#Possibly an unpopular opinion

1 messages · Page 1 of 1 (latest)

feral river
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There are several characters that could benefit from small adjustments or tweaks to improve their individual power. However, among all of them, there is one character that feels like she is at the very bottom of the roster, and that character is Wanda.

Wanda is possibly the only Counter archetype character that feels completely wasted. Her ability to generate permanent counter is mediocre, her cards come with negative AP value, and the actual value she provides depends far too much on investment compared to what the character realistically offers.

One of the biggest problems when trying to view Wanda as a defensive character is that her defensive value and team contribution are practically nonexistent around 80% of the time. Unless you have Overexalt, she cannot consistently reduce enemy power.

Her card that should theoretically be one of her stronger tools ends up feeling underwhelming. It drains your arithmetic resources and cannot reduce its own cost, which makes it inefficient unless you already have excess arithmetic available.

Her only offensive card scales with the amount of counter generated, which is unfortunate because Wanda herself is not good at generating counter in the first place.

It is honestly disappointing to see a character with such a good concept end up being almost the weakest character in the very archetype where she should be the queen.

If you compare her to other counter characters, the gap becomes very clear.

** Other Counter Characters**

Caecus:
Caecus can generate an absurd amount of permanent counter, even without being built as a full DPS.
He can also deal significantly higher damage through counter interactions and tentacle mechanics, while also providing healing. Meanwhile, Wanda struggles to even reach half of the counter that a simple Caecus can generate in a single turn. On top of that, Wanda needs her passive just to produce a small shield.

Wanda.webp
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Pandia:
Pandia is not the most outstanding counter character in the game. However, when paired with supports that amplify her strengths, she performs decently as a DPS, particularly with strong burst damage and temporary counter generation.

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Faint:
Faint completely outclasses Wanda in terms of defensive capability.
She can heal, grant death resistance, constantly reduce enemy power, and generate large amounts of counter thanks to her E+ mechanics and the realm she operates in.
She can also activate both permanent and temporary counter at the end of turns or when death resistance triggers.

Daffodil
Daffodil is capable of generating 30k temporary counter or even up to 300k temporary counter in a single turn, which puts his scaling far beyond Wanda’s capabilities.

Nautila:
Nautila has very strong temporary counter generation, extremely solid shields, and an ultimate ability that can prevent negative effects while increasing the current shield value.
Her Overexalt even allows her to exceed the normal shield limit. On top of that, she has a 500% fixed damage effect based on her current counter, regardless of whether that counter is temporary or permanent.

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Winkle:
Winkle may not stand out as a counter generator, but she has one of the strongest utility kits within her realm.
She can generate strong shields, cleanse armor break effects, regenerate Aliemus for allies, and even allow teammates to use their ultimate abilities twice.

When you look at all of these permanent characters, with the exception of Daffodil (who is a promotional character), they all provide strong defensive value, meaningful team support, and mechanics that allow them to properly utilize counter or contribute something impactful to the team. Meanwhile, Wanda contributes very little in comparison.

Daffodil is the only exception because her design is focused on raw damage output.

I genuinely like Wanda as a character, but there are several aspects of her kit that are difficult to understand. It feels like she is being deliberately balanced to remain weaker, even though permanent characters or characters that are not even focused on counter mechanics are already outperforming her.

Some players might argue that Wanda’s strength lies in reducing enemy power. However, Xu and Pickman do this far more effectively. They can reduce enemy power consistently and almost for free, while also generating resources for the team.
Meanwhile, Wanda needs 10 passive marks to activate her strongest defensive action and return damage to the enemy, in addition to spending 4 arithmetic points on her permanent counter card.
Some people may defend this mechanic by pointing out that Overexalt grants access to these effects for free, but this actually highlights the core problem even more clearly: Wanda is a character that requires significant overinvestment just to function at a decent level.

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Suggestions for Improving Wanda’s Kit

This is where I would like to propose some ideas to improve her kit.

** Keeper of the Lost**

The 4cost card Keeper of the Lost should have its cost reduced to 2.

In addition, her design should be more focused. If Wanda is supposed to specialize in enemy power reduction, then that aspect should be strengthened significantly instead of trying to combine it with weak counter generation.

Alternatively, if she is meant to be a counter focused character, then her counter generation should become efficient, even if that means lowering the values of her power reduction effects.

Another idea I personally prefer is changing Keeper of the Lost so that it reduces enemy power while generating shields instead of counter, while still lowering the cost to 2.

** Spine Needle Chains**

The 3cost card Spine Needle Chains should have its main mechanic redesigned.

Instead of dealing damage based on counter, the damage dealt by this card could be converted into temporary counter generation.

