The Problem with Poe Is Not Completely a Poe Problem
January 23, 2016 4:24PM
edited January 2016
There are multiple reasons Poe is a problem, and it's not all him.
1. About half the characters released with the Force Awakens were juiced. Poe, First Order Tie Pilot, and Rey are hands down the best characters in there class. The only reason people aren't posting "Nerf Rey Now!" posts are because she is so hard to get and there aren't many people using here. However, it just does not stop there. I keep waiting to see more Finn teams. He seems pretty solid too, but I do not have enough experience with him to have an informed opinion.
2. As stated in #1, Poe is simply the best Tank in the game and it isn't even close. Right now, the game is all about speed and damage. Poe is all that. He is a first turn toon. His "Taunt" not only lasts 2 turns, he exposes every toon in your group at a 65% chance rate which adds to the damage output of the team while also removing 25% turn meter from everyone in your group (see above that the game is all about damage and speed). Also, his basic attack has a 40% to 80% chance of inflicting offense down for 2 turns. All this offers unprecedented protection to the rest of Poe's group. Again, he is the best Tank in the game by far.
3. All other protective tanks in the game are irrelevant at high level pvp (and I use that tern loosely since the other team is AI controlled) matches. While you do see the occasional Chewbacca in the top 50, he always gets replaced eventually once you have options. I have not seen a Chewbacca in a top 10 fight in 3 weeks at least. It is all speed and damage and Chewbacca is all defense. The closest thing I have seem to a tank comparable to Poe is Stormtrooper Han, and while he has a bit of turn meter manipulation, he does not have the speed or hit points of Poe. By the time Han goes, the other team has already gone and his chance to protect softer toons has already passed.
4. There aren't that many people who have tons of toons. So when a toon comes out that seems out of balance, there aren't many people who can put different combinations of toons together to try counters. Our toon selection is very limited, especially when combined with a level increase that forces people to sink all their resources into keeping up. We have nothing left over to put towards toon farming. This will obviously change as time goes by, but the level increase was really badly timed. I realized that some people were bored, but it was not the best decision for fixing the game balance. It hurt game balance efforts.
It all adds up to more of a problem with game balance than solely a problem with Poe. How do you fix it?
1. Maybe Poe does ineed adjusted a little along with some of the other FA toons. It is to be expected that as players get a hold of toons and unlock their potential, some game breakage is going to occur and things will have to be adjusted. Get used to it.
2. Adjust the game balance so that it is not all about damage and speed and the outcome of most matches aren't determined in a minute or less. Maybe it means tuning down the overall damage output, but maybe it involves increasing the defensive abilities in the game.
3. This brings us to...maybe the rest of the tanks in the game don't need to be irrelevant anymore. Bring them up to something closer to Poe's level. If Poe needs adjusting, he does not need to be adjusted really hard if other tanks are brought up.
4. It is hard to see how out of balance things are when toons are broken. For example, Ventress' buff removal has been busted since launch. And while I think she may be far too slow to matter (fast toons with speed buffs or speeds slow downs mean they move at least twice before she moves once), if she could, say, remove Poe's taunt and other buffs from the group like she is supposed to, maybe things wouldn't seem so bad. But I will never know because, while I have used her experimentally in a few non-arena matches, I have not really taken her seriously because her ability is busted. In all the times I have used it, I don't think I have ever seen her remove a single buff. This is just one example, but how can we really truly know if things are out of balance and how to balance them if things aren't working right in the first place? You might just be making a balance change that is thrown out of balance all over again as soon as you fix something that is broken and you have to adjust things again.
Anyway, that's my response to all the "Nerf Poe" posts. In fact, it is my response to all the "Nerf toon X" posts. The problems in the game aren't all about one toon. It is bigger and more complicated than that and it is going to take some time to get it right. So just relax, play the game, and post constructive feedback to the forums so you can help make it right.
And stop with all the "money grab" posts. Of course they want to make money. They need to make money. This is their job. But I bet they also care about the game they created. They want people to like the game. They want to be proud of their work just like everyone who likes what they do for a living. Give them a break.
Krey
1. About half the characters released with the Force Awakens were juiced. Poe, First Order Tie Pilot, and Rey are hands down the best characters in there class. The only reason people aren't posting "Nerf Rey Now!" posts are because she is so hard to get and there aren't many people using here. However, it just does not stop there. I keep waiting to see more Finn teams. He seems pretty solid too, but I do not have enough experience with him to have an informed opinion.
