Character Rebalance - Mister Sinister (Nathaniel Essex) 5*

Scofie

To put this into perspective, Sinister is in one node in one event. He's going to be good to use for me far more than that. And he was pretty terrible to begin with so the buff is welcome.

He is an absolute menace in that node though. I wiped many times. On his first turn he took out Kang with a small cascade. On another attempt, IM40 died on my first turn by using his Yellow and triggering multiple traps. It was crazy.

Gymp28

@Mr_F I don’t think it was particularly unfair. Maybe just putting the AI on a par with the (advanced roster) player?
I also wiped maybe 4 or 5 times before I cleared the node 3 times, but I didn’t use Gorr, or any particular recommended combo of characters to win.
I just tried again with many different teams to find a weakness, or a way to mitigate the vast passive damage coming at me.
Personally I don’t think it was ‘too hard’, I think it was a fun puzzle because it was difficult.
Makes a nice change to just being able to mindlessly run the same team against every node without issue.
I wouldn’t mind at all if more challenge nodes posed this level of, well, challenge.

Mr_F

IMO, here's the catch: it's not about how hard it is to beat it or how useless are usuall solutions we all use. I have used few suggested combos and got no luck with them. Somebody has mentioned that some character had to be ascended or they would be screwed too.

The catch is something else. Some CN and 5* nodes are hard and wipes me everytime. But usually I just change the approach and with that everyday 10 healthpack I can do all 4 clears. Sometimes I do that with 4Negative/4Polaris/5 Carol. Sometimes with Wasphinite. Sometimes with boosted of the week. And sometimes with whatever weird combo I came up with like 5OR, 4Valkyrie, 4Mantis or whatever.

Point is, usuall solutions aren't tied to anything. No matter your roster, boosted list or whatever, if you are capapble of playting SCL10 on daily basis with your roster, then most of the time CN and 5* essential are just a speed bumb. Sometimes larger sometimes smaller. And sometimes two-three in the row. This node is not a speed bumb, it's a road barricade, because now Sinister's traps do damage upon leaving which bumps up the damage by a lot.

Don't get me wrong, I enjoy the CN and the fact that I have to put up something clever. But these time it was a stretch. I don't mind me losing few rewards here. My concern's aren't about me but the others. I just think that many roster who usually do SCL10 will struggle a lot more that usuall.

If ya know me, then thanks to my Adventures with Wasp and mThoir Dillemma threads you know that I first searh the solution and then raise alarm. with the latter, I did not said "nerf mThor" but raised the concern about what is the best aproach. Do we have solutions I do not see or we do not? Do we do A and B or maybe C and then A with Z. Same is here. There are solutions to this node and my evaluations of them is that they are not efficient enough. So I've raised a problem. Let's disscuss it. Maybe I am wrong. Maybe I am not. So far, I'm not convinced that this node is ok.

entrailbucket

There's a good discussion to be had here about what the game is, and, to a lesser extent, what folks want it to be.

The fact is that CL10 PvE is currently doable (and probably doable fairly quickly) by anybody who's able to roster certain characters. It's been this way for awhile now, and most players' expectations are that every PvE will be doable (and probably doable fairly quickly) by anybody who's able to roster certain characters.

It hasn't always been this way, and it doesn't have to be this way forever. But at this point, those expectations are what they are, and they're probably pretty locked in. Making PvE difficult (or, for some of us, interesting) now is not going to go over well among a lot of players, even though some of us would really like it.

I don't think they can make CL11 (I think the actual shield clearance levels in Marvel top out at 10) but I'd love a PvE that has similar rewards to CL10 but is full of really difficult (interesting) fights. You'd have to match the rewards, though, because if they were even a tiny bit better than CL10, everybody would feel like they were forced to move up and would complain endlessly.

MoosePrime

@kuntilanak said:

@bluewolf said:

@MoosePrime said:

@bluewolf said:

@MoosePrime said:
Is there a way to avoid the trap damage without downing Mister Sinister?

1. Stun him
2. Flood the board with protects and avoid the dmg

Oh, I didn't know that stunning him stopped the traps "leave the board" effects. Thanks.

To be clear, I’m not sure that stunning stops the dmg from the trap being matched etc…but it would stop him from making them in the first place!

Also, denying black will reduce his trap generation.

I think trap tiles work even when the character is stunned...

