*** Spider-Man (Classic) ***

Unknown

Meh, I already gave up on waiting - I sold a couple of Spidey covers over the weekend. I'm sitting at 5/3/3 and don't want to have to make any decisions until after the nerf. Easy come, easy go.

Unknown

I have an unused purple that I got from BTI. If the funbalancing doesn't happen before it expires, I'll probably end up using it to put his purple to 5 regardless.

Unknown

Twysta wrote:

Use 'em or lose 'em.
Pretty sure you won't see a nerf in the next few days.

Yup. Pretty sure at this point we won't see a Spidey "funbalance" before the devs work out all the major kinks to their PvE MMR system. If the devs were to funbalance Spidey beforehand, PvE would be all-but-unplayable in any form to most high-level veterans. Spidey in his OP form, currently does serve a role an ugly Band-Aid to allow high-level to still beat 200+ encounters.

Keeping with this thread's theme, I'm sitting on a 4/3/4 Spidey, with 1/1/1 ticking away in the cache.

I've thought this situation through and through, thinking of how Spidey will be re-tuned in the manner of Rags/Thor/Wolv. Considering only what Spidey will be post-change, I am having an **extraordinarily** hard time reaching any other conclusion than 5/3/5 (which is insane now) for Spidey in the future. Am I insane? (or does anyone care to hear my logic on the matter?)

Unknown

Oh, believe me, I don't think there's a snowball's chance in Hades of getting a funbalance in time, but I thought this thread would: 1) be fun; and 2) let the devs know just how badly people need the Spidey nerf to come down.

Lyrian wrote:

I've thought this situation through and through, thinking of how Spidey will be re-tuned in the manner of Rags/Thor/Wolv. Considering only what Spidey will be post-change, I am having an **extraordinarily** hard time reaching any other conclusion than 5/3/5 (which is insane now) for Spidey in the future. Am I insane? (or does anyone care to hear my logic on the matter?)

I would be very, very interested in hearing your logic, actually.

I had been planning to sell my yellow tomorrow if no nerf by then, but maybe I should use it or make a second Spidey. My roster is 33/33 right now, but 450 HP is probably not a terrible investment for another slot, given that there will undoubtedly be a new character soon enough.

itstime1234

wathombe wrote:

Oh, believe me, I don't think there's a snowball's chance in Hades of getting a funbalance in time, but I thought this thread would: 1) be fun; and 2) let the devs know just how badly people need the Spidey nerf to come down.

Lyrian wrote:

I've thought this situation through and through, thinking of how Spidey will be re-tuned in the manner of Rags/Thor/Wolv. Considering only what Spidey will be post-change, I am having an **extraordinarily** hard time reaching any other conclusion than 5/3/5 (which is insane now) for Spidey in the future. Am I insane? (or does anyone care to hear my logic on the matter?)

I would be very, very interested in hearing your logic, actually.

I had been planning to sell my yellow tomorrow if no nerf by then, but maybe I should use it or make a second Spidey. My roster is 33/33 right now, but 450 HP is probably not a terrible investment for another slot, given that there will undoubtedly be a new character soon enough.

This is where I have to disagree. You badly need a nerf so that you can build him to the best you can before your covers expire. I can guarantee you there are many many people who dont want a Spidey nerf anytime soon.

Dayv

NotYou13 wrote:

Edit: Plus there's the ability to potentially respec down the line that makes me think I might be ok just going 4/4/5 for now.

Yeah, I'm not worrying about perfect future builds on characters due to be nerved down the road -- Respec is Coming™.

Unknown

itstime1234 wrote:

This is where I have to disagree. You badly need a nerf so that you can build him to the best you can before your covers expire. I can guarantee you there are many many people who dont want a Spidey nerf anytime soon.

Fair point! I hadn't really thought about it that way. Analogous to playing with the broken Patch, I suppose--everybody who has already built x/5/x wants to enjoy his or her broken Spidey for as long as possible.

Unknown

itstime1234 wrote:

wathombe wrote:

Oh, believe me, I don't think there's a snowball's chance in Hades of getting a funbalance in time, but I thought this thread would: 1) be fun; and 2) let the devs know just how badly people need the Spidey nerf to come down.

Lyrian wrote:

I've thought this situation through and through, thinking of how Spidey will be re-tuned in the manner of Rags/Thor/Wolv. Considering only what Spidey will be post-change, I am having an **extraordinarily** hard time reaching any other conclusion than 5/3/5 (which is insane now) for Spidey in the future. Am I insane? (or does anyone care to hear my logic on the matter?)

I would be very, very interested in hearing your logic, actually.

