Cactuar Crate - Coalitions Edition

I am really having trouble understanding your point. Are you saying my suggestion is "re-building the entire design" of Xulos? I felt it was very minor - literally swapping Drain on base with DF 3, so that one upgrade slot wasn't Rank 1, Rank 2, Rank 3.

 

Yeah, it is really minor, you're absolutely right. Compared to a lot of stuff that shows up, juggling around a couple upgrades is a pittance. But, considering he had a complete rebuild just 2 patches ago, something like moving around upgrades and changing required ranks seems unnecessary. Weren't you driving at getting rid of Tariff? If so, here is a small selection of potential abilities that could occupy the same or similar slot (passive ability upgrades -- he's already AP hungry), without any further changes to the champ.

Favor (doubt people would go for this one -- similar reasons)
Anthomancy (bit expensive)
Ripples (makes him more AP hungry, but really neat in combo with Drain and Death Pact and all the FW deploys)
Grand Entrance
Sand of Time (a way to reintroduce this to FW, and fills a similar but softer role compared to Tariff)
Corruption
Council: Spells (softer version of Favor)
Leverage: Undead (little summoning boost -- might be too Spikey)
Dark Healing (co-opting more signature undead abilities, if that's still a go)
Mystic Push
Desecrated Zone 3
Impenetrable (feel this one is more thematic than functional)
Designate Scapegoat (probably too strong, but doesn't use AP)
Warding (simple option)
Weaken Spells (not a huge fan, but another passive, magic-related upgrade)

I think doing a straight 1-1 swap on some other ability, such as one of the ones listed above, would be preferable to juggling around builds. I think the cleanest swap, if Tariff is a real problem, would be Sands of Time. After the Hourglass change, FW doesn't actually have that any more, and this would be a way to ease it back in. It also fills a similar role to Tariff, so there's little design change. Heck, even just cut Tariff out if it's a problem, and leave him with 2 in line 2. FW already has Anthro, not like there's some big precedent towards more ups.

I do appreciate that your suggested shift (DF3->base, Drain2->ups, Consume>Tariff [and some other fudging around with ups]) modifies the champ little and maintains the new Drain/Heal setup. If he is going to have some change in a future patch, there are a million worse ways to go and few better. But I think one of those better ones would be a more minute ability swap.

Or even no change at all. That's always an option. We could just not change something. Could you elaborate on why Tariff needs to leave?

 

Tariff adds a lot to the attrition theme by stretching the nora difference between the players. Xulos is already an excellent unit for the attrition theme thank to DF 3, and will always be included because of that. With Tariff on Xulos, I feel like Xulos is doing too much in this area. You drop him and get an instant, strong effect, then get a longer game winning effect (via nora superiority). This IMO makes Xulos overly efficient ATM.

Plus, since Tariff doesn't stack, it makes other Tariff champs (like the Toll-Taker) become redundant. I would rather see these pieces of the attrition gameplay puzzle split between different runes than being all included on one.

 

That's a pretty fair assessment. Do you feel Toll-Taker is runable right now, and do you think Sands of Time would make sense as a replacement on Xulos? At this point, if Xulos loses Tariff, any attrition style isn't going to start involving more pieces, it's just gonna straight lose Tariff -- I really don't think Taker is viable. Would you expect any changes to him (I wouldn't think them necessary, but if you're talking about attrition as a whole you might) in relation to a change to Xulos?

 

The price for swag.

 

Speeking of swag... Xmas xulos lost his hearts animation ... SADFACE!

 

The bubbling hearts are you sure? I'll have to try him out again to confirm but last time I remember he lost the bubbly hearts coming out of his staff which made me a sad panda.

 

Just Deployed V-Day Xulos and he does NOT have hearts anymore.

Could you confirm on your end DMrBadguy? if you still have it I wonder if it is because I'm on a Mac...

 

@DMrBadguy thank you for your sluething on this, that should be a fairly simple fix @Sokolov

 

Is this a buff or am I missing something?

 

Maybe remove the +1 cap straight up from the FF bonus? Like, they already get that from +1 SPD.

 

No, I meant just as a change to the bonus right now, ignoring your disengage-AP-thing.

 

eliminate the problems with it and keep KF players happy.

KF bonus is less of a problem for me than the UD and ST. Only a few KF runes are really out of control with it are (Menalaus mainly). Just change FF KF bonus to give +1 speed for runes with 6 speed or less and make split bonus +1 speed to 5 speed or less. This would effectively end the problems with 8 speeds and the like while still allowing for speed boosts. It would also make the KF faction more attractive to split with and add viability to some of the slower runes in the game.

 

You seen to be forgetting the cost of speed.

 

you mean almost exactly the same as the cost of 10 hp or 4 damage or 6 nora?

That didn't stop Lich King from being a staple even though he didn't benefit from a faction bonus in early pox. Or even stop UD ranged runes from being run despite having almost no faction bonus. Though if it doesn't address your concerns I guess it doesn't matter anyways.