Luna Blaster: Analysis and Thoughts

[Calden]

I quite like the Luna blaster myself. I've found on the right map it can be devastating, but it's short range, is a huge disadvantage if you face a longer ranged opponent without flanking options and no I kooks charged. I found it easiest to use on the skatepark and oil rig. Those two maps seem to have great places to make use of its strengths, especially in splat zones.

 

[WaifuRaccoonBL]

I quite like the Luna blaster myself. I've found on the right map it can be devastating, but it's short range, is a huge disadvantage if you face a longer ranged opponent without flanking options and no I kooks charged. I found it easiest to use on the skatepark and oil rig. Those two maps seem to have great places to make use of its strengths, especially in splat zones.

You will be surprised how easy it is to flank. All you need is a wall.

Urchin Underpass has the section in the middle.
Bluefin Depot has the plus shaped wall, (not to mention just sneaking into their base).
Kelp dome has the walkways and lots of places to hide.
Moray has the alleyways.
Walleye has the crates in the middle and places to hide on the sides.
Arowana mall has alleyways and getting into the enemy base also gives you places to hide. Jumping off the metal grates on the top into the enemy base can give you a good surprise attack.

As for port mackeral...thats basically flanking the map.

 

[Lag Chan]

Honestly, the Luna Blaster feels like a straight upgrade to the normal Blasters. The lack of range means nothing thanks to the huge blast radius it has, pretty much you can destroy anyone who even dares come close to you. The massive killing ability, fairly reliable inking capabilities and overall okay sub weapons make it a really dangerous weapon in the right hands. This thing is a beast in Ranked and not too shabby in Turf War either, Ink Mines can do their job pretty well and Inkzooka as always is great at picking off enemies, a welcome ranged option. Ultimately, I feel it's the best of the Blasters. Completely invalidates the others and is just far too reliable to give up for any of the other choices. It might be too good, but I'll be damned if I said it wasn't fun to use.

 

[meleesplatter]

Honestly, the Luna Blaster feels like a straight upgrade to the normal Blasters. The lack of range means nothing thanks to the huge blast radius it has, pretty much you can destroy anyone who even dares come close to you. The massive killing ability, fairly reliable inking capabilities and overall okay sub weapons make it a really dangerous weapon in the right hands. This thing is a beast in Ranked and not too shabby in Turf War either, Ink Mines can do their job pretty well and Inkzooka as always is great at picking off enemies, a welcome ranged option. Ultimately, I feel it's the best of the Blasters. Completely invalidates the others and is just far too reliable to give up for any of the other choices. It might be too good, but I'll be damned if I said it wasn't fun to use.

Maybe it feels superior to normal blasters since they don't have that much range over luna, but it is definitely not a straight upgrade. Yes it's a monster up close, but the thing is many weapons don't have to get close, and against those you're generally boned unless you get the jump on them as usual. Even rollers can outrange you, especially when jumping, and they're just as capable, if not more, of one shots. The short range also means you lose the blasters ability to shoot enemies hiding behind cover safely in most situations.

Inkzooka was a saving grace, but now that it's requirements are higher this weapon's shortcomings are only going to be made even more apparent. It may be good at inking by blaster standards but it's still pretty slow, and once again the short range forces you to put yourself at risk to get the turf in the first place.

 

[D_Neon]

I love this weapon, and it quickly became my favourite after I first got used to it playing on Tower Control. It is an absolute beast in that mode, with Inkmine working to delay enemies taking the tower for a second or for getting revenge on some less weary when they do take it. I don't find the same kind of success with it on Splat Zones that people are claiming it has. While sure it covers them pretty quickly, others cover much quicker without needing to stand right on the zone, vulnerable to enemy fire, and it's incredibly difficult to attack the opponents when they've set up a solid hold on an area if I don't have Inkzooka up. I personally suck with the Inkzooka, but I can't argue with it's strength, personally though, I'd much prefer range to be more readily available on this gun. I can't wait for the Luna Blaster Neo with Suction Bombs and Bomb Rush to come out because I think I'd cut my deaths in half if I had that option to zone enemies without jumping straight at them, plus a safer method of capturing Splat Zones.

