Nader nerf incoming?

[Xenithos]

@K1X455 said:

@Wintergreen said:
Nein! Nein! Nein! Don’t touch Nader.

She needs to be buffed… Marty needs 100% activation time.

This means you can press f before you die right? Absolutely. Let’s do it.

[K1X455]

@Xenithos said:

@K1X455 said:

@Wintergreen said:
Nein! Nein! Nein! Don’t touch Nader.

She needs to be buffed… Marty needs 100% activation time.

This means you can press f before you die right? Absolutely. Let’s do it.

not necessarily… but I like your idea

[Xenithos]

@FalC_16 said:

@K1X455 said:
https://youtu.be/uXbbvntL3YY

This is the reason why Nader should be buffed and Phantom be left alone. The delay in activating her Martyrdom is so long, it becomes only 10% effective.

After so many years ppl should know that simply one does not go finish a downed nader. Why the delay then on martyr?

I forgot she even had a delay, but now that you mention it… when was it added?

[bgyoshi]

@Wintergreen said:
I always encourage people to spend a couple days playing exclusively as Nader and then report back if they still believe she needs changing. The more you play as her, the more you’ll realize how laughably predictable and easily countered she is.

I dunno about that. It’s not really a question of how predictable or unpredictable she is, and more about how spammy she is. She has no business getting 5 nades with almost no cooldown and would be much more balanced and way less spammy with only 3. They already aren’t particularly useful for destroying anything, but when you have 5, you can corner any merc with ease. Using her like a demoman to control the movement of the opponent and punish people for trying to hide around corners is more than half the reason why she’s too strong, and she wouldn’t be able to do that with only 3 nades.

Then again, you could keep her with 5 nades and increase the firing delay, or increase the cooldown per nade… that would be fine too.

As for countering her… I dunno. All you have to do as Nader is pin down a corner and you can’t counter her. If people rush, tuck around a corner and lay nades on it so you can’t get chased. If you’re chasing someone down, lay nades in their path so they can’t find cover. If enemies are holding a corner, bounce nades around it. There’s very little you can actually do against her besides throw grenades back.

But as it is, she’s on my list of things that I stopped using because they made the game trivial and removed any challenge from it for me, right up there with Fletcher and the BLSHLOK. Fragger was once on that list, but got nerfed into balance.

[K1X455]

a long time ago, when the players discovered Nader can take out Phantom and save the team from his onslaught, the butt hert Aura, Proxy, Sparks and Kira mains cried evertiem she pooped out Fragger’s nade.

[LoafOfBread]

[OCB-Wildcard]

@bgyoshi said:

@Wintergreen said:
I always encourage people to spend a couple days playing exclusively as Nader and then report back if they still believe she needs changing. The more you play as her, the more you’ll realize how laughably predictable and easily countered she is.

I dunno about that. It’s not really a question of how predictable or unpredictable she is, and more about how spammy she is. She has no business getting 5 nades with almost no cooldown and would be much more balanced and way less spammy with only 3. They already aren’t particularly useful for destroying anything, but when you have 5, you can corner any merc with ease. Using her like a demoman to control the movement of the opponent and punish people for trying to hide around corners is more than half the reason why she’s too strong, and she wouldn’t be able to do that with only 3 nades.

Then again, you could keep her with 5 nades and increase the firing delay, or increase the cooldown per nade… that would be fine too.

As for countering her… I dunno. All you have to do as Nader is pin down a corner and you can’t counter her. If people rush, tuck around a corner and lay nades on it so you can’t get chased. If you’re chasing someone down, lay nades in their path so they can’t find cover. If enemies are holding a corner, bounce nades around it. There’s very little you can actually do against her besides throw grenades back.

But as it is, she’s on my list of things that I stopped using because they made the game trivial and removed any challenge from it for me, right up there with Fletcher and the BLSHLOK. Fragger was once on that list, but got nerfed into balance.

Ummm… 10 seconds per grenade and she doesn’t regen all 5 at once. That means it takes her about 2 full spawn waves to get them all back, which is by no means a short amount of time, and 10 seconds for one grenade is not spam. Firing them all off at once is spam, when its just done without any aim involved or thinking; something which will have diminishing returns as people realize to not just rush in like the mindless NPC characters we see so often in single player games. Her explosive has a smaller radius than Fragger’s and does less damage; it does exactly 75 HP’s worth of damage with explosive drop-off, and 90 for a direct hit. Not to mention they’ve already nerfed her in the area of gameplay mechanics if you wanted to be technical about it, she can no longer direct hit generators; which means it takes more than your full complement of 5 to take down most generators.

