Characters Nerf XENOMORPH

[M12bj]

(I am using a translation site.)
Hi, I am Japanese and I always enjoy this game!

I think to write this feedback because I thought that XENOMORPH's SA1 is too strong.
She gives a 30 second DOOM when it changes to a dark element, But Conditions to trigger are too easy!
She just gets FINAL STAND, she can easily defeat the enemy with ONLY LUCK.
HEX is one of the few measures against her, but she can easily prevent it with SKETCHY etc.

I lament that my character is often beaten by her and I often watch chat lamenting that the lift boss was beaten by her.
XENOMORPH's SA1 will cause the player to give up on trial and error, and also take away the fun of trial and error for defense.

From the above, I think it needs nerf XENOMORPH.
Of course I also think it needs Nerf certain Catalist(for example FUTILE RESISTANCE and FROST ARMOR) what is difficult to beat without her.

Thank you very much for reading!

 

[Starsmore]

No.

 

[xcapibara]

I completely agree about nerfing xenomorph, BUT, i strongly disagree with nerfing futile resistance, frost armor and high waters; if anything they should be buffed!

 

[Starsmore]

Xenomorph first transmuting is wasted to move to another and then it's totally random, she need one second to transmute. Hit her while she's blocking and she doesn't change element, use immunity and she doesn't doom you, kill her and doom expire, use final stand and you don't die, characters like Doublicious can trasfer back the debuff, Silent Kill remove it, Private Dick 50% immunity to everytingh, Just Kitten 50% chances to convert it to precision, her hp are so low that even in high streak a combo or two are enough to beat her. She sin't an impossible character to deal with, actualy I have one and most of the time I use her I beat the enemy before the doom expires or even without even applying it.

 

[theLoneskull]

Let me say this, getting to dark isn't very easy to do. Especially when RNG's not on your side. And especially considering that her first move is wasted on transmuting to a random element. Besides, immunity also helps since it prevents the doom. Most of the time when I use Xeno, doom isn't even needed. She still has so much attack that going for the doom is, more often than not, a legit waste. Especially when paired with Chaos. Plus 30 seconds is a good amount of time to kill Xeno. Perhaps you're a lower level player without many damage dealers? She's extremely strong, but is balanced by RNG and her high attack stat making doom somewhat unnecessary. Its more like a Hail Mary sort of thing.

Conditions to trigger are too easy!

The same could be said for other fighters like Buzzkill, Primed, Wulfsbane or Bloodbath. Yet they're still balanced and if anything, their SAs are FAR easier to trigger than Xeno's, so why not mention them hmm? (No, I have nothing against them. If anything, I enjoy winning with them a lot . Its just that their SAs are SO MUCH EASIER to trigger than Xeno's).

 

[Am_Suitcase]

Xeno is fine the way she is. As Loneskull said, getting to dark isn't very easy especially without RNG. I also want to further add tho that there are ways to handle Xenomorph or at least make it even more difficult for her.

Dealing with her on Offense:
Bleed Resist is self-explanatory. Fighters like Private Dick or Just Kitten have a chance of resisting/converting her bleed stacks and its unlikely she'll have doom on her side. If she has Sketchy? Bring a sketchy of your own. Curse will often prevail over the immunity's tag in.

Alternatively, carrying more than one fighter also works well. Since you could easily kill Xeno then switch in another fighter. If the situation calls for it. Outtakes are a good option to.

Dealing with her on Defense:
Fighters like Bio-Exorcist can force Xeno users to have to outtake and put themselves at risk most of the time since she can potentially survive a doom. Even more discouraging on the Rift Boss Node with House Advantage.

Hexy Time catalyst and Surgeon General are good choices for forcing Xenos to pray on RNG even more as Immunity can often come in.

 

[Fel]

Just because a character has counters doesn't mean it doesn't need a nerf.
I think Xeno's doom SA invalidates too many strategies and has a negative impact to design space in the future.
Single player content has to be created with the fact that Xeno can cheese almost any modifier that would stop other strong top tiers.
People have to build rifts with specific catalysts or fighters to prevent a free win.
It'll be hard to balance but I do think its too strong currently.

