Captain Hammertime and his broken friends

tiomono

fight4thedream said:

LLohm said:

I agree wholeheartedly with what @JRYUART is saying. But I do think a flip could occur where people stop desiring the ultimate end goal of having maxed champed 5*. 5* acquisition in my opinion is a big revenue driver as it creates desire to own and the path to that is limited by randomness with no sure way to acquire, unlike 4* covers and below, whose covers can be earned in both progression and placement rewards.

Since Worthy Cap and Bishop are allowing simple setups which can take down 550 5* with relative ease, does chasing 5* hard even make sense anymore or should people stop at just champed 5* status?

This creates a muddying of goals in my opinion. The top tier is less desired. People will likely go into serious deep hoarding to wait for the unicorn which will give them a good ability to play their game with power.

Hoarding definitely takes away a lot of desire to spend. Did the devs in their attempt to bridge the 4* and 5* tier destroy their own revenue by taking away their most prized and supposedly coveted tier? The periods of lackluster 5* releases does not help.

i argue that devs should instead release far more awesome 5* designs to drive their revenue instead of reducing their best tier to trophy tier.

I don't think I follow your train your of thought.

The people that stand to benefit most from these changes are big spenders. A player with a big Thanos and Black Panther are going to have a field day with low champed level Cap and Bishop teams in regular PvP. Players with a high level Surfer will also get to dust off the Skyrider and have a reason to use him in PvP. A high level Dr. Strange might also prove to be a relevant threat. 

And perhap most significantly, the people who will be able to champ and level these 4* characters the fastest are big spenders. I have already heard there are big league players looking forward to max champ Worthy Cap since he will be a good deterrent against people running Okoye/Thor.

If anything, it should be even more enticing to use resources now instead of hoard since max champing a 4* is much easier to accomplish than to do with a 5*. This is especially true if a player lacks a proper counter character. 

Furthermore, Bishop and Worthy Cap are not going to be able to take down a decent 5* team on their own (although I suppose a skilled player might be able to do it with the right 4* partner). They do need a decent offensive character to actually win and their best partners are in the 5* tier.  In fact, if there is any team that can be blamed for making having a maxed champ 5* irrelevant it's the Okoye/Thor, specifically the Deluxe version where Okoye tanks all her colors. 

To put things in perspective, Post-Gambit we have gone from:

Phase 1: Okoye/Thor meta
Phase 2: Okoye/Thor  and  Kitty/4* Grocket meta  (with Black Suit Spidey counter)
Phase 3: Okoye/Thor, Kitty/4* Grocket, JJ/Bishop and Hawkeye/Worthy Cap  (with Black Suit Spidey, Silver Surfer counters) 

We are going from a meta where one team could beat all teams and many teams could beat that one team to a meta of diversification where no one team can beat all teams and counter characters play a more significant role. 

I personally think in terms of game play and design this is a great move but I know there are players that will not enjoy this meta change. However, I fail to see how this would disincentivize a player who is a big spender as they will most likely have the roster and resources to thrive in this new meta enviornment. 

Those that will benefit most from this meta change:

1. Whales with a strong (500+) deep roster. They will be able to max champ 4* meta shifters faster than anyone else and will be able to handle 4* meta shifters better than anyone else because they will have high level counter characters. 

2. Sharks with a decent level strength roster and who have access to counter characters and play competively so are able to get 4* meta shifter covers faster than most of the player base.

3. 4* players who happen to have one or two 5* characters that partners well with a 4*. 

Those that are at a disadvantage from this change:

1. 5* players who do not have access to proper counter characters. They will find matches against specialized 5*/4* teams frustrating, if not outright unwinnable. 

2. 5* players who preferred the simplicity of soft Okoye/Thor meta. They will find the inability to speed through matches annoying. 

3. 5* players whose roster is comprised almost entirely of low level 5* champs.

