I have been playing Hammond daily since his release and believe he’s one of the most fun heroes to play… however there are a few “quality of life” tweaks that could make him even more fun to play (and slightly more viable) in the current competitive landscape.
The goal is NOT to make him overpowered but apply subtle changes that will help the community embrace him as more than a throw pick. Especially after the recent bug fix (the damage drop off fix).
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By far the most frustrating Hammond mechanic is his reload. It feels INCREDIBLY long and worse, if you cancel it too early by entering ball form (or aren’t in ball form long enough for the reload), then you can enter a state of perpetually reloading.
His machine gun damage is low (which is fine) however reloading in a fight when an opponent is 15hp from death is the most frustrating thing ever. Instead, I propose that if you start reloading, the reload timer continues no matter what happens.
This would mean that you could hit reload, enter ball form and exit it as soon as the reload is done without any penalties. I doubt anyone would believe this is overpowered and would significantly improve the quality of life for Hammond players. We could even put it in the ‘bug’ section saying that you fixed a bug that ‘interrupted the reload while in ball form’. That way you wouldn’t get too much pushback from the community!
Alternatively (or even in combination), reducing reload time by 15-20% would likely help him be more viable and I would even go as far as testing unlimited ammo (like DVA). This would be a straight buff but I don’t think anyone would mind and it would make him a more viable tank. -
One mechanic that is ridiculous against Hammond is the Mei freeze. It essentially renders him useless. I’m not saying Mei shouldn’t be able to freeze him, however it’s just too strong because Hammond needs to build up momentum to move (unlike other characters). So when he’s being slowed, he cannot build ANY momentum. I would make a minor adjustment for Hammond where his INITIAL momentum is not affected by the Mei cryofreeze. That means that he would still be susceptible to being frozen but he would at least have a chance to get away. This type of minor tweak would barely be noticed by the playerbase but it would drastically improve the quality of life of Hammond.
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Using the same momentum idea, a tweak (nerf) to Hammond which I think would be acceptable is to reduce his speed when he is speed boosted by Lucio. Right now… it’s mind blowingly fast which is fun but almost broken. On control maps, I can get to the enemy spawn and to pummel them from behind BEFORE they even get to the first choke point. (Meaning I traveled from my spawn, to THEIR spawn and then back to the point before they even get there).
As fun as this is, I think it’s slightly overpowered so perhaps putting a limit on how fast Lucio can add to the initial speed of Hammond (kind of like how Mei affect his initial speed) would be fair. -
SLIGHTLY reduce the maximum time between boops. Right now, if you plow into a line of opponents, the maximum amount of times you can ‘hit’ them is 2. (This is assuming they are in a perfect line and your first hit propels them back enough for you to hit them again while you still have momentum.)
I believe the theoretical max should be 3… which would be difficult but not impossible. This would mean that you would reduce the amount of time between ‘hits’ so that if the wrecking ball (Hammond) player achieves maximum momentum RIGHT before impact, he would have a chance to hit them once on impact, once as they are being propelled back in the air and one last time when they hit the ground near the end of the maximum velocity.
Although this would be a challenging maneuver, it would be quite impactful. Right now teams just seem to ‘take it’ without too much concern. Once again, this would be a minor tweak but would open up a new world of opportunity for incredible Hammond plays.
To sum it up:
- A slight tweak for Hammond reload to make reloading more consistent (and perhaps slightly quicker)
- A slight tweak in how other characters can affect Hammond’s initial momentum (Lucio & Mei)
- A slight tweak on the damage ceiling Hammond can inflict while plowing into teams.