Upcoming Cull Obsidian and Ebony Maw Balance Changes

Lormif · September 2019

XxTapSterRxX said:

Kabam Miike said:
Hey all,

I know there will be a lot of questions about Rank Down Tickets and Compensation for changes, and there already are some. As a reminder, we did say that we will approach these on a case by case basis, and will not be able to make any comments on this yet, because we don't know what Cull's balance pass will look like at all yet.

Also, remember that these changes are restricted to Tuning updates, and are will not change any abilities or utility. Our intention is that if you love your Champion now, you should still love them after.
Where does kabam get this data from? Speak to your customers, not make assumptions.

Who would still love a champion that is nerfed? Especially when said champ requires huge rank ups in content to be of any use, he is completely useless below 3 favours and even then he doesn't output huge damage. You need to hit 5 favours for true accuracy which is on a timer and 8 favours or more to start seeing massive damage from him.

Depending on conditions it is possible to gain 2 to 3 favours per tile but how often is that? So that's still 5 fights to hit max favours or 4 best case scenario.

Some of us spent countless of hours in arena just to get a certain champ and that cost units for the refresh in arena or boatload's of cash on Crystal's to get that champ. How would you compensate that untold amount? A rank down would not be sufficient in my opinion.

Would anyone in this game score 70mil in arena for Kamala Khan?

Has anyone in kabam even tried using Cull Obsidian for questing, war or AQ map 6 even?

Or do you guys see some youtubers doing huge damage and think to yourselves that we need to change that as we arent earning from people who use him.

They get it from you, me, everyone else. Every fight we do they collect that data.

ESF · September 2019

THALEMKYKO1 said:

ESF said:

Lormif said:

Gkohler said:
The whole retuning idea is wrong. Test your champs properly before releasing.

I spent a ton of real life money on obtaining Cull. And that was based solely on his damage. I’ve ranked up all the way up to R5 and use him often. How fair is it to change anything at any time just because a champ is too good? That changes everything with this game. New champ comes out and does insane damage, but now there’s most likely a chance that character will be nerfed. What’s the point in trying to obtain a champ when that champ will most likely be changed in months time? Totally unfair.
Lets give an example
Champ a does 20k damage
Champ b does 22k damage
Champ c does 19k damage
Champ d does 40k damage.

There is obviously an issue with champ d. It does not mean there is an issue with being the top damage dealer, but that d's damage is way out of control. It means they have to design fights specifically with him in mind, similar to blades danger sense. This weakens the value of all other champs because they can no longer compete, and now everyone has to have cull to clear content.
How do people not see this? The argument he takes a lot of potions and ramp-up time so he still should have absolutely game-breaking DPS is ludicrous -- I could say the same thing about Sentry.

You can't have a game that says beat this content with Sentry and another character does the same content in 10-15 hits
And like I said champ d will do 5k damage in his first fight so if they buff him in other ways to make him more sustainable I don’t mind otherwise don’t touch the champ

I agree that his block proficiency should never have been that low.

But let's be real, too. Cull Obsidian isn't even close to the first ramp-up character in this game.

I don't have a problem with the character hitting hard. Other characters hit hard and will continue to hit hard, and some character has to be at the top of the heap.

I don't watch these videos too often, but I wanted to make sure I was correct in saying this: They can tone this character down, and should, and he still will hit very, very, very hard

DrZola · September 2019

Lormif said:

DrZola said:

Lormif said:

DrZola said:

Lormif said:

DrZola said:

DNA3000 said:

DrZola said:
I think you lost me with that last sentence.

Champs that damage like Cull (and I won’t name them because the last thing I want to do is put them in the crosshairs, although I’m confident you know which champs I mean) aren’t champs in the actual game played by actual players?

Dr. Zola
That should be parsed as saying "every other champion that you think can generate the same or more damage as Cull isn't actually generating the same or more damage as Cull when you look at the activity of all players playing those champions in the game."

What specifically they are measuring when they refer to "outdamaging" is a separate question. There are a number of possibilities. Simply adding up all the damage a champion does in the game wouldn't be reasonable for a number of reasons. It is more likely an adjusted damage output relative to certain constraints.

Is it possible the datamining is looking at the wrong thing? That's possible. The problem is virtually every game developer I'm aware of considers data mining to be highly proprietary: they don't share the data or precise methodology with anyone, sometimes not even with their own designers. That makes it difficult to contradict the data, or convince the devs they should ignore it. In all my time working with game developers I've only managed that trick once, and it required an arsenal of information I don't think even exists at the moment for MCOC.
I don’t doubt that. It’s impossible to know precisely what data points matter to the team, but there are probably some that matter far more than others.

