Throg's powers are a mixed bag.

[Toothbrush]

I misunderstood Throg's Zip Zap Zop power. I thought it was much better than it actually is, and so I thought that it's level 4 upgrade was actually a downgrade.

I THOUGHT it would target special (strike, attack, protect) tiles at random and then basic tiles at random (allowing Zop to clear the board of enemy specials), but it actually just targets all special and basic tiles at the same frequency.

Bellow is my initial complaint about it getting weaker as you leveled it, based on my misunderstanding.
I find it odd that if you upgrade Throg's green power (zip zap zop) to level 4 and 5 it gets worse rather than better.

The power converts up to 4 enemy special tiles (strike, attack, protect) to charged tiles, and if it did so, then it fires again.

Upon upgrading to level 4 the power instead converts 5 tiles.

Normally converting more tiles is better, but because it does damage with each time the power is fired it's more useful to fire it more rather than less.

Lets game this out.
Lets say the enemy has 3 special tiles.
level 3 power fires, converting those three and a basic to charged, dealing damage, and then because an enemy special was converted it fires again, converting 4 basic and dealing damage. (8 charge tiles, 2x damage)
Level 4 is almost the same, but because it converts 5 tiles, you end up with more charged tiles (which is a double edged sword, hopefully you've got someone else along to take advantage of those). (10 charged tiles, 2x damage)

If the enemy has 4 special tiles...
Exactly the same result

enemy has 5 special tiles
At level 3 zop power... first converts 4, then 1 and 3 basic, then fires again for 4 basic just to make sure the board is clean. (12 charged tiles, 3x damage)
At level 4 zop power... exactly the same as if it were only 4 specials. (10 charged tiles, 2x damage)

At this point it's better to have never upgraded the power.

If the enemy has 6-8 it's the same for both powers, with 9 and 10 again being better for the level 3 power which will fire 4 times... (16 charged tiles, 4x damage)

If you wanted to actually upgrade the zop power it should convert LESS tiles, that way the more tiles converted the more damage done. Take for example 10 attack tiles (I guess cause of carnage?) ... at level 3 (16 charged tiles, 4x damage), at level 4 as it is (15 charged tiles, 3x damage) (a downgrade), but imagine if level 4 instead converted 3 specials to charged... (15 charged tiles, 5x damage)

I surmise that firing the power and doing damage 5 times is better than firing the power and doing damage 4 times, while the current power fires and deals damage 3 times, which is worse than 4 times.

Why is this 'upgrade' so bad?

Anyway, zop is still interesting and possibly good (depending on level, team makeup) but not overpowered. Filling the board with charged tiles can certainly help you power up for more powers, but it also lets your enemy charge up their powers quick.

Pet Avengers can do a lot of damage, but since it only destroys charged tiles in your character's strongest colors, it can sometimes just be removing the charged tiles that you want to collect to fuel your powers. That can be annoying. Especially if it leaves all the charged tiles you don't care about but your enemy finds yummy.

And Throg's blue power... I dunno, avoiding damage is good, but it feels like it will pop too easily on low damage attacks and let high damage attacks through.

Still haven't had a chance to really test Throg out, but the powers are interesting and he looks cool. So I am excited.
(certainly more than for Beta Ray Bill, I mean that horse zombie... ugh.)

[Handoiron]

It's not a "bad" upgrade.

You're forgetting that it converts random basic or enemy attack/protect/strike tiles to charged tiles.

5 out of 64 chance to convert a special tile and fire again is better than 3 out of 64. Plus it does more damage so even if it doesn't hit an enemy special tile it is better at a higher level.

It producing more charged tiles per use also has a better synergy effect with his yellow that gets cheaper to use with more charged tiles of different colors because 5 tiles generated can be up to 5 different colors where 3 can only be up to 3. It also means it increases the possibility for the passive effect of his yellow being triggered because more charged tiles generated means more chances to be in the appropriate color to trigger the passive.

I do see your argument against the upgrade if it did target enemy special tiles first but being completely random in what it targets for conversion means more is definitely better.

[Toothbrush]

Originally posted by Handoiron:

It's not a "bad" upgrade.

You're forgetting that it converts random basic or enemy attack/protect/strike tiles to charged tiles.

5 out of 64 chance to convert a special tile and fire again is better than 3 out of 64. Plus it does more damage so even if it doesn't hit an enemy special tile it is better at a higher level.

