Consolidating the colour pie, a megapost

Pylgrim

Alright, I promised a while ago I would do this so here it is.

To summarise, there is a mechanical "colour pie" in MPQ that groups similar abilities and effects in a same colour. However, there are many, many exceptions in the game, most of them from the earlier days of the game when devs were still figuring out things. But what does this colour pie look like?

The colour of friendship, teamwork and compassion. Mechanics: Caring about Team Up tiles. Effects based upon or affecting team-mates. Healing and self-healing. Creating protect tiles. Summoning help from external sources. Generating AP. Improving friendly special tiles.
The colour of fury, violence and powering up. Mechanics: High single-target damage (often with small off-colour bonuses). Damage that scales up or multiplies based on something. Secondary at board destruction. AoE damage that includes allies too. Secondary at using traps. Secondary at creating strike tiles.
The colour of science, intellect and the powers of the mind. Mechanics: Stunning. Shuffling the board. Generating various kinds of special tiles, especially protect tiles (and secondary at improving them). "Charging" tiles. Locking tiles. Secondary at converting tiles of a colour into a different colour. Secondary at stealing special tiles. Tertiary at AoE damage. Secondary at generating AP.
The colour of power and destruction. Mechanics: AoE damage. Board destruction (usually with AP collection). Strike tile generation.
The colour of sneakiness, theft and manoeuvres. Mechanics: Stealing AP. Caring about and/or destroying opposing special tiles. Setting traps. Secondary in AoE damage. Changing tiles' colours. Caring about or creating Critical tiles. Secondary at swapping tiles.
The colour of relentlessness (and even, cruelty), implacability and sacrifice. Mechanics: Creating attack tiles. Obtaining a big (or off-colour) effect at a cost (besides AP) or fulfilling a condition. Stealing special tiles. Secondary at creating critical tiles.

Note that most effects appear in two colours, though more often in one than in the other. That's what I call "primary" and "secondary". Also note that all colours get to deal single-target damage, but red is the one who does it more frequently and efficiently, followed far behind by green. Similarly, all colours but yellow get some AoE damage, but green is definitely king, followed by purple and blue.

I'll now attempt to analyse power-by-power the appropriateness of their colour. Wherever I believe that the current colour is a break and the power should be another colour, I'll use a colour flag ( ); if it's only a suggestion of an alternative colour I'll just type it out. Without further ado:



Yelena Balova
Lethal Recon: Steals AP and deals damage. Correct.
Payback Mission: Both replacing enemy special tiles and creating critical tiles are purple, but that colour is already taken by an even purpler power. Black is the colour where both abilities make most sense, considering that. Correct.

Venom
Devour: Single-target damage with the potential of scaling up? This ability is pretty red but black makes sense as well, since the web tiles are sacrificed.
Symbiote Snare: One of the better stun abilities in the game. It also converts one tile to a green web which is a purple thing, but the main effect is definitely

Storm
Lightning Strike: Board destruction with AP generation. Correct.
Mistress of the Elements. Destroys TU tiles and collects TU AP. Correct.
Hailstorm: Adds attack tiles. Correct.

Spider-Man
Web Swing: Single target damage that scales up. Correct.
All Tied UP: Stuns. Correct.
Spectacular Strategy. Adds critical tiles. Correct.

Juggernaut
Unstoppable Crash: Board destruction. Correct.
Headbutt: High damage at the cost of health is clearly the domain of

Iron Man
Repulsor Blast: Single-target damage. Correct.
Armoured Assault: Adds protect tiles and deals some damage. Correct.
Ultra-Freon beam: Stuns. The high damage tacked on seems a by-product of the ability's cost more than anything else. Correct.

Hawkeye
Take Aim: Adds a critical tile. Correct.
Arrow Stab: Single-target damage plus limited board destruction. Correct, though cold be green, since the board destruction is the main effect.

Black Widow
Aggressive Recon: Steals Ap. Correct.
Widow's Sting: Stuns. Correct.



Wolverine
Feral Claws: Single-target damage that add strike tiles. Correct.
Adamantium Slash: High single-target damage. Correct.
Healing Factor: Self-healing. Correct.

Thor
Mjolnir's Might: Single target damage. Adding a few colour tiles is strange for Red but since it's not the focus it's ok. Correct.
Thunder Strike: Some damage and a lot of tile-colour conversion. There's nothing yellow here, but or blue (MM should generate the proper colour tiles instead of yellow, then).
Call the Storm: AoE damage. Correct.

Storm
Lightning Storm: As correct as the 1* one was.
Windstorm: AoE damage plus stun. Could be either green or blue, depending on what you think is the main effect, but since green is taken, it makes sense in blue, who is third at AoE.
Raging Tempest: AoE damage triggered by allies being damaged. Correct.

Steve Rogers
Sentinel of Liberty: Creates protect tiles. Correct.
Star Spangled Avenger: Single target damage plus bonus AP production. Correct.
Peacemaker: Stun plus bonus AP production. Correct.

Spider-Man
Switcheroo: Swaps tiles. Correct.
Web-Slinger: Locks tiles. Correct.
Snarky Remark. There are only two powers in the game that slow down enemy CDs, one is yellow and the other is blue (and it feels to me that it should be black or purple). There's no way of telling whether this is in colour or not.

Moonstone
Gravity Warp: Swaps tiles or deals damage. Correct.
Photon Blast: Scalable single-target damage. Correct.
Control Shift: Steals enemy special tiles. Correct.

Magneto
Iron Hammer: Board destruction plus limited damage. There's nothing here remotely blue, it's all
Polarity Shift: Changes tiles' colours. Correct.
Magnetic Flux: Single-target high damage plus board destruction. Correct.

Human Torch
Fireball: Single-target damage and limited board destruction. Correct.
Inferno: Creates attack tiles. Correct.
Flame Jet: This is a weird and unique one. Being single target and scalable suggests red, but that one is taken. Being similar to an attack tile suggests black, but that one is taken too. I guess of all the other colours left, green is the one that makes more sense, though perhaps it could get its own item in the colour pie and be always given to options-starved green?

