Gambit Character Update Details (6/26/18)

Player1575

@Brigby any chances on removing the teammate power restriction on Gambit's black before this goes live? It's overkill to keep that on there when he doesn't generate AP at near the same level he used to. As mentioned previously, Iron Man 40 and Vulture can both generate more AP than him in the same time frame, and much more easily in the case of Vulture.

Brigby

Player1575 said:

Brigby any chances on removing the teammate power restriction on Gambit's black before this goes live? It's overkill to keep that on there when he doesn't generate AP at near the same level he used to. As mentioned previously, Iron Man 40 and Vulture can both generate more AP than him in the same time frame, and much more easily in the case of Vulture.

They're still evaluating his design, but rest assured that suggestion is an idea we've brought up to the development team for their consideration.

killercool

Brigby said:

Player1575 said:

Brigby any chances on removing the teammate power restriction on Gambit's black before this goes live? It's overkill to keep that on there when he doesn't generate AP at near the same level he used to. As mentioned previously, Iron Man 40 and Vulture can both generate more AP than him in the same time frame, and much more easily in the case of Vulture.

They're still evaluating his design, but rest assured that suggestion is an idea we've brought up to the development team for their consideration.

Any late changes would be critical to know before the buy back goes live.  At the moment the lock out of red and purple for other characters is the key point that is making me lean towards selling Gambit.  I would hate to sell him only to find a month later his black has the lock out condition removed.

thedarkphoenix

killercool said:

Brigby said:

Player1575 said:

Brigby any chances on removing the teammate power restriction on Gambit's black before this goes live? It's overkill to keep that on there when he doesn't generate AP at near the same level he used to. As mentioned previously, Iron Man 40 and Vulture can both generate more AP than him in the same time frame, and much more easily in the case of Vulture.

They're still evaluating his design, but rest assured that suggestion is an idea we've brought up to the development team for their consideration.

Any late changes would be critical to know before the buy back goes live.  At the moment the lock out of red and purple for other characters is the key point that is making me lean towards selling Gambit.  I would hate to sell him only to find a month later his black has the lock out condition removed.

^^^^

Hopefully any changes made and any future changes that might be made, are made known when the sell bonus goes on.

Jaedenkaal

Player1575 said:

@Brigby any chances on removing the teammate power restriction on Gambit's black before this goes live? It's overkill to keep that on there when he doesn't generate AP at near the same level he used to. As mentioned previously, Iron Man 40 and Vulture can both generate more AP than him in the same time frame, and much more easily in the case of Vulture.

I wasn’t particularly fond of the 0/0/5 gambattery days, either.

Farmerbink

This just feels outrageously overdone. Yes he was too much, but now he’s virtually useless. Without being allowed to feed allies red/purple, he still has to be the primary key for any team he’s on. 

Only problem is that now neither of his other abilities are good enough to justify that. If his red somehow interacted with more charged tiles, he might be worth trying to indirectly feed his allies AP. As it is, all he has going for him is moderate damage on purple. Know who else does moderate damage? Every 5*.

What makes Gambit special now? Only his black drawback. 

KGB

Brigby said:

Player1575 said:

Brigby any chances on removing the teammate power restriction on Gambit's black before this goes live? It's overkill to keep that on there when he doesn't generate AP at near the same level he used to. As mentioned previously, Iron Man 40 and Vulture can both generate more AP than him in the same time frame, and much more easily in the case of Vulture.

They're still evaluating his design, but rest assured that suggestion is an idea we've brought up to the development team for their consideration.

In that case why not:

- Leave his Red unchanged.

- Keep the Purple change.

- Change his Black to only generate AP when Gambit is in front (instead of the repeater tile).

This means he's weak on defense since players can place him in the back where he can't generate AP. On offense you have to make sure he can tank in order to reliably generate AP.

More importantly they could restore 3* Gambit as well since the Black change means Gambattery isn't really feasible.

KGB

Jaedenkaal

KGB said:

- Change his Black to only generate AP when Gambit is in front (instead of the repeater tile).

This means he's weak on defense since players can place him in the back where he can't generate AP. On offense you have to make sure he can tank in order to reliably generate AP.

More importantly they could restore 3* Gambit as well since the Black change means Gambattery isn't really feasible.

KGB

I don't think Gambit is the "everyone behind me" kinda guy.

zodiac339

@Brigby Something that might help Gambit’s redesign at least a little is something like this. Adding a line to Aces and Eights:
“If this power doesn’t destroy any charged tiles, refund 3 Red AP.”

