Using a heroic on macro means his teamfight capability is lowered.
Compared to the average bruiser or mage Rag’s teamfight power can be highly unreliable at times. He has rather low HP for a bruiser, only having more than Malthael and Rexxar (and Misha, respectively) and until he gets several talents both his ability to poke and his EHP through armor and healing are rather low.
How scary rag is in a teamfight is how close he’s allowed to be to the enemy team. It seems like a lot of people forget he’s actually a melee bruiser due to the nature of his kit and seem to treat him more like a mage. Don’t do that. Last I checked his AA damage is second highest in the game, right behind Stukov. He hits like a truck and like Arthas his can instantly reset his attack with his ability for some nice burst.
That being said I feel like he’s rather mediocre in the majority of fights, providing no CC and his only utility being some movement speed (which is also really flexible and nice to use but it’s not exactly a cleanse) I wouldn’t call him an amazing dps.
For him to put in work he either needs to close the gap or people need to walk with Meteor. And there’s a good handful of games where those things might not happen so often.
Pretty much this.
A few heroes have suffered from this same syndrome of having two really good ults but one rarely ever sees play simply because it isn’t the other ult.
Like Johanna or Thrall before they reworked Earthquake to give him stacks of frostwolf resilience.
Sulfuras Smash is like someone took Lunar Flare, gave it a steady diet of steroids and protein and had it hit the gym for a few months. Then they gave it a gun.
It’s raw damage is some of the highest out of skillshots in the game (not including damage over time abilities), doing slightly more than Qhira’s Final Strike against heroes below 50%. Between the damage and the stun securing a kill is a fairly simple job for it.
Honestly I would still be taking it if Molten Core at 20 still gave 50% increased damage. I remember Smashing people so hard in those days.
However, it’s not Lava Wave. Pressing R to soak and push an entire lane while on the other side of the map is stupid good for macro and it’s basically impossible to whiff.
I love the thing but man is it braindead.
Rag does have a decently high winrate across the board, but I’d hate to see him lose any more power during fights.
That’s just not true. 1 is pretty much guaranteed, 2 is normal if you pay attention to the minimap, 3 is possible if the lane is heavily pushed in and you time it right (even on a small map like Tomb). That’s also not taking into account any sort of catapult buildup shenanigans going on.
The XP is nice to have (if it stopped giving xp who would cast it?) but not as good as the map pressure it provides.
map pressure is very minimal because in most cases, a hero is ALREADY laning, so they can VERY easily kill the minions. also, catapults do not matter till late game. even if you cast it on a lane without fort, the enemy has more than enough time to counter the push. if the keep is gone, well its nearly ALWAYS that a hero is at that lane cause the pressure is ALWAYS high. the exp is negligible after lvl 20 really, and no, 3 minion waves is impossible unless you are losing. and even IF you manage to get 3 minion waves, thats 90 seconds. which again, gives plenty of time for the enemy to react since it was far at YOUR side.
think about it. if you are in a small map, and you are the laner, why waste a really long CD if you can go there in much less time? that means that if you are the double soak, picking lava wave is pretty minimal value. ( not counting TF rag )
again im not saying its bad, in fact its one of the best ults in the game. but its not downright OP. it shouldent get nerfs, because the exp even pre 20 is actually not THAT much gain, and the pushing really comes to value late game, and in all cases, an enemy hero is supposed to be there to defend. technically, you can cast it before obj to force the enemy at a crossroads, but its very rare that it gives off so much value that it deserves a nerf. i do not approve of this nerf.
He doesn’t have mage lvl of burst, but his dmg is still really high.
The only Bruiser with more burst imo is Imp, but he lacks in PvE unlike Rag.
And even if Rag doesn’t have a Heroic for the teamfight itself, (and I want to say this to @MadKiller as well), Lava Wave gives xp, which can get xp lead.
And…
At least how I use Lava Wave is to got to a lane, force a fight and use Lava Wave before that on another lane, to create dividing pressure on the enemy.
And Rag still has his trait which can act as a pseudo-Heroic for teamfights.
I might be wrong, but I get the same vibe I had with Uther. I played him a lot when ppl didn’t know he was busted. I said he was bsuted but ppl disagreed. One year latter, with no change, he became meta and had to be nerfed.
My guess is that this is the case with Rag as well.
Usually if I have insane winrate with a Hero, it means that Hero is overtuned.
I want to argue with you because I don’t wanna see more Rag nerfs but for the most part it’s true.
I have played my fair share of games where even lava wave won’t give you a level advantage because the enemy team is really good at clearing and rotating, so I wouldn’t say it’s impossible to “counter” Lava Wave, just that the average team has issues responding to it.
I’d say the real strength in lava wave is that you can push with your team on one side of the map while not losing any soak or pressure on the other.
Like, if lava wave emanated from Rag himself and he had to be in the lane to use it then it wouldn’t be half as powerful, even if you can just fire it off from core before moving on.
Meta does weird things to a game. Where decent/good heroes can receive buffs and reworks simply because people are sleeping on them or average/decent heroes can get nerfed just because they’re safe and easy to play.
Uther caused a lot of problems when people realized that being labeled as a healer doesn’t mean that’s what the hero needs to do.
needless to say, he is powerful, and he is even better to counter melee/ranged based comps ( ie: 2 or more heroes of either is a comp based around that ) but maybe he can become meta someday… who knows
Like molten core is just really good. Don’t even have to do anything with it. Just the threat stops pushes. Lava burst can be cast on allies to give them move speed, fantastic waveclear, good teamfight damage, versatile builds, solid ults.
As for lava wave, it’s good, but I like sulfuras smash. Delete squishies. Slow with blast wave helps land it. But my favorite is molten core, stun+ sulf smash. It’s so dumb. People just die.
I take lava wave more on maps where team pushes are more common. Dragonshire, BoE shrines, GoT, those sorts of maps. I prefer using it to reinforce a push, as all defenders leave their fort, and then, free fort!
If people are sleeping on rag, then do us the honor and show us how great he is. I’d like to see someone prove people wrong, because the guy is just worthless in teamfights.
What I meant by "uncounterable" is that you can do nothing to deny value from it. Even if the enemy pushes back the cleared lane, Lava Wave still did its job and one can argue, that making the enemy to depush on that lane is part of that value.
How I see Lava Wave is that I have a button to make the map have -1 lane but only for my team.
But I don't want to nerf Lava Wave big, cuz I don't think it's op, just slightly overtuned.
@MadKiller:
MC protects a structure from push or from a lost obj. Almost every obj is near a fort so he can use it if he wants to to help secure it. And its dmg is not low and also every hit slows.
MC is Heroic lvled (same with Dragon Queen tbh).
Without a doubt it is op, a good adjustment would be:
That instead of killing the creeps, they lower the hp by 50% and with the improvement in addition to the additional charge that goes up to 75% and not eliminate a full lane at once as far as the damage to heroes keep it as it is.
Ragnaroks is classified by the game as a bruiser, however he is the hero with the most massive siege power in the game, which does not match his role.
