PolarisAegis
Inkster Jr.
- Joined
- Jun 2, 2015
- Messages
- 20
- NNID
- kirbyfreek33
Since the game was released, I've dedicated all of my play time in multiplayer to learning the Charger class. I never was one for sniping in shooters in the past, but the linear fire of ink for some reason I found fun since you could then squid along it reliably compared to the shooter having to concentrate fire in an area to make a reliable line. It also generally is very good for dealing with the short range monsters like the Aerospray and the Splat Jr, in theory. After playing a lot of Turf War and a lot of Ranked Splat Zones, I've decided to compile my views on the class in general. My personal preferred charger is the Kelp Splat Charger, as I like being able to hold a separate area with a sprinkler while I keep pressure on the area I"m actually at, and am also able to provide extra zone denial with the Killer Wail.
What makes the charger good?
The charger primarily has three strong points to its name when you look at the weapon itself:
1. It has the longest range out of any of the weapon classes.
2. Every weapon in the class has the potential to one-shot an enemy from a distance.
3. When you fire a charger, you are generally guaranteed a solid line of ink from you to however far you fired the blast, meaning you can be guaranteed to make paths in one shot, without having to continue firing for a longer period like a shooter or run forward with a roller.
The first is of course self-explanatory in its usefulness. Keep yourself away from your foe's firing range and you will easily survive. Combined with the second strength, with consistent aim, you can generally keep all of your visible area locked down within your firing range, barring an enemy special like the Inkstrike or Killer Wail. As for the third strength, this makes the charger ideal for opening up paths for your team and inking larger areas in Turf War, as well as neutralizing/taking Splat Zones. This advantage applies from just about any height, so you can be at your spawn in Arowana Mall, fire straight at the far walls separating you from the center area, and you can be assured you're inking the entire floor 15 feet below.
The Charger can provide some important strategic value, and can be very effective at inking large turf areas in a fashion that the enemy can't cover up as quickly as they could if they were following behind a roller or shooter. A single charger once in a good position can be a monster to deal with in terms of keeping an area held down...in theory. However, theory and practice are two very different things.
What makes the charger bad?
Unfortunately, the charger class has a multitude of problems. Let's address some of them in terms similar to the previously mentioned advantages.
1. The charger's range is not as strong of an advantage in Splatoon compared to any other shooter game. Not even counting the fact that each charger has a limited range (which honestly isn't as big of an issue in my opinion), utilizing the charger's much larger range is not nearly as simple nor effective due to the fact that every character can turn into a squid, reducing their hitbox size and speeding up significantly. This means that the possibility for a foe to close the gap between their range and yours is much much higher if your foe notices your presence. Since the charger has a very visible line, you need to generally hide it by aiming a bit further down or up to lessen the risk of an enemy noticing you. However, if an enemy can close the gap, you need to save your shot until the most perfect moment you can get. Otherwise, you are very often a dead squid. This same concept is part of why the aerospray and splattershot Jr are so widely used: the increased mobility and higher difficulty to hit a swimming target makes shorter ranged weapons much easier and more effective to use.
Of course, the obvious next answer is "take higher ground." And yes, this is probably a very effective method to maximize your effectiveness while also defending you from shorter ranged threats. However, this isn't quite the case. First, let's take the reversed situation. Let's say you're on Blackbelly Skatepark and an enemy Splattershot is on top of the central high ground. If they choose to squid into their ink to hide, as a charger on lower ground, you most likely can't hit them. If they're near the edge you may be able to, but if they're close to the center you might as well focus your efforts elsewhere or try to move to higher ground yourself. However, for a shorter ranged weapon, their lower range and slower-moving projectiles actually turn their weakness into an advantage for this exact situation. If you were to hide in your ink, your foe's shots will conveniently arc and land straight on the ink where you're hiding, so you can be easily splatted in your ink from an opponent lobbing their shots to hit you on the fall. For a charger, this feat is impossible except possibly at ludicrous ranges, meaning taking higher ground can leave you just as vulnerableif you don't manage to take out your foe on your one shot. Why only one shot?
2. The charger class has the most downtime of any weapon in Splatoon. You have to charge between shots, and unlike each other class, you can't take advantage of any of the movement options if you want to actually fire your weapon. Your enemy roller or shooter can continuously jump from puddle to puddle, raining down ink from shaking or shooting all the while being a harder target to hit, the charger not only can't jump effectively nor attempt to be remotely mobile while firing, but even CHARGES MORE SLOWLY while in the air. This means that if you decide to super jump as a charger, you essentially have no defense as you near your landing unless you have a sub/special that you can use as a substitute. Once you're actually ready to shoot, you need to hope one of two things: Either while you're firing at a foe they don't notice your shots, or if your opponent notices you that you can hit them with their next shot as they rush your face. If enemy ink is at all between you and your target, I wish you good luck with your shot, because you'll need it if you want to live. If you miss, as mentioned before, you can basically count yourself a dead squid.
