Is gold spire the new 10 chest?

[Henroo]

I started playing under the old tournament format. Back then, it was harder for a fellowship to get 10 chests in the tournament. Being a 10 chest fellowship was a big status symbol for a high performing fellowship and was important in recruiting. Under the current format, more fellowships are getting 10 chests and therefore it seems to have lost a little bit of its importance in sorting out how well a FS performs. But I see more and more top fellowships mentioning that they achieve gold spire status. Do you think Gold spire status now is comparable to what getting 10 chests under the old system was as a measure of a top performing fellowship?

 

[Aritra]

I hope they don't raise the bar on tourney because of this.... Not too easy, but easy enough to achieve on the regular is good for morale.

 

[Henroo]

I hope they don't raise the bar on tourney because of this.... Not too easy, but easy enough to achieve on the regular is good for morale.

The tournament format change I am talking about happening in Oct of 2020. I would have expected any adjustments to have been early after the change. I think after 8 months things any changes are unlikely.

 

[Gladiola]

I think 10 chests in the tournament is more valuable to players than gold spire, because in gold spire it is possible that everyone won't get the top rewards. With that said, as a player who climbs to the top of the Spire every week, I would prefer to be in a gold spire fellowship. (I'm not; I'm trying to encourage my fellows to aim for silver and we're getting a little closer.)

However, the individual and group rewards in Spire are more balanced and reflective of individual effort. I would probably move on from a fellowship that didn't at least achieve bronze, but the difference between bronze and gold is just a few diamonds and CCs, and I get an adequate amount of them from my normal Spire runs. RRs and blueprints you can only get in tournament chests. (Yes, you can use diamonds instead of blueprints and then make RRs, but you can get diamonds as an individual reward from Spire, not just in the group rewards.)

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

A lot of people talk a lot of talk about Gold Spire Fellowships, but these people must all be in the same fellowships together, because it does not happen anywhere as often as it sounds. Take a look at our home server of Arendyll and you will see only 11 fellowships made gold this week, and one poor fellowship finished 2 points short of gold. That must have been very frustrating for them.

Even in the old tournament days, a lot more than 11 fellowships got 10 chests, so no, until we see 50 or 100 fellowships making Gold every week, per server, I would not put much stock in it. Now, comparing the old 10-chest fellowships to Silver Spire fellowships may be more fair, as 49 fellowships made Silver this week, for a total of 60 of Silver or better.

 

[Kekune]

A lot of people talk a lot of talk about Gold Spire Fellowships, but these people must all be in the same fellowships together, because it does not happen anywhere as often as it sounds. Take a look at our home server of Arendyll and you will see only 11 fellowships made gold this week

So, if 11 is typical on a server then there are 88 total gold groups on US servers? Even if we round down and say 75, that's still a lot of groups where we can distribute all the forum folks who say they're in one.

 

[Dew Spinner]

So, if 11 is typical on a server then there are 88 total gold groups on US servers? Even if we round down and say 75, that's still a lot of groups where we can distribute all the forum folks who say they're in one.

Only 8 on Sinya and I am in one.

 

[Dew Spinner]

I think 10 chests in the tournament is more valuable to players than gold spire, because in gold spire it is possible that everyone won't get the top rewards. With that said, as a player who climbs to the top of the Spire every week, I would prefer to be in a gold spire fellowship. (I'm not; I'm trying to encourage my fellows to aim for silver and we're getting a little closer.)

However, the individual and group rewards in Spire are more balanced and reflective of individual effort. I would probably move on from a fellowship that didn't at least achieve bronze, but the difference between bronze and gold is just a few diamonds and CCs, and I get an adequate amount of them from my normal Spire runs. RRs and blueprints you can only get in tournament chests. (Yes, you can use diamonds instead of blueprints and then make RRs, but you can get diamonds as an individual reward from Spire, not just in the group rewards.)

Spire also gives you military boost buildings (DA), genies, magic residences and magic workshops, time boosters, coin rains, supply windfalls, portal profits and now artifacts, on top of the Diamonds and CCs. One stop shopping if you ask me!

 

[samidodamage]

Do you think Gold spire status now is comparable to what getting 10 chests under the old system was as a measure of a top performing fellowship?

