Character Rankings May 2015 Edition: The Results!

Unknown

Pwuz_ wrote:

raisinbman wrote:

I'd agree with you if already good characters didn't completely outshine him in ultron, as well. Black Panther instantly clears waves, Luke Cage mitigates damage completely, boosted Falcon with iron fist/luke cage = gg, patch is as patch does

I did mention I've been pairing him with Luke Cage to mitigate damage significantly.

Also Black Panther could only clear a whole wave till around Round 3-4 for me. And with Luke Cage dropping over 1k followed by 6k on a single target for the same amount of AP, it seems redundant to me. Yes I know that math doesn't make it sound impressive, but save up to 18 and now you've got 1k, 6k, & 6k dropping.

Boosting with Falcon certainly helps any team dropping strike or attack tiles.

Patch requires paying a little more attention to the board, it always sucks to use Berserker Rage without noticing that last lonely strike tile hiding in the corner. That and it honestly feels like Sentry Flyer is not the most common Sentry they keep throwing at me. Sentry Fighters are probably the most common I see, and they don't leave my special tiles on the board for that long. And let's not overlook the times that too many tiles on the board are filled with enemy specials to get the full benefit of Berserker Rage.

Use what works for you, because honestly what covers have fallen your way make a big difference what's going to be effective for you. I do stand by that my 5/5/3 Doc Ock is surprisingly effective against this type of opponent who spams special tiles for him to convert.

im not saying he isnt, i even made another comment lamenting doc ock

Unknown

Ai.

I need to do more Ultron, but after gearing myself up for it, seeing that the prize was more Vision...I lost a lot of interest pretty much overnight. For the first 4 roudns I used Patch/Cyc/CapA for Ultron, and for nodes, I've been using Patch/Cage/Feat. Cage has been frustrating though, I have to time his yellow right to not waste it if I have BP on my team (who I wanted to use all the time before I saw Patch was buffed).

Last time I had issues with the sentries - just not understanding to count the special tiles and finding the sweet spot, now that I got that, I just try and keep track, I've actually used it to my advantage, the ones that self heal, hit them with patch's green and watch them swallow up all the purple strikes.
- Unreall

Pwuz_

Unreallystic wrote:

Ai.

I need to do more Ultron, but after gearing myself up for it, seeing that the prize was more Vision...I lost a lot of interest pretty much overnight. For the first 4 roudns I used Patch/Cyc/CapA for Ultron, and for nodes, I've been using Patch/Cage/Feat. Cage has been frustrating though, I have to time his yellow right to not waste it if I have BP on my team (who I wanted to use all the time before I saw Patch was buffed).

Last time I had issues with the sentries - just not understanding to count the special tiles and finding the sweet spot, now that I got that, I just try and keep track, I've actually used it to my advantage, the ones that self heal, hit them with patch's green and watch them swallow up all the purple strikes.
- Unreall

I keep trying that, and it does not bode well for me more times than it works. One time I tried it, but hadn't done enough damage to the stupid thing for it to want to eat anything. Over the next turn between the cascades & attack tiles dropping; Patch was out. Another time I dropped it only to have my own unexpected cascade take out my own tiles. Meanwhile the AI ate a bunch of their own tiles, leaving the board saturated in the tiles I gave them and a fresh new batch of tiles to keep feeding on.

Though granted at Round 6 I'm finding it harder and harder to use the same two characters to back up the required for back to back nodes. Always nice to have a roster deep enough that one character stumbling out alive is a victory that doesn't slow me down.

Unknown

Having played extensively with Beast recently, I can say with some certainty whoever voted him that low is just dead wrong. You guys remember how Psylocke is supposed to be that quick DPS machine and fails? Well, Beast actually does that really effectively. His blue is insanely fast, and his green does pretty phenomenal damage, especially if his blue drops a few strike tiles, and especially if you're backing him up with, say, Black Panther (this is a good team, guys).

Unknown

Budget Player Cadet wrote:

Having played extensively with Beast recently, I can say with some certainty whoever voted him that low is just dead wrong. You guys remember how Psylocke is supposed to be that quick DPS machine and fails? Well, Beast actually does that really effectively. His blue is insanely fast, and his green does pretty phenomenal damage, especially if his blue drops a few strike tiles, and especially if you're backing him up with, say, Black Panther (this is a good team, guys).

