Is there any official statement about zeta attrition?

Technically yes, you're right.

But there's a massive difference in HAAT using say, Kylo vs Zylo, or Savage vs Zavage. There's a massive difference between running Resistance with and without Finn's zeta.

So no, it isn't"required" to have certain toons with zeta abilities unlocked, but there are things about this game that are always blanketed with "player's choice" like it's all equal and balanced. Zeta on CLS lends itself to GW, Raids, TB, Arena, and so on. A zeta on Palpoo, well.... You gonna take a plane over to Ireland or are ya gonna swim?

Not all choices are created equal, no, but that's very different from suggesting that you have to have everything to be able to compete. Some zetas are downright terrible and shouldn't even be counted. There are always going to be bad decisions that a person can make, but where there are multiple good options, it's not unreasonable to say it's your choice which to go with because you can't have everything. Not being able to have everything (or even all the pretty good things) is ok.

"leef;c-1328410" wrote:

"Neo2551;c-1328326" wrote:

"cannon_fodder;c-1328215" wrote:

"Neo2551;c-1327169" wrote:
Barris as well provides an awesome ROI. However these are the only ones that really shines, and you need a combination of them otherwise.

I would look at this statement as justification for the zeta on Barris being just a tad too much, especially when paired with GK. It would have been reasonable if it were limited to Jedi. I actually wouldn't be too put off if all zetas were limited to the faction with which the character was intended to work best.

Thanks for your concern, but we are not here to talk about whether a Zeta is good or not (because many are just lacklusters).

We just don’t have enough zetas.

quick question though, how many toons do you have are waiting to be zeta'd?
Most characters i can zeta (g11+ 7*) have meh zeta abilities, or aren't being used or are highly situational. Toons like cassian, rey, 5s and qgj etc etc.
Don't get me wrong, i could use more zeta's, but do i really "need" them? not really. I've got 13 equiped btw.

I am an explorer type of players: i want to discover new arena teams that can hold on D, but for these I need fully maxed characters.

I still need Zarris for GvG and probably Phoenix as well.

You need the Zetas to see the full potential of a team. For example take the actual meta team but take out all the Zetas: Not so impressive.

As for why I want a better supply of zeta material is because most toons without Zetas are just downright uselsss and it makes my gear investment feel totally wasted.

For example, Resistance is just bad without zFinn or Barris totally useless as well. Clones without Zody would be just a waste as well.

"Liath;c-1328527" wrote:
Not all choices are created equal, no, but that's very different from suggesting that you have to have everything to be able to compete. Some zetas are downright terrible and shouldn't even be counted. There are always going to be bad decisions that a person can make, but where there are multiple good options, it's not unreasonable to say it's your choice which to go with because you can't have everything. Not being able to have everything (or even all the pretty good things) is ok.

In this case, why would we ever invest real money on gearing toons if we will be bottlenecked by zetas anyway? We are not asking to be flooded but a 100% increase in zeta material would not even change the situation.

If I can max only a single toon per month with Zeta, I don’t need to even think about supporting the game financially while if I knew I could use a toon I gear I would gladly consider the option.

It is the exact situation as credit a year and half ago, where the exact same type of person made the exact same arguments against more resources. Guess players and devs do not like to read constructive feedback.

"Neo2551;c-1328732" wrote:

"leef;c-1328410" wrote:

"Neo2551;c-1328326" wrote:

"cannon_fodder;c-1328215" wrote:

"Neo2551;c-1327169" wrote:
Barris as well provides an awesome ROI. However these are the only ones that really shines, and you need a combination of them otherwise.

I would look at this statement as justification for the zeta on Barris being just a tad too much, especially when paired with GK. It would have been reasonable if it were limited to Jedi. I actually wouldn't be too put off if all zetas were limited to the faction with which the character was intended to work best.

Thanks for your concern, but we are not here to talk about whether a Zeta is good or not (because many are just lacklusters).

We just don’t have enough zetas.

quick question though, how many toons do you have are waiting to be zeta'd?
Most characters i can zeta (g11+ 7*) have meh zeta abilities, or aren't being used or are highly situational. Toons like cassian, rey, 5s and qgj etc etc.
Don't get me wrong, i could use more zeta's, but do i really "need" them? not really. I've got 13 equiped btw.

I am an explorer type of players: i want to discover new arena teams that can hold on D, but for these I need fully maxed characters.

I still need Zarris for GvG and probably Phoenix as well.

You need the Zetas to see the full potential of a team. For example take the actual meta team but take out all the Zetas: Not so impressive.

As for why I want a better supply of zeta material is because most toons without Zetas are just downright uselsss and it makes my gear investment feel totally wasted.

For example, Resistance is just bad without zFinn or Barris totally useless as well. Clones without Zody would be just a waste as well.

