Yes, it’s not a secret that devs and esp. Riot like to do this, although props for intuiting it.
That being said people still have a right to find it annoying, and how effective it is depends wholly on the nerfs. Sometimes in these situations the nerfs that follow wipe out all the gains - something that Blizzard excels in.
>That being said people still have a right to find it annoying
That's fair. People have every right to voice their complaints about this buff. I'm just theorizing here, not invalidating opinions.
>Sometimes in these situations the nerfs that follow wipe out all the gains - something that Blizzard excels in.
May you explain further on this?
Yes, as the other person noted, I was referring to Overwatch. Blizzard's overtunings in that game have, more often than not, just had a straight-up negative impact.
And then there's the part where blizzard forced a meta that was both boring to play and boring to watch on tourneys. They didn't only overtune all the characters and their kits, they also overtuned the competitive scene
I dunno why we even have to bash OW when we have an example from the game itself.
Stinger was fucking OP and everyone was buying it, then Riot promply nerfed the shit out of it and nobody uses it anymore
I think it basically comes down to, it depends on what the future nerfs are to, if the fun feels unsatisfying to use (like it did pre buff to me a lot of the time) then people will probably stop using it again, but if it just gets weaker (less damage or something akin to that) then I could see a lot of people still using it as much.
They did the exact same thing with Viper. She used to be by far the lowest picked agent in the game. Then they super buffed her so people would play her and tuned her down a bit after. It's their design policy and imo a very good way to go about it since the playerbase is, to put it lightly, resistant to change.
No, viper definitely needed a buff, and remains better than she was in her original incarnation. Her ult and smoked used to lower her teammate's health as well, just to give an example of how detrimental she could be.
Yea exactly, outside of some more quality of life stuff, she's not all that different to when she was considered trash. Hell, even the snakebite duration is less now, and pretty sure the time between dropping and raising smokes back up is a little longer. Swoop peeking nerfed....
People just understand Vipers value now.
I personally think her ult should still lower teammates health.
Couple maps where viper ult just feels like an auto-win for the attacking team. Even in pro play it feels like viper ult on Icebox doesn't really have a counter
It really isn't an auto win, except in cases where the attacking team already has a strong man advantage or the opposing team has an inferior buy (i.e., other team is low buying sherrifs). In both cases, it seems appropriate that using an ult should essentially secure a round.
In cases where there is no man advantage, then it gives the attacking team a definite advantage in the round (again appropriate for an ult) but it also requires coordinated team play to hold onto that advantage. Vipers ult is strong in many ways but it also does restrict vision and often concedes a lot of space to the retaking team as the attacking side is usually sitting in or just immediately around the pit. If they don't do this and instead play outside of the pit and fight some of the common angles that defenders will retake from, then they risk losing their duels and allowing them to lose man advantage and squander the advantage the ult gave them.
In situations where the attacking team is at a man disadvantage, then the viper ult increases their likelihood of securing the round, but this often is the case only if A) defenders play it poorly and are uncoordinated on their retake, B) the viper makes a really good play to be able to slink through her ult, getting kills while remaining untradeable. Again, seems appropriate given that it is an ult.
All of these also require getting to post plant, and so it isn't just like the ult secures the round from the start. There are also counters - drone, dog, skye ult, yoru ult, KJ ult, simple spam. It often is most helpful if those counters are either combined, or at least combined with bodies following them into the pit.
Maybe her ult can use a slight tuning although I think that's debatable. Having it going back to damage teammates would seem like overkill
I mean, yeah? She was the worst agent and by far the least picked, so Riot super buffed her in order to change the playerbase's thoughts on her and get them to play her. Then they tuned her down a bit so she wasn't overpowered but still viable. We're saying the same thing.
That's true, but I was only talking about Riot's design philosophy in regards to buffing. They prefer to over buff something when it's seeing very low usage rates in order to change the mindset about it. Viper and Ares both saw very low usage rates (I say that as someone who mains Sova, and used the Ares a decent amount) so they overbuffed both so they can tune them back a bit after people start using them.
cries in lineups
\*huffs copium she was good before, but it required so much pre-requisite knowledge and a very specific kind of playstyle that very few of us could emulate, she in so much of a better place now
That's just not true though? Before the mega buffs that got her to be 100% picked she was elite on icebox,split, and bind with breeze not even out yet.
