Why isn't double bruiser more meta?

General Discussion
1

If I wrote this before then disregard. I don’t remember.

Team comp I’m referring to: Tank, bruiser, bruiser, ranged assassin, healer

2 bruisers allow for two solo laners and to run a 1-3-1 comp. Admittedly this isn’t an advantage over 1-4 comps that double soak, but I just wrote this to show map comp still works. If it’s a 2 lane map, then the 2nd bruiser can go with the 4 man.

2 bruisers allow for a bulkier frontline, and I’d argue outscales the traditional extra ranged assassin on the other team. Bruisers have respectable damage as a whole, can self-sustain depending on the bruiser, and can basically do more late game. An issue would be getting poked early on in a teamfight and early game, but comps can strategize right (lucio, rehgar, other hero speed ups) to mitigate this weakness. Waveclear may or may not be okay depending on the bruisers.

A big weakness of the double bruiser comp would be if the single ranged assassin dies, they’re sunk. I’d say the extra bruiser can still do respectable damage and can still perform well in the teamfight assuming decent focus fire.

Example of a double bruiser teamcomp: Johanna, Imperius, Xul, Rehgar, Raynor
Raynor’s extra long attack range and self-sufficient heal means he will be safer than normal marksmen. Johanna + raynor + xul can keep up waveclear even on a three lane map. Rehgar does respectable damage too. Even if Raynor somehow dies, Rehgar can BL to create a winnable 4v5. Imperius + johanna stun means their front line is gonna die. Xul will also be powerful with BL. Blinds will counter this team, but since johanna is taken, the only common picks left is Mei, and Cassia. Players here will argue artanis would be drafted too, but ehhh.

The trick to pulling off this teamcomp is selecting Johanna + Xul first. The enemy team won’t suspect a double bruiser comp unless both bruisers lock in early. Since the bruiser is already picked, the enemy would pick their ranged assassin first, which may or may not be Cassia. Even if rehgar is stolen (he’s not really banned in my games), you still have lucio to speed up your team. Thrall can be used instead of Imperius to be the 2nd bruiser. Earthquake would accomplish the same thing by slowing enemies instead of speeding your team up. Plus, Thrall is self-sufficient, has cc like Imperius, and would be a fine substitute.

If the enemy doesn’t take % damage, or even if they did, there’s too many bulky targets to be a threat. Tychus is too low range and would be blown up when now there’s 2 bruisers + a tank in the front lines. Raynor can play safe and still attack the tychus. If rehgar used, there’s a 4th possible diver to finish him off while even totem can be used to slow his escape if he doesn’t dash away. If Johanna is banned by the enemies, they used one of their bans, and you still have Mei to secure the last tank that can blind. Perfect.

Illidian may be a threat since your team is AA heavy, but he’s gonna get blown up, or he just sucks anyway so he won’t be picked. Same with Genji against a beefy team.

2 Likes
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Because ranged assassins out-range melee? We all know, I’m super out of it when it comes to these types of threads.

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An extra bruiser can be better on a team than a ranged assassin. That’s what I’m saying. It’s not meta to take double bruiser.

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Because it gives your team two huge weaknesses.

  1. Ranged dps will poke you to death. Three melee, one ranged assassin and healer, means none of you can reach the enemy back line. Which is slowly wearing you down.

  2. AoE destroys you. Three of you need to be in melee range to hit something, which means you’re going to be grouped up a lot. Free AoE damage. Tassadar and KT 's dream.

6 Likes
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Living bomb is 5.5 range. If he’s that close to any of the frontline, he’s getting jumped

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To be honest, I hate meta. It just means the game is not viable in every playstyle or comp. Of course the game will never be balanced, and people will find the most optimal comp to use every single game.

Hated watching OWL because it was the same comp every game. Boring.

I also feel this will happen with HOTS. Being that the hero selection is slim for bruisers while ranged is nearly half the roster.