Her grenades used to have a shorter cooldown of 7 seconds and the problem hasn’t changed. The reason is because it’s not what the problem is, it’s the people mindlessly rushing in when they see grenade spam around a corner or from a distance. You see a Nader spamming her grenades into a narrow corridor then you back out and either find an alternate route, or wait; if you rush in regardless that death is entirely your own fault as you took a risk doing that. It’s a valid tactic to try and push in regardless but it’s still a calculated risk, and if you can’t accept that the chance of dying to the spam comes with that it’s your own fault. Her grenades already have a delayed explosive timer of 1.5 seconds each, unless it hits you directly. Most players with a good chunk of experience on her won’t even spam the grenades in that way unless the time it would buy is worth the downtime on your grenades; most of them will just shoot a grenade at their target, direct hit is a bonus but only is the ideal goal for Mercs with or at 90 hp and below, and then start firing their primary. The reason being that it gives more consistent returns than just spamming your grenade launcher, and unless it’s into a cluster of enemies close together that is usually the case.

The only place it’s that obnoxious is in public play, where the skill range is mostly concentrated in the lower end of the spectrum right now, as most of the old veterans and pro players have long since left this game; and so the average Nader you will typically find is the brainless ones who spam their grenades almost solely, as opposed to one who actually knows how to play. Plus, the P.T.S. Servers are done with a Merc Limit in place, as is the norm in the comp scene, so they clearly are still balancing it based around comp as opposed to the casual scene; where most of these complaints appear. Nader doesn’t exactly remove the challenge when not played as a mindless spammer, something that isn’t exactly very effective against competent players to begin with (I’ve charged such Nader’s with a knife and hit them once or twice before running away many times; the result was that the Nader in question died to their own grenade explosions). Spam implies mindless spray-and-pray, Nader is actually bordering between Balanced and Under-powered, in regards to her explosives, when it isn’t played that way without the Merc itself being stacked; something that is common in public matches.

I’ve said it many times before, and I’ll say it again:
Every Merc in this game mucks up the balance of this game in some way, shape or form, when used in copious quantities; this issue has nothing to do with the Mercs and their abilities, it’s simply a problem that exists in casual with the lack of a Merc Limit and is inherent to 7v7’s and 8v8’s; not to mention, although to a significantly lesser degree, 6v6’s.

P.S. Splash Damage themselves have said many times they will not implement a Merc Limit to the public server matches (the casual games) but has considered doing so for their competitive formats some day; so the problem is not going away and if they will not shift their opinion on that matter you might as well get used to it or move on; at least for the time being, as staying here is voluntarily putting yourself into a situation that induces stress (something not exactly good for your mental health & well-being).

[bgyoshi]

@-OCB-Wildcard said:
Ummm… 10 seconds per grenade and she doesn’t regen all 5 at once. That means it takes her about 2 full spawn waves to get them all back, which is by no means a short amount of time, and 10 seconds for one grenade is not spam. Firing them all off at once is spam, when its just done without any aim involved or thinking; something which will have diminishing returns as people realize to not just rush in like the mindless NPC characters we see so often in single player games. Her explosive has a smaller radius than Fragger’s and does less damage; it does exactly 75 HP’s worth of damage with explosive drop-off, and 90 for a direct hit. Not to mention they’ve already nerfed her in the area of gameplay mechanics if you wanted to be technical about it, she can no longer direct hit generators; which means it takes more than your full complement of 5 to take down most generators.

I’m well aware of the individual power of her nades, and I’m not talking about spamming all 5 at once. There are situations where you do that but they are few and far between.

Like I said in my post, she’s too easy to control mercs with. You only need to drop one or two before you can just spray your opponent down with even your pistol. If someone is retreating, it only takes 2 or 3 nades to cut off their escape and if not kill them, then dump their HP enough to finish them off trivially. If you’re being rushed, you only need to drop one or two around a corner while making your retreat. If they continue to rush after you they’ll be so soft that you can kill them with your primary long before they could kill you. I don’t even mean direct hits, they just need to be on the ground to either inflict splash damage, or keep enemies away while you escape.

