"The Rich Get Richer" part 2 (no flames please)

Using that weapon, and asking not to get flamed? Not gonna happen

TL;DR for everyone:
Guy using hacked wep.
Still can't beat UMF.
Claiming to be a casual.
Playing on open 2-3 times a week.
QQing about not having enough time for ranked and not being able to beat UMF like "HC" people that invest more time.

Hit F12 in game with mouse over weapon, hit Shift+Tab, look at screenshot miniwindow, follow obvious directions, give us a link for it.

Not sure what you mean here. You don't like having to be progressively better geared/strategize to get access to progressively harder content with progressively better rewards? (hint: progress) You have access to every single map the game has to offer, though beating it completely is directly tied to your skill as a player.


Nothing about this is true. You can afk shop anytime you want. I'm guessing if you cant afk shop for 500 mil/hour you consider it a waste of time...?


I'm still confused tbh. Can you sum up your argument into a 1 sentence statement?

The argument: the current mana gains are way too low for players to get to "end game" levels in any ascertainable time line and in addition to this issue there is nothing a low character offers to the current trading system.

Both of these items make getting to "end game" insurmountable... this type of curve is consistent to an MMO standard where it is the acceptable norm to put this type of... un-fun, mind-numbing grindfest into them... people accept that. That is NOT the case for any type of strategy tower defense type games. Can you imagine having to put in 200-300 hours just to access a map on Starcraft2... or even something like the browser-based "Gem-Craft" tower defense games?

Can you ban people from making posts on the forums? "My thread was closed, better make another!"

This is getting really annoying.

Guy, hand me that weapon and I will hold down mouse1 and win without any traps or auras. How can you NOT win with a hacked weapon like that? You hardly need a strat at all when you do 750k damage per hit.

WOOOOSH.... you totally missed the point.

WOOOOSH.... you totally missed the point.

The point is you cannot beat end game content with a weapon that is arguably 20+ tiers above current content. Please add me to steam, join my game, and let me view the stats on it personally.

Can you ban people from making posts on the forums? "My thread was closed, better make another!"

This is getting really annoying.

If it bothers you... go ahead and put me on your ignore. The thread was closed because some trolls started a flame war... and I engaged..... not because of the topic of discussion. I'm carefully adding the trolls/flame kids to ignore and not engaging them this go-round.

Feel free to do the same with me. It did take a bit of searching... to add someone to ignore... but I can walk you to it if you want/need. =)

The point is you cannot beat end game content with a weapon that is arguably 20+ tiers above current content. Please add me to steam, join my game, and let me view the stats on it personally.

No - see? You completely missed the point of this thread... by a mile. It has nothing to do with the item. It has everything to do with the fact that LEGITLY I invested probably a solid 150-200+ hours into this game or more... and have gotten about 20/35 upgrade gears... have roughly 250-325 or so of tower stats on my characters... and (my fault I DID have more but just switched my DPS character) about 80-100 DPS and was unable to make a scratch in UMF... like: level 1 UMF...

The "mana-curve" of this game is crazy. When I got 15-20mil/hour gains rate vs what I thought was awesome 2-4mil/hour gains running some hard map stupidly over and over and over and over and... x100000 over... just to get enough mana to up some of my 35 (below average) gear.... and not having access to sell a single item on AFK shopping because no one wants 20-28^ items but the vendor....

That's the point.

The item just allowed me insight into this mana-crazy world that I'm missing out on.

If it bothers you... go ahead and put me on your ignore. The thread was closed because some trolls started a flame war... and I engaged..... not because of the topic of discussion. I'm carefully adding the trolls/flame kids to ignore and not engaging them this go-round.

Feel free to do the same with me. It did take a bit of searching... to add someone to ignore... but I can walk you to it if you want/need. =)

YOU started that flame war by making an invalid argument. Someone already proves that you can enter UMF without mixed mode /UMF gear. If you can't do it with better stats than he/she had, then maybe YOU (a casual) should stop trying the HARDEST CONTET IN THE GAME just to compete with people who put in MORE THAN DOUBLE THE AMOUNT OF TIME THAT YOU PUT IN.

Close this flamefest please, no valid arguments are being made here.

