A massive textdump detailing how I would balance the game (with explanations)

Just for context, these are the changes I would make at this very moment with numbers that serve as placeholders. What I want to get across are the general ideas, but instead of explaining what I would change and have you try to form an image of it, I think giving solid numbers will help stimulate the mind a little more.

If something isn’t mentioned (For example, BreakingPoint is not mentioned in the items section) it means it doesn’t stick out to me as something that requires changing on a fundamental level. Maybe they require numbers adjustments, but I don’t want to mention them unless they’re large changes. This is already long enough already (as of writing this, it is 12 pages and I still need to provide an explanation to everything that I feel requires one). You’ve been warned.

Here are my personal directions that I would want the game’s balance to go towards. Removing CC from kits that don’t need it, particularly those in damage dealers

  • Better defining character strengths & weaknesses / themes
  • Nerfing 4 offence 1 defence builds
  • Giving Captains more of a supportive role (You can go ahead and assume I nerf all Captain base damage. I’m too lazy to go through all their abilities one by one)
  • Reducing the amount of burst healing/barrier captains can provide
  • Changes to mobility for certain characters (Mostly nerfs)
  • Alongside other character specific balance changes that I feel are needed

This isn’t to make a more ‘balanced’ game per say, but to make a more fun game. I can go on a whole extra page about how balancing is more about making the game fun than making the game fair for everyone but you don’t want to hear that and I don’t want to write that, so just know these are just opinions.

That are correct.

You might notice that a lot of this is reducing the power level of characters. This is intentional.

Item Changes
Notes
Tenacity: Reduces the duration of CC. Can stack up to a maximum of 50%
Now crowd control effects are separated from other negative effects.
When the statement ‘Receive additional healing’ or ‘Reduce received healing’ is used in that sort of context, this includes barriers. I just can’t be bothered to type it out.

Boots

Normalising boot costs
T1 remains at 300
T2 total cost increased to 800
T3 total cost increased to 2000
All T3 Boots will now only use ‘Journey Boots’ as part of their crafting tree.

Sprint Boots: +0.4 MS
Active: Gain a fading haste for one second (Gain a burst of movement speed which fades over time). 120 second CD.

Travel Boots: +0.5 MS, +100 Health
Passive (Travel): Gain +1 MS when out of combat with heroes, monsters or players.
Active: Gain a fading haste for one second. 90 second CD.

Journey Boots: +0.7 MS, +200 Health
Passive: Travel
Active: Gain a fading haste for two seconds. Landing an ability or an auto attack on heroes while ‘Journey Boots’ have a cooldown higher than 15/25 seconds (melee/ranged) will gain one ‘sprint’ stack. Once a hero reaches 3/5 ‘sprint’ stacks (Melee/Ranged), the cooldown of ‘Journey Boots’ will be set to 15/25 seconds (Melee/Ranged). 60 second CD.

Wartreads: +0.6 MS, +200 Health
Passive: Travel
Active: Grants a fading haste for two seconds to all nearby allies within 12 units. 60 second CD.

Halcyon Heels: +0.5 MS, +300 Health, +15% CDR
Passive: Travel
Active: Gain a fading haste for one second. 40 second CD.

Teleport Boots: +0.6 MS, +300 Health
Passive: Travel
Active: After channelling for 2.5 seconds, teleport to allied structure, minion or scout cam. Grant a 300 health barrier to the target while channelling. Gain a fading haste for two seconds after the channel is complete. 150 second CD.

(New) Dis-chargers [I am so sorry]: +0.6 MS, +300 Health
Passive: Travel
Passive (Lightspeed): Every time you cast an ability, gain +0.3 fading MS for 1 second. This effect can stack.

Explanation: Boots are too strong, plain and simple. If one person has boots up and another doesn’t, then they have the distinct advantage of ‘you can’t catch me’ or ‘I get a free engage’, which is too abusable with boots upgrades resetting the CD to be that powerful (or journey boots). The reasoning behind a fading haste is to still provide a relevant burst of movement speed that allows heroes to dodge skillshots or quickly close the gap, but not the amount of speed that would take you from the dragon pit to the safety of your tower. The changes behind Journey Boots are to prevent characters to refresh it simply by tickling your out of position top laner and force them to instead be aggressive with their boots activation to have it reset it. Halcyon Chargers lost its mana component to lose stop it from being a cheap, easy to pick up sustain item which nullified a large number of energy problems that would have otherwise been a weakness to many mages. Dis-chargers exist as an alternative choice for mages and WP ability casters aside from Heels. Personally I would also revert the movement speed changes made in 4.1/4.2 (I don’t remember) which increased the base movement speed for every hero; giving every character that much movement speed made ganking a bit too easy and made pushing an opponent out of lane not that big of a deal.

Crystal

(New) Occultist’s Tome: +5 CP, +5% Vampirism
Passive (Blood Rites): Restore 30/10 Health (Melee/Ranged) whenever you kill a unit.
Total Cost: 300 Gold

(New) Ritualistic Robes: +10CP, +10% Vampirism
Passive: Blood Rites
Total Cost: 800 Gold (Builds out of Occultist’s Tome)

Spellfire: +80 CP
Passive (I don’t have a good name): Abilities dealing crystal damage to enemies (excluding lane minions) deal 20-60 (levels 1-12) crystal damage + 65% of your crystal power as bonus crystal damage over 3 seconds and applies 20% + 5% crystal healing reduction over the duration (Maximum 40% reduction).
Explanation: Spellfire should really be a niche item, but it’s used as a general purpose damage item on anyone who can built it simply because it’s so powerful. AOE wounds are pretty busted, believe it or not. The idea is that one needs to both build other damage items and be in a situation where it makes sense to build this item, instead of simply picking it up over other items because it’s good against fountain (I know I’m guilty of this one on my Baptiste).

Broken Myth: +70 CP
Passive (Shield Shatter): 30% Shield Pierce
Passive (Slayer of Legends): Deal % additional damage to heroes with higher maximum health based on how much higher their health is. For every 5% more health the hero has, the user deals 1% more damage capping at 20% additional damage.
Total Cost: 3100 (Builds out of Heavy Prism and Piercing Shard)
Explanation: Now further counters full tanks while being less effective against bruisers. Broken Myth is more suited for fights with solid frontlines that ranged mages love to shred.

