I have my doubts that this would be balanced but at this point I would rather have the meta be broken than stay in this low skill, unfun tank meta.
General
Halving hard CC times for all characters, excluding those who require them for combo pieces (Celeste, Reim, Joule) and already short CCs (Base Lorelai A). Despite my exclusions in these brackets, I would still probably nerf some of these like Celeste B. A small amount of CC could come back for each level you put into the ability (similar to Cath A). (So around level 1, CC abilities would be about 40% effective, while at level 5 they would be around 60% effective. Just estimates.)
Nerf base tank stats on tankier characters.
Adding CC duration as a stat. Maximum of 25% increase. Only affects hard CC.
MAYBE Give mages CP ratios for their CC (Similar to ony)
Defence Items
Remove fountain of renewal and slumbering husk.
Change Metal Jacket to 130 Armour, 15 Shield, resistance to crits
Change Aegis to 130 Shield, 15 Armour. Reduce damage from consecutively cast abilities (up to 5 times.)
Add CC duration to Rooks Decree, Nullwave Guantlet, Stormcrown and the vision items (5%)
Add a new item: Guardians Might ~ 80 Shield, 15 Armour, CC duration (10%). Reduces the defence of all enemies a character hard CCs (Less effective on melee targets and AOE CC). 20% of armour and shield reduced, which is divided in half for every reduction. Duration matches CC duration.
Nerf Pulseweave damage.
Weapon Items
Nerf BP, especially for ranged characters
Buff almost everything else in the WP tree because the rest of it is basically trash compared to the god that is BP
Remove tension bow and replace it with a useful penetration item
Add a WP + Reflex block hybrid
Crystal Items
Add a CP + Reflex block hybrid
Give AS proc a CP and level scaling, reduce base. Increase gold cost.
Boots
15% CC reduction (Hard CC only). Cost increase.
Forcefully cancel someones teleport boots with hard CC (TP CD is set to 30).
Heroes
Don’t nerf characters that counter the tank meta while leaving the actual tank meta untouched
Goals: Force tanky characters to actually buy items to be useful. Reduce CC overall, give better options for counterplay. Remove defence items that 4 damage carries can buy that will keep them completely safe. Fix the power skew in the WP Tree (Breaking Point for EVERYONE!!!).
I would just say to remove all the newer tank items (Rooks, Pulse, Capacitor) and revert the changes to the tank/health and def items.
The game was fine before they started to rework the defense tree and added these broken ass tank items that allowed tanks to become tank carrys.
They should rethink the way the newer items work and release them again.
Pulseweave was supposed to help give a small amount of damage to aggressive tanks and frontline heros, but instead gave every jungler and roam the ability to tank to an crazy amount and deal enough damage and cc to kill off carrys which I think was a big mistake.
Hmm… the problem I see is with your suggestions is that it’s basically too much change. But then again, I understand that balance is not of a concern when this was made.
You want change for the sake of getting rid of the tank meta I assume.
Here’s my take and opinion on what could possibly be done to change the meta around a bit:
Crowd Control commentary:
Your CC scaling with ability level and crystal or weapon power is reasonable I say. Some already have this. Some other heroes may have to retain their fixed numbers though, as they’ll get outscaled as the game heads towards late game.
I think that there was an attempt to make CC have ‘diminishing returns’ or as you say it, less effective the more they are applied. I’m not sure whether that attempt came through or was redacted. I get that you want it to be restricted to hard CC, but we’ve never actually been given what is considered as ‘hard CC’ by the devs point of view. Also, diminishing returns might not work as well if there are too many varieties of CC being piled or chain piled onto one hero. One way I see to make CC more tolerable is to lower the cooldown of Reflex Block and implement more items that incorporate Reflex Block into them so that players don’t just have to just from the current choices of Aegis or Crucible. The community always seemed to want an armor version of Aegis after all.
Defense Stats commentary:
For defense stats, I think what the devs need to do is set a specific range or number for the armor and shield of heroes that are meant for a specific role. If you look at our current roster, each hero has armor equal to their shield, with the values being either 50, 60 or 70. Assign 50 to ranged heroes, 60 for semi-ranged and/or semi-mobile, and 70 for extremely close and immobile heroes. This is only the first step of adjusting the defensive stats.
Next is to look at each heroes HP total and HP regen. For this one, I think it needs adjustment based on the heroes kit, their intended role, their base defenses etc. There are numerous factors that can be used to determine what value would be most suitable. But I will be talking of one specific type of defense that should be looked at next.
