An Idea Regarding the Champion Review Program

We’ve now gone through two cycles of the champion review program without any changes being made to the released champions. I agree with the conclusions made by the game team’s decisions on these champs and, more importantly, I actually like the idea of this program. It’s absolutely true that the game team could never get as much testing data on a champion on their own as they could by releasing it out into the community to play with, and making tweaks to a champion based on that new trove of data is a good thing.

There is one potential aspect of this, however, that I think gives many players a bit of pause. If you are lucky enough to get one of these champions early in their lifespan, whether that was by arena grinding, getting lucky with Cavalier/GM crystals, popping a featured 5/6* and snagging them, or just straight buying them in a prerelease bundle, that champion is accompanied by a sense of dread that they may be tweaked downward. We saw a bit of that play out with the adjustment to the Quicksilver/Scarlet Witch synergy recently. Luckily, that problem was caught and addressed relatively quickly.

Which brings me to my suggestion: at the beginning of each month, players should be sent out a 2/3/4* version of the new champions (rarity varying by progression level). This would allow for the game team to begin collecting information on the champion even before pre-release bundles come out, and help in cases like we just saw to solve the most glaring issues before any transactions are conducted.

Obviously this isn’t a perfect solution and there will of course be champions who have their abilities tweaked at the end of the six month testing window, and that’s okay! But I think that getting the champion into the community’s hands before the champion is sold could be a good way to prevent some of the bigger issues going forward.

Let me know what y’all think

Comments

ItsDamien

We’ve now gone through two cycles of the champion review program without any changes being made to the released champions. I agree with the conclusions made by the game team’s decisions on these champs and, more importantly, I actually like the idea of this program. It’s absolutely true that the game team could never get as much testing data on a champion on their own as they could by releasing it out into the community to play with, and making tweaks to a champion based on that new trove of data is a good thing.

There is one potential aspect of this, however, that I think gives many players a bit of pause. If you are lucky enough to get one of these champions early in their lifespan, whether that was by arena grinding, getting lucky with Cavalier/GM crystals, popping a featured 5/6* and snagging them, or just straight buying them in a prerelease bundle, that champion is accompanied by a sense of dread that they may be tweaked downward. We saw a bit of that play out with the adjustment to the Quicksilver/Scarlet Witch synergy recently. Luckily, that problem was caught and addressed relatively quickly.

Which brings me to my suggestion: at the beginning of each month, players should be sent out a 2/3/4* version of the new champions (rarity varying by progression level). This would allow for the game team to begin collecting information on the champion even before pre-release bundles come out, and help in cases like we just saw to solve the most glaring issues before any transactions are conducted.

Obviously this isn’t a perfect solution and there will of course be champions who have their abilities tweaked at the end of the six month testing window, and that’s okay! But I think that getting the champion into the community’s hands before the champion is sold could be a good way to prevent some of the bigger issues going forward.

Let me know what y’all think

Never against getting “free” champs, however I don’t know how many people who would be eligible for the 4* (for example) would actually use them for anything remotely relevant. The other major problem being that some synergies tend to be locked to 5* and above as well, so even then we wouldn’t be able to really give full feedback and data based on that too, as a synergy (as with QS and SW) could be too powerful in itself.

Wicket329

We’ve now gone through two cycles of the champion review program without any changes being made to the released champions. I agree with the conclusions made by the game team’s decisions on these champs and, more importantly, I actually like the idea of this program. It’s absolutely true that the game team could never get as much testing data on a champion on their own as they could by releasing it out into the community to play with, and making tweaks to a champion based on that new trove of data is a good thing.

There is one potential aspect of this, however, that I think gives many players a bit of pause. If you are lucky enough to get one of these champions early in their lifespan, whether that was by arena grinding, getting lucky with Cavalier/GM crystals, popping a featured 5/6* and snagging them, or just straight buying them in a prerelease bundle, that champion is accompanied by a sense of dread that they may be tweaked downward. We saw a bit of that play out with the adjustment to the Quicksilver/Scarlet Witch synergy recently. Luckily, that problem was caught and addressed relatively quickly.

Which brings me to my suggestion: at the beginning of each month, players should be sent out a 2/3/4* version of the new champions (rarity varying by progression level). This would allow for the game team to begin collecting information on the champion even before pre-release bundles come out, and help in cases like we just saw to solve the most glaring issues before any transactions are conducted.

Obviously this isn’t a perfect solution and there will of course be champions who have their abilities tweaked at the end of the six month testing window, and that’s okay! But I think that getting the champion into the community’s hands before the champion is sold could be a good way to prevent some of the bigger issues going forward.

