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The Jop -> RE: =OS= Balance Discussion Thread (12/29/2013 2:05:08)
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Iron Hide can be put up every turn and block unblockables though. Wouldn't you see an issue if any other element could put up 2000 defense every turn? And DoTs don't really do much on their own since iron hide blocks 1000 damage per turn; you would have to have a lot of energy to put up several DoTs and break through iron hide with regular attacks. It has 4:1 efficiency compared to 1.67:1 for regular shields (how much defense you get per 1 energy). I put up most of the reasons I see to nerf it on pages 18 & 19 on this thread. It's available from the Neutral Series so there's nothing to stop players from adding 5 iron hides and using one per turn. Just because it's possible to beat someone who iron hides constantly (it would still be extremely difficult), it does not mean that the card is balanced by any means.
Here's the whole conversation I had with Resk about it. There's no need to read through the whole essay but I just wanted to put it in the right thread. It may lack context in some places because I was talking about what Resk had said previously:
quote:
Nerf iron hide for the love of all that is good and decent in the world. Every neutral character I've fought in PvP has used it every turn. How is 1000-1100 defense that REGENERATES EVERY TURN AND ABSORBS UNBLOCKABLES balanced? It effectively more than doubles the character's health if you fight long enough. If you put a cap on how many shields can be spammed by ice characters, you should really do something about this, because now neutral characters have the same infinite defense problem (except they can also block unblockables). I recommend it blocking 1000-2000 damage for one turn only, even if you want to lower the cost for that. It being temporary makes no difference; most players charge to the cap so they can regenerate at least enough for iron hide every turn, while using neutralize and their excess energy to use other cards.
That's the thing, it completely blocks most DoTs. When one card can completely counteract a whole type of character, there's a problem. Not many characters are purely offensive anyway, and neutral characters can always put up counterattacks to deal with them. Neutral has a way to deal with everything, so it should have some kind of disability to put it on par with other elements. That would have been its high costs for cards, but neutralize makes it very easy to get energy back. I'm okay with putting neutralize back at discarding 3 cards for 10 energy, so that iron hide might not be spammed as much. However, I still think iron hide is the main problem and making iron hide require more cards would just hinder dual element characters. More energy efficient shields that block everything and can be kept up throughout the battle are too powerful. I don't think it should last for 2 turns. Even having it as 2000 for one turn would be like a one turn stun or significantly reduce the damage done that turn. It's still more efficient than shields and it can block any attack including unblockables, but it would no longer be able to be used non-stop. I mean, if there's any defense card you can use non-stop, there's a problem. That's why a cap was set for shields, because ice characters could set up defense that could not be taken down (but at least unblockables worked against those).
Plus the ratio for iron hide would actually be 4:1 since it puts up 1000 (or 1100) shields each turn for 2 turns equaling 2000 (or 2200) shields for 5 energy, and you can see what that does to DoTs. So it's more than double the efficiency of regular shields and it can be (and normally is) used throughout the fight. It's more than double the efficiency (4 times the energy normally, and 4.4 for CC iron hide) of shields, blocks unblockables, and can be used every turn. Even if you couldn't you use CC so you couldn't draw it every turn it would still be overpowered. Now it's just a problem that an overpowered card can be used non-stop, giving a player 1000-1100 defense every turn.
Characters with Neutralize don't have the problem of only having 5 energy available every turn. It would be possible to slowly take down your enemy like that anyway, but they have energy near the cap when they finish charging at the start of the fight or whenever they use neutralize. I only actually won those battles because there were one or two times you didn't use iron hide. The other times you used it non-stop, and 4 or 5 electric arcs equal 0 damage in that case, since you also had a counterattack so I couldn't attack you normally. But for counterattack, you usually only have to put down one or two to discourage your opponent from attacking because of the massive hit they would take if they did, and the energy they would waste. It's not used as a shield usually, because it's intended to stop the opponent from using normal attacks instead of actually blocking 500 damage.
The card just makes it a struggle to move forward in any battle and that seems like too much. I know people would be complaining if ice characters could reach the cap of 2000 shields every single turn (CC iron hide even goes over the cap), and in that case at least unblockables could still do damage. It being temporary might have been a solution if some characters didn't have 2 of them, and CC made it possible to draw it every turn. I could argue that it's almost as bad as a stun card for the amount damage it blocks, so it shouldn't have been a CC card or have 2 iron hides in one character's deck. Plus it's not a matter of waiting for a neutral character to run low on energy because they use iron hide every turn, since they have the most efficient energy regenerating card.
Anyway, having it be 2000-2200 defense for one turn would still be just as efficient as it as now, except it would make people wait a turn to attack or make them waste a lot of energy to break through the shields (also DoTs would work for that one turn the neutral character is charging at least).
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