How is it fair that a mage can take off 50% of a squishy’s health simply by pressing one Q? And it’s not like it’s hard to hit as well - it passes through minions, short delay, and massive AoE.
Oh and the rest of Kael’s kit - two point and click abilities. Mages are supposed to have the drawback of being skillshot reliant, but Kael’s living bomb and pyroblast are POINT AND CLICK abilities - how is that even fair?
Kael is way too easy to get value - that’s my biggest problem with this character. Other mage characters you outplay by dodging their skillshots, and most of their skillshots are very telegraphed. Chromie, Ming, KTZ, Jaina, Orphea, Mephisto - all of their abilities are telegraphed and if you dodge their key skillshots their damage drops by a lot. Kael has two point and click abilities and one easy to land nuke that takes off 50% of a squishy’s health on a short cooldown.
What’s the counterplay to Kael’s double living bombs aside from “pray you can kill him very quickly”? What’s the counterplay to his pyroblast aside from “pray you have Medivh/Uther or ice block”?
I understand he’s squishy and lack mobility but to me that’s poor design because if you have a team backing you up, you can spam your abilities and not worry a thing about missing the same way you would when playing the other mages.
He’s a BURST MAGE. also the only way this is happening is if he built convection ( a talent that is incredibly risky to pick in the first place) and/or took ignite to add a living bomb to whoever is closest to the center of his Q.
It’s only a massive AoE if he empowered it with his trait. That means he’s missing out on a free living bomb or a stun that hits several enemy players. On top of that, since it doesn’t actually “travel” anywhere unlike Ming’s orb, it can be more difficult to set up people to get hit by it.
This isn’t a rule setup anywhere. you just made it up lmao.
Because living bomb gives you time before it explode and pyroblast has an insane amount of counterplay.
and as a result, becomes less useful as you climb the ranks. in higher ranks, people don’t clump up as much so you need to set up much more.
and in exchanged, they can do things KT can’t really do. Orphea has tremendous combo potential and can chase down people until they die thanks to her Q reset. Jaina can deliver the highest burst damage in the game+ constant slows and roots with icyveins and the root upgrade to her Cone of Cold. Mephisto has a global ult and native CDR. Chromie has more range than KT. Li Ming has the ability to reset all of her Cooldowns off of takedowns, making her incredibly powerful against teams with people like murky, rexxar or lost vikings. Nazeebo has his zombie walls which can trap players and can provide near endless zoning in a chokepoint due to toads.
The amount of counterplay Pyroblast has is pretty extensive. shields, burst healing, protected status, armor, etc.
What you don’t seem to understand is that this is a team game and the ENTIRE POINT of drafting is to build a team of heroes that covers each others weaknesses, empowers each others strengths, and creates or exploits weaknesses in the opposing team.
Of course KT has a team to protect him. Thats exactly what building a team should do.
Your job in counter drafting is to draft something that deals with him or makes him less of an issue. Dive to kill him, shields and protected to mitigate his damage, silence or CC to stop him casting, armour and healing and positioning to reduce his impact.
Or you can decide to ignore him and target a different member of his team, maybe the front line with poke and % damage so you stay out of range of his abilities until you can kill one of thr front line and then pounch on him.
The point is, complaining that an assassin is good at doing damage and you can’t do anything about it because the rest of his team is too good at enabling him MEANS you are out drafted and out skilled.
because they have 2.5 seconds to not be standing there anymore.
an orb flying across the screen is conveyed about as much as a circle of red on the ground presuming you are under the basic understanding in the game that some abilities are indicated by leaving a red ring on the ground, and they’re red to indicate that they are bad.
While that kael Q might chunk “50% of a squish’s” health, you might not want to look into how mirrorball + calamity li ming works. She might not be chunking heroes with just one spell,there’s some heroes she can outright kill in less than 2.5 seconds, which then resets her cooldowns and allows her to jump onto another hero to kill.
Jaina might need a similar span of time for her combo (ring/blizzard to hit) but she has roots and doesn’t need to trade defense for her wombo the same way kael does – which is kinda why upper levels of play tend to see more jaina or ming picks than kael.
and oh boy, don’t ever look up stuff like Dota or Lol and look into their mages that have point-n-click abilities! Cuz… some games have mages that have point and click abilities!
What is “fair” about something comes with opportunity cost. If you’re going to overlook all the bits that comprise that opportunity (such as comparing whole kits and comboes instead of just one button press) than you’re skewing information to not be “fair” out of wilfull neglect.
I think the point the OP is getting at isn’t that Kael is difficult to counter, but rather that he is exhausting to counter.
Living bomb being applied so frequently (two charges with trait + ignite on 16) means you essentially have to play spread the entire game. You could argue the same thing about other AoE mages but none of them have as little reprieve between casts as Kael does.
If you cast living bomb exclusively with your trait, you can get a living bomb off every 6 seconds. Since the bomb itself lasts 3 seconds, you have just THREE seconds of reprieve before the next one, thats not even counting if he uses his bonus living bomb.
I honestly can’t think of any other mages or even character for that matter that requires you to modify the way you play as extensively as Kael does. Some heroes come close (Ming orb can get down to 2 sec CD but only if specific conditions are met) but they usually come with either difficulty skill shots or require conditions to be met.
The only condition Kael has to meet is to click on you. The rest is on you.
