The thing that angers me about the toxicity of the community is that people keep going to such extremes as wishing that the game dies or that the company suffers and struggles until they "learn their lesson" and all I'm thinking is by the time they would learn such a lesson, we'd already be at the point of no return because no company would decide to stick it out to the very bitter end in a war with its fans and player base. Can anyone actually named a game or game company that did that? That actually suffered so greatly that it learned its lesson and became more Pro Player from the brink of death? No. It doesn't work like that because it's still a company at the end of the day and they can always decide that the hassle is not worth the investment and just write it off and walk away and then the game will just die and then you'll wonder will why didn't they do anything to save themselves.
It’s a two way street though …the player base aren’t “Karen’s” and just in their anger towards the issues in the game and everyone has a breaking point. The issues have stacked up so this isn’t just a recent or brief thing. But again this thread is getting out of context,…the buff program works and is very good…I myself took my 6* vulture to R2 and am very happy with the champ,..it is unfortunate Kabam isn’t getting recognition from some of the community for the buffs ,…but again this toxic environment has been created from multiple facets of the game…the main one being there are essential control issues that are not correctly working,..,among other issues.
The constant “Kabam bad” made my last alliance unbearable in the end, and while some of it was understandable frustrations about the parry bug, none of them bothered reading up the explanation to the issue so believed the reason to just be they want more $$. But what really tops it off was the amount of “Kabam bad” that got thrown out when actually it was just their inability to read champion abilities.
Yeah, and people just pile on it so much that anyone who thinks remotely dissimilar is labelled a Kabam apologiser. Anyone who doesn't join the hivemind of abuse that is the Kabam hate-train, and thinks about situations realistically is asked how Kabam's boots taste.
In one of the Line chats I'm in, people were discussing Miike's response in a venompool V8 thread where he used a meme of Homer Simpson saying I don't know, and then giving a more detailed answer in the same comment. Someone took great offense to this and exploded about how dare Miike use a meme in response to the community, and I just pointed out about how is that such a big deal? Miike is just communicating on the internet with people, it's a small light hearted response, alongside a normal one. Like, seriously, is that what people will get offended about nowadays? Anyway, I got told I was a Kabam sympathiser. For saying people should be able to use memes without a torrent of abuse. On the internet.
Some people.
Yeah there was one where a guy claimed that an OG vision killed him using an SP3 when it only had 1-2 bars of power. I ended up getting dogpiled for pointing out that it’s literally impossible for that to happen and he just didn’t pay attention to synthesis. Anyways, a new rule was then put in place in the alliance that was basically “if someone is ranting about a bug, don’t tell them it’s not a bug (even if it’s clearly not a bug)” and that’s when I knew it was time to go.
The constant “Kabam bad” made my last alliance unbearable in the end, and while some of it was understandable frustrations about the parry bug, none of them bothered reading up the explanation to the issue so believed the reason to just be they want more $$. But what really tops it off was the amount of “Kabam bad” that got thrown out when actually it was just their inability to read champion abilities.
Yeah, and people just pile on it so much that anyone who thinks remotely dissimilar is labelled a Kabam apologiser. Anyone who doesn't join the hivemind of abuse that is the Kabam hate-train, and thinks about situations realistically is asked how Kabam's boots taste.
In one of the Line chats I'm in, people were discussing Miike's response in a venompool V8 thread where he used a meme of Homer Simpson saying I don't know, and then giving a more detailed answer in the same comment. Someone took great offense to this and exploded about how dare Miike use a meme in response to the community, and I just pointed out about how is that such a big deal? Miike is just communicating on the internet with people, it's a small light hearted response, alongside a normal one. Like, seriously, is that what people will get offended about nowadays? Anyway, I got told I was a Kabam sympathiser. For saying people should be able to use memes without a torrent of abuse. On the internet.
Some people.
Yeah there was one where a guy claimed that an OG vision killed him using an SP3 when it only had 1-2 bars of power. I ended up getting dogpiled for pointing out that it’s literally impossible for that to happen and he just didn’t pay attention to synthesis. Anyways, a new rule was then put in place in the alliance that was basically “if someone is ranting about a bug, don’t tell them it’s not a bug (even if it’s clearly not a bug)” and that’s when I knew it was time to go.
You know the alliance is good when there’s a ban on information
First: How is this thread still in General? Is it a holiday in the Great White North?
Second: Late to this thread, but I don’t understand knee-jerk negative reactions to champ buffs. Disappointment with a live buff is one thing—and projecting what a buff will be like based on words is another—but flat slamming buffs this way makes little sense.
Third: Negativity does boil over, and there’s ample cause for a fair bit of negativity for things not related to the buffs. Sow—>reap
Yes but we're discussing how that negativity gets taken to a level of toxicity. How no amount of Goodwill or positive action can offset people's frustrations to the point that they're not happy unless they're yelling at everything and everyone.
Kabam has legitimate issues and they are worth criticizing however writing off everything because one buff didn't go as you would have hoped isn't one of those ways that's remotely constructive in any way shape or form.
Yes but we're discussing how that negativity gets taken to a level of toxicity. How no amount of Goodwill or positive action can offset people's frustrations to the point that they're not happy unless they're yelling at everything and everyone.
Kabam has legitimate issues and they are worth criticizing however writing off everything because one buff didn't go as you would have hoped isn't one of those ways that's remotely constructive in any way shape or form.
Yes but we're discussing how that negativity gets taken to a level of toxicity. How no amount of Goodwill or positive action can offset people's frustrations to the point that they're not happy unless they're yelling at everything and everyone.
Kabam has legitimate issues and they are worth criticizing however writing off everything because one buff didn't go as you would have hoped isn't one of those ways that's remotely constructive in any way shape or form.
Agreed. And that’s point two of my post. Point three just suggests in this type of game climate, it isn’t crazy to think people will jump to conclusions. It’s what people do, unfortunately, under certain circumstances. Doesn’t make it correct, but it should be no surprise.
Yes but we're discussing how that negativity gets taken to a level of toxicity. How no amount of Goodwill or positive action can offset people's frustrations to the point that they're not happy unless they're yelling at everything and everyone.
Kabam has legitimate issues and they are worth criticizing however writing off everything because one buff didn't go as you would have hoped isn't one of those ways that's remotely constructive in any way shape or form.
Agreed. And that’s point two of my post. Point three just suggests in this type of game climate, it isn’t crazy to think people will jump to conclusions. It’s what people do, unfortunately, under certain circumstances. Doesn’t make it correct, but it should be no surprise.
Dr. Zola
It may be predictable, but it is not involuntary. If someone chooses to become part of the problem, they cannot use the excuse that if there was no problem there would be no way for them to become part of the problem.
Kabam has the professional responsibility: their actions should be judged in that context. But players who make it harder to make progress with those problems need to accept their own culpability.
Not only that but how do you intend to fix a problem if you're just yelling FIX IT! and DO BETTER! without actually offering a suggestion as to how it could be better.
Great post mate. I think the centre of the issue is the way people present their opinions though, rather than the opinions themselves.
The comments made lack anything constructive and instead take the abusive approach, which is just never necessary.
If you honestly do not like a single of Kabam's recent buffs, fine. You're absolutely entitled to that opinion, but instead of saying "Kabam is pathetic, always useless" perhaps try "hmm, I don't feel the recent buffs are on the right track, I feel like the issue is the removal of previous abilities" or whatever. It's pretty simple, you don't have to say anything special, just don't be a nob.
