T1 Alpha debacle

While changing the cost is the T1 Alphas in the glory Store was helpful, the resource is indeed lacking. With end game players looking to develop a 5 star roster, of basically the same 4 star champs already ranked, the resource needs more availability. This needs addressed immediately with a more effective solution. Perhaps reducing the amount required for ranking from 5 and 6 to 1 to 3. Also, other catalyst will need even more distribution or the number will need to lessen for them as well. Looking forward to the added availability of the resources.

Comments

RagamugginGunner

CoatHang3r wrote: »

Anyone going to answer the question? At what rate do you think you should be earning t1a?

At a quicker rate than we earn t4b and t4c.

unknown

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CoatHang3r

Mhykke wrote: »

CoatHang3r wrote: »

@Mhykke

I can argue from the point of getting limited t1a but it’s been done in other threads. IIRC a fairly actively alliance who will be regularly acquiring 5s can earn roughly 20 t1a month missing out on most of the arena events. 20 t1a is not ranking 1 five star and a couple fours. Thats ranking 3 5s and ~5 4s with t1a per month. However it has to be noted that players who want to earn more t1a and rank more champions are ignoring a large portion or available t1a by sticking with alliances who are not interested in playing for thier resources.

That’s faster than was ever possible in the game previously due to t4b being the bottle neck which is why you hear about overflowing t1a in the past. It’s faster than I was able to rank my champions for competition. It takes time to build the rosters people are demanding.

Strategic ranking and resource management is one reason for limiting resources. Another is to stretch out the time investment as that’s one of the main goals of the free to play model. Players can freely level thier 5s and rank early 4s but must make decisions once higher end resources come into play.

Sorry, I should’ve been clearer. Using your figure of 20, it’s ranking 1 five star to rank four (16), and a couple of four stars to rank 3 (1), the other to rank five (3). So basically maxing (ignoring rank 5 for the five star) one five star and one four star over the course or the month, barely ranking any other characters above rank 2 four star. In my opinion, that’s very few characters for the state of the game as it currently stands. Five stars and four stars are much easier to acquire. The t1 alpha availability should match this new reality.

You’re correct if you only went to rank 2 it’s more five stars you can rank, but that’s why I said rank 3, as after that rank the limiting resources of t2a and t4cc come into play.

You’re correct that the rate one can level up four and five stars is faster than in the past. The thing you’re ignoring is that people are also able to acquire four and five stars much faster than they were able to in the past.

And I’m not quite sure I understand your point of strategic ranking and resource management. It doesn’t seem too difficult on what decisions to make with resources in the current state of the game. If one happens upon a five star they want to take to rank 4, they just pour all their t1 alphas into that character, buying them with glory and getting them where and when they can. It’s not exactly drawing up a landing plan on a French beach we’re talking here. The only strategy involved is with t2 alphas (and t4cc) as these aren’t readily available and by choosing to use them one is giving up the opportunity to rank 4 other characters for quite a while.

And I agree with you that players should be able to freely rank their level 5s and 4s but must make decisions once higher end resources come into play. The problem is t1 alphas are not a higher end resource, and players aren’t free to rank 5 and 4 stars freely in the current state of the game. If one wants to rank a 5 star to rank 4 today, they need 16 t1 alphas, out of the 20 a month figure you brought up earlier.

That leaves zero five stars they can rank to rank 2, and 1 four star they can take to rank 5. A month. I’m sorry, but again, a month is a while to just rank 1 five star that you like to rank 4, foregoing pretty much all other rankings.

So I still don’t understand why it’s better for the game for people to pull five stars and not be able to rank them a couple of ranks before limiting resources come into play. Pulling five stars and doing nothing with them is a drag, and for me, does not add enjoyability to game play.

Again, just my opinion. But limiting resources should be for higher levels of five and four stars. They shouldn’t immediately prevent one from ranking a character. Especially with the game moving to a new status of greater and greater availability of both four and five stars.

Wait are you saying there is a possibility of players earning 4 t2a per month? I guess lol is the Avenue players would do that but at the same time that’s 45 t1a which would be 1.5 months worth of t1a if you went after t1a as hard as you went after lol. 3 end game champions with 6 weeks seems like a perfectly reasonable pace considering most players at that level have been player for a year plus. But how much t2a can a player earn outside lol? Ottomh 1 per month or at the rate they acquire 20-30 t1a.

