**Mastery Loadouts**
Due to issues related to the release of Mastery Loadouts, the "free swap" period will be extended.
The new end date will be May 1st.
Due to issues related to the release of Mastery Loadouts, the "free swap" period will be extended.
The new end date will be May 1st.
Comments
The question that was asked was, and I'm paraphrasing here: why wasn't Guillotine targeted as a champion that would be useful to high tier players? And the answer was: Kabam learned that champions that get voted on need to be designed in such a way that higher tier players have a way to show off more performance with higher levels of skill.
That is an answer, it just takes some thought to parse. It says the reason Guillotine wasn't targeted as a "high tier player champion" is simply because: it didn't occur to anyone to consider that was a requirement of the update. Guillotine 2.0 is clearly designed to be a relatively flat performance champion. Her skill requirements aren't high, and there aren't a lot of ways to squeeze extra performance out of her once you learn how to player her at all. She's much more of a champ that beginning players might appreciate, playing early parts of the game where her higher damage matters more, and rosters are smaller and her toolset isn't as likely to be eclipsed. That all seems deliberate.
When you have a community vote, you expect a wide cross section of players to vote, and you might assume you'll be updating the champion based on what the playerbase needs as a whole, just as when you're making new champions. But in fact that's not a safe assumption, because when you engage the playerbase, you are actually engaging the active player community - in other words you're more likely to engage players who are already active participants in other areas of the game's community (aside from playing the game itself). These players are more likely to be veteran players, and your voting pool will skew towards the higher tier higher skill veteran players. If you make something most of them won't find useful, that will disproportionately impact the very people you asked to participate.
That seemed obvious to me (and I posted such elsewhere) but Kabam is saying this was not obvious to them.
Maybe it's time for a new vote. I'm sure if given a choice, most of us would vote for a full revert to previous state AND a new buff that preserves all of her previous qualities. One that adds utility, and improves upon her EXISTING playstyle. Which provided damage from basic attacks and sp3. Not heavy spam into sp1 or 2.
But, if that is simply not an option, we would absolutely prefer to have her reverted even without a new buff. And/or rdt, as an option to recover our investment and move on.
In my opinion, Hood is an example that a champion can successfully be rebuffed. I think his final state is perfect. A great mix of his old identity and the addition of a more useable phase mechanic and access to more damage. It's also my opinion that the notion that you have to take something away in order to add something has been successfully debunked with the Hood buff. Does anyone actually find him to be overpowered in his new state? I really doubt it. He's fun and effective enough that I do use him from time to time, but he has in no way become my go-to overpowered lane clearing champ or anything. 🙂
So, we know it's possible. The question becomes, is Kabam willing to spend the time to make it happen for Guillotine as well? If the answer is no, that is certainly disappointing considering the vote was held and that she's an original Kabam character. But, if that's the answer.. so be it. But please revert her back and/or offer a way to rank down if this is the final position of the company. That you aren't capable or willing to allocate any further dev time to her. If that's the case, just say so. Rather than tell us our opinion is wrong.
The most glaring counterpoint to this is the Hercules community choice buff that happened prior. Yes, there’s some variables to consider vs a new original champ vs a buff, but we were exposed to a lot of the process and I dare say in some of those Dorky Dave deep-dives it was underscored that in designing the champs they wanted to… do everything they said they’re learning now w Guillotine buff. We saw and heard Kabam Broc talking about different mechanics and making a champ that wasn’t too complicated but also allowed for the “skill expression” we recognize as missing from the Guilly buff. Perhaps their minds are erased after every champion design or buff is completed?
If not that, then we’re supposed to believe all that considering of the community needs wrt skill levels etc for Hercules then totally disappeared because… this was a buff and not an original champ. They’re not saying we swung and missed. They’re saying “we just learned this now! Thanks guys!” I think it’s fair to see it as a slight to our own ability to connect the dots and speculate on more legitimate reasons they don’t want to revisit her buff. There’s a designers/community exchange here that ends w same results that feels far less insulting.
