@Sokolov Ok im going to disregard the cost adjustments due to the costing formula since it affected everyone. Aside from that though im disappointed in many of the changes that affected IS as a whole. Here are the things stood out to me that I feel missed the mark for this patch: Martyrdom: losing the Majestic effect and a unique defensive mechanic is questionable. Recharge: This is the most blatantly horrific change in the patch (for me). this may positively balance other factions champs but the tinkerer which was lobbied to get the recharge mechanic returned at the expense of boost construct is totally F*ed now. It is overkill for aura spam and it is awkward for the mass summons aspect of this champ. A reasonable nerf would be to put a CD of 1 on the ability or increase the charges consumed to 3. the current state has absolutely removed my fav engineer from all my decks. THIS NERF HAS SHOEBOXED THE TINKERER. Euan's Hammer: Changing he CD to 3 is distasteful but understandable. that should have been the only change. merging the effect with impact strike and making it a static 10 damage is not only odd but sandbags the ability. Why should a champ pay MORE nora to do less damage? the secondary effect is counter productive for a melee champ with no closing abilities on top of that. could there be inconsistent scenarios that the knockback is usefull... sure. do I want to gimp my alt damage output for that effect... HELL NO. Euan: I understand that between the new formula and the heroes thread that changes were incoming. however he lost damage (understandable), range (unnecessarily over nerfed) an ability (understandable) had an ability sandbagged and he still costs more nora. all I can say is that compared to talgars changes WTF? I wont be using him anytime soon. Talgar: everyones biggest gripe is this this guy and his equip... instead of nerfing him you made him more efficient by putting blessed on the same tree as init... compared to Euan he got a buff... the equipment change I like tho. Terraformer: this guy still wont see play. until lave storm moves to the other tree it wont see any significant play. Crystal Golem: There was no reason to remove splintering. build up damage is evil now... escalation type effects aren't allowed in IS? much less a gimped version on a melee champ. Ward of Ailur: power atk is almost as bad as defensive strike. it doesn't synergize with multi atk or sunder. this is supposed to be a support champ and not a generic melee beater. give him defender stun or something similar instead. there are a lot of other good changes don't get me wrong but these are way off base.
Thanks for this post. Replying to some specifics. That got nerfed out with the revamp, all I did was recost it and fix the +dmg part from small letters to big letters. Recharge is a fairly abusive ability and disagree that it shoeboxes the Tinkerer. I put a CD on it and increased the rate of the reduction to compensate (i.e. instead of only 1 CDR a turn, you can get 2) at an extra .5 charges per CD. Euan had a -24 nora cost modifier when you counted up everything. I tried my best to keep him at a runnable cost instead of putting him at over 100+. I'd like to see how the new Hammer plays out as well as I feel it has playmaking potential. Again, the goal of the Hero changes was to try and keep them at runnable nora costs - in some cases this meant stat reductions, in his case I shifted an ability off base with no overall cost discount. So I am not sure if you can count that as a buff or made more efficient. Completely disagree. I think he's very runnable at 62 nora for a 2 bomb unit plus Shatter. That said, moving the upgrade around is not an unreasonable request either. I can see that. We can add Fury or some other escalation ability on him perhaps. But it's exactly the type of ability we've been consolidating and removing. Will definitely look into this one. Again, thanks for the detailed and informative feedback.
I would alsobe interested in hearing which changes you particularly liked so I know what was is working for you.
