[quote=“spicyHarp;82788”]And Fletcher isn’t used as much in comp is because Fragger is the most effective slayer in DB atm, far better and more versatile than anyone else. The release of Thunder could greatly affect the team compositions.
Fletcher can do so much more with explosives than Bush, it’s just that Fragger and Bushwhacker is more versatile than Fragger and Fletcher.[/quote]
wtf?
I will agree that the Blishlok is not a comparable SMG to any of the other SMG’s, or at least some of them versatility and potential wise, but the fact that Aura has the Blishlok at the moment and that someone who can actually use it on her is devastating at nearly all ranges means that it should not get a buff. And the reason that I talked about augments was because the fact that the Blishlok accompanies certain combinations is almost seen as a deterring factor from only using the cards with those combinations.
In competitve at least, why would anyone not take a Steady Lock-On KEK / Crotzni Bushwhacker? Quite simply, they wouldn’t. But the fact that the Blishlok is there instead with that combination stops it from being used.
I honestly have no idea why Sawbonez even has this weapon as his Crotzni with drilled loadout is insanely outclassing anything put up by the Blishlok.
Phantom, despite only getting drilled on cards with the Blishlok, still would not being using the Blishlok if he was to make it into the big leagues.
I am in no way saying that this way of doing it is correct I am merely saying that it is there.
So to be honest, the best way to buff this gun would be to take it off these classes all together. We do not want nor need it on Phantom, Sawbonez or Bushwhacker, whilst reworking some of the loadout augment combinations in order to not ensure favoring.
So Sawbones?[/quote]
He moves slower, has a larger hitbox and his healing is one target at a time and cancelled by damage. Aura has none of those drawbacks. Giving her a Crotzni would overpower her, so by the same logic giving buffs to her automatic primary (Blishlok) she’d become overpowered.
Same goes for Fletcher. He already has very strong secondaries and sticky bombs, which are pretty overpowered in the right hands. He would be beyond overpowered if the Blishlok were just as strong in any situation as the Kek-10 or Hochfir or Crotzni.
The whole point of weapons being different is they provide for another way to balance loadouts and mercs. Weapons can’t be directly balanced against each other because not every merc has the same hp, movement speed, hitbox and abilities.
Besides which, the Blishlok isn’t even weak. It’s just harder for some people to use. That’s not a good reason in its own to buff it, especially considering all the points I mentioned above that echo what ProfPlump says.
Again, just because a particular individual might suck with the Blishlok compared to [insert preferred gun here] is NOT a valid reason to buff it.
Let’s make something clear if someone is good, he will do great throwing potatoes, still he is just that good. The truth to be told, there is no place for a Blishlok in the competitive game.
[quote=“Jurmabones;83322”]
He moves slower, has a larger hitbox and his healing is one target at a time and cancelled by damage. Aura has none of those drawbacks. Giving her a Crotzni would overpower her, so by the same logic giving buffs to her automatic primary (Blishlok) she’d become overpowered.
Same goes for Fletcher. He already has very strong secondaries and sticky bombs, which are pretty overpowered in the right hands. He would be beyond overpowered if the Blishlok were just as strong in any situation as the Kek-10 or Hochfir or Crotzni.
The whole point of weapons being different is they provide for another way to balance loadouts and mercs. Weapons can’t be directly balanced against each other because not every merc has the same hp, movement speed, hitbox and abilities.
Besides which, the Blishlok isn’t even weak. It’s just harder for some people to use. That’s not a good reason in its own to buff it, especially considering all the points I mentioned above that echo what ProfPlump says.[/quote]
Shotguns are not viable in competitive, it leaves you only with the Blishlok as your only go to weapon. That gun is both hard to use and far to be as rewarding as any other SMG, which is one of the main arguments for a Blishlok buff. At high level of play, in a proper duel, with a Blishlok, you’ll probably rarely win. The reason is that other SMGs that much fire faster than you, and will be able to get headshots much more reliably, while with your Blishlok you’ll leave “gaps” between your shots. Enough to miss your target between a change of direction, which forces you to be even more precise, and anyway your efforts are not really worth it since any other SMGs outDPS you. You are not especially stronger at long range either, neither you do in any combat situation.
Aura is squishy as hell, have “meh” secondaries, and her primaries are not good either. Health matters much more in competitive than speed, and the health station camping thing can be counterplayed very easly. Especially in a metagame where Fragger is the absolute king. As for Fletcher, the Empire-9 will never replace a SMG (Blishlok aside). It’s DPS is still below every other SMGs after all, including the Blishlok. Okay, it’s very strong for a secondary, but is it to the point to outclass a primary ? Nope. Unless you play with a Shotgun. And the sticky bombs are not a miracle tool : if you want to use them at their best, you need to be extremely good at leading your targets. They’ll work nicely around corners and indoor, but you’ll have much more trouble in open spaces. Sticky bombs require a lot of practice, and unlike your weapons they have a cooldown.
