[Feedback/Suggestion] What is the point of 'bad' legendaries?

Feedback Problem:

In a game of this nature, I understand wanting to have diverse items, and have flavor as well as thematic elements for items.

With that said, the trend toward Legendary not necessarily denoting quailty, but rather rarity, really devalues the purpose of obtaining Legendaries.

Prime Example from my Randimar's this week: http://wiki.cardhuntria.com/wiki/Items/Oquith's_Foul_Incense

What in the world is the point of this item?



I consider this item absolutely useless. It is a level 15 legendary that costs 1 blue token. It is outclassed by a substantial amount of 0-1 blue token items in the game.

Cause Fumble itself is an ability that 'sounds cool' but is not effective functionally; on rolls of 5+ you block an attack targeting an ally within 6 squares. Unpredictable, unreliable, only blocks melee. Sure, you draw a card, but so what?

Twin heals: Heal 2 to two targets. What? This ability... is awful and has an inflated value.

*Reliability is the key to success over time in a game about RNG. Sure, the odd 5+ block may happen at a time that trolls your opponent, but this can't be counted on over time, and as such, is not useful in my eyes for multiplayer play if your goal is to have higher rating.

Here are two level 1 common divine items I would use instead of the level 15 Legendary Divine Item:

http://wiki.cardhuntria.com/wiki/Items/Hopeful_Charm


This item gives me a heal that can self-target or target my allies, another heal that heals for 4 after damaging for 2 (giving it utility in targeting an enemy or triggering a block, etc) AND an ability that trades my oldest card for my opponent's oldest card (a fantastic trade potentially especially versus someone with a really annoying armor card banked or defense). In short, this level 1 common quality item is superior to the level 15 legendary item, AND costs 0 tokens.

http://wiki.cardhuntria.com/wiki/Items/Wooden_Token


Righteous frenzy is a 6-range targeted frenzy 2 buff that can be used to enhance melee for 1 turn, or push off buffs/debuffs. Minor heal is discussed above. This card has more utility than the level 15 legendary and I consider it superior for most of the same reasons above.


Suggestion:

Rebalance Legendaries to be useful and to be consistent with the theme that if something is less common, it should make you more powerful. Nearly every loot based game adheres to this theory. Sure, there are odd exceptions, but the general premise should be that higher quality should provide more power, more utility, or something incredibly niche but situationally dominant, and not simply random flavor.

 

Cause fumble is the reason as you really don't see them on many cards and those you do they tend to be rarer value.

Maybe bump it down to 4+ to trigger as this could make a powerful defender priest staying back from the fighting while providing blocks to the fighters and heals when needed.

But since it also lets you draw a card that helps to replenish your character then.

 

Are you against Unreliable Block too? Cause Fumble procs on 5 instead of 6, ignores facing, has huge range, AND it doesn't use shield slot. There is legendary with 3 of them too, Oquith's Choking Incense

Anti-melee team support cards don't have to be useful for everyone.

 

Unreliable block is a by-product on items where you get good abilities. Cause fumble is terrible. If you want anti-melee support cards, go nimbus. Or heals, or entangle. All superior.

 

Unlike Nimbus, Cause Fumble is immune to Purge and target changes. Unlike Entangle, it stops non-step attacks too. It stays in your hand until it is discarded or it blocks attack - and when it does it gives you extra card too. In most cases, this will give you extra card + turn priority, which can be potentially game-changing.

 

How about different change - rather then lowering roll to 4, it could be "When this card is discarded, draw a card". So if it procs you draw a card, and if opposing team has no melee attacks you discard it and get extra card for next turn instead?

 

I just feel it's more because of the draw a card ability then anything as you see that for some other cards such as Cleansing Ray vs Cleansing Burst.

You see ray on mainly the rarer cards while burst tends to be on a lot of uncommon cards yet in many cases burst would probably work better.

 

We get a lot of threads like these which come down to personal preference. It may be STRATEGIC preference, but that's still preference.

Consider the logic of the opening argument. "This is a bad item. Here are two items which I would use instead of it." Sounds good, so let's compare the bad item to the two better ones. They are . . . almost completely incomparable. The main reason they are being compared is because of the preference of the person using them.

The "bad item" is a Divine Item with Blocks on it. "So what if you draw a card"? I don't have to argue the strategic merit of drawing a replacement card. As discussed already, this is a couple of Blocks on a Divine Item. Pretty cool for people who want that.

The "two better ones" include a Frenzy ability. Why is this being compared to Blocks? I think it's a pretty cool item, but since when is it "better"? Obviously it's not better if you're looking for a Divine Item with Blocks on it.

Then we get down to the healing comparison. I likewise don't have to argue about it, but for a different reason: because everybody here including the original poster understands healing just fine. This part works well. But it's NOT what people have since discussed in the thread: everyone has moved on to discussing Blocks and the strategies that may lead you to use them.

So beyond healing, we are asking why we have to see a Legendary so "terrible" as to give us Blocks on a Divine Item. Since it's not terrible at all, and just comes down to personal preference, I don't see a concern: some cards are rarer than others, and this gives us Legendaries which compile all the rare cards together. That's just how it works.

