Character Updates: Negasonic (Modern), Beast (AoA), Yellowjacket (Live 4/27)

SuperCarrot

I only mentioned the change might have been made for future card considerations because I have read devs from other games say they made a change for design space reasons. I agree it isn’t nefarious (this is just a game after all). I also agree they probably didn’t really know the character that well. No big deal though.

entrailbucket

@SuperCarrot said:
I only mentioned the change might have been made for future card considerations because I have read devs from other games say they made a change for design space reasons. I agree it isn’t nefarious (this is just a game after all). I also agree they probably didn’t really know the character that well. No big deal though.

Oh no, please don't feel personally called out, that wasn't my intention at all!

I think maybe I'm still reacting to (at least, what seemed to be?) a fairly common attitude around here -- that MPQ devs did this sort of stuff commonly for those sorts of reasons. The actual reasons are typically much more mundane and much less interesting! In truth, I wish they'd purposely address some more of that kind of stuff.

Wolvie171

@entrailbucket said:

@SuperCarrot said:
I only mentioned the change might have been made for future card considerations because I have read devs from other games say they made a change for design space reasons. I agree it isn’t nefarious (this is just a game after all). I also agree they probably didn’t really know the character that well. No big deal though.

Oh no, please don't feel personally called out, that wasn't my intention at all!

I think maybe I'm still reacting to (at least, what seemed to be?) a fairly common attitude around here -- that MPQ devs did this sort of stuff commonly for those sorts of reasons. The actual reasons are typically much more mundane and much less interesting! In truth, I wish they'd purposely address some more of that kind of stuff.

EB, how do you know what the actual reasons are? To use your line of thinking and basis for many of the topics discussed, we won't know the truth without communications from the devs. All we have are conjectures, and as long as we're open to others' ideas, we can continue to have a live and friendly discourse.

SuperCarrot

@entrailbucket, No worries!

entrailbucket

Right...the explanation they gave us, in this case, pretty much exactly tracks with what they did.

But, maybe they're just feeding us a line here. What if Beast was nerfed to prevent some current or future overpowered combo? Well, what could that combo be, and what would Beast's role be?

If he was secretly nerfed because he'd be too efficient as a blue feeder, then why were significantly more efficient blue feeders left untouched? Wouldn't they have been targeted first? Was there some unique aspect of Beast's previous skillset that couldn't have been replicated by anyone else?

I don't see it. He was fairly unremarkable before, and I can't picture a theoretical crazy combo that ONLY old Beast could've been key to, that new Beast can't be.

So, given that we have a candidate explanation that fits, no other characters were changed, and I can't figure out an obvious current or future problem...I dunno, I'm inclined to take their explanation at face value.

entrailbucket

I guess, like, in the interest of considering other viewpoints, what's the concrete evidence to support the other side, that he was purposely nerfed?

There's the Captain Marvel thing from forever ago (that I still don't find terribly convincing, to be honest). What else is there?

Wolvie171

@dianetics said:
The dev's did not seem understand the value of the blue charged tiles created. They did not turn basic to charged, it created blue charged tiles. Giving him a high level synergy with many different characters in his tier, and let him punch up.

If the dev's used him regularly they would have known.
They looked at it from the outside and tried to make him self feeding, but by doing so they just slowed him down in natural play. You would have no real idea unless you actually used him A LOT and figured out how his kit worked best.

100% agree on this. As the ones who play & know the characters intimately, the player base is usually the first to question the reason for these rebalances/updates/nerfs.

If one of the core principles of this game is to encourage players to create team match-ups that best utilize the synergies between characters, these types of changes achieve the exact opposite.

I mentioned Beast's synergy with Kang earlier. Where Beast was once a viable partner for Kang, this update reduces him to just another 4* in a sea of mundane 4* characters that will get little use.

Alex502

@dianetics said:

@Wolvie171 said:
EB, how do you know what the actual reasons are? To use your line of thinking and basis for many of the topics discussed, we won't know the truth without communications from the devs. All we have are conjectures, and as long as we're open to others' ideas, we can continue to have a live and friendly discourse.

We don't have just conjecture though, we have the developers reasoning in the OP.

Two important quotes on the changed abilties.

1. "However, in creating Black tiles, it doubles up on the Black special tile creation done by his Black Passive"
   This turned him into a match damage monster faster. The more black matches the faster he gets to 2k match damage completely chunking the 4* even better than Karnak. He has the second highest potential match damage after Blob.

2. "Why was Beast making Charged tiles instead of Special tiles when his kit works around Special tiles?"
   The dev's did not seem understand the value of the blue charged tiles created. They did not turn basic to charged, it created blue charged tiles. Giving him a high level synergy with many different characters in his tier, and let him punch up.

If the dev's used him regularly they would have known.
They looked at it from the outside and tried to make him self feeding, but by doing so they just slowed him down in natural play. You would have no real idea unless you actually used him A LOT and figured out how his kit worked best.

