Rebalance - Maria Hill (SHIELD Operative) 4*

S0kun

Health & Match Damage

Feeder Chart

Abilities

Ability: Life Model Ambush
Color: Purple
AP Cost: 8

Notes:
Fairly basic ability mechanically, it's a simple Trap ability with simple triggering states. Makes sense as this character came out just a little after Trap tiles were really starting to be used, so it followed the design philosophy of the time, which hadn't been cemented for Traps yet. After looking at the numbers, they are a bit low at this point, and our usage of Traps now normally has them triggering on destruction and replacement as well as matching, so it has been updated as such. So while the ability is still mechanically basic, it now has far more usability, with better damage to boot.

4 STAR: LEVEL 370
Before:
Using a Life Model Decoy, Maria sets up a devastating ambush for her foes. Create 2 Purple Trap tiles that deal 3049 damage when matched by either team.
Level 2: Create 3 Trap tiles.
Level 3: Deal 3941 damage.
Level 4: Create 4 Trap tiles that deal 4239 damage.
Level 5: Deal 6879 damage.

After:
Using a Life Model Decoy, Maria sets up a devastating ambush for her foes. Create 2 Purple Trap tiles that deal 4744 damage when removed by either team.
Level 2: Create 3 Trap tiles.
Level 3: Deal 5698 damage.
Level 4: Create 4 Trap tiles that deal 6162 damage.
Level 5: Deal 9972 damage.

5 STAR (ASCENDED): LEVEL 550
Before:
Using a Life Model Decoy, Maria sets up a devastating ambush for her foes. Create 2 Purple Trap tiles that deal 31556 damage when matched by either team.
Level 2: Create 3 Trap tiles.
Level 3: Deal 32187 damage.
Level 4: Create 4 Trap tiles that deal 33134 damage.
Level 5: Deal 34712 damage.

After:
Using a Life Model Decoy, Maria sets up a devastating ambush for her foes. Create 2 Purple Trap tiles that deal 38482 damage when removed by either team.
Level 2: Create 3 Trap tiles.
Level 3: Deal 39444 damage.
Level 4: Create 4 Trap tiles that deal 40406 damage.
Level 5: Deal 51951 damage.

Ability: Best of Intentions
Color: Black
AP Cost: 6

Notes:
This ability is unique in its strength due to the potentially large downside of massive self damage. It works decently well for what it is, and it's definitely flavorful for Maria Hill's personality. However, it doesn't really mesh with her other abilities. So let’s fix that. With the balance update, we've made the ability create many more, but smaller, Strike tiles than before. Strength-wise, there was a little budget at lower levels to increase the amount of overall strength, so we did so, but at level 5 it was actually already slightly overpowered by the numbers. So we left that as-is to keep everything at least as strong as previous. When combined with the updated mechanics of her Purple, this is a way to not only get some extra Strike strength on the board, but also provide a decent chance to immediately set off some of the placed Purple Traps for additional damage. The last portion of the ability in the new text preventing damage if Invisible is actually just a clarification, not a mechanics change, as it has always acted that way.

4 STAR: LEVEL 370
Before:
Maria puts a bold plan into action, ignoring the potential fallout. Create 3 strength 249 Strike tiles and create a 3-turn Countdown tile. When this Countdown tile expires, Maria Hill takes damage equal to 90% of her base health.

Level 2: Creates strength 338 Strike tiles.
Level 3: Creates 4 Strike tiles and creates a 4-turn Countdown tile.
Level 4: Creates strength 487 Strike tiles.
Level 5: Create 5 strength 539 Strike tiles.

After:
Maria puts a bold plan into action, ignoring the potential fallout. Create 14 strength 134 Strike tiles and create a 3-turn Countdown tile. When this Countdown tile expires, Maria Hill takes damage equal to 90% of her base health.

Level 2: Create 15 Strike tiles.
Level 3: Create 17 Strike tiles.
Level 4: Create 19 Strike tiles.
Level 5: Create 24 Strike tiles.

5 STAR (ASCENDED): LEVEL 550
Before:
Maria puts a bold plan into action, ignoring the potential fallout. Create 3 strength 2578 Strike tiles and create a 3-turn Countdown tile. When this Countdown tile expires, Maria Hill takes damage equal to 90% of her base health.

