Hat Events ~ Love ‘em or Hate ‘em!

The love-hate relationship players have with Hat Events presents an interesting conundrum. Hat Events include a Hat Adventure which is a special set of 10 levels that require you own specific hats in order to play. Only the birds in your flock that posses the event hat may participate. Every few levels there are rewards such as Rare Chests, Legendary Chests, and Rainbow Feathers.
During an event there is a freeze on purchasing any hats in the event set. The only way to obtain the hats is in the Tower of Fortune. Red’s hat is on the 5th floor, Blue’s is on the 10th floor, Chuck on the 20th floor, Bomb on 30th, Matilda on 40th, Silver on 50th, and Terence on the 55th floor. Most players don’t get past floor 20 in the ToF. Those that do are usually spending quite a few gems to get there. This is a big part of the ‘hate’. We will come back to that...
There are two types of Hat Events. The first uses existing hat sets, usually at or below the Magical Level (4x). This type of event will sporadically include a boost to the hats power level. The other type of event is for the release of new hats. Power levels for these hats start at 16x. For example, a new level 6x hat is a 16x hat for the duration of the Hat Event. When the new hats are won in the ToF they are automatically placed on the respective bird.
Normally, in our current ToF system, if you win a hat you already own you are awarded a percentage of the hat cost in Black Pearls. This is how it used to work for event hats. Then it changed. For a while, once that floors hat was found it was never offered again, and a 1x or 2x hat would be in its place for future ToF runs. The current system increases the hat power level by +1 every time a duplicate hat is found. Red and Blues are the most commonly won hats and could reach as high as +25 during a 10 day event.
As I mentioned, most players only collect 1-3 hats during an event. A level 6x hats cost 10,000 BP. Even if you won three hats, that leaves four to purchase to complete the set. That’s 40,000 BP! With a rapid fire of new hat releases recently, some players are spinning. How will they ever afford to buy all the sets? Other players are sitting on mounds of BP and have nothing to spend it on. These are the ones asking for new hats, who could blame them? They are the love.
One of the biggest concerns with a bunch of new hat sets is giving an advantage to cheaters. The theory is cheaters can immediately pick up all the new hats and complete the set, for bird card and slingshot level ups. This levels them up much faster than the regular player and creates an even larger gap in FP between them and everyone else.
The newest gem sucking strategy for Rovio has been to release new hats when Clan Battles are happening. It puts pressure on players to spend gems to try and get the event hats. If there are a lot of players on the opposing team that have won the event hats, your team may NEED the hats to stay competitive. Hence the pressure to spend gems and push further up the ToF. This is the hate.
New hats can be fun! Some of the sets are really creative, unless you’re Terence. For some reason the big guy always gets the shaft. Apparently there isn’t a Big & Tall section at Feathers-R-Us or Nestmart.
If there is a holiday or special occasion, like Super Bowl, coming up make sure to purchase any hats that coincide with the holiday. Around Easter, for example, there is an Easter Hat Event that calls for the Easter Hats. These are 3x hats already available in the Hat Shop. If you wait until the event starts you will only be able to win them in the ToF, until the event is over.
ToF Tip: Pay attention to where your event hats fall in the card order. Many times they are in the same place for a few days. Keep an eye on what was there before. For example, if the middle card on floor four is a pig and the event hats is the middle card on the fifth floor follow the pattern to the 9th and 10th floor. If the pig is in the first card position on the 9th floor pick the first card on the tenth. It’s likely Blue’s hat. Repeat for each bonus floor. Every couple of days the pattern changes. Hats may start following pigs, then follow spells, then follow feathers. More often than not there is a pattern to it and everyone’s pattern seems to be a bit different.
Hat Events are timed. When time expires hat power levels revert to normal and the adventure is closed. Don’t forget to swap the event hats for more powerful hats after the event ends. Keep collecting those Black Pearls and start shopping! Happy flinging my friends!
                                                    Cheers,
                                                        Lil Bug