If you don't like it . . . sell it!

 

You are missing my point; rare ineffectual blocks does not a good item or game balance make. That is one of my points. Another point is that a legendary item, has less overall utility than 2 common level 1 items in most builds. Sure, you can run a niche build for fun or for griefing or for 'priest blocking build' but it will be terrible. I'm not arguing, again, you can't make that build, just that it won't be any good.

And I would prefer to have a useful legendary item with 2500 value, than being forced to sell a legendary item for 100g.

 

No, I got your point just fine. I fear you are missing mine. Look at your response: you just argued that this is "ineffectual" or "terrible." Earlier you argued that Unreliable Block is "a by-product on items where you get good abilities." Your suggestion for a better card . . . was Impenetrable Nimbus.

I could stop there, because it really should be obvious what I'm saying. But let me repeat: you made an argument that Unreliable Block (or things you likewise consider inferior) should be discarded in deference to Impenetrable Nimbus.

No one would ever have made the mistake of comparing Unreliable Block to Impenetrable Nimbus. The discussion, of course, was about strategy and allowing for other ways of thinking. It seems like you're just trying to shoehorn "the dominant build" into any discussion, and using very strong language for anything else.

There may be certain cards that are the best. We know this, and hopefully Blue Manchu will make more interesting cards with more strategies and keep there from being too few dominant builds. But it seems like you are confusing "anything other than the dominant build" with "terrible cards that should not be in the game at any level."

 

Cause fumble, as implemented, should not be in the game. You brought up unreliable block, not I, and it is not relevant to the points I was expressing. For a legendary quality item, with 'rare' abilities on the silver tier, this item is abysmally balanced and should be increased to be more functionally useful. I don't know how to more clearly state that.

 

I see then.

So the topic of conversation has changed. You would like to discuss how Cause Fumble can be a better card.

Awesome. There are a lot of cards like that. Say, Healing Presence. Many people post "Why can't I cast this on myself? That's basically the only way I want to use it! Wow, this was a perfectly good idea for a card, but I don't think I can play it in my games." And that makes sense.

I likewise would enjoy it if Cause Fumble were more utilitarian. And no matter how sarcastic this post may sound, I'm serious.

But if you wanted to use the card AS A VEHICLE to convince me there's something wrong with the rarity system, it'd take a lot more effort. So let's talk about the card itself.

 

The them of the original post, if you read where I wrote my suggestion, was to balance legendaries. One way to do so is to balance the abilities themselves on the items to actually be functionally useful, OR to replace the abilities with different, better abilities.

 

Card Hunter is deliberately designed so the rarest items are not the best items. If they were, the game would be pay/play obsessively to win, neither of which is a good thing. More casual players have a good chance of being competitive with the current system. This has been brought up many times by many people and the devs have said approximately the preceding about the subject.

 

The rating system of items and cards is not absolute, as you can see you're saying that Cause Fumble , a silver title card, is way worse than some paper title cards.

 

First, I'm happy that rarer items don't totally overshadow more common items. I think that's healthier for the game than if all of the best items were Legendary. However, I think I see your point that it can be disappointing to get a Legendary item that seems entirely worse than another item of lower rarity. It would be nice if they were merely different, and it were a matter of opinion which was "better."

However, the example you've chosen here isn't a good fit for talking about bad items, because the items you're comparing are so different in their effects. A better comparison might be between the Rare Slippery Shield and the Legendary Hawlic's Surging Shield. Both are Level 18 and require a . The former has 3 copies of Hard To Pin Down, and the latter has 3 copies of Surging Shield Block. Hard to Pin Down seems to be a better card in pretty much every way (blocks more often, moves you 3 instead of 2, and moves you for free when it blocks), which makes the Slippery Shield strictly better than it's Legendary counterpart.

Now, I love that I was able to acquire 2 Slippery Shields because they're "only" Rare, and that I don't care that I may never get a Hawlic's because the odds of me getting one are terrible. But if I do get a Hawlic's...I'll be sad that I didn't get some other Legendary item that I might at least consider equipping. I'd rather Hawlic's came with a different set of cards that did something completely different than Slippery, rather than the same thing but less effectively.

 

Cause Fumble is not a bad card. Those who know how to use it, know it. Those who don't, don't.

 

I don't think OP is suggesting Cause Fumble is a bad card, just that the way it makes up the item he posted doesn't quite befit a legendary item. I agree with him. I can see it being more fitting if the roll were reduced a tick and there was 1 combo of the card on the item along with something else in place of the other, or something improved in place of Twin Heals. I would use the common items he listed ahead of the legendary also. If that may just be because I have no idea what I'm doing, sure, I'm open to that.

 

Cause Fumble nearly lost me a game, once upon a time. I had cast War Cry on my intended victim, and Cause Fumble blocked an Obliterating Bludgeon + All-Out Attack. Few people run Cause Fumble, but it can be tremendously powerful if used correctly.