Soul Gem Season Updates *Updated (12/13/17)

Andy9009 · December 2017

The nerf to Gambit should have been steal 2 enemy AP instead of destroy 2 enemy AP. He's a thief character after all!

I demand a bigger sell compensation lol

Matthewking72 · December 2017

thedarkphoenix said:

Sm0keyJ0e said:

Wait, wut?! So is this gonna happen for anyone without Gambit fighting an enemy Gambit?

end of turn 1: you have 1ap, opponent has 7ap
end of turn 2: you have 2ap, opponent has 14ap
end of turn 3: you have 3ap, opponent has 21ap...

Da fuq?!

EDIT: end of turn 4, you and your friends are dead.

If only the game was so static, there are so many different things that could happen in your favor or against that this scenario rarely happens.

If you use just one ap color boost gambit is thrown off completely at the start of a match.
If you match 4
If you match 5
If you match 3 and get a cascade of any type
If there is a charged tile on the board
If you have an AP generator, or anyone like a loki, BW, mocking bird...etc etc

And on the flip side

If it does play out like you mentioned

end of turn 1 you have 1ap, opponent has 7 (2 purple, 2 red, 3x)
end of turn 2 you have 2 ap, opponent has 14 (4 purple, 2 red 6x)
end of turn 3 you have 3 ap, opponent has 21 (6 purple, 6 red 9x)

This is the situation gambit wants, but its just not likely to be like that for either side and you can actively make sure its not by boosting, which most people never use or have an abundance of. You don't have to boost but it makes your life easier...aka what a boost is suppose to do.

Basically after 3 turns with a positive scenario for a gambit team( with it playing out how you mentioned), his team can fire off a 6 ap power (of a non red or purple) or less in 3 turns while preventing you from doing it.

You know who else could do that (and at a higher rate) and had an AOE stun and Nuke combined? Peggy Carter. You had to burn her down to 30 percent of her life or all your moves have a 40 percent increase cost until then.

I'm not saying gambit isn't strong, nor annoying, but he's far from game breaking or anything we haven't really dealt with before just presented in a slightly different manner.

No other character gens 4 AP every turn, regardless of the board. And no other toon destroys 2 AP every turn, regardless of the board. And maybe my math isn't as great as it once was, but I am failing to see how using boosts changes things. It might delay it by a turn or two at most. Having to rely on getting a cascade in order to possibly, and it is truly only a possibility, win the match, I'm not seeing how that isn't game breaking.

As for Peggy, that comparison isn't even close. At best, she makes things cost 4 more, but you are able to save and fire them still. Gambit destroys 2 AP EVERY TURN. Closer comparison might be Hood, if he had the health of 3* Thor instead of being squishy and didn't rely on the board to steal AP. Oh, and now he gens his own AP as well....

Health of a tank, gens AP like a battery, suppresses AP and hits like a truck...tell me again how we've seen this before?

sinnerjfl · December 2017

thedarkphoenix said:
I'm not saying gambit isn't strong, nor annoying, but he's far from game breaking or anything we haven't really dealt with before just presented in a slightly different manner.

... but... Gambit 5* is game-breaking! His auto-generation of AP is the biggest problem and now they lowered it by 1 while giving him a buff that destroys AP as if he wasnt miles ahead of everyone else.

Consider his red being top tier in damage and it generates AP, his purple is no slouch either with the ability to remove all specials at any level and big damage... then you toss in free AP generation to make it even more ridiculous.

All of his abilities are awesome (generally 1 ability will be middling/weaker), he generates AP by doing nothing...
This is terrible design and it destroys the whole balance of the 5* tier.

There's making a character desirable so people spend money and then there is the Gambit design. I can appreciate they dont want to scrap his black ability altogether but seriously, it was a bad decision then and it still is now. It was obviously a mistake but were gonna have to endure broken Gambit for another season or 2 before their metrics tell them the same thing it did now.

broll · December 2017

Matthewking72 said:

thedarkphoenix said:

Sm0keyJ0e said:

Wait, wut?! So is this gonna happen for anyone without Gambit fighting an enemy Gambit?

end of turn 1: you have 1ap, opponent has 7ap
end of turn 2: you have 2ap, opponent has 14ap
end of turn 3: you have 3ap, opponent has 21ap...