And since we only need two or three nades at a time, we have at least 2 or 3 in any given 10 seconds of time. Need to drop three? Great, now you have 2 left and in 10 seconds you’ll have another 3. How convenient for us that the enemy is now dead and has to regroup, that gives us another 10 seconds to get number 4 back. No matter what, you’ll always have at least 2 grenades ready to control the situation.

If we limit her to 3 nades only, you’ll get those 3 nades, once per two spawn waves. The merc control will be much more limited and much more balanced for 5v5, and it will limit the spam-ability in 7v7.

But in it’s current form, whether you’re in high competitive 5v5 or nooby pubs, she’s a “brain-off point and click” easy merc. She has effectively infinite nades and unless you’re really bad, you won’t ever be stuck without at least 2 ready. And 2 is more than enough.

[OCB-Wildcard]

@bgyoshi said:

@-OCB-Wildcard said:
Ummm… 10 seconds per grenade and she doesn’t regen all 5 at once. That means it takes her about 2 full spawn waves to get them all back, which is by no means a short amount of time, and 10 seconds for one grenade is not spam. Firing them all off at once is spam, when its just done without any aim involved or thinking; something which will have diminishing returns as people realize to not just rush in like the mindless NPC characters we see so often in single player games. Her explosive has a smaller radius than Fragger’s and does less damage; it does exactly 75 HP’s worth of damage with explosive drop-off, and 90 for a direct hit. Not to mention they’ve already nerfed her in the area of gameplay mechanics if you wanted to be technical about it, she can no longer direct hit generators; which means it takes more than your full complement of 5 to take down most generators.

I’m well aware of the individual power of her nades, and I’m not talking about spamming all 5 at once. There are situations where you do that but they are few and far between.

Like I said in my post, she’s too easy to control mercs with. You only need to drop one or two before you can just spray your opponent down with even your pistol. If someone is retreating, it only takes 2 or 3 nades to cut off their escape and if not kill them, then dump their HP enough to finish them off trivially. If you’re being rushed, you only need to drop one or two around a corner while making your retreat. If they continue to rush after you they’ll be so soft that you can kill them with your primary long before they could kill you. I don’t even mean direct hits, they just need to be on the ground to either inflict splash damage, or keep enemies away while you escape.

And since we only need two or three nades at a time, we have at least 2 or 3 in any given 10 seconds of time. Need to drop three? Great, now you have 2 left and in 10 seconds you’ll have another 3. How convenient for us that the enemy is now dead and has to regroup, that gives us another 10 seconds to get number 4 back. No matter what, you’ll always have at least 2 grenades ready to control the situation.

If we limit her to 3 nades only, you’ll get those 3 nades, once per two spawn waves. The merc control will be much more limited and much more balanced for 5v5, and it will limit the spam-ability in 7v7.

But in it’s current form, whether you’re in high competitive 5v5 or nooby pubs, she’s a “brain-off point and click” easy merc. She has effectively infinite nades and unless you’re really bad, you won’t ever be stuck without at least 2 ready. And 2 is more than enough.

Actually you only need one grenade and a Crotzni, at most, with the exception of Rhino and Thunder. I’ve never needed more than one grenade per person before I swap to my primary on her as I’m consistent on landing my grenade where I want it, right at their feet or directly into them; though I admit I’ve got good head tracking and am used to dealing with handling her grenade launcher (it handles similarly to using stickies on Fletcher with the added twist of taking a bounce into account). The Crotzni tears through hp quickly when you can track your targets effectively while controlling the spread, even more so if you can track heads effectively; so I generally have never needed more than 1 grenade when not fighting Rhino or Thunder.

The main reason lowering the grenade count is a bad idea is that she’s still useful for taking down generators and grouped up deployables, both of which will take a good chunk of her supply, if not all of it; this is also the primary reason she even has that many of them, as it sets her apart from similar Mercs like Fragger. Even this has been nerfed with SD’s removal of the ability to direct hit generators as Nader, a decision of theirs that baffles me in all honesty. Don’t get me wrong, I can see what you’re saying, but she mainly has that many grenades because of the few niche scenarios of area denial; as well as for the instances where a bit of demolition work is more efficient than the use of C4 (the generators and deployables), which is where most of her supply of grenades is typically spent.

