ThaRoadWarrior said: Sekilicious said: As a 4* player looking to transition to 5* play these ‘mediocre’ characters are better than anything I have. There is a thread that showed we can transition using the Robbie Reyes Ghost Rider as a solo champ. In a meta with Griity and Thoyoke. I get everyone’s philosophy is if you’re not first you’re last but this is kind of ridiculous That was my first Grand Experiment thread that seems to have been retired with the sub-forum it existed in during a site cleanup. Mediocre chracters from the above tier are definitely better than who you have, but as soon as you champ them, the threats you get matched up against in PVP will immediately scale up to a degree you are likely to find oppressive. The big takeaway from my GRRR experience was that he was thoroughly ill-equipped to combat the Kitty/Rocket meta, because the qualitative difference between Kitty and Ghost Rider is not something that MMR takes into account, except I was then exclusively matched up against single champ kitty and max-champ rocket basically until Sabretooth was released. Her ability to scale damage turn on turn immediately and passively was something that even a hard hitting (relative to the time) Ghost Rider was too slow to do anything about. At that time pre-shard, it was very difficult to chase counter characters, even at the 4* tier, so I spent the entirity of that meta trying my best to come up with some sort of reasonable team to exist in there. Main event Hulk, my second champed 5* Dr Doom could do it if he legit died in the match, so that left me trying to go solo...it just felt incredibly punishing and there was no reasonable time-frame character growth option for me besides sticking it out or selling off my 5*s to drop back down.
Sekilicious said: As a 4* player looking to transition to 5* play these ‘mediocre’ characters are better than anything I have. There is a thread that showed we can transition using the Robbie Reyes Ghost Rider as a solo champ. In a meta with Griity and Thoyoke. I get everyone’s philosophy is if you’re not first you’re last but this is kind of ridiculous
ThaRoadWarrior said: I don't know, I had pretty modest goals I felt - full progression capable as a hybrid player without aggressively chasing optimal placement, and to be able to at least win matches offensively. Keep in mind in those days there was no SCL 10 PVE, no shard based growth, most characters were unfed, no wins-based progression in PVP, it was points or nice knowing you, so just winning and farming retals but never getting your score above 700 was a tough one. Things are different now, the meta is different, in some ways it could be easier to transition with a dud than it was then, but I still maintain there should be no absolute duds in the 5* tier personally. I don't know if that means there should be no head and shoulders standouts either though.
HoundofShadow said: You look at all the top meta 5* since Gambit era:Gambit, Thor, Okoye, Kitty, Prof X, BRB, Hulk, Apocalypse, Colossus, Wanda.All of them are straightforward, easy to play, has low stakes even when things go wrong, doesn't require complicated synergies and mostly work alone well.
HoundofShadow said: When you have characters like Mr Sinister, OMD, Knull, Ronan, Cyclops, Heimdall, Magneto released, they don't fit into the above mold: There are high stakes when things go wrong. So, you need to protect their trap tiles, repeaters and cds. You need to make sure they aren't replaced or matched away. Most of them takes 2-3 turns to process, which to some players feel like a century has passed by. Their synergies are "complicated". Unlike meta team where synergies are as straightforward as do A and get B, these group of characters' synergies would be something like do A, followed by C, wait a turn or 2 then do D and you'll reach B.
ThaRoadWarrior said: HoundofShadow said: When you have characters like Mr Sinister, OMD, Knull, Ronan, Cyclops, Heimdall, Magneto released, they don't fit into the above mold: There are high stakes when things go wrong. So, you need to protect their trap tiles, repeaters and cds. You need to make sure they aren't replaced or matched away. Most of them takes 2-3 turns to process, which to some players feel like a century has passed by. Their synergies are "complicated". Unlike meta team where synergies are as straightforward as do A and get B, these group of characters' synergies would be something like do A, followed by C, wait a turn or 2 then do D and you'll reach B. When there are teams who are murdering you by turn 2 or 3, characters who take 3-4 turns to gather AP to drop a repeater that then takes 3 turns to do anything at all are why I say some of these characters seem intended for a different game than the one we have.
MegaBee said: ThaRoadWarrior said: HoundofShadow said: When you have characters like Mr Sinister, OMD, Knull, Ronan, Cyclops, Heimdall, Magneto released, they don't fit into the above mold: There are high stakes when things go wrong. So, you need to protect their trap tiles, repeaters and cds. You need to make sure they aren't replaced or matched away. Most of them takes 2-3 turns to process, which to some players feel like a century has passed by. Their synergies are "complicated". Unlike meta team where synergies are as straightforward as do A and get B, these group of characters' synergies would be something like do A, followed by C, wait a turn or 2 then do D and you'll reach B. When there are teams who are murdering you by turn 2 or 3, characters who take 3-4 turns to gather AP to drop a repeater that then takes 3 turns to do anything at all are why I say some of these characters seem intended for a different game than the one we have. In some cases, I think that different game you mention is called PvE.
