The Hanzo Ninja Clan Presents: Raid Raiders!!!!

25104



Raiding has made a huge impact for those players willing to break away from traditional toon building "rules". Unfortunately, I see so many players ingrained in the old way of building, where you either had to patiently wait for an eternity to develop a strong toon, sacrificing play time, enjoyment, and overall power as other players level past you, or spend a large amount of money to allow you the freedom to level without outgrowing your power base. Raiding has given us the ability to level almost with impunity and actually grow our toons as we do. No more are we required to level into empty levels which then need to be filled with powers. Raiding has allowed us to gain powers as we level.

Now, to be fair, Raids are far better for players as they increase their levels than they are early on for developing toons. This is because experience points are given for each hit, rather than the amount of damage done. Since lower level toons tend to be weaker, their hits tend to do less damage. So they are going to be gaining more experience for the same amount of damage as a toon that does more damage per hit, because the other toon is using fewer hits for the same amount of damage. Because of this, lower level and weaker toons will have a lower reward per experience ratio than stronger hitters. But as your toon gets stronger and learns how to do more damage, your rewards per level increase will increase dramatically.

Before we get into how to do more damage or get more rewards, let's take a minute to look at Raid Etiquette.

In order to be successful at raids, it's important to find a like minded group of players to mob up raids with. These players don't have to be part of your team or league. They can be anyone your group of raiders feels is right for the group.

Aside from just hitters, you also want players who can hunt down summon items and AMA parts for raid tokens. In my own group, all of us fit this category. Try to do your part in collecting tokens and summon items. Many players use multiple utility alts for this purpose.

Once you have a good group together, you'll discover not everyone is adding summon material for every raid. That's ok. As long as they all are always trying, it will even out over time. Some days you will hunt all day long and get back minimal returns. Other days, summon material will seem to be behind every corner. That means some days your friends will carry you, and some days you will have to carry them.

BUT........ when this happens, pay careful attention to who has added summon material to the raid. Learn what their damage requirements are and let them get what they need before claiming any for yourself. That doesn't mean wait till they are done. It simply means that if each of the 3 players that added summon material want 200k damage a piece, make sure there is enough left over when you are done to allow them to get that damage in, and a little more for an overages cushion. How much damage you can do should be agreed upon beforehand with your raid team. You should also consider what your own needs are from the raids, and discuss this with any potential raid partners. This will be critical on how much damage you need to do, and how much damage you need to do is critical in determining how many toons can be in a raid and everyone effectively get everything they want. Some players are looking for gear. Some are trying to fill their decks with every card they can. Some are hunting specific cards. How much damage they need to do plays a huge factor on building raid teams. Generally speaking, the gear is by far the 1st thing most players really hunt for. But most of the gear require huge damage at low return rates. But, even though the cost is high, the premium gear from raids very much hold their own against uber gear from the Nova Shuffle. And for players that already have their fill of such gear, the MP resell value can put some decent MP in your toon's pocket. The power cards and cons are also of great value. In order to get your best chances at getting ALL the drops, I recommend doing 1/3rd of the total damage required to kill the raid. But if you are only looking for specific pieces, you'll need to do a little math. Look at the piece you want 1st off. What is the damage requirement to obtain a chance at it? The Windswept power gives a 2% chance per 6000 damage done. That means for the 1st 6000 damage I do, I get a 2% chance to win that card. But thanks to progressive rewards, those odds increase each time the reward threshold is met. So when I get to 12000 damage, I now have made a 2% roll and a 4% roll. If this is the card I am hunting for, I want to do damage in damage increments of 6000, because 6000 is the damage requirement for a roll to get it. IDEALLY, you want to get to a 50% roll. That's not going to be easy. For Windswept, that would be 25 x 6000 for 150,000 damage. But if you want all 5 that are available, you will have to do that 5 times, for a total 750,000 for the absolute guarantee. But I have found that 11x for 5% drops, 26x for 2% drops seems to do the trick. After deciding what kind of rewards you're hunting and which raids are best to get them from, start tallying up your damage requirements per raid with your raid team. You don't want a team that needs more than the raids provide. So limiting participants is important. Only have enough members on your raid team so that they can all get what they are looking for. After an agreed upon time limit or after all members have gotten their desired damage in, go ahead and share with others.