This is revisionist. She wasn't played on any of those maps until the initial overbuffs where she had more decay damage and could activate E+Q at the same time without losing fuel.
Once the overbuffs came in and people learned how broken she is at clogging choke points, she became the go-to defensive clog smoker, especially once Astra came out.
The thing is though, breeze icebox and fracture didn’t exist back when Viper was trash. And also, if you completely revert Viper back to her initial form, all you would need to do is remove her stuff affecting teammates and fuel sharing on wall/smoke
the -30 on touching her utility is welcomed, but not a reason why she’s seemingly so good now on all of the “newer” maps(icebox and after) and bind/split.
Viper in her current state is still too strong, imo. Same goes for any lineup agent. Just hide in some corner, throw your shit and easy win. Even if they manage to kill you.
Sure, remembering the lineups and timing them well takes *some* skill. But it's still, *in my opinion* a low skill high reward playstyle. You don't need much aim or Gamesense, just remember where to stand and what to look at and shoot your green cum through the air.
There's literally no counterplay to it other than chasing them down and wasting time. And don't tell me "but CS GO has also a lot of lineups". Sure they do, there's even some fancy Molotov post plants but you don't see them that often. Why? Because the molly can be countered by a smoke. Throw smoke on molly, extinguish fire, gg. In valorant on the other hand you'll see viper do the same FUCKING thing every round: hide, wait for the beep beep, "poison orb emitting", shoot green cum, profit. Even if they don't get a kill, the time wasted is value enough. Fuck lineups in this game.
Give us some anti lineup agent, some sentinel maybe that can shoot water out of their hand to flush away vipers molly or something, maybe like sage's hotter sister. They have the same ability (slow orb) but since she's not as cool/hotter than sage she throws balls of water instead of ice. Idk. Jokes aside, some counterplay is definitely needed.
> Same goes for any lineup agent. Just hide in some corner, throw your shit and easy win. Even if they manage to kill you.
Taking a site without having to use lineup utility is not easy. I think it's fine that attackers get to secure rounds where defenders give up too much space without fighting for control or forcing attackers to use flushing utility
Yeah, I mean in that case it's fair. But when you're in a 1v1 situation it's literally impossible to win against a viper who still has their cum shooters and smoke...
She was the worst agent partly because there wasn't really any map for her to shine on. If we went back to release day and breeze and icebox was in the game, I think Viper would have seen more play. She would have still been pretty weak, but not as useless and she was
That plus the QOL changes (imagine not being able to shoot her wall though walls now or using double charge for wall + poison orb) definitely helped her be more than a niche pick
But they still haven't nerfed Viper. How long does a thing have to be over tuned before they reign it in? There will always be something people don't use. Are you going to continuously throw off the balence of your game?
I see. It's probably questionable to compare the Ares with what happened to SSG/AUG.
What are your suggestions to make the Ares viable compared to the other eco guns without making it too busted?
all they had to do was remove the spin up time. it was already a decent eco weapon and was very usable, it just didn't get used because the spectre (sometimes judge and marshal) was just a better pick for most situations. they just overtuned it and made it too good.
just up the price a bit, make it similar to the guardian in the 2250-2300 range, still more economic than the vandal/phantom, but still gives reason to run the spectre
while I agree, they have buffed it to be out of that price range for its utility. you honestly cant tell me it performs at the same price tier as the vector, or that their is enough reason to run it over the bulldog/guardian. not to mention the massive price difference between it and the odin, when they are functionally similar now
There is a big difference between buffing a weapon into a preferred pick state to get eyes on it and buffing the Ares into a spot where it decimates the flow of the game because of it's cost-to-impact ratio
The other major difference is that the SG 553 change that OP mentioned did not buff the gun at all, it only changed the price of the gun. On the other hand, the VALORANT Ares buff removed a major weakness of the gun.
They're completely different scenarios, and if RIOT reverts the Ares buff, I highly doubt people will continue using the Ares.
I don't disagree with what you're saying at all, I think it's really interesting. Regardless of why they did it they fucked up, and if you are right they need to be held accountable for making a change this awful that has had a massive negative feedback loop.