The trap tiles may still work normally when he is stunned, but overwriting or destroying them does not trigger the “leave the board” effect.

Scofie

Thanks @Mr_F - definitely a reasonable and balanced post as always. I guess the question is whether this is the Sinister rebalance or the node as a whole to blame.

Throughout history there have been a number of more difficult CNs - I remember wiping on the Royal Family node in HoD a lot of times and it was long seen as a difficult node. But there hasn't been one recently that caused this much trouble and my roster can deal with the Royal Family pretty easily now.

This one was a shock, not only because it was punishing on my team, but also because it used to not be hard at all. And for all the talk of other characters being OP, I've never lost 90k health in one turn before. That was all Sinister. The other characters were salt in the wounds in other rounds.

@entrailbucket brings up a really interesting point here around expectations and rewards. And it's worth of its own thread I think.

BriMan2222

Wong, Khan, Polaris handled it easily for me 3 times in a row. Took out medusa first so she couldn't fire off purple and steal all my tiles.

Timemachinego

@BriMan2222 said:

Wong, Khan, Polaris handled it easily for me 3 times in a row. Took out medusa first so she couldn't fire off purple and steal all my tiles.

Okoye and bros made it easy too, though I question if a node where only boosted characters make it approachable is at all fair. I certainly don't look forward to dealing with it if I don't already have a reasonably (leveled!) boosted meta character like Okoye or Wong. IMO there's similar "problems" with one of the nodes containing toon Kingpin and both the CN and 5E for the final stage of HoD have already been mentioned.

To Bucket's point, the game is scaled in such a way that your typical baby-champed roster can still expect to vie for t20 (50 at least!) in most slices, played VERY well. Having 2 (or 3?) events in which this isn't the case is just kind of strange, honestly. I'm personally interested in something like a CL11 but balancing that out between rewards and points is frankly something that I don't have any faith in BCS to do correctly.

Gymp28

Thanks for the balanced counter arguments Mr. F. Very fair.
I’m just hoping we don’t live in a world where Sinister gets his awesome rebalance immediately nerfed because a chunk of the player base got schooled by one PVE node…

Timemachinego

@Gymp28 said:
Thanks for the balanced counter arguments Mr. F. Very fair.
I’m just hoping we don’t live in a world where Sinister gets his awesome rebalance immediately nerfed because a chunk of the player base got schooled by one PVE node…

This has literally never happened.

Mr_F

@Scofie Ya can't argue with "Here is a problem. Devs, do something about it!" because there is no details what exactly is wrong and what makes that problem. I need to provide something to be discussed. That is why "nerf x and why we should/have to is obvious" is not a valid argument.

@Gymp28 Your welcome. I mentioned in mThor Dillemma that there are some things like I'd rather leave unchanged than change. Sinister's reworks is one of them. I'd rather whine once in a while on that node than nerf him.

@entrailbucket I'st a direct result of devs generosity. My countargument is simple: I do not expect, want, wish or whatever that a baby 5* roster (which consist, let's say, up to 10 meta 5) to be able to deal with anything. Same for small roster with random 5*. The problem is, where the border starts. Is my roster ok or not? I can't definetly say, but beyond High Evo and newest two, I think I have champed every meta 5* we currently have and double that with non meta. Definetly not an easy dillemma.

mThor, SC, Kang, BRB, OR, Okoye, High Evo, KK, Thanos and whatever. I just naved 8 most common I see in PVP and am aware are meta 5.

entrailbucket

@Gymp28 said:
Thanks for the balanced counter arguments Mr. F. Very fair.
I’m just hoping we don’t live in a world where Sinister gets his awesome rebalance immediately nerfed because a chunk of the player base got schooled by one PVE node…

I don't think it'll generate THAT much backlash. Simulator isn't run very often and (I believe) typically has the lowest engagement, precisely because the fights tend to be much harder. A lot of folks actually just skip it entirely.

As an aside, they used to update it pretty frequently with new characters -- I don't know why that hasn't happened in awhile.

Timemachinego

@Mr_F said:
@entrailbucket I'st a direct result of devs generosity. My countargument is simple: I do not expect, want, wish or whatever that a baby 5* roster (which consist, let's say, up to 10 meta 5) to be able to deal with anything. Same for small roster with random 5*. The problem is, where the border starts. Is my roster ok or not? I can't definetly say, but beyond High Evo and newest two, I think I have champed every meta 5* we currently have and double that with non meta. Definetly not an easy dillemma.

mThor, SC, Kang, BRB, OR, Okoye, High Evo, KK, Thanos and whatever. I just naved 8 most common I see in PVP and am aware are meta 5.

