5-Star Featured Crystal Change Discussion Thread

Summoners!

We've just released some more information on the future of the 5-Star Featured Crystal here: https://forums.playcontestofchampions.com/en/discussion/43300/upcoming-changes-to-5-star-featured-crystal

We know you've got questions, and this is the place to ask and discuss!

FAQ

Will you announce the pool of 18 each time it changes?
We do plan on sharing the list every time the crystal is updated.

Can you buy the 5 star featured crystal with units or only shards?
This crystal is replacing the currently available 15,000 Shard Featured Hero Crystals.

So does it means that if a new champ comes to the Battle Realm we won't be able to get them as a 5* right away?
You will still be able to get them in the Grandmaster Featured Crystal, but they will not be available in a featured 5-Star Hero Shard Crystal until they are added to this new Crystal. So, this might mean having to wait a little while to get some Champions, but it also gives you a shot at 6 New Champions at a time, as well as a smaller Basic pool.

Comments

Evil_Twin

This is awful. One of the worst ideas Kabam has put in place for a long time. It is bad for the players, it reduces our choices and the control of our own fate in the game. And the "curated" list is just terrible. Kabam, you were doing so well recently and now this. Big disappointment. Why not have both options? Offer a Featured Pool crystal and a Featured Hero crystal? Players / Customers want more choices, not less.

MSpawn

I mean come on man, don't you think this is cannibalizing your own crystal sales just a bit?

Apache

Bunch of scheming ass clowns

TheGodfather

Kabam Miike wrote: »

Spidermancg wrote: »

So the increased chance of obtaining Blade in his featured Crystal will go down. Boy that sucks! Who wants Taskmaster? This change is a direct response to people wanting Blade, and not going for Sentry and other new champs! Blade is too good! Please don't nerf Blade!!!!

Nope! No change to the Blade Featured Hero Crystal. We made an exception for Blade because we know how many of you were saving Shards for him.

...And once you fools all dump your resource on him, we slide in the nerf. Not before!

beyonder8421

khehmist wrote: »

Too bad Apple didn't start requiring transparency in communications, maybe the announcement would have looked more something more like...

Due to Apple's new transparency mandate we're changing the feature crystal drop rate (for the champ you were hoping to get) to the worst of our old manipulated drop rates, for everyone, no matter how much you spend.

Let it be known to all app stores that we will respond to any attempt to influence our business to the benefit of their customers in a way that will continue to make our revenue a priority far above all others.

Forget about apple already, you cannot buy 5 star crystals with money. You can buy units and use them for crystals, but I can see the legal loophole.

Spider_ManFTW517

There seems to be some good in these crystals but there are also many cons. If you wanted to increase GMC sales good job. My question is why not keep the old and add the new. Some of the champions of the last 6 months are trash and no one wants them. I understand in the old crystals there were trash champions but there was always that good chance they would get that champion. Sometimes people need that certain champion to complete something like LOL for example.

Frnkielo

Just hit me that after all this complaining and how upset kabam sees we are with taking our 20-25 percent chance away..they know we will still play..im pretty sure they sit around computer and laugh at all the complaints ...then when they click on our name they see we are still playing so what incentive do they have to listen to us..before changing a crystal that we have spent months on saving for kabam should consult with it’s player base

Dansakuduru

6 new champions + 18 ( luke cage , joe fix, she hulk ,venom ,antman, war machine, grooth, iron fist, kamala , iron patriot , iron man, HULK HOMO **** BUSTAR, red hulk, supirior Iron man, gambit , colossos, netflix DD, venompool...) that sounds great 15 k regularly acquire 5* a month the chance to get a good champion is geting even greater......
Or you can :
1. Tell us the odds so we know is it worth gambling
2. Give just more 5* shards

MSpawn

SO, curious to know.. how do you definitively know how many players were "saving for Blade" Is this admitting you know who sucks and who doesn't? Is that a basis used to manipulate the drop rates?

Atlas

What about morningstar that was going to come 8th february..??

Rasilover

So no more Hela , Taskmaster , Sentry, Void. etc reruns?
Also are new champs e.g Gladiator Hulk Killmonger Infinity Thanos etc. gonna have crystals on the first day for 15,000 shards with the regular 20% chance to pull the certain featured champ or will we have to wait for their 4 month rerun?

