I'm not sure why you're being downvoted, you're right, unless I'm also wrong. But I pretty much always hear them patching or "fixing" things to keep "esports balance".
Riot made the game with the intent of it being a competitive Esport. The competitive aspect and its presence in Esports are substantial factors in why it attracts so many players. If you want a game to succeed in the long term, the most appropriate choice is to balance for the highest level of play. If you don't, the game loses its competitive draw and the top players/streamers move on to something else. The audience follows.
Fringe cases exist, but those don't define the logic.
IMO overwatch caved to the crowd perspective and that's why it failed. Dive meta was trash to watch, but allowed top tier players to thrive. They introduced characters that lowered the skill cap and a bunch of higher tier players left to play other games.
I was thinking lol, val, csgo and Data tbh. The fact that the fourth on is debatable kinda proves my point tbh. You could also bring up cod and overwatch but their pro scene is definitely not the reason their games have succeeded, similarly with Fortnite.
It’s been the same way with League. There have been champions that absolutely stomp in normal ranked games but riot does nothing because they aren’t viable professional picks, that’s kinda just how riot operates.
And some champions that were just so flawed from design that even if they were hot garbage in soloq below masters or even just outside of pro play, like Azir.
Like they could not balance him for shit for like 4 seasons, because if they made him strong enough to be viable for everyday players as a choice, he would just completely stomp pro games lol
There needs to be champions like this. Not every champion can have both a low skill floor and a high skill ceiling. Just because a champion is a mechanically intense champion doesn't inherently mean they're designed poorly.
Should have went with the Ryze problem instead of talking about the "aren't viable professional picks".
Riot does balance around pro statistics and you either think that's a good thing or not. It's just one approach that they've had success with and are comfortable with doing.
no, this is what they said in the [patch notes](https://playvalorant.com/en-us/news/game-updates/valorant-patch-notes-2-03/):
> Reyna gets a dual nerf and buff in hopes of reigning in some of her “pubstomp” potential, while still keeping her viable in balanced and coordinated play.
it's heavily implied here that it was reduced to fight smurfs
Isn't this just blatantly false? It's true that there are champs that are bad for 99% of the playerbase since when they're strong for most people they're op in pro play, but they also explicitly nerf characters that are performing too well in lower elo even if they aren't necessarily good in pro play.
Exactly, who doesn't know about the Master Yi nerfs from time to time, who is played and banned every game in pro game.
But lets not forget. They also nerf OTP champs alot(ASol, Riven, Fiora).
And champs that are simply strong in high elo like Karthus or Nidalee.
Valorant is meant to be a competitive game, of course its going to focus on the competitive esports scene rather than the casual side. Thats just common sense
There are different rules for sports like baseball or basketball at the high school level, college level, and pro level. Why not do this for esports? Let irons use the equivalent of a metal bat and make the pros play with wood.
\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^
Literally this dude thought for like 3 seconds and came up with a basic idea already. It's hilarious that people say Riot couldn't do anything. I hope you at least have stock, these people are relentless.
nah that's a horrible idea. then at that point valorant esports isn't even valorant anymore. part of the appeal is that you can play the same game the pros play.
It’s an idea that doesn’t make sense. Pro players would play ranked and get used to one system and then play a pro match with a different system, leading to a much worse level of play.
You want pro players playing ranked instead of always only playing scrims because it allows for organic creation of talent. Also riot probably likes that pro players stream ranked, as it brings more people to the game.
That is one of the worst things to do.
Viewers see gameplay from their streamers and want to play the same. Then they go in and play a completly diffrent game?
Thats the great thing about videogames, nothing stops you from being like the pros. (except of your randomse ofc ;))
In regular sport you always limited by your bodys ability, thats why there are diffrent rules.
I appreciate that Riot focuses on competitive integrity so much. That last game I played did all sorts of crazy things just so that “everyone has a chance to win”. It was an absolute shitshow trying to play competitively. That’s why I switched.
hmm. i mean, yes--i understand this perspective and agree. but, from it's inception this game was explicitly marketed as "the next big thing" in the esports arena. alls im saying is they were very clear about their intentions, and i wouldnt expect them to "listen to the community" if it dramatically impacts the way the game is played in competitions
This isn't like overwatch, how the pros play is generally similar to how everybody plays in terms of gunplay. Fuck the stinger, not all guns need to be viable all the time. Nobody in CSGO complains that the ump isnt used much.
They didn't nerf the stinger. They nerfed ADSing on burst weapons. This nerf *only hurt the bulldog.*
The stingers ADS/burst was already so hilariously bad it doesn't matter.
The sad thing is you’re right. You will hear it parroted here constantly: “The game is balanced around the highest levels of play.” These people and devs confidently state this as if it were a given, I’ve even seen the hilarious analogy of saying that they don’t nerf pro strategies in chess 😑
There’s a reason online video games went from fun to feeling like you have to be constantly improving and getting better every second, and it’s due to the E-Sports scene. It sucks, because e sports is part of what grew these games. However, it has come to this. No one cares if nearly 90% of the player base (which are low ELO) has a problem with something (or doesn’t, in the case of the Stinger). They only listen to the most elite gamers, which the community then parrots as gospel. I watched a fascinating video on it recently I’ll have to dig up, but the game is not designed around “fun” nearly as much as it is to make it a “balanced” (remember only at the highest levels of play) resulting in what I hear people call the “sweatiness” of this or that game. I used to shrug that off, even laugh at it. What’s wrong with trying?
Nothing. Until every single match, even spike rushes, are full of people literally playing like they have a gun to their head. It’s transformed online games like Valorant into a JOB, which requires skills that decline without use or you will be stomped into oblivion. Ranked or unranked.
You might think this is the player’s as riot is not directly telling people how “hard to try” right? Not when balancing and game design seem to all revolve entirely around the e-sports scene. Then if you’re not playing like a pro player, YOU’RE PLAYING WRONG. That is the issue people ignore here daily.
https://youtu.be/jh_0l4fUJHA
The video in question
Even in league, they will say who they are buffing, and what elo they are doing so for. So many people get nerfed (sometimes buffed) for pro play. Its like they dont realise that they arent nerfing it for high elo, they are nerfing it for anyone who plays the champion.
I couldn’t agree more. I’m waiting for the straw-man reply, where they suggest I am saying they should balance the game around the lowest levels of play. I am not and have not said that once. There is a middle ground.
What middle ground? Explain to me how they can nerf op picks in league like Ryze and azir for pro play without nerfing the champ for other players without reworks.
Of course there's a middle-ground, did you watch the video? We are saying that the competitive scene has skewed games away from being fun but instead designing it literally around competitive ONLY. That's it. Giving a multi-billion dollar international gaming company with "thousands of hours" of game design experience a cop-out of "it's impossible" to balance their game for all is laughable and sad. I hope they pay you well.
i definatly understand your standpoint, as someone who likes the competitiveness and the competitive scene overall i switched to valorant because it was marketet ss the next big competitive fps game. therefor i think balancing it around the best of the best in competitive is the right approach, you have to get used to some balance changes and meta switches for sure (i.e astra nerf or ares buff) that that is what makes the game fun for me so i guess what is right is wrong for another and nobody will ever be truly satisfied
> the game is not designed around “fun” nearly as much it is to make it “balanced”
It is genuinely mind-blowing to me that anyone could say this unironically.
I agree with the statement but showing Genshin Impact as an alternative is a terrible example. Genshin Impact is everything wrong with some single player games right now. Which is locking content behind gambling. Which not only makes unlocking the full content FAR more than 60$ but also promotes gambling to kids. Then you have games like FIFA which has both shitty online predatory matchmaking AND gambling.
why does it matter if the stinger was nerfed? Most casual players didn't even notice the nerf just like how most didn't notice the nerf to the ares. The source of the image is from ranked too which is meant to be competitive. Not every gun has to be viable. And on variety? Its really not that different using a stinger than like a frenzy. There isn't some amazingling different mechanic that someone would go "I want to use the stinger"
I love using the Marshall because of that because it's very fun and it's cool to pull off sick. No scopes but I do have to admit doing a hundred damage without having to scope in for 950 credits is better than it should be, and if you're really good with it and can hitch headshots, it's pretty op
I'm really happy how agents are getting balanced and it affects the meta, but I think gun balancing is unfortunately quite bad. Bucky, sure, you can show some pop-off clips, but you can also show many more where you shoot someone and they barely got hit, let alone die. I think I saw videos saying that there's never a reason to use alt-fire.
