What could Heroes take from other gachas?

[Fabulously Olivier]

12 hours ago, Glennstavos said:

Do these other gacha games have orbs they could loan us? We could use more orbs these days.

I don't play other games like Heroes. I gave Dragalia Lost a shot but when I saw how much of a time investment it'd be to play, I gave it up. I spend enough time just keeping up with this game's regular events and bonuses, and this game actually has units I care about collecting.

I have to mirror this, except with added harshness.

 

Dragalia Lost is a waste of time. For all of the things it does right (leading to some to falsely call it more customer friendly than FEH), it's counterbalanced by 5 star exclusive dragons and wyrmprints being worthless to anyone but the whales (thanks to the merge system, capped levels when not at max merge, and the sheer excessive percentage of their power locked behind merges). 

 

Also, their event reward milestones are set so high that realistic progression (especially for those desirable weapon upgrades) are basically unobtainable for anyone who doesn't scrap every other game they play to endlessly repeat DL's boring raid events with no meaningful variation (ala FEH's Tempest Trials random enemy units) to provide any semblance of variety.

[Lewyn]

Waste of time that is a perfect phrase to describe how I view grinding.  There is more than enough in Heroes for people who enjoy this (or let's be honest they like the rewards, monotonous repeating same maps over and over is as tedious as it gets).  We have HM farming for feathers, one can go for rank in GC or TT+.  We have other ways to spend extra time like Chain challenges, squad assaults and Grandmaster tactic challenges.  

WHAT I HATE ABOUT OTHER GATCHAS.  I put that in capital to emphasize how strongly I feel about this.  Is frickin' time sinks where you have to grind for hours on a daily basis to get equipments, leveling or whatever stuff.  You aren't playing a game you are working a job for joke digital rewards rather than actual money.  Sorry I have a life, and people who have lives shouldn't be punished and forced to choose between wasting hours a day doing repetitive tasks to keep up.  Being able to grind for really can't miss/valuable resources would leave more casual players further behind, just cause they would rather listen to someone scratch a chalkboard than grind.

The only other gatcha I have played is SMT DX2 which I barely touch cause it is a super time sink.  Grind for brands (equipments) to get the best ones with the best properties, grind for mag a resource so you can fuse more demons, arena isn't a limited run but trying to get as many points so you want to be playing 24/7 if you can.  It is all just the biggest pile of dog crap in the world.  I haven't uninstalled it cause I enjoy playing the story chapters when they come out.

One of the best things about Heroes, is there mostly isn't this extreme time gated stuff.   Daily log in okay, not to hard to open the app once a day sometime.  When there is a GHB it lasts like a week (or 5 days can't remember) either way plenty of time.  Oh and if you don't complete it this run when it repeats you can still get those rewards for completing it.  What heroes should do is remove the other grindy aspects rather than add more.  Characters should arrive at level 40 and skills shouldn't cost SP to learn, if the character has/inherits them he/she can equip them.  Simple as that, and hey saves a bunch of time.  TT+, 1 run a day should be enough to get all the listed rewards (50k points) rather than needing 3 a day.  GC it shouldn't take more experience to gain levels as you go up.  Why I always stop at 20 cause it slows down so much not worth it to get 2 more orbs and a few coins.  

 

[Tree]

3 hours ago, Ice Dragon said:

It seems kind of silly to make a map scroll only 2 squares in each direction. If scrolling in implemented, I'd expect maps larger than Rival Domains maps to actually make it a worthwhile addition, but that kind of takes away from the compact, mobile feel that Heroes has going.

I think they could double the width of a RD map and implement horizontal scrolling if they don't want full scrolling. (I'd prefer full scrolling myself, but horizontal would be a decent compromise.) They could put a thin scrollbar at the bottom of the screen. This could be turned off in settings since you'd never actual need it, but it might help some players. An initial auto scroll across and back would remind players that it is a large map if they didn't pay attention to the description. This would have an option to disable also.

[Lord-Zero]

- Something similar to FGO’s Friend Gacha with a new currency to run it. That or the Sacred Coins. Most of the 1st year common units would be there at 1* and 2* rarities with the more recent ones at 3* which would be very, very rare. One free roll per day.

- Better writing. FE has a very large cast and the developers don’t take advantage of this. Since the game started, most of the added units’ reason to fight you comes down to “Hey, we’re under a contract by Embla/Múspell/Hel. Kick our butts, please”. Forging Bonds is a tiny step in the right direction but it needs to be...”beefier”. 

