Waiting on the shore with the nerf bat

Marvel Puzzle Quest MPQ General Discussion
1

As per the same spirit of this thread https://forums.505go.com/discussion/54997

You see many lifeboats coming happily to safety, players and characters alike with relieved smiles floating to the shore. But there you stand, gripping the nerf bat, white-knuckled and ready. D3 has your entire roster, ready to wipe it from existence if you don’t take the fall for them and bop a character from every tier.

Who do you pick and why? I understand Nerf talk is not popular, but I think there’s nothing wrong with having a discussion about rebalance. It helps paint a picture of everyone’s game experience, what they like, and what they don’t it helps paint a picture of everyone’s game experience, what they like, and what they don’t.
So with that said, my picks:

1* Juggs
In his own tier, he works well. However, in a scaled pve, his powers are way too cheap, especially when feeders are involved
2Bullseye
His other powers costs almost offset the cheapness of his passive. I think it needs to have more limitation
3 CMags
Similar to Juggs in that I think his powers are way too cheap for the damage output. I think his offensive powers need to be more costly, he needs a setback or he needs to be more squishy, since his defensive power is pretty cheap(3* Bullseye and IF are good squish levels imo). Cmags is almost tied with 3Thor’s green being too powerful, considering GSBW’s green.
4Rulk
I think he hits too hard for little ap, though his passive is kind of trash. It’s hard to deny green and purple while killing him slowly to avoid cascades. I’d boost his passive and maybe reduce the cost and damage of green. Close finish between him and Pegs. I skip them both every time
5*OML
Because a 1/0/1 build is good enough to get your through just about anything.

Those are my choices for the poor huddled masses seeking shelter from shipwreck. Hopefully nerf talk doesn’t upset too many people

2

Boo nerf
Yay buff
The End.

3

OML definitely doesn’t need a nerf. Within his tier, he’s actually a little under powered because he’s slow and doesn’t have a ton of health. Sure, when you run him through a bunch of 4s and 3s, he’s god, but you can say that about all the 5s. Also a 1/0/1 OML isn’t getting you anywhere, he’ll just slowly kill himself. The 5 tier is surprisingly balanced. Black Bolt stands out as a bit over-powered, but his yellow power sucks. Iron Man might need a bit of a drop on his red and blue powers, too.

4

I may be jumping to conclusions here, but you might want to wait to get a bit deeper into the game/meta before talking about nerf suggestions.

As an example, red hulks passive is part of what allows him to compete in PVP because it’s pretty hard for 5*s to hit him without triggering cascades every turn. Asking to buff his passive would just make things even worse.

5

1* Yelena
2* BagMan
3* Spidey
4* Fantastic
5* Cap

They already exist well below the game’s meta, make 'em worse and don’t ruin the good characters.

6

When ONE CHARACTER I hear folks constantly say “use this character in PVE and never need health packs!”
When ONE CHARACTER I hear folks constantly say “use this character with character X, and then character X is great!”
When ONE CHARACTER I hear folks constantly say “Not OP: Oh, rulk week? We’ll remove other 5* and keep that ONE CHARACTER”
When ONE CHARACTER I hear folks constantly say “Doesn’t need Nerf…I own him and he’s not ‘that great’” (rarely, if ever, heard from folks who don’t own him…)

When the game becomes “MPQ: You Know Who”…when the game has been 80% that one character in every single PVP match I’ve seen for six months…

It’s been LONG past time to nerf The Only Character That Matters.

BoP/Combined Arms show that Peggy/IM are a problem. D3 has seen that cheap stun can be an issue to let folks go beyond what they should (Iceman), but he can’t play D. It’s AP theft/gain that is the big problem that players love to have and hate to play against. When Bolt gets to be everywhere, he’ll be the 5* that needs a fix…but with the dillution of covers Bolt won’t be everywhere for a long, long time.

7

Also, a little about me:
Day~ 1050
61 roster slots
CL 49
Low 4* player, that is most of my 4* are around 220 or could be leveled to that
Been a long time lurker(at least since 4hor was released,
So hi, everyone.

8

Nerf iceman. His blue is incredibily cheap. Hit iceman with the nerf bat. Rulk is nothing compared to iceman. Peggy is a bit over powered but her blue gets worse with less characters. Also you can stun her and her yellow is no longer active. 18 green is not easy to get for rhulk. 11-14 blue is pretty hard to get for peggy. You can fight rulk with another rulk. But iceman is just ridiculous. 6 blue is easy to get and it stuns for a long time. And the green is incredibly overpowered. Did I mention iceman self accelerates?

9

No nerfs!!! Every character is both great to use and has plenty of weaknesses if you fight against them with the right opposing character.

The system works as expected!

10

I still disagree. OML is only everywhere because he was one of the first 5s and when he was released he was leaps and bounds ahead of Silver Surfer, so everyone chased him and leveled him. I got 10 of his covers very quickly, but haven’t pulled one since March. He’s since been surpassed or at least equaled by every new 5 except for Captain America (to be fair I have no idea if Black Widow is any good). Sure, I see him all the darn time in PVP also, but I’m not afraid of him. I’d much rather fight a level 450 OML than a level 450 Phoenix.

