Ranking Specials by Whether They Should Return in Splatoon 4

[OnePotWonder]

Splatoon 3 has a lot of special weapons. This means that they vary quite heavily in design quality, with some of them being absolute masterpieces of game design (Crab Tank) while others are abominations handled in the worst way possible (Splattercolor Screen). One thing is practically guaranteed; some of these specials will return in the next Splatoon game. I figure it would be a good idea to make a place for people to share their opinion on which should stay and which should be left behind. As you might expect, I have opinions on literally every special, and I'll try to cover them as concisely as possible in this post with the aid of a tier list:

I'll quickly go over the tiers one at a time, starting at the bottom.

Leave it Behind
I am a firm believer in the idea that nearly every special concept can be salvaged and turned into something good. Then you have these two extraordinarily terrible specials; glass cannon panic buttons that are practically guaranteed to splat anything they're aimed at, and be splatted by anything that aims at them. This dynamic needs to die in this game, and not carry over to the next. I don't care that these specials are visually cool or have their good traits, they simply cause too much harm.

Would Need Full Rework
This is the largest tier for a very good reason. It contains every special that I think shouldn't return, but could be used as the groundwork for a new special that wouldn't be as terrible. While I do have ideas for how each of these specials could be reworked, you probably don't need to read all of that in this one thread. Despite that, for those of you who do want to see them, I wrote them out anyway:

Spoiler: Special Reworks

A quick note that most of these ideas aren't really what I want to see done with these specials if they return in the next game, but would definitely help them in the current game. Something like Reefslider would work better with an entirely new set of mechanics, such as steering. I've marked the specials I think could work in Splatoon 4 post-rework with an asterisk '*'.

Ink Vac* sorely needs a way to protect itself when teammates aren't around. I would give it a new air-blast attack (triggered by releasing its suction early) that consumes some of its charge to knock enemies backward and deal 40 damage. On top of that, I would make it so the special maintains a small area of suction while it aims its shot if the vacuum isn't full.

Kraken Royale is a special that can feel like it handicaps the user more than it empowers them. I would remove the ability for main weapons to knock it back and increase the momentum it conserves when jumping to make its standard movement more effective, then compensate by replacing the special’s invulnerability with 700 HP of armor, the special ending early if it’s broken.

Reefslider needs to be reverted to its original form and given better recovery instead of a better explosion. Its 70 damage explosion radius would be reduced by 25% and its paint radius reduced by 10%, in exchange for the ability to roll off of the special when it explodes as though landing from a super jump with the Drop Roller ability.

Splattercolor Screen needs to not be completely terrible. First things first, the grayscale filter would be lightened and the fizzing sound effect removed in favor of muffling game audio. Touching the screen would also cloud out an enemy's HUD with gray bubbles, and most importantly, the user's team would be able to see through the entire screen.

Tacticooler is a special case since it isn’t inherently bad in terms of design, everyone is just sick of it. The drink stand concept should return for future support specials, but an entirely new boost effect will be needed; I’m not coming up with one right now.

Tenta Missiles* would be combined with Triple Inkstrike* to create a new special better than both of them. With Tenta Missiles' targeting circle, the special would lock two inkstrikes equal in power to Triple Inkstrike's onto up to two of the closest enemy players. Missiles’ method of targeting would create enough delay to make following up on the strikes possible on the part of the special user, and make leading the strikes away from objectives possible on the part of the targets.

Trizooka is a mess, and not in a good way. A change as simple as giving it four shots that fire one glob each with a straight trajectory would be a big improvement for it, but with just that it would be rather boring. One idea I had for making it interesting again would be to let its single shots bounce off of terrain once or twice like Bloblobber blobs.

Would Need Changes
These specials are all decently well-designed, but have things holding them back from being worth adding in the next game unchanged. Most of them are fairly obvious, the specials are just not very interesting to use or play off of. The exception is Zipcaster, which has its own set of issues; I could probably write an entire thread going over how overrated it is, but that's definitely something for another time.

Should Return
If I had to pick five specials to bring into the next game, these would be four of them. Even though Super Chump and Wave Breaker are on the weaker end of special power levels, their designs are just too fun to pass up bringing back, even without buffs. The other two specials are self-explanatory in being two of the most fun specials in the series to use and fight (bar gold Aerospray). There's a better one, though.

MUST Return
I'm going to be completely honest, I would have doubts about buying Splatoon 4 if it didn't bring back Crab Tank. This special is the only one in the entire Splatoon series that I would consider absolutely perfect, and the only one that should definitely return unchanged. I don't think I need to spend much time arguing this. You've all used it at one point or another. You know what I'm talking about.

Feel free to share your own opinions on what should and shouldn't come back in the next game. If you really think Ultra Stamp should return and Wave Breaker should stay in Splatoon 3, I'm curious to hear your reasoning.
Thank you for reading this post, and have a wonderful day.

