6-Star Units

[Armagon]

Regarding 6-Star units, i remember Tales of Link having them, but it was only for certain characters and you could only get them during specific events. You couldn't pull them from a banner either. You had to complete a very challenging quest to get a ticket to which you could then use to summon the 6-Star. And iirc, you could only get a 6-Star ticket per character once. Tales of Link had a merging system as well, but you couldn't really merge 6-Stars. So if Heroes were to implement 6-Stars, this would be the best way to do it. Like Ice Dragon suggested, 6-Stars should only be for final bosses.

17 hours ago, DraceEmpressa said:

IIRC I did saw someone mention gacha games that do implement 6* after release goes bankrupt soon after it does... 

Likely because they were implemented poorly. And it depends on the game as well. Tales of Link, for instance, implemented it well by having them be rewards for specific quests. And you could still easily play the game without them. There was also no Arena or anything where you fight other players' teams.

I haven't really gone back to that game tho. It's been a long time, so there's probably a massive update i have to download before i can play again.

[DehNutCase]

35 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

I already said HP is a few thousand on average.

So a maximum of 5,000 HP and a minimum of 2,000 HP, give or take.

For the purposes of my game, you cannot leave a room until you have cleared it. Your weapon is automatic and fires more than several bullets per second. Dodging for extended periods of time is nearly impossible and will likely result in you dying in a couple minutes. Ammo is plentiful, and you're likely to never run out unless you suck at the game and can't aim. Enemies are easy enough targets that landing a dozen or so shots from a single burst is not difficult. Enemies have no damage resistance of any type.

The more you try to rationalize your choice of picking a bullet other than the first one, the more details I will give you of my game that will invalidate your arguments. There will be no reason to pick Bullet 2 or Bullet 3. They suck in all possible situations. Hitting a single enemy, let's say it's the last one in the room, that can't reach you (maybe it ran out of ammo and can't jump or something like that) and waiting for it to slowly die will never be an optimal strategy even if it does work.

Okay, in circumstances where an option is never picked, said option doesn't produce power creep. (Don't forget to make the 1st bullet type completely free to fire as well, currently the 3+ type, that is, the 5 damage, 5 dps bullet, still has the advantage in terms of damage per bullet---if a group decide to determine score, that is, who's 'best,' by bullets used, then everyone would use the maximum amount of 3+ bullets that they can handle without dying.)

 

Not sure how that leads to Slaying edge not being power creep, however, considering Slaying Edge is very comparable to Wo Dao+ (better or comparable damage and more flexible in terms of special options), and Killers, while weaksauce, weren't exactly 'completely and utterly useless tier' merely 'mostly useless.' Simply having more viable options is already powercreep, because each new viable build has to compete with every other viable build, meaning the fact that Slayers exist, which increases the amount of viable builds, means that the average power level received a bump.

(It's actually pretty clear powercreep especially if Killers were 'totally useless' tier and Slayers bumped killer sets to 'situational.' Current viable builds simply don't have to account for killer sets at all because they're so bad, and now they do, and must compete with them to be viable.)

 

If you're going to argue, like in the RPS case, that the fact that other players get access to better options as well means your options are worse---that is, Scissors-EX somehow not being power creep---then nothing can be power creep. 4 units with infinite move, 1000 hp, atk, res, spd, and def are not power creep either, because everyone would be running them---barring logistics concerns.

Edit: After all, those 4 units 'nerfed' Reinhardt, it can't be power creep if current options were nerfed. Just like how Scissors-EX nerfed paper.

Double Edit: Actually, those 4 units aren't a completely good example. A better example would be 2 identical copies of Reinhardt, except in the other 2 colors. They 'nerf' Reinhardt because he's brought in line, and they're not stronger than Reinhardt, but it's very definitely power creep.

Edited July 31, 2017 by DehNutCase

[Ice Dragon]

2 minutes ago, DehNutCase said:

Current viable builds simply don't have to account for killer sets at all because they're so bad, and now they do, and must compete with them to be viable.

Killer sets are just ones that have better up-time on their special skill, which is somewhat reproducible with Quickened Pulse. There's also the fact that Minerva, Michalis, and Eldigan are all relevant units and have 16-Atk Killer weapons. Adding a few more viable Killer weapon users with the introduction of Slaying weapons isn't shaking up team-building by very much if at all.

Plus, Killer weapons don't really do much against the current dominant strategy, which is "kill things before they get a chance to attack".

 

5 minutes ago, DehNutCase said:

If you're going to argue, like in the RPS case, that the fact that other players get access to better options as well means your options are worse---that is, Scissors-EX somehow not being power creep---then nothing can be power creep.

In rock-paper-scissors, you'll never have power creep. Either the game will be perfectly even with two or three options perfectly matching each other with luck as the only factor or the game will be perfectly even with one optimal play.

This isn't the case in Heroes. Giving the opponent an option isn't the same as giving a player an option because the player and the AI play by different rules. The simplest example is that the AI must attack when possible. Team compositions for the player and for the defense team are also different because they have different goals. The goal of the player is to wipe the opposing team without losing a unit. The goal of the defense team is to kill one unit.

