The inf cost of becoming an Incarnate?

To add to this, on the few characters I've fully Incarnated out, I had enough salvage to create Tier 3 abilities for each slot at about the time the slots themselves were unlocked just through running trials.

And that's even with spending a few extra Threads and some inf on XP, which wasn't necessary... I just got impatient.

Originally Posted by Nethergoat it's NEVER too late to pad your /ignore list!

If you aren't in a rush, the repetition isn't bad. I don't team very much, so most nights I don't do Trials, other nights I will do 4 or 5, usually different ones. My Alpha is T4 (With another T4 and T1 of different kinds being put together from random drops) and I am working on the second T3 for the other slots. One way I have found to keep from getting burnt out is to try for the various badges when attempts are made for them. Last night I joined a MoLambda, which ended up with 4 runs of the trial. (And no Master badge for me because I crashed from the memory leak right at the end of the Well-Stocked run. ) But it really didn't bother me to do it over and over because we were working toward a specific goal.

Same thing when making a try for Avoid the Green Stuff badge on Keyes. 3 runs, none successful for that badge unfortunately, but working on that goal and practicing for it made the runs different enough to avoid burn out. And in the meantime, picking up lots of Astrals, threads, and components.

As for why there are different kinds of components for the Incarnate abilities, it is because the different slots were added at different times. Shards were put into the game with random drops possible in all content, when the Alpha slot was added. But at the time, there were no Trials and no way to get components beyond TFs and Shard drops. But people went all out getting them, building the powers, and stockpiling the drops for the next Incarnate abilities.

The Devs knew this would happen, and planned on the Threads being the major building block for the other powers, but it was only available in Incarnate Trials. If they had not changed the building method for the second 4 Incarnate ability, there would have been people with T4s in all of the powers as soon as they could get the IXP to unlock the slot. On the first day. Probably without having to even run the trials.

The really bad news is, right now we have a long time between releases of new Incarnate slots. And people are still grinding out trials, building up stockpiles of components and threads. So Posi has already said don't be surprised if there is a new level of components and building blocks for the next wave of Incarnate powers. Which to me is a good reason not to grind out the trials like mad right now. Run them enough to keep my enjoyment and get the stuff I need and/or want, then do other stuff.

Thanks for that little history lesson. It is exactly what I was looking for as an explanation.

It seems to me, however, that the devs could just have gone with components as the single type of ingredient (along with IXP for unlocking slots). All they would have had to do was create new components to go with new slots and they would solve the stockpiling problem. They could also have had more than just two kinds of IXP. A dedicated IXP "type" for each slot, for instance, rather than just splitting everything into physical and psychic branches.

Instead we have this rather bizarre Incarnate construction pyramid that makes sense to those who have been using it from the beginning, but which is really confusing for n00bs like me. And it is only going to get more confusing each time the devs create yet another strata of ingredients just to avoid players stockpiling the existing ones for future slots.

That is really just another way of saying the same thing, the only difference is players have to keep track of the components, rather than the game automatically putting the different xp types in the right place. The reason for having Shards and Threads is so the players can get exactly what they need, rather than waiting and waiting for what they want to drop. Before they put in the ability to change the various components, there were lots of complaints about having to wait forever to get the threads and the right drop to complete a power.

They are trying to balance it between being interesting and engaging, but not going too fast, without being too grindy, and limiting the ability of min/max munchkins to game it. No matter what, they are guaranteed to tick off someone.

As Hopeling said, all that does is unlock it. Unlocking the slots by gaining iXP is trivial compared to the average time it takes to get the components to build Rare or Very Rare versions of the powers to put in them.

For example, it's possible to unlock Judgement in about 3 BAFs, Interface in about 3 Lambdas, or you could unlock both in about two Underground trials. Depending on which route you take (or how you combine them), odds aren't good of having any Rare or better drops. Even if you get some, you probably won't have enough Common drops to craft your way to them, though you might get enough Threads to craft those commons outright. (You need seven Commons and one Uncommon to craft a Rare power. Seven commons would require 140 Threads to craft from scratch. A single Uncommon takes 60 threads.)

Since most of my characters have been able to curb stomp Trapdoor, I don't mind running Ramiel's arc.

More like "if you have to ask then you haven't tried", since they don't cost any inf at all.