How much of a change would 5* Scarlet Witch need to *only* be viable when boosted?

Sekilicious

Pantera236 said:

I think this is/was more of a thought experiment. Correct me if I'm wrong @entrailbucket (don't think I am as they've stated many times) but they're not calling for a nerf.

No. Just her effectiveness reduced so only playable when boosted. Hopefully you can see why some ignore the protest of calling it a nerf. 

entrailbucket

Pantera236 said:

I think this is/was more of a thought experiment. Correct me if I'm wrong @entrailbucket (don't think I am as they've stated many times) but they're not calling for a nerf.

That was the idea.  It immediately, catastrophically failed!  I'm pretty sure nobody even read the first post, they just reacted to what they thought it said.

entrailbucket

Sekilicious said:

Pantera236 said:

I think this is/was more of a thought experiment. Correct me if I'm wrong @entrailbucket (don't think I am as they've stated many times) but they're not calling for a nerf.

No. Just her effectiveness reduced so only playable when boosted. Hopefully you can see why some ignore the protest of calling it a nerf. 

There was no call for anything.  I asked a question.

Read the actual words in the actual title of this thread and point out where it calls for anyone to do anything.  If you read those words as a *call* for a nerf, that is your bias reading something into it that's not there.

entrailbucket

For reference, this is what a *call* for a nerf looks like:

https://forums.d3go.com/discussion/68924/please-nerf-5-gambit

Sekilicious

entrailbucket said:

Sekilicious said:

Pantera236 said:

I think this is/was more of a thought experiment. Correct me if I'm wrong @entrailbucket (don't think I am as they've stated many times) but they're not calling for a nerf.

No. Just her effectiveness reduced so only playable when boosted. Hopefully you can see why some ignore the protest of calling it a nerf. 

There was no call for anything.  I asked a question.

Read the actual words in the actual title of this thread and point out where it calls for anyone to do anything.  If you read those words as a *call* for a nerf, that is your bias reading something into it that's not there.

Telling my wife I’m not cheating on her I’m just sleeping with her sister will not save me from divorce. No matter how many times I point out her bias. 

entrailbucket

...what? 

Where, in the words that make up the title of this thread or the first post is a *call* for someone to do something?

BriMan2222

Sekilicious said:

entrailbucket said:

Sekilicious said:

Pantera236 said:

I think this is/was more of a thought experiment. Correct me if I'm wrong @entrailbucket (don't think I am as they've stated many times) but they're not calling for a nerf.

No. Just her effectiveness reduced so only playable when boosted. Hopefully you can see why some ignore the protest of calling it a nerf. 

There was no call for anything.  I asked a question.

Read the actual words in the actual title of this thread and point out where it calls for anyone to do anything.  If you read those words as a *call* for a nerf, that is your bias reading something into it that's not there.

Telling my wife I’m not cheating on her I’m just sleeping with her sister will not save me from divorce. No matter how many times I point out her bias. 

There's a big difference between "I am calling for X to happen" vs "I wonder what it would be like if X happened?"

As entrail bucket has clarified several times he is not calling for a nerf,  just pondering how you would do it to make her in line with characters that are good only when boosted 

To answer the actual question, I think if you just reduced her damage reduction and damage reflection so that it didn't really hurt that much unless she was boosted that would probably do the trick. 

Bad

Yes, we can pretend that the day is the night and the opposite, and it will be really fun.
But at the end some policeman agent will ask what are you doing at 3 A.M on the beach on a swimsuit with sun cream over the body.
Explain it to him, but be careful because you can end on the jail or on a mental asylum depending on your answer.
Now look at okoye. How much of a change okoye would need to only be viable when boosted?

entrailbucket

You guys are just absolutely killing it with the metaphors, that was delightful!  (Not sarcasm at all, that was funny.)


So sure, I'll play.  Okoye is a really complicated one, and one I've spent a lot of time thinking about over the many years she's been completely dominant. 

It's actually fairly simple to look at Okoye and see exactly what she's meant to do, and she's not overpowered at all if she does that.  The design requires you to make a tradeoff -- either match (useless) teamup AP to boost your powers, or match other colors to cast powers.  While you're matching colors to cast powers, though, Okoye is slowly bleeding TU AP, so you have to navigate that tension.

It's an elegant design with an interesting gameplay tradeoff that was utterly busted from the start because they forgot about 2 things: damaging passives (well, some of them.  She just randomly doesn't boost some stuff for no good reason) and characters that generate free AP (Thor).