MishHammer84

Kabam Miike wrote: »

Just talked to the team, and they are comfortable with sharing the list of Champions we plan to include in the first Featured Champion Crystal. It's important to note that this list could still potentially change a little before the release, but the selected Champions are based on empirical data showing their effectiveness as 5-Star Champions in both Alliance Quests and Alliance Wars.

Beast
Storm
Cable
Cyclops (New Xavier School)
Thor (Ragnarok)
Taskmaster
Agent Venom
Hawkeye
Modok
Sentry
Void
Ant-Man
Mordo
Thor (Jane Foster)
Loki
Juggernaut
Hela
Phoenix
Ronan
Venompool
Nebula
Punisher (2099)
Civil Warrior
Doctor Octopus

Bold Text denotes Featured Champions.

It was generous of you to allow us the blade featured, but you should realize this crystal will not be bought by ANYONE. Though the people in tier 258 may be effective with those champions, the majority of the community is not. If we were able to vote on the forums and choose 12 champions out of the 18 in this crystal, the true overall effectiveness and community's desire of these champions would be revealed. Take this into consideration please...

NOOOOOOOOPEEEEE

After thinking over about this I feel like this change was unnecessary, I get that now getting 5* Versions of some champs has been more available due to updating the basic pool. But you could have just removed reruns and it would basically be the same. Sense the first featureds would give you a chance at that new 5*. Plus. Not everyone will be uncollected so this really screws those guys over.

MSpawn

MishHammer84 wrote: »

Kabam Miike wrote: »

Just talked to the team, and they are comfortable with sharing the list of Champions we plan to include in the first Featured Champion Crystal. It's important to note that this list could still potentially change a little before the release, but the selected Champions are based on empirical data showing their effectiveness as 5-Star Champions in both Alliance Quests and Alliance Wars.

Beast
Storm
Cable
Cyclops (New Xavier School)
Thor (Ragnarok)
Taskmaster
Agent Venom
Hawkeye
Modok
Sentry
Void
Ant-Man
Mordo
Thor (Jane Foster)
Loki
Juggernaut
Hela
Phoenix
Ronan
Venompool
Nebula
Punisher (2099)
Civil Warrior
Doctor Octopus

Bold Text denotes Featured Champions.

It was generous of you to allow us the blade featured, but you should realize this crystal will not be bought by ANYONE. Though the people in tier 258 may be effective with those champions, the majority of the community is not. If we were able to vote on the forums and choose 12 champions out of the 18 in this crystal, the true overall effectiveness and community's desire of these champions would be revealed. Take this into consideration please...

They have and don't seem to care!

SpiritOfVengeance

@MishHammer84
They are not considering anything they have their hearts set out on this master plan. Notice how the subject changes when a respond comes through.

Snizzbar

Also, nobody said they are the top Champions, and while player perception of these Champions may differ, these Champions are ones that people use to great success.

Troll level: EXPERT

Mmx1991

Eccohawk wrote: »

rwhack wrote: »

Here’s a solution. Quit making terrible champs.

No dev/designer is sitting around the Kabam offices, or any other gaming office, talking about ways to make terrible design decisions. This is an idiotic comment to make. These guys try to create cool, unique, interesting and balanced new characters to bring to the game EVERY TWO WEEKS!! Do some miss the mark at times? Sure. But don't sit there and pretend like they do it on purpose or set out to create a character that you feel plays like garbage. Show a little respect to the hard work being put in here.

How about showing a little respect to the hard being put in by the players who play 8 hours a day breaking their fingers grinding every arena for 6 months so they can save up for a feature?

Or to those who begrudgingly try their shot at a 2nd rate feature cause every awakening gem they got from every story quest was worthless and now they're forced to go for a champ that can make or break it for them?

Or to the many others who regularly get pissed on the by RNG gods going 3 for 30 on feature pulls who now have their odds diminished even further?

Blackhawkbill

Kabam Miike wrote: »

bradshaw84 wrote: »

Beast, Jane foster, Cyclops, Ronan, Loki, Phoenix, Venompool, civil warrior, ant man amongst the 18 best and most used in aq and aw? GTFOH!

Bold Text denotes Featured Champions.

I didn't say most used, but they are among the most effective. Cyclops actually scores very high on this list. There is a smaller group of players that use him, but they use him VERY effectively. [/quote]

In what tier of the player base were these stats pulled from? Lmfao!! Top alliances use NONE of those champs to be “effective” in either AQ or AW.....what a f%^*ing joke Mike....cmon lol

sbb75

@Kabam Miike Please give us a general overview of the type of data used from AW/AQ used for the list of 18. How can you possibly defend the list of Mystigs compared to the rest?