Those that this meta change will probably have little effect on either way:

1. Players in battle chats and/or shield check rooms. They always find a way. 

As for your concerns regarding hoarding, I don't think this will cause more people to hoard. People hoard to maximize their advantage but if the current meta includes a new 4* and such player has no means to deal with such a meta, they are putting themselves at a serious disadvantage hoarding. Obviously this is roster dependant. 

Finally, if the devs are playing their cards right, they are cultivating a need in the 5* tier. While Silver Surfer is a legitimate counter to both Bishop and 4* Cap, many see him as lackluster due to power creep. I personally would prefer they buffed him but the more likely scenario is they release a character with a decent powerset that counters one or both. 

I do agree that the 5* tier has been less-inspired in terms of character design and hope they do more interesting things with the tier sometime in the near future. 

So I can beat gritshop with bssm, vulture, bishop. Is bssm a decent offensive character? Not really. And that only works when I can pick all 3 characters. Bishop is often paired with a single 5* when you only get to pick 2 characters. Worthy cap will be run with 5* hawkeye. How do I deal with the speddy ap gain that the enemy gets in that situation? Run a team of 2 4*'s in the hope they can deal with a 5*?

What is upsetting many 5* players is that they are having to stop running teams of 5* characters to defeat the walls of 4*'s paired with 5*'s.

Chrynos1989

fight4thedream said:

OJSP said:

fight4thedream said:

If anything, it should be even more enticing to use resources now instead of hoard since max champing a 4* is much easier to accomplish than to do with a 5*. This is especially true if a player lacks a proper counter character. 

-----
I personally think in terms of game play and design this is a great move but I know there are players that will not enjoy this meta change. However, I fail to see how this would disincentivize a player who is a big spender as they will most likely have the roster and resources to thrive in this new meta environment. 

-----
As for your concerns regarding hoarding, I don't think this will cause more people to hoard. People hoard to maximize their advantage but if the current meta includes a new 4* and such player has no means to deal with such a meta, they are putting themselves at a serious disadvantage hoarding. Obviously this is roster dependent. 

I agree with most of your post. But, if he gets nerfed in the future, people will be upset. On the other hand, if a lot of players  spend to get lvl 370 Cap ASAP, maybe he won't be nerfed. Catch-22.

It's the previous history of nerfs that is a problem for spenders (arguably not the major ones, because they would probably spend nonetheless). Some people would probably decide to stay in 4* land and keep hoarding (and it's entirely their right to do so. Nothing says they can't do it).

This is entirely an assumption on my part, but it seems the current dev team is not interested in nerfs. If they were, Okoye/Thor would have been hit with the nerf bat a long time ago. I think they are attempting to find ways to deal with Okoye/Thor without having to outright nerf them.  Considering their reported response on Bishop, I don't think we should expect a Worthy Cap nerf anytime in the near future. But you never know.

Btw, thanks for your Dr. Strange tip (on page 1). It did prove effective against Hawkeye/JJ/Worthy Cap. I used Surfer/Thor/Strange. @OJSP

As the OP of this thread, I’m pretty surprised that this thread has so much activity, actually with that kind of title.
The main problem in my opinion is, that countering a very strong character with an even stronger character isn’t working. What’s going to be the next char that overpowers cap?
I‘m not a fan of nerfs, gambit was destroyed, that’s a shame, although I had to chuckle a bit since those guys who built fat gambits with that 5$/7CP bug must have been pretty triggered.
It’s  more about doing small balancings, like only take gambits ap burn, add a little selfdamage to bishops blue or red and limit caps CDs to yellow tiles. With that these chars are still strong but can be beaten.
In it’s current form, cap HE isn’t beatable or only with very slow teams which will be a crutch in a so fast paced game. And after his boost runs out, caps damage threshold should go down if I’m right, so 3 and 4* will trigger him too

DyingLegend

Would you look at that, Hawkeye became relevant again!

bluewolf

You can say "the team isn't interested in rebalances" but let's consider again my info posted above about testing.

