Balance Update: Arcade and Northstar
MCOC Team
Administrator, Admin [en] Administrator › Posts: 595
Hey all,
Balance Team here again with an update on the latest round of Champions up for review, Arcade and Northstar!
Arcade
With a gauntlet of Traps and Tricks, Arcade was designed to reward space control both as an Attacker and as a Defender. An attacking Arcade requires some setup to get his damage loop going but benefits from a wide utility set (as long as you keep winning Prize Tickets!) and the space control granted by his Booby Trap. A defending Arcade was designed to be punishing with 2 main threats in his Auto-Block and Poisonous Clouds. A review of Arcade’s performance so far indicates that the damage output of his attacker loop is coming up shorter than targeted in most encounters (notably the Poison damage from his Poisonous Clouds), and will be rebalanced as a result. Arcade’s impact defensively has been slow but solid, having found success in a few spots on the Alliance War map over time, and has been impactful in some, but not all, Battleground seasons since release. Arcade’s Rebalance will be focused on upgrading his Poisonous Cloud and Auto-Block gameplay.Northstar
Northstar flew into the contest with the goal of being a reliable and effective Attacker in longer fights. While investigating this target for Northstar, we discovered two different things:At 10 momentum Northstar was able to stunlock opponents for millions of health at a time.
Players for the most part were struggling to consistently ramp up Northstar.
This has Northstar in the awkward spot of struggling where he was targeted, while also being too automatic in niche situations. To address this, we’ve decided to rebalance Northstar around a max of 6 Momentum, cutting the 10 Momentum stun ability. The goal is for his ceiling to be around the same place because we are happy with where he performs once he gets there, but easier and quicker to hit said ceiling within a fight.
What’s Next
A trio of rebalances incoming! ARCADE, NORTHSTAR, and SILVER SABLE’s tuning updates are slated to release in January, with our (48.1) build.You can expect communication about PATRIOT & THE LEADER’s Balance Review toward the middle of December!
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