I see a lot of people talk about characters being good or bad, but I was hoping for an idea of which characters are considered to be the best and why so I can get a better understanding of what to look for in a character when building a deck. Most of my decks (all) tend to suck and I don't have a lot of people to play against to make them better. I don't necessarily want to always play the strongest possible characters, but it would be nice to have an idea of what that would look like and to make a deck like that to compare my other decks against.
Are you using OP online? If you do, you can join me, Bios, Rucker and now Dr. Death for some games. The program has all the cards as well, you'd be able to experiment with deckbuilding.
As for great characters, there are many. Opinions will vary on who's the best, but when looking at a team I recommend balance. Especially if you're just learning.
You need to find just the right balance of assault, defense, tricks and counter tricks, (namely - negates). Many players like to find a common suit and make a team based around that suit. Having some characters with a high offsuit adds a healthy amount of teamworks to your team. For example - Capt. America has an 8 fighting and a 6 intellect. Meaning he can play 4 different teamworks on his own. Teamworks are a powerful assault tactic.
Take a look at the following characters for examples of commonly used 'strong' characters (this is by no means a comprehensive list, just an example of the characters that saw the most use in tournaments because of their strength):
Spawn - Good grid, off suit attacks and good team defense.
Heroes for Hire - Good grid, and lots of effective attack cards.
X-babies - cheap cost, very effective inherent abilty, good defense, some tricks and negates.
Hawkeye - Versatile character. Inexpensive, and is good in both the front lint or as a reserve.
Marauders - Even depowered, the vertigo is rough. They also have plenty of assault and two prime suits.
X-man - Cheap 8 grid character with very good specials. Defensive and offensive.
Four Freedoms Plaza Homebase - The inherent is the key to the strength of this deck. The ability to move any attack to another character for defense is very powerful. The team also has a balance of attacks and defense, plus the odd trick.
It's worth noting that your team may possibly revolve around a theme or tactic. You may favour more assault over defense, or vice versa. That's a deckbuilding preference of course.
A sample defensive deck that I saw often was:
Invisible woman, Nightcrawler, scarlet Witch and Spider woman. Solid defense and a bonus to venture through Invisible Woman. After they depowered the 'trick transport' I noticed people swapping out Nightcrawler, but Spawn fits in quite nicely to really make that team sick.
Just a few examples. Like I said, if you have OP online, the deckbuilder is really good - play with it and see what you can come up with.
-BBH
Since my specialty is DC I'll give a few hints there.
The Ray - an 8 Energy for low tournament-deck-building cost, a two-type 9 OPD and a Draw 3/discard dups OPD, and an Avoid any numerical attack which is good to have one of if you really want to keep him alive
Brainiac - an 8 and 7 on his Power grid, a 5 Strength CC code card (attack OR defense), an 8 Intellect, if succ. opp. must discard 1 placed card, and an Avoid 1 attack (see explanation I gave for the Ray)
Riddler - a two-type CC code and 3 good OPDs (play attacks face down opp. must guess defense, exchange remaining cards in hand with equal number from draw pile keep dups, and 3 Strength must be defended by a Power with a Universe)
Blue Beetle - +2 to venture per battle IA, plus a 6 Intellect attack if succ. opp. -4 to Venture
Comm. James Gordon - same IA as Blue Beetle, can use Comm. Gordon & G.C.P.D.'s 8 multi OPD
Wonder Woman - decent OPDs, an 8 and a 6 on her Power Grid, a numerical Avoid and a teammate Avoid
Neron - an 8 and a 6 on his power grid, a decent OPD that directs all of opp.'s attack on Neron to teammate of choice, an HY code which is a 6 attack if succ. opponent must discard 2 cards
Aquaman - this one may be debatable since he has two 6's and I think is over 19, but he has a 7 Fighting attack AR, an EB (play in front of Aquaman, special must be attacked before Aquaman can be, his IA lets him have dups), a 5 Energy may be played with a special card (which works great with both of the specials I just mentioned), and an OPD that makes Target discard all placed cards and not attack for remainder of battle - he can keep himself alive and land lots of off-type hits (his 6's are Strength and Intellect, take a look at his specials), so he's pretty self-sufficient and useful
Zert,
You left out Green Lantern and Flash. While single skill max 7s are something of a tough sell in tournament level competiton GL is one of the best imo as he's cheap, has non-opd 8s that he can just keep tossing at you all day long and then a half a mutli 9 for even more offense. Plus Gotcha is nice non-opd as well.
