Not played much sym until recently. In gold atleast I’m having tons of fun with her.
They’ve repeatedly said the opposite i.e. that they’ve moved into not having very niche heroes.
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She is a walking cheesecake factory, that’s her niche. Like I said, either you have to accept Sym as the nichest DPS, or you have to remove all her cheese topping and identity and make her a brand new hero.
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Then you go and convince all the Sym 1 tricks to agree to another massive rework, which might make her an entirely brand new hero, and unshackle the dev team to do what they want for Sym.
I had to ditch her. She is in the wrong category and is a mess of a hero. Had to rid her of my main
Such a shame but … oh well
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This needs to literally be pinned to the top of the forums and required reading before you can contribute posts or respond. This understanding revealed here shows why 2-2-2 was adapted in part, why all characters should be viable. Niche means meta reinforcing/enabling, everyone should desire all characters to be equally effective.
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You didn’t finish reading every thing from the devs, they tried to make them a bit more flexible, so their 1 tricks can play them on attacking phase, but they are still niche heroes. Where half of their damage still comes from auto aim and stationary turrets, (not forgetting cheese tele strat) they themselves as a hero will always be bad comparing to the rest of DPS.
The devs tried to alleviate their niches, not eliminate them.
She’s used as a tp bot, I mean you like it or not that’s all she exists for, there’s no hero in the game that is so niche.
They want less niche. The additional thought here is the fact they acknowledge one-tricking and are slowly trying to reduce “niche”. I mean you could argue McCree is “niche” in that he must play around his team, can only get the most value creeping behind a shield at medium range too…
When Mcree wants to play with his team, and his team wants him to be with them, like 99 percent of the time, it’s not a niche anymore.
On the hind sight, most players have distaste for cheese, in which Sym, Torb and Bastion specialize. That’s why it’s hard to find a team who are willing to work with them, making them even more niche.
I actually don’t like him on my teams more often than not. Without a shield he’s a liability too often.
The fact you have degraded the conversation to “cheese” kind of tells me how this is going to go. I think we are done here.
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Symmetra main issue is not about balance, it’s about flow and rhythm. Her kit is contradictory with itself, and have no thematic cohesion.
Sym 2.0 may had some issues, but at least her kit had cohesion: It was focused in marking a certain area “yours” and preventing enemy incursion within it. She being a support also meant that she didn’t had to mark certain checkboxes like a DPS need, like, eg, reliable damage output.
Sym 3.0 started with a more aggressive kit, but there is little difference choosing to go with beam or orb at close range (ramp-up time means the damage difference per fight is minimal), turrets and TP requires too much setup time to be used offensively against non-distracted teams, and not enough benefits to be used defensively, and the great wall of vishkar is complicated to use given most map geometry.
Blizzard need to decide if they want Symmetra to be a proper DPS (like they did with Torb) or a support in DPS clothes (like Sombra), and then ramp up her damage consistency, or her utility, respectively.
That’s what we mean when we say Sym kit is “clunky” and need fixing.
If they want Symmetra to be a niche hero, they could at least have the decency to revert her back to 2.0. Shield generator is greatly missed, and a lot of veteran Symmetra players prefer her old kit.
Shield generator allowed Symmetra to actually be a melee hero when she had 275 health. Her old photon barrier gave her space to push up (could also block ultimates. HUGE). New TP can’t do that because it has a 10 year cast time and gets destroyed so quickly.
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Well thought out and written, and most importantly, correct. In contrast, each element of Echo’s kit is for specific purposes, Sym’s is a mish-mash but I can accept that as a “builder”. However… there is no reason for her kit elements to be on such huge c/d’s and slow deployments. If we take the “we must balance around the top 5% harumph harumph” line of reasoning, then by gosh there is literally no reason not to speed up her deployments and reduce the c/d’s.
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I mean she doesn’t need a rework to be more generalist. what’s making her “niche” and “team dependent” are really the lack of a good mix of sustain, effective range and mobility, alongside with the stubbornness of people to think her only weapon fire is primary which then leads to a passive sym2.0 playstyle.
legit give her:
- old 3.0 tp or something equivalent —> mobility option to get in and out of effective range more often
- make her orbs actually midranged i.e. 30~35m/s orbs (back down to around 120 damage of course)
and she’d already be a lot more generalised. if she really needs more sustain after that then either give her 1 of either:
- a passive that triggers her shield hp regen when she interacts with her tp
- or make her switch weapon throw out her old photon barrier but puts turret ability on cd. simultaneously remove oldest active turret. and only requirement to be able to cast is having turret ability off cd.
nerf turret dps by another 10dps for these if necessary (but highly doubt it will be given we had an unnerfed sym for over a year before double shield meta and she was still underpowered then, but far more flexible than now).
Nobody can blame you for wanting to quit playing her, but they can call you a hero for even playing her.
I’ve said repeatedly simply raising the speed of Orbs would change Sym overnight. I’ve considered actually swapping the primary / secondary button on Sym specifically myself, the Orbs are terribly underrated by many as is, but need more speed.
I just played her for a few games and to be honest I just want them to make her damage flat damage. Just ditch the ramp up, it’s silly. It’s awkward and is weak if left alone, but OP if she’s pockets and lets it ramp up. If they have any shields and she has any sustain, she can just walk on things.
To avoid both of these scenarios, just make her beam a flat damage output. Like 90 DPS or something.
I stopped playing her when they deleted 2.0 and replaced it with the most boring kit in the game.
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I’ve been saying this since the 3.0 rework. If she have to aim, her aiming is how you balance damage output. Ramp-up was a balancing mechanic for the lock-on.
If her beam have a flat damage output, you can start balancing the rest of her kit based on actual numbers instead of assuming she will always be at max charge.