Basically just be a decent human being. Which is ridiculous to have to tell people, but hey, this is the internet, where people can say whatever the hell they want.
I agree 100% with op, the negativity here has been a bit much. Even some of the buffs that ppl dislike we’re fine IMO. Guilly was the only one that got me a bit bummed but I wasn’t coming on here ranting.
Ddhk I actually enjoy, I got a bunch of his synergy partners already ranked and when he has a team around him he’s actually decent and fun to play. He’s not the top dps but he’s tanky and has some great utility in anti miss and shrugging non damaging debuffs. He actually gets a lot better when u master him. I just recently r3ed peni and she makes him hit much harder too.
So many great buffs, hood I agreed with them changing to his 3rd form cause he was always a good buff controller and I agree with keeping core identities of champs.
But I hear ppl screaming nerf at Hawkeye and that’s ridiculous he still keeps a similar power control s1 rotation but they added so much more to his kit, the power control was just balanced to match his new damage. There’s a reason magik dosnt hit that hard, power control is a powerful ability so with him going to be doing great damage (on paper) I can see why they tweaked it.
I agree 100% with op, the negativity here has been a bit much. Even some of the buffs that ppl dislike we’re fine IMO. Guilly was the only one that got me a bit bummed but I wasn’t coming on here ranting.
Ddhk I actually enjoy, I got a bunch of his synergy partners already ranked and when he has a team around him he’s actually decent and fun to play. He’s not the top dps but he’s tanky and has some great utility in anti miss and shrugging non damaging debuffs. He actually gets a lot better when u master him. I just recently r3ed peni and she makes him hit much harder too.
So many great buffs, hood I agreed with them changing to his 3rd form cause he was always a good buff controller and I agree with keeping core identities of champs.
But I hear ppl screaming nerf at Hawkeye and that’s ridiculous he still keeps a similar power control s1 rotation but they added so much more to his kit, the power control was just balanced to match his new damage. There’s a reason magik dosnt hit that hard, power control is a powerful ability so with him going to be doing great damage (on paper) I can see why they tweaked it.
DDHK became my de facto favorite for countering Guillotine 2099 and Invisible Woman and I like having all the Defenders together on a questing team from time to time.
I agree 100% with op, the negativity here has been a bit much. Even some of the buffs that ppl dislike we’re fine IMO. Guilly was the only one that got me a bit bummed but I wasn’t coming on here ranting.
Ddhk I actually enjoy, I got a bunch of his synergy partners already ranked and when he has a team around him he’s actually decent and fun to play. He’s not the top dps but he’s tanky and has some great utility in anti miss and shrugging non damaging debuffs. He actually gets a lot better when u master him. I just recently r3ed peni and she makes him hit much harder too.
So many great buffs, hood I agreed with them changing to his 3rd form cause he was always a good buff controller and I agree with keeping core identities of champs.
But I hear ppl screaming nerf at Hawkeye and that’s ridiculous he still keeps a similar power control s1 rotation but they added so much more to his kit, the power control was just balanced to match his new damage. There’s a reason magik dosnt hit that hard, power control is a powerful ability so with him going to be doing great damage (on paper) I can see why they tweaked it.
If the idea of the buffs is to make a champ more relevant/useful/higher performing/"better", why go through the hassle of taking away 1 to add 2? What's the benefit beyond farming complaints?Would it have really broken the game to leave his power drain entirely alone and add the Perfect Release stuff on top? If it was a matter of "Oh noes, he can keep an opponent at 0 power!!1!", so what? That would be making him join a club. Not a big deal.
I agree 100% with op, the negativity here has been a bit much. Even some of the buffs that ppl dislike we’re fine IMO. Guilly was the only one that got me a bit bummed but I wasn’t coming on here ranting.
Ddhk I actually enjoy, I got a bunch of his synergy partners already ranked and when he has a team around him he’s actually decent and fun to play. He’s not the top dps but he’s tanky and has some great utility in anti miss and shrugging non damaging debuffs. He actually gets a lot better when u master him. I just recently r3ed peni and she makes him hit much harder too.
So many great buffs, hood I agreed with them changing to his 3rd form cause he was always a good buff controller and I agree with keeping core identities of champs.
But I hear ppl screaming nerf at Hawkeye and that’s ridiculous he still keeps a similar power control s1 rotation but they added so much more to his kit, the power control was just balanced to match his new damage. There’s a reason magik dosnt hit that hard, power control is a powerful ability so with him going to be doing great damage (on paper) I can see why they tweaked it.
If the idea of the buffs is to make a champ more relevant/useful/higher performing/"better", why go through the hassle of taking away 1 to add 2? What's the benefit beyond farming complaints?Would it have really broken the game to leave his power drain entirely alone and add the Perfect Release stuff on top? If it was a matter of "Oh noes, he can keep an opponent at 0 power!!1!", so what? That would be making him join a club. Not a big deal.
Easier said than done, but the idea is to buff them and rebalance them so that they don't have the possibility of an overpowered situation. It's more prudent to err on the side of less than more, simply because too much causes damage. It's easy for people to claim it wouldn't be too much because people tend to think of additives as being beneficial. If those additives result in a more imbalanced outcome, that's not beneficial.
I agree 100% with op, the negativity here has been a bit much. Even some of the buffs that ppl dislike we’re fine IMO. Guilly was the only one that got me a bit bummed but I wasn’t coming on here ranting.
Ddhk I actually enjoy, I got a bunch of his synergy partners already ranked and when he has a team around him he’s actually decent and fun to play. He’s not the top dps but he’s tanky and has some great utility in anti miss and shrugging non damaging debuffs. He actually gets a lot better when u master him. I just recently r3ed peni and she makes him hit much harder too.
So many great buffs, hood I agreed with them changing to his 3rd form cause he was always a good buff controller and I agree with keeping core identities of champs.
But I hear ppl screaming nerf at Hawkeye and that’s ridiculous he still keeps a similar power control s1 rotation but they added so much more to his kit, the power control was just balanced to match his new damage. There’s a reason magik dosnt hit that hard, power control is a powerful ability so with him going to be doing great damage (on paper) I can see why they tweaked it.
If the idea of the buffs is to make a champ more relevant/useful/higher performing/"better", why go through the hassle of taking away 1 to add 2? What's the benefit beyond farming complaints?Would it have really broken the game to leave his power drain entirely alone and add the Perfect Release stuff on top? If it was a matter of "Oh noes, he can keep an opponent at 0 power!!1!", so what? That would be making him join a club. Not a big deal.
Easier said than done, but the idea is to buff them and rebalance them so that they don't have the possibility of an overpowered situation. It's more prudent to err on the side of less than more, simply because too much causes damage. It's easy for people to claim it wouldn't be too much because people tend to think of additives as being beneficial. If those additives result in a more imbalanced outcome, that's not beneficial.
I’m not defending anyone’s outrageous behavior, but there’s likely damage if you err on the side of “too little” as well. The Guilly update is one such situation, and there are plenty of players still very angry about that. Several successive buffs viewed as “too little” prior to Guilly (Ronin, DDHK) created the impression the update program had lost its way. That type of repeated under-delivery damages confidence in the team and the commitment to make champs relevant.
