I think bottom-line is that everything that's available for us to earn money on needs to scale better with your player level. There's just not enough. You have to really sacrifice say having a competitive Arena team versus a competitive Raid team, or having a LS or DS team that can actually complete the different levels. It shouldn't be that way. Those are all aspects of the game that are available to play and you basically need to play all of them because there are different rewards that you need from each.
Just ease off on having to level and star every bloody toon. I will go days or a week without leveling or starring someone if i get near my base threshold of 15 million credits. I built that up grinding GW and I will not let myself go below it. This game is a grind, just like any other game built like an MMO. If you play MMOs long term its all one giant grind, there is no necessity to level everything fast unless you are impatient.
This is the crux of the issue. People are simply leveling too fast. Find a pace of leveling that stays at equilibrium with your earning power and you will have no credit problems. Each successive level takes more time to attain, which give you more days to complete GW and Challenges, which are the main source of credits. If you pace things right you can actually accumulate more credits as you continue to level.
Impatience is your problem, not insufficient payouts.
Im 74 and i have 3 million. The double rewards helped a ton. But the simple fact is you will spend millions on keeping your arena team max level, when in fact you probably only have the gear or mats to actuall capitalize on one out of the five.
Simple. Dont level your toons until you have a better reason than getting 15 more points on stats. You will have millions of credits. Until you are lvl 80 and start needimg to upgrade abilities, i dont see how youbcan possibly attain enough higher lvl gear at a fast enough rate to have credit crunch. Its a gear crunch, afaic.
Unless you bought a bunch of chromiums and want to seven star and level toons for which you have no gear. If you did that, you can buy some crdits, too.
I probably dont have enough to max out the level of all my arena squad, certainly not enough to max level all my 6 plus star toons. And i dont really care. I dont have the mats and gear yet, anyway. Id ratyer 5 star some other toons and get them into the 60s. Every gear level after 6 is way better than another star or even 7 toon levels.
@Darling_Ventress@LastJedi This is not meant to be mean, just conversational because I'm curious. You seem to have enough credits to complete all the game modes, so I'm curious who you use? What are your...
1. Player Level?
2. LS Battles: Squad and what level have you completed? Normal / Hard?
3. DS Battles: Same as above
4. Cantina Battles: Squad and what level have you completed @ 3-stars?
5. Galactic Wars: Squad and do you complete 100% every time you attempt?
6. Arena: Squad / rank?
7. Rancor Raids: How many 5-man squads can you field?
Wth heppened to the ability to sell stockpiled gear? I have HUNDREDS of items that have a ridiculously high drop rate, it would make sense to be able to make them worthwhile for credit exchange... Either that or mayhe reduce the steep pricing on all things in the game, character ahards are understandably high expense but ****.. Im level 72 and most my roster is under L 60...
Right!? Going from lvl 76 to lvl 77 is over 200,000 credits lol
I don't even care about LS/DS battles. I finish them when I can. I've been stuck on DS for 3 weeks now. I'm stuck on LS for several days, having just unlocked it. I still have plenty of shards and gear to collect from what I have 3 starred, so what's the rush? Those battles aren't going anywhere.
I'm not free to play. I have purchased the Droid pack and maybe 7 or 8 Chromiums, so I should be really down on credits. I purchased one credit pack of 500k credits, only. And I have 3 millons credits. (and a few toons that are sitting around unactivated, which I am not going to waste resources on)
For Arena, I use combinations of
Dooku 4S, MGWU (Max Gear level Without Unobtainiums)
Lumi 7S, one furnace
GS 7S, MGWU
GQJ, 6S, MGWU
RG, 4S, MGWO
86, 7S, MGWO
IG-100, 5S, MGWO
Again, these toons are not level 74. Only three or 4 of my toons are above level 68. Lumi is 73, so I could use the furnace. And 88 and IG100 are 72, so I could max one of their abilities.
Each toon level above 70 is insanely expensive.
For DS, I use droids. My Poe is only 5 stars, My Poggle is only 5 stars.
LS, I use the toons from my Arena squad plus a 5 star Biggs, not geared yet, and a 5 star JC with MGWU.
My JC is MGWU with max possible heal and is only level 59! He really doesn't need any toon level to get higher gear and abilities. I could make his health and heal a little stronger by leveling him, but I don't want to spend the credits. I'm farming Rey and JE and ST Han and working on Dooku and RG.
I dont' care to make my current toons marginally better at the cost of putting hugely useful new toons on the bench due to a credit crunch. My current toons can't get a #1, no matter how many resources I pour into them.
Wth heppened to the ability to sell stockpiled gear? I have HUNDREDS of items that have a ridiculously high drop rate, it would make sense to be able to make them worthwhile for credit exchange... Either that or mayhe reduce the steep pricing on all things in the game, character ahards are understandably high expense but ****.. Im level 72 and most my roster is under L 60...
