TA.

[classicallad]

This is quite an interesting idea, thought we could use this space to discuss Time anchor further.

Originally posted by Evan20000:


Alright, here's what I think about TA. If you guys decide that TA needs a nerf (I get the feeling that there's already a consensus, but I don't feel qualified to make any final statements given that I haven't actually played the game seriously in god knows how long...), then I propose implementing diminishing returns on your momentum when you anchor. For instance, when you use the anchor and have a momentum of X, you will anchor with a momentum of X-Y%. This lets the anchor be used tactically to get behind cover (as it was intended), but not as a universal "panic button" that it was during my time playing. If you are forced to anchor+warp to get back to top speed, I think that removes enough of the anchor's otherwise nearly endless options that it used to have while still leaving it with enough choices as to keep it a powerful runner/carrier without completely obsoleting other options.

[Ingbo]

Since everyone just wants to discuss laser in that other thread ill put my argumentative post about why i think ta is op here and ill start of prior to that by saying that ye i think sinstars idea seems VERY good. Also just a plz paragraph to everyone that wants to partake in this discussion: Plz add constructive arguments that are VALID and can actually take the discussion about ta somewhere useful. "Ta doesnt need nerf its not op" or "Ta op nerf" doesnt give any evidence at all imo and should be disregarded honestly. If you want to disagree with something im saying about it bring up what other runners can do that give them an edge over what ta can do etc. Or if u wanna agree (free bjs for agreers obv) do that. Anyways old post:



"Ta is a problem.... Ta frequently hits from underneath the base being vs 3 to 4 ppl on d alone.... Thats retardedly op in tbd no other plane can even get close to that. if lights starts circling down under base to attack it the ta anchor double warps and most likely hits ur base cause the lights left position to block the edges of the base. So if u approach it rapidly it will just anchor warp away which makes it even more op cause of its ability to stall / stale (not sure which word is best) out entire teams while its waiting for backups at enemies base (for team to respawn basically) making them unable to approach it like the could other randa runners being under the base cause of its ability to close to instantly having left everyone that approaches it under the base to being on top of the base hitting bomb.

Classical roids scenario for instance: 2 bombers 2 lights on top of base defending ta incoming and gets under base and starts going to far side of the base. 2 planes can either defend each side being stalled out or they (which will most likely happen) go towards the side which the ta is moving. Ta then anchors and warp warp for easy easy hit vs 4 players. Another alternative here is that the planes on top of the base are aware of this problem (which also happens frequently) what happens then is what i described in the earlier paragraph. Ta has now stalled out everyone on d and can approach / continue with its run whenever it chooses to or just wait til he gets explos or bombers that can spam away ppl. Theres no other runner in the game that can put this much positional pressure on a team without even breaking a sweat.

There are also boosting things ta can do like go down anchor up to get initial boost (behind a cliff for instance) then double warp over a 2nd cliff (cave for instance mid cliffs approaching enemies base) what this effectively does again is that ta just puts so much positional pressure on enemy teams and are soooooooo strong 1v1 that if u want to start a push and u have a ta doing this on cave in mid as u move in, ur pretty much forced to turn back with 2-3 planes to make sure ta doesnt hit alone. Since ta is so strong in 1v1 situations leaving a lone player to defend against it usually just ends up with the ta hitting ur base so i guess what my biggest problem with ta is at this point is its easy ways (hard plane to play ik w/e... theory is super easy behind this tho) to just completely stall out entire teams getting them into situations where it can play SUPER agressively without having anything to lose given how easy it can get away whereas the other team is playing in a spot where they can lose a bomb hit within 1-3 secs.

There are more ways i feel its op but its getting boarderline tl:dr at this point already so ill just leave it at this (added after switching threads).


