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| Thread: Is the stun meta broken again? |  This thread is pages long: 1 2 · NEXT» |
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Galaad
Hero of Order
Li mort as morz, li vif as vis
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posted December 25, 2017 06:16 PM |
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Edited by Galaad at 18:23, 25 Dec 2017.
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Poll Question:
Is the stun meta broken again?
Ever since the introduction of the Wood Nymph, there has been a lot of concerns among players in the CQ discord channel. We are now near the end of the second challenge with this new creature and my defense rate has solidly doubled. I don't mind when a creature is OP because well, many creatures can be OP in their own way when used efficiently even if there is some top cards, also it has always been like this in JVC games and provides tons of fun. Some lesser cards can surprise and having the strongest doesn't necessarily makes you the strongest (like some h3 secondary skills ie). I like the strategy and battle tactics in the game in general and I strongly dislike when people shout OP at every street corner if they can't win 100%.
However, I am starting to seriously wonder with this new meta. On one hand, it was a great counter to strong Air creatures which were usually at an advantage, but on the other it happens to face similar to the old stun situation. When it says that you are stunned for two turns, this is not accurate, you are in fact stunned for two ROUNDS, which means you will suffer up to 20 attacks without being able to act, if half of your party is stunned and there is another stunning creature you will get your other half stunned for the next two rounds. Which means you can get up to 40 turns with a broken multiplier chain and mana feed, which creates situations that are very similar to the previous empty wave 1 stun meta that was fixed after a point.
Defense has always been an issue in the game with endless very powerful offensive tactics so it is also a good thing that defense rates significantly went up for everyone, but was it the best way to do so? I am not sure. The stunlock mechanic is indeed quite frustrating to the player as you simply slowly watch your team die without doing anything depending on how fast the RNG will trigger, which is not very fun. Sure, there is some counters, but these require to have the right creatures with the right amount of dots and the right dot synergy, plus depending on the dungeon you face the right color counters. Needless to say, this is not exactly easily reachable to the majority of players. Kingdom already helped a lot with the PvP balance, rewarding more significantly the amount of time invested in the game -a n00b can't snipe a whale any longer- and we also got shield that can make up for someone out of luck with her/his defensive creatures, so I kinda fear a bit of an overkill now.
It may be a bit early to judge since this is relatively recent, but I believe we can already have some start of opinions on the matter. Do you believe this new stun meta is broken and should get addressed like the previous empty wave 1 one, or are things actually better and more exciting this way?
I personally have mixed feelings but I wonder what you guys think?
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Bragjul
Adventuring Hero
aka Titanu88
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posted December 25, 2017 06:35 PM |
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Edited by Bragjul at 18:53, 25 Dec 2017.
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Soon people will find a counter for it. The issue here is that the lack of prismatic orbs dont allow enough experimenting.
But i dont find the new meta OP. It can be countered(speaking from my own experience)
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Sandro316
Hired Hero
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posted December 26, 2017 04:58 PM |
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Galaad said:
Ever since the introduction of the [url=http://heroescommunity.com/viewthread.php3?TID=44821]Wood Nymph[/url], there has been a lot of concerns among players in the CQ discord channel. We are now near the end of the second challenge with this new creature and my defense rate has solidly doubled. I don't mind when a creature is OP because well, many creatures can be OP in their own way when used efficiently even if there is some top cards, also it has always been like this in JVC games and provides tons of fun. Some lesser cards can surprise and having the strongest doesn't necessarily makes you the strongest (like some h3 secondary skills ie). I like the strategy and battle tactics in the game in general and I strongly dislike when people shout OP at every street corner if they can't win 100%.
However, I am starting to seriously wonder with this new meta. On one hand, it was a great counter to strong Air creatures which were usually at an advantage, but on the other it happens to face similar to the old stun situation. When it says that you are stunned for two turns, this is not accurate, you are in fact stunned for two ROUNDS, which means you will suffer up to 20 attacks without being able to act, if half of your party is stunned and there is another stunning creature you will get your other half stunned for the next two rounds. Which means you can get up to 40 turns with a broken multiplier chain and mana feed, which creates situations that are very similar to the previous empty wave 1 stun meta that was fixed after a point.
