I said it when it first got changed, and now I’ll say it again: Flat buffing Lifeweaver’s healing output was a bad idea. The reason for this is based on how Healing Blossom actually works.
Healing Blossom is a unique Targeted Projectile. How it actually works is, once charged, Healing Bloosom fires a seeking projectile to the targeted ally. And while Lifeweaver needs to be within 30m of his target to fire the projectile, once it’s actually been fired, it’s range is now infinite. It keeps travelling until it hits its target, making Lifeweaver’s healing range deceptively large.
Say you’re a Tracer, for example. If Lifeweaver fires a Healing Blossom your way and you panic Recall after a random Fire Strike clips you, that Healing Blossom will follow you all the way back to where you Recall to, passing through walls and objects in its way. Which doesn’t really mean much for Tracer, as she’ll often Recall to full health anyway. But for the likes of other mobile heroes, they don’t have heals on their mobility tools, and as such can have a free 75 HP top up as they’re diving into combat. And Life Grip’s heal only adds to this.
The buffs to Lifeweaver’s weapons should’ve gone to Thorn Volley. Even now, Thorn Volley is still slow and clunky to use, with a problem I like to call the ‘Doomfist Dilemma’. If you’ve played Doomfist for any extended period of time, you’ve likely realised just how awkward the Hand Cannon can be to use at even short range, given its slow projectile speed and horrific spread. Thorn Volley has that same issue - The projectiles are slow, the spread still is pretty horrendous, and having no fall off is fine and all, but good luck hitting something that’s not a barrier or turret at that range.
So, I’d like to propose a shift around. And this is what I’d like to see:
Lifeweaver:
Healing Blossom:
Maximum Healing reduced from 75 to 65
Automatic Reload Time reduced from 3 seconds to 1.5 seconds
Fired projectiles now respect LOS
Thorn Volley:
Projectile Speed increased from 70m/s to 90m/s
Automatic Reload Time reduced from 3 seconds to 1.5 seconds
Enemies damaged by Thorn Volley now have a 3% chance to be Poisoned per projectile hit. Enemies poisoned take 5 damage per second suffer a 15% penalty to Fire Rate and/or Attack Speed for 4 seconds. Poison effects do not stack, and cannot be refreshed.
Its just weird to me that they added a hero that they wanted to act as a potential alternative to say Mercy for people that don’t need to aim as well. Yet, they go and buff his thorn needles to be 130 DPS, fast proj speed, and high accuracy with a faster than Mercy swap over time to do DPS.
This sounds reasonable IMO, I’d be up for trying it From both my own time playing Weaver and what I’ve seen mentioned on the forums, it seems like blossom generally doesn’t tend to reach its full 75 charge in the midst of a fight, anyway; at least not the more hectic ones
The poison effect sounds interesting, it could give him an extra little layer of utility in those situations where petal doesn’t have as much use. (Petal can be amazing when there’s highground a specific teammate couldn’t normally reach, for shutting down certain ults, and probably blocking the occasional doorway if you play it juuust right, but that all seems rather dependent on which map you’re on/which heroes are being played.)
I definitely agree. I would prefer if his power was shifted from raw healing to other parts of his kit, but I’m not a big fan of the implementation of the poison passive. RNG is gross. I would rather just make it so his heal charges at a reduced rate when not in use, just to incentivize him dealing damage a little more, without always putting him in a position where he puts his teammates at risk.
Also, I really wish they would have buffed his petal platform to provide more tangible utility in some way.
Actually yeah that’s a good point, I could see the RNG aspect being iffy, ahah; like the person above me said though, your post does sound like an overall good, fair direction
In any case though:
Being able to do a bit more damage while NOT risking his teammates safety as much, like with what you suggested here, would feel so good IMO
Also this
Hoping they’ll fix the occasional bugs it seems to have, too; is it just me or does it seem sluggish to rise up at times when you’re standing on it?
