Giving Bastion an E-ability: YOU rank them edition!

General Discussion
1

Forget about full reworks, forget trying to make bastion work in the Tank Role, forget about changing the ultimate* or how self-repair works… for now. This is just about giving bastion an ability that’s activated with the E-key. I need YOU to rank them but just tell me which ability you would most want to see bastion get and which you’d least want bastion to get.

IMPORTANT NOTE: I’m not including the cooldowns. Just assume they’d have whatever cooldown duration is appropriate, up to 30 seconds.

Target Scan

Press E to scan an area for enemies that you can see through walls and other obstructions. Not red outlines, just a crosshair and a "target lead" reticle for aiming rockets with the ultimate. All this is only visible to bastion, not any allies.

Shield Boost

Pressing E grants 75HP Temporary Shields (aka dark blue health), it disappears after 3 seconds. This would be like increasing bastion's health but without any synergy with healers as this dark blue health can't be healed.

Mini Barrier

Press E activates a tiny barrier when in sentry mode which has only 50HP and only lasts for 2 seconds. This barrier moves around with where bastion looks and bastion can still shoot and do any other actions but is cancelled by transforming.

Better barrier

Hold down E to activate a stronger barrier (150HP) but bastion cannot shoot/reload/repair/transform while the barrier is up, cooldown doesn't begin until the barrier is destroyed or E is released.

CC immunity

Like Orisa's fortify with the CC immunity and cleanse but (1) no extra damage resistance (2) a much shorter duration of only 2 seconds, and most importantly (3) Bastion can't attack during this 2 seconds but *can* reload, repair or transform.

Liftoff!

Rocket boosters erupt from bastion's frame causing bastion to slowly accelerate upwards to reach higher ground (bastion can't shoot or reload in this mode nor move laterally so is very vulnerable) or if a direction is pushed then bastion will quickly rocket off in that direction at about 10m/s skating over the ground with sparks flying. If he hits a wall he'll be subject to the "knockdown" effect like when two reins collide. If activated in sentry it'll transform bastion to Recon mode and can't be used in tank mode.

Super Ammo

Triggers a reload animation and loads new ammo and the cooldown doesn't start until all the ammo is fired or bastion reloads or reconfigures. Sentry gun: Reload an ammo box of only 120 rounds that will be fired at 3600rpm (double fire rate) but only 10 damage per bullet and spread never shrinks. Recon gun: Loads 20-round clip of ammo that does double damage and has no range fall-off but can only be fired in semi-auto at half the rate. Tank cannon: loads "Canister shot" which is a super shotgun dealing 300 damage from 20 pellets (which can't crit) in a wide spread.

E X T R A:

Tank On E

Transform into tank mode for usual duration except rockets only do 150 damage. But wait... what's the Ultimate?

*I said I wouldn’t change the ultimate but if tank was an E-ability this has the compound problem of coming up with a new ultimate which just opens up a whole new can of worms.

Maybe some of the E-abilities I’ve proposed would work better as ultimates to replace tank mode?

2 Likes
2

Shield.

We need this back

Bastion requires a shield to work mostly, and most peoplw dont want to play shield.

A personal one would make him more viable

Other stuff sounds clunky or just a bit too niche

3

He needs a way to protect himself when he gets dived, not more utility. His problem is how team reliant he is and he can only focus 1 target at a time, which makes it so teamwork destroys him. More heal, less damage, heal while shooting? Maybe able to move in turret form, but can’t shoot while moving and a small delay before he can start shooting

4

Then Bastion’s either OP or trash depending on how strong the barrier is

5

This. Tank config is the best thing about bastion and I wanna do it more often

6

Makes the most sense to me, and doesn’t require new artwork.

Just make it fire the equivalent of Pharah rockets.

And if they wanna make it really fun. Higher selfknockback on the attacks, and less selfdamage.

1 Like
7

Definitely this would be the best option.

Ideally, I think any Bastion rework should (like Torb) streamline his intended gameplay, which is changing forms often instead of sitting on Sentry all day. The hard part is how to scale Tank form into a normal ability. I would give the rockets a 120~140 damage each, a 6-bullet clip, and it reload over time like Doomfist ammo. This way, once you run out of tank bullets, you change into another form to keep shooting, and go back to tank once you have 6 bullets again.

Ultimate might just be some kind of Overclock that boosts each form in different ways. From all heroes, Bastion seem the best fitted for this kind of ultimate. Stuff like giving Recon increased RoF, infinite ammo and perfect accuracy (no spread), Sentry getting a 1000 HP barrier like on beta, and Tank working exactly like it do today.

