Is Sparks too weak?

(hawkeyeguy99) #1

Basically the title. Is Sparks too weak in terms of any damage output (in comparison to other medics) and hp? I know her revive gun is amazeballs but otherwise she seems super weak. Maybe I just suck with her. What do you think? I probably just suck.

(slicK.JTheJackal) #2

She’s super squishy but her revive gun does quite a bit of damage when it’s charged and can even do 1 hit kill headshots to some mercs so I’m on the fence.

She can get wrecked by stronger mercs but given her role of a long range medic, I think that’s the way it should be.

(MisterBadmin) #3

I don’t think so. She isn’t a traditional medic focused on keeping her team alive; she is a Starfish Necromancer that wants them to die over and over.

Sparks intentionally has shit weapons, because of the REVIVR being absolutely mental. If you can time the charge properly and hit the head in medium range, you can drop anything short of Fragger with minimal risk.

She is THE twitch class. Highest speed and lowest health (tied with Aura) with the highest Risk/Reward of pretty much anything. Miss a REVIVR shot entirely and you have to disengage unless your team has your back, and disengaging is probably still a good idea then. Hit all your headshots and you can drop 3 or 4 enemies. Strafe properly and she can hold a choke. Fail to predict and/or avoid the incoming pineapple/egg/meatball, and you just lost the area. Budget your packs poorly and you don’t have enough in the tank to engage, or get hunted down on low health.

Sparks is a shadow of her former self, there’s no doubt. But I don’t feel she is exceptionally below curve. She has one of the highest skill floors, but also one of the highest skill ceilings. Most players (including me) aren’t good enough at the game to be able to get enough out of Sparks to compensate for her weaknesses.

Could she use some minor buff to lower that skill floor? Probably. Would that minor buff translate to the REALLY good Sparks being able to stomp even harder? Almost absolutely.

(DMaster2) #4

She desperately needs a buff imho.

(hawkeyeguy99) #5

I just think she’s too hard to use. Her skill floor is insanely high imo, and I rarely see her at the top of aNY scoreboard unless the player is around level 80.

(Your worst knifemare.) #6

Its a shame that i decided to buy her before the other, did good on first time on free rotation and loved being Sparks ever since.

(Tanker_Ray) #7

Well, gotta say she was quite over-nerfed.

Her REVIVR dmg Range nerf was most vital nerf she deserved,

but reviving HP nerf was so damn huge.

She is depending on Get-UP augment more than ever to increase the reviving HP limit to 130.

MP9 nerf, REVIVR range nerf was needed as she was medic who were suppose to have weak fire power,

but I think what she needs right now is reviving speed roll back (0.7 sec normal speed from 1 sec) and that reviving HP range nerf roll back.

At normal pub levels, I don’t know. But at pro level games,(When I activate min 20 by inviting all pro, +100 levels) enemy always finish downed team mates so damn fast that Sparks is losing her job too much nowadays.

(JJMAJR) #8

The MP9 was overnerfed. High DPS, sure, but low accuracy makes that moot. Enemies can finish off teammates extremely fast, and Sparks couldn’t revive faster than the enemies can destroy her patients.

Finally, her healing is trash.

Because of this I think that Sparks could use a “healing spray” item, which could make her into a highly close-range healer, but a much more effective medic than she was before.

So, a healing spray could work like a special weapon, similar to Rhino’s minigun. Left click heals other people, right click self-heals, and there’s only so much that could be done before the spray needs to recharge.

Close ranged healer, long ranged necromancer.

(Your worst knifemare.) #9

[quote=“JJMAJR;194868”]The MP9 was overnerfed. High DPS, sure, but low accuracy makes that moot. Enemies can finish off teammates extremely fast, and Sparks couldn’t revive faster than the enemies can destroy her patients.

Finally, her healing is trash.

Because of this I think that Sparks could use a “healing spray” item, which could make her into a highly close-range healer, but a much more effective medic than she was before.

So, a healing spray could work like a special weapon, similar to Rhino’s minigun. Left click heals other people, right click self-heals, and there’s only so much that could be done before the spray needs to recharge.

Close ranged healer, long ranged necromancer.[/quote]

I kind of support this idea.