Flash of course speaks for himself as one of the two best reserves in the game and he's powered in what are probably the two most popular skills so he can team with just about any tournament deck. But if you were going to try a max 6 the frontline he has a plethora of excellent specials at his disposal.
BTW am I the only one that thinks that by and large JLA is actually a really good set that just got overshadowed by the ridiculously overpowered Monumental coming out two months later? Play them against characters from their own timeframe and most of them can hold their own with any hero in the game of that era and almost all of them have two or three really good cards (out of five total) with some heroes like Aquaman and Flash having 5 good cards out of 5.
This has really been a lot of good information. I just have not had the experience of playing a variety of people and decks to really learn the ins and outs of strategy in building a good deck. As soon as I have time in the next couple of nights I am going to build a couple of decks. I think I will be using the JLA set as the main resource for one and Monumental for the other. The sets I have the fewest cards from are Classic, X-Men, Image, and JLA, but I think I have all the JLA heroes and most of their specials even if only a single copy. I have a ton of Monumental including a completely unopened starter box. At this point I think I have every hero and enough copies of the specials though. I really like the heroes from the X-Men set though, so I may look for someone from there as well. My wife has a deck with all four characters from X-Men and I don't think I have won a single game against it. That could also be because I suck at deck building though.
Quote from: Palatinus on August 19, 2010, 12:52:31 PM
This has really been a lot of good information. I just have not had the experience of playing a variety of people and decks to really learn the ins and outs of strategy in building a good deck. As soon as I have time in the next couple of nights I am going to build a couple of decks. I think I will be using the JLA set as the main resource for one and Monumental for the other. The sets I have the fewest cards from are Classic, X-Men, Image, and JLA, but I think I have all the JLA heroes and most of their specials even if only a single copy. I have a ton of Monumental including a completely unopened starter box. At this point I think I have every hero and enough copies of the specials though. I really like the heroes from the X-Men set though, so I may look for someone from there as well. My wife has a deck with all four characters from X-Men and I don't think I have won a single game against it. That could also be because I suck at deck building though.
Yes, actually having the good cards helps too! ;)
Have you tried installing the OP Online program? It's got everything loaded up, and making decks is easy. Rucker, Bios and I have had several matches together, and Dr. Death recently joined the cadre.
-BBH
I don't have the program set up - yet. I very much want to but I haven't had time to do anything yet. I have a couple of people I want to get on this forum that I will get to play too.
You are absolutely right, The Dude! I actually thought about putting Green Lantern on the list, I didn't because I also left out Metropolis S.C.U. If you build a DC-only Energy deck, you are shooting yourself in the foot by not having at least one of these guys on your Front Line in my opinion! Green Lantern is great for those Any-Power 8's and of course the two-type 9 OPD, I really like Metropolis S.C.U. for their 6 Fighting attack (may be used against Reserve) which as a relatively high off-type can really annoy your opponent in apt quantities and of course their 11 Energy attack OPD. I also like The Flash's cards but since I've never managed to put him in a deck I kind of forgot about him! :-[ Totally agreed on your point about JLA as a stand-alone set. No where near as inferior and uncreative as the perfectly acronym-ed B/S set.
@Palatinus
As someone who also owns not a single Image OverPower card, I highly recommend you read through the set's checklist! Quite a few interesting ideas to be unearthed there, as weird as it may be for me to direct you to your own site. http://www.beenhereandthere.com/overpower/image.txt
I don't necessarily consider the Flash to be hands down one of the best two reserve characters in the game. He costs 19. You can get the same special from reserve from Velocity who only costs 16, and maintains the 6e icon. The only bad side is trading flash's 6f to velocity's 5f, and not having the draw OPD for flash, if you choose to play that with him. More than worth it in my opinion to go with Velocity over flash, with most of the decks I build, to get the 3 more points for your front line.