[quote=“GottaBeGreg;83151”]I will agree that the Blishlok is not a comparable SMG to any of the other SMG’s, or at least some of them versatility and potential wise, but the fact that Aura has the Blishlok at the moment and that someone who can actually use it on her is devastating at nearly all ranges means that it should not get a buff. And the reason that I talked about augments was because the fact that the Blishlok accompanies certain combinations is almost seen as a deterring factor from only using the cards with those combinations.
In competitve at least, why would anyone not take a Steady Lock-On KEK / Crotzni Bushwhacker? Quite simply, they wouldn’t. But the fact that the Blishlok is there instead with that combination stops it from being used.
I honestly have no idea why Sawbonez even has this weapon as his Crotzni with drilled loadout is insanely outclassing anything put up by the Blishlok.
Phantom, despite only getting drilled on cards with the Blishlok, still would not being using the Blishlok if he was to make it into the big leagues.
I am in no way saying that this way of doing it is correct I am merely saying that it is there.
So to be honest, the best way to buff this gun would be to take it off these classes all together. We do not want nor need it on Phantom, Sawbonez or Bushwhacker, whilst reworking some of the loadout augment combinations in order to not ensure favoring.[/quote]
At least you recognize that the gun itself is not a good pick. However, I keep thinking that the gun has its place among SMG mercs. Buffing it on par with other SMG shouldn’t be a big deal. Anyway, Shotguns badly needs a rework so they can be on par with every other weapons in competitive (without messing up pubs of course). I seriously doubt it’ll make Aura and Fletcher overpowered. This is another story though.
We shall have to agree to disagree, because I believe it would send Aura over the edge threshold of balance and into the broken.
I don’t get it.
When it comes to medics Sawbones destroys them in every single aspect, and you are scared that Aura will be OP because of the Blishlok’s slight buff? Where is the logic behind this?
Sawbonez does not destroy Aura in very aspect.
Aura is a better defensive medic, and she is great at holding a forward position with an attacking force. She is capable of bulk healing a group and at a constant, un-interrupted by damage, rate. Her healing is superior to Sawbonez in these aspects and as such she must compromise on her damage output. If we do as has previously been suggested and make the Blishlok as effective as a KEK-10 or any of the other SMGs, she would become too effective and make the decision between taking Sawbonez or Aura a decision of “Ok, we have our Aura, whos next?”
Please, Sawbones is the most versatile, not the best. Aura is far better at defence, Sparks is better at reviving and ranged combat, and Phoenix is somewhat better on offense.
And are we buffing blishlok for the sake of buffing the gun? Because I don’t see a “slight buff” changing anything for SMG mercs, we have loadouts that offer better augments and easier to use weapons. But it’ll further separate the gap between shotguns and SMGs. I personally, would hate to see shotguns become even less viable.
[quote=“GottaBeGreg;84022”]Sawbonez does not destroy Aura in very aspect.
Aura is a better defensive medic, and she is great at holding a forward position with an attacking force. She is capable of bulk healing a group and at a constant, un-interrupted by damage, rate. Her healing is superior to Sawbonez in these aspects and as such she must compromise on her damage output. If we do as has previously been suggested and make the Blishlok as effective as a KEK-10 or any of the other SMGs, she would become too effective and make the decision between taking Sawbonez or Aura a decision of “Ok, we have our Aura, whos next?”[/quote]
Yet, in competitive, you won’t see Aura that often, even in defense, because her weapons are just bad and she’s full of counters. In a metagame where Fragger is the king, she’ll be shut down extremely hard by frag grenades, ending in pieces along with every players sitting at the station. And those are not even the only ones : Nader, Fletcher, and to an extent Arty, Kira and Skyhammer if the station is not located indoors can deal with the health station extremely easly. Along with Rhino, she’s a merc extremely sensible to counterplay, and that counterplay is obviously explosives and everything hitting with splash damage. Later, you will also be able to add Thunder and Stoker to the list.
The goal is not to buff Blishlok to a KEK-10 level, because the KEK-10 is just overpowered. The goal is to make it more on par with SMG-9 and Hochfir (and to Crotzni if you consider that the weapon is now balanced with SMG-9 and Hochfir). It should be more rewarding, or should get a combat situation where it’ll perform better than other SMGs (like long range encounters).
[quote=“spicyHarp;84034”]Please, Sawbones is the most versatile, not the best. Aura is far better at defence, Sparks is better at reviving and ranged combat, and Phoenix is somewhat better on offense.
