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I tried to post this earlier, but it deleted itself, so I’ll try again. Apologies for the possible duplication.
I did a test of whether Cave 4-5 or Cave 9-5/9-7/9-8/9-9 provide a better payout of snouts and mastery on a per minute per bird basis. The test was done using only two birds, with the birds configured to provide maximum mastery per run through the cave. That means that AoE weapons were not used in Cave 9 since it’s mastery/snout payout is a function of the number of pigs you face per wave, so it’s beneficial not to kill multiple pigs per attack to clear a wave quickly (so that the game keeps feeding you pigs every two turns). (I think, anyway.) In contrast, for Cave 4-5 you want AoE effects so you clear things fast.
For the two-bird team of Guardian(70/69)/Princess(70/69), averaged over at least five runs through the cave, the results are:
Cave 4-5 . Mastery: 28 mastery/bird/min . 17 snouts/bird/min (steel wall/nightmare)
Cave 9-7 . Mastery: 21 mastery/bird/min . 7 snouts/bird/min (dragon/nightmare)
So Cave 4-5 is better in terms of both snouts and mastery because it clears so fast. The mastery per run of the cave was almost double for Cave 9-7 over Cave 4-5 (150 vs. 85) but it took over 6 minutes per run for Cave 9-7 whereas Cave 4-5 cleared in a little under half the time (3 minutes per run). The snout count for Cave 9 is low because when set up for maximum mastery (no AoE effects, steel wall/nightmare) it almost always lets the wealthy bandit pig escape so you miss the 50-snouts almost all the time.
So, for a pure grindfest using pretty much any two-bird set, Cave 4-5 is better than Cave 9. However, because of the high payout, in situations where maybe you can’t (or don’t want) to deal with the game every 3 minutes, Cave 9 is a good option, provided there is some healing effect on each bird or Matilda is there (in my runs with Princess, Matilda never buffed but used almost all of the rage chilies to heal both Red and her).