While it might seem like a good idea to make these raids public by inviting everyone on your friends list, consider instead leveraging these raids to other raid teams, in return for the ones they are finished mining. Your team is your 1st raid wave. Your raid trade partners are your 2nd wave. And vice versa. If you still need more hitters after 2 different raid teams have taken their swings, go ahead and release the raid to the rest of your friends list, or list it on the player's page, or finish it off with utility alts.

The biggest problem with being a successful raider are the massive energy requirements. You only have a maximum of 48 hours to do all the damage in a raid as you can get in. Daily energy gifts only give 480 energy. You're probably going to have to start looking at upping your energy stat skill points. Mine has 100 sp in energy. That gives me 110 energy. Combined with my HQ bonus, I get 120 energy. Using the 5 point energy refill option, now becomes worth using. Furthermore, the mp cards and gear I get from raids, that I don't want, can be sold for the MP I buy refills for. Between the gear and the large numbers of power cards, using raids to build a strong competitive toon is extremely possible. My main toon is almost entirely built off raid and bux cards. The amount of power cards one can acquire is relative to the amount of work one is willing to put in towards it. The gear is absolutely great.

Raiding certainly isn't for everyone, especially those who wish to polesit in the lower levels. But if you plan on taking your toon to over level 500 cheaply, Raids certainly are a great way to compete cheaply.

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The Hanzo Ninja Clan Presents: Raiders Of The Lost Arx!

25104

Image by Daryl Danforth

Raids are now a well known and well used mainstay in Heroes Rising. Unfortunately, it takes a lot of energy to be a raid toon successfully. In the past, putting Skill Points (SP) into your Energy stat beyond what was generally needed was generally frowned upon for competitive toons. Some players squeezed every point they could into fight stats, spending none on their Energy Bank. Most took their Energy Banks up to 30 (20 SP) so that they could complete an entire Fight Club. A few pioneers like John Dellorusso went a step further and upped their Energy Banks to 50 fairly early on, to give them a leveling advantage. Energy Alts were the primary exception, but aren't really designed for competition.

Things have changed though. Back then, we were pushing levels of 200, 300, and 400 for ages. Leveling was very slow and stagnated. Players had to really hoard every SP and carefully decide where each should go. But as we start to quickly reach level 900 and look beyond to level 1000, SP are becoming less and less as crucial a resource. Don't get me wrong. They are still extremely important. But as more become available, small numbers spent experimenting in other areas become less of a liability. Early on, everyone put their SP in Move. As time went on and diminishing returns started to cost heavier and heavier tolls, adding SP to Att and Def started to make sense. Later still, adding large quantities of points to life started to see a strong benefit. Yet, at one time, 99% of players would tell you to build a strictly Move SP allotment.

Now, with raids becoming a bigger and bigger part of HR, trying to find the energy to do Patrols, Fight Club, Missions, and successfully Raid might seem impossible. It most certainly can be. Something is going to have to give. Either you're going to give up FC, and miss out on more MP and Crystals, or you're going to miss out on Patrols that provide power cards, MP, Crystals, Bux, AMA, Summoning Items, etc., or you're going to miss out doing maximum damage for what you want from the raids, making the process more difficult and costly to you in the long run. Energy Gifts only provide 420 energy a day. That's pretty much only going to dent a raid. You can buy items from the store that provide more energy or speeds up energy production, but those cost resources too. Resources that might not be easy to come by. Sure, you can spend 5 MP and refill your Energy Bank, but at 30 energy a pop only, this can get expensive very fast.

Perhaps putting points into your Energy Bank isn't such a bad idea anymore. I have a toon with just slightly over 2 hours worth of an Energy Bank. Because of my HQ, my Fight Bank also takes 2 hours to completely fill. I only have to get in game every 2 hours to be sure I don't lose any resources that I can use to improve my toon. When I feel like it, making huge leveling feats becomes less a task than it once was. When I go to sleep or leave the game for extended hours, I lose far fewer resources from my Energy Bank and Fight Bank filling. When I level, I get a nice surge of energy and fights to help me in my in game efforts. And IF I decide I want to spend 5 MP to buy energy, 2 hours worth, 120, is 4 times as much of a bargain as what I was getting at 30 energy.