Let me know what y’all think
Never against getting “free” champs, however I don’t know how many people who would be eligible for the 4* (for example) would actually use them for anything remotely relevant. The other major problem being that some synergies tend to be locked to 5* and above as well, so even then we wouldn’t be able to really give full feedback and data based on that too, as a synergy (as with QS and SW) could be too powerful in itself.

I was thinking the 4* would go to Thronebreaker/Paragon specifically because it wouldn’t help their progression. I think enough people like playing with new toys that they’d see some testing get done. And if not, it could always be incentivized by some monthly crystal objective shards.

The synergies are a good point. I thought about that as well, and didn’t have a great solution for it at first, but I think the solution is a change to design philosophy. Rather than having entire synergies gated by rarity (beyond the 4* level), it could just be scaling potency. So the 4* would have access to everything, but the 5* and 6* would have it better. That should give some level of insight that otherwise would be missed.

BitterSteel

I think the main thing for me right now is about what is the process for when a champion gets balanced in a downward trajectory.

Let’s say for arguments sake that Quicksilver is deemed too powerful, and his whiplash debuffs are changed to do half as much damage. (I don’t think this is necessary or likely, but it’s just for this hypothetical)

By now, plenty of people have rank 3 and rank 4 Quicksilver’s. Do all of those people get QS rank down tickets? I feel that they should, they clearly ranked a champion up that was different to how they are post balancing.

What about sig stones? I can understand why Moleman didn’t have the extra effort in of returning sig stones because this was theoretically a one off, no other champ has an 18 month outstanding bug.

But with this balancing program there’s a chance that balancing could become a regular thing, and champions could see nerfs potentially twice a month. I think there needs to be a look into tech to allow sig stones to be quickly compensated should a champion be nerfed.

Clearly we are 0/4 for any champ changing so far, and we don’t know what nerfs would look like, but surely there needs to be more communication about what the process will be unless you want nobody touching a champion for 6 months until they’re given the green light.

If a champion is balanced down, it should be up to the player if they still want the champion invested in. I don’t particularly like the idea of RDTs becoming a regular part of the game, but with Kabam opening the door for regular nerfs/buffs - for every nerf that this program has (hopefully as few as possible), there needs to be an equal number of RDTs that give back sig stones, cats, iso etc. Otherwise this program will be an unmitigated disaster.

We cannot plan for or be hyped for new champions if there’s a chance we invest in them and then they’re nerfed 6 months later without any mitigation for the player who ranked them. New champions that are really good will just not be ranked.

I love the opportunity that this program gives to designers to be braver with designs, try new things in the hopes that it works, but if it’s too OP then they can be toned down later. I think it’s great to bring underwhelming champs up to a level as well and I can’t wait to see what they do with Gorr. But there needs to be a bump in communication about what the process is, and what happens if there is a nerf.

VanillaCoke

If the devs want us to be open to the idea of the devs developing champions to “try new things”, which I’m all for, the devs should be open to providing the players compensation (in the form of RDTs if nerfs occur). This has to be a mutually beneficial relationship in order for this program to truly succeed.

I fear that out of not wanting to provide RDTs (for whatever reason), the Balance Program will remain BUT it will always be a “this champion will stay the same” or “this champion will receive a tune UP” in order to avoid “nerfing” therefore avoiding accountability for people investing in new champions.

Wozzle007

We’ve now gone through two cycles of the champion review program without any changes being made to the released champions. I agree with the conclusions made by the game team’s decisions on these champs and, more importantly, I actually like the idea of this program. It’s absolutely true that the game team could never get as much testing data on a champion on their own as they could by releasing it out into the community to play with, and making tweaks to a champion based on that new trove of data is a good thing.

There is one potential aspect of this, however, that I think gives many players a bit of pause. If you are lucky enough to get one of these champions early in their lifespan, whether that was by arena grinding, getting lucky with Cavalier/GM crystals, popping a featured 5/6* and snagging them, or just straight buying them in a prerelease bundle, that champion is accompanied by a sense of dread that they may be tweaked downward. We saw a bit of that play out with the adjustment to the Quicksilver/Scarlet Witch synergy recently. Luckily, that problem was caught and addressed relatively quickly.

Which brings me to my suggestion: at the beginning of each month, players should be sent out a 2/3/4* version of the new champions (rarity varying by progression level). This would allow for the game team to begin collecting information on the champion even before pre-release bundles come out, and help in cases like we just saw to solve the most glaring issues before any transactions are conducted.

Obviously this isn’t a perfect solution and there will of course be champions who have their abilities tweaked at the end of the six month testing window, and that’s okay! But I think that getting the champion into the community’s hands before the champion is sold could be a good way to prevent some of the bigger issues going forward.