These factors mean that a buff to one side is not necessarily a nerf to the other of the same magnitude. In effect, a top-tier Arena offense team (measured by success, not by Arena tier or score) should already be prepared for nearly everything and would not be very significantly affected by a buff to defense team compositions. On the other hand, buffs to defense teams can be nerfs of a much higher magnitude to offense teams that are barely holding on by the skins of their teeth.

So while power creep is completely impossible in rock-paper-scissors because combatants are on even ground, power creep is completely possible in Heroes because it's possible to buff the top end of one side of the coin without significantly affecting the other, resulting an in average increase in power. (Also because PvE content exists and power creep is easiest to compare against static content that doesn't change. The corresponding case for static content in your rock-paper-scissors example would be an AI opponent that still only thinks Rock, Paper, and Scissors exists and never plays Scissors-EX or considers its existence.)

[Johann]

The jump from Killer to Slayer is +3 Atk, which is enough for people to consider using them, but doesn't really change the strategies that utilize or counter them. Sword users are just as capable and vulnerable in all the same ways they were before. The ceiling hasn't been raised, and the tables haven't been turned.

[Hilda]

Rather then seeing a 6 Star system, i would like them to implement Promotion Classes like in Fire Emblem games, with new learnable Skills Exclusiv to that Class.
In order to Promote your class you need 1000 Hero-Merits and Shards.
Stats will vary on Class change, some getting worse some better and even an option to equip different types of weapons.

[DehNutCase]

57 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

Killer sets are just ones that have better up-time on their special skill, which is somewhat reproducible with Quickened Pulse. There's also the fact that Minerva, Michalis, and Eldigan are all relevant units and have 16-Atk Killer weapons. Adding a few more viable Killer weapon users with the introduction of Slaying weapons isn't shaking up team-building by very much if at all.

Plus, Killer weapons don't really do much against the current dominant strategy, which is "kill things before they get a chance to attack".

In other words, as long as power creep happens in a direction that isn't currently dominant, it's not power creep? For example, let's say there's 3 strategies, rock, paper, and scissors, if rock were 100 points, paper were 70, and scissors were 70, and scores increase in 25 point intervals, going in all 3 in order, power creep only happens in a third of the intervals, where rock got stronger, despite the fact that paper and scissors are consistently getting buffed.

In other words, Reinhardt being released wasn't power creep, because Cavalry had no place back then due to scoring reasons. I understand your point, but I won't personally use that as my definition of 'power creep.'

57 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

These factors mean that a buff to one side is not necessarily a nerf to the other of the same magnitude. In effect, a top-tier Arena offense team (measured by success, not by Arena tier or score) should already be prepared for nearly everything and would not be very significantly affected by a buff to defense team compositions. On the other hand, buffs to defense teams can be nerfs of a much higher magnitude to offense teams that are barely holding on by the skins of their teeth.

By that definition, nothing will ever be power creep, unless power creep skills become available in 3-4* units and unused and infrequently used accounts get deleted from the arena pool.

This is because of the simple reason that lower score arena teams are often 'leftover' teams that haven't changed in ages, and, if only 'success' matters, you can simply run the exact same team forever while staying in the mid 4k range. Buffs to defense teams will never be nerfs so long as the offense team gets to fight people with similar score---because you can deliberately dumpster your score or simply choose Intermediate to fight in the ocean of depreciated teams.

(And how is it that buffs to defense teams isn't power creep, anyway? Stronger defense team = more arena feathers from defense, just like stronger offense team = more arena feathers from offense. Camus was huge power creep, in terms of defense teams, thanks to his color, spread, horse, and prf.)

57 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

In rock-paper-scissors, you'll never have power creep. Either the game will be perfectly even with two or three options perfectly matching each other with luck as the only factor or the game will be perfectly even with one optimal play.

RPS isn't limited to 3 choices, my 0.0.5 was rock, paper, scissors, scissors EX, with rock having 2 W, 1 T, 1 L, paper having 1 W, 1 L, 2 T, scissors having 3 T, 1 L, and scissors-EX having 1 w, 1 L, 2 T. (Rock actually got buffed like crazy, being the clear standout versus 'just pick anything' AI strategies---every option has only 1 loss, but rock has 2 wins, by far the best 'advantage' matchup spread.)

 

Scissors-EX was clear power creep because it introduced a counter to paper where non-existed before, sure, it had a counter itself (rock), but that's like saying, in a world without greens, Julia being introduced after 50 years of Reinhardt wasn't power creep because Reinhardt was nerfed, and Sanaki hard-counters her. There was literally never an option before that could handle paper, and now there is, even if it's merely 'in line' with an average choice. (Rock is clearly Tier 1, paper and scissors-EX are tier 2, and scissors is dumpster tier.)

