Adjusting Trash Characters Costs

By JoeyBriefcase, in Star Wars: Destiny

Hey there folks, this is something i always think about when comparing characters. Costs can be a little unruly and some characters end up stuck out in the cold and thats real rough. I just want to give some decent, nonmathematical reasoning as to why certain characters should be adjusted.

LUMINARA

Ooh boy is she not worth her points. Paying 17 points for a cap of 4 damage and 10 health with no decent pairings means she is outshone by dozens of cheaper characters. Generally speaking, characters with specials are less expensive than characters with inherent abilities. She is worse than dooku, who is tankier even with 10 health, but her die is better than seventh sister who has that all important inherent ability. For her to be playable and have an actual place in this game, she would need to be 11/14.

JYN ERSO

Love this girl but dang if she aint hot garbage. She's too weak for a kill deck and too squishy for a mill deck, plus her ability is mandatory on the first yellow event so you can't save it for a rainy day. Her die is great and though she does have a cap of 4 damage she would be perfectly playable as a 14/18 for all the utility she provides. I foresee her being rereleased with that ability instead being a power action.

IG-88

Crappy special and crappy sides=crappy die. 2 shields for a resource is so odd and hard to justify, especially with Obi-Wan Kenobi bringing those 3 melee sides in legacies. I want to be real conservative and say that at 15/19 he'd be good but thats not true. His die sides need adjusting. 14/18 is the only way i can see him being used these days. We really need to redefine what is reasonable for 18 or 19 point elite characters. So far Kylo and Krennic (barely) show their worth with caps of 6 (very situational) damage.

So hey, theres room to change and grow. I would love these changes to occur, but you know what? They probably won't. A guy can dream can't he? Share your thoughts on other reasonable point adjustments you'd like going forward.

Edited by JonasBenz

Seem to be fair assessments, especially for Luminara.

I know a guy who runs a pretty mean Jyn deck which utilises Infamous to ambush Never Tell Me The Odds at 2 Resources and basically OTK you with a well-upgraded Jyn. Ackbar serves as her off-sider, opening up Field Medic and Draw Attention to keep her alive. It’s a combo deck so it doesn’t always work, but bringing Jyn down to 18 would open up two-die Snap or one-die Leia, probably propelling it up to tier 1.5.

I think IG-88 is unsalvageable at this stage.

I see no reason why points can't be adjusted down in addition to up.

I think with the dice you are stuck though.

While I don't see any reason to not allow characters to get point reductions to be possible, I recall an old axiom that in game balance nerfs are more effective than buffs and I don't think you need to look farther than the current meta to see that's true. Without extensive testing I don't think I would be comfortable with them reducing character points right now.

However If we were say suggesting one's to be tested, I would say Chewy. He's just a little too expensive to be played sadly. Probably could get away with a 1 point reduction to allow him with Poe2 to do some special chaining.

Edited by Atomisk

Seeing that the new FINN is out of this world better than the last I think old Finn should slot in at 11/14 or even possibly 10/13.

I would adjust Bossk down 1 point. I actually have. I played Bossk jango against friends. And will play Fett Bossk in the future

I see no reason in casual to not play what you want as long as everyone agrees it's fair

kinda surprised to see Jyn before Leia suggested for a price cut lol

Jyn is somewhat useful but Leia is just...trash. She has a decent die but big whoop when her 16pt ability is utter garbage.

1 hour ago, Vineheart01 said:

kinda surprised to see Jyn before Leia suggested for a price cut lol

Jyn is somewhat useful but Leia is just...trash. She has a decent die but big whoop when her 16pt ability is utter garbage.

Oh yeah i agree, i didn't want a huge wall of text though. Leia needs to be 15 elite

I too think points adjustments are the easiest way to errata. I wish we had more characters that were playable in the meta. Most people like two character elite decks, so make it happen.

Imperial assault created upgrade cards that reduce the cost of characters. Maybe plots cards could do the same

It is hard to argue those characters are over cost however errataing cards is the worst way and last resort to fixing the game. Those characters sucking isn't breaking the game so they will be left alone. The best thing they can do is print new versions of those characters, hopefully better balanced. See new Finn.

1 hour ago, Mep said:

Those characters sucking isn't breaking the game so they will be left alone. The best thing they can do is print new versions of those characters, hopefully better balanced. See new Finn.

What goes in is, just as important as what doesn't sometimes.

Having 2-3 characters be overcosted, and then have several characters not have suitable combinations, does impact the meta as there is less choice.

New Finn has a different ability to old Finn, so waiting for a reprint is fine, but it would be nice to have 2 fair costed Finns that expanded our choices.

New Finn is also red, old Finn is yellow with redcard cheats.

Bit surprised at that one really. The two of them arent remotely similar.

What about good Old Luke Jedi knight? I see people saying K2 is better than him, Sabine is better, and even BOTH obi-wan's are better.

36 minutes ago, tunewalker said:

What about good Old Luke Jedi knight? I see people saying K2 is better than him, Sabine is better, and even BOTH obi-wan's are better.