Hawkeye
Electric Arrow: Stuns. The AP destruction is a bit strange for the colour but given that it's a secondary effect, it's fine. Correct.
Blast Arrow: AoE damage. Should be
Speed Shot: Deals high single-target damage on a 5-match. the other ability that cares about your 5-matches is blue, so it's hard to tell whether it "belongs" to a colour. Going by the result of the effect, it could be , but then again caring about friendly 5-matches could have its own slice of the pie in purple, blue or yellow.

Daken
Pheromone Rage: Creates strike tiles. Should be
Healing & Heat. Heals at the risk of damaging if conditions are not met. Could be yellow but also makes sense in black.
Chemical reaction: Single target damage that scales up and turns two blue tiles to green. Since you are sacrificing the strike tiles and also the diminishing the chances of healing, black would be a good fit but it's taken now, so the second colour that makes sense is .

Captain Marvel
Photonic Blasts: Single-target damage plus small bonus effect. Correct. Destroying specifically protect tiles is unique to this power but I do like it in red's slice of the colour pie, though could also be purple.
Sonic Boom: AoE damage x2 at the cost of additional AP. Could be green, but black, much like in MTG, can do anything as long as it pays the price. Correct.
Strategic Command: Creates TU tiles. Correct.

Bullseye
Adamantium Bones: Creates protect tiles. Should be or perhaps since thematically he's not trying to protect the team.
Murderous Aim: Creates critical tiles and deals damage. It's correct in black but could also be purple.
Deadly Precision: Board destruction plus damage. Correct.

Black Widow
Aggressive Recon: As correct as 1*'s one.
Anti-Gravity Device: This is a weird one. The main mechanic is CD-disruption, which as I said above doesn't really have a established place in the colour pie. Then you have the very yellow tacked on healing. Since the other ability that slows down CDs is maybe we should just give the effect outright to that colour? God knows it can use more diverse effects.
Espionage: Increases the damage dealt by certain colour matches in addition to stealing 1 AP of that colour (which is purple). It is a pretty unique ability and the closer ability to it, Imaginaut, is also black, so correct it is, I guess.

Ares
Onslaught: Single-target damage that scales up? Clearly should be
Rampage: AoE damage (that scales up) Makes a bit of sense in red, but much more in . Interesting that they mixed these two.
Sunder: High single-target damage with an HP cost. Definitely should be



Wolverine
Berserker Rage: Creates strike tiles. The drawback makes it so it could be black, but it's correct in green, anyway.
Best There is: Single-target damage that scales up. Correct.
Healing Factor: Heals. Correct.

Vision
Density: Heavy: It's kind of an unique ability, but it's more similar to the Espionage or Imaginaut than to anything blue has.
Attack Protocol: (Mostly) single target damage with changing effects. Hard to place in the colour pie but red makes sense for the basic form. Correct.
Density: Light: Another unique ability that could be compared to protect tiles, so makes sense in yellow, though could be blue I think.

Thor
Mjolnir's Might: Pretty much the same as 2* version
Thunder Strike: It is an even more egregious break than in the 2* version because this on has the higher, single-target damage that his red ability should have. My suggestion would be to switch this and Mjolnir's Might's damage and turn this or purple (and make MM add the corresponding colour tiles). This would also help make both abilities decently useful instead of the "completely worthless/near broken" current pair.
Call the Storm. Correct as it is for the 2*.

Storm
Exactly the same as her 1* version in every aspect.

Steve Rogers
Exactly the same as his 2* version in every aspect.

Squirrel Girl
The Bigger they Are: Creates protect tiles. Ending the turn as a drawback suggests it should be , but in all truth, what this ability needs is to lose that clause and perhaps do something more interesting.
Nuts from Above: It has the "cares for enemy's special tiles" going for it, but considering that it does nothing with them other than counting them for damage-scaling purposes, I feel this ability should be
Furry Friends: limited board destruction plus single-target damage makes it more red than green, but the previous power is even redder. Green is correct mechanically, but other powers themed around "help from external sources" are yellow. Since the whole point of this thread is to choose and stick to mechanics over flavour, I'll leave it green.

Spider-Man
Web Bandages: Heals. Correct (if uninspired and weak as hell).
All Tied Up: Stuns. Correct.
Spider Sense: Makes protect tiles. This belongs to the olden times when both he and Bullseye would make you believe that protect tiles were the domain of purple, but that was quickly and irrevocably deprecated moving forward, leaving these powers as ancient artifacts of their era. This should be , maybe replacing that lame and out-of-flavour yellow ability with an offensive red or green ability like players have been begging devs to do for ages.

She-Hulk
Settlement: Steals and improves enemy special tiles. Black is primary at stealing tiles, but the fact that she also improves them makes blue a better fit, I believe. Correct.
Furious Charge: "Destroys" AP. Destroying as opposed to stealing AP is an uncommon effect that usually appears in , usually attached to generation of AP (stealing). I'm guessing it also belongs to purple.
Power of Attorney: AoE damage plus board destruction. Should be .

Sentry
Supernova: AoE that scales up and damages everybody plus board destruction. Correct.
World Rupture: Board destruction and AoE damage. Correct.
Sacrifice. Creates a big strike tile at a huge cost of HP. I believe this ability is more than yellow as the HP cost is a strong part of its identity, especially taking in account that this version of Sentry is a villain and not a hero.

Scarlet Witch
Reality Crush: AoE damage plus big stun. Could be green and purple is definitely ok, but its similarity to Wind Storm (where the stun is the bigger "point" of the power) makes me inclined to believe this should be
Hexbolt: Limited board destruction plus AP collection. Correct.
Arcane Incantation: Changes tiles' colours. Could theoretically be blue but makes much more sense in in the same way that her purple should be blue. I'm going to hazard the guess that after the fiasco of winfinite, the devs were feeling a bit squeamish about adding an even more efficient blue battery so they swapped the colours. Funny thing is that, nowadays, a purple battery is much more dangerous than a blue one.