 

Your definition of power creep would imply that games like magic the gathering or hearthstone can't have power creep in a full access environment because nothing other than luck or skill would determine the result, despite the fact that a deck from today would own a deck from 10 years ago. Just imagine if my RPS game had version 0.0.6 which added rock-EX, which beats rock, beats scissors, beats scissors-EX, but loses to paper. No one would ever use rock now, but it's not power creep, I guess. Then imagine version 0.0.7 which adds paper-EX, which beats rock, beats scissors, beats paper, but loses to scissors-EX, still not power creep, supposedly.

A version 10.5.1 player would have a choice of options so utterly ridiculous that he would beat a version 0.0.5 player even if he picked what hand he's going to play out of a hat, because his options are so damn power creeped.

Edited August 1, 2017 by DehNutCase

[Zeo]

6 Star Askr Trio as said before would be fine. It would give reasons to use units that are eventually inferior to all others due to lack of merging. Anything else however, would be clear power creep.

6 Star Anna with Noatun++ and 3 more points in all stats? Yeah I'll take it.

Edited August 1, 2017 by Zeo

[Johann]

Reinhardt is hardly power creep. He's a menace, sure, but I mean the game gives you a suitable character to deal with him right out of the box. Y'all give him too much credit.

@Zeo I really don't see them boosting the Askr trio, since they are always bonus units in Arena and Tempest. You already have a reason to invest in them since you know you can fall back on them for points. Making them stronger than everybody else would lead to many people only bothering to invest in those three (and probably a dancer) and then never change their Arena team, especially if it meant they'd have the highest arena score potential.

[Zapp Branniglenn]

7 minutes ago, Johann said:

 

@Zeo I really don't see them boosting the Askr trio, since they are always bonus units in Arena and Tempest. 

Not Tempest. The next one will not have any of the trio as a bonus unit.

[Zeo]

12 minutes ago, Johann said:

Reinhardt is hardly power creep. He's a menace, sure, but I mean the game gives you a suitable character to deal with him right out of the box. Y'all give him too much credit.

@Zeo I really don't see them boosting the Askr trio, since they are always bonus units in Arena and Tempest. You already have a reason to invest in them since you know you can fall back on them for points. Making them stronger than everybody else would lead to many people only bothering to invest in those three (and probably a dancer) and then never change their Arena team, especially if it meant they'd have the highest arena score potential.

It would depend on what it took to boost them and weather or not you could boost all 3 I think.

[Johann]

5 minutes ago, Gustavos said:

Not Tempest. The next one will not have any of the trio as a bonus unit.

Ah, good point. Still stands for Arena though.

Just now, Zeo said:

It would depend on what it took to boost them and weather or not you could boost all 3 I think.

Considering the amount of time and money people put into this game, "what it takes" probably wouldn't matter all that much. Ironically, it's a slippery slope when you have that kind of vertical progression.

[Zeo]

2 minutes ago, Johann said:

Ah, good point. Still stands for Arena though.

Considering the amount of time and money people put into this game, "what it takes" probably wouldn't matter all that much. Ironically, it's a slippery slope when you have that kind of vertical progression.

If we're factoring in Whales, then I can't argue, but they are always going to be a million steps ahead of everyone else because of $$$. I don't think we should base system additions on them as long as they are in their own sectioned off corner which at the moment is tier 20 of the arena.

[Ice Dragon]

1 hour ago, DehNutCase said:

In other words, as long as power creep happens in a direction that isn't currently dominant, it's not power creep? For example, let's say there's 3 strategies, rock, paper, and scissors, if rock were 100 points, paper were 70, and scissors were 70, and scores increase in 25 point intervals, going in all 3 in order, power creep only happens in a third of the intervals, where rock got stronger, despite the fact that paper and scissors are consistently getting buffed.

It depends on how often each strategy is played. If Rock is exclusively played, then obviously only buffing Rock is considered power creep, but if any other strategy is viable, then each buff is power creep. This is what Wikipedia means by increasing the player's "average power level".

For the case of Heroes in the coming update, what matters for "player power" is how you fill the 28 slots for Arena Assault. If when buffing a build, you don't make it strong enough to viably take one of those 28 slots, it did nothing for the player's power level. If you did buff it enough to viably take one of those slots, but the unit it replaced is comparable in utility, it has still done nothing for the player's power level.

 

1 hour ago, DehNutCase said:

In other words, Reinhardt being released wasn't power creep, because Cavalry had no place back then due to scoring reasons. I understand your point, but I won't personally use that as my definition of 'power creep.'

If you measure "power" as arena score, then Reinhardt was nothing special, but if you measure "power" as arena success, Reinhardt was broken as fuck. His low stat total meant you'd be faced against easier opponents and his absurd killing power, even without Skill Inheritance, made sure he had no trouble killing those opponents. I honestly have no idea why he isn't S+ tier on Gamepedia's vanilla tier list (other than the fact that the people making the tier list are clearly dumb).

Since there wasn't a good objective definition of power at the time with how arena scoring worked, there's not really a good way to judge.

Also, I basically consider everything before skill inheritance to be a pilot for the game system and mechanics more than anything else.

 

1 hour ago, DehNutCase said:

By that definition, nothing will ever be power creep, unless power creep skills become available in 3-4* units and unused and infrequently used accounts get deleted from the arena pool.

