There’s been a lot of ranting and raving against a certain Swedish shield maiden lately, and one of the constant refrains in favor of utterly gutting her is the notion that a low-skill (re: less aim-dependent) hero shouldn’t be able to take down super ultra high-skill characters, most especially Tracer.
Tracer requires an incredible amount of skill because of her low health and high aim requirements, is the argument always put forth. She’s high risk, high reward, and because of the insane levels of skill needed to make her viable, she’s only remotely a presence in the highest tiers of play.
And it’s bollocks. Tracer doesn’t have insane skill requirements, she has an insane skill ceiling, which is something very different. Yes, Tracer’s low health and dependence on being in relatively close range to her targets does raise her skill floor a bit above most other heroes, but it’s not remotely as high as those decrying Brigitte’s ability to counter her pretend, because every other part of her kit reduces those weaknesses.
She has the lowest maximum health in the game, but she’s also the smallest hero target with some of the highest mobility. Taking a few less shots to kill is irrelevant when enemies have less ability to land shots on you in the first place, or Tracer would have been countered from day 1 by Widow, Hanzo, and McCree. Tracer’s tiny hitbox makes her harder to hit than the average hero before her player’s skill level is even involved, and while Blink does take a little getting used to the displacement effect on yourself, we’re talking a dozen or two games’ effort to get a basic awareness, not the “hundreds” that Brigitte’s haters constantly insist on.
Her individual bullets are some of the weaker in the game, yes, but she also has one of the highest rates of fire in the game, which raises her dps so high that her aim requirements are actually looser than a lot of other heroes at the same skill level. Of the hitscan damage heroes, Soldier has 171 maximum potential m1 dps without headshots; Ashe, Sombra, and recon mode Bastion have 160; and McCree has 140. Tracer has a whopping 240 - the only hitscan dps that outpace her are Reaper, whose 280 maximum potential is highly dependent on the random spread of his pellets, and sentry mode Bastion, whose insane 450 comes at the cost of making him a big stationary target. A Tracer with 72% accuracy will outdps a Soldier with 100% accuracy. She only needs 67% to match 100% Ashes, Sombras, and Bastions, and a measly 59% to beat a 100% McCree’s output, and her preference for playing up close with her targets makes it easier for her to get those numbers.
Yes, the counterargument that Tracers routinely 1 clip backliners is an exaggeration at most skill levels, but what Brigitte’s haters always seem to conveniently forget is that before the skill level where Tracers can consistently pull that trick off, the players she’s up against don’t have the coordination or aiming skills to consistently take her down before she gets two, three, or even four clips off (she also has one of the faster reloads).
And even if her aim is terrible, as long as she’s at least competent at her avoidance, she will still terrorize an enemy team. Between her high dps and preference to be in close range, the presence of a Tracer - even one with bad aim - means that a team can’t afford to ignore the presence of one harassing their backline or flank. They have to turn around to deal with her, and if she’s halfway decent at blinking around and hitting Recall, most of the team is going to have to take their attention off the rest of her team in order to deal with her before she picks one or two people off. Even a mediocre Tracer can be a great distraction that lets the rest of her team gain ground while the enemy is impotently trying to swat the mosquito.
Tracer has a crazy skill ceiling, but her skill floor is not that much higher than any other hero’s, and the insistence that it’s unfair for Brigitte to counter her because Brigitte doesn’t have to aim very hard to take her down is a load of bloody bollocks, especially when Tracers who actually have the skill levels that Brigitte’s haters insist every Tracer needs to have just to exist are already capable of outplaying Brigitte.
Cheerio, luvs.