Sam Wilson
Inspiration: Improving friendly special tiles does seem like a yellow effect to me but this rare effect is spread among colours in other characters (blue and green come to mind).
Redwing: It's a strange ability but when it comes to it, it's enemy tile destruction which is a effect.
Bird Strike: The last remnant of the purple=protect tiles era. Should be yellow but since that is taken, would do, for a clean swap of his current colours.

Rocket&Groot
I am Groot: Heals and destroys TU tiles. Correct and arguably the best and more interesting take on a healing power.
Blammo! We Got Ya!: Single-target scalable damage and board destruction. Does anyone else keep feeling that this ability should deal AoE damage when casting it? As it is, it makes more sense in
I Got a Plan: Create strong strike tiles. This is clearly one of the few cases where the colour was chosen by its flavour rather than mechanics, but that's the kind of ambivalence that has made a mess of the pie. Should be

Ragnarok
Godlike Power: AoE damage and limited board destruction. Correct, but for a green power it should destroy the board further or gain AP from it, especially considering the comparatively small AoE damage and the drawback damage. Could be black.
Thunderclap. Just a slight variation on Mjolnir's Might so it's correct.
Lightning Rod: Creates charged tiles and heals. I feel that the latter is more main effect than the former, so this could be yellow. Blue is not a stretch though.

Quicksilver
Idle Hands: Swaps tiles and single-target damage. Could be blue, but since it is taken, would do.
Supersonic: Creates locked tiles and deals AoE damage. Correct.
Fists of Fury: Single-target damage and locks a tile. The previous version that created a critical tile should have been black, this one is clearly

The Punisher
Molotov Cocktail: AoE damage and attack tile generation. The AoE damage is so small that it's clear that the main effect is the attack tile generation, so it's correct.
Judgement: Board destruction and strike tile production. Correct.
Retribution: Single-target damage based on current HP. Correct.

Psylocke
Psychic Knife: Single-target damage and strike tile production. Could be green, but red is not a terrible stretch.
Bewilder: Steals AP. Should be
Psi-katana: Single-target damage and attack tile creation. Correct.

Mystique
Shapeshift: Stuns and steals AP. The stun is a bit weird and tacked on but part of the flavour of the power. Correct.
Infiltration: Changes tiles' colours. Purple would be better but since it's taken, blue is the correct second option. These two abilities' colours could be swapped and still be correct.
Masterstroke: Single-target damage that scales up if you fulfil a condition. Correct, though could be red.

Magneto
Coercive Field: Adds protect tiles. Correct. Could be blue if the ability below were made yellow.
Polarizing Force: Destroys TU tiles and deals single-target damage based on it. This ability could easily be yellow (see Mistress of the Elements) but since yellow is taken, the scalable-damage nature of it makes it a good fit for red (green would be the third choice). Correct.
Swaps tiles and deals damage based on the amount of swaps. Could be purple but blue is fine.

Luke Cage
Righteous Uppercut: Deals damage based on the number of live teammates. Correct and a good example of tweaking a colour's mechanic with damage to create a good in-colour ability.
Unbreakable: Creates a protect tile. This is a head-scratcher. It clearly should be yellow, but since yellow is already taken, red is the colour in which it makes the least sense. Best choice for this would be
Jab, Jab, Cross: Deals single-target damage that scales up with repeated uses. Could be red because it scales damage, but black is a better fit for the kind of condition it necessitates.

Loki
Trickery: Steals (and transforms) enemy special tiles. Correct.
Illusions: Purple is not a too egregious choice for this but would be even better, especially because...
Mischief: Steals AP. This doesn't make any kind of sense in this colour and it's clearly a result of keeping the old colour strengths of the character. It very clearly should be

Kamala Khan
Bring Out the Best: Heals the team when allies use powers. Correct.
Inhuman Stretchiness: Changes tiles' colours. Correct.
Embiggened Bash: AoE damage. Correct.

Iron Man
Unibeam: Single-target damage at a cost. As it is should be , but I guess red is not a terrible choice.
Ballistic Salvo: AoE damage and board destruction (with a drawback). All the things that this does are and the only blue component the ability had was recently removed.
Creates AP out of the blue. A precious, rare effect that is well in yellow's slice of the pie. Correct.

Iron Fist
Shou-Lao Fang Strike: Moderate single-target damage and generation of strike tiles. Correct.
Iron Fist of K'un Lun: Changes tiles' colours. Correct.
Exquisite technique: Generates an attack tile. Correct.

Human Torch
Exactly the same as his 2* version in every respect.

The Hulk
Thunderous Clap: Moderate single-target damage plus board destruction. Correct.
Smash: Scalable single-target damage at the cost of green AP. Considering that it also has the potential to damage teammates, I'd make this power damage everybody like Carnage's red. Anyway, it's correct, though the rather heavy added cost would make black a good fit, too.
Anger: Changes tiles' colours plus slight AoE damage. Nothing black here, all

The Hood
Twin Pistols: Scalable single-target damage plus board destruction with a drawback. This could go several ways (not yellow, though), but I lean to as the damage is based on the amount of tiles destroyed meaning that the latter is subordinate to the former. GSBW's Pistol seems a confirmation.
Dormammu's Aid: Steals AP. Definitely a power.
Intimidation: Moderate single-target damage plus speeding up friendly CDs. The latter effect is fairly rare in the game but seems to me to be thematically the domain of either blue or

Gamora
Skullcracker: AoE damage plus stun. The stun is fairly significant to this ability while the damage is not stellar. Green is not a bad stretch, but I think would be a better fit.
Razor's Edge: Single-target damage. Correct.
Bad Reputation: Generates strike tiles. Definitely a power.