Eve of Harvest: +40 CP, +300 Energy, +4 Energy Regen, +15% Vampirism
Passive: Blood Rites
Passive (Soul Harvester): Your next 200-800 (level 1-12) points of crystal damage to enemy heroes have +15% lifesteal, recharges over 40s.
Total Cost: 2700 (Builds out of Ritualistic Robes and Void Battery)

Frostburn: +90 CP
Passive (Crippling Chill): Slow enemies by 40% when they are hit by your abilities for 1.5 seconds. Reduced to 25% for AOE abilities.

(Reworked) Dragon’s Eye
Passive/_Explanation:_Something similar to BP in the WP Tree. Old BP was bad design because characters could have 0-1 damage items with it and dominate teamfights. DE doesn’t seem as bad since most CP characters are based on skillshots until you realise that mages have CP Ratios on their autoattacks. Especially Vox and Varya. Also they get free lifesteal which means their 2 item spike makes them go from reasonable to not okay with one 1300 gold purchase. Yes, I got lazy for the numbers on this one

(New) Cursed Locket: +35 CP, 10% Vampirism
Passive (Shield Shatter): 20% Shield Pierce
Passive (Desperate Might): Gain 5% Tenacity for every 10% missing health, up to a cap of 30%. When you reach 30% tenacity, fire out a small AOE blast around you that applies a 40% slow and deals 40-100 (level 1-12) + 50% CP damage. 40 second CD.
Total Cost: 2900 (Builds out of Ritualistic Robes and Piercing Shard)
Explanation: The idea of this item is to be more friendly to CP melees, providing a small spread of important stats and tenacity to the bruisers and assassins out there. The downside of the item is, of course, the low amount of Crystal. Although this item wouldn’t likely be built on many ranged characters, if it’s too strong it should only give half tenacity for ranged or something similar.

(New) Mirror Shield: +60 CP, +200 Health
Active (Reflex Block): Gain a barrier worth 100-600 (level 1-12) and block all CC effects for 1.5 seconds. 30 second CD, only ticks down out of combat.
Total Cost: 2500 (Builds out of Heavy Prism and Reflex Block)

Weapon

Book of Eulogies: +5 WP, +5% Vampirism
Passive (Blood Rites): Restore 30/10 Health (Melee/Ranged) whenever you kill a unit.

Barbed Needle: +10CP, +10% Vampirism
Passive: Blood Rites

Poison Shiv: +35 WP, +35% AS, +10% Vampirism
Passive: Blood Rites
Passive (Infected Blade): Every 2/3 basic attacks apply 30% + 7.5% weapon healing reduction for two seconds (Maximum 50% reduction)

Serpents Mask: +70 WP, +15% Vampirism
Passive: Blood Rites
Passive (Flesh Harvester): Your next 200-800 (level 1-12) points of weapon damage to enemy heroes have +15% lifesteal, recharges over 40s.

Tension Bow: +60 WP
Passive (Armour Breaker): 20% Armour Pierce
Passive (Sudden Strike): Every 6s, your next basic attack will deal 20-140 (Level 1-12) + 100% of bonus weapon power bonus damage. Every time you land a basic attack while this passive is on cooldown, the cooldown of this passive is lowered by 0.2 seconds.
Explanation: A small tweak to make this item more of a squishy killer alongside making it viable for more characters.

Bonesaw: +20 WP, +40% AS
Passive (Armour Breaker): 30% Armour Pierce
Passive (Savage Shred): Your basic attacks shred 7.5% of the enemies maximum armour for 3 seconds. Maximum of 4 stacks.

(New) Curved Trident: +80 WP
Passive (Armour Breaker): 30% Armour Pierce
Passive (True Elegance): Increase the weapon damage on all abilities by 10%
Total Cost: 3100 (Builds out of Heavy Steel and Piercing Spear)
Explanation: More of a middle of the road time armour penetration item made for caster type weapon characters like with Rona or Kestrel who have a difficult time using both TB or BS to their full potential.

(New) Parrying Rapier: +60 WP, +200 Health
Active (Reflex Block): Gain a barrier worth 100-600 (level 1-12) and block all CC effects for 1.5 seconds. 30 second CD, only ticks down out of combat.
Total Cost: 2500 (Builds out of Heavy Steel and Reflex Block)

Weapon Infusion: Nerf the attackspeed on this it’s so stupid

Defence

(Removed) Slumbering Husk
(Removed) Aegis
(Removed) Stormcrown (Build path stops as Banner)

(Reworked) Reflex/Crucible: Cooldowns only tick down outside of combat. 120 and 40 seconds respectively.
Explanation: The cooldowns of reflex block have been lowered but have been set to only tick down while out of combat. This is mainly to stop players from abusing the ability to pop a crucible with an ultimate, then stall until that ability comes up again and repeat (We see you Phinn players).
Total Cost: 1000/2800 respectively.

(Reworked) Fountain of Renewal: +300 Health, +40 Armour, +40 Shield
Active: Fires out an AOE pulse with the range of 5 which heals allies for 50-200 health (level 1-12) and cleanses all negative debuffs on them and giving them an immunity to debuffs for 0.25 seconds. Healing is applied before cleanse. 40 second CD.
Explanation: Since CC blocks such as reflex block, San Fang A/B OD and Blackfeather ult don’t block negative effects anymore, they have to be cleansed. Since quite a few characters have debuffs, this item serves as a way to tell them to stop doing that.

(Reworked) Celestial Shroud: +95 Shield
Passive (Might of the Mysterious): Gain 20% Tenacity.

Atlas Pauldron: +75 Armour
Active: Fires out an AOE pulse with a range of 3 which reduces the attackspeed of enemies by 40%/65% (Melee/Ranged) for 4 seconds and applies a 40% second slow to ranged characters for 2 seconds.
Total Cost: 2200 (Builds out of Coat of Plates)
Explanation: Reducing the reward for hitting an Atlas on a melee hero and increasing the reward for landing it on a ranged hero. Essentially, the reward increases with difficulty. Since this is treated as a debuff, counter with fountain, not a block.

(New) Nullwave Gauntlet: +60 Shield
Active: Fires out an AOE pulse with a range of 3 which doubles ability cooldowns for 2/3 seconds (Melee/Ranged) and applies a 40% second slow to ranged characters for 2 seconds.
Total Cost: 2400 (Builds out of a Kinetic Shield)
Explanation: Simply an Atlas for more ability oriented characters. This can be used against certain abilities to put them on nasty, long cooldowns if you can time it right, but it the effect can be cleansed.