I had been planning to sell my yellow tomorrow if no nerf by then, but maybe I should use it or make a second Spidey. My roster is 33/33 right now, but 450 HP is probably not a terrible investment for another slot, given that there will undoubtedly be a new character soon enough.

This is where I have to disagree. You badly need a nerf so that you can build him to the best you can before your covers expire. I can guarantee you there are many many people who dont want a Spidey nerf anytime soon.

Actually, my debate is whether or not to let that blue cover expire or not. I would be more than satisfied with going 4/5/4, given my current situation. This would be the most ideal configuration given Spidey's current optimum configuration. Most would argue here that yellow or purple does not really matter as 5 blue ensures stunlock, which mitigates the need or healing or defense tiles.

For the sake of debate, I'll start typing my thoughts on the matter. It will be a bit though, as I tend to write longreads.

turul

Agreed on quick nerf. I want to pump iso in him, but only if he is worth it postnerf

Twysta

I think they learned their lesson with Rag (at least I hope they did) and I think they will try to keep Spiderman viable without being OP.
He's not overly strong now and helps to slow games, the main issue is the 2AP stun.
So if they raise this to their planned minimum 5AP cost which could spit out 2 web tiles then he's almost fixed... maybe.
Something like

Level 1: 6 AP Cost, 1 turn stun - extra stun turn per 2 web tiles - creates 1 web
Level 2: - 1 AP cost
Level 3: Creates extra web tile
Level 4: extra stun per 1 web tile instead of 2
Level 5: 2 Turn base stun/Extra web tile/ -1AP if base starts at 7AP.

Obviously this is just my 2 cents and the changes could be nothing like this.

Unknown

Going to try to keep this as short as possible, which may not flow as well as I had originally wanted.

Disclaimer: There are all my ideas and thoughts, which means I am just as credible on the subject as the next forum user. In the end, the only say on the matter that means anything belongs to the devs.


Premises:

-- All characters are tuned around a 3/3/3 core build, as no matter what build is used on any cover, 3 covers in any color will always occur during a full build.

-- Given this, the devs have designed a system where 3 covers is the "core build"; below 3 covers incurs penalties, above 3 covers generates benefits. Similar to the "skip tax/victory bonus" thread, it's all a matter of perspective (everything is a bonus from Rank 1 looking up, whereas everything is a penalty from Rank 5 looking down).

1: (Major penalty to skill functionality)
2: (Minor penalty to skill functionality)
3: (Baseline ability)
4: (Minor bonus to skill functionality)
5: (Major bonus to skill functionality)

-- At Rank 5 in a skill, there is some form of a "skill-defining" attribute that renders a skill beneficial above and beyond Ranks 1-4. This encourages specialization in skills over jack-of-all-trades builds, which end up as 5/4/4 in most situations, and often create a "no-best-build" category as the player has to make tradeoffs towards which skills to specialize in.

-- During rebalances, the devs have presented a history where they want to retain the gimmick a character uses, but is not afraid to rework a skill to redefine how the gimmick works.

-- 3 Star Characters are heavily weighted towards requiring most of their covers before unlocking the potential of most powers.


Looking at the skills,

YELLOW:

-- The two core healers in the game are OBW and Spidey. The advantage Spidey possesses is that while OBW's healing potential is fixed, Spidey's is variable, which has the **potential** for greater (or worse!) healing. This is key here, as this variability provides the devs with much flexibility in tuning Spidey's heals by playing on this risk factor.

-- OBW's heal is maxed at 1228, which is about 33-35% of an average hit point 2* character (3560). A main tuning question is then "What is considered to be an "average" heal for Spidey?" For the sake of argument, say that the devs keep 33-35% ratio, but scale that to the average hit points of a 3* character (5800). This places the average heal at 2000 hit points.

-- The next question is then "Well... how many web tiles are needed to generate an 'average' heal?" That's a question only the devs can answer. My guess here is 3 web tiles, given the framework for blue below. This creates enough of a potential that player may accept a reduced quick heal, instead of risking the existence of web tiles surviving on the board for a long period of time to generate a superior heal.