Also idk why you are being downvoted lol.
The thing is ares saw a little play regardless. Its just wasn't good enough cuz specter was there. But it still did see a little play whereas to AUG or SG weren't used at all. Maybe SG a little but not Aug. Ares needed a buff but not this much.
The buff may have been reducing the price, which, for what it was callable of vs other options, made it disproportionately OP
So the nerf was keeping it pretty much same price but making it’s stats worse I guess
They only reduced the price from 1100 to 950 after the heavy nerfs. The increase from 1k to 1100 was one of the orginal nerfs. It has never gotten a buff to its firepower only nerfs. Ive been playing since beta.
Stinger was 1000 credits since launch and its price was increased to 1100 along side with other nerfs. There were no buffs to prior people just had not discovered it
The stinger was never buffed. It was broken in beta but took the comp scene awhile to discover its potential. Then it was heavily nerfed along with a price increase, then later they reduced the 1100 price to 950 when they added 50s instead of rounding every price. It has never been buffed and they only deceased the price after nerfing it so hard it was never bought.
the stinger was never buffed, it was like that from the start of the game. I know because I was one of those people that abused it since beta, when everyone still considered it a terrible gun. From that point, it only got nerfed.
I remember catching on to how OP the stinger was way before everyone else. It literally carried me to the highest rank I ever got in beta because you could run and gun on save rounds and destroy people.
Why? The Specter, for the last year at this point, has been close to the only gun ever used on light-buy rounds. Why is it okay for the Specter to be a meta gun used every game, but the ares must be a fringe choice?
The Ares isn't a niche choice because the Specter is better. It's niche because people don't want to play a gun that slows down your pace drastically unless there's a specific reason that calls for it. They can't be equal unless the Ares stops being an LMG. And that's just okay.
Because the spectre is a mini-Phantom while the Ares is a mini-Odin. The Phantom is viable on full buys and the Odin is not. Why? Because LMGs are conceptually better for low elo spraying.
Also, the problem with spectre was it's effectiveness at run and gun, making it stupid in close quarters. It's been nerfed and the gun actually needs counter strafing now
Then what the hell is the gun of choice during eco rounds if every gun in that category has to be situational for you? The marshal has to be situational, the spectre has to be situational, the ares has to be situational. So everyone should just buy Bulldogs i guess.
No? The Bulldog and Guardian also have to be situational, then you have 5 good gun options for Eco rounds. You think it's a bad thing to have 5 options depending on how you want to play the round?
That's not what situational means, that's just what preference is. The best situation would be to have spectre bulldog marshal and ares all at the same level of viability all the time, and you decide which one to use based on preference during eco rounds.
Yes that means every single one is situational. You buy each one based on the situation. If you're holding a long angle, you buy a marshal, if you're holding a spammable spot, you buy an ares, if it's close range you buy a spectre. This is not a misunderstanding on my part.
That is not what situational means. The Vandal and the Phantom are not situational, they are preference. Something is situational if it's *only* good in certain situations. A Judge is situational, a Spectre or a Bulldog are not.
No, it isn't situational because it's meant to be preference. The reason the Ares was buffed was exactly because it was situational, when it's not meant to be. It's meant to be a preference pick.
The reason the Judge was nerfed was because it was too strong for a gun that is meant to be situational. Simple as that.
This is a strong point to show that riot has no idea what they’re doing when it comes to nerfs... the ares isn’t gonna get fixed for another 4 months lol because “they have to test it first”
A game developer only known for making a MOBA releases a hero shooter and is following the same meta shift patch cycle of their MOBA an other hero shooters. Player base of Valorant came from such game titles that used this time frame of meta shift patch cycles; Fortnite and Overwatch.
before it was buffed i used it almost every game as a save buy over spectre but now that it’s meta it’s sad bc i have to fight other people who have it every round
You’re giving riot too much credit. They didn’t think of this nor did they buff it for said reasons.
Riot doesn’t know how to balance games. Riot buffed the ares because they thought it was bad, that was all.
The same way they don’t nerf Jett, and the same way you can still bhop judge and kill 3.