 

[solz]

Stamp should get a rework like Less start frames

 

[🌌☾ᏉᎬᎶᎪ☽⭐]

I'll throw my hat in the ring. Always fun to talk about this stuff :>

[Last Tier is self explanatory I'm not dealing with this one lol]

Don't Come Back:

While I do love both of these specials on paper, Tristrike and Bubbler are way too extreme, one being instant death if you so much as breathe near it and the other a damage sponge that can be tedious to break and wastes valuable time while your enemy can shoot at you. I do like the counterplay of being able to walk inside but sometimes you're just not going to get that chance with Bubbler.

Funny But No:

Zooka could honestly go in the needs one change tier but as it stands, startup be nerfed as well, it's still a wildly inconsistent special. This isn't because of the skillshot aspect, rather the fact that in game the hitbox does not line up with what you see. If you've seen the desmos recreation, you know why this thing has a blind spot and doesn't kill, but to those that haven't, think of Zooka's hitbox as not 3 projectiles circling around, but instead 2 hitboxes, one of those just being slightly larger than the other spinning around, and you'll have a rough idea.

I can't find the link to that graph so here's my bad recreation of the hitboxes in game.

As for Kraken and Triple Splashdown, these two would be specials I would want back but it's better if they stay in S3. Both are noble reworks in their own right but only highlight why these specials were problematic in the first place.

Full Rework Needed But Concept Should Return:

I want Tacticooler back. I really do. In my opinion though, it's too iconic to come back. This is S3's Bubbler/Kraken/Ink Armor. The kind of thing you need to run to be good and if you don't you're kneecapping yourself. Tacticooler still remains the most healthy of these options but it does take away your ability to run other stuff because it's cooler. Why wouldn't you run cooler?

Therefore I want a new special to take it's place using the same framework as cooler. How Nintendo would go about it I'm not sure but I really want this special back nonetheless in some way shape or form.

Needs One Change To Be Back:

These specials are not far off from being good.

Splattercolor Screen just needs a few tweaks for me. I know it's one change but it needs two. First is just get rid of the sizzling for accessibility. The second is remaking the gimmick entirely for this. Even if the sizzling was changed for a more muffled sound it'd still affect people who are sensitive to the sudden change in color, which I didn't even know could happen until brought up to me a few times, so for good measure I'm throwing it in the trash. I wanna still keep the idea of obscuring information intact, so I wanna opt for covering the edges of your screen with bubbles whenever you touch Splattercolor Screen. It'd be subtle, but it would remove your ability to see your health for the duration it's active, meaning you can still see everything that's going on, color and all, but if you move too quick, you can end up getting yourself splatted because you overestimated how much health you had. I think this would be a cool way of messing with your UI, as well as being a good extra measure for accessibility.

Many people would suggest that friendly Screens should be transparent and allow you to see through, but I actually like this aspect so I'm keeping it in this rework. The fact that neither team can see through screen is so cool to me because it allows your enemy to perform their own counterplay by taking advantage of what you blocked off. You can shark for opportunities, but they can do so as well, meaning if you're not careful you can end up getting splatted if a roller decides it wants you to play their game instead of yours. I know nobody really likes being griefed by this thing but I think this is necessary as a downside to allow counterplay, even if subtle.

Reefslider really just needs the endlag removed. It's as simple as that to make it naturally good. Right now it's ranked highly but that's mostly artificial because the radius is so damn large but if that was toned back along with giving it zero endlag, this would make it a healthy special. It can keep the 30 frames of endlag invincibility too because Triple Splashdown kinda has that built in upon landing with it due to the splashdowns covering everything.

Ultra Stamp just needs to block from the front. To alleviate this there should be a second hitbox active in front of the user, but it doesn't move up and down with the stamp to make sure it actually blocks shots. This would make it way easier to get value with and it wouldn't be instant death for attempting to use the rush mode of this thing.

Ink Vac I think is really cool, but it's a sitting duck when it gets stuck. Normally I'd be on the same camp of letting it cancel the shot but I'm gonna be a bit creative with this change. I wanna give the Ink Vac user infinite Ink Resistance while the suction is active, like an Inkbrush, so it has freedom to walk wherever. In addition I'm gonna remove the weight of Ink Vac and let it stack with Run Speed better. Many of you might not know this but once you hit a certain threshold in Ink Vac your jump height gets reduced significantly, and you can't jump over blocks. That should be gone.

Do Come Back:

These four specials I think are nice to have. Chumps and Wave Breaker are well designed, while Ink Storm went from a meh special to a really cool one with the healing change, but Wail is an outlier for this. It's a bit of a stretch, and a hear me out, but I think this is as close as we're gonna get to a good global special. While I much prefer the old Killer Wail 1.0 as in my opinion it's the most healthy of the global specials, Killer Wail 5.1 I think is as close as we're gonna get to that. The tracking is much forgiving in my eyes and unlike Tenta Missiles, they can only target up to 3 people, and don't waste your time. They make you start dodging instantly and are there for a short period, whereas missiles has a travel time and it makes you wait for them to get by so you can dodge them depending on where they were launched. Only change I ask is to make the beams deal 50% less damage to players who were not targeted by the attack. This change would prevent situations where you'd take evasive measures to guide the beams away from you but someone else would get caught in your crossfire and die for it. This does apply to other beams fired as well, so if you're being tracked by some wail beams, but someone else is also being tacked by beams, the damage you take from your teammates beams would be halved so they can continue dodging the beams while you also dodge the beams and have time to get out of your mate's beams.