Adding SP to your Energy Bank will make raiding a much easier and much more rewarding task, that only minimally, if at all, invades your ability to do other tasks. You'll get more damage in, winning you more cards and gear, building your power and damage, increasing your rewards even more, etc, etc, on and on in a snowballing cycle. I think there's a bear wandering the lists that could tell you a little more about how that cycle works. My best toon has 100 SP in Energy plus a lvl 5 Cafeteria. That's a mere 50 levels worth of SP. That might sound like a lot, but as we start closing in on a lvl 1000 lvl cap, is it really?

WARNING!!!! I DO NOT advise this strategy for players that wish to pole-sit at 1 level or feel their toon must be so finely tuned as to not be able to afford leeway for versatility.

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FAN FICTION: BREAKING NEWS: CRISIS AVERTED

BY: Todd Goode id# 12205



Welcome to the WHRT 6 O'clock News. I'm your news anchor, Harry Wankman. Today in the news, numbers are the leading cause of statistics and ....

Hold on folks, we have a breaking emergency alert from NASA.

This is bad news folks, according to this, there is an asteroid headed directly for Earth and initial analysis are saying this asteroid is larger than the one that killed the dinosaurs.

NASA leaders are also saying that the world's Superpowers' have fired numerous nuclear warheads at the object and due to its enormous size and sudden appearance, attempts to destroy the asteroid or alter its course have failed.

I'm being told that the President will have a statement and will be speaking to the public in two minutes. This a somber moment in time folks. The end of all things.

Now, ladies and gentlemen, our president, President Franklin Hardwood.

I address you tonight not as the President of the United States, not as a leader of a country, but as a citizen of humanity. We are faced with the very gravest of calamities. What Mr. Wankman just reported is correct. This is a very dire situation. All of Earth's leaders' efforts have failed. It's still unknown where this monster rock came from. I have been told it just appeared mysteriously in an otherwise empty part of space. We are not giving up without a fight. We still have an ace left to play.

As some of you are already aware, there is an organization known as B.A.D.G.E. that has in the past been able to maneuver numerous anomalous situations and taken care of those threats.

I am aware that some think they cause more harm than good, but materials things can be replaced. The Earth cannot.

I have been assured that B.A.D.G.E. has created a new emergency defense system to prevent disasters such as this. They call it Atlas. I call it hope. They are our last hope to render this planet killing asteroid neutralized.

This will be the first test of this new system. The dreams of an entire planet are focused on these brave souls that traveling into the heavens to stop this, this Armageddon. As citizens of the world see this event through, God speed and good luck. MEANWHILE AT THE B.A.D.G.E. SPACE STATION .... Nova and Arx are watching the breaking news report.

"Nova! The world's governments are freaking out pretty bad. They have nearly exhausted most of their nuclear stockpiles and giving hope and good luck speeches. I think it's time," remarked Arx.

Nova replied, "Yes, It's time. Initiate Atlas."

Arx calls on Earth's heroes. He orders Quark and agent Justin to continue investigating the coordinates in space where the asteroid first appeared and let keep him apprised of what they learn. Someone or something has to be causing this.

Dr. Shapiro, I need you to run analysis on those crystals brought back earlier. See if they have any special properties of any kind. Arx radios some of Earth's strongest heroes,"Rakly, Hanzo, Death Punch, Island, Zen, Shinobi and Anomaly! Get up there and take lead. Make sure none of these new heroes make any mistakes. Figure out the best way to tackle this monster asteroid.

They all take off and rallied all of the other heroes together.

Rakly says, "I think the best way to do this is to have three platoons of heroes take positions around the asteroid at different intervals. That way the closest platoon, 1st Platoon, can concentrate fire on a bigger center mass and make the initial explosion. 2nd Platoon will make sure the largest chunks of the asteroid are destroyed and the 3rd Platoon will hang back the farthest and make sure any dump truck sized pieces are blown to bits. Any smaller pieces should burn up in the atmosphere."

"If your powers or suits enhance your attack strength take up the closest positions. It's critical that we hit this thing at full strength and take out as much as we can on the first attack."