(New) Garb of Dragons: +700 Health
Passive (Sacred Scales): Whenever you take 10% or more of your maximum health within 3 seconds from a single hero, gain 5% + 2.5% armour + 2.5% shield damage reduction from all sources other than that hero (caps at 10% damage reduction per hero). This damage reduction lasts for 3 seconds.
Total Cost: 2600 (Builds out of Dragonheart. Preferably two of them, but we don’t know it technology is there yet, so we can come back to that.)
Explanation: The item is for facetanking or when against teams with more than the usual number of DPS to ensure that your tank still remains somewhat tanky. Doesn’t work for duels though, unfortunately.

(New) Ceremonial Robes: +400 Health, +30 Armour, +30 Shield
Passive (Blessing of the Crown): All allied heroes within 12 units gain the ‘Lifespring’ passive.
Passive (Blessing of the Light): For every allied hero within 12 units all allies receive 2.5% additional healing and gain 5% bonus mana regen.
Total Cost: 2400 (Builds out of Lifespring and Warmail)
Explanation: A niche item for games of poke and siege where Captains can buy this item to provide their team with regen. Although it’s the closest to a dual defence item, it has low enough stats that it hopefully won’t matter (and no combat active).

Hero Changes
None of these changes are meant to be a personal attack on you if you main that character. Except Gwen.

Adagio

Gift of Fire
Slow on self cast is reduced to 0%, scales on 5% of bonus health up to a cap of 70%.
Arcane Fire shreds 2% of armour and shield every half second up to 8/8/8/8/10% + 1.5% CP (up to 15%).

Agent of Wrath
Agent of Wrath boosted AAs now apply a slow to targets afflicted with Gift of Fire
Base damage reduced to 30/40/50/60/90
Arcane Fire Bonus reduced to 5/10/15/20/30
Additional Arcane Fire Bonus: Applies 0% + 2.5% of bonus health slow up to a cap of 35%.

Verse of Judgement
Applies Arcane Fire to all targets.

Explanation: In my personal opinion, CP Adagio and Captain Adagio don’t really have enough differences in playstyle to justify switching from whichever is more powerful at that moment. The idea is to make CP Adagio more about helping melee characters deal more damage to enemies while raining damage from the backline while captain Adagio peels for his specific carries while healing them. Note that Arcane Fire is a negative effect.

Alpha

Termination Protocol
Gains 20% Tenacity during the duration of the ultimate.

Ardan

Vanguard
Ardan now grants a fading barrier and speed boost. The barrier fades over 4 seconds while the speed boost fades over 2.
Barrier: 120/160/200/240/300 + 60% Bonus Health

Blood for Blood
Remove Overdrive
Additional Effect: Enemies have 5/8/11/14/20 armour and shield shred after being hit by this ability for 1.5 seconds.

Gauntlet
The duration of any stun applied beyond the first in one cast is halved.
Ardan now gains 5/10/15% CDR while inside gauntlet (goes beyond CDR cap)
Stun Duration: 0.6/0.7/0.8

Explanation: Ardan’s Vanguard is extremely strong against burst damage but its effectiveness against sustain damage leaves something to be desires, especially after what Vanguard used to be. By making it a fading barrier, it can be a more well rounded ability that still rewards good timing but not losing all effectiveness within 2 seconds. Blood for Blood now serves as a good way to mark out who to focus and help your carries focus them down. Gauntlet has a weaker CC component but increases Ardan’s utility while he’s inside it, giving his team the edge if the opponents decide to fight inside the gauntlet.

Baptiste

Ordain
Duration of Ordained: 2/2/2/2/2.5 seconds

Fearsome Shade
Fear: 1/1.2/1.4 seconds

Baron

Rocket Launcher
Has a reduced attackspeed modifier (60%)

Explanation: Bring back Baron weaknesses thanks. He was more fun and satisfying when he had them. This is just the beginning of what I would do; I would also switch his jump to scaling distance based on CP and switching the CD reduction on his B to being on every target hit by his A but this would require further rebalancing. I would increase his range on ultimate rank up too, but that’s just me.

Blackfeather

Heartthrob
Heartthrob cannot be cleansed.

Feint of Heart
No longer applies Heartthrob stacks (outside of the 1 from counting as an AA).
Execute is True Damage.
Missing HP%: 5/6/7/8/10% + 2% Bonus Weapon (Caps at 20%)

On Point
Applies a 0% + 10% Bonus Weapon Slow (Caps at 20%)
Can now be used during Rose Offensive, which causes a circular slash around Blackfeather, applying the damage but forgoing the slow and barrier.

Rose Offensive
Rose Offensive is much faster and provides amour and shield instead of fortified health.
50/75/100 + 25% Bonus Weapon shield
50/75/100 + 25% Crystal armour

Explanation: Changing the focus of BF from a failure of a lanebully to something more akin to a flexible counterpick. Crystal is all about poking at the opponent with the standard On Point outside of a snipers range and going in when they’re low while Weapon is about getting onto a mages face and finishing them off with the execute as quickly as possible. The reason Heartthrob can’t be cleansed is because unlike many other debuffs it effects the timing of his ability combos and disrupting them would be too powerful.

Caine

Peacemaker
Caine will lose 1 MS while reloading.

Triple Tap
Slow applies to all bullets except the last with a duration of 0.1 seconds.

Once more
No longer resets ultimate.
Always reloads 3 ammunition.
Cooldown: 24/22/20/18/15

Explanation: Caine needs distinct weaknesses, but currently he doesn’t have them. These emphasise his reload mechanic as a negative more than a positive while keeping his current damage the same.

Catherine

Captain of the Guard
Additionally, reduce all cooldowns by 1 second every time Catherine lands a CC ability or debuff.

Mercilesss Pursuit
Stun duration: 0.7 (all ranks)

Stormguard
Each reflection extends the shield duration by 0.2 seconds (can proc every 0.2 seconds).
Damage/Sec: 10/20/30/40/50 + 70% CP Ratio
Reflects any damage above: 7.5% - 0.8% bonus armour - 0.8% bonus shield maximum health (5% minimum)

Blast Tremor
Silence Duration: 1.4/1.7/2

Explanation: Catherine is difficult to change with the parameters I set for myself since without her CC, she’s not… much of a character, let’s just say. The buffs to her Stormguard reward her for good use of it while the additional perk gives her an actual passive early game that might be useful (which also has synergy with captain items).

