Here’s your Marvel Contest of Champions news brief for Monday, December 2, 2019.
Schedule Notes: Round 2 of the 4* Doctor Strange, 4* Cull Obsidian, and Reed Richards (Mr. Fantastic) Featured Arenas at 1pm EST. Summoner Sigil Owners, your Solo Event and Gold Quest reset at 1pm EST. UMCOC Podcast, Live On Discord, 8pm EST.
In his latest PSA, KT1 urges you not to Rank-Up bad 6* Champions.
RichTheMan covers the new 6* Rank-Up materials and more in Marvel Contest News.
It’s been three months since my last account update, and like many others, I’ve made significant progress thanks to the Black Friday Deals, so let’s take a look at how things have progressed since September 1.
Prestige 10,288
I have a new top champion! Blade was the king of my profile for the past 23 months, but Corvus Glaive is finally Sig 200 and has taken over the top position. Sunspot, who I pulled from a Featured Crystal a few weeks ago, is the new addition to my Top 4, replacing Stark Spider-Man. The Black Friday Deals also allowed me to awaken my 5* Thing, who will be going to 5/65 shortly and should also make his way into my Top 4.
Big picture, I achieved three milestones, topping 1 million player rating, 10K prestige, and 500 champs collected. My 500th champion was 3* Man-Thing from the Marvel Insider rewards, which I know isn’t very epic for a 500th champ but hey, I’ll take it.
12 6* Champions
I added three new 6* champions to my roster, Ronin, The Champion, and Night Thrasher and I’m pretty happy with all three. Ronin is a fun bleed champ to play, and The Champion gives me a crucial synergy with Mephisto for Act 6 content. Night Thrasher I just pulled on Black Friday, so I haven’t had the chance to test him out, but he may be worth a Champion Guide down the line. Gladiator Hulk remains the one 6* I’m playing with any regularity though.
I now have 10 4/55 5* champions, down from 11 in September. Killmonger and Ghost-Rider graduated to max status, and Symbiote Supreme is my one new 4/55. With the additional access to T5b, I’m a little worried about my Tier 2 Alpha consumption going forward, which may hold back additional rank-ups. I recently pulled Void, Captain America IW and Proxima Midnight, all of whom are currently r4 candidates. I’d love to be able to rank up Psylocke and Nick Fury as well, and Mr. Sinister for AW defense, but there is only so much gold to go around.
Top 5 Most Wanted (5* or 6*) Venom The Duck – Super Enjoyable Play-Style Mysterio – Domino Counter/Prestige Warlock – Havok Counter/Heal Block/Prestige Claire Voyant – High Prestige Mystic Heimdall – Cheat Death Synergy
I managed to obtain 3 of my top 5 most wanted from the September list, pulling a 6* Champion, 5* Void, and 5* Sunspot, so I have to consider that a big win. I am currently sitting on 2 5* Tech gems and 1 Mystic gem, so I would really love to pull some champs worthy of those resources.
The biggest piece of content I completed in the last three months was the Variant version of Back Issues 3. As the owner of a 5/65 Sentinel and Sparky, this was an absolute blast and Variant 3 ranks as my favorite piece of permanent content in the game. I didn’t spend too much time in Act 6.1, but 6.1.2-6.2.4 are all 100% now.
While I didn’t make a big push in permanent content after completing Variant 3, that was mostly to allow my roster to catch up a bit, and I’m really happy with how it has come along recently. Thanks to November’s AQ rewards and Glory Store buffs, I’ll be able to make even more progress soon.
Going forward, I plan to jump into Variant 4 and 100% it as soon as possible upon release (love the concept of this one), then finally finish off the last 3 paths of Variant 1 (can you tell I’m really avoiding that buffet Korg?). At that point, I’ll have to turn my attention to 100% completion of Act 6.1 and then move on to Act 6.2. I don’t expect to make much, if any progress in Abyss of Legends before completing Act 6, unless there is an unexpectedly easy path for an initial clear.
Here’s your Marvel Contest of Champions news brief for Sunday, December 1, 2019.