"If your powers or suits can resist the physical effects of the asteroid take up the middle positions and if you have any movement speed enhancements, take the positions the farthest out and bat clean up."

"Okay, you have your orders, get into positions and start firing on my mark. So, keep your communicators on."

Rakly, Island and Death Punch took up 1st Platoon positions and reported aloud, "In position and ready!"

Hanzo and Shinobi took up 2nd Platoon positions and reported, "In position and ready!"

Zen and Anomaly took up 3rd Platoon positions, "In position and ready!"

Okay folks, this is it. It's time. Fire on my mark! 3 ... 2 ... 1 ... Mark! FIRE ON THE ASTEROID!!

After a few minutes of constant bombardment of the asteroid Rakly hollers out, "Are we doing anything? Are we even making a dent in this thing?"

Island replies, "It's getting a hot spot, shouldn't be much longer now to cause a fracture."

Death Punch breaks off from the platoon and flies closer to the asteroid and says, "I got this! I got the most power!"

Ralky replies, "Get back into proper position! We have to heat this thing up evenly or the asteroid will not break up into equal size pieces! This thing is already acting weird. It should have split apart already but it's just taking our blasts."

It was too late. Death Punch had already powered up and struck the asteroid with his strongest punch ever.

The punch exploded the asteroid apart unequally as suspected and the energy from the explosion sent a bigger part of the asteroid into Death Punch, both hurling through space away from Earth at an outrageous speed.

Rakly remarked aloud, "Death Punch! Report! Are you okay?" as he and everyone else shielded themselves from larger the chunks and shards of the asteroid.

There was no reply from Death Punch.

Island replied, "That guy just can't stick to a plan. His communicator is probably busted and may be floating away unconscious in deep space or both."

"You're probably right," replied Rakly,"but someone has to go and get him."

Rakly said, "Krystal Fae, I need you to catch up to him and take him back to med bay and get him checked out."

Krystal Fae said, "You got it, I'm on it. I'm going now."

"Death Punch may have a problem sticking to a plan but he at least one big chunk is safely flying away from the Earth," Martial Law replied as he took out five smaller chunks of asteroid.

Rakly spoke up, "Okay people! We still got two large chunks to take care of and countless smaller chunks. Hanzo! Shinobi! Take your platoons and pick a rock to take out. 1st platoon will split up and rejoin Ya'll."

Both Hanzo and Shinobi's platoons started to pick the two large chunks apart. The two chunks broke apart into smaller pieces. Some were still the size of skyscrapers and others about the size of a Volkswagen.

"Hey Hanzo! You seeing this? asked Shinobi. Hanzo said, "Yeah! I'm seeing all kinds of different crystals floating around when we blast a big chunk apart."

Well, grab a few as the fly by. We can add them to our rock collection when we get back. Once a rockhound, always a rockhound." Shinobi quipped.

Hanzo chuckled, "I got a hand full already and a lot of these crystals are different colors. There is also a bunch of powdered crystal along with bits of asteroid. Weirdly though, some of the crystal powder is sticking to my suit and some of the bits of asteroid almost seem to be avoiding our power blasts, like they are being controlled by something."

"Same thing over here!" Shinobi proclaimed. Shinobi got on the communicator, "Platoon 3, some of these chunks are getting past us and they seem to be sentient or at the very least, controlled by something or someone! Make your strikes count and take out as many as you can before they get close to you."

Zen and Anomaly, along with their platoons spread out and start blasting the leftover skyscraper sized remnants with amazing accuracy.

After blasting apart the biggest chunks of asteroid, 1st and 2nd platoons took up positions with 3rd platoon to eradicate the many larger chunks left.

Everyone but Midgardsormr struggled with the thousands of pieces of space rock, he took out the most but after an exhausting near twenty hours of nonstop blasting, the crisis was averted but not without a few scrapes and bruises.



"Great job everyone! Report back to the space station for decontamination then get checked out in med bay," Rakly exclaimed.

Rakly reported back to Nova, "The asteroid is destroyed but we need to look into the crystals that came from the asteroid and there is also some powdered crystal. I don't think it's good that the powdered crystal sticks to our suits. That's not all, some of the fragments of asteroid have a mind of their own. Some of the pieces dodge our blasts."

Nova was just about to summon Quark and Agent Justin when they sounded an alert.