I normally chose Spider-Woman if i am going to use a 19 in reserve. With the marvels, Silver Sable would of had the same 9-or-less from reserve, she would of been awesome.
But you are right about Hawkeye being devastating from reserve, especially if you are playing with his mavels card. (But even without the Marvels card he is still already the best reserve character in my opinion, at a nice 17 points he offsets your common 21-point front line heroes, which is nice)
Quote from: drdeath25 on August 19, 2010, 07:11:35 PM
I don't necessarily consider the Flash to be hands down one of the best two reserve characters in the game. He costs 19. You can get the same special from reserve from Velocity who only costs 16, and maintains the 6e icon. The only bad side is trading flash's 6f to velocity's 5f, and not having the draw OPD for flash, if you choose to play that with him. More than worth it in my opinion to go with Velocity over flash, with most of the decks I build, to get the 3 more points for your front line.
I normally chose Spider-Woman if i am going to use a 19 in reserve. With the marvels, Silver Sable would of had the same 9-or-less from reserve, she would of been awesome.
But you are right about Hawkeye being devastating from reserve, especially if you are playing with his mavels card. (But even without the Marvels card he is still already the best reserve character in my opinion, at a nice 17 points he offsets your common 21-point front line heroes, which is nice)
Well, the practical problem with that is Velocity's 'Speedthrough' card is nigh impossible to find. If you're playing OP online, it's not an issue- but playing with real cards means limited accessibility.
-BBH
Yea, I'm with Harve on that one. I have two copies of speedthru, which is nice; but for Flash I have all the Reap the Whirlwinds I could ever want.
And yea with his Marvels card Hawkeye is outstanding, but without it I find him clearly inferior to Flash and Spiderwoman. Yea the cost and the 7 is nice, but what he actually does in reserve (a single 6E and the 2/8 special) isn't all that tremendous.
Quote from: The Dude on August 22, 2010, 07:35:00 PM
Yea, I'm with Harve on that one. I have two copies of speedthru, which is nice; but for Flash I have all the Reap the Whirlwinds I could ever want.
And yea with his Marvels card Hawkeye is outstanding, but without it I find him clearly inferior to Flash and Spiderwoman. Yea the cost and the 7 is nice, but what he actually does in reserve (a single 6E and the 2/8 special) isn't all that tremendous.
Notice how all of these great reserve characters are also quite brilliant in the front line. So much so, that it almost seems a shame that they have been permanently relegated to the reserve!
-BBH
First of all - I love this site! I'm so happy I found it. My brothers and I started playing Overpower about 18 months ago after my wife got me an original booster box for Christmas - she regrets that now! :)
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Anyway, what especially caught my eye just now... BBH, where is this OP Online program? I would absolutely love to use that! Plus, my wife is talking about moving in the future and I wouldn't be able to play w/my brothers anymore. With OP Online, that would solve it. Dude, that's literally a dream come true! I was, no joke, wishing I knew how to program something like that!
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Thanks for the info!
Post Merge: July 08, 2011, 03:54:43 PM
Oh, and by the way, a few things I always look at when building a deck...
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The average Venture value of the attack specials in my deck. I specify "Venture value" because if Angel's NeuroToxins is successful, it essentially counts as a 10 when summing the Venture Total. Same goes for people who have a "2/8" attack like Gambit's Kinetic Detonation. While it's easier to defend than a normal 8, if it does hit, it's still an 8. So anyway, I generally shoot for an average Attack of 6.7 or better. I figure that means an average of 3 hits will kill some one.
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Also, I have an aversion to Character-specific avoids. In general, I won't put more than 1 personal avoid in a deck, per frontline hero. My Battlesites tend to be 80% defense or more.
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Here's an example of a pretty strong deck I recently built...
Gambit (BJ, HN, HN, EJ), Quicksilver (BV, AS, AG, AU), Rogue (AC, BD, AS, AG, AR), Jean Grey (in reserve, AS, BH). My Battlesite was Avalon (see the Fatal Attractions theme here?) with Bishop's AC, AY, Cable's AD, Colossus' AG, AR, and Prof'x AQ, AH.