Schedule Notes: The Gold Arena ends at 1pm EST. The AQ series begins at 3pm EST.
Kabam confirmed the start dates for several December events via in-game mail yesterday. The Halls of Heroes and Anniversary Boost start on December 10, and the Gifting Event returns on December 17. There will be two Anniversary Calendars, the first running December 9-16, and the second running December 16-31.
Here’s your Marvel Contest of Champions news brief for Saturday, November 30, 2019.
Schedule Notes: 100% Champion availability until AW attack resumes around 2PM EST. Dungeons reset for the final time this cycle at 1pm EST (Skill/Cosmic). Tier 4 Basic Arena begins at 6pm EST.
It’s the day after Black Friday. If you haven’t already made up your mind, here’s what the community is saying about the offers. Check out deal reviews from Seatin, Lagacy, RichTheMan, Brian Grant, and KT1.
Katy Candy teaches you how to use the new and improved Colossus in 6 Minutes or Less.
Be sure to follow me on Twitter @FrontlineMCOC or join the new Frontline MCOC Line Group for more updates! -Dano357
Note: Remember that while Black Friday offers are fun and the talk of the community right now, this is a game and you shouldn’t feel pressured to spend.
Black Friday offers for Marvel Contest of Champions have just gone live. If you’re like me, and have saved up 15K units, you’re wondering if these cache offers are a good value. Let’s take a look at the two choices.
So here’s the good news. Both offers, in my opinion, are worth more than the 15K unit offer price, if you have saved/grinded for units. But the Superior Awakening Bundle is significantly more valuable. I would put the items in the Awakening Bundle at a value of 23,240 units, while the Superior Rank Up Bundle has a value of 17,140.
Here’s how I valued each bundle. Note I am combining the 1K and 4K unit offers into these calculations. If you want to make your own value calculations, here’s the spreadsheet.
Apologies for the mobile formatting, you can also load the info below as a Google Sheet.
It’s the 5 year anniversary of Marvel Contest of Champions, so expect December to be a huge month. While we’re still waiting on the specifics for the individual events, release notes for v25.1 have already been posted. December will feature the Trial of Reed Richards (assuming this is the EQ title), The Halls of Heroes, an anniversary celebration, and the release of Back Issues (Variant) 4 – Waning Moon. Silver Surfer will be the only champion released in December. Squirrel Girl and Nova are confirmed for January.
In Alliance War news, Season 14 kicks off next week on December 4. The rewards lockout date for Season 14 is December 20 at 6pm EST, and the final war of the season ends on December 31.
Full Roster Availability (No AW/AQ): 100% champion availability on Friday, December 6 at 3pm EST following the conclusion of Alliance Quest, until Alliance War attack resumes on Saturday, December 7 around 2pm EST.
Sunday, December 1: The Gold Arena ends at 1pm EST. The AQ series begins at 3pm EST.
Monday, December 2: Round 2 of the 4* Doctor Strange, 4* Cull Obsidian, and Reed Richards (Mr. Fantastic) Featured Arenas at 1pm EST. Summoner Sigil Owners, your Solo Event and Gold Quest reset at 1pm EST. UMCOC Podcast, Live On Discord, 8pm EST.
Tuesday, December 3: Dungeons end at 1pm EST. Warlock enters the basic pool.
Wednesday, December 4: The new event quest begins at 1pm EST. The first matchmaking for Alliance War Season 14 starts at 6pm EST.
Thursday, December 5: Round 1 of the 4* Namor and TBA Featured Arenas begin at 1pm EST.
Friday, December 6: 100% Champion availability following the conclusion of AQ at 3pm EST. The Alpha Arena begins at 6pm EST.
Saturday, December 7: 100% Champion availability until AW attack resumes around 2PM EST.
Here’s your Marvel Contest of Champions news brief for Friday, November 29, 2019.
Schedule Notes: 100% Champion availability following the conclusion of AW attack around 2pm EST. Black Friday deals will go live at 1pm EST and last for 96 hours.