Defense has always been an issue in the game with endless very powerful offensive tactics so it is also a good thing that defense rates significantly went up for everyone, but was it the best way to do so? I am not sure. The stunlock mechanic is indeed quite frustrating to the player as you simply slowly watch your team die without doing anything depending on how fast the RNG will trigger, which is not very fun. Sure, there is some counters, but these require to have the right creatures with the right amount of dots and the right dot synergy, plus depending on the dungeon you face the right color counters. Needless to say, this is not exactly easily reachable to the majority of players. Kingdom already helped a lot with the PvP balance, rewarding more significantly the amount of time invested in the game -a n00b can't snipe a whale any longer- and we also got shield that can make up for someone out of luck with her/his defensive creatures, so I kinda fear a bit of an overkill now.
It may be a bit early to judge since this is relatively recent, but I believe we can already have some start of opinions on the matter. Do you believe this new stun meta is broken and should get addressed like the previous empty wave 1 one, or are things actually better and more exciting this way?
I personally have mixed feelings but I wonder what you guys think?
My biggest problem with it is that some people got the 4-dot nymph and some people didn't get it and have no possible way to now get a 4-dot. If a single creature is sooo powerful that 90% of people are now using it in their dungeon it shouldn't be a one time offer. Unless they make it available on a regular basis so people can get the 4-dot one it gives the lucky few a consistent advantage that others can't catch up to.
That said, I think higher defense rates are a good thing. I think getting to a point where you have to think about attack order and team composition is a good thing. I now have two different attack teams I use depending on if the other dungeon has a nymph. I also have a different attack order depending on which creatures start with specials in the nymph dungeon. Those are good things and I wouldn't nerf the nymph too much, because I wouldn't want to lose those aspects.
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Miervaldis
Hired Hero
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posted December 26, 2017 07:39 PM |
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Sandro316 said:
My biggest problem with it is that some people got the 4-dot nymph and some people didn't get it and have no possible way to now get a 4-dot.
Yeah, that wasn't too cool, leaving it completely up to luck. I mean, I know that 4-dots are random regardless, but when you only get a single chance at it...
But I'd bet that the nymph will be available again. Maybe as random gem summon, maybe from some new map, etc. Otherwise... Well, things are going to get quite tough for new players who weren't there to grab one from the event (or were too low-level at the time to climb the tower). Since pretty much everyone else is using the nymph, and they have no way to get one...
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That said, I think higher defense rates are a good thing. I think getting to a point where you have to think about attack order and team composition is a good thing.
I concur, that's a nice change. I was honestly getting tired of the >95% attack / <10% defense rate that I had for the past few rounds. It made things boring, always winning on attack and pretty much always losing on defense.
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Brukernavn
Hero of Order
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posted December 26, 2017 09:07 PM |
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I think it's fun that we now can trade defence losses instead of defence wins. But it's not optimal that one creature is nearly mandatory to have a good defence. This is not because I think the Nymph is OP, although she certainly is one of the strongest, but because the stun mechanism is not properly balanced when applied to attackers compared to defenders.
As opposed to silence, stun works very differently for attackers and defenders. Silence functions on a round basis in both cases. This means that the duration of silence has the same importance for attackers and defenders. Sand devil silences up to three creatures for one round, while owl silences one creature for two rounds. The balance makes sense.
