My $0.02 since the 04/17/15 reblance

Phaserhawk

So the 04/17/15 rebalance brought about the end of X-Force dominance, among other changes the largest being Health.

So being far enough into this I have to conclude that some characters that were left off the health bump list need a re-thought about their health

The 2 characters that have really had a rough time have been Patch and Daken. Yes they do regenerate, but they are laughable jokes now with some of the newer 3* and 4*. I think they at least could use a bump to 7500 or so.

Loki and Hood have definitely seen decreased play, I tend to see them only in boosted events, if this is the goal then it was a success, if not, the need a bit of a health bump as well.

Iron Fist is the other main player that didn't get healthy after the rebalance. I'm not saying he needs too much of once, but putting him in Storm tier along with Patch and Daken would go a long way, although he's strong enough he can survive no increase.

X-Force--He is definitely still decent, but I do think his green took too much of a hit on dmg and hope he gets a few hundred back,

In summation.

Give Patch and Daken 7500 Health
Give Hood and Loki a little love, just a little.
Iron Fist-- yeah he's probably okay.
X-Force-- Just a wee dmg increase on green.

Short of a few other minor issues, this game has been really getting better and so glad the devs have been looking to retain players rather than make a quick buck. Great job D3 keep it up.

snlf25

I agree with most of what you said, can't comment on X-force because I don't have ony fully covered. I would like to add that we need to be able to use three boosts like we used to. Having one 3 match worth of AP per color is very beneficial, less than one is nearly worthless.

Raffoon

If they added 800-1000 damage back on to Xforce's green and another 2-3 charged tiles onto Thor's blue, I'd actually consider spending money on the game again. As it stands, the changes were just so large that I can't really trust anything in the game enough to put more money into it.

The sweeping health changes seem to promote diversity, which is good, but they're also a bit overshadowed by the massive weekly buffs, so it's hard to tell their impact. If they toned the weekly buffs back just a bit, maybe 15-30 levels less for buffed 3* characters, then I think that there would be even more diversity, since you could actually use characters that aren't featured and have a hope at PVP.

SnowcaTT

I was moving my Daken up right before the health balance, having just received my 12 cover I put him to 153. I finished him off and raised him to 166...and he's sat there, basically never used. With the lower health, I found him pretty worthless.

Also around the time of the health balance finally, after more than a year, I got my 12th and 13th Patch covers. Seeing how poorly Daken faired, he also just lingered at a low level until his recent featured event.

Loki and Hood I had maxed at the time and I still use them - but not in the sim anymore, only when buffed. I think the weekly buff rotation is a much bigger change than the health, and that is -why- Daken/Patch/Loki/Hood should now (and should have then) gotten health buffs. They won't see "over" play, since they are pretty weak without the buffs. They just might start showing up in Sim occasionally again, where I rarely see them now.

Speaking of rarely seeing things anymore - what happened to Hulk? He didn't get a health buff and probably didn't need one, but you used to see him as a health scarecrow. With all the new health boosts and bigger damage overall (power creep?), I vary rarely see him around.

Oh, and speaking of not seeing things around much anymore - My XF just sits on the bench except when boosted, and whenever I see one in the field it is just an invitation to attack. You only have to deny one color, the other two are so weak - it's incredible that 2* damage attacks can be so much more devastating than a 4*. I said at the time I think if they did what they did to black and left green alone, XF would be playable. They killed his green so hard, he isn't playable.

[So yeah, long-form agreement with OP]

Unknown

Loki is the most important cover I have. I have others that can do heavy damage, but without Loki they can get bogged down in a stagnant board. Loki is the best for kick starting a match so it never becomes a war of attrition. I love my Loki.

GrumpySmurf1002

Raffoon wrote:

If they toned the weekly buffs back just a bit, maybe 15-30 levels less for buffed 3* characters, then I think that there would be even more diversity, since you could actually use characters that aren't featured and have a hope at PVP.

Doing so would likely move the game to 4* dominance again. As it stands, most 3* at 240 are equal or superior options to the non-buffed 4*. (some are superior to certain 4* @ 350). Bringing that number down makes the 270s that much stronger, and has potential to kill off even the boosted 3* from the top of PvP.

Tuning from 260 down to 240 left enough room for unboosted Thor, Fist, Cage to wiggle their way in. That makes up to 10 characters viable near the top each week (depending on who is boosted, and ignoring synergy teams like Patch-Hulk or Prof-GSBW). I don't think you'll ever get much better than that, at least in the current structure of PvP.

GrumpySmurf1002

Phaserhawk wrote:

In summation.

Give Patch and Daken 7500 Health
Give Hood and Loki a little love, just a little.
Iron Fist-- yeah he's probably okay.
X-Force-- Just a wee dmg increase on green.

Short of a few other minor issues, this game has been really getting better and so glad the devs have been looking to retain players rather than make a quick buck. Great job D3 keep it up.

