To Everyone Complaining About Sym Taxi TP

General Discussion
1

This pitiful state of sym isn’t caused by the design, but rather a combination of terrible balancing and ignorance.

Before I continue, no I’m not saying sym is currently fine, she’s terrible. but the point of this post is to debunk the claims of “sym3.0’s design is bad” or “sym having tp on e is the reason for this taxi’ing or poor balance” or “sym should be a support because dps sym obvs isn’t working”.

Point 1: The Golden Period of Sym3.0

We had a better tp, better about everything else on sym3.0 for >1yr across various different metas prior to infinite :put_litter_in_its_place: tp where she was still underperforming and pros didn’t use tp any differently. BUT sym was still nerfed in tp and everything.

if they’re “balancing around team tp” all those nerfs would be unjustified and unnecessary. but they happened anyways :thinking:

Point 2: TP is a necessary ability in Sym’s kit

blaming the design here is like, hypothetically speaking, blaming widow’s design being bad when blizz decides to randomly nerf her sniper to have an effective range of like 15m. or alternatively, blaming the design of most flankers when blizz decides to hard nerf their mobility abilities in cd like what happened to infinite tp.

the nerf ruining any chances of different gameplay is blatantly terrible and is THE failure, not the design.

Point 3: Unreasonable Expectations, Tunnel Visioning Primary + Taxi TPs and Ignorance

The general community and devs both hold a very unreasonable expectation of sym: “she’s supposed to be deathball team pocketed 24/7 for primary to have any active uptime and to taxi tp past choke or from spawn all day”

Team pocketing along with team tps are inherently niche and situational events, esp on ladder and requiring that condition for any opportunity to actively contribute on any hero, is simply an unreasonable expectation. You can’t expect her to have reasonable uptime with such a condition. YET that’s how pros and blizz view and balance sym.

That’s like nerfing everything of ashe, widow, mccree, soldier etc. because people expect those heroes to be damage boost pocketed 24/7 or expecting them to always land headshots. It doesn’t happen much at all and it’s unreasonable to expect that.

Meanwhile how sym is actually played for the majority of the match time where there isn’t a team pocket i.e. what she has most opportunities for (before it got nerfed hard):

but for some reason, neither blizz nor the populace will accept that as part of “what she’s supposed to do” let alone as what she is doing for most of her play time as opposed to waiting all game for team pockets or to reach a team tp spot.

More people need to start thinking of how sym can get uptime without a team pocket, esp the devs. Because most people haven’t, they rely on the lowest common denominator for sym gameplay: team pocket w+m1 and taxi tp.

This is very evident in pros:

  • every time they play sym it’s literally for that lowest common denominator gameplay
  • they’re putting a hitscan/tracking player to play her just for primary despite how inherently niche her primary is vs the rest of her kit
  • they’re still behind on sym strats and tp spots
  • pretty much all the time they play sym, they have really passive and static gameplay and structure placement leading to extremely high down times (a lot of value that could’ve been grabbed, missed).

If everyone, including devs, are tunnel visioning this lowest common denominator gameplay to balance her, of course her current state is this terrible.

The design of giving a shorter rangeed squishy hero a mobility option for themselves (and optionally occasionally teammates) is not the flaw here, it’s how blizz balanced it.

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2

Sym nerfs have been preventive, so no. She has been getting nerfed every time they use her in OWL, so yes, it is because of team TP.

Her issues are still from a design standpoint as the 3.0 rework removed her non-ignorable utility, reliable damage and survivability.

Numerical nerfs just made her issues even more glaring.

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I don’t have much to add.

OP worded this well.

Don’t ban me for bumping thread pls

4

Every close range hero could still have more survivability that Sym even if Blizz reverts TP 3.0, which was still the biggest issue with Sym 3.0. ITP just made it worse.

It doesnt qualify as combat mobility, it doesnt make her harder to aim against, it doesnt allow her to stay in her effective range like literally every single close range hero can - including Tracer.

Could Sym be slightly better if they revert TP 3.0? Yes. Could that make her not a troll pick unable to fend for herself? No, noy anywhere close that. Name a close range hero and they will have better survivability that fresh 3.0 Sym.

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5

preventive of what? because again, we had a better tp and about everything else, and team TPs have not been used much differently at all. if anything, they buffed the pro’s team TP usage (despite how blatantly terrible it is for anyone that actually puts meaningful play time into her) with the 30m placement range rather than the old 25m because they only ever use it once basically.

what reliable damage prior to 3.0? her orbs which were laughably more easily dodged compared to now? primary that still needed team pocketing or massive team distraction to use like now? is tp, assuming not placed poorly, ignorable?

did she drop in in-combat sustain? sure. but she got more burst and mobility to make her shorter range and squishiness function.

old and current sym were/are:

  • not enough sustain for how long they take to get something done
  • not enough mobility to get uptime for their range.

