User blog:DutchRits/Character Card Comparison, Part 5

I'll begin my discussion of the Event/Episode SR Cards with the first three events: Harvest of The Insecticons, Day of the Dinobots (Part 1) and Robots in the Sky. There are two reasons I'm discussing these three events separately from the rest:

1) They begin the stat deviation from the trend of MTM tiers I discussed in the previous installments (,, , and ) by dramatically increasing the stats of the SR and R cards.  (Note: I will go back to  to better define a few key phrases I've been using)

2) Up until Covert Operations they were the only events to feature R cards as Raid & Reward Cards.

The Events/Episodes are special Events in TF:Legends that help to break the "grind" of the campaign. Without going into detail, the idea is that there is a storyline introducing new cards, potentially "new" characters, and providing players a chance to compete against other players for some pretty spiffy rewards. "Raid Cards" are available on the Space Bridge as a random draw, and provide a stat bonus multiplier for the duration of the event, thus enabling your deck to do more damage. The end result is that you, as the player, should be able to acquire a few decent cards that build the overall power of your deck with a bit of work and dedication...or for a steep price on the Space Bridge. At the end of the event, even if you are a casual player you should have a decent chance for a reward, even if only Medals. You even receive Silver/Gold Medals during and after the event with which to draw cards in the hope of acquiring some of the elusive SR Space Bridge cards, which has the potential for Event Raid Cards, too. Yet after reading StarscreamG1 and Wardeal's  posts you'll see how all that good intention is absolutely destroyed by reality.

But before I cause you to stop reading, how 'bout we take a look at the cards for these events?

Harvest of the Insecticons

HotI brought Autobot Hound into the R Card club and boosted Mirage to a SR as Raid Cards for this event. However, Event Autobot Hound was the first indication that all was not right, MTM stat wise: his MTM stat total is nearly 2k points higher than Optimus Prime, the most powerful non-event R card! His attack power alone is ~700 points higher than Grimlock, who boasts the highest non-event R attack power. So clearly, his inclusion blows away the concept that the character cards have a "relative capabiliy" with the non-event cards. Their creation establishes an entirely new tiered system in which card power relates only to the power of a card from a similar tier in another event. In other words, the "standard" non-event cards are rendered obsolete. The reward R card (Event Kickback) follows suit, in that he becomes the most powerful Decepticon R card in the game, as of this event. Thus begins the concept of "deck creep" that will continue with each event. More on that later.

Event Mirage is another that breaks the mold, but for the SR cards. His MTM stat total of 49,360 is higher than Elite Megatron by 600 points, and he is easily the most powerful of the SR cards at the conclusion of this event, surpassing even Event Hardshell and Event Sharpshot in MTM stat totals. The ironic thing is that Hardshell and Sharpshot are two of the weakest cards in the game, which means that their event cards should have ranked at the bottom of the SR tiers if you were to maintain symmetry with the rest of the game (I guess Event Hardshell still fits that mold in a way, as his stat total puts him on par with Trypticon and a full 2k behind Elite Megatron, thus making him the weakest Event/Episode SR card, at the time). Likewise, Mirage should have placed somewhere in the SR high-Tier-1/low-Tier-2. I'll detail in a future post how Mobage could rebalance the cards to make them "fix" the game.

Day of the Dinobots (Part 1)

DotD(P1) followed the blueprint of HotI, introducing R & SR cards that immediately became the best in the game of their respective types. Additionally, it also provides the first real evidence of a systematic increase in card power in each event, thus rendering the Episode/Event cards obsolete within a mere 3-4 subsequent events. In the attached pic you will see an added field labeled "Diff. fm Prev." This is simple a subtraction of the MTM stat total of the previous event's card in the same Raid/Reward Tier from the current card. Here is what we can glean from this data:

Episode Dirge is in the same Raid Card "Event Tier" as Hound in HotI. However, his MTM stat total is 1,121 points higher than Hound's, and nearly 3k higher than the non-event Optimus Prime. Episode Sludge is quite a bit weaker than Dirge, but is still stronger (610 MTM points) than Kickback from HotI. Episode Thrust is 3,085(!) MTM Points stronger than Event Mirage even though they occupy the same Raid Card "Tier." Episode Snarl is nearly 3k stronger than Event Hardshell, and Episode Slug becomes the strongest card in the game (at the time) with an MTM stat total that is 4,769 points higher than his counterpart from HotI, Event Sharpshot. In short, Mobage took a broken concept and doubled-down on the deck creep factor.

Robots in the Sky

I started playing TF:L just after this event, so I missed out on some of my favorite characters. This event featured the last of the Raid/Reward Rare cards (Episode Cliffjumper, Episode Acid Storm and Episode Sunstorm) but it continued the aforementioned deck creep while adding an additional reward tier featuring another Rare card. From the table you can see that Cliffjumper is more than 2k stronger than Dirge (from DotD(P1)) while Episode Acid Storm gets a modest boost of 846 points over Episode Sludge. Episode Sunstorm did not have a counterpart in previous events, hence the blank cell. Episode Skywarp takes the biggest leap in tier power, jumping 7,904(!!) MTM points over Episode Snarl while Episode Thundercracker jumps 4,942 points over Episode Slug.

In case you haven't seen the pattern, in the span of three events there are now nine new SR cards that are all at least 1k MTM points higher than the most powerful non-event SR cards, and in some cases (I'm looking at you, Episode Thundercracker) are a full 10k stronger. What's worse, during the event the Raid Cards receive a stat bonus which is all but required if the player wants to keep pace with the competition for end-of-episode points placement, but those bonuses disappear at event end. While that's not an issue with these early events (the raid/reward cards are still clearly more powerful than any of the others) it can result in cards that don't even qualify for your team after the event, thus making some Reward Cards obsolete before you even get them. Or even worse, it cheapens the "reward" aspect of the Silver/Gold Medal draws, as the odds that you will receive a SR card is obscenely low and, should you get one, it still requires you to get the matching mode and weapon to make them reach their full potential...and they'll still be far less powerful than the event/episode cards.

I can only assume that players were simply happy to have such powerful event cards and didn't call the stat disparity into question. The player pool was much smaller then, too, and the impact was still rather confined to a small(er) community. However, beginning with Fatal Furies the Events/Episodes removed the Raid/Reward Rare cards resulting in six new SR cards being introduced in each event.

Bottom Line: Deck Creep is crazy evil. TF:L is quickly becoming unbalanced in favor of Event/Episode cards which are, in turn, becoming obsolete in subsequent events. Next: The Pre-UR Event SR Cards (i.e., Fatal Furies through Countdown to Extinction)