Characters that scare me a bit.

General GTG Sentinel Comics Lore
81

I don't grasp this.

Unless you are going for the strength is damage angle, which isn't at all where I am going.

I am not at all purporting that you can tell the intended strength of a character by trying to apply a damage to physical force type of argument.

I am saying that the game in a general sense mimics the imaginary comics that they come from.  That things heroes do in game correlate to how that hero or villain would act in a comic.  I mean we can pretty well assume that Expatriette doesn't boost her allies, and that Argent Adept isn't tanking.

Further that the general effectiveness of that hero would be an approximation of their effectiveness in a comic.  Legacy is one of the best heroes in the game, I don't think that is a total accident.  I give credit for that to the designers, they made their heroes feel like comic book heroes, they made some heroes work better together than others, and some villains or environments harder or easier for different heroes.

Some of that may be unintentional, but I think it is far more intentional than accidental.

This game isn't covering solo storylines.  We don't play months of investigation Wraith puts into solving crimes, we don't play Chrono travelling to Hoboken to eliminate a wierd mutant lizard thing, or Haka trying to protect wildlife from Ambuscade's hunting trips.  We play the big conflicts, and the main storylines.

In that context I think it is perfectly reasonable to assume a decent amount of correlation between in-game power and comic-verse power.

 

 

82

It is ultimatley an Apples/Oranges comparison. Regardless of how close making that comparison might get you to the reality of the comic vs game power scale, its still a fundamentally flawed extrapolation. Its fun to think about, and the arguments put forth are no less creative and thoughtful for it, but I'm not about to agree that its a sound argument.

83

Argent Adept actually makes a very effective tank. A DR of one and regaining four hit points a round. He do do that, while allowing a card draw/play or deal a point of sonic damage.

84

I meant more that he couldn't take damage for other people, he can keep himself alive, I probably should have written that differently.

85

If we follow that you cannot extrapolate from the card game to comics, then the only knowledge we have of these characters is from The Annual that is posted on the Website.  That is the entire extent of "Comic Book" they exist in.

86

Surely you can see the difference between extrapolating art and flavor text (you know, things that are actually directly "lifted" from these imaginary comics) and extrapolating relative power scales from the limited mechanics and scope of a structured card game. I believe you can do better.

87

He is also not being a primary damage dealer, usually. his 30 damage if you go completely balls out is nothing compared to the triple digit scored DEDICATED damage dealers (huzzah alliteration!) like Chrono and ExPat can rack up.

88

I really think you are selling the game design short Foote.

Card effects show us how heroes fight, and how heroes interact with teammates, they show off hero abilities.  Even if you could gleam the same insights from art and text it doesn't negate the design of the character as being informative of the character.

You shouldn't look exclusively at game mechanics, but you shouldn't exclude them either.

Seriously, outside of game mechanics these characters exist as flavor text, a bio and some art.  You learn a lot more about the Wraith playing her deck than you would if you looked at all the art and flavor text but never looked at the card text or played her.

If we cannot utilize the only purposeful existence of these characters to analyze them, then we can't analyze them in this manner at all.  I mean really, should we just say "Well, we have no clue what they are like in the comics so we can't know who is more powerful than anyone else."

What way other than Game mechanics are we to know if Akash' is more or less of a threat to the heroes than Iron Legacy?  Should we just never debate this at all?

I'd like to think that >G designed these characters to be like themselves, and didn't just throw cards together and say, "uh, let's make this deck the Wraith."

89

 

True that card effects show us how a hero does things, but a hero never hits a villain and says 'I just hit you for 2 points of damage'.

 

Comic Books are, first and formost, a story - if the story would  be better told for having the hero fail to hit, he's going to fail to hit. That is not in the 'I play Thokk and hit you for 2 damage' that the card says. Legacy may be about to Thokk Blade into oblivion, but the story says that blade dodges and kills Young Legacy instead. Story triumphs over 'mechanics' that we play with.

 

 

90

The original idea that spurred this argument was the idea was Omni-X was much less powerful than Omni classic because he can't fight Omni classic on his own. I think to an extent that this is a flawed perception. If we can say that part of Vengeance Blade's strength comes from his ability to utilize his team and utilizing his team doesn't make him physically weaker, than can't we say the same for Omni-X.

