Koth...Nerf him

morgue427

think you would be suprised though on how often using his first ability doesn't lead to any matches. depressing really but when it hit it hits hard, perhaps people are remembering the one time it face stomped them not the 3 times it didnt do much?

hawkyh1

morgue427 said:

think you would be suprised though on how often using his first ability doesn't lead to any matches. depressing really but when it hit it hits hard, perhaps people are remembering the one time it face stomped them not the 3 times it didnt do much?

I'm claiming the equivalence of koth using a 1d8
when everyone else has a 1d6. I'm reading your
argument as he still rolls 1's and 2's with his
current dice. I don't see how that's a counter
argument to why he should not be allowed to
roll three 8's. it's not losing, but losing to a dice
roll of three 8's that people have a problem with.

HH

morgue427

didnt say he isnt strong and yes the ability works as it should, amazing isnt it. i am saying that those mega cascades eveyrone is whining about is not as frequent people want to think, play him in training grounds and when the board is very light on red using it is seldom even gets me one match much less a mega cascade. but of course what could i possibly know.

hawkyh1

I'm not saying anything about what you do or do
not know.

I'm saying you're bringing up a point about the
wrong thing. whether or not he gets cascades
from his 1st ability often is not important. gonti
heart success rate is not important... if it's
broken then acknowledge that and deal with it.
is it ok to cheat if you do not win all the time?

HH

ElfNeedsFood

hawkyh1 said:

(people do care that cycling is overpowered)

HH

True, but not like the firestorm over Baral. That's the case where it truly broke the game because the AI could play too. If the AI could cycle, the heat would be as high as the Baral debate. 

Ohboy

Koth is not even a top tier walker. 

The only reason people are complaining is because his skill 1 actually does something that the ai can use reliably. 

GrizzoMtGPQ

@Ohboy insightful as ever. Is it complaining? Are we having a rational discussion about balance? You realize that we all realize this will hurt us when using Koth too. The problem is that his #1 is self sustaining. You use it and are almost guaranteed to be able to use it every turn from them on. You really think that is desirable? I'll grab my popcorn while you defend this. Go on ...

Kinesia

ElfNeedsFood said:

I agree with @IM_CARLOS: people only care about this because the AI can steer a Koth deck. If Greg ever learned to cycle there would be N3 outrage like crazy.

We all just want free wins....  therefore we can never have real PvP because win rates would decline to 50%. 

I agree too. I don't play Koth heaps either, I prefer Nahiri and Kiora. It's that the AI can do Koth so well compared to everyone else it messes up. We do tricky decks with Kiora that almost never lose but the AI can't play them at all..

Ohboy

GrizzoMtGPQ said:

@Ohboy insightful as ever. Is it complaining? Are we having a rational discussion about balance? You realize that we all realize this will hurt us when using Koth too. The problem is that his #1 is self sustaining. You use it and are almost guaranteed to be able to use it every turn from them on. You really think that is desirable? I'll grab my popcorn while you defend this. Go on ...

Talk about an overreaction. 

This thread is obviously one that's complaining that koth is overpowered and hence needs a nerf. Your reply to me itself consists of a complaint that one can chain his skill 1. Of course it's complaining. 

Koth is a high Variance walker. There's really nothing special about his skill 1 that requires a nerf. As a veteran of QB, you should know better than most that koth isn't the overpowered powerhouse that some people think it is. 

I haven't considered entering koth into a competitive event in ages. He's a great walker in the early and mid tier arena of play but he's too easily shut down by random circumstances. 

If you wish to discuss balance, koth certainly wouldn't be where we should start. He's smack in the middle. If anything, everything else should be rebalanced to match his power level. 

GrizzoMtGPQ

I have played thousands of battles with Koth. I say move his ability cost to 9.

What do you think that means? Am I a complainer? No. I'm a reasoned individual and a game developer. I too would never play Koth in an event. He's way too inconsistent and I don't have Chrome Mox.

