9 years ago
Has the game lost focus on the basics .....
Long post so apologies ahead of time -
The basics of these mobile games are pretty simple but it seems like the devs are starting to lose focus.
In these types of games there are typically three types of toon classes - offense, defense and support - and five types of skills - three active (basic, special and non damage) and two passive (leader and unique). Toons have four main areas of focus (levers) - speed, damage, health and special skills. Which tend to fall as follows.
Offense - attackers who focus on doing damage and making it easier to do damage (damage up, crit chance up, defense down, expose, etc.). They typically trade either lack of speed or lack of health for increased damage. Usually glass cannons (Rey) or slow heavy hitters (Vader)
Defense - tanks who focus taking damage and reducing in coming damage (defense up, offense down, etc.). They almost always trade damage for large increase in health and special skills (taunt).
Support - healers and other toons whose main focus is aiding allies or hurting enemies instead of doing actual damage (but they do have at least basic attacks which do damage). They typically have loads of special skills, and sacrifice speed, health or damage to have these skills (Bariss damage being really low for example).
While the game has never been great at putting people in the right group (Teebo - a tank whose main skill when not leader is to turn invisible so he can't be attacked) this is just a small part of the problem. They are now releasing toons that cover all three of the main areas and don't have any of the negatives usually associated with those groups.
The biggest problem that seems to be starting is the skills.
The three active types of skills are pretty self explanatory - basic is the normal attack which may give buffs or debuffs on a successful hit. Special is second or third type of attack for a toon that might be AoE or do extra damage with more chance of buffs/debuffs. Non damage attacks include healing, taunting, buffing/debuffing that is controlled by the player. The game does a pretty decent job here.
The two passive ones leader and unique are where these problems are starting to really come up. Leader ability which by definition is something given to all or some allies or taken away from all or some enemies only when a particular toon is placed in the leader position. I have never been completely sure that it should continue after death,but at this point it's water under the bridge (even though the devs have now made some leader skills - Vader zeta for example - that end with his death). Which leaves the unique skill that this game is now really struggling with. A unique skill should be something that benefits only the toon in question or something the toon does . It's unique to that toon by definition of the name of the skill type. Therefore upon the death of the toon, that ability should go away. Also it is an ability and therefore should be blocked if the toon giving it is ability blocked. The two biggest displays of this are the new synergies that are coming out and Bariss Zeta (though there were already a unique or two that I believe survived after death). Leader abilities can be said to be in the 'strategy' of the battle which I suppose could last after the death of the leader. But a unique where Bariss heals someone on crit, or Wedge is giving Biggs bonuses after they have died makes no sense (unless it's an on death bonus like old Ben). The game needs to make sure that it keeps leader abilities and unique abilities separate. I like the idea of synergies, but they need to figure out a better way to handle them.
Long story short, release all the OP toons you want, power creep is inevitable, but keep them in the actual 'rules' of the game and not make them have huge damage, lots of health, lots of speed, tons of skills and then give them a unique that is actually a second leader skill.
The basics of these mobile games are pretty simple but it seems like the devs are starting to lose focus.
In these types of games there are typically three types of toon classes - offense, defense and support - and five types of skills - three active (basic, special and non damage) and two passive (leader and unique). Toons have four main areas of focus (levers) - speed, damage, health and special skills. Which tend to fall as follows.
Offense - attackers who focus on doing damage and making it easier to do damage (damage up, crit chance up, defense down, expose, etc.). They typically trade either lack of speed or lack of health for increased damage. Usually glass cannons (Rey) or slow heavy hitters (Vader)
Defense - tanks who focus taking damage and reducing in coming damage (defense up, offense down, etc.). They almost always trade damage for large increase in health and special skills (taunt).
Support - healers and other toons whose main focus is aiding allies or hurting enemies instead of doing actual damage (but they do have at least basic attacks which do damage). They typically have loads of special skills, and sacrifice speed, health or damage to have these skills (Bariss damage being really low for example).
While the game has never been great at putting people in the right group (Teebo - a tank whose main skill when not leader is to turn invisible so he can't be attacked) this is just a small part of the problem. They are now releasing toons that cover all three of the main areas and don't have any of the negatives usually associated with those groups.
The biggest problem that seems to be starting is the skills.
The three active types of skills are pretty self explanatory - basic is the normal attack which may give buffs or debuffs on a successful hit. Special is second or third type of attack for a toon that might be AoE or do extra damage with more chance of buffs/debuffs. Non damage attacks include healing, taunting, buffing/debuffing that is controlled by the player. The game does a pretty decent job here.
The two passive ones leader and unique are where these problems are starting to really come up. Leader ability which by definition is something given to all or some allies or taken away from all or some enemies only when a particular toon is placed in the leader position. I have never been completely sure that it should continue after death,but at this point it's water under the bridge (even though the devs have now made some leader skills - Vader zeta for example - that end with his death). Which leaves the unique skill that this game is now really struggling with. A unique skill should be something that benefits only the toon in question or something the toon does . It's unique to that toon by definition of the name of the skill type. Therefore upon the death of the toon, that ability should go away. Also it is an ability and therefore should be blocked if the toon giving it is ability blocked. The two biggest displays of this are the new synergies that are coming out and Bariss Zeta (though there were already a unique or two that I believe survived after death). Leader abilities can be said to be in the 'strategy' of the battle which I suppose could last after the death of the leader. But a unique where Bariss heals someone on crit, or Wedge is giving Biggs bonuses after they have died makes no sense (unless it's an on death bonus like old Ben). The game needs to make sure that it keeps leader abilities and unique abilities separate. I like the idea of synergies, but they need to figure out a better way to handle them.
Long story short, release all the OP toons you want, power creep is inevitable, but keep them in the actual 'rules' of the game and not make them have huge damage, lots of health, lots of speed, tons of skills and then give them a unique that is actually a second leader skill.