Machines Downfall "Fixed" the meta

[Tornado]

This is just a topic i dont see discussed much so wanted to talk about it :D

Now this is a bold statment and i would argue only like 1/5 of the solution to the crab meta issue we had in the first months of the game but its a topic that i think really showed us a great understanding on what the devs want balance wise going forward

So Machine why was it so broken alot of people are going to just quickly say its a "No aim weapon" due to the massive hitbox and ill give some credability to that but at top level that dosnt matter as much cause people are landing their shots way more consistantly so both the machine player didnt need that hitbox for it to nessissarily be good and you would expect that in a close range fight it would loose. The Trick to it really was the kit and the meta, the kit was the best the machine could get Fizzy is for starters the best sub in the game but secondly its perfect for comboing with the machine, Chip damage that have combo numbers with indirects and directs a movment option great ranged paint and pressure a good spacing too and an option for more passive gameplay while say offering jumps or just contesting space. Then theres booyah bomb the best survivability specail right now with great versatility in displacment but most improtant to machine is the survivability letting it take a fight then pop a special to snowball its kill for the team by stoping it getting called out and picked off.

So the kit was great next the meta, the benifits machine had can be summed up in two words "Chip Damage" Crab had the explosive shot which machine could follow up on great and splash had burst bombs which again combo with machine and the meta was just run 3 splash and a machine or 2 splash and a machine oh and if your feeling extra special today 2 splash a machine and a stamper so any weapon you played with did combo damage with you and had a combo that combed with you. on top of all that you had a deacent matup to killing crab being able to reliably hit the rider from over the crab

This on top of machine just being a pretty good main weapon and being one of the few that had a deacent usage at the end of S2 so that as a factor probably ment that just more people knew how to run it into 3 shooters xD

then came the nerfs
Fizzy waiting frame nerfs - 1.2.0
Point per special 200p -> 210p - 1.2.0
10% ink consumption 210p - 2.1.0
Points per special 210p -> 220p - 2.1.0
Sub Resistance up reduced damage from fizzy and burst indirects 3.1.0

(and for some reason all of 4.0 aint on the website for patch notes)
but LDE got nerfed to reduce bomb spam
and the devistating one of Machines attack interval frames got nerfed

so machine got nerfed a tone and new weapons came into the fray and crab got nerfed a lot as well so machine didnt have its place as the king of AoE any more it had less combo tools and was a worse weapon with its subs being nerfed as well it was hit hard but this was good

pretty much the week following the attack interval nerf we saw slosher (which had prior to this had a strong buff) be used for the first time really in a top level set for a while we saw tri slosher and a tiny bit of Rapid Deco but not really but it was opening up we saw Zap Ballpoint and other weapons because machine didnt need to be ran and when it was you could contest it much more easily so the options for making comps just kept expanding ink jet became very strong with the 50 dmg radius buff and it started to really show the cracks in machine but it opened up new AoE and made it so any weapons countered by machine where viable all of a sudden because they didnt have to fight it

this lead to what for my opinion was the most fun S3 meta we had early cooler and inkjet meta for me it sucked a bit cause i was a machine main through and through but i wasnt even in comp so my weapon just saw nerf after nerf but it was the meta that made me get properly into comp because it was evolving and felt like their was suddenly a new game to play almost i picked up slosher and tri and now im a bucket main the fall of machine was the opening to weapon varrity and given nintendo has kept machine at 220p and reversed none of thier changes its clear that thats somthing they want weapon varrity. cooler enables this for the most part so i expect we wont see a change to cooler all that much and pencil well we will have to see as it does both it lets you play more of the skirmishers and slayers but less backlines and supports

I hope this is accurate
still like onyl 7-8 months into comp but ive been following meta and tornuments rarther closely so i would hope i know somewhat what im talking about :D

also machine 210p ? xD

 

[isaac4]

I'm not a comp player but do you think it would have actually prevented cooler meta from being as diverse as it is now had it not gotten the frame nerf? It just seemed to me that as more weapons got buffed with more kits and better maps, machine was going to get less popular anyway.

 

[Tornado]

I'm not a comp player but do you think it would have actually prevented cooler meta from being as diverse as it is now had it not gotten the frame nerf? I'm not a comp player but it just seemed to me that as more weapons got buffed with more kits and better maps, machine was going to get less popular anyway.

yes just because old machine with cooler would be insane xD
run speed is hugely useful for it it would let it retain booyah which i mentioned was reallllly good for it

plus the firerate nerf does 1 major thing to it you can rush it down which is way easier with cooler but if it had the frames it could contest alot of weapons oddly though might be nice rn cause of pencil dominating comp so much rn (only at top and mid level)

I recon the other strong AoE weapon would be Drapid but other than that maybe Ntri? but only kits that matched it's strength would be as good
i recon it would be Pencil and Machine + 2 slayers for weapons rn