Let's Talk About Strange

pseudotwentyone

*Disclaimer - This post is targeted towards mainly 3-4* transitioning PvE players, if you don't care about this tier or mode please disregard!*

 

As any PvE player knows, "goons" are a huge part of the game. I estimate at least 90% of the content in PvE revolves around fighting 1 or more goons, and/or the Dark Avengers. While the lack of new events or enemies has been bemoaned for a while, it is not the main thrust of this post.

 

The recent nerfing of Old Man Logan, due to his being played in over 10% of all matches, made me very worried. For one simple reason - Doctor Strange (3*) is essential to my playing, and enjoying the game. Powered up or not, there is simply no comparison when it comes to fighting goons, and I dare say suicidal to enter most nodes without him. Anyone who has had the pleasure of even letting one Muscle yellow tile goes off know what I am talking about, not to mention getting bombarded with AE's or powerful single target countdown attacks.

 

As an example, last night I accidently entered a fairly low level (78ish) goon node without Strange, and my whole team came out with about 1/3 life left. And this was getting fairly lucky!

 

The problem is, there is simply no other option for consistently and effectively dealing with goon countdown tiles, at least as a 3 star player. Let's look at some of the other heroes that come to mind:

 

• Sam Wilson (Falcon): His blue is good, but still inadequate when it comes to goon countdowns. First, you have to have enough blue mana, then you have to hope Redwing targets the right countdown tile. If there are multiple targets, Redwing is woefully unequipped to deal with the goon threat.

 

• Steve Rogers (Super Soldier): All 3 of his powers can overwrite countdown tiles! Great! Except good luck getting enough of any of his colors before there are 4 or 5 countdown tiles on the board...

 

• Quicksilver (Pietro Maximoff): His black switcheroo can almost always take out a pesky hard-to-get to tile. Notice I said "a".

 

Hopefully I didn't miss anything too obvious, but I believe these are all of the 3* characters that can effectively target countdown tiles. Beyond this, the rest of the options come down to random board shake/clear abilities that are far from ideal for dealing with the threat. This is analogous to just playing with a random set of characters and hoping you can match away the tiles as they appear.

 

Here is the thing - I agree with the stated developer position that no single character should be viewed as essential for one of your 3 precious team slots. I am still having fun using Strange in pretty much every mission (for now), but what about new players? Sure, he is in packs now - but will be vaulted soon, and champing 3 stars is pretty far into progression. I'd also like to be able to use the rest of my 3 star roster more consistently, after spending all the effort to get them champed!

 

I've seen mentioned that some people felt after getting all the 3*s champed it was a good time to quit. As I only have a few left myself, I can see myself going this route if Strange gets nerfed, or nothing else changes in PvE format.

 

Since no one wants to hear a bunch of whining and complaining without solutions, here's my idea - either nerf/change goons, or make all/most powers that affect enemy tiles also affect countdown tiles.

 

TL/DR; Strange is gonna get hit with the nerf bat, goon countdowns are OP - let me use my roster in PvE!

Borstock

Strange is a newish character. A LOT of the player base had to deal with goon CD tiles before Strange existed. I'm sure you'll find something that works well for you.

JablesMc

I have an awesome 3* team for goon nodes.

3hanos, Dak3n, Patch.

Cheap blue, and auto strike tiles while building up green for patch, down one goon and *BOOM* Court Death goes off, many times ending the match, with two true healers to offset the self damage from 3han-man.

They'll do clears for days, kehd.

Punisher5784

If Strange gets nerfed, then they might as well nerf every character that has a passive triggered from enemy powers (e.g. SL, C4ge). Nerfing Strange would affect all players that would create more pitchforks than OMLs nerf.

As far as how to handle goons in 3* land, before I entered 4* land, I consistently used Rogers, Mohawk and OBW. You can create a winfinty with this team and I can easily beat lvl 300+ goons without losing health. It can be slow though. 

JablesMc

Punisher5784 said:

If Strange gets nerfed, then they might as well nerf every character that has a passive triggered from enemy powers (e.g. SL, C4ge). Nerfing Strange would affect all players that would create more pitchforks than OMLs nerf.

As far as how to handle goons in 3* land, before I entered 4* land, I consistently used Rogers, Mohawk and OBW. You can create a winfinty with this team and I can easily beat lvl 300+ goons without losing health. It can be slow though. 