Therefore, I come up with these possible frameworks (3 covers is the baseline here - numbers arbitrary for explanation):

Yellow: 10 AP
1: Base heal 500, + 250 per web tile, 3000 max heal - 6 web tiles for average heal, 10 web tiles for max heal
2: Base heal 500, + 375 per web tile, 3000 max heal - 4 web tiles for average heal, 7 web tiles for max heal
3: Base heal 500, + 500 per web tile, 3000 max heal - 3 web tiles for average heal, 5 web tiles for max heal
4: Base heal 500, + 625 per web tile, 3000 max heal - 3 web tiles for above average heal (2375 vs 2000; nearly 50% of an average 3* hp), 4 web tiles for max heal
5: Possibility 1: Max heal increases to 4000 (obtaining superior healing efficiency and better maximum payout, although more web tiles would be needed for a 4000 hp heal - Potency specialization)
5: Possibility 2: Costs 1 AP less (reduces heal to 3 matches from 4, granting a speed specialization)

-- At 2 web tiles per Rank 3 Blue cast, two blue casts are needed to generate an "average" heal at Rank 2 and higher to increase the riskiness of the healing potential.

Blue: 6 AP (3 is baseline skill)
1: Stuns target for 1 turn; creates 1 random yellow web tile.
2: Stuns target for 2 turns.
3: Creates 2 random yellow web tiles.
4: Stuns target for 3 turns.
5: Stuns entire party for 1 turn. (Possible: Adds +1 or +2 to AP cost)

-- Still generates new yellow web tiles. These can be matched away from the board, generating risk towards healing potential. Also, as yellow tiles, they could be cannibalized to generate the AP needed to cast healing, increasing risk as the number of web tiles increase on the board.

-- Essentially creates "2-match" version of MWidow's Widow Sting at 5 blue, retaining most of his crowd control capacity. However, cost might increase from 6 to 7 or even 8 AP to accommodate this power boost to avoid permanent stunlock, which the devs do not want. The idea here is force a break in the action as the opponents untangle themselves from Spidey's webs. I thought about changing stun to 2/3/4/ 4-1-1 turns, but fear that 4-1-1 would result in chainlocks as the player gets a free turn to manipulate the board before the next cast of All Tied Up is required to keep the stun lock going. If 4-1-1 does happen, expect the a cost increase of +3 or +4 to move the cost into three match territory to prevent this from occurring.

-- I can't see 5 blue being "Creates 3 web tiles" as this would trivialize yellow healing and purple defense, and likely create a strong requirement for 5 blue as a mandatory build - which the devs are likely trying to avoid in this rework.

Purple: (3 is baseline)
This is one is rather easy and only requires a simple reordering of abilities. Other than the raw tile strength numbers itself, the core ability does not change from how it currently functions.

1: Creates 1 purple defense tile.
2: Increases defense tile strength by X% (Up to devs for tuning)
3: Creates 2 purple defense tiles.
4: Increases defense tile strength by X%
5: Creates 3 purple defense tiles.

-- Purple will likely be tuned to provide an upgrade path to Invisible Woman as the master of defense.

Summary of thoughts:

-- Post change, if you want any meaningful healing from Spidey, be prepared to be required to 5 Yellow him.
-- Post change, blue 5 will still be meaningful, but in a way that says "Oh tinykitty, the AI just miracle cascaded and will completely unload on me next turn. But, I can use Spidey to buy a few emergency turns to try to find a solution to this mess".
-- Post change, purple tile strength will likely be cut back (but still respectable), as to encourage building IWs for defense capabilities.

These are my thoughts on the matter, have at it folks.

Unknown

Thanks for putting all the time into that post, Lyrian! Serious food for thought.

And if the changes were similar to that, you would suggest 5/3/5 as the best (or your favorite) build? I assume this would be to maximize healing and defense while retaining a fair amount of stunning ability.

Phaserhawk

NotYou13 wrote:

So I'm currently sitting at 4/3/4 (Damn that stupid yellow misclick), level 57. I've got one of each cover sitting after the most recent Wolv tourney, but I'm not really sure how to use them. I'm inclined to just say screw it and go 4/4/5 with what I have instead of waiting for the 5th blue just because I have a feeling that by the time I get that last blue, All Tied Up will be nerfed pretty hard. I get the impression that his yellow will likely be changed to heal more based on covers with a set 12 AP cost and purple will probably be relatively unchanged, making 4/4/5 potentially viable post nerf depending on how badly they hit blue. Or do I wait for that blue cover to go 4/5/4 and sell the pink cover?

Thoughts?

Edit: Plus there's the ability to potentially respec down the line that makes me think I might be ok just going 4/4/5 for now.

If recent nerfs have any indication, spidey while being nerfed, while probably being buffed/tweaked at the same time. My gut feeling is that purple will be left the same, assuming they don't mess with the web tile feature, if they do, look to see purple have flat numbers instead of numbers based on web tiles, but purple will for the most part probably remained unchanged, however I hope that it also creates a web tile as well, it will fit with my nerfs as I predict.