Right!? Going from lvl 76 to lvl 77 is over 200,000 credits lol
How long does it take you to go from 76 to 77?
You can easily make .5 mil credits a day just from GW, Challenges and other sources. If it takes 6 days to do the level that is 3 mil credits. 3,000,000 / 200,000 = 15 . So you should be able to level 15 toons. If you need to level more toons, then take more time to level and make more credits. Whats the problem with that?
I don't even care about LS/DS battles. I finish them when I can. I've been stuck on DS for 3 weeks now. I'm stuck on LS for several days, having just unlocked it. I still have plenty of shards and gear to collect from what I have 3 starred, so what's the rush? Those battles aren't going anywhere.
I'm not free to play. I have purchased the Droid pack and maybe 7 or 8 Chromiums, so I should be really down on credits. I purchased one credit pack of 500k credits, only. And I have 3 millons credits. (and a few toons that are sitting around unactivated, which I am not going to waste resources on)
For Arena, I use combinations of
Dooku 4S, MGWU (Max Gear level Without Unobtainiums)
Lumi 7S, one furnace
GS 7S, MGWU
GQJ, 6S, MGWU
RG, 4S, MGWO
86, 7S, MGWO
IG-100, 5S, MGWO
Again, these toons are not level 74. Only three or 4 of my toons are above level 68. Lumi is 73, so I could use the furnace. And 88 and IG100 are 72, so I could max one of their abilities.
Each toon level above 70 is insanely expensive.
For DS, I use droids. My Poe is only 5 stars, My Poggle is only 5 stars.
LS, I use the toons from my Arena squad plus a 5 star Biggs, not geared yet, and a 5 star JC with MGWU.
My JC is MGWU with max heal and is only level 59! He really doesn't need any toon level to get higher gear and abilities. I could make his health and heal a little stronger by leveling him, but I don't want to spend the credits. I'm farming Rey and JE and ST Han and working on Dooku and RG.
I dont' care to make my current toons marginally better at the cost of putting hugely useful new toons on the bench due to a credit crunch.
I don't understand your DS comments, how are you using Poe for those? You're more or less not really doing the LS / DS battles then? Right now you're skipping a large section of the game's content? You've gotten into the level 5's maybe?
Galactic War: What do you do for this? How far do you get?
Arena: You do 3 to 5 per day to get the daily activity and that's about it?
Challenges; What tiers are you doing and are you able to get through those?
I typically reevaluate if I'm even going to try to advance once a week or so, after the Sunday challenge and ability upgrade spree.
Yeah, for Dark side, I guess I use droids plus or minus 4 star Talia, RG, or 5 star Poggle. No Poe, lol.
I clear GW every single day. I have only failed twice, before I knew there was a retreat option. Lumi and RG are key. And Dooku L is situationally amazing, even if he is only 4 stars. Poe and Chewy are useful even if their main purpose involves suicide.
Arena, I sometimes do one refresh if I can crack top twenty. Otherwise just 5. I'm happy to break top 50. But I will buy a refresh more than occasionally just to try new toons and strategies, to make sure I'm heading in the right direction. I consider that a good investment of crystals and entertainment.
I buy the 50 crystal energy and the 100 crystal Cantina, and that is all. I buy the credit booster for an additional 100. I net a positive "income" with the booster, to save for the Mk5 stun gun one day..... I dont' see any furnaces anymore...
I am always #1 in my raids, because my guildies on my server are apparently all free to play. But this is only tier 4, lol. I am not even bothering with gear until I get JE and Rey, other than what I might be able to obtain in shipments.
I can do any Challenge. Very easy.
AGI, all you need is 4 star Talia with her third special jacked up to put a negative status on Savage that lasts 3 turns. In that time, your 4-5 star JC can keep the team alive. And a 4 star Dooku can do 16K damage to Savage about 20 times for the kill.
Power challenge... Sid lead, 4 stars, and DPS toons just wipe up the rest. I think I had a hard time with tier 2 or 3 at first, but tier 4 was easy from the get go.
The tank challenge stage 3 is breeze. RG stun is reliable on Mace. He is all you need. 5 star Poe does enough damage to get past the first 2 stages, alive. The Bounty Hunter challenge, same. All you need is RG and enough DPS to get to stage 3 so RG can stun Cad Bane.
I can't remember all the other challenges, but they are all auto, except for the AGI, where the final stage takes a little manual direction. I will fail one time out of 10, due to the healing droids picking off Tali or JC, but most of the time it is cake. Anyone else dies, no problem. Even Dooku is not strictly necessary, if my QGJ with his assist attack lives.