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You’re like a broken record with the same False Dilemma:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_dilemma

Always the same with you, I’m sure your reply will be to say the EXACT same thing but slightly rephrased and surrounded with more pointless fluff. Are you capable of saying anything about this other can fabricating a fake problem?

Yeah and it doesn’t even feel like an ultimate, it feels like just a strong ability that should be on a long cooldown, especially if the damage was just slightly toned down. Though the transformation time should be reduced if it’s an ability.

What would feel like an ultimate is having their own personal barrier which in beta bastion got for free but makes far more sense as a high cost ultimate.

It has precedent, the only DPS hero that can generate any sort of barrier is Symm and that’s from an ultimate ability.

Why not just make it like the ultimate? 8 second duration with infinite ammo but instead of needing ultimate charge just wait for a 20 second cooldown to be done. It’s a novel ability that can only be used a minority of time time but you can use it enough to practice those direct hits.

1 Like
9

205 damage with such a large blast is too much for a cooldown ability.

Tank need to be toned down if it’s placed as a cooldown ability. Otherwise, it would just be Valkyrie 1.0 all over again.

Putting it on a strict cooldown would also be problematic because it would just be the kind of ability that you use as much as possible just to keep its cooldown active, like Hanzo Storm Arrow. Leaving it as an at-will change, but implementing some limitations so that you are forced to cycle through his forms might end up providing a player-friendly flow.

I used Torb as an example because that’s what his rework did. Every Torb main could tell you that if a fight is currently going on, you was not supposed to sit there trying to upgrade or repair your turret, you just throw another one and keep shooting. But people who didn’t played much Torb, when trying him out, tended to always try to upgrade every single turret they placed down. Making his turret a single level made more people simply use it as it was intended to be used, and Torb is now recognized as the decent hero he always was.

Bastion need to go through the same route. Keep the theme, improve the flow, build it upon his current base kit instead of trying something wildly different. More reworks like Symmetra 1.0 to 2.0, less Symmetra 2.0 to 3.0.

10

Give him a shield in sentry mode, but give it a timer and a cooldown to balance it.

That way Bastion would be much less reliant on barrier tanks, while the timer on sentry mode prevents him from camping in a stationary bunker all day long and adds a bit more “activity” to his playstyle.

11

I’d like to see Mini-barrier during Sentry, but one that can be flipped up and down at will, like Rein’s/Brig’s barriers. Not a strong one, just one that can be used reflexively to block key attacks like Hook or Sleep Dart. In return, remove Ironclad since a barrier and damage reduction seems a bit much.
Actually, just typing this out as I’m thinking of it, make Ironclad only be active during Self-Repair. It would give him some survivability in Recon mode also.

12

Oh, but as I said here:

150 damage is an important threshold, it’s enough that the damage boost from neither Mercy or Zen is alone enough to push it up to do 200 damage. It ONLY gets to 195 damage. But shooting through Amp matrix you deal 300 damage on direct hits which is good damage.

120 would be too low for an ability with such a slow fire rate. If you just increased the fire rate then it would end up feeling far too much like just a grounded pharah.

It’s fundamentally different from Storm Arrows as it’s not just a straight buff to damage, it’s a different style of fighting and mobility. It’s very much a downgrade in damage, even when rockets did 205 damage then Bastion could damage tanks and destroy barriers just as effectively just staying in recon mode.

Tank mode gives a different type of damage and a different type of mobility: rocket jumping. That’s just not something you’re going to need to do all that often but when you do it’s kind of a waste of a high cost ultimate.

You wouldn’t have to cycle THROUGH the forms,

Recon + press E = directly to tank mode

Sentry + press E = directly to tank mode.

You’d just have to wait for a 20 second cooldown

Have you considered a barrier as an ultimate?

Generally only tanks can have a barrier as cooldown/metered ability but it’s established with Symmetra that a non-tank can have a Barrier as an ultimate.

The only exception is Brig and… well… everyone loves brig!

The ultimate wouldn’t have to be used in every engagement, it could be used on reaction to if the return fire is too fierce and it prevents you routinely using a barrier on the first fight on a choke, to get the ultimate you’ve got to fight for it. You could even set up on a flank without enough ultimate charge and plan to use the damage from flanking to get enough Ult to activate your barrier.

One barrier shape we haven’t yet seen is a ring barrier, so like a fence going around the perimeter of Bastion. If it was fixed in space (not to a surface) then it couldn’t be used while riding forward on a payload and you wouldn’t be obliged to stay, you could leave just before the barrier broke.

