Great pod! I definitely agree! I went so hard on Arakni bought all the cards and just got burnt by having zero support for contract style and being irrelevant for years, never again.
The problem of heroes never moving up in power level is probably tied to the fact that some heroes just are not good. Their text boxes are not that powerful. Perhaps one way to help that is to release specialized weapons that give them a SIPSIP boost. They did that with new Prism.
I don't think the SIPSIP boost will help everyone though, Prism's problem was she did not have a good weapon, the kit did not work with any of the weapons that were legal at the time. Then LSS caved and printed OG Luminaris but balanced, and the deck became playable because that's all it needed. Not every class or hero *only* needs a bomb main deck or Equip. Boltyn as an example just need a better Common and Rare base of cards to be a good hero. He has most of the tools already, it's just his Charge cards are so terrible. Same for Teklo, but he has no way to turbo into his Evos without removing his Evo Upgrade threats from his deck via boosting.
Another thing, that can be seen with Rhinar and Dori is that their hero power is powerful and the balance point where they are top tier good but not completely broken is razor thin. We've seen how powerful Dori was in a suitable meta, and that was with weapons that are decidedly unoptimal for her cardpool. Give her swords that are comparable to axes in power (and consider that axes decidedly aren't top tier weapons) and Dori could become truly opressive really fast. On the other hand, I have a suspicion that LSS for reasons of their own want to keep the original heroes around for as long as possible. They've had plenty of time to make them meta relevant, but seem to be steering clear of it, feeding them just enough cards to keep them playable, but not powerful enough to gather significant amounts of LL points. I have a few theories of why that might be the case but they're pure speculation with nothing to back them up.
@@BoredLyron I don't think they're specifically not printing support for the original hero's to keep them in the game, I just think they keep continually getting overshadowed by newer hero's. Personally, I just think they have tended towards overtuning/pushing new Talents when they make them to make sure they excite/interest people, hence the first versions of hero's with new Talents generally being really strong. Chane, Prism, all 3 Aria hero's, Fai on release, Dromai, Iyslander, Starvo, all 3 Mistveil hero's, etc.
I understand why LL conceptually only goes to the hero that wins the event but wish points could factor for all of T8 and scale. A part of the bloat is all the heroes making top 8 but not fully getting to the finish line. It also rewards the players who pick the unconventional heroes and shows the impact they’ve made. Not to mention all the funny 998 situations that happened before. Thematically it doesn’t fit, but scaling the T8 would rotate out a lot of the almost there and make the roster a fair bit slimmer
Great discussion on the main topic! One aspect you didn't cover in the is moving to all Limited set also ties their hands more on how strong sets can be. It was asked at World's and confirmed that both Oscilio and Verdance's weapons were stronger but had to be increase in cost to accommodate limited. I'm sure there is a huge amount of cards that fall into this category however even worse for Wizard because it had to fit into the Kano bubble. In short had Rosetta not been a draftable set I think Verdance and Oscilio would have been in a much stronger position
They should change the LL point system a bit in my opinion. Instead of only rewarding the first place LL points i think they should spread the points overthe top 8 heroes. So a lot of heroes should get some pointsbut alsoeta dominant decks would still gain the most points. We had many tournament in the bonds Zen meta, where like 5-6 Zens were top 8 but they didnt win the calling etc getting no points while being the most present deck in top 8 etc. From time to tme there are also underdog heroes who get top 8, those would also gain some LL points and make the system a bit better i think,
I was expecting LSS to change to 1 expansion set and 3 draft sets a year, instead of doing only draft sets. The expansion slot helps, and it definitely should stay. But, say for example, it would be nice to get an expansion set at the start of the year (January) to shake things up after worlds concludes each year. Then we get draft sets in April, July, and October throughout the year.
Thanks a lot for answering my Command&Cookout question! Kinda sad that your answer is confirming that for example Betsy will never be tier1 because her main mechanic is created for limited not for CC :( Hope I will be able to catch you on some other event and get another fist bump. Love from Poland!