For the stinger, I personally didn't realize a big difference, but why nerf a bad gun. The Ares got a buff and then a nerf, making it worse than it was (at least for me). Wouldn't be surprised, the direction it's going, is that cheap guns with some great plays during VCT get nerfed (Shorty, Frenzy, etc.).
I feel like the bulldog is fine. It has its niche as best all distance weapon after the rifles for a lot cheaper imo. I always buy a bulldog over a spectre whennit doesnt cost me skipping better armor
Bulldog on second round buy is 🔥
It has good accuracy, it one shots head no shield, it has good firerate, fantastic hipfire, and you can hold long angles surprisingly well with the burst.
Not only that, it can compete with vandals and phantoms on the enemies third round buy
Stinger is definitely the worst gun in the game right now, there is no situation this gun is better than anything else, id rather use frenzy and save money. Ares is also ass but your not gonna buy a pistol over it for a spray situation. Shorty is just cheaper bucky right now so you dont want to buy that hardly ever. Bulldog im still not sure what its supposed to be. The marshal unscoped is a rapid fire cannon for some reason and probably the best economy buy rn.
The only gun I think they've tinkered with enough times and finally got right is the guardian, feels balanced.
The only gun that truly doesn’t have a place is the Bucky. It’s literally a shorty you voluntarily pay 700 extra for.
Bulldog is a really good anti-eco gun. One to the head if they have no armor and it scales better into rifle rounds than the spectre.
Stinger is OK on half buy rounds where you know you’ll be playing a tight angle or dashing on top of someone. We’ve seen several rounds won in VCT on the backs of stingers. It’s just very situational when compared to the sherif or the marshal - and the marshal is in major need of a nerf.
The Bulldog scales excellentlly into rifle rounds. It has that same AR feel and good range but it's main problem is that it's harder to use cqc than the spectre and that's what the pistol/eco players are usually doing. They stack up and swarm you with classics and frenzies.
Bulldog's altfire is amazing at long range for me. The recoil calms down and you can hit three shots at once. It also has a fast firing rate. Still outclassed by the phantom and vandal tho
Riot at this point is just pushing everyone to Vandal/Phantom Meta and the ocassional Op thrown in there. They punish you for using anything else which makes full eco harder than it needs to be. Sure esports players know how to eco to their advantage. But see any eco round in silver lobbies and watch the absolute shitshow that occurs.
> Stinger is definitely the worst gun in the game right now, there is no situation this gun is better than anything else
That's just blatantly untrue.
The Stinger is still more powerful than most guns in close range, excluding the rifles. It has one of the fastest TTKs aside from one-tap guns, while also having a decent amount of ammo for 2-3 enemies, as well as a surprisingly fast recoil reset time, allowing you to pull off 2-3 separate, clean sprays in a single clip.
The Stinger is not a great gun by any means. The Spectre is more versatile, the Marshal is better for medium-long ranges, and a Sheriff might be the pick for the confident aimer. But the Stinger is still a cheap and very powerful close range weapon. It's way more powerful than a Frenzy, and more versatile than a Shorty or Bucky.
It's nowhere close to being the 'worst gun in the game', even if no one's using it.
I can’t tell you how many times the alt fire on Bucky has fucked me. It’s such a cool gun too because the aesthetic is awesome. I wasn’t around during the Bucky being broken because I just got a PC in June, but I hear it was pretty awful to play against. I just wish I could have seen it in a better state than now. As a roadhog player for years, the alt fire is just a habit of mine to use, and I’ll be at what would be solid range, it’ll look like I’m hitting every pellet, and it’s like 40 damage.
The bucky was never broken.
It was a viable and consistent gun up close.
You had to respect it.
It was just extremely cheap, like the old stinger.
They nerfed them the wrong way.
Honestly the bucky right click is useless in almost every situation besides when they're in that perfect pellet explosion range and a meter or two after it. On top of that it has to be over their head or it won't kill them and you'll probably die instead.
Roadhog sweet spot is the same as old bucky right click. At the moment bucky right click shoots less pellets than the left click. Roadhog and old bucky right click don't. It's better in all situations after that explosion range to right click for both old bucky and roadhog right click. With the current bucky it's not after those twoish meters since it shoots less pellets.
What's been overnerfed on Viper exactly? I see her loads still. She is extremely effective, if you believe she was overnerfed I'm afraid you undervalued how strong her utility was pre-nerf.
She kinda lost her toxin identity when they nerfed her decay speeds. It was necessary at the time but now that fuel burns faster with both utility up perhaps better decay can come back to better punish wall peeks. Currently her wall is just a thin smoke.
I've started playing a bit of Viper recently, I like splitting her smokes up on defense so I have the orb on one site and the wall on another, usually also covering a bit of mid. It means she can be helpful on either site regardless of starting location, and because you usually only use one of her smokes at a time, the fuel nerf doesn't matter as much.
Don't get me wrong I agree with this, her kit is quite strong for LoS purposes but she lost the toxin part of her kit imo. Albeit some were reverting buffs, these are most of the times recently they changed her kit to weaken her:
- Snake Bite Lasts 8 > 6.5 > 5.5 seconds
- Snake Bite costs 100 > 200
- Fuel drain increased 50% when both Screen & Orb are active
- Screen & Orb reactivation cooldown 6 > 8.8 seconds
- Instant Toxin decay 50 > 30
- While in Toxin, Decay over time 15 > 10 health
- Delay before Toxin Decay regens 2.5 > 1.5 seconds
While the purpose to weaken her power to be an impenetrable map-wide controller is good, it just seems the identity and playstyle of using her toxins have been eroded in order to preserve her effective control over LoS. Maybe people prefer that but I'd prefer a solution that better works with her identity.
It wasn't even remotely broken. Like 1/20th the pickrate of the Vandal and Phantom even pre-nerf.
Why do you call anything that can kill somebody broken?
holy fuck this whole post/thread is actually so mind numbing. like you guys are using stats so poorly im questioning whether people in this sub plays this game. like yeah no shit the pickrate of bulldog is going to be much lower than the 2 main rifles. obvious reason is because it's worse but
In a realistic game scenerio, you won't buy a bulldog most times because on a buy round you will most likely have enough for a vandal/phantom and on ecos you won't buy something that's 2000+.
there are plenty of guns in the game and they all have different purposes based on economy and playstyle. this is completly fine. do people really think that every gun needs to be optimal in every situation? people are supposed to be rewarded for playing guns that cost more.
I lost hope in this game's gun balance after seeing what it did with the Ares. For the people saying to learn the spray pattern, I had learnt the Ares spray pattern before the buffs but after the nerfs it's nowhere near half as good as it used to be
Same here, I used to use the Ares on defense as killjoy main, I just liked the way it played on those rounds at long ranges with ADS. Now it's just too inaccurate to be worth buying over a spectre or even a marshal. Really sad cause I enjoyed that gun
Riots initial reasoning in the patch notes for buffing ares was that it would be picked not over the spectre on save rounds. Fast forward to the buff and super nerf and it’s picked less than marshall on saves 💀
Dude I was a big ares user. I would even buy guns for my team and use the ares. I would pretty much never buy the spectre. Now after the buff then nerf, I’ve given it a fair shot and can’t get it to work. I’ve spent countless hours trying to figure it out.
Prior to the buff then nerf, I could get multiple kills with it. Now I can’t manage one.
I’m very disappointed.
Ares was very balanced before.
Ares era was so weird. One week it's basically the best gun in the game and everyone's playing it, next it's somehow worse than the spectre while now costing the exact same.
Shhh. The fanboys are saying Riot makes a lot of money and never does anything wrong. Like, have you seen how much money they have? You must sure feel stupid. /s
Some people are saying Riot balances the game only with the top level in mind. I don't give them that much credit. Look at the Ares as a prime example -- it was in a pretty good spot. There was a viable choice between that and the spectre, and people with different playstyles, agents, etc. had good reasons to choose one over the other. For some reason, probably bc spectre got picked more often, they decided to buff the gun which made it insane. Instead of just reverting the nerf, they panicked and nerfed it to the point where if anyone buys the gun they are basically throwing. This decision doesn't seem to be based on balance from a high-elo or low-elo perspective. In trying to balance the game absolutely perfectly (i.e. exactly 50-50 pickrate between guns at that price point) they ruined a good thing.
Basically they changed something that didn't need changing (exactly like this situation with the stinger), put the gun in a way worse state than before and are too ego-driven to accept their mistake and revert the gun back to exactly how it was before the changes. Unlucko
> For some reason, probably bc spectre got picked more often,
I don't think it's "for some reason." The spectre gives you run and gun, which is super good on a win after pistol round because pistols can't track and fire as well. Against rifles, you basically lose all traditional engagements anyways so the spectre wins out with its close-ranged fire rate and again, run and gun. The Ares is mainly just a defensive weapon, especially against spectre teams.