This is because of the simple reason that lower score arena teams are often 'leftover' teams that haven't changed in ages, and, if only 'success' matters, you can simply run the exact same team forever while staying in the mid 4k range. Buffs to defense teams will never be nerfs so long as the offense team gets to fight people with similar score---because you can deliberately dumpster your score or simply choose Intermediate to fight in the ocean of depreciated teams.

Success for an offense team is both winning and being able to stay in Tier 20 consistently.

Last I checked, the 486+ score range still consists of decently built teams, and I don't think Nintendo is lazy enough to not clean up teams from inactive accounts.

 

1 hour ago, DehNutCase said:

(And how is it that buffs to defense teams isn't power creep, anyway? Stronger defense team = more arena feathers from defense, just like stronger offense team = more arena feathers from offense. Camus was huge power creep, in terms of defense teams, thanks to his color, spread, horse, and prf.)

I'm not sure how you got that because I literally didn't mention power creep at all in the paragraph you quoted. Cancel Affinity was power creep for defense teams by making archers harder to wall.

 

1 hour ago, DehNutCase said:

RPS isn't limited to 3 choices, my 0.0.5 was rock, paper, scissors, scissors EX, with rock having 2 W, 1 T, 1 L, paper having 1 W, 1 L, 2 T, scissors having 3 T, 1 L, and scissors-EX having 1 w, 1 L, 2 T. (Rock actually got buffed like crazy, being the clear standout versus 'just pick anything' AI strategies---every option has only 1 loss, but rock has 2 wins, by far the best 'advantage' matchup spread.)

No, version 0.0.5 only had 3 choices that were optimal. Assuming all players play optimally (which can be expected of high-level play; rock-paper-scissors is not a PvE game), Rock, Paper, and Scissors-EX are the only choices you and your opponent have. Scissors is never optimal and therefore optimal play treats it as if it doesn't exist.

The only equilibrium positions in an arbitrary game based on rock-paper-scissors that you can reach are to have 3 equal choices (rock beats scissors, scissors beats paper, paper beats rock) or 1 dominant choice (rock beats scissors, scissors beats paper, paper beats rock, Reinhardt beats everything else and ties with Reinhardt). If you add, remove, or change the comparisons between plays, you can only shift between the two equilibrium positions.

 

1 hour ago, DehNutCase said:

Scissors-EX was clear power creep because it introduced a counter to paper where non-existed before, sure, it had a counter itself (rock), but that's like saying, in a world without greens, Julia being introduced after 50 years of Reinhardt wasn't power creep because Reinhardt was nerfed, and Sanaki hard-counters her. There was literally never an option before that could handle paper, and now there is, even if it's merely 'in line' with an average choice. (Rock is clearly Tier 1, paper and scissors-EX are tier 2, and scissors is dumpster tier.)

I'm assuming your rock-paper-scissors has infinite availability for all hands because that's what I'm basing my argument on.

If it doesn't and you somehow need to obtain the right to use new hands, then things get complicated and is based on availability of the new hands and whether or not static content exists and is relevant.

That said, Rock, Paper, and Scissors-EX are all Tier 1 because the match-up against Scissors doesn't matter. Your opponent isn't randomly picking hands from a hat and will never play that hand.

This is exactly my problem with people using the W:L:D ratios for characters in Heroes. You don't see Arthur at the top of the arena and have no business caring about your match-up against him. Furthermore, you don't see vanilla characters at the top of the arena either, so you have no business caring about your match-ups against them, either.

The ratio for Rock of 2:1:1 is irrelevant because one of those wins is against an opponent that will literally never appear, and all three of Rock, Paper, and Scissors-EX have an effective W:L:D ratio of 1:1:1.

 

1 hour ago, DehNutCase said:

Your definition of power creep would imply that games like magic the gathering or hearthstone can't have power creep in a full access environment because nothing other than luck or skill would determine the result, despite the fact that a deck from today would own a deck from 10 years ago. Just imagine if my RPS game had version 0.0.6 which added rock-EX, which beats rock, beats scissors, beats scissors-EX, but loses to paper. No one would ever use rock now, but it's not power creep, I guess. Then imagine version 0.0.7 which adds paper-EX, which beats rock, beats scissors, beats paper, but loses to scissors-EX, still not power creep, supposedly.

A version 10.5.1 player would have a choice of options so utterly ridiculous that he would beat a version 0.0.5 player even if he picked what hand he's going to play out of a hat, because his options are so damn power creeped.

My definition assumes that rock-paper-scissors has infinite availability on all hands. If that is not the case, then make that clear (and provide details on how hands are obtained, whether or not static content exists, whether or not competition is direct (e.g. PvP) or indirect (e.g. PvE), etc.).

But assuming you have infinite availability, then there's no reason why you'd ever have a version 0.0.7 player playing against a version 0.0.5 player because the 0.0.5 player would instantly have access to the hands available at version 0.0.7.

Edited August 1, 2017 by Ice Dragon

[Interdimensional Observer]

39 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

*Scissors scissors snip, snip, snip*

Hypotheticals are always a danger on the Internet, and it appears this has turned into one such rabbit hole.