I have been playing eLuke in various forms since the game came out and I definitely don't think he needs any reduction. Plus he even topped a few Championships back during SoR meta w/ Rey. Imo he just needs a good partner for him and Yoda is the best pair thus far. Yoda just makes him scary consistent. I think Luke will be fine.

I think Awakenings Luke is perfect for a Return of the Jedi Luke. I agree that he needs a great partner. Maybe we will get a Last Jedi Luke. Look at poor Vader. He doesn't even have a light saber yet.

14 hours ago, Amanal said:

What goes in is, just as important as what doesn't sometimes.

Having 2-3 characters be overcosted, and then have several characters not have suitable combinations, does impact the meta as there is less choice.

New Finn has a different ability to old Finn, so waiting for a reprint is fine, but it would be nice to have 2 fair costed Finns that expanded our choices.

I agree that having all the characters on par with each other would open up the meta. However that gets accomplished with more releases. Changing what is printed on a card is difficult since not everyone keeps up with all these changes. I am sure they know some of their characters are trash and will be making new versions of them eventually - hopefully playable versions.

Either way, this isn't Imperial Assault where they can release a skirmish upgrade card to fix a character. It is just has easy to make a new version. I guess they could do zero cost plots that can only be played with the over-costed characters but I don't see them putting that much effort into fixing things. I get the feeling they just want to do better with their next release.

Adjusting character costs takes time and effort (playtesting if nothing else). For the most part, I would prefer FFG focus on polishing upcoming products. I say “for the most part” because I would like to see Finn’s cost changed. He has truly interesting gametext which would open up so many decktypes if he cost 10/14 instead of 13/16. For example...

ePoe/Finn - Throw AT-STs!

eLeia/eFinn - Tons of Ranged damage, even from Villain Weapons.

eChirrut/eFinn - Mixed base damage for the mixed modifiers.

EFinn/Padawan/Padawan - Cheap Riot Batons and Finn can hold unique Sabers.

Etc, etc.

yeah Luminara is so overcosted is not funny!!

Just been comparing her stats to Aayla Secura and there's almost no difference in dice faces and health, yet Aayla is a whole 5 points cheaper for the elite versions of the 2 characters, and TBH still only tier 1.5 to tier 2 anyways.

Luminara could easily get a 4-5 point cut and she would be fine, anything less and she would still be garbage.

It is also sad that soon after some of the Awakenings characters get new partners they will be rotated out.

My Chewie, Jyn deck is great!

Also my Chewie, Chirrut crushes. Can’t wait for both of those decks to get better with the plot cards!

But yeah, I agree about those changes.

On 12/12/2017 at 1:18 PM, GooeyChewie said:

ePoe/Finn - Throw AT-STs!

forget throwing ATST's i'll take my eHera/eFinn and literally play the ATST turn 1 lol
(the amount of times i somehow managed to get both Quadjumper and ATST in my starting hand is ridiculous. Hera the Quad, find a third resource which usually pops up among the other 3 dice, use quadjumper action play 3cost atst lol)

On 12/10/2017 at 8:04 PM, JonasBenz said:

Hey there folks, this is something i always think about when comparing characters. Costs can be a little unruly and some characters end up stuck out in the cold and thats real rough. I just want to give some decent, nonmathematical reasoning as to why certain characters should be adjusted.

LUMINARA

Ooh boy is she not worth her points. Paying 17 points for a cap of 4 damage and 10 health with no decent pairings means she is outshone by dozens of cheaper characters. Generally speaking, characters with specials are less expensive than characters with inherent abilities. She is worse than dooku, who is tankier even with 10 health, but her die is better than seventh sister who has that all important inherent ability. For her to be playable and have an actual place in this game, she would need to be 11/14.

JYN ERSO

Love this girl but dang if she aint hot garbage. She's too weak for a kill deck and too squishy for a mill deck, plus her ability is mandatory on the first yellow event so you can't save it for a rainy day. Her die is great and though she does have a cap of 4 damage she would be perfectly playable as a 14/18 for all the utility she provides. I foresee her being rereleased with that ability instead being a power action.

IG-88

Crappy special and crappy sides=crappy die. 2 shields for a resource is so odd and hard to justify, especially with Obi-Wan Kenobi bringing those 3 melee sides in legacies. I want to be real conservative and say that at 15/19 he'd be good but thats not true. His die sides need adjusting. 14/18 is the only way i can see him being used these days. We really need to redefine what is reasonable for 18 or 19 point elite characters. So far Kylo and Krennic (barely) show their worth with caps of 6 (very situational) damage.

So hey, theres room to change and grow. I would love these changes to occur, but you know what? They probably won't. A guy can dream can't he? Share your thoughts on other reasonable point adjustments you'd like going forward.

Are you saying Kylo isn't one of the best characters in destiny? Because if that is so, you are sadly mistaken. He is currently the second most winning deck (with grievous or baby vader) at 20% and probably the most played villian in the game.

1 hour ago, Psalm 112 said:

Are you saying Kylo isn't one of the best characters in destiny? Because if that is so, you are sadly mistaken. He is currently the second most winning deck (with grievous or baby vader) at 20% and probably the most played villian in the game.

Whoa pal, krennic is the barely in that situation. We all know kylo is super solid.

Edited by JonasBenz