2019 Retrospective: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

[GrimDusk]

2019 was an interesting year overall, not just in Legacy of the Beast. However, I'm not here to talk about the world, I'm here to talk about this mobile game and all of the things that occurred this past year. There were a lot of events and changes to the game overall, some good and some bad. In addition, I want to hear you guys' opinions on everything you thought about Legacy of the Beast in 2019! Just be civil :)

The Good: There was a lot of good and intuitive content that we got this year. Based on my recordings, we received 29 new Eddies, 86 new toons, and 38 talisman sets! That's crazy! The devs have been doing a great job giving us stuff, even if some people say it's too much. I'd personally prefer more content than less, but either way that's a lot of work put in. We also got the implementation of Clans, and though they aren't at their peak yet it's nice to feel a sense of community among fellow LoTB fans. Another huge change was the addition of Frontier Dungeons! These have given players a lot to do if they don't want to focus on a certain event or just farm for better materials. Some smaller changes include the ability to claim all fragments for souls, and the fix that prevented players from using all frontier keys at once. I think that these are some of the best changes made to the game aside from the addition of Night City to the campaign. The arena even got a new paint job for the background, and some other visual effects for the game were also updated!

The Bad: A lot of server issues plagued 2019, and some are still even occurring in 2020. For instance, the Eternal Frontier Dungeon update locked iOS players out for most of the day, and sometimes it was just impossible to claim the rewards from clans at the end of the day. The devs have promised to work on this though, so I am willing to give them a pass for now. Also, pay only Eddies were added to the game this year, beginning with Gangland Eddie up until the most recent, Guy Fawkes Eddie. This was problematic without a doubt, as even though these characters aren't game breaking, it still comes off as kind of stingy to prevent collectors from getting certain characters unless they cough up some cash. In addition, the store items have become more and more egregious, with lots of talismans locked behind the storefront until a later event where they can be earned through painstaking work.

The Ugly: "Seven deadly sins, seven ways to win" is the most bullshit lie I've ever heard related to Moonchild in any possible way; there are only like two ways to beat that fucker. There were a lot of interesting features added to the game this year, including Awakening and Cosmic Talismans, but by god above and the devil below, these are possibly some of the most annoying additions to the game that you could ever encounter. Let's start with Cosmic Talismans; you know how certain characters were locked out of talismans because they'd be too powerful with a certain combination? Well bullocks to that, Cosmic Talismans allow you to give any character an extra turn augment or the ability to heal on perfect hits. In my opinion, Cosmic Talismans have made PvP extremely annoying due to their random stats and lack of consistent power. My cosmic Echo could be much weaker than that of my opponents, but I have no way of knowing that in a PvP battle. In addition, new character specific Cosmic Talismans are just annoying to face off against, and they should just be part of the character's abilities rather than an arbitrary talisman. Secondly, Awakening as a mechanic is good, but the actual events surrounding it were dogshite. First off, the damn gold price switch the devs pulled. That made anyone who had a stage 5/6 awakened character pre-change lose even more gold, which is extremely annoying considering the devs didn't give any forewarning of the change. In addition, Awakening characters has been widely inconsistent, without a real reason given to us; Cyborg Eddie requires more materials and gold to Awaken than Gunner Lord of Light, and there isn't a reason that's been given for that. Specific awakening materials are made rarer so that purchase is made in order to obtain the higher ranked items, and it's getting worse and worse with each new character. Finally, let's talk about Moonchild. Dear god, this character has become the center of so much controversy it hurts.