Celeste

Julia’s Light
Damage: 65-125 (Level 1-12) + 60% Crystal

Solar Storm
Cooldown: 100/90/80
Stars outside of the lead star now deal 20% reduced damage for each additional hit of stars outside of the lead star after the first. (That was a mouthful)

Fortress

(Reworked) Packmates
Allies gain a speed boost when moving towards Fortress based on 20% of Fortress’s movespeed

Law of the Claw
Bleeding now stacks up to 10 times
Ability now initially applies its slow in addition to applying it at maximum stacks, no overdrive required. Overdrive doubles slow strength on the proc at maximum stacks.
Slow Strength: 20%
Percent max health: 4/5/6/7/8%
Each bleed stack now shreds 2/2/2/2/3 armour and shield

Attack of the Pack
Wolves can contribute to bleed stacks, but cannot apply the initial bleed.

Explanation: Changing Fortress to more of a team oriented character. Not a solo-maul you to death type. Personally I would change his A or B to some sort of more skill orientated ability, but I’m not exactly sure how.

Glaive

Bloodsong
Lifesteal per stack: 1/1.2/1.4
Slow: 0% + 20% Bonus Weapon (Caps at 40%)
Damage per stack: 15/20/25 + 6% Crystal

Grace

Retribution
Bonus damage: 10-65 + 5% bonus WP + 10% CP

Benediction
Passive damage reduction removed
Holy Shield: 30% + 5% Crystal (50% max)
Grace now only applies an omni-directional shield to herself for 2/2/2/2/3 seconds.
Overdrive removed.

(Reworked) Holy Nova
Grace rejuvenates the spirit of her allies and smites her enemies in an AOE around her. This heals allies, grants a weakened holy shield and speed boost for 2 seconds while dealing damage to enemies and applying a slow. This ability can be cast at any time including while CCed (exception being silence), while moving, while using other abilities ect.
To help visualise, imagine the current size of pre-OD Phinn B but without any delay.
Holy Shield: 15% + 2.5% Crystal (25% max)
Speed Boost: 0.2/0.3/0.4/0.5/0.6 MS
Heal: 0 + 40% Bonus Crystal
Damage: 0 + 80% Bonus Weapon
Slow: 0 + 15% Bonus Weapon (Caps at 40%)
Cooldown: 20/18/16/14/10 seconds

Divine Intervention
Holy Shield: 30% + 5% Crystal (50% max)
This ability can now be recast to cancel it at any time.
Heal is now applied every half second.
Heal per tick: 60/80/100 + 25% Crystal
This ability grants bonus WP + CP to the target for the duration
Bonus WP/CP = 0 + 15% Bonus Weapon (50 Max)
This ability can now last up to 5 seconds.
While casting this ability Grace takes 50% more damage.

Explanation: Changing Grace to more of a team oriented character. Not a solo-maul you to death type. Grace isn’t meant to be a Captain with these changes though: more of a bruiser who can go CP to support or WP to deal damage and occasionally assist.

Grumpjaw

Living Armour
Grumpjaw no longer regains stacks from basic attacks, but he now regains stacks for every hero he has hit with an ability

Grumpy
Slow Strength: 70%
Slow Duration: 0.5/0.5/0.5/0.5/1

(Reworked) Hangry
After a delay, Grumpjaw slams the ground with his body, stunning enemies and dealing damage.
Damage: 150/200/250/300/450 + 140% Crystal + 100% Bonus Weapon
Stun: 0.6
Cooldown: 14/13/12/11/8
Note: Swap ability names

Explanation: Since Grumpjaw’s currently playstyle ‘Spagetti onto them with really big numbers and win’ which surprisingly ISN’T FUN TO PLAY AGAINST, I decided to explore the thematic of having a big body. His A can set up for his B slam and you can also pre-emptively slam as you spit out an opponent, giving him a more strategic feel while being more of a caster-type damage dealer.

Gwen

Movement Speed: 3.7

Buckshot Bonanza
60/105/150/195/240 + 80% Bonus Weapon + 200% Crystal

Skedaddle
Passive movement speed removed
Cleanses both CC and negative effects and gives a fading sprint for 1 second
Cooldown: 20/19/18/17/14

Explanation: Gwen shouldn’t one of the easiest laners in the game, be the most difficult to punish thanks to her free movespeed and have a cleanse at the same time. I’ll leave it up to you to figure out what I removed. It’s not… that hard to figure out.

Joule

Thunderstrike
it can crit yay :slight_smile:

Big Red Button
Damage: 500/850/1000 + 220% Crystal
Additionally, Joule now gains a stack for every point of damage that she nullifies with her passive, which fall off during combat at the rate of 200 stacks per second. When using her ultimate, she consumes these stacks to deal bonus damage (+1 to total damage per stack, crystal damage).

Explanation: I get that SEMC wants for Joule to be a tanky WP bruiser character, but removing thunderstrike crits was unnecessary and killed off a fun build path that wasn’t particularly powerful. Now the ultimate rewards the tanky WP bruiser playstyle though, with bonus damage being on the ult based on how much damage Joule’s effectively negating with her passive.

Kensei

Immovable Mind
Changed back to the old formula. You get the idea.

Path of the Ronin
Distance of dash halved
Stun from Kensho changed to a 60% slow
Kensei now executes enemies under a certain health threshold after applying damage
Execute Threshold: 5/7.5/10% + 1% Bonus Weapon maximum health (Max 20%)

Explanation: Kensei is the tank killer. Instead of making him a ‘play like a coward till you can spagetti’ character, Kensei should be countered by the enemy team and their picks while countering teams with 2 or 3 tanks. He has his old formula on his AA’s which is much healthier for the state of the game (Suddenly doing 20% more damage because they have 5 more health is stupid). His ult provided access to the backline much too easily for a tank killer, so it’s been changed to be an execute similar to Caine’s. The stun has been changed to a slow as well (because it’s unneccesary).

Kestrel

Active Camo
Stun duration: 0.1 + 0.25% Crystal (1 second max)
Weapon required to fully remove cooldown upon getting hit: 150

Explanation: WP Kestrel already has very high damage against melee targets and a powerful escape ability. She shouldn’t also have a long stun. Fight me.

