The ChaHulk meta

HoundofShadow

What it proves is that Chasm is useless without iHulk, after seeing players saying how it wasn't difficult to beat him. The question is, who brought iHulk/Chasm into pvp. In Chasm thread, players were coming up with different fun teams for Chasm.

ThaRoadWarrior

I recall being curious if Black Bolt would help you empty out your AP at the time before we'd seen him in action lol. Those were the days...

I do agree though that if Hulk weren't in the picture, Chasm is a non-factor in most battles.

Bad

The very next release was Shulk, another zombie although capped.
So this proves they thought developing the revive meta further was a good idea.
BCS it's doing great and it's betting on characters shaking the meta however they should provide counters quickier so the rock paper system can prevail and the meta doesn't stale.

HoundofShadow

There are already counters available but you are choosy.The Chasm/iHulk just started in mid October, and you want them to provide hard counter in a couple of months. Players will then wonder, "Why bother chasing meta when the dev is going to create a counter 1 or 2 releases later?"

Gambit ran for 8 months(?)
Bishop -;over a year
iHulkoye - at least 6 months
Wanda/Colossus - a few months.

Bad

Ihulk had 2 counters, electro and SW.
SW and colossus had 2 counters, ultron and gamora.
Polaris has many counters, two of them morbius and mantis.
Not sure if any of these countered characters have been less played because there were characters directly countering them.

HoundofShadow

It's more of a "when" question. When should a new (hard) counter to meta be created, despite existing working counters being available? Should every meta have a hard counter team a couple of months after its release? If that's the case, is there a point in creating meta since it will be hard countered a couple months later? It takes about 3 months-6 months for someone to champ a batch of 5*. If the timing is right, it can be done immediately.

IHulk's hard counter came out 1 year later.
Wanda/Colossus counter came out 6-7 months later.
It is said that Chasm is a hard counter to Wanda/Colossus, and it came out ~ 1 year later.

Chasm's counter, Riri, came out in November. From what I see, Chasm/iHulk became a problem only in mid-October. During those 2-3 months, players were talking about how it wasn't difficult to beat Chasm. We are only about 1.5 months in into Chasm/iHulk meta.

ThaRoadWarrior

Chasm alone is a non-issue, he's very beatable. It really is the pair of them that are "ai proof," meaning the AI can play them the way it plays everyone and really can't mess it up.

HoundofShadow

Is it really a bad thing that once in a while, we get challenging AI teams? How often does such thing happen in MPQ? It's rare. The AI has already been nerfed since the start of it existence, and they can't do a lot of things that players can do. That's why players have been mowing down without much difficulty, except for certain circumstances like lack of roster etc.

Ultimately, it depends on individual. I find that Chasm/iHulk presents a good amount of challenge and allows me to think out of the box. Obviously, some hates it. It's just sad to see how majority of players in reddit in one of the thread suggested skip as an option because they are victims of meta-slave. They don't know what to do when their meta stop working.

Omegased

I know this thread has been going for while - so in case people are coming in looking for teams... one of the teams I think i read 18 or so pages ago was Colossus/Elektra/Electro. Electro negates ihulks damage, and generates 5 yellow per tern, Elektra's traps give a good smooshing to the opponents.

wail on ihulk until he's stronger than all, then take out chasm, etc.... if you're very fancy, you can get ihulk to trigger 3 of elektras traps in one turn, effectively taking down everyone (altho not necessary).

I also found some success in taking big hitters that DONT tank all powers. so if you big hitter isn't in front, they may have an easier time generating AP.

HoundofShadow

Pick-3 is pretty easy. There are over 20 counters available. It's pick-2 that is making some unhappy.

ThaRoadWarrior

Boosted Sighclops trivializes this team if you have the black available when both your partners die. His last man standing nuke is doing 53784 + 4712/team up, usually around 95k when I end up in that position. I haven’t gone so far as to pair him with a 1-2-3* to use this strategy on purpose, but half-Thor gets killed often enough that you can use this doomsday weapon fairly regularly.