Let's start off first with an in-depth look at Moonchild and maybe we can start to see why exactly so many people have called for nerfs or other changes to be made. Let's start with his basic ability, Born to Die. This ability at base level inflicts Doom and lowers stats, kinda like Magus Lord of Light. Not too bad! However, when awakened, this ability gains the power to stun opponents as well. This is more problematic for two reasons: one, the ability innately has a trigger which causes it to deal increased damage to stunned opponents, so if you equip Moonchild with a god-forsaken Cosmic Talisman that has the Echo augment, you can nuke an enemy quite easily. It doesn't stop there, though. His power ability, Mandrake Scream, removes golden effects, has a high chance of inflicting Perfect Stun, and cleanses and heals allies for all enemies already stunned.. It comes at a high power cost of 7, however this is still quite powerful overall. Once awakened though, the ability gains even more power: it also applies passive disable for 3 turns and grants an extra turn to a max of two allies. This is extremely good, but still could definitely be countered. So far, he's very easy to counter if you have the right setup. So, let's look at his passive, Seven Angels, Seven Demons. This grants Moonchild immunity to all effects (aside from Bounty Hunter Eddie's weird stun passive, but whatever), and prevents enemies from hitting him unless it's a perfect hit. That seems completely manageable, no? Well, at Max Awakening it becomes the worst addition to the game. Moonchild's passive essentially is an silence on all enemies that cannot be cleansed, meaning only basic attacks can be used. Now, all of this goes away if you kill him, right? Well, easier said than done considering Moonchild's talisman slots of all purple. This means he can equip Labyrinth talismans, some of the worst and most annoying talismans in the game. These talismans are designed to turn Assassin class characters into tanks, which wouldn't be a problem if you weren't immune to any effects placed on you. In addition, Moonchild's passive just makes the game more boring; why design cool ability animations and fury animations to just have them be silenced by this little kid. To be fair, things have gotten a bit better in the arena, but it's still shitty facing off against this little brat. Taking all of this into account, we also see how the devs have kinda realized how much of a mess-up Moonchild was, and have been frantically releasing new characters all with the intention of specifically countering the little shit. It's annoying as hell that all of the new characters don't get to have cool abilities or unique mechanics because Moonchild needs a thousand different ways to be stopped. He was designed poorly, and I'm not even sure where I would begin to suggest changes. I legitimately do not know what would make him still fun to use while keeping him from being necessary to place high in arena. If you have suggestions, definitely leave them below.

So overall, what do I think of 2019 for Legacy of the Beast? Well, I believe a lot of the content that was implemented was good in theory and I really liked some of the new creative ideas, such as Oni Eddie and his Empowered Blade. However, I think that Awakening as a mechanic has lead to a new gate to keep new players from catching up without paying money; you will only be able to efficiently farm for Awakening materials and characters if you already have a few of the Awakened characters. Otherwise, it's a lot more difficult. Cosmic talismans are similar, and even worse due to the random aspect of it. I do believe however that 2019 was overall good, but there were just some really unfortunate decisions made by the developers. I hope that going forward, the devs listen to us on the forums a bit more with certain suggestions; I think it'll make everyone happier in the long run. What did you guys think of 2019?

[Galactic Cosmos]

Well, you covered a lot of everything here, I’ll give ya that. I do agree on the whole Moonchild situation and what has resulted from it. His passive is amazing when he’s fighting for you but it is annoying when going against if you don’t have Quantum’s and a couple of good toons on the team, I’m 100% agreeing on that. You did forget to mention that two characters have been given something we all have been wishing for, but not exactly in the way we were expecting: Talisman Disabling! Sure it’s only a handful of sets (and it was added this year of 2020), but it’s a start. I did find it amusing about the rant of Moonchild, I agree on most parts. You did do a good job, well done.

You did forget one thing that’s the most important part here:

Tiny Tim needs to be Awakened.

-GC

[Ydex]

Amazing write-up. I would add one thing: all of the dungeons now remember what team you used last time.

[Olevipoeg]

Amazing write-up. I would add one thing: all of the dungeons now remember what team you used last time.
Not really. If you use multiple devices then changing device will clear remembered team.

[Discordian]

Fantastic writeup GrimDusk. I'll just add a few thoughts of my own:

Moonchild could easily be fixed by changing tali slots (as you pointed out) to something that disallows Labs. What I don't understand is that Lucifer, a comparatively wimpy toon that's basically garbage in PvP, has *ALL* of his talisman slots picked out - 4 purple, 2 yellow - and you have very little choice. Meanwhile, Moonie can wear labs, Babylons, etc... seems a little absurd when you think about it.

The other thing that I think that the developers really didn't focus on, especially in the latter half of the year, is making the game accessible to new players. And I don't think this is a minor problem. When someone joins a game like this, they're obviously not expecting to the start with all the top toons, top talismans, etc. However, at this point - with awakened toons, so many toons being added to the frontier store (which seems daunting to a new player when FCs are slow in coming), and so on - I think that any new player is going to get a grasp of the game, and say "this is fun"! And then they're going to realize exactly how far behind they are, that they won't feel after months of casual (ie, not paying boatloads of real life $$$) play that they can catch up, and they're gonna say "LotB? Fuck this shit! Banging my head against a cinderblock!"