He doesn't have drones because he doesn't need them. Other heroes are much more effective than drones will ever be. On the surface it may seem that Omni-X is weaker because his effects aren't as large or as immediately devastating than his earlier counterpart. Terraforming destroys all environment cards in play and gets Omni a free number of plays equal to the cards he destroyed, whereas Bioengineering Beam can destroy only one environment card at a time. The power of Terraforming is completely dependant on the number of environment cards in play, and most of the time, he's only going to get one or two extra cards. Most of the time Terraforming doesn't give him that much of an advantage and can actually help the heroes by getting rid of nasty environment cards. Bio Engineering Beam I would say is much more useful because once it's out it can be used every turn. Omni-X does a much better job of molding the environment to his needs than Omni classic.

Let's also look at the components. Disintegration Ray and Magnetic Railgun do a lot more damage than Focused plasma cannon, but saying they're more effective is a bit flawed given how easy it is to destroy Omni classics components. You only have to do seven damage in a round to Omni to destroy all of his components and his only means of armor outside of advanced is Adaptive Plating which does not at all protect his components if the team he's fighting uses multiple damage types. Omni-X's components only take five damage before they're gone, but five damage in a single turn is a lot harder to do than an entire round. Also, Omni-X's plating cards reduce the damage he takes from multiple sources simultaneously which is more times than not much better than Adaptive Plating. His components while individually don't do as much damage as his older incarnation are more sturdy, durable, and consistently effective.

There is also the issue of the global destruction. Omni-X can pretty much also do the technological singularity since his singularity card allows him to destroy any equipment card and not just his own. He can wipe the board pretty easily depending on the other members of his team. Disruptive flechettes is just as effective as Sedative flechettes. It doesn't do as much damage, but it hits all non hero targets which includes environment targets as well as villain ones, and even though it destroys only two ongoings, how many villains regularly have more than two ongoings out at a time. Most of the time Disruptive Flechettes will rid the field of all the ongoings you want destroyed.

Your argument with Ambuscade while correct can be applied to absolutely anyone. It's basically the argument people give for why Batman should be able to beat anyone and anything. There's no reason for us to assume that the heroes can't fight the villains solo if they were given enough preperation time as well. There is also no reason to assume that the heros never fight villains on their own and win in their individual comic lines. That's like saying that after Superman formed the Justice League he stopped taking on and defeating villains on his own.

The game has no mechanic for soloing because that defeats the whole purpose of the game. It's a game first and a story second. It's supposed to be a game where you and your friends enjoy being superheroes, and having the heroes be able to solo against the villain goes against that.

91

... Second

92

Actually it was about the stock Omnitron put in Empathy working, that we see him much less an individual powehouse.

I think the correlation between Omni and Blade work very well.  Both have weak original versions that have lots of minions and devices used to make them stronger.  They have promo versions where they try to defeat the heroes, then seperately they come to the same conclusion, Baron Blade that he needs a team to match the team Legacy has formed, and Omnitron deciding that the Empathy that causes that team to be so successful is the ticket to victory.

Both give up their minions and large scale plans to try and mimic the heroes they long to defeat.  Omnitron's experiment leads to him becoming a hero, while Blade forms a team of super powered people.

He doesn't have drones because he doesn't need them. Other heroes are much more effective than drones will ever be. 
Yes.  No argument here.  What Omni gave up was the ability to make his team (Drones&Devices) for an ability that in the end allows him to join a team of more powerful allies and work with them.  Omnitron-X's team is more powerful than Omnitron ever was alone.  Omnitron has gained a lot with that empathy.
Your argument with Ambuscade while correct can be applied to absolutely anyone. It's basically the argument people give for why Batman should be able to beat anyone and anything. There's no reason for us to assume that the heroes can't fight the villains solo if they were given enough preperation time as well. There is also no reason to assume that the heros never fight villains on their own and win in their individual comic lines. That's like saying that after Superman formed the Justice League he stopped taking on and defeating villains on his own.
My point wasn't that they couldn't.  The point is that those storylines aren't what we are playing.

 

As to Omni's actual abilities, in a vacuum Omnitron-X is not that strong a hero.  Give him some allies to eat some damage for him, to boost him and for him to boost and his value increases incredibly.

Yes I know, all heroes are better when they have team mates boosting them, but some improve more than others, and Omni improves a whole lot.  Omni does tons of little points of damage, he heals multiple targets, and can put cards in play for allies.  He is incredibly valuable in a team.  Take Legacy, this card game doesn't focus on what Legacy can do solo, yet we see it with how hard his one-shots hit and his survivability.  But we also see how valuable he is as a leader, more valuable in that role, clearing the way and strengthening his allies he becomes much more valuable than he is alone.