I'm not sure how you could fix her in a way that brings her back to earth without making her utterly useless.  If she boosted only active powers, that might do it, but I worry that it'd be way too much.  This metagame no longer really involves any active powers.  Dialling back the boost per AP doesn't  change anything unless you go *way* back, and that ends with her being useless too.  They could change her healing to burst heal (seriously, why does this character have the best healing factor in the game?) but that only makes her less sustainable -- she'd still be dominant.

They could just make a guy who passively sets enemy TU AP to zero every turn, that'd probably do it.

KGB

entrailbucket said:

KGB said:

entrailbucket said:

No, obviously he's underpowered now.  I think they should buff him now, and I supported his nerf at that time.

In retrospect, do you think they should've done what they did at that time?  How would you have countered Gambit, in that metagame, in a way that didn't completely take over the game with the counter?

If they had just waited another month or two everything would have resolved itself. Kitty was released about a month or so after Gambit's nerf. Had they waited, Kitty/Grocket would have handily countered Gambit because his AP destruction would not have mattered to that team and by the time his Purple was ready to fire Kitty would have buffed Grockets strikes a few times and killed Gambit.

KGB

Were you playing Gambit back then?  The top team at the time was Gambit/Thor, and that was 100% of the PvP meta.  Kitty would've been dead before she boosted anything enough to make an impact. 

Actually, nobody would've even discovered that Kitty was good.  At the time, all new 5* were deemed "DOA" by Gambit users, which was the entire top of the game.  Nobody was pulling for anyone because there was no reason to.

Not at all. I was an early 4* player then.

But what you just described is what players do when using Gambit. Of course they were going to win with half Thor/Gambit. I simply maintain that Kitty/Grocket would easily beat defensive teams of Gambit/Thor since the AI would never get to use half Thor's shenanigans. Thus the complaint that only Gambit beats Gambit would no longer have been true.

Plus 2 more months after Kitty, Bishop got released...

In other words Gambits reign of terror was about to end naturally anyway simply because the era of passives was about to begin.

KGB

Bad

Okoye is obsolete because she can only boost characters having less damage than her, so you can collect all the TUs you wanted but if you are using a modern character she will bleed off them each turn. 
That is the reason behing no one uses gamora although it would be a great efficient team for beating colSW, and that is the reason why a lot of players used her with SW, before realizing that okoye and SW hasn't any defensive deterrent. 

HoundofShadow

I went through the entire thread again.

 In the beginning, it was

This is just asking a theoretical question.  Since all other characters are only meant to be usable when boosted, what would it take for this one to match them?

I think the premise itself was already inaccurate in the first place. I don't think majority in here wants every characters (including meta) to be usable only when boosted. What they want is all the elder 5* released a few years back to be usable when boosted. Meta characters can stay where they are.

Next, 

The current metagame is driven by weekly 5* boosts, which is great.  It's as diverse as it's *ever* been at certain tiers.  At other tiers, the game remains composed of the same characters.  Having the boosted characters should give you an advantage.  Not having the boosted characters should be a disadvantage.  This may be the case at some tiers but it's not universal.

I feel like every 5* should either be usable unboosted, like SW Colossus Apocalypse etc, or only usable when boosted (post-buff Ghost Rider, Phoenix, literally everyone else).

Why do people want this divide to stay?  I know why the hoarders do...it's because they have the good characters maxed out and literally nobody else on their roster.  Why would a normal player want it to be this way?

What if every character was usable unboosted?

Basically, it seems like you have no problem dealing with the meta teams at your 550 tier, given that you mentioned before that you were taking down with meta boosted elder 5* without much problem. However, you are probably bored of seeing other players at your tier using non-boosted 550 meta team over boosted 5* team. So your solution is to make every 5* usable either boosted or unboosted.

After that you gave examples of rare cases about Colossus dealing 100k damage easily, or Wanda dealing 15k-25k every turn. If Colossus dealing 100k damage in a single cascade is a common occurences for you, you might want to contact Support instead. To put things into context at 450 5* level, it's as good as saying enemy Colossus cascade into ~36k damage to Shang Chi easily and frequently. It might happen (rarely), but it's weird to use rare occurences to support a viewpoint.

Next, you declared that Electro is unusable and have doubt about her ability to deal with meta teams. So, videos were posted proving that it can be done. Then, you doubt GRRR next and it was proven again it can be done.

As you can see, the word "usable" is subjective. You have proven why it's important to define the word "usable". Every players have their own preferences and biases. For example, I love characters who are good at trap or trap like tiles, board manipulation and tiles destruction. I also like to find the hidden diamond in trash characters like Ultron or Echo. However, not all players like what I prefer and that is fine. On top of that, every characters have their own strength, weaknesses, and default synergistic allies. 

