Finding the Right Character (Indexing Project)

nbperp

I'm starting to get the pieces in place for making all characters searchable based on keywords. I've got my database of characters, their powers, and now, the ability to apply sets of tags to each power.

To give folks an idea of how this may work, I've done all of the 1* and 2* characters (ok, I didn't do Hellcow yet because that just dropped). Below I'm showing how each power of each of those characters gets tagged.

1 - Does helping with this effort sound like something you'd like to do? Reach out to me by PM.

2 - Do you see anything below that may be missing or can be better? I'm all ears.

1* Black Widow (Modern) - Purple - "Aggressive Recon" [Active] Steal AP
1* Black Widow (Modern) - Blue - "Widow's Sting" [Active] Stun Target Non-Target Enemy
1* Black Widow (Modern) - Yellow - "Sabotage" [Active] Destroy Select Basic Tile Countdown Tiles Damage: Standard
1* Hawkeye (Classic) - Purple - "Take Aim" [Active] Select Basic Tile Protect Tiles Create Critical Tile
1* Hawkeye (Classic) - Red - "Arrow Stab" [Active] Destroy Select Row Damage: Standard
1* Hawkeye (Classic) - Yellow - "Smart Shot" [Passive] Use Power: Red Use Power: Purple Gain AP: Purple Gain AP: Red
1* Iron Man (Model 35) - Red - "Repulsor Blast" [Active] Damage: Standard
1* Iron Man (Model 35) - Yellow - "Armored Assault" [Active] Create Protect Tiles Damage: Standard
1* Iron Man (Model 35) - Blue - "Ultra-Freon Beam" [Active] Stun Target Damage: Standard
1* Juggernaut (Classic) - Green - "Unstoppable Crash" [Active] Destroy Random
1* Juggernaut (Classic) - Red - "Headbutt" [Active] Damage: Standard Damage: Self
1* Juggernaut (Classic) - Black - "Your Puny Toys" [Active] Destroy Friendly Enemy Protect Tiles Strike Tiles Damage: Standard
1* Spider-Man (Original) - Red - "Web Swing" [Active] Damage: Standard
1* Spider-Man (Original) - Blue - "All Tied Up" [Active] Stun Target Damage: Standard
1* Spider-Man (Original) - Purple - "Spectacular Strategy" [Active] Convert Random Basic Tile Create Critical Tile Damage: Standard
1* Storm (Modern) - Green - "Lightning Storm" [Active] Destroy Random Damage: Standard Gain AP
1* Storm (Modern) - Yellow - "Mistress of the Elements" [Active] Destroy Random Team-Up Tile Gain AP: Team-Up Damage: Standard
1* Storm (Modern) - Black - "Hailstorm" [Active] Convert Random Basic Tile Create Friendly Attack Tiles
1* Venom (Dark Avengers) - Black - "Devour" [Active] Damage: Standard Check for Web Tiles Destroy
1* Venom (Dark Avengers) - Purple - "Symbiote Snare" [Active] Stun Target Convert Random Basic Tile Create Web Tiles
1* Venom (Dark Avengers) - Green - "Symbiotic Rush" [Active] Damage: Standard Damage: Random Enemy Create Web Tiles
1* Yelena Belova (Dark Avengers) - Purple - "Lethal Recon" [Active] Steal AP Damage: Standard
1* Yelena Belova (Dark Avengers) - Black - "Payback Mission" [Active] Convert Random Enemy Special (Strike Attack Protect) Tile Create Critical Tile
1* Yelena Belova (Dark Avengers) - Blue - "Stealth Explosion" [Passive] Create Trap Tile: Blue
2* Ares (Dark Avengers) - Green - "Onslaught" [Active] Damage: Standard Opposing Gain AP: Green
2* Ares (Dark Avengers) - Red - "Rampage" [Active] Damage: AOE
2* Ares (Dark Avengers) - Yellow - "Sunder" [Active] Damage: Standard Heal: True
2* Ares (Dark Avengers) - Yellow - "Sunder" [Active] Damage: Standard Create Yellow Countdown Tiles
2* Black Widow (Original) - Purple - "Aggressive Recon" [Active] Steal AP