My current assumption is they plan to add more and more until there's notably more than right now. Maybe it ends up being 50, maybe 60, maybe s'thing like 80. But at that point, they'll likely, I figure, slow down with new Heroes and do the "Outsiders" thing y'all mentioned. 4-6 Heros in a set but 2-3 new ones and 2-4 old ones
There is one easy thing LSS could do to increase the natural rotation of heroes, that I believe you did not mention in the pod. Change Skirmish seasons into CC. Not only would that increase the LL points in the system, but given the local / tier 1 nature of those events, more fringe heroes would get their well-deserved points. Also, to my knowledge, not a lot of people actually enjoy blitz. Commoner - sure, but blitz ...
I am happy to see someone mention product fatigue/faster meta-shifts. While I still love to play the game, I am finding it increasingly difficult to keep up with the game/CC meta with so many new product releases.
IMO no WTR hero will LL in CC. Power creep is in the game and they are just left in the dust. If you want to play brute, there will always be a better option than Rhinar. That goes with Guardian, Warrior and ninja.
On the point of older heroes that got support and became viable competitive picks, I don't think you explicitly mentioned Dorinthea (was discussed for HVY meta), Prism (Luminaris in HVY) or Levia (Shadowrealm Horror in MST) as falling in this category also! And Katsu (Ancestral Harmony in HVY) was okay as well. So in the past 3 sets + armory decks, we've seen Vis, DIO, Dori, Levia, Prism actually go from completely unplayable to competitive options, and heroes like Boltyn, Katsu, Riptide and many others get some support that helps but maybe isn't quite enough to put them into competitively viable. I'm not sure LSS is too far off the mark with this too be honest, it has just been a bit overshadowed by the raw power level of MST heroes 😅
Super happy you guys covered this topic! I feel for players who buy into Betsy-type heroes and never see support. I would really like the game to have more depth in hero pools, not breadth.
I understand accessibility and play opportunity in choosing a hero that relates to you and your play style but I also think that too many heroes means it’s harder to account for a certain meta and how you need to shape your deck
I think there is definitely a hero bloat for tier3/4 events. Competitively, it's harder and harder to prepare for the major events because there's just so much to consider, especially with all the matchups that you have to sort of sacrifice due to a lack of sideboard slots. It does feel like tournaments are more decided by whether your pairings work out for you, rather than by good preparation. That being said, it is a lot better to have choices rather than ending up being just being a 1-2 deck metagame, so it's a tough balancing act by LSS.
Dusk til Dawn was an unforgivably poor product at power level, meta impact, desire-ability, and completely failed to meet expectations with very few exceptions in the entire set. 85% of the entire set is unplayable dumpster filler, but this was supposed to be the shadow support we were waiting for. I'm still angry. Any other game and I would have immediately peaced out.
Problem with bloat is when you need to prepare for a tier 3/4 event. Are you really not having a plan for arakni? You're there to win the event, right? You can not not have a plan for every single hero. Well if you add different archetypes within each hero (eg slab/boost dash, hatchets/dawnblade dori) you might be looking to prepare and sideboard for +60 decks lol even if you get 10 games into each one (which, to be honest, might not be enough) we're asking a pro player to get at least 600 games in? Seems a lot honestly
There may be bloat, i suspect they have a hero pool size theyre working towards and will then decrease the rate of new heros /increase the points awarded to rotate heros out faster
Are we really sure they are genuinely aware of this issue? I loved this episode because it speaks to a tremendous problem for me in FaB. Supplemental sets leaving the landscape was a mistake.
We definitely need to be careful with that limit though it could trap us in a meta that is just terrible and we will be stuck in it and that would be no fun and make players even leave potentially
I don't think so many heroes would be an issue if LSS stopped with bans across the board affecting all heroes instead of the select few causing problems for everyone else.
