To nerf or not to nerf? That is the question!

Thanks to everyone who watched my SOS video series and contributed by commenting! One of the topics that emerged since the Part 3 video is the Telluria and Vela Nerf. Check out my new video and be sure to vote: https://forms.gle/DF2w3P9UzYhpX3qR7

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Sometimes when balance is off kilter. What is a different option? Buff some other 200 heroes?
Or just fix the one that has caused imbalance?

It’s should be reserved for broken game scenarios.
Judging by the change log, I think the devs have been fair with the nerf hammer. All though, I think Vela has taken far too much credit for the recent saturation…

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Some solid suggestions, sadly I don’t think we will ever see a healthy approach to this issue. Mostly because the community flooded with people who understand very little about conflict management, and I don’t think SGG has anyone on their staff with enough pull to make a real difference either lol.

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I like the level-headed discussion.
Not just raising issues, but also providing solutions.

Unfortunately most will take changes personally as their investment is devalued, whether that be time, money or other.

Thanks for being a calm and concise spokesperson for the community.

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Another well considered perspective @NittanyLionRoar

Perception of randomness reminds me of one of my earlier poems…

I don’t have any heroes that have been nerfed while I’ve had them, but even so, I just don’t understand the rage that some people are feeling. Perhaps I am naturally too introspective?

My real love is Warhammer 40k (E&P is just a placeholder until the kids all leave home and I get my hobby room back…in 16 years).

In many hobby games the rule set is rewritten every few years, the characters and troops rebalanced and different aspects of combat given more weight.

In 1998 the range of a bolt gun, the standard armament of an Imperial Space Marine, when moving was halved from 24" to 12", a 50% nerf.

Now I was less able to mow down combat troops at range. But the overall game experience was much more dynamic and exciting.

I bought hundreds of models and their effectiveness in the game changed overnight.

And literally thousands of troops and items of wargear have been reworked in the years that followed and 7 subsequent editions of the game.

The concept of getting angry about it or asking for money back never crossed my mind.

Surely the important thing is that the game is balanced and fun for everyone?

This is a small number of my army books covering the same armies over the years.

And yes, I do understand that there’s a significant commercial element in relaunching games and also, that I am a colossal nerd.

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Hello all I don’t really use these forums much but nerfing these characters hurts I spent a lot of time and money getting these characters to just get screwed I think I’m just done and need a break enjoy your games it just angers me all the money I now feel I wasted on this game that being said I will never purchase anything from this game again and for all you people talking about balance/fair that’s not life.

I do hate the nerfs and I suppose that’s it’s largely influenced by my owning Tellvela. I don’t want my money back but I think an option of resetting either or both would seem fair given that my decision to spend resources and mats was based on comparing them to other heroes on my roster that have yet to be maxed. That’s what rubs me the wrong way.

Will it be good for the game? Time will tell. We’ve lost some awesome players over this ongoing debacle and I suspect that SGs position of nerfing any hero(s) not named Gravemaker that occur too frequently in defenses will continue to drive players away.

I do wish that they would listen to the suggestions of finding alternate ways to reduce certain heroes from taking over the game. Rotating war tank colors, 4* and under wars, 3* wars(!), class restricted defenses, and so on. Why not declare the third week of every month a Blue tank raid defense week?

Bah, instead SG has decided to tell us that the efforts we’ve expended aren’t worth what we should have received. That’s a load that smells bad.

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Alas poor Yorick, I knew him Horatio…

Legit Question:

If you had the option of resetting Telluria to have all of your resources returned, and honestly think about this, would you:

  1. Do nothing?
  2. Take off all emblems in exchange for 100% resource and emblem return?
  3. Take off emblems AND reset to 1-1 in exchange for return of emblems, mats and all resources?

I don’t have her and I don’t know what else you have. I’m just curious because, while I do think the option should be there, I don’t think most people would do a full reset.

That’s a very fair question. It’s funny because of the two I think Telly is the least impacted yet the one that I would most likely reset entirely. I have other greens that I could emblem up to act as war tank and certainly better offensive choices.

Vela is the one most severely impacted by the nerfs yet I have fewer choices as an alternate for defense. Magni would be a maybe choice for defense. Athena would be a great choice for everything but defense.

The bottom line is that I would at least be able to know that my decision was based on how the hero would operate, and continue to operate, as my roster progressed. As things stand now, any or all of our rosters is subject to the nerf hammer and that’s just bad for the game.

I would be extremely surprised if we ever see a massive nerf again because I think they will be much more careful about releasing a (relatively) easy to acquire hero that can change the entire meta of the game. There can be almost no question that they never want anything like this to happen again, because, absolutely NOBODY is going to be happy with anything that happens.

If you don’t nerf, people are going to continue to be upset about the game getting boring fighting the same teams all the time at the top level. If you do nerf, well, you see the reaction to that.

So, I think that we should (as players) give the benefit of the doubt this one time and hope that a mistake like Telluria will never be made again.

We do want to see heroes gradually get stronger and stronger as they are released, but I think this will be done more conservatively.

As far as Vela goes, I honestly think she’s still extremely good. I think she’s arguably as good as she was in her original form since she does the D down to everyone, even though it’s for a lower percentage than it was after the first, “Nerf.”

And, you mention the other green tank possibilities and that’s just it…as long as Vela has some sort of meat shield, she’s still going to be extremely good on defense.

The area where I really feel badly for folks on Vela is she’s not even close to being an outstanding offensive hero and never was…so that’s a shame for them. She’s useable, but nothing amazing.

