The Great Fixing Thread

Marvel Puzzle Quest MPQ Character Discussion
1

Here’s the deal meatballs. We all know there are still characters which need fixing so this thread is a contructive thread to help give devs some help and feedback on who to fix and how.

So…only post in this thread if your post meets the following criteria…

  1. You have identified up to a max of 3 characters (don’t want the thread unreadable) who you believe need fixing

  2. You have provided a fix for those characters which is reasonable.

I’ll get it started…

3* Spiderman

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6 ap spider sense
Places a CD tile and while on the board Pete will intercept any attack absorbing the damage while nullifying 20% and also stunning the attacker for x turns. CD tile length, damage negation and stun all increase with covers

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master of sarcasm (passive)
When Pete absorbs x damage he hides his hurt with his humour and generates 1 blue ap. Increases ap gained with covers and also adds red and black ap while slightly increasing damage threshold.

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acrobatic punch 8ap
Pete uses his acrobatic style to land a haymaker. Deals x damage and stuns for 1 turns. Damage and stun length increase with more covers.

This skill set seems to fit spidey in my opinion. Hit original set as a 100% support doesn’t suit. Spidey isn’t just support and has gone toe to toe (and won) against many opponents in his time. He’s also pretty used to being self sufficent too so these changes also reflect that

2

Personaly, i think Spidy blue is good has it is. However, its other two abilitys need somework

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Honestly, i have no idea how this need to be done, BUT it need a compleate rework.

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I love spider sense, but you can only have so many defensive titles before you need to match them away AND you need to do the match, that make no senese, this is my idea for this ability revamp:

Spider-Man’s senses tingle and he moves to protect his team. If an enemy match a purple tiles, Spider-Man creates a Purple Protect tiles and place a web title, if Spider-Man team match a purple titles, Spider-man follow it doing damage and creating a web title.

In this way, Spider Sense works as both an ofensive an defensive tool, in adition of creating more web titles to empower your other abilitys.

3

Elektra
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At level 4, increase number of tiles stolen to 3. At level 5, remove trap tile conditional for up to 4 tiles stolen.
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Reduce cost from 10 to 9. Add passive effect: if one of these tiles is out and an ally of Elektra would take X or more damage, move Elektra to the front.
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in addition to current effects, if this trap tile is matched by the opponent, deal X team damage.

[spoiler]fix announced 3/6/2017

Wasp
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Convert Strike to Protect, Protect to Attack, and Attack to Strike. Increase at current levels. If there are no friendly Strike, Protect, or Attack tiles on the board when this ability is used, create one of each.
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Reduce blue AP required to trigger the passive by 5.
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Reduce AP drained by stun from 3 to 2. (Which won’t turn off the passive blue power.)[/spoiler]

Captain Falcon
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In addition to current effects, turn 3/4/5/6/8 random purple or black tiles red.
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Add 1 to the number of special tiles buffed.
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In addition to current effects, add: For every 3 friendly protect tiles on the board, turn a random basic tile into a 3 turn countdown tile. When the countdown tile resolves, destroy two random enemy special tiles.

4

Daredevil

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Reduce cost to 8. Let it destroy countdown, invisibility and trap tiles at higher covers.
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No complaints!
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Make this placeable on first cast. After that, if it’s matched by the player it can place itself randomly.

5

Is this to be just about buffs? icon_razz.gif

[spoiler]Iceman

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Make his CD drain 1 friendly blue AP at the start of the turn. He can still punch for 12 AP if you have it ready upfront, and leave someone stunned for 4 turns. But it would be costlier (up to 10 blue AP instead of fixed 6 AP) to keep someone perma-stunned every 4 turns, unless you can destroy your own CD somehow.[/spoiler]

6

Yeah I did specify in condition 2 that the suggested change had to be reasonable. Keeping one character permanently stunned doesn’t strike me as reasonable. I do like that you’ve attempted a new mechanic though. Great creativity

7

I’m not sure I follow. What is more reasonable - needing 6 AP every 4 turns to keep one character stunned or needing possibly up to 10 AP every 4 turns for the same effect?

8

3 Spider-Man*
sections spoilered for your convenience

What needs fixing?

