** Black Widow (Original) ** [PRE 2014-06]

over_clocked

^ Popular PvP choices now include the Hulk (Anger produces A LOT of CDs), the Punisher (CD ability), Panther (CD ability), Psylocke (CD ability), MMN (with cStorm, 2 CD abilities), now we have lazyCap (2 CD abilities) who's gonna be quite popular I believe.
Sooooo next time when your x/3/x or x/4/x oBW fails to heal your team at all against all these characters, man up, you never needed healing!

Phaserhawk

locked wrote:

^ Popular PvP choices now include the Hulk (Anger produces A LOT of CDs), the Punisher (CD ability), Panther (CD ability), Psylocke (CD ability), MMN (with cStorm, 2 CD abilities), now we have lazyCap (2 CD abilities) who's gonna be quite popular I believe.
Sooooo next time when your x/3/x or x/4/x oBW fails to heal your team at all against all these characters, man up, you never needed healing!

While I agree with you, most people are gonna be running spider-man or C.Mags over OBW, so it won't matter.

over_clocked

But people who run cMagneto and Spidey probably do not run oBW on the same team, either (redundant much... what does oBW do there, manicure her fingernails? Why steal AP when you can nuke the enemy instead? Why heal for a smallish amount/delay CDs when you can stun the enemy to oblivion instead? As much as I love her too.). But if you're locked out of other options, 5 in blue seems, well, a must have.

Unknown

locked wrote:

But people who run cMagneto and Spidey probably do not run oBW on the same team, either (redundant much... what does oBW do there, manicure her fingernails? Why steal AP when you can nuke the enemy instead? Why heal for a smallish amount/delay CDs when you can stun the enemy to oblivion instead? As much as I love her too.). But if you're locked out of other options, 5 in blue seems, well, a must have.

Not for everyone. Even if you may believe their is only 1 option on how to build your character, the other builds will always be useful for something else. It all depends on what you need the character for and what team you're running.

Unknown

I screwed up when originally collecting her covers. I just trained every cover I had, and once I had them maxed I sold off any others that I got without even thinking about it. Now I'm stuck with 4/4/5 until I can get a blue cover to change it to 3/5/5 for good.

Unknown

OBW and Magneto is insane together if OBW gets blue tiles, like it is the case in the Unstable Isotope event. You end up being able to use Magnetic Field for only 4 AP as long as the enemy has blue, which is rather ridiculous. Unfortunately this generally only works if OBW is buffed or your Magneto is very low level, since blue is Magneto's strongest color.

Unknown

I've been using OBW, Magneto, and Patch in this event. Magneto is the only non-buff, but why he is there should be obvious. OBW does not need to heal, but sometimes raising countdowns by 4 is useful. Her espionage means every purple blue or black match does around 2000 damage after Patch tiles are out. Magneto can spam red for a thousand a pop while getting a small board reset each time. They can work well together. I will use OBW purple if I can't get enough green to use Berserker Rage on my own, otherwise purple goes to Mags.

It's a very good team for this goon-heavy event.

ronin_san

Exactly how would you propose "unbreaking" her? Personally, I see her as a graduated 1* BW / poor man's Spidey heals.

I really like her. I call her dorky widow. And dorky widow is best widow. Stop with this "character x is breaking the game nonsense". Spend some money and buy some 3* covers. She is ALL to easy to neutralize.

Unknown

I've been running 3/5/5 since she was released. Like you I've found as I've increased my teams roster and strength I've relied on her less.

I've started to move her to a 5/5/3 build as the extra damage on a match doesn't matter if she isn't the one making the match. With a 5/5/3 I'm happy to have her safe in the back with stronger characters out front.

Unknown

There are some characters that just plain need nerfs, like Spider-Man. But the prevalence of OBW is simply due to the fact that there's only 4 strong 2-star heroes and the other three fill the same niche. OBW fatigue would be solved simply by releasing more 2-stars.

Unknown

gamar wrote:

There are some characters that just plain need nerfs, like Spider-Man. But the prevalence of OBW is simply due to the fact that there's only 4 strong 2-star heroes and the other three fill the same niche. OBW fatigue would be solved simply by releasing more 2-stars.

Especially more characters for those colors... Of course people try to assemble a rainbow team and applicants are not queuing for the non R/G slots.

farlus

There's always going to be a 2* character that's the strongest or that synergizes the best, it just happens that OBW is readily available and a great deal of players are stuck that that 2* glass ceiling before transitioning into a roster that has enough 3* covers to not need OBW anymore. She helps people with these rosters (such as myself) continue to enjoy the game and remain semi-competitive, even though I've been sitting at this wall for a month or two.

