Shields, breaking LOS etc…
Like Bob isn’t hard to handle, but then nether is Ball spinning once you hit the ranks where they are not.
The issue with, you need either team co-ord, or the right abilitys on hand, just like spin to win.
I wasn’t against shortening the Bob running time, because lower ranks have a problem with it, and higher ranks don’t, but, I also see the value in lowering the time spin can happen for all of the same reasons.
Shields, breaking LOS etc…
Like Bob isn’t hard to handle, but then nether is Ball spinning once you hit the ranks where they are not.
The issue with, you need either team co-ord, or the right abilitys on hand, just like spin to win.
Not every team will have a shield. During overtime, the Attackers simply cannot go back to spawn and switch to a shield tank.
Most objectives do not have locations where you can contest and avoid LOS.
Bob is quite simply put, too low-risk high-reward and does not belong in this game. Possibly one of the most broken abilities we have seen.
Right, and not every team has a CC which is effective against Spin or has the co-ord to follow up the CC they do have.
It isn’t that I don’t agree with you that Bob can be a problem for low ranked play, it is that I can’t get behind you not applying the same logic to spin.
What are they to do if you don’t have the CC or Focus fire needed to stop it? Same problem.
I want you to understand that we SAME issue around having to switch heroes to deal with a problem is there for both.
Most of the time in mid ranks he just gets Slept, Shielded, Matrixed, Kensised, Hacked, Walled, Hooked out of LOS, or just bursted down and everyone goes about their business.
Same thing which happens to spin.
I think you especially are finding him annoying because you are taking a hero which can’t stop him, but, again, that happens for spin.
They are very similar problems game design wise.
You need either focus fire, or a hero which can deal with it, in the hands of someone able to use them well enough to do so.
I know many others will agree with my point of view.
And yet, I am also disappointed because I expect devs will never touch this OP cheese because bob belongs to a hitscan dps
p.s. they already forgot about mei/sombra/doomfist
That Bob is a problem? sure, but you are ALSO seeing people say spin is a problem right? for the same reasons.
Oh, I’m a DPS player, and I am TOTALLY on board with the idea that the Devs are playing silly buggers with favorites in the DPS lineup, that shouldn’t be in doubt.
Like being disappointed that they are willing to fix the problem in one area, and not the other is perfectly reasonable.
Not seeing the problem in the other, GIVEN you can clearly identify the issues around hero’s being picked is less great.
You know that not having the right tools to deal with a hero, and not being able to swap in OT is an issue.
You know that having to rely on team mates which can’t be trusted to use the ability to stop someone is a problem.
You know that in some ranks you can’t trust people to hit even stationary targets. Or that focus fire isn’t there is a bit of a lost cause.
You know that problems in low ranks don’t stop being problem because it is only low ranks, they are still game design problems.
I just want you to apply that knowledge more globally, since you are already a step up from most people because you can clearly identify the issue, and understand they are issues.
p.s. they already forgot about mei/sombra/doomfist
They didn’t… they just balanced them for OWL play, which you know, kinda wrecks them for ladder play to some degree.
But I enjoy them enough that I don’t really worry, and I understand why they are like this.
My bug bear is Tracer. I’ll admit that, I think she is a problem for the game, but weirdly enough she isn’t a problem for Sombra / Mei.
I think Tank players got super hard done by especially in the great tank nerfing of 2018-2019, and that DPS have been babied hard, and the queue time shift has been a direct result of that.
I think that Ball players are extremely skilled overall, I can’t make ball work, and my hat is off to anyone who can.
My big problem with this change is we lose new tank players because they lose this little step between making Ball work, and getting good at the rest of his kit, as a game overall health thing.
I’m sorry it seems like I am picking on you with these posts, but here is the thing. You understand the issues around Bob, and you understand that even though they go away in later ranks, they are still issues.
You can name them, and explain why they are a problem which means you get game design better than most, and I just want to help that along.
I REALLY want them to move stuff from grapple disconnection to changing starting adapter cooldown on disconnect (with a slightly shorted cooldown overall), because the current fix really causes problems for tech you will use later.
And we need the tank players, we need to keep them so much.
I want to say that while I’ll take a lot of things to get grapple permanence back, and this one GLADLY…
I don’t think I’ve ever had a spin-to-win using ball live long enough to Shield twice.
Your theory might stop some REALLY bad players down at the bottom (probably your goal) but… mid tiers where most people are, it really wouldnt’ do anything. …
… unless that is completely your goal though…
But still the complaint I hear isn’t that tetherballing is invincible cause he keeps getting shield, it’s that he’s hard to hit or stop.
The issue I’ve seen from trying to coach lower ranked players isn’t that they don’t eventually do enough damage to ball to kill him, it is that they can’t out damage adaptive, and the more of them which are there, the worse it gets 
I remember one game I was trying to demo how to deal with a spinning ball with Zarya, and I couldn’t out damage adaptive either (THE SHAME!), which… you know, kinda brought the problem home to me.
Normally I just hack / wall them, but sadly, people don’t stay playing ball on the other team long when I am playing Sombra/Mei (for some reason). I’ll fully admit that the countering between Sombra / Mei and Ball/Doom is a little bit too strong, but I don’t know how to make it less awful, without breaking stuff which needs work vs other heroes. (I am thinking about it though)
But yeah it is a low ranked problem, and I really want a fix which doesn’t damage high ranked play.
