Stealth jump dominance

[Vidknight]

When it comes to primary gear abilities Headgear and Clothing have pretty diverse options for the primary ability. Headgear got LDE, CB and even though its more niche OG the only bad ability being tenacity. As for clothing Ninja squid, Respawn punisher, Thermal ink, and Haunt are a bit more niche, but they still have their uses. This is not even getting into the abilities that are not gear exclusive so all in all Headgear and Clothing have a lot of options. Now what about footwear? Great question now lets see you have stealth jump... and that's it. Footwear abilities are heavily lacking since 99% of the time you're running SJ sometime there are exceptions like object shredder on some weapons and drop roller on ONE weapon in the game (Maybe 2, but nobody plays annaki nova so truth be told I'm not sure). SJ in so integral for so many weapons.

Now why is this? Simply SJ hiding your jump marker allows you to not only make safer jumps back into the fights, but also makes you faster in a way. Not faster as in jump speed being increased, but faster as in you can make jump toward players who are further ahead and as such spend less time needing to paint and swim back into position. While Object shredder has it uses and is a pretty decent ability if the enemy team has no objects than the ability is just pretty useless while SJ is just flexible in every situation. Meanwhile drop roller just get outclassed by SJ in every single way except for vanilla ballpoint.

So you might be reading this and think "just nerf SJ" and while on paper it might be a good idea in practice it would be a pretty bad idea. If let say we give SJ back its jumping penalty it won't decrease the usage for stealth jump it would just mean you might need 2 subs of QSJ instead of the usual 1 or we still only run 1 and just have an ability that feel slightly worse to use. All in all SJ would still be one of the best footwear ability. It has been since Splatoon 1 and it would most likely remain that way unless there are some major changes.

AND MAJOR CHANGES I WILL DO. So the idea I have is not really my idea I got it from a certain somebody with a mewtwo PFP and ever since then I felt like this is the best way of allowing for more diversity in footwear primary abilities while still having SJ in the game. Basically remove the ability and just make SJ an ability that everybody has by default SJ had been required for a majority of weapons for the entire series so by making it apart of your character naturally means that now everybody has one free main slot that can do a lot (While we're at it maybe IRU, QSJ, and SS as well).

Now for the ability to replace SJ it should be bomb sniffer an ability that was pretty decent in splatoon 1 as it allowed for players to quickly locate bombs and watch out for it and also tone down the splash damage reduction slightly since there ain't really any bomb rushes that players would need to worry about. OS is perfectly fine and with the SJ changes allow for more weapons to run it and also serves as a indirect nerf to splashwall. DR needs some buffs so I'm thinking of increasing the RSU, SSU, and IRU durations by about 1 second as it would serve as a way for players to use that speed to quickly get into position.

But this is just my thoughts. Do you agree?, disagree?, have any changes you would or wouldn't make? Please let me know because while I do love SJ I always felt that it pretty much just dominates the entire footwear category and leave no room.

 

[DzNutsKong]

I dunno man, I'm really not a fan of Bomb Sniffer. The reduced damage from bombs is something I don't like for making combos and stuff feel arbitrarily less consistent vs some people (and I don't like Sub Defense for that reason) and the location thing completely screws over Ink Mines while feeling like a band-aid solution for random bomb deaths. Should we really make a main-exclusive ability whose main point is "you'll die to random bombs less" or should we do something else to make those happen less? Maybe make them glow super bright before they explode so you can be aware of them around corners?

Otherwise not as much to say as I don't feel super strongly about this topic. I think there's plenty of gear freedom as is in this game and think Stealth Jump is very healthy for the game so I'd be fine either way as long as it's not completely axed in Splatoon 4.

 

[Vidknight]

I dunno man, I'm really not a fan of Bomb Sniffer. The reduced damage from bombs is something I don't like for making combos and stuff feel arbitrarily less consistent vs some people (and I don't like Sub Defense for that reason) and the location thing completely screws over Ink Mines while feeling like a band-aid solution for random bomb deaths. Should we really make a main-exclusive ability whose main point is "you'll die to random bombs less" or should we do something else to make those happen less? Maybe make them glow super bright before they explode so you can be aware of them around corners?

Truth be told only reason I really chose bomb sniffer was because I wanted to have something replacement stealth jump and I didn't have any ideas about footwear abilities so I just chose the only one that didn't really come back at all. Although I am perfectly fine with removing the reduce damage and making bombs more noticeable via glowing.

Otherwise not as much to say as I don't feel super strongly about this topic. I think there's plenty of gear freedom as is in this game and think Stealth Jump is very healthy for the game so I'd be fine either way as long as it's not completely axed in Splatoon 4.

That was my idea stealth jump is great for the game and I don't want to see it axed at all since it would just lead to a game that feels worse. The main reason why I went with this idea was because I feel that having one extra main slot for abilities would do wonders on some weapons like brella or nova which is pretty gear dependent

 

[isaac4]

So the idea I have is not really my idea I got it from a certain somebody with a mewtwo PFP and ever since then I felt like this is the best way of allowing for more diversity in footwear primary abilities while still having SJ in the game. Basically remove the ability and just make SJ an ability that everybody has by default SJ had been required for a majority of weapons for the entire series so by making it apart of your character naturally means that now everybody has one free main slot that can do a lot (While we're at it maybe IRU, QSJ, and SS as well).

Wow, that sounds like a pretty smart idea.
Shout-out to whoever that guy with the Mewtwo pfp is!


Jokes aside, my thoughts on the concept of having SJ be a part of how regular jumps work without being limited to a gear ability haven't changed.
SJ isn't bad for the game but I don't think gear building should be restricted to needing it as one of your main ability slots anymore.
It's basically a requirement for almost every weapon in the game and the disadvantages that come with not having it are too big to ignore.
Despite the gear ability system seemingly being designed so that players are able to change up the way they use their weapons to better fit their playstyle, SJ doesn't feel like it's a part of that.

You could argue that this might just open a door to other problems but I still think this is something that should be experimented with in Splatoon 4. I also really want to see what this change does for other shoe-exclusive abilities like Object Shredder and Drop Roller.
Now that they aren't completely outclassed by Stealth Jump, how useful do they really end up being?
Of course, Nintendo would probably not do any of this but it's an interesting thought.

 

[OnePotWonder]

There are a few things that the Splatoon community universally agrees on, and I’m pretty much certain that making the effects of commonly-ran utility subs default is one of them. Faster super jumps by default, more buffer time before enemy ink damages and slows a player, bombs dealing less damage by default (that last one might just be me). Opens up more gear slots for players to use as they please for a majority of builds.

Stealth Jump is not a utility sub; it’s a utility main. I think the best way to go about it is to give all players a nerfed version of stealth jump by default, with double the detection radius, then keep the gear ability as an option to gain the full effect. Either way we need a new footwear main-exclusive ability. Not sure if Bomb Sniffer is the best choice, maybe Cold Blooded could be reworked into one (assuming we remove Sub Defense Up as well, which seems like a gimme in this case).

 

[C-53]

As someone who would not mind all lethal bombs being powered down a hair, bomb sniffer seems really cool. It would be an interesting situational pick in game 2-3 against teams that bring 3-4 lethal bombs.
For the sake of fun, an alternative to adding something new might be to split IA into two abilities (one for the aim stuff, and one for the movement stuff), and make each one more powerful.
The movement ability would be a natural fit for footwear-exclusive. Making it more powerful would be easy if it had just one more capability on top of the roll and the surge, like faster standing jumps, a submerged direction-change mechanic, or little fireworks that come out during squid party.