Poll: Character animations triggered by passive abilities

mega ghost

Simply put, there are certain characters I try to avoid playing with simply because I find sitting through their animations to be horribly tedious. If these animations were to be limited or even turned off, I can think of several characters I've all but ignored that would make their way into my regular rotation.

Here is an incomplete list of some of the worst offenders, in my experience:

-Doctor Doom. Diabolical Plot. We're guaranteed a slow animation at the start of every turn.
-Quicksilver. Supersonic. He's supposed to be fast! Yet this animation can be described as a spiteful saunter.
-Carnage. Alien Instincts. Paired up with goons, every match becomes a living hell within a couple of turns.

Hypothetically:

-Dr. Strange. Flames of the Faltine. I haven't built either version up enough for regular use, but I can see this potentially growing tiresome especially when fighting goons that place tiles every turn.
-Medusa. I'm really looking forwards to her, but if her TWO passive animations are anything but very, very brisk I'm going to avoid her like the plague.

And to a lesser extent:

-Luke Cage's (Hero For Hire) 'Unbreakable' and Iron Fist's 'Exquisite Technique' animations always make me groan by the second through tenth time I'm seeing them because they're so slow. Sometimes I avoid matching their tiles just to so I don't have to watch the animation yet again.

What would it take to make the following revisions?

-If a character has an animation triggered by a passive ability, and the passive ability requires a specific event to trigger it, only show the animation once per turn and make sure that animation is very fast!
-If a character has an animation triggered by a passive ability, and the passive ability happens automatically at the start of each turn or is triggered by events that are likely to occur each turn, only show the animation once per match, the first time that it's triggered.

Tromb2ch2

I remember in the last heroic iron fist was a character you could use on i think day 2? I looked at him and went oh cool he's really good that will be a big help! Then I remembered that I was trying to get top 10 so I did not use him (I did up getting top 10 yay). But what I'm trying to say is that for matches I don't care about doing fast characters like iron fist don't bother me, but to be competitive he would need his passive animation cut down (or removed entirely).

Phumade

To D3's credit, they have been very responsive to our criticisms about the various animations. Its actually where they've done the best job of responding to forum complaints. The splash screens on venom bomb are down signficantly. They completely changed Luke cage power man effect. Changes to Peggy Carter animation, and star lord. lots of visual tweaks in a timely and responsive manner.

I'm totally comfortable in the direction of how they do character animations, and their willingness to make changes based on feedback.

arejaygee

I was having this same conversation with folks in my alliance just a couple days ago. The Carnage animation just bogs down after a while, it fires so often. I'd love to see these intrusive passive animations fire only once a match. Replace the subsequent passive firings with banners.

mega ghost

Phumade wrote:

I'm totally comfortable in the direction of how they do character animations, and their willingness to make changes based on feedback.

Agreed! They've definitely been responsive. And I never see the point in criticism or feedback that isn't constructive.

I've only seen one-off pointed requests to date, however, which focus in on specific instances versus the general in-game policies and rules for how passive abilities behave. I also couldn't find a thread or poll that discussed it wholesale or in a way in which they could easily review direct user feedback / data.

I'm also open to the idea that it's just me that gets annoyed, and that everyone else loves them! The poll will hopefully tell.

amusingfoo1

Carnage and Strange make an infuriating combo. You have to watch both animations, every time the enemy fires a power. Carnage, then Strange, then Carnage... I'd call it a bug in the code that's supposed to cut it down to one viewing every turn. Apparently, that code only works if the power is triggered consecutively.

mega ghost

I'm also hoping that Brigby, as the new community manager and as a new, active player, will be able to see and react to these things with fresh eyes once he's rostered the worst offending characters and has some serious play time with them. Until he has most of the 3-stars rostered and leveled, he'll probably only get the opportunity in various Vs. events. In my opinion, the Vs. events featuring over-animated characters quickly become an unenjoyable slog and time sink, in which you either avoid the event entirely or begrudgingly participate only if you have your sights set on a specific reward.

mega ghost

amusingfoo1 wrote:

Carnage and Strange make an infuriating combo. You have to watch both animations, every time the enemy fires a power. Carnage, then Strange, then Carnage... I'd call it a bug in the code that's supposed to cut it down to one viewing every turn. Apparently, that code only works if the power is triggered consecutively.