I wonder If LSS might eventually need to force heroes out of the game to deal with the volume. Something like, top 2 heroes with the most LL points living legend out of the format at the end of the calendar year or something like that.
And separate to my question: The risk with a 'diverse' meta being what matters is that the competitive scene is underpinned by the armory players and new players. Players invest in heroes they like based on the promise that even if they're bad, one day they'll be viable. And then they never are due to bloat and their financial investment feels wasted. This isn't something competitive players ever think about based on this podcast - you guys just move to the viable decks when you feel like it and you're comfortable spending the money to do so. In that regard it seems like what armory players care about is somewhat different to what competitive players care about.
I think the dominate problem I only hear from armory level players, not to discredit them and they are important, but if dominate was such an issue where is Bravo at these events? I'd also argue that Overpower is a much bigger feels bad than dominate when it gets stuffed because you can have good practices wait till they are off arsenal, equip is weak...but whoopsie they drew a dreact! Your play you invested into is now stuffed. Where as with bravo you more often than not get that crush to land if you follow good practices. Signed totally not salty Betsy player 😂
Hard disagree about the spoiler season. Spoilers for MST were a lot less hype than ROS. I would much rather have the bigger stuff back loaded so it is opened and exciting
To me it seems the deeper hero pool isn't aimed at competitive players. It is more for casual players who want to play cool different stuff
Great pod! I definitely agree! I went so hard on Arakni bought all the cards and just got burnt by having zero support for contract style and being irrelevant for years, never again.
The problem of heroes never moving up in power level is probably tied to the fact that some heroes just are not good. Their text boxes are not that powerful. Perhaps one way to help that is to release specialized weapons that give them a SIPSIP boost. They did that with new Prism.
I don't think the SIPSIP boost will help everyone though, Prism's problem was she did not have a good weapon, the kit did not work with any of the weapons that were legal at the time. Then LSS caved and printed OG Luminaris but balanced, and the deck became playable because that's all it needed. Not every class or hero *only* needs a bomb main deck or Equip. Boltyn as an example just need a better Common and Rare base of cards to be a good hero. He has most of the tools already, it's just his Charge cards are so terrible. Same for Teklo, but he has no way to turbo into his Evos without removing his Evo Upgrade threats from his deck via boosting.
Another thing, that can be seen with Rhinar and Dori is that their hero power is powerful and the balance point where they are top tier good but not completely broken is razor thin. We've seen how powerful Dori was in a suitable meta, and that was with weapons that are decidedly unoptimal for her cardpool. Give her swords that are comparable to axes in power (and consider that axes decidedly aren't top tier weapons) and Dori could become truly opressive really fast.
On the other hand, I have a suspicion that LSS for reasons of their own want to keep the original heroes around for as long as possible. They've had plenty of time to make them meta relevant, but seem to be steering clear of it, feeding them just enough cards to keep them playable, but not powerful enough to gather significant amounts of LL points. I have a few theories of why that might be the case but they're pure speculation with nothing to back them up.
@@BoredLyron I don't think they're specifically not printing support for the original hero's to keep them in the game, I just think they keep continually getting overshadowed by newer hero's.
Personally, I just think they have tended towards overtuning/pushing new Talents when they make them to make sure they excite/interest people, hence the first versions of hero's with new Talents generally being really strong. Chane, Prism, all 3 Aria hero's, Fai on release, Dromai, Iyslander, Starvo, all 3 Mistveil hero's, etc.