 

I'll just restate again that not every change is a power creep, some is fair balancing moves. To use Pokemon, the 2nd Gen additions of Dark and Steel types, the addition of new Ghosts and Grass types without Poison secondary typing, Megahorn and Shadow Ball, none of this was a power creep, just a check on the predominance of Psychics from the 1st gen. I think we can all agree on this at least.

[DehNutCase]

1 hour ago, Ice Dragon said:

It depends on how often each strategy is played. If Rock is exclusively played, then obviously only buffing Rock is considered power creep, but if any other strategy is viable, then each buff is power creep. This is what Wikipedia means by increasing the player's "average power level".

In that case, shouldn't Slaying Edge be clearly power creep? Killer sets were generally inferior before, and now are comparable, even at their very worst, to Wo Dao+ sets. The existence of new viable options is by definition an increase in average power, unless it knocked off a few previously viable builds. (Which it didn't, since Wo Dao+ sets are still at the same level of 'alright' they were before.)

8 or 9 damage from a 1 cd jump is all that's necessary for Slaying to perform identically to Wo Dao+ in Wo Dao+'s best case scenario, and anything other than the best case would have Slaying be the superior option. (For Moonbow to Luna, Draconic Aura to Dragon Fang, or Reprisal to Vengeance, that's 45 or 40, admittedly a high bar, at least for Moonbow and Dragon Fang, but for Bonfire to Ignis that's merely 27 or 30.)

In all seriousness, I have no idea how a flat out +4 Atk buff to all units within a certain category wouldn't be considered power creep, unless the category is literally never used. Average power level would increase in all cases except the 'never used' case, even if it's not a noticeable increase.

1 hour ago, Ice Dragon said:

For the case of Heroes in the coming update, what matters for "player power" is how you fill the 28 slots for Arena Assault. If when buffing a build, you don't make it strong enough to viably take one of those 28 slots, it did nothing for the player's power level. If you did buff it enough to viably take one of those slots, but the unit it replaced is comparable in utility, it has still done nothing for the player's power level.

Then, before AA, anything that isn't stronger than max powered Reinhardt (or some other, literal strongest character in the game) isn't considered power creep. Even 50 copies of Reinhardts under different names and colors (barring colorless, which is a whole different issue), wouldn't be power creep, because replacing Reinahardt classic with Reinhardt #47 is merely a side-grade in terms of utility.

1 hour ago, Ice Dragon said:

If you measure "power" as arena score, then Reinhardt was nothing special, but if you measure "power" as arena success, Reinhardt was broken as fuck. His low stat total meant you'd be faced against easier opponents and his absurd killing power, even without Skill Inheritance, made sure he had no trouble killing those opponents. I honestly have no idea why he isn't S+ tier on Gamepedia's vanilla tier list (other than the fact that the people making the tier list are clearly dumb).

If you measure 'power' as arena success, level 1, 2* units with all skills removed might be some of the best units in the game, considering the kind of teams you can force. (I imagine you can even deliberately make some crappy weaponless teams for these all 2* teams to face.)

It didn't matter, though, because the way to get lots of feathers was with a high arena score---deathless runs only matter insofar as they get you arena score, units that achieve deathless easily only matter insofar as said deathless runs achieve a high score. Reinhardt made wins easier, but he didn't make runs score more, so it didn't matter that he has the big fish in a small pond---a perfect level 1, 2* unit isn't worth jack even if he can carry his team to 7 win deathless on auto-battle.

Of course, my measure wasn't arena performance---which, as I've mentioned, is very easy to cheese: you can go 4x 5* +10s and just score your way through, ignoring deaths, you can deliberately 'deflate' your score a la Reinhardt, removing skills, running low BST units---possibly not even fully level ones---dancers are good here, both for dance and their low BST even if they were fully leveled---you can 'meta force,' get into a unique score range and deliberately place a team that's trivial to beat---or find one that's trivial---and just repeatedly fish.

 

My measure for a unit is: Offensive Matchups, Bulk, Counter-kill, Mobility, and Support---given and taken. Reinhardt scores in the top tier of everything except support needed, where he's excellent for giving buffs (he's on a horse, so automatically better than Eirika and Ephraim and Delthea as a buffer), but takes a large amount of investment---both buffs---for his perfect bulk and Counter-kill.

Moreover, my measure for player strength isn't the ceiling---which, as I've mentioned, would remain the same even if you added 50 different Reinhardts to the game, at least before copy-limits in arena---it's the aggregate. Which is even more sensitive than the average. That is, I even recognize the inclusion of unviable characters as power creep---imagine a worse Leo, no, a worse Henry in terms of spread, even worse Atk, even worse Speed, and only gaining in HP, that's still power creep to me, even if it's not as bad as 50 Reinhardts. It's another addition to a currently unneeded niche. Hell, even a perfect copy of Henry in all but name would be power creep, because that matters for copy-limit game modes. (You can see this a lot in MTG, where 4 card copy limit is mandated---a functional reprint, that is, a copy of a card with a different name, is simple power creep because certain spells can now get around the copy limit. This is true even if it's a functional reprint of a really shitty card---some really shitty deck out there that relies on that card just got more consistent. It might not be enough, yet, to be viable with just one extra card, but that didn't mean the standards of viability didn't just get higher, because this shitty deck is now less shit. Power creep doesn't just happen at the last straw that breaks the camels back, pushing a deck into viability, it happens as the unviable deck got stronger and stronger, even while it remained unviable.)