Da fuq?!

EDIT: end of turn 4, you and your friends are dead.

If only the game was so static, there are so many different things that could happen in your favor or against that this scenario rarely happens.

If you use just one ap color boost gambit is thrown off completely at the start of a match.
If you match 4
If you match 5
If you match 3 and get a cascade of any type
If there is a charged tile on the board
If you have an AP generator, or anyone like a loki, BW, mocking bird...etc etc

And on the flip side

If it does play out like you mentioned

end of turn 1 you have 1ap, opponent has 7 (2 purple, 2 red, 3x)
end of turn 2 you have 2 ap, opponent has 14 (4 purple, 2 red 6x)
end of turn 3 you have 3 ap, opponent has 21 (6 purple, 6 red 9x)

This is the situation gambit wants, but its just not likely to be like that for either side and you can actively make sure its not by boosting, which most people never use or have an abundance of. You don't have to boost but it makes your life easier...aka what a boost is suppose to do.

Basically after 3 turns with a positive scenario for a gambit team( with it playing out how you mentioned), his team can fire off a 6 ap power (of a non red or purple) or less in 3 turns while preventing you from doing it.

You know who else could do that (and at a higher rate) and had an AOE stun and Nuke combined? Peggy Carter. You had to burn her down to 30 percent of her life or all your moves have a 40 percent increase cost until then.

I'm not saying gambit isn't strong, nor annoying, but he's far from game breaking or anything we haven't really dealt with before just presented in a slightly different manner.

No other character gens 4 AP every turn, regardless of the board. And no other toon destroys 2 AP every turn, regardless of the board. And maybe my math isn't as great as it once was, but I am failing to see how using boosts changes things. It might delay it by a turn or two at most. Having to rely on getting a cascade in order to possibly, and it is truly only a possibility, win the match, I'm not seeing how that isn't game breaking.

As for Peggy, that comparison isn't even close. At best, she makes things cost 4 more, but you are able to save and fire them still. Gambit destroys 2 AP EVERY TURN. Closer comparison might be Hood, if he had the health of 3* Thor instead of being squishy and didn't rely on the board to steal AP. Oh, and now he gens his own AP as well....

Health of a tank, gens AP like a battery, suppresses AP and hits like a truck...tell me again how we've seen this before?

If you could bring a character with a low cost stun (like Gamora) and a character with strong AP generation (like Vulture), Start out with 4 AP needed for their 6 AP moves, you could stun lock and start your own auto generation within a turn or two.

Now that's certainly not something anyone could reliable do forever one of the billion Gambit matches in PvP, but it's possible to win it with boosts.

I'm not suggesting that as a legitimate fix btw.

Punisher5784 · December 2017

We all should know the real reason for this so-called "nerf" of 5* Gambit.. the devs want us to rush to get our own Gambit to combat enemy Gambits.. think of the time Hood reigned surpreme and the only way to fight him was bring your own.. then as soon as he enters Classic tokens, he will be nerfed OML style.

Devs: "based on your feedback from 3 mos ago, we have decided to rebalance Gambit again to be more akin to the 3* rebalance.

I will bet my roster this will happen! Place your bets

broll · December 2017

Punisher5784 said:

We all should know the real reason for this so-called "nerf" of 5* Gambit.. the devs want us to rush to get our own Gambit to combat enemy Gambits.. think of the time Hood reigned surpreme and the only way to fight him was bring your own.. then as soon as he enters Classic tokens, he will be nerfed OML style.
Devs: "based on your feedback from 3 mos ago, we have decided to rebalance Gambit again to be more akin to the 3* rebalance.
I will bet my roster this will happen! Place your bets

^This. They want people to chase Gambit until he leaves packs, then they'll go 'oh we realized our first nerf wasn't good' and apply a much more severe nerf as soon as he's in Classics.

