Time Gem Season Updates *Updated (5/2/17)

135

Comments

  • Jaedenkaal
    Jaedenkaal Posts: 3,357 Chairperson of the Boards
    zodiac339 said:
    Minor concern on Secret Weapon. The wording is "expire". I wonder if CD tiles that refresh at zero (Ghost Rider, Blad3, Human Torch) will not register as expired and won't activate the passive damage.
    They do expire and then immediately create a new one in the same space before the board falls. Remember the bug? :tongue:
  • bigsmooth
    bigsmooth Posts: 375 Mover and Shaker
    These are two characters that sorely needed updating, so I am happy to see these changes. Carnage was (unintentionally) nerfed into oblivion and this should make him usable again. Drax was certainly capable of big damage, but I felt like he wasn't any fun to play. I think his new powers definitely increase his synergy with other characters.
  • DapperChewie
    DapperChewie Posts: 399 Mover and Shaker
    So, what happens to black carnage teamups once the power goes back to being completely passive? 
  • Brigby
    Brigby ADMINISTRATORS Posts: 7,757 Site Admin
    *Added ability level tables
  • Jarvind
    Jarvind Posts: 1,684 Chairperson of the Boards
    Oh, hey, there's that major damage nerf on Drax's black I mentioned. Oy.
  • zodiac339
    zodiac339 Posts: 1,948 Chairperson of the Boards
    DapperChewie said:
    So, what happens to black carnage teamups once the power goes back to being completely passive? 
    Good question. I suspect MPQ will divide by zero, turning the game into an internet black hole. Hopefully, porn and cat videos will be enough to plug it up before it destroys everything, but it may end up bringing society to a downfall. Prepare your shelters and defenses now!

    Hopefully Demiurge will have something in place to change Alien Instinct teamups into Symbiote Scythes or Carnage Rules teamups.
  • DesertTortoise
    DesertTortoise Posts: 392 Mover and Shaker
    Carnage should be really fun now. Drax's black does less damage than I expected but is great board shake. A 968 strike tile after hitting all qualifiers will go great with his passive on his purple at 5 covers.
  • zodiac339
    zodiac339 Posts: 1,948 Chairperson of the Boards
    Drax needs one more change to The Destroyer. Right now, board shake is tied to enemy specials, making it super weak if there aren't any. It's like a modified Symbiotic Fury. I suppose they could be just considered to be similar niche powers, except Venom has a way to add the benefit to his power by using Lethal Protector to add enemy protects.
    the wording of the power still mentions "leaving allies high and dry". It still could do that by destroying tiles of your team's strongest color (up to all of them at rank 5) if there are no enemy special tiles. Still no AP generation, but you still get the damage from destroyed tiles and the board shake for a power with static cost that is obviously bad cost-to-damage without the shakeup. I know destroying your own strongest tiles might not be popular, especially if it also destroys friendly tiles on your strongest color, but it needs something.
  • mr_X
    mr_X Posts: 375 Mover and Shaker
    Nice. Carnage got a repreive and Drax got nice buff also. But shame they never buffed a 5* cough Banner. 
  • Tatercat
    Tatercat Posts: 930 Critical Contributor
    edited May 2017
    Hmm, that damage nerf to Drax's black is disappointing, despite the lower ap cost, though if you're trying to recreate the countdown bug with a Wasp/Carol team, you'd probably be running him at 3/5/5 anyway, and letting other use the black.

    This going to make his Crash a real challenge though, since two of his powers are dependent on allies or his opponent, and he'll rarely get the red off before the single enemy goes below 90%.  It was Starlord before, wasn't it?  Hopefully they will change that up.

    I was kinda tempted by the ISO for my champed Carnage last month, but knew that I'd still need him for required nodes and Crashes.  Its just not worth it to sell anyone above 2* in the long run.
  • Vhailorx
    Vhailorx Posts: 6,085 Chairperson of the Boards
    edited May 2017
    Carnage will be better. But still not great.  Dont see why demi is reluctant to let him fill the board with specials.  Is medusa + fantastic really too big of a threat to game balance?  And if not, why not just sokve the animation issues?