 

[Starsmore]

A character that have so many ways to be defeated or to avoid her doom (if she applies it, took me almost two minutes and half in the last prize fight and I was playing the normal way, if I had played only to inflict doom I would have lose for time out) doesn't need a nerf.
There are tons of catalysts with armor, nerf those if the problem is the abuse of defensive catalyst.

 

[Lulero]

What @Fel said, quoted what hits home in my view:

Just because a character has counters doesn't mean it doesn't need a nerf.
I think Xeno's doom SA invalidates too many strategies and has a negative impact to design space in the future.
Single player content has to be created with the fact that Xeno can cheese almost any modifier that would stop other strong top tiers.

I'm alright with the impact Xeno has in rifts, however.

 

[Gamma Ray]

Honestly as someone who loves playing Xeno, knowing that the current top player has 3-4 Xenos in order to smash through most rift defenses proves two separate things in my eyes.

1) Offensive diversity and catalyst diversity need to be a thing. I know this will affect some awesome players but at the same time, I am tired of using and seeing endless armies of sketchies and surgeon generals who are barely leveled up. At the same time, Xeno is a headache to think about and I feel having multiple of her and Doublicious is possibly the best way to approach most rifts atm while having characters that could handle reflect dmg.

Catalyst Diversity (and a futile resistance, autoimmune nerf) would be greatly appreciated as it would stop people from spamming armor ratings or other powerful catalysts as it is quite annoying, having to play around 6-8 blockbusted's in a single rift.

2) Xeno needs a rework. I love her to death, but doom has become an issue due to rift battles serving a greater importance for players. While Doublicious still requires you to be active, Xeno is infamously the only character that creates incentives to play purely defensive.

Meter control would be one way, or providing her a method to activate bleeds through her SA, but the simple fact is Doom needs to go as a modifier for players to use (AI can keep it as it does create a fun challenge).

Hopefully Xeno will still be strong thanks to her base stats but she definitely needs a new SA.

 

[Lulero]

Ouch.

@Gamma Ray

I'm all for enforcing more offensive and catalyst diversity too. I'm in Diamond 3-4 but my collection strength is more around mid-game (was able to afford my first diamond evolution a few days ago) and I didn't realize it was so bad late late game. I don't see armies of Xenos/SGs yet, but everyone seem to have at least 3 sketchies (me included).

I also like your take on Xeno but I don't see HV replacing her SA entirely. What about replacing modifier from her SA1 to heavy bleed for 10/15/20s and from her SA2 to doom for 20/15/10s? You'd still be able to cheese on 2p and 3p nodes using a teammate with resurect, but at a cost. Or restrict her SA2 to once a match on top.

 

[Dusty00]

Diversity is key for rift in my opinion. If they restrict one copy of characters (both defense and offense) and catalysts, then the meta should become healthier.

Down the road they will certainly add more catalysts and characters. On top of balancing current meta they have to ensure there will be enough design space for future releases.

Perhaps one way to modify Doom is that Xeno herself needs to stay in play. I abuse it myself but tagging out to tanks to wait out the doom is also problematic. She’d be less successful if she has to survive 30 seconds in boss node.

 

[Skepticemia]

I personally don't think that Xeno is a problem.

The annoyance of Xeno usually comes from having a very strong boss node that is defeated using a "Xeno cheese". However the strength of that boss node usually comes from having a strong catalyst like Futile Resistance, Dark Nut, Frost Armor, Don't Poke The Buer etc. paired with strong fighters. It can be just as annoying to have your node defeated by Xeno as it can be to face one of these strong catalysts and not have something to counter it. That being said, I also don't think that these catalysts need nerfs. They are all "beatable" even without a Xeno, as long as you have the right counters.

There are many ways to protect a node from Xeno if that becomes a constant problem. Hexy Time, Light Weight, Surgeon General etc. Just as how even though a Sketchy can nullify modifiers like Frost Armor, you can protect the node from this with Autoimmune.

@Fel said that "just because a character has a counter doesn't mean they don't need a nerf", but why does Xeno need a nerf? If you have to use Doom to defeat an entire node then you are losing out on the Blockbuster Finish Bonus, and you are quite possibly losing some Time Bonus. If you're losing a rift match only because your boss node was beaten by Xeno, then you probably didn't beat the opponent's boss node. Chances are, they probably had a stronger rift than you if you aren't clearing their map.

