Character Rebalance **** Lockjaw (Royal Bulldog) ****

Jaedenkaal

mexus said:

Before you know it the opponent wakes from stun, makes a match, cascades infinity and woops - my charged tiles are my worst enemy.

I've never had that happen to me even without Lockjaw. I think your problem there is that Vulture actively prevents you from building to 18 Blue.

mexus said:
I like Lockjaw because he's a dog.

For a support character he's awfully cute! And 100% damage prevention is good but it rarely triggers. Elektra does it better.

That's an interesting comparison. Loyal Protector does nearly double the damage that Shadow Step does, doesn't cost AP, and doesn't require Lockjaw to be in front. On the other hand, as you point out, it won't trigger reliably, and also won't protect LJ from ability damage.

Have you tried him with R&G? The added damage from R&Gs strike tiles seems like it would make Loyal Protector damage pretty substantial, and if no one matches away those massive strike tiles, you've probably won anyways.

therightwaye

Max damage @ level 270 : 
Yellow - Loyal Protector - 1609 damage to enemy
Green - The Dog That Bit You - 990 damage

Black Duke

I guess Lockjaw comes off too badly. I´ve played my nearly done doggie (4/5/3, level 70) with Cardusa in DDQ and I think that a championed LJ (5/3/5) definitely has the potential to make Cardusa even more annoying.

hopper1979

The fact that after a few terns he has a great chance of absorbing all damage and she heals.  Yea it will be annoying.  Another team I want to try is Nova, Lockjaw and Medusa, get those strike tiles out and enjoy.  A little slower but more control.

himatako

DarthDeVo said:

mexus said:

He's also a potential good Goddess Thor partner but didn't experiment much yet.

I posted this in a few other places, but I took him, IM40 and 4* Thor into TBE shortly after he was released. I think he had 2 green covers. At one point, I had over 30 charged tiles on the board, and my Level 194 Thor was doing more than 20K damage unboosted. I'd hate to see the damage a boosted champ could do with a board like that. 

This is why I'm afraid he might be broken when he is on the same team as Thor. None of their powers consume charge tiles, so it'll just keep increasing. But perhaps it might not be as broken as I think it would be.

Jaedenkaal

himatako said:

DarthDeVo said:

mexus said:

He's also a potential good Goddess Thor partner but didn't experiment much yet.

I posted this in a few other places, but I took him, IM40 and 4* Thor into TBE shortly after he was released. I think he had 2 green covers. At one point, I had over 30 charged tiles on the board, and my Level 194 Thor was doing more than 20K damage unboosted. I'd hate to see the damage a boosted champ could do with a board like that. 

This is why I'm afraid he might be broken when he is on the same team as Thor. None of their powers consume charge tiles, so it'll just keep increasing. But perhaps it might not be as broken as I think it would be.

Well, it's a good hit, but that still takes, what, 9 Blue, 10 Red, and 8 Green AP? I sure hope you could get good results spending 27 AP.

DarthDeVo

Jaedenkaal said:

himatako said:

DarthDeVo said:

mexus said:

He's also a potential good Goddess Thor partner but didn't experiment much yet.

I posted this in a few other places, but I took him, IM40 and 4* Thor into TBE shortly after he was released. I think he had 2 green covers. At one point, I had over 30 charged tiles on the board, and my Level 194 Thor was doing more than 20K damage unboosted. I'd hate to see the damage a boosted champ could do with a board like that. 

This is why I'm afraid he might be broken when he is on the same team as Thor. None of their powers consume charge tiles, so it'll just keep increasing. But perhaps it might not be as broken as I think it would be.

Well, it's a good hit, but that still takes, what, 9 Blue, 10 Red, and 8 Green AP? I sure hope you could get good results spending 27 AP.

Don't forget the 6 yellow AP to kick things off with Recharge. And it took a few cycles to get to that many charged tiles. 

hopper1979

Well now that info on Gambit is coming out he may have a new pet, looks like he does more damage with charged tiles on board as well.

Pongie

mexus said:

Do we have any new Lockjaw champs here yet?

Heard you from the other iso thread, unfortunately I haven’t really been using him. The champion was just because I had like 4 covers expiring

Rick_OShay

Lockjaw and Gambit work fine together, as long as you bring a yellow-black strike tile producer to round out the color schemes. Nova was my first choice (I don't have LJ champed yet, 12 covers). 
Fire off LJ green to charge random tiles, then use Gambit red to do some damage as you destroy two charged tiles - and gain the AP from them. That means you spend 7 red to earn 6 random AP. With Nova's cheap powers you are sure to fire things off a lot. Now, Nova's red is unfortunately locked out by Gambit, but his yellow and black are good at 5 covers each. 
With all the strikes you are putting down, Lockjaw protects your team by jumping in front a lot. If you happen to land a charged tile on the enemy's strongest color, his passive bites them each round with the added strike damage. 