1 Like
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A lot of it also has to do with how little manueverability you have in most of the maps, in the early game the ifght is always close to structures so melee have to play cautious without being too cautious and because of how tight knit the whole thing most mages have free reign to hit multiple targets with all their shenadagins.

1 Like
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The typical setup is tank, healer, ranged, dps, flex. DPS meaning you can take burst/poke (ranged/melee) and flex meaning you try to add to the comp what you feel is most missing, usually a solo laner (bruiser).

So tank, healer, bruiser, bruiser, mage/adc can absolutely work, but it won’t be meta because meta is usually the result of a class archetype being too strong (or cheesy) for its own good.

9

What is your opinion on the late game/when fights are at objectives? Objectives are far away from towers except on dragonshire mid, and volskaya mid. Volskaya mid lane won’t have a structure after the midgame.

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No, because you only move in after the tank used its CC, and a powered up Q also hits 3 targets.

It never happens for long. When a few heroes or comps dominate, they make changes. Malfurion used to be the #1 best healer that every team wanted. And GM’s only viable build was cocktail build (which no longer exists).

Also, Valla used to be on every team.

2 Likes
11

Okay 1, if you lose too much in the early game you are at a huge disadvantage regardless of picks

Second, My point about congested and enclosed spaces for melee still stands there might not be as much PVE stuff taking shots but any fight on the object is a very tight area, I think the only map that dosne’t have a congested Objective location is Hanamura and even that has some chokes if you pick your engages.

2 Likes
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Because 3 melees often means you have to be all-in every engage.

  • disengage /aoe cc ults can end you
  • aoe heroes can be really dangerous
3 Likes
13

Because the enemy team will draft accordingly. You are setting yourself up for 3 front line melee instead of two. The enemy’s draft is going to have higher value now because of your team’s lack of diversity.
We have all seen the videos of wombo combos. Where do you think the dmg is coming from? Not the front line. They setup the stun it is the dps that blows them up. So one good cc on your front line and 3 of your heroes are dead from the follow up.
Or here is another example, Ana sleeps your 3 front line guys, now your healer and assassin die because the enemy drafted damage to deal with your high health pool.
It could work but you are giving the enemy an advantage by having a lack of diversity on your team.

1 Like
14

Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. You’ll get out-poked, zoned or cc’d. If not, they’ll dive your healer and squishes.

Look at the Bruiser’s and Tank’s kits. Tanks have stronger cc’s, set-ups and a strong dive with survivability kit. Bruisers are like melee assassins and a half. Bruisers seem to be a bit more about themselves like getting the damage and kills.

Tanks have kits that also helps the team such as mitigating or affecting enemy damage to an extent like blinds or aoe slow like Mura’s claps.

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In addition to what people have already noted, a big reason the current meta is, well, meta, is due to the nature of damage. There are essentially two axes of damage in HotS at the moment, sustained vs burst, and ability vs AA. Generally you want a comp that mixes both types on each axis, to make it harder to counter your team, and to ensure that damage results in kills, and not just stat padding. This is why the meta comp will have a tank, a healer, a bruiser for the off-lane, a mage, and AA damage. There are certainly other ways to build a comp, and quite honestly, even the weirdest comps can work in HotS. I have had success with things like double healer, double tank, double bruiser/no tank, 3 assassins-formerly-known-as-specialists, and so on. But while any comp is viable, they will likely not be meta any time soon. For a long time, double healer/hyper-carry was meta, so the meta can change, especially if Blizzard decides to deliberately make changes to push it elsewhere.

But for your argument, let’s look at your comp.

There are two issues with this comp, they are very dependent on AAs, and depending on how the enemy front line is built, they have very little burst damage, it is almost all sustained damage. Drafting blinds and sustained healing will pretty much negate anything your comp can do.

And this is the larger issue with a tank/healer/double bruiser/hyper-carry comp, it will likely miss out on ability or burst damage, as almost all of the bruisers rely on AAs and are sustained damage.

So while a double bruiser comp can work, especially on a map like Cursed Hollow, there are too many ways is can be countered to be truly meta.

