I'm sorry that I am late in taking part in this discussion, but I think it would be a great pity to nerf Electro Pea, as I find it important that there are characters that require more than above average skill to use....and he is definitely one of them.
He is an odd character in many ways, as on the one hand, he requires real and exceptional skill to use effectively at close range and within a broad band of mid-range while on the other, one can spam him when in melée which requires an absolute minimum of skill.
Over the course of 6 years, I have met very few players who can use him properly and would therefore (after his nerf) broadly speaking rank him as being on par with the other powerful peas such as Stock/Plasma/Toxic and Agent.
He is really only effective at close and medium range, as his shot is far too slow to be of much use at long range (apart from the occasional lucky shot). He is definitely not an ideal character to come up against, but I have found when playing as engineers such as Painter at long and medium-range or the Plumber at medium to close-range that he can be countered.
So from my point of view characters that are out-and-out dangerous because they require skill to use should not be nerfed, as it would take a lot of the flavour away from the game for those who find it challenging to master a difficult character, while characters that are extremely dangerous, but require a minimum of skill, should be nerfed. Toxic Brainz being a case in point.
@PerniciousPea I see what you mean as far as character's requiring more skill than others should have a higher pay off. I just don't want them to be too good, especially in a game with so many younger players that aren't as tactically savvy as we older folks. The fact that E-Pea is the subject of so much ire, and so many max ranks play him to 'seal club' means there is a problem.
You're never going to get perfect balance in a game where characters diverge so much in how they operate from each other, and having a difficult to use character be excellent in the hands of an expert is fine, but that line of excellence can't be too high, or it ruins lobbies, and I strongly dislike abilities that are so oppressive that chunks of people just leave the match, that happens in BfN with Brainium Basher too, even if a lot of us can handle them, they're still obnoxious and get away too easy from retribution all too often.
Valid points @Iron_Guard8 . As regards E. Pea I see yours and stukapooka's point in having characters that are too overpowered even if they do require great skill to use, and see the danger of frightning away newcomers to the game.
That, on the other hand, puts an even greater emphasis on nerfing characters that deal out tremendous damage, but take a minimum amount of skill to use, such as Branium Basher and Toxic Brainz.On reflection, Toxic Brainz is indispensable in the Boss hunt, "Tale of the Spooky Squash", so having him nerfed (should that boss hunt ever return to the game) would give me a serious problem.
@PerniciousPea I am not sure if I directly suggested giving Electro Pea a nerf but despite that, I have firmly believed that he needed a nerf for a long time. I would not expect everything major, although players who are very experienced with this character or manual detonation characters in general could be very frustrating or unfun to fight against. I have played the shooters since late 2017 and I have still generally have trouble dealing with manual detonation characters.