No - see? You completely missed the point of this thread... by a mile. It has nothing to do with the item. It has everything to do with the fact that LEGITLY I invested probably a solid 150-200+ hours into this game or more... and have gotten about 20/35 upgrade gears... have roughly 250-325 or so of tower stats on my characters... and (my fault I DID have more but just switched my DPS character) about 80-100 DPS and was unable to make a scratch in UMF... like: level 1 UMF...

The "mana-curve" of this game is crazy. When I got 15-20mil/hour gains rate vs what I thought was awesome 2-4mil/hour gains running some hard map stupidly over and over and over and over and... x100000 over... just to get enough mana to up some of my 35 (below average) gear.... and not having access to sell a single item on AFK shopping because no one wants 20-28^ items but the vendor....

That's the point.

The item just allowed me insight into this mana-crazy world that I'm missing out on.

I was able to beat 2 waves on my 50k dps monk before I got this new weapon. PLEASE add me, join my game, and let me see this weapon that gets you stuck on wave 11.

No - see? You completely missed the point of this thread... by a mile. It has nothing to do with the item. It has everything to do with the fact that LEGITLY I invested probably a solid 150-200+ hours into this game or more... and have gotten about 20/35 upgrade gears... have roughly 250-325 or so of tower stats on my characters... and (my fault I DID have more but just switched my DPS character) about 80-100 DPS and was unable to make a scratch in UMF... like: level 1 UMF...

The "mana-curve" of this game is crazy. When I got 15-20mil/hour gains rate vs what I thought was awesome 2-4mil/hour gains running some hard map stupidly over and over and over and over and... x100000 over... just to get enough mana to up some of my 35 (below average) gear.... and not having access to sell a single item on AFK shopping because no one wants 20-28^ items but the vendor....

That's the point.

The item just allowed me insight into this mana-crazy world that I'm missing out on.

I disagree, the mana curve is proper, realistically you will be farming UMF for the best gear available and your going to have to upgrade that gear to be ready for Nightmare mode.

The mana your receiving is for upgrades, its going to cost you hundreds of millions to fully upgrade all your UMF gear. Not to mention all that extra mana is pointless because you won't be buying anything else besides maybe a pet for your character from there on out. At least until Nightmare and new game challenge's come out.

I was able to beat 2 waves on my 50k dps monk before I got this new weapon. PLEASE add me, join my game, and let me see this weapon that gets you stuck on wave 11.

Sakisan... you do understand that I have zero concept of level 10+ UMF until that 1 game... this 1 time in the game... the very very first time on that stage of the game... with "hacked" (who knows) item or not.... and some very badly placed auras which I understand now... this is why I hit wave 11 and ran out of time.... with no deaths.

You get that, right? It's not like I've battled my head against this... with this crazy item... for weeks at a time and unable to beat it. You understand the difference, right? Literally: 1st time ever to wave 11... no deaths... ran out of time.


But go ahead and try to continually put me down more.... keep it up and you can join ignore too.

I disagree, the mana curve is proper, realistically you will be farming UMF for the best gear available and your going to have to upgrade that gear to be ready for Nightmare mode.

The mana your receiving is for upgrades, its going to cost you hundreds of millions to fully upgrade all your UMF gear. Not to mention all that extra mana is pointless because you won't be buying anything else besides maybe a pet for your character from there on out. At least until Nightmare and new game challenge's come out.

I disagree... I did the math in another thread just to upgrade to 35/35 for 4 heroes. (I think 3 would be fine but still)... NOT including the cost involved of buying a 30mil pet on vendor (which I argue is necessary) or a weapon... which you basically will always be upgrading and investing mana into.... the HOURS and HOURS necessary is just ridiculous... and the rate gains for that stage of gear are equally ridiculous. Come on now... 2-4mil per hour mana gains. BRB: will get the chart I made from the other thread and then you let me know if you still stand with that argument....

Sakisan... you do understand that I have zero concept of level 10+ UMF until that 1 game... this 1 time in the game... the very very first time on that stage of the game... with "hacked" (who knows) item or not.... and some very badly placed auras which I understand now... this is why I hit wave 11 and ran out of time.... with no deaths.