That one, some or most people find a character exhausting to play against, most noteably those at mid to low end of the skill spectrum doesn’t really require or even suggest a remedy. Is one necessary?
Sure but he has to get close enough to do so. If KT wanders forward to drop living bomb he dies unless he has a team with him. So it’s not a no risk all reward. It’s something that is managed by the rest of the team.
The issue with KT strikes me as is pretty much the same issue people had with old stealth: The only people really struggling with it are ones who lack awareness or positioning sense.
At this point, I’m worried about them giving KT the stealth treatment to pander to those people. I’d really rather KT remain interesting and viable at upper-mid levels of play.
Another important thing to note is that the primary living bomb is the one that does not get the damage buff. It is the secondary living bomb recipients, i.e. the ones whom the first living bomb spread to, that actually benefit from the level 7 talent that gives the 35% damage buff. The primary living bomb doesn’t actually deal all that much damage, and can easily be managed. They can spam living bomb with the trait but it doesn’t actually do as much damage, its the secondary bombs talented that are dangerous.
Now it is important to note that because while you can guarantee the primary living bomb the secondary bombs, which deal more damage talented, are not something you can guarantee or apply as easily without a lot of set up – meaning the opportunity cost of using your trait for a free living bomb VS gravity lapse hitting multiple heroes (its not optimal really to spam living bomb with your trait actually you want it more for gravity lapse).
I’ve like 400-500 games on him and I agree, he’s one of the easiest damage dealers in the game. Can cast free Living Bombs all day in lane and the whole build is super duper strong against enemy teams that lack awareness of spreading it.
A lot of QM players really struggle with Convection, but you don’t need that quest to be a Flamestrike powerhouse either.
Ignite is a fantastic talent, I get your complaint, but I don’t know that I think it’s too strong. Pyroblast is very easy to counter as well. Some skilled heroes can self-dodge it too.
I don’t have that impression from them at all.
They seem to have more difficult in seeing ‘counters’ to kael at all, and less so being exhausted by the effort
They seem more content to neglect particulars of kael’s weaknesses in favor of claiming that certain stuff just isn’t “fair”. I’ve seen topics composed for the exhausting of dealing with heroes, and those present different details on the strength/weakness/opportunity-cost bits than “zomg, x is totally better than y on other hero!”
Now I think you’ve presented replies that do go into the exhausting ,or anti-fun, or such for kael (in the extent of how much it takes to deal with him) and as such want to agree with the OP in assimilating their topic to match the take you want, but not necessarily what they offer XD
Kael is listed as hard because his opponents are supposed to have a brain and avoid easy to juke aoes and gravity lapses.Also he his supposed to be punished if he gets close carelessly to use W.
People over struggling against kt is a testament of them being over baddies this is not news.
this wont get him damage, (unless the enemy has this strange urge to hug each other after having a bomb on them, but, BUT , thts not KT skils, thts enemy stupidity).
Playing against little better players, his bomb does NOTHING at all,
KT has low skill floor, so does Ming, but if you want to make use of these heroes, u need to practise the skill shots, KT flamestrike positioning is verrrrrrry important, spamming his bomb wont get much.
N kael can b countered by many hereos, just have some long range mage
Ming, even Jaina, or if u can get a valeera or zeratul or genji, KT will cry the whole game
Good post. He is not OP and he is a non issue in higher MMR, but his cooldowns are ridiculous. When you take in account the duration of Living bomb, he is actually spamming them out every 3 seconds.
I can understand why new players and people in low ratings hate him. He is obnoxious to play against, especially if your team has no idea how to spread to avoid the explosion.
Then again, he is definitely a ‘hard’ hero simply because he is one of the few heroes with zero mobility. Nothing. Not even at level 20 anymore since they removed his Bolt of the Storm. If you misposition even slightly against good enemies or miss your stun you’re dead on the spot.
So right click autoatack still wins over teammates spreading bombs until end of days. Maybe stop assuming what seems easy and start to actually see what’s easy in lower ranks.
KT just gets harder the higher up ranks you go. Raynor too for that matter, but not by that much.
AT LEVEL 16 A SINGLE KAELTHAS Q IGNITE DOES MORE DAMAGE THAN A FULL RANGE MING ORB
Tbh I dont see anything wrong with this statement lol
Anyway, I cant disagree with OP, completely at least. Silly skill floor. Similar to post-release Sylvanas, you cant get into melee range with minions with point&click KT around (basically only thing that requires any real skill in his kit).
More damage, smaller shield. Give him something more interesting rather than bland Pyro. Totally wouldnt mind if they increased his skill floor (even with more damage).
I used to play with graphics on low when i started (although my pc was a bit better than the minimun requirements) and i can tell you it was almost imposible to see a stealthed hero unless you were looking at a spot the whole time to see the breeze effect. I went to a friends house who had max everything and they were visible easily and quite predictable.
I mean, whats the point of publishing a list of requirements if you wont see a key skill that impacts gameplay and not only graphics? Fortunately i got my own pc that year
even KT’S bomb is just like a candle flame, i have to keep a really close look at the heroes whenever i hear the sound of kt putting bomb,
i play in lowest graphics with lowest possible resolution
my heroes seem stretched lol.
Hopefully i wil hav my new laptop n can play mid graphics then
![:smiley:](https://d3rakab8gpdsa3.cloudfront.net/en/heroes/images/emoji/twitter/smiley.png?v=6" ":smiley:")