The rest of the post is more or less about the same point about the usability of non-meta characters. Then, you mentioned "diversity" at your level a few more times. I don't think there's any mystery to it. At your level, those players are super competitive and they are all about practicality. Speed and damage/ap is what matters to them.

Basically, your goal is to see diversity at 550 level, and to you, the usability of characters define the diversity at your tier. That likely explains the existence of such thread. However, the bigger problem is that your definition of usability is unknown, and other players' experiences contradict your definition of usability.

entrailbucket

Bad said:

Okoye is obsolete because she can only boost characters having less damage than her, so you can collect all the TUs you wanted but if you are using a modern character she will bleed off them each turn. 
That is the reason behing no one uses gamora although it would be a great efficient team for beating colSW, and that is the reason why a lot of players used her with SW, before realizing that okoye and SW hasn't any defensive deterrent. 

Okoye is far from obsolete.  She wins CL10 PvE brackets every day.

I'm not sure why nobody else uses Gamora.  I don't use her because I can't bring a lvl451 character to fight 550s -- she'd just die immediately.

entrailbucket

KGB said:

entrailbucket said:

KGB said:

entrailbucket said:

No, obviously he's underpowered now.  I think they should buff him now, and I supported his nerf at that time.

In retrospect, do you think they should've done what they did at that time?  How would you have countered Gambit, in that metagame, in a way that didn't completely take over the game with the counter?

If they had just waited another month or two everything would have resolved itself. Kitty was released about a month or so after Gambit's nerf. Had they waited, Kitty/Grocket would have handily countered Gambit because his AP destruction would not have mattered to that team and by the time his Purple was ready to fire Kitty would have buffed Grockets strikes a few times and killed Gambit.

KGB

Were you playing Gambit back then?  The top team at the time was Gambit/Thor, and that was 100% of the PvP meta.  Kitty would've been dead before she boosted anything enough to make an impact. 

Actually, nobody would've even discovered that Kitty was good.  At the time, all new 5* were deemed "DOA" by Gambit users, which was the entire top of the game.  Nobody was pulling for anyone because there was no reason to.

Not at all. I was an early 4* player then.

But what you just described is what players do when using Gambit. Of course they were going to win with half Thor/Gambit. I simply maintain that Kitty/Grocket would easily beat defensive teams of Gambit/Thor since the AI would never get to use half Thor's shenanigans. Thus the complaint that only Gambit beats Gambit would no longer have been true.

Plus 2 more months after Kitty, Bishop got released...

In other words Gambits reign of terror was about to end naturally anyway simply because the era of passives was about to begin.

KGB

If Kitty could theoretically beat Gambit/Thor on offense, but Gambit/Thor beats *literally anything* on offense, including Kitty, why would Gambit players ever change teams?  Why would anyone choose to play a narrow counter character when you can just play the guy who beats everything?

Offense matters.

Phumade

KGB said:

entrailbucket said:

KGB said:

entrailbucket said:

No, obviously he's underpowered now.  I think they should buff him now, and I supported his nerf at that time.

In retrospect, do you think they should've done what they did at that time?  How would you have countered Gambit, in that metagame, in a way that didn't completely take over the game with the counter?

If they had just waited another month or two everything would have resolved itself. Kitty was released about a month or so after Gambit's nerf. Had they waited, Kitty/Grocket would have handily countered Gambit because his AP destruction would not have mattered to that team and by the time his Purple was ready to fire Kitty would have buffed Grockets strikes a few times and killed Gambit.

KGB

Were you playing Gambit back then?  The top team at the time was Gambit/Thor, and that was 100% of the PvP meta.  Kitty would've been dead before she boosted anything enough to make an impact. 

Actually, nobody would've even discovered that Kitty was good.  At the time, all new 5* were deemed "DOA" by Gambit users, which was the entire top of the game.  Nobody was pulling for anyone because there was no reason to.

Not at all. I was an early 4* player then.

But what you just described is what players do when using Gambit. Of course they were going to win with half Thor/Gambit. I simply maintain that Kitty/Grocket would easily beat defensive teams of Gambit/Thor since the AI would never get to use half Thor's shenanigans. Thus the complaint that only Gambit beats Gambit would no longer have been true.

Plus 2 more months after Kitty, Bishop got released...

In other words Gambits reign of terror was about to end naturally anyway simply because the era of passives was about to begin.