You get that, right? It's not like I've battled my head against this... with this crazy item... for weeks at a time and unable to beat it. You understand the difference, right? Literally: 1st time ever to wave 11... no deaths... ran out of time.


But go ahead and try to continually put me down more.... keep it up and you can join ignore too.

And you think I've been at UMF for weeks? I didn't start doing UMF until a few days ago. You seem to not realize just how bad you are that you lose wave11 with a weapon that does 750k damage per swing. It has nothing to do with some bad mechanic in game or some terrible mana curve. You not being able to succeed is no one's fault but your own. You hack an item that does 750k damage and still are unable to progress beyond what people do with 100k dps. The system isn't at fault here. You are. You can try to make up some story surrounding your hacked item to make it seem like you're not at fault for having it, but in the end anyone can figure this is just a front to make you look innocent. No one dropped that in your afk shop for you and if they did, it was just to get you caught. The fact that you held onto it makes you just as guilty as creating it. But that doesn't change the fact that you cannot beat the entry waves of UMF with it.

I disagree... I did the math in another thread just to upgrade to 35/35 for 4 heroes. (I think 3 would be fine but still)... NOT including the cost involved of buying a 30mil pet on vendor (which I argue is necessary) or a weapon... which you basically will always be upgrading and investing mana into.... the HOURS and HOURS necessary is just ridiculous... and the rate gains for that stage of gear are equally ridiculous. Come on now... 2-4mil per hour mana gains. BRB: will get the chart I made from the other thread and then you let me know if you still stand with that argument....

Here is what I wrote from the other thread:

I wish there was a calculator out so we could just look at the data and work it out.

We don't have access to the "raw data" and I couldn't tell you if it is even item specific of just an over-all "any item" costs X amount per level upgrade.... I do know that the giraffe costs are double to upgrade per level for example... however:

I can tell you this for 100% certainty: this is some of my own gear costs to upgrade right now...
Level 13 upgrade = 154793
Level 16 upgrade = 210700
level 33 upgrade = 617362


So... even if we play around and make up the following data...

1: 10,000
2: 20,000
3: 30,000
4: 40,000
5: 50,000
6: 60,000
7: 70,000
8: 80,000
9: 90,000
10: 100,000
11: 110,000
12: 120,000
*13: 154,793
14: 170,000
15: 180,000
*16: 210,700
17: 220,000
18: 230,000
19: 240,000
20: 250,000
21: 260,000
22: 280,000
23: 290,000
24: 300,000
25: 330,000
26: 340,000
27: 360,000
28: 370,000
29: 390,000
30: 400,000
31: 450,000
32: 500,000
*33: 617,362
34: 650,000
35: 700,000

8,660,000... 8-10mil lets say.... I think this is a pretty fair assessment. Go ahead and correct the math if you like or just play along... your call.

So lets say you have the following:
Squire Health Blocker
Monk Aura
Hunter Trapper
Apprentice DPS

So each character(4) has 4 slots minus pet & weapon. That is 32-40million mana per character or 128-160million mana.

That isn't even counting the following:
1) AVERAGE 35 upgrade gear... border line noob gear.
2) No weapons or Pets calculated.
3) No take-backs... you started the level 35 item in a PERFECT world setting where it had PERFECT stats and you never find a better 35 up items. No room for playing around. You are the worlds BEST min-maxer and we are not accounting for the time it takes just to get this perfect item.

So if we take your 1hour for 3-4mil that would take 42.6-53.3 to 32-40... I guess we could say: 32-53.2 HOURS of game time... solid/pure farming... to get AVERAGE 35 up gear leveled on 4 toons with NO PET or WEAPONS accounted for.

Is that acceptable - or laziness?


I don't think it is, sorry.

^ ^
This



I was also thinking about it... I didn't include the cost of each level 35 item... which at this point I am pretty much forced to do to progress... lowest pricing I see for 35s (honestly here) is 400-600k... however in this min-max position we are "playing" at I would suggest purchase price of 1-3mil per item? Again: we are taking about ultimate level 35 with the perfect stats... something you would actually want to invest 10mil into upgrading.

so add 16-48mil to our little calculation... so another 4-16 hours of time just to buy the items prior to upgrading them.