There's always a delay between a bad character being buffed and people realizing he's not bad anymore, unless the changes make it really really obvious (like X-Force's buff). People generally have to use him for a while before they realize it.

Unknown

That's right, I mean to be fair, how many people have a Beast at a high enough level to even use? Hell even with that, I stopped working on getting 166 on all my 3s and got all of them (with covers) to 120, including Beast. In the most recent PvP, he was boosted and I STILL chose to use someone else.

The 'bad' stigma is still there, and I doubt many peop[le have invested ANYTHING into him.
- Unreall

Unknown

Budget Player Cadet wrote:

Having played extensively with Beast recently, I can say with some certainty whoever voted him that low is just dead wrong. You guys remember how Psylocke is supposed to be that quick DPS machine and fails? Well, Beast actually does that really effectively. His blue is insanely fast, and his green does pretty phenomenal damage, especially if his blue drops a few strike tiles, and especially if you're backing him up with, say, Black Panther (this is a good team, guys).

beast is decent, cant say if actually good

Nonce Equitaur 2

When I need to cover , Beast is one of my goto guys. He's a few moves faster than Invisible Woman. Works great with Prof X since the board destruction only targets basic tiles.
Daredevil is a few moves faster than Captain America at slowing down an enemy with stuns, but lacks the board control.
She-Hulk's blue is kinda terrible, but her green is fantastic in long battles. Save up 12 green, then erase four of the opponent's colors.
Nick Fury's blue is fantastic. But I'll usually go for Beast instead.

morph3us

Pwuz_ wrote:

Also Black Panther could only clear a whole wave till around Round 3-4 for me. And with Luke Cage dropping over 1k followed by 6k on a single target for the same amount of AP, it seems redundant to me. Yes I know that math doesn't make it sound impressive, but save up to 18 and now you've got 1k, 6k, & 6k dropping.

I think this is an interesting point. As you develop your roster throughout the game, in 2* land, and in transition 3* (and early maxed 3* land), AEs form a strong strategic component of your power sets. There's a point up to which Rage of the Panther, or Embiggened Bash etc will wipe the opposing team, or at least significantly damage them such that you only need to administer a coup de grace.

There definitely seems to be an inflexion point (probably when you start getting some usable 4*s), however, where scaling significantly weakens the capability of those AE skill sets. When I'm facing Dark Avengers with 15k-25k health, even a boosted RotP at 5.5K damage or a boosted Embiggened Bash at 4.8K damage doesn't make significant inroads into that sort of health. In the case of RotP, it just irritates them such that they whack you back harder. That's not to say it doesn't work: in the Hunt, I've occasionally run KK, SW, LThor to repeatedly spam Embiggened Bash over and over again, but that only works because of the phenomenal green acceleration in that team (and if you lose Kamala, it's all over).

At this point in the game, single target damage becomes king (or queen) over the AEs. Hence, I think players who are well into the 4* transition tend to value characters like IMBH (single target red), XFW, Cyclops, Cage (single target black), Fury (single target blue), Cage (again, but for single target yellow) far more than players at an earlier stage in their roster development (since the single target damage is overkill against opponents with lower health). Despite her nerf, 4* Thor remains very playable for this same reason, since you can usually spam Smite several times after your first Power Surge to down opponents with excessive health. Likewise, I think late game players value AP generation more too, since ramping up to that single target damage is key to most matches.

Unknown

morph3us wrote:

Pwuz_ wrote:

Also Black Panther could only clear a whole wave till around Round 3-4 for me. And with Luke Cage dropping over 1k followed by 6k on a single target for the same amount of AP, it seems redundant to me. Yes I know that math doesn't make it sound impressive, but save up to 18 and now you've got 1k, 6k, & 6k dropping.

I think this is an interesting point. As you develop your roster throughout the game, in 2* land, and in transition 3* (and early maxed 3* land), AEs form a strong strategic component of your power sets. There's a point up to which Rage of the Panther, or Embiggened Bash etc will wipe the opposing team, or at least significantly damage them such that you only need to administer a coup de grace.