Oof, yeah, I'd never pair those two for that reason alone. They've been reworking characters as of late to help better balance our options and encourage more diverse rosters and teams. If simply speeding up or limiting some passive ability animations is enough to foster this, it just seems like really low-hanging fruit.

smkspy

Carnage, Strange, and Black Bolt. Now that is a team that will give you a migrane.

vinsensual

Agent Venom was a headache too, doing something each turn if Alien Weakness was up. And it was AV vs AV to boot.

mega ghost

vinsensual wrote:

Agent Venom was a headache too, doing something each turn if Alien Weakness was up. And it was AV vs AV to boot.

That Vs. felt grueling. Between the animations and having your AP pool constantly drained, the matches took forever.

Smudge

I made this joke with my alliance today about playing KK, Carnage, and Dr. Strang3 in PvP:

"Fire one power, two more shall fire. Hail Hydra!"

I agree though... it does get excessive. They don't really bother me, especially Strang3 since his is fast and I say "foom!" every time he lights up a goon, but they could stand to make these things faster, especially when some powers like the Crimson Bands CD don't even display banners.

firethorne

My preferred option: MAKE IT OPTIONAL. Settings menus exist in games. Use them. Allow each individual player to see as many or as few animations as they want.

mega ghost

firethorne wrote:

My preferred option: MAKE IT OPTIONAL. Settings menus exist in games. Use them. Allow each individual player to see as many or as few animations as they want.

I thought about that as well, but in competitive play having all animations turned off gives you an actual advantage, which would mean that anyone playing competitively would be forced to turn off the animations so that they're not at a disadvantage, even if they really like seeing them.

Fightmastermpq

I'd like to see the usual animation the first time it's used in a match, then a shortened version of it once/turn after that. If it fires more than once/turn just a quick flash of the banner is all that is needed.

It's unfortunate that character selection is often based on animation speed.

firethorne

mega ghost wrote:

firethorne wrote:

My preferred option: MAKE IT OPTIONAL. Settings menus exist in games. Use them. Allow each individual player to see as many or as few animations as they want.

I thought about that as well, but in competitive play having all animations turned off gives you an actual advantage, which would mean that anyone playing competitively would be forced to turn off the animations so that they're not at a disadvantage, even if they really like seeing them.

This is, unfortunately, true. However, I see that as a far bigger condemnation of PvP as a whole, where an extra minute left unshielded could potentially cost you over a hundred points. It is the the same reason so many of the characters the devs make are considered bad. Despite being able to win matches, they simply don't win them quickly, and therefore are deemed worthless. Sad. Anyway, I'm getting off topic. Despite strategic disadvantages, I'd still always say give the player more options.

bigsmooth

I don't mind animations - after all, one of the reasons why I play this specific version of Puzzle Quest is that I like Marvel characters - but there is really no need to show any animation more than once per turn. It should just be a banner after that.

fanghoul

One thing that could also be fixed in this vein is some of the healing powers taking so long to go off. I've noticed this particularly with X-23 this time around, that just matching 3 for her healing seems to take me almost as long as having Dr Strange fire a counter attack.

acescracked

Don't change Carnage, his annoying passive animation is his best defensive attribute in PvP!

amusingfoo1

smkspy wrote:

Carnage, Strange, and Black Bolt. Now that is a team that will give you a migrane.

I've gotten to the point of filtering out Bolt, generally. But yes, I did those three on the essential and it was endless animation. Not many turns to win, though, so I suffered through it.

SummerGlau

I don't mind them, but I'm sure I'll change my tune next time I have Strange and Starlord on my team again