I mean, you asked for a vod, he’s going to get it to you.
I don’t think it easily boils down to “git gud” either. I think valk’s issue is that it does a good job for what it is, but its impact isn’t one that feels immediately noticable.
So it’s incredibly hard to appreciate. There’s no flashy display of power, no cool immediate saves, none of what every other ult in the game provides. Which makes it feel deeply unsatisfying even though it’s not a bad ability.
If I were in charge, I probably would have redesigned her ult, and probably kept some (heavily changed) version of valk as a basic ability rather than rez.
It’s an ad hominem and pointless to the discussion. Saying the driver is bad doesn’t make the design of the engine better.
I’ve talked about this in paragraphs, the tldr is that no other ult covers for as many skills as Valkyrie and neither those heroes have such small skill gaps.
I think the main issue however is how Valk covers way too many skills of an already small skill gap, thus you get the “spectator mode feedback”, which is hyperbolic but not very far from literal truth.
I did read it; I just don’t agree with it. Valkyrie isn’t an “aura” ult just because it has chain beams. It does a lot of things. You also centered your argument around whether it was fun. You said it should be “short and punchy” for an amped up version of normal abilities to be fun. That’s a subjective argument because I already find the current form to be fun. Defining fun isn’t something you want to form a position around.
I guess if you are being technical Valkyrie isn’t an Aura because aura implies it is centered around your character and you do project it onto someone else instead. However in every other way the two chain beams are basically an aura.
Sure, her using her blaster isn’t an aura… but…
So… let’s review shall we?
Valkyrie’s direct impact on either allies or enemies takes one of three forms.
Chain heals.
Chain damage boosts.
Blaster.
2 of the 3 are chain beams… or projected auras if you will because they effect all allies within X number of meters from the projection point.
The third is something that the developers have straight up said isn’t supposed to be the main draw of the ultimate.
Simplifying further… Valkyrie is an ultimate where the main draw is projected Auras.
Projected auras aren’t any better than standard aura’s like Lucio’s got for their issues… so Valkyrie has deep seated issues in its design.
Edit… bleh. This forum desparately needs [PC], [PSN], or [XBL] tags on it… That’s the other reason our views on Mercy aren’t matching up at all. Mercy is significantly better on console than she is on PC. I’m on PC, so to me she feels generally terrible and unable to do her job.
Valkyrie has more to it than just the ways Mercy directly impacts other players, though. The indirect aspects of it (flight, speed, beam range) aren’t insignificant. I can’t consider any one aspect of it to be the “main draw”. I think of it more as a collective ability, kind of like a Swiss Army Knife of an ult. That’s what’s so great about it. It can be whatever you need to it be on a second-to-second basis (except a counter to burst damage, which it isn’t supposed to be). That’s the draw.
Also, I don’t believe there’s any real difference between PC and console in Mercy’s case. I watch a lot (probably too much) of pro Overwatch, so I have a good idea of how she can be used on PC. I watched almost every OWL game last season and it was interesting to see how her usage changed from stage to stage. The main thing that impacts Mercy’s pickrates differently between the platforms is that Ana isn’t quite as easy to use on console, so she gets picked less, which makes Mercy a bit more attractive. I think Ana is still picked more often than Mercy in GM+ on console, though. I fell back into masters for this season, so I haven’t played in many GM games in the last few weeks, but Ana is in masters pretty often, too.
Thing is… they are if the enemies are smart enough to not shoot you. Or shoot you with only Tac Visor or Dead Eye.
If you aren’t using your blaster they don’t really have a good reason to try to shoot you, and several good reasons to not shoot you.
Mercy herself is the same. Her surroundings are however different in ways that make her better.
That is exactly what I’m referring to. It is generally easier to aim on a PC than it is on console. That’s why you occasionally see posts asking Blizzard to ban people who use 3rd party stuff to use mouse and keyboard on Console.
That makes Ana significantly worse for the average player… but it goes deeper than that. In Overwatch, in general heroes who require more aim have higher potential DPS outputs. Makes sense. Mercy however… nothing she does is hampered by the harder aim and actually benefits a lot by making everything she does harder to counter. Controls making aiming harder? Outpacing Mercy’s healing is harder, interrupting Rez is harder, shooting down Valkyrie is harder.
You’re right that most heroes are disincentivized to shoot at Mercy during Valk, but I don’t think that has anything to do with the ult’s effectiveness. It’s more about how difficult it is to actually kill Mercy during Valk without certain abilities (which are the main way to counterplay the ult). Personally, I’m probably not going to shoot at her unless she’s in a position where she can really be focused unless I’m playing something with burst damage and can reasonably expect to kill her faster than she can heal herself. It’s usually a better play to try to focus down one target that you know she can’t keep up with 60 HPS. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that from either side of the fight. It makes positioning during Valk important for both Mercy’s team and the enemy team.
I don’t think there’s less DPS output on console; It’s just often put out differently. There are less Widow specialists (though there are still many very effective ones in higher ranks), for example, but console play has some strengths that result in other ways to kill people outside of just flick aiming. Abilities are MUCH easier to use with a controller and they flow much more nicely for the average player. Everything except aiming feels much more stilted to me with M+K. Console players are also typically much more positionally aware than PC players (they have to be because of the nature of aiming), which make more meaningful and deliberate engagements. We’re also able to move in more directions. You can’t walk in a perfect circle on PC, for example, while looking in one direction. You can with a stick. Also, not being able to ADAD spam makes Mercy more vulnerable during things like rez, which you made specific mention of. Mercy can definitely still die on console as easily as she can on PC.
This doesn’t increase the skill ceiling at all. Seriously - an increase in skill ceiling would be Mercy having to track their teammates across the screen to heal them.
Decision making is the easiest thing to do in this game - game sense isn’t skill, it’s something you should be learning from bronze onwards.
I disagree. As a GM Mercy, I hate Valkyrie with all of my being as it lowers her skill ceiling immensely during the ult.
To me personally, Mass Res (in higher tiers) had much more skill ceiling attached to it as it need much more thought to be done properly or to be positioned correctly for it. Most people massively over simplify it. With over 400 hours of both versions of Mercy, this is just my personal thought.
Regardless, it is gone. Who cares
But I would love for them to make Valkyrie less lame and more immediately impactful. With Mass Res, Mercy had HER moment to shine. During Valk, she gives everybody else even more moments to shine while she just enables it. I want something with more immediate oomph. I never want an ultimate as long as Valkyrie in the game ever again for any hero, because it needs to be extremely watered down to support the duration.
What? Valkyrie’s skill ceiling is way lower than mass rez’s. Valkyrie literally does your job for you and basically erases the need for player input and decision making. It’s also not anywhere near as impactful. Mass rez could sway a fight, valkyrie cannot. Are you playing the same game?
Also, unfortunately the Alliance seems to have more honor than the Horde these days. I’m not sure why Blizz decided to make the Horde into mustache twirling Saturday morning villains again
I’m sure you deserve the rank if that’s where you are, but there’s always more you can do with Valk. If you look a couple of posts up, I linked a thread I made today with a bunch of videos or me using Valkyrie in it. It might give you some ideas.
I linked it just above this comment.