Nerf Kitties that are below level 450

TranscendGod

Before Kitty, the 4* meta was fairly diverse. But shortly after her release, low level Kitties (mostly in the 300-400 range) ruined the 4* meta until Bishop helped mitigate the damage. Now the meta has almost recovered, and it is mostly thanks to Bishop. Bishop counters fast damage teams that trigger his passives easily. There are many slow damage teams that counter Bishop effectively. And even more teams that can counter those teams effectively.

Bishop is a terrible problem for 5* players, and a simple fix would be to make Bishop's passives only work against sub level 450 characters.

Low level Kitties are over powered relative to their MMR. She augments special tiles at a ridiculous rate, and her purple passive counters some of the best 4* abilities. She is not just a problem with Rocket and Groot, she is brutal when combined with virtually any other character that passively creates special tiles (and is often paired with Daken at even lower MMRs).

Other 4* Kitty counters are far less effective, and make you much more vulnerable on defense. Sabretooth is far worse against Kitty for 4* players unless he is boosted (which is relatively rare).

 

Despite having access to Bishop, low level Kitties are still a problem for 4* MMR. You can keep champion Kitty as is, just reduce her numbers at lower levels (make her yellow more comparable to Nico's purple passive until she gets close to level 450).

peterdark

I really wanted to build a team around Nico's purple but was waiting on covers. Then out pops a yellow Kitty cover. I've now taken the BH off Nico as there's no point running her if you have 1 yellow Kitty.

MegaBee

So, you're saying nerf tinykitty?

BoyWonder1914

TranscendGod said:

Bishop is a terrible problem for 5* players, and a simple fix would be to make Bishop's passives only work against sub level 450 characters.

I can't tell if this post is some kind of satirical response to the "Nerf Bishop" thread yet. 

tiomono

BoyWonder1914 said:

TranscendGod said:

Bishop is a terrible problem for 5* players, and a simple fix would be to make Bishop's passives only work against sub level 450 characters.

I can't tell if this post is some kind of satirical response to the "Nerf Bishop" thread yet. 

I'm leaning satire as another topic on nerfing passives was made at about the same time by the same person. Only 33 posts since Oct of 2015 also means they lurk more than comment. Just feels more satire than someone wanting to truly discuss something. But I could be wrong.

To the OP. I would not call gamora,groot, and medusa diverse. There was an undeniable wall of that for 4* play before kitty. If you did not have the counters you were struggling.

Neutering bishop vs all 5's is a horrible idea. Giving 5* players options to deal with him is a good idea.

TranscendGod

Hah, it's true that I don't comment much. But this is not intended to be satire and I would like to have a conversation about tinykitty (nice call on that one!). I posted because I wanted to ensure greater visibility for the 3* and 4* perspective.

I agree that there are better, less extreme changes for Bishop that could also fix the problem for 5* players without making him useless for 4* players. For example, you could make it so that his damage threshold is proportional to the average enemy team level. So that normal match damage won't trigger his passives, but powers and large strike tiles will.

The 4* meta was not dominated by gamora, groot, medusa before Kitty's release. In fact, it was at it's most diverse point in the history of MPQ. There were Carol teams, Peggy teams, America teams, Rogue teams, Vulture teams, and many other 4* and randomly covered 5* teams in the 300-400 range. The medusa teams had become much less common in events like simulator because so many strong counters had emerged over time (such as carol, R&G, rulk or hulk teams). I know this because I used to love playing fast counters against those teams and they had become much more difficult to find than in the past. And in normal PvP that have a featured character (other than a GotG character or medusa), it was never particularly powerful or popular, especially when R&G or medusa weren't boosted.

Tinykitty is not just a problem for 4* players. I've talked to dozens of 3* players, and a tinykitty with just a few yellow covers are an absolute nightmare for them. 3* counters to kitty are far slower and less effective than 4 or 5* counters. A friend of mine who is a 2* player has even run into a 2* daken + 1 yellow cover kitty who just destroyed her in PvP. This forum is dominated by 5* players who don't have much experience with lower MMRs.  A typical 3* player might have about half of the tier championed, with most of them under level 200. They have relatively low health and don't do that much damage. To fight a character in their MMR that gives their opponent match damage like 550 max champion 5s within a few turns is pretty ridiculous.