I agree 100% with op, the negativity here has been a bit much. Even some of the buffs that ppl dislike we’re fine IMO. Guilly was the only one that got me a bit bummed but I wasn’t coming on here ranting.
Ddhk I actually enjoy, I got a bunch of his synergy partners already ranked and when he has a team around him he’s actually decent and fun to play. He’s not the top dps but he’s tanky and has some great utility in anti miss and shrugging non damaging debuffs. He actually gets a lot better when u master him. I just recently r3ed peni and she makes him hit much harder too.
So many great buffs, hood I agreed with them changing to his 3rd form cause he was always a good buff controller and I agree with keeping core identities of champs.
But I hear ppl screaming nerf at Hawkeye and that’s ridiculous he still keeps a similar power control s1 rotation but they added so much more to his kit, the power control was just balanced to match his new damage. There’s a reason magik dosnt hit that hard, power control is a powerful ability so with him going to be doing great damage (on paper) I can see why they tweaked it.
If the idea of the buffs is to make a champ more relevant/useful/higher performing/"better", why go through the hassle of taking away 1 to add 2? What's the benefit beyond farming complaints?Would it have really broken the game to leave his power drain entirely alone and add the Perfect Release stuff on top? If it was a matter of "Oh noes, he can keep an opponent at 0 power!!1!", so what? That would be making him join a club. Not a big deal.
Easier said than done, but the idea is to buff them and rebalance them so that they don't have the possibility of an overpowered situation. It's more prudent to err on the side of less than more, simply because too much causes damage. It's easy for people to claim it wouldn't be too much because people tend to think of additives as being beneficial. If those additives result in a more imbalanced outcome, that's not beneficial.
I’m not defending anyone’s outrageous behavior, but there’s likely damage if you err on the side of “too little” as well. The Guilly update is one such situation, and there are plenty of players still very angry about that. Several successive buffs viewed as “too little” prior to Guilly (Ronin, DDHK) created the impression the update program had lost its way. That type of repeated under-delivery damages confidence in the team and the commitment to make champs relevant.
Dr. Zola
I'm talking about damage to the game overall. Not damage to feedback. Although I suppose a case could be made for the damage of doing too little. I don't really dispute Guilly. It can certainly go south at times. It's just not practical or feasible to operate on adding alone.
I agree 100% with op, the negativity here has been a bit much. Even some of the buffs that ppl dislike we’re fine IMO. Guilly was the only one that got me a bit bummed but I wasn’t coming on here ranting.
Ddhk I actually enjoy, I got a bunch of his synergy partners already ranked and when he has a team around him he’s actually decent and fun to play. He’s not the top dps but he’s tanky and has some great utility in anti miss and shrugging non damaging debuffs. He actually gets a lot better when u master him. I just recently r3ed peni and she makes him hit much harder too.
So many great buffs, hood I agreed with them changing to his 3rd form cause he was always a good buff controller and I agree with keeping core identities of champs.
But I hear ppl screaming nerf at Hawkeye and that’s ridiculous he still keeps a similar power control s1 rotation but they added so much more to his kit, the power control was just balanced to match his new damage. There’s a reason magik dosnt hit that hard, power control is a powerful ability so with him going to be doing great damage (on paper) I can see why they tweaked it.
If the idea of the buffs is to make a champ more relevant/useful/higher performing/"better", why go through the hassle of taking away 1 to add 2? What's the benefit beyond farming complaints?Would it have really broken the game to leave his power drain entirely alone and add the Perfect Release stuff on top? If it was a matter of "Oh noes, he can keep an opponent at 0 power!!1!", so what? That would be making him join a club. Not a big deal.
Easier said than done, but the idea is to buff them and rebalance them so that they don't have the possibility of an overpowered situation. It's more prudent to err on the side of less than more, simply because too much causes damage. It's easy for people to claim it wouldn't be too much because people tend to think of additives as being beneficial. If those additives result in a more imbalanced outcome, that's not beneficial.
I’m not defending anyone’s outrageous behavior, but there’s likely damage if you err on the side of “too little” as well. The Guilly update is one such situation, and there are plenty of players still very angry about that. Several successive buffs viewed as “too little” prior to Guilly (Ronin, DDHK) created the impression the update program had lost its way. That type of repeated under-delivery damages confidence in the team and the commitment to make champs relevant.
Dr. Zola
It’s times like these that I wish the game and community had a different mentality when it came to nerfs. It would allow the designers to be so much more out there and innovative with buffs. And this isn’t a “community bad” opinion, just more of a musing about the game.
The issue is that since we invest so much in champions, a nerf is actually pretty catastrophic to you as a player. Sig stones, rank up materials and even emotional investment to some extent. Ranking a champion only for them to be nerfed isn’t a great feeling.
But I wish that even just for the buff program, we had some sort of pledge/agreement from the designers with the players that there was a schedule. Something like a champion buff is released, and for the first month, they are in their beta or grace period.
During that time, the developers will be looking at numbers and seeing whether the champion is performing too strongly in places, and at the end of the period they will make adjustments if necessary. Now that would work for the players twofold.
One: champions that underperformed will be able to be tuned up a bit. And two: designers will be able to push the boat a bit more out, since there isn’t the risk anymore that a champion is going to be released and absolutely break the game in some way. Because of that, they can try new stuff. If it were communicated properly with the community that a champion is in trial stage for the first month of their release, and either rank up at your own risk, or at the end of the month send out champ specific rank down gems.
Now for me, this is more wishful thinking than a suggestion. I all but know the community or the game doesn’t have the sort of attitude to nerfs that would allow this. But we’ve seen a lot from kabam that they are sometimes conservative with designs so that they don’t accidentally create another quake or ghost. And that’s fair enough, because they can’t Nerf those champions now.
It’s just a shame that conservative designs could have stifled many, many more amazing designs because of how nerfs work in this game.
I agree 100% with op, the negativity here has been a bit much. Even some of the buffs that ppl dislike we’re fine IMO. Guilly was the only one that got me a bit bummed but I wasn’t coming on here ranting.
Ddhk I actually enjoy, I got a bunch of his synergy partners already ranked and when he has a team around him he’s actually decent and fun to play. He’s not the top dps but he’s tanky and has some great utility in anti miss and shrugging non damaging debuffs. He actually gets a lot better when u master him. I just recently r3ed peni and she makes him hit much harder too.
So many great buffs, hood I agreed with them changing to his 3rd form cause he was always a good buff controller and I agree with keeping core identities of champs.
But I hear ppl screaming nerf at Hawkeye and that’s ridiculous he still keeps a similar power control s1 rotation but they added so much more to his kit, the power control was just balanced to match his new damage. There’s a reason magik dosnt hit that hard, power control is a powerful ability so with him going to be doing great damage (on paper) I can see why they tweaked it.
If the idea of the buffs is to make a champ more relevant/useful/higher performing/"better", why go through the hassle of taking away 1 to add 2? What's the benefit beyond farming complaints?Would it have really broken the game to leave his power drain entirely alone and add the Perfect Release stuff on top? If it was a matter of "Oh noes, he can keep an opponent at 0 power!!1!", so what? That would be making him join a club. Not a big deal.
Easier said than done, but the idea is to buff them and rebalance them so that they don't have the possibility of an overpowered situation. It's more prudent to err on the side of less than more, simply because too much causes damage. It's easy for people to claim it wouldn't be too much because people tend to think of additives as being beneficial. If those additives result in a more imbalanced outcome, that's not beneficial.