(hoyes) #10

In my opinion sparks does fit a very nice supportive role in a match as the ability to revive people at range is godsent. Though despite all this, she is extremely weak. She has less hp than other medics, less healing power, very little damage and coupled with the low hp, makes her extremely bad at combat, which quite frankly, doesn’t make her a very rewarding character to play. Sure you can get kills, but with the amount of skill it takes to consistently get them is extremely ridiculous.

What i think should happen is that they basically increase the damage on the revivr to about 80 within its effective range. It would make her better at combat by being able to take out auras on full charge, and just make her a more damaging merc in general. She would still be hard to use, but be more rewarding due to being able to kill enemies better at all ranges.

(Szakalot) #11

sparks is fine, still super powerful in the right hands.

(Dawnlazy) #12

Gimmicky and redundant merc. The only thing she’s good at is running away because of the self-heal and then going 2/1 after a 30 minute match. Phoenix is a much better field medic since he actively contributes to fights far more than her. There’s probably only a single digit of people who I consider a threat when playing Sparks, and all of those could IMO do much more with other mercs.

(Szakalot) #13

in comp sparks can be extremely potent, where opponents do not give you time to gib your kills in firefights. Sparks on chapel is so crazy good on defense, i saw some teams run her as the only medic in the team.

(Dawnlazy) #14

in comp sparks can be extremely potent, where opponents do not give you time to gib your kills in firefights. Sparks on chapel is so crazy good on defense, i saw some teams run her as the only medic in the team.[/quote]

On the contrary I find that Sparks revives get gibbed the vast majority of the time compared to other medics since it takes longer to stand up and yes I’m talking about competitive matches. Most people in comp will finish off kills right after and also very likely have team mates shooting alongside them who can finish the gib (many teams even have the pocket Sawbonez specifically prioritizing gibs on whoever the Fragger kills). It’s why I prefer any other medic in the team since they contribute much more to the fight effort and can usually kill them first and then revive, and if they’re standing right next to whoever died the revive has a much better chance of going through since the animation is shorter.

(Szakalot) #15

I guess its debatable, i saw & experienced some excellent teams that would not overextend, and if someone is down and you go for the gib to deny revive you are being shot at by someone else in the meantime. Plus the sparks would sniperino herself and poke people for significant damage.

(hawkeyeguy99) #16

I gotta agree here. I never consider a sparks any threat when I see her. All you have to do is land a few shots or chase her down as she runs away. Once she’s out in the open she’s a goner if I see her. Let me put it this way, at no time in my DB career have I ever felt threatened by a Sparkie. Never.

(Equanimity) #17

A great sparks is an absolute monster. Honestly a good sparks is the most intimidating of opponents. I can confidently compete with most other people skilled with their respective mercs, but a good sparks who hangs back and lands nothing but consistent snipes and instant revives can be insanely frustrating when playing with an uncoordinated team.

(becomingModel) #18

I wish they’ll speed up the charge rate of her Revivr since the Augment quick-charge was nerfed from 15% to 10%

(SweetGenocide) #19

I’m a sparks main, and i love playing her. shes the only sniper/medic that i unlocked first, and i firstly s*cked with her, but then i slowly got better and better and i can do my role as a medic while also executing mercs that are below 90 - 60 health with a single Revivir shot, sometimes if im lucky i can also land an headshot, Sparks’ weaponry is trully for a potato, but giving the fact that she technically haves an ability with infinite ammo and also an unlimited supply of health, it’s hard to take her down mang, if you let her get away and follow her she’ll probably be at full health, and maybe take you down while hidding behind a corner. The only weapons that i find available with Sparks are the Empire and the MP400 the Tolen can also work, but you gotta land some headshots with it, and if you have a bad aim it’s kind of hard taking a kill with it, the secondaries… Welp, you’ll only use them as backup when your Primary is out of ammo and must be reloaded. My opinion is that Sparks isn’t really that weak, because as i said, she technically haves unlimited ammo for a weapon that she can spam with the Quick Charge augment, even if it’s nerfed. And also she haves unlimited health, so yeah, Shes not weak.

(CCP115) #20

Absolutely not.

Insta heal medpacks, a lot of speed, and the potential to one shot majority of classes in the game? I don’t think she’s weak, just requires a lot of skill to use, something a lot of people fail to grasp.

Could she use a buff? Maybe to her medic abilities, but in terms of combat she is a fierce fighter, just requires a bit of skill to use.