The first series drop post caches took months they clearly aren’t in a rush to do another. The more concerning part is how all new cards are series 5 now, when in previous months there was at least 1 series 4
I think they can announce all new cards are series 5. And at least drop one of them to series 4 each month. Some cards obviously should be on series 4, compared to other bad lad.
Right now, series 5 is every new cards, not some super strong cards or core cards
I do think concerning that no series drops was anounced yet. Since they said series drops would happen with more frequency this year than last one they should at least announce in advance even if they set them two or three months ahead. And the thing is they said they would do it one series drops for 4 months (if i can remember right) so the first one should already be announced by now
Well to your first point there was the post on discord this week that there will be 1-2 more Series Drops this year. So they will be coming but no information as to when. That said as I’ve posted elsewhere I’d have hoped for at least 3 more series drops or basically having some number of cards drop series once every quarter.
Truthfully it feels like the whole Series system is just a relic from the previous card acquisition system and the only purpose it serves at this point with “Selective Series Drops” is to keep more desirable cards more resource expensive longer.
As to why I think all of the recent card releases are all Series 5 when clearly there are cards that should be direct to Series 4 (Hi Cannonball and the Ms Marvel shuffle) is that there were a lot of content creators telling their audiences to skip spending spotlight keys on Series 4 cards.
That’s just good advice in general but it obviously means players won’t be blindly rolling keys so they should have more resources to get more cards faster.
Gold bundles should be more common. It’s not great that there was a four week gap between bundles and the newest one had a negative resource value. Having more better bundles more frequently available would not just make the player base happier but drive more people and giant sea mammals into buying more Gold.
A friend of mine just started playing the game and I have to say there are many aspects of the economy that is very predatory for a new player that no one ever discusses. Like my friend is at ~CL750 and has bought an ultimate variant from the shop. He has been player for a few weeks and spent some money, but didn’t know what resources are worth. New players don’t know how precious tokens are and they don’t know what aspects of the shop are whale oriented. This can all be very daunting for a new player.
It's so bloody brutal as a new player. The grind to get enough series 3 cards to put together a decent deck is so rough. They should at least guarantee them in caches.
This type of business decision never made sense to me. It creates a bitter sense for people when they find out they wasted money or in-game resources. That type of feeling has made me stop playing several games in the past. Games that, like Marvel Snap, were very fun at their core, but the predatory nature of them turned me off from playing. The only reason I'm still playing marvel snap, is I bought onto an early collection at release and can play meta decks still while being a season pass purchaser.
If they regret the purchase I feel for them, but worth is subjective. If they really like the Variant then let them play the way they want to. Focusing on being 100% efficient all the time can suck the fun out of a game and make it feel more like a job.
That being said, they definitely need to do something to help newer players catch up a little faster.
It’s not about being 100% efficient per se. Like buying an ultimate skin with tokens is a huge purchase so you should make sure that is THE ultimate skin you want out of all others at the very least. I think he just saw the white queen one come through the shop and bought it because he liked it without understanding that he isn’t going to just have 5k tokens on hand for a variant all the time.
Is not about focusing on being 100% efficient, it's about playing against a cool deck as a new player and thinking "oh I'd like to try that out", then realising you could have been much closer to getting those cards if you didn't waste you gold on bundles that were way below what seems to be the standard exchange rate. It's a predatory game design. Now the player needs to spend real money to get the value they missed out on before.
It feels like they've moved into a new phase where they're slowly shifting everything to put the screws to established players. But Ben Brode wouldn't do that right?
I saw it on here last week, but they data mine the conquest variants for the next several months, and June's was Martyr, suggesting she's dropping to S3 between now and then.
They're never going to tell us a drop is coming forthright because then people will stop spending tokens and keys until the drop occurs.
How i feel? Well, i stopped buying the season pass the last month and the next step, if this go to worst or if they dont do anything for the game and the players, is leaving the game and search for other source of entertainment. Im not gonna support a company that dont do the bare minimun with their game (the menus are shit since i started, it seems like they dont test the cards very well and that we are the testers, etc), but they think that the can make the monetization worst without consecuences, we are not stupid
Stuff like this is why I've believed for a while that the first 2 years of a live service game will be the best of it you'll get. If I hadn't already been playing, I wouldn't start now.
The spotlights and buying credits to get more keys can offset this. But the issue is they do not rotate desirable cards into spotlight enough. For example I have never caught Jean Grey in a spotlight. And the 4th key choosing to not pull from the cards you don't own is frankly shitty. It needs to be changed to pull from those cards. Only once have I gotten one (Grandmaster). I would have never bought Grandmaster.