Focus on Gearing not leveling, and you will have no problem with credits, IMO. At least not until you get darn close to the level cap... and/or you get really lucky with raid gear drops. Also, be selective in who you are going to 7 star. A gear 9 RG at 4 stars is better than a 7 star RG at gear 8. Some toons is not worth paying a million to 7 star, unless you already have nothing better to spend on. Only certain toons will pay off bigger with stars (like ST Han, where every bit of life = way more utility). If your GW is hard, that's bad luck/server. But the levels aren't going to help you much; they might even give you harder opponents. So save your credits and work on gearing new toons.
A lot of the opponents I face are all 7S all level 72-77... much higher level and stars, on average, than my GW squad. And I wipe them easily, because of gear (and AI and TM). Almost every team I face is all the same toon level, showing that the player is leveling their entire squad at the same time... for little gain.
In arena, likewise. I don't care what toon levels the matchups have. I check to see what gear they have. The amount of protection shows their gear level. And then you can also look at their abilities. The toon level is not even remotely a factor. Droid teams, doubly so. Check the speed of their Poe/Poggle and the health of their 88/86. That right there tells you if it's an auto win or an auto lose.
*If you are seven starring like HK or Phasma or Chewie or JC, and you are complaining about credit crunch, you are doing it wrong. Ditto if you are max leveling your arena squad to hopefully drop 5 spots less a night, if you're lucky. If an opponent has a tough time with a max level 7s team with your composition, he will have almost as hard a time with your squad that is on average 5 player levels lower and minus a star or 4. A single gear level or omega ability difference, and that's a big difference. Lvls and the 6th or 7th star, not so much.
@Darling_Ventress@LastJedi This is not meant to be mean, just conversational because I'm curious. You seem to have enough credits to complete all the game modes, so I'm curious who you use? What are your...
1. Player Level?
2. LS Battles: Squad and what level have you completed? Normal / Hard?
3. DS Battles: Same as above
4. Cantina Battles: Squad and what level have you completed @ 3-stars?
5. Galactic Wars: Squad and do you complete 100% every time you attempt?
6. Arena: Squad / rank?
7. Rancor Raids: How many 5-man squads can you field?
Ok, I'll play this game, even though you will tell me my example is invalid because I am not level 70+ .
1. Player level 59 . 17 toons max level. 23 total toons. 2 - 7*, 2 - 6*, 5 - 5*, 6 - 4*, 3 - 3*, and the rest are useless, neglected, stragglers I don't care about. Today I just promoted Lumi to 7* and Fives to 5* cost me 1.25 mil . I still have 8 mil in the bank. Rey and Sid are coming up to 80 shards. It will cost around 2 mil each to level them from 1-60, but no problem. Might only have enough droids for one of them.
2. I have maxed out LS level 6 N/H and waiting for level 63 to start lvl 7
3. DS Normal 6-J Stuck at that node. The level 66 Hoth Soldiers destroy me at the end. I need more health. I only have one Darkside healer - Taila and she can't keep up.
4. Maxed Cantina level 4 and waiting to reach player lvl 61 to continue. Only a few nodes not 3* but I could, I just don't farm them for anything.
5. GW I complete everyday. missed node 12 a few days ago, but that is rare. I use all my leveled toons and loose only a few.
6. Arena rank tier #11 500-200. sometimes tier #10 . This is by choice. It is the most cost and time effective rank for me. Cost/benefit of higher ranks are not worth the effort.
7. Raids Our guild does tier 4 raids. I rank 20 - 15 in damage along side level 60-76 teams. I field 3 5-man teams, and complete 2 rounds of 4 attempts.
Oh yeah, f2p all the way.
So what? I'm sure I don't meet your standard of "aggressive" game play. I don't care. I am playing MY game not yours. I am progressing comfortably and effectively and have no complaints about the game mechanics. I play within the constraints of the game design - i.e. the rules of the game - and I don't b**ch and moan about changing the rules so I can win faster.
@Darling_Ventress@LastJedi This is not meant to be mean, just conversational because I'm curious. You seem to have enough credits to complete all the game modes, so I'm curious who you use? What are your...
1. Player Level?
2. LS Battles: Squad and what level have you completed? Normal / Hard?
3. DS Battles: Same as above
4. Cantina Battles: Squad and what level have you completed @ 3-stars?
5. Galactic Wars: Squad and do you complete 100% every time you attempt?
6. Arena: Squad / rank?
7. Rancor Raids: How many 5-man squads can you field?
Ok, I'll play this game, even though you will tell me my example is invalid because I am not level 70+ .