To sum it up: Ta is op because it can put too much situational / positional pressure on opposing teams (without even being in an agressive position on the map to begin due to its amazing speed and allusiveness) compared to other bomb runners in tbd yet being as good or even better at killing than other runners. "

[classicallad]

Originally posted by lemon:


If we are to nerf something, first thing should be TA. Lazer is a tiny tiny problem compared to TA. Here's some thoughts
TA is the most mobile plane in the game by far. This is the root of the problem and other things are just the symptoms. As long as TA has that huge mobility edge it will be imbalanced. Slight nerfs like making anchor cost more while carrying the bomb barely do anything because they aren't fixing the core problem. Consider how fast other planes would have to be to be able to pull similar stuns to TA? I really don't know, but maybe loopy with 2x speed and insane turning rate would do the trick. And it would be incredibly hard to control properly when at full speed, so yeah. Other randas are imbalanced in this aspect too, but not anywhere near TA.
TA carrying the bomb completely changes the way pushes work. TA can happily move forward and bail out if it meets resistance, or at least buy alot of time for reinforcements to arrive. This indirectly affects other planes too because they no longer have to babysit the carrier so much and can focus much more on pushing. All of this leads to faster, stronger and more organized pushes. Non-TA carriers have to be extremely careful as to not get flanked and stay out of open areas and in general whole team has to babysit them because if carrier comes into contact with other plane(s) it will die every single time
"But TAs are hard to play so they should be rewarded" idea. Well, TA actually isn't hard to play at all. There is the initial period where you have to get used to the movement scheme but after that, its like any other plane. Consider which is harder A)Bomb carrying with TA B) Defending against said TA. Consider trying to kill a plane that is multiple times more mobile than you even with a bomb. Consider trying to kill that plane when it has support. Its so incredibly hard to do it that you don't expect anyone to succesfully stop TA 1v1 or even 1v2 unless they are much, much better than the attacking TA. 1v3-4 TA still bombs sometimes. Consider what you would need to do to bomb 1v4 with other planes. Lots of luck, jukes out of this world that would make the spectators **** their pants and gross mistakes by the defense. With TA you hang back and wait for lights to come at you and then try to beat the heavies. If they make some tiny mistake with positioning or have bad aim, you'll get a hit. Whoop de doo.
"TA only dominates unorganized competition" idea, I see this one alot. And it's definately true that TA is very strong against uncoordinated teams, it dominates organized ones just the same, except you won't be seeing any 1vMany bomb hits that happen frequently in ladder and such. In fact, there's one video that illustrates very well how much TA dominates at the most competetive settings.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X9261aaSK5g IL vs Flb from the last APL finals. Don't think you'll be seeing any more organized and coordinated teams than this. I believe most people here saw or watched these games but here's a reminder anyways. Flb was dominating IL in the series, having some of the best players in the game and basically outclassing IL in every possible category. And in this last game they decided to spec donk at the start. And then IL raaaaaaaped them. Then flb subbed donk back in and it was reversed in an instant, flb going on to dominate IL in one sided fashion. The effect was soooooo huge, switching one player like that completely changing the direction of the game. Yes flb was using a dubious setup and donk is a great player and there was that whole contraversy, but it seemed like they were playing 4v5 before the switch compared to after it. After watching that game it really hit me how overpowered TA is. I mean most top teams use TA runners nowadays so you'll rarely see such, ahem, evidence as this video.
TA is the only plane carrier that can use repair drone. Many times I've seen TA support killed off and then TA completely healing up against remaining 3-4 players. This is complete and utter BS because any other plane would die in a second but TA, it can survive for many seconds without even using warp? What in the world?
TA is an incredible killing plane, we just don't see it much because its more benefitial to have them carry the bomb. However TA focusing on killing is an absolute nightmare to deal with, basically being a trickster on steroids. We don't see this much, but in a few cases where I saw 2 TAs on a team and one focusing on killing, rape ensued. Luckily for the rest of us, most TAs seem to be a bit uncomfortable without the bomb and switch to lazer or something.
There's no counter to TA. Acid, which counters it in theory is a joke, at best it cuts of one route but TA can just go the other way. HC and emp and trickster are the best I think. I personally can't imagine ever winning 1v1 vs a time anchor, even when they have the bomb I have lots of trouble finishing them off. From what I've seen other "counters" have the same problems. This leads to having to use TA yourself, which is bad for the diversity of the game. Donk calls this evolution of the game or something but I don't see anything exciting about using TA or losing.
"Nerf donk, not the plane". This is just retarded. While donk is a great player and he might as well be #1 with some other plane but I cannot imagine him dominating ladder or other leagues like now. Also we have ballin, who in season 1 wasn't even in top 50 if i recall correctly switching to TA and now sitting in top 5. He also happens to play TA in the most predictable way ever, but it doesn't stop him doing great. Switching to TA literally added like 800 points to his ladder ranking over a month or so.
To be completely honest, if someone participates in discussions like these and just thinks about the game in general and still believes TA is fair, he's either, ahem, not so bright or has some other motives (like playing ta himself, or his team relying on TA). It just seems so obvious when you look at TA and there's a bunch of things that are flat out better than what other planes can do. I don't need to know how exactly TAs work with precise moves like ingbo does, I just know that it can move around with unbelievable speed. And as I said in the beginning, there's all that is to it. Arguments for TA being fair are a joke (and I read the previous TA threads, and mikesol said that TA is fair because other runners have tools that are similarly effective, like loopy lobing capabilities and trick/lazer bomb flicking... Yeah right). TA is broken, it makes the game stupid where everything revolves around that plane.