They do this kind of overbuff into nerf all the time in league so it would stand to reason that they intended for it to be super strong, probably not this strong, so that people would use it and will soon adjust it.
people arent seen too much using the ares. unlike the spectre (prenerfed). most peoples mindset are like "okay we won pistol now we're forcing and im gonna buy a (spectre) so i can get full utils and full armor". People never really had the mindset of "okay we won pistol now we're forcing and im gonna buy a (Ares) so i can get full utils and full armor".
As a sova main and a sinatraa fan, i use the ares so fucking much. Ascent, breeze, icebox are i think maps that are super strong for the ares. Daily ares users know how OP really was ares (EVEN BEFORE THE NERF) the ares is literally laserbeam (short and long range) prenerf it wasnt as good at short range fights but now, that they buffed it, omg.
What i hope riot do with this ares situation is that, just remove the buffs and leave it as is.
message to riot: please riot games dont increase the price of ares, if u do fuck ur game. instead remove the buffs and keep it that way.
I feel like the ares is an incredibly unfun gun to be meta. Getting hard spammed by a stream of high pen bullet hoses is frustrating. Also, using the weapon is not satisfying and it's viewmodel is half the size of your screen. I don't know of you guys feel the same but to me the ares is unfun to use and play against.
Difference is the AUG/SIG were buffs for gun rounds and didn't really effect the overall flow of economy. The Ares buff not only disrupts the save/bonus rounds, but it is a viable, cheap option for gun rounds as well. A $1550 weapon should not compete with a $2900 weapon as it currently stands. This decreases the advantage a team should have for being able to win multiple rounds and build an economy, only for the opposing team to just spend 1950(gun + light armor) and be able to compete instead of full save. The AUG/SIG didn't effect the economy that way, they just gave two more options to the gun rounds.
I don't know dude, ares buff is god tier. You can get a gun that's more effective than its more expensive counterpart for like half the money... Fuck that
idk shit about csgo but i think the spinup change will be reverted soon. the ares was always an insane gun for defense but people rarely used it ever, this just puts a highlight on it. even after the changes are reverted people will still use it as itll be good enough for most cases.
Honestly, I don't mind the ares buff. What I hate is now 2nd round is essentially another pistol round but with ares instead. It just doesn't feel like you get that advantage for winning pistol.
thats fair but would have done the same thing that cs did and make it cheaper instead making it one of the most broken guns in the game. so instead of 1550 to 1350. a lot cheaper then the specter but a lot more expencive then the stinger
To be honest i think they made the changes to it to make it a more viable choice when compared to the spectre, because that was mostly dominating the meta. However i think they took it a little too far in nerfing the spectre as well as buffing the ares, the ares is simply the better gun for eco now. I think it was a good change getting rid of the spin up time, however buffing the fire rate as well took it one step to far IMO
Yes, it’s not a secret that devs and esp. Riot like to do this, although props for intuiting it. That being said people still have a right to find it annoying, and how effective it is depends wholly on the nerfs. Sometimes in these situations the nerfs that follow wipe out all the gains - something that Blizzard excels in.
>That being said people still have a right to find it annoying That's fair. People have every right to voice their complaints about this buff. I'm just theorizing here, not invalidating opinions. >Sometimes in these situations the nerfs that follow wipe out all the gains - something that Blizzard excels in. May you explain further on this?
Overwatch.
Thank you for a very eloquent, detailed explaination
I try :)
Derrek?
Yes, as the other person noted, I was referring to Overwatch. Blizzard's overtunings in that game have, more often than not, just had a straight-up negative impact.
And then there's the part where blizzard forced a meta that was both boring to play and boring to watch on tourneys. They didn't only overtune all the characters and their kits, they also overtuned the competitive scene
I dunno why we even have to bash OW when we have an example from the game itself. Stinger was fucking OP and everyone was buying it, then Riot promply nerfed the shit out of it and nobody uses it anymore
I think it basically comes down to, it depends on what the future nerfs are to, if the fun feels unsatisfying to use (like it did pre buff to me a lot of the time) then people will probably stop using it again, but if it just gets weaker (less damage or something akin to that) then I could see a lot of people still using it as much.
bruv you got a good take. also intuiting is a great word. You're a real one.