It producing more charged tiles per use also has a better synergy effect with his yellow that gets cheaper to use with more charged tiles of different colors because 5 tiles generated can be up to 5 different colors where 3 can only be up to 3. It also means it increases the possibility for the passive effect of his yellow being triggered because more charged tiles generated means more chances to be in the appropriate color to trigger the passive.

I do see your argument against the upgrade if it did target enemy special tiles first but being completely random in what it targets for conversion means more is definitely better.

Yeah, having played with him once I was considering editing this, but I still haven't had enough time with him.

The way it's written makes it sound like it picks random tiles, not that it picks the tiles randomly, because other powers worded similarly do target first, though they do tend to list specials before basic, or say 'up to' 4 special tiles or basic tiles.

But I still am unsure how to feel about the power because I haven't seen it fire again even when it does replace an enemy special. I purposefully let the magia muscle propogate strike tiles, it saw the strike tiles get replaced with charged tiles, and the power didn't activate again.

So until I see it in action I can't say much on the topic.

I do kinda wish more powers would reduce the activation cost as they leveled, like Ares' Onslaught power goes from 6 cost to 5. Or Iron Man bringing the cost of his Recharge down to 6.

[Handoiron]

I bet I ran the same 1 fight you did.

Was the first fight of his special event where you fight maggias. I did manage to have a strike tile get picked by the ability and it did fire again, it was just fast enough that it was hard to tell.

I know I ended up with 10 charged more charged tiles when it was finished. II didn't let it cover the board with strike tiles though so I didn't get to see if it would reactivate multiple times.

I honestly thing they designed him to be a mixture of an anti support tile character (combat polaris / medusa / carnage / etc.) and a charged tile team character like captain america worthy, negasonic and thor goddess of thunder (and others).

[Toothbrush]

Originally posted by Handoiron:

I bet I ran the same 1 fight you did.

Was the first fight of his special event where you fight maggias. I did manage to have a strike tile get picked by the ability and it did fire again, it was just fast enough that it was hard to tell.

I know I ended up with 10 charged more charged tiles when it was finished. II didn't let it cover the board with strike tiles though so I didn't get to see if it would reactivate multiple times.

I honestly thing they designed him to be a mixture of an anti support tile character (combat polaris / medusa / carnage / etc.) and a charged tile team character like captain america worthy, negasonic and thor goddess of thunder (and others).

Yeah, but by the time the board is covered with polaris' strike tiles you're probably dead already... but you're right, it's a nice counter to that, and fits well with Negasonic and Worthy Cap.

Between Elsa's Bloodstone and Throg's Zop I feel like we're getting characters who have powers that are made to make good Team Ups.

But charged tiles are always a double edged sword.

And the pet avengers, I initially thought it would destroy all the charged tiles, but it's way less effective the way it's used... it only takes away the charged tiles that I actually want to match!? Why?

at least the blue power is still awesome.

and 2020 was just the year to receive Anti-Venom as a new character, wasn't it?

[Dhaunas]

His green does not get weaker going from 4 to 5. At level 5 it still converts 5 tiles

[Toothbrush]

Originally posted by Dhaunas:

His green does not get weaker going from 4 to 5. At level 5 it still converts 5 tiles

I don't know where you got the idea from level 4 to level 5 was the downgrade.

It's from 3 to 4 that I was complaining about. Because it doesn't upgrade damage, and converts more tiles to charged.

[Handoiron]

Yeah the possible issue (I thought) was converting more tiles meaning fewer free recasts because more tiles converted per use would leave fewer to be converted by the free recast.

But that would only be an issue with it prioritizing enemy special tiles which it doesn't do so more converted per use means it is more likely to randomly pick an enemy special tile.

Charged tiles themselves will always have the "double edged sword" effect but it is still a mix of damage increase and AP production kinda. Just not spectacular for either hehe.

[Toothbrush]

Originally posted by Handoiron:

Yeah the possible issue (I thought) was converting more tiles meaning fewer free recasts because more tiles converted per use would leave fewer to be converted by the free recast.

But that would only be an issue with it prioritizing enemy special tiles which it doesn't do so more converted per use means it is more likely to randomly pick an enemy special tile.

Charged tiles themselves will always have the "double edged sword" effect but it is still a mix of damage increase and AP production kinda. Just not spectacular for either hehe.