 

That is, a game, to me, would power creep unless it's completely stagnant, but that's also fine because power creep is just strength inflation---a decent amount of inflation boosts the economy by making borrowing more profitable, since you pay back less in 'real money,' and a decent pace of power creep rewards new players compared to the old, because the newest is the best, meaning missing, say, a year of content doesn't make you literally play for a year to catch up.

 

1 hour ago, Ice Dragon said:

Last I checked, the 486+ score range still consists of decently built teams, and I don't think Nintendo is lazy enough to not clean up teams from inactive accounts.

Really? Anything below 690 feel like total jokes. Hell, even the majority of 690+ are jokes---there are some annoying ass ones that I can't beat with my ultra point-inflated teams (where I'm running junk like danceless Galeforce, Growing Wind -blade tomes, and random Spur Attack 2), but as long as I pay attention, even the horse emblem teams aren't a problem despite my completely unbalanced unit pool. Anything below 690 I can literally auto-pilot through---not auto through, but I don't have to think about my moves at all. Above 690 I'm fighting versus units that have like 10 points in every stat on me, thanks to buff disadvantage (the only reliable buff I pack is Hone Atk, everything else is Spurs because that's what I happened to have on hand, months ago) and merge levels, and it's still not hard.

In all honestly I'd have a lot less trouble in Arena if I cared enough to take 30 minutes to fix my skill loadouts---I don't even change my seals around most of the time, leaving my defense team 'optimized'* even though I got my wins already.

*This is a very strange definition of optimized which includes Rising Thunder, L&D 2, Spur Atk 2 Camus.

1 hour ago, Ice Dragon said:

I'm not sure how you got that because I literally didn't mention power creep at all in the paragraph you quoted. Cancel Affinity was power creep for defense teams by making archers harder to wall

I might've misunderstood you, then, because you're saying asymmetrical power creep isn't real power creep, or at least that's what I got from your statement. The fact that certain changes hit one part of play harder than another part of play still feels like power creep to me, and what I remember is you saying something like: FEH isn't a competitively balanced game, therefore a buff to one arena isn't necessarily a buff to all areas, implying that anything that isn't a buff to all areas (or just the area that's strongest) isn't power creep.

Mind, I might've just completely misread.

1 hour ago, Ice Dragon said:

No, version 0.0.5 only had 3 choices that were optimal. Assuming all players play optimally (which can be expected of high-level play; rock-paper-scissors is not a PvE game), Rock, Paper, and Scissors-EX are the only choices you and your opponent have. Scissors is never optimal and therefore optimal play treats it as if it doesn't exist.

Are you honestly implying the units we're facing are 'optimal'? Horse emblem (at least pure ones) can be dodged, and if we ignore dodging, perfectly built defense (or even offense) teams are hardly the norm. In PvE, we have a huge information advantage, in PvP, we have a huge choice advantage---you can choose shitty teams, you can dodge horses, and, even if you're too lazy (like me), the vast majority of teams are so sub-optimal that you can consistently get deathless even if your team would get wiped by a single optimized lineup.

1 hour ago, Ice Dragon said:

That said, Rock, Paper, and Scissors-EX are all Tier 1 because the match-up against Scissors doesn't matter. Your opponent isn't randomly picking hands from a hat and will never play that hand.

This is exactly my problem with people using the W:L:D ratios for characters in Heroes. You don't see Arthur at the top of the arena and have no business caring about your match-up against him. Furthermore, you don't see vanilla characters at the top of the arena either, so you have no business caring about your match-ups against them, either.

This is exactly what's happening in Arena, though---you're facing a more or less randomized set of teams. You might not see vanilla characters at the top, but the characters are janky enough that matchups vs. Vanilla is a far better representation than perfectly built units. (Particularly because perfect vs. you is often face-roll'd to someone else.)

 

Edit:

@Interdimensional Observer Me and Ice are mostly arguing just to argue, so I wouldn't worry too much about the random crap we're typing. Pretend we're talking about tv shows or something.

Edited August 1, 2017 by DehNutCase

[Ice Dragon]

3 minutes ago, DehNutCase said:

In that case, shouldn't Slaying Edge be clearly power creep? Killer sets were generally inferior before, and now are comparable, even at their very worst, to Wo Dao+ sets. The existence of new viable options is by definition an increase in average power, unless it knocked off a few previously viable builds. (Which it didn't, since Wo Dao+ sets are still at the same level of 'alright' they were before.)