I understand why LL conceptually only goes to the hero that wins the event but wish points could factor for all of T8 and scale. A part of the bloat is all the heroes making top 8 but not fully getting to the finish line. It also rewards the players who pick the unconventional heroes and shows the impact they’ve made. Not to mention all the funny 998 situations that happened before. Thematically it doesn’t fit, but scaling the T8 would rotate out a lot of the almost there and make the roster a fair bit slimmer
I like the variety of Heroes. Much like games like Overwatch/others, there is a Hero/Playstyle for everyone
Great discussion on the main topic! One aspect you didn't cover in the is moving to all Limited set also ties their hands more on how strong sets can be. It was asked at World's and confirmed that both Oscilio and Verdance's weapons were stronger but had to be increase in cost to accommodate limited. I'm sure there is a huge amount of cards that fall into this category however even worse for Wizard because it had to fit into the Kano bubble. In short had Rosetta not been a draftable set I think Verdance and Oscilio would have been in a much stronger position
They should change the LL point system a bit in my opinion. Instead of only rewarding the first place LL points i think they should spread the points overthe top 8 heroes. So a lot of heroes should get some pointsbut alsoeta dominant decks would still gain the most points. We had many tournament in the bonds Zen meta, where like 5-6 Zens were top 8 but they didnt win the calling etc getting no points while being the most present deck in top 8 etc.
From time to tme there are also underdog heroes who get top 8, those would also gain some LL points and make the system a bit better i think,
I liked LLS not showing the M's during spoiler season. Then the decks weren't "figured out" before the cards even available for purchase
I was expecting LSS to change to 1 expansion set and 3 draft sets a year, instead of doing only draft sets. The expansion slot helps, and it definitely should stay. But, say for example, it would be nice to get an expansion set at the start of the year (January) to shake things up after worlds concludes each year. Then we get draft sets in April, July, and October throughout the year.
Thanks a lot for answering my Command&Cookout question! Kinda sad that your answer is confirming that for example Betsy will never be tier1 because her main mechanic is created for limited not for CC :( Hope I will be able to catch you on some other event and get another fist bump. Love from Poland!
My current assumption is they plan to add more and more until there's notably more than right now. Maybe it ends up being 50, maybe 60, maybe s'thing like 80. But at that point, they'll likely, I figure, slow down with new Heroes and do the "Outsiders" thing y'all mentioned. 4-6 Heros in a set but 2-3 new ones and 2-4 old ones
There is one easy thing LSS could do to increase the natural rotation of heroes, that I believe you did not mention in the pod.
Change Skirmish seasons into CC. Not only would that increase the LL points in the system, but given the local / tier 1 nature of those events, more fringe heroes would get their well-deserved points. Also, to my knowledge, not a lot of people actually enjoy blitz. Commoner - sure, but blitz ...
I am happy to see someone mention product fatigue/faster meta-shifts. While I still love to play the game, I am finding it increasingly difficult to keep up with the game/CC meta with so many new product releases.
IMO no WTR hero will LL in CC. Power creep is in the game and they are just left in the dust. If you want to play brute, there will always be a better option than Rhinar. That goes with Guardian, Warrior and ninja.
On the point of older heroes that got support and became viable competitive picks, I don't think you explicitly mentioned Dorinthea (was discussed for HVY meta), Prism (Luminaris in HVY) or Levia (Shadowrealm Horror in MST) as falling in this category also! And Katsu (Ancestral Harmony in HVY) was okay as well. So in the past 3 sets + armory decks, we've seen Vis, DIO, Dori, Levia, Prism actually go from completely unplayable to competitive options, and heroes like Boltyn, Katsu, Riptide and many others get some support that helps but maybe isn't quite enough to put them into competitively viable. I'm not sure LSS is too far off the mark with this too be honest, it has just been a bit overshadowed by the raw power level of MST heroes 😅
Super happy you guys covered this topic! I feel for players who buy into Betsy-type heroes and never see support. I would really like the game to have more depth in hero pools, not breadth.
I understand accessibility and play opportunity in choosing a hero that relates to you and your play style but I also think that too many heroes means it’s harder to account for a certain meta and how you need to shape your deck
I think there is definitely a hero bloat for tier3/4 events. Competitively, it's harder and harder to prepare for the major events because there's just so much to consider, especially with all the matchups that you have to sort of sacrifice due to a lack of sideboard slots. It does feel like tournaments are more decided by whether your pairings work out for you, rather than by good preparation. That being said, it is a lot better to have choices rather than ending up being just being a 1-2 deck metagame, so it's a tough balancing act by LSS.