Now for some suggestions as how to possibly fix it:
Remove it. The concept itself is broken and no amount of "anchor costs 5% more energy" nerfs is going to fix it. Not going to happen obviously...
Add a significant delay before anchoring so you cannot use it as a panic button. And it needs to be very noticeable, like one second or more so that it's in line with what other planes can do when they see 4 nades coming to their face (that means, not much).
I also like the speed reduction on anchor suggestion alot, but it needs to be very significant to make anchoring a serious decision. 20% reduction wouldn't be very noticeable and in a few weeks anchors would adjust and everything would be exactly the same.

Again, I dont feel like lazer is a huge problem and I strongly urge to first deal with really broken things. However, I'm all for correcting the warp box. I don't think it will change the lazer or whatever balance in any way, but it will make for a cleaner game which is very nice. I use warp alot with trickster and I know for sure I've gotten some kills I shouldn't have. Also one idea to fix for lazer if you really must do it would be having it extend, not immediately start doing damage like right now (its the only plane that can deal damage without some projectile travel time).

[Smushface]

Classic / lemon's post sums it up really nicely and I would love to see anyone try to argue against it.

Remembering back to the old nerf TA thread, the anti-nerf side had 2 arguments:
1) TAs saying that TA isn't that good.
2) Elixer / void saying l2p nubs.

[lemon]

I didn't notice this thread so I posted in lazer one, sorry. Anyways quoting myself to keep the formatting.

Originally Posted by lemon

If we are to nerf something, first thing should be TA. Lazer is a tiny tiny problem compared to TA. Here's some thoughts