So now we have 36->69.2 HOURS of farming hard mode glitter. How such fun! I can't wait!


Now throw in 30mil per pet... that would be worthwhile to upgrade from the vendor for another 120mil without even calculating any type of upgrades.

30-40 MORE hours

And then we can talk about the weapons... or do we have to go on?



And back to the point of this thread: Those who have the mana... are staying richer through being able to trade their items. They have a side-business essentially able to generate mana even if they aren't online. While I have my "godly" 20-28 ups from Hard Glitter to offer... for... what.... less than what the vendor would take 'em for. Ooo-la-la!


It honestly wouldn't even be that bad if there was a 5% chance of items dropping in that hard mode glitter that have 35-70 upgrades on them... or even 1% chance... hell... even .5% chance.... SOMETHING... that we can then have a small hope in hell of selling and making extra mana.

And you think I've been at UMF for weeks? I didn't start doing UMF until a few days ago. You seem to not realize just how bad you are that you lose wave11 with a weapon that does 750k damage per swing. It has nothing to do with some bad mechanic in game or some terrible mana curve. You not being able to succeed is no one's fault but your own. You hack an item that does 750k damage and still are unable to progress beyond what people do with 100k dps. The system isn't at fault here. You are. You can try to make up some story surrounding your hacked item to make it seem like you're not at fault for having it, but in the end anyone can figure this is just a front to make you look innocent. No one dropped that in your afk shop for you and if they did, it was just to get you caught. The fact that you held onto it makes you just as guilty as creating it. But that doesn't change the fact that you cannot beat the entry waves of UMF with it.

I played 1 game with it so far this morning when I found it.... I set up enrage auras in a stupid place that prevented mobs from getting to me and failed on time. (EDIT: not to mention those who are successfully completing the maps are 500-600 ups on their traps, auras... whereas mine are currently 290-325/350 Mobs just simply aren't dying fast enough)I made a mistake that cost me in the late waves of a map... 750k DPS or not... legit or not... it doesn't matter. The focus isn't on the item or that I failed wave 11... you mocking me and throwing in a red herring into this discussion does nothing to further the discussion. It doesn't say a thing against what I am saying... nor does it bolster anything you are saying... which is... what? Nothing... but to attempt to belittle me. That's it... a common troll, sir.

And I am mearly commenting on the mana-gains given to this map that I have been working hours upon hours of my life towards... at a pace of 2-4mil per hour and unable to sell anything on the AFK shop because no one wants 20-28^ items.

I feel that the mana gains to low character are not properly tuned... and I also feel that ALL accounts should have something of value to offer to the AFK market.

So, if I have 600 hours play time in this game... (which I do!) I should not be allowed to have gear that others don't have the patience to farm? If there isn't some mountain top to sit on, what do you strive for? If everyone had a ton of mana right away, then what would I sell my very best loot for?

There is a matter of supply and demand. Prices go up as demand goes up. That is simple economics. If everyone could break into UMF insane right away, then prices on all the gear would be dirt cheap. I wouldn't have a reason to edge out every last bit of dps to barely beat UMF if someone with 300 hours less playtime can just do it with gear they got off hard/insane Glitterhelm.

Fact of the matter is that there has to be some content that the players willing to invest more than everyone else can experience, or we wouldn't bother. If everyone beat the hardest levels on week 1 and left the game, there wouldn't be anyone left to purchase the next content expansion. The game would die. As long as there are items that slowly leak into the stores that set the gold standard for 99,999,999 mana, the economy will balance.

If the end game gear is too easy to get, then you will find that no one will sell anything except the highest end loot. Supply will go up, so cost will go down. Now everyone has high end gear. Top geared players will leave the game. Supply dries up. QQ'ing will ensue because content is too hard and "no one" can beat it. Content is made easier. More people "beat" the game and leave. Game dies more. No new content. Repeat cycle until TrendyNet servers are shut down.

No one beats the last boss of WoW and sells that gear to everyone. It is too rare. Multiple raids of the top end players ensue.