If you've fought polaris or storm filling the entire map with specials, then the chance of not hitting one is pretty low.

[Dhaunas]

Originally posted by Toothbrush:

Originally posted by Dhaunas:

His green does not get weaker going from 4 to 5. At level 5 it still converts 5 tiles

I don't know where you got the idea from level 4 to level 5 was the downgrade.

It's from 3 to 4 that I was complaining about. Because it doesn't upgrade damage, and converts more tiles to charged.

I misread, please ignore me lol. I should avoid reading forums while on my phone

[Handoiron]

Originally posted by Toothbrush:

If you've fought polaris or storm filling the entire map with specials, then the chance of not hitting one is pretty low.

Yes, but most fights aren't against teams that fill the entire board up with support tiles.

5 random tiles converted is always going to have a better chance than 4 or 3 at hitting those few spread out support tiles. Even when you do hit 1 of them, the extra charged tiles created should make it even more likely the re-fire will hit any support tiles that weren't converted by the initial fire.

[Toothbrush]

Originally posted by Handoiron:

Originally posted by Toothbrush:

If you've fought polaris or storm filling the entire map with specials, then the chance of not hitting one is pretty low.

Yes, but most fights aren't against teams that fill the entire board up with support tiles.

5 random tiles converted is always going to have a better chance than 4 or 3 at hitting those few spread out support tiles. Even when you do hit 1 of them, the extra charged tiles created should make it even more likely the re-fire will hit any support tiles that weren't converted by the initial fire.

I'm sure there's some complicated math that could tell us at what point it becomes favorable to use 4 converts rather than 5 (probably somewhere just bellow 50% of the board being filled), which would further be complicated by the presence of a questionable amount of team up tiles, and your own special tiles, which won't convert but will reduce the amount of basic tiles that zop could convert.

So if you use Storm's black power to fill the board with low damage attack tiles, even those few specials an enemy did have are now going to be the only things to convert.

Sooo... situationally the 4 (or 3 or fewer) might be better because it would activate and thus deal more damage... but in general, unless you're fighting a special tile heavy team, more converts will be better.

I got the zop power as a team up from the battle today and I'm kinda excited for it. More excited than I am to actually have Throg on my battle team.

[Handoiron]

Yeah I'm not sure many will think he's part of a meta unless there is some mix of charged tile characters I haven't considered.

He's got an odd mix of archetypes, defending with his airborne and blue damage absorb, minor AP production and match damage from his charged tile production, a bit of temp healing and situational support tile clearing.

A his abilities have multiple levels of "if" to them. I just tend to look at "if" abilities as what they do if none of the "if" factors occur and then consider the "if"s as bonuses instead of the main purpose of the ability.

[Dan]

Throg vs Throg one on one...

Can you think of another instance in which two characters neutralize each other like this?

[Handoiron]

Originally posted by Dan:

Throg vs Throg one on one...

Can you think of another instance in which two characters neutralize each other like this?

Hood vs. Hood... both just keep stealing AP back and forth with almost nothing to spend it on that's worth using. Whoever gets more black faster wins after 45+ minutes.

[Toothbrush]

Originally posted by Handoiron:

Yeah I'm not sure many will think he's part of a meta unless there is some mix of charged tile characters I haven't considered.

He's got an odd mix of archetypes, defending with his airborne and blue damage absorb, minor AP production and match damage from his charged tile production, a bit of temp healing and situational support tile clearing.

A his abilities have multiple levels of "if" to them. I just tend to look at "if" abilities as what they do if none of the "if" factors occur and then consider the "if"s as bonuses instead of the main purpose of the ability.

Well I was on the recieving end of Zop today, I had ignored Throg because Adam Warlock (boosted) hits like a beast with charged tiles in his favorite color... so the board was mostly my special tiles when Zop turned the board into a mess of charged tiles.

I count myself lucky that Zop (at it's level 1 ability) doesn't do much damage, and also that I had Throg out front to take it.

The battle quickly turned from 'AH HA! Now I only have this pansy to deal with' to 'well ♥♥♥♥, what do I do now?' ... I mean I still won, because my people were higher level, but I immediately made the mistake of going airborn with pet avengers figuring that would finish him off, but he thought the same thing and ... yeah. Don't go airborn first.