So that's 0 characters you actually "need" a zeta on. Got it.
You just want more zeta's so you can try out more stuff, wich is fine. To a certain extend i even agree with that. There is however a rather significant difference between "want" and "need". Alot of people confuse those 2 on this forum.

@leef

I don't disagree with the thought that some people confuse "want" and "need". But I think that there's a legitimate use for the word "need" here when you're discussing "need" in order to do something specific that has specific requirements. You need Captain Han to get ROLO. Yes, getting ROLO is optional, but if you're going to get ROLO, Captain Han is not optional.

So in that sense, I think it's important to say that in order to participate in all the content the developers work so hard to create, you need many different factions, all geared to g9+. You don't need them all at g12, but if you intend to simply play the content of the game, g9 is mandatory for a lot of that content. Certainly g8.

So getting lots of different toons up to g8 should be relatively easy, just so that the content can be played. This doesn't guarantee a win (and it shouldn't) but being unable to get past encounter 6 of 8 in assault battles is different than simply not getting a chance to play.

Zetas are mostly optional, I agree, but there are times when they become less so, based on the design of the game. I'd be wary of putting too much emphasis on the idea that people "just want" something and don't "actually need it".

I mean, it's a game. We play it because we "just want" to play it. The devs don't have to give out a single shard of anything, and we could all be stuck playing the opening light side battles, using JC and Chewie, forever.

I actually think that Territory Battles is a good way to illustrate the paradigm: many missions require specific toons, and as the battle goes on, you need them at higher & higher stars. But even if you just beat the first encounter, you still get something (a few more Territory Points). I'd actually prefer that the first encounter or two in the battles for the last 2 stages be a bit easier for those who got some toons up to 7* but haven't had a chance to gear them, because there are so many toons to gear.

Now, it's not **necessary** that they let us use low-star toons in the first stages, and I have a lot of 7* toons, so I don't think it would hurt me if they changed all battles to require 7* toons (except it would hurt me on the ROLO mission, I can't get decent drops on HRSoldier), but I think it's reasonable to say that the devs **need** to provide TB content for a wide range of player power-levels.

But here's the thing, it's only a need in the sense that it's necessary if you think people should be able to play the content.

If you don't (and you're an EA/CG dev), that's fine. But no one is going to play your game if you're not giving out any shards or otherwise allowing people to develop and grow and, ultimately, access the content.

There need to be bottlenecks, but the Devs have done us wonderful favors by creating lots of toons and lots of content targeting specific toons or factions. This is great, but it does mean that it has to be reasonably possible to get all those shards and get enough gear to at least make a decent attempt at the content.

Given all that, I think it's very reasonable to say that more zeta mats are necessary, as are more pieces of certain gear that is needed before gear8 - Mk3 Holos of course, but possibly a couple others as well. Once you have a toon to 6* and finished with g7 (but no gear added from g8), then bottlenecks become interesting and force useful strategic choices ... and also create a hurdle which one can feel good about jumping over. But requiring g6 toons to acquire the same pieces of gear as g10 toons (so that you have to trade off moving a toon from g10->g11 vs a toon from g6->g7, instead of just trading off one g6 toon vs another g6 toon), and especially when every single toon needs multiple copies of that gear (I'm thinking specifically of Mk3 Holos right now) isn't reasonable.

Likewise, Resistance content has to be set up to challenge both a decent geared Resistance squad with no zeta on Finn AND one with zeta Finn. You can do this with multiple tiers, but you can't do it without having a very wide gap between the two because the faction is completely transformed by Finn's zeta.

But once you do create that separate content, now you need to make it reasonably possible for someone to zeta Finn in order to access the content.

You don't need to make it free, but "reasonably possible" is still important.

Right now, a lot of people seem to feel differently than you about what constitutes "reasonably possible", and your "want" vs. "need" while kind of interesting, is also missing the point.

@MasterSeedy
Without getting into the specific examples you give, i agree with pretty much everyting you wrote.
"Right now, a lot of people seem to feel differently than you about what constitutes "reasonably possible", and your "want" vs. "need" while kind of interesting, is also missing the point."
While my opinion on this matter may be unpopular, it isn't necessarily wrong. The way i see it is that the zeta droprate being super frustrating is a bigger issue than the amount of zeta's being accessible for the players. Coincedentilly (not really) said droprate is also the reason why alot of players seem to think the "need" more zeta's.
I like gated progression, everyone playing this game does, eventhough i really, really hate it from time to time. Specially at moments when i get 0, 0, 0, 0, zeta's from the challenge. However, when i look at my roster and see 13 zeta's while another player only has 6 i'm all of a sudden glad that zeta's are hard to get.
I understand that the difference between me and another player is relative, so i probably would have had 26 and that other guy only 12 if they were more accessible. But i also realize that the difference between 13 over 6 is alot bigger than 26 over 13. The more accessible things are ingame, the less your choices matter. Also making more and more content a joke, wich you acknowledged yourself.
Eventually the zeta's will become more accessible, just like the omega's did. Not entirely sure if we actually get relatively less omega's than we used to because of zeta's also requiring omega's though. Maybe purple mats are a better example, haha.
End of the day, i think reward/effort ratio for zeta's is still fine. Hence the "need" vs "want" argument. Others may feel they "need" more of them to still enjoy the game, i just don't. I "want" more of them, but that's just because they're scarse. If they weren't i wouldn't want them. It's good to want things ingame, it keeps me playing.
It's all subjective though, so yea...