Doctor Octopus
Manipulation: Shuffles the board, destroys enemy special tiles and deals damage. While blue is the main board-shuffling colour, can also do it. More importantly, it's also the colour that destroys enemy special tiles, so its a better fit overall.
Insult to Injury: Generates attack tiles. Correct.
Armed and Dangerous: AoE damage, stun, stealing AP and improving a friendly special tile. This is a pout-pourri of mediocre effects of several colours, but at least can claim two- or three of them.

Doctor Doom
Summon Demons: generates attack tiles. Correct.
Technopathic Strike: Changes tiles' colours. Purple is primary in this effect, but since it is taken, blue will do finely. Correct.
Diabolical Plot: Generates traps and deals damage: Correct.

Deadpool
A Little Off the Top: Deals single-target damage based on the target's HP. Correct.
Whales! Whales! Whales!: AoE damage, potentially ends the game. This could be green but its tricky, bizarre nature makes me happy to leave it in purple, which is secondary at AoE anyway.
Life of the Party: Protects a teammate from high damage and self-heals. Nothing black here(except maybe the selfish, attention-craving flavour of it), all

Daredevil
Radar Sense: Destroys enemy special tiles and deals damage. Correct.
Billy Club: Stuns and possibly generates AP. Correct.
Ambush: Sets a trap and deals high single target damage. Correct.

Daken
Exactly the same as his 2* version in every respect.

Cyclops
Optic Blast: High single-target damage plus limited board destruction. Correct.
Mutant Revolutionary: Changes tiles' colours. Normally this is a purple ability, but affecting only TU tiles makes it an acceptable bend into yellow. Correct.
Full Blast: Scalable damage with a small drawback. This could be red, but since it's taken, black is a good fit too.

Colossus
Immovable Object: Protects allies and reduces damage to himself. Correct.
Colossal Punch: Single-target damage that scales up and possible AoE. The AoE is weird for a red ability but it's actually just a small bonus to the main high single-target damage effect. Correct.
Fastball Special: Single-target damage at a cost plus a free cast of a power. The latter part of the effect is otherwise unexplored in MPQ so has no place yet in the pie (feels blue or yellow to me). That said, in general, black is a good enough fit.

Captain Marvel
Photonic Blasts: As correct as the 2* version.
Hypersonic Punch: Single-target damage plus stun with a small drawback. The drawback is almost insignificant, while the stun is decent so it could be blue. Thematically, though, black is a good choice.
Energy Absorption: Creates AP. Correct.

Bullseye
Lethal Improvisation: Deals damage and removes special tiles. This could be black because the requirement for special tiles just to cast the ability plays half of the time as a drawback, but purple is a good enough fit.
Contract Killer: Creates strike tiles. It should be green, but that's taken. At least the effect feels thematically right in black and if more abilities are created that care for a character dying, they would definitely belong in black.
Deadly Precision: Targeted board destruction. Correct.

Blade
Nighstalker: Deals damage and steals AP. Clearly should be
Keep Your Enemies Closer: Creates attack tiles. Clearly . My guess is that back when Blade was released, there was a dearth of powerful, damage-dealing purple abilities (hard to believe nowadays) so they switched these two powers around to help that.
The Thirst: Creates strike tiles. Correct.

Black Widow
Sniper Rifle: AoE damage and board destruction. It's weird and likely an artefact of old design that this power only gains AoE with the 5th cover, it definitely should be like that at every amount of covers. Anyway, correct.
Pistol: Single-target damage and board destruction: Correct.
Deceptive Tactics: Changes target tiles' colours. Correct.

Black Panther
Battleplan: Creates strike tiles. Could very well be green, but tying the power of the strike tiles to TU AP is a clever way of bleeding the ability into yellow.
Defence Grid: Creates protect tiles. Correct but could be yellow if it weren't taken.
Rage of the Panther: AoE damage with a drawback. AoE would normally be green or purple but black is paying a significant additional cost for this bleed. Correct.

Beast
Mutagenic Breakthrough: Generates various special tiles. Correct.
Animal Inside: AoE damage plus (possible) board destruction. Correct.
Medical Marvel: Heals and creates protect tiles. Correct.



X-23
Holding Back: Single-target damage plus (eventual) strike tile generation. This could go either red or green, so it's fine as it is.
Savage Healing: Heals herself. Now this one makes no sense at all and it's hard not to think that it was forced into this colour for an external reason. Should be
Tracking Prey. Creates a trap that deals high single-target damage. traps are ok in purple, but the colour tends to create several traps, while is the one that makes a single trap for high damage. I'm going to guess here that they didn't go this way because they didn't want her to be the same colours as 2* and 3* Wolvie, in order to emphasise that's she's a different person? Still, that shouldn't trump gameplay, in my opinion, especially taking in account the saturation of green-purple characters we've reached.

Wolverine
X-Force: Single-target damage and board destruction. Correct.
Surgical Strike: High single-target damage plus board destruction. Should be . I get why they wanted to give this version
of Wolverine a black power but this is not one. Maybe if they raised the power a bit more and gave it a drawback or condition...
Recovery: Heals with conditional singe-target damage and board destruction. The alternative effect is clearly green but being secondary to the very yellow main effect is a good way of making an otherwise boring power into something interesting and decently powerful.

Venom
Symbiotic Fury: Single-target damage with conditional board destruction. Green is not too much of a stretch, but would be better.
Give and Take: Buffs enemy attack tiles and nerfs their protect tiles. Messing with values like this is entirely new design space (though it's somewhat similar to yellow's improving of special tiles). Makes sense in black, mostly because there's a drawback, though thematically I could see blue messing in this space as well.
Lethal Protector: High single-target damage with a small drawback. I see here that the devs really wanted to give Venom a yellow ability for that anti-hero vibe while giving yellow another high-damage power, following on Righteous Uppercut's footsteps. However, unlike RU, this power fails to represent the colour mechanically; as it is, it should be black or at least red. To leave it yellow, my suggestion would be to give protect tiles to both teams and then maybe scale the damage based on the number of protect tiles on the board.

Thor
Smite: Single-target damage that scales up plus some charged tiles. Correct.
Striking Distance: AoE damage that replaces enemy special tiles with charged tiles. Should be
Power Surge: Stuns and creates charged tiles. Correct.