Additionally, instead of dealing 20% of the current counter as damage, the card could convert 20% of the temporary counter gained from that damage into permanent counter.

Slumber Counter

Finally, Slumber Counter should become a more reliable defensive tool.

It could provide enemy power reduction or a shield, allowing it to function as another sustainable defensive option alongside its other form, Echoes of Whisper.

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Another possible change would be modifying its current effect. Instead of converting 50% of permanent counter into temporary counter, it could convert 20%–30% of temporary counter into permanent counter.

This would create much stronger synergy with other counter archetype builds and mechanics.

With all of these points considered, I only have one thing left to say: Make counter great again, and bring Wanda out of the deep pit she is currently stuck in.

rancid falcon
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Another important point: We need that Wanda skin 🙏

feral river
coral mauve
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Before reworking Wanda, we need the counter rework

vivid light
# feral river **Suggestions for Improving Wanda’s Kit** This is where I would like to propose...

She does need some changes for sure, but i'm not sure about the spine needle, i think it depends what route they want to take her, if to go for defensive focus with ramping generation, in with case they need to focus more on strengthening her defensive capabilities, or generator.
Plus, i'm scared about the temporary to permanent conversion, they made all the counter changes exactly because of the excessive amount of temporary counter oe daff can make.

blazing stone
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“Possibly an unpopular opinion”
proceeds to drop an ice cold take

vivid light
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honestly, fixed counter generation has some problems, mostly because you both can't increase the generation if not with amp, levels etc, but mostly because we don't have effective enough defensive unit's to make the slow game plan viable, especially if they don't change the Gaze intention https://discord.com/channels/1131791637933199470/1473982519350132839

feral river
# vivid light She does need some changes for sure, but i'm not sure about the spine needle, i ...

also feel like Daffodil is partially part of the problem. She is the only character capable of generating insane amounts of temporary counter without any real limitation other than her damage output.
Because of that, constantly limiting future counter characters and older counter characters just because of her existence is not a good design choice. Not everyone will have Daffodil heavily invested with Overexalt, so balancing the entire archetype around that scenario does not make much sense.
That is also why I mentioned several different improvement options earlier. The goal of those suggestions is to improve Wanda herself, not to turn her into another Daffodil servant like what happened with 24 or Pandia support builds.
Regarding Spine Needle Chains, I feel like are ok understandable the potential impact of the proposed change. The idea is that only 20% of the damage dealt by that ability would become permanent counter.

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This ability does not have any direct power scaling bonuses. It only gains increased critical chance, which means the permanent counter generation would not suddenly explode in value.
If the change were implemented, the most noticeable improvement would come from the temporary counter generation, which would already be a good step forward. Meanwhile, the permanent counter would still scale gradually over time, but this time in a healthy and meaningful way, instead of the current mediocre scaling.
As I mentioned earlier, trying to balance Wanda’s fixed counter in a way where it cannot become strong but also ends up feeling weak is not a good solution. Especially when there are already other characters that clearly break that supposed balance “rule”.
That is why I lean much more toward reinforcing her defensive role. Wanda should finally be stabilized as a proper defensive character instead of sitting in this awkward position where she feels like a low-tier character that barely reaches a mediocre middle ground.
If Wanda is meant to be a defensive character, then she should fully embrace that role. And if she is going to have offensive mechanics, they should function similarly to other temporary counter characters, who are capable of generating meaningful amounts of counter without feeling restricted.

brave verge
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Wanda lives matter.

fleet patio
feral river
versed plover
distant ermine
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Those are good ideas, but I honestly doubt the devs care. Wanda will probably just get replaced by a new counter character with better mechanics, and she’ll be left behind. Even if she gets buffs, they’ll likely be minor balance changes. I doubt they’ll actually bring her out of the pit she’s in.

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If she’s in such a bad spot, it’s probably because they want to keep her that way that’s honestly what I think. There are also several characters who don’t even have a personal passive besides the Arc 2 one, and they’ve just been left like that.

wide girder
# distant ermine Those are good ideas, but I honestly doubt the devs care. Wanda will probably ju...

I agree with this. It really feels like balance feedback or rework suggestions don’t get much attention from the devs unless it’s about bug fixes or visual issues. It’s just easier for them to leave a character as they are and release a new one that does the same thing, but better. A good example is Vortice. She basically fills the same role as Doresain, but does it better. She can buff her own crit rate and crit damage, has AoE Dmg, and can even wave damage without using her ultimate. On top of that, she ignores fortress, and her scaling is much better since it’s based on tentacle damage instead of just Power.

copper sparrow
stable estuary
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@eternal turret Helot_slack_off

eternal turret
rancid falcon