Compare that to Haka or Wraith, who both benefit from having team mates and benefit teams, but they would be just about as strong if you put Isolated Hero on them for the whole fight, you do that to Legacy or OX and a whole lot of their kit isn't good anymore.

That isn't just mechanics, it is backed up in their bios and text and storyline.  They traded in their individual might to become a key part to an even mightier team.

That is why I said Omnitron-X gave up a good bit between Cosmitron and Omnitron-X.  That it is so well exemplified in the way their decks work is why I take issue with this notion that gameplay tells us nothing about the characters.

93

Original Omnitron does exist in a vacuum and isn't really that impressive of a villain. I just don't buy that Omni-X gave up more than what he gained coming into this particular incarnation. I'm not saying that gameplay tells us nothing about the characters, I'm saying that it can't be relied on alone to tell us what the power scale is between characters. Visionary is considered by many to be one of the most powerful characters in the game, but by herself she is also not that special. We know from flavor text and art that she can control people's mind and incapacitate large groups with her psychic powers. She has her damage cards by the majority of her powers are represented in utility and helping the team.

This does not mean that a damage heavy version of the Visionary's deck would be unfaithful to the character. It would just be more boring. This is a team game, and in order for a team game to be interesting different characters have to fill different roles and niches, and visionary's is mostly control. Likewise, Legacy is a mostly support character even though we know he's strong enough to lift trains and stop meteors. The gameplay of a hero greatly reflects their personality and how they work with others, but it shouldn't be the only factor when trying to judge a character's overall power.

If Omni-X has any weakness over his earlier form it is simply a lack of available resources. He doesn't have as many devices lying around, but again he doesn't really seem to need them. We can't judge a hero by how powerful they are based on how they could act by themselves because that's not how this game is designed. If it was designed with the intent of heroes being able to solo fights, then I guarantee you that there would be drastic changes to the existing decks that would make soloing more possible. Each hero would still have their strengths and weaknesses but they would be designed to exist in a vacuum. They're not designed to exist in a vacuum though, so judging how they do by themselves is an inaccurate way to judge or compare a hero's power or effectiveness.

94

One thing that can be good to consider is how the DIFFICULT villains stack up against each other. Like, is the Chairman; a relatively normal, if hard-to-kill and highly intelligent -- mob boss, REALLY more of a threat than an invading alien army, a fallen angel, Gaia on PMS, and a freaking ELDER GOD?

95

The Chairman is more powerful than all of those because, unlike all of those, he's concentrated all his power into one spot.  Trying to fight Akash is like trying to go through a mountain...given time, you can drill a path straight through, because you're attacking one spot on the rock, and ignoring the rest of the mass because it isn't directly in your path.  Chairman, by comparison, is a reinforced iron gate - much smaller, but made of a tougher material, designed specifically to block your entry rather than just happening to be in the way.  You can beat Akash'Bhuta because you were only ever capable of commanding about 1% of her attention, and that's when she's fixated on you; the rest of her is just spread across the whole planet, turning corporate executives into animals and stuff.  You could never beat ALL of her; the game just shows you beating one particular incursion.

Likewise, Voss is trying to conquer the whole galaxy; his billions of troops are distributed across many star systems at a time, and while he's come down to supervise this invasion personally, he doesn't want to waste time transporting his entire army across vast distances, so he sends the vast formations of troop transports out in all directions, and uses a smaller and more mobile flagship to get to each battle when the time is right for him to assume personal command.  Gloomweaver is a cross between the two - a vast cosmic entity emanating from another dimension, probably not yet fully made real in this universe, and when you beat him, he just oozes back through the membrane into his home reality...it's not like you actually HURT him any more than a mosquito hurts a person, you just distracted him enough to thwart his plans and make him withdraw temporarily.

But the Chairman?  If you come into his town and start messing with his racket, arresting his Thieves and firing his Crooked Cops, then you suddenly become his sole priority, and all the might of The Organization is thrown behind no other purpose than getting rid of you.  He doesn't mess around; he doesn't hold any resources back to divert to other battles; he doesn't try to ensure his survival in case the worst happens, because he has no fallback plan and so can't afford to lose anything.  He devotes all the power he can muster to squashing you like a bug, caring nothing for reputation or a propaganda victory, willing to play as dirty as he must, taking no prisoners, etc. etc.