1. Player level 59 . 17 toons max level. 23 total toons. 2 - 7*, 2 - 6*, 5 - 5*, 6 - 4*, 3 - 3*, and the rest are useless, neglected, stragglers I don't care about. Today I just promoted Lumi to 7* and Fives to 5* cost me 1.25 mil . I still have 8 mil in the bank. Rey and Sid are coming up to 80 shards. It will cost around 2 mil each to level them from 1-60, but no problem. Might only have enough droids for one of them.
2. I have maxed out LS level 6 N/H and waiting for level 63 to start lvl 7
3. DS Normal 6-J Stuck at that node. The level 66 Hoth Soldiers destroy me at the end. I need more health. I only have one Darkside healer - Taila and she can't keep up.
4. Maxed Cantina level 4 and waiting to reach player lvl 61 to continue. Only a few nodes not 3* but I could, I just don't farm them for anything.
5. GW I complete everyday. missed node 12 a few days ago, but that is rare. I use all my leveled toons and loose only a few.
6. Arena rank tier #11 500-200. sometimes tier #10 . This is by choice. It is the most cost and time effective rank for me. Cost/benefit of higher ranks are not worth the effort.
7. Raids Our guild does tier 4 raids. I rank 20 - 15 in damage along side level 60-76 teams. I field 3 5-man teams, and complete 2 rounds of 4 attempts.
Oh yeah, f2p all the way.
So what? I'm sure I don't meet your standard of "aggressive" game play. I don't care. I am playing MY game not yours. I am progressing comfortably and effectively and have no complaints about the game mechanics. I play within the constraints of the game design - i.e. the rules of the game - and I don't b**ch and moan about changing the rules so I can win faster.
See there was really no reason to be nasty there, as I said in my first post to you and DarkJedi I wasn't trying to be mean; I was truly curious and trying to see this from your perspective.
You actually have more max level (comparatively for your level) toons than I do; I just hit level 79. I have 12 what I consider "useable" characters for Arena (top-5) and GW. I cannot advance in DS battles past 7G (I think, Kit Fisto node)and I just barely cleared what I did; I do not have the credits to level the DS characters I need. I've had to prioritize my Arena and GW squad and I did the Yoda event last month to 7-star Yoda and I cannot use all of those characters now unfortunately, so it was kind of ****-away credits to some degree.
I've been farming more important raiding characters like Admiral Ackbar but cannot level or gear him either because once I level my main squad, I only have enough credits to very slowly level and gear one other DPS character that I need for raiding. I do GW religiously every day, Challenges, and I am fortunate enough to buy crystals so I refresh Cantina and some hard nodes as much as I can but it's still not enough.
If you want to do well in every aspect of the game you can't do it without buying a ton of credits. I'm assuming EA wants us to play all of their content, but I can't even play the DS battles because I can't afford to level those players. I'm just lucky that EA brought the challenge level back down to earth or I wouldn't be doing those either because my Agility squad and 2 level 70's on it and Strength challenge squad also had 2 70's on it until yesterday, just 1 now. Those first couple days when the challenges went crazy I didn't even bother doing them.
I don't know how it's possible to really play all aspects of this game well without purchasing some credits.
5 toons, level 79, how many credits is that? How many gold mats will you be able to use by leveling all your toons? That's over a million in credits.... And the toon levels you already have are probably sitting around doing very little on some of your toons. Millions more locked up in levels. The extra health you get from 5 levels doesn't even protect against one additional hit, on average. Most all your DPS and potency and tenacity is going to come from gear, too.
Level a Lumi or Barisse or a Han to the max, if they're integral to your squad. Most everyone else, there's very little gain unless you are immediately activating a new ability or attaining the next gear level. The guy you can't snipe for #1, you still wont' be able to snipe him when your toons all go up one level. The guy that is sniping you, he's still going to be able to snipe you.
If you're not leaving enough credits to progress your new toons, you can kiss top 5 goodbye, in the long run. You will get locked out by the new meta, and will have to level your new toons without the aid of the million credits you have locked up in the toons you are replacing.
See there was really no reason to be nasty there, as I said in my first post to you and DarkJedi I wasn't trying to be mean; I was truly curious and trying to see this from your perspective.
...
I don't know how it's possible to really play all aspects of this game well without purchasing some credits.
I am being defensive because every time I explain my position on this topic I am told I'm full of s**t. I'm not just talking to you, but every other nay-sayer on this subject.
My only question to you is how quickly are you progressing between each player level? Are you collecting all the Daily Activity awards? Each level takes longer to progress. If you spend that time acquiring credits from GW, Challenges, and Arena you can make .5 mil each day. It adds up fast. The longer you take to progress through the level, the more credits you will earn. Stop leveling for 2 weeks and you will be set.
I stopped collecting the daily XP awards long ago. I take a long time to turn over my player level, but each time I do I have more credits than before. And each time I have more max toons than before. I will keep doing this until I hit a speed bump. If I start spending too much I will slow down my leveling rate.