- Actual events. Just slapping 3-5 maps with some very short dialogue isn’t an event. 

- Better character interaction and I mean between each other especially if the newest unit happens to know an older unit you have and so on like...if you have Zephiel, Idunn would make a comment about him or even talk to him and vice versa. Characters mentioning something if they happen to be fielded on the same team with a character they know like Lucina going “Watch me, Father!” if she’s fielded with Chrom and so on. M!Corrin or Elise commenting on Spring Xander, Dorcas talking about FE6 Bartre, the Nohrian siblings and Garon, etc. 

 

Edited March 13, 2019 by Lord-Zero

[XRay]

10 minutes ago, Lord-Zero said:

- Actual events. Just slapping 3-5 maps with some very short dialogue isn’t an event. 

But that is the formula for Fire Emblem Heroes though. Basically almost everything is 1+ maps with short dialogues sprinkled through out. I do not think it is possible to create events without implementing the core structure of the game. While I do not mind having longer dialogue since I can always go back and read it, I definitely do not want any event that requires more than 5 to 7 maps per session. Tempest Trials is already annoying enough that I have to beat 7 maps in a row 3 times daily.

While I do not mind incorporating different videogame genres into the game like Tap Battles did, I am not sure if those events would pique my interest. I like Tap Battle because of the rewards, it offers a nice break/distraction, and it does not require me to be good at it, but I still dislike the rhythm games genre and I find it extremely boring after a song or two.

[Rezzy]

I've not actually played any other gacha, but I do like the idea of grindable modes where we could grind for feathers or other non-Orb (doubt they'd be that generous) Orbs.  HM is a start, but it's finite and once your unit is HM maxed, they no longer contribute in that regard.

[Rafiel's Aria]

I don't play FEH anymore. But that's mostly because I have migrated to other gacha games. Still lurk on the forums, keeping up with updates in case something catches my eye. I don't play any mainstream ones like Dragalia Lost or FGO, but I enjoy Knights Chronicle and Epic 7. Both have some major issues that stem from the fairly greedy companies that manage them, but despite this, I enjoy both of them.  

I'll put this little disclaimer here just in case. Both games have issues, some of them major. And I could be plenty critical about both, but I've picked out the elements that have made my experience with the games enjoyable. 

Spoiler

 

Both games have a guild system. You can join or create a guild. Participating in guild events/quests gets you extra rewards like items to enhance your characters. You can also use your guild's representative hero in KC to complete different dungons to obtain items/characters. For KC, I think this is the main reason I've played for as long as I have. I joined a great guild and ended up becoming part of a great community on Discord which actually encouraged me to play more. On E7, your guild leader/vice-leaders can buy buffs that last for 7 hours that give you additional EXP and gold when you farm. Both games have a guild war system that I have mixed feelings about, but that's mostly because I don't really enjoy PvP that much. 

I like how both games treat seasonal characters/alts. E7 hasn't done any seasonal banners yet. And I'm not sure they will. However, every alt they create is placed into a separate gacha from the main one, and they don't take the place of a new focus character for the main gacha. For example, last week, we got a new focus unit from the story. This week, we got two alts (a 4* and a 5*) who got placed into the separate Moonlight gacha while the current focus is still active. The downside is that you have to use a different currency, and it's much rarer. They've done limited unit banners as well, but they've been new characters so far. For alts/seasonal characters in KC, they have a costume system. Instead of pulling for a new unit, you can simply reskin the unit you already have by buying a costume with your currency. Normal costumes let you use in-game currency and allow you to boost your stats. However, you've gotta dish out actual money for "special costumes" that give your character different skills. Which sucks. But like I said, I'm focusing on the positive. 

Both games have some form of guaranteed focus unit. In KC, if you summon 7 times on a banner, you get to select one of the non-new focus units. If you summon 10 times, you get a ticket for the focus unit. So if you're smart with your saving, you can always get 2 focus units from a banner no matter what. The game also periodically gives away SSR tickets which is basically a random 5* unit. Every now and then, they'll do selector tickets you can grind for. I haven't even played this game for a year, and I've managed to get almost ever SSR unit. E7's system isn't nearly as generous, so I won't talk about it as much. It's actually pretty bad, but they do sell random 4-5* tickets you can purchase. On limited banners, they have a pity system, so if you're smart and save up enough currency, you can get the character. It's just a lot of currency. 

