I don't want to play meta.
There is a reason why I prefer to play Wattson, Rampart or Fuse. All 3 are Legends who's style I absolutely adore. Yet the use behind those characters is limited. An Octane can very quickly overcome the abilities of these 3. You trap a squad with an Octane in a ring of fire? Trampoline out of it. You've built a well-crafted defense? Octane will just hop over it. You've built a lot of fences to deny an area? Octane goes whee.
At the current point of the game you could just go ahead and create a character who blinks 10 meters forward when tapping the sprint button with a 4 second cooldown, and it wouldn't even come off as weird or overpowered because that's literally what the game is built around.
I remember in Season 4 - when I was relatively new - I made a suggestion about a character who can fly with their tactical. Not even in an extreme manner, just a slight air-hop thing. Everyone went wild and said "That's so freaking OP" or "That would outclass almost every legend!" - Valkyrie is here, and no one gives a crap about it. People in fact adore that it's her passive instead of a tactical.
I'm not one for changing the whole premise of a game, but at the current state there are two options. Reduce the viability of mobile legends, or give drawbacks to being mobile in the first place. At the current time, using Legends like Rampart, Wattson, Caustic, Fuse or Revenant has little reward. The amount of times my squad and I built a well-crafted defense, only to be diminished by flying, jumping or grappling enemies is astonishingly high.
Defensive Legends needing some kind of buff is something that I do keep in mind. And I can't stress enough that these buffs shouldn't be overdone. Hard-countering mobility would then cause a defensive meta, because there isn't much more in diversity that one can make use of.
There is little to no point playing defensively, carefully or from a safe distance at the current time. People get in your face and personal in a matter of a very few seconds, usually with 3 loaded shotguns that are happy to blast their load in your face. I'm not even caring about those people who can hit every shot from miles away, that's a whole different topic entirely. I'm solely talking about those that rush your position in a matter of a few seconds.
I have talked about something like this not long ago. Shotguns are so exceedingly powerful because you can get close to your enemy in no time and even faster with specific legends. Again, a weapon type that would usually count as balanced for this matter is surprisingly powerful due to how quickly you can get into the prime range. Which to my knowledge has also received quite some recognition.
I don't have anything against the mobility itself. But I have something against it's high relevance and synergy with certain other things in the game. I wouldn't even care if Octane runs twice as fast or if Valkyrie has higher maneuverability. Or heck, even if we give back the old strafe speed for Horizon... If there was SOME kind of drawback attached to those advantages.
Ok so if you are clumped together in one spot anyone rushing you from different angles will always have the edge. Because they shoot at the clump while you have to shoot in different directions. It would seem this would be obvious, but I know it is not as I have had to teach some of my friends to keep from doing this.
If you are going to camp, the moment to take Octane or anyone down is when they leave their cover to run to you. If anyone is pushing you without getting a knock first, that is on you not picking them off at the right time or waiting too long.
I play watson from time to time, and I play her similarly to pathfinder when I need to get aggressive, because a good push has very little to do with abilities. It has to do with timing and speed in the fight.
Great, had a situation today in which I hardcore parcoured all around the place with a slither of health, picking up my teammate banners as the only one alive, going over boxes, under tunnels and teleporting with Loba's bracelet all while basically having an Octane, Valkyrie and Pathfinder glued on my tail. Honestly, if you have neither of them, you're better off just standing still and get killed. Saves nerves and frustrations while you're at it.
Ahh... I remember season 4... If you were good enough with movement, you had good chances to pick up banners of your team mates and get away safely, no one who chased you down with insane speeds, no one who flew over obstacles. We are at season 9, and this has become impossible. I don't know, but if this is really the definition of balancing, then honestly we should just make Caustic's gas deal 15 damage per tick, wattson fence should just completely strip shields and rampart's minigun should be able to fire 360°.
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