EvilGeko

2 days to unlock a slot;
6 days to an common;
10 days to an uncommon.

A little over two months to get uncommons in each slot.

That's at the 10:10 conversion rate.

It's only the rares and above that become difficult. You get a significant amount of the flavor of the Incarnate abilities at the uncommon level.

For someone who refuses to do the trials, that's not that bad.

Every 20 hours, 10 shards can convert to 10 threads. You can take a 50% penalty to do it more often.

I do not recommend that they create costume unlocks, but if they do, they should be for the character only.

Which is the whole point. When people complain how long it takes to get this stuff, I just shake my head. You aren't ever supposed to be finished. This system is so awesome because you can be making progress all the time. Even if you have a preferred power in each slot, you can get the others and there's reasons for doing so. Especially with Interface and Destiny.

Reading a couple of paragraphs in an UI is hard?

Doing a trial once in awhile is "grinding"? OK. Let's suffice it to say that I don't see it that way. And for whom is doing a 30 min. BAF trial "not an option" ever?

It is when it's supplemented by an occasional trial.

This. There's some kinks to work out, but I'm having a ton of fun.

The devs have never been against repeating interesting and difficult content. That's not farming a TV map of family for purples.

In other games it's not uncommon for raids to take months for hardcore guild groups to complete. Groups whose members have requirements for gear, raid participation and even try out for their slots. Both BAF and Lambda were completed by PUGs on the first day. If that's not inclusive I don't know what is.

I agree, I don't know what the devs are thinking. It's not like in the comics heroes join in these huge groups to combat major threats.









Wait what?

If you don't like it don't do it. It's not like the trials are the only content is Issue 20. The game that existed on Monday is still there. If you enjoyed that, then I don't understand what's changed to create this much ire.

Aren't 50% of the tasks in this issue for non-incarnates? How does that constitute 'mostly'?

It might help if you honestly described the issue to her. First off, everyone counts up the thread only cost of the very rares in each slot and then proclaims DOOM! Ignoring that in the process of earning those threads you'll be earning Empyrean merits and Astral Merits and direct components which shorten the process considerably. For example, in my first two successes I got a very rare and a rare. Now, of course, that's very lucky and I don't expect that all the time, but those two drops have literally removed hundreds of threads from your total above.

Adding to that, everyone focuses on the very rare powers without an appreciation of the fact that the very rares are intended to be a long term goal. Further, none of those slots offer really major advantages over their rare counterparts. Getting to rares isn't nearly as difficult as its made out to me and that gets you 75%-85% of the power of that slot.

The trials are more difficult than standard content and provide rewards that are equally strong. That's enough justification right there.

In any event, the trials are simply the most efficient way to earn the rewards, they aren't the sole means to.

That's not exactly true. The enemies do have more HP and hit harder, but there is also a level of coordination and strategy that's not present in other content.

Yes, there's a substantial amount of "gear check" to Lambda (much less so BAF), but it's much much more paying attention. The biggest problem with Lambda for instance is making sure that people use the darn temp powers or passing them on to someone who will.

The Incarnate trials can be completed by a team without even having the rare Alpha. I know this for a fact.

Being IOed to the gills doesn't necessarily make these trials easier. Perseverance and practice count for significantly more.

Actually you will get a rare with eight successful runs. I know people want their very rares, but they really need to start looking at that as a long term goal.

In a few weeks, people will be running Lambda and BAF together in less than an hour.

I didn't answer you because I agree to a certain extent. Masterminds depend on pets who are too squishy for most of this content. Pet A.I. is not capable of making the decisions needed during the trial to be effective.

I suspected this would happen. Pets (except ones like PA which are invincible), and raids are troublesome. It's usually OK when you have tight control over ONE pet like in other MMORPGs, but it's much more difficult here when characters are running around with multiples.

One of the Nictus attacks is auto-hit.

That's a very good description of Lambda. The game is pushing back a bit folks on this content. It gets easier. If you really don't feel like you can handle it come back in two weeks once others have built up their slots and know the strategies. Listen to them and you'll do fine.