FEH sort of does free summons,  but basically every other game I follow does free daily summons. The rates are a little lower than focuses, but I mean...you can still get SSR or 5* units. I've gotten four free 5 stars on E7 and one from KC. 

In terms of story and character development, KC sucks, but E7 has done a fabulous job of creating a world and developing the people in it. And I'm not just talking about the main characters. Each new unit introduced gets a side story which usually develops not only the focus character but several characters related to them. We even got a special Valentine's event that was basically a choose your own adventure with unlockable endings. And it wasn't a dorky, "lol Spilled chocolate on this hawt guy, do I blush or slap him?" It was a story that followed an assassination attempt and political intrigue and aristocratic drama and allowed you to get to follow arcs for four girls involved in it. As a lady who enjoys some male fanservice, was I upset? Not one bit. The story was so good that I didn't care. Honestly, I could gush all day about the variety of characters and the interesting backstories and the beautiful designs. 

I will say that something FEH does well is adjusting its gacha. I can appreciate that it drops 5 star characters to 4 star rarities, and that they did the massive shift that one time. I would say that I also appreciate that FEH tries to buff old units, but both KC and E7 do that as well. 

 

 

[Medeus]

6 hours ago, Etheus said:

Also, their event reward milestones are set so high that realistic progression (especially for those desirable weapon upgrades) are basically unobtainable for anyone who doesn't scrap every other game they play to endlessly repeat DL's boring raid events with no meaningful variation (ala FEH's Tempest Trials random enemy units) to provide any semblance of variety.

As someone who plays the game very casually himself, unless you're trying to get every single little thing out of the event that's not true at all. In the previous event, all I needed to do to get the 5 Star Dragon was get 100 Silver Emblems, which between a decent enough team ran on the second level raid (which gave around 25 Emblems, probably more, but I'm lowballing it ) I was able to do in no more then five runs. Considering the event ran for 12 days, I could've played event that once per day and got him plus extra Blazon for pulls (meaning I could've gotten another of him), grinding material, more of the event wyrmprint, and whatever else offered. That's a pretty easy milestone for any player to obtain with little investment in the event, especially if they don't care for the higher level content like I do. 

That also doesn't include the boss, which all I did for it was send a team set on auto to kill it on a daily basis.

Edited March 14, 2019 by Medeus

[Arcphoenix]

3 hours ago, Lord-Zero said:

- Better character interaction and I mean between each other especially if the newest unit happens to know an older unit you have and so on like...if you have Zephiel, Idunn would make a comment about him or even talk to him and vice versa. Characters mentioning something if they happen to be fielded on the same team with a character they know like Lucina going “Watch me, Father!” if she’s fielded with Chrom and so on. M!Corrin or Elise commenting on Spring Xander, Dorcas talking about FE6 Bartre, the Nohrian siblings and Garon, etc. 

 

I really want this. Reminds me of Granblue’s cross-fate episodes which are always between two characters you possess. A cross-fate is a cutscene of sorts involving the the two characters spending time together, perhaps in conversation or training together. Each character receives a bonus after completion. I imagine this could translate to Dragon Flowers in FEH. I feel it’d best for characters from different games to share scenes. Map dialogue between certain units would be amazing as well. Granblue also apparently has something like this? VA is Japanese, so I have no idea what anyone is saying in battle myself

Edited March 14, 2019 by Arcphoenix

[NegativeExponents-]

10 hours ago, Etheus said:

Dragalia Lost is a waste of time. For all of the things it does right (leading to some to falsely call it more customer friendly than FEH), it's counterbalanced by 5 star exclusive dragons and wyrmprints being worthless to anyone but the whales (thanks to the merge system, capped levels when not at max merge, and the sheer excessive percentage of their power locked behind merges). 

Dragalia does have its problems but being able to merge things is not one of them. Not only does it take less copies to fully merge dragons/wyrmprints than it does to fully merge units in Heroes (5 copies in DL vs 11 in FEH) but Dragalia actually offers other means outside of the gacha to merge them (Golden Keys/Sunlight Stones) which are frequently offered as reward for events and can even be grinded for.