Also, fun fact, your name pops up after I finish fighting seeds in lightning rounds like 8 out of 10 times. Dunno why.

11

If you’re only playing around with low 4*s I don’t think you have a clear view of the current meta.

When it comes to nerfs, Demi’s biggest measuring stick seems to be PvP usability. Because of that there’s pretty much zero chance of nerfs for the 3* tier and below, as even boosted they don’t stand up well to champed 4s and decently covered 5s.

Within the 4* tier the biggest candidates for a nerf appear to be Bobby, Jean, and Peggy. Characters like Rulk and Cyke are pretty monstrous boosted, but unboosted not nearly as much of a threat. Even the first three I listed aren’t really that threatening unboosted, but have utility that extends beyond damage that makes them aggravating to deal with (Bobby’s cheap stun, Jean’s match-5 protection, and Peggy’s AP shenanigans). There are enough ways to play around them though that most who use and play against them would agree there’s no real need for a nerf.

Peggy has been getting a lot of attention recently, but really that’s more because she’s the best of the newer 4*s and non-whales are just now getting to the point of having her champed. Stun her or get her below her health threshold (neither are difficult) and she’s not at all difficult to deal with. Bobby’s stun gets a lot of flak, and it’s definitely one of the best powers in the game, but Peggy counters it very nicely and once Gwenpool is more prevalent her black will make it even less threatening. Top tier characters tend to lose their shine over time without the need for a direct nerf. Just look at HB, still solid but not at all the powerhouse he used to be.

The 5* tier is a mess in and of itself, and even more difficult to evaluate because there’s no real path for most players to get there. If you were to look purely at usage statistics OML and PHX would standout pretty heavily, but that’s because they’re two of the originals and therefore much more likely to be covered and usable. Combine that with their decent synergy, and the fact that no one but super whales will have much more objectively powerful characters like GG or BB covered, and you might think they’re the most powerful and deserving of a nerf.

Lastly you have to consider the backlash that comes with nerfing. Who knows what the actual numbers look like, but over the years it certainly appears that the bigger nerfs (true healing, MagStorm, Thoress/XFW) have lost Demi a good chunk of players and money (mass refunds hurt). With the addition of VIP and Signal Intercepts I don’t think it’s a stretch to assume that Demi isn’t in the best of financial shapes, so I doubt they’ll do anything that would upset the majority of their playerbase.

Buffs to lower tier characters on the other hand make far more sense. Players will be more willing to roster and spend money on them, plus it elicits much happier and thankful reactions that keep people engaged with the game.

tl;dr For a lot of reasons there’s no need for nerfs, and Demi is going to win far more points with players by buffing low-tier characters.

12

13

Seriously guys enough with the nerf talk. Buffs are way better and more constructive way forward.

On that subject. Yeah 5 cap sigh. When is he gonna get fixed. He is really bad.

14

No more nerfs please. Imagine working hard /spending money to cover a character then having it nerfed. Ouch.

Create character counters, buff/strengthen other characters. Strong characters give us a trophy / goal to work for.

Rightfully just make more strong characters instead of lessening the pool we already have

15

Came came back after a long hiatus and the only character I have run into that surprised me was Peggy Carter. Everything else was just the same standard affair which isn’t that difficult at all. I like the Star Lord change and I’m waiting for that IW change.

16

Do you hear any 5 player saying that (3+ 5s champed), that he is the best 5? I really doubt it. Just people in lower tiers.

OML is very good, so are PH, IM, GG, BBolt, Strange, Spidey, etc. Do you know how long OML lasts against GG?

The only thing that makes OML so good for these people in 3 or 4 land is that he self-heals. That’s it. The only reason. (and match damage, but this is the same for all 5s). So yeah he is great as first leveled 5, but that’s it.

And again, if you see OML and PH more than any other 5s is just because they have been released for longer, and getting 5s is completely broken in this game (so much that now people is opening just LLs, when they are more expensive, hoping to max new 5s, because now is impossible to champ the ‘old’ ones). Also because PH and OML play great together. If I could I would run Spidey and PH in all events, but I have been really unlucky with my Spidey (or IM and Spidey), so I have to use OML instead.

OML is also much worse than a 450 level Peggy, Rhulk, Cyclops or Iceman, much much worse than those.

Seriously, stop this crusade against OML, he doesn’t deserve to be nerfed!

17

I would only nerf the spanish description of IM40s Red and Blue powers. According to the text, they drain the AP of the opponent, not the player. When used, they work as intended, tho.

18

try this. imagine patch with 5 yellow given to a 1* player or a champed patch to a 2* player (but with no green/red). patch would tank and heal and protect everything else. to those 1* and 2* players, he would be the absolute best thing. does that make him the best 3* out there?