I thought it was a pretty trite lesson in "The Dark Knight Rises" where they said that you couldn't get out of the Pit until you learned the fear of death...but, whether it's true in any general sense, it's very much fitting for stories in the Batman vein, and The Chairman is a pastiche of a Batman villain.  If it makes sense for Batman to be able to stand side by side with Superman in certain battles, then it makes sense for Chairman to draw such strength from his desperation, his urge to win or die at the game of thrones, that he poses a much greater in-the-here-and-now threat than some cosmic villain, who basically clowns around and doesn't take the battle seriously because they think Earth is just some tiny planet, just a stepping-stone on the way to a far greater conquest, and/or humans are an insignificant species whose entire civilization is just a geologic eyeblink.

96

Legacy has two support powers and two support cards.  Most of his deck is tanking.  His support is geared towards his leadership, he is a pretty tough hero on his own, with a team he himself stays that tough, but he makes his team ridiculously strong.

Visionary by herself can turn villains against each other, manipulate their actions, make herself invincible, protect herself with decoys, boost her own damage, reduce villain damage, neuter any environment damage, and with demoralization, twist the ether and her one shots she can put out pretty nice spurts of damage.  If you take Dark visionary she's even better.  She can make her allies better or herself better, she is a control with the ability to take one player (herself or another) and make them extremely powerful, esp. Fanatic or AZ.

Omnitron-X has a balance of these styles, his timeshift is a powerful boost to any hero, much like Visionary he has to use it wisely on himself or others.  He also has a group heal.  On his own he's not weak, but he is definitely sub-optimal.  Innervation Ray is a great recovery system, and Time Shift ranks right up with the best support abilities in the game.  He adds to these great destruction abilities, and several different damage options.

He gains a lot more from ally support than either Visionary or Legacy, Defensive blast is ok on its own, as is gaussian coil blaster, but both get much better with any damage boosting.  Defensive blast gets ridiculously more powerful with + damage, something Omni can't give himself.  His irreducible damage is great, but not very big.  On his own he can put up a bunch of single points of damage on un protected minions, or hit hardened targets for 2 or 4 damage, and then pull off a finishing move with self-destruct or singularity.

Omni is one character that gains incredibly with support, but also gives support as well, possibly more than anyone else  With his component-destruction text he benefits greatly from others taking damage for him, and in return when he is protected he can get a ton of components out and heal allies and timeshift them, while buffing Omni's damage allows him to deal some really potent damage.

The point is this is his Empathy.  He is designed to function in a team like this.  Omnitron traded the potency he had with no one else working with him, for the ability to have that kind of impact in a team.  Put a Legacy and Unity with Omnitron-X and he is more powerful than his earlier forms, because you can't hit him to destroy his components, he is making his team mates more powerful (ridiculously so in Unity's case) and their boosts to his damage can result in some ridiculous numbers from Defensive blast and his four damage components.

97

Legacy and Visionary would be hurt just as much from being on their own as Omni-X. Legacy has no ongoing destruction and few cards that hit multiple targets. It would take a while for him to die, but villains can easily overwhelm him. Also he cannot benefit from his own base power without a Legacy Ring effectively halving his effectiveness on his own versus with a team. Visionary has a lot of control bur very little damage. Wrest the Mind also has a steep damage cost and she can't keep it up for long. Again, by herself she woul also be overwhelmed pretty quickly.

If the game was indeed designed for one on one battle, than the limit for Omni-X's components would probably be increased. 5 is a mechanically sound number for the average dealt to heroes from the villains in a round. I gave a long list of example of card by card comparisons with Omni-X and classic Omni. Omni-X trades raw damage for more durability, consistency and efficiency.

The only advantage Classic Omni really has the potency of Technological Singularity. In pretty much every game I've played with the two, Omni-X completely dominates the field until that card is played. In story terms, Omni-X can only carry whatever he has on him when he time travels, but that's still a lot of stuff that appears to generally be more useful than drones or devices. It' pretty consistent with how technology normally advances becoming smaller and more efficient. There are trade offs in both forms, but I think saying Classic Omni is just way more powerful is incredibly deceptive.

98

When I think alone vs. with team I'm not thinking of that hero soloing, but basically the difference in effect you could have if you were under the effects of Isolated Hero for the entire match.