Perhaps high end gear being bound to the player picking it up will restrict the top end gear to those that can beat the content, and prevent others from riding the coattails. High end gear found in stores that is tradable but not bound to the character would be clearly identified as hacked gear. The Guy's high end sword would never have made it to the public.

Rich getting richer isn't bad. Giving mana to those that didn't earn it is. It sets unrealistic expectations that everyone should be able to beat content if they just had the gear to do it (Oh please, AFK Shop Dieties, please let someone sell me a 90^ monk weapon for under 20 million mana! If it is 99 million, I shall troll all that is Holy so help me Eternia!) Cut out the shortcuts, and the rest will follow.

I played 1 game with it so far this morning when I found it.... I set up enrage auras in a stupid place that prevented mobs from getting to me and failed on time. I made a mistake that cost me in the late waves of a map... 750k DPS or not... legit or not... it doesn't matter. The focus isn't on the item or that I failed wave 11... you mocking me and throwing in a red herring into this discussion does nothing to further the discussion. It doesn't say a thing against what I am saying... nor does it bolster anything you are saying... which is... what? Nothing... but to attempt to belittle me. That's it... a common troll, sir.

And I am mearly commenting on the mana-gains given to this map that I have been working hours upon hours of my life towards... at a pace of 2-4mil per hour and unable to sell anything on the AFK shop because no one wants 20-28^ items.

I feel that the mana gains to low character are not properly tuned... and I also feel that ALL accounts should have something of value to offer to the AFK market.

Mana gains are fine. Survival is where you get a ton of mana. Insane/hard summit/glitter is where you get pets to sell to people who have tons of mana. Reading the forum saves you hundreds of hours of figuring stuff out yourself. Can't get mad if you make no attempt to research the problem.

I just sold my 4th giraffe. I price them at 50m each and they all sell within minutes of shop being open. That's 200m I made from giraffes. Know how I got 2 of them? Afking for 5 hours doing pure strat alch labs. Hard stuff. 100m from afking 5 hours and literally not doing anything but hitting g.

You seroiusly need to actually READ these threads.
http://forums.trendyent.com/showthread.php?33860-From-zero-to-hero-in-under-3-hours
http://forums.trendyent.com/showthread.php?33709-So-I-was-wrong.-My-apologies.

They didn't have 35^ gear. They didn't have the best weapons in the game. They didn't spend X random number of hours that you randomly spun out of thin air.

Go cry about some nonexistant issue somewhere else.

I will repeat myself a final time. DON'T CALL YOURSELF A CASUAL IF YOU ARE NOT GOING TO PLAY AS A CASUAL. THE HARDEST CONTENT IN THE GAME MAY NOT BE FOR YOU. DON'T COMPLAIN THAT YOU ARN'T "ON PAR" WITH PLAYERS WHO SPEND 500 HOURS OR MORE PLAYING THIS GAME, UNLESS YOU ALSO PUT IN THAT MUCH TIME.

*Side note* I'm dirt broke and weapons with over 60^ in my shop priced for under 1m never sell. Go figure.

I think my issue is the time... I think any legit player can contest the Mana curve in this game is very very low.


I was shocked at how much mana I was getting in UMF... I actually feel pretty ripped off... I mean... you guys maybe do appreciate this: I did HOURS and HOURS and HOURS now of farming mana..... HOURS. Like: enough time to level 2-3 max level toons in some MMO and gear them out.

I'm sorry... buuut... that ain't right. This is a CONSOL game.

You where doing the wrong levels or wasting management on upgrading items then. This isn't to bash or flame but if it takes you so long to get mana then you weren't looking for mana on the right levels. Ramparts, summit, and glitterhelm can get you as much as 4 mil a run and don't even take an hour to complete.

So, if I have 600 hours play time in this game... (which I do!) I should not be allowed to have gear that others don't have the patience to farm? If there isn't some mountain top to sit on, what do you strive for? If everyone had a ton of mana right away, then what would I sell my very best loot for?

There is a matter of supply and demand. Prices go up as demand goes up. That is simple economics. If everyone could break into UMF insane right away, then prices on all the gear would be dirt cheap. I wouldn't have a reason to edge out every last bit of dps to barely beat UMF if someone with 300 hours less playtime can just do it with gear they got off hard/insane Glitterhelm.