3 Likes
16

  1. 1-3-1 compositions tend not to work out much because the usual goal of the solo lane is to just soak it. They’re not competing to ‘win’ the lane by pushing in the minions and destroying the fort. Being too close to a structure can be prone to ganks and esp getting cced into the enemy gates (garrosh or diablo) So what does the hero do with the time they have between waves? Either rotate, mercs, or just wait.

  2. Allied body blocking is a thing. Front heavy compositions can end up keeping the other person from being able to attack or pull back out as they would want because they’re more bodies around them.

  3. Even when pushing with an objective, that extra frontliner might not accomplish anything (again, garrosh or diablo or other effects can isolate the melee hero)

  4. If a team wants a heavy dive composition, they’d probably want a melee assassin instead of another bruiser. Having more ‘frontline’ can sometimes just mean they need to heal more, and if it comes down to needing to out-heal the other side, then a burst wombo with a melee assassin would probably be better once they commit to an engage.

Before the role-rename, there were instances of 3 warrior drafts, but that wouldn’t have the same label as used now. For instance, a former ‘3 warrior’ pick might include zarya as she provided utility, additional damage mitigation and she can deal damage from a distance.

The same thing applies to Thrall – who wasn’t a ‘bruiser’ at the time – he has ranged poke and follow-up cc so he doesn’t have to commit to the fray, get blocked in, and can be threatening from a distance.

If a team wanted 3 frontline, or two solo, then they may want to build around medivh instead. Portals allow for group movement to avoid [some] body blocking issues, and he tends to be in crow form to scout around not commit to a given range, so having a free ‘solo’ allows crowmage to do crow things.

A Cho’gall comp would probably be something akin to a ‘double bruiser’ as team picks tend to pick a tank alongside Cho.

But basic gist is that such a formation usually lacks either safe poke, ranged sustain damage, has too much down time to make use of their composition, or gets countered by other picks.

For QM teams, 3 bruisers can really mess with the other team since there won’t be a conventional tank on the other side, so having a bulker team can enable a dive pugs won’t be prepared to handle but I guess mentioning that is pretty much akin to just pointing out Maintank imperius comps have used two bruisers, but that doesn’t mean they have 3 upfront.

Again, usually space and function tend to regulate the flex spot to a hero that has some ranged or hybrid forms to them, like Greymane. So in that case, his wolfform acts like another ‘bruiser’ but only when he needs it as he can otherwise just attack from afar.

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a good orp player can 1v2 bruisers is prob why lol chomp build is NASTY

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I don’t see it often, but it’s my personal favorite team comp. It can invade with ease, has a much better zoning potential and enables the main assassin and the tank even better.

You get an Imperius Q build, Thrall Crash Lightning, Zarya or DW on a 2 lanes for constant sustain war.
Sonya, Malthael, D.Va or Artanis AO + Q build for greater macro on a 3 lanes.
Yrel and Xul fits anywhere.

A bruiser in the 4 man can have a surprisingly high hero dmg since he doesn’t have to take care of minon waves as much as the solo laner.

19

Well firstly, that heavily depends on the comp.

Secondly, assassins like malth exist.

Into consideration, you’d have to have bruisers that can bring their life totals up themselves quickly or it would take too much from the healer to sustain. You could run this if your team wins the fight in the first few seconds like imperius, sonya, blaze, but more often than naught, if the enemy team withstands the burst of abilities or so happens to have a medivh, there are plenty of ways to counter this.

However, if the bruisers can win their lanes AND get camps AND siege well it seems like an “ok” strat as long as the DPS is a hyper carry that can deal all the ranged damage you need to deal.

With how conditional said double bruiser comp with additional tank is, you’re setting yourself up to be countered. Not to mention, it would be complicated to draft as well; I suppose the enemy team would not see it coming however.

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Teamfights in HOTS is longer lasting than LoL, but a LOT of times I see an assassin (below masters but still "higher elo) or squishy die relatively quickly within 4 seconds. I guess the meta is meta for a reason, I just thought double bruiser + tank could outscale potentially