Interestingly to me, in pick-3 should both chasm and hulk rebirth around Sighclops, it doesn’t trigger his last man standing power to be available.

GrimSkald

@ThaRoadWarrior said:
Boosted Sighclops trivializes this team if you have the black available when both your partners die. His last man standing nuke is doing 53784 + 4712/team up, usually around 95k when I end up in that position. I haven’t gone so far as to pair him with a 1-2-3* to use this strategy on purpose, but half-Thor gets killed often enough that you can use this doomsday weapon fairly regularly.

Interestingly to me, in pick-3 should both chasm and hulk rebirth around Sighclops, it doesn’t trigger his last man standing power to be available.

You have a funny definition of "trivial." Boosted Cyclops' nuke is 13 black. That's a hard ask even when someone is not draining your AP.

I'm glad you're enjoying the meta, but I guarantee most of us are not. Chasm is pretty boring to play, and even more boring to play against since he effectively cancels out your average match AP. He brings the "passives rule the game" to an even higher level, since you can only rely on your passives.

This week is relatively ok since Boosted 5 Thor draws enough AP that you can actually do things, and Knull has some reasonable passives on top of that (as well as deliriously high HP and decent match damage.) I'm seeing a lot less Hulk/Chasm, and so long as my Thor isn't too beat up I can take down that team fairly easily. But I'll tell you right now, unless you have a AP gainer in your pick-two we'll be right back to Hulk/Chasm even if the boosted 5s are amazing otherwise.

ThaRoadWarrior

It’s easy to hang on to black with Thor/Sighclops because you can match black while Thor accrues colors in the background passively and it doesn’t become a high color till Sighclops is alone on the field. Then he one-shots the whole team. I wouldn’t say I’m enjoying the meta, I’m pretty on record in this thread as not being super stoked about it actually, I was just sharing that in this boost week, we have an option that works.

Omegased

@GrimSkald said:
You have a funny definition of "trivial." Boosted Cyclops' nuke is 13 black. That's a hard ask even when someone is not draining your AP.

He will probably earn black without much issue with half thor as Chasm won't eat black.

It's the same strategy as i mentioned with your nuke in the back, so his AP won't drain.

hothie

Something that Sekilicious said early on in this thread is something that I noticed too, as I'm sure you all have as well. Chasm doesn't drain team-up ap. So is there a good team up to bring that can be useful against Chasm?
I actually stumbled across using Devour (1* Venom black) against him, and I'm really starting to like it.

Devour, (even at 1 cover) if there are at least 8 web tiles on the board (which, let's face it, there usually are), using Devour destroys ALL web tiles on the board. So, if enemy Chasm is relatively medium to low on health, using Devour removes his healing properties, which means he dies far more quickly. I try to bring one with me whenever i face Chasm, as it helps me to break the cycle of endless matching and healing.

Disclaimer: I usually always skip chasm+ihulk, so I don't know how well this will work against them, but it could be a tool that will help if you're trying to time your chasm dying right before the enemy chasm does.

HoundofShadow

The typical team up recommended is 5* Prof X AoE. 1* Black Widow 5 turn stun might be one of them too. If not, you can filter your roster by green because majority of AoE is green.

The second colour to consider is red because many multi attacks come from red.

Lastly, I think 5* Deadpool Penance Flare should be good because it has double attack and Chasm is likely to be one shot by it. On top of that's it only 6 tu plus 3 colour aps of the effect chosen. It's the one that deals damage to other enemy. It's +3 yellow ap.

hothie

@HoundofShadow said:
The typical team up recommended is 5* Prof X AoE. 1* Black Widow 5 turn stun might be one of them too. If not, you can filter your roster by green because majority of AoE is green.

The second colour to consider is red because many multi attacks come from red.

Lastly, I think 5* Deadpool Penance Flare should be good because it has double attack and Chasm is likely to be one shot by it. On top of that's it only 6 tu plus 3 colour aps of the effect chosen. It's the one that deals damage to other enemy. It's +3 yellow ap.

