Intro:
I honestly believe that the Hero Refresh has been quite successful in pulling up certain heroes to relevance. Jack Sparrow has become a huge threat to meta heroes, and Hiro has become a wonderful Stun machine that works differently from Gaston. The most recent one with Merida has turn her into a dangerous hero with potentially one of the best comeback mechanics in the game. And while I’m no expert on Finnick, I think he can finally synergize with meta heroes like Elsa more easily than ever. But I want to see more. I want to see players in PvP with teams so diverse, that it’s hard to pin down the meta because so many heroes are just viable. So with that out of the way, I’d like to present my ideas on how some of the currently weak characters can be improved upon.
Yax:
Generally considered wonderful in the early game, he becomes much, much weaker upon reaching the mid-late game. He’s considered rather detrimental because of how awkward he is at building up his White Skill so his timing is quite bad on Auto-Mode. The rest of his skills also provide very little utility outside of his healing, which in itself is thoroughly outclassed by Mickey, Miguel… heck, Sulley is more competent at healing with the Woody disk!
Base Stats:
+Improve HP
+Improve Skill Power
Yax is frail with no way to fend for himself if he gets jumped. Improving his HP should help him survive more often while improving his Skill Power amplifies his skills which his healing heavily relies on.
Flower Power:
This skill will do fantastic damage to the closest target. And… that’s it? This is what I mean when I say Yax provides no utility. As a Support hero, he should ideally be doing stuff that actively enhances his team’s performance, and a skill like this contributes nothing. What if it does no damage but instead reduces the closest target’s Armour or Reality? Something like that allows him to fit in a comp with Merida and/or Mr. Incredible. What if it cleanses a single ally from a disable? That could allow him to synergize with Kevin so that the two can work together to counter freezes and charms. It can be anything else, really. It just needs to be an actually supportive skill in nature.
Body Odor:
Oh look, yet another damaging skill that contributes absolutely nothing. He releases a painfully SLOW moving cloud that cannot even begin to damage enemies until it passes them by… what? “Body Odor” sounds like a skill that is disruptive by nature, so why not turn this skill into a debuff of some kind. Maybe this cloud can slow enemies for a short time, or lower attack power, or literally anything else more useful than a slow armpit cloud that can really only threaten enemies at 1 HP.
Chill Vibes:
I actually like the idea of this skill for the most part. I think it should just be more potent, because as it is, it is negligible and doesn’t actually give his team a meaningful advantage in the same way that Judy or Maui can.
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Genie:
Genie is an interesting “Control” hero who actually focuses significantly more on supporting his allies than disrupting his enemies. His biggest issue is that his Blue and Purple skills are directly tied to his White Skill, which is hard to pull when the meta CC’s him to oblivion. Most of the time, he gets no chance to really use it, and as such, wastes 3 out of 4 of his skills in a single instance. At the very least, I find his base stats to be quite reasonable and I don’t necessarily think it should be improved upon. Rather, it’s the mechanics of his skills that should be looked at.
Move to the Backline:
Genie’s animation of shooting magic already means this should be a reasonable change. Much like Hiro, putting Genie at the back will give him a lot more breathing room to attack more safely.
Three Wishes:
Before any of you start arguing about whether or not he should be able to heal himself, let me remind you that the Genie used in this game is no longer bound to a lamp. He is FREE. And I don’t care that he still has his bracelets, his interactions with the characters explicitly implies his boundless freedom. So with that said can he please, just let him HEAL HIMSELF? Genie targets the 3 weakest team members, so that should include himself (should he find himself in a pinch). This allows him to save himself should things turn bad, and he can also potentially benefit from his other skills.
Break the Ice:
The disk he gets from Elsa is supposed to help Genie provide some more frequent CC. Honestly, I think it just needs a small boost in freeze chance.
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Vanellope:
Vanellope isn’t actually that bad, and she even carries decent stats. However, her real problem here is that she is outclassed by other DPS heroes that can do her job better. But with a few tweaks, she can be just as devastating as the likes of Elsa.
Soda Geyser:
The fact this attack can also apply a slowing effect is pretty neat, but for only 3 seconds? That’s just negligible. Elsa can cause large damage to a single target and freeze that target for 7 seconds, so what’s her excuse? I think simply extending the slowing effects of Soda Geyser would make this move so much better.
Minty Fresh:
The idea of this move is that it gives Vanellope a skill that can snipe a backline hero with its large damage. But it’s not powerful enough to KO a target, and it shouldn’t have to be (that’s what Elastigirl is for). I think it just needs an added effect to make it add more pressure to the backline. For example, it can reduce that target’s Reality for a short time, which combos well with her own White Skill.
Pulled A Fast One:
Make it give slightly more Basic Damage.
Ultimate Princess:
Make it give slightly more Skill Power.
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Frozone:
Frozone is a very tricky character to balance as a freeze-inducing hero, since he’s one of those characters who could potentially be too powerful if not balanced properly. However, with Finnick’s recent Refresh, Frozone is finding it harder and harder to fit in a team. WALL-E outclasses him for the unique utilities he brings, and he cannot ever hope to compete with Elsa and Olaf, both of whom can freeze indiscriminately while Frozone’s freezes may fail against enemies of higher levels. But a few small tweaks could just be what he needs to be relevant again.
Base Stats:
+Increase HP
+Increase Basic Damage
+Increase Skill Power
Increasing his HP and Basic Damage by just a small amount should bring him up to par in consistency with the other backline heroes. Increasing his Skill Power by a bigger margin though will greatly improved 2 of his skills.
Cold Front:
Characters can’t really get away with basic moves that only do damage and nothing else anymore. If this move gets an added mechanic, such as maybe pushing back the target, it would make Frozone more competent as a Control Hero. It does Fantastic damage, so it can be the counterpart to WALL-E’s pushback which does Normal damage. Or maybe it can reduce 200 energy from the target, which is not so far fetched coming from a move that blasts cold energy at a target.
Arctic Chill:
Can you believe that Elsa has a move that can blast a target for large damage AND still freeze them for a short time? Frozone can that do that too! Except for the part that contributes meaningful damage. Anyways, comparisons aside, the freeze alone makes this tricky to balance. With the other freeze characters excelling at freezing “the closest target”, I think one way to breathe new life to this tired move is to make it target something else. What if it freezes “the farthest” target instead? Some of the best heroes in the game puts pressure against the backline such as Woody and Tia, so if Frozone can freeze a backline hero, that would make for more dynamic timings with certain hero combinations.
Frostbite:
Someone mentioned it before and I’ll mention it here too. Make the effects also available for other freeze sources. Part of what makes Olaf dangerous is that his presence causes all freezes to slow enemies as well. If the same can be done with Frozone’s DOT to also apply for freezes from his teammates, then he’d fit in to freeze teams more consistently. HOWEVER, I will say that this could potentially make freeze teams even more difficult to deal with, but even now there are ways to counter freeze comps.
Cool As Ice:
Eve’s disk adds a situational healing mechanic to Frozone’s “Stay Frosty”, which has potential to be very fun. However, it’s exactly just that, situational. I think the restrictions on this move should just be removed altogether. Make it heal at any point, regardless of HP percentage. This change alone makes this disk significantly more flexible. Also, just change the animation so that healed characters are NOT frozen for 2 seconds. Seriously, the fact that it even freezes allies makes this extremely detrimental. However, I think it’s also reasonable to slightly lower the HP healed to justify the disk’s more flexible healing.