Dormammu · December 2017

aesthetocyst said:

Dormammu said:

So... 3-star Gambit now does damage to your team. Guess he'll be about as popular as Ragnarok & Sentry.

We asked for a nerf, not another self-damager. *sigh*

Thano3 damages team. He's quite popular.

When 3-star Gambit does 5k AoE to the enemy team, let's talk.

Anon · December 2017

broll said:

Punisher5784 said:

We all should know the real reason for this so-called "nerf" of 5* Gambit.. the devs want us to rush to get our own Gambit to combat enemy Gambits.. think of the time Hood reigned surpreme and the only way to fight him was bring your own.. then as soon as he enters Classic tokens, he will be nerfed OML style.
Devs: "based on your feedback from 3 mos ago, we have decided to rebalance Gambit again to be more akin to the 3* rebalance.
I will bet my roster this will happen! Place your bets

^This. They want people to chase Gambit until he leaves packs, then they'll go 'oh we realized our first nerf wasn't good' and apply a much more severe nerf as soon as he's in Classics.

I was figuring this myself.

huktonfonix · December 2017

@Brigby
@CaseyMalone

There is near-unanimous consent among high-level, competitive 5* players that Gambit is game breaking and in need of a nerf. Based on the note from the developers, it seems that the design/development teams have recognized this as well. Unfortunately there is also near-unanimous consent among high-level, competitive 5* players that this attempted nerf is actually a significant buff that further exacerbates the biggest problem with Gambit: against a similarly-leveled opponent he is only effectively countered by your own Gambit. Before Gambit, we could effectively use our whole rosters at the 5* tier, and frequently also high-level, boosted 4* champions. Some characters are better than others, and some are more effective for specific purposes, but all teams are viable.

Gambit ended that. Only a few very specific character combinations can reliably beat him, other than your own Gambit, and even then it's highly risky and requires an unsustainable use of boosts, teamups, and health packs. This will only get worse as people grow their Gambits, as right now we're struggling against 450 Gambits with our 475+ older 5s. I play daily with 50+ players who all have years put into this game, have well-developed rosters of 5* champs, all reliably place t5 most every PVP (CL8). All but a small handful have Gambit champed. Full disclosure, I'm in that small handful, but mine will be champed as soon as CS completes a swap (yay?). Every single one wants Gambit nerfed, because nobody wants to put years into developing a deep roster in order to only be able to use, and only face, one character every match.

This "nerf" has made the problem far worse. The only way to defeat Gambit today is to neutralize him very quickly before his passive AP generation and red damage/AP generation spiral out of control. He needs to be dead or stunned within a few turns. Most effective strategies against him involve either large amounts of passive damage (Panther, Doctor Strange, etc) or a series of cheap stuns.

This change, while slowing down his red and purple, shuts down that second option and magnifies the AP imbalance.

Current state, assuming both teams match 3 every turn, the first few turns go like this:

Turn 1
3 AP for me
9 AP for enemy

Turn 2
6 AP for me
18 AP for enemy

Turn 3
9 AP for me
27 AP for enemy

This is the do-or-die point for me against Gambit. Most good stuns in the game cost between 6 and 10 AP. If I can get the right AP in these first 3 turns, I can stun Gambit and continue the rest of the match at merely a huge disadvantage instead of an impossible one.

Now let's look at it post-"nerf":

Turn 1
1 AP for me
7 AP for enemy

Turn 2
2 AP for me
14 AP for enemy

Turn 3
3 AP for me
21 AP for enemy

It will take the Gambit user more turns to down my team, yes, but the AP gap is actually significantly wider now. Where previously they enjoyed a 3-1 AP advantage, it's now 7-1. By the time I have 6 AP for the cheapest stuns in the game, they'll have 42 (previously 18), and by the time I can fire a 9 AP stun they'll have 63 (previously 27)!