Stun on the other hand works on a turn basis when used on defenders, but on round basis when used on attackers. To avoid being stunned for up to seven rounds, the devs put a maximum on two round stun on attacking creatures. But this has the unfortunate side effect that the duration of the stun is irrelevant for defending creatures, since virtually all stuns are longer than two turns. So the more important aspect becomes the number of stunned creatures, rather than a balance between duration and number, as you have with silence. The balance will be skewed when used in defence, which is one of the reasons stun is so powerful for defenders. Take the Toad for instance. It's supposed to stun the main target for 6 turns and adjecent targets for half the duration. The duration is used to balance the ability. But when used as a defender the turns are converted to rounds, and capped at two, so all targets will be stunned for two rounds - making the special more powerful than intended.
Another aspect is that stunned creatures neither receive nor give mana. This doesn't really make sense, for instance passive abilities still trigger when you are stunned. I don't see why it should effect mana generation. Compared to silence, stun already has an advantage in breaking combos. There is no need to additionally cripple mana generation. This also makes stun more powerful than it should be when applied to attackers.
In summary
I believe stun would be much more balanced when used in defence, if these two aspects were adjusted:
1) Do not change from turn to round when stun is applied to attackers. Stunned for 6 turns means 6 actions, not two rounds.
2) Stunned creatures should still be able to give and receive mana.
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Markmasters
Famous Hero
Dragon of justice
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posted December 28, 2017 08:54 PM |
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Red Giamt is a great counter to wood nymph. almost guaranteed to avoid stun. i like the color counters also work with conditions
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hayenne
Known Hero
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posted December 28, 2017 09:50 PM |
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It is broken, but not again -- it was never fixed to start with.
The major problem of stuns in defence (duration, mana etc) was highlighted half a year ago by some of the best players directly to the devs.
Then, the nymph is too good a creature for a medium size. Her ability casts her into the large size with her being basically a blue drake (while the latter has better stats and damage, her stun is more powerful).
What you see now is basically an ole good 3 wave blue drake + double frog defence. Except the issue is now magnified with kingdoms.
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Galaad
Hero of Order
Li mort as morz, li vif as vis
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posted December 28, 2017 10:10 PM |
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Edited by Galaad at 22:14, 28 Dec 2017.
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hayenne said:
It is broken, but not again -- it was never fixed to start with.
It was fixed when they capped it so that a stunned creature could act between two stuns and not remain chainlocked until death, also when they incapacitated the ability to fill up an empty wave one. I never had any more stunlocked problems since that day, until they introduced Wood Nymph.
The thing with this Nymph is it's as you say so powerful even with everything working as intended we can face similar situation than before, mostly depending if you use another stunner along her. I do not think the situation is nearly as bad as the previous stun meta though, only wondering if this was the best way to improve defense rates, as I feel the RNG more than ever in battles right now, maybe a bit too much.
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Except the issue is now magnified with kingdoms.
Not really, equal Kingdoms makes things even. Kingdom brought a balance relative to the amount of time a player invests in the game, which was clever as perfectly balancing more than 500 creatures is impossible.
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hayenne
Known Hero
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posted December 28, 2017 10:32 PM |
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Edited by hayenne at 22:34, 28 Dec 2017.
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Galaad said:
I never had any more stunlocked problems since that day, until they introduced Wood Nymph.
You never had any problems because the chief offender of the old dungeon layout (blue drake with 2 round stun on 3 targets) was cast away from wave 1 with removing the large flyer. Had it still be there, you would have seen the same problems. Adding an action between stuns was a small bone to chew on because why do you need this action if you have no mana?
As Mark said, there (kinda) is a workaround with charging a red killer with the first move. However if this is the solution to the newly introduced problem.. uh oh. You would have needed to compile a new team with each new creature introduced to the game/vip reward and reroll all the combos to accomodate that. Lucky us, who actually have (at least) creatures to choose from. Woe betide the less lucky players.
Galaad said:
Not really, equal Kingdoms makes things even. Kingdom brought a balance relative to the amount of time a player invests in the game, which was clever as perfectly balancing more than 500 creatures is impossible.
I can't rule out this possibility, because I run a lowly castle level 20, but it looks all the same the worse because the other acting creatures have a much better go at you now when you are stunned for the whopping two rounds.
