Preface: Im salty as hell that this game that I love (or used to cuz it’s garbage now) is currently UNPLAYBABLE.
I tried giving this patch another chance earlier today. I just cannot and will not play this game anymore until Captains get buffed.
It was a ranked match. No one was toxic, no one was actually even bad- I just straight-up did not have fun at all.
There was not a single occasion in that match where I felt the THRILL of playing as a support. This update’s changes undoubtedly ruined the role for me.
CAPTAIN ITEMS
“The item cooldown changes were to make captains feel more iMpAcTfUl” my ASS.
Wow! In a 5v5 match where CC is everywhere, never have I felt sOOoOOOooo impactful! Not only am I getting items later than usual, their stats are worse (not to mention the CDR cap reduction).
“But hey if you babysit midlane u get $$$”
I don’t want to feel like I’m punished for rotating to help my other teammates out. I get it that this could be a “decision-making mechanic” to make things more interesting, but does it really? It just feels like I’m stuck in a lose-lose situation. Not fun.
And then there’s the Crucible CD nerf. I understand if only Reflex Block / Aegis was affected, but… CRUCIBLE?
Such as having Phinn’s Forced Accord being able to be cast for a second time without worrying that the enemy Reflex Block/Crucible is available.
But the thing is: that was the part of the beauty of being a Captain. Being aware of your opponents’ blocks, and knowing how to time your ults (such as Phinn) properly. Now they just dumbed it down. Hooray. Pretty much all the non-healing captains were in a decent spot before this change. To me they just “fixed” a non-existent problem.
Captains don’t need a buff, they got nerfed, yes, but that’s because last update they were broken. They are still extremely strong. Keep in mind the other captain will have the same problems with the crucible.
I would even say more: I would nerf them. Their CC was very strong (ults) because they could be blocked, right now they can’t, and those abilities are almost instawin when hit. For example, if Catherine hits the enemy with her ult, you’ve won, they can’t use abilities or items.
By “buff” I meant item-wise. This “buff” would be an indirect nerf as well since my CC would be more easily blocked by the enemy captain and vice versa. Nonetheless, I think that’s the kind of captain playstyle I fell in love with in 5v5: blocking a lot of CC and carefully timing ultimates. It just feels so rewarding and fun. Now I have to hold my Crucible and meticulously choose which CC I want to block because of the long CD, and it’s more annoying than rewarding IMO.
My point came out as “captains are weak”. But really I just meant that playing them officially bore me to death.And because I literally play only captain, it’s a bummer So yeah, I’ll be waiting for 3.9!
And oh, If you nerf them even more in their current state, I might as well finally quit for good lol.
Even more? They got buffed hard. Before the changes their extremely impactful ults wouldn’t do anything, right now those ults can’t be blocked, which is almost a guaranteed team fight for you. That’s op.
There are a lot of valid points here. There are a lot of ‘Oopsie Doopsies’ happening with the active items ATM and it’s just kind of unfun for the side that’s getting the shaft. I say this as someone who really enjoys playing CP Bap in 3v3, but like. The fact I can get CW and ult a billion times in a fight and I know for a fact that after the first Crucible I get 2 guaranteed ults is kinda stupid. If you went double crucible you used to be able to block every Bap ult but NOT ANYMORE!
The problem is that Captains have inherently overloaded kits because of their tanky nature. Let’s look at the Cath and Ringo and compare. Ringo has a okay single target slow, a strong damage & speed buff and an ultimate we don’t talk about. Cath has a single target STUN, semi-invincibility & counter damage and a massive AOE silence that lasts too damn long. The reason these characters have such powerful abilities is because if they didn’t, nobody would play them. You can’t directly tank most sources of damage for your teammates, so if your abilities/items aren’t a threat, you may as well go damage. What SEMC is doing is pulling power from items instead of pulling power from characters, which is what we call a ‘big feels bad’.
This is why I personally think that SEMC should take basically all Captain CC and hit it with a good old 50% reduction. Afterwards, offer tank items with CC duration up that can offer slight increases to CC power while having lower power in the item itself. Then you have a choice between item power and kit power. Do you choose to go for big actives like Fountain or Crucible, or do you go for items that reward you constantly like Rook’s Decree or Capacitors Plate (Assuming they have CC duration on them. Rooks definitely would.)
Of course, this would break the game, but it would be a break that would be conceptually healthier. Especially since the 0/7 Cath only has a 1 second silence and can’t swing a teamfight for free.
Also you would have to add CC scalings to damage characters but shut you succman I can’t be bothered with all this dumb ‘going through every character’ shiet. Not today, at least.
Hmm… from what I perceive, you are salty because the micro plays that Captains (good Captains) have through their item choices are practically voided or reduced very drastically in 3.8.
Additionally, you have grievances with how Captains are now somewhat relegated to babysit the mid lane because of the Gold changes.
I understand this one, as it puts the Gold income of the Captain in the hands of the mid laner.
Why do I say so? If they miss a lot of farm, you can kiss getting Gold quickly goodbye, lol.
I think the cooldown of the activatable Captain items nerf feels bad in general because there’s just too much CC loaded into heroes kits nowadays. Like, almost all of the meta heroes have some sort of CC to slap someone with.
The Crucible nerf would have been justifiable if they nerfed all the cooldowns of heavy or teamwide CC abilities and nerf the duration on some of the CC present.
In tandem with that, maybe nerf how long Crucible’s block is in effect before it disperses.
I think the Fountain of Renewal and Atlas Pauldron are somewhat affected, but their use then to be sporadic at times and usually have a broader room for error.
This change gives me the impression that Captains are to rely on their abilities, which have to be carefully managed due to the energy changes (mostly applies to energy reliant Captains); and opt for more of the passive style defense items such as Rook’s Decree and Capacitor Plate.
