Reasonably buff existing characters to make them competitive

Marvel Puzzle Quest MPQ Suggestions and Feedback
1

Let’s use this thread to make reasonable suggestions for character tweaks to make non-competitive characters more competitive.

Why would we want to make more characters competitive in the meta? Because it will add more variety to PVP. If Marvel Now Magneto, Modern Hawkeye, Loki, etc. were more viable, you would see these characters more often on other people’s teams, which means you would see the usual suspects (Ragnarok, Magneto, Spidey) LESS often. Which would mean PVP would hopefully be a more interesting experience with more variety overall.

In addition, you would have the added benefit of comic book fans being at least closer to viably picking a team of their favorite characters from the comics and standing a fighting chance. This will open up the game to more players other than hardcore PQ fans and keep them more interested.

For your reference, it may be fastest to refer to Shikao’s character max skills thread.

I will start with suggestions on characters I feel are very close to being useful, but still not.

Captain America (Modern)
2 Star Rarity (Uncommon)

At Max Level:
HP: 4450 ← Fine icon_e_smile.gif

Tile damage: 50/45/39/9/10/11 ← Fine so far icon_e_smile.gif

Sentinel of Liberty - Yellow 19 AP ← As often discussed, this is the character’s biggest problem right now. icon_e_sad.gif

I suggest reducing this cost to 14 yellow AP, which puts it juuuust out of the reach of 4x normal match-3s at 3AP apiece, and almost guarantees you will pretty much never first-turn this ability, even with boosts, unless you get some insane, once-in-a-lifetime cascade.

Yes, I know, this is potentially a mini-C. Magneto blue that is theoretically more powerful since it is even easier to make a crit tile, since Cap changes 3 tiles to yellow while Magneto can only change 2 tiles to blue.

And yes, keep in mind, using this ability to make crits with 2-3 existing yellow tiles on the board will return 5-6 yellow AP to Cap when he uses this to make a match-5 or match-6.

However, 19 is just ridiculously expensive and there’s no other character to feed Cap yellow the way Ragnarok feeds Grey Widow’s 19 AP green. Thor’s red doesn’t come close. With a reduced AP cost, Thor and Cap will become the best buddies that comic fans would expect them to be icon_e_smile.gif

Captain America courageously rushes to protect the team’s flank. Transforms 3 chosen basic tiles into Yellow Protect tiles, each with a strength of 6. ← 5?
Level Upgrades
Level 2 – Increases Protect Strength to 7. ← 6?
Level 3 – Increases Protect Strength to 8. ← 7?
Level 4 – Increases Protect Strength to 10. ← 8?
Level 5 – Transform 4 tiles.
Max Level: Damage reduced by 95 per Protect tile ** ← Reduce the protect values if necessary to reduce the utility of the skill, since it would be used more often with a lower AP cost. Let’s be realistic, no one has, or ever will, use this ability specifically to protect themselves from damage. icon_e_smile.gif
**

I would suggest the initial protect tile strength should be 5, then go to 6, then 7, then 8. At max level (85), his protect tiles could protect something like 40-60 damage apiece instead of the current 95.

Star Spangled Avenger - Red 11 AP ← I would increase the cost to 12AP and slightly increase the damage. This ability’s current max damage of 614 at level 85 is so poor that it’s negligible.

The Captain hurls his trusty shield into battle. Hits the target for 50 damage and transforms a chosen basic tile into a 3 turn Countdown tile that returns 8 Red AP.
Level Upgrades
Level 2 – Returns 9 Red AP.
Level 3 – Can target Strike, Protect, Attack, and Web tiles. ← Does 75 damage?
Level 4 – Returns 10 Red AP.
Level 5 – Can target any tile. ← Does 100 damage?
Max Level: 614 damage ← This should be closer to at least 800-ish at max level, I think. Again, this is the guy’s only direct-damage ability, and he’s a 2-star with a level cap of 85. Right now, nobody can touch Thor’s damage, but Thor is also both the tankiest and most damaging 2-star. For reference, at max level, Wolvie’s red does 2225 and Thor’s red does 1113. If this did 800-850-ish, it would in no way jeopardize Wolvie’s or Thor’s damage, but it would make Steve a lot more viable IMO.