My level makes zero difference to me. I compete and succeed in every aspect of this game at level 59 and every level before that. I'm not #1, but I don't care right now because I am still building up a squad.
Fast leveling is your worst enemy. You simply have to stop spending faster than you make credits.
See there was really no reason to be nasty there, as I said in my first post to you and DarkJedi I wasn't trying to be mean; I was truly curious and trying to see this from your perspective.
...
I don't know how it's possible to really play all aspects of this game well without purchasing some credits.
I am being defensive because every time I explain my position on this topic I am told I'm full of s**t. I'm not just talking to you, but every other nay-sayer on this subject.
My only question to you is how quickly are you progressing between each player level? Are you collecting all the Daily Activity awards? Each level takes longer to progress. If you spend that time acquiring credits from GW, Challenges, and Arena you can make .5 mil each day. It adds up fast. The longer you take to progress through the level, the more credits you will earn. Stop leveling for 2 weeks and you will be set.
I stopped collecting the daily XP awards long ago. I take a long time to turn over my player level, but each time I do I have more credits than before. And each time I have more max toons than before. I will keep doing this until I hit a speed bump. If I start spending too much I will slow down my leveling rate.
My level makes zero difference to me. I compete and succeed in every aspect of this game at level 59 and every level before that. I'm not #1, but I don't care right now because I am still building up a squad.
Fast leveling is your worst enemy. You simply have to stop spending faster than you make credits.
My 5 main squad members I've been leveling each level, others I've been letting lag behind. There was one character that I've been promoting and then finally slowly leveling and gearing because I needed another good DPS. My clan is raiding T6 right now and it's rough when you don't have a lot of max-for-your-level characters. What I do have leveled up do pretty well in raids and arena but I don't have much of a bench to fall back on for raids. Luckily I have 3 tanks to use for GW when things get bad too.
My 5 main squad members I've been leveling each level, others I've been letting lag behind.
This is a problem. You aren't getting much improvement in arena nor raids by doing this.
In arena you may need two or three teams in order to advance to any given spot on any given day.
In raids, you need more bodies of the appropriate star level that are fairly well geared.
There is absolutely no point in max leveling toons simply for the STAT increase. Even if you go in Arena against the exact same team, with many toon levels of difference but the same gear and abilities, there will be squat worth of difference.
I kinda doubt you are going to sit in top 5 for very long with only 5 good toons.
My 5 main squad members I've been leveling each level, others I've been letting lag behind.
This is a problem. You aren't getting much improvement in arena nor raids by doing this.
In arena you may need two or three teams in order to advance to any given spot on any given day.
In raids, you need more bodies of the appropriate star level that are fairly well geared.
There is absolutely no point in max leveling toons simply for the STAT increase. Even if you go in Arena against the exact same team, with many toon levels of difference but the same gear and abilities, there will be squat worth of difference.
I kinda doubt you are going to sit in top 5 for very long with only 5 good toons.
You have to level them eventuraly. It's either 1.5M now or 1.5M later, doesn't really matter. Unless the meta seriously shifts I'll be okay. A few 80s in my server is all I really have to worry about.
You have to level them eventuraly. It's either 1.5M now or 1.5M later, doesn't really matter. Unless the meta seriously shifts I'll be okay. A few 80s in my server is all I really have to worry about.
1. yes it does matter if you are running out of credits to level other toons. By the time you have the gear and mats to make that level increase worth it, you might have another 1.5M credits in your account doing nothing.
2. the meta seriously shifts all the time. The only reason there is any semblance of a stable meta on your server is because of gear imbalance. There are a limited number of toons on your servers with the new gears, and some of these higher gear toons are making a bigger impact than others while this disparity exists.
If you eventually run out of better ways to spend those credits, yes. You will eventually use credits to randomly level toons for the STAT increase. But that's a low amount of impact per credit.
You can level up your 5 man squad to the max and it will still never, ever beat certain other squads of similar gear level. And there will be other squads that will easily beat it. If you sharpen only your scissors, you will be able to easily cut paper. But that won't change what happens when you're up against a rock, lol. When it costs increasingly much just so you can cut paper better, maybe it's time to start investing in another tool, first. The leaderboard isn't going to be full of paper forever.
Even if I had the current dream team, but no gears for them all, I wouldn't bother leveling them all.
You're not going to do anything to deter other people with the same team and gear but lower/higher toon levels. You have a great team against other "noobs" who don't have the right toons/gears, yet, to beat you. That is all. Your toon levels don't matter for squat.
If a challenger has the right toons and gear to beat you, a few toon levels will not matter but for a very small percent change of the win/loss RNG ratio.