2. As stated in #1, Poe is simply the best Tank in the game and it isn't even close. Right now, the game is all about speed and damage. Poe is all that. He is a first turn toon. His "Taunt" not only lasts 2 turns, he exposes every toon in your group at a 65% chance rate which adds to the damage output of the team while also removing 25% turn meter from everyone in your group (see above that the game is all about damage and speed). Also, his basic attack has a 40% to 80% chance of inflicting offense down for 2 turns. All this offers unprecedented protection to the rest of Poe's group. Again, he is the best Tank in the game by far.
3. All other protective tanks in the game are irrelevant at high level pvp (and I use that tern loosely since the other team is AI controlled) matches. While you do see the occasional Chewbacca in the top 50, he always gets replaced eventually once you have options. I have not seen a Chewbacca in a top 10 fight in 3 weeks at least. It is all speed and damage and Chewbacca is all defense. The closest thing I have seem to a tank comparable to Poe is Stormtrooper Han, and while he has a bit of turn meter manipulation, he does not have the speed or hit points of Poe. By the time Han goes, the other team has already gone and his chance to protect softer toons has already passed.
4. There aren't that many people who have tons of toons. So when a toon comes out that seems out of balance, there aren't many people who can put different combinations of toons together to try counters. Our toon selection is very limited, especially when combined with a level increase that forces people to sink all their resources into keeping up. We have nothing left over to put towards toon farming. This will obviously change as time goes by, but the level increase was really badly timed. I realized that some people were bored, but it was not the best decision for fixing the game balance. It hurt game balance efforts.
It all adds up to more of a problem with game balance than solely a problem with Poe. How do you fix it?
1. Maybe Poe does ineed adjusted a little along with some of the other FA toons. It is to be expected that as players get a hold of toons and unlock their potential, some game breakage is going to occur and things will have to be adjusted. Get used to it.
2. Adjust the game balance so that it is not all about damage and speed and the outcome of most matches aren't determined in a minute or less. Maybe it means tuning down the overall damage output, but maybe it involves increasing the defensive abilities in the game.
3. This brings us to...maybe the rest of the tanks in the game don't need to be irrelevant anymore. Bring them up to something closer to Poe's level. If Poe needs adjusting, he does not need to be adjusted really hard if other tanks are brought up.
4. It is hard to see how out of balance things are when toons are broken. For example, Ventress' buff removal has been busted since launch. And while I think she may be far too slow to matter (fast toons with speed buffs or speeds slow downs mean they move at least twice before she moves once), if she could, say, remove Poe's taunt and other buffs from the group like she is supposed to, maybe things wouldn't seem so bad. But I will never know because, while I have used her experimentally in a few non-arena matches, I have not really taken her seriously because her ability is busted. In all the times I have used it, I don't think I have ever seen her remove a single buff. This is just one example, but how can we really truly know if things are out of balance and how to balance them if things aren't working right in the first place? You might just be making a balance change that is thrown out of balance all over again as soon as you fix something that is broken and you have to adjust things again.
Anyway, that's my response to all the "Nerf Poe" posts. In fact, it is my response to all the "Nerf toon X" posts. The problems in the game aren't all about one toon. It is bigger and more complicated than that and it is going to take some time to get it right. So just relax, play the game, and post constructive feedback to the forums so you can help make it right.
And stop with all the "money grab" posts. Of course they want to make money. They need to make money. This is their job. But I bet they also care about the game they created. They want people to like the game. They want to be proud of their work just like everyone who likes what they do for a living. Give them a break.
Krey
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Replies
I was not talking to you... TL;DR means "Too long;didn't read" I was summarizing your wall of text.
Ah. My apologies. I was not familiar with that acronym. I end up having to write a lot of technical documentation for the stuff I develop. I get on a roll and dump out all the stuff in my head on a topic. It's always more than I excepted.
Krey
Keep it up man
If you happened to read beyond the title, his point (and others) is that a solution doesn't always need a nerf. If Poe was a chromium toon, he wouldn't be getting half the attention.
Imagine - if a Poe counter (like QGJ) was equally farmable. Or reduce dmg overall to make the average battle duration 3 minutes instead of the 1-2 minutes it is today. Many others have mentioned other ideas.
If that is the way they want the game to work, that's fine. I can play that game too. But I have a feeling fights are supposed to last more than a minute. They shouldn't last 5 minutes, but there's got to be a better balance. While tuning Poe may (or may not) be a part of the solution, it isn't a silver bullet that will cure everything that's wrong.
Krey
As I have been saying, it's not necessarily a Poe problem. It is a game balance issue.
Krey