[spoiler]Spider-Man is a support character that was designed (and re-designed) against a metagame that no longer exists. His main problem is that even the metagame that he was last redesigned against is so far in the past now that he’s completely outdated in almost everything he does. I think the current 3* Spider-Man’s one saving grace is probably his stun, which is still quite formidable - however I’d also argue that Dr Strange’s stun is easily the superior.

His Yellow is a group burst heal which is way too expensive in a game where Kamala Khan is an option, and his Purple passive has a quirky interaction with Web tiles which worked great when you could slow the game down with 2AP stuns but doesn’t quite have the same impact now - plus Luke Cage offers a perpetual protect tile in a much better package.

Previously 3* Falcon and Spider-Man had shared the privilege of having no damage dealing abilities, but recently Falcon got a rework which gave his Purple ability an AoE. It’s a much more significant change than I had first anticipated and there are some subtle changes to the way Falcon sits in team comp now. AoE damage on Purple isn’t exactly new (hi SWitch) but it’s cheap and still provides some friendly special tiles that Falcon can buff.

Spider-Man is showing his age and looking tired.[/spoiler]

How do we fix it?

[spoiler]Spider-Man has some pretty serious super-strength, but he’s not a brute fighter. He relies on agility and wearing his opponents down (usually through smaller, quick hits and snarky comments) more than delivering big hits. Healing is out, damage is in.

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Listen Bud 9 redtile.png

Spider-Man swings at the target, dealing X damage.
If the target is stunned, he instead deals Y damage but removes the stun from the target.

Rank 1-4 increase base damage values
Rank 5 no longer removes stun

I think this is a pretty straight forward red ability, deals one damage value as a base, or a greater damage value under certain conditions.

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Same as current.

At this point in time, I don’t think there’s a need to change this ability. It’s still probably the 2nd best stun in the 3* tier, and it still supports the two other abilities for Spidey.

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Great Power 12 blacktile.png

Spider-Man delivers a crushing blow, hitting his target right where it hurts.
Deals X damage, and if there are more than Y web tiles, remove all web tiles and stuns the target.
This power becomes Great Responsibility

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Great Responsibility (Passive)
Whenever an ally would be targeted by an enemy ability, Spider-Man swings in and takes the hit instead.
This ability becomes Great Power.

Rank 1-3 increase base damage value
Rank 4 adds the stun component
Rank 5 increase damage
Passive remains the same for each Rank - Peter eats one targeted ability.

This alone is an ability which I have wanted to see for a long time. It’s a split form ability which alternates each time it is activated. Great Power is a an offensive ability which can shut down a big threat. Great Responsibility is a passive ability which takes the form of Peter learning some hard lessons.[/spoiler]

Final Comments

We gain another Red/Blue/Black user in the 3* tier, next to Psylocke (iirc, she’s the only one there right now). With Strange and Falcon taking care of variations on Yellow/Blue/Purple, there’s no gap left there.
The colour changes are required, given the way the powers now work, but I’ve arguably created a very strong partner for IM40, which could lead to some issues?
Still not sure on costing for Great Power. It should be a strong attack, but I feel it can afford to lose a few AP points off the cost, since Peter is likely to take a hit once the Great Responsibility passive takes its place.

9

3 Sentry*
once again, spoilered for convenience

What need fixing?

Sentry exists in kind of an odd space in MPQ. He counts as a Villain - a Dark Avenger, no less - but doesn’t appear as an enemy in the Dark Reign chapters. He was the king of the meta at one stage, but nerfs and power creep have left him as a mostly toothless tiger (he’s still got some claws, but he’s not fearsome as he once was).
There are some “gaps” in the 3* tier, mechanically speaking, which I think can be plugged. Gaps which essentially teach players about upcoming game mechanics or train them further on what they learned in the 2* tier.

How do we fix it?

[spoiler]:redflag: Supernova 7 redtile.png
Rework this ability so that it works like Ares’ Onslaught or Hulkbuster’s Rocketpunch.

  • Drop the cost to 7 AP
  • Remove the team damage
  • Ability now drains all Red AP when used and deals X damage per AP.

IMO, Sentry is the perfect character to bridge between Ares and Hulkbuster, and he feels like a natural choice for a similar “overkill” style ability as those two.