Let's just use Dark Lilith as an example, since she's arguably the most necessary toon for PvE, and almost as necessary as Moonie to PvP. For a brand new player to attain DL, they're going to have to buy 5 LoLs in the frontier store - each one priced at 2,500 FCs. They're then going to have to get their hands on the materials to awaken said toons. Then they're going to have to run LoL XI-XV 100 times with each. Finally they get Dark Lilith - who they have to awaken as well.

A new player who isn't attached to the game is going to do the math, and realize that even if they bought some entry-level real life money purchases - the ironite daily drip pack, for example - it would take them months, if not an entire year, to get their hands on this toon - which is almost necessary to be competitive. Facing that, I reckon that most players aren't going to have time to get obsessed with the game enough to put in the time and effort.

This is clearly problematic. There's obviously attrition every week as people lose interest; in order to maintain momentum, the game needs to attract new players. Effectively putting so many necessary things behind a paywall (because you can't run tons of LoL frontier keys without tons of ironite), is telling new players to sod off and do something else.

Which despite the great graphics, epic soundtrack, mostly good community (with some whiny turds aside), great playability (when we actually get new dungeons that are fun), exciting release schedule - is going to kill this game. We're down to what - someone floated the figure ~15K daily players now? In a year, I'd be surprised if that's much over 5K without something done to bring new blood in.

And this is speaking to someone who came in to the game early in 2019. If I'd have started the game after the LoL Mega Event, I'd have played through the end of Night City, said "What's Next?", taken a look at, for example, getting Dark Lilith... and set the game down.

Just something for the developers to consider before they focus on making things even more topheavy for those already at the top.

[waymo]

I've been playing over 2 years & still don't have dark lilith but I haven't spent a penny on the game so i don't expect to get the best toons. I do ok tho with what I've got. I refuse to spend real money on a game as buggy as this

[Beddie]

I’d say 2019 was the year the game made the leap from a simple game to a long form RPG (Hopefully it can go from a meh one to a great one)

[GrimDusk]

So a few things here: one, thank you all for being civil in your discussion here. Second, I agree with your points. The game has indeed shifted further away from new player accessibility, and it may kill the game if the devs aren’t careful with what they add. Dark Lilith is a good example, because she and Lucifer are the hardest toons to get in the game (Lucifer’s kinda bad though). As for moonchild, changing talisman slots could work, but there are other talismans that could make him just as annoying. If you made it all blue, or even 2 blue and a purple, he can equip celestial talismans. Make it yellow, he can equip Valhalla or light talismans. Red, viper talismans. Green would be the only difficult one, as most of the good green talismans are sub par to the other colors. In addition, his passive just drains all fun from the game. Why would you not want us to do the super cool stuff all the characters can do?

[MuzakMaker]

My biggest gripe (aside from some very poor interactions with a certain CS member) is that on the onset this was a game where everything was attainable through hard work and time. Money was only used as a way to expedite progress. If you only spent your naturally occurring resources you could still get everything after a while.

Now we are seeing character specific talismans that are only available during events that if you're lucky will only require you to drain from a premium resource like ironite or frontier coins. For a lot of players (and all new players) these will only be available through paying.


Improvements we need for 2020

More Inventory Slots
No more event specific anything (a delay between events and adding to the long term method is fine like we saw with Gangland Eddie)
No more long term souls/keys that look the same for colour blind players



I would also just like to add, I know I'm in the minority but I am still consistently getting server disconnects. No where near as bad as late last year where it was stealing resources (still waiting for the 230 ironite that was stolen) but still enough that is happening every few runs. I can no longer grind over night which luckily the past few events haven't required.

[GrimDusk]

It's less event specific as much as it is that we can't possibly know when they will come back. Cyborg Talismans might only come back next Cyber Monday, but who knows?

[Ydex]

So a few things here: one, thank you all for being civil in your discussion here.

Cheers. How about we make 2020 the year for being cool with each other? I'm toasting to that-- with a spicy red bull (red bull + fireball :p). I've made some comments on the forum, in jest, but if they contributed to any rancor, I feel regret. Everyone here is someone we could make friends with IRL, given the right circumstances. This is a great community, and I'm happy to be here with ALL of you.

[rags-6094]

I’ve read everything before this post and agree with most of it.
I was one of the unlucky ones that walked away from the Dark Lilith /Lucifer introduction event with neither, I had to do precisely what Discordian has described already, purchase every lord of light with fc and then spend the gold awakening them. I completed the challenges all except running Lucifer through the higher level dungeon fully awakened.

