Onigashima
something that I think is neat in gameplay is ways of nerfing an ability or strategy without directly touching it
Onigashima
I'm hearing just now about one in Marvel vs Capcom 3
Onigashima
where, and I don't know fighting games so details will be wrong,
Onigashima
there was some really good strat with Wolverine, where you were basically supposed to time out an attack at a specific time for a really powerful punish
Onigashima
but players quickly realized that you could just mash the button for that attack really fast and then you didn't need to time shit
Onigashima
so it made Wolverine stronger but also just really stupid and easy to play
Onigashima
the kind of thing you don't want!
Onigashima
so what they did in Ultimate Marvel 3
Onigashima
was not to adjust that move
Onigashima
but to add a new move, called Swiss Cheese
Onigashima
where Wolverine does a bunch of shitty stabs
Onigashima
and it's like, a moderately okay move
Onigashima
but the input for it is
Onigashima
the button that people were mashing, pressed three times in a row
Onigashima
so now if you try to mash it you do Swiss Cheese instead
Onigashima
and eat shit
Onigashima
pushing the original move back to having to be carefully timed
ғᴏxʏᴍᴏʀᴏɴ
... that's really good
Onigashima
the other one I can think of was from Hearthstone
Onigashima
there was a powerful creature card at some point
Onigashima
where it had the ability of
Onigashima
"whever you use your hero ability, summon a random murloc card"
Onigashima
and it was TOO powerful
Onigashima
and they fixed it, not by touching the card at all
Onigashima
but by adding more weak, low-cost murloc cards to the game
Onigashima
this didn't make murlocs worse as a whole, because the new murlocs are cheap to play and effective in early game
Onigashima
but it watered down the "random murloc card" pool
Onigashima
with some shitty low-tier murlocs
HotXC
good design and more murlocs
NekoInc, MSPM
Legitimately a good solution to the problem, and in keeping with at least part of the intent of Murlocs, which is They're Kind Of A Joke.
Bloodededeborne
IIRC Smash has nerfs like that
EsperBot
A related concept is that in some contexts you can buff a character so hard that it never sees play, at least in high level play
Bloodededeborne
Albeit those were less intentional. The most notable one being Jigglypuff's nerf from Smash 4 to ultimate due to everyone's movement options being notably strengthened.
EsperBot
Like in DOTA 2 all tournament play is done in Captain’s Mode, where each turn has a Captain who take turns picking their lineup and - more significantly - banning characters they don’t want to play against
EsperBot
So if a character is completely off the chain and busted what happens is that they...get banned every game
連続犬
ah, the league of legends kassadin problem
連続犬
yes
EsperBot
Every now and then a team will be like ‘ we can handle that’ and let it through, and then usually it turns out that they cannot
Onigashima
and the more consistently a character is banned
Onigashima
the less practice people have facing them
EsperBot
The dynamics are more interesting when it’s a specific combo fo characters that are busted, but each of the characters are just okay on their own
EsperBot
So like in a recent DOTA patch, Tiny and Io were each just decent
EsperBot
But if you got them both together, played properly, they were almost unstoppable
EsperBot
At any moment a rock giant with a huge tree could get teleported into your midst from anywhere on the map, and just instantly obliterate your whole team
EsperBot
So as a result, both Tiny and Io each saw a lot more play than normal
EsperBot
Even though separately they were just okay
EsperBot
Because teams were fishing for the combo and not getting it
Axe Goth Real?
A recent one that I loved was perennial joke character Dan launched in Street Fighter V with an infinite that hinged on the Gadoken, his crappy Hadouken, which does minimal damage but has no pushback because of how small and weak it is, so you'd cancel into it to keep from being pushed too far from your opponent.
Onigashima
oh dan
Onigashima
what can't you do
Axe Goth Real?
The fix to this is that now the Gadoken has a small but increasingly rising chance to come out way more powerful, but when it does it basically blows him back on his ass.
Axe Goth Real?
They flat out buffed the move but removed the infinite combo by doing so.
Onigashima
while still keeping it funny
Axe Goth Real?
Yeah!