Reaper needs some buffs – Here are some balance ideas to make him more viable

General Discussion
21

You made yourself a lot of work here.

22

Sounds fine to me.
Torb’s Shotgun feels more consistent now.

1 Like
23

I’ve made this mistake before as well but let me explain why this is a bad idea.

If you have a spread of 20.1 and reduce it by 25% the spread will still be 15. The highest spread after Reaper and Hog with 20.1 is D.Va with 4.15 (I believe).

Now if you also reduce the amount of pallets by 50% (20->10) the spread for the little amount of pallets is to high. Because there are less pallets the spread will become even more random since you can’t cover a big space with your shots anymore.

I like the idea of reducing the spread (maybe even to 10 instead of 15) but we shouldn’t reduce the amount of pallets since that makes them more inconsistent. If you want Reaper to do more damage against armor just give him a passive with ?% armor piercing.

2 Likes
24

I’ve already explained a few times why I disagree with an armour-piercing ability.
I didn’t account for the extra pellets. I suppose with these changes, the spread could be reduced by a lower amount, like 5%, or not at all. I haven’t done any testing, of course, so the numbers aren’t set in stone.

I’ve removed the spread angle reduction from my post. Perhaps, simply increasing his damage per pellet and reducing his pellets per shot would be enough; or, alternatively, his damage per pellet and number of pellets could remain the same but with a simple reduction in spread instead.

25

Maybe I didn’t explain it well. The spread reduction should stay. The lowering if the amount of pallets should be gone.

Otherwise the pallets can spread out from eachother more and leave more holes in the area you are shooting at making it more difficult to hit people.

Now if you only reduce the spread and not the pallets, the pallets are closer together and it’s easier to hit your target. So by all means. Please reduce the spread more and not less. :wink:

26

I understand what you’re saying, and I think you’re right. I’ve edited my post. What do you think about these changes? Of course, no numbers are set in stone since I cannot do any testing, but these numbers should be near what would be appropriate changes to implement into the game.

Lowering Reaper’s Hellfire Shotguns’ spread angle and reducing their random spread pattern would make his damage more consistent but wouldn’t outright increase damage against armour like my original ideas had in mind. However, like I told others who gave me feedback, I don’t think that Reaper needs a passive ability that lets him ignore armour, as that would likely be too powerful and would severely hurt most tanks, Brigitte, any hero who has gotten armour from Brigitte, and, most importantly, Bastion, who definitely doesn’t need any indirect nerfs; that’s for sure.

Maybe Reaper doesn’t need increased damage per pellet and reduced pellets, and maybe he doesn’t need to do extra damage to armour. With these changes that I’ve suggested, he would definitely be a lot more viable, and that would probably make up for the relatively little damage that he does to armour. It’s not like it’s impossible to take down someone with armour as Reaper, though.

27

I’d like to present something that you might be overlooking when you talk about tank “busting”, this ideal has been clear since pretty much the Sym rework and it goes as follows

“Barriers are safe spaces to hide behind”

That being said, you talk about reaper being a tank buster but no where is it stated that he is a barrier buster… I don’t argue that Hanzo is breaking barriers a bit too fast from range but in reality Hanzo takes his whole storm arrows and a few more shots to break orisa’s, winston’s and brigitte’s shields (he cannot break Reinhardt’s quickly) meaning he is wasting cooldowns and torb can only bust barriers effectively with his ult…

What I’m trying to say is that the only hero with barrier busting as a feature is symmetra and she needs to be heavily gated in other aspects in order to balance it out…

So as you can see, giving Reaper the capacity to bust barriers would come with a hefty cost and you could argue that he is behind enough already as to pay for that feature but again… “barrier are safe spaces to hide behind” is the philosophy and in all honesty tank players have it awful as it is as to add even more stuff against them

I would like to see Reaper being more viable as well but you gotta let go the barrier busting thing

28

I don’t get how Symmetra is a barrier-buster.
The only actual barrier busters that I can think of are Bastion and Hanzo. Bastion is the worst hero in the game and not viable at all, and Hanzo is just overpowered; he’s not supposed to be a barrier buster.

Other damage heroes like Doomfist, McCree, Soldier: 76, and so on can’t do enough burst damage to effectively take down barriers. Having a damage hero who is not only a tank shredder but also a barrier buster would be interesting. Currently, Reaper is mediocre at both.

And, of course, Death Blossom’s biggest weakness is a barrier (well, right below simply killing Reaper while he’s doing his little flower dance), so 30% extra damage against barriers would help him take down barriers during Death Blossom.

Reaper’s role is a tank shredder, and every hero with a physical barrier is a tank, aside from Brigitte (but let’s be honest here: Brigitte is basically a tank, as well as a support hero and a damage hero). Making it easier for Reaper to take down barriers would in turn make him a better tank shredder. Besides, someone needs to take out those annoying, seemingly neverending Orisa barriers.