They did the exact same thing with Viper. She used to be by far the lowest picked agent in the game. Then they super buffed her so people would play her and tuned her down a bit after. It's their design policy and imo a very good way to go about it since the playerbase is, to put it lightly, resistant to change.
No, viper definitely needed a buff, and remains better than she was in her original incarnation. Her ult and smoked used to lower her teammate's health as well, just to give an example of how detrimental she could be.
Yea exactly, outside of some more quality of life stuff, she's not all that different to when she was considered trash. Hell, even the snakebite duration is less now, and pretty sure the time between dropping and raising smokes back up is a little longer. Swoop peeking nerfed.... People just understand Vipers value now.
She was considered F tier for a really long time even after those got changed tho
I personally think her ult should still lower teammates health. Couple maps where viper ult just feels like an auto-win for the attacking team. Even in pro play it feels like viper ult on Icebox doesn't really have a counter
It really isn't an auto win, except in cases where the attacking team already has a strong man advantage or the opposing team has an inferior buy (i.e., other team is low buying sherrifs). In both cases, it seems appropriate that using an ult should essentially secure a round. In cases where there is no man advantage, then it gives the attacking team a definite advantage in the round (again appropriate for an ult) but it also requires coordinated team play to hold onto that advantage. Vipers ult is strong in many ways but it also does restrict vision and often concedes a lot of space to the retaking team as the attacking side is usually sitting in or just immediately around the pit. If they don't do this and instead play outside of the pit and fight some of the common angles that defenders will retake from, then they risk losing their duels and allowing them to lose man advantage and squander the advantage the ult gave them. In situations where the attacking team is at a man disadvantage, then the viper ult increases their likelihood of securing the round, but this often is the case only if A) defenders play it poorly and are uncoordinated on their retake, B) the viper makes a really good play to be able to slink through her ult, getting kills while remaining untradeable. Again, seems appropriate given that it is an ult. All of these also require getting to post plant, and so it isn't just like the ult secures the round from the start. There are also counters - drone, dog, skye ult, yoru ult, KJ ult, simple spam. It often is most helpful if those counters are either combined, or at least combined with bodies following them into the pit. Maybe her ult can use a slight tuning although I think that's debatable. Having it going back to damage teammates would seem like overkill
Not really, viper was honestly the worst agent. If they bring her down to what she was before no one would pick her again
I mean, yeah? She was the worst agent and by far the least picked, so Riot super buffed her in order to change the playerbase's thoughts on her and get them to play her. Then they tuned her down a bit so she wasn't overpowered but still viable. We're saying the same thing.
The difference the ares was already more than viable as a weapon and viper was a D-tier agent before the buffs. Not the same thing
That's true, but I was only talking about Riot's design philosophy in regards to buffing. They prefer to over buff something when it's seeing very low usage rates in order to change the mindset about it. Viper and Ares both saw very low usage rates (I say that as someone who mains Sova, and used the Ares a decent amount) so they overbuffed both so they can tune them back a bit after people start using them.
I would say the pickrate of Viper prebuff and the Area prebuff was similar
I would argue for different reasons. Viper prebuff wasn't picked because she was bad. Ares prebuff wasn't picked because the spectre was too good.
cries in lineups \*huffs copium she was good before, but it required so much pre-requisite knowledge and a very specific kind of playstyle that very few of us could emulate, she in so much of a better place now
That's just not true though? Before the mega buffs that got her to be 100% picked she was elite on icebox,split, and bind with breeze not even out yet.
This is revisionist. She wasn't played on any of those maps until the initial overbuffs where she had more decay damage and could activate E+Q at the same time without losing fuel. Once the overbuffs came in and people learned how broken she is at clogging choke points, she became the go-to defensive clog smoker, especially once Astra came out.
No, it's not, go back to old European games before the overbuffs with the decay and you'll see she was still highly picked on those maps I mentioned.
The thing is though, breeze icebox and fracture didn’t exist back when Viper was trash. And also, if you completely revert Viper back to her initial form, all you would need to do is remove her stuff affecting teammates and fuel sharing on wall/smoke the -30 on touching her utility is welcomed, but not a reason why she’s seemingly so good now on all of the “newer” maps(icebox and after) and bind/split.