That's the first team I was able to beat the old DDQ Big Enchilada with.

carrion_pigeons

Is the point of this post to talk about future bans, or to ask about other strategies for dealing with goons?  Because the first of those seems reeeeeeally unhelpful.

People dealt with Muscle nodes long before Strange came around.  Sure, they were always unpopular, but it's hardly "suicidal" dealing with them.  If you can't get enough AP to use Steve, then you aren't using him with IM40, which is probably a mistake.  OBW is still good at dealing with goons, even in the 3* tier, and enough board shake will usually solve the problem for you too.  3* Hulk is a decent option for that: in fact Hulk/Patch is one of the classics for handling them, although it will cost you a health pack (better than 3 of them, though!).  You can also steal the strikes, which makes the nodes trivial, with Moonstone or Loki.

(Incidentally, I don't get all the Strange love.  I mean, yes, he trivializes goon nodes, but he makes gameplay so *boring*.  I manage to play about 1 and a half nodes with him before I start falling asleep.  No way could I grind out a whole sub with him.)

Dormammu

Grey Suit Widow and Hood have targeting abilities that are excellent at eliminating tiles of any kind.

Strange is excellent at taking out goons, or really any cheap power spammers, but we all survived for three years without him so I hesitate to agree that life can't continue without him. If you asked me who I'd rather give up, Strange or IM40, I'd have to say bye-bye to Strange.

I'll use Strange right up until the time the goons are about 30 levels higher than my 4-stars and boosted 3-stars, at which point his yellow can't cope with their health, and I need to pull out some heavy hitters.

Orion

IM40/3Cap/Kamala - fire off IM40 yellow to get plenty of AP for Steve's shield tosses and KK's AoE.  KK heals everyone up with each toss if a goon cd ever goes off.

Straycat

I am more self conscience about using any team too many times since they set an arbitrary mark with OML. But I don't think you have to worry about that with 3* Strange. Scaling stops him from being used too much and his health is so low that he is not good in pvp. Strange is good in pvp but when it takes more than 3 flames to down someone his passive alone is not enough. He might be a default against goons, but he's well balanced enough that I don't think he'll be nerfed. Knock on wood 

As for 3* options against goons
2* Magneto. You can usually set up a match 4 to clear out a tile. Blue could destroy the board if you have him at 5
Daredevil- stunlock the goons, especially if you can get 2 billy clubs out
3* Bullseye- green can set up matches
Patch- you don't have to worry about enemy strikes
3* Fist- self accelerator and constant damage
She Hulk- goons only generate a couple colors so green can keep them down. If the tiles are low she can smash them away

Borstock

If we're treading into 2* category, I used 2* Black Widow to constantly up CD tiles in the beginning. Eventually, scaling made it problematic when she could be one shot by basically any tile on the board, but it did work for a while.

Spiritclaw

He's good enough with goons to replace invisible woman and star lord, who were excellent in that capacity.  Now I only pull them out of strange is wounded.

Jaedenkaal

carrion pigeons said:

Is the point of this post to talk about future bans, or to ask about other strategies for dealing with goons?  Because the first of those seems reeeeeeally unhelpful.

+1. Are we really worrying about 3* characters getting nerfed?

dramatist

In the days before Strange I used to use Iron Fist, Scarlet Witch and Cyclops.  All three do board shake and are batteries so AP gain is quick. Iron Fist's attack tile whittles goons down pretty quickly, Scarlet Witch makes purple which Iron Fist can use to make black, Cyclops yellow can make red and Cyclops red and black are great nukes, or you can save black and use Iron Fist's purple nuke too. Rounds go by very quickly, often with no damage taken.

hopper1979

Rocket/Groot, 3 draken and Patch you should  never need a health kit again.  I still use this group on occasions even though I am well into the 4 realm.  I would also recommend Rocket/Groot, Patch and Thanos, they can shake of his damage fairly well and you can save Patch's red for that character you must kill while clearing the board with Rocket/Groots green.  If Thanos had been around when I was in 3 land that is who I would have used for at least the first 4 nodes probably more.  I actually think Thanos is more effective than Strange because Dance with death one shots most of the characters in the first 3 nodes, Strange takes 2-3 enemy casts to take out enemies so you have more tiles to worry about.