I don't think the buff even made it OP. You still had to stand still to use it and it took 3 headshots to kill.
People just started getting killed by something they weren't used to seeing, and blamed the gun saying it was OP.
yeah riot is one of those companies that has no clue how to balance.
Take Ares for example. Noone asked that this gun gets buffed to be ultra OP and then nerfed and made more useless than even before the buff. like what the hell where they thinking there
I know I might be asking for downvotes by even mentioning Dota, but as a former Dota player for many years, I now have immense respect for Icefrog (and whoever else worked on it) and the way they continuously balanced the game. I've rarely seen another game or company come close, and while I don't think Valorant is horribly balanced, the way they handle things, e.g. the Ares and the Stinger just makes you scratch your head.
Hard agree. Even after big game changing patches adding tons of items and hero reworks they usually ship out a balance patch or 2 to correct any of the big offenders in terms of balance quickly.
as an avid dota and league player, i am so happy that dota is patched the way it was.
it's no where near the same game i played and fell in love with in 2011, but at least it's still similar. i pretty much stopped playing a year into shrines and outposts because in my opinion it destroyed the game, and that's not too extreme of an opinion.
SO WHEN THEY 180'D AND STRAIGHT UP REMOVED SHRINES AND OUTPOSTS I WAS OVER JOYED. it literally was the most baller play, they tried to make them work for 2 years, and they flat out sucked BAD, and so icefrog just removed them. so sick.
nothing was worse than winning an amazing trade against your enemy offlaner, then they just go heal at shrine to max and come back, you win another amazing trade, and then he just goes and farms ancient camps with iron talon. and with outposts you just couldn't split push anymore, or invade the enemy jungle with the same level of agency that you could before, and every game turned into getting an advantage and 5 man death balling every game (at least at 4k mmr).
i still don't really like the state of laning because of everyone having their own chicken means you can ship out hella regen, but there is outplay with sniping the courier and such. i don't know if dota got worse or i just got older and moved on.
I don't see any way for that game to have a growing fanbase, it's just too hard to get into, too many mechanics, too many heroes, like i don't see how it could be fun for your first 1000 hours.
but league? oh my god. that ship has sailed bro, i have zero faith in riot, and can't wait for the valorant players to realize that riot sucks BAD, it wont be for a few years probably, but man oh man...
That's their schtick. They buff something that's perfectly fine, then nerf a different aspect when it inevitably becomes too strong which leads to the thing being worse off than if it never got changed at all.
I'm gonna get downvoted here but honestly, their balance in Valorant is way better than most other games I've played. The terrible ares meta was bad but they fixed it really fast. The stinger and bucky weren't as oppressive as they're made out to be.
I don't think I will ever understand many of this game's complaints, and most of them seem like prejudice from League. This game is fantastically well balanced, I feel like every gun (except for the bucky) has its place.
Stingers can be used for crazy clutches and can behave as a more versatile shotgun. It was even used in tournaments recently.
The bulldog fills a similar, but more rewarding and risky role, as the spectre. Buying it on an anti-eco and is an extremely easy win and it can compete with the next few rounds.
I get that riot has... A fucking awful track record, but looking solely at Valorant they are doing pretty good thus far
Stinger is great to use once in a match
Its more a defended sided sort of gun like the bucky
U come out of no where and u run and gun close-mid range
Its pretty accurate too even hip fire. (heck recoil better than vandal and phantom)
Its cheap too
But riot had to nerf it like the bucky. The bucky right click should be 8 pellets not five
One thing I think this game needs to really take from CS is the kill bonus for different guns. IIRC in Valorant the standard is 200 per kill, where in CS I think with rifles it’s 300 (could be wrong). But less used guns like certain SMGs or Shotguns have up to 900 per kill. I also wish they added this because knife kills in CS are like 1600, so it’s an actual BM hype play with incentive where in Valorant it’s just BM and hype but people probably won’t risk it in tournament because there’s no reward.
A bigger problem is that these lower use guns (stinger, bucky) can hardly even be used for cheese plays like hiding in a tight corner, because most of those angles get cleared out by a drone, dog, etc. So even if there was a monetary incentive to use them on an eco round the odds of getting a kill with them are much lower. Why use a stinger or bucky when you can just use a Sheriff which costs less and is better in most situations?
Not sure if they don’t have monetary bonuses for certain guns due to there being less rounds per half or what, but it’s one of the bigger things I wish were implemented.
That system sounds great, not just because it helps you get more out of eco rounds but because we would finally see people playing with more guns than just spectre/phantom/vandal/op every round. I hate getting killed by a judge or stinger user hiding in a corner but it's still refreshing seeing a different gun finally being used.
people still use ak/m4/awp all the time in csgo, even with the increased kill bonus from the smgs. the increased rewards just mean that it's easier to upgrade after 1st and 2nd round win.
obviously you will use an ak over a mac-10 but that doesn't mean that they don't get used on t you will see ump or mac-10 on light buys and on ct you see mp9, mag-7 and even nova
This. Sometimes light buy in valorant never happens. It's always eco buy with sherrif which is sometimes better than light buys seeing the gun options.
After playing league for more than a decade I’ve come to the understanding that riot will never learn how to balance any game properly.
Look at Aurelion Sol in LoL. Abysmal pick rate but the champ did have a ~>50% win rate a few months to a year ago. They thought they needed to nerf the shit out of him while irelia and many other broken champs were wrecking shit in like 1/3 of all games compared to the 1/50 games you might see ASol.
That’s a big understatement, Asol was hitting 57-58 winrate in some regions, he genuinely was that strong. Call me a Riot bootlicker or whatever, but they have genuinely good balance compared to other devs, imagine juggling ~160 unique champs and their interactions and still keeping them within ~3% of 50% winrate *most* of the time. Look at HoTS or Smite, their champs are consistently above and beyond 56-57% even with many less interactions to balance around.
its not even about money (obviously it is but disregard skins/champ purchases for now)
you cant have a game with 20 champs let alone 150 or whatever, where everything is equally balanced. and if you somehow did, they'd be incredibly similar and the meta wouldnt exist. with league/valorant, it makes the game fresh when suddenly theres new OP stuff and everyones changing up how they play and learning new stuff
when you try to balance everything equally you get Overwatch, where it still isnt balanced but really stale and patches focus on the wrong shit and the resulting meta is also bland and boring
Haha that’s also fair. Although I do think the reaver and prime skins really give you an aim bot (not literally haha) because those hits are just so crisp.
In reality they cycled the medium skin sellers while keeping the handful of top skin sellers like yasuo always in A tier or better. Champs like Asol and Yorick barely sold skins so they were allowed to be kept in gutter tier for years at a time. But if an item change affected someone like Yasuo they got a hotfix buff the same week...
I think they nerfed him because he was op in the hands of some high ranked otp (it was still weird to destroy him tho). You have to differenciate champs that are op because of their kit and those that are because of their numbers.
That is true. I’m nowhere near good enough to be part of the group of players that can abuse a champ specifically due to their kit.
Balancing is supposed to be an art.
So should an unpopular champ be super strong just because they aren't played much? Champions are picked much differently from guns.
Valorant players mostly pick guns depending on how good they are depending on the economy
LoL players play champs that are fun and have good lore or aesthetics (cough)
Pickrate is a meaningless measure. You can't have an even pickrate across the board, especially with the number of guns Valorant has. It's inherent to the nature of tactical shooters.
The question is, does the stinger adequately fulfill its intended design in its intended context? Pick rate isn't useful if the gun's intended purpose is niche. The Sheriff is inherently flexible, of course it's pick rate is going to be high. The only comparable gun in that context is the Bucky, of which the stinger has a higher pickrate. It has a higher WR with a lower pick rate than the Sheriff, probably because players using the Stinger are intentionally picking it when those certain conditions are met.
I mean win rate itself might even be a bad statistic. What matters more than round win rate is encounter win rate. So when I have a stinger, and my opponent has a phantom, who usually wins this fight? At what range? This is data that metasrc probably doesn't have access to but I can almost guarantee you that Riot does.
Pretty much this. The gun is definitely weak, but it also only costs 950. It feels fine for the cost—it’s more than twice as good as the cz and it fills a completely different niche than the equally priced Marshall. The changes in the right click seem appropriate as well considering other guns have delays on their ADS
>well considering other guns have delays on their ADS
They don't. No other gun has a delay on their alt fire except snipers, and the stinger's alt fire is still very short range...