I'll be champing Yondo this week, so he may also be a decent teammate for LJ and Gambit, with cheap strike tiles and a huge blue power. 

hopper1979

Now that we know what Gambit does he is not as good as a partner as I hoped (I was hoping for a something along the lines  of 4-Thor red or Mordo's black) but Lockjaw getting those charged tiles out quickly will maximize Gambit's red attack.  With Gambits pink running at full steam you are hitting with his red power every turn or every other turn at the worst, it is crazy, the excess of charged tiles keeps this going, and played right his defensive abilities are top notch, him and Electra are the only character with 100% damage reduction/avoidance.  Rogue and Mockingbird are still my top priorities for the recent 4's but Lockjaw still strikes me as a great support character either as a defensive meat shield or a offensive feeder for characters like Thor and Gambit.  

Yepyep

mexus said:

I'll run Nova / Gambit / Lockjaw in the simulator later if I manage to find a team that it not Gamora / Rocket & Groot / Medusa (which will will that team straight away).

Good luck... Literally EVERY match that comes up for me lately is this set...

hopper1979

I wish I could debate with you guys but I am nowhere near to championing him.  On paper he looks like a great support character to me.  I tell you what when I get him covered in about 3 months I will be back and we can debate more then

Punisher5784

Everyone keeps saying he sux but I totally want to pair him with Carnage and Medusa.. is this team not that good?

hopper1979

It should be a solid team but slow, I keep advocating for him, the 100% damage reduction should be very useful, the issue I think people have with him is he has little to no damage output, he is a true support character you need attack tiles to make his passives do reasonable damage so he is basically a shield and if you cannot get those tiles out for him to absorb damage he is not very good in most peoples eyes (I have to concede this point).  He is definitely niche and niche characters do not get much love.  So if you can get a lot of team tiles out on the board Carnage, Nova, OML, Prof-X etc he can be very useful for damage reduction.  The other option is charged tile generation, I think he might pair very well with 4Thor or Gambit.  Unfortunately this is all speculation on my part I do not have enough covers in him to play test any of the teams I would like to try.

Tiger_Wong

I champed him this week and I think I found a team for him although there’s some color overlap. 

Lockjaw 5/3/5
4Rocket and Groot 3/5/5
Yondu 3/5/5

the key here is Yondu’s black. It only costs 7 AP and while the strikes it creates are weak, they’re mostly there to get matched by the opponent so Lockjaw’s yellow passive goes off. And you start the match off with some very powerful strikes that makes the passive hit really hard if matched. 

They all have a blue power and even though they’re all useful, Yondu’s is TOO good so I usually end up saving to use it. 

hopper1979

I cant suggest anything because the game will not give me any of his frigging cards.  I am glad to see people have not completely given up on him.  With a little tweak (increase the damage on all his powers) he would be a very solid toon.

hopper1979

I think any team you make with him has to focus on his passive ability to tank, he should be a great meat shield but you need to spam tiles.  The only other person I see him pairing well with other than tile generators is 4-Thor, his green produces the most charged tiles or any character in the game at one time (I think) he only has one job when he is on a team, charged tiles or soaking up damage.  I will mess with him some day.

hopper1979

Boy this update to the match 4 makes "exploit" him even harder to use he is taking a real hit.  His ability to block all match damage is his one great feature, he is under-powered in ever other way, but on the right team, as a tank, he can be great, especially when he could jump to the front on a match 4 destroying a friendly tile, now we have to actually have a match for him to get this benefit.  The power only blocks the initial match damage, not all the follow matches on a cascade, or any attacks tiles or powers that are cast later, this is not a broken power even with the match 4 tile destruction, he still takes significant damage even on a high tile output team.  I understand the change in terms of Rogue and Chaves they are top 10 4's and this will bring them back into the 4 star fold a little more but this hamstrings an already under-powered 4 to a point where nobody will even attempt to use him.

I was really looking forward to paring him with the new BP and 4Cage.  I will still try that team but with this new nurf his damage output need to be upgraded for him to be used ever.  He is already a bottom 5 4 star and now he is worse.  

sambrookjm

Has anyone ever received an error message using Lockjaw saying that they couldn't fire his blue power?  I got one of those in the SImulator today.  The mode of his blue was the one that would have given you a strike, attack, and protect tile...there were open tiles in each of the colors that the special tiles would be on, but the power just would not fire.  I've submitted a bug report, but I'm curious if anyone has ever had any of his other modes not fire properly.