8 or 9 damage from a 1 cd jump is all that's necessary for Slaying to perform identically to Wo Dao+ in Wo Dao+'s best case scenario, and anything other than the best case would have Slaying be the superior option. (For Moonbow to Luna, Draconic Aura to Dragon Fang, or Reprisal to Vengeance, that's 45 or 40, admittedly a high bar, at least for Moonbow and Dragon Fang, but for Bonfire to Ignis that's merely 27 or 30.)

In all seriousness, I have no idea how a flat out +4 Atk buff to all units within a certain category wouldn't be considered power creep, unless the category is literally never used. Average power level would increase in all cases except the 'never used' case, even if it's not a noticeable increase.

I already said. Unless a new build is replacing a noticeably weaker build in a typical player's top 28, you haven't increased the player's average power. Slaying Edge builds right now are roughly comparable to Wo Dao builds and Killer Sword builds are non-existent because Wo Dao is strictly better.

Slaying Lance and Slaying Axe builds would push a few more units into a player's top 28, but would probably still only be on par with the units that they replaced. More options is not power creep unless you can simultaneously use all of those options, and this is the crux of why using the aggregate power of all available units to determine a player's power is complete baloney.

 

7 minutes ago, DehNutCase said:

Then, before AA, anything that isn't stronger than max powered Reinhardt (or some other, literal strongest character in the game) isn't considered power creep. Even 50 copies of Reinhardts under different names and colors (barring colorless, which is a whole different issue), wouldn't be power creep, because replacing Reinahardt classic with Reinhardt #47 is merely a side-grade in terms of utility.

Assuming this is Arena offense and there exists a Reinhardt of every color, then yes, anything that isn't stronger than Reinhardt is not power creep because adding a new Reinhardt is a side-grade and anything weaker than Reinhardt, but stronger than something else, is of no functional utility to a player.

 

23 minutes ago, DehNutCase said:

Moreover, my measure for player strength isn't the ceiling---which, as I've mentioned, would remain the same even if you added 50 different Reinhardts to the game, at least before copy-limits in arena---it's the aggregate.

You have yet to make an argument as to why units that don't contribute any utility to a player should be counted as player strength. All you have done so far is claimed it to be so then elaborate on the implications of that claim assuming it to be the case.

For the record, "latent potential" of a role that is worthless, but could potentially be worth something in the future, isn't utility. If that latent potential comes to fruition in the future, it's the event that unlocked the potential that would be evaluated for power creep, not the implementation of the unit with latent potential because that unit was functionally without utility at the time it was implemented.

 

1 hour ago, DehNutCase said:

Are you honestly implying the units we're facing are 'optimal'?

No, I'm implying no more than I said: In modified rock-paper-scissors, there is always an optimal strategy, and you can expect any competent player to play optimally. I'm not sure how you tied that into Heroes because there wasn't one.

 

1 hour ago, DehNutCase said:

This is exactly what's happening in Arena, though---you're facing a more or less randomized set of teams. You might not see vanilla characters at the top, but the characters are janky enough that matchups vs. Vanilla is a far better representation than perfectly built units. (Particularly because perfect vs. you is often face-roll'd to someone else.)

No, you aren't.

If you see a Cordelia at the top, you can be certain she's running Life and Death 3 or Distant Counter and not Triangle Adept 3. If you see Bride Cordelia at the top, you can be certain she's running Brave Bow+ or Firesweep Bow+ and not Cupid Bow+.

Vanilla is an absolute shit representation of actual units you will fight because it literally overlaps with 0% of actual unit builds, and while comparing against fully optimized units is not 100% accurate, it's still more representative of a metric and has a functional meaning: This is the unit's worst-case scenario in a game mode where you need to be prepared for nearly anything.

[XRay]

7 hours ago, DehNutCase said:

Uh, no, Enemy Phase units---Sophia being a very strong example---also have the job of positioning.

Namely, forcing enemy movements so that you can clean up easier on player phase. TA-3 Sophia isn't doing jack to that axe hitting her on enemy phase, but that doesn't mean she did nothing that turn.

When you play Pokemon, do you literally run 6 sweepers without a single stealth rock setter or defog user? The point of a pokemon team is to wipe the opponent's team, but that doesn't mean each individual pokemon has to kill everything they touch or be useless.

Dancing is a role. Buffing is a role. Panic Ploy is a role. (Also, Odin's +3 all stats L&D build has 122 wins. The guy is strong because he's a fucking tome user. A tome user, incidentally, who dies to only 4 units on enemy phase with those same +3 all stats buffs. Odin sacrifices a minor amount of player phase matchups and support needed (that is, he needs more support), in return for major bulk and debuffing capability---thanks to his hp stat.)

A part is a part of the whole---a increase to a particular niche's strength is an increase in overall strength. For a build to be viable, it must compete with every single build that was viable before Slaying weapons were added and any builds that are viable after Slaying weapons were added. Unless slaying weapons did literally nothing in terms of adding viable builds, overall, units need to be stronger (since they're competing against more builds) to be viable.