True, those are some of the usual suspects when it comes to team up usage, with good reason of course, because they work well in many situations. I was trying to highlight one that many may not have thought of before.

I had a Devour so I absent-mindedly brought it one time, and when I used it, the effect was eye-opening to me. It made me re-read the team-up to make sure I fully understood it. Like I said, timing is key, but it can be very effective if used well, too.

Bad

@HoundofShadow said:
It's more of a "when" question. When should a new (hard) counter to meta be created, despite existing working counters being available? Should every meta have a hard counter team a couple of months after its release? If that's the case, is there a point in creating meta since it will be hard countered a couple months later? It takes about 3 months-6 months for someone to champ a batch of 5*. If the timing is right, it can be done immediately.Chasm/iHulk became a problem only in mid-October. During those 2-3 months, players were talking about how it wasn't difficult to beat Chasm. We are only about 1.5 months in into Chasm/iHulk meta.

Sorry, but no, sorry.
The chahulk meta was discussed even before chasm entering LL: https://forums.d3go.com/discussion/87385/chasm-i-hulk-thought

About counters to meta, absolutely no gacha game will guarantee that your character will be the top for an x amount of time.
The meta character will be always strong, but counters to him MUST be released in order to protect balance and diversity.
Players will get them regardless of them being tops.
And a soft or a hard counter is always better option than a nerf so players will be grateful.

BriMan2222

@HoundofShadow said:
I wonder what hard counter and soft counter mean in MPQ. I actually googled these two definitions, and looking at the replies from various game forums, it doesn't seem like there is a widely agreed consensus on what these two mean.

Chasm/iHulk is a revive meta. Silver Surfer kills the revive meta and he's immune to stun. If you throw Electro or Wanda together, Wouldn't they make this a hard counter team? Stun team incapitates Chasm and iHulk, rendering them helpless, wouldn't they be considered hard counter team?

Stun teams don't incapacitate chasm and Ihulk though. Even if you bring a team that can stun both of them, they shake off the stun each> @hothie said:

Something that Sekilicious said early on in this thread is something that I noticed too, as I'm sure you all have as well. Chasm doesn't drain team-up ap. So is there a good team up to bring that can be useful against Chasm?
I actually stumbled across using Devour (1* Venom black) against him, and I'm really starting to like it.

Devour, (even at 1 cover) if there are at least 8 web tiles on the board (which, let's face it, there usually are), using Devour destroys ALL web tiles on the board. So, if enemy Chasm is relatively medium to low on health, using Devour removes his healing properties, which means he dies far more quickly. I try to bring one with me whenever i face Chasm, as it helps me to break the cycle of endless matching and healing.

Disclaimer: I usually always skip chasm+ihulk, so I don't know how well this will work against them, but it could be a tool that will help if you're trying to time your chasm dying right before the enemy chasm does.

You can also use a 3 star deadpool whales team up if you have enough deadpool points to insta win the game. That's the surest counter I've found so far.

HoundofShadow

I'm not sure if Oscorp Spidey's red can be sent as a teamup, but he removes all web tiles and then create up to 4(?).

If 5* Emma's purple can be sent as a teamup, you can use it before Chasm is downed, so that when he revives, his abilities and other enemies' abilities are reduced by 3 levels.

I think 5* land, as of today, is diverse enough to handle various (future) meta. We got quite a number of defensive characters out this year and last year. If we are talking about a counter that kills the meta immediately, then this is where timing is important. Think Wanda vs iHulkoye. They almost disappear overnight when she was released. However, she came out about 1 year after their existence. I believe there should be a period where players should have sufficient time to play around with new ideas on how to counter new meta, instead of giving up or asking for nerf without trying. If the players don't want to deal with them, they can always skip. However, skipping is merely running away from problem, rather than gaining new insights or ideas. Meta comes and goes and you can only skip this much before players give up.