Your last point I 100% agree with. Still need to something about the awfulness of PvE grinding, but that's neither here nor there.

To the other points:

Any DA has enough benefit. Not that 3* Daken appears often in PvE, but 300+ versions of him are annoying enough, more health is the last thing he needs. But overall, I don't think either are bothersome at 6800, it just removed their sustainability to climb PvP with. I don't think a boost to 7500 will make them any more/less of a target when they're unboosted, when the top boosted characters are dealing 8-10k damage in one shot.

Hood/Loki/Fist shoulda kinda get lumped together. The latter is more hybrid than support, but I think PvP has been helped by the reduction of their presence. Similar to Patch/Daken, if you want to throw them a little health, I'm sure it'd be fine, but don't think it's moving the needle.

XForce. Yeah he should probably hit harder on green, but I actually don't mind it, even at level 4. It's a semi-quick hit that breaks up the board. Given the choice, I'd much rather see the AP reduction (not the gain) added back to his black first. That's the element missing from him.

Overall, I really do like the new PvP a lot. Easier progression w/ now an added challenge (1300 isn't easy), good variety week to week, and now Shield Sim progression that actually makes sense. Looking forward to Anniversary 2: Cruise Control

Unknown

GrumpySmurf1002 wrote:

Any DA has enough benefit. Not that 3* Daken appears often in PvE, but 300+ versions of him are annoying enough, more health is the last thing he needs. But overall, I don't think either are bothersome at 6800, it just removed their sustainability to climb PvP with. I don't think a boost to 7500 will make them any more/less of a target when they're unboosted, when the top boosted characters are dealing 8-10k damage in one shot.

We see 2* Daken much more often than 3* Daken in PVE, and I use 3* Daken more frequently, even with his pitiful health, than I see him in PVE, especially lately. I'd like to see both Patch and Lazy Daken get higher health more for PVE than PVP; they're unusable on higher-level PVE nodes because they're health is so low.

simonsez

Ben Grimm wrote:

We see 2* Daken much more often than 3* Daken in PVE, and I use 3* Daken more frequently, even with his pitiful health, than I see him in PVE, especially lately. I'd like to see both Patch and Lazy Daken get higher health more for PVE than PVP; they're unusable on higher-level PVE nodes because they're health is so low.

Right, but then when they're buffed for PvP, they'll become awful to play against. The Patch PvP was unpleasant enough as it is.

Attack the problem from the other direction... if high level PvE nodes make good 3*s unusable, that means the scaling is too damn high.

SnowcaTT

simonsez wrote:

Ben Grimm wrote:

We see 2* Daken much more often than 3* Daken in PVE, and I use 3* Daken more frequently, even with his pitiful health, than I see him in PVE, especially lately. I'd like to see both Patch and Lazy Daken get higher health more for PVE than PVP; they're unusable on higher-level PVE nodes because they're health is so low.

Right, but then when they're buffed for PvP, they'll become awful to play against. The Patch PvP was unpleasant enough as it is.

Attack the problem from the other direction... if high level PvE nodes make good 3*s unusable, that means the scaling is too damn high.

Agree with this completely as well. Pushed my XF to 250 and suddenly all my 3*'s were pretty worthless in PVE - and this was one of the main reasons I simply quit that portion of the game. When the game starts to assume you need to use your very few characters every single time, it gets pretty boring - and pretty impossible when you have no other team to go to when you are out of health packs.

Anything beyond 166 should simply be considered 166 for scaling. You are trying to get folks to do the 3*->4* transition, right? Let's make that a benefit, and not a penalty!

GrimSkald

I agree on pretty much all the salient points - Patch and LDaken's health is a bit too low, but I'm not sure it's unsustainable. The "stealth nerf" to Iron Fist's health was probably necessary to bring him more into balance. X-Force and GT were hit too hard.

I've less of a strong opinion about GT, since I don't have a real playable version (2/3/4, so getting there,) but X-Force's green was hit too hard, IMHO. I think his black and yellow are fine as it currently is, but his green went from noticably too powerful to noticably too weak. Heck, you can't even one-shot OBW with it, unless you're lucky and get some nice cascades.

Boosting the damage by 800 - 1000 would fix it, I think, but the more exciting option, at least to me, is to reduce it's AP cost instead. At 7 green AP it becomes quick board-shake with some damage on top. With some green AP generators it can become a really nice "fish for a cascade" power. Add that to something that takes out a type of tile or color (like Magnetic Projectiles or X-Force's own Surgical Strike,) and you can do some devestating combos.

Just my $.02

Malcrof

GrimSkald wrote:

I agree on pretty much all the salient points - Patch and LDaken's health is a bit too low,

Fairly certain their health is kept low because they are true healers. You can still prologue heal those 2 if needed...

Azoic

Yes you can go back and heal them...if they live through the fight. I'm not even at the top of the scaling, but 320 ares/venom/moonstone will basically one shot them. No healing from that.