For blue These are in order of what I feel most likely.
1: Blue stuns target for x turns, where x = web tiles on the board, cost 6 AP, use of skill will create a web tile (think they may add a bit of damage as a compensate, like getting punched in the face with a web ball)
2: 3 AP, do X damage, create a web tile, for every 3 web tiles on the board stun current target for 1 turn. (6 web = 2 turn stun). (you could do 2 web tiles as well, those numbers could be tweaked)
3: 9 AP, Aoe damage?, creates three web tiles, entire team stunned for 1-2 turns

Yellow, again assuming they keep the web tile feature
1: 9AP the same as it is but a huge heal nerf
2: 9AP consumes x web tiles for x health, with a 3 tile minimum
3: 6-9AP creates a web tile, spiderman and allies heal x amount for every three web tiles on the board
4: 9AP the same as it is but only spidey heals

These are my thoughts, blue is gonna get spanked, and basing alot on how they treated Wolvie's Green, it will go up in cost and do slightly less, which is why I think it will cost 6 but no less than 4, and the stun numbers will be reduced. Yellow will be dependent upon how they treat blue, and purple I think comes out buffed in the end with more protection and as said, I think purple should also be able to create a web tile on any random color, that way if they leave purple tied into web tiles, it actually can make it's own thus making it more reliable, and offsetting the nerfs on blue and yellow because you can at least create web tiles a third way, that's my gut feeling, it keeps spidey thematically the same, ie. making web tiles and locking down/protecting his team, without making him laughably weak like Rag's

but gone will be the days of, start with 3 blue AP, match 3 blue, stun everyone for 1, 2, 3 turns respectively, match blue again stun unstuneed for 4 turns, rinse and repeat, yeah, that's not gonna happen, we all know it, we all know it's OP'd, we love it, but we know it's too good and easy, they hope is that it's a good nerf like Thor and Wolvie, while keeping there usefulness, but reducing their overall power.

Twysta

Yeah I also think creating 3 webtiles is a bit much, I was just out of ideas on what to put haha.
That said making 5 blue do a 1 turn stun almost puts spidey into that venom category... really makes teh stun redundant and it would be mainly just used to create webtiles.

Unknown

wathombe wrote:

Thanks for putting all the time into that post, Lyrian! Serious food for thought.

And if the changes were similar to that, you would suggest 5/3/5 as the best (or your favorite) build? I assume this would be to maximize healing and defense while retaining a fair amount of stunning ability.

If the last few new characters serves as a guide, the answer is going to be "What do you want out of Spidey"? He is not going to be able to do everything all at once post-change. Can he be still be strong in blue post-change? Its possible. At the end of the day, its all going to be about how the numbers are tuned by the devs for each skill.

Take away the numbers though and looking at the framework alone... betting on blue post-change appears to be a really risky gamble.

Guidance on the matter by devs would be awesome, but as mentioned above, I don't see that happening until the PvE issues get worked out.

Spencer75

Great thoughtful post Lyrian!

Unknown

Twysta wrote:

Yeah I also think creating 3 webtiles is a bit much, I was just out of ideas on what to put haha.
That said making 5 blue do a 1 turn stun almost puts spidey into that venom category... really makes teh stun redundant and it would be mainly just used to create webtiles.

That is why if 5 Blue were to generate a MWidow type stun, it would surely require an AP cost boost.

Without web-tile generation being the specialty of 5 Blue, then the specialty has to be the stun. The question then, is do the devs want to allow Spidey to have a "Widow's Sting", and at what cost?

At best, it likely can't cost any less than Widow's Sting, at 9 AP. But, if the cost of blue jumps to 9 or more, would players even want that as it would indirectly cause his yellow and purple to become more expensive to cast because of the increased cost to generate web tiles? This would be a very hard pill to swallow for players wanting to specialize in stun and might be worth it for them, but at a very significant cost.

Unknown

Just posting to add my signature to the petition.

Hurry up devs. At high MMR there is a spidey on every team, and I'm too afraid to spend my Iso on fighting fire with fire.

reckless442

I don't understand the need to nerf Spidey at all. Yes, stunlock is effective, but it is not a guarantee to victory. On a bad board layout, he becomes useless. Moreover, the complaint seems to be that he skews PVP due to the easy stunlock. But he slows the game down significantly, which can be very costly in a PVP like NHB Elite. In the time it takes to play a couple of Spidey matches that depend on stunlock, you're likely to lose more points that you'll win.

Unknown

The devs have already said he's going to be "balanced," so while that might be an interesting discussion academically, it doesn't alter the fact that change is coming. Given that, I'd personally rather it come sooner than later.