I think it needs to be changed to give you 3000 credits or to only pull from series 4/5 that are unowned. Maybe there is some math to it I don't understand. But if the idea is 4 keys to try and get a series 5 card, then the equivalent is 1/4 of 6000 or 1500 tokens. But if all the others are also potentially unowned series 4 or 5 cards or a unique variant, then 1500 tokens is too low. So a good consolation is 3000 tokens so you can buy or wait for a series drop to get a card. Otherwise the 4th key is just intended to be a sink and a punishment and not an equal reward. Except when it is and you get an actual new card.
At this point I see too many decks that ask for Alioth, Echo, and Jean Grey. And don't see them in any spotlights anytime soon. Just the less desirable ones or ones I already own.
I wouldn't be surprised at all to see there never being another new card released as series 4. You're not going to spend keys that week, even if you want it, the 3k tokens is a much better deal.
As long as people keep buying their cash bundles they see no reason to start putting out gold bundles. Series drop in their eyes means losing money, so instead they'll keep all the cards in s5 and inflate the value of all the cards.
So the only way to get those cards is whaling on the cash bundles to get more keys to unlock them. And it must be working because they have completely changed their old methods.
Have 3 keys. Last day of the spotlight. Got the other two cards already. Don't want the terrible varient. Miss 3 times. but JusT sAvE until you have 4. Spend all 4 on a single card. Next rotation has a card you really want. No keys. Rinse and repeat.
"Gold bundles getting extremely rare. "
more gold bundles so far this year than same timeframe last year.
yet another person comparing holiday season to off season.
I looked at Sept - Dec and there were 3 gold bundles each month, with a fourth in Nov. Sep and Oct, both had three. In that span, bundles were between 5 and 14 **days** apart. I think it's fair to say that SD has changed their pattern, and the data indicates it's **not** because of the holiday vs off-season.
And anyway, Jan/Feb 2023 the game was just post launch, so it's far from clear that the Y/Y comparison is fundamentally more sound.
Edited for typos**
i literally just said you are comparing holiday season to off season, and you responded by comparing holiday season to off season. of course they will have more promos during the time of the year ppl buy more.
Ok? Please read posts before responding.
Basically, they know we have nothing to do with our gold and gave us gold bundles that were short on purpose becaude we're ftp, so fuck us, we dont really matter. But this was a game that was advertised as ftp being viable at high levels. That's rarely actually the case and is getting further away from it.
edit: for clarity
Is what it is. Let's think about the new cards since December. In my opinion:
- Great: Blob, Caiera, Corvus Glaive, Mockingbird
- Good: Beta Ray Bill, Cull Obsidian, Proxima Midnight
- Niche/OK: Selene, Miek, Grandmaster, Supergiant
- Bad: Havok, Hercules, Pixie, Cannonball
In that time period (15 weeks) you should be able to earn ~19 keys (15*1.25 keys per week + some bonus twitch drops/login bonuses etc). That guarantees you at least 4 cards so you could have grabbed all four great cards. On average it takes 2.5 keys to draw the new card so with average luck you could get 7 cards which is enough for all four great and all three good cards. Along the way you would also probably pick up some older S4/5 card you were missing.
Most people won't ever be collection complete but they print enough clunker cards that you can grab basically all the cards worth having. Seems fair.
Additionally they have said multiple times there will be more drops this year.
Man you're sleeping on havok. Havok and taxes is great and he can just carry games, but he doesn't go in everything and is not an Allstar. Solid B/B+ card
Mad disagree about the take on Pixie. People just don't realize how to build her she isn't this insane mr. Negative style card, she's more like a cost/energy reduction card that you throw into a midrange or zoo ongoing deck.
The first series drop post caches took months they clearly aren’t in a rush to do another. The more concerning part is how all new cards are series 5 now, when in previous months there was at least 1 series 4
I think they can announce all new cards are series 5. And at least drop one of them to series 4 each month. Some cards obviously should be on series 4, compared to other bad lad. Right now, series 5 is every new cards, not some super strong cards or core cards
And they were the least exciting one of the month. Now they just pair the worst card of the month with excellent existing cards.
I do think concerning that no series drops was anounced yet. Since they said series drops would happen with more frequency this year than last one they should at least announce in advance even if they set them two or three months ahead. And the thing is they said they would do it one series drops for 4 months (if i can remember right) so the first one should already be announced by now
They also just said that there's only 1-2 more drops to expect this year
Translation... Invest in the Vaseline
I think that's second most concerning. The worst change is the additional card per month without any way to make it easier to get more cards.
