY gated by content achievement. Aside from one player, the first opportunity to become Valiant was Necropolis exploration. There was no way to spend your way to getting there ahead of the Necropolis explorers, at least for a short window of time. Then it became possible to become Valiant by spending, but only by very high spending and you *still* needed to do a completion run of Necropolis to make it happen. Spending still mattered, spending was still a way to get ahead, spending was still incentivized, but it didn't completely substitute for playing the game. The way in-game achievement and spending was balanced here seems to me to be the model moving forward. You can always spend to get ahead, but skill still matters.

All of this would get blown apart if the Banquet rewards contained R3 rewards. It would then be possible to whale your way to Valiant without touching Necropolis at all. But aside from R3 materials, what else do the top tier players really want at this point? Everything else is a nice to have, not a need to have. So the only way to impress the current top tier players who are already Valiant or well on their way to becoming Valiant would be to overload on everything else. But that would make banquet be the singularly best source of rewards for everyone else by enormous margins, and *that* is economically unbalancing. We don't want players waiting for one single event in the whole year.

Now, someone could say that the rewards could still be better and not be problematic, but that's always true. Once you realize that they can't be meta-relevant for the Valiants and soon-to-be Valiants, there's no point in even trying to get close. Instead, you target them to be more relevant to lower progress players, and let the top tier players go back to targeting things like Necropolis for the most relevant rewards to them.

Rewards are not an unlimited resource. Technically you can add as much as you want, but every time you put a reward in the game, you dilute the value of that reward moving forward, especially at the top end of the game. You can only have so many blockbuster reward buckets. You can only have so many noteworthy ones. You can only have so many average ones, even. We all know that events like J4 and CW are things the players look forward to and expect to be blockbuster reward sources. Even those the devs can't completely satisfy expectations on, because expectations are so incredibly high. If we don't need to try to meet those expectations for banquet - and in this case I don't think we do - it is better if we don't, and save that reward potential for the times when it would do more good. The rewards surrounding the Necropolis, to include the rewards in the Necropolis itself and the bonus rewards in the Road to the Crypt, seem to me to be better uses of that reward potential.

ahmynuts

All im gonna say is im happy i spent units on what i wanted to pick up on cyber weekend because i would have been REALLY upset had i been hoarding for this
It's me, hi, I'm really upset - it's me.

Demonzfyre

No one else remembers how everyone said R2 7* resources were coming too fast last year?

Emomike

This honestly feels like fallout from 4th of July when kabam faced backlash from the deals. So they have tuned everything back and noq the same people that were complaining about the 4th being to game breaking are now complaining about the deals being underwhelming.

Chuck_Finley

This honestly feels like fallout from 4th of July when kabam faced backlash from the deals. So they have tuned everything back and noq the same people that were complaining about the 4th being to game breaking are now complaining about the deals being underwhelming.

Are they the same people? Cause what I see are people who are set with big accounts are happy that the unit grinding event low spenders /FTP players save for got nerfed back to 2022.

Giantwalrus56

This honestly feels like fallout from 4th of July when kabam faced backlash from the deals. So they have tuned everything back and noq the same people that were complaining about the 4th being to game breaking are now complaining about the deals being underwhelming.

Totally agree. Personally, I think they jumped the progression gun, so to speak, so they've "forced" themselves to slow things down. I was one who's account definitely grew on July 4th & was hoping during CW & Banquet, I would of seen the same growth. Am I upset, not really. Kind of bummed, maybe slightly. Surprised by these rewards, no. Something had to give

Jefechuta

This honestly feels like fallout from 4th of July when kabam faced backlash from the deals. So they have tuned everything back and noq the same people that were complaining about the 4th being to game breaking are now complaining about the deals being underwhelming.

Banquet event last year was perfect, not as game breaking as July 4th, not as bad as this year.

7* R2 rewards would be fine, some 7* shards, some Titan Shards, even some cheeky 7* sigs as one of the rarest prices, mostly what we already got, but in nowadays amounts, not in last year ones, I mean, getting exactly the same or less that I could get a regular month feels pretty pretty bad.

jcphillips7

For me, Banquet was always one of those events that's cool to all participate in as an alliance, but is heavily RNG based. Sometimes you strike out, and sometimes you can hit it big. The issue I'm seeing this year is that even if I 'strike it big', there's not much that would change my account. The 7* gifted guardian crystal is about it outside of Kang or Thanos, but really, who's going to be using those 2 guys?

There's not enough 7* or Titan shards given out (in giant chunks) for me to be swayed to spend more than what I normally would, which are the $50/10 GBC bundles they offer, and whatever units I currently have on me.

PT_99

This honestly feels like fallout from 4th of July when kabam faced backlash from the deals. So they have tuned everything back and noq the same people that were complaining about the 4th being to game breaking are now complaining about the deals being underwhelming.