Peacemaker - Blue 12 AP
Captain America gallantly launches his shield at the enemy. Stuns the target for 2 turns and transforms a chosen basic tile into a 3 turn Countdown tile that returns 8 Blue AP.
Level Upgrades
Level 2 – Returns 9 Blue AP.
Level 3 – Can target Strike, Protect, Attack, and Web tiles.
Level 4 – Returns 10 Blue AP.
Level 5 – Can target any tile. ← Seems fine to me. No change needed.

2

Let’s see somebody make bag-man useful without completely changing how his skills work

3

Please note that tile damage is the same for all characters of a certain rarity and level. All that changes is what color does what damage.

As for Cap – I might even advocate for lower on yellow… even down to 11. That would turn it into a smaller version of BWGS’s purple, but with a protect feature as a possibility instead of just AP generation/board manipulation. But to use the protect you have to trade off the AP/board bit, making it viable to stay at 11 instead of going higher.

I’d also say both red and blue need to be lower AP cost, and the AP returned lowered equally. Instead of 11 AP, make it 9, with a maximum return of 8. Same for blue. As it stands even those two cost too much to be very usable. Lowering the AP cost on red also makes the current damage more reasonable.

The only real danger you run by lowering the AP costs is that you could more easily gather enough AP to have multiple CD tiles on the board at a time. But the CD tiles are their own vulnerability, and having one matched makes his powers suddenly become very, very expensive.

DumDum – As for BagMan, eliminate his increasing AP costs. Change purple to be 10 AP. He wouldn’t be great, but he’d at least be usable in PvE, and swapping around 4 tiles for 10 AP is reasonable.

4

Captain America’s red is difficult to judge because you get most of your red APs back if the CD tile successfully resolved, which is probably why it does so little damage. He can use a buff, but figuring out the correct value for his red is pretty tricky. It’d probably be easier to make his red do more damage and return less AP, like say 1000 damage for 12r, returns 6r. That’d put it on Thor range if you always resolved the CD successfully, but still borderline usable even if not. Right now Captain America’s ability is better than Thor if resolved successfully (it’s basically 1 red AP), and garbage if not resolved successfully. That’s too wide of a spectrum.

5

I’m with you man, but I think the concern the devs prolly had is how, if the ability were very cheap, the yellow would start to self-fund itself a la Classic Magneto’s blue.

Given that this guy is a 2-star and not a 3-star, I’d be fine with leaving it a bit on the pricey side. Putting it north of 12 means that, even with boosts, you need more than 2 regular match-3s in order to get it started.

In any case, the real issue, and it’s well-documented, is that 19 is just…not realistic…

Well, his blue carries a stun, which is still one of the most important abilities in the game. Bring down his blue cost too much and he starts getting dangerously close to Spidey territory.

Again, he’s a 2-star character, so I’m fine with him not being competitive with a Spidey or a Magneto. But I would like to see the guy standing a little closer to Thor, if not shoulder-to-shoulder.

Cap actually has a lot of things going for him already and he could be an interesting finesse character, if he just got a little bit more tweaking IMO.

I think that could be an OK compromise too. My original thinking is that right now, he does so little damage that he doesn’t really add a ton of value to a team. If his blue were cheaper, he’d be 2-star Spidey. If his red were more damaging, it might actually almost maybe kinda sorta be worth considering adding him to your team and swapping out your Wolvie or C. Storm. Almost. Maybe. Kinda.

6

The problem of the cap is that he is heavenly pve, its only use is to destroy countdown tiles with his red and blue, there are better red and blue heroes out there to fill those colors.

A good way to make it competitive would be making his red spammable, lowering the ap cost and the damage (also changing the ia to target the count down tiles and other effects tiles). That would make him a better support.

I hate his blue but it is almost at a 2 stars sweat spot (spidey the king of the stuns), and hard to balance.

And his yellow is to damn costly to be used.