"Nova! Our sensors are picking up another disturbance from the same coordinates as the asteroid we just took out and also, these crystals you have us analyzing are starting to glow a little." reports Quark.

Nova order Quark, "Lock down those crystals in the lab's safe room and tell me the second anything appears in that part of space." Rakly asked Nova, "How are Krystal Fae and Death Punch? They should have been back for a while now. I sent Krystal Fae to fetch Death Punch after he jumped the gun and went all gung-ho on the asteroid and the initial explosion blew Death Punch into deep space."

I can't say Rakly, they never made it back ......

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R.A.I.D. Simulator: The New Big Thing

 Like kids to an arcade when a new video game came out back in the 80's, heroes now rush to the BADGE orbital platform to train in the new R.A.I.D. training simulator. Excitement is rampant as each hero hopes to take part in defeating one of the two newly offered holo-villains to defeat. Will this training be beneficial? To some, yes. To others, a little bit, and to a few it will be an exercise in futility. 

How can players best make use of the new opportunity?

First, it depends on being aware of new options available to players. If you know your goals, resources, build, and resources, it is possible to improve your odds of maximizing your benefits.

• Equipped Gear: Each foe has specific weaknesses/resistances. When fighting, use appropriate gear choices that give bonuses to damage based on your core. Stick with items that give specific damage bonuses over burn, poison, or aura damages, as they (at this point) aren't as favorable in your efforts. Gear that provides defense and health boosts are also unneeded, as damage isn't being done to heroes by the foe. It is all about the damage you can inflict. Xdamage multipliers do work, so make use of them if possible for some big pops of damage.
• 
  Be stocked in consumables. The daily maximum of More-Fun Bars has jumped from 14 to 16 uses per day which adds some additional attacks. There is also a consumable purchasable at the bottom of the GIFTS tab call Liquid Learning. It comes in different strengths, based on your purchase choice, but it can be used to improve XP gains, should that be your preferred route while raiding.
• There are multiple routes for playing, so understanding how RAIDing will impact your style is going to help determine your strategy. If you just want to play and get what you get, that is an option. If you are fast leveling or playing an energy alt character(one that puts a good amount of skill points into energy when they level), RAIDing is a very useful opportunity. If controlling your leveling speed to control your gains is your preference, you may want to look at the cost/benefit margin before participating. The current style of play that benefits from the RAID structure is a character that can deal out substantial damage in the hits they inflict, moderate damage in a high volume of hits, or substantial damage in a high volume of hits. 
• Look at your power cards and if possible, bulk up on ATTACK cards to give you extra strength for your strikes. You can temporarily replace some of your lower value crystal cards with BUX cards for the duration of the raid. If you haven't already, a player can use the Power Counts button on the POWER>TRAIN tab to see what cards you are actively using for each attribute.

For the lower level, Abominable Yetti RAID, a team of 4-5 player who each dole out 200,000 damage during the course of the raid each have a fair shot of getting a substantial quantity of all the offered rewards. On the Heroes Rising Players Page, there are several opportunities to see other player's RAID results. After some examination and participation, these are some of the results I have observed.

• There are quite a few players participating and sharing raids. I've seen RAID results shared from groups of 10 and groups of nearly 30. There are invites going out like mad, but several of them have already ended before I have received the invitation.
• Typically, there are 2 or 3 characters that dominate each of the lower RAID score-wise. I have observed one instance where a high level character sweeps in and in one hour does over a third of the RAID target's health in under an hour. Open invitations do allow players to come in and dominate the field in a moments notice. This isn't a negative, per se, about the RAID activity or a players enthusiasm to dominate, but it does quickly reduce the allotted time and damage available to players who have to wait to build energy back up. Don't count on being able to hit certain thresholds in your own performance in an open field. Crows will come in and ravage if possible.
• 
  In the Abominable Yetti RAID with only 10 participants, all below level 300, those doing over 200,000 damage earned far more quality items than those doing around 100,000 damage. Individual damage ranged from 200-300 for most, with one doing and average of 500(Lvl240ish) to the lowest doing around 100 damage per hit(Lvl 60).
• The available rewards are not to par with a typical World Raid, which for the summonable aspect of doing them is as to be expected. There are uses for all rewards, either in resale, filling Power Card slots, or adding variety to an arsenal.  
• The snowglobe for summoning these R.A.I.D. events (found in Neo Utopia, along with the AMA parts needed to purchase tokens) drop with fair frequency, but have been discovered for sale in a Black Market during patrols for 50MP. They are your MP to spend, but a bit of farming will get you one for free, so shop wisely.
• It is possible when creating the RAID to make it private or public. This will help players control who participates.