I’m not defending anyone’s outrageous behavior, but there’s likely damage if you err on the side of “too little” as well. The Guilly update is one such situation, and there are plenty of players still very angry about that. Several successive buffs viewed as “too little” prior to Guilly (Ronin, DDHK) created the impression the update program had lost its way. That type of repeated under-delivery damages confidence in the team and the commitment to make champs relevant.
Dr. Zola
It’s times like these that I wish the game and community had a different mentality when it came to nerfs. It would allow the designers to be so much more out there and innovative with buffs. And this isn’t a “community bad” opinion, just more of a musing about the game.
The issue is that since we invest so much in champions, a nerf is actually pretty catastrophic to you as a player. Sig stones, rank up materials and even emotional investment to some extent. Ranking a champion only for them to be nerfed isn’t a great feeling.
But I wish that even just for the buff program, we had some sort of pledge/agreement from the designers with the players that there was a schedule. Something like a champion buff is released, and for the first month, they are in their beta or grace period.
During that time, the developers will be looking at numbers and seeing whether the champion is performing too strongly in places, and at the end of the period they will make adjustments if necessary. Now that would work for the players twofold.
One: champions that underperformed will be able to be tuned up a bit. And two: designers will be able to push the boat a bit more out, since there isn’t the risk anymore that a champion is going to be released and absolutely break the game in some way. Because of that, they can try new stuff. If it were communicated properly with the community that a champion is in trial stage for the first month of their release, and either rank up at your own risk, or at the end of the month send out champ specific rank down gems.
Now for me, this is more wishful thinking than a suggestion. I all but know the community or the game doesn’t have the sort of attitude to nerfs that would allow this. But we’ve seen a lot from kabam that they are sometimes conservative with designs so that they don’t accidentally create another quake or ghost. And that’s fair enough, because they can’t Nerf those champions now.
It’s just a shame that conservative designs could have stifled many, many more amazing designs because of how nerfs work in this game.
I actually thought they said they were doing that - though it was something like looking at newly brought out champions before release into crystals and adjusting them as necessary.
IIRC Odin was one of the only "underwhelming" characters to actually get a buff shortly after being released (though this may have been because the original intended playstyle was pretty... nasty to anyone who actually wanted to use him)
I don't know... it seems like they've stopped doing that, considering champs like Purgatory weren't changed despite seemingly being rather disappointing.
Anyway, as always, I do wish they had a bit more communication regarding these things. I know Champion changes take a while to design, but if I saw that people were genuinely unhappy with the changes I would not be as... concrete? Can I say that?
I agree 100% with op, the negativity here has been a bit much. Even some of the buffs that ppl dislike we’re fine IMO. Guilly was the only one that got me a bit bummed but I wasn’t coming on here ranting.
Ddhk I actually enjoy, I got a bunch of his synergy partners already ranked and when he has a team around him he’s actually decent and fun to play. He’s not the top dps but he’s tanky and has some great utility in anti miss and shrugging non damaging debuffs. He actually gets a lot better when u master him. I just recently r3ed peni and she makes him hit much harder too.
So many great buffs, hood I agreed with them changing to his 3rd form cause he was always a good buff controller and I agree with keeping core identities of champs.
But I hear ppl screaming nerf at Hawkeye and that’s ridiculous he still keeps a similar power control s1 rotation but they added so much more to his kit, the power control was just balanced to match his new damage. There’s a reason magik dosnt hit that hard, power control is a powerful ability so with him going to be doing great damage (on paper) I can see why they tweaked it.
If the idea of the buffs is to make a champ more relevant/useful/higher performing/"better", why go through the hassle of taking away 1 to add 2? What's the benefit beyond farming complaints?Would it have really broken the game to leave his power drain entirely alone and add the Perfect Release stuff on top? If it was a matter of "Oh noes, he can keep an opponent at 0 power!!1!", so what? That would be making him join a club. Not a big deal.
Easier said than done, but the idea is to buff them and rebalance them so that they don't have the possibility of an overpowered situation. It's more prudent to err on the side of less than more, simply because too much causes damage. It's easy for people to claim it wouldn't be too much because people tend to think of additives as being beneficial. If those additives result in a more imbalanced outcome, that's not beneficial.
I’m not defending anyone’s outrageous behavior, but there’s likely damage if you err on the side of “too little” as well. The Guilly update is one such situation, and there are plenty of players still very angry about that. Several successive buffs viewed as “too little” prior to Guilly (Ronin, DDHK) created the impression the update program had lost its way. That type of repeated under-delivery damages confidence in the team and the commitment to make champs relevant.
Dr. Zola
It’s times like these that I wish the game and community had a different mentality when it came to nerfs. It would allow the designers to be so much more out there and innovative with buffs. And this isn’t a “community bad” opinion, just more of a musing about the game.
The issue is that since we invest so much in champions, a nerf is actually pretty catastrophic to you as a player. Sig stones, rank up materials and even emotional investment to some extent. Ranking a champion only for them to be nerfed isn’t a great feeling.
But I wish that even just for the buff program, we had some sort of pledge/agreement from the designers with the players that there was a schedule. Something like a champion buff is released, and for the first month, they are in their beta or grace period.
During that time, the developers will be looking at numbers and seeing whether the champion is performing too strongly in places, and at the end of the period they will make adjustments if necessary. Now that would work for the players twofold.
One: champions that underperformed will be able to be tuned up a bit. And two: designers will be able to push the boat a bit more out, since there isn’t the risk anymore that a champion is going to be released and absolutely break the game in some way. Because of that, they can try new stuff. If it were communicated properly with the community that a champion is in trial stage for the first month of their release, and either rank up at your own risk, or at the end of the month send out champ specific rank down gems.
Now for me, this is more wishful thinking than a suggestion. I all but know the community or the game doesn’t have the sort of attitude to nerfs that would allow this. But we’ve seen a lot from kabam that they are sometimes conservative with designs so that they don’t accidentally create another quake or ghost. And that’s fair enough, because they can’t Nerf those champions now.
It’s just a shame that conservative designs could have stifled many, many more amazing designs because of how nerfs work in this game.
As great as that sounds, opening up such an avenue to the community is going to be catastrophic.
Imagine receiving feedback from an aligned community that says Hawkeye needs prefights where you can pick which DoT effect the arrow inflicts. That’s a whole rework which they will never be able to commit to. Nor should we expect them to.
Additionally, the fact that it’s only John and Dorosh working on the Buff Program tells us there is no way that this is going to happen unless the Buff Program team size increases.
And even if it does happen, Kabam are going to need to implement change control, more intensive community interaction, they will be forced to provide data and reasoning to back their decisions up, and when they do take back a champion back, they will need to address how will it affect the cadence of other champions. Which is a very tall order considering attention needs to be put elsewhere too.
I think we just need to trust Kabam with the Buff Program. Many things have come as a pleasant surprise, and many things won’t go our way. Our voice is our best tool as usual to getting Kabam’s attention. We just need to use it wisely.
I agree 100% with op, the negativity here has been a bit much. Even some of the buffs that ppl dislike we’re fine IMO. Guilly was the only one that got me a bit bummed but I wasn’t coming on here ranting.
Ddhk I actually enjoy, I got a bunch of his synergy partners already ranked and when he has a team around him he’s actually decent and fun to play. He’s not the top dps but he’s tanky and has some great utility in anti miss and shrugging non damaging debuffs. He actually gets a lot better when u master him. I just recently r3ed peni and she makes him hit much harder too.
