Mastery Rank Rewards; An Idea To Keep Our Noses To The Grind.

[Yastin]

Okay, so here's the thing, beyond a few weapons, what does mastery earn us? A little number next to our name? That's not very worth it, especially past level eight. So, I've come up with a simple system of rewards;

 

Each rank is pretty much three sub-ranks, right? So there's a simple pattern the game could follow;

 

1/3, base rank, for achieving any given rank, you get a levelled amount of credits and/or materials and a badge that shows your Rank's icon! Woo!

 

2/3, silver, And what do our silver people get? A mod, or a small set of mods! This set would include a certain mod-type that span's across all weapons, just to ease the grind. Perhaps even have a choice. Get a slash, puncture, -or- impact set, for all four weapon types, etc. Or one of four elementals, or a defensive pack of frame mods versus an offensive pack. I'm not saying that level 2 should get multi-shot packs, but why not give the lowbies a little insured damage to start, and the high-levels some guaranteed extras?

 

3/3, gold, or, the fun levels! These are the ones people really look forward to, because this is the level that nets you a mastery aesthetic! Either a set of weapon skins, or a special pallet, or, for high levels, even a cool new Syandana that you have to earn! Give people special things at these ranks that let 'em show off! Maybe a poncho, or a glow pallet at high levels...

 

Anyways, that's my thought... Maybe combine the tiers slowly, so super-high- mastery-ranks earn all three reward-types each level, since their ranks take a lot longer. Ideas? Questions? Thoughts?

Edited December 22, 2013 by Yastin

[xWindScar]

I do like the idea of custom aesthetics or skins for certain Mastery milestones. Would be easily implemented, too. Especially if they simply give badges for Mastery milestones like they did for the Founder's program. Here's to hoping.

[Yastin]

Heh, guess nobody's too miffed about mastery being 'useless' at the moment above level 6-8... Still, I think it'd be a great way to give newbies a free serration an' all, let 'em be effective at a lower level... It's not like one mod-set will upset the balance and... Well, as the delightful man behind the hardware store says as he sits in his shady sports car with the window cracked, "The first one's free." : P

[Cobalt313]

Sure, this sounds pretty nice! Free mods are always welcome and usually not unbalancing, and having badges and skins to show off your high mastery would hold some appeal to many.

[Yastin]

Sure, this sounds pretty nice! Free mods are always welcome and usually not unbalancing, and having badges and skins to show off your high mastery would hold some appeal to many.

 

Exactly. Once you get to level 8, there's no more fancy guns, but if people have a really cool metalic pallette, or some awesome exclusive syandana at high level, that becomes a goal. It's something to hook you in, and make you think, "Hey, maybe I should build the bo after all..." hoarding all that precious mastery to get a cloak or poncho or hood...

[MrPeaches777]

Love it. I think this is one of those things people don't realize that they want until it's brought up like this. I'm sure they'll do something like this in the future. It's highly probable that they'll at least do some badges cause that's pretty easy to do. The skins and syandanas seem a bit less likely though, cause that's "a lot" of work that they could be making money from, but then again I'm sure a level 12 has spent more than a fair share of money on the game by then, and would be a nice way of saying "thanks for supporting the game". But anyway, I would love to see all of this in the game and hope the devs put some thought into this sooner rather than later (after the new HUD of course).

[(PSN)GR13V4NC3]

Platinum is always a great reward, even in small amounts. It's everywhere you want to be.

[Yastin]

Platinum is always a great reward, even in small amounts. It's everywhere you want to be.

 

Eh, Platinum's more like them paying you to play... While it'd be cool, the idea is that you have something cool to wear that makes all the newbies drool over your high rank, and some incentives to get to said rank. If it's the same stuff that anyone could buy for real money, it's not as much of a "reward" for sticking wwith the game so long, and uing all that cool content they keep putting out.

[(PSN)GR13V4NC3]

Eh, Platinum's more like them paying you to play... While it'd be cool, the idea is that you have something cool to wear that makes all the newbies drool over your high rank, and some incentives to get to said rank. If it's the same stuff that anyone could buy for real money, it's not as much of a "reward" for sticking wwith the game so long, and uing all that cool content they keep putting out.

I see your point. I'm just saying, its a nice gesture. They give thousands away every week or so on the livestreams, so I wouldn't think a paltry sum of 5-20 platinum for worthy events wouldn't be bad. It's better than 1000 credits. You can't do crap with 1000 credits. At least with 20 platinum you can get an orokin cell. That's all. 