Replies
The struggle is real sirs
This is the crux of the issue. People are simply leveling too fast. Find a pace of leveling that stays at equilibrium with your earning power and you will have no credit problems. Each successive level takes more time to attain, which give you more days to complete GW and Challenges, which are the main source of credits. If you pace things right you can actually accumulate more credits as you continue to level.
Impatience is your problem, not insufficient payouts.
Simple. Dont level your toons until you have a better reason than getting 15 more points on stats. You will have millions of credits. Until you are lvl 80 and start needimg to upgrade abilities, i dont see how youbcan possibly attain enough higher lvl gear at a fast enough rate to have credit crunch. Its a gear crunch, afaic.
Unless you bought a bunch of chromiums and want to seven star and level toons for which you have no gear. If you did that, you can buy some crdits, too.
I probably dont have enough to max out the level of all my arena squad, certainly not enough to max level all my 6 plus star toons. And i dont really care. I dont have the mats and gear yet, anyway. Id ratyer 5 star some other toons and get them into the 60s. Every gear level after 6 is way better than another star or even 7 toon levels.
1. Player Level?
2. LS Battles: Squad and what level have you completed? Normal / Hard?
3. DS Battles: Same as above
4. Cantina Battles: Squad and what level have you completed @ 3-stars?
5. Galactic Wars: Squad and do you complete 100% every time you attempt?
6. Arena: Squad / rank?
7. Rancor Raids: How many 5-man squads can you field?
Right!? Going from lvl 76 to lvl 77 is over 200,000 credits lol
I'm not free to play. I have purchased the Droid pack and maybe 7 or 8 Chromiums, so I should be really down on credits. I purchased one credit pack of 500k credits, only. And I have 3 millons credits. (and a few toons that are sitting around unactivated, which I am not going to waste resources on)
For Arena, I use combinations of
Dooku 4S, MGWU (Max Gear level Without Unobtainiums)
Lumi 7S, one furnace
GS 7S, MGWU
GQJ, 6S, MGWU
RG, 4S, MGWO
86, 7S, MGWO
IG-100, 5S, MGWO
Again, these toons are not level 74. Only three or 4 of my toons are above level 68. Lumi is 73, so I could use the furnace. And 88 and IG100 are 72, so I could max one of their abilities.
Each toon level above 70 is insanely expensive.
For DS, I use droids. My Poe is only 5 stars, My Poggle is only 5 stars.
LS, I use the toons from my Arena squad plus a 5 star Biggs, not geared yet, and a 5 star JC with MGWU.
My JC is MGWU with max possible heal and is only level 59! He really doesn't need any toon level to get higher gear and abilities. I could make his health and heal a little stronger by leveling him, but I don't want to spend the credits. I'm farming Rey and JE and ST Han and working on Dooku and RG.
I dont' care to make my current toons marginally better at the cost of putting hugely useful new toons on the bench due to a credit crunch. My current toons can't get a #1, no matter how many resources I pour into them.
You can easily make .5 mil credits a day just from GW, Challenges and other sources. If it takes 6 days to do the level that is 3 mil credits. 3,000,000 / 200,000 = 15 . So you should be able to level 15 toons. If you need to level more toons, then take more time to level and make more credits. Whats the problem with that?
I don't understand your DS comments, how are you using Poe for those? You're more or less not really doing the LS / DS battles then? Right now you're skipping a large section of the game's content? You've gotten into the level 5's maybe?
Galactic War: What do you do for this? How far do you get?
Arena: You do 3 to 5 per day to get the daily activity and that's about it?
Challenges; What tiers are you doing and are you able to get through those?
Raids?
On LS I am stuck on 8 normal.
I typically reevaluate if I'm even going to try to advance once a week or so, after the Sunday challenge and ability upgrade spree.
Yeah, for Dark side, I guess I use droids plus or minus 4 star Talia, RG, or 5 star Poggle. No Poe, lol.
I clear GW every single day. I have only failed twice, before I knew there was a retreat option. Lumi and RG are key. And Dooku L is situationally amazing, even if he is only 4 stars. Poe and Chewy are useful even if their main purpose involves suicide.
Arena, I sometimes do one refresh if I can crack top twenty. Otherwise just 5. I'm happy to break top 50. But I will buy a refresh more than occasionally just to try new toons and strategies, to make sure I'm heading in the right direction. I consider that a good investment of crystals and entertainment.
I buy the 50 crystal energy and the 100 crystal Cantina, and that is all. I buy the credit booster for an additional 100. I net a positive "income" with the booster, to save for the Mk5 stun gun one day..... I dont' see any furnaces anymore...
I am always #1 in my raids, because my guildies on my server are apparently all free to play. But this is only tier 4, lol. I am not even bothering with gear until I get JE and Rey, other than what I might be able to obtain in shipments.
I can do any Challenge. Very easy.
