Kemo Coliseum

An R18+ m/m match-3 puzzle rpg game. · By Dudedle Studio

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Is it just me, or is Water extremely underpowered?

A topic by MarloweC created Nov 12, 2024 Views: 1,468 Replies: 8

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MarloweC1 year ago

Maybe I just don't get it, but I really don't see the point of Water. The initial healing spell is nice, but that's it. It's not much easier to use than the Wind healing spell, despite the lower cost. Bubbles are actively bad half the time, and if you're using Ice (which you always start with) you never know which ones will Freeze. Water damage heals some enemies.

At no point using other elements have I had nearly as much trouble with any enemy as I did with nearly every enemy while trying Water. True, I was only using the heal for most of it, but that's because everything else is just straight bad. If Water is supposed to be useful for something, I have no idea what that something is. I actually just stopped the run after losing handily to Aoba, because it's not fun to be so horrifically weak.

Dudedle StudioDeveloper1 year ago (1 edit) (+2)

It's nice to see different opinions on the builds and elements. I've seen people saying various things about ranging from it being weak to it being one of the best support elements.

Water by itself isn't that strong, but Bubble Gems can be transform into Freeze or Shock Gems easily, so they're good source for providing these gems in a few actions. For Chapter 0 and Chapter 1, you can use Aqua Splash and Frostbite to keep making 2+ Freeze Gems on the board, then cash out later with Forward Dash or Glacial Strike. From Chapter 2 onwards, you'll have more ways to use the Freeze Gems with Armor Bonuses. You'll also have an option to use Elec with Water, which lets you make a stun-lock build with Water, Elec, then converts Shock Gems into Paralyze Gems.

I can see that it might be tough to see its strength right now in Chapter 0 and Chapter 1, but once you unlock Skill Stores in Chapter 2, it'll open up to many interesting builds.

- Punipen

MarloweC1 year ago(+1)

Huh, ok. So the purpose of Bubbles is to convert them. The way I was looking at it, their purpose was to sometimes randomly move stuff to get additional matches, and you can hopefully remove the correct Bubbles also completely by random using Ice or Elec. Which would make them extremely high variance. But it seems the intent was "these are extra Freeze or Shock gems in the future, but in return, there's a bit of initial randomness."

MarloweC1 year ago(+1)

Ok, I completely get it now. Yes, Bubbles by themselves are really bad. However, Freeze gems are great, especially if you get more of them. And somehow I hadn't actually noticed that when Bubbles Freeze, they *become* P-Attack gems (since that's the gem that gets enchanted with Freeze), regardless of what gem type they were before. So it not only gives you more Freeze gems, but more P-Attack gems too.

MarloweC1 year ago (1 edit)

Ok. I've played with it a bit more now, at least in the context of Water/Ice. I still don't like most of the Water spells, and later on, you get enough Ice spells that you can and probably should replace Aqua Splash with a superior Ice spell, which will do essentially the same thing except with higher damage and without any of the drawbacks. If you really need more P-Attack gems, Forward Dash is generally better at that than Aqua Splash. So the progression seems to be Ice + healing > Ice + Aqua Splash Combos > back to Ice + healing. I dunno. Maybe it's just not for me, but I significantly prefer Wind.

raccan1 year ago

i been playing a phys/ice focus build, you spam ice gems and you can get tons of crits and with pinpoint attack you get even more damage and add glacial strike which more damage the more freeze gems are in the field, with that move you can solo phase almost any enemy or instant destroy any armor (with 50 str and rage i manage to do 653 with glacial strike in cyruz fight)

MarloweC1 year ago (2 edits)

Well yes, but you can do that without taking Water as your second primary. Pure Ice/Physical is good. There is very little reason to add Water to that. Especially if you're spamming STR because then not even the heal is useful. Even if you do want to use Aqua Splash, that is easily purchasable by the time you have the later Ice Physical skills, and Fire spells get you through the early game a lot better than starting Water.

Flicker5 days ago (1 edit)

Old post but I started playing again recently and I can say for sure, Water gives off a bad first impression.
Every other element starts with their basic enchantment spell, allowing them to have more power and interaction in battle. But Water starts with a weak heal spell, that has a very situational (specially at early game) secondary effect, so it ends up not being used most of the time, making you feel like you have 1 less skill most of the time.
And I know getting the first level should remedy that, but it doesn't. You're kinda forced to pick the basic bubble spell, to START doing something with water, but that comes at the cost of any other skills the player might have preferred to get. So while other elements are picking their first lvl up skills to start building their combos or trying different spells/builds, Water is forced to spend a lvl up making up for their start. And early levels are a TEDIOUS grind, specially when you have a start as weak as Water has.
Now there is also the chance of missing the basic bubble spell on lvl up, which just leaves water feeling like it does nothing at all.

MarloweC5 days ago

I don't think the heal is bad at all. It's actually the best spell Water gets, and I've discovered that Bubbles can be good depending on your build. It's just the rest of the Water spells that do nothing. I'd even say Water's heal is better than Wind's heal, but Wind has the advantage of being a really strong element overall, just with a worse heal spell.

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Kemo Coliseum

Is it just me, or is Water extremely underpowered?