X isn't the weakest hero under that scenario, but he isn't far off.  If the villain has reduction of 1 Omni maxes out at 6 damage to one target a round unless he destroys his stuff.  He still has destruction and a fast deck, which is good.

If other heroes can eat the destruction Visionary can solo many villains in this setup.  Both Twists on herself, demoralization, wrest the best damage dealing minions.  Use Decoys and Cocoons as needed, play one-shots, mess with the villain deck.  You can beat a good number of villains.

Legacy the same, you miss that base power but with one shots +2 to damage and incredible toughness he can do a lot as well.

Take that isolated hero off Omni and he gets so much better, while helping the team a lot, Legacy makes the rest of the team better, and Visionary gets to choose between herself or an ally doing more.  Omnitron gains incredibly from +damage, right up with Fanatic and Ranger, and from a tank protecting him, since no other hero loses cards when they take enough damage.

 

Classic Omni has EPE, alternating -1 or +1 on different sides, and a near constant supply of drones that deal damage or heal him.

Omnitron-X has the ability to work well with team mates.

Overall that is a win for X, because of how well he and those team mates interact.  Isolated from them he is significantly weaker than his earlier forms.

99

So for fun, and because I'm off school so I've got some time to burn. I threw out both omnitron's "perfect set-up", of all their components best plating ect. This sort of represents their "comic book power" as it gives them all their options all the time.

 

For omnitron I put out copies of interpolation, railgun, and disintegragtion, as well as adaptive plating. I did not count his drones of electro-pulses but I will make note of them. I also did not do nemesis bonus, I just didn't feel like it :stuck_out_tongue:

 

Repair drones don't do any good damage wise, but if all drones are out they would heal 10 each.

Automaton drones are generally pointless (omnitron deals mostly energy so Omni-x would equip elemental exochasis so Auto drones need at least H=3 to deal any damage)

Assault drones would be devasting, 10 damage each if all drones are out (30 total) this is also true of the electro-pulses if both were put out.

 

Interpolation does 0 damage (1-2)

disintegrationg does 0 damage unless h=3, in which case it does 2 total ((3-2) *2)

railguns will do 2-4 depending on h (an h-1 I said could not end up below 1 damage)

 

so if we do not count drones and pulses we get omnitron dealing about 6 damage at h=3, any lower and we have 2 damage. If we count the drones and pulses and set h=3 he deals about 69.

 

Omni-x

would have reactive plating in play, so deals at least 2 energy damage, perhaps more depending on if you count complete cancelations and you bother hitting drones since omnitron is immune to energy after the first hit

Start of turn omni-x  has 2 electro deployments so he can play 2 cards without sacrificing anything to his big cards at this point 2 sedative fletchettes would be useful, killing all drones in play (if we put them there) and destroying adaptive plating. 4 damage

2 plasma cannons deal 4 damage

2 gausian coils deal 2 damage (and could hit 2 other things if other targets still exist)

omni-x gains 2 hp from innervation (could also heal 4 other targets if so desired and if they exist)

play slip through time

use defenseive blast for 4 damage to everything

use defensive blast for 4 damage to everything

play self sabotage, destroy all of own and omnitrons components for 28 damage

Total damage to multiple targets would be about 14 or so damage (enough to kill or at least neuter the pulses)

to omnitron it would be about  48 damage

 

So, if X strikes first then he destroys or neutuers omnitrons entire field and hits him for almost half his health.

If omnitron strikes first without his drone army and massive bombs (and we set power at h=3) he has enough damage to destroy X's components and severly neuter the rest of his play. If h does not equal at least three omnitron does negligible damage. If he  brings to bear his entire drone army and massive bombs he destroys X quickly, which makes sense if you have 1 guy vs an army.

 

So, straight up 1v1 with all components X rips omnitron apart. If omnitron can use his army then he wins, of course, then it isn't 1v1.

 

While doing this my Darkwatch promos finally arrived, so I'm going to go enjoy them for a time :grin:

100

First off, why wouldn't you include the drones? They are tools, created and controlled by Omnitron; they aren't like allies or servants or something. They are PART of him. He is a SENTIENT ROBOTICS FACTORY, not just a big robot. That's an important part of the character you can't overlook, but people seem to do.

 

Second, you switched the effects of the disintigrator and the railgun around. The Railgun hits 2 for H-1, the railgun hits 1 for H+1.