I picked up Lucifer about 3 days ago, so that should give you all a rough idea of what to expect if you going for it time wise..
I can’t remember when they introduced them 6 months ago? 9 months ago?
I still managed to be competitive in arena without them though I will admit I’m not driven to finish as high tier as I used to, but that said, the arena high end finishers pool is much bigger now than it was 12 months ago...

If your thinking about having a go, I say do it! You can do it! If you haven’t got all the resources you need right now don’t worry there’s plenty of time, you’ll gather stuff along the way!
I do spend a little on the game but only for ironite that helps me keep going everything else you can gather as you go.

It’s a hell of a grind but then the prize at the end is worth it! Don’t be put off by nay sayers, just take good advice from the pool of forum members here and in your clans and Lilith and Lucifer will be yours... good luck on your mission...!

[MuzakMaker]

It's less event specific as much as it is that we can't possibly know when they will come back. Cyborg Talismans might only come back next Cyber Monday, but who knows?

I thought they had said that these talismans weren't coming back. Even if they do eventually come back, by that point the meta will have moved long past their use (if they were even useful in the first place).

I guess the real thing I hate is events used to introduce long term goals and now that focus has switched to "Get it before it's gone and when we do bring it back it will be pointless".

[Beddie]

I picked up Lucifer about 3 days ago, so that should give you all a rough idea of what to expect if you going for it time wise..
I can’t remember when they introduced them 6 months ago? 9 months ago?

They were introduced in late August (Lilith was September and Lucifer was October)

[Beddie]

Also where’s the Eternal Encounter event?

[Ydex]

I had just started playing during the Lords of Light mega-event, but I didn't understand what events were, and I think I spent my Fallen Angel souls fragments on random items in the shop. I'm glad I missed it. Not having that 6-month drain of resources has allowed me to stay current in the meta rather than playing catch up. I don't have any LoLs (bought Alex Ed and KP with FC), but I am able to Max every new awakenable that is released. I don't have Charlotte, but I spend all my IC on Relics. I'm able to auto every dungeon that comes out, and I'm finishing above 4,000 in PvP.

If I started now and spent 6 months trying to get Lilith, I'd miss out on a dozen new characters that will be more important to staying current. I'm fine with where I'm at and I don't think anybody needs to do the Lilith grind.

[drrchmnd]

I will agree with this pretty much all the way. Just got a couple of things to add to it.

The following statement is in the description on the Google Play site. I am also gonna bet its in the apple description also.

Why is Iron Maiden: Legacy of the Beast free to play?
We want every Iron Maiden fan and every mobile gamer to be able to enjoy our game! You can fully enjoy the game without ever spending a penny! Battle it out and earn every element of the game through sheer victory on the battlefield, or speed up progress by purchasing Ironite in the Vault.

Unfortunately this statement is no longer true. There are aspects of the game that the only method of completion is to pay for it. Until they put in auto purchase/sell/key redemption (etc) features so we can buy SoT, sell junk talisman, and continue on in XXX key restricted dungeon so the game can play itself there are going to be a lot of grind events that people will not complete. And isn't the point of a game to have fun even if it is work? Not to be going how do I manage to complete this task that task while there is this task and so on ad nauseam.

I will agree that there are some real issues surrounding specific characters and how they are being used in PvP (ie arena). When we are talking about gauntlet and PvE that is another story completely. Gauntlet has its own set of issues that are more related to craptastic code and code implementation than anything else. Basically how talisman implementation takes place and rampant AI cheating. Which also includes how talisman (and character passives) interact with each other and cause some very interesting secondary effects that are not supposed to happen. PvE yeah there are issues but that almost always goes back to talisman and passive interaction issues. With exceptions like not paying attention to what brave talisman on two characters might cause to happen or D Lilith managing to revive herself about 10 times or watching a character get an extra 10+ turns or... I think you get the idea. And yes most of what I just said also happens in Arena and Gauntlet also. A good chunk of the issues that happen in the game are well intended character traits that are not completely thought through. No character should have a 100% affect or trait because it causes things to break. And as far as I am concerned 50% is seriously pushing it especially if it can keep re-triggering itself. Which is where a diminishing rate of re-triggering should come in to play.


Back to the PvP or Arena issues. I have been thinking about this for awhile and I have commented on this a few times. As far as the changes I am suggesting below the only place I would want to see this implemented is in the Arena, everything else would stay the same.