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World Rupture 12 greentile.png
Sentry takes to the air (self airborne 1 turn)
before slamming into his opponent (X damage to target)
the impact creates ‘aftershock’ CD tiles (same X pattern, same damage as current)

I don’t really know what to do with WR. It’s a bit of an odd duck, but I don’t have any idea what to replace it with and I’m already reworking both other abilities. I think the 1 turn airborne and inital single target damage give some additional benefit which help offset the wait time on those CD tiles.

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The Void Also Gazes (Passive)
Whenever an enemy gains AP from any source except from shattering tiles, if no friendly Strike tiles exist, create a strength X Black Strike tile, otherwise improve a friendly Strike tile by Y.

Whenever Sentry or his allies gain AP from any source except from shattering tiles, The Void creates a strength X Black Attack tile.

OK. This is a little convoluted because I’m trying to introduce a passive trigger that doesn’t exist in the game right now. Basically, this passive should trigger whenever either team gain AP in any way other than matching tiles. The Hood steals AP? it activates. Carol Danvers generates AP? it activates. Recharge CDs resolve? it activates. (Goons have a turn? yeah, it probably activates… it may need some tweaking of numbers to account for this, but also Sentry should be able to decimate goons.)

The result of activation depends on which team was generating AP. If it was the enemy, then Sentry strengthens (or creates) friendly Strike tiles. If you try to accelerate against Sentry, he’ll just get stronger. If it was the friendly team, then Sentry creates enemy Attack tiles. This was the best way I could represent The Void working against Sentry, seeking a way to break out. Robert is afraid of his own power, and what might happen if he was ever unchecked.

The strength of the enemy Attack tiles should be minor to average, since there is “no limit” to the number that can be created. In contrast, the Strike tile improvement should be quite strong, since it can be easily undone by removing the buffed tile (in which case the ability starts all over again with a new tile).

And yes, the title of this ability is a reference to the famous Nietzsche quote modified just slightly to reference The Void.[/spoiler]

Final Comments

[spoiler]The Void Also Gazes simply has to to Black, given the way it works it just fits that colour. That said, I’m not too keen on simply turning one of the RGY characters into another RGBk one. I’m also kinda cautious of making just another 2 actives and a passive type character, but agree that the 3* tier isn’t really the place for too many experimental abilities.

This build reinforces the overkill mechanic first learned from Ares, which players will definitely see again from Hulkbuster as they progress into the 4* tier. It also provides a second opportunity to interact with the Airborne mechanic (aside from Colossus), and retains Sentry’s status as the go-to for learning about how to deal with self-damage before players go on to face Carnage. It also helps players identify when and how to accelerate AP and what to do against characters that try to stall you.[/spoiler]

10

I’d vote for this change. Any time new mechanics can be thoughtfully and usefully introduced is good in my opinion

11

5* Hulk

Improve AOE damage by 35%

Make it so that when in hulk form the match made by AI collects AP - or - does triple damage.

12

I just came up with a way to improve WR in a flavourful way: Make it so the CDs are shorter the closer they are away from the centre. Make the four central CDs be 1-turn, the four in the “middle ring” be 2-turn and the eight towards the corners be 3-turn. That way, there will be a much more increased likelihood of more CDs going off (and reaping benefits each turn for all our new characters that care about CDs). Also, I think it should cost 10 AP

13

A shockwave radiating out from the middle of the board. Makes sense to me. Making the tiles more likely to go off almost makes a cost reduction less necessary. World Rupture is already absurd with any sort of (reasonable-strength) strike tile out, provided most of them go off.

14

4 Elektra*

What needs fixing?

She’s got a significantly interesting powerset (tile steal + improve, damage mitigation, incidental damage), however her powers are generally slow, yet narrow in scope, and somewhat fragile.

How do we fix it?

[spoiler]I think the general idea behind Elektra’s inital design was to be a kind of harrasser - someone that doesn’t have a huge Nuke, but is difficult to take out and constantly wearing away at her opponents. I want to preserve that concept as much as possible, while drawing upon a few game mechanics which have come along since her addition to the game in order to give her a bit more sting.

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Elektra’s time with The Hand gave her training with a wide array of devices to confound her enemies.

