topkilla wrote:Sorry guys. Still busy...

But I'll be making a pretty big post sometime this weekend.

oh great

bangerz wrote:

topkilla wrote:Sorry guys. Still busy...

But I'll be making a pretty big post sometime this weekend.

oh great

??

This a critical discussion and its seems that it's being rushed.

I was just trolling you xD

janitorialduties wrote:

escher wrote:
That's not on the mechanics of the game, that's on the players. I just came from a game where I had two engineers, and their abilities very strongly affected my gameplay and allowed me to win almost as easily as it would have been with a King. It's not that the King is too strong, it's just that some players see the popularity of the King and the controversy behind it and believe that it's the most powerful specialist in the game, when in reality, there are other specialists that are just as powerful, but without the popularity to appear commonly in the game. If more people would hire stacking Engineers instead, there would be complaints to nerf the Engineers rather than the Kings.

I disagree. The Meta of the Game is not shifting as new combo's are found. At the begining, it was fair to say that specialists where being stacked regularly- each one was more or less being used equally- The king was hardly used because of his double sword of an ability ( powerful buff for the loss of your shields). However as games progressed peope are getting a sense of what is most effective- Stacked Kings is now a winning strategy (with supporting specialists of course) that is not showing any stopping.

I'm not saying that Engineers can't win against a King, I'm saying the Stacked King is a frustratingly powerful specialists combo to deal with. And that is evident with the amount of complaints. People aren't complaining for nothing- Stacked Kings IS frustrating and powerful. This is a patch that people look forward to I believe.

Actually, I have to agree with escher here.
I feel like it's just the momentum of kings that have made them so apparently powerful. In fact, now that I come to think about it, I literally haven't seen a single engineer for 3/4 games now. I think I've seen more war heroes than engineers in my entire time in subterfuge. What this is telling me is that everyone things kings are OP because it just so happens that they are a 'trending' specialist right now. In fact, I had literally forgotten that engineers existed. While I do think that specialists like the war hero are less powerful than the king, there are other specialists which I think are on par with the king (on in some cases even better). And the reason why I think that King's aren't going to go out of fashion anytime soon is because, as nojo said, they're easy to use. A no-brainer could use them and get devastating effects. And because of this, the 'king stack' has spread like a virus. I literally see almost no other specialists stacks these days. I'm wondering if any new players have actually tried out any other stacks?

Yeah they are trending, but they are also stupid strong and effective. This post is about balancing specialists. Balancing the king would inhibit it's ease of use, or its overall effectiveness.

Unless of course you think they only are trending because they are the new thing to do nowadays, like wear a backwards hat?
Is your solution to do some media attention to the other specialists? Get some billboards up?

Kings are not a top pick by experienced players because of fashion or anything. Most specialists are really good, although sometimes only in niche situations. I had only a foreman pick as first pick which actually worked really well. I upgraded to engineer because it also worked really well in my situation.

However if I had a hypno offered at any point I would have taken it. Not because of fashion but because if you don't have a king or two towards late game you will get destroyed by the one who does. Stacking two engineers in a sub with say 290 drills and a thief destroys anyone...which I had last game. I got countered by three kings in my neighbor. He only had stacks of 90 drills in his subs coming my way but he could easily destroy me.

I couldn't fight the king stack so I attacked his ally and got countered by smuggler/martyr. A double agent would have hard countered my kill sub. A sub with thieves or engineers is easily hard countered.

If I had two or three kings offered I would have won that game. Hands down.

Kings are not fashionable, they are overpowered (after that first king which is balanced enough).

Maybe the way to balance kings is to have its effect be local only. Stack them all you want then.

imo the single most overpowered stack is the Admiral. One of the core parts of this game is speed, and with your drillers moving at 2-3x other players' subs, diplomacy becomes almost irrelevant since you can run circles around all the other players.

gardengnome wrote:Kings are not a top pick by experienced players because of fashion or anything. Most specialists are really good, although sometimes only in niche situations. I had only a foreman pick as first pick which actually worked really well. I upgraded to engineer because it also worked really well in my situation.

However if I had a hypno offered at any point I would have taken it. Not because of fashion but because if you don't have a king or two towards late game you will get destroyed by the one who does. Stacking two engineers in a sub with say 290 drills and a thief destroys anyone...which I had last game. I got countered by three kings in my neighbor. He only had stacks of 90 drills in his subs coming my way but he could easily destroy me.

I couldn't fight the king stack so I attacked his ally and got countered by smuggler/martyr. A double agent would have hard countered my kill sub. A sub with thieves or engineers is easily hard countered.

If I had two or three kings offered I would have won that game. Hands down.

Kings are not fashionable, they are overpowered (after that first king which is balanced enough).

Well, Kings are just not a top pick for some experienced players. If you have tycoons, generals, etc. you would have countered anyone with kings without too much problem.

And yes, you would have won that game (probably) hands down. But that's probably because of the inexperience of other players. Play a few games with forum regulars, and you'll quite a few other stacks as well. I personally go for generals every time because no number of kings can counter driller-destroying specailists

This is great and all, but again we are looking for balancing ideas, not specialist preference of high level players. There is an old post for that or you can start a new one.