I put in 20 powercards, 6 Teamwork cards, and 3 Ally cards to get me to a 51 card deck.
Quote from: ncannelora on August 26, 2010, 01:23:36 PM
First of all - I love this site! I'm so happy I found it. My brothers and I started playing Overpower about 18 months ago after my wife got me an original booster box for Christmas - she regrets that now! :)
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Anyway, what especially caught my eye just now... BBH, where is this OP Online program? I would absolutely love to use that! Plus, my wife is talking about moving in the future and I wouldn't be able to play w/my brothers anymore. With OP Online, that would solve it. Dude, that's literally a dream come true! I was, no joke, wishing I knew how to program something like that!
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Thanks for the info!
Yeah, it's great that OP isn't entirely dead. ;)
Jack (another user on the forum) has a website dedicated to OverPower. He has the OP online available for download. Go to - www.overpower.ca - and you can get the program.
Depending on your OS you may have trouble getting it loaded. I had some issues with it at first, but eventually solved it.
-BBH
Thanks a ton for this, BBH! I've actually been to that site before, I just never even notice that on the bottom, there! I'm at work now, but you know what I'll be doing as soon as I get home (maybe even on my lunch)!
So, it's funny this topic was mentioned and I never came back to it. A few months ago, my brother and I started breaking down all of the things that make a character good, or terrible.
It came down to 2 catagories:
Power Grid
Special Cards
In the first, the Power Grid affects Sum Deck Total, so there's the element of a character's cost. It also affects their Power Card pool, so the max-8 is obviously more valuable than the max-6. Then there is value in the dual-grids (people with 6+ ratings in 2+ catagories), because they fit into various decks better. Those last 2 elements (overal max stat, and dual grid-ness) combine to also give the value of available Teamwork cards for a character. This is the summation of a person's Power Grid values.
In the second, the Special cards create, obviously, vast variation in decks. We singled out just a few of the elements of Special cards breaking them out into 3 basic catagories. Attack, Defend, and Card Advantage.
Attacks were easy to quantify, obviously. We created an adjusted average for them.
Next was the Card Advantage, which we really limited to cards that affect the current battle. So, Mr.Sinister's "Keep Duplicates" is super useful, but you can't Venture up when you draw it, since it affects next battle. This was a little tougher to quantify, but we eventually found a relative rating system for these types of cards, ranging from the best (HQ) and the worst (FB) and all of them in between.
Defense was also difficult to quantify (without extensive data processing), but we simplified the usefulness of teammate-type avoids (AO, AD, DB, etc). We again created a sort of curve-rating system.
After putting all of this together (and recognizing that there is quite a bit of subjectivity involved) we arrived with a comprehensive list, ranking all of the Overpower characters (4-stat cards only). We included different rakings for Alternate cards, too, since their varying grid can change their relative value (with a few exceptions, but we kept them listed for uniformity).
Some of the rankings really surprised us, but the data really is there to back these people up (we did include The Marvels, by the way). Here's top and bottom ten:
1. Professor X
2. Marauders
3. Mojo
4. Mr. Fantastic
5. Nightcrawler
6. Ghost Rider
7. Hulk
8. Morlocks
9. Holocaust
10. X-man
...
...
253. Forge
254. Taskmaster
255. Maggot
256. Ripclaw
257/258. Comm. Gordon & GCPD (same as Comm. James Gordon)
259. Thorn
260. Doctor Polaris
261. Warlock
262. Psycho-Man
263. Deathlock
i agree that professor X is one of the top Heroes with 4 stats but you don't include Scarlet Witch in top 10 (yet include ghost rider & mojo both Max-6) heroes? I would have to put more weight in the averages to the ability to use a 7 power card over the specials (although both mojo and ghost rider have great ones).... how many tournament decks used Ghost Rider? If he were truly a top 10 hero he would at least seen some play in the top 16 tables but none of the deck lists I have come across include him (some include Mojo). Just my two cents. I think that Scarlet Witch should be one of the top 5 heroes all things considered (her inherent is incredible).
I agree, it's an odd list, a few things don't seem to add up.
For example, Nightwing is not on your bottom ten. He is arguably the most shafted character in OP.
