Skill Increase Percentages Nerfed?

Lately I have been on a mission to increase the skills of one of my teams to (20) so I have been trading for a lot of single skills and skill stacks. I have noticed many more of the dreaded "Power Up" than usual and was wondering if this was a problem for everyone, or just bad luck.

For instance some of the things I have noticed:
While upgrading a Demon Down (1) it took 2 sacs to get to (2) and once at (3) the mob ate 2 more (1) skills. Also while trying to upgrade a skill (5) Demon Down with (3) stacks the mob ate 2 of them.
I would also say about 1/3 of all (1) skilled mobs ate the first sacrifice to it.
I had 3 agility (4) stacks fail before getting the skill to (20).
A skill level (11) Impulse Down at 2 (4) stacks and no increase.

I understand that upgrading skills is a percentage game, but this is getting expensive (EP wise)

A-team has changed the skill up chance tables a couple times in the last few weeks; you aren't alone, I think we all are having shit luck with it.

Yeah, something is definitely going on, I had 5 sac failures using 1s to get from 3 to 4 today

I would recommend sacrificing Skill (1) to get from 1-3, Skill (2) to get to 4 and then skill (4) from 5-20; should give you close to 90% success rate, average for skill 1-20. So....roughly 80 skill monsters to get your skill level to 20.

This has been working for me, your mileage may vary. When I first started I was advised that sometimes it is better to "bite the bullet" and this formula does do that as far as cost is concerned but it has wasted far fewer skilled monsters for me. I do not claim 100% success but this has come closer (especially in recent weeks) than anything else...

GNK = Green Knight Kobold or any other BP1 mission mate.
MAJOR SAC R= Monster receiving skills you are building to 20 skill level (or whatever)
MINOR SAC= Sacrificed skill monster(s)

These steps are the ones I use to raise MAJOR SAC R to SKILL 4 as well as building skill stacks:

Step 1: Sacrifice GNK (raise to level 2)
STEP 2: Sacrifice MINOR SAC (raise to SKILL 2)
Step 3: Sacrifice 2 GNKs (raise to level 4.5)
STEP 4: Sacrifice MINOR SAC (raise to SKILL 3)
Step 5: Sacrifice 3 GNKs (raise to level 6.5)
STEP 6: Sacrifice MINOR SAC (raise to SKILL 4)

Step 7: Hereafter I sacrifice skill stacks (4) to SKILL LEVEL UP my MAJOR SAC R

2 observations;
1. During experimentation step 1 was not always necessary but I did lose skills to level up and power up. I have not lost skills to get to skill level 2 when step 1 was taken.

2. The attaining of levels 2, 4.5, and 6.5 seem to be more critical than the number of GNKs it takes to get there. Sometimes it takes one more GNK to get to the level prescribed.

I would be very interested in hearing from others who build skill stacks to see how they have altered their process in the last few weeks.

I never heard of a correlation between the lvl of a monster and its skill up chance... Much less specific levels. That seems a little ridiculous.
How many times have you tested this? And about how many failures have you gotten?

Event Horizon wrote:I never heard of a correlation between the lvl of a monster and its skill up chance... Much less specific levels. That seems a little ridiculous.
How many times have you tested this? And about how many failures have you gotten?

^^^^^ Agreed, very interested to see some stats on monster level and skill up chance...

I have leveled my monsters' skills at all sorts of levels (1-70) and never noticed any correlation. Or is it the act of gaining a level between skill-ups...?

Event Horizon wrote:I never heard of a correlation between the lvl of a monster and its skill up chance... Much less specific levels. That seems a little ridiculous.
How many times have you tested this? And about how many failures have you gotten?

EH,
I don't claim to be an expert at all and it may very well be a fluke but I have built between 10-15 skill stacks and raised at least 4 monsters from skill 1 to skill 4-8 since the end of the Dragon Wall using this formula. I haven't kept track of the exact number of failures (I will begin keeping a log as of now) but I know I have had FAR FEWER failures since beginning to build in this fashion. I am defining a failure as failing to SKILL LEVEL UP and wasting a skilled monster to level up or power up.