July, August, September, October, November, 20th December.
So 6 months have passed in between both deals but why is it that Banquet rewards are not even half of what July 4 was? Hell they feel like ¼th.

Tony_5tank

I have to admit I expected a little more. We don’t need 3 T5B drops. That’s silly. But then I remember 300 unit paragon crystals are a thing. C’est la vie

Freakyd

I will probably just keep saving units, I don't get many but tried to have a a few thousand for this event. To me 300units for the rewards in the GBC just isn't worth it and I'd honestly be happy if I could sell those items from my stash for 300units

Polygon

Its interesting, Caps Comissary gave more 7* crystals than Banquet

Milan1405

Personally, I don't know how to feel about this (I'm valiant btw). On one hand, the rewards seem a bit lacklustre and tbh I would even go as far as to say meaningless for my account. But on the other hand I actually don't really mind it too much. I'll just spend enough for my deathless guillotine piece (even though she seems a bit ****) and go on with my day, without having to whale out.

Milan1405

What I have never liked about Banquet is still there though, and that's the RNG factor. It's always disheartening to open 10-20 banquet crystals and get nothing of value and then see alliance mates, or youtubers get insane stuff. I've always been a big proponent of having better rewards in milestones than crystals so players don't feel hard done by, but it seems this year the only worthwhile rewards for most will involve getting lucky out of a crystal.

Chuck_Finley

Personally, I don't know how to feel about this (I'm valiant btw). On one hand, the rewards seem a bit lacklustre and tbh I would even go as far as to say meaningless for my account. But on the other hand I actually don't really mind it too much. I'll just spend enough for my deathless guillotine piece (even though she seems a bit ****) and go on with my day, without having to whale out.

This event is great if you don’t have a bunch of units or spent a big chunk on cyber week. Why? Because you aren’t missing a thing.

Those that have been saving for months,
grinding arena milestone, side quest units, 22 event units, etc. because they enjoy this event (like me) aren’t happy about it.

Milan1405

Personally, I don't know how to feel about this (I'm valiant btw). On one hand, the rewards seem a bit lacklustre and tbh I would even go as far as to say meaningless for my account. But on the other hand I actually don't really mind it too much. I'll just spend enough for my deathless guillotine piece (even though she seems a bit ****) and go on with my day, without having to whale out.
This event is great if you don’t have a bunch of units or spent a big chunk on cyber week. Why? Because you aren’t missing a thing.

Those that have been saving for months,
grinding arena milestone, side quest units, 22 event units, etc. because they enjoy this event (like me) aren’t happy about it.

Yeah I spent all my units getting cyber weekend deals and exploring necro. If you haven't done necro, I recommend you do so as the necro rewards + valiant title is worth a whole lot more than banquet.

Chuck_Finley

Personally, I don't know how to feel about this (I'm valiant btw). On one hand, the rewards seem a bit lacklustre and tbh I would even go as far as to say meaningless for my account. But on the other hand I actually don't really mind it too much. I'll just spend enough for my deathless guillotine piece (even though she seems a bit ****) and go on with my day, without having to whale out.
This event is great if you don’t have a bunch of units or spent a big chunk on cyber week. Why? Because you aren’t missing a thing.

Those that have been saving for months,
grinding arena milestone, side quest units, 22 event units, etc. because they enjoy this event (like me) aren’t happy about it.
Yeah I spent all my units getting cyber weekend deals and exploring necro. If you haven't done necro, I recommend you do so as the necro rewards + valiant title is worth a whole lot more than banquet.

I did the completion run of necro. I don’t have a 7 star shuri, can’t take aegon to R5, and am not skilled enough with R4 Kate. I don’t have the units to explore it.

Milan1405

Personally, I don't know how to feel about this (I'm valiant btw). On one hand, the rewards seem a bit lacklustre and tbh I would even go as far as to say meaningless for my account. But on the other hand I actually don't really mind it too much. I'll just spend enough for my deathless guillotine piece (even though she seems a bit ****) and go on with my day, without having to whale out.
This event is great if you don’t have a bunch of units or spent a big chunk on cyber week. Why? Because you aren’t missing a thing.

Those that have been saving for months,
grinding arena milestone, side quest units, 22 event units, etc. because they enjoy this event (like me) aren’t happy about it.
Yeah I spent all my units getting cyber weekend deals and exploring necro. If you haven't done necro, I recommend you do so as the necro rewards + valiant title is worth a whole lot more than banquet.
I did the completion run of necro. I don’t have a 7 star shuri, can’t take aegon to R5, and am not skilled enough with R4 Kate. I don’t have the units to explore it.

I know how you feel. I had to r5 and ascend my 6 star shuri. Still dont have her as a 7 star tho, maybe she's my white whale.