• TA is the most mobile plane in the game by far. This is the root of the problem and other things are just the symptoms. As long as TA has that huge mobility edge it will be imbalanced. Slight nerfs like making anchor cost more while carrying the bomb barely do anything because they aren't fixing the core problem. Consider how fast other planes would have to be to be able to pull similar stuns to TA? I really don't know, but maybe loopy with 2x speed and insane turning rate would do the trick. And it would be incredibly hard to control properly when at full speed, so yeah. Other randas are imbalanced in this aspect too, but not anywhere near TA.
• TA carrying the bomb completely changes the way pushes work. TA can happily move forward and bail out if it meets resistance, or at least buy alot of time for reinforcements to arrive. This indirectly affects other planes too because they no longer have to babysit the carrier so much and can focus much more on pushing. All of this leads to faster, stronger and more organized pushes. Non-TA carriers have to be extremely careful as to not get flanked and stay out of open areas and in general whole team has to babysit them because if carrier comes into contact with other plane(s) it will die every single time
• "But TAs are hard to play so they should be rewarded" idea. Well, TA actually isn't hard to play at all. There is the initial period where you have to get used to the movement scheme but after that, its like any other plane. Consider which is harder A)Bomb carrying with TA B) Defending against said TA. Consider trying to kill a plane that is multiple times more mobile than you even with a bomb. Consider trying to kill that plane when it has support. Its so incredibly hard to do it that you don't expect anyone to succesfully stop TA 1v1 or even 1v2 unless they are much, much better than the attacking TA. 1v3-4 TA still bombs sometimes. Consider what you would need to do to bomb 1v4 with other planes. Lots of luck, jukes out of this world that would make the spectators **** their pants and gross mistakes by the defense. With TA you hang back and wait for lights to come at you and then try to beat the heavies. If they make some tiny mistake with positioning or have bad aim, you'll get a hit. Whoop de doo.
• "TA only dominates unorganized competition" idea, I see this one alot. And it's definately true that TA is very strong against uncoordinated teams, it dominates organized ones just the same, except you won't be seeing any 1vMany bomb hits that happen frequently in ladder and such. In fact, there's one video that illustrates very well how much TA dominates at the most competetive settings.
  
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X9261aaSK5g IL vs Flb from the last APL finals. Don't think you'll be seeing any more organized and coordinated teams than this. I believe most people here saw or watched these games but here's a reminder anyways. Flb was dominating IL in the series, having some of the best players in the game and basically outclassing IL in every possible category. And in this last game they decided to spec donk at the start. And then IL raaaaaaaped them. Then flb subbed donk back in and it was reversed in an instant, flb going on to dominate IL in one sided fashion. The effect was soooooo huge, switching one player like that completely changing the direction of the game. Yes flb was using a dubious setup and donk is a great player and there was that whole contraversy, but it seemed like they were playing 4v5 before the switch compared to after it. After watching that game it really hit me how overpowered TA is. I mean most top teams use TA runners nowadays so you'll rarely see such, ahem, evidence as this video.
• TA is the only plane carrier that can use repair drone. Many times I've seen TA support killed off and then TA completely healing up against remaining 3-4 players. This is complete and utter BS because any other plane would die in a second but TA, it can survive for many seconds without even using warp? What in the world?
• TA is an incredible killing plane, we just don't see it much because its more benefitial to have them carry the bomb. However TA focusing on killing is an absolute nightmare to deal with, basically being a trickster on steroids. We don't see this much, but in a few cases where I saw 2 TAs on a team and one focusing on killing, rape ensued. Luckily for the rest of us, most TAs seem to be a bit uncomfortable without the bomb and switch to lazer or something.
• There's no counter to TA. Acid, which counters it in theory is a joke, at best it cuts of one route but TA can just go the other way. HC and emp and trickster are the best I think. I personally can't imagine ever winning 1v1 vs a time anchor, even when they have the bomb I have lots of trouble finishing them off. From what I've seen other "counters" have the same problems. This leads to having to use TA yourself, which is bad for the diversity of the game. Donk calls this evolution of the game or something but I don't see anything exciting about using TA or losing.
• "Nerf donk, not the plane". This is just retarded. While donk is a great player and he might as well be #1 with some other plane but I cannot imagine him dominating ladder or other leagues like now. Also we have ballin, who in season 1 wasn't even in top 50 if i recall correctly switching to TA and now sitting in top 5. He also happens to play TA in the most predictable way ever, but it doesn't stop him doing great. Switching to TA literally added like 800 points to his ladder ranking over a month or so.
• To be completely honest, if someone participates in discussions like these and just thinks about the game in general and still believes TA is fair, he's either, ahem, not so bright or has some other motives (like playing ta himself, or his team relying on TA). It just seems so obvious when you look at TA and there's a bunch of things that are flat out better than what other planes can do. I don't need to know how exactly TAs work with precise moves like ingbo does, I just know that it can move around with unbelievable speed. And as I said in the beginning, there's all that is to it. Arguments for TA being fair are a joke (and I read the previous TA threads, and mikesol said that TA is fair because other runners have tools that are similarly effective, like loopy lobing capabilities and trick/lazer bomb flicking... Yeah right). TA is broken, it makes the game stupid where everything revolves around that plane.