FWIW PVP and PVE meta have become pretty dang divergent and the PVE side contains more ascended 3s and 4s than you'd think. Of the 5s you listed, only SC, OR, Okoye (and sometimes Kang) are at all relevant day to day (boosts add a few, but they're rare enough that I think we shouldn't be considering them, especially considering younger 5* rosters and who they should go after )

Mr_F

@Timemachinego

I specifically listed only nat 5* as 3* and 4* are way easier to get and even without ascending them, some still highly usable in some nodes. Gorr being best example, but I frequently am using Valkyrie, Mantis (and am avoiding Polaris) and whatever. I mentioned 5* as they are entry point here. You need health to survive here and
1. Ascension takes time and champing 5* can be easier and faster with devs generosity,
2. We all know Brolalis and SC/whatever is all ya need to do most of the SCL10. (or at least something like this)

I started fully clearing SCl10 with eleven 5* (Emma, Chasm, Wasp, Kitty, She-Hulk, Storm, Arcade, BRB, Electro, Professor X and Yelena). And it wasn't easy. If I had today just that I would not have concern aboout not being able to do CN or 5* node. I woul blame my underdeveloped roster.

That is why I say that just baby 5* roster, even if full of meta should't be able to do SCL10 so easy.

The 5* I listed comes from staple teams I am using I know peopla are using and make SCL10 doable on easy mode. This might nor be top of the top, but just right ten 5* champs makes it piece of cake. My concern are not for such roster (or the one I had when entering SCL10). Mine is about 30, 40 or whatever 5* champs and whatever else theyhave not being able relativaly easy (=with few tries and healthpack burned) to beat that.

I repeat myself: tough nodes are ok. Nodes when I have to use right characters, like specific 5* or asc4 are not. Go watch @PiMacleod videos to see what I mean. He frequently shows that you can beat tough stuff with underdeveloped rosters. Be it Shield Training or Puzzle Gauntlet. But this time it's diffirent. This not just can't be beat with whatever. You just need right characters to do the job: not any tile remover but Gorr. Not any SAP spammer but Polaris. And such.

BTW: I made the list with just these teams in mind. Just those are enough for SCl 10 top 200.
Gorr/OR/Okoye
Polaris/BRB/KK (or mThor)
SC/mThor/Whatever
Kang/High Evo/Deathlock
mThor/Riri/Whatever
Thanos/Whatever/Whatever (easy nodes)

Timemachinego

@Mr_F said:
@Timemachinego

I specifically listed only nat 5* as 3* and 4* are way easier to get and even without ascending them, some still highly usable in some nodes. Gorr being best example, but I frequently am using Valkyrie, Mantis (and am avoiding Polaris) and whatever. I mentioned 5* as they are entry point here. You need health to survive here and
1. Ascension takes time and champing 5* can be easier and faster with devs generosity,
2. We all know Brolalis and SC/whatever is all ya need to do most of the SCL10. (or at least something like this)

I started fully clearing SCl10 with eleven 5* (Emma, Chasm, Wasp, Kitty, She-Hulk, Storm, Arcade, BRB, Electro, Professor X and Yelena). And it wasn't easy. If I had today just that I would not have concern aboout not being able to do CN or 5* node. I woul blame my underdeveloped roster.

That is why I say that just baby 5* roster, even if full of meta should't be able to do SCL10 so easy.

The 5* I listed comes from staple teams I am using I know peopla are using and make SCL10 doable on easy mode. This might nor be top of the top, but just right ten 5* champs makes it piece of cake. My concern are not for such roster (or the one I had when entering SCL10). Mine is about 30, 40 or whatever 5* champs and whatever else theyhave not being able relativaly easy (=with few tries and healthpack burned) to beat that.

I repeat myself: tough nodes are ok. Nodes when I have to use right characters, like specific 5* or asc4 are not. Go watch @PiMacleod videos to see what I mean. He frequently shows that you can beat tough stuff with underdeveloped rosters. Be it Shield Training or Puzzle Gauntlet. But this time it's diffirent. This not just can't be beat with whatever. You just need right characters to do the job: not any tile remover but Gorr. Not any SAP spammer but Polaris. And such.