I firmly believe all of this could have been avoided...with testing. Substantive, meaningful testing by people who actually play the game at a high level. I suspect the Cull issue is how he operates in the hands of a very good player...much like She-Hulk.

Someone said it above, but it’s absurd to pay to be in a beta test. But I’m convinced that’s essentially what anyone who purchases crystals does every time they play this game in its current incarnation.

Dr. Zola
I take it you are knew to MMOs There is no amount of substantive testing that can be done that will get you all the data needed to make these determinations in every case.
Nope. Not new. But thanks for asking.

Dr. Zola
If you are not new then you should not have made such a faulty claim.
“All the data...every case...”

If you’re the logician you claim to be, you shouldn’t have to resort tostraw-manned the point I was making.
DNA3000 said:

DrZola said:
I firmly believe all of this could have been avoided...with testing. Substantive, meaningful testing by people who actually play the game at a high level. I suspect the Cull issue is how he operates in the hands of a very good player...much like She-Hulk.
I don't think so. Game developers rarely balance purely because of what a few people can do. They care more about averages. It doesn't really worry a developer much if one guy can destroy all the content with a champ. What worries a developer more is if everyone does everything 40% faster with that one champ.

Of course even when you look at averages, you tend to contextualize. In other words, you look at the average level 30 player, the average level 60 player, the average UC player, the average Cav player, etc. You look at Act 4 performance, Act 5 performance, Act 6 performance. AQ and AW performance.

One thing I don't really have a good idea about in this case is whether this is a normalized performance issue or a cumulative performance issue. In other words, is Cull dealing much more damage much faster in combat per fight, or is he responsible for more of the damage being dealt by players overall. The first one is a measure of how good Cull is. The second one is a measure of how good players think Cull is. The better players think he is, the more often they use him, the higher his raw output will be.

Players are going to have preferences: Blade, Iceman, Domino, Ghost for example. The game has to allow a certain amount of high verses low preference. But it is possible Cull far exceeded the maximum allowed guardrail for that number.

I think we presume that most players are far more skilled than they actually are. When the forum consensus is that Ghost is great, that gets filtered down to the average player, who then uses Ghost because she's supposed to be great. But Ghost requires special skills and understanding to make work, and I suspect only one player in five can actually do that. So while some players excel, many others actually do worse than average when they try to use her, which makes her average overall performance much lower than we'd otherwise expect. It is possible that Cull's problem is this isn't true for him: when the average player hears Cull is good and starts using him a lot, they can actually unlock a lot more of his ramp up strength and thus Cull is great for the top players, but also pretty good for the average players. And since there are a hundred average players for every top player, it is what they do that matters more.

Cull seemed to me to be a bit of a glass cannon, which I thought might insulate him from nerfs. But it is possible that is an error, and in reality the average player gets more mileage out of him with minimal additional risk, and that's a bigger nerf threat than what the top players can do.
My experience at 6* R1 is that he’s got great burst damage, and then he’s done. Can make arena very quick, but longer fights he burns out, and a champ that can’t block at least a little wont last long in most high end content unless you play flawlessly against the right opponents.

One thing I don’t buy: I find it hard to believe the game team worries about a L30 player with a Cull at any highish rank (if there is such a player). There are more than enough readily available button smasher champs that deal great damage that can cut through Kang and Thanos in Acts 2/3 who are just as much an issue as Cull—assuming damage is the true issue. And the “wildly” over the top damage Miike references isn’t likely to be happening at that level.

Dr. Zola
And what exact strawman did I make, ill wait.

Actually, that was text from another comment I didn’t post that accidentally wound up in my response to DNA.

But...since you are literally sitting on the forums, wait no longer:

I said I believed “this could have been avoided with testing,” referencing the flawed rollout and subsequent rebalancing of Cull.

You asserted I must be new to MMOs because there was “no amount of substantive testing that can be done that will get you all the data needed to make these determinations in every case.”

Never once did I reference “every” case or “all” the data—your straw man.

I only referenced this case—Cull, the already once-revised champ who still deals such wildly out of proportion damage he needs to be further revised. That’s the case that could have been avoided by testing.

If you want to argue about “all the data” or “every case” you can do that with yourself.