Kinetic

(Rework) Tracer Shots
Landing Plasma Driver grants Kinetic stacks of tracer shots. Kinetic consumes these to enhance her basic attacks. Stacks fall off one by one after not gaining any stacks for 5 seconds (1 stack every 0.2 seconds).
Additional Damage: 15-60 (Levels 1-12) + 25% Bonus Weapon + 40% Crystal damage

Plasma Driver
Plasma driver grants stacks of Tracer Shots. The number of stacks gained are halved on targets outside of heroes, miners and mythic creatures, rounded up.
Stacks gained: 1/2/3/4/5

(Rework) Inertial Dash
Dash now goes further but is slower (Similar to Skye B).
Kinetic resets the cooldown on Plasma Driver when dashing and if it is cast during Inertial Dash will fire a much more powerful projectile.
Stun is unlocked at 300 CP (0.2 second stun)
Cooldown: 20/18/16/14/10
Slow duration: 1

Charged Pulse
Now applies the bonus damage from each stack consumed instead of increasing damage by 25% per stack. Each additional instance of bonus damage past the first does 5% reduced damage.
Damage: 300/450/600 + 70% Crystal + 50% Bonus Weapon

Explanation: Kinetic should actually has to land her skills on players to deal damage. Insane, I know. Although it’s more forgiving to not perfectly maintain stacks by sticking to the timer, it’s more punishing to be missing projectiles in the middle of a fight with this version of the kit. For the ultimate change, it just feels fitting and cool. Just for a visual, imagine Kinetic tracer shots following the pulse and whittling you to death in a humiliating fashion. Fun :slight_smile:

Lance

Impale
Damage: 150/200/250/300/350 + 80% Crystal + 80% Bonus Weapon

Gythian Wall
Lance additionally gains Tenacity against abilities he is facing.
Strafing Damage Reduction: 10%/10%/10%/10%/20%
Tenacity: 10%/10%/10%/10%/20%

Combat Roll
Cooldown: 10/8/6
Damage: 50/75/100 + 80% Crystal + 30% Bonus Weapon

Explanation: Making Lance better as a character that can tank CC but nerfing his ability to full tank and still deal tons of damage.

Lorelai

Fish Food
Stun is now a Root

Splashdown
Slow Strength: 30% + 0.012% Bonus Health

Waterwall
Cleanses both CC and negative effects
Barrier Strength: 500/650/800 + 12% Bonus Health + 80% Crystal

Lyra

Bright Bulwark
Slow Strength: 30%
Slow Duration: 1/1/1/1/1.5 seconds

(Rework) Arcane Passage
Lyra can place up to two portal entrances on the map which allies can travel through when both are placed down. These portals can be destroyed by 5 autoattacks from enemies. After placing down both portal entrances, the portals take 5 seconds to activate. Portals can be used an unlimited number of times but they have an internal cooldown of 5 seconds for each hero. If Lyra attempts to place a third portal entrance, the oldest remaining entrance will be destroyed. Lyra can intentionally destroy portal entrances by casting Arcane Passage on it a second time (regardless of ability cooldown) which will not put the ability on cooldown. Lyra gains bonus range based on ability rank.
Cooldown: 60/50/40
Bonus Range: 0.5/1/1.5

Explanation: Currently, you can’t do anything about Lyra’s ultimate. Even with vision, when she has 60 range it’s absurd to expect players to set up cams to cover 60 units all around them when taking an objective. This version of the ultimate isn’t combat based but does reward clever players on both teams. This also gives a captain the ability to give their allies the ability to get back to lane faster, which is honestly healthier than a damage dealer just getting it for free because your name is Gwen (also you can do something about this one).

Magnus

Chrono Driver
Stun is now a 80% slow

Reza

Troublemaker
Charge time is reduced by 2 seconds every time Reza lands Scorcher on an enemy hero.
Charge time: 18/17/16/15/14

Ringo

Hellfire Brew
Whenever Hellfire Brew is available, Ringo stacks up to 5 stacks onto enemies when autoattacking, which adds a missing health damage component to the Hellfire Brew burn (Crystal Damage)
Execute (Per Stack): 2/3/4% over 4 seconds

Explanation: Giving Ringo ult a bit more of a kick to it when building WP alongside making it more of a viable debuff cleanse target.

Rona

Red Mist
Rona gains 30% tenacity while using this ability

San Fang

Tiger’s Bridge
Sans will not dash without countering
If Sans takes direct damage from abilities during Tiger’s Bridge, his next attack with dash to his opponent and stun for 1 second. Sans will ignore the effects of the first enemy ability applied to him during Tiger’s Bridge.
Overdrive: Ignore CC for 2 seconds

Big Boy Blessed Boom Blast
Overdrive: Ignore CC for 2 seconds

Explanation: Sans and his counter are straight up badly designed. It can proc from random captain autoattacks, fish puddles and other forms of damage so delayed that it goes from a counter to a game of finding what sort of gimmicky interaction you can abuse. Counters in general are really bad for games that are buggy and have connection issues (hint: Vainglory) so…
Just don’t! This should make it more bearable though.

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Silvernail

(Rework) Double Shot
Silvernail deals 20% more damage to characters who are hard CCed
Also rename this.

Caustic Blessing
Caustic Blessing now has a even larger delay (Double the current delay, maybe even more) but shreds the enemies armour and shield.
Shred: 10/12/14/16/20%

Explanation: Silvernail’s current passive/B doesn’t meld into his kit properly. Make him actually the thinking man’s carry instead of the ‘haha doubleshot b doubleshot and I run away’ carry.

Skaarf

(Rework) Fan the Flames
Skaarf’s abilities burn enemies which can stack up to 10 times, which deals damage every second for 5 seconds. If the enemy is already burned, Skaarf’s basic attacks also adds a stack. Adding stacks refreshes the duration of the burn.
Damage per stack per second: 2-13 (Level 1-12) + 7.5% Crystal + 0.5% Crystal Max Health

Goop
Damage per second: 40/60/80/100/120 + 40% Crystal
Just as clarification, this applies Fan the Flames once for each tick.

Dragon Breath
Damage per second: 300/450/600 + 120% Crystal
Just as clarification, this applies Fan the Flames once for each tick.

Explanation: Skaarf’s kit doesn’t particularly have much of an identity outside of ‘mage who throws out projectiles’. This gives him more of a tank counter role while still keeping every active ability the same.

Varya

Chain Lightning
Lifesteal against minions on chain lightning is reduced by 50%. Maybe even 25%. or 0%.
Explanation: Currently, Varya can chain lightning onto minions to get like 600% of the lifesteal she should be getting even during duels. That’s not fun!