Rank 1: Elektra fires a small volley of Shuriken. Create two 2-turn Black Countdown tiles that deal X damage when they resolve.
Rank 2: Smoke bomb! Create a 3-turn Purple Countdown tile that grants Elektra Invisibility for 2 turns when it resolves.
Rank 3: Caltrops! Whenever Elektra gains Invisibility, create a Caltrop trap on a random basic tile.
Rank 4: Poisoned Weapons! Each Shuriken Countdown also creates a strength Y Attack tile when they resolve.
Rank 5: Improved Kit! Create an additional two Shuriken tiles (total 4) and Smoke Bomb now grants Invisibility to Elektra’s allies as well.

It’s Maggia Pawns, but for Ninja type tricks. This is probably the biggest change; completely replacing one of Elektra’s abilities and changing her strongest colour to Red. By its nature, this is a “do everything” type ability, so I tried to keep it balanced and interesting. The name is, of course, an allusion to The Hand (that’s how you make Shadow Puppets) - although for the purposes of flavour I’ve described it as Elektra using those weapons and devices rather than calling in Hand Ninjas. I’m sure everyone would appreciate an opportunity to drop some caltrops of their own and finally let the AI know what it feels like.

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Double Double-Cross 8 purpletile.png
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Elektra adds enemy AP of a selected colour, then siphons some back to her team.

Rank 1: Adds 5 AP of the selected colour to the enemy AP pools, then steals 33% of that AP.
Rank 2: Adds 7 AP of the selected colour to the enemy AP pools, then steals 33% of that AP.
Rank 3: Adds 7 AP of the selected colour to the enemy AP pools, then steals 50% of that AP.
Rank 4: Also steal 25% from another random colour
Rank 5: Also steal 50$ from another random colour

Most of the issue with the original DDX was around the initial cast - if there were no enemy Strike tiles to steal then you end up paying AP to give the opponent Strike tiles with no benefit to your team. I felt it was better to simply move away from the tile steal/buff entirely and take a look at another sort of double double-cross. This was a little trickier than anticipated (and required a little bit of maths to make sure that it did actually improve at each rank). The final product is, I think, fairly straight forward - first the enemy gains AP, then you steal a portion of that pool.
This ability will always return something (although there are still plenty of scenarios where it would be inadvisable), so I think that alone makes it an improvement. I did bump the cost up by 1, but it’s targeted AP steal which I think is worth paying for.

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Ballet of Death 7 blacktile.png
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Death is a dance and only Elektra knows the next blood-soaked step.

Rank 1: Create a trap on a random basic tile. If the trap is matched by Elektra or her allies, deal X damage to the targeted enemy and recreate the trap on a new random basic tile. If Elektra would take more than Y damage, instead negate the damage and destroy the trap tile. While a friendly Ballet trap tile exists, this ability is disabled.
Rank 2: Increase damage dealt
Rank 3: Increase damage dealt
Rank 4: Increase damage dealt
Rank 5: Create 2 trap tiles

I’ve blended the original Ballet of Death with Shadow Step, and thrown in a dash of Daredevil’s Ambush. The end result is how I thought Ballet should have always worked, right from the beginning. I’ve reduced the cost by 1 AP, but the “shadow step” portion no longer deals damage back to the enemy and the ability becomes locked, so you can’t just keep stacking traps.[/spoiler]

Final Comments

[spoiler]Not sure if there’s anything much more to add here that wasn’t covered in ability descriptions. I guess it’s difficult to really guage without solid damage values, but I think this does at least deliver a character that fits to that harasser/annoyer type design but now has more reliable abilities.

AP Steal had to be on Purple to avoid the most possible combo creation/conflicts
The Hand/Do Everything on Red was a bit of a happy coincidence; again, I think it creates enough of a conflict with, say, Star-Lord, but there’s still some clear synergy with Coulson (although if you’re after value in AP for number of Countdowns, Kingpin or Deadpool would still be better options).[/spoiler]

15

3* Hulk

I’ve been wanting to do something with Hulk for a while, but I couldn’t come up with that hook that really sells a character. Today, I finally had the inspiration that I needed and I think I have something to work with.

What needs fixing?

Hulk doesn’t feel like the Hulk. Both of his actives have some conditions on the damage, and neither of them really feel like it’s really worth it. Then there’s that whole situation where his passive gets “worse” as he gets more levels.

How do we fix it?