Actually, you don’t need any zeta basically in this game: you can do fine with Rex lead in arena (and insane mods probably).

Butmy argument is more about balance between demand and supply of Zeta in comparison to the other ability materials. Devs showed at multiple occasions they did not fully understand some bottlneck (for example credits).

In the end, I think this game is supposed to provide some fun, and while I agree choice should matter, Zeta is a punitive dimension of the game and totally prohibit the exploration of new type of teams. Moreover, Devs spend times to create these abilities however only a few handful of players will ever use them in most case because they are not ground breaking OP, meaning their ROi is fairly low on creating new abilities.

@leef

While my opinion on this matter may be unpopular, it isn't necessarily wrong.

In case it wasn't clear, I do agree with this statement. What you wrote is absolutely right for many meanings of what you wrote. "Need" can very highly overstate things. And yes, "wanting things" is good: as you say, it provides motive to actually play the game. I just worried about the reductionism that might (but might not) be implied in in using the phrase "just want" without putting that in some sort of context. it can be hard to walk the line between overstating and understating.

i also realize that the difference between 13 over 6 is alot bigger than 26 over 13. The more accessible things are ingame, the less your choices matter.

yep. this. It's hard to know how many people who play the game more than 3-4 times per week have 13 zetas, how many daily players have 13 zetas, etc. (I have only 3, but I'm finally at a point where I don't have big needs in the fleet store for ship blueprints or toon shards, so I can buy zeta mats now and things are greatly accelerating) without access to data only EA/CG has. So I tend not to criticize when people raise their voices about over scarcity*, but I'm very sympathetic to your voice of temperance as well.


*indeed, on a few things I've done this myself - perhaps the best example is Mk3 Holos which allow you to open up content because they are the biggest barrier to reaching g7/g8 when you can first start using a toon in events, but even a flood of Mk3 Holos wouldn't make anyone super-powerful in this game - it wouldn't change Arena at all, for sure, and the effects on GW would be minimal (when developing a new squad that requires a bunch of toons working together to be competent, like Phoenix or Resistance or NightSisters it would help get your squad up to just-barely-ready-to-try-this faster than otherwise, but focussed development on single toons wouldn't change noticeably at all). It might change the balance of players just beginning to reach the higher levels but who haven't had time to diversify their rosters - say levels 65-75 - but that's an issue that can easily be solved by coding in a level gate for that sort of thing. Since its easy to make availability level-dependent, and since it increases access to content without making it at all easy to actually defeat those newly opened battles, I think Mk3 Holos are really inappropriately gated. But hey, what do I know?

"Neo2551;c-1328735" wrote:

"Liath;c-1328527" wrote:
Not all choices are created equal, no, but that's very different from suggesting that you have to have everything to be able to compete. Some zetas are downright terrible and shouldn't even be counted. There are always going to be bad decisions that a person can make, but where there are multiple good options, it's not unreasonable to say it's your choice which to go with because you can't have everything. Not being able to have everything (or even all the pretty good things) is ok.

In this case, why would we ever invest real money on gearing toons if we will be bottlenecked by zetas anyway? We are not asking to be flooded but a 100% increase in zeta material would not even change the situation.

If I can max only a single toon per month with Zeta, I don’t need to even think about supporting the game financially while if I knew I could use a toon I gear I would gladly consider the option.

It is the exact situation as credit a year and half ago, where the exact same type of person made the exact same arguments against more resources. Guess players and devs do not like to read constructive feedback.

Not sure how this has anything to do with the post I was responding to that claimed that an argument based on player choice is meaningless.

You might consider gearing a character because that character is useful even without a zeta. But I'm not going to argue that you should spend money on the game, since I honestly don't see why anybody would ever do so.

I am not opposed to more resources, I am just disagreeing with the claim that those resources are needed to be able to complete content or enjoy the game. Personally, at this point, I would much rather see an increase in the availability of bottleneck gear than the availability of zetas. And disagreeing with things that are posted in no way means that I "do not like to read constructive feedback" and that conclusion is frankly obnoxious.