I'm not pretending that cascades, boosts, match 4s and 5s, etc don't exist, but I'm trying to establish a fair baseline for comparison here. Those can certainly occur, but so do boards where I can't match the colors I need in the first few turns. I'm starting from a basic premise here that in a "Match 3" game, I should be able to beat a similarly-leveled character at the same tier by matching 3 and firing powers in an intelligent manner most of the time. That is simply not the case here.

I'm begging you to please reconsider this change. Nerfing Gambit's black is needed, but this is not a nerf. After two months of absolutely miserable PvP with Gambit in his original state, this change will make non-Gambit versus Gambit PvP go from extremely difficult and miserable to near-impossible. If you spend weeks or months evaluating this change, come to the same inescapable conclusion your entire high-level playerbase has already arrived at, and then additional time designing and developing the next nerf, you'll have lost a significant portion of your already frustrated and dispirited player base.

cpeyton3535 · December 2017

Anon said:

broll said:

Punisher5784 said:

We all should know the real reason for this so-called "nerf" of 5* Gambit.. the devs want us to rush to get our own Gambit to combat enemy Gambits.. think of the time Hood reigned surpreme and the only way to fight him was bring your own.. then as soon as he enters Classic tokens, he will be nerfed OML style.
Devs: "based on your feedback from 3 mos ago, we have decided to rebalance Gambit again to be more akin to the 3* rebalance.
I will bet my roster this will happen! Place your bets

^This. They want people to chase Gambit until he leaves packs, then they'll go 'oh we realized our first nerf wasn't good' and apply a much more severe nerf as soon as he's in Classics.

I was figuring this myself.

I actually hope this is true as it implies a significant level of long-term planning. One might even call it clever.

Otherwise this change is a bit concerning for it's lack of vision.

thedarkphoenix · December 2017

Matthewking72 said:

thedarkphoenix said:

Sm0keyJ0e said:

Wait, wut?! So is this gonna happen for anyone without Gambit fighting an enemy Gambit?

end of turn 1: you have 1ap, opponent has 7ap
end of turn 2: you have 2ap, opponent has 14ap
end of turn 3: you have 3ap, opponent has 21ap...

Da fuq?!

EDIT: end of turn 4, you and your friends are dead.

If only the game was so static, there are so many different things that could happen in your favor or against that this scenario rarely happens.

If you use just one ap color boost gambit is thrown off completely at the start of a match.
If you match 4
If you match 5
If you match 3 and get a cascade of any type
If there is a charged tile on the board
If you have an AP generator, or anyone like a loki, BW, mocking bird...etc etc

And on the flip side

If it does play out like you mentioned

end of turn 1 you have 1ap, opponent has 7 (2 purple, 2 red, 3x)
end of turn 2 you have 2 ap, opponent has 14 (4 purple, 2 red 6x)
end of turn 3 you have 3 ap, opponent has 21 (6 purple, 6 red 9x)

This is the situation gambit wants, but its just not likely to be like that for either side and you can actively make sure its not by boosting, which most people never use or have an abundance of. You don't have to boost but it makes your life easier...aka what a boost is suppose to do.

Basically after 3 turns with a positive scenario for a gambit team( with it playing out how you mentioned), his team can fire off a 6 ap power (of a non red or purple) or less in 3 turns while preventing you from doing it.

You know who else could do that (and at a higher rate) and had an AOE stun and Nuke combined? Peggy Carter. You had to burn her down to 30 percent of her life or all your moves have a 40 percent increase cost until then.

I'm not saying gambit isn't strong, nor annoying, but he's far from game breaking or anything we haven't really dealt with before just presented in a slightly different manner.

No other character gens 4 AP every turn, regardless of the board. And no other toon destroys 2 AP every turn, regardless of the board. And maybe my math isn't as great as it once was, but I am failing to see how using boosts changes things. It might delay it by a turn or two at most. Having to rely on getting a cascade in order to possibly, and it is truly only a possibility, win the match, I'm not seeing how that isn't game breaking.