Two words: Countdown. Management.
The Hulk is a fairly devastating force when unleashed, but he’s also known to get bored and walk away from encounters. So I wanted something that could resolve in a few different ways under a few different circumstances.

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Anger Management (Passive)
At the start of each turn, if one does not exist, create a Black 2-turn Anger countdown tile. When this countdown expires, The Hulk is deals damage to each enemy equal to 50% of the damage he sustained while the countdown was on the board.
If the countdown is matched, instead heal the Hulk for 3% of his total health.
If the countdown is destroyed, instead create a strength X Strike tile.
Rank 2: 75% damage to enemy team, stronger Strike tile
Rank 3: 3-turn countdown, 4% healing
Rank 4: 100% damage to enemy team, stronger Strike tile
Rank 5: 5% healing, creates two Strike tiles

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The Hulk taunts his enemies into really getting on his bad side. Add 1 Anger countdown to the board & grants 1 turn of invisibility to his allies.
Rank 2: Adds 2 Anger countdowns
Rank 3: Adds 3 Anger countdowns and grants 2 turns of invisibility
Rank 4: Grants 3 turns of invisibility
Rank 5: Adds 5 Anger countdowns.

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I think this is more or less ok, I just wanted to tweak it to be a bit closer to the mechanics of Rhulk’s clap.
Deals X damage and destroys 3 tiles. If Hulk has 20 or more Green AP, instead drain all friendly Green AP, deal Y damage and destroy 9 tiles.
Rank 2: destroy 4 or 12 tiles
Rank 3: destroy 5 or 15 tiles
Rank 4: destroy 6 or 18 tiles
Rank 5: destroy 8 or 24 tiles

Final Comments

I think this creates much better synergy between his powers, and different strategies can arise out of protecting, matching, or destroying Hulk’s countdown tiles. I tried to simply put some new spins on existing mechanics. Wasp creates a countdown that has two possible outcomes, Ghost rider has an ability which tracks damage, etc. This version of Hulk certainly brings a lot together that hasn’t been seen inside the 3* tier before. As always, I like to discuss the idea of teaching or training players on abilities - which was the decision behind my changes to Thunderous Clap. So this version of Hulk does have a lot of different mechanics which do pop up again in the higher tiers.

16

3* Spidey.

Yellow is the worst, so we’re removing it. Fix forthcoming.

Blue is fine, as-is, but might need tweaking with my character suggestions. So we’ll come back to it.

So we start with purple. Spidey Senses currently only drops protect tiles if you match purple (which Spidey can’t use). They don’t react to anything (which is stupid for one of the most reactive superhero powers EVER). And there’s a sad lack of webs being used here (Spidey has reacted to a gunman pulling a trigger fast enough to web up the gun and render it useless, so let’s add some webbing in here).

The fixes.

3* Spidey Purple now makes strike tiles when the player makes purple matches, and protect tiles when the opponent makes purple matches (allowing it to react both offensively and defensively). These tiles increase in strength based on the number of web tiles on the board. This power also creates one web tile of a random color up to that threshold. Now, Spidey’s purple slowly ramps up the offense or defense when purple is matched, as well as dropping web tiles onto the board.

3* Spidey Blue will probably remain unchanged. Or rather, my intent isn’t to change it. But my changes to his other powers will increase the number of web tiles available, which could make his blue stronger, so it might require a tweak to re-balance. My current thought is to slow down the rate he gains bonus stuns, but allowing longer lengths at lower levels. For example, for 2 covers, his blue stuns for one turn, or two turns if 3 web tiles are present. 3 covers reduces that web tile threshold to 2. So maybe instead we make it stun for one turn, 2 for 3 web tiles (like 2 covers), and then add a third turn of stunning if 5 web tiles are present. Takes more web tiles to get the longer stuns, but that should even out if you have more ways to generate web tiles, you know? (and if the pacing is “slower”, maybe at 5 covers it could add a fourth turn of stun, with an even higher web tile requirement)

3* Spidey Red, I would go partway between 1* Spidey’s Red and 4* Miles’ purple. Swing attack for damage, more web tiles, more damage. Maybe a mild drawback, removes a web tile on use (to balance it out with his blue/purple, and maybe to reduce the need to tweak his blue as much).