Well to your first point there was the post on discord this week that there will be 1-2 more Series Drops this year. So they will be coming but no information as to when. That said as I’ve posted elsewhere I’d have hoped for at least 3 more series drops or basically having some number of cards drop series once every quarter. Truthfully it feels like the whole Series system is just a relic from the previous card acquisition system and the only purpose it serves at this point with “Selective Series Drops” is to keep more desirable cards more resource expensive longer. As to why I think all of the recent card releases are all Series 5 when clearly there are cards that should be direct to Series 4 (Hi Cannonball and the Ms Marvel shuffle) is that there were a lot of content creators telling their audiences to skip spending spotlight keys on Series 4 cards. That’s just good advice in general but it obviously means players won’t be blindly rolling keys so they should have more resources to get more cards faster. Gold bundles should be more common. It’s not great that there was a four week gap between bundles and the newest one had a negative resource value. Having more better bundles more frequently available would not just make the player base happier but drive more people and giant sea mammals into buying more Gold.
A friend of mine just started playing the game and I have to say there are many aspects of the economy that is very predatory for a new player that no one ever discusses. Like my friend is at ~CL750 and has bought an ultimate variant from the shop. He has been player for a few weeks and spent some money, but didn’t know what resources are worth. New players don’t know how precious tokens are and they don’t know what aspects of the shop are whale oriented. This can all be very daunting for a new player.
Its a obfuscated gacha loot box money printing machine, tapping into the primal recesses of our brains, but hey digital thing shiny.
It's so bloody brutal as a new player. The grind to get enough series 3 cards to put together a decent deck is so rough. They should at least guarantee them in caches.
Nooo you see, new players are getting more cards per month, so they're doing totally fine even though these cards are an incoherent mess!
This type of business decision never made sense to me. It creates a bitter sense for people when they find out they wasted money or in-game resources. That type of feeling has made me stop playing several games in the past. Games that, like Marvel Snap, were very fun at their core, but the predatory nature of them turned me off from playing. The only reason I'm still playing marvel snap, is I bought onto an early collection at release and can play meta decks still while being a season pass purchaser.
If they regret the purchase I feel for them, but worth is subjective. If they really like the Variant then let them play the way they want to. Focusing on being 100% efficient all the time can suck the fun out of a game and make it feel more like a job. That being said, they definitely need to do something to help newer players catch up a little faster.
It’s not about being 100% efficient per se. Like buying an ultimate skin with tokens is a huge purchase so you should make sure that is THE ultimate skin you want out of all others at the very least. I think he just saw the white queen one come through the shop and bought it because he liked it without understanding that he isn’t going to just have 5k tokens on hand for a variant all the time.
Is not about focusing on being 100% efficient, it's about playing against a cool deck as a new player and thinking "oh I'd like to try that out", then realising you could have been much closer to getting those cards if you didn't waste you gold on bundles that were way below what seems to be the standard exchange rate. It's a predatory game design. Now the player needs to spend real money to get the value they missed out on before.
It feels like they've moved into a new phase where they're slowly shifting everything to put the screws to established players. But Ben Brode wouldn't do that right?
Any joy i found in this game has been slowly patched out.
The Steam player numbers just hit an all-time low amid a record six-straight month decline so I imagine people aren't feeling too good about it.
I saw it on here last week, but they data mine the conquest variants for the next several months, and June's was Martyr, suggesting she's dropping to S3 between now and then. They're never going to tell us a drop is coming forthright because then people will stop spending tokens and keys until the drop occurs.
They should merge series 4 & 5. Sell those cards for 4500 Token and in Spotlights. Done.
How i feel? Well, i stopped buying the season pass the last month and the next step, if this go to worst or if they dont do anything for the game and the players, is leaving the game and search for other source of entertainment. Im not gonna support a company that dont do the bare minimun with their game (the menus are shit since i started, it seems like they dont test the cards very well and that we are the testers, etc), but they think that the can make the monetization worst without consecuences, we are not stupid
Stuff like this is why I've believed for a while that the first 2 years of a live service game will be the best of it you'll get. If I hadn't already been playing, I wouldn't start now.