Now for some suggestions as how to possibly fix it:

• Remove it. The concept itself is broken and no amount of "anchor costs 5% more energy" nerfs is going to fix it. Not going to happen obviously...
• Add a significant delay before anchoring so you cannot use it as a panic button. And it needs to be very noticeable, like one second or more so that it's in line with what other planes can do when they see 4 nades coming to their face (that means, not much).
• I also like the speed reduction on anchor suggestion alot, but it needs to be very significant to make anchoring a serious decision. 20% reduction wouldn't be very noticeable and in a few weeks anchors would adjust and everything would be exactly the same.

Again, I dont feel like lazer is a huge problem and I strongly urge to first deal with really broken things. However, I'm all for correcting the warp box. I don't think it will change the lazer or whatever balance in any way, but it will make for a cleaner game which is very nice. I use warp alot with trickster and I know for sure I've gotten some kills I shouldn't have. Also one idea to fix for lazer if you really must do it would be having it extend, not immediately start doing damage like right now (its the only plane that can deal damage without some projectile travel time).

[DJ Nightost]

Stop Hating on TA

[Evan20000]

Originally Posted by DJ Nightost

Stop Hating on TA

Any particular reason why people shouldn't nerf it, or should we change our minds solely because you have an emoticon in your post?

[leggomyeggo]

Personally, his capitalization and emoticon changed my mind completely. BUFF TIME ANCHOR!

[DJ Nightost]

Originally Posted by leggomyeggo

Personally, his capitalization and emoticon changed my mind completely. BUFF TIME ANCHOR!

Haha yeah it would break my heart and i would cry rest of my life in a corner in a public toilet if it Got nerfed.

[Mt.Vesuvius]

Originally Posted by DJ Nightost

Haha yeah it would break my hear and i would cry rest of my life in a corner in a public toilet if it Got nerfed.

Lold .

[Evan20000]

Originally Posted by DJ Nightost

Haha yeah it would break my heart and i would cry rest of my life in a corner in a public toilet if it Got nerfed.

If the public toilet was at a McDonalds, you could meet up with SSD after he's done with his league matches.

[shrode]

I would love to see an anchor-free tournament or a week of no-TA on ladder, to see how it would be.

[leggomyeggo]

Originally Posted by DJ Nightost

Haha yeah it would break my heart and i would cry rest of my life in a corner in a public toilet if it Got nerfed.

You won't do it.

[matattack]

Originally Posted by shrode

I would love to see an anchor-free tournament or a week of no-TA on ladder, to see how it would be.

Rise of the Explo!
But in all seriousness it seems like the nerfs that were discussed by lemon really drops the capabilities of running as an anchor at all. If a randa's warp box is decreased as well as their capability to run, who would play it really? wouldn't a trickster be better then a time anchor in almost all situations? Just seems like I'm reading a double nerf for anchor which seems to be a bit harsh. Also I could argue thru some vids that acid counter or loopy counter in general is NOT a joke but having a loopy in a setup with 3 lazors and an anchor could be.
I understand that there are advantages like having repair drone and such but it still seems way too harsh of a nerf especially if hit box is decreased. Also for those like Balln and Donk who have almost mastered the plane itself making it overpowered yes I see that they do dominate in all ladder game situations. But imagine if those two people did not play this game. Would we be having this discussion at all? Maybe more people need to exploit the potential of other planes to come near to matching the skill level of a
Pro anchor. I've seen it in quite a few players recently in ladder. Just be careful to how much we are really nerfing in general because anchor is most defiantly counterable if you work your way around it. Also keep in mind great explos can stop great anchors when teamplay is active.