This also limits your options for covering ink and taking objectives. while any shooter can try to brute-force defend a Splat Zone by just holding down their fire button to keep spreading ink, the charger will have to carefully place their shots and can generally not defend a zone from any other weapon. Not only this, but if you come upon an enemy and you didn't hit them before they noticed you? Your only other means of defense is either your sub/special or your wimpy uncharged shot. Uncharged shots do a base of 40 damage, meaning to take out an enemy Inkling you need to hit with THREE uncharged shots. With the charger's slow rate of fire you will often find yourself respawning, along with a foe if you're lucky and can calmly aim while under fire.
3. The charger is a "win more" style of weapon in many cases. While in Turf War it's generally useful on every level, in Splat Zones the charger stands out as something that you NEED an advantageous position to effectively use. The Charger can be helpful to gain that position from neutral, but if for ANY reason then on you get splatted and your team can't defend perfectly, you are very likely to be punished for the rest of the game for DARING to have the SHEER UNADULTERATED AUDACITY to use a weapon that has a noticeable startup before being of any use while being nearly unable to move. Is an enemy hiding behind a slight jutting out portion of wall on Urchin Underpass? Hope you have a bomb, because you are NOT going to make it past that point unless they fail to notice you as a squid. If you show your face in front of them you will NOT be able to take them out without finding a different vantage point. Of course, this is sort of to be expected. However, you are basically left with no real defense if you are not in the advantageous position already, and often could be just as useful with a different weapon in a winning situation. Once you've lost that advantage, getting it back will take a miracle from your team and a number of clutch shots while their team doesn't notice you or is too distracted by your team.
4. The charger's actual firing area is the smallest: you have a single projectile that fires in a line, and will stop on the first thing it hits. All of the ink left behind does no damage, so if you miss above or below you aren't going to have a fun time. This also makes it much harder to hit any squid target, as all you have at your disposal is a tiny circle of hittable area on your screen that is likely moving quickly around. You need to have extremely consistent aim if you want to have a hope of being effective in a splat zones game. Miss a shot or two that gets you splatted and you turn into little more than a detriment for your team that your team needs to carry back in order to get you into a useful position again. Meanwhile, every shooter around you can keep firing for a much longer time, not being nearly as heavily punished for missing a few shots.
5. The charger takes the most ink per shot in general. If you've been using charged shots to pick people off or claim a long, thin area, you will much more quickly find yourself out of ink. This makes sense as the long line is worth a lot of points comparatively, but it also means you have to much more frequently dive down into ink while trying to defend an area, and that's not even counting if you use a sub-weapon. You have to charge your shot generally at least 2/3 or 3/4 of the way to actually kill a foe and you need even more if you want to utilize your full range.
So you consume more ink, have much more down time before shooting, have no mobility options available to you while trying to shoot much at all, can't cover as much turf as easily, and are nearly worthless while trying to come back from a disadvantageous situation in splat zones in particular. At least you can still one-shot enemies, right?
Yes, but is that really that useful?
6. If you aren't killing on the first shot, you become the slowest weapon in the game for splatting a target. Basically every other weapon in the game may have weaker shots, but fires them at such a fast rate that in the time it takes you to charge a shot from zero, you are dead. Because of your uncharged shot needing THREE HITS to take out a foe, you also are still on the short end of the stick since your uncharged shot firing rate is also slow, and while firing them you move much more slowly as well. It's useful for taking out rollers, but any shooter will destroy you.
In short, the charger requires a massive amount of extra skill from the player for a reward that in many cases isn't worth the effort. As a support the charger can be useful to give paths that people can take, but that same role is filled more easily with the seeker. When your team has the advantage, a charger can help keep that advantage on certain maps. However, if that advantage is lost (by a foe hiding behind 6 inches or sideways wall), taking it back is exponentially harder and you aren't nearly as impactful when trying to take a zone compared to trying to defend it.
The charger is a horribly situational weapon to a very strong degree. If your'e playing a charger, you're most likely doing so because you like how it plays and don't care as much about actually winning ranked games. In Turf Wars, the charger's inking powers can prove to be a consistently useful tool, but in Splat Zones the charger can very often turn into more of a detriment than a benefit to your team. If the charter actually did any damage on the line that it leaves or didn't have such a difficult shot to actually hit with due to enemies being able to squid, it would likely do better. However, as it is right now, the charger class seems to have been designed like a sniper rifle in other shooters, but the biggest issue is that due to Splatoon's ease of mobility through hiding and swimming in ink, that is not enough to reliably make the Charger a useful tool on any map. The charger received no compensation for it being next to unable to move and for opponents being able to dodge shots much more easily than one might dodge a sniper rifle in any other shooter. Thus, it feels left behind.