Well, let's define two types of failures.

1. The big failure. Your skill stack flops, you're left with a 7100 gold hole, and you've cleared up an inventory slot:).

2. The mini failures. Tell us how many of each one. Maybe someone else can provide the standard skill stack ratio data, but a 1 to 2 transition is much more secure than a 3 to 4 transition.

Also, the level system is weird. It doesn't make any real sense in theory, but maybe it works in practice??

blah wrote:Well, let's define two types of failures.

1. The big failure. Your skill stack flops, you're left with a 7100 gold hole, and you've cleared up an inventory slot:).

2. The mini failures. Tell us how many of each one. Maybe someone else can provide the standard skill stack ratio data, but a 1 to 2 transition is much more secure than a 3 to 4 transition.

Also, the level system is weird. It doesn't make any real sense in theory, but maybe it works in practice??

I am keeping a log. Today I built a Preemptive Strike skill stack exactly as I described previously except that I had to sacrifice one more GNK to surpass both the 4.5 and 6.5 levels. I did fail to mention previously that when I do a sacrifice I do it one monster at a time.

You guys obviously have more experience at the game than I do. I don't wish to lead anyone down a primrose path. I will cease giving advice BUT I will continue to keep a log while building stacks in this manner. It works for me. For me, gold is a much easier commodity to come by than specific skills and I would rather spend gold than waste skilled monsters. Wasting skilled monsters is MY definition of failure. I cannot speak to attempting to skill level up a maxed level monster as I have yet to find a successful method for doing that.

If don't mind any advice given, especially if there is any evidence. But right now, I have no idea of what your "success" rate is, and what that is in comparison with a normal success rate.

Tell us when you have data.

this is all too deep for me..., all i know is a month ago i could take a monsters skill to (5) and sometimes (6) without any fails, or maybe one. now to make a (4) stack of anything it takes about 8 singles...

if any think im crazy, look at the monsters lvl next time you are buying stacks from ppl, if you see the monster is lvl6 or 7 (and for a monster to lvl up from 6 to 7 it takes 2 singles, yeah ive failed a retardedly high amount of times to figure out this inticate shit ), that stack took 7+ singles to make. fking ateam... lol

Lol. I have an IPD stack level 3(okay, it's old). I just made a lvl 4(1 fail) DED stack(I don't have it, I used it). Also, I have a few Pre-emp stacks, they don't seem to be that high leveled. Nothing above 5, that's for sure.

J-Tin wrote:Lately I have been on a mission to increase the skills of one of my teams to (20) so I have been trading for a lot of single skills and skill stacks. I have noticed many more of the dreaded "Power Up" than usual and was wondering if this was a problem for everyone, or just bad luck.

For instance some of the things I have noticed:
While upgrading a Demon Down (1) it took 2 sacs to get to (2) and once at (3) the mob ate 2 more (1) skills. Also while trying to upgrade a skill (5) Demon Down with (3) stacks the mob ate 2 of them.
I would also say about 1/3 of all (1) skilled mobs ate the first sacrifice to it.
I had 3 agility (4) stacks fail before getting the skill to (20).
A skill level (11) Impulse Down at 2 (4) stacks and no increase.

I understand that upgrading skills is a percentage game, but this is getting expensive (EP wise)

All of the the above seems pretty normal to me when I did alot of tracking of skill level ~2 months ago. It takes me on average 6 skills to build a stack of 4. That's from averaging 100s of stacks. I just did some today on ipd, slum and dea. The slum stacks were failing alot but the ipd and dea were not failing at all so on average across all of them still about 5-6.

On failure of stack(4). Your experience is also average. I usually have 3-4 failures on the way to 20 using stack 4 from 5-20. That's from average of about a dozen max20. The worse case I had was 15 skills to get to a stack of 4 and 4 stacks of agility(4) fail on me in a row but that's the only 4 failure to 20.

As for level with skill. I'm pretty sure there is no correlation. I have done skill at all level with about the same failure rate. In particular when building skill stack, it levels when it fails so you automatically hit those targets. I have stack that were as high as lv8-9 before reaching 4. If the chances were better at higher level particularly after 7. I shouldn't have hit level 8 or 9.