Both (Tel/Vel) would have been better if they were hit/buff 3 in their released form.

Now it’s some kind of doctoring around to keep the combo best and make us wanting S3 heroes at the same time.

I already stripped Vela and probably will strip Telly as well for Heimdall.

If they buffed some older HotMs like e.g. Ares, Greg (fast), Khio and some more to buff all allies instead of only nearby it would have been a community friendly solution, too.

I’m looking forward to face more non GTV defenses in the future.

Weekly tank color rotation in wars as well as in raids would have been a nicer step, too.

All these things were mentioned long before the first nerf, some even before their releases. Sadly non of those suggestions got enough attention.

So now it is like it is, go F2P, cheaper2P, stay whale or leave. All those options have been there and will be there as long as the game is up.

Ranting isn’t a good idea, no matter what will happen.

Reason I maxed Vela was because of that extra damage against fire she had, to improve my scores on red titans (since I dont have Athena or Frida/Arthur). Lepus was “blue” on my defense team and he was emblemed. So, I have maxed her ASAP, even bought two telescopes for her. Few months later Tellu was out, I was not planning of doing big pulls for her, got lucky on a 10-pull for Valhalla (I was after Nordri, as I recall), and got Tellu as a bonus draw. I maxed Tellu pretty fast (had tonics for her), and then realized how powerful Tellu/Vela combo on defense is, transferred emblems from Lepus to Vela, and they were backbone of my defense ever since. But primarily, I maxed Vela for titan team.
After Vela got nerfed first time, I was not so much bothered, since she remained excellent defense hero, but with this nerf, I will most likely remove her from my defense and replace her with some other ice hero. By doing that, I will strip her of emblems, and what is to be left of her will probably not be good enough to use on offense. That is my biggest issue with this Vela nerf.

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An unfortunate byproduct of the recent nerf party has been other heroes getting dragged into the discussion who really have no place there. I mean, there is an ‘Alfrike is too powerful’ thread now which is wholly unjustified imho.

@Olmor are you switching to heimdal? Thats what I am debating on. And who are you going to give velas emblems too? I dont have Ckad or zim. No good 5s to put them on.

I dunno man… I hear you. But… people were saying this back when Guin got nerfed. And the sky never fell afterwards. Also… Guin stayed in the game!
Until April, 2020 that is…

I can’t imagine that keeping balance is an easy task.
No matter what direction or method they choose. There’s a lot going on in this game, and keeping it from becoming stale…is exactly how SG described:
"an on-going process"
It always has been. It always will be. It has to be!

Which makes you right! All our heroes are subject to the nerf hammer. But they aren’t behaving like lumberjacks. And I’m glad my Telly got thwacked

The green wars and green raids. That was also:

They don’t want to eliminate Telly. They don’t want to "eliminate" any one… but they did. They mistakenly eliminated every other tank in the game.

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Telluria & Vela Adjustments

Telluria and Vela are still, once again based both on our metrics and player feedback, too powerful when compared to the other top tier heroes. Despite the previous balancing passes, their use rate on Diamond Tier raids is much higher than what it should be. We believe that even the best heroes should not be present in the notable majority of defense or attack formations – and Telluria is, at worst, present in three out of four defense formations!

*To address the issue we’re making further adjustments to the Special Skills of Telluria and Vela. These changes are necessary for the game balance

and if they are not effective enough, we will continue doing similar changes in the future too.*

This is straight from SG.
They nerfed both Tell and Vela because they are being used too much for their liking. If players don’t chuck all that time, ham, feeders, and emblems to the curb, they’re going to keep right on beating them into submission. And it’s not just the effort spent on Tell and Vela, some players no doubt built up other heroes around those to of the other elements and alternate classes.

I’ll maintain that a far more equitable solution would be to introduce restrictions in a more positive and creative manner. Rotating tank classes or elements. For war or raids. Restrict TP levels on defense teams. Omit a given element. At least by implementing new rules SG would not be telling us that we’ve wasted our efforts but instead would be telling us that we’ve got more work to do. I think that would be received far better than a bop on the head.

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Stripped Vela already to power up Freya. Telly still +19, but I test some other tanks right now.

I think I don’t want Tootie as tank, but I use him very often. Telly is only a tank. Almost never used anywhere else.

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Haha tootie. Cheers! I use him everywhere too. I just think bc of tellurias speed is hard to justify “tootie” at tank

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Do you suppose that applying tournament rules (in essence) to war and raids will have have some further kinks for balancing issues?

I see that move adding more strains to emblems.

On one hand you have the player who spent 6 months getting his 1st 5*, Telly, max’d up and is applying emblems. Just got 18 on there and thwack!

On the other hand, you have a lot of us, who dream up defense combos. And spend 6 months maxing out our dream defense team. Moving all the emblems. Just got ready to put it to the test and thwack!
Holy is banned.
4* only.
Wth?!..

The problem with rotating wars is… emblems!

In our family of alliances. We used to move back and forth between alliances for some down time. Now we have different tank colors. Which is similar to your idea. Emblems prevent teams from changing defenses…
And competitive players want to field their best defense.

I personally like the idea of further war restrictions. I’m fairly well suited to adapt. I think there are many players, who will feel differently.

There is no perfect solution for balance. Hence…
The on-going process

Sometimes the simple solution is the right one.
Which in this case, directly address the issue which is causing imbalance.

There’s a lot that complicated fixing this particular issue. It won’t be the last time an issue like this happens. It certainly wasn’t the first time.