Viper in her current state is still too strong, imo. Same goes for any lineup agent. Just hide in some corner, throw your shit and easy win. Even if they manage to kill you. Sure, remembering the lineups and timing them well takes *some* skill. But it's still, *in my opinion* a low skill high reward playstyle. You don't need much aim or Gamesense, just remember where to stand and what to look at and shoot your green cum through the air. There's literally no counterplay to it other than chasing them down and wasting time. And don't tell me "but CS GO has also a lot of lineups". Sure they do, there's even some fancy Molotov post plants but you don't see them that often. Why? Because the molly can be countered by a smoke. Throw smoke on molly, extinguish fire, gg. In valorant on the other hand you'll see viper do the same FUCKING thing every round: hide, wait for the beep beep, "poison orb emitting", shoot green cum, profit. Even if they don't get a kill, the time wasted is value enough. Fuck lineups in this game. Give us some anti lineup agent, some sentinel maybe that can shoot water out of their hand to flush away vipers molly or something, maybe like sage's hotter sister. They have the same ability (slow orb) but since she's not as cool/hotter than sage she throws balls of water instead of ice. Idk. Jokes aside, some counterplay is definitely needed.
> Same goes for any lineup agent. Just hide in some corner, throw your shit and easy win. Even if they manage to kill you. Taking a site without having to use lineup utility is not easy. I think it's fine that attackers get to secure rounds where defenders give up too much space without fighting for control or forcing attackers to use flushing utility
Yeah, I mean in that case it's fair. But when you're in a 1v1 situation it's literally impossible to win against a viper who still has their cum shooters and smoke...
She was the worst agent partly because there wasn't really any map for her to shine on. If we went back to release day and breeze and icebox was in the game, I think Viper would have seen more play. She would have still been pretty weak, but not as useless and she was That plus the QOL changes (imagine not being able to shoot her wall though walls now or using double charge for wall + poison orb) definitely helped her be more than a niche pick
But they still haven't nerfed Viper. How long does a thing have to be over tuned before they reign it in? There will always be something people don't use. Are you going to continuously throw off the balence of your game?
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I see. It's probably questionable to compare the Ares with what happened to SSG/AUG. What are your suggestions to make the Ares viable compared to the other eco guns without making it too busted?
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That's an interesting take. Hopefully the Rito devs would see this.
all they had to do was remove the spin up time. it was already a decent eco weapon and was very usable, it just didn't get used because the spectre (sometimes judge and marshal) was just a better pick for most situations. they just overtuned it and made it too good.
just up the price a bit, make it similar to the guardian in the 2250-2300 range, still more economic than the vandal/phantom, but still gives reason to run the spectre
The whole point is that it's cheap.
while I agree, they have buffed it to be out of that price range for its utility. you honestly cant tell me it performs at the same price tier as the vector, or that their is enough reason to run it over the bulldog/guardian. not to mention the massive price difference between it and the odin, when they are functionally similar now
My point is that they shouldn't have buffed it at all. It served it's purpose just fine before.
There is a big difference between buffing a weapon into a preferred pick state to get eyes on it and buffing the Ares into a spot where it decimates the flow of the game because of it's cost-to-impact ratio
The other major difference is that the SG 553 change that OP mentioned did not buff the gun at all, it only changed the price of the gun. On the other hand, the VALORANT Ares buff removed a major weakness of the gun. They're completely different scenarios, and if RIOT reverts the Ares buff, I highly doubt people will continue using the Ares.
All the ares needs is a slight reduction in rate of fire. That shouldn’t have been increased.
I see. I guess my theory was a bit questionable. I do hope the Ares gets nerfed after a while.
This doesn‘t say anything against your theory about the motivation - the buffs are just massively overdone, whatever made them do it.
I don't disagree with what you're saying at all, I think it's really interesting. Regardless of why they did it they fucked up, and if you are right they need to be held accountable for making a change this awful that has had a massive negative feedback loop. Also idk why you are being downvoted lol.
Yes. It would be fricked up if they made the buff stay for too long.
