Is levelling non A+ tier heroes a waste?

[Zeus]

I’ve hit a stage in the game where I’m genuinely questioning whether it’s worth leveling new 5★ heroes anymore.

With how limited Alpha Aethers are (for those of us not fortunate enough to be able to buy every offer or buy in to every alpha mimic) it feels like you have to save them for only the absolute top-tier heroes. Since second limit break (to 90) is basically required to stay competitive at higher levels, anything that isn’t elite feels like a bad investment.

Because of that, I’ve got new 5★ heroes just sitting there unlevelled. Even if they’re good, they’re not “must-2LB” good and without that second limit break, they feel underpowered compared to fully maxed teams.

It creates this strange situation where
You pull new heroes
You’re excited for a minute
Then you realise you probably shouldn’t level them because Alpha Aethers are too scarce and makes you question just holding on to the other materials as a result too
So they just sit there

It makes progression feel gated in a way that discourages experimenting or building depth.

Am I alone in feeling this way?
How are you all handling Alpha Aether allocation?

Are you
Only 2LB’ing absolute meta heroes?
Still leveling new heroes even if they may never reach 90?

Curious how others approach this, because right now it feels like hoarding is the only rational strategy and that’s not very fun.

[NevarMaor]

Levelling non-A+ heroes depends on your situation in the game. I still level up most heroes, although I have had Isrod sitting at 1-1 for four years now. Other heroes keep jumping the red queue. For me, non-A+ are still useful for wars, elemental quests, towers (when I decide to do them), etc. Not so much for raids. But my go-to raid team does include Vainamoinen who I don't think was ever considered A+.

[Sillyboy]

It's definitely very frustrating to get a 5* that's basically garbage vs other 5* heroes. I pulled Freya in the elemental summon a few days ago and was pretty bummed knowing she'll just be SE fodder. It would be nice for all 5* to have the same stats vs another 5*, but I know SG won't do that for free. That's why so many costumes. If they would at least just give every 5* a costume with the same stats vs another in the same roll (tank, support, healer, dps, etc), then we could summon and that would be that. There are so many abilities, families, and passives that the variety of team builds wouldn't make the game boring. Just my $0.02. 

[JoshuaK]

I try and limit every 5* as costumes are sure to come and, if it's new to me, it must be good as there are so many I don't have. What I don't like about a vanilla 5* is that if I 2 lb and emblem to 25, when a costume comes, I lose the ability to reemblem for the costume and not lose the 50 master emblems used to take the hero to 25. Personally, I hadn't been 2lb most 5* so I had plenty. Season of love though changed that as I received three of the top four and they became 2lb. As always, it's never a waste of it fits your current situation. A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. Why wait for a better hero that may take forever to come? 

[Pr0spero]

I never pull current Meta heroes, but I think im getting the next shelf down. 

Shortages of Aethers, 4* ascension mats and Alphas mean im always picking and choosing who can get maxed. 

And yeah, I do find it frustrating, but I dont store the materials. I just max the current best option I have. 

[Spinach]

Depends on your point of view and aims I guess.
From my perspective, no it's not a waste.

For reference, I am fully FTP, lvl 77, been playing for 4 years and currently have 71 5*'s in my roster (including all dupes & unlevelled crap etc). 26 alpha aethers in stock.

I don't have 6 war teams of 5* and by the end I'm probably using some of my best 3*s. 2LB is reserved for the best and those who I see myself using often and for a long time. Any hero who is going to be used but is not top-tier (relatively) gets 1LB. Any hero who might be used at some point or I'm levelling simply 'cos I've got no one better in that colour stays at 80 unless they prove themselves good in a fight!

1LB heroes are very useful for me, yes 2LB would be better but I can do without.

It also depends on the hero. Eg Von Rothbart, he's great, he can shut down a bunch of enemies and does good damage as well, however he's only at 85. 2LB will not improve him all that much beyond better survivabilty, it's his ability not his raw power that's his strength, so he's not top priority for aethers.

TL;DR? For me, no. For top players, probably yes.