I wonder if they also fixed that silly situation with luck difference when a 1400 luck toad would merrily a-stun a 3800 luck Medusa. Hmm.
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Galaad
Hero of Order
Li mort as morz, li vif as vis
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posted December 28, 2017 10:38 PM |
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hayenne said:
You never had any problems because the chief offender of the old dungeon layout (blue drake with 2 round stun on 3 targets) was cast away from wave 1 with removing the large flyer. Had it still be there, you would have seen the same problems. Adding an action between stuns was a small bone to chew on because why do you need this action if you have no mana?
Basic attacks on multiplers? Works fine. Blue Drake does the same as a frog, so this also happened with players putting a 4d Toad in first wave, it was there and it was much more survivable.
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As Mark said, there (kinda) is a workaround with charging a red killer with the first move. However if this is the solution to the newly introduced problem.. uh oh. You would have needed to compile a new team with each new creature and reroll all the combos to accomodate that. Lucky us, who actually have (at least) creatures to choose from. Woe betide the less lucky players.
Color counter is the obvious but not the only one, it is indeed forcing you to use different parties and therefore more creatures, but players were complaining about not being able to use their other creatures...
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I wonder if they also fixed that silly situation with luck difference when a 1400 luck toad would merrily a-stun a 3800 luck Medusa. Hmm.
Since when didn't you play? This was fixed a long time ago, when they upped color counter resistances as well as targets from defense.
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reyto
Hired Hero
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posted December 29, 2017 12:26 PM |
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Edited by reyto at 12:27, 29 Dec 2017.
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Galaad said:
Color counter is the obvious but not the only one, it is indeed forcing you to use different parties and therefore more creatures, but players were complaining about not being able to use their other creatures...
Not my talk, but still, people were mostly complaining that many creatures are not good enough to use / not used cause of resources shortage.
And you still don't use small/mediums in offense after Nymph's appearance.
Frog wasn't commonly used cause one frog is often not enough and there are not many players around with 2 frogs (+ double small creature significantly decreases your defense power). With Nymph, there appeared the second stunner in the wave 1 and stun meta is immediately back.
hyenne is right, stun has never been fixed/balanced properly.
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Monana
Tavern Dweller
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posted December 29, 2017 05:14 PM |
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My 4d, mana funneled, fire giant is constantly stunned by green nymph. So there's that...
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ScottKnight
Tavern Dweller
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posted December 31, 2017 07:52 PM |
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AlHazin said:
OK, the Stun problem is definitely back my friends. I made some testings and if I drop the Green Nymph from the dungeon the defense rate drops like a lot, so even the 3 dots one is a serious threat, coupled with that statue it's devastating.
Dark nymph in comparision isn't as deadly, that's because it's not involved in stun.
Now the only solution is what a lot of players said: stun stops a creature from acting, but its combo dots aren't frozen and it can recieve mana (since even dead creatures recieve). But even with that I feel like the green nymph is going to have a good nerf because if it keeps this way, all pvp will depend only on one creature and your ability to counter it, which is definitely a break to the balance of this game. It's obvious that devs are already seeking out a way out of this unbalanced hell.
Agree. The stun meta will continue to be a problem if the combo dots keep frozen in stun mode, as I'm afraid there will only be more small/medium stunners in the future.
The most sensible change to Wood Nymph would be its special to be stun & damage the target + poison the target & randoms, instead of damage & poison the target + stun the target & randoms of now.
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reyto
Hired Hero
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posted January 01, 2018 01:33 PM |
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AlHazin said:
It's obvious that devs are already seeking out a way out of this unbalanced hell.
Just curious, why is it obvious?
For me, it's quite opposite. Perhaps, you will bring hope to me.
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Galaad
Hero of Order
Li mort as morz, li vif as vis
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posted January 01, 2018 05:50 PM |
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Frog wasn't commonly used cause one frog is often not enough and there are not many players around with 2 frogs (+ double small creature significantly decreases your defense power).