Yates

Overwhelm
Whenever Yates lands an ability he marks them for 0.25 seconds. When landing Overwhelm on a marked opponent, the stun duration is doubled. (This can be cleansed)
Stun duration: 0.4/0.4/0.4/0.4/0.6

Explanation: Making Yates more of a combo based character instead of the current… strange abomination we have. His B is too reward even when using it in a low risk way.

Ylva

Removed.

Explanation: Clickstuns are a sin in game design. I don’t care what sort of character you are in whatever game, you shouldn’t be able to point and click on somebody to catch them out or ruin their combo. I was tempted to change the stun on Cath A but decided against it because otherwise her kit is even weaker than before, but Ylva is inexcusable. Not only is her stun longer and have more damage, but it has a lower cooldown and comes from range. She’s also a journey boots abuser and a burst one shot character, creating what I would describe as pure ‘unintuitive gameplay’. Her ultimate is also a sin on mankind; the size of the ability alongside the two second root at max rank simply shouldn’t be in the game, especially when one idiot can walk up and pop it to screw over your whole team. Getting punished directly by a teammates misplay is also not fun, surprisingly. Who would have thought.

Characters I’d change but I have no ideas on

Koshka
Explanation: Koshka is a low counterplay character with relatively low power (when she’s balanced) which is very polarising for lower and higher tiers. She honestly needs more complexity and more obvious strengths and weaknesses because currently the way you beat Koshka is simply having numbers she can’t break through but having enough numbers to demolish her back. Same thing with Fort, but I actually had some ideas on him.

Krul
Explanation: It’s pretty obvious Krul’s kit doesn’t work in 5v5. Although Krul’s kit is one of my favourites, it really needs more defensive utility to actually stay alive during team fights. Although he doesn’t seem like he would need a complete overhaul, he definitely needs something fundamentally changed to make him function.

Samuel
Explanation: Samuel is essentially balanced around not having an ultimate, which doesn’t feel good to play against or as. When you’re against Samuel all you notice is that he completely trashes your early game and all you feel is bad but when you’re playing Samuel all you notice is that when it comes to teamfighting Celeste gets to one shot people from a global distance while you get the worlds easiest to dodge CC (and the CC isn’t even good). Sap some power out of his A/B and rework him to give him a better ultimate… or something like that.

Skye
Explanation: Skye, similar to Krul, doesn’t work in 5v5 except they actually tried to make Skye viable instead of giving up like they did with Krul. The problem was instead of addressing the fact that Skye is extremely matchup dependant and has difficulty pushing objectives or teamfighting to win games (Late game she’s an inconsistent ranged assassin or CP Vox without bounces). This leaves Skye with two possibilities; she gets a good/neutral lane matchup and the enemy laner doesn’t get to play the game for 20 minutes or she gets a bad lane matchup and loses.

General Game Mechanics
Fundemental stuff that makes the game unfun. If you want to only read the most important stuff, I’d recommend here.

Flask Slot

Some characters use flask better than others. Kensei, Varya and other characters who have defences that they can generate with their abilities throughout a fight use Flask as a crutch during the downtime for their barriers. Meanwhile, a character like Flicker gets very little out of flask, since he’s probably going to die either way. So… introducing…

Other abilities you can put into the flask slot during the beginning of the game! (name pending)

  • Flash
  • Haste
  • Ignite
  • Exhaust

You get the idea. I’m sure somebody has better ideas on this than me. Not only does this increase diversity in gameplay but it allows characters where flask is weak on to choose something else.

Everyone will probably still take flask though.

I also think that this is the easiest way to deal with the Stormcrown and Stormguard banner problem. Give an active ability to deal a large amount of damage to jungle that you can control, which stops both tanks from abusing the damage and forces those who abuse the clear as non junglers to be locked into their choice.

On a more real note, there’s no real reason that they added flask without doing something like this (a dev hinted at this sort of system but said they couldn’t finish it). All you’ve done is made us wait on fighting for 2 minutes AND triggered negativity bias without doing anything interesting with it. Stop.

Jungle Buffs

If I could blindly have the developer that chose to make blue buff give lifesteal the opportunity of a lifetime to experience what it’s like to be a human Beyblade for 27 consecutive hours, I would. Blue buff is so powerful that the game has somewhat come to revolve around it. The lifesteal it gives midlaners is absolutely no joke and it’s powerful enough that 98% of midlaners take it at level one so they don’t fall behind in lane. The main reason is because you have the AOE CENTRIC DAMAGE DEALERS a combination of FREE LIFESTEAL AT LEVEL 1 and MORE MINIONS TO HEAL OFF OF/FARM WITH. It seems absolutely bizarre that midlane is this special privileged lane that has everything they could ask for, but that’s Vainglory for you I guess.

Red buff on the other hand is less powerful outside of ganks, where it used to be a powerhouse. They nerfed it thankfully but it’s still much more powerful on certain characters. Kinetic and Kensei make extremely good use of red buff; Kinetic’s constant AAs and stun on her B can keep an enemy in range and Kensei almost requires it in teamfights to keep enemies glued to him. However, on other characters, you almost don’t need it; think Baron or Gwen.

The major different in power between these two buffs is both odd and unhealthy. It emphasises midlane and de-emphasises bot lane, which make the sidelanes somewhat irrelevant. All that matters is who’s mid is winning and if the opposing team has something that can shut down said midlaner, usually a CC chain.

Gold

What makes this even worse it the gold system. Currently bounties are so large that it can force games to drag out; the winning team doesn’t approach the enemies in their base because they’re too scared to actually engage and possibly give over a bounty to an enemy damage dealer. What this does is rewards burst damage and CC to secure gold bounties when behind and to pick off the enemy team one by one in teamfights in the safest and dullest way possible when ahead, which is surprisingly NOT FUN and de-emphasises skill. This also makes winning top/bot even less valuable; even if you dominate and put your lane opponent 3k behind, they can instantly catch up with a few lucky bounties. Compared to how it is currently, IMO they should reduce bounty cap and growth by 25% and increase the gold trickle to compensate, normalising gold a little more while reducing massive gold swings. Although one might argue that increasing the gold trickle also de-emphasises skill, I would prefer that compared to the circus we have currently.

Map Design

To finish off this actual 20 page ‘thing’ (this isn’t a joke), I want to talk about the map design. Currently, the difference between top and bot lane is that top lane gets to be a little closer to the jungle shop while bot lane gets literally everything else. As a bot laner, you get red buff, the better jungle path which means you get ganked more often and are more difficult to gank based on how the lane is shaped. To explain the last point.

