Upgrades are going to be the death of this game

That would be something new indeed.

 

That's almost exactly what I am talking about.

Champs with 4 potential upgrades hit the board at level 1. During the game, based on some mechanic ** those champs can then be leveled up by choosing their upgrades... since (we are assuming here) all of the upgrades are viable in some thematic, situational, or synergistic way, the choice to upgrade X over Y will be based on the dynamics of that particular game.

** this mechanic could be as simple as "two rounds after a champion is deployed, you can choose one upgrade and pay the associated nora cost, and 4 rounds after deployment you can choose the second upgrade and pay that associated nora cost" - basically just a time factor.

** alternatively, the upgrade mechanic could be based on XP gained during play (something that is already calculated anyway), and a champ must reach a certain number of XP (collecting globes, capping fonts, doing damage, taking damage, healing others, healing self, using AP, etc)... and then can upgrade, and pay the nora cost.

 

I think that's a separate issue, and one that I think we all agree needs to be dealt with very harshly. SwissArmyKnife champs need to go extinct. They interfere with design space and game play far more than any upgrade system ever will.

 

Nice idea, very interesting Sok. But I might I see an issue on that.

If some champions have upgrade abilities that interact in some way with their base abilities, you would have to see the champion as a whole.
So you have to take into account all 4 upgrades and base abilities at the same moment on deploy, probably going back to the ability complexity creep.
And as you said, the thing here is to minimize complexity.
If abilities are chosen in Rune Manager, there's less complexity while playing, since its complexity would be more related to battlegroup building.

The way I manage this now, is I run different upgrades on the same champion I am running 2x and deploy the one depending on the situation, so I don't see high impact with this change. If choosing upgrades on deploy adds too much complexity, then making all upgrades like Tide Master would be also a good idea, whose upgrades depends on the battlegroup you are running and not the situation, at least extending the customisability of a rune.

 

Totally agreed - if the in-game mechanic were implemented, it would have to be done carefully. I would argue that in many cases, if the upgrade paths themselves were carefully balanced around the champions (i.e. potentially OP upgrades should never go on strong champs, like adaptive should never be on a bounty-hunter champ, or tempo should never be on an adaptive/ranged champ, and so on)... if that balancing were followed through on, and the costs of abilities were appropriately calculated, and had to be paid for... either a pre-game or an in-game upgrade system could work quite well.

 

I would say that "theme enabler" abilites should be on the base champ. Chained fae, for example should never have to "upgrade" the wizard HP/Cost buff.

 

Chained fae: Deployed wizards cost 5 less nora and gain 5 max HP.

@Sokolov that's an interesting idea... or if there were some phase in the game where upgrade choices could be made/modified.

 

Ok then it might be a nice idea. :3

On Topic with OP, Upgrades add diversity and flexibility to players without adding too much complexity, so I see no reason on removing them.
Not everybody takes the same upgrades on their champs. Only in some cases it's like this, and it can be addressed with each rune specifically.

 

This is just my two Nora from someone who has been in and out of the game since it went to octopi many years ago.

1) some factions just out class almost all others because of certain runes they have which there is no substitute for in other decks.

2) faction bonuses are terribly unbalanced. Kf +1 speed or Ud +5 Dmg is so ridiculous when you compare it to, let's say, sp and their whopping 8% Nora refund.... Average Nora cost of 70 nets you a massive 5.6 Nora per champ. I'll take the +5 Dmg please. You could completely remove abilities and upgrades, and the faction bonuses would win games by themselves.

3) some champs in certain bgs are damn near unstoppable without destroying half your runes to take them out. Refer to 1, and 2. Those snowball certain champs from the get go.

It basically all boils down to the fact that the game was never designed to be balanced from the beginning. Certain factions will always outclass others. Certain runes will always blow others out of the water, and certain combinations will always end up becoming meta. Yes, there are the rare cases when actual strategic game play happens, but as it stands now it is essentially everyone trying to get that one combo of runes out to bulldoze everything on the field.

Dog should start off by removing horribly broken runes (aoe ap generation, etc). Then they should start by rebalancing faction bonuses. After that they should start toning specific combinations down to be on par with everything else.

I do believe they are going in the right direction with the upgrade rebalancing, but no one can know for sure until we actually get our hands on it.

My only real concern is that certain runes will lose that special something they have, I.e. Chronomaner haste/slow, the old 150k runes being unique to each faction, etc. I've seen companies go from having very unique systems in place to reducing them to nothing more than a cookie cutter template for everything. Only time can tell.

 

MisterTuggles, the fact that you value UD or KF bonus over SP tells us all something...

 

I'll take sp bonus over +1 spd or +5 damage anyday , in fact i think most players would. Yet i do agree some champs are quite unstoppable but usually only early game. Example would be turn 1 i draw elven archer turn 2 my opponent draws pirahnid tempest next turn i don't draw a champ this is when the problems begin in pox.

 

I think that falls under "Swiss Army Champ" -- personal foul, violation of common sense, please sit in the corner for the rest of time.

 

Why are you running elven archer in the first place?

 

That basic math tells us you would need to deploy thirteen 70 Nora runes to be able to get a "free" rune? How many rounds does it take to net 700 Nora? While during that time two champs from Ud are combining for the same damage as that fourteenth free rune, or that kf has made many extra attacks/moves during that time.

Seriously, sp faction bonus is trash when compared, and there are many situations where a faction bonus has won are lost a match. For that matter, you can also throw in deployment zone bonuses. For example Is pumping an extra ap whil in deployment zone turns that font cap that takes two rounds into a font cap that takes one, etc, etc.

Maybe I am the only one that can manage my Nora properly if everyone thinks SP has a top notch bonus.

But on topic; faction bonuses are as big a problem as upgrades.

 

You're doing it wrong.

 

I like the idea of gaining levels during the game but this may be something strictly for a dungeon crawl add on.

If you were to have it be in vs matches then IMHO upgrades would be relegated to stats or upping levels of current base abilities. I would not add new abilities outright as it would add too much complexity. Stats and ranks are easy to wrap their head around.