I mean, I can understand if you hate grinding but at least it offers you a way to eventually get the materials you need to improve units at your own pace as opposed to FEH where no matter how long you wait you won’t be able to go anywhere without the gacha which always has the chance of screwing you over and everything else not in the gacha is time gated behind terrible pvp modes which aren’t even actually pvp (though I do sorta like Aether Raids but it’s still not great)

Edit: I guess since I’m here I should have said what it is I would like for Heroes to learn from other gachas but it should be fairly obvious what i want Heroes to take from Dragalia and other gachas that do this: offer merges and skills outside of the gacha and have coins/stones/dew/etc be farmable instead of just time gated.

Edited March 14, 2019 by NegativeExponents-

[eclipse]

I think the daily rewards need to be upped.  100 feathers is a pittance.

Also, a little more community interaction would be nice.  DFFOO does a much better job of this!

[Ottservia]

14 hours ago, Lord-Zero said:

Better character interaction and I mean between each other especially if the newest unit happens to know an older unit you have and so on like...if you have Zephiel, Idunn would make a comment about him or even talk to him and vice versa. Characters mentioning something if they happen to be fielded on the same team with a character they know like Lucina going “Watch me, Father!” if she’s fielded with Chrom and so on. M!Corrin or Elise commenting on Spring Xander, Dorcas talking about FE6 Bartre, the Nohrian siblings and Garon, etc. 

 

There’s also the awakening trio and their parents/original selves(well for inigo and owain at least) there really are so many avenues to explore with this

[daisy jane]

19 hours ago, Etheus said:

I have to mirror this, except with added harshness.

 

Dragalia Lost is a waste of time. For all of the things it does right (leading to some to falsely call it more customer friendly than FEH), it's counterbalanced by 5 star exclusive dragons and wyrmprints being worthless to anyone but the whales (thanks to the merge system, capped levels when not at max merge, and the sheer excessive percentage of their power locked behind merges). 

 

Also, their event reward milestones are set so high that realistic progression (especially for those desirable weapon upgrades) are basically unobtainable for anyone who doesn't scrap every other game they play to endlessly repeat DL's boring raid events with no meaningful variation (ala FEH's Tempest Trials random enemy units) to provide any semblance of variety.

 

thanks for this. Dragila Lost is finally available in Canada, so i was like oh let me check it out but i mean I play FEH because i care about this franchise

 

i just feel (I don't play other gatchas at all)

I think just having more focus banners (even if it's like 3 days over the weekend or something) - for any kind of units/skills/abilities etc. (there are some units who NEVER have a banner, or are always colour blocked or something).  other things i know i've been (or people have said) can work. instant demotes or something etc. 

[Sylphid]

Seems like I'm not saying anything new but from the games I've played:

Granblue Fantasy: People were mentioning writing already, but since "writing quality" is annoyingly abstract, I'm diving slightly deeper into that. Their Fate Episodes (character specific mini story, can range from fixing deep emotional trauma across multiple episodes to making Valentine Day chocolates for the main character), Cross-Fate Episodes (Interation between two characters, sometimes completely unrelated ones) and Scenario events (Think Forging Bonds without tying the scenes to grinding the event and all the scenes being one big coherent story. Most of the time) are all ways to give more spotlight time to characters. This way their fans would get more of what they like and people who don't know the character could learn more about them. Plus having characters from different games interact would be fun.

Overblown streams and anniversary/summer/christmas celebrations.

Also Surprise Ticket, being able to pick a non-limited unit of your choice for a price would be great. They would likely have neutral boon/bane.

There's a ton of smaller things I like about Granblue but those would be the big ones.

Langrisser Mobile: I see history mode was already mentioned and that is brilliant. It obviously wouldn't be the full game experience but getting a highlights reel of sorts would be nice.

Interaction between friends is something done nicely in Langrisser too. It's not without it's problems but I would like FEH to take some lessons from that.

Things that aren't exclusive to either: a cheaper gacha that can be pulled with a farmable currency separate from orbs that would give lower grade rewards. In most games I know to have this it's limited to 3* units (or equivalent) and sometimes a rare high rarity unit specific to that gacha.

Ability to change your character's look into an alternate version of them. I want to let my regular Micaiah wear her yukata too. An extension of that would be purchasable alternate arts that aren't actually units.

 

On 13.3.2019 at 4:29 PM, Arcphoenix said:

How are those tickets obtained in GBF by the way? Also, do you think something like the spark system would transfer to FEH well?