I would like to insist seeing waves 1 with Frog and another stunner type Roo or Panda was not so rare, but yes, as you said, the stun mechanic was not powerful enough so people started being more creative with their synergies. I learned for instance how dangerous the Sky Dwarf can be the hard way. So for me, after they indeed fixed the two turns chainlock issue, the mechanic was working all right, it was not only survivable but as you point out often not strong often to rely on. So saying they never fixed anything to start with is wrong from my perspective.
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Dark nymph in comparision isn't as deadly, that's because it's not involved in stun.
Not really comparable, I find the Chaos Nymph quite interesting and already encountered a few setups where she caused me trouble, +50% to all stats is nasty.
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The stun meta will continue to be a problem if the combo dots keep frozen in stun mode
Actually the multipliers aren't frozen, a stunned creature with the comboing active will stay active until the end of the round and you can still use it if you manage to cleanse in time.
OTOH I tend to agree with Brukernavn and others that allowing a stunned creature to feed mana to the creature is not a bad idea, as it would allow to cleanse for second round, which seems to be the one closing the deal no matter what happens next, at least from my experience.
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The issue here is that the lack of prismatic orbs dont allow enough experimenting.
I want to come back on that, and think that is relevant comment. I could understand the scarcity of prismatic orbs and difficulty on rerolling in the past because of the offensive advantage, but right now adjusting teams depending on the dungeons you face is becoming more significant and the combo dots sets are also suggesting and encouraging players to do so, so doing something on that area certainly shouldn't be off the table imo.
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Ouch Galaad that hurts...
Hmm?
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Galaad
Hero of Order
Li mort as morz, li vif as vis
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posted January 03, 2018 12:10 AM |
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Edited by Galaad at 16:05, 03 Jan 2018.
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AlHazin said:
stun is somehow OP in this game.
You know what is *really* 'OP'? Attack teams. 
Even with the Wood Nymph ruling the dungeons you still find some players running with a 90%+ offense rate, most competitive players have at least 70%. This challenge, I had something like 78/35 and I was in the hardest group, and honestly, while some battles can be frustrating, the overall experience felt better for me. Not winning as much as I used to is not such that big a deal when I see my defense is finally giving some results.
That said, is putting emphasis on stun the best solution? Probably not, but at least the overall balance feels better in terms of defense investment/offensive tactics, IMO
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Galaad
Hero of Order
Li mort as morz, li vif as vis
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posted January 13, 2018 02:21 AM |
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Brukernavn said:
Stunned creatures should still be able to give mana.
It just hit me, a stunned creature can get cleansed before the end of the round and then get its mana balls for itself when acting.
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Rakshasa92
Supreme Hero
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posted February 12, 2018 04:15 PM |
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Please fix that annoying, ugly, boring, overpowered Forest Nymph.
Pretty please.
They are always the winning factor, they always make me loose, they are annoying, everybody has the same freaking line-up. One Ugly Nymph, one Stonehead, one gnome shooter, two blacks to kill ressurection before I can even perform it.
Boring, change it please.
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Galaad
Hero of Order
Li mort as morz, li vif as vis
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posted February 12, 2018 08:44 PM |
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Rakshasa92 said:
everybody has the same freaking line-up.
That's not true at all, with everyone running multiple dungeons now there has never been as much variety than currently.
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Rakshasa92
Supreme Hero
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posted February 13, 2018 10:28 AM |
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Galaad said:
Rakshasa92 said:
everybody has the same freaking line-up.
That's not true at all, with everyone running multiple dungeons now there has never been as much variety than currently.
I can't fill 3 dungeons, only 1.
And on silver currently, every castle that I fought had one of those nymphs, some not even full of totems or fully awake, they all use them. Same with stone faces and little gnomes that stun, all have skeleton and rat.
It is getting boring.
I don't care for gold, can't beat a single person there.
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