There are things going on in battles all the time and I have no freaking idea why. Heroes on one side or the other will randomly take damage, have effects added/removed, get healed, etc. It’s all way too complicated. I can’t even tell if certain things happening are bugs or not. I’ve tried recording battles to see what the hell was going on afterwards and while I can usually figure it out (with lots of effort) sometimes I have no clue. You have multiple passives, aether powers, abilities attached to minions/fiends, costume bonuses, family bonuses, emblem abilities, super talents, and who knows what else. Oh, we have passives and other abilities attached to legendary troops upcoming too to add to the chaos. There are even abilities that are confusing to understand (looking at you Goblins). Why does the new elemental 4* Lexi have “Soul Connection” as her ability instead of just the shared damage that has been around since Season 2? It’s confusing!! What’s the difference? Just because it only affects nearby instead of all means it needs to whole new name? The number of heroes with so many different abilities is also impossible to remember, much less all the extra stuff that goes along with each hero. It all makes the game less fun… Anyways, as I think I’ve demonstrated, the game is too complicated. Solution? No idea. Probably should just pull the plug on the game to be honest… would be best for all of us if they did.
Even some abilities are complicated to use… like defense going up/down per turn over 4 turns. It’s hard to keep track of it all to make full use of it.
Shared damage was rebranded as “Soul Connection” in one of the recent updates.
I do agree with you mostly. Too much stuff going on. Much of it, left to RNG. Feels less and less like a puzzle game and more like a slot machine.
Making it more complicated: Passives don’t always work but are based off RNG (as Dr_Evil_Genius brought up). That makes it even more confusing: this happened when I did this last time but not this time or vice versa.
It was a happy day when passives from my team dealt the death blow fast enough to get me some speed bonus points in HL.
Conversely my team has been massacred by defence team passives too.
I don’t bother to analyse when one match or one special causes “fireworks”.
I wait for the smoke to clear and then check if I can continue or whose turn it is or … 
I disagree.
The complexity is what Make this game fun for me!
All the synergy that you can fond Between heroes is awsome.
If you know Well you’re hero it Make you Stronger than a random player…
Don’t understanding the synergy Between defensive team is less important… It helps, but you can live without it
But you need to know your team with the subtility.
I think it would be bad to take away the subtility, because it would just Make more Space for randomness.
It always has been! For me as well, complexity is the fun part.
Before all the niches and variety limiting development material, I spent days… and days… working on and testing different attack synergies. Whether I wanted mono, 2-3, 2-2-1 or rainbow …days! I had printed up options to sort through on a table and made computerized folders to scroll through on a tablet.
Long hours, composing all 5 slots into one lean mean fighting machine. Old schoolers like @madmarv @Uclapack @Razor @Xero786 @Kerridoc @Coppersky @Avicious not enough space to mention them all.
None of them… are Neanderthals.
The complexity and strategy of the game has always been team composition. Board management takes some decision making at times, but personally I find that elementary compared to composing something consistent and efficient.
Just because it’s more niche now…
doesn’t change the core mechanics of the game.
There is still only 6 flags for war. That’s 30 heroes you need to isolate. Adding niches like Rush or mega minions would be more interesting and challenging if they were balanced. Because they are not… the added compilations for synergizing our bench is actually less thoughtful, and more about acquisition.
So we grind and pull and grind and keep and grind and develop overpowered niches when we get them. The process of composition is mutating towards identifying which material or new hero the devs have chosen to profit from.
Personally I find that less strategic and more a brainless revolving door.
If the game is so complicated and no longer fun for you then why are you still playing?? Why put yourself through the pain? Seems a tad masochistic, especially when there are a ton of other games out there and a ton of other things to oocupy your time and ease some stress in your downtime.
Some people like the complexity. Other people don’t. Either way, no one is forcing you to play. If you are one of the latter people then I would suggest finding something else to fill your spare moments as it’s not going to get any simpler any time soon
Just one gamer’s opinion
Game Well 
Why would someone have to continuously switch games rather than the title remaining consistent. Maybe they should develop more games to satisfy different preferences rather than the gamers having to jump ship from legacy titles.
It is not the player’s fault. These changes are based on profit seeking within the mobile gacha model and trying to keep one title going rather than broadening the catalog more than they want to. People don’t need to change to satisfy a product. That has never been the case, and particularly not with entertainment.
As much as I dislike the exponential power creep I must admit that power creep is what has kept me playing for so long. The chance to play with new and improved heroes (even if already a couple years outdated when I get them) still keeps me interested. Certainly I would have stopped years ago if the game never progressed beyond S1, or even S2, heroes.
Since I don’t spend I tend to play in a lower bracket than most here, where I can safely avoid the worst of the worst the game can throw at me. It does still get very confusing at times though when unexpected things happen.
It’s really not that complicated. Just pay up and pull for new heros and you will be fine. And don’t forget to buy the LB2 packages while you are at it.
For me it’s not so much the new mechanics but the pace at which they are being introduced. It’s like finishing a 4 year course in 1 month…
I have to agree with the overly complex mechanics and especially the passive skills.
I run a startup company with more than 150 people and yet this game has managed to become uncomprehensively comlex and frustrating with too many heroes and passives.
Zynga - Slow down!
Exactly my thoughts. Battles are a complete mess. Suddenly an enemy occurs with burn damage. Looking the cards doesnt say anything about burn damage.
People are playing for years this game without any reward back. Just random 5* pulls with o.4% chance to get a 5*.
This game is not about being competitive or strategic the ones that have the more money they have the most pieces of the cake.
You don’t respect a 85year old lady that wants a little joy in her olds people’s home.
Who created this game is psychotic.
Disagree with this. The more rolls of the dice (percent chance of things happening) the greater the entropy. If I have 5 things that can happen at 50% chance that is less random than 15 things at 50% chance. At some point things can become so random it makes no sense to plan for them to occur since the number of meaningful potential outcomes gets so large.
It used to be rock - paper - scissors
Now it’s rock - paper - scissors - lizard - Spock
I am afraid the game owners dont really know you exist!
What do you expect from the game?
How could the game owners respect you?
I think the game owners are greedey but not psychotic.
Statistics disagree with you! 
Huh? How is that so? It’s a pretty simple thing I explained. The more potential outcomes the higher the randomness and lower the predictability.
I dont know what you know about statistics and probability.
But probabilities work out if you have MANY tries.
Example:
If you throw a 6-sided die you have a probabilitie of about 16.7 % that it will show a 1.
Now if you throw this die 10/100/100/ 1 Billion times the result for a 1 will get closer to 16.7 % until it will be there within the standard deviation.
This means the more often you throw the dice the closer to the expected result you will be.
Sorry for the clumsy explenation but English is not my native language.