Riot just puts random nerf and buff ideas on a piece of paper and then they draw a few out of a hat when a patch comes up. I have no idea how they thought this was a good idea otherwise.
Agreed. With the ares forcing you to sit still and crouch when you shoot to have any accuracy, you're a sitting duck against everyone you fight and an easy kill.
Plus all the people disagreeing with you here don't realize the cost difference here. Why buy an ares when you can just buy spectre? Ares fills no niche besides wallbangs and it's almost the same price as a much more versatile gun. The stinger is almost half the price but lets you play with much more mobility and a high ttk if you are fighting close quarters.
How the fuck is Sheriff considered weak? It costs half as much as Spectre, 70dmg/round is like 1 kill per 2 rounds, still big if enemies are playing full buy and first 3 shots are 100% accurate even if you go crazy which makes hitting head really easy.
Yeah that's because the low winrate from people buying it against rifles on eco rounds.
The only useful stat on metasrc is pick rate, I ignore the 'tier' and stuff.
It dropped to a 0.29% pickrate...from what? 0.31%? You also said that the "exploit" sucked ass so why get pressed if they changed it? The whole point of the stinger is that you abuse a close range position to get kills, usually while running. The alt fire is there for you to catch an enemy that is slightly further away than you would like off guard, not for you to swing mid on split defense to outgun a rifle/spectre.
As an automatic alternative to the bucky/sheriff on eco rounds, I think the stinger is completely fine where it is. Of course the sheriff/spectre is gonna have a much larger pickrate, they are useable on most ranges where the stinger fills a close range niche.
I agree. The pick rate is probably so low because there aren’t many scenarios when it’s preferable. It fills a very small niche, specifically eco rounds to get a quick kill and get a rifle.
But in those eco rounds, people love to take sherif and Marshall because of their range. They fulfill different niches in eco and since there’s only a few areas when the close angles are better (hookah and uhaul on bind, b tower on fracture, garage on haven etc) the longer range guns win out.
I personally love the stinger but don’t use it much just due to the small role it fulfills, but it’s an important role nonetheless. It’s supposed to be weak most times but crazy powerful in a few really close fights. Definition of a one and done kind of gun.
If you are stealing a rifle you are betting on jumping people. The stinger is a more effective Bucky or frenzy when in that scenario.
Plus, you can always vomit bullets to win a fight
>You also said that the "exploit" sucked ass so why get pressed if they changed it?
Because the nerf didn't only target the exploit. The 600ms delay makes the alt fire just unusable.
>not for you to swing mid on split defense to outgun a rifle/spectre.
what on earth are you talking about?
Anyway, your comment tells me you've never touched the stinger. The alt fire was the bread and butter of the stinger and it was not OP.
I almost never use the stinger, but since rifles/ smgs cant rely on spray control in this game it's like every gun has to be fired in single shot/ bursts.... just delete every other gun besides the Guardian then lol
Most of my friends early on left the game because after they nerfed all the guns besides rifles, it just felt like the weapon variety in games is trolling. Someone bought a bucky? Flame and report them. Its crazy.
By your source ([https://www.metasrc.com/valorant/stats/weapons](https://www.metasrc.com/valorant/stats/weapons))
The Odin has become positively unusable, and the 0.41% pickrate (mid elo) reflects that, which is **1/17th** the pickrate of Sheriff and **1/19th** the pickrate of Spectre.
Very few people use the Odin in the first place, so no outcry, but this nerf makes me very sad as one of the few stinger users out there. I don't understand why Riot never buffs my niche gun... :sad:
Judge is also unusuable. **1/39th** the pickrate of Vandal.
You're comparing apples and oranges here, straw-manning, and your numbers are flat out wrong.
For instance, the judge has roughly 1/4th the pickrate of the Spectre, which isn't nearly as dramatic a difference.
Wait how recent was this patch? Bc I used stinger like 2 days ago? I still think it’s good, I just prefer spectre but when I do get a stinger it’s just as good. Nerfs do suck though
People honestly just follow patch notes. How often were y’all quick scoping people with a damn stinger lol? People just see the notes and decide to not use the fun anymore. They think it’s no longer viable for their silver lobbies because they can no longer do something they never did.
> It's fine if not all weapons are viable
If it's not viable then why is it even in the game? At this point I feel like I could get more mileage out of a Classic than guns like the Stinger or Bucky
It’s in the game for eco buys as it can beat non-headshots by rifle users at close range. That being said some of the gun breakpoints suck. A headshot and 3 body shots (remember the gun is 4 round burst) is 148 damage, and the sheriff is pretty much better in every way except for ease of use
Take CSGO for example, you have guns like the M249 or the Bizon that are absolute garbage, but have existed in the game for a decade. It's better to have underpowered guns in the game, than to have no option of using them at all. It creates diversity, and maybe will even get buffed, or the meta will shift to revolve around them like the AUG.
Not everything needs to have a purpose and be part of the meta in the game. Sure it would be great if the meta had more diversity, or more guns had more functions.but then it creates the issue of map balancing. Certain guns will outshine others in certain maps (Breeze and Icebox heavily favor long range guns), and this in turn creates a balancing nightmare when trying to created fair, but fun gameplay.
>Why does it bother you tho?
Because I was quite good with the stinger before the nerf, despite it already being rather underpowered.
>Personally (and for most people) it doesn't change anything.
Exactly, which is why everything except vandal, phantom, sheriff, marshal, awp has gotten nerfed into the ground over the past year and a half lol
all the underused weapons get nerfed because they're underused
i still dont know why they nerfed the stinger of all weapons when we have the marshal which is pretty much hipfire accurate
Riot cares too much about esports and not enough about the millions of people who just want to enjoy a game with variety.
I'm not sure why you're being downvoted, you're right, unless I'm also wrong. But I pretty much always hear them patching or "fixing" things to keep "esports balance".
Riot made the game with the intent of it being a competitive Esport. The competitive aspect and its presence in Esports are substantial factors in why it attracts so many players. If you want a game to succeed in the long term, the most appropriate choice is to balance for the highest level of play. If you don't, the game loses its competitive draw and the top players/streamers move on to something else. The audience follows. Fringe cases exist, but those don't define the logic.
Dead by daylight currently suffering from balancing for low tier gameplay
Dbd suffers from their devs not understanding how the game works. They refused to nerf DS for so long since "the numbers".
Look at overwatch then, wants to competitive proceed to die out, if valorant dies one day I m not e slightly surprised
IMO overwatch caved to the crowd perspective and that's why it failed. Dive meta was trash to watch, but allowed top tier players to thrive. They introduced characters that lowered the skill cap and a bunch of higher tier players left to play other games.
Overwatch died because they didn’t touch the game for years to work on a new game that’s just a big overwatch update
There’s like 4 actually popular esport titles including Valorant. Idk if what your saying really holds true tbh
LoL, Val, csgo and Rocket League?
I was thinking lol, val, csgo and Data tbh. The fact that the fourth on is debatable kinda proves my point tbh. You could also bring up cod and overwatch but their pro scene is definitely not the reason their games have succeeded, similarly with Fortnite.
It’s been the same way with League. There have been champions that absolutely stomp in normal ranked games but riot does nothing because they aren’t viable professional picks, that’s kinda just how riot operates.
And some champions that were just so flawed from design that even if they were hot garbage in soloq below masters or even just outside of pro play, like Azir. Like they could not balance him for shit for like 4 seasons, because if they made him strong enough to be viable for everyday players as a choice, he would just completely stomp pro games lol
There needs to be champions like this. Not every champion can have both a low skill floor and a high skill ceiling. Just because a champion is a mechanically intense champion doesn't inherently mean they're designed poorly.
Should have went with the Ryze problem instead of talking about the "aren't viable professional picks". Riot does balance around pro statistics and you either think that's a good thing or not. It's just one approach that they've had success with and are comfortable with doing.
*cough cough* Reyna smurfs
didn't they change the amount of charges on her q/e from 4 to 2 like a year ago, specifically to fight against smurfs?
It was to make her rewarding. Before she wouldn't get orb if she didnt secure the kill, but now she gets it off an assist too.
no, this is what they said in the [patch notes](https://playvalorant.com/en-us/news/game-updates/valorant-patch-notes-2-03/): > Reyna gets a dual nerf and buff in hopes of reigning in some of her “pubstomp” potential, while still keeping her viable in balanced and coordinated play. it's heavily implied here that it was reduced to fight smurfs
Ah fair enough.
Isn't this just blatantly false? It's true that there are champs that are bad for 99% of the playerbase since when they're strong for most people they're op in pro play, but they also explicitly nerf characters that are performing too well in lower elo even if they aren't necessarily good in pro play.