[Nulak]

Well i like the idea of more stuff each rank. But i would like to see better unique reward. Plat / mods at low level seems fine but at rank 4 lets be honest i already have 2k mods rotting in my stash.

Same for credits, who the hell want 20K or 30k credits when you are rank 4++ ...

 

Trophy that gives you various pieces of decorative equipment is imho a  cool feature. Similar to some rare game like Warhammer online : http://warhammeronline.wikia.com/wiki/Trophy 

Or a sreenshot here : http://i33.tinypic.com/34g34ex.jpg

 

Or couse unranked weapon is still a must-have, but its difficult to balance a weapon that ask very high end rank to unlock.

 

-More moves/ finishing moves unlock for ranking up could be fun too.

 

Just my 2 copper

[Siubijeni]

This is an excellent idea. I especially like your division of base, silver, gold rewards. A couple of thoughts:

 

Base Rank: I like that the badge is down here. It goes along with the achievements, which are also for the base ranks. Credits can be a nice reward, but for those people with over two million it won't hold much interest. Depending on what resources you get, that's a nicer reward, but still of limited appeal to a lot of players with stockpiles. I would say rather than doing one or the other, do both: a leveled amount of credits, and some resources based on level. Perhaps a choice of three packages that randomly pick a common, uncommon, and rare resource, with amounts based on how useful the resource is as well. For example, a low-leveled package could include 2-3 Gallium as rare, since it's arguably the least useful rare (morphics being the other one that could be considered, but for them it's less that their not useful and more that they're just common), or it could include 1 Orokin Cell or Neurode, seeing as they are more valuable and rare.

 

Silver Rank: Mod packs are an excellent idea. To have much appeal, it would have to be rarer mods that are harder to get... not corrupt mods or nightmare mods, of course (well, maybe with a really low chance to show up once you start getting into the higher ranks), but things like Fever Strike, Enemy Sense, Hand Spring, Master Thief... y'know, things that have very limited methods of acquisition, not necessarily based on rarity or utility. Any rare mods could be thrown in, though, naturally (continuity, focus, serration, etc). Maybe it picks three mods and you have three sets to choose from?

 

Gold Rank: I totally agree with putting aesthetics here. Syandanas, skins, color palettes, maybe cosmetic "Mastery Helmets?" They could be universal, and usable with any frame (then there wouldn't need to be as many different designs). Or they could be a helmet that is usable with any frame, but it takes on a slightly different shape for each frame (so it matches), but has the same sort of theme. Or they could just be like the current cosmetic helmets, and come in sets of 3 or 4 rather than individually... or if they were implemented as the only gold reward (less exciting, but realistic), you could just get them one at a time... perhaps in the order the frames were made? Excal first, then, naturally :D

[Zoig]

I feel like the idea is good, but the idea on how it would work based on mastery ranks seems flawed. I  feel like it would work better like this

 

first of all give a badge at each rank. 

 

then at levels 1-3 give some credits (say 10000) and one or two mods that people consider essential. it would be really nice to get a assured flow at level 3 .

 

4-9 it starts to give alt skins to commonly used weapons. getting a useless skin is not good, but getting a skin for say...hek. that would be nice. not to mention that in a way it gives a sort of subtle recommendation on weapons if people haven't heard about them yet.

 

at level 10 maybe a special syndana. most syndanas are cash only so I don't know what else to really say about this. it would take a hell of a long time though, almost 400 hours maybe.

 

and then you would keep getting weapon skins if the devs felt like going that far. if they did i would say that level 20 most certainly should have a syndana, because people like to brag, and the only reasonable way to get there is by spending at least a little cash for the space (maybe).

 

in a way if they implemented rewards like this it would be a good thing, since it would provide extra  motivation to collect and use all of the weapons, which is pretty much most of the game.

[Yastin]

Well, ranks are broken into threes, and in the end there's going to be around 30 ranks, I feel like 10 special aesthetic packs is enough. From a special skin pack for all weapons, to a metallic/glowy/camouflage palette, to a hooded muffler or something else that's just "bad-&#!" these mastery rewards need to be different enough from anything you can pay for to have people -want- to stick around to earn them. They're the carrot dangling in front of you as you run the treadmill of weapons and frames, and eventually a source of pride that you want to equip to every frame, to show that you mean business. Also, mod-packs for beginners would definitely include a Serration/Hornet Strike/Point Blank, because we all know the concept of, "The first one's free." You want newbies hooked, DE, and that's a way to do it.