I am in favor of a complete Arena rebuild. As it is Arena is not able to be won by anyone and everyone. About the only way to win is to have a team of top echelon characters and talisman. Yes there is a time and SoW commitment in there along with other things that I am forgetting and just not mentioning. Toss in the lovely arena event that we just had and its even more annoying. So yeah I think Arena needs to be completely rebuilt in a manner that actually levels the playing field out a bit. There isn't a way to completely level it out nor should there be. People who invest the $ and time etc should be able to reap the benefits of such investments. But it should be set up so those of us who can invest the time, SoW, have a competent team, have the ability to counter top echelon teams, and a bit of luck can beat it. It should be a strategy type item not a I have the impossible to beat talisman and characters.

Back in the beginning of the game the characters were set up with a point value (I don't know if this has been removed or not because I can't see it). I don't think I ever encountered a situation where I had a team that had more points than I could field. Which makes me think that this point or value assignment to characters wasn't really for the main story but for when the Arena was introduced.

I would like to see this brought back into play specifically for the Arena. Where you can only field a team that has a combined value of X points. Using the first post in this thread as an example BHE with M Fortune, D Lilith(maxed), MChild (maxed). Lets say this is the current top echelon team. You wouldn't be able to use it because your points would be over. Lets say 25 points is a top tier character. BHE, Lilith and MChild would definitely fit the bill here. MFortune might be a tier 2 with a value of 20 points. That would give us 95 points on this team. So where should the line be as far as team point value? With 4 characters that would be a max of 100 points but it would be all top tier and not change anything. How about 80 points. That allows you to have 2 tier 1 for 50 points and 30 points to round things out. Or 1 tier 1 (25) with 2 tier 2 (40) and 1 tier 3 (15). Or any other combination of 80 points.

This would help immensely in evening things out but lets take it one set further.

A point set up for talisman. Same basic concept as above. The only difference would be in having 2 point totals. One for the character and one for the team overall. Tier 1(20) would be things like Starfire and Labyrinth. Tier 2(15) would be more like Orbit and Venom. Tier 3 (10) along the lines of necropolis. Tier 4(5) say comet, lightning, explosive. Tier 5 (0) would be health, holy, endure and such. With an arena max of 25 points per character and 80 per team. This won't eliminate all of the more annoying talisman combinations at all but it would eliminate some. Especially when things like Angel start showing up as a cosmic talisman. (Labyrinth and Angel is very annoying in my opinion.)

Can also outright eliminate specific combinations of talisman in the Arena. If this talisman is worn this one can't be etc..

Another item that could also be tossed into the mix is add some negative aspects. And this is where I think one of the biggest fails has happened. With very few exceptions (characters and talisman) there are no negative effects generated by talisman or character combinations. How to make the labyrinth talisman a questionable item to use is simple. Add a clause to it that there is a 10% failure rate where all attacks hit you and cause 50% more damage than normal. Or say The Prisoner and The Alchemist despise each other and if used on the same Arena team it lowers the entire teams atk and magic by 25%.


Basically the wtf to do with new players is the million dollar question. It is also one of the absolute hardest to address and can cause a LOT of animosity within a player base. Think about it like starting out brand new in WOW. How in the hell do you catch up with people that have been playing for 15+ years? Answer is you don't until you have put in a lot of time and such. But they can use that because of the amount of content in the game that will take a new player a long time to play through. My understand is there are also a number of methods of catching up to a point are there but thats all I can say. The biggest issue is the problem of what do you do after you have done everything in the game? I.e. endgame problems. With WOW the answer is release another update with a new story line with new quests etc etc etc. Change the player dynamics and allow for a higher level cap and add in new and unique abilities that only max lvl characters can access and so on and so forth. And yes I know that the lvl cap is being squished in WOW with the update this year.

Unfortunately I don't think anyone at NF/Navigator/50cc really has put any real thought into it. Because if they had we might have 3 or 4 new worlds opened up along with additional story lines and a game that doesn't crash servers. In a nut shell the only thing it appears they are looking at is the immediate (short term) financial aspect of it. When you change screens and a pop up appears EVERY TIME trying to sell you some pack or another it makes ya wonder.

A new player can not compete in the Arena effectively. They story line play through for most new players will end at Night City because they probably won't be able to play through it because they won't have the right characters to do so. So literally 2-3 months after picking the game up they are going to put it down unless they really really like it. And they have the $ to burn to allow them to catch up.

