The role of the Alchemist

Competitive Multiplayer
1

Hello.

If acid bomb would still receive further nerfs, we could see a pandaren brewmaster (or other picks) more often by the top player and even on ladder. Right now, the alchemist still fits in both roles: Healer and Damage dealer with great survivability due to chemical rage. In my opinion, the alchemist should be more of a healer and debuffer. If acid bomb would deal alot less damage, that would also decrease his capability as antiair hero which is too powerfull against most fragil air units. The minusarmor and the huge damagevalue are too good and I’am fully aware of that he already has been nerfed recently with the argument that he shouldn’t fit into every checkbox.

I mean, It should be a strong decision: Pandaren brewmaster as pure damagedealer with some debuff potential which also helps against buildings OR
Goblin alchemist as powerfull healer and debuffer but right now, its more or less “brainless” because the alchemist is still so good in every aspect.

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the two main reasons elf players choose alchemist in ladder:

  1. he is a bulky tank that is very hard to kill…which elves need.

  2. he has a combat heal which turns out to be one of the best in the game. elves lack combat healing so it’s an obvious choice.

acid bomb at lvls 2 & 3 are meant to be pretty strong choices, and i feel that lvl 1 is also a fair trade. Increasing the mana or cooldown are the only two “nerfs” to the spell that would work without making it utterly useless.

there’s already a problem with utterly useless spells on heroes in this game (far sight, mana shield, immolation, etc.).

I’m not sure why i’d ever pick panda (as an elf player) over alchemist in the current meta - but some top tier players do. OC is one of the players that uses him in specifically Elf vs Human matchups…i’m pretty sure he did it in his WCG qualifier as well.

alch is just a good hero and some of the other tavern heroes are just not. /shrug

if you were to ask me what the best fix would be, it would be to bring other heroes up to par rather than nerf him to trash like the others. like…firelord is a trash hero past lvl 1…pit lord spells don’t synergize well. panda is useful to 2 races, because other races have better natural heroes.