So many great buffs, hood I agreed with them changing to his 3rd form cause he was always a good buff controller and I agree with keeping core identities of champs.
But I hear ppl screaming nerf at Hawkeye and that’s ridiculous he still keeps a similar power control s1 rotation but they added so much more to his kit, the power control was just balanced to match his new damage. There’s a reason magik dosnt hit that hard, power control is a powerful ability so with him going to be doing great damage (on paper) I can see why they tweaked it.
If the idea of the buffs is to make a champ more relevant/useful/higher performing/"better", why go through the hassle of taking away 1 to add 2? What's the benefit beyond farming complaints?Would it have really broken the game to leave his power drain entirely alone and add the Perfect Release stuff on top? If it was a matter of "Oh noes, he can keep an opponent at 0 power!!1!", so what? That would be making him join a club. Not a big deal.
Easier said than done, but the idea is to buff them and rebalance them so that they don't have the possibility of an overpowered situation. It's more prudent to err on the side of less than more, simply because too much causes damage. It's easy for people to claim it wouldn't be too much because people tend to think of additives as being beneficial. If those additives result in a more imbalanced outcome, that's not beneficial.
I’m not defending anyone’s outrageous behavior, but there’s likely damage if you err on the side of “too little” as well. The Guilly update is one such situation, and there are plenty of players still very angry about that. Several successive buffs viewed as “too little” prior to Guilly (Ronin, DDHK) created the impression the update program had lost its way. That type of repeated under-delivery damages confidence in the team and the commitment to make champs relevant.
Dr. Zola
It’s times like these that I wish the game and community had a different mentality when it came to nerfs. It would allow the designers to be so much more out there and innovative with buffs. And this isn’t a “community bad” opinion, just more of a musing about the game.
The issue is that since we invest so much in champions, a nerf is actually pretty catastrophic to you as a player. Sig stones, rank up materials and even emotional investment to some extent. Ranking a champion only for them to be nerfed isn’t a great feeling.
But I wish that even just for the buff program, we had some sort of pledge/agreement from the designers with the players that there was a schedule. Something like a champion buff is released, and for the first month, they are in their beta or grace period.
During that time, the developers will be looking at numbers and seeing whether the champion is performing too strongly in places, and at the end of the period they will make adjustments if necessary. Now that would work for the players twofold.
One: champions that underperformed will be able to be tuned up a bit. And two: designers will be able to push the boat a bit more out, since there isn’t the risk anymore that a champion is going to be released and absolutely break the game in some way. Because of that, they can try new stuff. If it were communicated properly with the community that a champion is in trial stage for the first month of their release, and either rank up at your own risk, or at the end of the month send out champ specific rank down gems.
Now for me, this is more wishful thinking than a suggestion. I all but know the community or the game doesn’t have the sort of attitude to nerfs that would allow this. But we’ve seen a lot from kabam that they are sometimes conservative with designs so that they don’t accidentally create another quake or ghost. And that’s fair enough, because they can’t Nerf those champions now.
It’s just a shame that conservative designs could have stifled many, many more amazing designs because of how nerfs work in this game.
As great as that sounds, opening up such an avenue to the community is going to be catastrophic.
Imagine receiving feedback from an aligned community that says Hawkeye needs prefights where you can pick which DoT effect the arrow inflicts. That’s a whole rework which they will never be able to commit to. Nor should he expect them to.
Additionally, the fact that it’s only John and Dorosh working on the Buff Program tells you that there is no way that this is going to happen unless the Buff Program team size increases.
And even if it does, Kabam are going to need to implement change control, more intensive community interaction, they will be forced to provide data and reasoning to back their decisions up, and when they do take back a champion back, they will need to address how will it affect the cadence of other champions.
I think we just need to trust Kabam with the Buff Program. Many things have come as a pleasant surprise, and many things won’t go out way. Our voice is our best tool as usual to getting Kabam’s attention. We just need to use it wisely.
Oh no I’m not saying requesting a whole other rework like you say pre fights would be. Not massive changes like that, but take one of the buffs that hasn’t gone down as well with the community, Gamora. Imagine if they’d released her with a miss counter after 2 buffs, and given her buffs a huge duration. And after that month, decided wow that’s pretty OP, let’s dial it back to 4 buffs and the duration was decent, but not ages.
Instead, I feel like they went way too conservative and gave her a miss counter at 10 buffs, and a short duration of buffs.
I agree John and Dorosh don’t have the time for something like that. Which is why I said it was less of a request, and more of a musing.
One: champions that underperformed will be able to be tuned up a bit. And two: designers will be able to push the boat a bit more out, since there isn’t the risk anymore that a champion is going to be released and absolutely break the game in some way. Because of that, they can try new stuff. If it were communicated properly with the community that a champion is in trial stage for the first month of their release, and either rank up at your own risk, or at the end of the month send out champ specific rank down gems.
Now for me, this is more wishful thinking than a suggestion. I all but know the community or the game doesn’t have the sort of attitude to nerfs that would allow this. But we’ve seen a lot from kabam that they are sometimes conservative with designs so that they don’t accidentally create another quake or ghost. And that’s fair enough, because they can’t Nerf those champions now.
It’s just a shame that conservative designs could have stifled many, many more amazing designs because of how nerfs work in this game.
I agree 100% with op, the negativity here has been a bit much. Even some of the buffs that ppl dislike we’re fine IMO. Guilly was the only one that got me a bit bummed but I wasn’t coming on here ranting.
Ddhk I actually enjoy, I got a bunch of his synergy partners already ranked and when he has a team around him he’s actually decent and fun to play. He’s not the top dps but he’s tanky and has some great utility in anti miss and shrugging non damaging debuffs. He actually gets a lot better when u master him. I just recently r3ed peni and she makes him hit much harder too.
So many great buffs, hood I agreed with them changing to his 3rd form cause he was always a good buff controller and I agree with keeping core identities of champs.
But I hear ppl screaming nerf at Hawkeye and that’s ridiculous he still keeps a similar power control s1 rotation but they added so much more to his kit, the power control was just balanced to match his new damage. There’s a reason magik dosnt hit that hard, power control is a powerful ability so with him going to be doing great damage (on paper) I can see why they tweaked it.
If the idea of the buffs is to make a champ more relevant/useful/higher performing/"better", why go through the hassle of taking away 1 to add 2? What's the benefit beyond farming complaints?Would it have really broken the game to leave his power drain entirely alone and add the Perfect Release stuff on top? If it was a matter of "Oh noes, he can keep an opponent at 0 power!!1!", so what? That would be making him join a club. Not a big deal.
Easier said than done, but the idea is to buff them and rebalance them so that they don't have the possibility of an overpowered situation. It's more prudent to err on the side of less than more, simply because too much causes damage. It's easy for people to claim it wouldn't be too much because people tend to think of additives as being beneficial. If those additives result in a more imbalanced outcome, that's not beneficial.
I’m not defending anyone’s outrageous behavior, but there’s likely damage if you err on the side of “too little” as well. The Guilly update is one such situation, and there are plenty of players still very angry about that. Several successive buffs viewed as “too little” prior to Guilly (Ronin, DDHK) created the impression the update program had lost its way. That type of repeated under-delivery damages confidence in the team and the commitment to make champs relevant.