2* Black Widow (Original) - Blue - "Anti-Gravity Device" [Active] Increase Enemy Countdown Tiles Heal: Burst Allies
2* Black Widow (Original) - Black - "Espionage" [Passive] Match-Purple Match-Blue Match-Black Damage: Standard Steal AP
2* Bob (Agent of H.Y.D.R.A.) - Yellow - "We're Gonna Die!" [Active/Passive] Damage: Self Create Strike Tiles Increase Allies Damage: Standard
2* Bob (Agent of H.Y.D.R.A.) - Purple - "Evasive Strategy 423!" [Active/Passive] Create Countdown Tiles Damage: AOE Make Invisibile Self
2* Bob (Agent of H.Y.D.R.A.) - Red - "Get Away From My Pals!" [Active] Damage: Standard
2* Bullseye (Dark Avengers) - Purple - "Adamantium Bones" [Passive] Trigger Match-Purple Create Protect Tiles
2* Bullseye (Dark Avengers) - Black - "Murderous Aim" [Active] Convert Basic Tile Special (Strike Attack Protect) Tile Critical Tile Damage: Standard
2* Bullseye (Dark Avengers) - Green - "Deadly Precision" [Active] Destroy Select Basic Tile Team-Up Tile Damage: Standard
2* Captain America (Steve Rogers) - Yellow - "Sentinel of Liberty" [Active] Select Basic Tile Create Yellow Protect Tiles
2* Captain America (Steve Rogers) - Red - "Star-Spangled Avenger" [Active] Damage: Standard Convert Basic Tile Red Countdown Tiles Gain AP: Red
2* Captain America (Steve Rogers) - Blue - "Peacemaker" [Active] Stun Target Convert Basic Tile Blue Countdown Tiles Gain AP: Blue
2* Captain Marvel (Ms. Marvel) - Red - "Photonic Blasts" [Active] Damage: Standard Destroy Enemy Protect Tiles
2* Captain Marvel (Ms. Marvel) - Black - "Sonic Boom" [Active] Damage: AOE Create Black Countdown Tiles Lose AP
2* Captain Marvel (Ms. Marvel) - Yellow - "Strategic Command" [Active] Create Team-Up Tile
2* Daken (Dark Avengers) - Purple - "Pheremone Rage" [Passive] Trigger Match-Green Create Red Strike Tiles
2* Daken (Dark Avengers) - Black - "Healing & Heat" [Passive] Heal: True Damage: Self
2* Daken (Dark Avengers) - Blue - "Chemical Reaction" [Active] Damage: Standard Convert Blue Green
2* Daken (Dark Avengers) - Blue - "Chemical Reaction" [Active] Convert Friendly Strike Tiles Create Basic Tile
2* Electro (Maxwell Dillon) - Green - "Lightning Volts" [Active] Select Charged Tiles Black Basic Tile Damage: Standard Destroy Row
2* Electro (Maxwell Dillon) - Green - "Lightning Volts" [Active] Trigger Match-Charged Destroy Charged Tiles Gain AP: Black Damage: Standard
2* Electro (Maxwell Dillon) - Black - "Living Dynamo" [Active/Passive] Create Charged Tiles
2* Electro (Maxwell Dillon) - Black - "Living Dynamo" [Active/Passive] Trigger Create Charged Tiles Increase Damage: Standard Reduce Damage: Taken
2* Electro (Maxwell Dillon) - Purple - "Master of Electricity" [Active] Convert Select Basic Tile Create Charged Tiles
2* Electro (Maxwell Dillon) - Purple - "Master of Electricity" [Active] Convert Random Basic Tile Enemy Special (Strike Attack Protect) Tile Damage: Standard
2* Ghost Rider (Alejandra Jones) - Black - "Sin Eater" [Active] Damage: Standard Create Countdown Tiles Increase Enemy
2* Ghost Rider (Alejandra Jones) - Yellow - "Guardian de Almas" [Passive] Revive Heal: Burst
2* Ghost Rider (Alejandra Jones) - Red - "Scythe the Chaff" [Active] Damage: Standard Special (Strike Attack Protect) Tile
2* Hawkeye (Modern) - Blue - "Electric Arrow" [Active] Create Blue Countdown Tiles Stun Target Enemy Lose AP
2* Hawkeye (Modern) - Red - "Blast Arrow" [Active] Convert Select Red Basic Tile Create Countdown Tiles Damage: AOE