Each rebalance (the way they approach it) should - if done right - require the same extensive testing as a new character.  Thousands to millions of teams to test if done right.  Because they change powersets and that should mean you take that new character into testing to make sure you it works, isn't OP, etc.

With NO increase in resource pressure and almost no good way to build revenue from the extensive work involved in creating a new powerset (again, as they do things) the work involved in rebalancing characters is probably prohibitive at this point.

I mean you would think, at minimum, they would go back to characters like Emma or Talos and try to make people less annoyed at pulling them somehow.  But nothing has happened all year except at the very beginning of the year, under the old lead developer, when Mr F was rebalanced during "Fantastic January" or "World's Greatest Month" or whatever. Which was probably only done because all the 4 were in the game already.

Don't think they will be doing any more rebalances.

bluewolf

OJSP said:

Chrynos1989 said:

As the OP of this thread, I’m pretty surprised that this thread has so much activity, actually with that kind of title.

It's actually an important topic. I honestly think the title is a bit inappropriate, but I suppose it's just your way of expressing your frustration. I'd be happier if you could edit the title to be a bit clearer about who you're complaining about, but I'm not too bothered about it.

I wasn't going to be that guy, but I had a foster brother who died of cancer at 27 and left 3 kids behind.

And have a father with cancer.

Hammercap is at least semi-broken but it's still just a &%$! video game.

jp1

bluewolf said:

You can say "the team isn't interested in rebalances" but let's consider again my info posted above about testing.

Each rebalance (the way they approach it) should - if done right - require the same extensive testing as a new character.  Thousands to millions of teams to test if done right.  Because they change powersets and that should mean you take that new character into testing to make sure you it works, isn't OP, etc.

With NO increase in resource pressure and almost no good way to build revenue from the extensive work involved in creating a new powerset (again, as they do things) the work involved in rebalancing characters is probably prohibitive at this point.

I mean you would think, at minimum, they would go back to characters like Emma or Talos and try to make people less annoyed at pulling them somehow.  But nothing has happened all year except at the very beginning of the year, under the old lead developer, when Mr F was rebalanced during "Fantastic January" or "World's Greatest Month" or whatever. Which was probably only done because all the 4 were in the game already.

Don't think they will be doing any more rebalances.

Nothing in the game burns me more than spending 25 cp and getting a Talos cover. No need to rework him, just get rid of him entirely, so we aren’t wasting precious resources for garbage. I’m pretty sure nobody is chasing Talos.

tiomono

OJSP said:

bluewolf said:

You can say "the team isn't interested in rebalances" but let's consider again my info posted above about testing.

I agree with your opinion about playtesting. That number is staggering and we are all human with limitations. It is simply impossible at the current rate of new character releases to do proper team composition testing prior to a new character being released. It's possible they had an oversight and missed the synergy between Hawkeye and Cap, but that's why players feedback are also important as long as they're constructive.

Saying someone is broken and complaining without expanding the reasoning is not particularly helpful. We could assume what makes someone unhappy, but that's not the right way to communicate our displeasure.

If we tell the developers what mechanics specifically we are unhappy about with regards to Cap, we have a higher chance of getting that power(s) changed (or even Bishop's power(s)) instead of getting even stronger newer characters to counter them.

Like it or not, even though they are denying it, we as players are also the playtesters of the game and we have more time and manpower than them to find interesting combinations.

Specifically I dislike that for 5* players bishop and cap force you to deal with them until they are dead. If you target them first they will punish you. If you try to target them last, they will punish you. If you make a match 3 they pop a passive that leads to advantages for their team. If you get a cascade they can have 20+ ap before they even move a tile. At least cap requires 1 certain teammate to get the ap gain.

This is not a concern of this character gathered ap and hit me with a power. This is a concern that I took my turn and the enemy already has more ap than me without them even taking a turn.