[Ingbo]

if no one is there to show that something is op there would be no discussion about it being op, unless u had mathgeeks studying the game without actually playing it. i dont really see any relevance in the argument nontheless tho...
ur argument is very abstract... what potentials in other planes? theres been very specific details about situations where ta outshines every other plane. why dont u reply to these statements instead?
the only thing i want to do is to get other planes to be as valid as ta as far as running goes. especially given how strong of a killer ta is as well. plus make these redicilous having 3-4 ppl stuck at base for 10 secs vs 1 lone ta runner situations go away. obviously no one wants a second delay on anchor lemons just painting a picture of how u can do it.

"Also keep in mind great explos can stop great anchors when teamplay is active. "
- true, i guarantee u that u will have a much easier time stoping other runners tho.

also lone warp hit box nerf on anchor (randa) would be gawdawful. that nerf would pretty much ONLY target laser and trickster since anchor doesnt even have to kill that much to function amazingly as a runner whereas trickster and laser are much more utility in their roles and do have to kill a lot.

[lemon]

Warp box nerf wouldn't have any effects on randas. I mean, its not hard to warp straight into someone. It would stop randas from getting some stupid kills they shouldn't be getting, but the overall effect would be really small and would not effect game balance in any way I think.

I also don't see any other planes approaching TA no matter how good you get and how hard you exploit your plane advantages - TA can just move waaaaaay faster than any other plane, and in a game that ultimately comes down to positioning thats the biggest advantage you can have.

P.s. Discussion is encouraged because this is just my opinion and I happen suck at this game, so yeah.

[Smushface]

Originally Posted by lemon

I also don't see any other planes approaching TA no matter how good you get and how hard you exploit your plane advantages - TA can just move waaaaaay faster than any other plane, and in a game that ultimately comes down to positioning thats the biggest advantage you can have.

P.s. Discussion is encouraged because this is just my opinion and I happen suck at this game, so yeah.

I think you can argue that ufo has demonstrated some of the potential of flex loopy that no one has yet to unlock. It's arguably as fast and mobile as TA.

TA still wins out because it has a panic button, repair drone, and better damage output so...

[Ingbo]

ta can gain more speed as well since they can double warp and then anchor which is something that a flexi trickster cant do. a ta can be much more agressive in their double warps than a flexi trickster (if they would use ultra) could without it punishing them so they can still put way more pressure than flexi trickster can. in addition to this they could also dip down and anchor up to get boost from that so i doubt that a flexi trickster would be as fast OR as mobile as an anchor would at top tier level... u sure about that?

[matattack]

All I'm sayin is not to nerf too harshly. Sure it can outshine other bomb carriers or create situations your team gets stuck in. I just feel like many times it isn't completely the anchor that puts the rest of the team into a frozen state but their teammates as well. It's just so situationable it's hard to say how OP it is in reality. Just don't make it a plane that ends up being used like acid or dumb bombs or something -.-

[banana]

Nothing new to post other than I've been moaning about TA's for months. You hardly ever see a plane other than TA carry bombs nowadays, with good reason.

[Smushface]

Originally Posted by Ingbo

ta can gain more speed as well since they can double warp and then anchor which is something that a flexi trickster cant do. a ta can be much more agressive in their double warps than a flexi trickster (if they would use ultra) could without it punishing them so they can still put way more pressure than flexi trickster can. in addition to this they could also dip down and anchor up to get boost from that so i doubt that a flexi trickster would be as fast OR as mobile as an anchor would at top tier level... u sure about that?

Whachyu talkin about willis

[Boko]

We could also buff biplanes bomb carry speed to introduce another viable bomb runner

[Mt.Vesuvius]

Originally Posted by Boko

We could also buff biplanes bomb carry speed to introduce another viable bomb runner

Biplane OP

not really but it certainly doesn't need a buff..

[elxir]

TA is so overpowered that there are still less than five players who I want using TA on my team.

[[Y]]

good point

lix2012