Dr. Zola
It’s times like these that I wish the game and community had a different mentality when it came to nerfs. It would allow the designers to be so much more out there and innovative with buffs. And this isn’t a “community bad” opinion, just more of a musing about the game.
The issue is that since we invest so much in champions, a nerf is actually pretty catastrophic to you as a player. Sig stones, rank up materials and even emotional investment to some extent. Ranking a champion only for them to be nerfed isn’t a great feeling.
But I wish that even just for the buff program, we had some sort of pledge/agreement from the designers with the players that there was a schedule. Something like a champion buff is released, and for the first month, they are in their beta or grace period.
During that time, the developers will be looking at numbers and seeing whether the champion is performing too strongly in places, and at the end of the period they will make adjustments if necessary. Now that would work for the players twofold.
One: champions that underperformed will be able to be tuned up a bit. And two: designers will be able to push the boat a bit more out, since there isn’t the risk anymore that a champion is going to be released and absolutely break the game in some way. Because of that, they can try new stuff. If it were communicated properly with the community that a champion is in trial stage for the first month of their release, and either rank up at your own risk, or at the end of the month send out champ specific rank down gems.
Now for me, this is more wishful thinking than a suggestion. I all but know the community or the game doesn’t have the sort of attitude to nerfs that would allow this. But we’ve seen a lot from kabam that they are sometimes conservative with designs so that they don’t accidentally create another quake or ghost. And that’s fair enough, because they can’t Nerf those champions now.
It’s just a shame that conservative designs could have stifled many, many more amazing designs because of how nerfs work in this game.
I actually thought they said they were doing that - though it was something like looking at newly brought out champions before release into crystals and adjusting them as necessary.
IIRC Odin was one of the only "underwhelming" characters to actually get a buff shortly after being released (though this may have been because the original intended playstyle was pretty... nasty to anyone who actually wanted to use him)
I don't know... it seems like they've stopped doing that, considering champs like Purgatory weren't changed despite seemingly being rather disappointing.
Anyway, as always, I do wish they had a bit more communication regarding these things. I know Champion changes take a while to design, but if I saw that people were genuinely unhappy with the changes I would not be as... concrete? Can I say that?
Yeah they did it with Namor, Cull, Torch, Maw and Ronin I believe (though Ronan was left as is). And maybe Annihulus as well. But after that it kinda fizzled out.
I have the same thoughts on it as I explained above, I think it would be great, and allow a champion like Pyscho man to have had a much more exciting kit, or at least one with higher numbers. I feel like the potential of champions if they were able to be tuned up or down after release would be much higher.
Obviously a champion like Hercules wouldn’t be toned down in my ideal world where I’m imagining this happening. I’m only talking about a tune down being necessary if they were insanely broken. Like if Herc’s immortality was a passive and paused for 10 seconds each time you hit the opponent.
I agree 100% with op, the negativity here has been a bit much. Even some of the buffs that ppl dislike we’re fine IMO. Guilly was the only one that got me a bit bummed but I wasn’t coming on here ranting.
Ddhk I actually enjoy, I got a bunch of his synergy partners already ranked and when he has a team around him he’s actually decent and fun to play. He’s not the top dps but he’s tanky and has some great utility in anti miss and shrugging non damaging debuffs. He actually gets a lot better when u master him. I just recently r3ed peni and she makes him hit much harder too.
So many great buffs, hood I agreed with them changing to his 3rd form cause he was always a good buff controller and I agree with keeping core identities of champs.
But I hear ppl screaming nerf at Hawkeye and that’s ridiculous he still keeps a similar power control s1 rotation but they added so much more to his kit, the power control was just balanced to match his new damage. There’s a reason magik dosnt hit that hard, power control is a powerful ability so with him going to be doing great damage (on paper) I can see why they tweaked it.
If the idea of the buffs is to make a champ more relevant/useful/higher performing/"better", why go through the hassle of taking away 1 to add 2? What's the benefit beyond farming complaints?Would it have really broken the game to leave his power drain entirely alone and add the Perfect Release stuff on top? If it was a matter of "Oh noes, he can keep an opponent at 0 power!!1!", so what? That would be making him join a club. Not a big deal.
Easier said than done, but the idea is to buff them and rebalance them so that they don't have the possibility of an overpowered situation. It's more prudent to err on the side of less than more, simply because too much causes damage. It's easy for people to claim it wouldn't be too much because people tend to think of additives as being beneficial. If those additives result in a more imbalanced outcome, that's not beneficial.
I’m not defending anyone’s outrageous behavior, but there’s likely damage if you err on the side of “too little” as well. The Guilly update is one such situation, and there are plenty of players still very angry about that. Several successive buffs viewed as “too little” prior to Guilly (Ronin, DDHK) created the impression the update program had lost its way. That type of repeated under-delivery damages confidence in the team and the commitment to make champs relevant.
Dr. Zola
It’s times like these that I wish the game and community had a different mentality when it came to nerfs. It would allow the designers to be so much more out there and innovative with buffs. And this isn’t a “community bad” opinion, just more of a musing about the game.
The issue is that since we invest so much in champions, a nerf is actually pretty catastrophic to you as a player. Sig stones, rank up materials and even emotional investment to some extent. Ranking a champion only for them to be nerfed isn’t a great feeling.
But I wish that even just for the buff program, we had some sort of pledge/agreement from the designers with the players that there was a schedule. Something like a champion buff is released, and for the first month, they are in their beta or grace period.
During that time, the developers will be looking at numbers and seeing whether the champion is performing too strongly in places, and at the end of the period they will make adjustments if necessary. Now that would work for the players twofold.
One: champions that underperformed will be able to be tuned up a bit. And two: designers will be able to push the boat a bit more out, since there isn’t the risk anymore that a champion is going to be released and absolutely break the game in some way. Because of that, they can try new stuff. If it were communicated properly with the community that a champion is in trial stage for the first month of their release, and either rank up at your own risk, or at the end of the month send out champ specific rank down gems.
Now for me, this is more wishful thinking than a suggestion. I all but know the community or the game doesn’t have the sort of attitude to nerfs that would allow this. But we’ve seen a lot from kabam that they are sometimes conservative with designs so that they don’t accidentally create another quake or ghost. And that’s fair enough, because they can’t Nerf those champions now.
It’s just a shame that conservative designs could have stifled many, many more amazing designs because of how nerfs work in this game.
As great as that sounds, opening up such an avenue to the community is going to be catastrophic.
Imagine receiving feedback from an aligned community that says Hawkeye needs prefights where you can pick which DoT effect the arrow inflicts. That’s a whole rework which they will never be able to commit to. Nor should he expect them to.
Additionally, the fact that it’s only John and Dorosh working on the Buff Program tells you that there is no way that this is going to happen unless the Buff Program team size increases.
And even if it does, Kabam are going to need to implement change control, more intensive community interaction, they will be forced to provide data and reasoning to back their decisions up, and when they do take back a champion back, they will need to address how will it affect the cadence of other champions.
I think we just need to trust Kabam with the Buff Program. Many things have come as a pleasant surprise, and many things won’t go out way. Our voice is our best tool as usual to getting Kabam’s attention. We just need to use it wisely.