TP on e circumvents most of that by

  • directly allowing her to get to where she wants to be AT WILL like most other heroes
  • letting sym pre-charge or pre-place structures to not have charging/setup time actually a part of the engagement i.e. more burst

that is not a flawed design, that’s legit an improvement in actually giving her something that lets her function reasonably in the solo queue dominant environment.

here at 7:56 (youtube vids not playing with with forums for timestamp): https://youtu.be/Wf2YWc1Bb0M?t=476

https://streamable.com/vmwz3

not perfect obvs, but in making her orbs actually midranged along with a better tp, a lot of gaps will be filled.

sure she could use a bit more sustain, but completely removing tp for nowhere near tank levels of sustain while also keeping the sub15m effective range (both weapon fires) is a clear recipe for disaster.

sustain, range, mobility and burst. distribute power among those parameters. if you want low in 3 of them, the remaining one better be really high to compensate.

what I see as the way forward is:

  • tp is moderate mobility when put back to old 3.0 finite tp state.
  • midranged orbs to up sym’s effective range to midrange.
  • burst remaining about the same as when put back to old 3.0 finite tp state (also near moderate).
  • if necessary, give a small sustain passive.
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It’s the being :sparkles: booped :sparkles: And dying for me

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Sym’s kit by itself is actually not bad. I think the issues are indeed the nerfs but also her kit needs more refinement.

I personally feel her abilities are very close to perfection. However they do need some tweaks and additions, such as the TP and turrets.

Also nerfs will always make a hero’s kit seem worse than it is. Especially for ability heavy heroes.

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8

OWL is a league. They dont use balanced, beautiful things there.

They literally try to abuse whatever disbalanced and overpowered thing they aware of.

Melt Queen Sym wasnt balanced in slightest

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9

The issue there is that she is being used as a taxibot. Every nerf has been aimed at her damage because team TP is an unbalanceable broken gimmick that cant be nerfed for its mainlt used purpose.

So since they cant really nerf TP in any way that matters, they just make Sym as horrible of a hero outside it as they can. Every single nerf aimed at her has been to nerf her DPS hero potential.

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There’s no proof nor evidence to really justify that claim that “team allowing allies to interact with it is unbalanceable”. esp since in that “Golden Sym3.0” period with lower placement range for tp I talk about in the OP, what she lacked then was really numerical tweaks or simply just a small sustain passive to fully balance out her time to contribute in effective range vs the amount of time she has in effective range.

whether if that’s through a shield regen passive like “sym interacting with tp to trigger her natural shield regen” or “sacrifice an active/placed turret to throw a much lower hp version of old photon barrier with a 10~12s cd on this ability” or whatever.

but the point is, it is balanceable. heck placement range legit is a very important aspect to balance out team tps in forcing more risk for team tps.

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11

Not sure why teleport is considered “broken”, when it’s just overly costly replacement for mobility of other heroes.

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Apart from a faster ramp time on her beam and 2m to her beam length she is fundamentally weaker than she was at launch and she wasn’t good at launch.

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never indicated otherwise. but that doesn’t mean the design is the point of failure.

again, tp fits very much so in her kit given that she’s untended to take the shorter effective ranged + squishy route.

where it all fell apart was when infinite :put_litter_in_its_place: tp came and neutered her core tool for uptime. and before that, sym3.0 was in a better place (not just in terms of 3.0) and the sym community was in general consensus that she just needed more number tweaks and maybe a touch more sustain to being on the mark.

that’s not the design failing, neither is that tp failing. it’s purely the dev balancing failing.

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14

Preach Zephrin!!!

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15

I will say her nerfs had more to do with other meta’s at the time.

For instance her ultimate duration was reduced to it adding to the layers of barriers that existed during double barrier. Which god forbid look at a screen shot or two during that time, four tank barriers + the two sym walls made almost impossible to see anything.

Her beam nerf was listed by the devs, as way more damage then expected do to a fix in how beam weapons apply damage.

Her TP rework was of the heels of the Sombra infinite Invis rework. Which the devs perceived as a buff for what ever reason, with all it actually doing was turn the TP back into a taxi.

Be it that I will say is that everything else in the post is on point.

16

There’s absolutely no issue there.
These are the best of the best, they are going to rely on the most broken strategy at all times. This includes the most useful heroes in a given situation.

On the maps where Symmetra can TP out of spawn faster than you can get out yourself, you do it. Why? Not because it’s inherently useful in the base-game, not because Symmetra is strong or that TP is strong, but because it gives you an edge if the enemy doesn’t.

The Grand Finals were almost entirely double-sniper. If anyone thinks Symmetra can compete with double-sniper they need to get out of Bronze, harsh but its the truth. She’s not picked for TP because it’s the only useful part of her kit, she’s picked the same way Lucio is on non-Lucio comps because it’s the only hero that can give them an edge out of spawn.