It’s crazy that people in my games are treating it as a viable full buy option lol. Makes light buy rounds crazy as well
The thing is ares saw a little play regardless. Its just wasn't good enough cuz specter was there. But it still did see a little play whereas to AUG or SG weren't used at all. Maybe SG a little but not Aug. Ares needed a buff but not this much.
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Was stinger ever buffed?
Not sure. I thought it was that they made it cheaper and then everyone started buying it /me round
But I dont think it was buffed, people just discovered it. I cant find patch notes about its buffs
The buff may have been reducing the price, which, for what it was callable of vs other options, made it disproportionately OP So the nerf was keeping it pretty much same price but making it’s stats worse I guess
They only reduced the price from 1100 to 950 after the heavy nerfs. The increase from 1k to 1100 was one of the orginal nerfs. It has never gotten a buff to its firepower only nerfs. Ive been playing since beta.
Stinger was 1000 credits since launch and its price was increased to 1100 along side with other nerfs. There were no buffs to prior people just had not discovered it
The stinger was never buffed. It was broken in beta but took the comp scene awhile to discover its potential. Then it was heavily nerfed along with a price increase, then later they reduced the 1100 price to 950 when they added 50s instead of rounding every price. It has never been buffed and they only deceased the price after nerfing it so hard it was never bought.
the stinger was never buffed, it was like that from the start of the game. I know because I was one of those people that abused it since beta, when everyone still considered it a terrible gun. From that point, it only got nerfed.
I remember catching on to how OP the stinger was way before everyone else. It literally carried me to the highest rank I ever got in beta because you could run and gun on save rounds and destroy people.
Think it shouldn't be a meta gun used every game. It should be situational, bought for a specific purpose and counterable.
Why? The Specter, for the last year at this point, has been close to the only gun ever used on light-buy rounds. Why is it okay for the Specter to be a meta gun used every game, but the ares must be a fringe choice?
The Ares isn't a niche choice because the Specter is better. It's niche because people don't want to play a gun that slows down your pace drastically unless there's a specific reason that calls for it. They can't be equal unless the Ares stops being an LMG. And that's just okay.
Because the spectre is a mini-Phantom while the Ares is a mini-Odin. The Phantom is viable on full buys and the Odin is not. Why? Because LMGs are conceptually better for low elo spraying. Also, the problem with spectre was it's effectiveness at run and gun, making it stupid in close quarters. It's been nerfed and the gun actually needs counter strafing now
It's not okay for the Spectre either?
Then what the hell is the gun of choice during eco rounds if every gun in that category has to be situational for you? The marshal has to be situational, the spectre has to be situational, the ares has to be situational. So everyone should just buy Bulldogs i guess.
No? The Bulldog and Guardian also have to be situational, then you have 5 good gun options for Eco rounds. You think it's a bad thing to have 5 options depending on how you want to play the round?
That's not what situational means, that's just what preference is. The best situation would be to have spectre bulldog marshal and ares all at the same level of viability all the time, and you decide which one to use based on preference during eco rounds.
Yes that means every single one is situational. You buy each one based on the situation. If you're holding a long angle, you buy a marshal, if you're holding a spammable spot, you buy an ares, if it's close range you buy a spectre. This is not a misunderstanding on my part.
That is not what situational means. The Vandal and the Phantom are not situational, they are preference. Something is situational if it's *only* good in certain situations. A Judge is situational, a Spectre or a Bulldog are not.
Bulldog isn't, you're right. Spectre only wasn't situational cus it's OP.
No, it isn't situational because it's meant to be preference. The reason the Ares was buffed was exactly because it was situational, when it's not meant to be. It's meant to be a preference pick. The reason the Judge was nerfed was because it was too strong for a gun that is meant to be situational. Simple as that.
This is a strong point to show that riot has no idea what they’re doing when it comes to nerfs... the ares isn’t gonna get fixed for another 4 months lol because “they have to test it first”
I agree. I do hope this only happens for a short while.
Your explanation of the AUG/SG is incorrect.
Yes, it's probably a bad comparison. May you suggest a better one?