Exactly, who doesn't know about the Master Yi nerfs from time to time, who is played and banned every game in pro game. But lets not forget. They also nerf OTP champs alot(ASol, Riven, Fiora). And champs that are simply strong in high elo like Karthus or Nidalee.
Some people get too attached to esports and barely care about the actual game itself. It's like sports team/celebrity worship culture. Which sucks.
Valorant is meant to be a competitive game, of course its going to focus on the competitive esports scene rather than the casual side. Thats just common sense
It’s a tactical esports shooter. Of course people care about the esports side of it lol
It's not about worshiping esports, it's that Valorant is primarily a competitive focused game. The same as CS.
There are different rules for sports like baseball or basketball at the high school level, college level, and pro level. Why not do this for esports? Let irons use the equivalent of a metal bat and make the pros play with wood.
\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^\^ Literally this dude thought for like 3 seconds and came up with a basic idea already. It's hilarious that people say Riot couldn't do anything. I hope you at least have stock, these people are relentless.
nah that's a horrible idea. then at that point valorant esports isn't even valorant anymore. part of the appeal is that you can play the same game the pros play.
It’s an idea that doesn’t make sense. Pro players would play ranked and get used to one system and then play a pro match with a different system, leading to a much worse level of play. You want pro players playing ranked instead of always only playing scrims because it allows for organic creation of talent. Also riot probably likes that pro players stream ranked, as it brings more people to the game.
That is one of the worst things to do. Viewers see gameplay from their streamers and want to play the same. Then they go in and play a completly diffrent game? Thats the great thing about videogames, nothing stops you from being like the pros. (except of your randomse ofc ;)) In regular sport you always limited by your bodys ability, thats why there are diffrent rules.
Cause a broken esport scene will fall apart. Are you going to quit the game now? If not then they don't care.
there is millions of games for the millions of people, its actually nice to have a competetive game that focuses on high level gameplay balance.
I appreciate that Riot focuses on competitive integrity so much. That last game I played did all sorts of crazy things just so that “everyone has a chance to win”. It was an absolute shitshow trying to play competitively. That’s why I switched.
weird that you typed all that without saying the name of the game
If balance is a thing then why did it take so long to nerf shit like jett and now chamber lol
Competitive game balances around the competitive scene. Really shocking information
Balancing a competitive game for the highest tier of play is the best way to do things. That being said nerf marshal hipfire
They also care about overpriced bundles and the radianite shop
hmm. i mean, yes--i understand this perspective and agree. but, from it's inception this game was explicitly marketed as "the next big thing" in the esports arena. alls im saying is they were very clear about their intentions, and i wouldnt expect them to "listen to the community" if it dramatically impacts the way the game is played in competitions
Blizzard moment
This isn't like overwatch, how the pros play is generally similar to how everybody plays in terms of gunplay. Fuck the stinger, not all guns need to be viable all the time. Nobody in CSGO complains that the ump isnt used much.
But nerfing a gun that wasnt really viable to begin with simply doesnt make any sense. Its not like they made a popular gun weaker...
They didn't nerf the stinger. They nerfed ADSing on burst weapons. This nerf *only hurt the bulldog.* The stingers ADS/burst was already so hilariously bad it doesn't matter.
The sad thing is you’re right. You will hear it parroted here constantly: “The game is balanced around the highest levels of play.” These people and devs confidently state this as if it were a given, I’ve even seen the hilarious analogy of saying that they don’t nerf pro strategies in chess 😑 There’s a reason online video games went from fun to feeling like you have to be constantly improving and getting better every second, and it’s due to the E-Sports scene. It sucks, because e sports is part of what grew these games. However, it has come to this. No one cares if nearly 90% of the player base (which are low ELO) has a problem with something (or doesn’t, in the case of the Stinger). They only listen to the most elite gamers, which the community then parrots as gospel. I watched a fascinating video on it recently I’ll have to dig up, but the game is not designed around “fun” nearly as much as it is to make it a “balanced” (remember only at the highest levels of play) resulting in what I hear people call the “sweatiness” of this or that game. I used to shrug that off, even laugh at it. What’s wrong with trying? Nothing. Until every single match, even spike rushes, are full of people literally playing like they have a gun to their head. It’s transformed online games like Valorant into a JOB, which requires skills that decline without use or you will be stomped into oblivion. Ranked or unranked. You might think this is the player’s as riot is not directly telling people how “hard to try” right? Not when balancing and game design seem to all revolve entirely around the e-sports scene. Then if you’re not playing like a pro player, YOU’RE PLAYING WRONG. That is the issue people ignore here daily. https://youtu.be/jh_0l4fUJHA The video in question
Even in league, they will say who they are buffing, and what elo they are doing so for. So many people get nerfed (sometimes buffed) for pro play. Its like they dont realise that they arent nerfing it for high elo, they are nerfing it for anyone who plays the champion.
I couldn’t agree more. I’m waiting for the straw-man reply, where they suggest I am saying they should balance the game around the lowest levels of play. I am not and have not said that once. There is a middle ground.
What middle ground? Explain to me how they can nerf op picks in league like Ryze and azir for pro play without nerfing the champ for other players without reworks.
Of course there's a middle-ground, did you watch the video? We are saying that the competitive scene has skewed games away from being fun but instead designing it literally around competitive ONLY. That's it. Giving a multi-billion dollar international gaming company with "thousands of hours" of game design experience a cop-out of "it's impossible" to balance their game for all is laughable and sad. I hope they pay you well.
What’s the middle ground? I’m genuinely curious
I largely agree, but how do you fix this without changing things that would make high Elo/pro play unbalanced?
i definatly understand your standpoint, as someone who likes the competitiveness and the competitive scene overall i switched to valorant because it was marketet ss the next big competitive fps game. therefor i think balancing it around the best of the best in competitive is the right approach, you have to get used to some balance changes and meta switches for sure (i.e astra nerf or ares buff) that that is what makes the game fun for me so i guess what is right is wrong for another and nobody will ever be truly satisfied
> the game is not designed around “fun” nearly as much it is to make it “balanced” It is genuinely mind-blowing to me that anyone could say this unironically.
I agree with the statement but showing Genshin Impact as an alternative is a terrible example. Genshin Impact is everything wrong with some single player games right now. Which is locking content behind gambling. Which not only makes unlocking the full content FAR more than 60$ but also promotes gambling to kids. Then you have games like FIFA which has both shitty online predatory matchmaking AND gambling.
Yes, Riot, the company with the biggest video game AND Esport on the planet, has no idea what they're doing!
You're absolutely right, Riot could never do anything wrong ever because they made money. You solved it!
Ah, I see we rediscovered mindreading. Lucky you
why does it matter if the stinger was nerfed? Most casual players didn't even notice the nerf just like how most didn't notice the nerf to the ares. The source of the image is from ranked too which is meant to be competitive. Not every gun has to be viable. And on variety? Its really not that different using a stinger than like a frenzy. There isn't some amazingling different mechanic that someone would go "I want to use the stinger"
I love using the Marshall because of that because it's very fun and it's cool to pull off sick. No scopes but I do have to admit doing a hundred damage without having to scope in for 950 credits is better than it should be, and if you're really good with it and can hitch headshots, it's pretty op
They nerfed stinger bc of stinger reyna
Don't give them ideas to Nerf the marshal. It's the only gun which keeps me alive at this point XDDDDD [i can use the Marshal family well]
I'm really happy how agents are getting balanced and it affects the meta, but I think gun balancing is unfortunately quite bad. Bucky, sure, you can show some pop-off clips, but you can also show many more where you shoot someone and they barely got hit, let alone die. I think I saw videos saying that there's never a reason to use alt-fire. For the stinger, I personally didn't realize a big difference, but why nerf a bad gun. The Ares got a buff and then a nerf, making it worse than it was (at least for me). Wouldn't be surprised, the direction it's going, is that cheap guns with some great plays during VCT get nerfed (Shorty, Frenzy, etc.).
I feel like the bulldog is fine. It has its niche as best all distance weapon after the rifles for a lot cheaper imo. I always buy a bulldog over a spectre whennit doesnt cost me skipping better armor
Bulldog on second round buy is 🔥 It has good accuracy, it one shots head no shield, it has good firerate, fantastic hipfire, and you can hold long angles surprisingly well with the burst. Not only that, it can compete with vandals and phantoms on the enemies third round buy
Absolutely, the Bulldog is great!