Lucio Strat
+When running Mercy or Moira

  • Swap the most mobile healer to Lucio
  • Use Speed-Amp as the doors open
  • Follow team for 1s (optional)
  • Swap to most mobile healer in actual composition
  • Use mobility of that healer to catch up with team

^ Lucio sees no other play for this strategy unless they swap compositions.
This is not just a Sym balance issue, it’s a lack of understanding by the casual playerbase.

If it can benefit the whole team, it’s likely going to be used in the League because it’s truly team vs team in every single aspect.

Symmetra is actually picked on her niche maps a lot in the League, not just for TP, but for the actual fights too. Lijang. In this instance, they use the TP but she remains due to how she can be played within the team environment (that she is designed for) wherein she receives adequate peel and healing from her incredibly synchronized team.

This is similar to the way McCree can be played in OWL whereas on ladder, if your team doesn’t pay attention to keeping you alive, you’re dead.

17

>best of the best
>blatantly flexing hard on sym relying on the lowest common denominator gameplay of “she’s supposed to be deathball team pocketed 24/7 for primary to have any active uptime and to taxi tp past choke or from spawn all day”
>meanwhile actual high ranked sym gameplay is using tp for sym to individually flank whether to get off burst combos or to claim enemy territory and only w+m1’s or taxi tps when there’s an opportunity to rather than wait all game passively like the pros.

:thinking:

I’m going to have to refer you back to Point 3 in the OP. team pocket w+m1 24/7 isn’t meant to be her “niche” and it’s completely contradictory to the claim that that is what “best of the best” sym play would look like given how that strat basically is “handle everything for sym to just m1”. esp when it inherently involves a lot of waiting (i.e. missing many opportunities for value) and actual higher skilled sym players don’t rely on that at all because of how many opportunities for value are missed.

18

Yes I’d love to see this! And then the Symmetra player would instantly die because they’re going up against an Overwatch League team.

Your individual TP flanks would end in you feeding.
Your space you think you claim would end in you feeding.

There’s no point in throwing out her orbs from safety (which is what most of Ladder does with her) because in OWL that just feeds some of the best ults in the game (Supports). So it’d be actually hurtful to do so.

Symmetra’s biggest threat is her M1. Tanks can’t defend against it because she gains ammo from them. Tanks can’t out-dps it. The META dps can’t deal with her if she’s properly protected from flankers and snipers.

Ladder playstyles do not work in OWL.
That’s not a balance issue.
That’s a “I don’t understand OWL” issue.

Again, great. But in OWL you are going to get punished for those risky plays.
If they want an assassin, they’ll pick Tracer, Widow, Hanzo, or a pocketed Ashe.
Not Sym.

They’re not playing passively, they’re waiting for a team-wide opening.

19

if they can brute force out sym+m1 despite how much of a black hole it is for team resources for very little uptime, flank with snipers like widow or hanzo, flank rein, etc., without being feeding, I see no reason why can’t pull off a less team reliant flank with tp like

without being feeding.

it’s really ironic that you mention that and how detrimental it is because in going for team pocket w+m1 with passive tp placements only like how the pros are literally player her, time spent on that inconsistent low value orb spam from outside their effective range is EXACTLY what’s being maximised.

and if we’re going off just potential like you are with sym’s primary, you can say something similar about reaper ult:
“Reaper’s biggest threat is his Death Blossom. Tank’s can’t defend against it because it deals more damage against barriers. Tanks can’t out-dps it. The META dps can’t deal with death blossom if he’s properly protected from CC and OHKO combos”

like is OWL or anyone for that matter going to play reaper like sym is rn now i.e. basically playing unnecessarily passive (not using mobility to engage) waiting for ult to charge and for a team pocket to ult just because of that fallacy?
No. you go out and grab whatever opportunity you can get or create for the most value you can achieve for your team in the limited time everyone has in a match.

Same with sym. The principle doesn’t magically disappear just because one chooses to play sym or any other hero. Opportunities to team pocket w+m1 don’t come often over the course of the match time, even in the pro setting, stubbornly waiting for such an opportunity to arise is inherently more inefficient than going out and grabbing it yourself or you creating them. AND SHE SHOULD BE BALANCED THAT WAY AND NOT FOR WAITING ALL GAME FOR A TEAM POCKET W+M1.

Hence the entire point of Point 3 in the OP. It’s an unreasonable expectation to hold for any hero.

because in the pro setting, team-wide openings definitely occur often over the course of the match. So often enough that it’s completely reasonable to expect a hero gameplay to only be able to have uptime during those moments to perform better than gameplay that doesn’t solely rely on such a condition… /s

And that expectation is totally reasonable to balance a hero around… /s

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I feel like if someone in OWL went for a individual Sym flank, their tp would get killed instantly and they would die

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