Dr. Zola

peeet007 · September 2019

Simply return my money and the resources back & take your cull .

Asean18 · September 2019

For cull y’all could reduce his damage by about 25% and increase in block to about 65-70 and give him an immunity

DocB · September 2019

Just to jump on this train and agree - cull does not need to be “balanced” he takes a ton of potions to use, has horrible block proficiency and eats a ton of potions questing even when you play perfectly. I have him at r3 but was going to take him up farther. If he gets nerfed to take away the one thing he has going for him I would rank him down in a heartbeat. Useless for AQ and AW, and really just useful for giggles in quests.

Seriously kabam... if this is what you are going to do each balance needs a rtd just to be fair to us. We spend real money to get these champs.

SDP · September 2019

If Cull is changing a little, then alright.... He’ll be a little stronger and hit a little lighter? Ok. Show me why. Let us understand the strategy here.

...But don’t just throw out a bold statement of “wildly outdamaging other champs” based on some mysterious “data”, but it’s ok cause he’ll still be good. What?

Show respect to the players that love your game. Be a part of the community. Show us the cool data you’ve acquired and help people understand why. Get people on board with your plan. Give them assurances not more questions.

“Hey, Summoners! So here’s some cool data we’ve acquired on Cull and Maw, and we’d like to share it with you. It’s quite interesting, and has led us to the following balance changes. Tell us what you think.”

Imagine that. Crazy, huh?

Lormif · September 2019

DrZola said:

Lormif said:

DrZola said:

Lormif said:

DrZola said:

Lormif said:

DrZola said:

DNA3000 said:

DrZola said:
I think you lost me with that last sentence.

Champs that damage like Cull (and I won’t name them because the last thing I want to do is put them in the crosshairs, although I’m confident you know which champs I mean) aren’t champs in the actual game played by actual players?

Dr. Zola
That should be parsed as saying "every other champion that you think can generate the same or more damage as Cull isn't actually generating the same or more damage as Cull when you look at the activity of all players playing those champions in the game."

What specifically they are measuring when they refer to "outdamaging" is a separate question. There are a number of possibilities. Simply adding up all the damage a champion does in the game wouldn't be reasonable for a number of reasons. It is more likely an adjusted damage output relative to certain constraints.

Is it possible the datamining is looking at the wrong thing? That's possible. The problem is virtually every game developer I'm aware of considers data mining to be highly proprietary: they don't share the data or precise methodology with anyone, sometimes not even with their own designers. That makes it difficult to contradict the data, or convince the devs they should ignore it. In all my time working with game developers I've only managed that trick once, and it required an arsenal of information I don't think even exists at the moment for MCOC.
I don’t doubt that. It’s impossible to know precisely what data points matter to the team, but there are probably some that matter far more than others.

I firmly believe all of this could have been avoided...with testing. Substantive, meaningful testing by people who actually play the game at a high level. I suspect the Cull issue is how he operates in the hands of a very good player...much like She-Hulk.

Someone said it above, but it’s absurd to pay to be in a beta test. But I’m convinced that’s essentially what anyone who purchases crystals does every time they play this game in its current incarnation.

Dr. Zola
I take it you are knew to MMOs There is no amount of substantive testing that can be done that will get you all the data needed to make these determinations in every case.
Nope. Not new. But thanks for asking.

Dr. Zola
If you are not new then you should not have made such a faulty claim.
“All the data...every case...”

If you’re the logician you claim to be, you shouldn’t have to resort tostraw-manned the point I was making.
DNA3000 said:

DrZola said:
I firmly believe all of this could have been avoided...with testing. Substantive, meaningful testing by people who actually play the game at a high level. I suspect the Cull issue is how he operates in the hands of a very good player...much like She-Hulk.
I don't think so. Game developers rarely balance purely because of what a few people can do. They care more about averages. It doesn't really worry a developer much if one guy can destroy all the content with a champ. What worries a developer more is if everyone does everything 40% faster with that one champ.

Of course even when you look at averages, you tend to contextualize. In other words, you look at the average level 30 player, the average level 60 player, the average UC player, the average Cav player, etc. You look at Act 4 performance, Act 5 performance, Act 6 performance. AQ and AW performance.

One thing I don't really have a good idea about in this case is whether this is a normalized performance issue or a cumulative performance issue. In other words, is Cull dealing much more damage much faster in combat per fight, or is he responsible for more of the damage being dealt by players overall. The first one is a measure of how good Cull is. The second one is a measure of how good players think Cull is. The better players think he is, the more often they use him, the higher his raw output will be.

