Chests or Sure bets?

Wrote this up to answer some questions someone had, and thought I'd post it here too.

Regarding buying Treasure Chests. Really it depends on what one has the general(s) you most desire. A word of caution though, if you seek to get an Epic General, remember that you only have a 5% chance of getting an Epic, and only a 1.25% chance of getting a specific Epic General. I suggest playing with this simulator first: http://www.defyeler.com/ca/chests/onslaught_chest.php

If you have not invested in certain Oracle Offer Generals, your Favor Points may be better invested that way. Each of these Generals costs 30 Favor Points. They are sure bets. Top recommended (but not in a specific order):

1) Barbarus [18 Attack/15 Defense]: Increases Cost and Damage of Power Attacks/Fortify by 3x @ lvl 4
-Recommended for use attacking on any monster battle with a blue fortify/dispel/heal bar. How it works: When you click the 5 stamina button, you use 15 stamina (hitting for 3 times the damage), but the monster only retaliates with 1 times the damage, Using Barbarus results in a third less damage to the blue bar.
-Optional: His Wrathbringer Helm will give +1% critical strike chance when Barbarus is your active general.

2) Kaiser [17 Attack/16 Defense]: Increases chance to land a critical hit on a monster by 3% @ level 4
-Recommended for use on Hydras and Lotus.
-Optional: His Backdraft magic will give +1% critical strike chance increasing you critical chance by 4% with Kaiser as your active general.

3) Adrianna [16 Attack/18 Defense]: -3 Defense to Opposing War Council @ lvl 4
-Recommended for War battles and for War of the Red Plains when using Tactics.

4) Godric [17 Attack/17 Defense]: +20 Max Energy @ lvl 4
-Receommend to equip just before leveling up so that you start the new level with an extra 20 energy (will help you reach your next level faster).

5) Scarlett [17 Attack/17 Defense]: +6% Income/hour @ level 4
-Recommended to be left up while you are not playing so that income acrues faster.

You can find the links for purchasing these generals at http://valerianknight.narutorpg.org/valerian-armory-f5/purchase-links-for-generals-from-the-oracle-t6.htm

I just had to tussle with this very question. As some of you will be aware snow's gone after serpent fp farming with some gusto and I hitched along for the ride there for a little bit. I had planned on going for some chest 3-packs, but decided to go for the very same heroes that you list that I didn't already have. I decided that until I had significantly more generals the abilities based off of hero quantity just weren't sufficient for me to use those heroes. Therefore higher stats and specific special abilities that I'd actually use were more significant. The "transformers," always take more than they give. It's why Vanquish isn't necessarily a super general. Now I suppose I ought to trick out Kaiser. Uggh. Just what I need, another 105 fp general like Barbarus.

Just to indulge my curiosity I ran the simulator using the 3-pack button for a while and tracked how many fp I needed to spend before I got all the epic generals.

Trial 1: 3,760 favor points
Trial 2: 3,820 favor points
Trial 3: 2,760 favor points
Trial 4: 1,060 favor points
Trial 5: 1,630 favor points

Allright, now in all of these there were lots of replications so refunds would have come to offset some of the above costs. But ignoring that, and assuming that our aspiring bad asses of the credit card want to go nuts on these, at the oracle the optimal exchange of real world money for in game favor points is $45 for 300 fp. So if you got the luckiest of my trials, at the previously listed increment you could buy them for 4 increments or $180. If you weren't so lucky and get something more like trial 2, then it'd be more like $585 in real world dollars. And this is just one of the three chest sets. I believe fb has an additional chest set (oblivion) which they'll probably migrate to squeeze a little more out of ca players in ms eventually.

In all of these things, people pay all kinds of attention to the shiny epic generals up on top. But pay attention to the common items, because most likely, with a 55% probability, that's what you'll end up with. Buyers remorse is a common side effect of chest acquisition. But like gamblers world wide, folks don't mention the true cost. They only mention the hits. They won't say "I had to buy over a hundred chests to get Azeron." They just say "I got Azriel."

And bear in mind too, that you might get sick of this game and abandon it for some cool new app. Whoever owns the rights might just decide that it's not sufficiently profitable and shut it down. And perhaps most importantly, this is fantasy. It doesn't exist. The exchange of substantial real world value for a little bit of code, and a graphic . . . well, I wish you luck, you're going to need it.

Mikel wrote:Just to indulge my curiosity I ran the simulator using the 3-pack button for a while and tracked how many fp I needed to spend before I got all the epic generals.