ThaRoadWarrior said: 5Witch punishes heavy cascades just as much as she does bulk micro-hits,
entrailbucket said: ThaRoadWarrior said: 5Witch punishes heavy cascades just as much as she does bulk micro-hits, This is so important and so overlooked, although kind of unrelated to the "bad 5*" discussion. SW punishes you for *being good at match-3*.Over 7 years and innumerable thousands of matches I've gotten really good at match-3. Almost every time I move the board the result is 6AP or more. I can find little cascades quickly, and sometimes they turn into big ones. Against SW I have to find ways to be bad at the game.
ThaRoadWarrior said:Coming back to Ultron - why are we worried about AP denial in 2021? As Tiger-Wong pointed out, we're here deep in that heavy match-damage meta (which to be quite honest, I don't think is actually what the 5Witch/Colossus meta is - it's a heavy defense meta that rewards stunners and big single target hitters rather than the free AOE meta we are coming off of. 5Witch punishes heavy cascades just as much as she does bulk micro-hits, and Colossus's black is doing the heavy lifting offensively more than his match damage in my experience) so what is the point of only reducing AP? Odin does that too, which makes me think the devs think it matters for some reason? Or potentially is going to matter?
Tiger_Wong said: ThaRoadWarrior said:Coming back to Ultron - why are we worried about AP denial in 2021? As Tiger-Wong pointed out, we're here deep in that heavy match-damage meta (which to be quite honest, I don't think is actually what the 5Witch/Colossus meta is - it's a heavy defense meta that rewards stunners and big single target hitters rather than the free AOE meta we are coming off of. 5Witch punishes heavy cascades just as much as she does bulk micro-hits, and Colossus's black is doing the heavy lifting offensively more than his match damage in my experience) so what is the point of only reducing AP? Odin does that too, which makes me think the devs think it matters for some reason? Or potentially is going to matter? I also don’t think Scarlett Steel is about the match damage meta as much as great defense. You either stun them then hit them or hit one of the hard with a one hitter nuke. I also agree that Ultron doesn’t look stellar on paper but he has to be controlled to know the deal. His CD I’m looking to use for the stun more than the AP destruction. A black stun that costs 8 AP? I’m here for it. Not a fan of the CD but it is fortified. I really feel like a passive CD/repeater manipulating character would turn the meta upside down. And I think it’s coming soon.
Sekilicious said: ThaRoadWarrior said: Sekilicious said: As a 4* player looking to transition to 5* play these ‘mediocre’ characters are better than anything I have. There is a thread that showed we can transition using the Robbie Reyes Ghost Rider as a solo champ. In a meta with Griity and Thoyoke. I get everyone’s philosophy is if you’re not first you’re last but this is kind of ridiculous That was my first Grand Experiment thread that seems to have been retired with the sub-forum it existed in during a site cleanup. Mediocre chracters from the above tier are definitely better than who you have, but as soon as you champ them, the threats you get matched up against in PVP will immediately scale up to a degree you are likely to find oppressive. The big takeaway from my GRRR experience was that he was thoroughly ill-equipped to combat the Kitty/Rocket meta, because the qualitative difference between Kitty and Ghost Rider is not something that MMR takes into account, except I was then exclusively matched up against single champ kitty and max-champ rocket basically until Sabretooth was released. Her ability to scale damage turn on turn immediately and passively was something that even a hard hitting (relative to the time) Ghost Rider was too slow to do anything about. At that time pre-shard, it was very difficult to chase counter characters, even at the 4* tier, so I spent the entirity of that meta trying my best to come up with some sort of reasonable team to exist in there. Main event Hulk, my second champed 5* Dr Doom could do it if he legit died in the match, so that left me trying to go solo...it just felt incredibly punishing and there was no reasonable time-frame character growth option for me besides sticking it out or selling off my 5*s to drop back down. Thanks for clarifying your perspective. Mine is that a single champed Ultron would make PvP significantly more difficult than Polaris and her various counters with a 4* MMR. A single champed Kitty or BRB may make PvP more bearable than Ultron, but a single champed Ultron would make PvE in SCL10 possible beyond spamming endless Winfinites, though maybe not the challenge node. Getting to top-50 to 100 in SCL10 every event is a significant hurdle to champing every 5* as they are released.