My Idea for Balancing the Arena

[HeadOnFire]

It seems to me that whoever gets the first turn in a PvP match has a huge inherent advantage. Between energy talismans and stun/freeze/silence effects, the first team that attacks can cripple, if not kill outright, most of the other team. For example, when I go first, I use my Reaper Eddie's "Horrow" AOE attack to steal power (usually enough to use The Nomad's "Mirage" move) and then nail someone with The Prisoner's basic attack. If Eddie gets an extra turn, then I'll just use the Nomad's basic attack and then use my Golden Son's "Hand of Fate" ability to give The Nomad an extra turn. I will then use Reaper Eddie's second turn for another AOE attack, which usually steals enough power to use Mirage (even after the 5-power cost of Hand of Fate). After all that, it is quite likely that 1 enemy will be stunned by the Prisoner, 1-2 enemies frozen by Eddie (who has a freezing set) and all of them heavily damaged. Obviously, this is ONLY happens under ideal conditions and cannot be counted on every time, but even if all this stuff doesn't trigger for me, the battle usually begins with at least one enemy dead and the rest badly hurt.

The same goes the other way - if I don't win the coin toss, I'm usually crippled right out the gate.

So HERE'S my suggestion: whichever team wins the coin toss, ONLY EDDIE gets to act. He does whatever he wants, and then the other team gets to act with Eddie only. Then, it could proceed as normal from there, or maybe each team gets 2 actions, then 3, then proceed normally at 4. This would slow battles down, but I think it would make the arena a lot more fair and give RNGesus much less influence over our PvP. And that's it!

Thoughts, suggestions, criticism? I'd love to hear what the players and developers think of this.

[90mphyorker]

Sounds like an interesting system. Certainly easier to impliment than the speed stat idea I came up with. Haha.

Your idea would mean you'd have to think more carefully about who you'd attack and who with. Hopefully bringing more stratergy into the game. AI would need to be smart for hold rates to be good though.

[HeadOnFire]

True, it would certainly raise new issues with the AI. My system would work well with an idea I read yesterday (wish I could find it and link) of being able to watch replays of your defense team and "program" which characters attack first and which moves they use under certain conditions.