And are we buffing blishlok for the sake of buffing the gun? Because I don’t see a “slight buff” changing anything for SMG mercs, we have loadouts that offer better augments and easier to use weapons. But it’ll further separate the gap between shotguns and SMGs. I personally, would hate to see shotguns become even less viable.[/quote]
Shotguns needs a rework anyway, because they are just totally useless at high level play. Don’t worry, I didn’t forget about them : I just don’t talk about it here because it’s off topic
A very simple buff would be to give +15 RPM to the Blishlok. Making it sit slightly above SMG-9 DPS wise (~ 125 DPS), making it more rewarding. It’s a safe tweak. Then we can see how it performs before buffing it further. If it’s not enough we can still tweak things, like buffing the RPM further at cost of bullet damage (without changing the fact that Blishlok should be the most heavy hitting SMG), giving it a more “SMG” feel and reducing those “gaps” between bullets that makes the gun so hard and unrewarding to use. Of course this would not come without a clip size buff, so the gun would keep its ammo efficiency as a small perk.
I’m not against a Blishlok buff. It is fairly weak compared to other SMGs. But what is a minor buff going to achieve?
If you are saying Aura and Fletcher needs a buff, then I’m totally fine with those changes, though personally I don’t think they need a buff. But if it’s to make SMG mercs use the Blishlok loadouts, it’s probably not going to happen as they have access to both superior augments and weapons.
I don’t understand what is so hard to grasp about the fact that the Blishlok is designed to be slightly inferior in most situations to the other SMGs because it’s used as a weapon choice to balance out certain mercs.
Aura or Fletcher with a Kek-10 would be stupidly overpowered. There’s a reason the Blishlok is their only primary automatic weapon. You either have to use a shotgun or a slightly weaker automatic weapon. It’s the same exact principle as Sparks only getting machine pistols for her primary weapon slot.
Again: you cannot balance weapons directly against each other. You have to consider which mercs have access to which weapons. A very high move speed merc with a tiny hitbox and uninterruptable healing would be massively overpowered with stronger weapons. Use your brain.
Having weapons that don’t suck wouldn’t make Aura or Fletcher OP, if anything it would reduce the overload of Sawbonez and Bushwhackers everywhere in higher level play.
I think the common issue between some people in this topic is the ground they are playing at.
Aura better at defense?
Please, Aura’s healing station is screaming, “throw a nade here for a few frags”.
Want me to tell you a secret?
Most of yours assumptions are made, based on the game-play i do see on the casual servers.
One more, there is not a single ability in the game that cannot be countered, obviously they mean a lot, but still the main stage is played with an actual Weapons, you know the ones that do PEW-PEW.
On the other side i get your point, when i play casually with my Fletcher, people tend to rush me like idiots, or shoot me without having any cover next to them, then crying how broken the Stickies are. Or trying to kill the Rhyno face to face while he is standing in the Healing Station spinning his bloody gun.
But hey, worry not, just keep your ignorance and enjoy the game with 7 mercs used in the competitive stage.
Thanks for defending me here. That was respectable.
Now getting a bit more on topic : I know you are concerned by Aura/Fletcher being OP after a Blishlok buff, but I positive it won’t be the case at all. Anyway, nothing is set up in stone in a beta game, so if Aura or Fletcher suddenly becomes a bit too above others we can still think about one or two tweaks. Once again, the goal is not to make the Blishlok as good as KEK-10, because KEK-10 feels overpowered anyway. 415 RPM for the Blishlok shouldn’t be too much of a big deal, I think we all agree about it.
I want to suggest a change, I think this may get people a bit more relax. It’s a pretty big one, but it shouldn’t make the Blishlok above others. How about decreasing Blishlok’s bullet damage to 15 (still the highest damage per bullet among SMGs by pretty far), increasing RPM to 500 (still the lowest SMG RPM, keeping the gun’s identity), and increasing max ammo to 40 ? This would give the Blishlok a 125 DPS, while still being a tad bit more tedious to use due to its fairly low RPM and high recoil. I’m also adding 10 more bullets in clip, because it feels needed : I reduced the guns ammo efficiency after all. So one would get the blishlok for a straight middle ground between DPS and range, and a bit better ammo efficiency than other SMGs.
increasing the fire rate for this gun would simply make it the same as most other smgs. all it needs is a damage buff by like 1 or 2 damage per shot, and i think that would make it much more viable
I’m playing Bushwhacker and i got a golden BL73… can i be more unlucky? the other two weapons are pretty good SMGs but this blishlock is really bad atm. i hope for a balance change on it.
I think we could get by with it just getting a bit of an acc bump.
Maybe some extra range and ammo too.