** Moonstone (Dark Avengers) ** [PRE 2015-05]

Unknown

I've got her 4/5/3 right now, and a black cover in cache. She's probably not going to see much use either way, so I think I'll use the cover rather than toss it.

Really, 5/3/5 is probably just as valid as any other build since you'll likely have someone else on red damage. But again, doubt I'll use her except in events where she's required/needed.

Unknown

I've got a 4/3/4 right now with a black cover in cache... any more comments regarding on what to build her ?

Unknown

I am 1 cover away from my 5/5/3. I don't see the extra 2 black covers as terribly useful.
1) There are not that many counters that start at 4 or higher in PvP. In PvE there are quite a few, but at 17AP, you are only going to be able to get 1 anyways.
2) Because there are so few counters to be found, the secondary effect of always stunning and controlling a counter at lvl 5 black is kind of useless.

I see the ability as an extremely expensive stun that has a secondary effect of taking control of a counter.

Unknown

For some reason I got a ton of her covers right around the time of her release. I went 5/5/3 even though there's no reason to use her as a red damage dealer because there are much better ones out there. But her black seems even worse. Just doesn't seem worth maxing out for the cost. If her level 5 black was a full-team stun instead of a one-character stun, that might make it more worthwhile.

As it is, I literally haven't used her once since the Dark Avengers tourney. I'd say the character is a bust.

Unknown

OK, her purple has been changed with the December 5 update:

Moonstone has further harnessed her Kree powers and brought down the sheer chaos of her Gravity Warp. She has learned to create a localized Gravity Warp that weakens her opponent's powers and can cause massive explosions on enemies that are not actively using powers.
Moonstone (Dark Avengers Ms. Marvel)
Gravity Warp - Purple 8 AP
Moonstone manipulates gravity, warping a random Purple or Black Special tile to the location of a chosen basic tile. If there are no valid Special tiles, the warp collases doing 75 damage.
Level 2: Can warp Red Special tiles. Collapse damage increased to 86.
Level 3: Can warp Yellow Special tiles. Collapse damage increased to 98.
Level 4: Can warp Blue Special tiles. Collapse damage increased to 109.
Level 5: Can warp any Special tile. Collapse damage increased to 120.

I have to say, I like this change for purple. A lot more useful and I feel it very much fits the character's theme of gravity-based powers. (For reference, Moonstone's powers on Wikipedia)

I would've liked to see level 5 give her the ability to warp any tile, special or basic, though.

Still not going to bother leveling her, but this is a definite improvement.

Unknown

The purple change is a bit of a dud, you can't select which special tile you want to move - so, unless there is only one special tile on the board, it's random. Hits for about 1000 damage at max level with no special tiles on the board.

Unknown

The Ladder wrote:

The purple change is a bit of a dud, you can't select which special tile you want to move - so, unless there is only one special tile on the board, it's random. Hits for about 1000 damage at max level with no special tiles on the board.

Could you be bothered to give me exact damage, please? (for Compendium) Also, I assume you have it at rank 5.

Unknown

Sure - 1069. And yes, I have gravity warp at level 5, moonstone at max 85.

Unknown

The Ladder wrote:

Sure - 1069. And yes, I have gravity warp at level 5, moonstone at max 85.

Not that bad for 8 purple. Sucks that you can't get both damage and the swap. Makes her kinda useless to run with Spidey (assuming it will swap your own special tiles).

Edit: Just tested it and it's bugged. If you have only your own special tiles on board, it does no damage and no swap. All it does is destroy the selected tile. What a ****. If both teams have special tiles, it draws from the enemy team.

Edit2: I take that back. It does do the damage but I guess the destroyed tile modifies it from the listed damage. My Moonstone is low lvl that I earlier assumed the damage was just tile damage. Destroying an env tile produces the exact listed damage.

I think I might aim top 25 at this event and start using her with Spidey.

Dayv

I'm at 3/3/3 with a black cover in my cache and I can't decide whether to apply it. It's too expensive by several AP, but otherwise it's a nice ability to have on hand. I'd like her purple a lot more if you could select the affected special tile.

Unknown

The purple seems almost useless, and gets more so as you rank it up, because there's less chance to just use it to deal damage, and at the same time any surgical use you might get out of it is radically diminished.