Healing Blossom already has a LOS requirement, in terms of actually firing the projectile initially. This change simply makes it consistent, since in those instances where Lifeweaver’s able to preemptively fire a Blossom, it can be really tedious to actually combat.
Take a Genji for example. Genji dashes in just as Lifeweaver fires him a Healing Blossom. That Blossom will now endlessly track Genji until it reaches him. So Genji takes some damage in retaliation to the dive, but now he’s suddenly at full health again with seemingly no enemy Support hero in sight.
And it’s not like this is a rare occurrence. I often end up doing this, as I’m playing Lifeweaver, and often end up on the receiving end of this small tech. And in those situations where it does occur, it can feel pretty unfair, as you almost always now lose that duel.
This change doesn’t prevent this scenario entirely, as Healing Blossom can curve around small doorways and gaps, it simply makes it more consistent with other projectiles.
There is a reason they follow ‘infinitely’ (not true though).
The travel time on lotus is such that not allowing it to follow players through doors/around corners would mean Weaver’s healing would end up being horrible. With the charge up time, recovery time, and travel time, allowing it to path around (not through, it doesn’t go THROUGH anything) objects is necessary, otherwise even a light pole would stop the heal from reaching its target. It’s also completely blocked by enemy barriers/shields.
If you have an issue with it being able to follow people for long distances (which it really can’t unless the hero in question has super fast move speed, and that is literally only going to happen with Tracer), then change it to dissipate after it has traveled x amount of distance - say 50 or 60 meters.
You want to do this and keep it the same otherwise, be ready for the screaming.
Thorns is fine as it is. I average 4-5k damage per 10. People just have no idea how to use it.
Thorns has pinpoint accuracy on one thorn, no drop, no falloff. The only time you will experience ‘horrific spread’ is if you fire for a long period of time without stopping at a very distant target, like any other hero with increasing spread (76, Sojourn). And up close, which is where you really need thorns to defend yourself, the spread is negligible.
Also thanks cause now I’m inspired to start looking through my replays to pull out footage to make a thorns kill montage.
If Genji dove and only took 75 damage, y’all are doing something very wrong or have very bad aim.
I definitely think it would help the flow of his gameplay. I hate that I’m risking my teammates lives any time I want to try to contribute a little damage in a fight, especially because his gun is actually fun to use.
It has it’s fair share of bugs. I once tossed myself a petal platform when I was being chased by the enemy team’s Rein. I stepped directly in the middle and… Nothing. Rein came up and started bashing my face in, THEN the platform raised. I guess I didn’t meet the weight requirement.
Oooof That reminds me so much of the time I tried to use platform to get away from an attacker, it didn’t rise, and after I died all I saw was THEM being lifted by it; I guess the platform just liked them better, ahah
I 100% agree with this.
They keep trying to buff all the wrong parts of his kit.
Even if they don’t want to reduce his healing. They can still go back to 65 blossom and adjust the charge rate so he just shoots faster. Which would also fix the clunky feeling people complain about.
I’ve also said he needs increased projectile speed and maybe 0 spread. Just 2 beams of thorns.
Then they don’t have to adjust his damage numbers.
Also don’t think he needed so many survivability buffs. 225hp with 50 shieldHP was big. Add in the buff to dash healing to 50.
I would go back to 200 hp but keep the 50shield.
The poison effect is a very interesting idea. Have it drown in how many thorns hit.
Say you land 12 it’s starts like 5 damage per second for 3 seconds.
But then stacks maybe. 20 thorns 10damage for 3seconds. 30 thorns. 15damage for 3 seconds
From both my own time playing Weaver and what I’ve seen mentioned on the forums, it seems like blossom generally doesn’t tend to reach its full 75 charge in the midst of a fight, anyway; at least not the more hectic ones
That reminds me so much of the time I tried to use platform to get away from an attacker, it didn’t rise, and after I died all I saw was THEM being lifted by it; I guess the platform just liked them better, ahah