Champs with highest % of health remaining or died the least? .... Because they never fought? It's not because they are boss killers.
The people that use then really well probably use them for a synergy with a goof champ.

Maybe those were 18 champs with best Diversity. SMH!!

Hulk_77

Kabam Miike wrote: »

Just talked to the team, and they are comfortable with sharing the list of Champions we plan to include in the first Featured Champion Crystal. It's important to note that this list could still potentially change a little before the release, but the selected Champions are based on empirical data showing their effectiveness as 5-Star Champions in both Alliance Quests and Alliance Wars.

Beast
Storm
Cable
Cyclops (New Xavier School)
Thor (Ragnarok)
Taskmaster
Agent Venom
Hawkeye
Modok
Sentry
Void
Ant-Man
Mordo
Thor (Jane Foster)
Loki
Juggernaut
Hela
Phoenix
Ronan
Venompool
Nebula
Punisher (2099)
Civil Warrior
Doctor Octopus

Bold Text denotes Featured Champions.

Did you guys use your advanced analytics to avoid the best champs or something?

DNA3000

Iron_Deceiver wrote: »

Kabam Miike wrote: »

Just talked to the team, and they are comfortable with sharing the list of Champions we plan to include in the first Featured Champion Crystal. It's important to note that this list could still potentially change a little before the release, but the selected Champions are based on empirical data showing their effectiveness as 5-Star Champions in both Alliance Quests and Alliance Wars.

Beast
Storm
Cable
Cyclops (New Xavier School)
Thor (Ragnarok)
Taskmaster
Agent Venom
Hawkeye
Modok
Sentry
Void
Ant-Man
Mordo
Thor (Jane Foster)
Loki
Juggernaut
Hela
Phoenix
Ronan
Venompool
Nebula
Punisher (2099)
Civil Warrior
Doctor Octopus

Bold Text denotes Featured Champions.

So would it be possible for us to receive a more detailed explanation of these champions/effectiveness in both AQ and AW and the level at which this empirical data was taken from? It sounds very vague and doesn't give insight as to whether the champions are used for anything meaningful or what level they are being used.

I've never seen an MMO development house explain their datamining methodology. Its generally considered sensitive information.

I can say that based on my experience, barring errors which do happen, when Kabam says this list is based on the effectiveness of these champions in AQ and AW, they are most likely looking at the percentage usage of each champion first (for each champion how often are they used on attack or placed on defense) and then when they are used how high they score on a set of effectiveness metrics (probably the obvious: how many kills they get on offense, how many kills they generate on defense).

I should also point out that having seen these statistics myself, what "the players" think the actual players are doing and what the actual players actually do is always, and I mean ALWAYS wrong in pretty much every game. Unless you actually see real data, guesses based on your circle of friends and Reddit posts are statistically meaningless most of the time. The problem is public discussion about what is going on in the game heavily self-censors for narrow consensus. Anyone who posts "I think this champ is good" that doesn't match what "the players" think is shouted down, and those players tend to not post anymore. But they continue to play the game, and vote with their playtime.

You can shout down and belittle the people who think Cyclops is a great champ, but you can't eliminate their play from the game stats. Every one of us has a vote on what's good and what's bad, and that vote is registered in the actual game. To be blunt, shouting down the people the vocal players think are wildly wrong in the public spaces is actually extremely counter-productive in most games, even though it always happens. Because you just don't see what they are doing, until you are confronted with something like this and you just assume its because Kabam doesn't know what "the players" are actually doing. But while I've seen a lot of datamining errors (usually, flawed analysis), that data tends to be more accurate than player public guesses. You will never convince Kabam that your opinion should be trusted over their data. You wouldn't ignore your own data just because another player told you to, you can't expect game developers to do so.

I look at that list, and I ask myself what that list tells me about the average player. Anyone who looks at that list and just tells themselves that its obviously wrong because they know better is really closing off an avenue to learn something.

Winner12344321

The only reason they are doing this is to push people to buy featured GMC. It’s painfully obvious. This isn’t an improvement in any way.

Kabam Miike

MSpawn wrote: »

SO, curious to know.. how do you definitively know how many players were "saving for Blade" Is this admitting you know who sucks and who doesn't? Is that a basis used to manipulate the drop rates?