I guess I’ve never had that problem or could imagine you could miss ball enough to let him eat whatever damage and make Adaptive (and it’s 15 second cooldown) be a self sustain. This isn’t humblebragging either no matter how much it might sound like it… I HAVE used spin-to-win in my earlier ball days because it was such a logical initial tactic, but abandoned it quickly because no matter who I did it to I would take wayyy too much damage to be sustainable.
Would be nice. Happy that you are one of the few who sees there are valid things tether can be used for that aren’t going in a circle around one place.
Hey you know me, if I didn’t get it right away, I’d get it as soon as someone explained it to me.
Personally I can’t play him. I tried, but ball is too hard for this wizard. I am nothing but impressed with people who can make him work.
I know you picked him up, how long did you have to put into them before the movement started getting fluid?
eeem… I have good days. It’s honestly still a work in progress, but probably about half a year later it finally started to feel GOOD.
I found the big change was when I stopped planning out my routes entirely and just started adapting as I flew. I would pick somewhere I wanted to be and then on the fly would plan the next move as stuff happened. Instead of “ok I’m going to be there, then swing up to there then go there and roll through” it became, “I want to be behind their team, I’ll start by swinging up there” and then ad-libbing the rest since planning routes would “encourage” me to take bad paths through risky areas just because I thought it was where I wanted to go.
I still make bad choices and melt sometimes, but it’s less.
Yeah, I tried for around 4 months, and just couldn’t even get the basic movement to work.
It may have worked if I tried for longer, but my desire to play OW was on the downhill at the time anyway, so my heart wasn’t really in it.
It took 100 hours for Mei to click for me, and 500 hours for Mercy to start making sense, so I’m not a fast player at picking things up, and Ball is more complex than most.
I’ve picked OW up again, in part because it is one of the game I can play well from the gaming laptop in hotels, and I have to go on the road for my job soon. (which is weird, since I’ve been work from home for a year now)
And honestly, the break did me the world of good. My skills are total garbage, but I am enjoying the game again, and that counts for a lot. For all I think OW2 has some serious issues, I’m even looking forward to that.
Anyway it is good to see you It’s been a while
Same here. Glad you’re having fun again, as we both know… games are supposed to be fun =]
…Why are you standing within 7 meters of Ball?
Zarya’s beam has a 30m range. Adaptive Shield has a 7m radius. Why are you standing close enough to give him shields from you?
Maybe they should’ve applied the change when the grapple is attached on a payload/point
Zarya’s beam is 15 meters, and you can’t be at max range vs Ball because then you would have a VERY low time where you can damage him.
Since grappling hook is 6 meters, he has a diameter of his swing of 12 meters. So, you need to be within 3 meters of him if you were to be able to damage his entire rotation.
Zarya with 30 meters beam would be TERRIFYING. Moira’s grasp is 20 to put it in perspective.
IF she had a 30 meter beam, you would be right, but she doesn’t, and her right click has a much lower damage rate, so trying to blast him wouldn’t work out either.
If he is spinning alone, you want to get that tasty tasty charge off him to up your beam damage as well, which involves closing
You can always just Grav him, if you are willing to burn an ult to make him go away though
That would be messy, since a heroes mechanics would change depending on their location. I can see what you are trying for there.
But yes, it would let Ball use their tech without issues.
Idk not a fan of the change to be frank I totally get the point of the nerf so he can’t stall the point for eternity but it was done in such a lazy way I can see they’re going to increase the number a bit. Ridiculous
I’m not a fan either, which is why I would have just made it so you can’t get adaptive off cooldown until you disconnect.
Okay, you’re right. I don’t know why I thought it was 30m.
But I don’t know what you mean about “you would have a very low time where you can damage him”. How does distance matter?
If he’s spinning alone, then you’re better off just shooting at him from a distance. The scant charge you get from him hitting you isn’t worth giving him shields.
Hey you were at 14 meters from the edge of his circle he is travelling though. You would ONLY be able to hit him for the briefest moment every time he rotated.
The closer you are, the more you can reach the rest of the circle he is traveling around.
But you can’t mostly, you don’t have the range to get most of the circle he is traveling around.
When he is on other side of the pillar, he is 12 meters further from you than when he is at the closest to you on your side of the pillar.
You only have 15 meters range, so, you want to hit him for more than 1/4 of the time he is in LOS, you are going to have to get a lot closer.
You have a 15 meter circle around you of where you can damage, he has a 12 meter circle around the pillar of where he will be.
You need the two circles to overlap as much as possible, and you can’t do that 7+ meters away.
But you have an eight meter leeway between the max distance of his shield and the max distance of your beam. The window for hitting him isn’t that tight.
The other side of the pillar is negligible. With the exception of areas like Point B Volskaya, where Hammond can spin on the small nub at the center of the objective, most pillars are going to be obstructed on the other side anyway. You’re better off standing at least 8m away from him and just shooting him as he passes by.
This is just wholly unnecessary. Just shoot him when he’s passing by.