Given the fixed rate at which players acquire resources within the game. (I’m really missing why people do not accept resources are not farmable and come in at a set rate players can adjust via glory). It’s clear Kabam wants to meter the rate at which players can rank up high rarity and high end champions. This to me is part of the play over time aspect prevalent in freemium games. It keeps guppies (f2p players) invested in the game while whales spend to acquire things faster than the rest.

I gotta say all this is done on my phone so it’s hard to follow you while responding and I have arenas to play or my time over the past few days will be wasted so I gotta break it off. I really wish I could fully respond at this time but that r4 a month really threw me for a loop cause I wanna know how people attain them at that rate, get me on that train so I can complain about t1a too I guess.

I understand not ranking can be a drag but as I just said I find a use for all my champions in the arenas.

RagamugginGunner

The only problem with the "you can earn a bunch of t1a if you do everything" argument is that if you do everything needed to get those t1a you'll also be getting more t4b and 5* shards at a rate that doesn't scale with the availability of t1a. As a player in a top 200 alliance that gets every available t1a (every 3 day event, every t1a arena, every normal, heroic and master 100%, 4-5 from glory store depending on glory) I get t4b and 5* shards at a much higher rate than t1a when considering the cost to rank 5* champs.

Already 100% act 5, Uncollected and just finished my 5th LOL path and will have it done soon. Go take a look at the rewards for those three events and maybe you'll start to see why many top end players are hurting for t1a.

Assuming you won't actually look it up, here are the rewards for 100% LOL, Uncollected and act 5:

Fully formed 5* crystals: 2
5* Shards: 92500
t4b: 5
t4c Crystals: 10
t2a: 18.33
t5b: 2.2
Full t4c: 30
T4c shard crystals: 90
t1a: 0

Nerfed2Def

@RagamugginGunner Boom! Solutions have been more than offered especially in earlier posts. Let’s keep the chatter up and hopefully we can see some changes. My first rank 5 5 star is waiting on ......T1 Alphas. Then the plan is to finish LOl for more t2a’s so I can again wait on T1A’s. Hahaha T1 alpha’s boys. Geez

Mhykke

DarkestDestroyer wrote: »

Love how everyone is giving @C0atHang3r sh!t instead of coming up with a way to make t1 alphas more accessible.

I mean don't just moan about it; think of a solution or at least say something noteworthy.

Idiots

I think a simple solution would be to up the drop rate of t1 alphas in the greater solo crystals.

Right now, t1 alphas are listed as a reward for greater solo crystals. I can say I do a lot of the solo achievements, so I’ve opened up a number of these greater solo crystals (well over a thousand)...and I have never received a t1 alpha from this crystal. They should drop fairly regularly in these crystals.

That way, people would still have to play the game in order to get more t1 alphas, and nobody would have to adjust drops from crystals elsewhere.

Speeds80

Haha ragamuffin that's exactly right, as a bottleneck it actually detracts from the motivation to do said content, because even with all that swag, it's all unuseable without a **** ton of t1as, making it an illogical and frustrating bottleneck resource, there isn't really a good argument that it's a better bottleneck than t4bs or t2as, in another thread I've asked this multiple times and the only half decent argument (which was old mate coathanger- oh yes This is probably our 6th lengthy debate over t1as) was that they are cheap in the glory store.... valid point but I don't Think as a bottleneck from a design perspective. It's cons of keeping us gamers frustrated, unmotivated and detracting from our overall enjoyment of the game. Outweigh said pro.

Feel free to add any other pros to this list

And to @DarkestDestroyer saying we need solutions there are many available, alpha arena having several alpha reward milestones, decrease the massive amount needed for 5* ranking, add them to map 5 crystals, any of those would be logical, there are many more solutions (daily arena, $offers, add them to uncollected rewards etc.. but the first 3 are the most logical to me

Mhykke

CoatHang3r wrote: »

Wait are you saying there is a possibility of players earning 4 t2a per month? I guess lol is the Avenue players would do that but at the same time that’s 45 t1a which would be 1.5 months worth of t1a if you went after t1a as hard as you went after lol. 3 end game champions with 6 weeks seems like a perfectly reasonable pace considering most players at that level have been player for a year plus. But how much t2a can a player earn outside lol? Ottomh 1 per month or at the rate they acquire 20-30 t1a.

Given the fixed rate at which players acquire resources within the game. (I’m really missing why people do not accept resources are not farmable and come in at a set rate players can adjust via glory). It’s clear Kabam wants to meter the rate at which players can rank up high rarity and high end champions. This to me is part of the play over time aspect prevalent in freemium games. It keeps guppies (f2p players) invested in the game while whales spend to acquire things faster than the rest.

