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I just read @ThePinkOtter’s (Yeah that nerd) recent post and some very good points were made (As well as changes I could 100% get behind) and I am making this post since it was closed, so Imma try to keep it a bit more organized. (Keep in mind this is mostly gonna be me paraphrasing @ThePinkOtter’s post, but in a more organized matter to continue the discussion cause I really liked what @ThePinkOtter had to say there …so credit for most of the content here goes to @ThePinkOtter )
THE PROBLEM WITH BRUISERS
It is well known that bruisers are not played very often, and the only ones played are generally ones with very high base damage such as Grumpjaw (As a Baron counter) who’s sole purpose is to slow down the bot laner’s progress as much as possible. The post explains in high detail how Kensei’s new passive punishes his role as a bruiser/tank buster by forcing him to build less defense to ensure his damage boost will remain active and how it adds a weird interaction where being under leveled can be a good thing with his new passive. However, it forces Kensei into a more assassin-like role where he aims to burst enemies down and can be killed with ease unlike the unkillable powerhouse he could become back then if he were given the ability to stay in a fight for a prolonged period of time. In fact, captains are just bruisers anyway due to their high base stats like @ThePinkOtter mentioned. However, since captains have far more utility than a traditional bruiser has, there’s no real reason to use the other.
TOO MUCH CC
Too many heroes have several CC options. Every hero released barring assassins have been loaded withCC such as Magnus’ double stun, Kinetic’s B, Yates in general (Yeah he’s a captain, but his CC is off the charts), Ylva, Silvernail (But he has some of the healthiest forms of CC tbh), and most recently Sang Feng with his insane ult (Which is literally a faster, better version of Adagio’s ult in terms of utility). Most comps have at least 3 heroes that can CC chain you, so generally fights are decided based on who can coordinate their CC better. It is difficult to make traditional bruisers good when everyone gets good CC such as ranged carries which already have an inherent advantage with their range (Especially meta mages with their extremely high range such as Magnus and Skaarf).
SUGGESTED CHANGES:
This is where @ThePinkOtter makes some suggestions that I really agree with and believe could definitely improve the viability of heroes like Glaive, Rona, Kensei, etc.
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Nerf captain base damage: This does need to happen. Captains deal very high damage at the moment and just makes bruisers irrelevant. Some captains could have decent stats like Phinn due to his slow movement speed or MAYBE Lance, but captain damage across the board needs to go down overall.
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Nerf CC across the board: This could be a great change! All CC needs to either be nerfed or changed (With maybe a few exceptions imo like Cath’s A and Captain CC should only be affected slightly, but still nerfed). @ThePinkOtter mentions Magnus’ B could be a 99% slow and Kinetic’s stun should be locked under a 300 CP requirement.
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Add utility to purely damaging abilities on captains: An example for this that @ThePinkOtter mentioned would be adding armor/shield shredding on BfB for Ardan.
One change I would add is lower Yate’s A range cause if overall CC is nerfed his A will 100% need a big boi nerf cause that ability is just plain dumb.
O and did I mention that @ThePinkOtter is a nerd?