*** The Hood (Classic) ***

GuntherBlobel

Hood is actually very well balanced, yet also powerful, in my opinion. Any character that you need to down before Sentry doubles his threat level. OBW and Mystique would be just as bad. Intimidation does synergize nicely with WR, but it can't be more worrisome that strike tiles, is it?

Here's my real problem with your post. Hood is not THE problem as you say because it's really the synergy between the two that make the pair so compelling. Daken is exactly the same, a powerful character that also synergies well with WR.

Bowgentle

onimus wrote:

Ultimately, both of them, as well as xforce and possibly even thor,eventually need to be nerfed.

I sure hope that they're not going to nerf Xforce again, after it took them a year to make him playable.

over_clocked

How do you nerf Hood? He already has the lowest health class, his black is already a mediocre situational ability that does piddling damage and is only OP with Sentry and goons and maybe Hulk/modern Hawkeye if maxed (lol wut?), yellow while strong is expensive and late-game. Blue is strong, incredibly so, but nothing that you can't power through with just match damage, unlike, say, Patch and Daken's regen. Both Patch/Daken and Hood's passives are counterable, you just need to plan for them. You can't even nerf it without reworking it considerably. By the way many recent additions counter it well: 2* Daken's purple + blue, Deadpool, X-Force's reworked green, Blade, Mystique most probably. Overall? 3* Daken (+ Falcon optionally), Psylocke, Human Torch are all fast damage types too that can kill off Hood with focusing one colour.
What can you do once Sentry deploys a Sacrifice Rupture bomb? Ooh you can always bring oBW or cStorm and be destroyed by attackers faster than you can say 'Level Shift'. Or bring Spider-Man and again, suffer a loss of -200 points in the 15 minutes it takes you to actually win the game while allowing the AI hurt itself with World Ruptures more than it can hurt you.
Oh and not mentioning how Sentry is the problem and not Hood since it is, like, obvious. One does huge AoE attacks and the other doesn't. Hmmmmmmm.

Bowgentle

Locked, you're biased
No need to come out in every thread where even the thought is ventilated that Hood may need a nerf, your loved one is safe

NighteyesGrisu

Take Hood away and Sentrybombing becomes a bit slower. Take Sentry away and it doesn't happen at all. Sentry can basically bring the whole opposing team down by himself. And if Wordrupture doesn't work you can go fully M.A.D. and just go Supernova. Hood by himself is harmless. It's pretty clear who the really OP char is.

wymtime

Let's see boost 2 green 3 yellow 2 to all match 1 yellow 1 green and the game is over. Hood just makes it so you don't have to use boost to all for a sentry hop.
The easy fix is make WR only do damage to a single character and then remove the self damage from WR. He would still be super powerful and kill 1 possibly 2 enemy's but would be in line with X-force.
X-force the strategy is boost 3 to green and black to speed up X-force and sergical strike. You bring Hood to go faster. A lot of people use Cmags with Xforce so you board shake up with red to get black.
X-force does massive damage but it is to 1 target not all. He is a beast, but can be denied and beaten even if he gets off his powers.

Unknown

onimus wrote:

Sentry is broken.

Hood is what allows him to be broken.

Ultimately, both of them, as well as xforce and possibly even thor,eventually need to be nerfed.

But make no mistake. Sentry is definitely broken.

So the top 4-5 should be nerfed, then what, nerf again the next top 3 the next month because it's too strong?
This is ridiculous, there will always be a top X of choice, but Sentry is so broken it cant compare.
And Hood without Sentry is still very good but not problematic.

Unknown

Ok, once again. I dont have Sentry so this isn't a rage post. I'm simply discussing Hood being essential. Sentry may well be a little op, you can run him with many and win. My point is that the same can be said for xf.
The thing about hood is that he demands you boost, fighting sentry or xf without hood is easy.
I like this game, I like using different characters. I dont like fighting the same ones over and over (obw anyone?) and I think that's where we are headed. I want to use iso to level up, not boost for every match

Unknown

What about Sentry+LDaken? Although not as effective as with Hood, but still gets the job done.

Sentry is a one man army. Get 7 Green and 8 Yellow. Wait 2 turns and you win. Assuming he is strong enough for said opponents.

Hood is more like a forced partner is crime who would be more than willing to testify against him.

GrumpySmurf1002

Arith wrote:

Ok, once again. I dont have Sentry so this isn't a rage post. I'm simply discussing Hood being essential. Sentry may well be a little op, you can run him with many and win. My point is that the same can be said for xf.
The thing about hood is that he demands you boost, fighting sentry or xf without hood is easy.
I like this game, I like using different characters. I dont like fighting the same ones over and over (obw anyone?) and I think that's where we are headed. I want to use iso to level up, not boost for every match

Hood is essential only because you need him to counter Hood. If you're fighting a Hood-less team, you can run Sentry-Yelena and still nuke their team. Hood is a luxury, Sentry is the essential to all the nonsense.

