Regarding Fletcher....is it me or is he a bit too spammy?

(watsyurdeal) #1

So, lately I’ve been running into people playing Fletcher, who will jump around a lot and instead of landing their sticky bombs on you will often just throw as many as they can for the sake of spamming you. And the cooldown on these is actually fairly quick, only about 8 seconds per bomb.

Maybe it’s just me but I feel like we could give Fletcher a little skill indexing, maybe make the throw animation faster and allow the bomb to travel at a more, well, I guess easier arc. Something like how the Nade Launcher works.

And in exchange, lower the number of bombs he can have at a time to 2, or keep it at 3 but increase the cooldown.

This is just based on my experiences mind you, but I feel like people are relying too heavily on spamming them and not trying to set traps or land direct sticks. And who knows, it could actually make him better in comp because it increases his skill ceiling, allowing players to get crazy kills with the right placement.

(Rosenkreuz) #2

Not in favor of it. When players do that they’re only making themselves look desperate, and when I used to do that I only got myself killed since I didn’t land the sticky bombs in optimal positions. Fletcher isn’t “spammy” (I hate that… word… thing).

(LifeupOmega) #3

I’m an avid Fletcher player and honestly I wouldn’t really mind if he got an increase in cooldown - I tend to time my throws so that I always have a backup anyway. If you cripple his actual sticky damage no one would ever use him over Bushwhacker, remember him before they fixed the sticky bugs? Low or unreliable damage just doesn’t cut it.

(watsyurdeal) #4

I’m not asking they nerf the damage, just punish spamming and encourage good accuracy or traps. Whether that means faster throws, faster bombs, more radius, etc.

(Szakalot) #5

I also main fletcher and indeed rarely do I feel like I ran out of bombs to throw.

It used to be 4 bombs actually.

While I wouldn’t scoff at an increased cooldown, Fletcher is barely keeeping up with the Bushwhacker meta, so I’d want to see something to balance that first, before nerfing the only other engineer choice.

(Amerika) #6

I mostly just get annoyed at playing against them. 120HP + jumping off walls non-stop means rarely getting headshots on a fletcher and he has a chance to tank damage while he throws stickies and praying.

His current iteration isn’t overpowered in my perspective at all. But it is annoying to fight against most of the time. I wish he had proper weapons to use as opposed to being saddled with the shotgun/blishlock setup so his sticky bomb CD could go up slightly and have a lot more incentive to use guns.

(CCP115) #7

Fletcher in his current state is just off. Most of his gameplay is just jumping around and throwing stickies with an 8 second cooldown. His guns are just there for if you run out. Also the sticky is pinpoint, meaning there isn’t a lot of prediction outside of an arc, which isn’t hard to do.
His stickies also aren’t amazingly strong, with something like ~90 damage per sticky.
Setting traps is also not effective. Proxy is far better at that, and can actually gib, something that Fletcher’s bombs are just terrible at. You also need to stare at a doorway for lightyears, and have pretty good reactions.

If the devs want to change Fletcher, they honestly might need to do a full rework. Currently he’s turned into a wall jump spam merc.

(Szakalot) #8

sticky deals 100 damage. i also dont see anything wrong with wall spam, for me its a part of the game, and anyone complaining should go back to quake3 : P

frst bomb will never giva merc, but you can throw a bomb at the body for a very effective gib& potential damage to approaching medic. overall i dont want any major reworks to his playstyle, i think its great and maybe it could be just a tad less spammy

(watsyurdeal) #9

All they need to do is give him the Fragger treatment, 2 stickies, maybe a 10 second cooldown for each one. And change the way he throws them a bit, maybe a better arc, cause it feels like they only go so far.

(RyePanda) #10

I dunno, he already is 2nd to Bushwhacker. maybe nerf to 99 damage? idk.

(Eox) #11

I strongly disagree here. He NEEDS his three stickies for the sake of his viability. Not only his weapons are not great in the current meta, but Bushwhacker just surpasses him in a lot of points. Fletcher needs to be aggressive, two stickies would just kill the merc.

I am on my mobile phone right now. I’ll argue more consistently later.

EDIT : all right, just found a PC where I can post and argue about this.

I can understand the willing of making Fletcher more skill indexed, however this shouldn’t be made at the cost of his versatility or his viability. Three stickies, it’s enough to keep him versatile, and as far as we can see Fletcher is far from being overpowered. Only two ? This feels like killing the merc, and an unneeded nerf. Especially if we consider the current meta (looks like Bushwhacker is the best engineer you can get). Everything why ? Just because that one guy is humping the walls ? Then why isn’t Nader targeted too ? She technically would have the same issue right ?