Players are going to have preferences: Blade, Iceman, Domino, Ghost for example. The game has to allow a certain amount of high verses low preference. But it is possible Cull far exceeded the maximum allowed guardrail for that number.

I think we presume that most players are far more skilled than they actually are. When the forum consensus is that Ghost is great, that gets filtered down to the average player, who then uses Ghost because she's supposed to be great. But Ghost requires special skills and understanding to make work, and I suspect only one player in five can actually do that. So while some players excel, many others actually do worse than average when they try to use her, which makes her average overall performance much lower than we'd otherwise expect. It is possible that Cull's problem is this isn't true for him: when the average player hears Cull is good and starts using him a lot, they can actually unlock a lot more of his ramp up strength and thus Cull is great for the top players, but also pretty good for the average players. And since there are a hundred average players for every top player, it is what they do that matters more.

Cull seemed to me to be a bit of a glass cannon, which I thought might insulate him from nerfs. But it is possible that is an error, and in reality the average player gets more mileage out of him with minimal additional risk, and that's a bigger nerf threat than what the top players can do.
My experience at 6* R1 is that he’s got great burst damage, and then he’s done. Can make arena very quick, but longer fights he burns out, and a champ that can’t block at least a little wont last long in most high end content unless you play flawlessly against the right opponents.

One thing I don’t buy: I find it hard to believe the game team worries about a L30 player with a Cull at any highish rank (if there is such a player). There are more than enough readily available button smasher champs that deal great damage that can cut through Kang and Thanos in Acts 2/3 who are just as much an issue as Cull—assuming damage is the true issue. And the “wildly” over the top damage Miike references isn’t likely to be happening at that level.

Dr. Zola
And what exact strawman did I make, ill wait.
Actually, that was text from another comment I didn’t post that accidentally wound up in my response to DNA.

But...since you are literally sitting on the forums, wait no longer:

I said I believed “this could have been avoided with testing,” referencing the flawed rollout and subsequent rebalancing of Cull.

You asserted I must be new to MMOs because there was “no amount of substantive testing that can be done that will get you all the data needed to make these determinations in every case.”

Never once did I reference “every” case or “all” the data—your straw man.

I only referenced this case—Cull, the already once-revised champ who still deals such wildly out of proportion damage he needs to be further revised. That’s the case that could have been avoided by testing.

If you want to argue about “all the data” or “every case” you can do that with yourself.

Dr. Zola

I never attributed ever case or all the data to you, which is required for a strawmn argument. I never misrepresented you in any way. You said it could have been avoided by testing, I stated testing does not capture it all.

Also cull has not been revised, he had a bug correction. There is a difference.

ZEN · September 2019

This is the reason we should stop buying crystals. It’s bait and switch. False advertisement... They’ll release a very good champs to attract us to spend our units, time and hard earned money. Then, after 3 months they’ll just nerf it. total bs! It should be illegal.

Lormif · September 2019

ZEN said:
This is the reason we should stop buying crystals. It’s bait and switch. False advertisement... They’ll release a very good champs to attract us to spend our units, time and hard earned money. Then, after 3 months they’ll just nerf it. total bs! It should be illegal.

Do you feel this way when they adjust a champion upwards?

GroundedWisdom · September 2019

KingOfKings1 said:

Lormif said:

KingOfKings1 said:
Either reverse course or I’ll reverse bank charges pretty simple. If you can nerf a champion thi badly I’ll nerf my payments to you.

This is now 3rd time unacceptable you’ve had your chance leave him alone!!!!
you dont even know how the changes are going to be made yet...
It’s a nerf third time since relate they’ve screwed him over shame on them #reverseyourbankcharge

There were two fixes. One subsequently broke him in a way that made his Damage way too OP.

IronMaiden66 · September 2019

If you're gonna lower cull obsidians damage output at least increase his block proficiency. He deals a lot of damage but also takes a lot while doing parry's. It'd be more of a rework and not so much a nerf. The way it's described in this post is that you're just not happy about his damage output. If you just nerf his attack he'll be a dead or mediocre champion. If you up his block prof he'll stay strong and actually be more balanced.

DNA3000 · September 2019

Chovner said:
I'll never grind for a new champion ever again, or spend on new champ featured crystals... EVER!!
People who gets new champs right away are just renting them during a live Beta test, and from now on are just hoping that champ will stay the same way.