BTW: I made the list with just these teams in mind. Just those are enough for SCl 10 top 200.
Gorr/OR/Okoye
Polaris/BRB/KK (or mThor)
SC/mThor/Whatever
Kang/High Evo/Deathlock
mThor/Riri/Whatever
Thanos/Whatever/Whatever (easy nodes)

You're kind of arguing against yourself here. I started playing (and full completing, mostly) CL10 with low 4s. We know it's possible but that was also with the absolute meta at that time, it was slow, like an hour either way, but I could complete it (and I was kind of hating the game at that time, but better rewards are tempting). I'd usually have to grind out the CN with Polaris SAP spam and stunlock, lol.

We both agree that tough nodes are fine, ones that require much more specific teams (or luck, in the case of Kang stuff which I bump up against sometimes) are not.

DyingLegend

I like the rework. I used him against Mthor and he did pretty well.

Mr_F

yep, I agree with last sentence in 100%.

And quick clarification: SCL 10 was designed without ascension in mind and for developed 5* rosters. That is why I have written what I have written. The fact it's doable by 4* or baby 5* rosters is another case.

Sure, if you chase top , that another story. I'm talking about just beating the nodes x times/x+y times.

UnityGamer

To echo a lot of what users have said, I was also frustrated with that Sinister rebalance/node. There's one part where you want to buff the character enough so that they're better, but then there's another part where you don't want to make them too powerful when you're facing them. I struggled against the Sinister-Carnage-Medusa teamup too many times - in fact, I couldn't get a chance to stun them. I brought in Polaris in one of my matches to activate her Iron Proficiency, and I was one Blue AP away from 7, the amount needed to activate. What happens next is total unlucky annihilation.

The only way I was able to defeat this team was to bring in 3-star Deadpool and pony up the Deadpool points for the automatic win. I was only able to achieve this twice (team disclosure: Shang Chi-3 star Scarlet Witch-3 star Deadpool) before the damage output became too unbearable. It does makes me wonder if this node was created with the newly released 5-star Jubilee in mind to take advantage of her secondary Play Again power, the one where you can spend Black AP to down everyone (or is it forfeit) for the automatic win.

I don't know if this is good or bad practice, and I do like to be challenged, but I personally don't like it when a node becomes virtually impossible to win without bringing in a character with an automatic win feature like 5-star Jubilee, 3-star Deadpool or 4-star Multiple Man. Puzzle Gauntlet, on the other hand, that's because the win conditions are different/unique and it can be accomplished by everyone and by specific characters with easy outs or know-how (when the occasion calls for it).

WhiteBomber

I had a completely different experience here and sometimes enjoy having to think about counter teams. I think I probably also have a pretty weak roster (in comparison to most here). I didn't lose a single character or have to heal through all 3 matches:

All noted 5stars are freshly champed (like 450's), except Riri who is only 1, 3, 3

Rounds 1 - 2 (no boosts)

• 5OmegaRed, Chasm and level 180 3 May
• Targeted Sinister first both times, match damage plus buffed red made quick work

Round 3 (1 green boost)

• Chasm was a little hurt and I knew he wouldn't make the fight so I did:
• 5MThor, 5Riri, 5Evo
• Match 1 green, stun to victory. Just use Riri red less than you normally would to avoid creating more traps.

I struggled more with the 5 star Phyla fight from the last tournament. You could make this even easier by subbing Evo for Chasm to really keep them suppressed and use more boosts, but that didn't seem necessary. I also believe we could find multiple other teams to shut this team down, we just need to try, which for most other nodes, you don't have to.

If you are really stingy, I also took team 1 through all of the intro nodes, where 3May fully healed any damage they took at no cost.

entrailbucket

I think they just need to decide who CL10 is actually for, and what they want it to be.

If it's meant to be trivially doable by pretty much any roster, then they really shouldn't be putting stuff like this in there. Just give us 100% goons and Daken/Bullseye or whatever and let people win with one move and collect their free stuff.

If it's meant to be hard, and not doable by everybody, they should probably make that more clear -- because now it's not, at all. Put a bunch more hard fights in there, update the challenge nodes, and buff the CL9 rewards significantly, so players will understand where they're supposed to go.

They'll still get a bunch of flak for it (which is why I'd prefer some new CL with exactly the same rewards so nobody can complain about it), but at least it'd make sense.