  1. The main entrance into the side lane is not only closer to the top laner’s side but has a bush on their side as well, which is a prime spot for a jungler to sit in and wait for their opportunity to strike or to hide their approach.
  2. The secondary entrance’s bush is further away compared to the main entrance alongside not having the extremely powerful river speed to help engage. This path is also easier to cover with cams, since one cam can cover this entrance AND detect any players invading the jungle.

In my honest opinion, the mostly ranged bot laners should be encouraged to be in the lane that’s easier to gank while the mostly melee top laners should be in the lane that’s harder to gank. The jungle paths could also do with some balancing; currently it’s too easy for junglers to clear bot side, camp for two minutes and repeat, letting the mid laner take their CP and bears. Junglers should be encouraged to go top lane more often instead of many avoiding it since it’s simply a waste of time. Personally I would place the blue buff where the red buff currently is and have red buff sit in the wall where the shop bush is (the one not adjacent to river.) and reverse the positions of top and bot, but that’s just me spitballing.

Conclusion

I just want to applaud anyone who actually read everything I’ve typed out. For those curious on the total, it’s 21 pages and 6716 words in my word doc (excluding this conclusion), although it would probably be 20 pages if I removed all the spacing. I really do want VG to be good but there are just so many things that can send me on an hour long rant about how bad the balancing is (I’m sure my guildmates can tell you stories about these). It’s not uncommon that I’ll start talking to myself about how much fun I’m not having when I decide to soloQ, which isn’t the best sign for both me or the game.

Perhaps I need a therapist.

1 Like

yes. I would love a starting item for CP heros (including for my CP Melees :smiling_face_with_three_hearts:)

Yes. They nerfed CP heros and WP heros but not the heros that are CP AA dependent… Also bring back Ability focused VARYA!

YEEEEESSSS!

Honestly I back you up/agree with alot of these changes. And I have to admit I haven’t fully and carefully read though it all but I havent seen anything that’s blasphemous :new_moon_with_face:

Edit: I hate your changes to Grace :cowboy_hat_face:

Yates B is the ability that grinds my gears the most in this game its basically grace B but way better, both abilities do the same thing stunning enemies within a radius of 2.5 ish meters. But while grace is totally immobilized when channeling the ability Yates gets a freaking speed boost cause logic, also stunning Yates whilst he’s channeling his B should well… cancel the ability, logic again. I actually like the changes to Caine, it’s a nerf that he could actually use although the numbers would need some tweaking obviously. I wouldn’t wanna see the other changes you proposed cause they’re a bit too crazy but i respect the time and thought put into them.

I didn’t read because reim not there and you said you going to nerf captains , nerfing captains damage is a red line , you don’t want to have games without captains , to be honest I won’t touch 5v5 if captains get a nerf they already have a low impact going to be lower because you nerfing damage and healing/barrier.

My opinion of some characters. This was written in the way most people dislike here (with quotes and all) so I decide to hide it so nobody has to go through all of them. I did so to make it clear what I was answering to, but @RiseChu gave me an idea of how to do it better... nest time I’ll try it 🙂

No, increasing even more the CC power is not a good idea, and for 1 item that requieres skill… simply no. The RB and Crucible rework is another big mistake.

??? Nerfing more the FoR? It needs a buff, not a nerf lol.

More slows! The game has enough.

So nerfing his early game? What? Adagio’s strength comes form his early.

Less damage! Great (ironic)! His B is quite useless and you are, again reducing his damage in exchange of… CC. The game is suffering from CC and you think adding more will be more fun?

CP adagio is not a captain, is a self sustained carry. The verse of judgment changes… does it still stun?

Which weakness has disappear?

True damage? Remember Brokenfeather?

Caine is strong, but this will just kill him really hard.

More healing to her?? That ability is useless in early, it has nothing.

You are destroying him…
His passive is now healthier and easier to balance, with more inconsistencies, right, but healthier. His was meant to be an hypercarry and a hero able to defeat 1v1 most heroes by hability (like BF), not just as a tank counter since you can have heroes that does this better and doesn’t require as much gold as Kensei does.

So he can’t do anything against snipers? …

I just covered some heroes that I feel like doing so, which doesn’t mean I agree with the ones I didn’t. I barely agree with any of this changes.

Edit: I know I was told to now answer this way, but in this specific case, I don’t know how to answer without doing so. :oops: :sunny_sad_3:

This is going to be long I guess, so let’s start…

So RB no longer builds into anything useful for carries? I guess you love Cc oriented metas. Hate this changes honestly. AP needs to be stop with the fountain, so a carry can’t block it himself but rely on their captain? Rip Solo Q.
So basically you want to make people rely more on their captain and make RB useless.

Edit: okey, nvm, missed 2 new items.

The early game is dead. You basically kill CP adagio, and probably Captain too. With this changes you can just remove him.

So the A is very strong but the C is crap. Not a fan of this change.

The builds with no attack speed right now are shit, this change would throw him to potato level, another hero killed, great!

Don’t think any of this makes any difference to be honest.

The A got a massive utility nerf. The B and ult: so she basically heals everything. 2 abilities with powerful healings? That’s going to be hell to fight. Also, why the hell can the B be casted while cced?

The old passive was terrible to balance. I don’t think it should be changed, the new one is more consistent and easier to balance. You are missing what was his designed. He wasn’t just designed as a tank killer, he was designed to be able to either stay in the front line and kill it or dive hard on the carries, this completely shuts down a play style, which I don’t see how it makes it more fun.

She doesn’t have a long stun.

He would die. This is… the 3rd hero killed? Or the 4th?

Unnecessary, he is already the most mobile character in the game.

Given that stuns still stop her ult, it doesn’t seem that much of a change,

The A is useless against AA based heroes. Of course it can proc from random captain autoattacks, you are attacking him, the same way a random autoattack can kill you. If you don’t want him to counter, don’t randomly autoattack. Not a good change IMO. Makes him useless against non mages.

You can rename the B to “the never hitting ability”.

You complain about him playing with just 2 abilities:
1.- if you can’t use correctly the ult it doesn’t mean it’s bad.
2.- yet you propose to make Adagio play with one.

I would probably hate any of this changes, I’m unable to see how completely destroying kits, removing outplay potentials, making heroes more straightforward, removing cc counters, making people depend much more on their team mates, making defence useless with how much pierce/defence shred you’ve given and killing builds variety would make this game more fun.

Captains are the class with the higher impact what are you talking about.