I personally don't have too much trouble with tinykitties (mostly thanks to Bishop). I hit 1200+ in PvP and do well in PvE. In fact, I used to specifically target her in simulator after I got Bishop to discourage her use. But most 4* players don't have a roster like mine, and most 3* players are in a difficult situation.

tiomono

I actually felt the same way about oml. I felt his abilities at one or 2 covers needed to be reduced but left alone at the higher covers.

That way he would be the same at champ status but less effective at lower covers. Then they addressed him and it was harsh. He is the poster child for bad nerfs. He is the reason they went soft on gambit and it wasn't enough. And I hope he is the reason they do not try and touch kitty.

They have released counters for kitty. They can continue to put them out for all I care. But when they try and change a character it seldom goes well.

shardwick

peterdark said:

I really wanted to build a team around Nico's purple but was waiting on covers. Then out pops a yellow Kitty cover. I've now taken the BH off Nico as there's no point running her if you have 1 yellow Kitty.

Why not run her with Kitty? You'd have two characters that can create special tiles plus improve them every turn. Nico will stay in the background and just keep popping out protect tiles with her cheaper yellow. I'm surprised I don't see more Nico and Kitty teams.

tiomono

shardwick said:

peterdark said:

I really wanted to build a team around Nico's purple but was waiting on covers. Then out pops a yellow Kitty cover. I've now taken the BH off Nico as there's no point running her if you have 1 yellow Kitty.

Why not run her with Kitty? You'd have two characters that can create special tiles plus improve them every turn. Nico will stay in the background and just keep popping out protect tiles with her cheaper yellow. I'm surprised I don't see more Nico and Kitty teams.

Because nico first has to take damage to be able to use her actives. 

TranscendGod

tiomono said:

I actually felt the same way about oml. I felt his abilities at one or 2 covers needed to be reduced but left alone at the higher covers.

That way he would be the same at champ status but less effective at lower covers. Then they addressed him and it was harsh. He is the poster child for bad nerfs. He is the reason they went soft on gambit and it wasn't enough. And I hope he is the reason they do not try and touch kitty.

They have released counters for kitty. They can continue to put them out for all I care. But when they try and change a character it seldom goes well.

I agree. Most of their nerfs have been too extreme. They should have only reduced OML when below 450, and should restore him to his previous status when 450+. If they release more effective Kitty counters, I would be satisfied (although it's unlikely to help 3* players who are struggling with her).

Daredevil217

What is wrong with Sabretooth and Thanos as 4* counters? Vulture goes airborne and destroys specials, Prowler, Elektra and Medusa steal them, Thing puts down beefy protects, Iceman/Gamora with blue boosts can throw a lengthy stun after a single match. Dazzler removes specials getting hit once, X-23 has one of the best true heals, Kraven punishes special tile makers, MEH Hulk and Chavez create all kinds or board chaos. 

Basically what I’m saying is that there are over 80 4* characters. I find it hard to believe that none of these characters can beat Kitty. Especially when you get to bring three. 

Also the 4* meta was not more diverse before. Not by a long shot. It was ALL Grockmordusa. Because everyone could get them. Not everyone can get that specific Kitty cover. I’m sure those that do play her a lot, but not everyone is so lucky. 

TranscendGod

Daredevil217 said:

What is wrong with Sabretooth and Thanos as 4* counters? Vulture goes airborne and destroys specials, Prowler, Elektra and Medusa steal them, Thing puts down beefy protects, Iceman/Gamora with blue boosts can throw a lengthy stun after a single match. Dazzler removes specials getting hit once, X-23 has one of the best true heals, Kraven punishes special tile makers, MEH Hulk and Chavez create all kinds or board chaos. 

Basically what I’m saying is that there are over 80 4* characters. I find it hard to believe that none of these characters can beat Kitty. Especially when you get to bring three. 