DAZ0273

I also would welcome a thread name change but if not then I would acknowledge the OP clearly means no harm.

bluewolf

OJSP said:

Thinking about an alternative to changing Bishop's or Cap's power(s). I think the main issue is the low damage threshold that makes it almost inevitable for 5* characters to trigger their passives. But, increasing the threshold would render these characters weak against their own tier (similar issue with characters like 3* Cap Marvel and 4* Thing, and to a certain extent X-Force Deadpool as their levels go up).

What if there's a new character who punishes someone who jumps to the front? Either stunning or dealing damage to the jumper or destroying random APs or stopping the team from gaining AP for a turn? I don't think this is particularly OP as a power, because it's very niche.

I don't think I've seen this mentioned before and I don't know how feasible it is from the coding perspective.

Now...the game lets you choose the AI target (other than these special JIF characters).  But you, dear player...your characters jump around like a bunch of grasshoppers during cascades etc.

Not sure if the game would be able to discern between those two conditions if you were facing an AI-controlled character who punished the person moving to the front.

But that DOES sound like another cheap, easy to exploit defensive character if it couldn't.  Maybe that's the 4 we'll see in a few months......

acescracked

Two 4*s reinvigorated the general forum!

Chrynos1989

DAZ0273 said:

I also would welcome a thread name change but if not then I would acknowledge the OP clearly means no harm.

Here you go, was triggered, frustrated and awake for 36h, not a good combo to create a thread

bluewolf said:

OJSP said:

Chrynos1989 said:

As the OP of this thread, I’m pretty surprised that this thread has so much activity, actually with that kind of title.

It's actually an important topic. I honestly think the title is a bit inappropriate, but I suppose it's just your way of expressing your frustration. I'd be happier if you could edit the title to be a bit clearer about who you're complaining about, but I'm not too bothered about it.

I wasn't going to be that guy, but I had a foster brother who died of cancer at 27 and left 3 kids behind.

And have a father with cancer.

Hammercap is at least semi-broken but it's still just a &%$! video game.

Sorry to hear that, had two parents with cancer myself, they were both damn lucky since early discovery, but lost a lot good friends to cancer 
as stated above, title was chosen under the most unfortunate combination ob mental states 

OJSP said:

Chrynos1989 said:

As the OP of this thread, I’m pretty surprised that this thread has so much activity, actually with that kind of title.

It's actually an important topic. I honestly think the title is a bit inappropriate, but I suppose it's just your way of expressing your frustration. I'd be happier if you could edit the title to be a bit clearer about who you're complaining about, but I'm not too bothered about it.

Edited and sorry for first choice, as stated👆above

bluewolf

No harm, no foul......this combo can be frustrating.....the seeming carelessness of design grinds my gears too.

Bowgentle

Kudos for cleaning up the title, OP.

dkffiv

OJSP said:

Thinking about an alternative to changing Bishop's or Cap's power(s). I think the main issue is the low damage threshold that makes it almost inevitable for 5* characters to trigger their passives. But, increasing the threshold would render these characters weak against their own tier (similar issue with characters like 3* Cap Marvel and 4* Thing, and to a certain extent X-Force Deadpool as their levels go up).

What if there's a new character who punishes someone who jumps to the front (added for clarity: specifically due to their passive power)? Either stunning or dealing damage to the jumper or destroying random APs or stopping the team from gaining AP for a turn? I don't think this is particularly OP as a power, because it's very niche.

I don't think I've seen this mentioned before and I don't know how feasible it is from the coding perspective.

Or they could make it trigger off match 4 or greater (3* Loki, 4* JG) or special power firing/ damage (Doctor Strange, Kitty red).  Triggers are already built into the game.

jp1

Seems obvious that even though whales may hate these characters, they will likely spend chasing them. They have to hold on to their top placement at all costs. 

Whether or not the characters are broken is debatable, but I think from a revenue standpoint they are “working as designed”. 