Punkaj is elite tier. Arsenal Pass used to be a pass but now it’s a must listen. Love Hayden and Punkaj together.
What about viserai? I mean the most recent set saw him gain how many points for the first time in years
Dusk til Dawn was an unforgivably poor product at power level, meta impact, desire-ability, and completely failed to meet expectations with very few exceptions in the entire set.
85% of the entire set is unplayable dumpster filler, but this was supposed to be the shadow support we were waiting for. I'm still angry. Any other game and I would have immediately peaced out.
Problem with bloat is when you need to prepare for a tier 3/4 event. Are you really not having a plan for arakni? You're there to win the event, right? You can not not have a plan for every single hero. Well if you add different archetypes within each hero (eg slab/boost dash, hatchets/dawnblade dori) you might be looking to prepare and sideboard for +60 decks lol even if you get 10 games into each one (which, to be honest, might not be enough) we're asking a pro player to get at least 600 games in? Seems a lot honestly
35:42 Poor Maxx. He's my current main. He's bad. I'm still having fun though.
More heroes is more good, heroes on the bottom should get specialized stuff to help them out
The more heros the harder it becomes to have space for cards that help weak heros since they need to expand the card pool of newer ones..
I think it is altso super intresting i wonder if they have a plan for the old heros
LL format should award points to heroes that haven't LL yet. It only makes sense since the non-rotated heroes are beating the Living Legends
There may be bloat, i suspect they have a hero pool size theyre working towards and will then decrease the rate of new heros /increase the points awarded to rotate heros out faster
Are we really sure they are genuinely aware of this issue? I loved this episode because it speaks to a tremendous problem for me in FaB. Supplemental sets leaving the landscape was a mistake.
We definitely need to be careful with that limit though it could trap us in a meta that is just terrible and we will be stuck in it and that would be no fun and make players even leave potentially
I don't think so many heroes would be an issue if LSS stopped with bans across the board affecting all heroes instead of the select few causing problems for everyone else.
My command and cooker question: are generics that are Best in Slot an overall negative or positive for the game?
I wonder If LSS might eventually need to force heroes out of the game to deal with the volume. Something like, top 2 heroes with the most LL points living legend out of the format at the end of the calendar year or something like that.
So is the hero pool now... in a good number? 36ish is a good hero pool number? i would think closer to 40 is the best number
And separate to my question: The risk with a 'diverse' meta being what matters is that the competitive scene is underpinned by the armory players and new players. Players invest in heroes they like based on the promise that even if they're bad, one day they'll be viable. And then they never are due to bloat and their financial investment feels wasted.
This isn't something competitive players ever think about based on this podcast - you guys just move to the viable decks when you feel like it and you're comfortable spending the money to do so. In that regard it seems like what armory players care about is somewhat different to what competitive players care about.
Why is bloat bad I'd rather that than my hero LL in 9 months
Listen to the pod, lmao 😂
@@dmitrysorokin2622 idk who you are but leave me alone
"Fellas, are options bad for a game? Survey of our middle IQ audience says yes!"
I think the dominate problem I only hear from armory level players, not to discredit them and they are important, but if dominate was such an issue where is Bravo at these events? I'd also argue that Overpower is a much bigger feels bad than dominate when it gets stuffed because you can have good practices wait till they are off arsenal, equip is weak...but whoopsie they drew a dreact! Your play you invested into is now stuffed. Where as with bravo you more often than not get that crush to land if you follow good practices.
Signed totally not salty Betsy player 😂
Hard disagree about the spoiler season. Spoilers for MST were a lot less hype than ROS. I would much rather have the bigger stuff back loaded so it is opened and exciting
No. More ways to play is good. Less heros to ll. I think we need more rangers for real. Azalea is about to ll.
Yes, I do believe there are too many heroes, I don’t think the game needs over 30heroes for players to find one and identify/specialize with them
First
Nope