Honestly, the Luna Blaster feels like a straight upgrade to the normal Blasters. The lack of range means nothing thanks to the huge blast radius it has, pretty much you can destroy anyone who even dares come close to you. The massive killing ability, fairly reliable inking capabilities and overall okay sub weapons make it a really dangerous weapon in the right hands. This thing is a beast in Ranked and not too shabby in Turf War either, Ink Mines can do their job pretty well and Inkzooka as always is great at picking off enemies, a welcome ranged option. Ultimately, I feel it's the best of the Blasters. Completely invalidates the others and is just far too reliable to give up for any of the other choices. It might be too good, but I'll be damned if I said it wasn't fun to use.

If you've ever gone face to face with another type of Blaster using this (a decent one) you'll know this is incorrect. Other Blasters are actually what I consider to be the biggest counter to this weapon because the extra range is very noticeable assuming you didn't catch them in an ambush. Against most other weapons the extra shot you may take closing that little range difference doesn't count for much, but with other Blasters it means that they'll get their second shot off before you can, so you have to get a 1 hit kill on them or they win, and that's if they didn't 1 hit you.

 

[Reila]

I believe Splatoon is a balanced game overall, but I feel as if the blaster line is a little OP. They can OHKO you from full health and they tend to really annoy me. That being said the Luna Blaster looks really cool.

Just stay out of the blasters range and you will be fine. From my experience playing Luna Blaster, people who tend to walk backwards while shooting are troublesome to kill, because with my poor range I can't kill the opponent if they are moving backwards, let alone try to stop them by shooting on the ground behind them.

So many "them"s

 

[curry time]

I’ve been playing with the Luna lately, and it’s great fun for corner fights and for making close-range trickshots. Despite its meager range, it seems to work well on a majority of maps and game modes besides Splat Zones as long as your team has good map control, which might be alleviated by the Neo’s bombs (using it on Kelp Dome is suffering, though, and at that point I opt for Range Blaster or something else entirely to bully the tower). But I’m curious about what builds Luna players generally use.

Damage Up increases the effective kill radius on the AoE burst, of course. I’m running a Damage Up main on my head and a couple sub damage ups and the inner ring of the AoE is doing about 80 damage per shot, which is enough to secure kills on even lightly-injured enemies. I imagine running a damage up main and, say, three damage ups on a rather unfresh Anchor Sweat would get you close to 100 damage on the inner AoE. I’d like some confirmation from other Luna users whether this is the case, since I have no way of testing it myself at the moment.

Swim speed is also great, since it lets you get to mid faster and assassinate targets that get too close while the rest of your team catches up. It also lets you chase fleeing targets as well as juke them better in 1v1s. I had two Swim Ups on my red lo-tops and another one on my Urban Jacket, but I got greedy and rerolled the lo-tops with my remaining snails. Now they have no Swim Speed Ups. Alas.

I’m just not sure what else I’d run. Luna is already great in terms of ink efficiency; when the Neo Luna rolls around, Sub Saver might be useful. Though you’d still want to take Damage Up to increase the kill radius on your bombs.

 

[curry time]

Bumping, because I have another question.

How do you guys deal with Sloshers? I can't even try to flank or blindside them since the cone on their splash protects them from the sides, and if I'm 1v1ing them I'm trading at best because of the cone + they can fire off their shots much faster than I can + they can just throw splat bombs at their feet if necessary.
My only chance is to try to corner fight them since the Slosher loses that to Blasters, and then only slightly.

I'm guessing this will become much easier with the Neo Luna. Zooka is great and all, but I'd much rather take the consistency of being able to challenge the Luna's bad matchups with splat bombs/splat rush over the Zooka. Plus, Splats will allow us to corner fight better if we cover a choke and meet the enemy at another exit; Arowana basin area with the ramp comes to mind. Luna excels in certain areas but loses some very important matchups simply because it poses little threat to Chargers/Dynamos/Sloshers, and it has a bit of a hard time dealing with Tentateks and Gals even if it gets the jump (it must kill with the direct hit or the Luna user will get shredded on the shot recovery). I understand that this is the inherent weakness of the Blaster class, but I hope the splat bombs on the Neo help alleviate the Luna's reliance on Zooka and make it a more flexible weapon.