My theory is they know/hope they have amazing champs and/or buffs coming December and those will make people forget about this debacle. Otherwise this is just Kabam botching the buff then doubling down w bad PR afterwards. I can’t even credit them w “at least they engaged” because it came off so disingenuous.
But if the December Dr. Strange buff brings that iconic character back to relevancy, I think that’s another viable road to redemption.
Get 25 souls and fire sp3, that damage was so satisfying.
Her regen was great as well.
Personally, the regen is fine now but the sp3 has gone from top to rock-bottom.
I didn't pick Guilly from my 6* Nexus because of this "buff", Whatever happens now would just be unfair to someone or the other.
It is what it is and they've said they "learnt" from it and will consider it in future updates.
Pain Link: Essentially a defensive ability... given to a community choice buff?
There was an opportunity to add viable utility to her sp1 here. And apparently they said "pass, let's add something to make her more annoying to fight *against* instead."
Like, just choose one.. Buff mitigation, some form of Power Control, something Mystic-ish.. idk. Or simply a combat mechanic such as miss or autoblock mitigation?
Bleed Curse: This is my least favorite change. As it essentially changes her entire original playstyle. I/we enjoyed her original playstyle. Aggessive basic attacks. Her basic attack animations are fantastic. Smooth, quick fluid sword animations. Her heavy is a little clunky imo, but I hadn't really noticed in the past because it wasn't required to access her bleed damage before this. Also, Bleed Curse has no utility. It just locks the bleed damage she already had from basic attacks behind heavy and special spam now.
Delete Bleed Curse and restore original bleed values to basic attacks please. If you wish to add a viable utility to her heavy instead, great, but I'm ok either way as long as Bleed Curse it scrapped and her original bleed values are restored to her basic attacks and call it a day.
The sp3: The degen is neat, I guess, but the attack itself was gutted. With zero exaggeration it now hits for less than a single medium attack... As mentioned, this was one of my (and many others) favorite parts of her original kit. Was legitimately shocked the first time I tested it after the buff. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. I can only guess that this was nerfed so badly out of fear of how it would react with her new regen values? Idk, I really don't have any idea. But I truly don't understand how it wasn't obvious that her fans would be so disappointed in this change.
It was like our worst fears about the buff were unfolding as we play tested her for the first time. 😅 I can be quoted in my alliance chat saying things like: "As long as they don't mess with her bleed abilities, regen or sp3.. I'm sure I'll be happy with the buff..." prior to the update. Never did it occur to me they would literally change all 3 of my favorite things about her.
As I started playing her for the first time (before reading, I wanted a completely blind test) I already noticed a reduction in bleed procs/damage. It also seemed like her health wasn't topping up. Then, I built a lot of souls and launched the sp3... I was shocked. No other way to say it.
That being said, the increased damage based on number of souls was a great idea. That does actually fit perfectly with her previous aggressive basic attack playstyle. Her sig ability is pretty cool too. But that's kind of where it ends for my positive feedback unfortunately.
It is actually outdamaged by four lights... and that's not accounting for crits
Deadpool and Joe Fixit have similar issues where their SP3 "damage" is a result of a debuff rather than the actual Special.
As long as people spend, keep their levels of play up, the data will never back up the dissatisfaction that players are experiencing.
Until the data (including financial data) reflects what people are saying, Kabam has zero motivation to do anything.
If I am reading this correctly, he can get up to 28% Life Steal? Correct please, if I am wrong. But if I'm not, can someone please explain to me then why Guillotine only get 2%? And don't say "Because it applies to all damage sources." In almost every scenario, her bleeds will heal like 8 HP or less and her attacks less than 50. Let's say Joe Fixit deals 3k damage on a light attack. Thats 840 health regenerated in a single hit. Guillotine can't even heal that much with an SP2 unless she has like super amped up damage. How is this fair???