Essentially, what I'm trying to say is that I haven't really heard a compelling argument for why Xeno needs a nerf/rework. Sure she can be used to beat some strong matchups by just blocking/delaying until you inflict doom, but there are lots of characters that can win matchups easily using their SAs. Bio-exorcist can drain an opponent's health with her SA, Filia's can inflict permanent bleeds that drain an opponent as well. The beauty of this game is that no matchup is ever really 100% unbeatable.

All of that being said, I do agree with some of the suggestions that have been mentioned. Specifically, offensive diversity and catalyst diversity. Using a variant (e.g. Sketchy) more than once should come at a cost (even if you have multiple copies of the variant). Using a catalyst on 2 different nodes should also come at a cost. It would also be great to see some more catalysts introduced. Maybe even a "Doom Proof" catalyst that makes the character immune to Doom specifically. Or even a "No X allowed" catalyst that prevents you from using a specific character on a node.

 

[Gamma Ray]

@Skepticemia

1) Hexy time does not limit Xeno nearly as much as people believe, especially if you team her up with Surgeon General as I traditionally do.

2) If I see someone burning Light Weight, then most likely they are not using autoimmune, armor rating, or blockbusted. And many will pair it with last words, in which case you can simply use Doublicious since they force themselves into Xeno proofing to the point of making their node easier for another character.

3) Surgeon General is only as strong as a player's refusal to bring her tag-out. If you're not bringing tag-out onto Xeno, that's on you. Tag out negates the SG immunity as well as dealing with Light Weight by forcing the tag outs.

4) Xeno's issue is that a well-played Xeno comp will almost always get a high health bonus which is where the complaints lie. Most people need to sacrifice some form of HP bonus but with Xeno, you are sacrificing the time bonus and that is it.

5) YOU CAN GET THE BLOCKBUSTER BONUS THROUGH DOOM. I need that cleared up now. I have repeatedly mentioned you can finish with a blockbuster to secure the bonus so long as you can manipulate it to occur while the doom debuff times out. It allows her to secure the 100 points even if an opponent is at full hp.

I respect where you are suggesting Xeno doesn't need changes, but you are not viewing the main problem of "Why not run several Xenomorphs"? The current top player currently possess 3 diamond level xenos and an additional gold xeno which makes it impossible to create a set of trio nodes that cannot be smashes through by either Xeno of their other assortment of characters.

If HVS is not intending to add catalyst/offensive diversity, then Xeno needs to be looked at in the same way Doublicious would need to.

HOWEVER

I do agree that Xeno should be left alone should the diversity changes be added. Using Xeno for one node is perfectly fine in my book. My issue comes at seeing her being used for 2-3 additional nodes.

 

[Skepticemia]

I do agree that Xeno should be left alone should the diversity changes be added. Using Xeno for one node is perfectly fine in my book. My issue comes at seeing her being used for 2-3 additional nodes.

I completely agree with you on this. Offensive diversity and Catalyst diversity bonuses would make things more interesting in my opinion.

 

[Lulero]

@Gamma Ray

Very good points. I'd just like to stress what @Fel said once more: It's not only about Xeno being harmful or not to rift. With or without attacker diversity, she also affects future single player content:

"I think Xeno's doom SA invalidates too many strategies and has a negative impact to design space in the future." -Fel
You can find the full post higher in this very thread.

 

[Starsmore]

Xenomorph doesn't invalidate too much stategies, we already said how easy is to counter or negate her doom. You said she's unfair on rift nodes? Just use the catalyst autoimmune, problem solved.

 

[Skepticemia]

@Starsmore autoimmune doesn't help against Doom. Hexy Time though can help reduce the chance of Xeno being able to apply Doom.

 

[Starsmore]

@Starsmore autoimmune doesn't help against Doom. Hexy Time though can help reduce the chance of Xeno being able to apply Doom.

I fight a node with Assassin Greed and Surgeon General with Valentine autoimmunity and wasn't able to doom them.

 

[Gamma Ray]

You are fighting incorrectly if you are applying debuffs and not focusing doom to be the only debuff you land. Autoimmune does nothing to Xeno if you know how to set up safe throws and create distance with her dash attack to get 1-2 transmutes in before they dash back in.