And while it would stop you being attacked from the side it would have a weak spot, anyone who could gain altitude and shoot bastion from above. This would mean using tank to get to high ground would be especially important.

13

I used 120~140 because that’s the damage range of the other explosive projectiles in the game, from Pharah to Symmetra.

Also, Tank blasts are huge because it is an ultimate. Adding the high damage blast with a large explosion radius means you can aim at the ground or wall near your target and still deal considerably good damage.

It needs testing and some numbers crunched before a number is set. Either number we throw around is just a gut estimate anyway.

I’m glad we agree 205 is too high.

Not what I mean.

I’m just saying too many players think top Bastion play is sitting still in Sentry mode while the rest of your team babysit you. Just like in the past many players thought top Torb play was tending to his turret instead of using the turret as an asset.

Bastion intended gameplay flow is to move around on Recon, stay in Sentry long enough to burst a target or two, and then relocate again. Pretty much any Bastion player agree sitting still is just a plain bad idea.

If they go through a rework of Bastion, they need to do so by giving Sentry (and Tank) a logical reason to swap away from that form, and at the same time giving them different perks that you can’t get while in Recon.

Sentry already have this coded as the absolute lack of mobility. My idea is that Tank downside is having a time-based reload. But we can work something else.

Also, if it’s no longer an ult, Tank mode need to get a crit zone.

14

Hmm I think we have different concepts for how Tank on E should work.

You seem to want to make it balanced normal mode so something bastion could theoretically would always be “in play” without being too much.

I’m coming from the direction that it should remain a high impact ability but recognise it’s just not going to work as an ultimate ability.

Just as Baptiste’s Immortality Field works better on a 25 sec cooldown and Amp Matrix can’t be tweaked to work as a cooldown ability, tank mode works better as a high impact long cooldown ability. And trying to tone down tank mode too much would be like trying to tone down Immortality Field to be as available as Torb’s turret.

The splash radius isn’t that much higher than other heroes with similar attacks and still would drop off to 30 damage at the edges, this is something that would be worth it for an ability on a 25-30 second cooldown.

One thing I’m worried about with you able to stay in tank indefinitely with the rounds recovering like Doomfist’s hand cannon is how this will encourage extremely passive play, so hanging way back and finding an angle where you can shoot into a capture point all day and just keep spamming endlessly.

That’s not a very bold play.

Tank mode should be for BOLD PLAYS!

If you’ve only got 8 seconds to shoot then the way to maximise your use of the ability is with bold plays, it doesn’t enable passively holding back in a safe position as you always get a new rocket to shoot every few seconds.

But what if that’s replaced by sitting on a corner shooting a rocket every time it recharges?

But slowly recovering rockets one at a time rather than gaining effectively 8 rockets back after being forced to do something else other than use tank just encourages staying in tank mode (as they can) to keep spamming rockets into a choke or onto a point. You’d never have to worry about the transformation animation.

You have to be aggressive and get a job done when you’ve got 8 seconds and then you’re locked into a 1.5 sec transformation, you’ve got to use the rockets to push through a choke AND push through to a safe position where you can transform.

A 20 second cooldown means bastion can use rocket jumps for mobility often enough but isn’t going to be constantly trying to rocket jump around the map, most of the time he’s going to be fighting in recon mode using the poke of his assault rifle waiting for a good angle and opportunity to use sentry like staying in recon until roadhog uses hook.

Tank mode would be a special mode, not special enough to be an ultimate as it may only be used to make a series of rocket jumps to high ground, but still a special mode. You still wouldn’t always want to use it as you’ve got the longer transformation time and it’s not a hitscan attack so longer ranged foes, especially those in the air, you’ll have a much harder time with.

Not necessarily as Hammond doesn’t have a crit zone when in rolling mode and this hasn’t been a particular problem. In fact it’s quite an accepted tech for when he’s facing Mei. As there is no easy way to add a crit zone it would be better to just accept this upside and make sure the cost of tank mode isn’t too low for this upside.

Some things work as a super long cooldown and Tank mode is one of them.

There’s definitely a place in Overwatch for relatively high imp

1 Like
15

Probably. The way you envision it is as a high impact ability, and the way I envision it is as a horizontal power level change compared to Sentry and Recon, with different strengths and weaknesses.