As for Peggy, that comparison isn't even close. At best, she makes things cost 4 more, but you are able to save and fire them still. Gambit destroys 2 AP EVERY TURN. Closer comparison might be Hood, if he had the health of 3* Thor instead of being squishy and didn't rely on the board to steal AP. Oh, and now he gens his own AP as well....

Health of a tank, gens AP like a battery, suppresses AP and hits like a truck...tell me again how we've seen this before?

. No other character has done a lot of things for the 1st time in 3/4 land. Gambit is the 2nd character do have a 1st in 5 land. With jean dying and coming back.

locking out 2 colors for a team outside of one character would mean those colors need to be somewhat powerful, which red is.. and purple is kind more of a utility.

Peggy making things cost 4 more is huge, thats a total of two more regular matches or two turns, so instead of it taking 2 turns to fire a 6ap move it now it takes 4 and thats if you get a match 3 in the color you need every turn. and 6ap is along the cheaper side of power cost. That's for EVERY single power static, while gambit destroys 2 at random.

so that's a 2 out of 6 chances to destroy 1 ap in a color or if you only have one color 2 ap in that color each turn. Its annoying but far from game breaking.

I'd gladly swap peggy's passive for gambit in 5 land. let her gen 2 ap a turn and destroy 2 ap randomly in favor of gambit having a passive that made everything cost 4 more for the opposing team along with his purple and red ap.

better hope the board is in your favor.

She still has one of the best passives in the game along with hood and black bolt.

moss04 · December 2017

I can't wait for six months from now when Franklin Richards has a passive that gives him 2 extra turns each round, then 2 seasons go by and the devs say "we recognize this power needs a nerf so we changed it so that Franklin's team only gets 1 extra turn per round but the opponent now loses a turn every other round".

In all seriousness though, I do appreciate the attempt to fix gambit while not actually nerfing him (making him useless or low tier), but like others I feel this fix at best leaves just as tough to beat and at worst makes him even harder. I have little doubt that metrics will be the same by the end of next season.

Kmjakob · December 2017

I dont like that gambit 3* and 5* dmg yours team. Then for me he is no use for me becaue he dmg yours team member

ViralCore · December 2017

thedarkphoenix said: a bunch of stupid things

Do you really think the community has no idea how to play? Or, lack the experience on how to evaluate a character? Believe it or not, there are many of us who don't use cupcakes.

[Moderator edit: don't insult people and don't edit their quoted text to make them look bad. Be nice. -Dayv]

LifeofAgony · December 2017

Except, as has been stated many many times, Peggy passive is, say it with me, Conditional. Once Peggy is below certain health threshold, the power goes *poof*

Unconditional AP gain and now AP destruction is borked. Broken. Busted. Ridiculous.

Theres no other passive in the game that’s in the stratosphere of similar for comparison purpose.

Wumpushunter · December 2017

I know everyone wants to talk Gambit, but just one response on CL/shield rank, please. This topic ends my game.

cpeyton3535 · December 2017

Wumpushunter said:

I know everyone wants to talk Gambit, but just one response on CL/shield rank, please. This topic ends my game.

Totally agree with you that this ruins things for some players who are going to be trapped in 7 with no way of escaping and an inability to improve their roster in any meaningful way.

Beer40 · December 2017

Maybe they only did this so they can appear they tried to fix the issue while still generating the revenue they want from people chasing Gambit?

Would you be more likely to quit a game/quit spending over something bad being ignored? Or an attempted fix that just didn't quite work? Seems like the former to me.

If that's the case they can let this go on for a little while longer, claim new metrics showed them their nerf didn't work (which they already likely know), and then come down on him OML style, after that revenue stream has started to dry up.

Or maybe its just an innocent try and fail? Or maybe its a good hearted attempt to take the nerf slowly so they don't over nerf him into the ground? They did see the OML backlash after all.

No one really knows but the team. Maybe they don't even know. Could be that they're told exactly what to do without getting the specifics as to why and they have to guess themselves. Wouldn't be the first company that operated that way.