Basically what did NF/Navi do when there wasn't anything left to do was release endgame content. The lets see if we can squeeze a few more months out of the game if people spend money on some of this stuff. Lather, Rinse, Repeat. At this point in time there is NO game other than a cycle of endless grind and repetitious monthly quests. With the end result being the same 2-4 new characters with a new talisman or 2 and the same exact issues from one month to the next.

What do they need to do to fix this is simple but expensive for them. Pretty much they need to put everything on hold for a few months. Rebuild the game and correct the myriad issues that plague game play. Chart out a story line direction for where they are going to go for the next year which has to include opening up 2-3 new worlds. Realize there has to be a balance between end user content and enabling new players to advance to become end users. Put an effective PvP environment together that allows anyone to win it not just end users with all the toys.

And enough about me... So how yall doing?

[MuzakMaker]

stuff about team point values in the arena


I made a comment in another thread about this. I would love to see team point values come back in to play. I personally would go a step further and only have one point maximum combined for characters and talismans.

Simplified example

Want to use four powerful characters and 4 powerful talisman sets. Too bad.

Let's say you can only have 3 top tier of anything. Now you have to think do I want top tier characters with mediocre talismans, 3 mediocre characters with 3 top tier talisman sets, or maybe some combination like 1 powerful character with a top tier talisman plus a top tier character with mediocre talisman or vice versa.

Not only will this drive more strategy for arena it will also break up the monotony of seeing the same thing in all 10 slots of your attack list.

[drrchmnd]

I made a comment in another thread about this. I would love to see team point values come back in to play. I personally would go a step further and only have one point maximum combined for characters and talismans.

Simplified example

Want to use four powerful characters and 4 powerful talisman sets. Too bad.

Let's say you can only have 3 top tier of anything. Now you have to think do I want top tier characters with mediocre talismans, 3 mediocre characters with 3 top tier talisman sets, or maybe some combination like 1 powerful character with a top tier talisman plus a top tier character with mediocre talisman or vice versa.

Not only will this drive more strategy for arena it will also break up the monotony of seeing the same thing in all 10 slots of your attack list.


Strategy is exactly what is missing in arena. For all I care make the opposing teams talisman visible. But yeah 3 top tier char with 2 or 3 top tier talisman and forced to use a total gimp that might actually get in your way? Priceless.

Biggest reason I am for a dual point set up is to make it hard to have 3 top tier chars with top tier talisman. 2 top tier and talisman with 2 other mid tier and good talisman sure. 3 top tier char with 2 top tier talisman and the rest mid or lower sure... Anything to cause a person to have to change up the set up. And even better it would almost force you to change up the setup for each battle.

[Blazpheme]

Well said.

There has definitely been a lot of stuff happening this past year, so much that it bordered on overwhelming at times. Still, I mostly enjoyed playing through new dungeons, earning new characters, and learning the ins-and-out of all the new features. More importantly, some of the new characters and talismans I acquired finally enabled me to access and complete areas of the game I was still struggling with before (it is laughable to me now remembering how much I struggled with Brave New World).

I have also had my share of frustrations, but missing out on Dark Lilith is probably the top of my list. Now I find myself staring down that long corridor of achievements needed to earn her outright, and I get the feeling that it would be best not to tread there. I don't even have all 5 Lords of Light yet, let alone being able to fully awaken them all. The amount of materials I would need are just staggering at my playing level. Sure, I have been buying relics and doing all of the maximizing of characters and talismans as I can, but I just seem to have a hard time in some of the Frontier Dungeons. I mean, I do okay, but not efficiently enough to rack up the number of runs to make it worthwhile.

Which brings me to the Moonchild issue...

Now I know that there is a good amount of scorn that has been poured on this poor lad, but it mostly seems to be coming from people whose focus is on the Arena and Gauntlet areas. Yes, he is a miserable little bugger to deal with as an opponent - there's no denying that - but I really don't focus too much on the arena. The arena is but one aspect of the game, and initially it was kinda fun taking on human-generated teams (there would always be some very creative combos that were actually fun to attempt). Now, it just seems like the same dozen or so characters and sneaky talisman sets keep popping up over and over. So I really only hit the arena if there's an event, or if I'm looking to try out new stuff. Don't get me wrong, I am impressed by what it takes for a player to battle their way to the top. I just know that I could never attain that, so the arena is just not something I focus on...