The Thing
It's Clobberin' Time: Single-target damage plus stun. Since the damage is not that great for the cost, this could be blue. Red is ok, though.
Rock Solid: Protects allies from damage and creates protect tiles. Correct.
Yancy Street Special: Single-target damage plus board destruction. Could be red, but green is fine.

Star-Lord
Sleight of Hand: Replaces a special (or any) tile with a CD that deals single-target damage with the possibility of AoE. Correct
Everyone with Me: Makes your characters' powers cheaper. Entirely unexplored design space beyond this, but it does feel yellow.
Oldest Trick in the Book: Makes enemies' powers more expensive and deals high single-target damage. The first part is also unexplored design effect, but I couldn't help to think that it belongs in black more. Nevertheless, the rest of the effect is pretty red. Correct.

Spider-Gwen
Teenage Kicks: Stuns and creates web tiles. Web tiles are the domain of yellow, blue and purple, though I don't really see why not any colour could have them. On the other hand, stun is definitely
Cherry Bomb: High single target damage that sacrifices a web tile. The additional cost of sacrificing an useful tile suggests black, but it's such a tiny drawback, and it's such an efficient damage to AP ratio, that red makes more sense.
Kick Out the Jams: Heals allies and creates web tiles. Correct, if unsurprisingly uninspired and weak for this modern age of design.

Sam Wilson
Wings of Liberty: Creates protect tiles. Correct.
Aerial Avenger: Strengthens friendly special tiles and speeds up a friendly CD tile. The first part of the effect is yellow and the second is black (according to the only other existing power like that). However, I definitely can see blue being secondary in both.
Dive Bomb: Single-target damage that scales up. Correct.

Red Hulk
Seeing Red: Board destruction. Normally this would be green, but his green power is an even better fit, so red will do.
Hammer & Anvil: AoE Damage. Correct.
Gamma Syphon: Destroys enemy AP and generates AP. Close enough to outright stealing AP to make it correct in purple.

Quake
Earthquake: AoE damage plus board shuffling. Green is not outrageous, but would be more accurate.
Coordinated Tactics: Reduces enemy AoE damage. A fairly novel effect, but one that definitely makes sense in yellow.
Resonance Frequency: Semi-targetted board destruction. Definitely a effect. Another of those puzzling colour swaps in a character.

Professor X
Master Plan: On a 5-match deals single-target damage and generates AP. The only other power that cares for friendly 5-matches is purple (though it feels yellow to me) and generating AP is , too.
Blind Spot: Invisibility and friendly tile strengthening. Invisibility seem to be either yellow or purple but the second effect is yellow or blue. However those two colours are more properly taken by the other two abilities, so purple will do.
Psychic Convergence: Generates varied special tiles. Definitely . Interesting that the colours are correct but shuffled around. I can only wonder about the reason.

Nick Fury
Avengers Assemble!: Varied effects based on the powers of other characters. A very unique power, but definitely feels yellow.
Demolition: Creates several traps that deal damage. Should be
Escape Plan: Single-target with possible AP stealing and creating a strike tile. Purple is not a terrible stretch but it fits better Demolition. Seeing how only the damage is assured, it could be

Nova
Takeoff/Rocket: Creates strike tiles and deals single target damage. The first effect is definitely green, the second could be red or black. Since red is secondary at generating strike tiles, I'm ok leaving the whole as red.
Nova Blast: Single target damage plus strike tiles tied to living allies. The main effect is either red or green but the power uses the clever trick of mechanically tying the effect to allies to make sense in yellow.
Danger Zone: Creates strike tiles and opens the possibility of high single-target damage by sacrificing strike tiles. The conditions and additional cost paid make the ability fully black. I find interesting how they made a strike tile-centric character but managed to spin it in ways to avoid using the main strike tile generating colour, green.

Mr. Fantastic
Flexibility: Stuns and creates protect tiles. Correct.
Master of the Fantastic: Heals and possibly generates AP. Correct.
Imaginaut: "Adds" damage to matches. As I said above about Espionage, this seems to be in black's pie, even though in an infrequently used effect. Correct.

Miles Morales
Hide & Seek: Invisibility that turns into scalable single-target damage. The first effect is yellow and the second is red. it is hard to tell whether this a break of the colour pie or purple is intended to be primary in invisibility (like Blind Spot suggests) without more examples. Since the other two colours this could be are taken, I guess purple it is.
Power and Responsibility: Creates web tiles and generates AP. Correct.
Venom Blast: Single-target damage plus bonus stun. Correct, but I could see it being blue.

Kingpin
Wilson's Gambit: Single-target damage that scales up by sacrificing a CD tile. Correct.
The Fisk Defence: Destroys enemy AP and generates AP. Like Red Hulk's is similar enough to stealing AP that makes sense in purple.
Maggia Pawns: "Summons" goons to deal a barrage of timed single-target damage and strike tiles. Like other powers where the effect is represented as coming from external sources, this is correct.

Jean Grey
Mind Over Matter: AoE damage plus destruction of enemy special tiles. Correct.
Psychic Feedback: AoE damage and stun. Correct.
Full of Surprises: AoE damage plus special tile generation. The second effect is a bit off-colour, but since blue, the right colour for it is already taken, green is fine enough.

Iron Man
Repulsor Punch: Scalable single-target damage. Correct.
Overdrive: Generates AP and strike tiles in exchange for life. Black is here getting a green and a yellow effects, but it's paying the cost for it. Correct.
Hulk-Proof: Changes tiles' colours and creates protect tiles. The first is a purple effect and the second a yellow effect, however, blue is secondary in both so it makes a nice middle point.

Invisible Woman
Grant Invisibility: er, grants invisibility. I'm guessing that the fact that it helps any ally instead of only the caster is what makes this more yellow than purple. Correct.
Force Bubbles: Locks tiles and creates protect tiles. Correct.
Force Field Crush: Scalable single-target damage plus board destruction. Green is ok, but is better.