A full ten red AP to break 2 regular tiles and make 2 charged tiles is really bad, even when generating his own AP. Adding a refund to that first use would really help his useability. Bringing the refund up to 4 at ranks 4 or 5 would really sweeten the deal when not using him with a Charged Tile creator.

GrimSkald

I want to take another look at his black, both to spell out how it will work and to reflect on how much of a nerf it is.  Honestly, I think it's a really big one, and I'll go into why.

As it currently exists, pre-nerf, it's a straight +4 AP/turn (2 red, 2 purple) to you, -2 AP to your opponent.  I'm not going to argue against it being too powerful - I thoroughly believe it is.  Heck, even removing the negative component, I think it's still good.  But anyway, that's neither here nor there, I want to look at how much AP it will generate post-nerf.

So, turn 1 it will place that repeater tile.  Turn 2, that repeater tile will tick down to 1.  Turn 3, it generates 6 AP total (three red, three purple.)  Turn 4 it will tick down to 1 again, turn 5 it will generate 6 AP, etc.

So in an ideal world, it will generate, on average 2 AP/Turn for the first 3 turns, then shift to 3 AP/Turn.  Trouble is, every time that repeater is destroyed, that "first 3 turns" lesser AP gain resets again.  And repeater tiles get destroyed. They get destroyed a lot.  I use Thor's yellow all the time (usually because I have nothing better to do with Yellow,) and I cannot tell you how many times I've used the power with no benefit at all (i.e. it was destroyed before it could produce 1 protect tile.)  It always seems worse than it is, of course, but regardless, it's a lot.

Someone with a good simulator should please chime in on this, but at this point I'm estimating that his AP production will be tremendously reduced.  There's a non-zero chance that the repeater will be destroyed every time before it actually ticks.  That is to say, the black power does not yield any AP at all over the course of the match.  It's probably not a high chance, but I'm betting it's statistically significant.

Actually, I realized the above is not quite accurate - the passive doesn't fire on the first turn, so it will be turn 4 before you see any benefit from the power, but the above is a good model for what happens after the match is underway - 3 AP/Turn while the tile exists, but dipping down to 2 or even 0 frequently depending on how often the repeater gets destroyed.

Anyway, just my $.02 on the power.  Do I have any suggestions?  Honestly, making it a 1-turn repeater will go a long way toward making it useful, even if the AP on it is reduced.  Even 4/turn at 5 covers doesn't seem unreasonable - that repeater is going to get destroyed and it will not generate anything when it gets laid down.

Jaedenkaal

Bring someone to Fortify it every turn, I guess?

MoosePrime

If you can get two repeaters, will it double the AP gain?

Jaedenkaal

MoosePrime said:

If you can get two repeaters, will it double the AP gain?

Presumably, except that it only creates one if another doesn't exist. I guess edge case if you can get your first one locked, and then unlocked later?

GrimSkald

Jaedenkaal said:

Bring someone to Fortify it every turn, I guess?

Sure, but the only character to do that regularly, without cost, is Green Goblin, and Gambit blocks the Goblin's purple. So that's Meh.

Shuri can fortify it with her Red, but hers is random - I think it prioritizes special tiles over basic... no, wait, Gambit's red blocks it.

I think that's it for characters - Repeater tiles aren't specifically targeted by anyone but Goblin.  A few supports fortify random specials, but they're random as to what they fortify, and also random as to whether or not they fire.

Jaedenkaal

Oh right, Hawkeye only does CD tiles. Well that's unfortunate.

ZeroKarma

After some time thinking about the degree of nerfage, I think making all 3 changes is too much. 

Making 1 change likely brings him back to the pack. You could change the purple to open up the counters and I think he still wins the day, but only moderately so. 

Making 2 changes moves him to the middle of the pack. No longer an auto-include and definitely going to be a target on defense. 

Making all 3 changes is going to crush him. I have to play with him to try it, and I wish there were a special node where the changes could be tested and feedback given. That should be possible, shouldn't it? 

Besides the point, it is now clear that he has competition in the meta, and I find the timing so....odd, when they do these nerfs unless it's meant to get you to spend a ton of cash now on Okoye. She is absolutely worth it, and an excellent example of character design which has a number of intriguing possibilities on offense but is not spectacular on defense. It would be great if they could do this an create a defensive character someday. 

Now that I think of it, the timing does make sense. They got a good character and want to monetize her but can't quite do it with Gambit around. Nerf incoming!