There's a very good reason to put 3 Camus when you can put 3 Reinhardts: Camus can run CA to murder Julia, Fae, and whatnot, for excellent 'fuck you' coverage to TA-3 greens off the back of his ridiculous matchup spread, particularly with the stat advantage of defense teams. Triple CC Vantage Reinhardt with full horse buffs is excellent, but suffer vs some janky crap like TA-3 Vantage Julia, who would just Vantage sweep their asses. (3x Camus is also easier to obtain, since they don't need to be pulled, so, since both team variants would do alright at netting wins, the fact that one's easier to build wins out.)

On enemy phase teams, as I've mentioned earlier, positioning is far easier since you can dictate enemy movement via forcing combats rather than merely AI manipulation. Yes, it's easier to 'fight up' with a player phase team---god knows I had, what with stuffing all my units with worthless skills---but that doesn't mean enemy phase teams are bad or anything. A properly built enemy phase team should actually have a easier time in actual usage, since their positioning requirements are lower, thanks to better enemy phase control.

That axe unit could have charged its Special even if Sophia took 0 damage. It is usually no big deal, but just in case there is an enemy Dancer/Singer nearby, that axe unit could have killed something.

I do not have enough competitive Pokémon experience. Based on my limited knowledge of the Anything Goes meta, I would run one or two Tapu Lele, three or four Attack Forme Deoxys, and one Rayquaza, so that would be the equivalent of one or two Eirikas and four or five Blade mages.

Like Pokémon, the goal of a Heroes team is to wipe out the enemy team. Unlike Pokémon, our debuffers are not very useful and they take up a valuable slot that could have went to a unit that can actually kill things.

Unlike Dancing/Singing and buffing, Panic Ploy debuffer is unnecessary at best and it wastes a valuable unit character slot that could been filled with another nuke. For the same investment into Odin, another Blade mage can achieve 130+ wins. Dying on Enemy Phase is irrelevant when you can Assist a unit out of enemy range.

Slaying Weapons has not done much to the meta. I am still not going to run an Enemy Phase unit if I have a choice between it and a Player Phase unit. Slaying Weapons do not make Enemy Phase units more powerful than Player Phase units. Player Phase units are still far ahead. Even the most powerful Enemy Phase units do not run Slaying Weapons.

Reinhardt is easier to build. He has a much higher potential of being 5* and he has appeared 3 times in banners so far, so Reinhardt is not exactly rare. Camus needs to be upgraded, and he has only appeared once so far, and twice when a third Camus comes out. All Reinhardt requires is some Orbs. Camus requires a lot of Feathers. You can use Reinhardt right out the box as is or slap Death Blow on him. That is pretty much it; all other skills are optional. Death Blow 3 is also available at 4*, while Cancel Affinity 3 is locked at 5*.

The ability to force combat comes at a price. HP drain is guaranteed for Fury units, so their effectiveness decreases with each round of combat. Triangle Adept walls need teammates to function as their coverage is bad. On modes with enemies with boosted stats, it is easier to overpower the enemy with Blade mages and BB!Cordelia and use a Dancer/Singer for safety and speed.

3 hours ago, Johann said:

Reinhardt is hardly power creep. He's a menace, sure, but I mean the game gives you a suitable character to deal with him right out of the box. Y'all give him too much credit.

@Zeo I really don't see them boosting the Askr trio, since they are always bonus units in Arena and Tempest. You already have a reason to invest in them since you know you can fall back on them for points. Making them stronger than everybody else would lead to many people only bothering to invest in those three (and probably a dancer) and then never change their Arena team, especially if it meant they'd have the highest arena score potential.

Reinhardt is power creep because there were no Brave tomes before him. He also has a decent attack to abuse Dire Thunder. He can operate with little to no support. None of the units before him can operate on Reinhardt's level. Keep in mind Reinhardt was released before skill inheritance was implemented, so Blade cavalry was not a thing yet.

Edited August 1, 2017 by XRay

[JSND Alter Dragon Boner]

7 hours ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Hypotheticals are always a danger on the Internet, and it appears this has turned into one such rabbit hole.

 

I'll just restate again that not every change is a power creep, some is fair balancing moves. To use Pokemon, the 2nd Gen additions of Dark and Steel types, the addition of new Ghosts and Grass types without Poison secondary typing, Megahorn and Shadow Ball, none of this was a power creep, just a check on the predominance of Psychics from the 1st gen. I think we can all agree on this at least.

 

Steel type is actually a power creep based on the effect it had on the game. The catch is that the power creep is contained between 2 pokemon: Foretress who have the absurdly overpowered move Spikes, and Skarmory who can tank majority of the game. They invalidated most of the game that didn't fit the specific criteria they forced, which is the textbook result of power creep

Megahorn not being a PC is heavilly correlated to Steel typing existing actually. Like Steel type plays most of the role, then bug being trash, and then the old stats system all keep it in check

 

The very first time Nuke make its way towards competitive scene is Gen 3, and for a good reason. Even outside the introduction of Choice Band, the old stats system makes the metagame bulkier. This is the same thing as why Ubers as a metagame is extremely dictated by residual damage. A lot of standard Uber team runs 2-3 Toxic on one of their 6 slot.

Edited August 1, 2017 by JSND