Iceman
Whiteout: Scalable AoE damage.
Uncanny Snowman: Stuns and possibly deals single-target damage. Correct.
Cold as Ice: Changes tiles' colours and drains enemy AP. Correct.

The Hulk
Mastermind Excello: Scalable single-target damage plus board destruction. Ok in green, better in
See the Math of It: Creates charged tiles and board destruction. The former effect is clearly blue, but the latter is green. Could go either way in my opinion, so I'm happy leaving it at blue.
Hot-Dog Stand: Heals and changes tiles' colour with a condition and a drawback. A yellow and a purple effect made black by the rather crippling additional costs. With the low values of the effects, I think drawbacks could be removed and the ability made yellow. Anyway, correct as it is, if not great design.

Ghost Rider
Burning Rubber: (slightly) scalable AoE damage plus attack tiles. This is quite similar to Molotov Cocktail, so I'making this
Hellfire: This on the other hand is more close to Flame Jet. It definitely could be black but I think BR is even blacker, so it is.
Penance Stare: Scalable single-target damage. all the way. Interestingly, another character in the right colours but shuffled around.

Elektra
Double Double Cross: Adds and steals (then improves) enemy strike tiles. Should be or black
Shadow Step: Creates traps that negate damage and deal damage. Traps that deal damage are definitely purple but the negate damage effect is very yellow. Could go either way, but I'm leaning towards
Ballet of Death: Creates a trap that deals single-target damage. Correct.

Devil Dinosaur
Prehistoric Bite: Single-target damage. Obviously red but since it already has a red ability (that does exactly the same) green is ok.
Prehistoric Chomp: See above.
Prehistoric Arms: Shuffles the board. Correct, but could be blue.

Deadpool
Out of Bullets: Single-target damage plus healing. It is ok in red but a completely missed opportunity of making a powerful yellow power in a world that has few.
X-Enforcer: "Avenges" damaged allies. Thematically makes sense in black, but mechanically, it is
Countdown for What: Creates countdown tiles that damage if destroyed. This is a rare effect but similar enough to traps that I'm happy leaving it at purple.

Cyclops
Combined Forces: Scalable single-target damage plus limited board destruction. Correct.
Uncanny Strategist: Generates AP on TU matches. Correct.
Called Shot: Targeted board destruction that deals damage and collects AP. Shoud be

Carnage
Symbiote Scythes: Damages all characters, especially the target. Correct.
Alien Instincts: Creates attack tiles for both teams. Correct.
Carnage Rules: Board destruction plus damage for every special tile destroyed. The second part of the effect is purple-ish, but the main effect is green. Correct.

Ant-Man
Pym Particles: Creates a trap that generates attack tiles. Traps are purple, yes, but this one is merely a device for the actual effect, which is
Small Crooks: Steals enemy special tiles. Black is primary for this effect, but fits better Pym Particles, so I'll leave it blue.
Ants! Ants! Ants!: Generates strike tiles and single target damage. As other powers that are themed around external help, yellow is correct, but strictly mechanically speaking, it is



Green Goblin
Goblin Glider: Super high single-target damage at the risk of entirely losing the ability for the rest of the game. Correct.
Trick or Treat: Creates countdowns with several different effects depending on colour. Thematically, if not mechanically (which would be hard to place), it does feel purple.
Goblin King: Speeds up friendly CDs and fortifies special tiles. The first effect has shown in blue and black while the second is entirely new and feels either yellow or blue. I feel that, overall, the power is more than anything else, though I don't mind it in yellow.

Jean Grey
From the Ashes: Revives the character, then it transforms into a power that deals damage to everybody. The former is a never-before-seen effect and I don't think we'll see it very often so we just have to assume that green is its rightful colour. Seems like an awfully yellow effect to me, though. The latter is a red effect, but I guess is not a huge stretch for green.
Psychic Rapport: Changes tiles colours and passively improves friendly special tiles while decreasing enemy ones. The first effect is very definitely purple but the second is yellow or blue.
Psychic Flames: Single target damage plus strike tiles and po

Mawtful

I ~just~ finished adding my own stuff to the other colour pie discussion thread. And then I see you've gone ahead and done this.

Ok, well, I promise I'll go back and read it all - although at a glance it looks like you and I have very similar ideas on colour themes (blue's science/mind/mysticism and black's "at any cost" traits for example), although I was reluctant to attribute specific special tiles to colours (it did cross my mind, but Strikes are still just so much better than Protects or Attacks).

Anyway, thanks for putting this up - I look forward to more analysis & discussion about colour soon!

Pylgrim

aesthetocyst wrote:

It's like it's 2013 all over again. This mind virus is breaking out all over, again.

The devs have enough problems with character design and balance, why try to straitjacket them?

It'd be nice, for the sake of imagining narratives, to imagine that their were consistent conceptual themes in regards to the colors, similar to the infinity gems concept. Such a consistent theme can help explain 'why' 3* Spidey is yellow, pink, blue, for instance, or Scarlet Witch being pink green blue.

But insisting that each color literally be tied to a mechanic? I.e., that all AoEs be green, all tile color flips be pink, etc?

Nuts. Impractical and nuts. It would result in the devs hands being in regards to design, balancing, and re-balancing. It would also tie the game down in terms of evolution.

A lot of effort being poured into insisting on a orthodoxy that never was, isn't now, nor should ever be.

Did you actually read my post? I actively encourage and explore the branching of abilities in other colours, as long as there's consistency. AoE, as per your example is an effect that makes sense, when used properly, for all colours but yellow; However, I think it's important that there are colours that are /better/ at it than others at certain effects or at least, have to hoop through less loops for them. AoE in particular has three primary colours were it consistently show up, giving lots of flexibility.

Strong mechanical identity for the colours are as important (some would argue more, some would argue less) as flavour identity for the colours and is one of the reasons why MTG has been around for 20 years. What you propose, a narrative-oriented only use of colours would not only be an even bigger overhaul but also, it'd be even more limiting mechanically: Only goody two shoes heroes would be yellow. All villains would have to have a black ability. Only brainy characters could have blue, etc.