Maybe, maybe not. Like @Enevhar Aldarion said, only a handful of FS's reach gold every week right now. Here's something I find slightly amusing:
Convincing 24 other people to do 1600pts week in and week out in the tourney used to be very tough. It took folks awhile of actually doing it (including me!) to see that it was not the resource hog it appeared at first, but an expenditure of resources that provided items that helped cities advance. That you could use those rewards to build your city and generate the resources needed to do the tourney to keep getting more rewards.
Now, I see the same thing with the Spire. It's a bit different as it's got the RNG for the individual rewards, but the concept is the same. It feels like a resource hog and the RNG can leave a player with a negative impression of the Spire as well, so they stop doing Spire or only do a little bit. But, over time, the rewards work the same way and the rewards allow you to build your city and generate the resources needed to do the Spire to keep getting more rewards.
I started playing the Spire when it launched in August 2019 and have been playing to the top every week in one city since Fall 2019; the other since early Spring 2020 (missed one week by one chest-ran out of time!). Yes, it felt like nothing but a resource hog at first, but over time, I learned it. I stuck with it because I had the experience of the same feeling in the beginning with tourneys. It's beneficial to me to go to the top even in the Silver Spire FS. In the Gold Spire FS, it's even better. The FS rewards are guaranteed; no RNG. Between both cities, that's 400 diamonds guaranteed week in and week out. Not counting any of the smaller amounts I might win individually or the other Spire only rewards like CC's, teleports, magic bldgs, dwarven armorers, genies, etc. During that time I have maintained a 3-4K tourney average as well, so I'm not competitive in tourney rankings, but I get what I need from both of these features and continue to advance my cities. I do move slowly through chapters so that has some impact on the resources I need.
Over time, I expect more players will begin to see the benefits of Spire and more and more FS's will rise to the level of Gold; exactly the way more FS's rose to the level of 10chest tourneys...

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

So, if 11 is typical on a server then there are 88 total gold groups on US servers? Even if we round down and say 75, that's still a lot of groups where we can distribute all the forum folks who say they're in one.

Arendyll is the most populated and oldest, so I would expect the others to be the same or probably less, so yeah, somewhere between 70-80 out of how many several hundred that are active enough to try for Gold? Oh, and as a side note, my fellowship generally gets halfway to Gold, but we do not push our members to go for Gold.

 

[Iyapo1]

@Enevhar Aldarion
There are only 4 gold spire FS on Harander this week, 9 on Elcy.

Do you think Gold spire status now is comparable to what getting 10 chests under the old system was as a measure of a top performing fellowship?

Yes absolutely.
But I am a spire addict.
A player who loves the FA would place status on a different ranking board.

 

[Dew Spinner]

Soggy, said once...Gold Spire is a self fulfilling prophesy, once you get Gold, you attract Gold Players, very true!

 

[SoggyShorts]

the difference between bronze and gold is just a few diamonds

That's one way to look at it. Another way is that it's about $100 per year worth of diamonds which I'm guessing is more than many players spend.

 

[crackie]

(speaking of...anyone need a Spire merc for like a month or two?)

 

[SoggyShorts]

Soggy, said once...Gold Spire is a self fulfilling prophesy, once you get Gold, you attract Gold Players, very true!

Indeed.

Building/recruiting for a "soon to be Gold spire" FS:
"If I smash troops and try hard for a few weeks, eventually there will be enough of us to get full rewards"
vs
joining an already Gold spire FS:
"If I do what I was going to do anyways, I'll get 275 more diamonds?"

 

[SoggyShorts]

(speaking of...anyone need a Spire merc for like a month or two?)

What server?

 

[crackie]

Ceravyn

 

[mikeledo]

I started playing under the old tournament format. Back then, it was harder for a fellowship to get 10 chests in the tournament. Being a 10 chest fellowship was a big status symbol for a high performing fellowship and was important in recruiting. Under the current format, more fellowships are getting 10 chests and therefore it seems to have lost a little bit of its importance in sorting out how well a FS performs. But I see more and more top fellowships mentioning that they achieve gold spire status. Do you think Gold spire status now is comparable to what getting 10 chests under the old system was as a measure of a top performing fellowship?

In a word. Yes. I play in 3 FS that get gold every week. I average over 1100 total diamonds a week from the three.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

That's one way to look at it. Another way is that it's about $100 per year worth of diamonds which I'm guessing is more than many players spend.

This will, of course, vary on how many servers someone plays on. One account with cities on all 8 servers, that all get Silver every week, is more diamonds than 3 cities all getting Gold. But I would not be able to do that, because I would want to play all my cities fully and use diamonds in all of them. That is part of why I cut down to just one US city. lol

And yeah, I think I spend $5 every time the 100% offer comes around, so $20-25 per year? Silver every week in one city, at 125 diamonds guaranteed, is 6500 diamonds in a year.

 

[Henroo]

Soggy, said once...Gold Spire is a self fulfilling prophesy, once you get Gold, you attract Gold Players, very true!

The same is true about 10 chests. It is just that 10 chests are now more common now. That was also one of the hardest parts to me about building a fellowship. Your most motivated, competitive players are normally also the highest scoring ones. If you are a developing fellowship they are also the most important to your success in tournament and spire. But if you have not achieved 10 chest or silver spire status these kind of players are also the most likely to leave for a better performing FS. There were multiple occasions when growing a FS where one of my best players would leave for a bigger FS. Now that we average 10 chests and silver spire, player retention is no longer nearly as big an issue. So not only does success mean you attract successful players, it also means you are more likely to keep the ones you already have.