There definitely seems to be an inflexion point (probably when you start getting some usable 4*s), however, where scaling significantly weakens the capability of those AE skill sets. When I'm facing Dark Avengers with 15k-25k health, even a boosted RotP at 5.5K damage or a boosted Embiggened Bash at 4.8K damage doesn't make significant inroads into that sort of health. In the case of RotP, it just irritates them such that they whack you back harder. That's not to say it doesn't work: in the Hunt, I've occasionally run KK, SW, LThor to repeatedly spam Embiggened Bash over and over again, but that only works because of the phenomenal green acceleration in that team (and if you lose Kamala, it's all over).

At this point in the game, single target damage becomes king (or queen) over the AEs. Hence, I think players who are well into the 4* transition tend to value characters like IMBH (single target red), XFW, Cyclops, Cage (single target black), Fury (single target blue), Cage (again, but for single target yellow) far more than players at an earlier stage in their roster development (since the single target damage is overkill against opponents with lower health). Despite her nerf, 4* Thor remains very playable for this same reason, since you can usually spam Smite several times after your first Power Surge to down opponents with excessive health. Likewise, I think late game players value AP generation more too, since ramping up to that single target damage is key to most matches.

there's also less variety at the 4* level

Unknown

morph3us wrote:

Pwuz_ wrote:

Also Black Panther could only clear a whole wave till around Round 3-4 for me. And with Luke Cage dropping over 1k followed by 6k on a single target for the same amount of AP, it seems redundant to me. Yes I know that math doesn't make it sound impressive, but save up to 18 and now you've got 1k, 6k, & 6k dropping.

I think this is an interesting point. As you develop your roster throughout the game, in 2* land, and in transition 3* (and early maxed 3* land), AEs form a strong strategic component of your power sets. There's a point up to which Rage of the Panther, or Embiggened Bash etc will wipe the opposing team, or at least significantly damage them such that you only need to administer a coup de grace.

There definitely seems to be an inflexion point (probably when you start getting some usable 4*s), however, where scaling significantly weakens the capability of those AE skill sets. When I'm facing Dark Avengers with 15k-25k health, even a boosted RotP at 5.5K damage or a boosted Embiggened Bash at 4.8K damage doesn't make significant inroads into that sort of health. In the case of RotP, it just irritates them such that they whack you back harder. That's not to say it doesn't work: in the Hunt, I've occasionally run KK, SW, LThor to repeatedly spam Embiggened Bash over and over again, but that only works because of the phenomenal green acceleration in that team (and if you lose Kamala, it's all over).

At this point in the game, single target damage becomes king (or queen) over the AEs. Hence, I think players who are well into the 4* transition tend to value characters like IMBH (single target red), XFW, Cyclops, Cage (single target black), Fury (single target blue), Cage (again, but for single target yellow) far more than players at an earlier stage in their roster development (since the single target damage is overkill against opponents with lower health). Despite her nerf, 4* Thor remains very playable for this same reason, since you can usually spam Smite several times after your first Power Surge to down opponents with excessive health. Likewise, I think late game players value AP generation more too, since ramping up to that single target damage is key to most matches.

I'm around that tipping point you are referring to, still in 3* land, but double digit maxed 166 and double digit 3*s at 120+, with 4 4*s between 140 and 170. I find AoEs are for clearing weaker nodes and PvP matches, esp[ecially something like RotP. The reason 3* thor seems to be OK with it is that while green is an AoE, its the 'spike' dmg on the point character that's so beautiful, I mean not boosted, a typical chain of yellow to green w/o cascades factored in will net you about 7-8k dmg to the point, with cascadde dmg on top, match 5s on top, and like 3k dmg to the other two people.

On that same token, a lot of moves like Cage's yellow are 'over the top' dmg for most of what I fight when used in conjunction with those AoE attacks. If I land RotP and then throw out Cage's yellow, thats like 11k dmg, which outside of a few matches that I typically avoid, is overkill. When it comes to developing your roster at this point, the big thing - to me at least - is less about big dmg AoE and more AP generation to put a threat down ASAP...its usually one 'scary' character that I need to kill, so getting black high enough for SS is top priority (for example). I'm finishing up my Cage & Cyc, but my next two goals are KK & IF, two great AP generators.
- Unreall

Unknown

Nonce Equitaur 2 wrote:

When I need to cover , Beast is one of my goto guys. He's a few moves faster than Invisible Woman. Works great with Prof X since the board destruction only targets basic tiles.
Daredevil is a few moves faster than Captain America at slowing down an enemy with stuns, but lacks the board control.
She-Hulk's blue is kinda terrible, but her green is fantastic in long battles. Save up 12 green, then erase four of the opponent's colors.
Nick Fury's blue is fantastic. But I'll usually go for Beast instead.