Well, yes. You say that like it is different anywhere else. Every online game out there has been accused of being a "paid beta test" by people who don't understand that when it comes to games as a service, there is no final form of the game. The game is, and always will, constantly change over time. This has been my experience with every massively multiplayer online game run as a service. The more complex the game, the faster the rate of change over time.

And the reason why this is the case is simply because the majority of players are okay with it, despite the delusion that the forums represent everyone. Most paying players are willing to accept a game that is constantly changing things, because that comes with constant content development to spend their money on. Spenders need things to spend on, and dynamic games offer that, even if they don't always like all the changes. And most free players are willing to accept a game that is constantly changing things because they aren't paying for anything, so everything is free, so it is a reasonable price to pay for a completely free game.

Only a small, if often vocal, percentage of players find this genuinely unacceptable. Even though the statement that things will change without warning or compensation is in the EULA of every online game out there, game developers don't do it just because it is legal. They do it because it is successful, because the cost of not making these changes would cost them more players in the long run.

You never buy anything, you never own anything in this game. And if you're hoping things will stay the same forever, you're eventually going to be disappointed, because the game straight up guarantees you that everything is subject to change.

GroundedWisdom · September 2019

KingOfKings1 said:

GroundedWisdom said:

KingOfKings1 said:

Lormif said:

KingOfKings1 said:
Either reverse course or I’ll reverse bank charges pretty simple. If you can nerf a champion thi badly I’ll nerf my payments to you.

This is now 3rd time unacceptable you’ve had your chance leave him alone!!!!
you dont even know how the changes are going to be made yet...
It’s a nerf third time since relate they’ve screwed him over shame on them #reverseyourbankcharge
There were two fixes. One subsequently broke him in a way that made his Damage way too OP. </

Shocking **** resident clown shows up to defend his masters. </p>
I'm defending the facts of what you're implying.

BigPoppaCBONE · September 2019

It would really be helpful if Kabam were to be a little (lot) more transparent in their thought process here. They can be vague and still give people an idea what they were going for. This balancing act is always going to have a lot of problems due to the methods of acquiring champs, the content additions, the bugs, and the new champs being added constantly and the old champs, many of whom super-super stink. I just wonder what they were expecting given that they have all the performance numbers and past customer behavior at their fingertips. Why and how are they giving the impression that they are always, ALWAYS blindsided by how almost everything turns out? I've said this before and I'm sure I'll say it again: Daredevil could've seen this coming.

Plantesan · September 2019

GroundedWisdom said:

Plantesan said:

DNA3000 said:

Plantesan said:
I am curious at what point did they start collecting data, because didn’t they have an adjustment on him already? Seems kinda silly to do another one

The game constantly records data. The problem with datamining champion performance is that initially the performance of every champion is skewed by the fact that very few players have them, and the players that do tend to skew higher in skill than average. They aren't completely representative of the playerbase. Conversely, they are also less experienced with the champs, and there's less meta-information about the champs floating around.

Over time as more players get and rank champions up and start using them, the breadth of the players who have the champ becomes more representative of the whole playerbase, and the overall performance of the champ tends to rise as both the skilled players get more practice with them, and things like guides and videos and friend-of-a-friend experience filters down to the rest of the players.

Given how crystals work, it could be three to six months or more before you get a rough representative sample of players using a champ, and six months to a year before the champ's full potential actually shows up in the data when the majority of players using them have a better understanding of the champ.

To put this another way, everyone seems to be assuming that the "data" being collected is about the champion, so all it takes is one person playing the champ to show what the champ can do. But the data being collected is not about the champ. The data being collected is actually about *us* and how we do when we have the champ. Champs are balanced not based on how good they are, but on how good we are when we play them. It is the combination of champion and player that is being judged, across all the players playing the game.
Working from your explanation, would it be wrong to suggest if the data began to show the majority of the players using him were clearing content not designed to be cleared so easily, that this adjustment (plus their recent featured crystal for him) could be seen as a bit shady?
I think you're mistaking rebalances with Shulk. That was a very specific bug which was brought to light by a very specific piece of content being "cheesed". Not the same, really. Looking at the data in this case means looking at the numbers, not what content is being cleared. It's not about who used him in End-Game. Had it been something that jeopardized the level of content, it would have been looked at sooner. In this case, you have two Champs, one showing they underperform in the data, the other showing they overly perform. The two extremes highlight each other, and the goal isn't to neutralize all Champs. Only rebalance any noticeable extremities. Thus far, they're proposing exactly what they said they would. They're doing it retroactively in this case because of the overwhelming response about Maw. However, they can't do one and overlook the other. The data isn't just in 6.2, or LoL. It's not just about preventing people from breezing hard content. It's about balance for the health and longevity of the game, and being proactive in stopping issues down the road.