 

Edit:

I counted up my heroes, out of interest.

Lvl 90: 14
Lvl 85: 12
Lvl 80: 16

Is this relevant? I have no idea 

Edited February 25 by Spinach (see edit history)

[HootingPirate]

I'm in the same boat. I have 35 x 5* heroes at level 90. So unless I pull a very new hero or costume, they won't even crack my top 30 without 2LB. And when I pull a hero that is say, 1 year old, I don't feel any excitement (assuming it's not a crazy powerful hero for its day, which it usually isn't). I just feel a big let down knowing that there is no point in levelling it anyway. A good example is my last 5* pull: Xiaoqing, the snake healer from last year's Lunar New Year. He would make my top 30 if I took him to 2LB. But am I really going to spend those valuable resources on a year old hero that wasn't exactly dynamite on his release day?

To me the problem isn't the number of AAs though. They actually seem well balanced compared to other resources. I think the problem is that they keep giving out older heroes long after they've reached obsolescence. Maybe Xiaoqing isn't completely obsolete yet, but I also pulled Tinsel at Christmas, and M&M at Halloween. What are we even supposed to do with those?

[Pike]

You have to take what you can get. And then it takes time to level up what you've got. Until then, you collect more material for levelling up. And new coins and gems to summon new heroes. It's an endless cycle.

Whether old or new, I level up to at least 80, whatever suits my playing style. So some Vanillas are at 90 with their best costume (in my opinion), while others are waiting at 80 for their costumes. And I'm levelling up to 90 what fills my gaps. I don't save anything, because I never know what's coming.

Why should I save Aethers for the next Dawa?

[BobTheSnark]

On 2/23/2026 at 7:19 AM, Zeus said:

How are you all handling Alpha Aether allocation?

On 2/25/2026 at 4:04 AM, Spinach said:

1LB heroes are very useful for me, yes 2LB would be better but I can do without.

I’m here to second what @ Spinach  said — I don’t automatically 2LB every hero.  

Sure, if I had infinite alphas, I guess, but how much you 2LB depends on the rate at which you accrue both heroes you actually wanna use versus the rate at which you accrue alphas — and there’s a fair of portal RNG on the former, and spending level (zero or otherwise) affects both.  —If nonzero spending on a finite budget is involved, it signals that it’s time to spend less on summons and more on more-optimally-priced sales on alphas.

(It’s also worth noting that one use for Hero Coach is to jump a hero up from 4/80 or 4/85 up to 4/90 for cheap — if the hero is old enough.)

But overall?  I mean, I actually use, at times, some

* snipers

* HotM

* Slow heroes

* Insanity heroes

much less sometimes even heroes who aren’t (yet, or even ever planned to be) 2LB.

 

Maybe all of this is… heresy, at least to folks who are or would like to be used to being constantly able to draw and fully max top-level Borg defenses.  

But I agree with a lot of folks that plenty of us are more in another camp:

Resource management is part of the game, neh?

[Dunial]

@HootingPirate I'm with you 30 x 5* heroes @ lvl 90 and I'm lvl 94. At this point AAs are scarce. I'm sitting on 30 AAs atm with Omen, Astrid, Lempi, & Violet Potts at 85 all good heroes who should go to 90 with my roster but I've also got Grovert, and Bernadette waiting to hit 3/70 so they aren't far away from 2lb. With SE I've ejected the rubbish and brought in Silverpaw. 

 

7 candidates for 30 AAs. I' looking at my back catalogue and wondering why I 2lb Inari, Kemeny, Voidstar and Rocket back in the day. 

7 hours ago, BobTheSnark said:

it signals that it’s time to spend less on summons and more on more-optimally-priced sales on alphas.

This actually is the space I think I'm encroaching on. I spend $50/yr but I'm afraid to get a meta hero knowing that my AAs could be gone tonight   

Instead of coin deals it's time for AA deals. If I remember the old gem spending thread of @ mrchief  $2/AA was the best rate.