Trial 1: 3,760 favor points
Trial 2: 3,820 favor points
Trial 3: 2,760 favor points
Trial 4: 1,060 favor points
Trial 5: 1,630 favor points

Allright, now in all of these there were lots of replications so refunds would have come to offset some of the above costs. But ignoring that, and assuming that our aspiring bad asses of the credit card want to go nuts on these, at the oracle the optimal exchange of real world money for in game favor points is $45 for 300 fp. So if you got the luckiest of my trials, at the previously listed increment you could buy them for 4 increments or $180. If you weren't so lucky and get something more like trial 2, then it'd be more like $585 in real world dollars. And this is just one of the three chest sets. I believe fb has an additional chest set (oblivion) which they'll probably migrate to squeeze a little more out of ca players in ms eventually.

In all of these things, people pay all kinds of attention to the shiny epic generals up on top. But pay attention to the common items, because most likely, with a 55% probability, that's what you'll end up with. Buyers remorse is a common side effect of chest acquisition. But like gamblers world wide, folks don't mention the true cost. They only mention the hits. They won't say "I had to buy over a hundred chests to get Azeron." They just say "I got Azriel."

And bear in mind too, that you might get sick of this game and abandon it for some cool new app. Whoever owns the rights might just decide that it's not sufficiently profitable and shut it down. And perhaps most importantly, this is fantasy. It doesn't exist. The exchange of substantial real world value for a little bit of code, and a graphic . . . well, I wish you luck, you're going to need it.

Pooh said the refunds for duplicates are part of the running totals, Still, crazy money.

the chests aren't too bad as long as you don't try to "clean them out". i've used the chests 2 times so far (gonna be 3 in 2 more favor points). first time, not too long after i started CA, i opened 1 Onslaught chest and got a Nightcraft Helm, i was pretty disappointed and left the chests alone for awhile. second time was just a week or so ago i noticed Alpha chests were only 55 FP to open 3, and i want Orc King, Stone Guardian and maybe Meph. so i open 3 and this time i got 2 generals, Tifanna and Artanis. not the ones i wanted but i was still happy. i'm gonna try another Alpha 3 pack soon and see what i get. as far as money goes, i haven't spent any real money on CA for reasons like Mikel stated. i make my FP by simply taking a week (or more) to do nothing but farm Ancient Reds. i've been keeping some statistics on the FP drops. one of my top payouts i did just over 245k damage on it, and the payout was 2 FP x3, i almost dropped a load in my pants when i saw it. i'll share all my findings on another thread when i finish my "research" and get it all organized into a nice chart.

just bought another 3 pack Alpha and got Savanna, Elven Blade and Crystal Rod. at least i got another general

Crystal Rod: 9/4 obtainable as a drop from Emerald sea serpent, emerald dragon, or alpha chest.
Elven Plate: (I'm assuming that's what you meant) 6/6 obtainable as a drop from Amethyst sea serpent, gold dragon, or alpha chest
Savannah (@lvl 4) 14/19 and increases invasion army size-- only available by alpha chest

You bought by 3-pack which, if you're going to do this at all, is probably the smartest way since it effectively reduces your cost from 20 to slightly more than 18 fp each. If you'd bought an individual chest and acquired either the crystal rod or the elven plate that way, you'd have probably been frustrated. If you don't have an invasion army expanding general, I suppose Savannah fills that role. But if you don't have the generals listed in dor's original post here then this fp purchase could have worked out better for you with the sure things.

Dear DoR...

Nice posting for this matter....
As every new player would like to get this information for the general that would be great to choose for surety from Monthly Generals than gambling from the Chest....
( Unless they are CC Player who do not care about buying the FPs.... )

yea, i think i'm gonna go ahead and buy all the generals from the purchase links post before i go for chests again. out of 110 FP (2 Alpha 3-packs) i got 3 generals. could have saved those extra 20 fp toward my next general.

by Mikel on Fri Nov 05, 2010 6:22 pm

Elven Plate: (I'm assuming that's what you meant) 6/6 obtainable as a drop from Amethyst sea serpent, gold dragon, or alpha chest

nah, the soldier Elven Blade http://castleage.wikidot.com/elven-blade

Thanks for the info and all the reminders re the uncertainty of gambling.

The 25 FP I've got is very tempting but I just keep reminding myself of my first chest roll on FB: a golden fang. It was months before I gambled again, so this time I'm sticking to the sure thing.

I was thinking of saving up for Zin. I have her on FB and that 15 extra stamina a day is terrific. Her or Godric at any rate, then I'll save up for Barbie when I have enough ene/sta to use him.