That said, the Moonchild instead represents an opportunity to get further in my game. Maybe now I can hit some of the Frontier Dungeons, and start working towards some of these long-term achievement characters. With Moonchild, I can get more than 10 runs in the Trooper Dungeon for each key (which is how poorly I did the first time I attempted it). Hell, some of these Dungeons might even be a cakewalk with that faux-hawked Swiss Army knife. So for me, I would rather not see him wussified in any way - I'm going to need his punk ass to help carve out any real progress in the game.

And thanks for the Echo cosmic talisman tip, sounds nasty - I am definitely going to try that out...

[GrimDusk]

If you aren't looking at Arena and Gauntlet, sure, Moonchild isn't an issue because you won't encounter him anywhere. However, there are a few issues on that end as well. Moonchild's design has affected how the devs have been actively changing the game as a whole. For instance, The Alchemist's Awakened passive. This ability is solely balanced around the idea of countering characters like Moonchild; disabling Labyrinth talismans and inflicting passive disable. Rather than have interesting mechanics similar to Oni Eddie's Empowered sword, we got something that is very niche in design. True, talisman disable is really interesting, but it's still very specific in its uses. The devs have seemingly focused away from actually interesting new things in the game in order to fix the problem that is Moonchild. His release has caused a rift across the entire game. In addition, there are characters that are better for farming than Moonchild if you really need him to get through frontier dungeons.

[scott-5496]

Some really great points raised here and I largely agree with them all - some ace ideas on points systems for example. It may be a step too far - what is top tier, middle, bottom etc that will take ages to figure out as it changes on each new character release.

I still largely feel that nerfs are not of any use at all unless something is broken. I do not think Moonchild is broken - he does what he is supposed to. For me if players spend a lot of time/resources/real money to get him top top tier awajen then they should not in any way suffer from a nerf. Mine is not there yet but is one step away. if I spent all my gold and ironite or awaken souls to get him to the top then he should stay as he is, all powers in tact and no nerf at all. That goes for any character that is out p do not nerf unless they are actually broken in some way as that is fraud to me. Why pay all that resources out just to lose its worth? It makes no sense at all even if, like now I am on the receiving end in arena if I face off against him at full awaken, or Best for that matter - they are both doing what they were designed to do and will eventually face a new character or talisman that stops them being the must have....that is the way of this game to me. Power spread week after week, character after character and tally after tally - it cannot or will not change.

I know how much time and effort I spent getting Lucy and Lilly - if they were nerfed I would be annoyed as spent ages and resources getting them. In no way should any of these characters be nerfed - in fact I agree with some that Lucy needs buffed - he is not that great at the moment.

I also think the game loot needs revised up the way - we need to see increases in sands coming out way to catch up with the massive rise in sands commitments required to play. Same for awaken drops and ironite drops - both need to be boosted in line with changing game requirements - as others have said, it is the same for slots for tallies and characters - they need to increase each month to keep up with what is being put out each month. That is just so basic a requirement and cant believe it takes this long to address.

I generally like the inclusion of all of the different dungeons. These test skills and rosters and also often help to use old allies - I think we could go further down the line and make really tough limits on them though - 1 star based for example, 2 star and so on as then everyone is more likely to be able to have a chance at them. One other thought I had on making them different is to have different routes to victory - not sure we have seen that yet but have a routing in the dungeon - maybe two routes or three that trigger based on doing something in a certain way or by using a certain approach. For example if we can use a points system - have an easier route for lower points based teams and then a route for mid level and so on - so kind of like normal/medium/hard but giving different options in the same dungeon - it could be using an all magus team does something or a certain talisman - might be too complicated though but I see something like a normal level being maybe a 1 star team based thing, then a 2 star etc - some class or star limits kind of like Gangland for example. Maybe link this to awakening - have variants of each dungeon and have each one tied to a awakening brick colour and only that colour?

Anyway, the main thing for me is there are less server issues - that was a pain in the ass and for me it is mostly a load better than it was.

[Galactic Cosmos]

Remember when they put in the Eternal Dungeon? That’s what most of us on my server assume it was.

[Volrath]

Glad to see a post like this. I agree with just about all of it.

I want to talk a bit about Awakening. I like the potential it has to make older characters relevant again. I was delighted to hear Horus was joining the club as I once used him constantly. He was a valuable ally in Night City but newer and more OP characters came along. So I'm glad to see him ascend.

