Thread by @DFKnous

[1] Okay, time to resume this thread. But I'm just going to start over at [1]...

Incidentally, you can find these charts I'm using on the #DefiKingdoms Discord, or at @DFKStronghold's site:

dfkeggspert.com/infographics/

And class growth stats are posted at:

docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d…

https://twitter.com/DFKnous/status/1529172227224133639

[2] Yesterday, I discussed how a higher class tier and a higher rarity level will increase a hero's stats, on average (and stats are probably the most important part of what makes for a "good" hero.)

But that difference among heroes becomes more pronounced as heroes LEVEL UP...

[3] To illustrate, let's start with an ABSURDLY good, UNFAIRLY AMAZING #DFK hero summoned by @Sovrezd yesterday. (I'll explain summoning later.)

The hero in question is a mythic dragoon, of which only 32 exist AT ALL, only 4 of which have an advanced subclass (here, ninja)...

[4] Just consult the chart in tweet [2], and you'll see how a Mythic Elite is near the top of the hierarchy for leveling (and that's WITHOUT taking into account this hero's advanced subclass or Vitality summoning enhancement -- to be discussed later.)

But leveling takes TIME.

[5] Even though mythics start with 10 more points than commons, and @Sovrezd's hero has an ADDITIONAL starting bonus on Vitality, its total stats are lower -- for now -- than a randomly selected COMMON dragoon/ninja at level 7, because that hero has had 6 rounds of "level-ups":

[6] That's why the third factor on my list of criteria for what makes a #DFK hero "good," after class tier and rarity, was LEVEL (and the fourth, closely related, its STATS for class and level.)

Levels = more stats. Level-ups require xp, which takes time to accrue. Time = money.

[7] So, if you can buy, say, a level 7 common archer/thief forager or a level 5 common archer/thief forager for the same price, you should go for the level 7, right?

Not necessarily. First, hero owners choose to "level up" different stats, and some make... questionable choices.

[8] Recall this tweet, in which I noted that new players often fixate on stats for profession rather than core stats for class:

https://twitter.com/DFKnous/status/1528338411605696519

How was the level 7 archer leveled up? Does it have high INT? If so, the owner likely spent points on a non-useful class stat.

[9] Of course, I don't KNOW that loading an archer up with Intelligence (as opposed to, say, STR or END -- DEX, the top archer stat, is a given in this hypothetical) is a bad long-term strategy.

Some people DO argue that common basic-class heroes should focus on professions...

[10] But there are several reasons to believe that your precious choices of which stats to boost at leveling time (docs.defikingdoms.com/learn/gameplay…) should be guided more by a #DFK hero's class than by its profession.

One of those reasons is commentary from @DFKumberdale in this vein:

[11] Even putting player choices about which stats to boost aside, randomness within probability parameters (#RNG, as the #DFK and #RPG communities often abbreviate the concept) plays a large role in how well a #DefiKingdoms hero is actually doing at a given level.

$JEWEL $ONE

[12] Let's compare two common archers. This level 7's current stat total is 100; the level 4's is 84. If the level 4 gets a typical +7 on the next three level-ups, it will reach 105 by level 7.

How does one weigh TIME, RNG, and POINT ALLOCATION to decide which archer is better?

[13] One can see that at level 4, the second hero already has the same Dexterity as the Level 7. That means the second archer COULD get as many as +3 x 3 more points in DEX by Level 7, in which case it would have 9 more points on the class's core stat at the same level. BUT...

[14] Realistically, the Level 4 will get about +5 points on DEX in the next three levels up, if its owner guarantees that stat and lets the archer's 80% chance of a DEX increase do its job. (The Thief subclass might add a point, too.)

docs.defikingdoms.com/learn/gameplay…

But the headstart?

[15] The Level 7's headstart looks significant -- and, to be sure, it is not trivial; that's months of questing -- until one notices that the xp requirement to level up increases with each level. So while time is time, it's possible the two archers' levels will "flatten out."

[16] That possibility, along with the choices made by the Level 7 archer's owner to put precious, limited bonus stats into Intelligence (a stat of some use for the foraging profession, but of little use to the archer class), makes the Level 4 a "better" hero, in my view.

$JEWEL

[17] If you think you couldn't possibly spot all this without months of #DefiKingdoms experience, I have good news: @Weghuz has created a site that makes it easier. DFKanalytics.com has a "Class Score" for each hero, which is (roughly) a measure of how well it's doing...

[18] When you put the #DFK hero IDs from the bottom of each card into DFKanalytics.com, you get a row that, when clicked on, looks like this.

Note that although the Level 7 has been questing and leveling up months longer than the Level 4, their Class Scores are similar:

[19] @yappyisyippy has taken the data from DFKanalytics.com and created incredible useful charts, posted at medium.com/@yappyishappy/…, that display the average DFKanalytics Class Score by rarity, class, and level.

How does each archer fare under that metric?

#DFK $JEWEL

[20] Since the average level 4 common archer (without enhancements or #PerilousJourney boosts, to be discussed later) has a Class Score of 5.93, our 7.20 level 4 archer is above-average right now! The level 7, at 7.99, is far below the average of 10.50 for level 7 common archers.

[21] Now, if you want an archer "optimized" for the foraging profession, the DFKanalytics.com Class Score tells you exactly the wrong thing: it essentially tells you which archer is better AS AN ARCHER, for its level.

The level 7 owner has created a prof-oriented hero...

[22] That might be fine -- it SEEMS fine to many who level heroes (especially common basic-class heroes) for prof -- except that I know from experience that they tend to do this because they KNOW profs, not because they're deciding on them over #pvp, #pve, or other #DFK features.

[23] The #DefiKingdoms roadmap is long and ambitious. In my view, you want heroes that can be viable in all features to come -- not just in the features that happened to come first but are, per the devs, "a small piece of a much larger puzzle."

$JEWEL #DFK #pvp #pve #RPGs $ONE