    Drax is better, but his upper limit on damage is significantly lower. 10 black for 3.5k damage + sone board shake is good, but the power is difintepy not a nuke any more.  And demi is overvaluing boardshake again!  These random powers only work when they are cheap and spammable.  Otherwise they are too hit or miss to build a team aroubd. 9 purple for a potentially large strike tile (1k) is solid.  But overall i suspect he will just be used for his purple passive and cheap red (to start a match).  He will be awesome combined with many newer CD heavy characters (carol, coulson, new wasp, hawkeye, etc).  His passive effectively recreates the recently fixed CD damage bug.
  • Tiger_Wong
    Tiger_Wong Posts: 1,056 Chairperson of the Boards
    I was really debating getting rid of Drax but I was confident the devs would retool him. Now I'm happy. I'm digging the rework a lot. 
  • DesertTortoise
    DesertTortoise Posts: 392 Mover and Shaker
    OJSP said:
    @Brigby I noticed a few times that the character levels shown for the 4* characters' abilities are at base level, 270 and 366. Is the 366 a typo or the numbers for the abilities are indeed for lvl 366? A maxed championed 4* is lvl 370.
    366 is displayed because it's the level a 270 4-star becomes when boosted. It's to give us an idea of how useful they'll be when that's the case. 
  • zulux21
    zulux21 Posts: 249 Tile Toppler
    hmmmm I am torn.
    the updates look decent, but I don't know if they are decent enough to give them a regular spot in my heroes I play.

    on the other hand the changes are going to make both of their clashes way way harder.

    you previous won with carnage against doc oc by saving up your AP to unleash a big attack so that he couldn't use your attack tiles against you.... now he is going to have very fast access to the attack tiles and after a few matches likely have way more attack tiles then you do, and even if he doesn't his blue will do a lot of damage.

    and then drax faces off against starlord.... which might not be horrible, but as bad as his purple move was before it was still way more useful for such a fight. putting a tile on the board for the black to eat it at the cost of a turn wasn't great but it still allowed you to do a decent chunk of extra damage, now it's just a tiny strike tile and nothing else since drax can't make his own countdown timers. With his black damage basically cut in half this battle could be a decent amount more difficult.

    I think the drax one should be alright still but I am really hoping they change the venom clash to something like 3 star spiderman as even with the stuns spiderman can't do much against carnage cause 3 star sucks :P
  • ZeroKarma
    ZeroKarma Posts: 513 Critical Contributor
    To be honest, I really enjoyed the Carnage nerf, as he is a major part of the most obnoxious PvE in the world, Venom Bomb, and this would have made it infinitely more palatable.


    I'm still not planning to champ Drax regardless of the buff, given the state of vaulting and the fact that he will be 270 for the foreseeable future while characters like Coulson will end up level 330 and more playable.
  • bigsmooth
    bigsmooth Posts: 375 Mover and Shaker
    zulux21 said:
    you previous won with carnage against doc oc by saving up your AP to unleash a big attack so that he couldn't use your attack tiles against you.... now he is going to have very fast access to the attack tiles and after a few matches likely have way more attack tiles then you do, and even if he doesn't his blue will do a lot of damage.
    Keep in mind that Carnage Rules has remained at the new, lower AP cost even though his black has been changed back to quickly creating tiles passively. Green is one of the colors you need to deny Doc Ock anyway, so you'll probably be able to hit him with it for good damage multiple times. There's also no need to wait to get to 10 red to use Scythes in the Crash. Sure, you'll take some damage from attack tiles, but unless Otto cascades into a whole bunch of blue it should still be very winnable.
  • STOPTHIS
    STOPTHIS Posts: 781 Critical Contributor
    Darknes21 said:
    Here is an idea...revisit the NERF to OML! 
    Not going to happen. Pure speculation on my part, but I think Carnage only got nerfed because when put alongside Mr F and Medusa they were kind of unbeatable. I mean when was the last time a villain got a nerf? Rags maybe? The only reason he got a re-buff so quickly is because he's villain designed to take health packs from players and in his current form he's useless for that. The current DP vs MPQ second sub is proof of that. There's no need to even target him first. Venom Bomb would have been a walk in the park.

    An OML rebuff would only benefit the players, so I wouldn't expect it. X-Force's got the same over-nerf a few years and he hasn't been buffed even though the 4* world as largely pasted him by.
  • KFloppy
    KFloppy Posts: 34 Just Dropped In
    mr_X said:
    Nice. Carnage got a repreive and Drax got nice buff also. But shame they never buffed a 5* cough Banner. 
    Silver Surfer say Hi!

    I sold Carnage & Electra the last time around, and I don't regret it.  I can use the HP for roster space still (C&D, 3* Starlord, 2 old 4* in the queue from champ rewards).
  • Brigby
    Brigby ADMINISTRATORS Posts: 7,757 Site Admin
    @STOPTHIS

    Carnage's previous character updates were intended to be buffs, but based on the community's feedback, it quickly became apparent that the changes didn't express that as well as they had hoped. As a result, the developers decided to re-visit the adjustments, and update them to make sure that this time around, Carnage's changes resonated as improvements!

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