Surprise Tickets are limited time purchases that get announced few hours before they go up and last usually for about a week. They technically don't have a specific schedule, but every 3 months is a fairly safe estimate on their frequency. After you get them, a ticket that will get you a full pull from gacha is sent to your inbox (so you can save it for later use, unlike their star draw) and you have until the end of the purchase period to pick the character of your choice from the menu you made the purchase earlier (you can leave the choice for after that period too but you'll be unable to play rest of the game until you make a choice, to my understanding).

Worth noting is that the choice of unit on Surprise Ticket has recently left out most recent additions to the gacha (generally this means characters released between current and previous tickets, though this can vary depending on how little or much time goes between tickets).

Also for two years now they've had a special anniversary ticket which is exactly same thing for same price, except it has expanded choice for the free unit: you can also choose any seasonal unit released the previous year or earlier (this really only leaves out Valentine Day units of the current year because anniversary happens in March) and as of this year you can also pick among grande characters (basically their Legendary Heroes without blessings) released before 2018.

On 14.3.2019 at 4:42 AM, Arcphoenix said:

Map dialogue between certain units would be amazing as well. Granblue also apparently has something like this? VA is Japanese, so I have no idea what anyone is saying in battle myself

Characters have a line they say when they use a skill. When two related characters are together in a party (though not all related characters have this), the skill lines are extended to be stuff like another character finishing the line for the character using a skill or complimenting them. It's adorable. They will also sometimes comment on things the silent protagonist does, like thanking for heals or buffs.

[Xenovia]

Work on developing either new story chapters or new maps, instead of rehashing old content month after month, ruining old modes (like Arena and Aether Raids), and making waifubait banners month after month.

[Jingle Jangle]

•  Better daily rewards. It has been over 2 years and I still don't understand why 15 feathers are given daily when there could be more.
• Permanent banner for weaker units. Similar to FGO and the FP gatcha
• Universal tickets: I prefer to chose what use them for rather than it feeling like an ad to the current Forging Bond units
•  Starter units that improve as game progresses. The askr trio are greatly underpowered at this point. 10 less bst than gen 3 unit and no way to give merges is cruel to them.
• Better daily quests, and daily maps: bring back a new rotation of special maps have units like Rhajat, Silvia, or older seasonal characters.

[MisterIceTeaPeach]

• Better characterization (forging bonds is a first good step) 
• Adding a friend's lead to any kind of quests and modes. 
• Universal summoning tickets

Edited March 30, 2019 by Little Princess

[XRay]

19 hours ago, Little Princess said:

Universal summoning tickets

But that is just Orbs.

[Interdimensional Observer]

1 minute ago, XRay said:

But that is just Orbs.

Not quite. 5 Orbs is 5 Orbs, while with a universal ticket, if you had only two orbs you wanted to summon on in a circle, you could use the ticket on the first, and then use Orbs on the second, saving yourself one Orb.

Also, they could experiment with universal fivefold tickets. No pick of color means you're open to pitybreaks from colors you aren't sniping, unlike the same quantity of Orbs.

Though I think you do have a point in Orbs having limited uses outside of summoning, whereas other gachas may use summon material for other expenditures.

[Ice Dragon]

17 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Not quite. 5 Orbs is 5 Orbs, while with a universal ticket, if you had only two orbs you wanted to summon on in a circle, you could use the ticket on the first, and then use Orbs on the second, saving yourself one Orb.

That's still just having the ticket replace 5 orbs. There is literally no difference between 5 orbs and a universal ticket except for the fact that you can use orbs in place of stamina restores, etc. (not like anyone would unless they're desperate).

[MisterIceTeaPeach]

Five orbs are still better than one, I would say. 

The summoning tickets are great for sniping. 

Edited March 31, 2019 by Little Princess

[Ice Dragon]

31 minutes ago, Little Princess said:

Five orbs are still better than one, I would say. 

The summoning tickets are great for sniping. 

If they add universal tickets into the game, it should be common sense that they'd reduce the amount of free orbs they give us by 5 for every ticket they let us have to balance it out. Any other result is simply wishful thinking.

In other words, adding universal tickets does absolutely nothing because they are exactly equivalent to 5 orbs each. Whether they give us 1 ticket or 5 orbs makes no difference.

Edited March 31, 2019 by Ice Dragon

[Xenovia]

Danmachi has a crossover with Date A Live.  Each new character had their own banner where you could spend paid iris (their version of orbs) to guarantee getting a character.  I used this to get Kurumi.  I thought this was really cool and it would be great to do in other gachas.  I got all the Date a Live characters and spent ~$30 total including the Kurumi banner.