(Recon need some buff regardless)

If they go with my idea, that means you are not exactly “spamming”, you are waiting a few seconds and shooting a rocket. Pharah and Junkrat would do a better job at this kind of spam than a permatank Bastion with a new bullet every few seconds.

Also, I used Doomfist as comparison, but I don’t mean to recharge as fast as Doomfist. Just like damage values, this is something that would need playtest and math to determine the correct interval, but I would think somethink like a 4~6 bullet clip and recharge one every 3~4 seconds. You go tank, pew pew pew a bit, run out of ammo, swap to something else to keep shooting, in case something is still alive.

And if you are in a safe position where you can stand still and shoot, that would instinctively tell me you would perform better in Sentry than Tank.

The animation speed can be adjusted as part of the balance pass. And maybe some small QoL like allowing you to self-repair while transforming.

Wrecking Ball also can’t properly “attack” while in full ball mode. He only poke and slam, neither are strong enough to finish off any target without getting out of Ball mode and shooting at them.

Bastion in tank mode can shoot and finish off targets by himself. He needs a critzone if Tank become an ability, be it yours or my idea.

Config:Tank have a 4m blast radius. That’s a total area of around 50m².

For comparison: Junkrat mine have a 3m blast radius (28m²), Pharah rockets have a 2.5m blast radius (19.6m²), and both Junkrat grenade and Symmetra orb have a radius of 2m (12.5m²).

When you read just the radius it may seem small, but because of how area is calculated, a 4m radius area is actually 4 times larger than a 2m radius area.

The only attack with the same radius that is not an ultimate is Ana Biotic Grenade.

Anyway, I think that’s more than enough talk between us, We made our propositions clear, and we just have different visions on what would be the best path to follow.

Thanks for the conversation.

16

What if he could create a small Dome around him instead of the Barrier ? I like the idea of Holding E to create a shield, let’s make it a dome ! That way he would actually be protected if he’s getting dived on, or if he’s trying to position himself to turn into Sentry Mode.

Aditionnally, for the Extra Ammo, what if when you used it in Sentry Form, it’d hide his Headshot hitbox (The glowing cube on his back) when the new ammos are loaded in ?

17

Regardless of who’s better, anyone who IS playing this hero and IS in tank mode has a pressure to not go through the animation of leaving tank mode and just stay and wait for more rockets to “load”.

The bias towards passivity is strong.

6 rockets, 4 seconds per rocket, that’s 24 seconds for only a 6 rocket burst.

Why not just make it a 25-30 second cooldown?

The problem is wanting to put off the risk of transforming out of tank mode.

Tank mode, just look at it, it’s vibrating and shaking, barely holding itself together, it’s very much a temporary ad-hoc sort of thing.

That sort of inconsistency just won’t fly, why do you need that arm to come up to self-repair when not transforming yet when you are transforming the arm with the welder doesn’t need to come up.

When you SQUARE it then it exaggerates small differences and you lose track of what really matters. This is only relevant for something like where the enemy is homogeneous like thousands of 1cm tall enemies spread 1000 per square metre all over every map and each has only 1HP.

But that’s not the enemies faced.

What really matters is that with damage scaled down (so a direct hit deals 150 damage) the Bastion will need the splash damage from three rockets to frag a 200HP hero even if they all land on average of more than 11cm away from their target. This is because even with 4m radius the splash damage does less than 100 damage so you need more than 2 rockets to kill.

This is in fact the same as Pharah’s rockets as the splash deals 67 damage out to a radius of 58cm from the rocket explosion, so as long as her rockets.

And Pharah’s rockets fire at a much faster rate.

So it’s not overpowered, it’s not going to lead to excessively fast times to kill in 1 vs 1 scenarios.

The wider splash radius will mainly mean firing a lot of rockets into a large group can actually exceed the healing of area of effect healing like Brig’s inspire.

It wouldn’t help with being dived on, any high mobility would get inside a barrier whether it’s got a roof or only has walls.

I like the idea of an open top as that encourages enemies who can take the fight into the vertical to do so. I think that would just look cool, everyone responding to such a threat with something really flashy and if only one of the heroes does it then it’s really obvious which one Bastion should take out first, the Junkrat that just blast jumped up at you!

It can’t be something that has too few counters.

(also, we already have a hero with what looks like a dome. Winston’s ultimate looks like a dome though it is technically a sphere the bottom half almost always goes into the ground so people are just too likely to mistake it for a Winston bubble, even if you have it a new surface effect, barriers have had their visual surface effects changed quite often. Plenty won’t have gotten the memo and wonder how Winston gave bastion a barrier.)