Fun, fair, etc... All that matters to the people cutting the checks is ROI. I imagine it is higher on “broken” characters than anywhere else.

No idea why this is in a quote box.

LLohm

My thoughts @fight4thedream and you’re free to keep yours if you still don’t find the sense behind it. Both sides to the coin.

Whales don’t chase 4*. They’re byproducts of the act of chasing 5*.

The time for spending in the 4* tier has long past even if its meta. 

The sheer amount of pulls super whales need to cover those huge 550s are frequently enough to create more than a few maxed champed 4* via BH.

I can’t speak on behalf of the mega whales but I am betting that if their 550s are easily squashed by Worthy Cap and Bishop teams, it brings into light the question of why bother with 550s. 

Why did Demiurge try to relegate the worth of their 5* is more called into question. Once the shiniest trophies are trodden upon, it will result in loss of revenue as people don’t need or see the want to chase that anymore.

The chase for a specific 4*, diluted as it is is never the equivalent of the chase of a 5*.

To be more specific on hoarding, if players cannot find a 5* that tickles their fancy, buying will slow and people will just hoard instead. There are enough people walking around with 20k CP.

Warbringa

An issue with the jump characters and damage thresholds is that you have a character like Grocket.  So at first I thought why couldn't you just code them to say if damage is greater than x but less than y, they jump.  This would allow 4* match damage to trigger them but not 5* and should be an easy code. But then I forgot about strike tiles from Grocket....one of the whole reasons these jump characters were made....which breaks that simple logical fix.....thanks Grocket!

Honestly they need to make a 5* with a cheap, active power of 3 AP (pick your color).  Character X deals 2000 damage to target character and if a character jumps in front to absorb this damage they are automatically downed. This damage cannot be boosted by friendly tiles or allies powers and does not trigger allied passive powers.  Fixes all of your WorthyCap and Bishop problems.  Give the character two other decent abilities and you are set.

tiomono

Warbringa said:

An issue with the jump characters and damage thresholds is that you have a character like Grocket.  So at first I thought why couldn't you just code them to say if damage is greater than x but less than y, they jump.  This would allow 4* match damage to trigger them but not 5* and should be an easy code. But then I forgot about strike tiles from Grocket....one of the whole reasons these jump characters were made....which breaks that simple logical fix.....thanks Grocket!

Honestly they need to make a 5* with a cheap, active power of 3 AP (pick your color).  Character X deals 2000 damage to target character and if a character jumps in front to absorb this damage they are automatically downed. This damage cannot be boosted by friendly tiles or allies powers and does not trigger allied passive powers.  Fixes all of your WorthyCap and Bishop problems.  Give the character two other decent abilities and you are set.

Time to bring in 4* toad. At battle start he spits a sticky substance all over the battlefield that prevents opponents from moving around. Toad and his allies can still target whoever they choose.

jredd

tiomono said:

Warbringa said:

An issue with the jump characters and damage thresholds is that you have a character like Grocket.  So at first I thought why couldn't you just code them to say if damage is greater than x but less than y, they jump.  This would allow 4* match damage to trigger them but not 5* and should be an easy code. But then I forgot about strike tiles from Grocket....one of the whole reasons these jump characters were made....which breaks that simple logical fix.....thanks Grocket!

Honestly they need to make a 5* with a cheap, active power of 3 AP (pick your color).  Character X deals 2000 damage to target character and if a character jumps in front to absorb this damage they are automatically downed. This damage cannot be boosted by friendly tiles or allies powers and does not trigger allied passive powers.  Fixes all of your WorthyCap and Bishop problems.  Give the character two other decent abilities and you are set.

Time to bring in 4* toad. At battle start he spits a sticky substance all over the battlefield that prevents opponents from moving around. Toad and his allies can still target whoever they choose.

5* professor pull-my-finger should have had a passive that freezes the enemy team in place. he did it in the movies. would have made sense.

peterdark

Does this mean the focus is no longer to nerf bishop?