Unknown

That's kinda my point, sentry/daken, xf/deadpool and no doubt various other teams. All strong and beatable without boosts because you can deny. Hood/? almost require boosts to beat.
Im not even all that much against him, havent really played him. I just think his stealing is a bit over the top, there's no reason to choose blade or mystiqe over him as they just don't compare

Unknown

I actually kinda agree with Locked. Hood is at a point right now where he's metagame-warping... But not broken. In the current meta, Hood is a top tier character. He's really, really good. This is not a given - if Daken and Psylocke were more common, Hood would be nowhere near as valuable. The problem isn't hood so much as it is a lack of alternatives. There's nobody who fills Hood's niche, and it's a pretty important niche - being the only character with reliable AP drain makes OBW the absolute MVP of the 2* roster; the same goes for hood in the 3* roster. It's not that Hood's "too good", it's that nobody else does what he does at all.

The problem with Sentry Bombing isn't hood, by the way. The problem with sentry bombing is that Sacrifice+World Rupture does upwards of 10k damage to each member of the opposing team on turn 4. That's completely broken.

simonsez

Arith wrote:

I agree with boosts but Hood is still THE gamewarping char. He's a big reason games are so fast

Sorry, but this is just crazy talk. Sentry can still end a game in 30-45 seconds without Hood. Hood can't come close to that without Sentry.

Unknown

Even if you took away boosts, Sentry can end a match in less than two minutes. Hood speeds it up, boosts speed it up, but a maxed Sentry, alongside a first level Yelena and Hawkeye, could still beat most teams pretty easily in a couple of minutes. Hood without a strong damage dealer just dies.

Unknown

Hood have the same problem as oBW - they are AP stealers, their ability scales both with strenght of yours and opponent roster. I'm actually amazed how those abilities are tuned given how horrific some of AP denial (which is only half as powerful) are. Wheather or not he is OP I don't know, but he might be similar to Widow in which he himself seems weak, but is unquestionable best support to any other character in game.

Unknown

simonsez wrote:

Arith wrote:

I agree with boosts but Hood is still THE gamewarping char. He's a big reason games are so fast

Sorry, but this is just crazy talk. Sentry can still end a game in 30-45 seconds without Hood. Hood can't come close to that without Sentry.

/facepalm
Of course Hood can't, others can with his help. I guess I need to elaborate that I want to discuss if Hood has become essential to end game with or without Sentry. My issue with Hood is I don't want to be forced to level him just to not being forced to buy boosts every time I face him.
That IS what is happening in the meta and I'd like to hear opinions on it, not "op is just raging because he lost to sentrybombing"

Xiltyn

NighteyesGrisu wrote:

Take Hood away and Sentrybombing takes one extra turn. Take Sentry away and it doesn't happen at all. Sentry can basically bring the whole opposing team down by himself. And if Wordrupture doesn't work you can go fully M.A.D. and just go Supernova. Hood by himself is harmless. It's pretty clear who the really OP char is.

Fixed that for ya.

Dayv

Sentry is an exotic sports car. Incredibly fast, uses expensive fuel, needs to go to the shop for repairs all the time.

Hood is a turbocharger. He can make almost any car faster, but without an engine to add him on to, he's just a piece of a car sitting uselessly on the starting line.

And Beast is a rusty old Yugo with a serial killer hiding in the back seat, waiting to kill the driver.

Unknown

Arith wrote:

Im not even all that much against him, havent really played him. I just think his stealing is a bit over the top, there's no reason to choose blade or mystiqe over him as they just don't compare

And now your credibility is gone. You haven't played him much, you're not all that against him, but you're convined he's the issue? Really?

There are a number of strategies that can defeat Hood easily. Bringing Hood essentially means giving up 2 other abilities for AP steal. His yellow is irrelevant almost all of the time in PVP, and his black is (as others have said) situational - it really only gets used when Sentry bombing to shave 1 turn off the clock.

I don't fear Hood. I fear Hood when he's paired with someone with cheap, brokenly-over-powered abilities... like Sentry. But oh wait, I fear Sentry even when he's not paired with Hood.

The easiest way to beat Hood is to bring a rainbow of abilities team (or as close as you can), and then study the board and focus on matching a color that he won't steal. There are 7 different tile types and it takes 9 required tiles to trigger the ability. With a little thought and planning (and b/c this is a match 3 game, a little luck as well), his ability will trigger no more than a couple times before he's dead. But as with any strategic decision, burning him down first means leaving characters that can actually hurt you alive. It takes time, but beating Hood is rarely an issue.

Unknown

DayvBang wrote:

Sentry is an exotic sports car. Incredibly fast, uses expensive fuel, needs to go to the shop for repairs all the time.

Hood is a turbocharger. He can make almost any car faster, but without an engine to add him on to, he's just a piece of a car sitting uselessly on the starting line.

And Beast is a rusty old Yugo with a serial killer hiding in the back seat, waiting to kill the driver.

All of this depends on the driver