I still play the charger because it's the only weapon type I find I reliably enjoy, but that doesn't stop me from getting frustrated at its huge glaring weaknesses now an then. It'd certainly be nice to not feel like a worthless pile of garbage in 75% of my ranked games because I don't want to jump on the bandwagon.
What makes the charger good?
The charger primarily has three strong points to its name when you look at the weapon itself:
1. It has the longest range out of any of the weapon classes.
2. Every weapon in the class has the potential to one-shot an enemy from a distance.
3. When you fire a charger, you are generally guaranteed a solid line of ink from you to however far you fired the blast, meaning you can be guaranteed to make paths in one shot, without having to continue firing for a longer period like a shooter or run forward with a roller.
The first is of course self-explanatory in its usefulness. Keep yourself away from your foe's firing range and you will easily survive. Combined with the second strength, with consistent aim, you can generally keep all of your visible area locked down within your firing range, barring an enemy special like the Inkstrike or Killer Wail. As for the third strength, this makes the charger ideal for opening up paths for your team and inking larger areas in Turf War, as well as neutralizing/taking Splat Zones. This advantage applies from just about any height, so you can be at your spawn in Arowana Mall, fire straight at the far walls separating you from the center area, and you can be assured you're inking the entire floor 15 feet below.
The Charger can provide some important strategic value, and can be very effective at inking large turf areas in a fashion that the enemy can't cover up as quickly as they could if they were following behind a roller or shooter. A single charger once in a good position can be a monster to deal with in terms of keeping an area held down...in theory. However, theory and practice are two very different things.
What makes the charger bad?
Unfortunately, the charger class has a multitude of problems. Let's address some of them in terms similar to the previously mentioned advantages.
1. The charger's range is not as strong of an advantage in Splatoon compared to any other shooter game. Not even counting the fact that each charger has a limited range (which honestly isn't as big of an issue in my opinion), utilizing the charger's much larger range is not nearly as simple nor effective due to the fact that every character can turn into a squid, reducing their hitbox size and speeding up significantly. This means that the possibility for a foe to close the gap between their range and yours is much much higher if your foe notices your presence. Since the charger has a very visible line, you need to generally hide it by aiming a bit further down or up to lessen the risk of an enemy noticing you. However, if an enemy can close the gap, you need to save your shot until the most perfect moment you can get. Otherwise, you are very often a dead squid. This same concept is part of why the aerospray and splattershot Jr are so widely used: the increased mobility and higher difficulty to hit a swimming target makes shorter ranged weapons much easier and more effective to use.
Of course, the obvious next answer is "take higher ground." And yes, this is probably a very effective method to maximize your effectiveness while also defending you from shorter ranged threats. However, this isn't quite the case. First, let's take the reversed situation. Let's say you're on Blackbelly Skatepark and an enemy Splattershot is on top of the central high ground. If they choose to squid into their ink to hide, as a charger on lower ground, you most likely can't hit them. If they're near the edge you may be able to, but if they're close to the center you might as well focus your efforts elsewhere or try to move to higher ground yourself. However, for a shorter ranged weapon, their lower range and slower-moving projectiles actually turn their weakness into an advantage for this exact situation. If you were to hide in your ink, your foe's shots will conveniently arc and land straight on the ink where you're hiding, so you can be easily splatted in your ink from an opponent lobbing their shots to hit you on the fall. For a charger, this feat is impossible except possibly at ludicrous ranges, meaning taking higher ground can leave you just as vulnerableif you don't manage to take out your foe on your one shot. Why only one shot?
2. The charger class has the most downtime of any weapon in Splatoon. You have to charge between shots, and unlike each other class, you can't take advantage of any of the movement options if you want to actually fire your weapon. Your enemy roller or shooter can continuously jump from puddle to puddle, raining down ink from shaking or shooting all the while being a harder target to hit, the charger not only can't jump effectively nor attempt to be remotely mobile while firing, but even CHARGES MORE SLOWLY while in the air. This means that if you decide to super jump as a charger, you essentially have no defense as you near your landing unless you have a sub/special that you can use as a substitute. Once you're actually ready to shoot, you need to hope one of two things: Either while you're firing at a foe they don't notice your shots, or if your opponent notices you that you can hit them with their next shot as they rush your face. If enemy ink is at all between you and your target, I wish you good luck with your shot, because you'll need it if you want to live. If you miss, as mentioned before, you can basically count yourself a dead squid.