Overall, these highly desired player summoned RAIDs are a substantial improvement to the game, but will not be of much interest to new players, as they can not join until at least level 50. Even once hitting the threshold, it is likely the damage output of a low-level player won't earn much during one of these events. 

Building an "energy toon" will foster several advantages to strong performance in a RAID event. With additional energy to spend, a player can get far more attacks in. When they level, they will get the opportunity to do far more attacks than a player who is relying on Energy Consumables. I predict there will be growth in this type of build in the coming days as more and more players participate.

Opening up a RAID to everyone at this time is a pitfall that can cost players the chance to build up their damage sufficiently to defeat a foe while crossing thresholds for prize awards. Choosing a group of known players to cooperate in damage output might prove to be far more beneficial than sending out a global call for help. 
Repeated completions of these RAIDS will build a players ability with each run-through. The arm gear offered in the Yetti RAID will directly help if equipped in the next attempt, as it offers and Elemental Damage boost. The core offered in the Skelanimal RAID is going to be highly sought after. 

If you aren't sending out or collecting Gifts from the GIFTS page, start doing so. The depletion of these resources is going to be increasing the longer RAID events are available.

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RAIDS!!!! Free Play Just Got Way Better!!!!

Player ID: 25104

Well, October is over. But before we move on, I'd like to take a moment to reflect on last month. There was a writing contest, a costume contest, a take a picture with a box on your head contest, a raid, a lws, and even trick or treating. Some folks gave out some really big treats for trick or treat. I got about 8 pieces of gear I can really use on my newest toon, just from trick or treat. Just from the contests and giveaways, I managed to acquire about $100 worth of MP. And honestly, I probably spent less than 2 hours total acquiring them. That's pretty big, especially for free and budget players. I'm neither, and that's still big to me. So there are all kinds of options for players of all categories to gain the means to grow, not just stronger, but competitive as well. Which brings me to the newest method, RAIDS!!!!

While we have had world raids for awhile now, the much begged for player summoned raids have just now hit Heroes Rising. These raids go fast, in their current incarnation. The 1st 3 were finished within hours, despite the 2 day timer. Once more players start rolling in, this will only compound itself. I feel there's one of 2 options here for players to get enough damage in to see good rewards. Either Justin will have to increase the life of Raid Bosses, or else players will have to start limiting who they share raids with. I'm hoping for the former. Still, these raids are still in the beta test format, so who knows what changes are to come? We can be sure of one thing though. Justin will soon be on the boards asking us for our opinions and suggestions.

Now, early mumbling seems to revolve around players not getting as good or as many drops as they would like. Let's take things into perspective though. These aren't World Raids. Unlike World Raids, that come every 3 months or so, these raids can be summoned whenever and as often as we have materials for. As soon as they launched, we had 3 going and done within hours. So if you didn't get that raid drop you wanted, keep raiding. It'll come in time. In the mean time, the cards are great. Most are crystal cards, so tiering them up costs no MP. And they're GOOD crystal cards! The MP cards are also pretty top notch for prize cards. I have a feeling a lot of players will be able to go a long way with their toons if they combine and work at Raids and FC.

I'll be honest, I felt like I was playing SHC again when the Mayor summoned that 2nd Raid. Ever since Justin took over, things have been getting better. Instead of feeling like a fool's prison, it's starting to feel like home. I expect Raids will make a lot of people happy and hopefully be a trumpet call to those who have already left and those who never came, to finally return home too. I earnestly look forward to what else Justin brings to the table. I do have a little bit of an inside scoop, and I can assure you that Raids are just the beginning. It's about to get wild up in here! I hope I see the rest of you here with me once all the dust settles.

Also, a big shoutout to Justin! Thanks Justin! You're the REAL MVP!!!!

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