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Zekent and Sonata could never :monkey_face:

I’m not going to specifically reply with anyone since

  1. That almost ends up with the thread getting locked, although I disagree with that it’s how it is.
  2. It’s inevitable that with this many changes there’ll be disagreements with everyone.
  3. I don’t have time and I already knew who I’d butt heads with.

BUT

Can you please actually read EVERYTHING if you’re going to argue with me?
Aegis is replaced with WP/CP specific Weapon and Crystal items. I made this decision to cut down on the 1 defence item 4 offence meme that’s been plaguing this game, where squishy ranged characters aren’t actually squishy unless the whole team CC locks them. Husk got removed for the same reason, but there’s no replacement for that since it’s… husk.

I also note that I should have actually explained why I changed Fountain. I am of the opinion that Fountain and Crucible are items that overshadow the rest of the utility tree for captains and need to be nerfed. Crucible can be changed by reducing the actual amount of CC in the game but Fountain can’t. Since a lot of damage characters would be getting nerfed in my examples, I thought it would be suitable for characters to not have to rely on the crutch that is fountain to survive teamfights. Would this be immediately balanced, not really. However, I think it’s fundamentally healthier for the game to allow for more variety in item choice, especially for defensive/utility trees which have the most opportunity to be reactive to the enemy team.

Also I forgot that I wanted boots to cleanse slows since it makes boot speeds vary wildly and feel inconsistent gomen.

THIS is why your threads get locked: they’re basically just you dumping a lot of text onto the screen, making it very difficult for anyone to respond, then you shutting down the responses you do get.

I mean, come on – this is a discussion forum. If you just want to post stuff for people to read without bothering to respond to them, post on Medium or someplace.

3 Likes

Missed that somehow, my mistake. I already dedicated the comment, but still the rest maintains.

Aegis only provide a small amount of defense, if squishy heroes are not as squishy is not because of Aegis but thanks to they being able to disengage easily. If kinetic gets ganked, she will just use RB to block the CC AND then use her BA combo so you can’t catch her, making her unkilable, but again, it’s not because Aegis is enough.

FoR doesn’s overshadow anyone, and Crucible just do so because in this game CC is so strong that any chance you have to block it is better than nothing, not because the item itself is better that the others.

There are tons of people I can almost never agree with. That includes you. When I do disagree with someone I’m now trying to

  1. State my opinion again, making sure I do it completely.
  2. See if the way we see things differently is fundamental and we won’t come to see eye to eye. I know I personally am very stubborn, but what can I say. My ego can’t take being wrong.
  3. If not, we can continue. If it’s true, then I’m flat out wasting my time.
    I’ve already come to understand that there are people I can skip to step 3 on. That’s indeed ‘shutting down’ conversation that wouldn’t ever go anywhere, although I consider it better than shutting everything down. Wink wink, nod nod.

What I post are just my thoughts and what I’m looking for now are others thoughts, which I get in their first response. Less time spent replying (except to this. Oops!) and more time spent doing other things.

If you want to blame it on anything, look towards the collective stubbornness and the rules on this site. It’s just more efficient this way for someone like me.

I’ve only read through your opening text. Will need to look into details after work.

What I’ve quoted above is an immediate contradiction in my opinion. You want them to be more supportive, but then want to nerf their supportive capability?? Doesn’t make sense and i disagree. I don’t mind reducing their damage/mobility slightly.

If you find anyone who never agrees with you, you should still try to defend your point. Each one can have different points of view, but that’s the beauty of the forum: dicussing so people can develop their own opinions in a variety of ways, not just to have 1 valid opinion.

People made an effort to read all, so you should, at least, make an efford to read their opinion and answer them. If you end up with no agreement, then you just agree in disagree.

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If OP considers answering is a waste of time, maybe reading this thread is a waste of time too. It’s making a thread that generates no discussion. The thread can pretty much be closed, given it’s been stated there won’t be any discussion.

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Your 2nd point is probably the reason why your threads get locked. You want to drasticly rewrite the game, idk what kind of response you expected bro. I strongly have to disagree with captain nerfs, you do not think about repercusions of taking all the fun from captains and arguing past this point is, well, pointless.

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That’s pathetic. Too bad for you and your ego, but you are wrong. Wrong in that post. There are ways to have debates, disagreements, and discussions. Your 3 step process is horrible. Who taught you that? I hope for your sake a misguided professor - because maybe then we can help correct it. If that’s self taught… Ouch. Ego can be a bad thing when it grows too large… From reading your post, you may already be beyond saving.

Classic. Blame everything else and let’s not look in the mirror and self reflect, right? The greatest growth comes from self reflection.

This next point is also a larger scope on life and general. When you visit another country, state, or even someone’s home… It’s their rules, not yours. You don’t get to go in and dictate. Research, know the rules before visiting, and then enjoy your stay while appreciating the differences. You don’t have to agree. That’s the beauty.

If you find such disagreement with the infrastructure of this forum site, why are you here? I find the forum structure here completely refreshing that it does the exact opposite of what you’re claiming it does.

Instead of stubbornness, I find it creates an environment where constructive criticism trumps personal attacks and flaming/toxic behavior. It creates an environment where content is valued more than quantity.

I encourage you to self reflect. Your ego, which I imagine you were talking about with some level of facetiousness, may be a larger issue for you than you think if you find such disagreement with a site such as this, and furthermore, find your threads are often being closed on a site that i find to be very encouraging toward thoughtful discussion.

The approach of ‘If I disagree with someone, I don’t engage with someone’ (which, whether you agree with me or not, is clearly what you’ve communicated as your sentiment is here) is a approach that leads to zero growth (for you) and the bane of self-improvement.

One love.

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Yeah, sorry all, I’m going to close this one. Big posts like this are sometimes ok, but to work well, they need everyone to want the collaborative back and forth of a real conversation. I’m not sure I see this one accomplishing what the OP wants, or the OP wanting to satisfy what responders might want, so maybe not super productive moving forward.

In the future, I don’t hate big “how I would balance the game” posts, but I’d recommend future OPs to really consider all the ways that people might respond to their ideas:

  1. Agree/Disagree that situation X exists (i.e., CC is dominate, captains are weak)
  2. Agree/Disagree that situation X should be changed (i.e., CC should be dominate, captains should be weak)
  3. Agree/Disagree/Quibble with suggested fixes to solve situation X (i.e., getting into the weeds)

I feel like most big posts don’t really contend with 2 and 1, while expecting everyone to slide right into 3, when actually it’s the least important, as far as productive conversations go.

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