I haven't level demon down. From what people are saying it sounds particularly difficult to level which might be the case or it could be that it is just that much more costly when it fails so people remember it more. Agility has always been claimed to be a hard one to level but in my experience it isn't really any different from the other skills when you take the time to really track it.

I will say that the only change I notice is that from 1 to 2 seems to fail more than before. It use to be almost 100% but no longer but on average to 4 sacrificing singly still hasn't change for me.

Kyan

I was wondering about this myself. I guess now I know I wasn't just unlucky over the past few days. Yesterday I tried getting my pit from 8 to 9,and the darn thing ate two skill stacks... it left me cussing at my tablet.

I guess they figure this way people will buy more dark summons?

I agree with the consensus. They nerfed something up pretty good. I used to get sick of looking at shitty A's in my inventory and end up sac'ing them for the skill. I sac'd 4 slumb A's to a random B or B+ and ALL failed. (I've always suspected that there is a higher failure rate when sac'ing an A, but never heard or saw it comfirmed). Happened Yesterday

Then, another kick in the nuts, I had five impulse down B's.....I now have one with still a skill of (1). Happened Today

Another capital of Thailand: I had 8 preemptive B's, now I have one with skill (2). Happened Today

On a side kick in the balls note, I don't spend much or often to play. But today, I thought: "Hey, you have to The wheel of fortune the piper sometimes!" I bought 9 dark summons worth of soul points. I got 8 B's (5 slumbers and 3 NO SKILL) and ONE Scorn Black Wings.

This shit is getting out of hand.

Ladin wrote:I agree with the consensus. They nerfed something up pretty good. I used to get sick of looking at shitty A's in my inventory and end up sac'ing them for the skill. I sac'd 4 slumb A's to a random B or B+ and ALL failed. (I've always suspected that there is a higher failure rate when sac'ing an A, but never heard or saw it comfirmed). Happened Yesterday

Then, another kick in the nuts, I had five impulse down B's.....I now have one with still a skill of (1). Happened Today

Another capital of Thailand: I had 8 preemptive B's, now I have one with skill (2). Happened Today

On a side kick in the balls note, I don't spend much or often to play. But today, I thought: "Hey, you have to The wheel of fortune the piper sometimes!" I bought 9 dark summons worth of soul points. I got 8 B's (5 slumbers and 3 NO SKILL) and ONE Scorn Black Wings.

This shit is getting out of hand.

thats just sounds like u have horrible luck, i've sac mutiple monsters up to stack 4(last few days), never had more that 2-3 failures(if any at all) going from (1) to (2), and i dont notice that sacing As have lower chance. as for the ds, i dont spend M0n3y on this game but last event(dragon wall) when the ds glitch was happening i got about ~12 ds and of those i had about 3 Bs the rest were As of various type(did notice alot of them were progs for that event though)

Joe Smoe wrote:This has been working for me, your mileage may vary. When I first started I was advised that sometimes it is better to "bite the bullet" and this formula does do that as far as cost is concerned but it has wasted far fewer skilled monsters for me. I do not claim 100% success but this has come closer (especially in recent weeks) than anything else...

GNK = Green Knight Kobold or any other BP1 mission mate.
MAJOR SAC R= Monster receiving skills you are building to 20 skill level (or whatever)
MINOR SAC= Sacrificed skill monster(s)

These steps are the ones I use to raise MAJOR SAC R to SKILL 4 as well as building skill stacks:

Step 1: Sacrifice GNK (raise to level 2)
STEP 2: Sacrifice MINOR SAC (raise to SKILL 2)
Step 3: Sacrifice 2 GNKs (raise to level 4.5)
STEP 4: Sacrifice MINOR SAC (raise to SKILL 3)
Step 5: Sacrifice 3 GNKs (raise to level 6.5)
STEP 6: Sacrifice MINOR SAC (raise to SKILL 4)

Step 7: Hereafter I sacrifice skill stacks (4) to SKILL LEVEL UP my MAJOR SAC R

2 observations;
1. During experimentation step 1 was not always necessary but I did lose skills to level up and power up. I have not lost skills to get to skill level 2 when step 1 was taken.