However, here's the problem. I've awakened several characters but I haven't gone past the first awakening with any of them. I could if I put my mind to it, but it's SO much grinding, SO much ironite and SO much gold to pull it off. Plus, after the excitement of the first upgrade, the second Awakening is usually just a small stat boost. Seriously? I know that once you max out, you can get some insane abilities but come on. If I'm going to spend millions of gold and melt my phone trying to get those damn one-star awakening shards, I need more than just a little jump in ATK. The process needs to be scaled better, imo.

As far as Moonchild goes, he can be infuriating in the arena but my Moonchild is also kicking some serious ass in Gauntlet, so I'm not sure I want him nerfed too hard.

Clans are nice. Even if they never got upgraded, it's a welcome stream of currency that you can get some pretty awesome stuff with.

I actually like most of the events. Most. I really don't care for the "spend all your resources" events. The "grind 24/7 for weeks to get a palette-swapped Eddie" ones are iffy too, although I really enjoy seeing new dungeons. On that note, the Frontier key dungeons are okay. Most of them are too aggravating to run hundreds of times but once in a while, sure.

For the love of God, please do something about the ioS issues. Having people locked out for hours after a new update is fuckin' ridiculous. And I'm sorry, I don't really buy the idea that it's 100% Apple's fault.

On the whole, I enjoy the game very much. It can be aggravating but it's still a lot of fun. Up the irons.

[Storm]

Some really great points raised here and I largely agree with them all - some ace ideas on points systems for example. It may be a step too far - what is top tier, middle, bottom etc that will take ages to figure out as it changes on each new character release.

I still largely feel that nerfs are not of any use at all unless something is broken. I do not think Moonchild is broken - he does what he is supposed to. For me if players spend a lot of time/resources/real money to get him top top tier awajen then they should not in any way suffer from a nerf. Mine is not there yet but is one step away. if I spent all my gold and ironite or awaken souls to get him to the top then he should stay as he is, all powers in tact and no nerf at all. That goes for any character that is out p do not nerf unless they are actually broken in some way as that is fraud to me. Why pay all that resources out just to lose its worth? It makes no sense at all even if, like now I am on the receiving end in arena if I face off against him at full awaken, or Best for that matter - they are both doing what they were designed to do and will eventually face a new character or talisman that stops them being the must have....that is the way of this game to me. Power spread week after week, character after character and tally after tally - it cannot or will not change.

I know how much time and effort I spent getting Lucy and Lilly - if they were nerfed I would be annoyed as spent ages and resources getting them. In no way should any of these characters be nerfed - in fact I agree with some that Lucy needs buffed - he is not that great at the moment.

I also think the game loot needs revised up the way - we need to see increases in sands coming out way to catch up with the massive rise in sands commitments required to play. Same for awaken drops and ironite drops - both need to be boosted in line with changing game requirements - as others have said, it is the same for slots for tallies and characters - they need to increase each month to keep up with what is being put out each month. That is just so basic a requirement and cant believe it takes this long to address.

I generally like the inclusion of all of the different dungeons. These test skills and rosters and also often help to use old allies - I think we could go further down the line and make really tough limits on them though - 1 star based for example, 2 star and so on as then everyone is more likely to be able to have a chance at them. One other thought I had on making them different is to have different routes to victory - not sure we have seen that yet but have a routing in the dungeon - maybe two routes or three that trigger based on doing something in a certain way or by using a certain approach. For example if we can use a points system - have an easier route for lower points based teams and then a route for mid level and so on - so kind of like normal/medium/hard but giving different options in the same dungeon - it could be using an all magus team does something or a certain talisman - might be too complicated though but I see something like a normal level being maybe a 1 star team based thing, then a 2 star etc - some class or star limits kind of like Gangland for example. Maybe link this to awakening - have variants of each dungeon and have each one tied to a awakening brick colour and only that colour?

Anyway, the main thing for me is there are less server issues - that was a pain in the ass and for me it is mostly a load better than it was.

Agree with all. Above all about Moonchild. I'm fighting my way in arena with a non maxed Moonchild an I can't wait for him to be fully awakened. If when I get it they are going to nerfe him, you bet I'll feel really frustrated and angry. I'm sure there's a lot of players in my situation.
Too much resources wasted awakening a character to see him nerfed.
And that takes me to the other point. It would be greatly appreciated if the devs put events to gain gold. Awakening a char is too expensive. That's the reason why I can't fully awaken my Moonchild and my Cyborg Eddie.
Thanks for reading and sorry for my English.
Up the Irons 🤘