Play of the Game

[Newage]

Snip

Alright, I got a few of my buddies together and we did some testing with it. Same map spot, same scenario (me on Reinhardt, and my friends on Bastion and Mercy). First I checked if it was a problem with the stairs (someone on reddit said recently that Earthshatter didn't work when used on stairs), by having my buddy face the stairs, while I Earthshattered. It worked, so we continued

I then tried to see if line of sight was a problem. First I tested on the wooden pillar, and when I ulted, The bastion didn't budge (I was looking directly at him, and I could see roughly 50% of his silhouette). However, seeing as my friend couldn't see the point, we supposed that's not where the Bastion was. So we put him on the other side of the stairs, close to the spawn tunnel. As it turns out, even if I could see 2/3 (his chest cannon and his folded left arm) of the Bastion, my Earthshatter would not have any effect on him. he had to be almost fully visible for me to stun him (which did work). This setup (Bastion at the end of that spawn tunnel overlooking the point) is is generally used on that map.

I think what you saw was a Bastion that wasn't quite enough in your line of sight. part of his body must've been hidden behind the wall, and when you Earthshattered, the game must've considered him not in LoS. I didn't record the experience (because I'm stupid like that), so I invite to to recreate it yourself (and it's a good opportunity for you to check that you can stun Bastion with Earthshatter).

 

[hentropy]

Then there are the play of the games that just don't look that impressive. I got a team kill on D.Va's self-destruct which did earn play of the game, even if was just me ejecting immediately hiding behind a wall and standing there. The commendations are where the real rewards are handed out.

 

[Ticklefist]

People with "mains" have problems with Bastion. The rest of us do just fine.

 

[vallorn]

Ahhh Bastion, the cheerful little robot from WALL-E's dreams of what he would be like as a terminator.

There are reasons why Bastion often gets PotG though, and it's all tied into how PotG works.

 

[RJ 17]

I think what you saw was a Bastion that wasn't quite enough in your line of sight. part of his body must've been hidden behind the wall, and when you Earthshattered, the game must've considered him not in LoS. I didn't record the experience (because I'm stupid like that), so I invite to to recreate it yourself (and it's a good opportunity for you to check that you can stun Bastion with Earthshatter).

Fair enough, I will say that - considering how fast everything happens in this game - I can't verify with certainty whether or not part of the Bastion was obscured, it just looked like the cracks from my ult went right to where he was and he just kept firing. I do know that I was fully up the stairs before I ulted because I too have heard that Reinhardt's ult has troubles with stairs, so I wanted to make sure that wouldn't be an issue.

I'll take your word for it, though, that what happened to me isn't supposed to happen and hope for a fix for instances such as this. I can't imagine that Blizzard intended to allow ults to "miss" just because someone's toe wasn't in LoS.

 

[Cowabungaa]

Literally more than half of the heroes can counter him, so why would you choose him?.

He is easy to counter yes, that is true, but even I when admitting it must admit that Bastion deserves somewhat of a nerf. Not a complicated one though, if you ask me all he needs is more ranged drop-off for his damage. More bullet spread, something like that. Because his range is ridiculous and leads to very frustrating moments. Time and time again did I suddenly die only to see a Bastion getting me in his sights through some tiny peephole where I could never engage him away mowing me down in half a second. That's not fun. It's not super overpowered, but it's not fun to play against either.

The same goes for Torbj?rn's sentry, that thing has ridiculous range too. It's funny how you sometimes get a tip that you can engage his sentry out of its 40 meter range. But there's barely any situation where you can actually engage him at that range because of the map design. There's simply barely any areas with those kind of unimpeded distances. That's not super overpowered, but it is once again pretty frustrating.

 

[freaper]

Bastion has gone through a lot of changes since the early betas and this is probably the most balanced iteration. Give it another week or so, and people will figure out why higher level players don't pick it as often.

 

[aegix drakan_v1legacy]

On topic about comic: Wait...Bastion has a mom?!

Anyway, he REALLY is a pain in the ass, but he's not "OP". Close, but not there (unless we're talking double Reinhart and a bastion on a payload with a 76 watching the flanks and Mercy keeping them all alive. THAT'S rediculous).