Also the 4* meta was not more diverse before. Not by a long shot. It was ALL Grockmordusa. Because everyone could get them. Not everyone can get that specific Kitty cover. I’m sure those that do play her a lot, but not everyone is so lucky. 

First of all, the 4* meta became incredibly diverse over the ~6-8 months before Kitty's release. I know because I could climb from 0-2000 in simulator while using and fighting against a different team in every match. Prior to that, yeah, RGM was an incredibly popular team in PvP events where you could choose all 3 characters. They were never common in the majority of PvP events unless the featured character was GotG or medusa or R&G was boosted. And even in choose 3 PvPs it became much less popular throughout 2018 (to the point where it became somewhat difficult to find in simulator).

R&G, Gamora, and Medusa were easy to acquire in the second half of 2017 because they were still in the latest 12. But by early 2018, all 3 had become vintage characters. Over time, a large percentage of the 4* players with those 3 characters transitioned to 5* land. Most of the new 4* players did not have them (and now, there's an even smaller % of 4* players with all 3 of those characters champed). For a 3* player transitioning to 4* land, it would be difficult to get all 3 without using all of their bonus heroes for quite a long time. And by that point, they'd be close to having enough legendary pulls for 5* champs.

In normal PvPs with a featured character that isn't particularly useful, unboosted 4s tend to be too weak or inconsistent to effectively counter Gritty without taking massive amounts of damage. Effective TinyKitty teams are far more painful than any other team in 3* or 4* MMR. First I'll explain why many of the 4s you listed are not sufficiently effective against Gritty. Then I'll discuss the much worse team (Carnage + Kitty).

X-23 (especially unboosted) has weak actives and her healing is rapidly outpaced by Kitty's yellow.

Kraven's passive is too weak, especially considering his incredibly bad actives. Sure, he'll buy you some time, but also contribute relatively little beyond that.

Dazzler requires you to use a character like R&G or Carnage (which means you'll often have to use two unboosted characters). It also requires you to make a match with her (which can be difficult when the featured character shares her colors). At first it seems great, you remove the enemy strike tiles and stun kitty for a while (after Dazzler gets hit fairly hard). But after that, you're in for a long painful fight. You have no good way to deal damage quickly. Kitty's purple is incredible against R&G's active abilities, and it's good for removing Dazzler strikes. Carnage is a double edged sword in this matchup. Can be great for maintaining a stun lock, but you'll also have to deal with large attack tiles for at least a turn before Dazzler can remove them. Unboosted, she can only take a few Kitty enhanced hits before she's down and you're in big trouble.

Iceman: I agree that you have a pretty good chance of a turn 2 stun with boosts, and you might be able to keep Kitty stunned until you can finish her. But she'll still get to boost strike tiles at least once, so you're likely to take quite a bit of damage. Could be decent if there's a boosted 4 that works well with him (or can remove special tiles), but you're in trouble if you can't turn 2 stun.

Gamora: Unless you can keep Kitty stunned (a little harder than with iceman), she'll remove Gamora's special tiles with her purple passive and eventually inflict lots of damage. Unlike iceman you can make a faster unboosted team by pairing her with R&G. Can be decent but you'll still take a fair amount of damage, and you're in serious trouble if you can't turn 2 stun.

Thing: Doesn't work that well in practice. First turn: You make a match with an ally of Thing. Second turn, Kitty pumps strike tiles and hits Thing hard (hope they don't get a cascade!). You get decent protect tiles. After that, Kitty continues to pump strike tiles but now you might not be able to activate Thing passive because he needs to have more health than the ally in front. You might get one more activation if you brought a lower health character. But then you'll find that most of the yellow tiles are protect tiles so you can't get many more. While Kitty continues to pump strikes until she is doing far more damage than you can protect. Once you account for Thing's relatively weak actives, he isn't an effective counter unless boosted.

Prowler: Way too slow and inconsistent. You need to wait for his passive to gradually fortify their strikes and get lucky with placement. Gives Kitty a long time to make enormous strike tiles. And then Kitty purple will remove the tiles you steal and eventually do massive damage.