Need You Back:

These specials are in my opinion, the best of the best. These should be in every Splatoon installment going forward. They're great to use, great for the game, and overall you really cannot go wrong with them. Really hope all 4 of these return because there's so much potential that these all have.

Well anyway that's my yapping over with. Really hopeful for the game going forward as I love the state of the game currently.

 

[isaac4]

This list is based more on my personal feelings which you can see from most of my placements here.
A special like Slider does have potential if it was reworked (despite already being a rework) but I don't trust the devs to pull it off so I don't want to see it again in any form which is why it's at the bottom.

No
Pretty self explanatory but I should explain some of the specials in this tier.
Stamp and Vac have interesting concepts but as I've said for Slider, I don't trust that the devs can take the concept of these specials and make them work for Splatoon 4.
There's some other choices in there which are less about being done right and more about the fact that I don't think we really need them again such as TSD and Kraken Royale. I don't mind them but I think the novelty of having these iconic S1 and S2 specials will wear off if they return again in the next game.

Major rework needed
All the specials in this tier are ones that I believe could have a second chance at either being better or being turned into a much healthier special.
Wave, Screen, and Wail are more obvious examples so the main thing I want to focus on here is Zooka.
I like the idea of having this simple bazooka special that lets you reposition and shoot at enemy players from far away with a shot that can be angled to hit around cover. The concept wasn't handled well in S3 though and the terrible map design has only made the issues of the special more prevalent.

Some changes needed
While I would like for both Inkjet and Super Chumps to come back, I think the state they're currently in isn't great and won't change in the next game if they come back exactly the same way.
For Inkjet specifically, I would want the special to have another form of movement in the air to help it deal with chargers and midlines that currently have an easy time picking it off.
Nothing big of course, a simple dash that has some endlag before being able to shoot again would be nice.

Would like
These are the two specials that I don't have a lot of strong feelings on but I do think that having them come back would be a good choice.
They're fine the way they are now and while Zip is a little more picky on which weapons it works best on, it's a fun special to use regardless of the kit.

Please
Lastly, Booyah and Crab are the two specials that I think need to return for S4.
Booyah Bomb is a very flexible and simple special that has been decent at worst throughout both S2 and S3 so I think it only makes sense that keeping it as an option would only help the chances of getting more decent kits despite the weird sub/special combinations that the Splatoon devs like to make.
Crab isn't as flexible as Booyah Bomb but it's an extremely well designed special that didn't get a chance to really show all the types of kit combinations it could work with.
It's only on 6 weapons with three of them being shooters and two of them being overshadowed by their vanilla kits.
It deserves to come back in a game that doesn't only have two kits per weapon and 19 specials.

 

[QuagSass]

I was gonna make a list myself, but turns out the only one I feel strongly about is the Wave Breaker. So I guess I'll talk about that.

I think Wavebreaker was done dirty by the weapons it got put on. Yes, the special is weak, oh so horrifically weak. But it's good at one thing: supporting the main weapon. It's good at locating people, giving the main it's attatched to valuable information. It's fast to deploy, letting the main instantly get back into the game with a full inktank. It can tank hits long enough for the main to recover from any endlag they might have.
Wavebreaker relies on the main to be good, so weapons that were already weak or weapons that needed something extra from their specials are not gonna like having it. So things like the Jr and Painbrush aren't going to like it. But already strong weapons like Range Blaster and E-liter thrived with it. Even now with CRB out, vRange still sees occasional use since Wavebreaker lets the main stick around longer.
But neither E-liter or Range make use of Wave's shielding abilities. And so we must turn our eyes to the one main that has perfect synergy with Wavebreaker. The Heavy Splatling.
Heavy as a main is plenty strong enough to deal with a weaker special, so giving it something more focused on enhancing the main was honestly genius. It also benefits from all the things that Wave brings to the table.
Location utility? It's a backline/midline anchor, it needs to know where it's enemies are.
Tank refill? Oh baby, long lasting pressure is Heavy's specialty and you just made it longer.
Miniature shield? It lasts long enough for Heavy to get partials going. Melee encounters are no longer an issue!
Heavy can even use the special's waves as a combo tool, drastically lowering it's TTK. Though this part is only a nice bonus rather than the main utility.

The way Heavy uses Wavebreaker should've been the gold standard for Wavebreaker kits. And surely the devs understood this, note how the kits I mentioned were good with Wave were all launch kits. I appreciate them experimenting with Wavebreaker on more unusual weapons, but I think it ended up hurting it's reputation more than it's overall weakness did. The special honestly needs some pretty minor buffs and it would be in the perfect spot. If any supportive special should return, it's this one.

I was gonna type something about Super Chumps too, I think it should also return for similar-ish reasons as Wavebreaker. But after writing the Wavebreaker part my brain kinda lost focus and kept thinking about Wavebreaker. So yeah. Maybe next time.