The (normal) gear evolution of games such as this one.
I love this game (no, seriously, I do), however, there are some things that I fail to grasp when it comes to this one in particular and one of them is the way gear is handled / priced.
Since the introduction of the Rancor, we got gear X. Since the AAT, Gear XI and now Territory Battles are Gear XII. Every gear level we got specific gear to get us there. I cannot for the life of me understand why things such as Carbs / Cuffs / Guns / ETC are still 1,400 crystals, salvages not purchasable via credits and overpriced in other currencies considering A: Everyone needs them and some need a LOT and B: We are blocked by raid gear. We cannot request certain AAT raid gear, so therefore we are paywalled / rng-walled. THAT I take no issue with. Usually in games of this type, when the goalpost gets moved the previous gear gets devalued because you are still behind a paywall to max out. There's no reason the purple gear that you need a metric ton of should be this expensive anymore. Sure, adding another row of gear for 20 helps, but it's still the same price.
And before everyone clamors it's about the money, I get that, but when is the last time you got anything over 5 Carbs in Challenges even though 7 is possible? Even if I AVERAGED 5 or 6 Carbs, I'd be OK with that, but it's 3-4 right now. If you want me to track for a month, I'd be more than willing to do that. They said in a podcast (I think when Fulcrum came out) that they were going to look at the gear crunch. Adding 20 for crystals instead of a full piece for 1,400 probably doesn't help many people. I could be incorrect on that, but I don't think so. Looking just at Thrawn's Carbanti requirements (8 I think) and looking at the HP on CLS, I can tell you that CLS is probably going to be a ridiculous gear.
Anyways, since these are the forums, I figured I'd just complain for a bit
The dev team is doing a LOT of things right lately. I just don't understand why older gear is so darn high.
Since the introduction of the Rancor, we got gear X. Since the AAT, Gear XI and now Territory Battles are Gear XII. Every gear level we got specific gear to get us there. I cannot for the life of me understand why things such as Carbs / Cuffs / Guns / ETC are still 1,400 crystals, salvages not purchasable via credits and overpriced in other currencies considering A: Everyone needs them and some need a LOT and B: We are blocked by raid gear. We cannot request certain AAT raid gear, so therefore we are paywalled / rng-walled. THAT I take no issue with. Usually in games of this type, when the goalpost gets moved the previous gear gets devalued because you are still behind a paywall to max out. There's no reason the purple gear that you need a metric ton of should be this expensive anymore. Sure, adding another row of gear for 20 helps, but it's still the same price.
And before everyone clamors it's about the money, I get that, but when is the last time you got anything over 5 Carbs in Challenges even though 7 is possible? Even if I AVERAGED 5 or 6 Carbs, I'd be OK with that, but it's 3-4 right now. If you want me to track for a month, I'd be more than willing to do that. They said in a podcast (I think when Fulcrum came out) that they were going to look at the gear crunch. Adding 20 for crystals instead of a full piece for 1,400 probably doesn't help many people. I could be incorrect on that, but I don't think so. Looking just at Thrawn's Carbanti requirements (8 I think) and looking at the HP on CLS, I can tell you that CLS is probably going to be a ridiculous gear.
Anyways, since these are the forums, I figured I'd just complain for a bit
The dev team is doing a LOT of things right lately. I just don't understand why older gear is so darn high.Meanwhile, down on the farm....
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Replies
What's worse is $20.00 for a piece of gear that's 3-4 max gears old.
Exactly. $20 for a Stun Gun that was required before g9 was possible for more than a few characters is just ridiculous.
It's another encouragement to pay, of course, but also take a look at it from another perspective. These gears are typically needed by different type of characters. Tanks might use stun cuffs, too, but typically attackers need more stun cuffs and tanks need more stun guns. Tanks may need more carbantis while attackers need more syringes.
That isn't entirely accurate, as I use the term "tank" more loosely than the game. I mean tanky characters, that have a relatively high health and protection, need more carbantis, whereas glass cannons typically don't need carbantis.
Anyways, all of that is to say that it is also an encouragement to be gearing different types of characters for more varied teams.
And I understand that. My gist of the post is A: These are older gears, B: We're blocked by raid gear and paywalls anyhow and C: NOW gears are tied to star level. Having a gear 8 / 9 / heck, even X doesn't really amount to a hill of beans right now in any aspect of the game that I can think of.
Yeah, it wasn't really stated to provide a counterpoint so much as another view of it. Perhaps their cost should be lowered a bit, but I see stun guns and such as something they have in here for us to farm while we're waiting for the raid gear exclusives to drop.
J/K, thanks my man
OK, I can see that, HOWEVER, my point is the cost and the abysmal drop rates. At the rate they're releasing characters the catch-up game goalposts get moved almost weekly. The Krakens might get bored, but the whales down to f2p always have something to work on regardless.
You make some good points, a gear crunch is fine, but it should always be at a point, usually at the top. Here the whole path is hurdles, and some are completely unavoidable. It is an odd setup.
I have always thought it's about the pace and they don't want any new toons you get to be easy to gear and move up. We all know née toons are more powerful and useful, so the pacing does make sense.
Edit: I have to add that I understand that gears 10 and 11 must still be difficult to achieve, as they are now. But with the addition of gear 12, it should be a bit easier (or less difficult) to achieve gears 8 and 9.
That's spot on.
I've said before that you want to feel like you're accomplishing something, but the game forces us to have broad rosters - look at all the toon required for Mod challenges!
Gear tier8 should be much more achievable than it currently is for new toons. heck, even tier 7: r2 needs TWO mk3 Holos at gear 6, and we all know that they're in annoyingly short supply with no good source. You can farm them from easy nodes, of course, but that requires spending your crystals on normal refreshes and then spending regular energy on mk3 holos only, when the game is constantly pushing us to get yet another character up to 7* for the next event.
The combination of new, high gear tiers + demand for broad character rosters + a strong barrier to participation in new content for toons with gear under 8 means that g7 should be easily achievable and g8 should be much easier than it is now, even though it should be as automatic as g7.
That last battle in the CLS event you can be completely carried by a g11 STHan if you have the 3 other toons at gear7. Same with g11 Leia. But drop your top toon down to g8/g9 things become very, very iffy even if all 3 other toons are g8.
Granting easier access to g8 doesn't mean no new challenges. Players are still going to strive to get to g11/g12. But the gear system has failed to evolve with the realities of the current game, and that's not good.