Level 2: Creates strength 2733 Strike tiles.
Level 3: Creates 4 Strike tiles and creates a 4-turn Countdown tile.
Level 4: Creates strength 2939 Strike tiles.
Level 5: Create 5 strength 3351 Strike tiles.

After:
Maria puts a bold plan into action, ignoring the potential fallout. Create 14 strength 962 Strike tiles and create a 3-turn Countdown tile. When this Countdown tile expires, Maria Hill takes damage equal to 90% of her base health.

Level 2: Create 15 Strike tiles.
Level 3: Create 17 Strike tiles.
Level 4: Create 19 Strike tiles.
Level 5: Create 24 Strike tiles.

Ability: Get Out Alive
Color: Blue
AP Cost: 7

Notes:
Simple and does what it says on the tin. Does team damage and makes Maria Invisible. It's actually very AP efficient for damage/AP once you account for some of the budget being eaten by Invisibility, so we wanted to keep that. As a result, we left level 5 as-is, and made sure that the earlier levels matched up to the AP efficiency for damage, raising these by a modest amount.

4 STAR: LEVEL 370
Before:
Maria Hill always has a high-power exit strategy. Deal 558 damage to the enemy team, and turn Invisible for 2 turns.

Level 2: Deal 1228 damage.
Level 3: Deal 1339 damage. Turn Invisible for 3 turns.
Level 4: Deal 2678 damage.
Level 5: Deal 4799 damage. Turn Invisible for 4 turns.

After:
Maria HIll always has a high-power exit strategy. Deal 691 damage to the enemy team, and turn Invisible for 2 turns.

Level 2: Deal 1345 damage.
Level 3: Deal 1531 damage. Turn Invisible for 3 turns.
Level 4: Deal 2801 damage.
Level 5: Deal 4818 damage. Turn Invisible for 4 turns.

5 STAR (ASCENDED): LEVEL 550
Before:
Maria Hill always has a high-power exit strategy. Deal 5772 damage to the enemy team, and turn Invisible for 2 turns.

Level 2: Deal 9235 damage.
Level 3: Deal 9986 damage. Turn Invisible for 3 turns.
Level 4: Deal 15007 damage.
Level 5: Deal 21183 damage. Turn Invisible for 4 turns.

After:
Maria Hill always has a high-power exit strategy. Deal 7119 damage to the enemy team, and turn Invisible for 2 turns.

Level 2: Deal 8849 damage.
Level 3: Deal 9618 damage. Turn Invisible for 3 turns.
Level 4: Deal 10579 damage.
Level 5: Deal 13469 damage. Turn Invisible for 4 turns.

pepitedechocolat

so 4* blue does more dmg but ascended blue does around 30% less dmg after update ? is that correct ?

CASSIDYFROST

And the new costume will be for her too? 👁👁

S0kun

@CASSIDYFROST said:
And the new costume will be for her too? 👁👁

We'll post it to the socials tomorrow! Just had some last minute things that needed attention so I couldn't post today.

@pepitedechocolat said:
so 4* blue does more dmg but ascended blue does around 30% less dmg after update ? is that correct ?

I checked prior to publishing and yes, these numbers are correct for this rebalance.

WhiteBomber

I think the focus here was probably the black, 24 strike tiles? Impressive for 6 AP. Not sure if it fully justifies her over someone else, but that is a crazy amount of strikes being put out at once and could be fun.

Maybe use her to feed Black King? Definite synergy with X23 5star and Honeybooboo.

KGB

The upgrade to the Black power at 6 AP is impressive. At 550, you get 24 strikes of strength 962 which is 23088 worth of bonus damage. Even the 370 version gets 16584 worth of strike damage.

With so many strike tiles she's an obvious partner for Polaris of course. Might work with Lockjaw too who would deal out damage as the enemy matches them away.

It's going to make those PvE nodes that feature her (one is in Simulator) just that much harder to win. It's yet another character who is featured in PvE nodes who gets a rebalance. It's no longer a coincidence...

KGB

entrailbucket

Weird. She was fine. Fix cable and black widow and the other terrible 5*!

LavaManLee

@entrailbucket said:
Weird. She was fine. Fix cable and black widow and the other terrible 5*!

