Feedback on 7 Ascension: Please reconsider the current implementation

I’ve been a long-time player of this game, and I’m writing this because I am genuinely concerned about the current direction of the 7* Ascension mechanics. I want this game to succeed, but frankly, I haven’t seen a single person in the community who is happy with these changes.

Why is this so complicated?
We already have working systems for 4*, 5*, and 6* champions. Why overcomplicate things now? This new system, with its heavy reliance on Champion Tokens, Class Tokens, and specific requirements, is confusing even for veteran players. If a long-time player can’t easily wrap their head around it, there is no chance for a new player to understand it.

My main concerns:

Unnecessary Complexity: If you want to monetize this, we understand that, put it behind a paywall or specific offers if you need to generate revenue. But don't sacrifice the game's intuitiveness for it. Just introduce a Tier 3 Dust and keep the progression consistent with what we already know.

Champion Limitations: Limiting ascension to only specific champions is not fun. It restricts our rosters and makes the system feel arbitrary. Why not make every champion ascendable?

The 8* Alternative: Honestly, the community wouldn’t be against the introduction of 8 stars. It would be much cleaner and more logical than this current, convoluted workaround.

This is arguably the worst news I’ve seen regarding game mechanics in a long time. Everyone I see is concerned.

Please, Kabam, take a step back and reconsider this implementation. Simplify the process, make it accessible, and stop adding layers of mechanics that don't add value to the player experience.

Comments

WednesdayLength

I dont think the complexity is all that bad, the only bad thing about it is the new champions being locked to featured

lucianxvs

please let us ascend new champs in 2026 without spending thousands of dollars ..

TheUglyone123

https://forums.playcontestofchampions.com/en/discussion/comment/2933283#Comment_2933283

what a novel concept. Crazy that we even need to ask for this. It’s also completely wild how they rug pulled us from summoner fest to this last livestream.

BattleWarriar

https://forums.playcontestofchampions.com/en/discussion/comment/2933279#Comment_2933279

I agree. It was misleading to tell the community that every champ after pav and lizard will be ascendable immediately, then tell us now that it's only for the first 2 levels and only from purchasing featured crystals.

https://forums.playcontestofchampions.com/en/discussion/411979/feedback-on-7-ascension-please-reconsider-the-current-implementation

I also think the expectation that we would be able to ascend any champion is kinda crazy. They will not let serpent, jean, nico, okoye, onslaught, etc. rule the roll out of ascension. This is a star level replacement, and because of that we need to filter who is available for the initial power boost. It's much healthier for the contest.

Vanitelia

I disagree with the healthier for the contest approach. If the balance program did it's job, we wouldn't need ascension to boos a pool of champs to make them usable. There was obviously a ton of effort put into updating all of those champs. Those champs should have been updated already. Instead, they lived at the bottom of our rosters for years while they figured out a clever way to monetize the balance program.

I am all for the game evolving. We had a core concept of ascension in the game via dust that allowed us to choose who we wanted to ascend. If it's game breaking, limit the arms race of ascension to competitive modes so the team doesn't have to design content around those rank up choices. The team already has the ability to disable added power to defenders (battlecasts in AW for instance). Couldn't ascension be coded like relics to achieve it?

Anyway, we'll need to see how it unfolds. I have a funny feeling we'll be seeing some of the newer champs from 2025 added like Dracula in the future. Big wins on the new challenges, progression title and some of the other things coming to the game.

MrSanguini

https://forums.playcontestofchampions.com/en/discussion/comment/2933318#Comment_2933318

The balance program is dead dude.

And even if it wasn’t, there’s too many champs they’d have to change in order to healthily shake up the meta. The cosmic big three, Nico, other stacked Dual threats like SW, Jean, Onslaught, the list goes on.

Taking those guys out of the meta purely via positive (additive) balance changes would be a ridiculous task. Doing it with negative balance changes (nerfs) would be much easier, but you know how much this community hates nerfs, even to an already and still consistent top tier like Spiderwoman.

When 7 stars were initially introduced they successfully brought some older, weaker champs in the 6 star era back into the limelight. This seems to be Kabam’s same strategy with ascensions- limit the pool, break the meta. It worked back then, and if they handle it properly (as of now, they aren’t) it can work again.

WednesdayLength

https://forums.playcontestofchampions.com/en/discussion/comment/2933295#Comment_2933295

We already new that only the first 2 levels would be available at the start, and technically yes all new champions will be available for ascension as soon as they launch. I think that the decision to lock new champion ascension for a year is a bad one, but I dont think they lied as much as people are making out

BattleWarriar

https://forums.playcontestofchampions.com/en/discussion/comment/2933349#Comment_2933349

I meant the new champs would be locked at the first 2 ascension levels until they are added to a specific pool. My initial understanding was that new champions would be added to an ascension pool, similar to how new champions were immediately available as 7*s through the titan pool.

While kabam did not lie, it feels like they wanted us make assumptions based on past experiences. Even if they didn't tell us exactly how it works, I would have appreciated some notice that newly released champions would have some sort of caveat when it comes to ascension, specifically only being available at the first 2 levels for the foreseeable future.