AGI, all you need is 4 star Talia with her third special jacked up to put a negative status on Savage that lasts 3 turns. In that time, your 4-5 star JC can keep the team alive. And a 4 star Dooku can do 16K damage to Savage about 20 times for the kill.
Power challenge... Sid lead, 4 stars, and DPS toons just wipe up the rest. I think I had a hard time with tier 2 or 3 at first, but tier 4 was easy from the get go.
The tank challenge stage 3 is breeze. RG stun is reliable on Mace. He is all you need. 5 star Poe does enough damage to get past the first 2 stages, alive. The Bounty Hunter challenge, same. All you need is RG and enough DPS to get to stage 3 so RG can stun Cad Bane.
I can't remember all the other challenges, but they are all auto, except for the AGI, where the final stage takes a little manual direction. I will fail one time out of 10, due to the healing droids picking off Tali or JC, but most of the time it is cake. Anyone else dies, no problem. Even Dooku is not strictly necessary, if my QGJ with his assist attack lives.
Focus on Gearing not leveling, and you will have no problem with credits, IMO. At least not until you get darn close to the level cap... and/or you get really lucky with raid gear drops. Also, be selective in who you are going to 7 star. A gear 9 RG at 4 stars is better than a 7 star RG at gear 8. Some toons is not worth paying a million to 7 star, unless you already have nothing better to spend on. Only certain toons will pay off bigger with stars (like ST Han, where every bit of life = way more utility). If your GW is hard, that's bad luck/server. But the levels aren't going to help you much; they might even give you harder opponents. So save your credits and work on gearing new toons.
A lot of the opponents I face are all 7S all level 72-77... much higher level and stars, on average, than my GW squad. And I wipe them easily, because of gear (and AI and TM). Almost every team I face is all the same toon level, showing that the player is leveling their entire squad at the same time... for little gain.
In arena, likewise. I don't care what toon levels the matchups have. I check to see what gear they have. The amount of protection shows their gear level. And then you can also look at their abilities. The toon level is not even remotely a factor. Droid teams, doubly so. Check the speed of their Poe/Poggle and the health of their 88/86. That right there tells you if it's an auto win or an auto lose.
*If you are seven starring like HK or Phasma or Chewie or JC, and you are complaining about credit crunch, you are doing it wrong. Ditto if you are max leveling your arena squad to hopefully drop 5 spots less a night, if you're lucky. If an opponent has a tough time with a max level 7s team with your composition, he will have almost as hard a time with your squad that is on average 5 player levels lower and minus a star or 4. A single gear level or omega ability difference, and that's a big difference. Lvls and the 6th or 7th star, not so much.
Ok, I'll play this game, even though you will tell me my example is invalid because I am not level 70+ .
1. Player level 59 . 17 toons max level. 23 total toons. 2 - 7*, 2 - 6*, 5 - 5*, 6 - 4*, 3 - 3*, and the rest are useless, neglected, stragglers I don't care about. Today I just promoted Lumi to 7* and Fives to 5* cost me 1.25 mil . I still have 8 mil in the bank. Rey and Sid are coming up to 80 shards. It will cost around 2 mil each to level them from 1-60, but no problem. Might only have enough droids for one of them.
2. I have maxed out LS level 6 N/H and waiting for level 63 to start lvl 7
3. DS Normal 6-J Stuck at that node. The level 66 Hoth Soldiers destroy me at the end. I need more health. I only have one Darkside healer - Taila and she can't keep up.
4. Maxed Cantina level 4 and waiting to reach player lvl 61 to continue. Only a few nodes not 3* but I could, I just don't farm them for anything.
5. GW I complete everyday. missed node 12 a few days ago, but that is rare. I use all my leveled toons and loose only a few.
6. Arena rank tier #11 500-200. sometimes tier #10 . This is by choice. It is the most cost and time effective rank for me. Cost/benefit of higher ranks are not worth the effort.
7. Raids Our guild does tier 4 raids. I rank 20 - 15 in damage along side level 60-76 teams. I field 3 5-man teams, and complete 2 rounds of 4 attempts.
Oh yeah, f2p all the way.
So what? I'm sure I don't meet your standard of "aggressive" game play. I don't care. I am playing MY game not yours. I am progressing comfortably and effectively and have no complaints about the game mechanics. I play within the constraints of the game design - i.e. the rules of the game - and I don't b**ch and moan about changing the rules so I can win faster.
See there was really no reason to be nasty there, as I said in my first post to you and DarkJedi I wasn't trying to be mean; I was truly curious and trying to see this from your perspective.