Completely agree. The only reason I can see for this rebalance, as mentioned by @KGB is to help the defensive teams in PVE (as they have done with several other characters). This does not move the scale for more use by the player base.

entrailbucket

@LavaManLee said:

@entrailbucket said:
Weird. She was fine. Fix cable and black widow and the other terrible 5*!

Completely agree. The only reason I can see for this rebalance, as mentioned by @KGB is to help the defensive teams in PVE (as they have done with several other characters). This does not move the scale for more use by the player base.

She was Tier 2 before (use when boosted) as a 5*. I actually used her then, too -- the strike tile power was crazy good!

Now she's still Tier 2, and has maybe moved up a few spots in that tier. It's not totally pointless, but they could've made a much bigger impact by moving a Tier 3 guy up to Tier 2.

DAZ0273

I always thought she was pretty decent as was. If we are rebalancing 4* then Black Knight, Hulkbuster, Winter Soldier, Nebula, Red Guardian off the top of my head and a bunch of others need attention more.

Mr_F

@DAZ0273 said:
I always thought she was pretty decent as was. If we are rebalancing 4* then Black Knight, Hulkbuster, Winter Soldier, Nebula, Red Guardian off the top of my head and a bunch of others need attention more.

Cough! Cough! Spider-Woman! Cough! Cough!

DAZ0273

@Mr_F said:

@DAZ0273 said:
I always thought she was pretty decent as was. If we are rebalancing 4* then Black Knight, Hulkbuster, Winter Soldier, Nebula, Red Guardian off the top of my head and a bunch of others need attention more.

Cough! Cough! Spider-Woman! Cough! Cough!

Oh yeah, definitely! Also Flaptain and personally I think 4* Luke Cage could do with some tweaks too.

Bzhai

They'll get on those rebalances as soon as their artists are finished doing up their new costumes.

entrailbucket

@Bzhai said:
They'll get on those rebalances as soon as their artists are finished doing up their new costumes.

They're doing rebalances and costumes though! And like honestly, 1 rebalance a month is ok. It's more than we've EVER had before.

The problem is so much smaller than it used to be. Before, they never rebalanced anyone ever. Now they're doing them, and regularly! It's just how they're choosing which guys to rebalance.

pepitedechocolat

I still think they should do an bulk buff of old 5* life/match damage, no changing any ability just making them up to par. i cannot imagine that it would take a lot of ressources.

entrailbucket

@pepitedechocolat said:
I still think they should do an bulk buff of old 5* life/match damage, no changing any ability just making them up to par. i cannot imagine that it would take a lot of ressources.

I've asked them in the Q&A and they say they can't do this. I really didn't understand their explanation though.

ThaRoadWarrior

I was kind of hoping that she would finally go airborne instead of invisible. We were told at release that nobody knew how to make a countdown decriment while the issuing character was in the air, even though Spider-Ham had literally just come out with that exact circumstance in his moveset. Anyway these changes look good even if she wasn't in dire need of it. I wonder if she's going to feature in the Agatha show or something to get on the radar?

the countdown while airborne thing comes from IceIX's post on page 2 of her release thread, which was perhaps comically and quaintly overtaken by complaints about Bishop and also changes to the Shield Training release event, specifically it going away altogether. Good times. https://forums.d3go.com/discussion/81784/maria-hill-s-h-i-e-l-d-operative/p2

DAZ0273

@entrailbucket said:

@pepitedechocolat said:
I still think they should do an bulk buff of old 5* life/match damage, no changing any ability just making them up to par. i cannot imagine that it would take a lot of ressources.

I've asked them in the Q&A and they say they can't do this. I really didn't understand their explanation though.

They can't do bulk costumes to go with!

DAZ0273

And crikey I didn't realise Maria had been around that long. Feels more like 2 years than 4! 😮

Pantera236

The trap tiles from the purple power not only being stronger but also triggering even when overwritten is pretty good too. My 468 is doing 27k per trap. At 672 would probably be like 100k per.

ThisisClemFandango

@Mr_F said:

@DAZ0273 said:
I always thought she was pretty decent as was. If we are rebalancing 4* then Black Knight, Hulkbuster, Winter Soldier, Nebula, Red Guardian off the top of my head and a bunch of others need attention more.

Cough! Cough! Spider-Woman! Cough! Cough!

I think you all meant MYSTERIO and just typed his name wrong