KGB

Having lived through that era meta as a 460-470 player.  Kitty/Grocket wasn't really an easy win against gambit/thor.  you had to boost damage and pray that you had good board control manageable board to kill gambit before he knocked out your strikes. and you were most certainly burning healthpacks.  I can say with certainly, I would never have gone after a Gambit/thor A team unless it was worth 75 points and I was boosting damage.

The other big thing you have to really keep in min is the differential in team levels was a much bigger factor in match success.  a 450 kitty/ Grocket won't have any chance of success against a 470 or better thor/gambit.  Conversely a 480 kitty/370grocket is a solid favorite against a 450 Gambit/thor especially with damage boost.  You'll still pay an Heathpack penalty, but its a winable match.  

A twenty point level difference was really hard to overcome without boosts and "skillful" play.  Today even a 450 Shang chi can beat a 600+ combo.   

Phumade

entrailbucket said:

KGB said:

entrailbucket said:

KGB said:

entrailbucket said:

No, obviously he's underpowered now.  I think they should buff him now, and I supported his nerf at that time.

In retrospect, do you think they should've done what they did at that time?  How would you have countered Gambit, in that metagame, in a way that didn't completely take over the game with the counter?

If they had just waited another month or two everything would have resolved itself. Kitty was released about a month or so after Gambit's nerf. Had they waited, Kitty/Grocket would have handily countered Gambit because his AP destruction would not have mattered to that team and by the time his Purple was ready to fire Kitty would have buffed Grockets strikes a few times and killed Gambit.

KGB

Were you playing Gambit back then?  The top team at the time was Gambit/Thor, and that was 100% of the PvP meta.  Kitty would've been dead before she boosted anything enough to make an impact. 

Actually, nobody would've even discovered that Kitty was good.  At the time, all new 5* were deemed "DOA" by Gambit users, which was the entire top of the game.  Nobody was pulling for anyone because there was no reason to.

Not at all. I was an early 4* player then.

But what you just described is what players do when using Gambit. Of course they were going to win with half Thor/Gambit. I simply maintain that Kitty/Grocket would easily beat defensive teams of Gambit/Thor since the AI would never get to use half Thor's shenanigans. Thus the complaint that only Gambit beats Gambit would no longer have been true.

Plus 2 more months after Kitty, Bishop got released...

In other words Gambits reign of terror was about to end naturally anyway simply because the era of passives was about to begin.

KGB

If Kitty could theoretically beat Gambit/Thor on offense, but Gambit/Thor beats *literally anything* on offense, including Kitty, why would Gambit players ever change teams?  Why would anyone choose to play a narrow counter character when you can just play the guy who beats everything?

Offense matters.

Having faced that exact dilemma many times.  The only time you moved off Gambit/thor to Kitty/Rocket was if you had no health packs or you had a big enough level difference to make it an easier match.  There were definitely times during a speed hop where kitty/Grocket is a faster win than a 1/2thor/ full health gambit.  but you were boosting damage, had your own roster level superiority, and looking to make that fight against a baby champ combo.

entrailbucket

Phumade said:

entrailbucket said:

KGB said:

entrailbucket said:

KGB said:

entrailbucket said:

No, obviously he's underpowered now.  I think they should buff him now, and I supported his nerf at that time.

In retrospect, do you think they should've done what they did at that time?  How would you have countered Gambit, in that metagame, in a way that didn't completely take over the game with the counter?

If they had just waited another month or two everything would have resolved itself. Kitty was released about a month or so after Gambit's nerf. Had they waited, Kitty/Grocket would have handily countered Gambit because his AP destruction would not have mattered to that team and by the time his Purple was ready to fire Kitty would have buffed Grockets strikes a few times and killed Gambit.

KGB

Were you playing Gambit back then?  The top team at the time was Gambit/Thor, and that was 100% of the PvP meta.  Kitty would've been dead before she boosted anything enough to make an impact. 

Actually, nobody would've even discovered that Kitty was good.  At the time, all new 5* were deemed "DOA" by Gambit users, which was the entire top of the game.  Nobody was pulling for anyone because there was no reason to.

Not at all. I was an early 4* player then.

But what you just described is what players do when using Gambit. Of course they were going to win with half Thor/Gambit. I simply maintain that Kitty/Grocket would easily beat defensive teams of Gambit/Thor since the AI would never get to use half Thor's shenanigans. Thus the complaint that only Gambit beats Gambit would no longer have been true.

Plus 2 more months after Kitty, Bishop got released...

In other words Gambits reign of terror was about to end naturally anyway simply because the era of passives was about to begin.