All we can do is speculate. Personally, I usually just assume incompetence (especially when there's a history of it) but when there's money involved, and there's also a history of shady money dealings, I generally assume something more "sinister" (sorry, only word I could think of) at play, which is what I think is happening here.

thedarkphoenix · December 2017

Sm0keyJ0e said:

thedarkphoenix said:

Sm0keyJ0e said:

Wait, wut?! So is this gonna happen for anyone without Gambit fighting an enemy Gambit?

end of turn 1: you have 1ap, opponent has 7ap
end of turn 2: you have 2ap, opponent has 14ap
end of turn 3: you have 3ap, opponent has 21ap...

Da fuq?!

EDIT: end of turn 4, you and your friends are dead.

If only the game was so static, there are so many different things that could happen in your favor or against that this scenario rarely happens.

If you use just one ap color boost gambit is thrown off completely at the start of a match.
If you match 4
If you match 5
If you match 3 and get a cascade of any type
If there is a charged tile on the board
If you have an AP generator, or anyone like a loki, BW, mocking bird...etc etc

And on the flip side

If it does play out like you mentioned

end of turn 1 you have 1ap, opponent has 7 (2 purple, 2 red, 3x)
end of turn 2 you have 2 ap, opponent has 14 (4 purple, 2 red 6x)
end of turn 3 you have 3 ap, opponent has 21 (6 purple, 6 red 9x)

This is the situation gambit wants, but its just not likely to be like that for either side and you can actively make sure its not by boosting, which most people never use or have an abundance of. You don't have to boost but it makes your life easier...aka what a boost is suppose to do.

Basically after 3 turns with a positive scenario for a gambit team( with it playing out how you mentioned), his team can fire off a 6 ap power (of a non red or purple) or less in 3 turns while preventing you from doing it.

You know who else could do that (and at a higher rate) and had an AOE stun and Nuke combined? Peggy Carter. You had to burn her down to 30 percent of her life or all your moves have a 40 percent increase cost until then.

I'm not saying gambit isn't strong, nor annoying, but he's far from game breaking or anything we haven't really dealt with before just presented in a slightly different manner.

I can only guess that you are not in the 5* tier and have never faced a Gambit. Sure, all those things you mention could happen in your favor... or against you. Bad luck or boards allow enemy Gambit to go out of control. You are also assuming he does not match red or purple in those initial moves and quickens his assault.

Peggy is not a fair comparison at all. She delays powers--she doesn't destroy AP and prevent them from firing altogether... for free... every single turn.

Gambit IS game breaking. You either have him and can compete or you don't and settle for low placement/rank or just quit. Those arguing otherwise are being naive or don't know what they're talking about.

I'm in 5 tier with a handful of 5 champs, and I don't have a gambit champed and until last week I only had 1 cover in black.

So yes I face 5 gambits all the time, I skip them most of the time truthfully. But I also skipped Blackbolts before gambit and Hawkeye/coulsons, thanos/panther's before that and oml's before that.... there's always something.

My example used was with what was provided, my point was like you said.....the odds of a gambit encounter going like that are pretty low, either you get blown up quick usually or they get blown up pretty quick usually. And its less to do with his passive and more to do with blackbolt providing charged tiles for him off the jump or the teams strongest color being red/purple and those getting either matched or denied by you 1st.

When everyone is on a equal playing field peggy delaying the use of a power plays similar to gambit but worst because its static and effects all abilities. If I dont fire a ability that gets her to 30 percent with match damage, then I have to start the journey of gaining ap all over again.

Its a nightmare in 4 land to deal with, well it was until medusa/gamora/R&G/cap marvel came around.

thedarkphoenix · December 2017

LifeofAgony said:

Except, as has been stated many many times, Peggy passive is, say it with me, Conditional. Once Peggy is below certain health threshold, the power goes *poof*

Unconditional AP gain and now AP destruction is borked. Broken. Busted. Ridiculous.

Theres no other passive in the game that’s in the stratosphere of similar for comparison purpose.

So basically once she's dead... what a condition. They should add that to gambits powers so people can "feel" better about it.

Soul Gem Season Updates *Updated (12/13/17)

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