Are Talents Generally Worthwhile?

@General_Confusion threw down the gauntlet on this question here:

It’s a fascinating question, and I think it deserves it’s own thread.

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I don’t have any input on embleming 3* because I think it’s a waste when I have several maxed 4* and 5*. I will say that I have BT emblem 7 and his revive has saved me multiple times! I have used some on Guin but jinx is useless on her. I’m doing it to beef up defense and make her more annoying lol! The companion with druids doesn’t hurt either- gives a little extra.

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I do think we may see some sort of split here based on offense vs. defense. For example revive I find as an almost useless talent on defense, but on offense I think it works much better.

Delilah reviving when her special is ready to fire isnt useless on defense. :smiley:

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The stat upgrades are worth it, for any hero. Talents, I think that 4 stars and 5 stars make the best use of them.

Since that question is specific to the 3 star tournament… I don’t think so. Even though I’m one of the ones that did upgrade my Gunnar, Gato, Gill-Ra, and Mnesseus… I still don’t think emblems on 3 stars are worth it, unless you are a fiend for high scores in these rarity tiers like me. :wink: don’t say I didn’t warn you!

I did see someone on Discord who gave Gunnar 18 nodes just for this tournament. He shared the following, check this out:
image

With spirit link and paladin active, equipped with a blue 4* crit troop, Gunnar gets a whooping 1312 defense.

Buuut yeah, again. That’s very specific to your needs.

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I have only once had a fighter revive (due to talents) with a special ready to fire…and it wasn’t game changing. I suspect if you tile kill more than special kill this may be different, but almost all my kills, even tanks, are with specials.

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There are specific cases but in the main reviving a hero with 1hp doesn’t really help on defense. Much more useful on offense where you can coordinate healing to up the hp and keep that hero alive.

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And the AI doesn’t know to target them…where as we know to just hit them with 1 tile, or make sure they get a splash of a special will take them out so that’s what we do,

I’d group talents into the following categories:

  1. Always beneficial, and potentially fight-transforming

Rogue/Evade – There’s never a bad time to skip the damage from a special. At full talent, this amounts to a 20% damage reduction from specials, which is enormous. The variance is what makes this talent killer, though, since it makes sniper shots a craps-shoot against rogues.

Cleric/Mana Shield – A 35% chance to protect against mana effects is hugely beneficial, and it really changes my strategy when using mana controllers against a defense. As people emblem up 5* Ariel, Vivica and MoNo, I expect this talent to be a game-changer for defenses. It’s already huge for Rigard at 4*.

  1. Situationally incredibly powerful

Fighter/Revive – on BT or Delilah, this can completely transform a fight. On the rest of the heroes, I find it deeply “meh.” Popping back to life with 1hp as a damage dealer is unlikely to change the fight, and the AI on defense has no way to work to protect or assist the revived hero. Essentially, this makes tile kills on a healer a far riskier proposition.

Ranger/Pierce – Defensive buffs at the 4*/5* level can really cripple a hero’s ability to do useful things with a special. Pierce allows heroes to occasionally punch damage and status effects past these buffs, which can turn a “hurt” into a “kill.”

Wizard/Jinx–The problem here is not the talent, but the recipients. Many of the most desirable Wizards to give stat boosts to don’t really benefit at all from Jinx. Zeline, Sartana and Hel are probably the poster children for the Talent, since it can boost damage output, and they actually do decent damage. Jinx can convert a Sartana shot into a guaranteed kill on a buffed target. Isarnia fires late generally, and if she fires, it’s usually game over anyway.

Monk/Withstand–the lack of cleanses at the 5* level means that withstand is quite powerful. The real issue here is that the heroes one would most like this on are not the heroes for whom it’s available.

  1. Solid and useful, but not game-changing

Paladin/Protect–The short duration of Protect means it’s very easy to work around. I don’t really change my strategy based on its presence/absence, but it is annoying when a target suddenly has 25% more defense. Occasionally, it is the difference between a hero dying or living to fire a special.

Sorcerer/Delay–this would be a super useful defensive ability if it proc’d on taking damage, and applied to the mana from the attack as well as the next 2 turns. As written, though, it’s basically useful for making slow tanks even worse than they already are. Also, sabina vs Guin is already a desirable matchup, so it’s not really changing behavior there.

Druid/Companion–the extra health on proc is nice, but this doesn’t change my playstyle at all when it’s present. The damage from the minion is generally irrelevant. It also doesn’t help that this class is a dumping ground for a bunch of unloved heroes who one is unlikely to class up in the first place.

  1. Generally not very useful

Barbarian/Bleed–Applying a low-damage DOT on normal attack is deeply “meh.” In theory, this should be really awesome. But in practice, I find that this just adds a bit of damage to already-won fights, and doesn’t nothing to help me on the close fights. If I cam focus tiles on a target, a little extra damage boost doesn’t make much of a difference.

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If you used tile kills more than special kills, you’d feel differently. As @KLinMayhem says, Delilah popping back and firing after a tile kill is a phone-into-wall kinda moment :slight_smile:

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talents arent necessarily game changing, and they shouldnt be, but the STAT upgrades are huge for 3* heroes.

im not sure about you all, but im having a very difficult time in the tournament with my 2300 (no emblem) team. 8/9 attacks were against teams 2450 to 2550 (all with emblems), so for me, nearly every battle has been an uphill battle. Im facing guys who are emblemed +10, and its a very difficult win for me (ive lost 2/9 so far, heh)

so… i would say, talents are meh, but the stat bonuses that come with emblem usage is huge.

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Where I find the barbarian bleed useful is against Titans. My barbarian is a +7 Gretel. The last purple Titan, 9* I believe, I used a 3/2 stack of Wu, Vivica, Gretel, Boldtusk, Wilbur. With all the various buffs going, the bleed ticked for about 320-350 damage per turn. That’s not a small tick, especially if you can proc it more than once during the fight.

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Why yes, yes it is.

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@Garanwyn
For me it is more of a… ’ yes get in there ’ kind of moment.
Just a shame that my, my, myyyyy Delilah is only on a 12% revive chance at the moment.

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It is probably worth mentioning for the record that I 100% care about the stat boosts more than the talents for the heroes I class up. Even the best talents are only a chance to proc, while the stat boosts are always on.

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damn, +5 is impressive for a 5*. Mine are only at +3.

Most of my raids comprise of both teams having fully maxed four stars or better. Some have emblems, some don’t (none of mine do). In these fights I have seen the talents proc a decent number of times, but rarely to much overall impact. That is, I won the fights I would have won anyway, and lost the ones I was losing anyway. At this point, the stat change (e.g., it takes longer to kill a Boril tank) has seemed more impactful than the talent.

However, in the three star raid tournament I have heavily felt the impact of emblems (again, on my opponent’s defense - none are on my heroes). I have now lost two fights to heavily emblemed teams that I think I would have won had they had none. In one Valen at tank revived four times in a row. He was able to fire his special one of those times, which hurt, but the larger impediment was that he absorbed tiles that otherwise would have been ghosted or damaged the flank.

It made me feel that maybe not enough emblems have been accumulated to affect four and five star fights drastically, while also giving me a preview of how (and that) they will.

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@capertillar
I have another 7 5*'s all at level 3, waiting for the emblems (65) to hit level 4.
The RNG just smiled on me and paid out 50 fighter emblems in a titan chest one day, so i have always been ahead of the game with fighter emblems… just luck.

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Nerf @LSLordy

Twenty not fairs!

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lol, holy cow. 50 is an insane pull from a titan chest. Good for you! =)