7

Here’s a go at making bagman viable (but not OP or completely concept changed):

Switcheroo - Purple 13 AP <span style="color: #FF0000"><---Purple 9 AP</span>
Spider-Man pulls the old switcheroo, swapping 2 basic colored tiles and turning them to Web tiles.
Level Upgrades
    Level 2: Also swaps Strike and Protect tiles.
    Level 3: Also swaps Web and Attack tiles.
    Level 4: Swaps all tiles that have a color.
    Level 5: Swaps 2 pairs of tiles. Costs 18 AP. <span style="color: #FF0000"><---Swaps 2 pairs of tiles. Costs 13 AP</span>

Web-Slinger - Blue 9 AP <span style="color: #FF0000"><---8 AP</span>
Slings a web that wraps 1 tile(s) in a sticky cocoon. These locked tiles stick in place and their special effects are neutralized. The locked effect is removed and tile effects resume if it is matched or otherwise destroyed. <span style="color: #FF0000"><---Slings a web that wraps 1 tile(s) in a sticky cocoon. Enemy tiles locked this way stick in place and their effects are neutralized. Friendly tiles locked this way stick in place and continue to function. The locked effect is removed and tile effects resume if it is matched or otherwise destroyed.</span>
Level Upgrades
    Level 2: Locks 2 tiles. Costs 11. <span style="color: #FF0000"><---Locks 2 tiles. 10 AP</span>
    Level 3: Locks 3 tiles. Costs 13. <span style="color: #FF0000"><---Locks 3 tiles. 12 AP</span>
    Level 4: Locks 4 tiles. Costs 15. <span style="color: #FF0000"><---Locks 4 tiles. 13 AP</span>
    Level 5: Locks 5 tiles. Costs 17. <span style="color: #FF0000"><---Locks 5 tiles. 14 AP</span>

Snarky Remark - Yellow 7 AP
The wise-cracking web-head befuddles his foe making it harder to attack and more likely their battlefield mistakes will hurt themselves, increasing the timer on a selected Countdown tile by 1 plus 1 for every Web tile (up to 10). Turns all Web tiles to basic tiles. <span style="color: #FF0000"><---The wise-cracking web-head befuddles his foe, increasing the timer on a selected Countdown tile by 1 plus 1 for every Web tile (up to 10). If there are no enemy Countdown tiles, he creates a yellow 7 turn minus one for each web tile (minimum 1) Countdown tile. When this friendly countdown tile reaches 0, the enemy makes a critical mistake hurting himself dealing 5x the enemy's level + 1x per web tile damage(up to 10).Turns all Web tiles to basic tiles when the selected timer is increased or the friendly timer reaches 0.</span>
Level Upgrades
    Level 2: Increases timer by 2 plus 1 for each Web tile. <span style="color: #FF0000"><---Increases timer by 2 plus 1 for each Web tile or decreases friendly timer by 1 minus 1 for each Web tile. (minimum 1).</span>
    Level 3: Increases timer by 3 plus 1 for each Web tile. <span style="color: #FF0000"><---Increases timer by 2 plus 1 for each Web tile or decreases friendly timer by 2 minus 1 for each Web tile. (minimum 1).</span>
    Level 4: Increases timer by 4 plus 1 for each Web tile. <span style="color: #FF0000"><---Increases timer by 2 plus 1 for each Web tile or decreases friendly timer by 3 minus 1 for each Web tile. (minimum 1).</span>
    Level 5: Affects 2 Countdown tiles.  <span style="color: #FF0000"><---Affects 2 enemy Countdown tiles or creates 2 friendly countdown tiles.</span>

With this, his purple and blue are a little more cost effective, his blue can be used to protect your special tiles while they still function and his yellow can deal some damage…in fact a lot if you’re willing to pit him against a level 230 enemy.

8

This is… excellent! This could actually make him a viable character, with many unique abilities that actually do something useful. I love it!

9

Thanks DerigiblePilot, I’m glad someone liked it. The biggest problem I see is that it’s complex and the AI wouldn’t be able to play it well on defense as is. Would be nice to be able to use the blue to protect your countdown tiles as they continue to count down though : )

10

Well, that’s true, but defense is rarely taken into consideration anyway, as the AI already plays most characters pretty darn poorly. icon_lol.gif

11

Really cool suggestions for Cap and Bagger Vance!

As many have noted, Loki could use a 3rd power to compete with the rest of the *** crowd.

(Green) Phantom Decoy - 14(?) AP
Loki creates illusory doppelgangers of his team, confusing the enemy and creating opportunities for counter-attacks.