KGB

If Kitty could theoretically beat Gambit/Thor on offense, but Gambit/Thor beats *literally anything* on offense, including Kitty, why would Gambit players ever change teams?  Why would anyone choose to play a narrow counter character when you can just play the guy who beats everything?

Offense matters.

Having faced that exact dilemma many times.  The only time you moved off Gambit/thor to Kitty/Rocket was if you had no health packs or you had a big enough level difference to make it an easier match.  There were definitely times during a speed hop where kitty/Grocket is a faster win than a 1/2thor/ full health gambit.  but you were boosting damage, had your own roster level superiority, and looking to make that fight against a baby champ combo.

Sounds like that must have been a skill deficit on your part!  Anyone who has a difficult time winning a match simply isn't using all the available counters the devs generously provided you with.


But seriously, when you have a spare 3 hours, read all 20,000 words in this thread.  The players I know by reputation as playing at the top of the metagame have had much different reactions than the folks I've never heard of.

JackDeath666

I'm also happy to confirm that 100k+ Colossus cascades happen all too frequently at high levels. Entrail is not exaggerating there. 

Re: Gamora - mine is 550 (that's level not cover spread) and even then her yellow is not reliable. You need to gather yellow, cast it and then hope that it doesn't get matched. Very often Colossus blue comes out immediately to remove it as he's not had a chance to use it until then. It's a fantastic power if you can use it and keep it out. But having done that you still have 177k health to chew through (plus SW health and passive) and all you've achieved is the chance to do this with normal damage being applied, so it's hardly a massive benefit.

He's a great character and so is Scarlet Witch. They work very, very well together which is why they are so dominant. 

HoundofShadow

So, the probability of getting a critical match for AI Colossus that allows him to deal 100k damage or more is more frequent at level 550 than a 450 Colossus?  EB mentioned that the 100k damage comes from critical match in cascades.

Colossus' critical mutiplier is 3.5x, which means that the cumulative match damage from cascades is ~28571. In other words, it means that AI Colossus at level 550 cascades into match-5 more frequently. 

Could we give a number or percentage to what "frequently" means in this specific scenario? For every 10 matches against Colossus, how many matches does he cascade into 100k damage? 


I use Colossus frequently as well and my Colossus hardly cascades into match-5. Is this some kind of hidden perk that 550 rosters have? 

DAZ0273

entrailbucket said:

DAZ0273 said:

entrailbucket said:

DAZ0273 said:

entrailbucket said:

Bad said:

By the way SW is not so great. She is a great character for to synergy, but she by herself is all but great.
As a SW user since her release, if she is the last character standing I can swear how miserable she can turn you in, hoping for big cascades on enemy turn but at the same time hoping they don't match her repeater, because that's is only the weapon she has, or matching a lot of blue for her hex, and then hoping for big cascades but at the same time repeater and cd not being matched.
Not the best performance for a candidate to getting nerf!

This would be a fantastic argument to counter someone calling for a nerf to a character.  Sadly, this thread does not do that.

But...you said Ghost Rider is unusable when not boosted. Then Ghost Rider and buddies best a "meta" team unboosted. And your opening post refers to "let's try one going the other way" referring to Scarlet Witch. The only other way is down.

So by your words you say we need to take Scarlet Witch the opposite way to 5* getting buffs to create some sort of equilibrium because she is usable no matter what and then she gets beaten by Ghost Rider and Electro (who cannot beat her ever, your post).

None of it makes sense. 

We're not the developers!  Speculation is what the forum is about.

The post didn't say anything about needing to do anything.  Asking the forum what kind of changes the developers have to make for a character to be not-"meta" but still useful is...asking a question.  I have an opinion, of course, which a bunch of people attacked instead of answering the question.  Nerf PTSD kicks in immediately and people get very angry.

The other thread asked what it would take to make a character usable but not "meta." I just flipped it around because I thought it was an interesting question.

But...your concept got disproved. Twice! Nothing needs to be done to make Switch "unusable" because the other characters mentioned have proved "usable" unboosted. Are they all equal? No but they are not "unusable" because they beat the meta team! Twice!

Another thread asked, "what buffs would it take for Thanos to be usable when boosted (but not so good that he was usable unboosted)?"

I asked, "what change would it take for scarlet witch to be usable when boosted (but not so good that she was usable unboosted)?"

That's it!  It's the same question, from a different direction!

I guess I missed something but I thought the answer was : none. I think Hound is right though that this comes down to definition of what "usable" is to any given player. I use all my 5* unboosted at some point, some more than others but they generally get some play. So from my perspective Switch is no more usable unboosted than Cable is. She is better, I am not arguing otherwise but Cable can still do a job.