This also limits your options for covering ink and taking objectives. while any shooter can try to brute-force defend a Splat Zone by just holding down their fire button to keep spreading ink, the charger will have to carefully place their shots and can generally not defend a zone from any other weapon. Not only this, but if you come upon an enemy and you didn't hit them before they noticed you? Your only other means of defense is either your sub/special or your wimpy uncharged shot. Uncharged shots do a base of 40 damage, meaning to take out an enemy Inkling you need to hit with THREE uncharged shots. With the charger's slow rate of fire you will often find yourself respawning, along with a foe if you're lucky and can calmly aim while under fire.
3. The charger is a "win more" style of weapon in many cases. While in Turf War it's generally useful on every level, in Splat Zones the charger stands out as something that you NEED an advantageous position to effectively use. The Charger can be helpful to gain that position from neutral, but if for ANY reason then on you get splatted and your team can't defend perfectly, you are very likely to be punished for the rest of the game for DARING to have the SHEER UNADULTERATED AUDACITY to use a weapon that has a noticeable startup before being of any use while being nearly unable to move. Is an enemy hiding behind a slight jutting out portion of wall on Urchin Underpass? Hope you have a bomb, because you are NOT going to make it past that point unless they fail to notice you as a squid. If you show your face in front of them you will NOT be able to take them out without finding a different vantage point. Of course, this is sort of to be expected. However, you are basically left with no real defense if you are not in the advantageous position already, and often could be just as useful with a different weapon in a winning situation. Once you've lost that advantage, getting it back will take a miracle from your team and a number of clutch shots while their team doesn't notice you or is too distracted by your team.
4. The charger's actual firing area is the smallest: you have a single projectile that fires in a line, and will stop on the first thing it hits. All of the ink left behind does no damage, so if you miss above or below you aren't going to have a fun time. This also makes it much harder to hit any squid target, as all you have at your disposal is a tiny circle of hittable area on your screen that is likely moving quickly around. You need to have extremely consistent aim if you want to have a hope of being effective in a splat zones game. Miss a shot or two that gets you splatted and you turn into little more than a detriment for your team that your team needs to carry back in order to get you into a useful position again. Meanwhile, every shooter around you can keep firing for a much longer time, not being nearly as heavily punished for missing a few shots.
5. The charger takes the most ink per shot in general. If you've been using charged shots to pick people off or claim a long, thin area, you will much more quickly find yourself out of ink. This makes sense as the long line is worth a lot of points comparatively, but it also means you have to much more frequently dive down into ink while trying to defend an area, and that's not even counting if you use a sub-weapon. You have to charge your shot generally at least 2/3 or 3/4 of the way to actually kill a foe and you need even more if you want to utilize your full range.
So you consume more ink, have much more down time before shooting, have no mobility options available to you while trying to shoot much at all, can't cover as much turf as easily, and are nearly worthless while trying to come back from a disadvantageous situation in splat zones in particular. At least you can still one-shot enemies, right?
Yes, but is that really that useful?
6. If you aren't killing on the first shot, you become the slowest weapon in the game for splatting a target. Basically every other weapon in the game may have weaker shots, but fires them at such a fast rate that in the time it takes you to charge a shot from zero, you are dead. Because of your uncharged shot needing THREE HITS to take out a foe, you also are still on the short end of the stick since your uncharged shot firing rate is also slow, and while firing them you move much more slowly as well. It's useful for taking out rollers, but any shooter will destroy you.
In short, the charger requires a massive amount of extra skill from the player for a reward that in many cases isn't worth the effort. As a support the charger can be useful to give paths that people can take, but that same role is filled more easily with the seeker. When your team has the advantage, a charger can help keep that advantage on certain maps. However, if that advantage is lost (by a foe hiding behind 6 inches or sideways wall), taking it back is exponentially harder and you aren't nearly as impactful when trying to take a zone compared to trying to defend it.
The charger is a horribly situational weapon to a very strong degree. If your'e playing a charger, you're most likely doing so because you like how it plays and don't care as much about actually winning ranked games. In Turf Wars, the charger's inking powers can prove to be a consistently useful tool, but in Splat Zones the charger can very often turn into more of a detriment than a benefit to your team. If the charter actually did any damage on the line that it leaves or didn't have such a difficult shot to actually hit with due to enemies being able to squid, it would likely do better. However, as it is right now, the charger class seems to have been designed like a sniper rifle in other shooters, but the biggest issue is that due to Splatoon's ease of mobility through hiding and swimming in ink, that is not enough to reliably make the Charger a useful tool on any map. The charger received no compensation for it being next to unable to move and for opponents being able to dodge shots much more easily than one might dodge a sniper rifle in any other shooter. Thus, it feels left behind.
I still play the charger because it's the only weapon type I find I reliably enjoy, but that doesn't stop me from getting frustrated at its huge glaring weaknesses now an then. It'd certainly be nice to not feel like a worthless pile of garbage in 75% of my ranked games because I don't want to jump on the bandwagon.