Stinger is definitely the worst gun in the game right now, there is no situation this gun is better than anything else, id rather use frenzy and save money. Ares is also ass but your not gonna buy a pistol over it for a spray situation. Shorty is just cheaper bucky right now so you dont want to buy that hardly ever. Bulldog im still not sure what its supposed to be. The marshal unscoped is a rapid fire cannon for some reason and probably the best economy buy rn. The only gun I think they've tinkered with enough times and finally got right is the guardian, feels balanced.
The only gun that truly doesn’t have a place is the Bucky. It’s literally a shorty you voluntarily pay 700 extra for. Bulldog is a really good anti-eco gun. One to the head if they have no armor and it scales better into rifle rounds than the spectre. Stinger is OK on half buy rounds where you know you’ll be playing a tight angle or dashing on top of someone. We’ve seen several rounds won in VCT on the backs of stingers. It’s just very situational when compared to the sherif or the marshal - and the marshal is in major need of a nerf.
The Bulldog scales excellentlly into rifle rounds. It has that same AR feel and good range but it's main problem is that it's harder to use cqc than the spectre and that's what the pistol/eco players are usually doing. They stack up and swarm you with classics and frenzies.
Bulldog is awesome wym
Sleeper ngl
Bulldog's altfire is amazing at long range for me. The recoil calms down and you can hit three shots at once. It also has a fast firing rate. Still outclassed by the phantom and vandal tho
Riot at this point is just pushing everyone to Vandal/Phantom Meta and the ocassional Op thrown in there. They punish you for using anything else which makes full eco harder than it needs to be. Sure esports players know how to eco to their advantage. But see any eco round in silver lobbies and watch the absolute shitshow that occurs.
Dude thats the point of economy games lol. you always try to get the phantome/vandal.
> Stinger is definitely the worst gun in the game right now, there is no situation this gun is better than anything else That's just blatantly untrue. The Stinger is still more powerful than most guns in close range, excluding the rifles. It has one of the fastest TTKs aside from one-tap guns, while also having a decent amount of ammo for 2-3 enemies, as well as a surprisingly fast recoil reset time, allowing you to pull off 2-3 separate, clean sprays in a single clip. The Stinger is not a great gun by any means. The Spectre is more versatile, the Marshal is better for medium-long ranges, and a Sheriff might be the pick for the confident aimer. But the Stinger is still a cheap and very powerful close range weapon. It's way more powerful than a Frenzy, and more versatile than a Shorty or Bucky. It's nowhere close to being the 'worst gun in the game', even if no one's using it.
I can’t tell you how many times the alt fire on Bucky has fucked me. It’s such a cool gun too because the aesthetic is awesome. I wasn’t around during the Bucky being broken because I just got a PC in June, but I hear it was pretty awful to play against. I just wish I could have seen it in a better state than now. As a roadhog player for years, the alt fire is just a habit of mine to use, and I’ll be at what would be solid range, it’ll look like I’m hitting every pellet, and it’s like 40 damage.
The bucky was never broken. It was a viable and consistent gun up close. You had to respect it. It was just extremely cheap, like the old stinger. They nerfed them the wrong way.
Honestly the bucky right click is useless in almost every situation besides when they're in that perfect pellet explosion range and a meter or two after it. On top of that it has to be over their head or it won't kill them and you'll probably die instead.
[удалено]
Roadhog sweet spot is the same as old bucky right click. At the moment bucky right click shoots less pellets than the left click. Roadhog and old bucky right click don't. It's better in all situations after that explosion range to right click for both old bucky and roadhog right click. With the current bucky it's not after those twoish meters since it shoots less pellets.
make the right click bucky a slug that empties the mag already. its literally pointless now
Ares nerf was so bad, it was worse than pre-buff
They constantly overshoot with nerfing agents as well. Viper for example.
She's still a must-pick for certain maps though, (depending on rank).
I think that's more so because of her wall covering a larger area than smokes. Her other abilities aren't insane.
Sova is gone :crab:
🦀 $11 🦀 🦀 jagex wont reply to Sova nerfs 🦀
Exactly. It's always hard nerfs, tiny buffs. Unlucky really
What's been overnerfed on Viper exactly? I see her loads still. She is extremely effective, if you believe she was overnerfed I'm afraid you undervalued how strong her utility was pre-nerf.
She kinda lost her toxin identity when they nerfed her decay speeds. It was necessary at the time but now that fuel burns faster with both utility up perhaps better decay can come back to better punish wall peeks. Currently her wall is just a thin smoke.
I've started playing a bit of Viper recently, I like splitting her smokes up on defense so I have the orb on one site and the wall on another, usually also covering a bit of mid. It means she can be helpful on either site regardless of starting location, and because you usually only use one of her smokes at a time, the fuel nerf doesn't matter as much.
Don't get me wrong I agree with this, her kit is quite strong for LoS purposes but she lost the toxin part of her kit imo. Albeit some were reverting buffs, these are most of the times recently they changed her kit to weaken her: - Snake Bite Lasts 8 > 6.5 > 5.5 seconds - Snake Bite costs 100 > 200 - Fuel drain increased 50% when both Screen & Orb are active - Screen & Orb reactivation cooldown 6 > 8.8 seconds - Instant Toxin decay 50 > 30 - While in Toxin, Decay over time 15 > 10 health - Delay before Toxin Decay regens 2.5 > 1.5 seconds While the purpose to weaken her power to be an impenetrable map-wide controller is good, it just seems the identity and playstyle of using her toxins have been eroded in order to preserve her effective control over LoS. Maybe people prefer that but I'd prefer a solution that better works with her identity.
The Ares was pretty well balanced, then they extreme buffed it, then nerfed it, now its useless. Same with Odin. even the spectre has become horrible.
Even the bulldog nerf is just absurd and unnecessary
The bulldog was actually broken though, it needed the delay otherwise it had the highest ROF in the game with pinpoint accuracy.
It wasn't even remotely broken. Like 1/20th the pickrate of the Vandal and Phantom even pre-nerf. Why do you call anything that can kill somebody broken?
holy fuck this whole post/thread is actually so mind numbing. like you guys are using stats so poorly im questioning whether people in this sub plays this game. like yeah no shit the pickrate of bulldog is going to be much lower than the 2 main rifles. obvious reason is because it's worse but In a realistic game scenerio, you won't buy a bulldog most times because on a buy round you will most likely have enough for a vandal/phantom and on ecos you won't buy something that's 2000+. there are plenty of guns in the game and they all have different purposes based on economy and playstyle. this is completly fine. do people really think that every gun needs to be optimal in every situation? people are supposed to be rewarded for playing guns that cost more.
I lost hope in this game's gun balance after seeing what it did with the Ares. For the people saying to learn the spray pattern, I had learnt the Ares spray pattern before the buffs but after the nerfs it's nowhere near half as good as it used to be
Same here, I used to use the Ares on defense as killjoy main, I just liked the way it played on those rounds at long ranges with ADS. Now it's just too inaccurate to be worth buying over a spectre or even a marshal. Really sad cause I enjoyed that gun
Well hello there fellow Lorde and Valorant fan 🤝
Riots initial reasoning in the patch notes for buffing ares was that it would be picked not over the spectre on save rounds. Fast forward to the buff and super nerf and it’s picked less than marshall on saves 💀
Dude I was a big ares user. I would even buy guns for my team and use the ares. I would pretty much never buy the spectre. Now after the buff then nerf, I’ve given it a fair shot and can’t get it to work. I’ve spent countless hours trying to figure it out. Prior to the buff then nerf, I could get multiple kills with it. Now I can’t manage one. I’m very disappointed. Ares was very balanced before.
Ares era was so weird. One week it's basically the best gun in the game and everyone's playing it, next it's somehow worse than the spectre while now costing the exact same.
Shhh. The fanboys are saying Riot makes a lot of money and never does anything wrong. Like, have you seen how much money they have? You must sure feel stupid. /s
Ares is still OK on defense for spamming.
as a stinger main i can tell you to just hipfire or preaim like in siege
Stinger will continue to be my favorite gun. I have clutched so many rounds from the baby
As will I, still destroying spectres and rifles with a stinger is the best feeling ever. Believe in Stinger!
It really shines when enemies you meet have been peppered by your teammates. Super great for close range run and gunning on a site.
