I'm chronicling my kraken roller adventures on arowana mall today in splat zones, My starting rank was B+ 20, I ended at B+ 0. My first match was a close loss in overtime, I personally went 12-6 and succesfully held the anchor role. Match two, we won by knockout and I went 10-6 with a slightly more developed strategy. Just for fun, let's throw in my other maps too. Lost in overtime on blackbelly skatepark by 60 points, I went 11-5. Lost a second match in overtime on blackbelly skatepark by 19 points, I went 7-8. That match was much closer, and my team consisted of one other roller, a kelp splatterscope, and a splattershot pro. I don't really remember my teams from the first three except that there was the same kelp splatterscope and two splattershots of various types.
So, after playing these few matches, I want to say that the roller isn't as bad on arowana mall as I thought it was going to be. What I did on that map is hold the back hallways, I spent most of my time on the enemy hall, splashing down on the hill by swinging the roller. I would often go back and check the hall to see if any enemies were coming, if they were I would pop out, ambush, and kill them. Then repaint the hall. I also put several beacons on the hall hiding behind the potted plant there. When I got my kraken special, I would charge down into the zone, kill any enemies, swim up onto the opposite side, and clear out that back hall if enemies were there. Often they were. So I played a sort of risky aggressive anchor role and it paid off the second match once I got the hang of it.
On blackbelly, I couldn't really think of one particular thing I should be doing, so I was sort of all over the map. I would go up to the upper area that overlooks the halfpipe and place 3 beacons there before moving on. My teammates used these often, and if I saw the enemy clear them out I knew they were camping and dealt with them. I used my kraken to clear out the middle, including the top platform, and also cross the map to check on the other side. I tried not to go directly into the zones, and more of less splashed them from the side before getting back to the same ol. My goal was to keep as much of the map painting my color as possible while clearing out the enemy whenever they tried to camp. I was very mobile and it worked decently. But that strategy is very unrefined and needs more work. I couldn't get the enemies if they were camping from their base area for example, and that hurt me and my team because it made it hard to control the zones.
All in all, I played a sort of passive-aggressive roller, and it worked okay. It was my first time using the roller in ranked, so I figure as I use it more I might get better at it. I did lose most of the matches, but they were pretty close losses excluding blackbelly 1. My strategy on arowana was a lot stronger though, so that may be why I did better on that map. After playing these matches, I want to say that my k/d spread was not a big deal. The last match on blackbelly kind of proved that. It was probably the most exciting and closest match I played, and I went negative in the end. So don't just assume you're doing poorly if you went negative, and don't assume you did well if you went positive. There's always more to it than just that.
I'm going to use the roller some on the next set of maps as well. I hope my strategies come in handy for roller users like Kimmorz, since I normally don't use the roller and go for different options.