I don’t think that all tank players have it awful, but I do think that main tank players have it awful right now. Reinhardt and Winston don’t need any changes per se, but Orisa does need buffs. However, the biggest problem is, of course, these new huge and unfair stun, stunny, stunning counters to tanks like Reinhardt: mainly Brigitte and Doomfist. So, if those two heroes were nerfed, tank players would have an easier time.

Of course, this ”Barrier Buster” ability could be replaced with a passive ability that makes Reaper deal more damage to armour instead, but that would affect the amount of damage he does to not just tanks but also Bastion (again, the worst hero in the game), Torbjörn, and Brigitte—not to mention basically any hero in the game since Brigitte can give armour to her teammates.

It would be nice for Reaper to have another passive ability (or a secondary fire) to make him more interesting to play as, which is why I thought up this Barrier Buster ability. I don’t think that it’s a terrible idea, but if you have a better idea for a new passive (or a secondary fire), I’d be glad to hear it! (Not trying to sound condescending; I promise! I genuinely would like to hear another good idea for new passive or secondary fire to make Reaper more interesting, fun, and viable.)

29

Her primary literally recharges by hitting barriers and it scales up,a Reinhardt who finds symmetra up close is forced to fight back or he will lose his shield in a few seconds, that’s a real tank buster and no other hero interacts with barriers like sym does and even in her case, she needs to spend quite a bit of time doing the deed in order to get the reward

Hanzo isn’t supposed to be a barrier buster but it’s just a byproduct of his kit, McCree who has a similar skill with fan the hammer could also be considered a tank buster of sorts but again, it’s a byproduct, not an intended thing and the proof of this lies in the fact that no barrier is broken easily, they are not supposed to be broken easily

I mean I told you, barriers are safe spaces, you aren’t supposed to break it… specially when you can simply walk through without any negative effect. Barriers are one of the few things that make a tank player and you want to take that away from them? while being also a tank buster? It doesn’t sound too fair to me

Not to mention that there are very few heroes who compare to Reaper’s dmg up close, so you would be literally walking to a tank who cannot kill you because of lifesteal and you’ll even break through their only defense? yeah… no

Again, being effective against tanks doesn’t mean being a hard counter against them, they deserve space too

As for Armor… it’s pretty much the same story as for barriers, tanks have very few ways to defend themselves against a dueling reaper, armor increases their chances of making it out alive because again they cannot kill him, a shooting dva will break her mouse shooting reaper and she will die before she can ask for help

Tanks need to be durable even against reaper and currently they are arguably so, tipping the balance towards more damage will snowball dmg creep through the whole game incredibly… Reaper can and should get some quality buffs but nothing specific towards tanks

30

I see what you’re saying, but Reaper is supposed to be a big counter to tanks. He deals massive damage up close, but he’s really weak against heroes who aren’t tanks due to their smaller hitboxes, making it more difficult to deal a lot of damage, even if he hits all his shots.

31

I don’t think he is supposed to be a counter to tanks really, before they gave him lifesteal he was subjected to soul collecting in order to get his health back, back then his tank fighting skills were zero… this identity came forth once they added the lifesteal because naturally tanks cannot outdamage him so it made him naturally good against them but never a direct counter, that’s why Reaper can handle a 1v1 against a tank but on a 2v1 he evaporates

The smaller hitbox thing I can understand though this is probably related to his effective range which is almost melee… Reaper is a very difficult design exercise but I think he can be made better without necessarily pushing an unhealthy anti-tank meta

32

I think the Barrier Buster would be better suited to Bastion. Reaper is definitely a tank buster, but I think he should also be thought as a flanker. Buffing Shadowstep is definitely the way to go, alongside making sure his primary is up to par.

I’d give him a secondary fire (ability on cooldown) that spits out a smoke grenade. It’d help him as a flanker by either covering his escapes or making it easier to initiate fights

33

Reaper has always been supposed to be a tank-shredder due to his close-range shotguns that are easier to deal damage with against enemies with big hitboxes (i.e., tanks).

To quote myself:

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34

I agree.
You said it all. All Reaper needs to be more viable.

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35

Let reaper walk on walls and ceiling, and let him teleport to walls and ceiling as well, lol.

Imagine a room with high ceilings, players have issue looking up, so let reaper camp above their head, lmao.

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36

I don’t know, sound a bit broken to be honest.

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37

This, a buff to SS and an alternate fire is what Reaper needs. Pretty much.

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38

Imagine if it was implemented, give Reaper a Bat suit/skin and you will see every reaper mains in the game pretending to be Batman, lmao.

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39

But saying “I am Batman” doens’t help Reaper

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40

I agree, definitely a Shadowstep buff

1 Like