Please..... let us disable counterproductive traits

1

I’m having fun with a recently released Mythic, Archproxy Yvendra.

Her 3rd trait creates an Uber Doomstorm when an enemy is killed.

I’m using Stormcaller class with her, as the Lightstorm both feeds her mana and maximises the effect of her spell.

The point of her spell is to inflict damage, and blow up the board. What’s not to love about that?

The problem is that when an enemy dies, I lose the Lightstorm. Worse than that, if I also lose control of the board, I hand my opponent control of a board while an Uber-Doomstorm is active, which can, and often does, go horribly wrong.

Of course I make sure I will get a 4-match before I cast her spell, in which case I get the benefit of the uber-doomstorm. But, if I cannot wipe out the enemy team before I lose control of the board, it can backfire spectacularly.

Because this trait activates when I kill an enemy, I am probably winning the battle at the time, and arguably don’t need the Uber Doomstorm, making this a “win-more” ability. The risk of it backfiring usually outweighs the benefit of a “win more” ability.

I get that using a trait like this will be risky. However, I’ve decided that the risk just isn’t worth the reward, and I don’t want to use it.

Also, of course, there is the infamous case of summoning a meat shield (Bandit) who has stealth. By definition, no-one wants stealth on a “meat shield”. That would also be fixable if this were possible.

However, once activated, it is impossible to disable these counterproductive traits. Also, they are required for kingdom progress.

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Clicking on the trait in the upgrade menu highlights the trait, but does not allow any interaction with it. PLEASE… give us the option to temporarily disable (or permanently unlearn) a trait. I don’t mind losing the traitstones if that is necessary, and would be happy to buy the trait again if I ever changed my mind.

7 Likes
2

The ability to turn it on and off is better.

5 Likes
3

Absolutely :slight_smile:

But if, for whatever reason, that isn’t going to happen, I have plenty of traitstones. Also, I have a stockpile of Orbs of Wisdom, so using resources up putting the trait on again if necessary isn’t an issue. Either way will work :slight_smile:

4

I think the argument historically from Sirrian in a Q&A was that they’d rather look at the ‘problematic’ traits themselves, rather than have a system of turning them on/off, which they considered bad design (creating traits only for them to be turned off).

Counter arguments:

  • The GoW team realistically no longer has time to re-examine traits

    • An on/off design could relieve pressure on the team from a systems perspective – assuming they have time to and are able to implement it successfully

  • Several traits are ‘conditionally useful’ – Archproxy Yvendra’s from the OP being an example

    • If the idea is that players have to make a decision between the usefulness of a Troop traited vs untraited, and Power Levels vs utility, this ignores both the different contexts in which a Troop could creatively be used (creativity should be encouraged!)
      and the evolving nature of the game, where priorities may change

    • Alternatively, perhaps conditionally useful traits simply shouldn’t be released – although again, the GoW may not have time to review such traits if they miss seeing the conditional aspect before release (which is a reasonable consideration, I think, since it was often mentioned that the GoW team can’t always predict the myriad of ways any feature/piece of content will be used once in the wild)

tl;dr: the GoW design team perhaps shouldn’t be so squeamish about an on/off system for traits, with no need to commit to on/off systems elsewhere

9 Likes