You actually have more max level (comparatively for your level) toons than I do; I just hit level 79. I have 12 what I consider "useable" characters for Arena (top-5) and GW. I cannot advance in DS battles past 7G (I think, Kit Fisto node)and I just barely cleared what I did; I do not have the credits to level the DS characters I need. I've had to prioritize my Arena and GW squad and I did the Yoda event last month to 7-star Yoda and I cannot use all of those characters now unfortunately, so it was kind of ****-away credits to some degree.
I've been farming more important raiding characters like Admiral Ackbar but cannot level or gear him either because once I level my main squad, I only have enough credits to very slowly level and gear one other DPS character that I need for raiding. I do GW religiously every day, Challenges, and I am fortunate enough to buy crystals so I refresh Cantina and some hard nodes as much as I can but it's still not enough.
If you want to do well in every aspect of the game you can't do it without buying a ton of credits. I'm assuming EA wants us to play all of their content, but I can't even play the DS battles because I can't afford to level those players. I'm just lucky that EA brought the challenge level back down to earth or I wouldn't be doing those either because my Agility squad and 2 level 70's on it and Strength challenge squad also had 2 70's on it until yesterday, just 1 now. Those first couple days when the challenges went crazy I didn't even bother doing them.
I don't know how it's possible to really play all aspects of this game well without purchasing some credits.
Level a Lumi or Barisse or a Han to the max, if they're integral to your squad. Most everyone else, there's very little gain unless you are immediately activating a new ability or attaining the next gear level. The guy you can't snipe for #1, you still wont' be able to snipe him when your toons all go up one level. The guy that is sniping you, he's still going to be able to snipe you.
If you're not leaving enough credits to progress your new toons, you can kiss top 5 goodbye, in the long run. You will get locked out by the new meta, and will have to level your new toons without the aid of the million credits you have locked up in the toons you are replacing.
I am being defensive because every time I explain my position on this topic I am told I'm full of s**t. I'm not just talking to you, but every other nay-sayer on this subject.
My only question to you is how quickly are you progressing between each player level? Are you collecting all the Daily Activity awards? Each level takes longer to progress. If you spend that time acquiring credits from GW, Challenges, and Arena you can make .5 mil each day. It adds up fast. The longer you take to progress through the level, the more credits you will earn. Stop leveling for 2 weeks and you will be set.
I stopped collecting the daily XP awards long ago. I take a long time to turn over my player level, but each time I do I have more credits than before. And each time I have more max toons than before. I will keep doing this until I hit a speed bump. If I start spending too much I will slow down my leveling rate.
My level makes zero difference to me. I compete and succeed in every aspect of this game at level 59 and every level before that. I'm not #1, but I don't care right now because I am still building up a squad.
Fast leveling is your worst enemy. You simply have to stop spending faster than you make credits.
My 5 main squad members I've been leveling each level, others I've been letting lag behind. There was one character that I've been promoting and then finally slowly leveling and gearing because I needed another good DPS. My clan is raiding T6 right now and it's rough when you don't have a lot of max-for-your-level characters. What I do have leveled up do pretty well in raids and arena but I don't have much of a bench to fall back on for raids. Luckily I have 3 tanks to use for GW when things get bad too.
In arena you may need two or three teams in order to advance to any given spot on any given day.
In raids, you need more bodies of the appropriate star level that are fairly well geared.
There is absolutely no point in max leveling toons simply for the STAT increase. Even if you go in Arena against the exact same team, with many toon levels of difference but the same gear and abilities, there will be squat worth of difference.
I kinda doubt you are going to sit in top 5 for very long with only 5 good toons.
You have to level them eventuraly. It's either 1.5M now or 1.5M later, doesn't really matter. Unless the meta seriously shifts I'll be okay. A few 80s in my server is all I really have to worry about.
2. the meta seriously shifts all the time. The only reason there is any semblance of a stable meta on your server is because of gear imbalance. There are a limited number of toons on your servers with the new gears, and some of these higher gear toons are making a bigger impact than others while this disparity exists.
If you eventually run out of better ways to spend those credits, yes. You will eventually use credits to randomly level toons for the STAT increase. But that's a low amount of impact per credit.
You can level up your 5 man squad to the max and it will still never, ever beat certain other squads of similar gear level. And there will be other squads that will easily beat it. If you sharpen only your scissors, you will be able to easily cut paper. But that won't change what happens when you're up against a rock, lol. When it costs increasingly much just so you can cut paper better, maybe it's time to start investing in another tool, first. The leaderboard isn't going to be full of paper forever.
Even if I had the current dream team, but no gears for them all, I wouldn't bother leveling them all.
You're not going to do anything to deter other people with the same team and gear but lower/higher toon levels. You have a great team against other "noobs" who don't have the right toons/gears, yet, to beat you. That is all. Your toon levels don't matter for squat.
If a challenger has the right toons and gear to beat you, a few toon levels will not matter but for a very small percent change of the win/loss RNG ratio.