2* Hawkeye (Modern) - Purple - "Speed Shot" [Passive] Trigger Match-5 Convert Purple Basic Tile Countdown Tiles Damage: Standard
2* Headpool (Undhead) - Black - "So Hungry" [Passive] Heal: True Increase Damage: Match
2* Headpool (Undhead) - Purple - "Bonesweeper" [Passive] Match-Trap Trigger Damage: Standard
2* Headpool (Undhead) - Purple - "Bonesweeper" [Passive] Create Trap Tile: Red
2* Headpool (Undhead) - Red - "Quick Bite" [Active] Damage: Standard Create Attack Tiles
2* Human Torch (Johnny Storm) - Red - "Fireball" [Active] Damage: Standard Destroy Red
2* Human Torch (Johnny Storm) - Black - "Inferno" [Active] Create Attack Tiles Lose AP: Blue Lose AP: Purple Lose AP: Yellow
2* Human Torch (Johnny Storm) - Green - "Flame Jet" [Active] Create Repeater Tiles Damage: Standard Lose AP: Green
2* Iron Patriot (James Rhodes) - Purple - "Star Unibeam" [Active] Board Shuffle Create Critical Tile Lose AP: Yellow Lose AP: Red Lose AP: Blue
2* Iron Patriot (James Rhodes) - Yellow - "Defensive Array" [Active/Passive] Create Protect Tiles
2* Iron Patriot (James Rhodes) - Yellow - "Defensive Array" [Active/Passive] Reduce Damage: Taken
2* Iron Patriot (James Rhodes) - Red - "Red White and Boom" [Active/Passive] Damage: Standard Damage: AOE Create Repeater Tiles
2* Magneto (Marvel NOW!) - Blue - "Iron Hammer" [Active] Create Random Countdown Tiles Board Shuffle
2* Magneto (Marvel NOW!) - Purple - "Polarity Shift" [Active] Create Random Red
2* Magneto (Marvel NOW!) - Purple - "Polarity Shift" [Active] Create Select Blue
2* Magneto (Marvel NOW!) - Red - "Magnetic Flux" [Active] Create Random Countdown Tiles Board Shuffle Damage: Standard
2* Moonstone (Dark Avengers) - Purple - "Gravity Warp" [Active] Select Basic Tile Swap Enemy Special (Strike Attack Protect) Tile Damage: Standard
2* Moonstone (Dark Avengers) - Red - "Photon Blast" [Active] Damage: Standard
2* Moonstone (Dark Avengers) - Black - "Control Shift" [Active] Steal Enemy Special (Strike Attack Protect) Tile Random
2* Nightcrawler (Uncanny Spider-Man) - Purple - "Spider-Portation" [Active] Damage: Standard Color Change
2* Nightcrawler (Uncanny Spider-Man) - Red - "Astral Cutlass" [Active] Damage: Permanent Ignore Protect Tiles
2* Nightcrawler (Uncanny Spider-Man) - Blue - "Great Kinship" [Active/Passive] Damage: Standard Trigger Match-Strongest Create Strike Tiles
2* Spider-Man (Bag-Man) - Purple - "Switcheroo" [Active] Swap Create Web Tiles
2* Spider-Man (Bag-Man) - Blue - "Web-Slinger" [Active] Create Locked Tile
2* Spider-Man (Bag-Man) - Yellow - "Snarky Remark" [Active] Increase Countdown Tiles Convert Web Tiles Basic Tile
2* Storm (Classic) - Green - "Lightning Storm" [Active] Destroy Random Tiles Board Shuffle Gain AP
2* Storm (Classic) - Blue - "Wind Storm" [Active] Damage: AOE Stun Target
2* Storm (Classic) - Yellow - "Raging Tempest" [Passive] Trigger Friendly Damage: Standard Damage: AOE
2* Thor (Marvel NOW!) - Red - "Mjolnir's Might" [Active] Damage: Standard Create Yellow Basic Tile
2* Thor (Marvel NOW!) - Yellow - "Thunder Strike" [Active] Damage: Standard Create Green Basic Tile
2* Thor (Marvel NOW!) - Green - "Call the Storm" [Active] Damage: AOE
2* Wolverine (Astonishing X-Men) - Green - "Feral Claws" [Active] Damage: Standard Create Red Strike Tiles
2* Wolverine (Astonishing X-Men) - Red - "Adamantium Slash" [Active] Damage: Standard
2* Wolverine (Astonishing X-Men) - Yellow - "Healing Factor" [Passive] Heal: True