P.S. Realistically though unless your aim is a tad off, resulting in the grenade not being within close enough proximity to your target, you shouldn’t need more than 1 against anyone but Rhino or Thunder. For the sake of clarification here’s the breakdown on the math behind it:

-Each grenade does 75 HP worth of damage if you land it right at their feet ( a little over 65 with unshakable).

-The Crotzni takes away 12 HP per bullet on body shots (24 for a head shot).

-The HP of all Mercs in the Roster, outside of Rhino and Thunder, range from 80-130 right now.

Assuming you can land the grenade in the proper place consistently, which with practice should not be difficult, you should never need more than 1 per Merc in most instances; only 2 Mercs in the entire roster have an HP pool high enough to require more than 1 grenade.

[Tanker_Ray]

So seems like few guys are taking this post REAL serious. hmm.

[jemstar]

LEAVE NADER ALONE!!! Her marty only gets splash damage 50% of the time…You can be in the middle of 4 enemies, one of them tea bagging your face and when you marty looking for the party…NOT EVEN 1 splash damage… you go boom but the marty party fizzles!!! and 4 enemies are still 100% alive wondering what the boom was.

[K1X455]

@jemstar said:
LEAVE NADER ALONE!!! Her marty only gets splash damage 50% of the time…You can be in the middle of 4 enemies, one of them tea bagging your face and when you marty looking for the party…NOT EVEN 1 splash damage… you go boom but the marty party fizzles!!! and 4 enemies are still 100% alive wondering what the boom was.

Nah… 50% too high; at the speed of those 90HP mercs, only 1 in 10 Marty work. And with Guardian’s Skyshield active, there’s no way even the GrenLauncher will work.

Seriously, she needs a buff.

[ThunderZsolt]

This post was meant to be a joke, but I see that I’ve touched a sensitive point of many players.

I’m sorry to upset you fellas :’(

[Kirays]

That’s a lovely conspiracy you have going there.

[OCB-Wildcard]

@THUNDAAA said:
So seems like few guys are taking this post REAL serious. hmm.

Only am because @bgyoshi and a few others decided to make a serious discussion of balance, with regards to Nader, so I figured why not?

[OCB-Wildcard]

@ThunderZsolt said:
This post was meant to be a joke, but I see that I’ve touched a sensitive point of many players.

I’m sorry to upset you fellas :’(

No apology needed, I actually found it amusing, but some folks didn’t realize it was a joke it seems and decided to make a serious discussion of it; besides this was bound to crop up eventually (a lot of people get their britches in a bunch over spam-y abilities in this game).

[bgyoshi]

@-OCB-Wildcard said:
Assuming you can land the grenade in the proper place consistently, which with practice should not be difficult, you should never need more than 1 per Merc in most instances; only 2 Mercs in the entire roster have an HP pool high enough to require more than 1 grenade.

I know, like I said I’m well aware of the damage output of the nades. That’s why I said 2 nades is more than enough and you often have 3 or more. And you’re right, spamming a generator is a rare situation and an unnecessary waste of grenades. Just give it one or two and have the stoker molotov the rest of the HP.

In general when you’re ducking around corners, you’re not just going 1v1 against someone and retreating. She hands down wins all 1v1 situations against everyone but Fletcher, which is bad enough… so I’ve entirely excluded that, save for situations where they’re retreating.

Back to my original point, 5 nades is way too many, Nader is too easy to play, too easy to kill with, and needs a nerf at all levels. Reducing her to 3 grenades max would be fine.

@-OCB-Wildcard said:
(a lot of people get their britches in a bunch over spam-y abilities in this game).

Back to my original statement: We can only pray she gets nerfed soon. Otherwise I’ll continue to be forever Vasilli to stay far far away from all the trash.

[henki000]

Nader is fairly balanced. No modifications recommended or small buff to martyrdom.

[AlbinMatt]

If you really want to show how brainless people are, the grenade spam is nothing. Add the feature to martyrdom when alive, then see how many wasteful idiots abuse it.

Edit: I did not realize what I had just implied. Apologies for that.

[Da_Mummy]

I already said it but I will say it again: if you dare try to touch my Bratwurst Mädchen I’m going to murder people.
Don’t take away the one thing that stood strong through all these times.