GrimSkald

ZeroKarma said:

After some time thinking about the degree of nerfage, I think making all 3 changes is too much. 

Making 1 change likely brings him back to the pack. You could change the purple to open up the counters and I think he still wins the day, but only moderately so. 

Making 2 changes moves him to the middle of the pack. No longer an auto-include and definitely going to be a target on defense. 

Making all 3 changes is going to crush him. I have to play with him to try it, and I wish there were a special node where the changes could be tested and feedback given. That should be possible, shouldn't it? 

Besides the point, it is now clear that he has competition in the meta, and I find the timing so....odd, when they do these nerfs unless it's meant to get you to spend a ton of cash now on Okoye. She is absolutely worth it, and an excellent example of character design which has a number of intriguing possibilities on offense but is not spectacular on defense. It would be great if they could do this an create a defensive character someday. 

Now that I think of it, the timing does make sense. They got a good character and want to monetize her but can't quite do it with Gambit around. Nerf incoming!

I agree in general - though I think it's his black that is most in need of a nerf.  If you leave his black untouched, but, say, nerf the other two?  No, that probably does bring him into the pack, but he becomes a pain in the tinykitty on both offense and defense.  He'll be a character you hate to face, but also a character who is no fun to use.

I honestly think the change to his purple is a good one - he shuts down just too much with it not-nerfed.  He really disables a significant portion of the 5* tier.

In general, I think they should nerf the black, but not quite as much as they have in the prelude.  I think the change to the purple is fine - more damage for less utility.  It's the red that has been taken from a top-notch skill to almost useless.  They should leave it the same or change it completely.

GrimSkald

Jaedenkaal said:

Oh right, Hawkeye only does CD tiles. Well that's unfortunate.

Yeah, I actually have Hawkeye but don't have a reasonable Goblin, so I really don't like that Hawkeye doesn't fortify repeaters, but I have to admit, it's fair.  Hawkeye really doesn't need the added utility - he's a solid character that is half of one of the best combos in the game (Coulson/Hawkeye is capable of taking down pretty much any other team so long as you can survive long enough to start getting CDs off.)  Goblin... needed the boost, and probably could use a bit more.

Smart80

GrimSkald said:

ZeroKarma said:

After some time thinking about the degree of nerfage, I think making all 3 changes is too much. 

Making 1 change likely brings him back to the pack. You could change the purple to open up the counters and I think he still wins the day, but only moderately so. 

Making 2 changes moves him to the middle of the pack. No longer an auto-include and definitely going to be a target on defense. 

Making all 3 changes is going to crush him. I have to play with him to try it, and I wish there were a special node where the changes could be tested and feedback given. That should be possible, shouldn't it? 

Besides the point, it is now clear that he has competition in the meta, and I find the timing so....odd, when they do these nerfs unless it's meant to get you to spend a ton of cash now on Okoye. She is absolutely worth it, and an excellent example of character design which has a number of intriguing possibilities on offense but is not spectacular on defense. It would be great if they could do this an create a defensive character someday. 

Now that I think of it, the timing does make sense. They got a good character and want to monetize her but can't quite do it with Gambit around. Nerf incoming!

I agree in general - though I think it's his black that is most in need of a nerf.  If you leave his black untouched, but, say, nerf the other two?  No, that probably does bring him into the pack, but he becomes a pain in the tinykitty on both offense and defense.  He'll be a character you hate to face, but also a character who is no fun to use.

I honestly think the change to his purple is a good one - he shuts down just too much with it not-nerfed.  He really disables a significant portion of the 5* tier.

In general, I think they should nerf the black, but not quite as much as they have in the prelude.  I think the change to the purple is fine - more damage for less utility.  It's the red that has been taken from a top-notch skill to almost useless.  They should leave it the same or change it completely.

Make purple only overwrite basic tiles
Keep red the same
Delete ap steal from black (i assume whoever came up with that ‘nerf’ was fired on the spot, yet made ceo after digital day..)

tph_james

Gambit is actually slow without Black bolt. Without black bolt, he needs 14 red AP to deal most damage. And to keep dealing most damage, u have to protect the two only charged tiles he himself creates. If both charged tiles are matched or destroyed, he needs to start all over to collect 14 AP again. So as a standalone, he's not that OP. Why don't blame black bolt? 
Reasonable nerf will be keeping his red, either reduce his AP generation or his AP destruction. Might as well keep his purple also, because of reduced AP generation, his purple will be too slow to be useful.