If they aren’t using end-game content in this collection, I would ask then what data points could be they using to make that call on Obsidian that a QA/QC team could have figured out on their own?

THALEMKYKO1 · September 2019

Lormif said:

THALEMKYKO1 said:

ESF said:

Lormif said:

Gkohler said:
The whole retuning idea is wrong. Test your champs properly before releasing.

I spent a ton of real life money on obtaining Cull. And that was based solely on his damage. I’ve ranked up all the way up to R5 and use him often. How fair is it to change anything at any time just because a champ is too good? That changes everything with this game. New champ comes out and does insane damage, but now there’s most likely a chance that character will be nerfed. What’s the point in trying to obtain a champ when that champ will most likely be changed in months time? Totally unfair.
Lets give an example
Champ a does 20k damage
Champ b does 22k damage
Champ c does 19k damage
Champ d does 40k damage.

There is obviously an issue with champ d. It does not mean there is an issue with being the top damage dealer, but that d's damage is way out of control. It means they have to design fights specifically with him in mind, similar to blades danger sense. This weakens the value of all other champs because they can no longer compete, and now everyone has to have cull to clear content.
How do people not see this? The argument he takes a lot of potions and ramp-up time so he still should have absolutely game-breaking DPS is ludicrous -- I could say the same thing about Sentry.

You can't have a game that says beat this content with Sentry and another character does the same content in 10-15 hits
And like I said champ d will do 5k damage in his first fight so if they buff him in other ways to make him more sustainable I don’t mind otherwise don’t touch the champ
Your statement makes no sense.. Lets take a look at the damage output of a normal 8 fight path

acculmative:

Champ a does 20k damage
Champ b does 22k damage
Champ c does 19k damage
Champ d does 5k damage.

Champ a does 40k damage
Champ b does 44k damage
Champ c does 38k damage
Champ d does 45k damage.

Using these numebrs you can see that even with the first fight he is doing 5k damage after the second fight he has already recovered and done more:

Champ a does 60k damage
Champ b does 66k damage
Champ c does 57k damage
Champ d does 85k damage.

Now he is doing a third more than anyone else after the third. This will grow until he is doing close to double the damage still, the first fight does not matter, over the course of the fight he will greatly surpass the others.

Thing is it doesn’t go straight to 40k and your not factoring in his lack of utility bad block profiency etc

GroundedWisdom · September 2019

Plantesan said:

GroundedWisdom said:

Plantesan said:

DNA3000 said:

Plantesan said:
I am curious at what point did they start collecting data, because didn’t they have an adjustment on him already? Seems kinda silly to do another one

The game constantly records data. The problem with datamining champion performance is that initially the performance of every champion is skewed by the fact that very few players have them, and the players that do tend to skew higher in skill than average. They aren't completely representative of the playerbase. Conversely, they are also less experienced with the champs, and there's less meta-information about the champs floating around.

Over time as more players get and rank champions up and start using them, the breadth of the players who have the champ becomes more representative of the whole playerbase, and the overall performance of the champ tends to rise as both the skilled players get more practice with them, and things like guides and videos and friend-of-a-friend experience filters down to the rest of the players.

Given how crystals work, it could be three to six months or more before you get a rough representative sample of players using a champ, and six months to a year before the champ's full potential actually shows up in the data when the majority of players using them have a better understanding of the champ.