Second, it's disingenuous to say that the rules were never there to begin with. It's precisely because they are there, clear as the light of sun, that the comparatively few exceptions or outright mistakes stand up. There is no straitjacket other than the set of rules they themselves once designed and have been developing over the years. It'd be like calling a house's foundation a straitjacket. Having a solid understanding of this foundation will also allow to manipulate it where it is flexible as they have done several times, particularly with yellow powers.

Third, I'm aware that there are many and much more important issues for devs to pay attention to. Hell, my other big thread in General Discussion is all about that. Also, I realise that this is a minor concern for the developers as there are a few modern examples of pie-breaking that for sure they had to notice, but for whatever reason, they disregarded when choosing colours. This was meant as an academic exercise/wishful thinking. It was fun to analyse and helped me widen my perceptions about the colour pie (for example, it was only until I wrote it that I realised that straight up AP generation is a yellow ability). I wrote it back in January after participating in a long discourse about it and I actually refrained from posting it because I knew a lot of people would either don't care or be bothered by it. I decided to dust it up just because discussion on the matter sparked again.

Koffitok

While I think it's useful to look at trends in mechanics in different colors, boiling abilities down to pure mechanics and saying they should be this color or that color is unhelpful. It's stripping out half of the ability's meaning, which is very important in looking at color identities.

It would be better to look at the mechanics and *how* they apply to each color. I'll admit a few abilities might be better suited to another color, but most of your color "corrections" fail to take the flavor into account. Take Quake's abilities for example:

"Everything around Quake shakes and trembles as buildings collapse and the earth rips open at her feet."
This is an earthquake. It's wild, unbridled power. That's green green green.

"Quake emits a high intensity, precision vibration aimed at the enemy’s weak point."
Here's she's using her intellect and knowledge of the enemy's weaknesses to produce a finely focused attack. That's blue blue blue.

Pylgrim

Koffitok wrote:

While I think it's useful to look at trends in mechanics in different colors, boiling abilities down to pure mechanics and saying they should be this color or that color is unhelpful. It's stripping out half of the ability's meaning, which is very important in looking at color identities.

It would be better to look at the mechanics and *how* they apply to each color. I'll admit a few abilities might be better suited to another color, but most of your color "corrections" fail to take the flavor into account. Take Quake's abilities for example:

"Everything around Quake shakes and trembles as buildings collapse and the earth rips open at her feet."
This is an earthquake. It's wild, unbridled power. That's green green green.

"Quake emits a high intensity, precision vibration aimed at the enemy’s weak point."
Here's she's using her intellect and knowledge of the enemy's weaknesses to produce a finely focused attack. That's blue blue blue.

This is true, however I'd like to point two things. First, the "flavour" of an ability is much easier to make up around a mechanic so it fits than the other way around. See:

Earthquake 7
"The ground around Quake shivers and ripples as she unleashes her power but she remains in control, pinpointing the damage on enemy structures. Select a tile and destroy up to 3 random tiles of that color. Does not generate AP."

Resonance Frequency 11
Quake reaches with her power deep into the ground, reorganising the lay of the land at her whim and opening a massive chasm at the enemy team's feet. Deals 361 damage to the enemy team and shuffles the gameboard.

You could even change the abilities' names so they would be more fitting too! Dressing a mechanic with proper flavour is much easier than changing a mechanic to fit a name.

Second, once you decide to wallow on the waters of adjusting colours by flavour, you'll find yourself in a bigger mire of confusion and disassociation than the comparatively few mechanical colour disconnections: Why is Hex Bolt green? Why is Symbiotic Fury not red? And Anyway, Sunder would still not be yellow nor Spider Sense purple. The list would go on and on.

I think the problem with the current colour pie is precisely that sometimes they assign the colour by mechanic (like Hex Bolt and most others) and some times by flavour (like I've Got a Plan, Illusions or Anti-Gravity Device) (and, needs to be said, some times by completely inexplicable reasons). While I'm partial to the mechanic approach, I'd actually wouldn't mind so much if they consolidated the pie to always work for flavour. The lack of commitment to one or the other is what rubs my designer's sense the wrong way off.

bbf2

Nice writeup.

One move I wanted to give input on: "Countdown for What" makes sense in purple because of the thematic element of "trickery/deception" that purple carries. The move is essentially Deadpool trying to mislead the enemy into thinking that the CD tiles will do something bad if they are allowed to go off and should match them, when it's actually the opposite. The text for it even says "Shh, don't tell anybody"

Also, Thunder Strike is yellow because that's the color most people attribute to lightning bolts. I'm ok with ignoring the color mentality thing sometimes for basic common sense stuff like that (I also think one of Gobby's abilities should have been green regardless of whatever his powers were)

Pylgrim

bbf2 wrote:

Nice writeup.

One move I wanted to give input on: "Countdown for What" makes sense in purple because of the thematic element of "trickery/deception" that purple carries. The move is essentially Deadpool trying to mislead the enemy into thinking that the CD tiles will do something bad if they are allowed to go off and should match them, when it's actually the opposite. The text for it even says "Shh, don't tell anybody"

Also, Thunder Strike is yellow because that's the color most people attribute to lightning bolts. I'm ok with ignoring the color mentality thing sometimes for basic common sense stuff like that (I also think one of Gobby's abilities should have been green regardless of whatever his powers were)

I do agree in the writeup with Countdown for What being in purple

As for Thunder Strike, that's basically what I'm talking here. It doesn't make sense to me to make entirely random exceptions for certain abilities to be assigned for whatever reason. Also of note is that Thunder Strike is one of the oldest abilities in the game. Things were much more in flux back then and the colour pie was just being established.

AaronTheLuigi

Knowing this has already been addressed by others in his character thread, I'm assuming The Punisher (MAX) needs some tweaking to his colors. Here's my attempt at an analysis.