Let me know what y’all think
Never against getting “free” champs, however I don’t know how many people who would be eligible for the 4* (for example) would actually use them for anything remotely relevant. The other major problem being that some synergies tend to be locked to 5* and above as well, so even then we wouldn’t be able to really give full feedback and data based on that too, as a synergy (as with QS and SW) could be too powerful in itself.
I was thinking the 4* would go to Thronebreaker/Paragon specifically because it wouldn’t help their progression. I think enough people like playing with new toys that they’d see some testing get done. And if not, it could always be incentivized by some monthly crystal objective shards.

The synergies are a good point. I thought about that as well, and didn’t have a great solution for it at first, but I think the solution is a change to design philosophy. Rather than having entire synergies gated by rarity (beyond the 4* level), it could just be scaling potency. So the 4* would have access to everything, but the 5* and 6* would have it better. That should give some level of insight that otherwise would be missed.

But what we content would we use a 4* on? We regularly get given champs as 2* and 3* and I never use them. I wouldn’t want to use iso and gold to rank up a 4* just so Kabam had game data. I think a viable solution would be to have the beta server open for 3 days where the 6* could be use on any content, but the content completion didn’t count towards main account progression.

The downside to this is, once you played with a new toy on the beta server, are you going to want to spend units/money/time getting the champ as soon as humanly possible, or once had your fun are done?

Wicket329

We’ve now gone through two cycles of the champion review program without any changes being made to the released champions. I agree with the conclusions made by the game team’s decisions on these champs and, more importantly, I actually like the idea of this program. It’s absolutely true that the game team could never get as much testing data on a champion on their own as they could by releasing it out into the community to play with, and making tweaks to a champion based on that new trove of data is a good thing.

There is one potential aspect of this, however, that I think gives many players a bit of pause. If you are lucky enough to get one of these champions early in their lifespan, whether that was by arena grinding, getting lucky with Cavalier/GM crystals, popping a featured 5/6* and snagging them, or just straight buying them in a prerelease bundle, that champion is accompanied by a sense of dread that they may be tweaked downward. We saw a bit of that play out with the adjustment to the Quicksilver/Scarlet Witch synergy recently. Luckily, that problem was caught and addressed relatively quickly.

Which brings me to my suggestion: at the beginning of each month, players should be sent out a 2/3/4* version of the new champions (rarity varying by progression level). This would allow for the game team to begin collecting information on the champion even before pre-release bundles come out, and help in cases like we just saw to solve the most glaring issues before any transactions are conducted.

Obviously this isn’t a perfect solution and there will of course be champions who have their abilities tweaked at the end of the six month testing window, and that’s okay! But I think that getting the champion into the community’s hands before the champion is sold could be a good way to prevent some of the bigger issues going forward.

Let me know what y’all think
Never against getting “free” champs, however I don’t know how many people who would be eligible for the 4* (for example) would actually use them for anything remotely relevant. The other major problem being that some synergies tend to be locked to 5* and above as well, so even then we wouldn’t be able to really give full feedback and data based on that too, as a synergy (as with QS and SW) could be too powerful in itself.
I was thinking the 4* would go to Thronebreaker/Paragon specifically because it wouldn’t help their progression. I think enough people like playing with new toys that they’d see some testing get done. And if not, it could always be incentivized by some monthly crystal objective shards.

The synergies are a good point. I thought about that as well, and didn’t have a great solution for it at first, but I think the solution is a change to design philosophy. Rather than having entire synergies gated by rarity (beyond the 4* level), it could just be scaling potency. So the 4* would have access to everything, but the 5* and 6* would have it better. That should give some level of insight that otherwise would be missed.
But what we content would we use a 4* on? We regularly get given champs as 2* and 3* and I never use them. I wouldn’t want to use iso and gold to rank up a 4* just so Kabam had game data. I think a viable solution would be to have the beta server open for 3 days where the 6* could be use on any content, but the content completion didn’t count towards main account progression.

The downside to this is, once you played with a new toy on the beta server, are you going to want to spend units/money/time getting the champ as soon as humanly possible, or once had your fun are done?

I think a large scale beta server is probably not feasible. Just from a Kabam-side resource perspective, running additional servers is probably more intensive than they’d like.

I think that if objectives were put out each month for the use and ranking of these new champs, or if Kabam started putting out more challenge content designed around lower rarity levels, there would be a lot of player buy in. I’d say that overall though, there are enough people who’d be willing to test to some extent to start catching major issues.

TheDaywalker

What about sig stones? I can understand why Moleman didn’t have the extra effort in of returning sig stones because this was theoretically a one off, no other champ has an 18 month outstanding bug.

Sentry says hi.