Oh no I’m not saying requesting a whole other rework like you say pre fights would be. Not massive changes like that, but take one of the buffs that hasn’t gone down as well with the community, Gamora. Imagine if they’d released her with a miss counter after 2 buffs, and given her buffs a huge duration. And after that month, decided wow that’s pretty OP, let’s dial it back to 4 buffs and the duration was decent, but not ages.
Instead, I feel like they went way too conservative and gave her a miss counter at 10 buffs, and a short duration of buffs.
I agree John and Dorosh don’t have the time for something like that. Which is why I said it was less of a request, and more of a musing.
I must say I admire your quickfire responses 🤠 left me no time to edit my mistakes.
Yes, I agree with you. Maybe if they opened this up to a small portion of the community like they did the CCP. But a smaller set of users so that things don’t leak or spiral out of control. BG and KM only maybe.
I agree 100% with op, the negativity here has been a bit much. Even some of the buffs that ppl dislike we’re fine IMO. Guilly was the only one that got me a bit bummed but I wasn’t coming on here ranting.
Ddhk I actually enjoy, I got a bunch of his synergy partners already ranked and when he has a team around him he’s actually decent and fun to play. He’s not the top dps but he’s tanky and has some great utility in anti miss and shrugging non damaging debuffs. He actually gets a lot better when u master him. I just recently r3ed peni and she makes him hit much harder too.
So many great buffs, hood I agreed with them changing to his 3rd form cause he was always a good buff controller and I agree with keeping core identities of champs.
But I hear ppl screaming nerf at Hawkeye and that’s ridiculous he still keeps a similar power control s1 rotation but they added so much more to his kit, the power control was just balanced to match his new damage. There’s a reason magik dosnt hit that hard, power control is a powerful ability so with him going to be doing great damage (on paper) I can see why they tweaked it.
If the idea of the buffs is to make a champ more relevant/useful/higher performing/"better", why go through the hassle of taking away 1 to add 2? What's the benefit beyond farming complaints?Would it have really broken the game to leave his power drain entirely alone and add the Perfect Release stuff on top? If it was a matter of "Oh noes, he can keep an opponent at 0 power!!1!", so what? That would be making him join a club. Not a big deal.
Easier said than done, but the idea is to buff them and rebalance them so that they don't have the possibility of an overpowered situation. It's more prudent to err on the side of less than more, simply because too much causes damage. It's easy for people to claim it wouldn't be too much because people tend to think of additives as being beneficial. If those additives result in a more imbalanced outcome, that's not beneficial.
I’m not defending anyone’s outrageous behavior, but there’s likely damage if you err on the side of “too little” as well. The Guilly update is one such situation, and there are plenty of players still very angry about that. Several successive buffs viewed as “too little” prior to Guilly (Ronin, DDHK) created the impression the update program had lost its way. That type of repeated under-delivery damages confidence in the team and the commitment to make champs relevant.
Dr. Zola
It’s times like these that I wish the game and community had a different mentality when it came to nerfs. It would allow the designers to be so much more out there and innovative with buffs. And this isn’t a “community bad” opinion, just more of a musing about the game.
The issue is that since we invest so much in champions, a nerf is actually pretty catastrophic to you as a player. Sig stones, rank up materials and even emotional investment to some extent. Ranking a champion only for them to be nerfed isn’t a great feeling.
But I wish that even just for the buff program, we had some sort of pledge/agreement from the designers with the players that there was a schedule. Something like a champion buff is released, and for the first month, they are in their beta or grace period.
During that time, the developers will be looking at numbers and seeing whether the champion is performing too strongly in places, and at the end of the period they will make adjustments if necessary. Now that would work for the players twofold.
One: champions that underperformed will be able to be tuned up a bit. And two: designers will be able to push the boat a bit more out, since there isn’t the risk anymore that a champion is going to be released and absolutely break the game in some way. Because of that, they can try new stuff. If it were communicated properly with the community that a champion is in trial stage for the first month of their release, and either rank up at your own risk, or at the end of the month send out champ specific rank down gems.
Now for me, this is more wishful thinking than a suggestion. I all but know the community or the game doesn’t have the sort of attitude to nerfs that would allow this. But we’ve seen a lot from kabam that they are sometimes conservative with designs so that they don’t accidentally create another quake or ghost. And that’s fair enough, because they can’t Nerf those champions now.
It’s just a shame that conservative designs could have stifled many, many more amazing designs because of how nerfs work in this game.
I actually thought they said they were doing that - though it was something like looking at newly brought out champions before release into crystals and adjusting them as necessary.
IIRC Odin was one of the only "underwhelming" characters to actually get a buff shortly after being released (though this may have been because the original intended playstyle was pretty... nasty to anyone who actually wanted to use him)
I don't know... it seems like they've stopped doing that, considering champs like Purgatory weren't changed despite seemingly being rather disappointing.
Anyway, as always, I do wish they had a bit more communication regarding these things. I know Champion changes take a while to design, but if I saw that people were genuinely unhappy with the changes I would not be as... concrete? Can I say that?
Yeah they did it with Namor, Cull, Torch, Maw and Ronin I believe (though Ronan was left as is). And maybe Annihulus as well. But after that it kinda fizzled out.
I have the same thoughts on it as I explained above, I think it would be great, and allow a champion like Pyscho man to have had a much more exciting kit, or at least one with higher numbers. I feel like the potential of champions if they were able to be tuned up or down after release would be much higher.
Obviously a champion like Hercules wouldn’t be toned down in my ideal world where I’m imagining this happening. I’m only talking about a tune down being necessary if they were insanely broken. Like if Herc’s immortality was a passive and paused for 10 seconds each time you hit the opponent.
I remember when CGR was toned down after KM allegedly freaked out. They halved the potency of his Armour Breaks and he is still a massive damage dealer. That’s also a change one can’t or shouldn’t be mad about.
And yes, the approach they took w/ Namor, Cull, Torch, Maw and Invisible Woman was perfect. But it’s more resource intensive as they have to provide data and invest in long posts and back and forth which might further delay the buff program / reduce the flexibility and creativity they need to do their thing.
Maybe this activity can be done at the end of the buff program where an inventory can be taken of the lesser or non successful buffs, such as Gamora, Nova and maybe even Ronin and DD Flix.
I think Kabam could look into rewarding constructive criticism by opening up a small channel for buff testing. Let it be a month before each patch drop. Give a max of 3 or 5 trusted users beta access.
Advantages: 1) Builds a more established and trusted channel with the community. 2) Rewards and encourages positive behaviour and criticism.
Disadvantages: 1) Risk of leaking buffed information in advance? Unless Kabam communicate this information at the start of each month, which isn’t a bad move either.
Someone disagreeing with this specific post is just a sign that Disagrees are straight up meaningless. Someone is disagreeing with expressions of gratitude to between players?
Thanks for the post otherwise. I enjoyed your well thought out piece.
It does make me wonder why Kabam got rid of the beta-buff player testing program.
1. Too slow? I am sure if they wanted to, they could speed up the recruitment portion, shorten the actual time for players to test (I am sure players could figure out bugs and cheesy interactions even with just one day to test).
2. Too much resources? Could be a thing both on the front end (recruitment, setting up the beta environment, etc) and on the back end (responding to feedback and making changes or another beta), or just one. But it could be worthwhile to avoid having to rebuff champions or deal with player outrage.
3. To keep the surprise factor? I wouldn't have any knowledge whether keeping champion buffs a secret until a few weeks before release does something regarding player engagement/purchases. So I don't have any insight there.
