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Monster Train >  Workshop > Rising_Dusk's Workshop > Unofficial Balance Patch > Discussions
Unofficial Balance Patch
Description Discussions12 Comments133 Change Notes
KuponutLatte 25 Oct, 2020 @ 4:05pm
Anecdotal Balance Testing
I've played about 6 runs so far, and my TL;DR is I like it.
I've lost about half the runs, partially because I like to make stupid mistakes like picking a shop with an upgrade I want before remembering that I have no gold, and partially because most of the changes aren't OP enough to make a bad strategy win. Even powerful new combos lost when I took the wrong challenge or didn't answer one of the three questions(boss, backline, double heavies) well enough.

I just finished a Cultivating Sentient Awoken/Stygian run with a win, and I really liked how the balance changes made it feel. I benefitted hugely from several changes- the permanent health obviously (reached 250 max HP vs Seraph), Attuned 2 on Frozen Lance with Frozen Nostalgia event relic hitting for 36, the additional spell weakness and sap on Energy Drain, and the reduced cost/buff on pyre shards and sharpen. I went with a Sentient blocker and Animus of Will striker with two razorsharps in the deck. It felt very powerful at times, especially when Energy Drain + Frozen Lance could finish off heavies. But I still took plenty of pyre damage from double/triple heavies on Temperant Seraph when my Animus couldn't scale fast enough, so the run wasn't free either. The victory felt earned, and I had to do some math to get there.

The patch turned cards that would've been mostly useless to me (like frozen lance and energy drain), and turned them into MVPs of the run. I probably would've lost without the changes, but the game is definitely more fun with them in. Nothing that can show up in a draft feels like a 'dead pick' in all situations anymore.

Some lessons from runs I lost: Imp Parade with double Welder Helper start and Molting/Pyre Chomper/Fledgling drafts felt stupid powerful in the first couple fights, but I lost when it got hard-countered by a sweep boss. Even though Superfood Primordium now has most of the benefits of two paths squished into one, I still lost by attempting a Perils of Production-based rage run when I didn't get the picks to support it. Plink is still weak AF, but it now does what it's supposed to do in the deck and contribute to morsel strats.

All my wins and my losses felt fun and fair. This patch may still need some tuning, but IMO this is a better and much more fun Monster Train. It makes the difference between me not playing and me choosing to play this game over competitors.

I love the Attuned (amount) change, btw. I had the same idea myself the day Attuned was added to the game! It's obviously brilliant.

(edit) Oh, and I drafted Hoarfrost Effigy in a deck with no other Frostbite. It barely did anything, so maybe it's not such a big deal after all.
Last edited by KuponutLatte; 25 Oct, 2020 @ 4:08pm
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Showing 1-15 of 16 comments
KuponutLatte 25 Oct, 2020 @ 4:57pm 
Railbeater might be a liiiiittle broken in Relentless. With 1-2 Multistrike you win infinitely against every boss until Fel. (I got Grrg's Goad and a multi stone on him and it didn't feel like any other mechanic in the game in that even if the boss had had infinite-1 health, Railbeater would always 1v1 it) I believe they changed Coldchannel Solgard for the same reason- he used to be Action: Apply Frostbite, but that was OP in Relentless, then they nerfed him too hard with Resolve: Apply Frostbite, and finally settled on Revenge: Apply Frostbite so that his health would act as a natural limiter to how many times the frostbite could be applied during a relentless fight.
#1
Rising_Dusk  [developer] 25 Oct, 2020 @ 5:42pm 
Thank you so much for giving the mod a try and letting me know your thoughts! I totally understand that seeing such changes in a Google Doc can inspire some fear that the changes are more drastic than they might really be, so that you tried them and saw for yourself what they do for the game is great. I encourage you to keep trying to use it and let me know if anything seems uncharacteristically strong or if there are other cards that have fallen behind a bit. I genuinely appreciate hearing your thoughts here, though, and it reassures me that I did some good here!
#2
Rising_Dusk  [developer] 25 Oct, 2020 @ 5:44pm 
I will let you know that Railbeater is on my short list of possible adjustments. I need to do a lot more testing, but given that he scales both with Multistrike and Railhammer, he can potentially get out of hand factoring relics like you had. I'm having some other folks test him and am running him myself, and will make adjustments accordingly.
#3
Notme2222 25 Oct, 2020 @ 7:11pm 
Tethys rework should say non-boss enemy units i think. Referencing relentless is kinda strange
#4
Rising_Dusk  [developer] 25 Oct, 2020 @ 8:25pm 
Sap Tethys specifically references relentless so you can stack Sap on floating bosses before they enter the train if you play really well and clear the mobs! Hopefully that makes sense.
#5
KuponutLatte 25 Oct, 2020 @ 8:37pm 
I just played a Sap Tethys run where I mixed in 1 Spell Weakness, so I got Quick, Sweep, 2 sap, 1 spell weakness. I fought Patient Seraph and managed to stack a fair bit of sap on him when he landed on Tethys' floor. I think it works great using the Relentless keyword. It's a bit of a bummer that Withering Tethys does a fat nothing during Relentless. It wasn't a problem on this run, because I got a Lifesteal gorger with double gorge relic, so relentless was F'd no matter what, but it would feel nice if Withering did *something* during relentless.
#6
KuponutLatte 25 Oct, 2020 @ 8:38pm 
Quick/Sweep sap tethys synergizes really well with frostbite shark, btw. Keeps him alive longer. It feels good because frostbite shark is a core tool in any Stygian run, and very little synergizes with him.
#7
KuponutLatte 25 Oct, 2020 @ 8:39pm 
I like Withering Totem, but replacing Conduit feels like a missed opportunity to have a Conduit Tethys who adds Magic Power to spells cast on his floor, which should absolutely exist.
#8
KuponutLatte 26 Oct, 2020 @ 2:57pm 
I LOVE Paraffin Enforcer with Strike: Burnout. It's SO FUN. It might be good to nerf his rage generation now that he can fill such an important role on the team, though.
#9
Gumballosaur 27 Oct, 2020 @ 1:03am 
I reached 694 health with Cultivating Sentient before going into Seraph; having her on the bottom floor and applying spikes is a really powerful combo. Going in to Seraph with almost 700 health I'd say it's probably too powerful.
The changes to Imp Parade are interesting, it feels like the design is meant to push you toward investing in your imps, using them as actual units rather than just status appliers and chump blockers. It's a fun idea, though sweep units completely wreck the imp line you've carefully built up. I didn't really feel like Imp Parade needed to be rebalanced, I know a lot of people considered it the weakest build for Shardtail but I found it could be really strong, it just struggled in the early game. I think this reworked Imp Parade would be better as it's own path, along with the Tethys rework. I understand it might be a lot of messing about to add a whole new path for champions though.
For context all of the above is written playing on cov25.
#10
Rising_Dusk  [developer] 27 Oct, 2020 @ 9:50am 
Thanks for the feedback, @Gumballosaur! When you think about it, a good Harvest Rector run reaches 600 HP at Seraph as well, but also has a very potent offensive component. A champion that, if played well over the entire run, reaches 700 HP with zero offense at Seraph may seem like a lot, but is really in a well balanced state compared to others.
#11
Gumballosaur 28 Oct, 2020 @ 12:01am 
That's a fair point, but all the scaling based champions (minus Little Fade) are forced to scale in the confines of a battle, there's an element of risk to them, then a big pay off if you manage to get them setup. The other units that scale permanently tend to be more difficult to trigger their scaling on, requiring planning and/or upgrades etc.

