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Ways to Improve Sting Ray?

Spaceswitchmars

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This joke would've worked better as a one-off, but at this point you're over-extending.
What if Ray were also a beam of pure energy who could shoot through walls, but you moved slower? You could see the enemies through walls as well -- even while shooting. Ray will let you cancel out of the special whenever you want (in case enemies approach). Would you like Ray more then?

"Nice shooting, SquidBud! You got him right through that wall!"

Thanks, Ray!
 

Cyndane

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Please stay on topic. The focus of this thread was serious and warrants real discussion. A little joking now and then is fine, but try to to keep it to a minimum unless it truly adds to the discussion at hand. Overextending jokes borders on spam.

For non-serious discussions, there are plenty off-topic threads in the Crispy Calamari. Thanks.
 

Spaceswitchmars

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Please stay on topic. The focus of this thread was serious and warrants real discussion. A little joking now and then is fine, but try to to keep it to a minimum unless it truly adds to the discussion at hand. Overextending jokes borders on spam.

For non-serious discussions, there are plenty off-topic threads in the Crispy Calamari. Thanks.
Hey, sorry if I made anyone mad. I had some real ideas in there that I buried in jokes. I thought it was more fun that way. Apparently not.

No harm meant, and I'll try to reign in outside the box thinking and posting until you guys get to know me better.

"Good looking out, pal!"
 

the

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I honestly think one of the most important things is that a target is slowed or knocked back when hit, like what happens with pretty much any other weapon. Even if aim speed is improved, anything short of 1-to-1 aiming will hold the weapon back as long as ppl can dash through it without consequence. There's no reason to be afraid of it unless u are particularly careless.
 

Spaceswitchmars

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What if it was a laser when you hold down shoot but a melee sword when you tap it? That way you can defend yourself when someone comes close?

Balance it by making it break out of the special if you score a melee splat (it's a single hit splat, though). That way people can't charge in and melee wipe a team. It's more for defensive purposes.

*You're doing well... hold back the urge to make a Ray the Friendly Sting Ray joke...*

And that's it. Could be cool. Nothing else after this.

"You did it, friend!"

*Crap...*
 
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Flygon109

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Here's an idea I don't think has been mentioned yet but what if the sting ray put a small puddle of ink (around rapid blaster size) underneath your target. This will make it harder to dodge and force better players to splatters dash in order to escape allowing your rebates to pick of the running enemies.
 

Luminario

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I think that instead of adjusting the regular weapon itself you should be able to throw it as a Steelhead bomb. It offers more variety in battles than simply changing the beam size or turn speed and allows you to simply throw it away to continue covering turf elsewhere as it explodes. To balance it they could then give it the same warnings as the regular Steelhead bomb, with the sound effect and the drawn out exploding animation, and could become weaker the longer the special gauge goes down, where throwing it right away gives it Steelhead bomb range but throwing it at the last second makes it no larger than a burst bomb.
 

the

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Increasing its size/ability to spread ink would def be a welcome change, kinda getting back to the thing i said earlier about the ppl being targeted having too much mobility and therefore usually not being intimidated by it.

Other ideas for buffing the stingray: change it completely, just make it so ur squid looses phantamanta upon the map.
 

Spaceswitchmars

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Imagine the sting ray combined with the "throw" mechanic from Arms. You hold down shoot to use the sting ray how it's always used, but if the ray is very close to someone, you can hold down the L shoulder button, and the ray turns into an actual sting ray that wraps its body around the enemy squidkid, and you can (non-lethally) pick up the squidkid and drop it anywhere on the map (by controlling the forward/back/left/right movement with your left and right sticks). The limiting factor here is that once you sing ray grab someone, it drains the special even quicker, so you may not be able to get the enemy player where you want it in time.

You also wouldn't be able to move your character at all while in grab mode, and it only grabs one player at a time (in cases where two or more players are right next to each other). The player caught in the grab is invincible while encased in the sting ray grab (so you can't lift someone off the ground and have your team shoot that player in the air).

This could be very good for tower. Although, I'd make the RM holder immune to its grab powers (but not the ray when it's in shooting mode and not grabbing mode).
 

