Weren't they also designed with op nora gen? They seemed to have got rid of that, don't see why ponderous on 5 speed units is still a thing. It's cool saying you want tortuns to be slow and a turtle bg until you try and win with 5 and 6 speed units that can't ever double tap. This bg has never been anywhere close to viable since the revamp in anything besides ff kf, abusing the faction bonus. Even in ff kf tortuns have still sucked and been a below average bg.
He didn't just say it was one of their main traits, he said anyone considering removing ponderous from these extremely slow units should not play tortuns because according to him this doesn't need to be considered to make them a competitive theme which doesn't make much sense. That's why I responded the way I did. Their nora gen was already gutted and just as much a part of their identity as ponderous. I am sure tortun players wouldn't mind some changes to make the theme a little more playable and suck less. If you asked tortun players, I am sure most would have cared much more about keeping tortuns trade/pillage a strong form of nora gen(which has already been gutted) alot more than keeping ponderous.
Tortuns are far from being bad. The amount of damage they deal through combos is absurd, they just demand a high level of positioning and AP management. I'm totally against removing ponderous, they would be too powerful. So that my words don't pass completely empty: Privateer Captain deploys land mine adjacent to enemy> moves back 1 space> shoots = 13+ 12 + 10 dmg. If you put a repeater at least 3 spaces away from target(2 from mine), + 12 dmg. If you activated TT and shot once through normal attack, you triggered it twice(because it also counts non-basic attacks). If you think this is too hard to do because they're slow, I'll tell you I run 2x time slip, reminding they don't lose ap, for a max of 25 ap, making them able to easily attack 3 times. And you can always use horn of order. Or the high risk-high gain cannon barrage: having 5 tortuns out, you can win a game with one cast/usage from tremir(which can do it every round given he has charges). This is also a cute way of making nora if you position a summoned nora shielded tortalleon well. It's a known fact that although I'm bad at playing I understand the mechanics in this game(at least I think so), so with that said I assure it's a matter of draw luck( you need some terrible draws to get rushed), a decent timing with turtle and positioning. Of course they're not top tier, but we all know top tier right now isn't even intended.
They might not be bad in lower ranks or normals but if you are trying to win with them in higher ranked games then they are terrible. They are extremely weak, nearly all physical damage, and very slow compared to many of the stronger bgs. A current 1400 rating fs player would be lucky to hold 1250 with a full tortun bg.
That's why I said top tier isn't even intended, I'm trusting most of what we see in high ranked games will be nerfed. And still I don't think the difference is that great if you rule out the obviously broken champions.
I said we can't consider the FF bônus for a split theme, they can be played as such, but is not the way it meant for. Making all tortuns lose ponderous will give +10 nora to all of their units, sandbagging most of them (if not all). They need something to make them flavorfull and viable, giving back an global nora gen, but that can be activated, will make them a solid theme, keeping it flavor: slow SPD, high DMG, HP units, that slowly advance toward enemy shrine, generating nora and recieving reinforcement over time. An SLOW theme, but viable.
they were made around not being able to have the ff kf bonus and the original tortun's trade. both things have changed since then (as with many other things), so they've become clunky design wise. maybe they need a slight redesign, or maybe its just how the current state of the game is. hard to tell.