They got buffed hard and nerfed hard at the same time I’d say.
The 45-second CD in Crucible didn’t make it impossible to land impactful ults, they were just more challenging- which made sense! It forced captains to better their positioning and be less predictable.
But with Crucible’s new cooldown, the impactful ults are definitely wAaay more OOMPH. Is it unhealthy? Yes IMO. I dislike how they traded “item niceness” for “ult impact” as if the ults had no impact in the first place when in fact, they did when timed right.
Not saying they’re weak (although the title kinda implies it), it’s just that they suck (to play as). The changes strengthened them in some areas and weakened them in others to a weird “skewed” way that makes them B O R I N G
I feel like it’s because phinn is the meta every other captain is just there and he’s the lowest skill floor captain imo. Maybe it’ll be more fun for you once Lorelai Lance and Lyra captain start to shine.
The funny thing is that Phinn hasn’t even been buffed across the few patches since the new Captain items came into play.
The other supports just got nerfed or get banned enough that Phinn slips through.
Either that or they get relegated/taken to top lane.
In my opinion:
Adagio isn’t viable as a Captain or carry because his values are skewed towards having both health & CP ratios high (which makes him meta) or low (which kills him, lol). Capacitator Plate I think was supposed to make him good, but that got nerfed because other Captains got way better with it.
Ardan is good going either Captain or Carry; though the later is currently most favoured because One Punch memes and Tension Bow, lol.
Catherine is somewhat ok but not favoured in this meta because she can’t do much facing against Phinn. She’s also one of the most abnormally low damage Captains. Everyone else just have more damage and even better spam than her.
Churnwalker is the next meta Captain after Phinn I feel. He can work around Phinn after all and can force enemies to run even of Phinn can’t be CC’ed. He’s just reliable. Most would ban him though.
Flicker is another Captain that is strong, ever since Pulseweave really. The speed boosting aspect of the item synergises with his kit nicely. He doesn’t bypass Phinn’s and Churnwalker’s superior CCs, but he can enable a 5 man dive easily against all the squishies. Invisible Tension Bow slaps are deadly, heh. Additionally, he’s fast and can rotate out of mid lane to other places really quickly if he needs to.
Fortress isn’t as meta before his nerfs because diving and speed boosting towards one target is his forte. The nerfs were justifiable, though I think players just suck at countering Fortress. Then came Inara… #FortressWasNerfForThis?
Grace is mainly played top lane WP with TB right now I feel. Her support side generally wants a bit of CP (read that as one Shatterglass) because her damage reduction and heal scales off of CP. Captain Grace’s build is probably too costly right now.
Similar to Grace, Lance is mainly going WP because TB and his generally high base damage. Support wise, he’s too skill demanding to make work in casual ques. Plus, anothet herp that can’t do much against Phinn and his plays can be affected by Phinn’s ability to displace people (Churnwalker too).
Lorelai is a meta Captain currently because her pools can affect Phinn a lot. He’s already slow, so why not go even slower, hehe. She also has the benefit of being able to rotate back to midlane because of her 5v5 specific river buff. However, she isn’t as strong as Phinn and Churnwalker because her CC is telegraphed clearly and she’s mostly protect and zone out. Kind of like Flicker where their CC is quick enough but predictable if you understand them well.
Lyra is not meta as a Captain because her heal never got buffed back when Capacitator Plate got nerfed. However, she is a great team dive Captain, which is generally unpredictable. She’s just outclassed in other aspects right now really. I’m surprise we haven’t seen a rise in CP Lyra. I’ve rolled her a couple of times in BR and smacked a lot of people with her (I did not use her Rare Talent, but I did use her Epic Talent level 1).
Phinn is meta because other supports simply fell flat a bit in 3.8 or got other roles they could fill. The one thing players probably did not note is that all defences bar health got buffed, and Phinn’s perk and B immediately gains a boost in a sense. He has always had high damage. Players just feel the damage now because they all went squishies rushing TB, lol. Plus, he gets a boost from Reflex Block/Aegis/Crucible getting a cool down nerf on their active effect, as that has always been the bane of his ult.
*Tony is one I consider a Captain in disguise. He’s like Ardan, but self barriers and a bit more CC but easy to predict or chaotic to use. He isn’t meta because others simply do the job better or people don’t like how unpredictable the ult is 99% of the time.
Yates is powerful and in the meta. He isn’t as powerful as Churnwalker and Phinn, but much more impactful than Flicker and Lorelai. However, players probably favour the others because he requires a good amount of skill for his A and his ult requires map awareness which casual players generally lack (read that as suck bad). I haven’t seen people play him WP yet though, which is probably a sleeper pick because his perk does enable him to hit hard while going WP.
In conclusion, I think Captains are ok; just a slightly different way to play with active items and where to go.
Extra:
I think SEMC needs to decide how to give carries CC that isn’t a stun, slow that isn’t too strong and long, and not any similar CC that locks players up from doing anything for more than one second. Roots are slightly fairer, but not much cause some heroes have all movement based abilities.
His CP ratios on his A give more health than his roaming path. Talk about being a healer.
Honestly it annoys me on how Smec doesnt fix these obvious things such as reverting back the health change on Lyra and make it more stronger heal for adagio
Moved this out of the Salt Mine because it has became too useful to remain there Also, split off the Lyra/Varya discussion into its own topic, because it was too good not to.
That’s why a good controlled “salt” thread is a useful thing. Not to mention it’s not exactly a salt one, you put your arguments for the current meta/captain position and started a good discussion.
So yeah, I’ll be waiting for 3.9!
Also, split off the Lyra/Varya discussion into its own topic, because it was too good not to.