I gotta say all this is done on my phone so it’s hard to follow you while responding and I have arenas to play or my time over the past few days will be wasted so I gotta break it off. I really wish I could fully respond at this time but that r4 a month really threw me for a loop cause I wanna know how people attain them at that rate, get me on that train so I can complain about t1a too I guess.

I understand not ranking can be a drag but as I just said I find a use for all my champions in the arenas.

No, one point I was bringing up was that t2 alphas are the limiting resource, which apparently you agree with. It doesn’t make sense to have t1s be a second limiting resource for higher powered characters, especially since t1s are required for both four and five stars.

Let people rank their five stars more easily to rank 2 and 3, as well as their four stars to rank 3....after those ranks limiting resources come into play. You’re correct that kabam wants to meter the rate at which people can level their characters to high ranks. We already have limiting resources for that (t2 alphas, t4cc, t4b depending on what star rating we’re talking about).

As it stands now, someone can rank up a couple characters, pull another, and sit and wait for a couple weeks to rank that character just to rank 2. It doesn’t make sense in the game as it’s found today, with ever increasing availability of four and five stars.

Hulk_77

CoatHang3r wrote: »

Hulk_77 wrote: »

CoatHang3r wrote: »

@Hulk_77
Those numbers are highly misleading as you need to factor in the rate at which you acquire the materials and 5*s past r3 require materials (t2a and t5b) that come at a rate so slow it’s ridiculous to factor the rate in comparison if you are comparing to 4*s.

I completely disagree with you. The numbers are the numbers. They are factual. The t1a cost between 4* to 5* went up at a much greater rate than other "more rare" materials. It is a nonsensical farce. You only need to factor in all of the things you are factoring in if you want to build a man of straw to defend what is clearly a poor policy wrought of poor decision making.

The numbers are the numbers on that we can agree. I understand you would need to disagree on considering the rate at which the game provides the materials or your flawed argument falls flat.

The rate is fine. The number of t1as required to rank a 5* is not. Altering the rate is treating the symptom rather than curing the disease.

GroundedWisdom

DarkestDestroyer wrote: »

It all depends on how quickly your looking to rank up champs.

If you want to rank a 5* up a level per day, then yes there is a mega shortage.

But 5* are the most sought after champs, so ranking 1 per day isn't reasonable or a reason to say t1 alphas aren't around.

If your doing a 5* per week/2 weeks there's enough alphas to do that.

This is what I would agree with. They are available in the game. The main reason there is talk of a shortage as I see it, is because people are focusing more on Ranking 5*s. Now, there are a few factors going into that such as the addition of 6*s and the increased availability of 5*s, etc. However, there is a rate at which we can Rank different rarities. It's easier to Rank a 3* than a 4*, 4* than a 5*, so on. Simply put, something is going to take time to amass either way, and focusing on a higher rarity doesn't change the fact that a 5* is not literally a 4*, even though the general opinion is that it is becoming that. We aren't going to Rank a 5* as fast as we Rank a 4*.

Gwendoline

I'm just really scared that we need t1a for our 6* champs, making the problem even worse.

If we don't need t1a and just t2a (and probably t3a for the higher ranks) this issue might fix itself. We'll shift to ranking our 6* champs leaving the t1a to rank up the 4 and 5* champs we want.

I maxed out all my 3* champs, since the 4* champs are "the new 3*" I'll hopefully no longer need those resources soon to at least take them all up to r3 (and after that to r4 and eventually r5). I'm not in a hurry with this, but I hope their will come a day I actually threat them as I have the lower champs.

belli300

Yeah I’ve decided I’ll be spending time in a map 3 alliance this year til I farm boat loads of t1a

DarkestDestroyer

Moneygrab wrote: »

@DarkestDestroyer there has been lots of ideas thrown around on this thread. Maybe if you read all the comments you would know that.

Fair enough but when the first page is just still full of coat hanger asking the question and getting no response apart from rubbish... it gives no motivation to read more garbage.

Why don't you all say how often you want to rank a 5* to start with? Just because 6*s are coming next year, 5* is the rarest champ to gain still...

Expecting to rank a 5* up a level daily isn't a fair arguement to say there are not enough T1 Alphas, I opened 145k 5* shards on Xmas day, that's 14 new champs... I understand I can't level them all up instantly.

Maybe tier1 Alphas being needed for 5* is the actual joke, and 5 just to go up 1 level... but that's the case unfortunately.

