Re: Berries MUST be Nerfed

You can't really change it without completely destroying berries.  They're not even overpowered, as you have just stated.

The problem is with the zombie players.  Not enough of them are using decks that can defeat berries because instead of responding to the decks that are in play by changing their decks to counter, they expect the game to change around them, so that their favorite deck is still viable.

That and I can't tell you just how few players below Platinum use removal cards.  If you actually look through the zombie cards in the game, there are at least two (when considering joint classes) that can be used to counter those cards (strawberrian and strongberry) as they come up.  That means you have double the chance of countering those cards when they come up as they do of having those cards available on the turn.  But again, most zombie players would rather change the game then change their strategy...   ... So, if they don't have the counters in their hand, and berry decks continue to have high win rates because of their (zombie's) refusal to adapt and overcome, then you'll continue to see boring Berry decks in play.

There other problem, admittedly, is a lack of imagination from plant players to come up with new and interesting decks when they have the option to just recreate strong ones they see online...  ... Especially when those decks get them wins

I can beat them with several decks ... I am just tired of ONLY playing those. If I change, it is hard to beat berries. The funny thing is I created a specific "berry crusher" deck, and when I play that one, somehow I see far fewer berries ... it is like they KNOW! LOL

I don't see how raising the sun price on at LEAST Strawberrian to 4 would "destroy the berry decks". I think it should be 4 for Strawberrian and 5 for Strongberry. Or at least limit the max number of extra hits a pair of Strongberries can do. And of course fix the actual BUG that strong berries keep hitting back and forth AFTER they are dead.

They made the same change to Valkerie and the mustache fusion bonus attack (sorry can't remember the name) and it did add some balance back to things and those decks were not everywhere after that.

But yes, I blame the uncreative, unmotivated berry players more than the devs.

Well, think about the cards that are available for okay by the zombies during those turns.  Imagine some of the more perfumes zombie combinations you have and what it would do to raise their cost by one...  It devastates, doesn't it? Especially when you and I can both concede that it isn't even overpowered in the first place.  

The main problem, Which can't be remedied is the cost of those cards to create.  Strongberry should be legendary at the very least, but now that those cards are already played by everyone, it's moot.  

Which is why I take it back to zombies.  At higher levels, yes, the players have created good counters to the berries, but against lower skilled players, they get amazing results . They have no reason to stop playing them.  It's a hard situation to resolve.  Because again, begging berries makes them completely underpowered, but you also can't make lower skilled players change their style of play either.

Honestly, the best we can do is hope for an expansion in the future that shakes things up.

But raising the prices of Valkerie and Mustache Platform by one did not ruin those. In fact I have a deck I call "Rocket Opera" that they are the key. I think it would at least be worth trying.

I agree that Strongberry should have been Legendary since day one. And that "infinite loop of bonus attacks" never sat right with me. Especially when they still had the bug that allowed them to RESUME ATTACKING after the shield. Luckily they fixed that quick. But like you said, too late for that now.

Those were overpowered cards that could help win the game without any answer, though...  There were reasons for those.  Certainly you remember just how strong prof/valk decks were before the nerf!  They're still strong, but balanced now, as opposed to before the nerd...

Berry decks are, in fact balanced now.  So raising the cost only makes a balanced deck less effective and underpowered

I guess we have to agree to disagree. I don't think Berries are balanced now. Beatable does not equal balanced. It is too easy to wipe out an entire board on rounds 3-4-5 with berries. And if you happen to get some unlucky draws as a zombie, you are toast. The combination of Strawberrian hitting each for one when another berry played, plus the strongberry hitting for an additional 2 is just too much "bonus hits". Add in a second Strongberry and forget about it. Only Legendary cards like Gargantuan Thrower etc can help at that point. It just should not be that easy (translation: no legendary needed) and cheap to build that strong of a deck. There are no other examples like this in the game. The closest would be an Astro-Shroom/Admiral Navy Bean/Planet of the Grapes combo. But that is FAR more beatable than your basic Berry deck.

Speaking of ... how the heck are Grapes "berries"? First time a squirrel wrangler destroyed my grape environment I was like, WTH? 😛

Grapes are technically berries...  Strawberries on the other hand, are not.  Crazy, right?

While I would normally agree with your sentiment because of their win loss ratio at lower levels of play, that is brought in by players refusal to adapt and not the core of the mechanics.  Much like I truly believe zombies were not overpowered in series 3, and plants simply refused to adapt....   ... And look at how those nerfs neutered many of those cards.

I get it. I have most cards and reach level 50 quickly. But I am tired of only playing Berries. I HAVE adapted - I just don't think I should be forced to play one way to win. Just sad ... another pointer to the dying of this fun game.

I completely agree with everything you just said.  I know you can beat them, which makes it ask the more ffrustrating to play them constantly, I really do understand that.  Like I said, I don't believe series 3 was overpowered, but uI wa incredibly tired of playing the same decks constantly, so I feel your pain.

It's not bad for plants right now to level of zombies, but the whole game is stuck in a rut.  I see maybe ten different decks constantly (as opposed to just cyclecap, berries and heals), with a few outliers that either blow my mind or are completely terrible.

I'm really hoping this delay leads to a few new expansions and creative cards that can truly shake up the meta and open the game up.  I just don't want to see berries nerfed...  Partially because it doesn't need it in my opinion when facing more experienced opposition, but also because I'm one of the originators of the deck lol I posted it back when people thought berries were trash.  Nobody wants to see their baby get unjust treatment!

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@daalnnii wrote:
I just don't want to see berries nerfed...  Partially because it doesn't need it in my opinion when facing more experienced opposition, but also because I'm one of the originators of the deck lol I posted it back when people thought berries were trash.  Nobody wants to see their baby get unjust treatment!