Punish: Damage that scales up with friendly Strike tiles. If an ally is stunned/downed, he creates Strike tiles before dealing the scaling damage. Scaling damage is red, but the ally condition seems yellow and the strike tile generation is green. However, since the yellow effect is only a small condition to get a minor green bonus, I feel this ability should be .
Merciless Charge: Deals damage, stuns Punisher's allies, and deals bonus damage for downed enemies. Stunning allies is a heavy cost, and the only other skill to care about downed enemies (Contract Killer for 3 Bullseye) is black. This skill is wholeheartedly .
Weapons Expertise: Creates Strikes, and passively buffs them. Buffing the tiles is in the realm of blue (and yellow), but being how it's focus is on Strike tiles and that it creates Strikes I'd say it's better suited to being . Blue isn't a bad choice, however.


Also, I think this is an amazing write-up you have done, Pylgrim. It's a great look at color balance, and personally it helps me better understand what kinds of stories abilities are/should be telling.

Mawtful

AaronTheLuigi wrote:

Knowing this has already been addressed by others in his character thread, I'm assuming The Punisher (MAX) needs some tweaking to his colors. Here's my attempt at an analysis.

I'm one of those who have chimed in on the colouring of his abilities a few times. I definitely agree that his first two abilities are Red and Black respectively, but I disagree that specific Special tile types should be associated with a colour. For me, the passive improvement is the real focus of this ability, so I think it should be Blue (or Yellow).

AaronTheLuigi

Mawtful wrote:

I'm one of those who have chimed in on the colouring of his abilities a few times. I definitely agree that his first two abilities are Red and Black respectively, but I disagree that specific Special tile types should be associated with a colour. For me, the passive improvement is the real focus of this ability, so I think it should be Blue (or Yellow).

I can see the philosophy behind Weapons Expertise being blue. My post was more in line with what Pylgrim had for his colors, but your reasoning is also solid.

AaronTheLuigi

To reflect on the two last releases ( ) I wanted to chime in on my views of how they utilize the color pie as outlined by Pylgrim.

First, our favorite comic duck:
The Quack-Fu One-Two: Scalable single-target damage with color-specific board destruction. Green is a good fit, although I'm inclined to believe is better because scalable damage of this nature is similar to CMagneto's Polarizing Force. [This doesn't even touch the meta issue the G/B/P combination is already in use by solid, high-level characters in SWitch, Teen Jean, Iceman and Black Suit Spidey. Meanwhile, the R/P/B combination was devoid of any representation in 4 and 5 star land until Winter Soldier arrived.]
Bill of Rights: Stun that also removes enemy Special tiles. Given Howard already has a better skill suited for purple, and the stun could be argued as the main focus of the ability, I say it stays blue. Correct.
Duck, Duck, Loose!: Invisibility tiles that double as pseudo-Attack tiles. The self-invisibility in the realm of Miles and Xavier's purples, I think, outweighs a black-like bonus effect. Correct.

Next, the worlds-renowned Destroyer:
The Destroyer: Single-target damage that scales up by sacrificing your Countdown tiles. Correct.
Secret Weapon: Places a CD tile that deals single-target damage when an ally activates a power. Ending the turn is a heavy penalty that begs to be placed on black skills, but since it's taken I say this is better-suited to being a skill, as it triggers when your allies fire off powers in the same vein as Kamala's burst-heal. I imagine this was chosen to be purple for the flavor rather than the mechanics, but I could see the argument for it being like XF Deadpool's trap-like CDs.
Slice & Dice: Single-target damage based on the enemy's HP. Correct.

Pylgrim

Holy ****, that's almost exactly what I would have written word by word. I would probably have left Quack-Fu green as both colours could theoretically have this effect justifying it either way. A case definitely could be made for red, but when the difference is so subtle, I'm happy leaving the ability the colour it already is. Other than that it's very impressive how accurately you matched my analysis!

And man, is it not a shame that Drax's power is purple and not yellow or what? Especially when it's not only the mechanics but also the flavour of the ability that is so yellow. We have dozens of great purple powers and not so many yellow. A missed opportunity.

Mawtful

Agree with Drax; Black and Red are correct, Purple > Yellow makes mechanical sense. Would be nice to have another damage dealing Yellow ability.

Mostly agree on Howard; Blue and Purple are correct, and Quack-Fu does seem to fit right in between Red and Green. Based on it's current mechanics, I think you could make an argument for Black - since casting it essentially eliminates it's colour from the board, and that greatly extends the time before you can cast it again. Alternatively, I think a slight mechanic change could make it more "Green" - for example: for each X Green tile on the board, destroy a random basic tile; this ability generates AP for each tile destroyed. This is essentially a slight change on the "Lightning Strike" formula. All that said, I kinda wish that Howard had a Yellow ability because then we'd have a board full of yellow rubber duckys whenever he's in play.

Jaedenkaal

Colors also seem to have element themes; Fire powers are (more often than not) red, electrical powers green, and cold powers blue.

I also consider Purple to be the colour of using your opponents resources against them, which is (my) rational behind Pheremone Rage and Adamantium Bones; you're using your opponents matches against them.

hopper1979

I found this a very interesting read, thank you for your hard work on putting this together and explaining your rational behind your choices. I don't know if anybody will ever agree on the colors and what exactly belongs where but this does a great job of tying many of them together. Thanks again for all your hard work.

Pylgrim

hopper1979 wrote:

I found this a very interesting read, thank you for your hard work on putting this together and explaining your rational behind your choices. I don't know if anybody will ever agree on the colors and what exactly belongs where but this does a great job of tying many of them together. Thanks again for all your hard work.

Why, thanks a lot!

TLCstormz

Even though I have the OP on my ignore list, I still just wanted to say THANK YOU for the hard work and efforts that went into making this thread.

And the fact that some people decided to voluntarily come in here and COMPLAIN about someone else speaking at length about a topic that had absolutely NOTHING to do with them is very, very bizarre.

Once again, thank you, OP. And congrats on the good job.