@Steele:

Maxing affection doubles the bonus received, which is why even if your 2* is unevolved, her stats can compare to 5*s of slightly higher level. At 40-50% affection vs. Max affection, the bonus your 2* is receiving from that is essentially 3.5-4x what the 5*s receive (affection bonus is linear, so 50% is twice the bonus of 25%, so 100% would be twice 50% except the doubling makes it 4x, slightly less due to higher rarities getting bigger base bonuses.

As Maotd mentioned, if your 2* is evolved, that will result in a substantial power advantage over a similar level, but unevolved 5* (since it's essentially 40-50 extra levels). Another thing to keep in mind.

In the end, if you're a power gamer/optimal setup type guy, you're going to ditch 2/3*s and eventually 4*s for the 5/6*s due to superior passives in addition to stats. Roentgen went over the advantages 5* event girls have over 2/3/4*s and even have some ways to balance their statistical/passive inferiority to their 5* gacha counterparts. The reason you'll want full 5/6*s is Passive ability synergy. This is ultimately the deciding factor of who makes the team and who doesn't (unless you whale hard enough to get lots of 6*s who auto-kick out the 5*s and below) because synergy can drastically boost a team's effectiveness more than simple leveling (and of course you'll eventually hit the level cap on your girls).

Playing from Day 1, RNGod is finally kind with me \o/.

->Open Spoiler<-

On top of that she's one of my favorite 6*.

Well done ^^

@Steele

I hate to correct Ivan but max affection only gives you a 20% additional bonus over where you would be. Evolution then doubles that.
Still, at low levels affection bonuses are quite large compared to base stats, so it's less surprising that a low level max affection 2* out stats a 50% affection 5* at a similar level. As the levels go up, the affection bonus stays the same so the 5* will pull ahead in time.
Total power also doesn't even begin to include skills and abilities.
Because this game doesn't involve any actual player input in battles other than the occasional solar blast, glass cannons per se are less useful - your girls will take damage, since there is no control on your end on dodging/positioning or anything else. They have to be able to survive enough hits to take full advantage of their attack power until your units are so high level that they can usually one round enemies.

Thanks everyone for your input

Originally Posted by kringley

@Steele

I hate to correct Ivan but max affection only gives you a 20% additional bonus over where you would be. Evolution then doubles that.
Still, at low levels affection bonuses are quite large compared to base stats, so it's less surprising that a low level max affection 2* out stats a 50% affection 5* at a similar level. As the levels go up, the affection bonus stays the same so the 5* will pull ahead in time.
Total power also doesn't even begin to include skills and abilities.
Because this game doesn't involve any actual player input in battles other than the occasional solar blast, glass cannons per se are less useful - your girls will take damage, since there is no control on your end on dodging/positioning or anything else. They have to be able to survive enough hits to take full advantage of their attack power until your units are so high level that they can usually one round enemies.

Ah, mixed up the Evo bonus with the Max bonus. My bad.

And yeah, Glass Cannons are bad. Fortunately, no girl is an irredeemable glass cannon (as in, will die in 2 hits regardless of what buffs your team has), but Ability synergy on teams is REALLY helpful later on, as TP is a rough estimate that is skewed by HP and the fact it does not take into account Passive Abilities or skill usefulness.

Originally Posted by IvanLedah21

Ah, mixed up the Evo bonus with the Max bonus. My bad.

And yeah, Glass Cannons are bad. Fortunately, no girl is an irredeemable glass cannon (as in, will die in 2 hits regardless of what buffs your team has), but Ability synergy on teams is REALLY helpful later on, as TP is a rough estimate that is skewed by HP and the fact it does not take into account Passive Abilities or skill usefulness.

This. I probably should have come to forums first as I usually do, but I didn't know this site existed when I started. I feel like I have too much into it at this point to start over via new account so I'm going to go with what I have. Team 1 is at 52K power with no girls evolved. I'm seeing here that I should have max affected and evolved at least 1 or 2 characters by now instead of having say 20 Knights in their 30's with about 10 in the 40's/50's. Given enough grinding I think I can fix it, really just need to rack up levels and dragons on the 5 and 6 stars.

So...that being said...I have 2 4*s at lvl 50 98% affection and 2 6*'s lvl 47 and 51, the 51 at 98% affection. Should I go ahead and evolve the 4*s or holdout resources for the 6*s??

Well, I don't really know what others think about this but I don't recommend to have 1 or 2 high level girls with low level girls in the same team. I think it's better to have less powerful girls with almost the same power. The team wil be more efficient. At least it's what I have noticed on this event with teams of 2 5* and 6* ~lvl60 (evolved, max affection) and some random unevolved low level 5* and 4* added just for speed.

Originally Posted by steele1743

This. I probably should have come to forums first as I usually do, but I didn't know this site existed when I started. I feel like I have too much into it at this point to start over via new account so I'm going to go with what I have. Team 1 is at 52K power with no girls evolved. I'm seeing here that I should have max affected and evolved at least 1 or 2 characters by now instead of having say 20 Knights in their 30's with about 10 in the 40's/50's. Given enough grinding I think I can fix it, really just need to rack up levels and dragons on the 5 and 6 stars.

So...that being said...I have 2 4*s at lvl 50 98% affection and 2 6*'s lvl 47 and 51, the 51 at 98% affection. Should I go ahead and evolve the 4*s or holdout resources for the 6*s??

The 4*s you KNOW will eventually be phased out, so I'd recommend going for the 6*s, who will stick around for eons (unless you somehow whale hard enough to get more than 20 6*s... >.>). Only caveat to this is if you're having issues clearing event stages even with powerful helper squads, in which case it might be better to go for short-term boost to let you get over that hurdle.

Originally Posted by steele1743

This. I probably should have come to forums first as I usually do, but I didn't know this site existed when I started. I feel like I have too much into it at this point to start over via new account so I'm going to go with what I have. Team 1 is at 52K power with no girls evolved. I'm seeing here that I should have max affected and evolved at least 1 or 2 characters by now instead of having say 20 Knights in their 30's with about 10 in the 40's/50's. Given enough grinding I think I can fix it, really just need to rack up levels and dragons on the 5 and 6 stars.

So...that being said...I have 2 4*s at lvl 50 98% affection and 2 6*'s lvl 47 and 51, the 51 at 98% affection. Should I go ahead and evolve the 4*s or holdout resources for the 6*s??

If you're looking to build your squads, it's not a bad idea to evolve a few 4* to fill holes in your teams until you get units to replace them. The resources needed aren't huge (100k in coins and 1 large dragon) - I mean if that's a huge chunk of your money then yes hold out, but I found it easy enough to replace that. I found it much easier to get together the dragons for silvers. Past evolution, I only leveled mine to 30-40 or so, i.e. what I could do with the lvl 5 manyus and maybe a few lvl 20s.
There are significant advantages to having 4 squads that are reasonably strong - the helper may be getting you through tough maps for now but you'll stand a better chance of collecting more items/chests if all of your squads can get through pest nodes, and a better chance of three-medalling maps as well (which means more FGs for current event maps.