Ghost Rider is an interesting anomaly. He rarely gets used (well, I use him regularly, but I too am an anomaly!) but he doesn't have a single useless card. Add his draw 3 from the Marvels and you have a truly stacked character that fits into any deck but and intellect deck.
-BBH
This list is far from perfect. Our rankings are really for an individual evaluation. A person being used a lot doesn't make them the best. X-Babies are a great example of that, and I think Scarlet Witch is another.
Also, Ghost Rider drops out of the top 10 without the HQ he gets from The Marvels.
As for Nightwing, we can all agree he got hosed for who he is, because he shouldn't be so... useless. But, in terms of game play, can you really argue that he's worse than those bottom 10? I can't.
Post Merge: July 08, 2011, 03:55:56 PM
Also, keep in mind that being rated as one of the strongest characters isn't all there is to getting the most of a character. I mean, there's a lot more strategy to deck building than finding strong individuals.
For example, ProfX, Marauders, Mojo, and Mr.F are the highest rated (on our list), sum-legal team you can make, but that team would be a tough sell.
No Spawn or H4H? I also agree Scarlet Witch not being in top 10 is crazy... An interesting list though.
Spawn was #13
H4H was #21
Where was Beast: The Brute? Seems like using your formula he should be in the top 10.
I still have to agree, this is very interesting stuff.
Quote from: ncannelora on December 15, 2010, 03:33:28 PM
As for Nightwing, we can all agree he got hosed for who he is, because he shouldn't be so... useless. But, in terms of game play, can you really argue that he's worse than those bottom 10? I can't.
Oh yes I can. :) Each of your Bottom ten has redeeming cards or a redeeming grid going for them. Nightwing does not.
Forge - No great defining cards, but a series of cards that are usable, plus a 7 on his grid.
Taskmaster - Admittedly not too much - but he has a truly solid OPD, and his non-OPD 4s aren't terrible.
Maggot - Again, not much, but what he does have hits hard.
Ripclaw - Good grid, and His Pacifist Heart card makes him extremely playable. Concede and fully heal any character? Definitely a plus.
Comm. Gordon & GCPD (same as Comm. James Gordon) - Solid cards all around. Good OPDs, as well the Holohero has a good inherent ability.
Thorn - Weak, yes, but she has two OPDs that aren't bad.
Doctor Polaris - Again, Not fantastic, but not unusable.
Warlock - No cards - but decent grid and can manage 4 TWs.
Psycho-Man - Underrated. His 'Hate' card is sweet - lock down opponent's cards with the word teammate is useful.
Deathlock - JW cards, and a good card from the marvels to cancel opponents inherent's.
ALL of those are reasons to use any of those characters over Nightwing, who hasn't got much. Now, give him an inherent ability like - "May play Robin Specials, may play any Batman non-OPD specials" and suddenly Nightwing is a little more viable. ;) (Which is the inherent we gave him, BTW.)
My two cents on the Nightwing debate.
-BBH
I'm not going to get into an argument about whether or not Nightwing (34th worst, btw) is worse than Deathlock. We both agree that he shouldn't be in the bottom HALF, let alone the bottom 15%, or bottom 10.
Ultimately, I'm going to have to post our formula for quantifying all of this. Maybe I can even get some feedback on some of the more subjective data (like the relative value of Card Advantage type cards, Defensive cards, etc.). That'll be a long post, but maybe I can start by posting some polls. I'll kick it around when I have more time (maybe this weekend).
Post Merge: July 08, 2011, 03:56:10 PM
QuoteWhere was Beast: The Brute? Seems like using your formula he should be in the top 10.
I still have to agree, this is very interesting stuff.
Beast: The Brute was #40
Keep in mind there was some pretty minimal separation between some of the groupings. I mean to say that the top 5 or so, are pretty clear, then the next 10-15, then the next 20 are all super-close, etc.