dianetics

Obviously ability cost.
For damage abilities it would be nice to see damage per AP spent. Either at champ or max champ level.

nbperp

The damage numbers is challenging in a few ways. For now, I'm using my own roster, though I'm always setting the power to level 5 to get the text/values. Unless we got inside help (or someone has the data they would like to share), I don't know that I could commit to the numbers reflecting a specific level. Now, that said, I could put in a place where the level of the character from whom the data is being pulled can be recorded; that may get some of what you're looking for.

Ability cost is part of what I'm recording, I just didn't output it into the text stream above.

dianetics

The raw numbers are available on the forums on the character release threads.

If you get a bunch of gremlins to help I’m sure they’ll be able to manually scrape the data for you.

Of this is going to be a live page you could place a submission form for character needing to be filled.

nbperp

I've designed it so that folks can have the editor permission. I'm hesitant to make a data project open to the world, although maybe for the number data, it could be open more broadly. I'll pin this feature and come back to it. I know I won't get this done for Puzzle Gauntlet next week, but I'd really like to have the index in place for May's Gauntlet.

dianetics

I don’t think having it as open edit ALA a wiki would be good.
But having an approval page or approval editor confirm changes would likely be more practical.
But only for portions of the character data not all of it.
You obviously don’t want people to overwrite work you’ve already done.

nbperp

Correct. So for now, the data is mostly read only, except for:

. Any user can create/modify their roster(s).
. Editors can adjust the colors, text, active/passive info for a power
. Editors can add/modify tags for a power.
. Editors can submit a new term to be considered and they can work with that term while it is in a "Requested" status, but the tagging won't be visible to the public until it's been approved.
. Only admins can create new characters and load images. I will eventually move image editing to an Editor permission as well, once it's built out. The system design is ready to capture the current cover image, historical/special cover images, as well as costumes - but it's not there yet, I'm prioritizing indexing.

entrailbucket

@nbperp said:
The damage numbers is challenging in a few ways. For now, I'm using my own roster, though I'm always setting the power to level 5 to get the text/values. Unless we got inside help (or someone has the data they would like to share), I don't know that I could commit to the numbers reflecting a specific level. Now, that said, I could put in a place where the level of the character from whom the data is being pulled can be recorded; that may get some of what you're looking for.

Ability cost is part of what I'm recording, I just didn't output it into the text stream above.

Damage numbers all have the same scaling factor -- if you know the damage at any level, you can work it out for every level.

For example, the +120lvl 5* boost always results in a roughly 2.5x increase in power damage.

trenchdigger

The scaling factors are roughly the same but not 100% identical. In the most part this is due to rounding eg. 450 to 550 is 2.16 to 2 decimal places (generally between about 2.1605 and 2.1630). There are a few small inconsistencies which I have never understood eg. Okoye damage buff on her black passive increases from 450 to 550 by a factor of 2.149 instead of 2.16 which is too large a difference to just be rounding (if you used 2.16 the figure would be 14 higher than the actual).

So if you use standard scaling factors you be 99% correct, which is fine for understanding how hard a power hits, but may lead to confusion for a user of the data if it isn't 100% correct.

entrailbucket

@trenchdigger said:
The scaling factors are roughly the same but not 100% identical. In the most part this is due to rounding eg. 450 to 550 is 2.16 to 2 decimal places (generally between about 2.1605 and 2.1630). There are a few small inconsistencies which I have never understood eg. Okoye damage buff on her black passive increases from 450 to 550 by a factor of 2.149 instead of 2.16 which is too large a difference to just be rounding (if you used 2.16 the figure would be 14 higher than the actual).

So if you use standard scaling factors you be 99% correct, which is fine for understanding how hard a power hits, but may lead to confusion for a user of the data if it isn't 100% correct.

Yeah, I guess it's down to this person's intentions. If it was me and the data needed to be 100% correct, I'd code the 1% as exceptions and apply standard scaling to everything else.

Alternatively you could just ignore damage entirely, or attempt to collect actual data on every character at every level.

nbperp

Yeah, I guess it's down to this person's intentions.

Have the most complete collection of MPQ character data.

I see the value in having these numbers, including the ability to cost it out per AP.

Alternatively you could just ignore damage entirely, or attempt to collect actual data on every character at every level.

For now, getting the data collection started, I'm just putting in whatever damage number I personally have and I'm not indicating the level. Once the indexing project is underway and caught up with all pre-existing characters, I can look into expanding the variable numbers to be displayed accurately for their level. That said, I'm certain there are exceptions that will make a formal "this level => this amount" the most consistent way to collect the data

entrailbucket

@nbperp said:

show previous quotes

Yeah, I guess it's down to this person's intentions.

Have the most complete collection of MPQ character data.

I see the value in having these numbers, including the ability to cost it out per AP.

show previous quotes

Alternatively you could just ignore damage entirely, or attempt to collect actual data on every character at every level.

For now, getting the data collection started, I'm just putting in whatever damage number I personally have and I'm not indicating the level. Once the indexing project is underway and caught up with all pre-existing characters, I can look into expanding the variable numbers to be displayed accurately for their level. That said, I'm certain there are exceptions that will make a formal "this level => this amount" the most consistent way to collect the data

Sorry! I was just trying to be helpful and save you some work.

nbperp

Sorry! I was just trying to be helpful and save you some work.

I definitely appreciate it. I hope my reply didn't come off otherwise.

dianetics

Coming back around on this.
I think this specific data set would be quite valuable for the player community.
Dmg per AP compared against peers could likely give us a window into how they value damage.
It will get quite difficult to track directly though as you get into the newer character designs.
How will we be able to compare Beta Ray Bill vs Golden May?
The dev's recently are doing weird stuff to enhance damage for sure.

Seemingly it would have to manually be explained