Dormammu

Jaedenkaal said:

1. Are we really worrying about 3* characters getting nerfed?

I don't think it's unreasonable to be concerned, especially for a player in the 3-star tier (where I'd guess a majority of players are, especially non-forumites). While 3-star rebalances have slowed to a crawl the developers showed they aren't ignoring the tier by changing 3Falcon.

While I'd like to see a number of 3-star characters improved (Spider-Man, Pun, Psylocke, Rags, Sentry, Colossus come to mind) I too would hate to see any nerfs. I am into the 4-star tier and 3-stars remain greatly useful to me. This will remain the case as I have no intention of ever moving into the 5-star tier.

Jaedenkaal

I don't think it's unreasonable to be concerned, especially for a player in the 3-star tier (where I'd guess a majority of players are, especially non-forumites). While 3-star rebalances have slowed to a crawl the developers showed they aren't ignoring the tier by changing 3Falcon.

But what would be the point? (Of nerfing 3*s, I mean. I totally support the buffing of underused 3*s and even 2*s. Poor Carol)

I can't think of a single 3* cover that completely changes the way you play the game the way a 5* cover can. And the 3* tier isn't the focus of the game nor the top tier of it, so (in PVP at least) at this point a 3* isn't really 'overpowered' truly unless he's out-competing 4*s, and I think Strange's low HP will keep this from ever happening.

As far as the OP's concerns go, I don't think 3* characters have ever been nerfed for PVE reasons except to prevent winfinite combos; nerfs have basically always been in response to degenerate PVP environments (as far as I can tell)

pseudotwentyone

Thanks all for the replies. I think Strange is safe for now, due to his low usability in PvE, and appreciate the feedback on other ways to tackle goons. There were definitely a few chars/combos in there I had not considered and will be trying out! My real concern was using him in so many matches, and figuring if everyone else did too, then that would look bad from a character usage stat to the devs.

Which IS still a problem for multiple reasons from my OP, but the structure of PvE has not really changed that much since the beginning and I don't see goons going anywhere or changing all that much. It would be awesome if we could get more powers that directly affect countdown tiles though. Maybe something with limited charges, like Hawkguy's arrow quiver (great new way to structure a power BTW) or something with a cooldown on its own? Most of the powers that affect other enemy tiles would admittedly be way overpowered if they affected countdown tiles the same way.

Using some of these combos will hopefully help with my "strange" addiction - wish me luck!

Tiger_Wong

No disrespect but I think a lot of people around here just need to sit down and examine their roster and come up with ways to do work. Just look at their roster and THINK.

youre looking for one character as a catch-all. Dude.... you use a team of 3 characters. Before Strange came along I was using a different bunch of teams. 

im40
cap
punisher

im40
cap
gamora

Switch
2*mags
2*hawk

vision
2*mags
quicksilver

3* cage
vision
3*fist

2* widow
3* daken
2* wolvie

5* widow (at 2/1/1)
switch
3* cyke

those are just off the top of my head. Stop looking for a 1 character catch-all. Build a TEAM to defeat your opponent. 

Dormammu

Jaedenkaal said:

I can't think of a single 3* cover that completely changes the way you play the game the way a 5* cover can.

IM40 changed the way I played the game.

Tiger_Wong

Dormammu said:

Jaedenkaal said:

I can't think of a single 3* cover that completely changes the way you play the game the way a 5* cover can.

IM40 changed the way I played the game.

Ditto with switch. 

DaveR4470

What @Tiger Wong said.  There are dozens of ways to deal with goons via 3*s.  Bring Witch and Loki, and just scramble the board constantly to set up matches to eliminate the countdowns.  Bring color changers like Cyclops to get a board shake.  Chain stun with Daredevil and Carol.  Let Storm do her thing.  Keep OBW around for her blue.  

And as someone who is comfortably in the 4* transition, let me tell you -- Strange is not gamebreaking, and isn't going to get nerfed.  I use him a lot, but as an adjunct to make burst damagers work a little faster.  If I really want to slice through goon nodes, though, I fire up the champed Medusa/Carnage/Mr F team that hits like a tank and never drops below maybe 90% health.  You haven't lived until a goon fires off a sniper shot.... that does 1 damage and winds up triggering a small chain reaction that heals your team for 9800 health and gives you 5 random free AP....