The big thing with Bastion is that with the element of surprise, he's rediculous. Once you know where he is, he can be countered. And if you kill him, keep an eye on him when he comes trundling back from spawn. An enemy team did that to me the last time I tried him. Every time I was just about to make it back, they had someone scouting ahead (Tracer, pharah, etc) who spotted me before I had hooked up with my team, and they put me out of my misery right quick.

That said, they REALLY need to tweak Play of the Game a little further. He gets them way too often.

 

[Frankster]

I get most PoTG as Pharahs now that I'm back in the groove with her, the game seems to love her rocket spamming, usually just killing 3 people in quick succession with vanilla rockets is enough to get me end of game highlight, especially if it's on objective.

Also what is this myth of "if you know where Bastion is, you can counter him". That is just bull of the highest degree, there are chokepoints such as on Vostroya industries where you can damn well know where the bastion is, it doesn't change diddly squat, not least because you also have to deal with said Bastion's team supporting it as it overwatches the only entrances.

Tbh when a really annoying Bastion is on the enemy team, the hero I most want to see on my own team in response is Junkrat, maybe because I instinctively feel non direct explosives the best way to deal with static defences. Failing that, I hope we got a reinhardt player master of the shield.

 

[Headsprouter]

I complained about Bastion during the beta, but now I'm okay with him (aside from his boring POTGs).

Reinhardt's god damn shield through. "Hello, my flend! I am here to stagnate gameplay for a bit! HA-HA-HA-HA-HA!"

It's fine in close quarters but the fact it's so effective at letting his entire team roll up on you is just infuriating. And then it shows up as a shitty statistic at the end and people commend it like the person playing him actually had to work hard.

 

[Seraj33]

I played Zenyatta once and did a trancendence heal that healed 1100+ hp and saved my entire team from any casualties during a combined Zarya+Phara ult.

...

Then a Widowmaker got play of the game for "Shutdown" (denying an ult) by sloppily bodyshotting another Phara at 20% health who was treathening bascialy no one.

The level of salt was unreal from my side.

Edit: For reference, 1100 hp is like 7 Tracers.

 

[Metalrocks]

i did manage to get POTG several times with widowmaker, so as d.va and pharah. twice even with tracer. but yes, most of the time is bastion who gets POTG. once i got POTG with pharah right at the beginning of the round, killing 5 people.
but there are really moments i ask my self how this guy got POTG when he hardly did any damage or kills. with one guy he killed only 1 person wile i know that me and others have killed way more or made more damage.

the only person im struggling (yeah, i know) to get it is mercy. but then again i should not be surprised since im mainly healing and the highest amount of resurrection was 3 players so far. but yesterday a player did get POTG with mercy and all he did was resurrecting 2 players only. so this really made me question my self whats going on there. but at least i get the highest votes when i play mercy.

 

[aegix drakan_v1legacy]

Also what is this myth of "if you know where Bastion is, you can counter him". That is just bull of the highest degree, there are chokepoints such as on Vostroya industries where you can damn well know where the bastion is, it doesn't change diddly squat, not least because you also have to deal with said Bastion's team supporting it as it overwatches the only entrances.

Tbh when a really annoying Bastion is on the enemy team, the hero I most want to see on my own team in response is Junkrat, maybe because I instinctively feel non direct explosives the best way to deal with static defences. Failing that, I hope we got a reinhardt player master of the shield.

To point 1) A Mei ice wall in his face, or a DVa Defense matrix to block his shots while your team charges up into a better position maybe would work. I was a reinhart defending a Bastion up on the little raise platform on Anubis/Desert point A, and I though we were going to lock that down, when a Mei just up and blocked us with an ice wall and that gave the enemy team enough time to rush in and get an early advantage. :s We lost that point pretty hard after that.

2) Yeah, junkrat is a good counterpick for Bastion, assuming you can get him close enough to lob those nades and get hits. Peek-a-boo widowmaker or Genji-deflecting-his-own-shot-at-him or a really sneaky tracer are also good counters.