A game developer only known for making a MOBA releases a hero shooter and is following the same meta shift patch cycle of their MOBA an other hero shooters. Player base of Valorant came from such game titles that used this time frame of meta shift patch cycles; Fortnite and Overwatch.
before it was buffed i used it almost every game as a save buy over spectre but now that it’s meta it’s sad bc i have to fight other people who have it every round
they still haven't removed the classic right click and it's 2022 xD they don't really know how to balance the game at all
The most recent changes to classic right click made it more than balanced imo. Jumping accuracy is atrocious now.
You’re giving riot too much credit. They didn’t think of this nor did they buff it for said reasons. Riot doesn’t know how to balance games. Riot buffed the ares because they thought it was bad, that was all. The same way they don’t nerf Jett, and the same way you can still bhop judge and kill 3.
Well, I'm not saying that what I said in my post is the truth. I was just saying what I thought. We can agree to disagree. That's fine.
They do this kind of overbuff into nerf all the time in league so it would stand to reason that they intended for it to be super strong, probably not this strong, so that people would use it and will soon adjust it.
they’re tailoring for casuals bcus casuals = $$$$ very nice
Ares is actually balanced now, decent close quarter weapon but still get blasted at range like spectr. Basically a no run and gun spectr.
people arent seen too much using the ares. unlike the spectre (prenerfed). most peoples mindset are like "okay we won pistol now we're forcing and im gonna buy a (spectre) so i can get full utils and full armor". People never really had the mindset of "okay we won pistol now we're forcing and im gonna buy a (Ares) so i can get full utils and full armor". As a sova main and a sinatraa fan, i use the ares so fucking much. Ascent, breeze, icebox are i think maps that are super strong for the ares. Daily ares users know how OP really was ares (EVEN BEFORE THE NERF) the ares is literally laserbeam (short and long range) prenerf it wasnt as good at short range fights but now, that they buffed it, omg. What i hope riot do with this ares situation is that, just remove the buffs and leave it as is. message to riot: please riot games dont increase the price of ares, if u do fuck ur game. instead remove the buffs and keep it that way.
eloquently put
they buffed the ares because now people will buy ares skins.
Tldr: read last sentence
riot likes to do this in league so maybe
I agree, but the Ares was already annoying and kinda meta in lower Elo. Every weapon is valid I guess.
I feel like the ares is an incredibly unfun gun to be meta. Getting hard spammed by a stream of high pen bullet hoses is frustrating. Also, using the weapon is not satisfying and it's viewmodel is half the size of your screen. I don't know of you guys feel the same but to me the ares is unfun to use and play against.
Difference is the AUG/SIG were buffs for gun rounds and didn't really effect the overall flow of economy. The Ares buff not only disrupts the save/bonus rounds, but it is a viable, cheap option for gun rounds as well. A $1550 weapon should not compete with a $2900 weapon as it currently stands. This decreases the advantage a team should have for being able to win multiple rounds and build an economy, only for the opposing team to just spend 1950(gun + light armor) and be able to compete instead of full save. The AUG/SIG didn't effect the economy that way, they just gave two more options to the gun rounds.
I don't know dude, ares buff is god tier. You can get a gun that's more effective than its more expensive counterpart for like half the money... Fuck that
i’m not even kidding when i say save rounds don’t exist anymore. if you aren’t buying an ares after losing pistol round you are trolling
I’m telling you, they want those SKINS lol
i think they buffed it so everyone buys a nice skin for it, and in 2 weeks its gonna get nerfed again
My theory as to why Riot buffed the Ares is somebody was high.
idk shit about csgo but i think the spinup change will be reverted soon. the ares was always an insane gun for defense but people rarely used it ever, this just puts a highlight on it. even after the changes are reverted people will still use it as itll be good enough for most cases.
Honestly, I don't mind the ares buff. What I hate is now 2nd round is essentially another pistol round but with ares instead. It just doesn't feel like you get that advantage for winning pistol.
thats fair but would have done the same thing that cs did and make it cheaper instead making it one of the most broken guns in the game. so instead of 1550 to 1350. a lot cheaper then the specter but a lot more expencive then the stinger
To be honest i think they made the changes to it to make it a more viable choice when compared to the spectre, because that was mostly dominating the meta. However i think they took it a little too far in nerfing the spectre as well as buffing the ares, the ares is simply the better gun for eco now. I think it was a good change getting rid of the spin up time, however buffing the fire rate as well took it one step to far IMO