Excellently put, and this is why I'm rather upset about this change to him. I used him all the time. Easily one of the most flexible and easy to play 4 star's. Now, he's just... lacking so badly. The only benefit to his powers now are that his Green builds on enemy SAP's too. Not really a selling point that as the enemy gets stronger, you get more AP, but wow what a terrible way to hamstring him.

Again, the Blue Charge tiles were meant to help fire his blue again, which made attack tiles that fueled his other two powers, and helped him fire off Green again to make more Charge tiles.

Frankly, if they wanted to avoid the double dip on Black Tiles, they could have just made his black passive make Blue Protect tiles, which would actually bring his theme closer to 3 star Beast's.

His green and blue needed NO* change. I will fight for his revertion.

Alex502

I created a Poll in the Suggestions and Feedback page where we could vote on this issue. I'd appreciate the participation.

entrailbucket

@dianetics said:
They didn't do anything that would have been a purposeful nerf though. They didn't reduce the match damage gains. They didn't reduce damage or increase AP costs.
If they were trying to nerf him why was his black unchanged? It was (at the time) his beefy ability. Green looks like a sort of nerf, but not when they changed his blue to help it.

Really looking at it, they are trying to make green and blue play off each other. Instead of having a slide up effect of green to blue to black. His usage was get him to make fat matches and create blue charged tiles. Now it's kind of a weird game of use expensive powers and don't feed his match damage.

Right, the simplest, Occam's Razor explanation here is that they were trying to make him better, and achieved...mixed results (charitably). It also has the benefit of lining up with the explanation they provided, and it fits what we've seen the MPQ developers do in the past.

Again, we don't KNOW what happened, and never will, but this fits enough that I'm willing to accept the explanation.

LavaManLee

I think part of the challenge of even doing a poll on this is that, at least in my case, once you are way into 5* land, it doesn't matter if it was a nerf to him or not. I only used him when required. So I actually have no real way to tell if he was nerfed or if it was a buff.

Definitely not trying to be "look at me, I'm in 5 land", but it does explain why my vote on what this did, has no relevance one way or another.

Omegased

Agreed - I've never used Dark Beast outside of required nodes. I currently have 147 4 stars rostered, and realistically probably use at most 10. While a change to Beast may not be great for the handful that use him religiously - the vast majority just simply won't be affected by this change. he was never considered Meta, so people would generally not chase him.

I would love to see the usage patterns of all characters, especially "classic" characters. it's so hard to get covers for these classics.

Currently in-game there are 414 unique 4-star covers, and you'll need 1,794 (1,755 if you exclude limited) covers to champ everyone. to get Beast champed, you'll need 0.74% of the achievable covers. If EVERY 4star you get from a Herioc token is a beast cover, you'd still need a minimum of 208 pulls to champ him.

The chances of pulling a Beast cover is 0.05% per heroic pull.
I know his black makes him hit harder, and that's it.

Alex502

I appreciate the perspective from 5 star land, but as someone else mentioned, Dark Beast was a Top 20 ish character in the 4 start tier, and he feeds Apoc whom is Top 5 in the 5 star's. Dropping his effectiveness puts another roadblock on the way to 5 star land.

This is coming from a player that is missing only three 5 star characters from my roster, but only one 5 star champed. The vast majority of my play comes from 4 star characters, and I haven't pushed to change that for years.

So from a long time 4 star player, they've seriously hurt one of my top ten favorite characters, and I'm overtly irritated with that.

DAZ0273

Was he a better blue battery than Deathlok? That doesn't seem possible if we are talking about Kang partners? Likewise I barely have ever used him/forgot he existed. Oh and just to say I don't mean to sound like some 5* player coming in here and being all precious about a 4* character - if anything it just shows you how bad at this game I am not knowing how good Beast was!

DAZ0273

@Alex502 said:
I created a Poll in the Suggestions and Feedback page where we could vote on this issue. I'd appreciate the participation.

Oh no...you'll have an easier time finding the Holy Grail than a Dev looking at that section...

LavaManLee

@Alex502 said:
he feeds Apoc whom is Top 5 in the 5 star's. Dropping his effectiveness puts another roadblock on the way to 5 star land.

I'm a bit confused as how dropping his effectiveness puts another roadblock on the way to 5 star land. He still feeds Apoc, no matter what. So isn't that a wash?

Also, don't take for gospel about Apoc being a Top 5. I never use him, except when boosted and even then, very rarely. I find him slow and Shang Chi hits much, much harder paired with MT. Of the ten 5s I use most often, he isn't in that list.

Bowgentle

Apoc needs a lot of levels to become good.
I'm not using my 464 one, either.

LavaManLee

@Bowgentle said:
Apoc needs a lot of levels to become good.
I'm not using my 464 one, either.

That's a great point. I may not have him at high enough levels whereas my SC, MT, Riri, etc are at the perfect levels for them.

Seph1roth5

apoc was my first big hitter, used him all the time. I never used dark beast that much, but when I did he was pretty fun. His black passive was what I mainly focused on, so the update doesn't affect my style THAT much, but I'd still like him reverted.

SuperCarrot

I’m in 5 star land as well. I just liked playing Dark Beast as Age of Apocalypse is my favorite X event.