L1 - Turns one random basic tile into a Decoy tile. As long as there is a Decoy tile on the battlefield, opponent attacks (including special attacks) directed at Loki have a 25% chance of hitting normally, a 50% chance of doing nothing, and a 25% chance of dealing their damage to the attacking enemy. Decoy tiles become basic tiles again if Loki dies.
L2 - -1 AP cost
L3 - Can choose the basic tile to turn into a Decoy tile.
L4 - -1 AP cost
L5 - Decoy tile affects all attacks towards any of the player’s heroes.

12

I like it, but the % chance is too high and I think it needs to be limited to 1 tile at a time.

As you wrote it, 75% of enemy actions will not work or work against them…this is WAY too much. Something like 20% nothing happens and 5% that it backfires is more reasonable.

13

Bring the Hood up to 5K hp, add 25% damage to black.

14

(Green) Phantom Decoy - 14(?) AP
Loki creates illusory doppelgangers of his team, confusing the enemy and creating opportunities for counter-attacks.

L1 - Turns one random basic tile into a Decoy tile. As long as there is a Decoy tile on the battlefield, opponent attacks (including special attacks) directed at Loki have a 60% chance of hitting normally, a 30% chance of doing nothing, and a 10% chance of dealing their damage to the attacking enemy. Decoy tiles become basic tiles again if Loki dies. Only one Decoy tile on the battlefield at a time.
L2 - -1 AP cost
L3 - Can choose the basic tile to turn into a Decoy tile.
L4 - -1 AP cost
L5 - Decoy tile affects all attacks towards any of the player’s heroes.

Better?

15

I like the idea of cutting down on his AP costs. That’s the biggest problem with the guy.

The yellow as a judo-like, use your enemies’ levels against him, type of ability is a really interesting one that I probably would never have come up with myself. Seems like it would mainly limit him to The Hulk-style PVE events with level 240 characters, or a troll pick in a NHB or a 3-star tourney though.

I personally never thought of Bags as a damage character (one of my old suggestions is here) but interesting ideas overall icon_e_smile.gif

Interesting idea. I think most people would be too scared to attack him even with the 10% chance of damage reflecting back. Right now, a big part of the meta is all about big burst damage in a single attack. Magneto. Thor. Grey Widow. Hulk red (maybe). Having one of these big burst damage abilities reflected back will ruin a game. Answer: run Spidey to permanently stunlock Loki. A character that most top players are already running in most of their teams.

There isn’t really a decent DOT (damage over time, poison-like) system as an alternative, for instance…attack tiles I believe are counted as a single total damage attack. The closest is Ragnarok’s relatively low-damage red → cascade → relatively low damage green → cascade, and frankly with the way Rag’s red & green work, this ability would not be a threat to Rag in the least (reflect 650 damage from his red? 300 from his green? Not super scary). I’d wonder if this kind of ability might drive even more people to run Rag on their team to mitigate risk. Maybe that was the idea, but I’m looking for ways to give people alternatives to him. (says the hypocritical L115 Rag player icon_e_wink.gif
)

16

I don’t know how reasonable they are but I’d like to make a couple suggestions for Sentinel of Liberty.

  1. To make it possible to use it sooner it could make more protect tiles the more yellow AP you have to spend, for instance:
    6 AP = 1 tile
    11 AP = 2 tiles
    15 AP = 3 tiles
    18 AP = 4 tiles
    and still you could wait and hoard yellow if able, to use it for bigger effect or simply to save some on costs.
    Maybe make the Captain stunned for a turn afterward to prevent making “delayed” cascades with placing just one tile in consecutive turns.

  2. Another possibility is that Captain makes just one strong tile. When it is matched it weakens to a lower strength and maybe relocates like Daredevil’s tiles. And when cast again it’s back to full strength OR makes a new tile and again lowers the strength of old tile(s) - whichever is easier to balance. The more covers the power has, the stronger the tile and more strength levels it has so is harder to get rid off.

The problem is it would be a bit (too) complicated? And there are no comparable powers in other characters. Also, how to describe it in a sentence or two?

17

Like the cap and bagman ideas, but what’s wrong with modern hawk Op? I use him all the time.

18

I’m pretty sure that bagman was only introduced just to be a troll character. As for captain America…He just needs a severe ap cost reduction of sentinel of liberty and MAYBE a reduction in all his countdown tiles.

19

If only someone could fix yelena …

20

bumping this up