Also keep in mind that this tier list leans toward hypothetical. Traditionally a tier list (as in a fighting game like Tekken) is made based on the number of appearances in a given tournament. This could be somewhat different from what one might think would be true, and Scarlet Witch is an excellent example of that. This tier list is assuming a number of things are true, but more importantly it is not a deck construction guide but rather an attempted overview of a characters worth. So while Scarlet Witch might not rank high on this list, that doesn't mean she isn't an excellent character that saw plenty of use because of a number of factors (cheap cost, max-7, AI, AO, AQ). Instead this list is a ranking on a much more singular basis; if you could only choose one character for your team, whom would you choose? Scarlet Witch most certainly would not be my first choice (it would actually be Cyclops, but hey, I'm a fan, so... yeah).
Let me try to clarify what I mean with an example.
In Tekken 5 some players attempted to compile a tier list of the 35 fighters based solely upon the raw data. In a fighting game it would be the "frame data": frame data being the number of frames (60 frames of animation in 1 second of game time) it takes to execute, land, and recover from any given move in the game.
The fighter Marshall Law was given a mid-mid tier status because the number of frames in his best moves exceeded the time it would take to recover from them being blocked. In other words, based on the data, it is too easy to block an attack from Law and attack him back.
However, a little bit later in the Korean tourney circuit, Marshall Law saw a lot of use. So much so that he was actually ranked high-mid (actually like number 5 or something, just below the "God Tier"). The reason being he had plenty of moves that were good, and more importantly, plenty of people knew best how to take advantage of his moveset to give them the edge.
So in our "tier list", we look at all the data we deem important (cost, dual-grid, number of playable teamworks, offensive output, card manipulation, avoids (negates, teammate, self or teammate, etc.) etc.) and put to a curve of sorts and compiled a list of characters based on a point average.
So this list is not necessarily definitive, and by no means a "true" tier list (we don't play, nor have we played in tournaments), but rather a fun way to gauge how ostensibly "good" a character is.
-Kaz mentions a good point. The list was individually rated, but it's still a team game.
Like football, everyone has a role. The best Kick Returner in the NFL might be listed as a Wide Receiver, but that doesn't make him the best WR. Even though he can get a job with every NFL team, he's still not going to get paid like a top WR, even though he technically is one.
For Scarlet Witch, she might be the best there is to fill her role (Negator), but she's still filling her role. She's not going to be able to carry a team of characters. You wouldn't exactly build a team around her. If we were holding an Overpower Draft, she would be a second round pick. A very good second rounder, but still not the top pick for most people (I think).
the only hero i would draft over her would be an 8 stat hero if we doing a true "draft" of OP heroes. Because as I said in the "rankings" thread, an 8 stat is better than the specials ;-)
Ultimately it depends on the team as a whole. I don't mind foregoing an 8 character on my team for a lesser grid, but complementary specials.
As you say, everyone fills a role. If there's not necessarily a role for an 8 character over someone who has a utility role for their specific cards, then that's the route to go. The opposite is true too. I have a few decks that I use that are grid based, and deliberately light on the specials. In which case, yes, grid is of utmost importance because Teamworks are a heavy factor for the team.
That's what's great about this game - the versatility of design.
Dammit, all this OP talk makes me want to play. But for whatever reason, my OP online isn't connecting any more.
-BBH
where does colossus rank on this list?
Quote from: steve2275 on September 22, 2011, 10:41:37 AM
where does colossus rank on this list?
he was at 57. Our quantification of defensive cards needs serious work though. I realized that about 4 months ago, but haven't really made any progress toward that end, yet.
Sorry for the thread necro...
Got interested in this game again recently, and started reading forum threads. I have 7 decks built, and only have 2 DC because I bought much less of it. But I thought it was amusing to read that Nightwing is pretty reviled as a card and he's on my DC Heroes team! I think I only bought one starter box of DC, so limited options for specials. But still...there he is.
It's not that he's reviled, so much that he just doesn't have any redeeming qualities from a deck-building perspective.
His grid is 2-6-4-6, which makes him very frail. Can't use 7s or 8s for defense, and doesn't have a proper defensive special to help protect himself or his teammates.
His low gird also means he can only play 2 teamworks. Compare that to character like Professor X (same grid point total), who can play 5 teamworks.
These might be acceptable trade-offs, if Nightwing had specials worth using. Unfortunately, he does not.
tl;dr - there's no reason to use nightwing over almost any other character in the game.