 

[RedDeadFred]

Bastion as more counters than probably any other hero in the game. If you're willing to switch, you will make his life miserable. I played a game tonight where I had two Bastions because, in their words, "he's OP." The other team saw this and immediately picked two Widowmakers. They killed those Bastions over and over for the whole match because they wouldn't switch. It was like playing a game with only 3 teammates. The problem is that people haven't gotten out of the mindset of sticking with one hero for the whole match. Once everyone realizes that switching is a core part of the game's strategy, Bastion will seem significantly less oppressive.

He's one of the least picked heroes by pros for a reason, and if Blizzard wants their game to have a competitive scene, they'll balance it around that. Certain heroes are always going to be noob stompers.

 

[The Enquirer]

I complained about Bastion during the beta, but now I'm okay with him (aside from his boring POTGs).

Reinhardt's god damn shield through. "Hello, my flend! I am here to stagnate gameplay for a bit! HA-HA-HA-HA-HA!"

It's fine in close quarters but the fact it's so effective at letting his entire team roll up on you is just infuriating. And then it shows up as a shitty statistic at the end and people commend it like the person playing him actually had to work hard.

I usually will run as 76 and flank the Reinhardt. The helix rockets will definitely grab his attention and make him either retreat, drop his shield to attack you, or then his back to your team.

 

[Cowabungaa]

Reinhardt's god damn shield through. "Hello, my flend! I am here to stagnate gameplay for a bit! HA-HA-HA-HA-HA!"

Nahh. What do you think Junkrat and Pharah are for? They laugh at Reinhardt's shield and simply circumvent it.

 

[Metalrocks]

Remove Bastion (he's only a low to mid level frustration that seems ridiculously powerful, but is pointless to bring later on), nerf Thorbj?rn turrets by 50% and diminish autoaim, then remove Reinhardt who is basically mandatory at this point = Game mostly fixed. As it stands, defending is somewhat easy, with way too many chokepoints.

Remove "Play of the Game" since it's incompetently made anyway, reinstate kills/score screen to let people know whether they improve or not (people mostly don't play the objective anyway, making the removal irrelevant) and make all health pickups 100% heals so map awareness and knowledge is properly rewarded.

There needs to be more focus on playing characters, not setting traps. Also, overtime needs to be removed, people should already be focusing on making final assaults before the timer runs out, not rely on overtime and a 0-100% win, which happens surprisingly often. The joke here is that people who don't go with their team is actually helping them and being rewarded for bad play.

Besides the novelty of original characters and a good theme, I sorely regret paying full price for this game. It's a complete joke that doesn't deserve the success it has.

the game is certainly far from perfect but a fun title never the less. i at least are having a good time with it. but yes, bastion is a pain. again i played for over 2 hours and every time bastion got POTG. for once i was hoping i managed pretty well with my widowmaker but nope, bastion it is.

see nothing wrong with overtime either. if you or the enemy team was so close to get the point, why not. these few seconds can be very crucial and not all the time the overtime goes very slowly. at times its really just a second or two.

 

[ObsidianJones_v1legacy]

I can be Lucio, have a really bad damage weapon, need to stay straight in the mix, blow people off ledge, heal, put a crucial sound barrier off that kept us on the point, kill another guy, and then amp it up so we can heal while the barrier is up... And a Hanzo unleashes a dragon once and kills three people. He's the play of the game, and I just get most healing done. Right.

Anyway, I'll just say one thing for Bastion that will fix him in my eyes.

Remove the self heal.

If he has to sit there and take all that abuse and he still manages to mow down a team, then yeah, he's a pro.

But the whole thing about the self heal is that Bastion can find a great spot and not have to move. If Bastion had to have a Mercy around him to help him survive, then I don't care that he has that great spot, as it's taking two characters to hold it. Thereby lessening the effectiveness of the team. Fair trade.

If the Bastion has a great perch, but he needs to go running for health every five seconds, Fair trade. If he manages to hold it down, we just suck. He needs to keep ducking out to make sure he can continue to fight.

There are just certain Characters that Blizzard loves most and gives them the most Kit.

To me, those characters are certainly Bastion, Reaper, Tracer, and Mei. Their damage potential, ability to singlehandedly take care of a team, and heal themselves is way too much. With most of them, just take the ability to heal themselves away would make them fair in my mind.

For Reaper, I'd just take away the teleport. He already has a mist form. Just too much.