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I get that ... I was one of the first to play the Astro-Shroom/Admiral Navy Bean/Planet of the Grapes deck, without ever seeing anyone else doing it. So now when I see it, I think, "HEY!" But like I said, that one is very beatable ... especially if you never get Planet of the Grapes or they keep getting over-written.

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@daalnnii wrote:

I completely agree with everything you just said.  I know you can beat them, which makes it ask the more ffrustrating to play them constantly, I really do understand that.

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I guess the part that bugs me is when they DO beat me, for some reason I picture them being all smug about it. LOL

Here’s an idea (hear me out): Adjust Cut Down to Size to hit 4-power plants.

Cut is literally the reason I don’t play Super-Brainz and hesitate on Rustbolt. More importantly, it is often useless in the Berry match-ups, with Berry’s strongest Berry often being Strongberry.

I don’t think adjusting a conditional kill card to make it marginally better is going to shake up the meta too much... especially the competitive meta, in which I don’t see Rustbolt or Super Brains being overwhelmingly popular. However, it would provide a solution to Strongberry for many decks (especially beginner decks, which Berrys like to prey upon), provides a slight disincentive to play berries, and does so without nerfing any plant cards.

If Cut becomes too powerful at 4... which I guess is possible, but again I don’t think the two affected heroes are going to rock the meta... it could always be adjusted back.

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@puntwothree wrote:

Here’s an idea (hear me out): Adjust Cut Down to Size to hit 4-power plants.

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I think that might help. I still think the single most effective step would to raise Strawberrian cost to 4. It would prevent the all-too-common chain of Shelf Mushroom -- Strawberrian Fusion on that -- giving you not only 2 damage for the fusion, but then the additional 1 hit from Strawberrian. PLUS you now have a FREE Berry Blast to use in future rounds. And that all happened on only Round 3. Round 4 you throw a Strongberry, and that is tough for any deck to fight.

And for those saying, "Well berry decks aren't that hard to beat or even that common at the higher tourney levels." I can now say that is not true. I am at level 47 right now and STILL seeing mostly Spudow Berry Decks -- and they are all in the mid- to high-40s level.

I have a berry "splash" deck that is just insanely OPd. I just finished a fight were I was so beaten down (I had 4 health left and he had 16). And with zero plants on the field, in round 8. I was able to wipe out all his zombies and win on the next round. I should not be able to fight back with ZERO legendary cards like that. It felt ... "dirty".

I think you're completely overlooking the fact they can be completely dominated in games as well.  Again, if people choose not to run decks that counter these when the meta had them  in play constantly, whose fault is that?

I think you're completely overlooking the fact they can be completely dominated in games as well.  Again, if people choose not to run decks that counter these when the meta had them  in play constantly, whose fault is that?

I don't understand the word "meta" in this context...can you please explain?

As I have said before, I feel like I have to play only anti-berry decks to be competitive as a zombie. That is very narrow and restricting for a game with this much richness and variety.

In card games the most common metagame design usually follows a rock-paper-scissor pattern. Each deck will be strong against a certain type of deck, but weak against another. Often, one of those decks also happens to be very strong against less than tier 1 decks, while the others not so much. That is the case of the Berries deck. It also happens to have quite a low rarity count making it very accessible (it's ironic that in all card games the same people who complain about the game being too expensive also complain about popular but accessible decks being too strong) and thus very popular.

If Berries are "Rock" then Armour/sports and gravestone/mill decks are "paper". Unfortunately, Ramp is plant's "scissors" in that case. Then Valk OTK becomes your zombies "Rock" in this analogy. Anyway, there are plenty of decks that beat each other, but what Dalnii is getting at is that too many plant players are playing "Rock" but zombie players insist on playing scissors decks or simply tier 2 decks that aren't effective.

That makes sense. But I think in this case, soooo many people are playing just ONE Rock, and not "all paper" decks are really that effective against it.

One question: Please post or describe a single Zombie deck that has that much power for such low cost with zero legacy cards. :-)

What's a legacy card?

No matter. My favourite consistent Zombie deck is dance aggro for Boogaloo.

The base package is based on these cards:

Bungee Plumber

Disco-Naut

Aerobics Instructor

Conga Zombie

Disco Dance Floor

Cosmic Dancer

Flamenco Zombie

Final Mission.

Also Disco-Tron.

Quick draw con man is also very strong even though it's not a dance card, but it's very aggressive. Gizzard Lizard also works well as mass removal. Area 22 is probably the best environment for the deck.

You can add legends like Binary Stars, Head Hunter and Valkarie, but they are not required.

This is fairly fast aggro deck. It doesn't have the best of matchups against Berries, though it certainly holds it's own. The valk helps against that deck due to her higher health. Against most Plant decks, it's so fast that it is very consistent.

Sorry I meant Legendary.

That is a strong deck, and I have similar ones. In fact, early on it was one of my favorite decks. I still don't think it matches Berries in terms of win rates etc ... especially when you factor in rarity.

I guess what I was trying to say is that if there is not a matching deck on the other side (Zombie), that in itself is an indicator of a possible OP deck.

Looks like you got your wish!

Berries are being nerfed.

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@Gabochido wrote:

Looks like you got your wish!

Berries are being nerfed.

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Where do you see that? I am still seeing "Spring Update" in the News.

You really should follow the reddit forums. That's where most of the discussion about this game actually happens. Just search "PVZ Heroes Reddit". People keeping track of the game are constantly datamining their sources and an update came up over the weekend showing a balance update. They don't have an exact date of when the update will happen, but they've been consistently correct beforehand.