Fact of the matter is that there has to be some content that the players willing to invest more than everyone else can experience, or we wouldn't bother. If everyone beat the hardest levels on week 1 and left the game, there wouldn't be anyone left to purchase the next content expansion. The game would die. As long as there are items that slowly leak into the stores that set the gold standard for 99,999,999 mana, the economy will balance.

If the end game gear is too easy to get, then you will find that no one will sell anything except the highest end loot. Supply will go up, so cost will go down. Now everyone has high end gear. Top geared players will leave the game. Supply dries up. QQ'ing will ensue because content is too hard and "no one" can beat it. Content is made easier. More people "beat" the game and leave. Game dies more. No new content. Repeat cycle until TrendyNet servers are shut down.

No one beats the last boss of WoW and sells that gear to everyone. It is too rare. Multiple raids of the top end players ensue.

Perhaps high end gear being bound to the player picking it up will restrict the top end gear to those that can beat the content, and prevent others from riding the coattails. High end gear found in stores that is tradable but not bound to the character would be clearly identified as hacked gear. The Guy's high end sword would never have made it to the public.

Rich getting richer isn't bad. Giving mana to those that didn't earn it is. It sets unrealistic expectations that everyone should be able to beat content if they just had the gear to do it (Oh please, AFK Shop Dieties, please let someone sell me a 90^ monk weapon for under 20 million mana! If it is 99 million, I shall troll all that is Holy so help me Eternia!) Cut out the shortcuts, and the rest will follow.

Majormer... first let me thank you... it's a breath of fresh air something written like this... non-judgemental, and non-argumentative... something to just discuss nicely like civilized people. I appreciate this. *thumbs up*


I want to say that I am not here saying that I should log into the game... and BAM... 100billion mana in my pocket. That's not what I'm saying even close....

I am also NOT saying that I deserve better or even equal to you... who played 600 hours to my... say... 200-250 hours. You should ALWAYS be "better" than my characters by putting in more of the effort. In fact: I SHOULD be at the very least 1 tier lower than you... while you are in 55-60+ I am in 35-45.... that's fine by me.

Here is what I'm saying:
1) I don't have 4-6 hours to sit through to wave 25+ to get upgrades.
2) I don't WANT to spend any more time on Hard Ramparts or Hard Halloween or Hard Glitter or even insane versions... realize that I've spend countless games now on those SAME MAPS over and over ad-nausium... just trying to gain mana.
3) I have nothing to offer the AFK trading market except 20-28^ items.... so I have no alternative source of mana gains.
4) 2-4mil/hour is not acceptable as so much mana is needed to enter into other maps. I feel it is excessively low.

I'm willing to put in time... just not the pace that is set out for me. I have better things to do with my time... and me asking for a quicker pace through 20->45 ups will not impact your 45-60+ maps at all.

You where doing the wrong levels or wasting management on upgrading items then. This isn't to bash or flame but if it takes you so long to get management then you weren't looking for management on the right levels. Ramparts, summit, and glitch can get you as much as 4 mil a run and don't even take an hour to complete.

Good point. If you're on the CONSOLE as you say that you are, just use the glitch and stop trolling the forums with redundant arguments. It's been proven that you can enter UMF in less than a day, so stop saying that you FAILED on it because of some outside reason. A tip: don't use enrage/ensnare auras. They waste time.

*Side note* I'm dirt broke and weapons with over 60^ in my shop priced for under 1m never sell. Go figure.

60^ is great, but doesn't mean anything if the stats are low to start with. It would just be a waste of mana to upgrade it... They could go buy a better one for a little more and get much better stats.

I don't know what the stats on are your weapons, but that's the first thing that comes to mind.

Good point. If you're on the CONSOLE as you say that you are, just use the glitch and stop trolling the forums with redundant arguments. It's been proven that you can enter UMF in less than a day, so stop saying that you FAILED on it because of some outside reason. A tip: don't use enrage/ensnare auras. They waste time.

Correct! I see that now after 1 time making it to wave 11 =)

Also it is much easier to heal and upgrade less stuff....


And I am not on consol... sorry let me just clarify I am on PC. I call this a consol game though. =)