I've been eagerly awaiting this weapon. Hydra is a weapon I've wanted to love but could never find a groove with it. It didn't help that every time I went to try it, Dome was in the rotation. I've also never found much of a groove with sprinklers, so I figured the pairing of two things that I want to like but can't use well might do good things.
So this time, unlike with the poor Sloshing Machine Neo, they actually picked good maps for the introductory rotation: Skatepark, and Museum. Both showcase the Hydra and sprinklers pretty well with big open areas, tight choke points, and high ledges.
Two hours into trying it in TW, the bad news is I still just don't feel all that effective with a Hydra. The good news is that I did a lot better with it than I did the original. Neither one of them really has an optimal sub to me. Splat bombs are great on relatively mobile weapons, but don't buy quite enough getaway time on immobile weapons for my liking. Meanwhile sprinklers, on more mobile weapons tend to seem silly beyond a decoy since you can move and ink faster without them usually.
In this case, I certainly have moments where I wish I had splat bombs for pressuring, but the sprinklers seem genuinely effective. I've been staying far back where possible, not approaching the front unless it's already very secure. I'm staying even farther back than I tend to with eliter. Coupled with reduced range, that probably makes me less effective as a killer, however with this weapon I'm focusing squarely on turfing and pressuring, not killing. It's difficult to judge my effectiveness in the role. Most of the time I went around 2/0 or 3/0, #3 ink (TW), exluding the rounds with "that S+ player" that just kept nailing me again and again and I went 0/7, and excluding the round I went 13/0 against a particulary incompetent team. Generally only a few kills and no or few deaths. In that situation I did a LOT more killing with Sloshing Machine Neo. But the reason I've wanted to like this weapon so much is because it's so different. I wasn't killing much, but I kept undoing the enemy's progress, ,and kept them turning tail, unable to approache successfully, holding back, and often getting run over. This game's matchmaker makes it impossible or me to ever really evaluate how well I'm doing with the yoyo of opponent difficulties. But my takeaway is, even when I felt I did badly, such as the 4/4 rounds, I found I actually outperformed my team in k/d and was #2 or #3 in ink. This thing does NOT turf as well as everything about it makes it seem. It's not an aerospray by any measure. Even with sprinklers. Though I was using my sprinklers to keep the enemy busy rather than painting much bare ground. I did notice that I didn't get splatted often, and one round when we had two of these puppies on our team we managed to get spawncamped by halfway through in skatepark, and for the first time EVER that I've seen, we actually turned the spawncamp around, made a comeback, and won the match. That was pretty amazing. I also noticed one round on the museum when I felt fairly ineffective and barely holding back incursions into our base or repelling them once in, once I got splatted everything fell apart and they were all the way into our base for the rest of the match. Apparently my Custom Hydra was the only thing slowing them as much as they were slowed, and without it was enough for them to make a full push. So maybe I was more effective than it seemed at times.
I realize most people will use this to charge a never ending barrage of bubblers, but I found I used my bubbler all of 4 times in 2 hours. There were a few moments I forot it was there and SHOULD have used it, but most moments, holding back as I was, I did not need it and did not get splatted. It's too heavy to press forward so an aggressive bubbler is a no-no. It's a good panic button. But, ike the Sloshing Machine, I'm not sure the special really defines the gun, the main gun is weird enough to do that alone, but here, the sub really adds value unlike the Sloshing Machine. There aren't many sprinkler weapons, and fewer still where you ca really keep a distance and use the sprinklers as a non-stop nuissance to the enemy. Gien it's very supportive role, I cant see it not being valuable in any game mode. But it's also not for the aggressive or impatient. Staying back, harrassing, impeding and cancelling progress are its roles. Make the opponent pull their hair out at never getting anywhere, not to press attacks or directly hold the line. You have to rely on the team for that.
I like it, I want to use it in TW sometimes, but I don't feel skilled enough with it to take it to ranked. I don't have the level of control and confidence with it I'd like that I'm used to with Carbon, Eliter, Splatcharger/scope, splash-o, luna, blaster, rbpd, I'm not sure if I have more or less conotrol of this than Heavy, or even Zink. And yet it's great fun to use, and so far only the S+ players have really taken me to task while usin it, which is actually better than my eliter record to date.
(And, kudos,
@HappyBear801 on getting the thread up and ready, and for all the great Analysis and Thoughts threads. It's sad to see this is the last one. They'll be missed! )
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