I stand by what I said. It's the same reason that I begged for Baral to get nerfed. I don't want to luck lose. If the AI consistently gets ahead and outruns me, thems the breaks. But Koth can cascade smoke you and there is nothing you can do about it unless you build to deny him red, trashing your own deck idea. And it's #1 that does it. This is no different than back when Kiora's first cost 6.

morgue427

agree with you i was thinking 8 personally but i havent tweaked my koth in a while and it may have drifted away a bit from truly competitive. when it works it is a beat down when it doesnt may as well have rage quit the match after the first round lol

Grenade110

I've found that in a Koth deck if you have a more varied cost range he can work even if he isn't getting red matches.

Like running Kari Zev and Samut. Samut is hard to get out with suboptimal matches but Kari is a lot easier and a worthwhile drop generally especially with Call of the Full Moon or Giant Spectacle. 

I don't think Koth needs a nerf at all. He has power and cascading into Olivia and War Pig is brutal but sometimes you have to play to the weaknesses.

Ohboy

GrizzoMtGPQ said:

I have played thousands of battles with Koth. I say move his ability cost to 9.

What do you think that means? Am I a complainer? No. I'm a reasoned individual and a game developer. I too would never play Koth in an event. He's way too inconsistent and I don't have Chrome Mox.

I stand by what I said. It's the same reason that I begged for Baral to get nerfed. I don't want to luck lose. If the AI consistently gets ahead and outruns me, thems the breaks. But Koth can cascade smoke you and there is nothing you can do about it unless you build to deny him red, trashing your own deck idea. And it's #1 that does it. This is no different than back when Kiora's first cost 6.

Where did you get this weird idea that all complaints are unreasonable? Being a complainer and being a reasonable person are not opposite ends of a spectrum. 

If you're anti luck losing, then a game where every element revolves around rng might not be the one you should be playing. 

As a game for developer, you should know that variety in gaming comes from a system of checks and balances. This leads to the idea of build order loses and the importance of building a flexible deck that can react to the more common meta strategies. 

If you've built a deck strategy so inflexible that trying to deny him red gems kills it, then you have only yourself to blame. You've used it to streamroll other decks, and now your invincible rock finally met paper.  If you're playing elspeth, then you're hard countered. It happens. And it should happen. Just like koth is hard countered by green ramp decks. Having hard counters is what keeps a game interesting. It's what keeps any one specific strategy from being the runaway dominant strategy. 

I'll use your baral as an example of this. It had no hard counters other than insidious will. It generated value the turn it hit the board that far exceeded it's cost, sometimes leading to an instant kill. You're equating that with a skill 1 that whiffs half the time if the opponent has been killing all red gems. 

Anyway, as a game developer... What exactly is the mental process behind identifying a Planeswalker as too uncompetitive to play in major events and then singling him out to nerf further? 

watman

Koth was 'nerfed' with the nerf of Corrupted Graftstone... If I recall correctly, that was not even communicated, and "He's way too inconsistent and I don't have Chrome Mox." sums him pretty much the best...

Ohboy

Complaints about koth's ability to ruin your day go back to before Grafstone was even released. 

shteev

Grafstone was nerfed?

Steeme

I think he's calling the move to Standard a nerf.

Regardless, the only way to determine if Koth requires retuning is to look at the data.  They did that with Kiora, ie. "according to our internal data her win rates are through the roof" which somehow justified the complete destruction of a planeswalker.  Thankfully the community rallied to get most of those changes reverted.

watman

shteev said:

Grafstone was nerfed?

Yup, with the release of Chrome Mox, Graftstone only converts two instead of three...

Mainloop25

Hmmm?? Unless I remember incorrectly, Grafstone has always converted only 2 gems. That is why most people preferred other gem changers to Grafstone for dual-color walkers. I need to see a picture of the card where it's says 3 instead of two to believe otherwise. 

Ohboy

It's always been two I think.