If you want to take a 5* up every week/2 weeks there are more than enough Alphas to do that.

So everyone saying there is a shortage is just trying to rush in a progression game, and that's all there is to it.

Speeds80

@belli300 it's actually negligible we ran the maths off some videos of hundreds of map 3 crystal openings, in a discussion in these forums. It was About 1 in 5.8 from memory. the average of full alphas in the map 3 crystals so you average about 4 a week if map 3 keeps you in advanced tier.(21 map 3 crystals) But you drop a lot of glory so a 5x5 ally was not much worse off if they spend all their glory on alphas. And since the alpha price reduction it's actually almost exactly negligible, to do 5x5 and spend all glory on alphas, you just won't have the imbalance of t4cs and t4bs anymore, and can run a much easier map, which solodifies my point that the alpha bottleneck is anti motivating people to push to higher levels on the game
https://forums.playcontestofchampions.com/en/discussion/36355/map-3-t1a-question#latest

Kpatrix

GroundedWisdom wrote: »

DarkestDestroyer wrote: »

It all depends on how quickly your looking to rank up champs.

If you want to rank a 5* up a level per day, then yes there is a mega shortage.

But 5* are the most sought after champs, so ranking 1 per day isn't reasonable or a reason to say t1 alphas aren't around.

If your doing a 5* per week/2 weeks there's enough alphas to do that.

This is what I would agree with. They are available in the game. The main reason there is talk of a shortage as I see it, is because people are focusing more on Ranking 5*s. Now, there are a few factors going into that such as the addition of 6*s and the increased availability of 5*s, etc. However, there is a rate at which we can Rank different rarities. It's easier to Rank a 3* than a 4*, 4* than a 5*, so on. Simply put, something is going to take time to amass either way, and focusing on a higher rarity doesn't change the fact that a 5* is not literally a 4*, even though the general opinion is that it is becoming that. We aren't going to Rank a 5* as fast as we Rank a 4*.

This argument is flawed because it makes the assumption that new 4* pulls are more frequent than 5* pulls for end game players. That's not the case, the majority of 4* pulls are dupes at this stage, and they are already at 3/30.

Bottom line is we need more access to t1a at the very least, we are out of 4*s to rank up and need something else to fill that void. Adding proving grounds and/or shards to map 5/6 crystals is a step in the right direction, and it needs to happen soon.

Ashburn

While this problem doesn't apply to me now, I empathise with the majority of you guys. It is quite disheartening and worrying to see my inventory of t1a to drop below the max after ranking up my first few 5*s. I think kabam should at least remove the t1a requirement from r3->r4 and r4 -> r5. It just doesn't make sense to include it, like how you don't require BOTH t3b and t4b to rank up a 4*

GroundedWisdom

The problem with me accepting that it's a shortage is the number that are potentially available every month. It also becomes tricky when you suggest making one Resource more available in a large way because something else will run out. There is a pace to Ranking, and that's how the game is designed.

belli300

Speeds80 wrote: »

@belli300 it's actually negligible we ran the maths off some videos of hundreds of map 3 crystal openings, in a discussion in these forums. It was About 1 in 5.8 from memory. the average of full alphas in the map 3 crystals so you average about 4 a week if map 3 keeps you in advanced tier.(21 map 3 crystals) But you drop a lot of glory so a 5x5 ally was not much worse off if they spend all their glory on alphas. And since the alpha price reduction it's actually almost exactly negligible, to do 5x5 and spend all glory on alphas, you just won't have the imbalance of t4cs and t4bs anymore, and can run a much easier map, which solodifies my point that the alpha bottleneck is anti motivating people to push to higher levels on the game
https://forums.playcontestofchampions.com/en/discussion/36355/map-3-t1a-question#latest

I really appreciate your feed back on this

Gwendoline

GroundedWisdom wrote: »

The problem with me accepting that it's a shortage is the number that are potentially available every month. It also becomes tricky when you suggest making one Resource more available in a large way because something else will run out. There is a pace to Ranking, and that's how the game is designed.

You’re right on this, however you keep failing to see that t1a should not be the bottle neck. Kabam didn’t intend that. By making everything more available and by having 5* needing both t1a and t2a to rank it’s what’s happening right now.

The resources that should hold us back are the once that are in the most difficult content (aq map 5 and 6, master and uncollected montly’s, act 5, high war tiers) however those more difficult area’s of the game don’t provide the recourses that are needed to rank up the more difficult to obtain champs. For some reason normal eq and map 3 do, this doesn’t make sense.

