Hope for the Future of Crab Tank

[OnePotWonder]

I count zero Reefslider kits, two Wave kits, and one Stamp kit at A-tier or above. I don't know what kits you're claiming are better than vDualie or StamperN, but if they're not being played in the meta, they're not.

I don't have anything against Crab Tank. I play Edit Nouveau! I just don't understand why you're downplaying a special that is extremely well-represented in the meta right now.

Because it has the worst kit diversity out of any special. How hard is this to understand?
Crab Tank, a top tier special, has six kits. One’s outclassed, one is plain bad, one is both, and one gets barely any specials. It does not matter that the special itself is good. If all specials were equally balanced, Crab Tank would easily be holding the shortest straw. That’s the problem here. If you want Crab Tank, your options are Splash, nEdit, a Dualie that will only get special every two minutes, the worse Stamper, or a mid shooter with a no synergy, weak sub weapon. If you want any other special, you have a better set of options.

 

[youre_a_squib_now]

Viability and relative quality are two very different things. If you look at ProChara's 8.0 tier list video, I distinctly recall him saying when he was placing nStamper, something along the lines of: "I don't know why you'd pick this over the vanilla kit, but it's still a Stamper with Crab Tank so it goes here."

You seem to have this definition of "relative quality" that I can't understand, and I think that's where a lot of the confusion is coming from. You say things like this, which make me think you're talking about purely kit synergy:

Kindly stop forgetting how the quality of a special affects the viability of its kits. Specials aren’t equally balanced; your tier list is a wholly inaccurate metric for how good each special’s kits.

but then you also talk about weapons outclassing each other, which only makes sense if you're considering weapon viability. Otherwise the concept of "outclassing" doesn't even make sense. Hence why I can't figure out what you mean.

You're saying that crab tank's kits are bad compared to other specials, so what metric are you using to determine that?

 

[missingno]

If you want any other special, you have a better set of options.

But you don't. That's my whole point here, the majority of other specials have it even worse.

If you want Inkjet, you have three weapons, two of which have bad matchups against Pencil which is everywhere.
If you want Splattercolor Screen, you have two weapons that are each a tier below their other kit, which by your logic means they are outclassed.
If you want Zipcaster, you have one weapon. One extremely good weapon, but still just one weapon.
If you want Reefslider or Tenta Missiles, lol, lmao.

 

[OnePotWonder]

You seem to have this definition of "relative quality" that I can't understand, and I think that's where a lot of the confusion is coming from. You say things like this, which make me think you're talking about purely kit synergy:

but then you also talk about weapons outclassing each other, which only makes sense if you're considering weapon viability. Otherwise the concept of "outclassing" doesn't even make sense. Hence why I can't figure out what you mean.

You're saying that crab tank's kits are bad compared to other specials, so what metric are you using to determine that?

You do have a point. I can't exactly spread out my thoughts on the matter like butter.
A lot of this has to do with sub weapons, because a lot of this is running under the hypothetical that all specials are equally balanced. This is easy enough with Stamper because its two specials are already in the same tier; the Nouveau kit outclasses the vanilla because Toxic Mist is nowhere near the level of Burst Bomb, and never will be.

As for my repeated statements regarding the viability of Crab Tank as a special and how it affect its kits' placements, that's simply trying to make it clear that just because Stamper Nouveau is high on the tier list doesn't mean it's a good kit.

Let me make it flatly clear:
Crab Tank has six kits, three of which are kneecapped by their sub weapons, and one of which is a skirmisher that barely gets any of its special when played correctly. There are two good Crab Tank kits for players that want to use Crab Tank.
It doesn't matter how weak other specials are.
If you want Zipcaster, you have Stamper, Squiffer, Octobrush.
For Tenta Missiles you have REEF-LUX, Painbrush, and Flingza.
For Reefslider, you have Aerospray, Dread, and Tetras.

 

[missingno]

Wait. If you're writing off any kit with a bad sub, then you can't also cite Reef-Lux, PainbrushN, or Flingza. StamperN is a good enough main weapon to make up for a bad sub, but that sure as hell can't be said for any of those weapons, those are both bad mains and bad subs.

And just in general, you can't tell me Aerospray is better here.

 

[OnePotWonder]

Wait. If you're writing off any kit with a bad sub, then you can't also cite Reef-Lux, PainbrushN, or Flingza. StamperN is a good enough main weapon to make up for a bad sub, but that sure as hell can't be said for any of those weapons, those are both bad mains and bad subs.

And just in general, you can't tell me Aerospray is better here.

REEF-LUX, nPain, and Flingza all have decent subs for what their mains are trying to accomplish. Mostly, though, Missiles are on bad kits intentionally for reasons we should all know.

And if Reefslider was as good as the other specials, Aerospray would definitely be a better weapon. Whether it would be healthy is up for debate, but it would have a niche.

Though, that's all beside the point.
The point is that Crab Tank should be on more and better weapon kits. You don't disagree with that, right?