4. Some other (monetary) reason?
There must be some reason champion buffs are no longer a thing, as Kabam is clearly find doing betas for Act 7 and making tweaks.
Comments
Second: Late to this thread, but I don’t understand knee-jerk negative reactions to champ buffs. Disappointment with a live buff is one thing—and projecting what a buff will be like based on words is another—but flat slamming buffs this way makes little sense.
Third: Negativity does boil over, and there’s ample cause for a fair bit of negativity for things not related to the buffs. Sow—>reap
Dr. Zola
Kabam has legitimate issues and they are worth criticizing however writing off everything because one buff didn't go as you would have hoped isn't one of those ways that's remotely constructive in any way shape or form.
Dr. Zola
Kabam has the professional responsibility: their actions should be judged in that context. But players who make it harder to make progress with those problems need to accept their own culpability.
The comments made lack anything constructive and instead take the abusive approach, which is just never necessary.
If you honestly do not like a single of Kabam's recent buffs, fine. You're absolutely entitled to that opinion, but instead of saying "Kabam is pathetic, always useless" perhaps try "hmm, I don't feel the recent buffs are on the right track, I feel like the issue is the removal of previous abilities" or whatever. It's pretty simple, you don't have to say anything special, just don't be a nob.
Basically just be a decent human being. Which is ridiculous to have to tell people, but hey, this is the internet, where people can say whatever the hell they want.
Ddhk I actually enjoy, I got a bunch of his synergy partners already ranked and when he has a team around him he’s actually decent and fun to play. He’s not the top dps but he’s tanky and has some great utility in anti miss and shrugging non damaging debuffs. He actually gets a lot better when u master him. I just recently r3ed peni and she makes him hit much harder too.
So many great buffs, hood I agreed with them changing to his 3rd form cause he was always a good buff controller and I agree with keeping core identities of champs.
But I hear ppl screaming nerf at Hawkeye and that’s ridiculous he still keeps a similar power control s1 rotation but they added so much more to his kit, the power control was just balanced to match his new damage. There’s a reason magik dosnt hit that hard, power control is a powerful ability so with him going to be doing great damage (on paper) I can see why they tweaked it.
Dr. Zola
The issue is that since we invest so much in champions, a nerf is actually pretty catastrophic to you as a player. Sig stones, rank up materials and even emotional investment to some extent. Ranking a champion only for them to be nerfed isn’t a great feeling.
But I wish that even just for the buff program, we had some sort of pledge/agreement from the designers with the players that there was a schedule. Something like a champion buff is released, and for the first month, they are in their beta or grace period.
During that time, the developers will be looking at numbers and seeing whether the champion is performing too strongly in places, and at the end of the period they will make adjustments if necessary. Now that would work for the players twofold.
One: champions that underperformed will be able to be tuned up a bit. And two: designers will be able to push the boat a bit more out, since there isn’t the risk anymore that a champion is going to be released and absolutely break the game in some way. Because of that, they can try new stuff. If it were communicated properly with the community that a champion is in trial stage for the first month of their release, and either rank up at your own risk, or at the end of the month send out champ specific rank down gems.
Now for me, this is more wishful thinking than a suggestion. I all but know the community or the game doesn’t have the sort of attitude to nerfs that would allow this. But we’ve seen a lot from kabam that they are sometimes conservative with designs so that they don’t accidentally create another quake or ghost. And that’s fair enough, because they can’t Nerf those champions now.
It’s just a shame that conservative designs could have stifled many, many more amazing designs because of how nerfs work in this game.
IIRC Odin was one of the only "underwhelming" characters to actually get a buff shortly after being released (though this may have been because the original intended playstyle was pretty... nasty to anyone who actually wanted to use him)
I don't know... it seems like they've stopped doing that, considering champs like Purgatory weren't changed despite seemingly being rather disappointing.
Anyway, as always, I do wish they had a bit more communication regarding these things. I know Champion changes take a while to design, but if I saw that people were genuinely unhappy with the changes I would not be as... concrete? Can I say that?
Imagine receiving feedback from an aligned community that says Hawkeye needs prefights where you can pick which DoT effect the arrow inflicts. That’s a whole rework which they will never be able to commit to. Nor should we expect them to.
Additionally, the fact that it’s only John and Dorosh working on the Buff Program tells us there is no way that this is going to happen unless the Buff Program team size increases.
And even if it does happen, Kabam are going to need to implement change control, more intensive community interaction, they will be forced to provide data and reasoning to back their decisions up, and when they do take back a champion back, they will need to address how will it affect the cadence of other champions. Which is a very tall order considering attention needs to be put elsewhere too.
I think we just need to trust Kabam with the Buff Program. Many things have come as a pleasant surprise, and many things won’t go our way. Our voice is our best tool as usual to getting Kabam’s attention. We just need to use it wisely.
Instead, I feel like they went way too conservative and gave her a miss counter at 10 buffs, and a short duration of buffs.
I agree John and Dorosh don’t have the time for something like that. Which is why I said it was less of a request, and more of a musing.
I have the same thoughts on it as I explained above, I think it would be great, and allow a champion like Pyscho man to have had a much more exciting kit, or at least one with higher numbers. I feel like the potential of champions if they were able to be tuned up or down after release would be much higher.
Obviously a champion like Hercules wouldn’t be toned down in my ideal world where I’m imagining this happening. I’m only talking about a tune down being necessary if they were insanely broken. Like if Herc’s immortality was a passive and paused for 10 seconds each time you hit the opponent.
Yes, I agree with you. Maybe if they opened this up to a small portion of the community like they did the CCP. But a smaller set of users so that things don’t leak or spiral out of control. BG and KM only maybe.
And yes, the approach they took w/ Namor, Cull, Torch, Maw and Invisible Woman was perfect. But it’s more resource intensive as they have to provide data and invest in long posts and back and forth which might further delay the buff program / reduce the flexibility and creativity they need to do their thing.
Maybe this activity can be done at the end of the buff program where an inventory can be taken of the lesser or non successful buffs, such as Gamora, Nova and maybe even Ronin and DD Flix.
I think Kabam could look into rewarding constructive criticism by opening up a small channel for buff testing.
Let it be a month before each patch drop.
Give a max of 3 or 5 trusted users beta access.
Advantages:
1) Builds a more established and trusted channel with the community.
2) Rewards and encourages positive behaviour and criticism.
Disadvantages:
1) Risk of leaking buffed information in advance? Unless Kabam communicate this information at the start of each month, which isn’t a bad move either.
Thanks for the post otherwise. I enjoyed your well thought out piece.
It does make me wonder why Kabam got rid of the beta-buff player testing program.
1. Too slow? I am sure if they wanted to, they could speed up the recruitment portion, shorten the actual time for players to test (I am sure players could figure out bugs and cheesy interactions even with just one day to test).
2. Too much resources? Could be a thing both on the front end (recruitment, setting up the beta environment, etc) and on the back end (responding to feedback and making changes or another beta), or just one. But it could be worthwhile to avoid having to rebuff champions or deal with player outrage.
3. To keep the surprise factor? I wouldn't have any knowledge whether keeping champion buffs a secret until a few weeks before release does something regarding player engagement/purchases. So I don't have any insight there.
4. Some other (monetary) reason?
There must be some reason champion buffs are no longer a thing, as Kabam is clearly find doing betas for Act 7 and making tweaks.