To put this another way, everyone seems to be assuming that the "data" being collected is about the champion, so all it takes is one person playing the champ to show what the champ can do. But the data being collected is not about the champ. The data being collected is actually about *us* and how we do when we have the champ. Champs are balanced not based on how good they are, but on how good we are when we play them. It is the combination of champion and player that is being judged, across all the players playing the game.
Working from your explanation, would it be wrong to suggest if the data began to show the majority of the players using him were clearing content not designed to be cleared so easily, that this adjustment (plus their recent featured crystal for him) could be seen as a bit shady?
I think you're mistaking rebalances with Shulk. That was a very specific bug which was brought to light by a very specific piece of content being "cheesed". Not the same, really. Looking at the data in this case means looking at the numbers, not what content is being cleared. It's not about who used him in End-Game. Had it been something that jeopardized the level of content, it would have been looked at sooner. In this case, you have two Champs, one showing they underperform in the data, the other showing they overly perform. The two extremes highlight each other, and the goal isn't to neutralize all Champs. Only rebalance any noticeable extremities. Thus far, they're proposing exactly what they said they would. They're doing it retroactively in this case because of the overwhelming response about Maw. However, they can't do one and overlook the other. The data isn't just in 6.2, or LoL. It's not just about preventing people from breezing hard content. It's about balance for the health and longevity of the game, and being proactive in stopping issues down the road.
If they aren’t using end-game content in this collection, I would ask then what data points could be they using to make that call on Obsidian that a QA/QC team could have figured out on their own?

I'm saying they're not looking at End-Game exclusively. They're looking at data overall. Champs perform in more than one area in the game.

Markjv81 · September 2019

This new balancing system is ridiculous, let’s just say I pull cull obsidian from a crystal today, now I have to sit and wait for 3 months to see if he’s worth ranking or not. So I’ve been punished by being behind everyone else that has already pulled him and cleared content easier with him and now I’m going to be punished for a further 3 if not forever depending how you balance him.

Kabam said hoarding crystals was bad but this new system now promotes catalyst hoarding.

DNA3000 · September 2019

DrZola said:
One thing I don’t buy: I find it hard to believe the game team worries about a L30 player with a Cull at any highish rank (if there is such a player). There are more than enough readily available button smasher champs that deal great damage that can cut through Kang and Thanos in Acts 2/3 who are just as much an issue as Cull—assuming damage is the true issue. And the “wildly” over the top damage Miike references isn’t likely to be happening at that level.

Dr. Zola

I'm not saying the problem necessarily exists at level 30. I'm simply saying I'm pretty sure the devs aren't looking only at some gigantic average that puts everyone in the same bucket, and in fact it is possible the problem doesn't exist at level 30 but it does exist elsewhere, and the datamining wouldn't miss that just because it blended everyone up into one average. The problem might exist only in certain subsections of gameplay, but it popped up in enough of them to be considered widespread.

Conversely, I wouldn't bet my own money that the problem *doesn't* exist at level 30 either. I've seen enough first hand to know that's an unsafe bet.

ZEN · September 2019

Lormif said:

ZEN said:
This is the reason we should stop buying crystals. It’s bait and switch. False advertisement... They’ll release a very good champs to attract us to spend our units, time and hard earned money. Then, after 3 months they’ll just nerf it. total bs! It should be illegal.
Do you feel this way when they adjust a champion upwards?

I dont give a F of what champs they are buffing up. I haven’t spent resources with them. They can buff or nerf them...I give F of what champs i spent my hard earned resources. I used my hard earned money and units and time with that. That all i care!

TheKiryu · September 2019

https://youtu.be/Fmg6XFnfo9w

Here is my initial response to all of this in case people are interested.

I will probably make another video on tomorrow once I have had a bit more time to put my thoughts together.

F1TLYFE · September 2019

Currently have a 6 star Cull Obsidian duped champion that I have obtained by spending over a $1,000 on gambling with the Volcanic Crystals. My reason for doing such thing was due to his amazing damage output. I have recently read a post that is saying his damage output will be reduced and such (what the in-game players would consider a nerf). I do also have him as a 5 star duped champ that I have been ranking up as well. So this is a huge dissapointing factor in regards to my gameplay experience and my wallet . As the reason I went all out for this champ spending over $1,000 on those Volcanic Crystals was because of his damage output. So I am asking for some additional information and what can be done on this subject or what is going to be done.

F1TLYFE · September 2019

Currently have a 6 star Cull Obsidian duped champion that I have obtained by spending over a $1,000 on gambling with the Volcanic Crystals. My reason for doing such thing was due to his amazing damage output. I have recently read a post that is saying his damage output will be reduced and such (what the in-game players would consider a nerf). I do also have him as a 5 star duped champ that I have been ranking up as well. So this is a huge dissapointing factor in regards to my gameplay experience and my wallet . As the reason I went all out for this champ spending over $1,000 on those Volcanic Crystals was because of his damage output. So I am asking for some additional information and what can be done on this subject or what is going to be done.

Upcoming Cull Obsidian and Ebony Maw Balance Changes

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