Elektra. With 7 purple, you take two strike tiles and give them 3. Then Kitty purple proceeds to remove your strikes while pumping the tiny new ones you provided. She's terrible against Kitty.

Medusa: Way too slow and inconsistent. You need 10 purple and then quite a bit of luck with the shuffled tiles.

Vulture: Great once he gets going (and very powerful even when unboosted), but too slow to start. Even with boosts and a turn 2 black, he won't have 10 blue until the second time he takes flight. By then Kitty will have made massive strike tiles and inflicted incredible amounts of damage to your other characters. You'll win but likely require 2 health packs.

MEH requires a lucky initial board shake. Or great luck with his shuffling passive.

America: Great character (even unboosted), and her crit tiles definitely improve your odds of clearing enough strikes to stop Kitty. I use her quite a lot, but I still avoid Gritty because she can't consistently remove enough strike tiles.

Thanos: Too slow and fairly weak unboosted. His passively definitely helps and greatly improves your odds of reducing their strikes below 4 within a few turns (hope the featured character isn't an xman). But then they'll often have one or two very large strike tiles, and you're in for a long fight.

Sabretooth: Pretty damn awesome, and definitely a worthy counter when boosted. When unboosted, he can still be pretty good at the start but becomes much less effective as the fight drags on.

Most other 4s get destroyed by Gritty when unboosted (and even struggle when boosted). Which means that she dominates the meta most of time (and also events like simulator that don't have boosts). Sure, there are a few 4s that can be decent (with Bishop being the most consistent and effective overall). On average, you'll still take far more damage than almost any other team.

All that being said, a far more difficult team to fight is Kitty + Carnage. Against that team, the few somewhat decent counters to Gritty are much less effective. It's not as popular as Gritty because it is a bit slower and requires more health packs, but it is a god tier defensive team. And in choose 3 PvPs there are several third characters that can make them even worse. If you know of any effective 4* counters to Kitty Carnage then please let us know about them!

Finally, your comment doesn't address the 3* meta problem (I.E. Kitty + Daken, or Kitty + partially covered Carnage/R&G). How do you counter that with relatively low level 3* characters? You can sort of use 3* marvel's passive + black to stun Kitty (although it sure doesn't feel great to generate enemy strike tiles!). Kitty makes strike tiles too big too quickly. 3* characters don't last long. My alliance has over 100 active players, and many of them have 3* or 4* rosters. I've talked to several of them about these issues over the past year. There is no other 5* that causes so much trouble with just a few covers.

Again, I'm not asking for Kitty to be changed 450+. Just make her more comparable to other 5* characters when she's lower level.

TranscendGod

OJSP said:

TranscendGod said:

If you know of any effective 4* counters to Kitty Carnage then please let us know about them!

I'm quite sure I've used Medusa MrF to beat them before, but it really depends on a lot of things like our levels, their levels and the board. Boost APs.

Is that prior to the MrF change? I could see the old MrF being pretty awesome at locking down kitty with medusa generating blue (and MrF swaps matching away their giant attack tiles).

tiomono

@TranscendGod

Many people calling for nerfs to kitty based on her prevalence in lower tiers than 5* play will all call her either low levels or low covered. "At one yellow she is a problem."

Your list of ineffective counters all seem to have very well covered kitties fighting  them. If her purple is a problem for your countdown making friends she has 5 purple. If Kraven cannot keep up it's because she has multiple yellow covers. A level 345 kitty at 5 yellow can buff 5 tiles by 276 every turn. A level 288 kraven outpaces that when she has 8 specials on the board. That same level 345 kitty at 1 yellow is only boosting 5 tiles by 160 every turn. That level 288 champ kraven unboosted is only needing 4.5 tiles on the board to outpace kitties buffs. Any more than that and he is really outpacing her.

For a player to have a 5 yellow or 5 purple cover kitty would mean they are transitioning out of 4* play. They should have easier times beating 4* teams but being beat by actual champ 5* teams.

So are the problem kitties for 4* or 3* that are from level 300 to 400 high cover or no? A level 300 5* only has 3 covers. Level 400 has around 10 covers. A 10 cover 5 should absolutely be a problem in 4* play in my opinion.