I run with OBW as often as possible but I don't fear her in PVP. She's always my first target and goes down relatively quickly. Just like Thorverine before her, I just think people are getting tired of seeing her face, but that doesn't translate to instant nerf. She is not an instant win button.

Unknown

If you're running her in your party, but you aren't having her make any matches, she probably shouldn't be in your party.

MrsZeroDeville

I think availability is the biggest problem with her currently. There is simply no one else that can replace her at the 2* or below level, I don't even know what does a similar job in the 3* range; Her ubiquity is mainly because there are no other options. Do I think she is needs a nerf? I don't really think limiting characters from design is a good idea, I just wish that instead of piling her plate so high they spread the wealth around. She can steal AP, which not only puts you behind in the POWER race but also in the MATCH race, because after she steals AP she heals her team. You are now back at square one while they just started with half to three quarters full AP reserve. On top of that she is not nearly as squishy as a medic should be and she can hit pretty damn hard with a full espionage. Her "faults" however are a positive in a way because it's the first chance a lot of players probably get at game management. You learn start denying colors or just use what AP you have before you lose what AP you have. Her well-rounded strength makes you manage a game different and forces you to develop a strategy that adds a layer to the gameplay. So while I agree she is very very powerful and -at no fault of her own -is seemingly alone in the niche she fills, I think that she presents enough challenge to make some people mad enough to form a strategy, think more or maybe even join a forum and see what other people think about it which is overall good for the game.

over_clocked

^ Spidey/Hood somewhat replace oBW, especially Spidey. The Hood still goes nicely with oBW even if he takes blue and black from her (add a red/green with optional yellow/black character and you're gold), whereas running both oBW and Spidey is redundant and not beneficial at all.
I'm still losing some games to a maxed oBW sometimes, especially when paired with mStorm in Jungle (surprise non-stop looping team!), and I'm not alone She's very good, but you'll be seeing other characters too, once you develop your roster more.

Unknown

pasa_ wrote:

An interesting observatiom: OBW is not really good standing alone.

In the current game I killed storm first (obviously) then somehow the other guy got downed leaving just OBW. I was thinking 'what threat'?

And this is the crux of the matter. She's an extremely good support hero, a role that no other characters fill at the moment. Alone, she poses no threat, but combined with any potent active skill user such as Ares/Thor/Storm and an unlucky cascade and you can kiss your victory goodbye - especially on Desert/Forest boards. Obviously she gets completely outgunned at 3* level, but we aren't talking about them now.

Unknown

I love the discussion all around, there is just one thing bothering me.

No argument for or against the relative strength of a 2 star character or how to defeat a two star character should be, get a high level 3 star team and all problems go away.

We are all working on our roster all the time but this kind of logic is kind of like saying yes there is a problem, just deal with it till you can level past it which may take months and why should anyone who already has leveled past it care at all?

over_clocked

It has been said a thousand times already, oBW is the only character in 2* range covering black, blue and purple (opposite of red, green and yellow). There are no decent black users here, because Moonstone doesn't count. If we're looking at only blue and purple, only Magneto MN, mHawkeye and Bag-Man cover them too. One relies on CDs a lot and is best paired with cStorm or Spider-Man to generate blue for them, the other two are largely useless. So who would you take to your Thor/Ares/Wolverine team as a support which covers blue, black and blue? It's not the character's fault that oBW is overused among 2*s.

Unknown

locked wrote:

It has been said a thousand times already, oBW is the only character in 2* range covering black, blue and purple (opposite of red, green and yellow). There are no decent black users here, because Moonstone doesn't count. If we're looking at only blue and purple, only Magneto MN, mHawkeye and Bag-Man cover them too. One relies on CDs a lot and is best paired with cStorm or Spider-Man to generate blue for them, the other two are largely useless. So who would you take to your Thor/Ares/Wolverine team as a support which covers blue, black and blue? It's not the character's fault that oBW is overused among 2*s.

Why is Moonstone's black is so bad anyway? Maybe she needs a buff in her black. Her purple and red are so so and her black is horrendous.

Kolence

Yes, I would love if Moonstone AND Hawkeye were buffed so they can choose which tiles are affected. It's not as if they would suddenly become OP and better than any other 2*. There are strictly 2* lineups I'd like to try where OBW would be replaced by such better Moonstone for instance.

But back on topic, as many others have said, no I don't think OBW is really ruining PvP, if anything I'd say she makes the game better. I wish there were more versatile and useful support characters that would force us decide do we want to use OBW or someone else.