Frank/Stein changes

[KellyR]

I get where these are coming from because yeah, Frank and Stein were auto-picks the way it was... But could they maybe go back to being support when they hit perfected level, or possibly when combined into Frank-in-Stein? It just feels like the storage area expansion boosts aren't worth much after that change.

[Pixie1001]

I don't know, the storage area is still good for storing minions to roll for upgrades, and I think it's much funner to actually be able to use his stats to clobber people than having a minion with 40 HP just kinda sitting in your support bench because your build would fall apart if he died.

Plus, there's still a ton of fungus minions with interesting sacrifice effects you can fill it with, in addition to stuff like Ancestral Scholar.

[KellyR]

I rarely end up using it for storing minions for upgrade, and I'd only need like the starting two slots for that. Support minions make it feel like there's a real reason you want to expand the storage, so that you actually have to think about maybe not taking study when you can't get them both. As it is, it's pretty much a no-contest.

[Pixie1001]

Originally posted by KellyR:

I rarely end up using it for storing minions for upgrade, and I'd only need like the starting two slots for that. Support minions make it feel like there's a real reason you want to expand the storage, so that you actually have to think about maybe not taking study when you can't get them both. As it is, it's pretty much a no-contest.

I don't know, I feel like I rank it the opposite. The 1 or 2 extra points of magic or poison mastery feel totally inconsequential compared to the massive amounts you can get from minions - they're ok early game, but past that I feel like they don't have much impact.

The slots means you can speculate a lot more on your picks, and can gold minions way more easily, which is a huge upgrade. Aside from relics, I normally see them as the most important upgrade in the game.

[KellyR]

Originally posted by Pixie1001:

Originally posted by KellyR:

I rarely end up using it for storing minions for upgrade, and I'd only need like the starting two slots for that. Support minions make it feel like there's a real reason you want to expand the storage, so that you actually have to think about maybe not taking study when you can't get them both. As it is, it's pretty much a no-contest.

I don't know, I feel like I rank it the opposite. The 1 or 2 extra points of magic or poison mastery feel totally inconsequential compared to the massive amounts you can get from minions - they're ok early game, but past that I feel like they don't have much impact.

The slots means you can speculate a lot more on your picks, and can gold minions way more easily, which is a huge upgrade. Aside from relics, I normally see them as the most important upgrade in the game.

I think this may depend on which leader you're using. My favorite, the Necroforager, for instance, is simply never going to have a significant surplus of minions.

Regardless, however, my point is that even if you consider the space more valuable for minions, it hurts the game if there are so few support minions because you have less hard choices you have to make. If there are a lot of support minions, you have to really struggle with the decision of whether to use your storage slots for minions to facilitate combining later, or for supports.

[Rhinkalis]

Weirdly, with my Forager run, I ended up needing an extra storage space to hold on to whoever was to PERISH next since I always wanted one on hand to sacrifice at the start of the next turn, honestly it didn't cut down on my need for storage space at all.

[Pixie1001]

Originally posted by Rhinkalis:

Weirdly, with my Forager run, I ended up needing an extra storage space to hold on to whoever was to PERISH next since I always wanted one on hand to sacrifice at the start of the next turn, honestly it didn't cut down on my need for storage space at all.

Yeah I was gonna say, Necroforager is when I hurt for space the most, since you don't wanna sacrifice a minion with a spot on your team, or waste the first buy bonus on a minion you plan to immediately sacrifice again for scaling.

Originally posted by KellyR:

...

Regardless, however, my point is that even if you consider the space more valuable for minions, it hurts the game if there are so few support minions because you have less hard choices you have to make. If there are a lot of support minions, you have to really struggle with the decision of whether to use your storage slots for minions to facilitate combining later, or for supports.

I mean, I guess that's a fair point - it would be cool if there were a few more options. I think currently there's like 6? But some of those don't scale as well into the late game as well as others obviously.v I think removing Frank and Stein honestly made the bench slots more competitive though since you now need to think about who to slot in there rather than always filling it with multiple copies of the 'get +5 poison/magic damage' character.

But maybe a Reaper Steward that gives temporary stat bonuses on minion death, or a zombie that gives like +1 or 2 poison mastery could be good? Or a spirit that grants an extra spell slot?

[KellyR]

Another consideration is that the new version, while making it so that you keep their bonuses even if Frank/Stein die, actually leave you in a position where their bonus doesn't apply to your own start of combat spells (Since those happen before minion abilities) and also there's a chance that an enemy's start of combat effects could kill Frank/Stein before their effect happens, so you don't get their bonus at all for that battle.

Given that getting a perfected Frank, Stein, or Frank-in-Stein represents an investment of 12-15 skulls, I think it would be fair for their ability to become a support ability at that stage.

[halykan]

I honestly had no idea you could combine Frank and Stein (though it seems obvious in hindsight) simply because there's exactly one build (Lethal Fallout) where you'd be interested in having both, and even then you're usually just stacking normal versions across your storage for bigger bonuses, y'know?

[KellyR]

TBH I'll never skip the chance to combine them into Frank-in-Stein if it arises, because of one card: Ancestral Scholar.