And that next thing is ‘damage reduction’ passives. This is one is particularly important when considering which hero it is on. It’s basically ok on those with ‘directional’ damage reduction such as Grace and Lance. Side note, I think Joule should have been given this passive considering her current one gives armor and shield instead and is basically not as useful. The one that’s brings to light the problem with self-sustained damage reduction that ties to easy regeneration and no scaling is of course Grumpjaw. Easily solvable though, just make it scale with level rather than give him flat damage reduction.
Defense item commentary:
I don’t think Fountain of Renewal is a problem. Rather, the understanding of players on the Casual scene of the importance of Mortal Wounds applying items is a bit less. Some do get it, but I think they need slight buffs that bring them back as an optional but substiteable choice still. I think Poisoned Shiv and Spellfire is common in pro play from what I’ve seen.
Slumbering Husk I think needs to lose a good chunk of the armor and shield stats it offers. It shouldn’t really offer twice the defensive stats of its Tier 2 predecessor. Maybe cut them to 45 or 50 armor/shield. Then, maybe give it a much shorter proc range or shorten the duration of the health fortification.
I don’t think Aegis and Metal Jacket needs changes. Rather, the devs should introduce items that are the opposites of them. Essentially, an armor version of Aegis and a shield version of Metal Jacket. That way, we have a defensive line up that isn’t too advantageous as they offer what is currently present and not used as much at times.
By ‘CC duration’, I assume you mean that those items with CC duration will boost the CC from the holders of the items? I think this is a bit unnecessary and counterintuitive change if you want to implement diminish returns. It’ll also just makes those CC/utility heavy tanks more relevant to pick these items up.
I don’t think an item that straight out shreds armor/shield when a hero hard CC’s an enemy will help in getting rid of the tank meta. It’ just make the tank more relevant because they can just hard CC the poor target and bust through their defenses. Instead, why not buff Bonesaw and introduce a shield counterpart of Bonesaw. Sounds reasonable?
Pulseweave’s problem is that it gives too much. The speed boost is good in my opinion, but the slow and damage is essentially better versions of Shiverstell and a free AoE damage item ala a reverse of Aftershock as it scales with the holder’s health. What I think needs to be done is nerf the slow or remove it, or remove the damage altogether. The combination of these two is what enables high health tanks to deal more damage by just going into tank items as most tank items offer a bulk load of health.
Weapon item commentary.
I agree with the notion of nerfing Breaking Point for range characters. They’ve become too mobile and defense items they usually pick up have become too good as well. It may push some less relevant heroes out of the picture, but it is a small price to be paid.
I think the only items that need buffing are Poisoned Shiv, Tension Bow and Bonesaw.
What I would remove or rework instead is the critical strike items. There is almost always one of them in a weapon carry’s inventory nowadays, usually a Tyrant’s Monocle. I think the RNG and synergy with BP need to be taken out of the equation or reworked. Sure, you can ensure RNG doesn’t go into effect by going full crit, but that usually cost too much and takes too long to achieve. If reworked, I think they should deal bonus damage and amplify only basic attacks; but make it so that the damage comes consistently either through a timer or through having a condition that it will only take place after a few basic attacks. This in turn will make other attack speed item such as Bonesaw much more relevant and synergistic with them.
Reflex Block with Offense and Boots Items:
I get the idea, but this will just take away the relevance of defense items, so that’s a no from me.
As for teleport boots, I think it just needs to be removed because we now have Yates that can teleport anywhere and drop Scout Cams for a cheesy teleport target in.
Aftershock:
I think it needs Nivmet style of nerf, but slower. A 0.5% decrease in its percentage of health damage.
Hero balance:
If you nerf tanks, the busters need to go as well (unless they scale off of tanks like Kensei to a certain extent).
I dont think AS needs anymore nerfs. I think though that SF needs It. The problem with PW is that It gives damage, mobility AND allows the player to be extremely tanky (700 health wtf).
You may say that, but before the new items, everyone was complaining about how stale the Captain item path was. We need those items, and possibly more. Here’s some suggestions:
introduce an item with crit resistance (@ThePinkOtter mentioned this as a change to MJ, I think it would be better as a separate item)
-add an item which gains defence stacks (or maybe even 2, one for shield and one for armour) that works similarly to BP or DE but for increased defence
-Nerf Pulseweave, I suggest removing the lifespring passive
-Change Aegis to have equal values for shield and armour
-add an item similar to MJ but with high shield and low armour values
I realise this is a lot, but maybe we you don’t need all of it. These are just some ideas I had.
This is just personal opinion but FoR is often my third, maybe second, item. Any of the new defensive items and even crucible is more effective and clutch.
Cath/Churn/Adag/Lyra is my top hero rotation, if it matters
ony)