KGB

@ tiomono,

Many players like myself are softcapping Kitty so she doesn't affect their MMR. She's the one character you MUST look at the opponent roster to see what her Yellow is. I've seen LOTS of Kittys at L300 or less with 3-5 yellow covers.

KGB

tiomono

KGB said:

@ tiomono,

Many players like myself are softcapping Kitty so she doesn't affect their MMR. She's the one character you MUST look at the opponent roster to see what her Yellow is. I've seen LOTS of Kittys at L300 or less with 3-5 yellow covers.

KGB

Ok? I'm not saying they are not out there. Im saying if they are intentionally low level they can be dealt with by counters in the 4* tier.

Thats clearly a high level player that could transition to the 5* game if they wanted to. If you can transition to 5's or are already there, you should have a variety of teams that can win matches vs 4* players that have no high cover 5's.

A 7 to 8 cover 5 should absolutely start to be an option on teams for 4* players. Especially if those covers landed in good spots on certain characters. Not just kitty.

TranscendGod

Most 5*s with 7 or 8 covers are incredibly weak on defense. Before Kitty, the best and most popular defensive 5* in this MMR was Jessica Jones. I think she's still the second best on defense. And there's a massive gap in difficulty between a 360 Jessica and a 360 Kitty. Jessica feels much more fair to fight against. Although you sometimes get unlucky with traps, they don't do much damage at that level.

If Kitty was more comparable to other 5s with similar coverage, this wouldn't be a problem. But she is far more powerful than the 2nd best defensive 5*. As KGB said, there are many players who have softcapped her. And virtually all new players are advised to set Kitty as their only bonus hero because of how much she can enhance a new roster.

All that we ask is that they make lower level Kitties a bit closer in power level to the other 5s.

Southside84

As a player transitioning from 3 to 4 star land, gritty is pretty much an auto skip if she's over a 300.  I have 20 four star champs, and gritty isn't worth the hassle between health packs and revenge losses.  I can comfortably fight anyone else 390 and lower.  Even with champs of kraven, prowler, dazzler, x23, and Chavez (all listed counters) a 270 gritty with 1 yellow and no other covers is a difficult task, and a bad board equals a loss.  No other 1 cover 5 star poses anywhere near that much danger

tiomono

TranscendGod said:

Most 5*s with 7 or 8 covers are incredibly weak on defense. Before Kitty, the best and most popular defensive 5* in this MMR was Jessica Jones. I think she's still the second best on defense. And there's a massive gap in difficulty between a 360 Jessica and a 360 Kitty. Jessica feels much more fair to fight against. Although you sometimes get unlucky with traps, they don't do much damage at that level.

If Kitty was more comparable to other 5s with similar coverage, this wouldn't be a problem. But she is far more powerful than the 2nd best defensive 5*. As KGB said, there are many players who have softcapped her. And virtually all new players are advised to set Kitty as their only bonus hero because of how much she can enhance a new roster.

All that we ask is that they make lower level Kitties a bit closer in power level to the other 5s.

She is actually comparable to thor at 5 green and okoye at 5 black. Jessica at 5 blue at the level you list does 5k per trap. She is not the only strong 5. But she is the only one that has a lot of counter options besides hit em hard. And a 1 yellow kitty is not some unstoppable monster.

If a 5 star cannot be a problem for 3 or 4 star characters then why progress up the tiers?

helix72

I'm a 4* player and I still have fairly good luck against Gritty teams with the old Grockmordusa counter team, Red Hulk Bomb. It does depend on the number of yellow covers, purple covers, and hit points the opposing Kitty has--it's not taking out any 5/5/3 450 Grittys.

Freddy

I strongly feel that groot is the problem and not Kitty. Champed groot strike tiles render all small teams up to 15k meaningless, and boost all thanos aeo. Kitty is only a problem because the strike tiles affect all matches and cascades. Changing groot to use attack tiles would solve all those problems.  And his blue could be changed to generate strike tiles instead.