I've been thinking about this more and more.....so where does beast rank for u? use him pretty much w/ professor x only?

wymtime

I am going to give some praise to a couple of the female characters that are rated rather low:
#1 Gamora. Gamora can be deviating once she is fully covered and fully leveled. I run her 3 in green 5 red 5 black. I run her with IF to speed up black to get some massively nasty strike tiles out. With her red then doing massive damage for 5 AP and IF double dipping on her strike tiles this is a formidable pair. i have also run her with grot for massive strike tiles everywhere. She needs the right team, but when you have it she is fun.

#2 Squirrel Girl. Squirrel Girl is an anti special tile creator with her purple and her green can do massive damage with AP generation. She pairs well with CMags as Cmages red can cause cascades to accelerate other powers. When she is buffed I always pull her out in PVE and PVP. Her fury friends when buffed can take down the front character and do damage to the next.

Neither are top tier, but are ranked low by the voters. I feel they are a little under rated in the 3* tier and with the weekly buffs are getting more of a chance to shine.

Thanks to everyone who worked on this list it is always fun.

Unknown

I've never been sold on Gamora...like I see where she can be effective...but she's just not scary enough on defense ya know? Same goes for SG. Only when boosted has Gamora ever been "yuck" to fight against the AI, and SG - as you pointed out is great in certain matches, but on defense 'certain matches' doesn't hold water.

And no that isn't a knock on either - just an observation. Psylocke falls into that group as well - very effective in 'your' hands or when boosted, but IMO suck on defense.
- Unreall

Unknown

Unreallystic wrote:

I've never been sold on Gamora...like I see where she can be effective...but she's just not scary enough on defense ya know? Same goes for SG. Only when boosted has Gamora ever been "yuck" to fight against the AI, and SG - as you pointed out is great in certain matches, but on defense 'certain matches' doesn't hold water.

And no that isn't a knock on either - just an observation. Psylocke falls into that group as well - very effective in 'your' hands or when boosted, but IMO suck on defense.
- Unreall

SG is very scary

wymtime

raisinbman wrote:

Unreallystic wrote:

I've never been sold on Gamora...like I see where she can be effective...but she's just not scary enough on defense ya know? Same goes for SG. Only when boosted has Gamora ever been "yuck" to fight against the AI, and SG - as you pointed out is great in certain matches, but on defense 'certain matches' doesn't hold water.

And no that isn't a knock on either - just an observation. Psylocke falls into that group as well - very effective in 'your' hands or when boosted, but IMO suck on defense.
- Unreall

SG is very scary

You have been hit with nuts from above in real life haven't you? It's ok we still care about you.

We will laugh behind you back though

Unknown

Unreallystic wrote:

That's right, I mean to be fair, how many people have a Beast at a high enough level to even use? Hell even with that, I stopped working on getting 166 on all my 3s and got all of them (with covers) to 120, including Beast. In the most recent PvP, he was boosted and I STILL chose to use someone else.

The 'bad' stigma is still there, and I doubt many peop[le have invested ANYTHING into him.
- Unreall

So 2 great points..

1) Beast was a turd, and is still a quasi turd, and players need to direct their resources to upgrading characters in a somewhat long terms fashion, so most won't stop midstream and say "hey, beast isn't garbage anymore so I'll ignore the other characters I've been working on for months to buff him."