I think it needs to either allow you to choose the tile to swap with (and even then it's probably too weak), or deal the damage regardless of whether it works or not (which would make it worthwhile).

Dayv

Saeviomage wrote:

The purple seems almost useless, and gets more so as you rank it up, because there's less chance to just use it to deal damage, and at the same time any surgical use you might get out of it is radically diminished.

I think it needs to either allow you to choose the tile to swap with (and even then it's probably too weak), or deal the damage regardless of whether it works or not (which would make it worthwhile).

Agreed.

All of her powers have downsides:

Purple is very difficult to use effectively. If there's more than one enemy special tile, you'll be hard pressed to get the desired effects out of it.

Red damage is based on having red tiles on the board to do decent damage, which you are collecting to fuel it. So you have to collect red AP and then do other matches for a few rounds to keep from wasting it.

Black is just too expensive by 5 or 6 AP.

Marty17

I still don't get how the purple power works. I get you choose a tile & it's swapped to somewhere else...

Unknown

Marty17 wrote:

I still don't get how the purple power works. I get you choose a tile & it's swapped to somewhere else...

You have it backwards. You choose a tile that gets replaced, and it grabs a random special tile off the board and moves it to that position.

Which actually works pretty well in the Bad is Good tourney, since you're not going to see any special tiles that Daken doesn't put down, it's essentially an easy way to make a red match and maybe clear some enemy strike tiles.

Spoit

No, you also have bullseye protect tiles.

OnesOwnGrief

Well, the way I see it. You also have the choice if which area to fight in during PvP. Been figuring out which would be optimum for the group in which I'm running. I've been running Moonstone with Daken as lead. The green matches buff her red power a lot. One thing very bifocals though is that the Dark Avengers lack a solid AP generator. Ragnarok is OK as a green generator but outside of using forest, it's kinda annoying to build AP.

She's really not a good character on her own and it's quite difficult to see just exactly where she shines. It would be nice if the Dark Avengers used more than Black and Purple for a majority of the characters.

Marty17

soupfist wrote:

Marty17 wrote:

I still don't get how the purple power works. I get you choose a tile & it's swapped to somewhere else...

You have it backwards. You choose a tile that gets replaced, and it grabs a random special tile off the board and moves it to that position.

Which actually works pretty well in the Bad is Good tourney, since you're not going to see any special tiles that Daken doesn't put down, it's essentially an easy way to make a red match and maybe clear some enemy strike tiles.

Thanks, I'm kinda grasping her purple ability (even though it isn't that great but at least I KNOW how it works)

Unknown

I've been playing her in the Bad is Good tourney, and I think I underestimated her before.

Previously, I had dismissed her as a fairly insignificant character. However, her powers tend to work really well in Bad is Good. Red especially. Since you're likely to conserve red tiles anyway thanks to Daken, it's easy to build up to a very powerful blast that can decimate enemies.

Although I've never once used her Black skill. I honestly don't see a reason to level Black passed 3 since Countdown tiles are so rarely used. 5/5/3 seems like her ideal build.

Dayv

newdarkcloud wrote:

I've been playing her in the Bad is Good tourney, and I think I underestimated her before.

Previously, I had dismissed her as a fairly insignificant character. However, her powers tend to work really well in Bad is Good. Red especially. Since you're likely to conserve red tiles anyway thanks to Daken, it's easy to build up to a very powerful blast that can decimate enemies.

Although I've never once used her Black skill. I honestly don't see a reason to level Black passed 3 since Countdown tiles are so rarely used. 5/5/3 seems like her ideal build.

If you don't have a significantly levelable Ragnarok, but have Moonstone, she fills a decent offensive role in Bad is Good, but only because the character selection is so limited there.

I've used her black skill, but only once or twice -- after Bullseye got knocked out.

Ronfar

Is is just me, or does Gravity Warp actually do this, instead of what the description says?

If there is an enemy special tile on the board, choose one at random and swap it with the targeted tile. If there are no enemy special tiles on the board but there are allied special tiles, swap one of them with the targeted tile, destroy the special tile that was moved, and do damage. If there are no special tiles at all, destroy the targeted tile and do damage.