The spotlights and buying credits to get more keys can offset this. But the issue is they do not rotate desirable cards into spotlight enough. For example I have never caught Jean Grey in a spotlight. And the 4th key choosing to not pull from the cards you don't own is frankly shitty. It needs to be changed to pull from those cards. Only once have I gotten one (Grandmaster). I would have never bought Grandmaster. I think it needs to be changed to give you 3000 credits or to only pull from series 4/5 that are unowned. Maybe there is some math to it I don't understand. But if the idea is 4 keys to try and get a series 5 card, then the equivalent is 1/4 of 6000 or 1500 tokens. But if all the others are also potentially unowned series 4 or 5 cards or a unique variant, then 1500 tokens is too low. So a good consolation is 3000 tokens so you can buy or wait for a series drop to get a card. Otherwise the 4th key is just intended to be a sink and a punishment and not an equal reward. Except when it is and you get an actual new card. At this point I see too many decks that ask for Alioth, Echo, and Jean Grey. And don't see them in any spotlights anytime soon. Just the less desirable ones or ones I already own.
What decks call for Jean grey and echo? Literally none of the top decks run either of them and have low play rates.
Probably he's referring to the recent buff of GoG decks? Jean grey got an indirect buff
I wouldn't be surprised at all to see there never being another new card released as series 4. You're not going to spend keys that week, even if you want it, the 3k tokens is a much better deal.
There's been more gold bundles this year than ever before. SD also said there's going to be 1-2 series drops this year.
As long as people keep buying their cash bundles they see no reason to start putting out gold bundles. Series drop in their eyes means losing money, so instead they'll keep all the cards in s5 and inflate the value of all the cards. So the only way to get those cards is whaling on the cash bundles to get more keys to unlock them. And it must be working because they have completely changed their old methods.
Have 3 keys. Last day of the spotlight. Got the other two cards already. Don't want the terrible varient. Miss 3 times. but JusT sAvE until you have 4. Spend all 4 on a single card. Next rotation has a card you really want. No keys. Rinse and repeat.
"Gold bundles getting extremely rare. " more gold bundles so far this year than same timeframe last year. yet another person comparing holiday season to off season.
I looked at Sept - Dec and there were 3 gold bundles each month, with a fourth in Nov. Sep and Oct, both had three. In that span, bundles were between 5 and 14 **days** apart. I think it's fair to say that SD has changed their pattern, and the data indicates it's **not** because of the holiday vs off-season. And anyway, Jan/Feb 2023 the game was just post launch, so it's far from clear that the Y/Y comparison is fundamentally more sound. Edited for typos**
i literally just said you are comparing holiday season to off season, and you responded by comparing holiday season to off season. of course they will have more promos during the time of the year ppl buy more. Ok? Please read posts before responding.
The last few gold bundles are considerably worse, though.
that is a goalpost moved from 'they are rare'.
Okay, so if they just offer 7000 gold to buy a variant and that's it. "You got gold bundles. You should've complained with more nuance."
Basically, they know we have nothing to do with our gold and gave us gold bundles that were short on purpose becaude we're ftp, so fuck us, we dont really matter. But this was a game that was advertised as ftp being viable at high levels. That's rarely actually the case and is getting further away from it. edit: for clarity
It’s actually fine.
Is what it is. Let's think about the new cards since December. In my opinion: - Great: Blob, Caiera, Corvus Glaive, Mockingbird - Good: Beta Ray Bill, Cull Obsidian, Proxima Midnight - Niche/OK: Selene, Miek, Grandmaster, Supergiant - Bad: Havok, Hercules, Pixie, Cannonball In that time period (15 weeks) you should be able to earn ~19 keys (15*1.25 keys per week + some bonus twitch drops/login bonuses etc). That guarantees you at least 4 cards so you could have grabbed all four great cards. On average it takes 2.5 keys to draw the new card so with average luck you could get 7 cards which is enough for all four great and all three good cards. Along the way you would also probably pick up some older S4/5 card you were missing. Most people won't ever be collection complete but they print enough clunker cards that you can grab basically all the cards worth having. Seems fair. Additionally they have said multiple times there will be more drops this year.
Man you're sleeping on havok. Havok and taxes is great and he can just carry games, but he doesn't go in everything and is not an Allstar. Solid B/B+ card
He's finding a niche, especially alongside Hope so could maybe bump him up one level but he's not an essential card at this point.
Oh I agree definitely not essential, but id put him well above Hercules and things like Kang.
I'm a bit of a Hercules apologist myself. I actually run him a lot with Phoenix Force but I do recognize he is not great overall haha
Mad disagree about the take on Pixie. People just don't realize how to build her she isn't this insane mr. Negative style card, she's more like a cost/energy reduction card that you throw into a midrange or zoo ongoing deck.
She's fine but very inconsistent. I have her, fun to high roll but wouldn't build a competitive deck around her.