I mean... there's a website dedicated to saving Crystal Shards for Blade, and many of you have posted all over the Forums and Reddit about how you're saving for Blade.

SgtSlaughter78

Kabam Miike wrote: »

Grimmbear wrote: »

I mean this in the worst of ways. Your team is deluded. In what universe are those champs even semi useful? Tier 20? There is NOBODY in any decent ally using 90% of those champs anywhere but defense (and only a couple for that) let alone **** attack or aq. They are NOT top options. Not a single one is god tier. Pathetic. Open your eyes.

If you are not a fan of the Champions in the Crystal, you can always wait until the Featured Champion you like is added to the Basic Pool, like the 3-Star and 4-Star Champions.

Also, nobody said they are the top Champions, and while player perception of these Champions may differ, these Champions are ones that people use to great success.

So someone sticks Cyclops on an Unblockable SP1 node in AW and picks up a few kills and this suddenly means that he is an ‘effective’ champ?

People use the likes of him in war because he’s a common champ and likely ranked these sorts of champs before they had a more developed roster and experience! Nobody pulling a Cyclops today is taking him to rank 4 or 5.

How will this help people further progress against 6 stars in the game? What’s the link that I’m missing here?

I don’t mean this sarcastically but I genuinely feel sorry for Miike having to post and defend this.

Miike, take this back to the ‘team’. Have them come onto the forum for for an hour at some point and answer questions directly.

gohard123

Such a trash idea

bradshaw84

This screams of a panic on kabams part that players were using the system to earn champs they want rather than randomly get champions they don’t for unlimited expense.

So we’re all to blame for playing hard for weeks and months to grind for shards for a 1 in 5 chance at a champion we want.

When will we learn that when kabam gives us Cyclops, don’t be sad, go fully explore LOL with him.

TheBaldAvenger

Kabam Miike wrote: »

MSpawn wrote: »

SO, curious to know.. how do you definitively know how many players were "saving for Blade" Is this admitting you know who sucks and who doesn't? Is that a basis used to manipulate the drop rates?

I mean... there's a website dedicated to saving Crystal Shards for Blade, and many of you have posted all over the Forums and Reddit about how you're saving for Blade.

Guess we need to start a website for useful aw/AQ 5* champs for you guys to see too then because you are so far off the mark with the champs you are putting in this new crystal it would be laughable if it wasn’t so pathetic

Qu1ckshoT32_Gaming

Kabam Miike wrote: »

MSpawn wrote: »

SO, curious to know.. how do you definitively know how many players were "saving for Blade" Is this admitting you know who sucks and who doesn't? Is that a basis used to manipulate the drop rates?

I mean... there's a website dedicated to saving Crystal Shards for Blade, and many of you have posted all over the Forums and Reddit about how you're saving for Blade.

Man I can't figure out why that is, might be because he single handily nullifies any argument you had for nerfs in the past. Maybe because he's the most unbalanced champion in the game. Can't figure out why people are going all in for the next cheat code.

SMiller80

Hyperion
Stark Spidey
Starlord
Phoenix
Magik
Ghostrider
Iceman
Archangel
Quake
Voodoo
Gwenpool
Rogue
Hulk
Ultron
Yondu
Angela
X23

These are the champions that I would consider worthy of r4 or r5 as 5*s. I know there's some debate about some on the list, and you could probably add some. Different strokes for different folks, and all that.

But here's the thing: no one wants to r4 any of the basic 5*s that you're putting into the featured. They might be forced to in some situation, but that's it. Forced. There are some in there who are okay, and who you wouldn't want to shoot yourself after pulling (here's looking at you, Iron Patriot).

What I don't get is why you didn't even include ONE of the champs listed above. Don't put all of them in, or even a quarter of them. But why not at least two or three? It doesn't seem logical to me.

I know people are always going to complain about change, and frankly that seems to be what the forums are designed for. I don't mind the change myself. And if you were to list a couple of the ones above, that I don't have already, in the featured crystal, I might think about it. But with all of those in the basic crystal, and none of them in the featured, I can't see you selling many. Hela isn't that good.

SpiritOfVengeance

What is with the sarcastic smarty responses. You guys drive a hard bargain don't you. But still none of us agree and are begging for this to not happen and you really don't seem to have a care in the world.

Bring the idea people out and let us speak with them instead.