2) for roster development the smart way to go is to get a stable of 166ers, then focus on getting as many 120+ as you can. You're right on. At that point you balance bringing the odd character up to 166 while buffing others to 120. Once you're established you need to prioritize characters who seem to be either "overpowered" or "featured." I've focused on getting cage and IF upgraded and it has been the best resources I've ever spent. Using beast as an example, if he comes along in a PVP I play sparingly and focus on the other levels. ANY character fully upgraded is OK, but to me there are a dozen other characters off the top of my head to spend resources on than beast.

over_clocked

Beast is so good now that he makes weak characters like Psylocke and Falcon much better. Definitely a 3* that is above average: very strong when boosted, very usable and versatile when not.
I like running him with Elektra and Hood when Elektra can do some double crossing.
Simulator ISO node:

Start (no boosts whatsoever)


Finish


Elektra/Beast form a full rainbow by themselves so any third can be used theoretically, Loki too, Cage or lazy Thor for better yellow, etc. They just win out with AP stealers because their skills already have good synergy. And like Nonce already said, Beast is a cheaper IW/Grocket. He and cStorm are my top choices for green/blue characters.
Another fun team to try: Deadpool/Beast/Hood. Try it whenever one of those is buffed. Try it anyway.
I can see Moonstone/Beast too Moonstone is also not a **** 2* now!

Unknown

tuscan panty raider wrote:

2) for roster development the smart way to go is to get a stable of 166ers, then focus on getting as many 120+ as you can. You're right on. At that point you balance bringing the odd character up to 166 while buffing others to 120. Once you're established you need to prioritize characters who seem to be either "overpowered" or "featured." I've focused on getting cage and IF upgraded and it has been the best resources I've ever spent. Using beast as an example, if he comes along in a PVP I play sparingly and focus on the other levels. ANY character fully upgraded is OK, but to me there are a dozen other characters off the top of my head to spend resources on than beast.

I'm actually trying to figure out which way to go now...I've got my stable of 166s, my stable of 120s, my stable of 'tweeners like Cyc, Cage, GSBW who I wanted to get to 166, but they've shown their usefulness at roughly 140 and I question the ISO commitment to get them to 166, I've got some 4*s I cna lvl, XF is @ 200, IW is at 170, Fury is maxed at 140ish if I recall, DD is around 170, and then I have everyone else, leveled as high as the covers take them. I can't figure out if its worth taking characters past 140...should I be 166ing my 3*s, or 140ing. The way boost play out, being 120 makes me competitive ALL the time, now I didn't have max thor/cage/widow, but I was close enough (do have max thor) that not a single person attacked me.

Boost really change this list to me. I mean before I saw it in a tiered fashion, but now all I see are 'tiers'.

God Tier - characters you use even when not boosted because they are that good...(3hor, PX, IMHB, IF)
Top Tier - characters you use all the time unless a God tier is boosted...(XF, CapA, CMags)
High Tier - Great characters who whenn boosted, own PvP, but when not boosted, you use sparingly(Cage, Blade, Deadpool)
Mid Tier - Characters you ONLY use when boosted (Falcon, HT, GSBW, Spiderman)
Low Tier - Characters that even when boosted, you would rather use an unboosted higher tier character(Beast, Mystique)
Joke Tier - why are you wasting a slot on them? (DD, Bags & Rags)

That's how I see the game now. We can argue about a match-up/importance like the Falcon/HT, but 'in general' 'who's going to get ISO first'? That's how tiering is to me. Those God Tiers? They absorb ISO the moment I have a cover and ISO. The other difference about tiering instead of outright numbering, its a bit different than the numbers due to overall effectiveness. I could have all max 4*, 2*Storm and 2*OBW will maintain a spot on my roster. When boosted, even at 2* you see them scattered about PvP. I haven't started this Hood PvP yet, but I'm expecting some OBW/Hood teams. They fall into High Tier. Then I look at the currently discussed Beast, fairly or not, he's still Low tier for me. Beast boosted still doesn't compete with RnG not-boosted for me. It's not that Beast sucks, its just in the scheme of lvling and PvP, he's outclassed substantially (in my eyes). It's just like how when XF was the second coming of Jesus, Patch dropped.

Not asking we do things differently, just how I see things with more time dealing with boosted rosters.
- Unreall

Unknown

Just wanted to chime in and say that this list was instrumental to my decision-making since I started the game in earnest a few months ago. There was a period of time before I found this that I sold several covers (2x Steve Rogers being the ugliest) on the advice of RL friends, who also happened to be new (and therefore didn't know their **** from a lightpost). It might surprise you to know that this post actually played into decisions to spend real money on this game, and for that, D3 should send you commission.

I can't wait for the next iteration. Thanks!