Edited March 1 by Dunial (see edit history)

[BobTheSnark]

33 minutes ago, Dunial said:

Instead of coin deals it's time for AA deals. If I remember the old gem spending thread of @ mrchief  $2/AA was the best rate.

For what it's worth, there's currently the Moonlit Vault deal (here in USD)

 

Of course, even this deal (like many with alphas) depends on how much you value what else is in the deal -- here, how much you value paying for a couple of Covenant draws.  (But if you do value an AA at around 2USD, then it means two Covenant pulls for 1USD.)

cf. Phoenix VIP 10USD for 3 alphas, 950 gems, 1 big/5 medium/10 small LB1, some emblems/memblems, one max ascension item and trainer heroes and food/iron boxes.  If you actually want at least some of the other stuff, it can be a fair deal, but (assuming "2 USD alphas") the rest needs to actually be worth more than 4USD to you.

With these deals around, I'd agree that the goal would be to indeed avoid paying more than 2USD (without buying too much other stuff in a bundle you don't want to actually shell out for), if you are buying over the long run.

[JoshuaK]

And then there are people like me. A lot of times I'd rather lb2 a 3* or 4* hero with utility before most 5* heroes. I have a broad assortment across the board and unless the 5* offers a skill that offers broad utility, I won't lb2. That said, for me, some aether talents need to also be taken into account. I do like the auto taunt yet Krampus doesn't see much use for me these days. 

[Burrito 2008]

If the heroes I get don't make my roster better, they go to SE. Not all the heroes are good enough to be LB2.

Right now, I'm getting Rosalind to 90. Next in line is Silverpaw. These heroes are great for me. 

I have better and newer ones. For sure. Sizzleomatic Will have to wait a bit until I 'm done with the fox and get the AAs.

But it's the way it is. 

[BobTheSnark]

19 hours ago, JoshuaK said:

some aether talents need to also be taken into account

A fair point - and that reminds me that it's worth remember that for heroes who invoke minions/Mega Minions/fiends/Mega Fiends, LB2 can also be important, as minions/Mega are capped at 1000hp/2000hp in size until 2LB.  (These days, with at-all-modern-ish heroes plus legendary troops, it means generally if you want your minions/fiends to reach the full % of hp listed on the card, you kinda need to 2LB.)

[Pain of Sugar]

Yeah, I can't 2 LB most heroes. The 3's and 4's I rarely do because I need the alphas for 5's and most 5's I can't either. If they are not brand new, I really struggle with the decision to 2 LB them nowadays, because even if their skills are great, they drop like flies in wars against the teams we face that I can barely deal with using my best team as a so-called "cheap to play" (everyone has cats, veggies, Ustad et al, Salome and so on). 
 Edited to add, I do level most relatively new 5's to 1 LB, but I do wonder what the point is. I'm at the stage where I have stopped bothering with HOTMS. 

Edited March 4 by Pain of Sugar (see edit history)

[Raffinho]

Same here, not every hero can get the LB2. Those I'm conviced of for most use cases I get to 4/85.

LB2 only get the (for me) top ones. 

I'm currently leveling Daemon, Jett+C, Xiaotu+C, Silverpaw, Elyssa, and Hysteria in parallel.
Of those, Elyssa, Xiaotu+C, and Silverpaw will receive LB2. One of them will get it from the hero coach. I'll bring all the others to 3/70 and then see where the journey takes me. But max to 4/85. 

[NevarMaor]

It's a vicious circle. You need LB2 heroes to compete in the raid tournaments to get better loot, but you need the better loot from the raid tournaments to LB2 the heroes.

It is -- by the original book title -- Catch 18.

I am currently levelling Vernon and Lempi -- who will definitely go to LB2 --  Aurox, Daemon, and Xnolphod -- who will go to at least LB1. Xnol likely LB2 as my only non-slow purple healer (and I do have his costume). My next Hero Coach target is Vaishali at 3/70 to save on darts and a tome. Tomes are STILL my biggest shortfall in the game.

Edited March 5 by NevarMaor (see edit history)