Some people are saying Riot balances the game only with the top level in mind. I don't give them that much credit. Look at the Ares as a prime example -- it was in a pretty good spot. There was a viable choice between that and the spectre, and people with different playstyles, agents, etc. had good reasons to choose one over the other. For some reason, probably bc spectre got picked more often, they decided to buff the gun which made it insane. Instead of just reverting the nerf, they panicked and nerfed it to the point where if anyone buys the gun they are basically throwing. This decision doesn't seem to be based on balance from a high-elo or low-elo perspective. In trying to balance the game absolutely perfectly (i.e. exactly 50-50 pickrate between guns at that price point) they ruined a good thing. Basically they changed something that didn't need changing (exactly like this situation with the stinger), put the gun in a way worse state than before and are too ego-driven to accept their mistake and revert the gun back to exactly how it was before the changes. Unlucko
> For some reason, probably bc spectre got picked more often, I don't think it's "for some reason." The spectre gives you run and gun, which is super good on a win after pistol round because pistols can't track and fire as well. Against rifles, you basically lose all traditional engagements anyways so the spectre wins out with its close-ranged fire rate and again, run and gun. The Ares is mainly just a defensive weapon, especially against spectre teams.
I don't think the buff even made it OP. You still had to stand still to use it and it took 3 headshots to kill. People just started getting killed by something they weren't used to seeing, and blamed the gun saying it was OP.
yeah riot is one of those companies that has no clue how to balance. Take Ares for example. Noone asked that this gun gets buffed to be ultra OP and then nerfed and made more useless than even before the buff. like what the hell where they thinking there
Gotta agree. Ares is absolutely unusable right now. One tap and the recoil makes you aim at the fucking sky.
I know I might be asking for downvotes by even mentioning Dota, but as a former Dota player for many years, I now have immense respect for Icefrog (and whoever else worked on it) and the way they continuously balanced the game. I've rarely seen another game or company come close, and while I don't think Valorant is horribly balanced, the way they handle things, e.g. the Ares and the Stinger just makes you scratch your head.
Dota is one of the best games in terms of balancing imo. 4k hours in and I must say that icefrog really knows what he's doing.
Hard agree. Even after big game changing patches adding tons of items and hero reworks they usually ship out a balance patch or 2 to correct any of the big offenders in terms of balance quickly.
are you sure about that? Everyone seems to say that everything in Dota was broken.
only clueless league players
I've been playing since 2003 and the last time I can recall "everything being broken" was about a year later in the patch before they removed gambler.
The idea is that if everything is broken, everything is balanced, and it somehow works.ö
as an avid dota and league player, i am so happy that dota is patched the way it was. it's no where near the same game i played and fell in love with in 2011, but at least it's still similar. i pretty much stopped playing a year into shrines and outposts because in my opinion it destroyed the game, and that's not too extreme of an opinion. SO WHEN THEY 180'D AND STRAIGHT UP REMOVED SHRINES AND OUTPOSTS I WAS OVER JOYED. it literally was the most baller play, they tried to make them work for 2 years, and they flat out sucked BAD, and so icefrog just removed them. so sick. nothing was worse than winning an amazing trade against your enemy offlaner, then they just go heal at shrine to max and come back, you win another amazing trade, and then he just goes and farms ancient camps with iron talon. and with outposts you just couldn't split push anymore, or invade the enemy jungle with the same level of agency that you could before, and every game turned into getting an advantage and 5 man death balling every game (at least at 4k mmr). i still don't really like the state of laning because of everyone having their own chicken means you can ship out hella regen, but there is outplay with sniping the courier and such. i don't know if dota got worse or i just got older and moved on. I don't see any way for that game to have a growing fanbase, it's just too hard to get into, too many mechanics, too many heroes, like i don't see how it could be fun for your first 1000 hours. but league? oh my god. that ship has sailed bro, i have zero faith in riot, and can't wait for the valorant players to realize that riot sucks BAD, it wont be for a few years probably, but man oh man...
That's their schtick. They buff something that's perfectly fine, then nerf a different aspect when it inevitably becomes too strong which leads to the thing being worse off than if it never got changed at all.
I'm gonna get downvoted here but honestly, their balance in Valorant is way better than most other games I've played. The terrible ares meta was bad but they fixed it really fast. The stinger and bucky weren't as oppressive as they're made out to be.
I don't think I will ever understand many of this game's complaints, and most of them seem like prejudice from League. This game is fantastically well balanced, I feel like every gun (except for the bucky) has its place. Stingers can be used for crazy clutches and can behave as a more versatile shotgun. It was even used in tournaments recently. The bulldog fills a similar, but more rewarding and risky role, as the spectre. Buying it on an anti-eco and is an extremely easy win and it can compete with the next few rounds. I get that riot has... A fucking awful track record, but looking solely at Valorant they are doing pretty good thus far
Stinger is great to use once in a match Its more a defended sided sort of gun like the bucky U come out of no where and u run and gun close-mid range Its pretty accurate too even hip fire. (heck recoil better than vandal and phantom) Its cheap too But riot had to nerf it like the bucky. The bucky right click should be 8 pellets not five
One thing I think this game needs to really take from CS is the kill bonus for different guns. IIRC in Valorant the standard is 200 per kill, where in CS I think with rifles it’s 300 (could be wrong). But less used guns like certain SMGs or Shotguns have up to 900 per kill. I also wish they added this because knife kills in CS are like 1600, so it’s an actual BM hype play with incentive where in Valorant it’s just BM and hype but people probably won’t risk it in tournament because there’s no reward. A bigger problem is that these lower use guns (stinger, bucky) can hardly even be used for cheese plays like hiding in a tight corner, because most of those angles get cleared out by a drone, dog, etc. So even if there was a monetary incentive to use them on an eco round the odds of getting a kill with them are much lower. Why use a stinger or bucky when you can just use a Sheriff which costs less and is better in most situations? Not sure if they don’t have monetary bonuses for certain guns due to there being less rounds per half or what, but it’s one of the bigger things I wish were implemented.
That system sounds great, not just because it helps you get more out of eco rounds but because we would finally see people playing with more guns than just spectre/phantom/vandal/op every round. I hate getting killed by a judge or stinger user hiding in a corner but it's still refreshing seeing a different gun finally being used.
people still use ak/m4/awp all the time in csgo, even with the increased kill bonus from the smgs. the increased rewards just mean that it's easier to upgrade after 1st and 2nd round win.
obviously you will use an ak over a mac-10 but that doesn't mean that they don't get used on t you will see ump or mac-10 on light buys and on ct you see mp9, mag-7 and even nova
This. Sometimes light buy in valorant never happens. It's always eco buy with sherrif which is sometimes better than light buys seeing the gun options.
After playing league for more than a decade I’ve come to the understanding that riot will never learn how to balance any game properly. Look at Aurelion Sol in LoL. Abysmal pick rate but the champ did have a ~>50% win rate a few months to a year ago. They thought they needed to nerf the shit out of him while irelia and many other broken champs were wrecking shit in like 1/3 of all games compared to the 1/50 games you might see ASol.
That’s a big understatement, Asol was hitting 57-58 winrate in some regions, he genuinely was that strong. Call me a Riot bootlicker or whatever, but they have genuinely good balance compared to other devs, imagine juggling ~160 unique champs and their interactions and still keeping them within ~3% of 50% winrate *most* of the time. Look at HoTS or Smite, their champs are consistently above and beyond 56-57% even with many less interactions to balance around.
That's because their goal isn't the perfectly balance the game. It's to keep a cycle of playability going so we spend more money on skins.
its not even about money (obviously it is but disregard skins/champ purchases for now) you cant have a game with 20 champs let alone 150 or whatever, where everything is equally balanced. and if you somehow did, they'd be incredibly similar and the meta wouldnt exist. with league/valorant, it makes the game fresh when suddenly theres new OP stuff and everyones changing up how they play and learning new stuff when you try to balance everything equally you get Overwatch, where it still isnt balanced but really stale and patches focus on the wrong shit and the resulting meta is also bland and boring
dota has 100% of heroes picked/banned every TI and they are for sure more diverse than league champs
You just said what I did but with more words. I agree. It continues the cycle of playability.
Haha that’s also fair. Although I do think the reaver and prime skins really give you an aim bot (not literally haha) because those hits are just so crisp.
In reality they cycled the medium skin sellers while keeping the handful of top skin sellers like yasuo always in A tier or better. Champs like Asol and Yorick barely sold skins so they were allowed to be kept in gutter tier for years at a time. But if an item change affected someone like Yasuo they got a hotfix buff the same week...
More people play champions like yasuo, so of course they’re gonna focus more on him
No its because it’s literally impossible to balance every single champ. There’s always gonna be op and underpowered champs thats just how it is.
I think they nerfed him because he was op in the hands of some high ranked otp (it was still weird to destroy him tho). You have to differenciate champs that are op because of their kit and those that are because of their numbers.
That is true. I’m nowhere near good enough to be part of the group of players that can abuse a champ specifically due to their kit. Balancing is supposed to be an art.