After playing with it a few times I think the card draw sentient probably makes for a more interesting mechanic. I think the + permanent health is a fun idea and it embodies the idea of a big tree wall that grows very well, but there isn't much of a sentience about it.
There isn't a lot of risk or planning with scaling this version, especially if you have spikes but even without them. Maybe I'm missing something, but for me the most effective strategy was putting it on the bottom floor, healing when necessary and taking multistrike trials as often as I could.
#12
KuponutLatte 28 Oct, 2020 @ 11:31am 
I have a recommendation for your next re-balance: Change Imp Parade Queen's Summon effect to "When played", like Transcendimp's.

Here's why: Currently, Transcendimp repeats Queen's summon effect and adds another Imp-in-a-box to your hand when played. This combo was delightful when I first discovered it, but it got dumb pretty quickly. Especially because the imp-in-a-box that transcendimp gives you can give you another transcendimp, and then it repeats all over again. I played a run last night where I got to 99 energy and hundreds of rage and armor every combat. Sure, transcendimp is usually broken, but this was even more broken than base-game transcendimp, and it made every combat into a joke.

The champion redesign giving you an imp-in-a-box once per battle is, in my opinion, great. But getting more and more and more from transcendimp feels like too much and breaks the game.
#13
Rising_Dusk  [developer] 28 Oct, 2020 @ 1:27pm 
@Wonky Kong: That's a fair point, but that kind of Imp-in-a-Box insanity already exists in the core game as well. Imp scaling in general gets quickly out of hand in core as it is, resulting in some very trivial runs. That said, I'll configure a few runs and do more testing to see if I feel it's overperforming just because you start every combat with one of the combo pieces (an Imp-in-a-Box).

@Gumballosaur: There are some other really neat tricks you can do to min/max the HP on Cultivating Sentient, like using targeted damage spells on your own Sentient. You also have to balance how much damage you want to do on her floor against how much permanent progress you want to make with her and whether you need her with your offensive plan. I usually spend a lot of effort maximizing her efficacy when I play her, but I'll do some additional testing and see. Thanks for your feedback!
#14
Kaerius 11 Nov, 2020 @ 2:54pm 
Originally posted by Wonky Kong:
I have a recommendation for your next re-balance: Change Imp Parade Queen's Summon effect to "When played", like Transcendimp's.

Here's why: Currently, Transcendimp repeats Queen's summon effect and adds another Imp-in-a-box to your hand when played. This combo was delightful when I first discovered it, but it got dumb pretty quickly. Especially because the imp-in-a-box that transcendimp gives you can give you another transcendimp, and then it repeats all over again. I played a run last night where I got to 99 energy and hundreds of rage and armor every combat. Sure, transcendimp is usually broken, but this was even more broken than base-game transcendimp, and it made every combat into a joke.

The champion redesign giving you an imp-in-a-box once per battle is, in my opinion, great. But getting more and more and more from transcendimp feels like too much and breaks the game.
Came here to report this. Ended up with the double summon effect artifact as my starting artifact too, had more imps than I ever had space to play them, going space space on rewards, and ludicrous amounts of armor, rage and ember, not to mention wiping heavies with the summon effects copied from queen's impling and molten imp. It got silly, I got a 4-turn boss rush on Seraph.
#15
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