2. The attaining of levels 2, 4.5, and 6.5 seem to be more critical than the number of GNKs it takes to get there. Sometimes it takes one more GNK to get to the level prescribed.

I would be very interested in hearing from others who build skill stacks to see how they have altered their process in the last few weeks.

I wanted to test this because I have never heard anyone come close to suggesting a correlation between monster level and skill up success.

Just to keep Joe Smoe's idea in the discussion, I created 3 skill stacks using his prescribed method. Did not fail a single time. 9/9. One Psycho Down(4), Decrease Attack(4), and Increase Defense(4).

Now I realize this is an EXTREMELY small sample size but for now, I am going to keep trying it and see where it goes. Still can't make any conclusions, I may just be lucky. Anyone else have any luck with this method?

***EDIT***

I am going to keep a log of sacs needed when building skill stacks [skill level (4)].
This is using the method described above.

3 sacs is a perfect success rate going from skill level (1) to (4).

Skill Stack(4)	Sacs needed
Psycho Down	3
Decrease Attack	3
Increase Defense	3
Agility Up	4
Decrease Attack	3
Critical Up	3
Increase Defense	4
Critical Up	4
Critical Up	5
TOTAL	30/35

TOTAL is the number of sacs successful out of attempts.

Comments: Encouraging signs at first, but the failures are starting to pile up. Still can't make any conclusions, with a large enough sample size the success rate may average out to what everyone else is experiencing.

I have failed three times.. from critical skill lvl 19 to 20 with the stack of 4...



And then, the skill increase for IPD failed twice from lvl 19 to 20...



Agility, Failed three times from 14 to 15 and finally... on the fourth try, it became 15.



All were with the Stack of 4 and it's really annoying me Perhaps, i should do w/ stack of 5 for 19 to 20 lol.

lol, yeah, stacks of 5 are my preferred method, especially when my monster is already maxed. i've yet to fail with a stack of 5, whereas i've failed on occasion with stacks of 4, though thankfully not as many times yet, lol

The problem with making 5 stacks is that it is hard to get from 4 - 5 easily. I use 3 stacks to go from 4 to 5 but even that was about a 25% fail rate.

So if I consider that in 4 attempts to raise a skill from 4 - 5 I will take on average 4 skills to get the 3 stack and one of the four times will need 4 more then for those 4 attempts I will need a total of 20 skills (more than this mathematically but trying to keep it simple for my brain) so 5 skills on average. So for the very high skill raises where failure of a 4 is deemed to be 50% or more, then a 5 stack is better but if we always think we have a better then 50% shot at a 4 taking then making 5s is a waste.

Just reviving this for an interesting skill leveling experience I just had. Was leveling Health on my Adan plus from his base (1) to (20) got him to (4) with just 3 singles (4) - (5) with a (3) sac, all as planned so far.

In buying stacks/singles I got a (5) stack early on and decided to save it specifically to get from (19) to (20), nice to have a guarantee in the bag.

Got to (12) end of day one with no stack losses but quite a few singles making the stacks. Day 2 to (14) and today day 3 went all the way to (19) with not a single failed sac! I kinda have a system for this but still may just be luck! And my first failure? Using my (5) to finish it off! Thought they were guaranteed but NOOOO! So had to waste EP making another (4) from scratch and it worked.

Stupid (5) stack, had a perfect run without it.

lol I had a Berith with Dea at (3) and I wasted 8, 8! singles on him.

I sold him in the end for 1 ep.

I'm so mad at the change, I'm pretty sure it wasn't this hard before.

Dam greedy A-team, first they lower B's from b summons, now this....

I had a few slubbering Breathes to play around with (9) total cards.

Strated with a Kelpie and proceeded to burn 8 cards..

End result...The highest leveled B+ Kelpie in the game, with a skill level of 1.

After this huge let down, I wasn't too excited to start making DED and AGI stacks.

I should add that with my Adan leveling the most it took to build a single stack was 7. About 4 were 6, 8 took 5, and 2 took just 4 to make a 4!