I think euans hammer should be something like a magical attack that does more dmg to unholy at 2-3 range, solid usefull and match with euans lore
Ok here are some of the things I like: Barricade made cheap enough to consider using as the occasional gimmick spell... especially in structs. Carouse recosting, now I don't feel like I'm taking a significant tempo hit to start setting up my alcohol engine. Consecration recosting, doesnt feel like as sandbaggy for post hallow ground nerf cost considerations. Both barb guardian and earth golem look good for ability layout and on paper effectiveness. I like that talgar is more efficient but I'm sure people while still whine about him because he could still get scale armor. I like that cavalier has a workable range to match his abilities and role but I don't like the layout of what abilities are where. I like that you are consolidating abilities and considering undoing/tweeking recent changes to Crystal golem and the ward. To rebuttal (aand I only like using this word cuz it has a butt in the middle) some of your counter points. I'm still have to insist this version of recharge will shoebox the tinker. In its current form it only affects summoning as the only ability with a CD greater than 1. So Either: A) you wait 5 turns to use it once due to supercharged (at this point you already have 2 summons out and using it once means you get your 3rd on turn 8 instead of 10 B) you wait for 2 spells to be cast to use it once. (This relies as much on hoping for your enemy to fuel you as you being in a secure enough position to be able to afford the Nora for spells) C) you wait for to units to die to use it once (this relies on you being a death benefit groupy that should be playing a FW bg) In all of these scenarios the effectiveness of recharge for summons spam is negligible. It is a ridiculous idea to think this is beneficial to aura spam. With the old recharge at least you could dual aura every other turn with supercharged, now it's once every 5 turns. Your new version is descent for champs with multiple abilities that have a CD of 3+ but it shoeboxes the tinker with CD 1 abilities.
Recharge should be one of the following 2 variations to limit the admittedly abusable potential of the ability without shoe boxing the tinkerer. Recharge: CD 1, AP 0. Spend 3 charges and the cool downs of your abilities is reduced by 1. (This either limits aura spam to once every 3 turns or to once per spell.) Recharge: CD 2, AP 0. Spend 3 charges and the cool down of the next ability you activate this turn is set to 0. Any remaining charges are reduced by half. I can't stress enough how impracticable your version is for the tinkerer. You effectively gave her an large reduction to efficiency in this aspect. She went from 50% up time to a 20% uptime. That is huge!
Also I'm posting from my tablet at work so I'm sorry these posts are all broken up. Also I missed the old martyrdom change.... my bad. As for Euan most of my ire is wrapped up in the change to the ability doing significantly less damage but costing more for a secondary effect. I will reserve judgement to an extent till I've thoroughly playtested it but I'm not impressed by the change to say the least. I do appreciate your openmindedness and willingness to discuss alterations to your design goals and intentions. Thanks
I played like 5 games with euan since his change. While euans hammer is useful, its use is impractical. You will either get desperate enough to use it on your own champions for a sandwhich gale effect(with worse positioning) or you use it to spread out melee combat for a bit(use on ranged units just don't work unless they are pinned next to a wall). That said, I wish the equipment could have been changed to this ability as well. While not effective on a unit like Euan, himself I can see this ability getting played like a ghetto Ironfist version of gale force. Still it would open up some more strategies for IS at least.
Beer maiden is awesome sauce on a stick, a stick that washes your car and cleans your house. Great job with that rune. The equip is very good too. It does quite a bit. That SP cannon though. That thing is OP.
So far I've played drunks and Griffins. Beer maiden is great. Gives a reason to run all dwarfs and tie them all together. A strong combo is equip a black label brew, shatter it with maiden, then equip St. Joseph brew. Plus nine damage for the combo. With invigorate on the maiden as well you can get your hooligans or scarlet wings to hit for very high damage. This combo costs 7 ap on the maiden so it's not always easy to set up but it's sweet when you can. I played Griffins yesterday. 5 games or so. The new griffin really helps the theme out. A good combo is the emerald wings grant teleport sigil to go with the barrage upgrade on the new griffin. Gives a very high threat range that often suprises your opponent. The teleport distance doesnt trigger the lumbering on the bird. The relic is meh. I run it because it's cost is right and occasionally comes in handy. The revamp hurt the c wing and the hound master. Hound master was replaced by the herder 2x in my bg and has worked well. The c wing is now to expensive with the revamp. Easily replaced by the wings from the last expac. Overall the revamp helped wings as they didn't do to well vs efficient champ spam. Now that that playstyle has been brought in line the griffin bg is much more viable. In short Griffins now are much more competitive. Constructs today.