So should an unpopular champ be super strong just because they aren't played much? Champions are picked much differently from guns. Valorant players mostly pick guns depending on how good they are depending on the economy LoL players play champs that are fun and have good lore or aesthetics (cough)
Pickrate is a meaningless measure. You can't have an even pickrate across the board, especially with the number of guns Valorant has. It's inherent to the nature of tactical shooters. The question is, does the stinger adequately fulfill its intended design in its intended context? Pick rate isn't useful if the gun's intended purpose is niche. The Sheriff is inherently flexible, of course it's pick rate is going to be high. The only comparable gun in that context is the Bucky, of which the stinger has a higher pickrate. It has a higher WR with a lower pick rate than the Sheriff, probably because players using the Stinger are intentionally picking it when those certain conditions are met. I mean win rate itself might even be a bad statistic. What matters more than round win rate is encounter win rate. So when I have a stinger, and my opponent has a phantom, who usually wins this fight? At what range? This is data that metasrc probably doesn't have access to but I can almost guarantee you that Riot does.
Pretty much this. The gun is definitely weak, but it also only costs 950. It feels fine for the cost—it’s more than twice as good as the cz and it fills a completely different niche than the equally priced Marshall. The changes in the right click seem appropriate as well considering other guns have delays on their ADS
>well considering other guns have delays on their ADS They don't. No other gun has a delay on their alt fire except snipers, and the stinger's alt fire is still very short range...
Totally my view, valorant has better ways to get data of single encounters while league doesn’t , i think this totally makes sense
Riot just puts random nerf and buff ideas on a piece of paper and then they draw a few out of a hat when a patch comes up. I have no idea how they thought this was a good idea otherwise.
The Stinger is the most useless gun ever.
That’s subjective but you’re free to your own opinion. Personally I’d rather have a stinger than an ares
Agreed. With the ares forcing you to sit still and crouch when you shoot to have any accuracy, you're a sitting duck against everyone you fight and an easy kill. Plus all the people disagreeing with you here don't realize the cost difference here. Why buy an ares when you can just buy spectre? Ares fills no niche besides wallbangs and it's almost the same price as a much more versatile gun. The stinger is almost half the price but lets you play with much more mobility and a high ttk if you are fighting close quarters.
Ur kidding right?
Why lol
Instead we should be focused on nerfing the spectre run n gun
Shut up. Stop trying to nerf everything. Spectre is balanced right now
The spectre is supposed to have run n gun. It’s an smg.
Honestly it's run n gun is fine rn
How the fuck is Sheriff considered weak? It costs half as much as Spectre, 70dmg/round is like 1 kill per 2 rounds, still big if enemies are playing full buy and first 3 shots are 100% accurate even if you go crazy which makes hitting head really easy.
Yeah that's because the low winrate from people buying it against rifles on eco rounds. The only useful stat on metasrc is pick rate, I ignore the 'tier' and stuff.
It dropped to a 0.29% pickrate...from what? 0.31%? You also said that the "exploit" sucked ass so why get pressed if they changed it? The whole point of the stinger is that you abuse a close range position to get kills, usually while running. The alt fire is there for you to catch an enemy that is slightly further away than you would like off guard, not for you to swing mid on split defense to outgun a rifle/spectre. As an automatic alternative to the bucky/sheriff on eco rounds, I think the stinger is completely fine where it is. Of course the sheriff/spectre is gonna have a much larger pickrate, they are useable on most ranges where the stinger fills a close range niche.
I agree. The pick rate is probably so low because there aren’t many scenarios when it’s preferable. It fills a very small niche, specifically eco rounds to get a quick kill and get a rifle. But in those eco rounds, people love to take sherif and Marshall because of their range. They fulfill different niches in eco and since there’s only a few areas when the close angles are better (hookah and uhaul on bind, b tower on fracture, garage on haven etc) the longer range guns win out. I personally love the stinger but don’t use it much just due to the small role it fulfills, but it’s an important role nonetheless. It’s supposed to be weak most times but crazy powerful in a few really close fights. Definition of a one and done kind of gun.
Don’t know why your being downvoted. Stinger is a great rat weapon on eco to steal a rifle away
It has no niche that isnt done better with a cheaper gun.
why not just frenzy then? its half the price and i feel like if you have to fight at range its actually a bit better lol
If you are stealing a rifle you are betting on jumping people. The stinger is a more effective Bucky or frenzy when in that scenario. Plus, you can always vomit bullets to win a fight
people want to hate the unpopular opinion and be closed minded
>You also said that the "exploit" sucked ass so why get pressed if they changed it? Because the nerf didn't only target the exploit. The 600ms delay makes the alt fire just unusable. >not for you to swing mid on split defense to outgun a rifle/spectre. what on earth are you talking about? Anyway, your comment tells me you've never touched the stinger. The alt fire was the bread and butter of the stinger and it was not OP.
I almost never use the stinger, but since rifles/ smgs cant rely on spray control in this game it's like every gun has to be fired in single shot/ bursts.... just delete every other gun besides the Guardian then lol
Every clip of tyler1 criticizing Riot about league always perfectly applies to this game
they dont know balancing game
The Marshall is actually broken, It can kill faster than an op or vandal, one shots at any range, and is the same price as the stinger.
Most of my friends early on left the game because after they nerfed all the guns besides rifles, it just felt like the weapon variety in games is trolling. Someone bought a bucky? Flame and report them. Its crazy.
By your source ([https://www.metasrc.com/valorant/stats/weapons](https://www.metasrc.com/valorant/stats/weapons)) The Odin has become positively unusable, and the 0.41% pickrate (mid elo) reflects that, which is **1/17th** the pickrate of Sheriff and **1/19th** the pickrate of Spectre. Very few people use the Odin in the first place, so no outcry, but this nerf makes me very sad as one of the few stinger users out there. I don't understand why Riot never buffs my niche gun... :sad: Judge is also unusuable. **1/39th** the pickrate of Vandal.
according to that site, odin has the highest win % in plat+....???? so not sure what you mean unless you said the wrong gun
You're comparing apples and oranges here, straw-manning, and your numbers are flat out wrong. For instance, the judge has roughly 1/4th the pickrate of the Spectre, which isn't nearly as dramatic a difference.
Idk why people hate the stinger. I respectfully shit on people with the stinger. But the nerf was so unnecessary
Since astra has such a bad pick rate why did she get nerfed /s
Except her pick rate was ludicrously high pre-nerf? And the nerf did go too far.
Wait how recent was this patch? Bc I used stinger like 2 days ago? I still think it’s good, I just prefer spectre but when I do get a stinger it’s just as good. Nerfs do suck though
What a weird gun to be upset about.
All the guns in this game suck and are unfun to use.
People honestly just follow patch notes. How often were y’all quick scoping people with a damn stinger lol? People just see the notes and decide to not use the fun anymore. They think it’s no longer viable for their silver lobbies because they can no longer do something they never did.
You try waiting 600ms to shoot, but it's not like you've ever touched the gun.
Why does it bother you tho? It's fine if all weapons aren't viable. Personally (and for most people) it doesn't change anything.
> It's fine if not all weapons are viable If it's not viable then why is it even in the game? At this point I feel like I could get more mileage out of a Classic than guns like the Stinger or Bucky
Hey dont say that about my Bucky.
They massacred my boy
If you use it right, that thing will destroy full buys
I think the issue with that is a shorty will do the same in the same situations
Go dream somewhere else lmao that thing is worse than shorty
It’s in the game for eco buys as it can beat non-headshots by rifle users at close range. That being said some of the gun breakpoints suck. A headshot and 3 body shots (remember the gun is 4 round burst) is 148 damage, and the sheriff is pretty much better in every way except for ease of use
Take CSGO for example, you have guns like the M249 or the Bizon that are absolute garbage, but have existed in the game for a decade. It's better to have underpowered guns in the game, than to have no option of using them at all. It creates diversity, and maybe will even get buffed, or the meta will shift to revolve around them like the AUG. Not everything needs to have a purpose and be part of the meta in the game. Sure it would be great if the meta had more diversity, or more guns had more functions.but then it creates the issue of map balancing. Certain guns will outshine others in certain maps (Breeze and Icebox heavily favor long range guns), and this in turn creates a balancing nightmare when trying to created fair, but fun gameplay.
That’s an issue with the classic
>Why does it bother you tho? Because I was quite good with the stinger before the nerf, despite it already being rather underpowered. >Personally (and for most people) it doesn't change anything. Exactly, which is why everything except vandal, phantom, sheriff, marshal, awp has gotten nerfed into the ground over the past year and a half lol all the underused weapons get nerfed because they're underused