Please provide some arguments that make sense, other then “you want to much” and “there are enough alpha’s out there”. I laid out what I find weird and unbalanched, please help me understand why it’s not. I’m not trying to make this in a personal thing, but you always say the same thing and I’m really trying to understand your view so please don’t repeat the same stuff but say something new/different that provides me insight in your way of thinking.

JMANCREW

Dear Kabam,

We are having a crisis of sorts at the upper mid level to high level stage of the game experience. Mostly, it is a shortage of a very basic resource needed throughout all stages of the game experience. We are starving for more of your Tier 1 Alpha Catalysts.

Please grant us access to more T1 Alpha Catalysts through Special Offers and Daily Deals, as well as increasing the drop rate in event milestones, arena milestones, and event rewards.

Also, please lower the requirements for Tier 1 Alpha Catalysts when ranking 5* champs as follows:
Rank 1-2: 2 T1 Alphas
Rank 2-3: 3 T1 Alphas
Rank 3-4: 4 T1 Alphas
Rank 4-5: 5 T1 Alphas

Thanking You,
The Summoners

Hulksmasshh

I agree that T1A are the most scarce resource for anyone ranking up 5*s, but remember that we just had a huge T4B supply come in from cyber monday deals. So it’s understandable that many players are looking at 30+ T4B with only 3 T1A in their stash.

But since T1As are so valuable, you need to prioritize it in all the ways you can get it. Since the glory store update, I buy 5/5 T1A every time and only buy 1 or 2 T4B fragments. I also save excess glory over so I know I’ll have enough to buy 5/5 T1A next round. Do all the T1A arena, heroic, master, maybe even normal event quest to get T1A. Tbh the bottleneck of T1A allows players to advance at a more steady rate. When you need T1A, there will always be places to get them in time.

Speeds80

Everytime this debate come up it ends up coming down to that the naysayers swing their point that the definition of shortage is very loose, and so they can legitimately argue that there isn't a shortage because if you do everything right you can rank up x amount of champs. I don't think anyone is arguing wiTh the fact that there isn't a balance of materials at higher levels of gameplay. there will always be a bottleneck. The debate really comes back to are t1as a good bottleneck,
I have to say I found it very strange that after that map 3 number crunch about 5 days later kabam did the alpha price reduction to almost exactly lineup with the odds and glory difference. maybe because they realised that they shouldn't be motivating people to map 3s? That's not a conspiracy theory it actually is a good quick Business solution once you see the numbers crunched. (I'm not claiming it necessarily is true though but I do wonder.) my hope is that, this was their quick solution and there maybe a better solution coming. They clearly know how we feel, and this minor change is at least evidence of that. I can't understand the logic of keeping them the bottleneck by barely Adjusting anything. but when you are a 9 figure business with 8 figure turnover and dozens of employees you have to assume that it is in their plan for slowing game progression
This is.why I enjoy participating in these debates, I actually hope that they are keeping l1s as a bottleneck For now then may move it on to t4bs, and t2as when they see the logic behind the lack of motivation this brings to end gamers to actually do the harder content and the frustration it creates when we can rarely earn rewards from rankup events , when we have rosters worth ranking. And all the other materials except for t1as( sidenote I think they have let too many t4cs into the competition for us ever to hope that will be the bottleneck again and I think this is evidence of a lack of planning on their behalf)

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Feeney234

Or add some alphas in the stupid Sunday arenas

Star_Lord_

Moises_H wrote: »

How about making the Sunday night special be a purchase of 3 T1A’s instead of T3B’s or have both available.

Great idea! Kabam please take note.

nelly22

Kabam - At least remove and reduce the XP Boost in the greater solo crystals and add more T1A.

DrZola

Actually, I was under the impression that Kabam’s response to complaints about T1a shortages was to make sure the worst 5* champs dropped most frequently out of the crystal.

Crummy 5*’s, park at R1, no need for more T1a. Case closed and problem solved.

Dr. Zola

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ShadowNet

If these "end game" player need alphas more than other rank up materials they're free to run map 3. All the t1a you could ever wish for. It's their own fault.

CoatHang3r

DrZola wrote: »

Actually, I was under the impression that Kabam’s response to complaints about T1a shortages was to make sure the worst 5* champs dropped most frequently out of the crystal.

Crummy 5*’s, park at R1, no need for more T1a. Case closed and problem solved.

Dr. Zola

I never though I would

one of your posts, well played.

I’d like to see t1a in the war challenger crystals (the ones you get when you lose) so that even when you lose you win.