Ulk

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Very sensitive topic. One false change, and with its range that passes through the entire map it could easily be broken. I would begin by slowly increasing its mobility with each patch by a minimal margin just to see how much it helps people handing this special. Perhaps also allowing them to trace inklings for a longer time and keep increasing that time with each patch as well by an extremely slow margin. We have so many patches coming up.They can easily use this to slowly and carefully approach the buff without taking one step too far.
 

sammich

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Being able to use a sub would help a lot, if someone gets close to you, you wouldn't be as helpless. Although the special IS meant to be used at a long range.
being able to use a sub would be good, along with a reticle.

tbh i like the stingray close to how it is, with it MOSTLY being useful for pushing/protecting the objective, and i've had a lot of success with it. my REAL problem with it is that special functionality up (or whatever it's called) increases the duration rather than beam size or aiming speed. duration up with the stingray is almost a detriment. you only really need it for a little bit to push a few dudes out of key areas and maybe pick up a splat or two.

anyway, rather than buffing it too hard, i think other specials inkjet deserves a heavy nerf....
 

Spaceswitchmars

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being able to use a sub would be good, along with a reticle.

tbh i like the stingray close to how it is, with it MOSTLY being useful for pushing/protecting the objective, and i've had a lot of success with it. my REAL problem with it is that special functionality up (or whatever it's called) increases the duration rather than beam size or aiming speed. duration up with the stingray is almost a detriment. you only really need it for a little bit to push a few dudes out of key areas and maybe pick up a splat or two.

anyway, rather than buffing it too hard, i think other specials inkjet deserves a heavy nerf....
Agreed... and not being able to quit out of it when we want is a punishment, which makes special up worse than useless -- it's actually a bad thing.
 

Elecmaw

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Very sensitive topic. One false change, and with its range that passes through the entire map it could easily be broken. I would begin by slowly increasing its mobility with each patch by a minimal margin just to see how much it helps people handing this special. Perhaps also allowing them to trace inklings for a longer time and keep increasing that time with each patch as well by an extremely slow margin. We have so many patches coming up.They can easily use this to slowly and carefully approach the buff without taking one step too far.
I personally think the opposite, give it a strong buff just to see where it ends up in the meta. Sure there's a chance next patch it'll get broken, but once the devs know at what point it is OP and at what point it is UP they have a much better idea on how to balance it properly next time around.

I don't want it to get stuck in limbo for the next 7 patches until it eventually becomes useable.
 

Ulk

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I personally think the opposite, give it a strong buff just to see where it ends up in the meta. Sure there's a chance next patch it'll get broken, but once the devs know at what point it is OP and at what point it is UP they have a much better idea on how to balance it properly next time around.

I don't want it to get stuck in limbo for the next 7 patches until it eventually becomes useable.
I'd have to completely disagree with that. If there is one thing they have rarely managed to do properly it's nerfing. Especially with a weapon that can so easily get out of control this is an absolute no-go. Perhaps it would be a solution if it was entirely underwhelming, but it isn't. Extremely skilled players make far better use of it than automatic specials like Tenta Missles. We have the time right now and we have plenty of patches to come. There is no reason to take the risk of making this weapon an absolute game changer during a period where the game is already released.
 

Nuddlmaus

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The reticle is heavily needed, the point is, as more as i play i more and more encounter players who can wield it very good and effective, even in turfwar.

I still think the problem lies in the handling, without reticle its hard to get use to... if they would add it more people would give a try and learn how to wield it properly.

Its not a weapon for anyone for sure but it could find more users if they could get into.
 

Miyako

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I think they should do one little change at a time to test the waters so as to not make it insane. Just faster turning time would already make it pretty good imo, maybe also make it a little more powerful, but the stingrays the enemies use in salmon run show how much better fast tracking makes it so I would just try that first, but who knows what Nintendo will do.
 
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redbunnyer

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being able to use a sub would be good, along with a reticle.

tbh i like the stingray close to how it is, with it MOSTLY being useful for pushing/protecting the objective, and i've had a lot of success with it. my REAL problem with it is that special functionality up (or whatever it's called) increases the duration rather than beam size or aiming speed. duration up with the stingray is almost a detriment. you only really need it for a little bit to push a few dudes out of key areas and maybe pick up a splat or two.

anyway, rather than buffing it too hard, i think other specials inkjet deserves a heavy nerf....
I think it would be great if special up increased beam size. Would make that ability and the Sting Ray more viable.
 

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