Frosty pack with New Abilities (Future parrot and Dark Garlic drone)

Hate it.  Not fair.  EA/PopCap is catering to new players,  with the tease that if purchased, they get new items,characters, abilities.  This favors new players.

What about their long time, faithful, loyal, genuine grinders, players?  Where's the LOVE?

If they offer to purchase *JUST* the abilities, i would buy it, but since its bundled with *already owned* items, it seems over priced and unfair.

Thumbs down.  Crappy move by EA/Popcap not rewarding the TRUE Loyal players.

Wow... that's three purchase pack exclusive abilities now. Pretty sure this has broken into pay to win territory now... It's what? $30+ for all of those abilities. More than the cost of the game at this point. Guess Battlefront II is losing more money that EA would like, they are just pulling money from anywhere they can get it.

WIth the amount of drama EA has been getting into with microtransactions/loot boxes (which has effected this game in a way since it started), this kind of stuff isn't even surprising to me anymore.

Doesn't make me any less disappointed though

I got both immediately, even though they were a little pricy, but no one is forced to buy these things. If you don't want what's in the pack, then don't buy.

As far as the technical mechanics go, both of the new abilities are good, but the dark drone for the Cactus is pretty excellent. Both it's standard shots, as well as its drone strike, does splash damage. The metal pirate drone is self-explanatory and simply has better health, but a second Deadbeard drone is long over due, so good buys (at least for me).

Also just did a head to head test with the two pirate drones and the new drone actually does quite a bit more damage.

Regular Parrot has: A) 5 health

B) Does about 8 damage per shot with the regular blaster.

Future (Armored) Parrot has: A) 20 health

B) Does about 12 damage per shot with the regular blaster (which is still automatic like the regular)

The Cactus' new drone does pretty big splash damage, but it's more of a pulsed shot compared to the regular garlic drones fully auto. However: The dark garlic drone does NOT have a cool down, which means you can fire it indefinitely.

Just tested the Cactus' two drones in terms of damage and the dark one does more with standard shots...

Well, If only I could say that I didn't see this coming. I can't exactly overlook the fact that the Pirate FINALLY gets an alternate ability, either.

Stars and legendary characters aside (which is a massive factor to put aside, obviously), both of these abilities are situational, but good nonetheless.

The Dark Garlic Drone's primary weapon is the Dark Garlic. It fires slow moving projectiles that cause up to 12 splash damage, and an addition 10 damage on impact. Be careful, as you can also destroy your own drone with this attack.

While the firing rate is slow (one shot every 0.6 seconds), you don't have to worry about overheating, you can fire infinitely.

Its air strike is very similar to that of the normal Garlic Drone's. The only thing different about it other than its appearance is its damage, which is slightly lower (Only up to 50 per bomb instead of 70).

Sure, it's not that good in damage, this drone's splash damage can be really helpful for those who aren't that confident in their skills piloting a drone, or when fighting against Imps. It's a good ability.

Oh, if only I could say the same about the Future Parrot Pal...

While the Future Parrot Pal does have more health, it's very heavy. It moves slower, and you'll have to spend a bit more time trying to fly up and down.

Don't be fooled by its weapon name being the same as that of the normal Parrot Pal, this drone hits much harder. While the normal Parrot Drone hits between 7 and 8 damage and slightly more for critical hits, this Future Parrot deals 10 damage, 12 for critical hits, at all ranges.

It sounds good, but it really isn't. In addition to your already slower movement speed and more difficult control of the drone, there are three more drawbacks for having this higher firepower.

First, trying to turn left or right makes your reticle move upwards, which can really throw off your aim.

Second, the Future Parrot Pal's accuracy isn't exactly good. You'll find yourself missing most of your shots at long range, and even a few at medium range due to bullet spread, and there's not really anything you can do about that.

Finally, this drone's weapon doesn't hold out for as long as that of the normal drone's. You'll find yourself overheating a bit quicker than before.

"Oh, but what about its air strike? Surely that might make up for all of these downsides!" Oh, how I hoped this would be true.

The normal Parrot drone always drops 6 bombs in a small radius. Each deals up to 25 damage, and an additional 25 damage should any of the bombs land right on top of an enemy.

The Future Parrot, however, always drops 7 bombs in a consistent, 'X' shaped pattern which is larger than the radius of the normal Parrot's. While this can mean more damage, it also takes about a second longer for the bombs to drop, giving your enemies slightly more time to react before they're damaged.

Okay, the Future Parrot may not be as effective as the normal Parrot in most situations, but at least it looks cool, right? Right...?

Well, while this exactly like EA to do this, at least we get something to know they haven't given up on this game entirely (though we're getting pretty close).

So far I'm holding out on these upgrades.  I'm very unhappy with the pay to play direction in which this situation is going and I think my line has been crossed.

I was hoping to see if the new abilities were decent, but I've come unstuck.

Since the new upgrades became available, I wanted to buy them both at the same time, but when viewing their offer for one of the upgrades, the option below it only says "Buy It Now" instead of "Add To Cart" ( this is for the PS4 version). I don't like the idea of buying them separately, because I wanted both upgrades immediately. Anyway, after I bought them, I returned to GW2, expecting the new items to come through, but nothing happened. 24 hours later, they still haven't showed up. The offers for both upgrades are still visible in my mailbox in-game, even though I've bought them.

I need an explanation from the dev team, and if there isn't one, my $30 went down the drain.

That's another reason I'm holding out.  Although it has not happened to me yet, there are WAY too many reports of people not receiving the various upgrades after paying for them on PS4.  Sony blames EA and EA blames Sony.  You need to try to get a refund from Sony, which I understand will take a bit of work.  Good luck!