There’s plenty other ways to make the stickies more skill indexed. Decrease the stickybomb damage from 80 to 75 for exemple (no more Aura or Sparks one shot), while keeping the damage to 100 for stuck stickies. You can also nerf the Stickies RPM (yes, they have one) to make sure that brainless spam is even less rewarding than calculated throws. On the other hand, increase the force at which the projectile is thrown, giving sticky bombs more effective range. A small CD nerf is also something that we can deal with. But certainly not one less sticky available : this is insane.

(watsyurdeal) #12

The thing is he will always be second to Bushwacka so long as he only has the Blishok, Ahnuld, and Hollunds as primaries.

That’s imo no reason to allow him to basically be, well, a spammer, the vast majority of Fletchers I see get ost of their kills for just throwing their stickies, not even directs mind you, just tossing em out and jumping constantly.

I feel like there’s plenty of ways we can actually add more depth to him, while making him less annoying to deal with. Increasing the skill floor and skill ceiling at the same time.

Right now, really it just feels annoying to deal with Fletcher, not even op, just annoying, and for the reasons that I’ve already stated. There’s no skill to it, no tactics, just throwing them out as soon as you get them and then cleaning up with the Machine Pistols and Shotguns. Is this really how he should be? I would like to think not.

(RyePanda) #13

[quote=“Watsyurdeal;91015”]The thing is he will always be second to Bushwacka so long as he only has the Blishok, Ahnuld, and Hollunds as primaries.

That’s imo no reason to allow him to basically be, well, a spammer, the vast majority of Fletchers I see get ost of their kills for just throwing their stickies, not even directs mind you, just tossing em out and jumping constantly.

I feel like there’s plenty of ways we can actually add more depth to him, while making him less annoying to deal with. Increasing the skill floor and skill ceiling at the same time.

Right now, really it just feels annoying to deal with Fletcher, not even op, just annoying, and for the reasons that I’ve already stated. There’s no skill to it, no tactics, just throwing them out as soon as you get them and then cleaning up with the Machine Pistols and Shotguns. Is this really how he should be? I would like to think not.[/quote]

There are some pretty skilled Fletcher players (Sniff, Szakalot, I’m sure there are more). But, I see your point. Maybe increase the CD to 9 or 10 seconds.

(Eox) #14

Then once again this can be done without removing the 3rd sticky. Better reduce a bit the rate at which stickies can be thrown, so the DPS you earn by a dumb spam is less worth it. Then reduce the damage on 75 if the sticky is not directly stuck. On the other hand, make them travel longer and faster.

Anyway, from my own experience, Fletchers that tossed their stickies at random were always at the bottom of the scoreboard. It’s already better to try to go for a direct hit IMO than spamming those dumbly.

(Szakalot) #15

[quote=“Eox;91028”]Then once again this can be done without removing the 3rd sticky. Better reduce a bit the rate at which stickies can be thrown, so the DPS you earn by a dumb spam is less worth it. Then reduce the damage on 75 if the sticky is not directly stuck. On the other hand, make them travel longer and faster.

Anyway, from my own experience, Fletchers that tossed their stickies at random were always at the bottom of the scoreboard. It’s already better to try to go for a direct hit IMO than spamming those dumbly.[/quote]

I rarely try to get a sticky stuck, its a lot more effective to throw stickies at corners etc. to prevent people from pushing/escaping

(watsyurdeal) #16

Honestly, I wouldn’t mind the cooldown being reduced to 10 seconds, and a slightly slower throw if I can throw them far enough to stick people at medium distance. The arc the travel and the speed just makes it harder to get direct sticks.

(Rosenkreuz) #17

I’ll accept a higher cooldown if the AoE of the stickies gets increased AND the hit detection bug on the bombs is fixed.

Edited to correct a misspelling.

(Szakalot) #18

distance is pretty good if you sprint-jump/long-jump in the opponents direction

(CCP115) #19

Proposed ideas to increase skill index:

-Slower throw & travel (make them weightier)
-Arming time
-More damage (I’m sorry)
-Make it so he actually holds the stickies and detonator in the same first person viewmodel, so less animation to get through

I don’t like these changes, but I also don’t like Fletcher in his current state.

He is in a bit of a… sticky situation…

(MercifuL) #20

I think his stickies need more radius tbh and maybye the cooldown increased. Other than that he is fine until he gets viable weapons which he shouldnt I feel like his stickies are “spammy” only because he is meant to be like that, same case with Nader her grenade launcher is considered primary although she has the better weapon choices, you could argue that Nader needs to be somehow worked on instead of trying to nerf fletcher who is not overpowered compared to other mercs.