Ok, I know what you’re thinking. Really, Joe Fixit? Let me take you back in time to the week after the infamous version 12.0 update. I had just finally, after over a year of playing the game, completed my third science T4cc and was ready to rank 5 my first 4* champion. A momentous occasion in any Summoner’s career.
But remember this is early 2017. Thing, Void, Wasp, Captain America IW, Human Torch, Invisible Woman, and Gladiator Hulk weren’t in the game yet. Red Hulk, Spider-Gwen, and Luke Cage hadn’t been buffed, and I hadn’t pulled Quake.
My choices are Captain America World War II (remember perfect block has just been nerfed) and Joe Fixit. After some testing, I pulled the trigger on my man Joe, and despite questions from every single person that joined my alliance, I rode Joe Fixit to victory on the Map 5 poison path for over a year.
Key Information: Joe Fixit is a Las Vegas gangster version of the Hulk, and has a few tricks up his sleeve. At the start of the fight, and after landing a heavy attack, Joe is able to trigger one of four random poker suits, each with a different benefit.
These suits are Hearts (regeneration), Spades, (chance to weaken/fatigue opponent), Clubs (increased critical rating based on combo meter), and Diamonds (increased attack based on lost health). Of these four suits, Clubs is the best for damage, while hearts is also beneficial for the regeneration. If one of these two suits does not come up, it is usually best to parry and then heavy attack to try to get a new suit.
Like all Hulk champions, Joe Fixit is poison-immune.
Joe Fixit is a villain and member of the Black-ISO Mafia.
Signature Ability: Joe’s signature ability grants a chance at second suit. This is nice to have, but not required to play the champion. You should not use an awakening gem or signature stones on Joe Fixit. This ability does not scale well beyond the initial dupe.
Team Building/Key Synergies: Joe Fixit has a unique synergy with Kingpin that grants him 15% attack when the opponent has a debuff. You can also pair Joe with Ms. Marvel (Carol Danvers), The Hood, Yellowjacket, or Moon Knight for increased critical rating, and OG Hulk for increased attack. None of these are required though.
Mastery Setup: Joe Fixit should be run with maxed Deep Wounds to maximize the damage of the SP1 and get more benefit out of the Kingpin synergy. As you’ll want to spam this attack in most situations, do not run this champion with suicides on.
Alliance War Defense: Joe Fixit is a diversity defender for lower-tier alliance war.
Special Attacks: The SP1 is Joe’s single best source of damage. That is because each bullet hit of the SP1 has a 60% chance to cause a bleed for 4 seconds, and I have seen bleed stacks as high as 7. This is why you want to run deep wounds with this champion. If the opponent bleeds, this is the go-to special attack.
The SP2 has a 100% chance to stun for 3.4 seconds. While it’s a decent stun, there aren’t many situations where you can stun lock with a SP2.
The SP3 is a torrent of Tommy-Gun fire that has 100% chance to cause bleed, but if the opponent bleeds you’re never going to want to save up the SP3 anyways.
Pros: Can do relatively good damage when spamming the SP1, especially on a power reserve node.
Has an above-average health pool and critical resistance for a 4*.
Stun on the SP2 provides a secondary bit of utility in bleed-immune match-ups.
Cons: Not available as a 5* or 6* champion, and has an outdated kit, so he’s not going to be useful beyond Act 5.
Regeneration is not substantial or reliable.
Roulette wheel aspect of the suits can be frustrating, and difficult to access in stun-immune fights.
Not any match-ups in the game where Joe Fixit is undeniably the best option.
Pro Tips: Best used against mystics that are not bleed-immune.
Here’s your Marvel Contest of Champions news brief for Thursday, November 28, 2019.
Schedule Notes: Round 1 of the 4* Doctor Strange, 4* Cull Obsidian, and Reed Richards (Mr. Fantastic) Featured Arenas begin at 1pm EST. The AQ series ends at 3pm EST.
Episode #100 of the UMCOC Podcast with special guest MCOC and MROC Creative Director Gabriel Frizzera. If you’re interested in the future of both games in 2020, you don’t want to miss this one.
KT1 has a Top 10 List of potion saving champs in MCOC.
Frontline: MCOC 