Look, this is like the 79th argument over shooters we've had at this point, this is my last contribution
Is there some kind of shooter bias in the balance? Yes, most likely. Were all the mobility buffs necessary? No. Do they need to be reversed? I don't think so. Shooters having great mobility isn't that big an issue imo, it allows for a lot of skill expression in their movement and makes weapons like splash feel really fluid, I think they're fine.
I honestly think stuff like splattershot is totally fine as a main weapon, the problem just lies with zooka now. The main issue was simply that shot got an unecessary buff in its pfs, then they overbuffed zooka, and then the weapon could just rely on zooka spam in order to win, even at high levels, which felt extra annoying to fight. I'd guess that if vac got the same treatment as zooka and became meta tomorrow, jet squelcher would be insufferable because it's 180p, it's the same problem.
But at this point, I agree with this:
The thing is, you shouldn't buff or nerf things based on theory, you should buff or nerf based on results.
The issue with 52 and squeezer is that they are overtuned as heck as main weapons.
52 has an extremely quick kill time, good range, good paint, good ink efficiency, good mobility, and its 'weaknesses' are a lower fire rate, which is made up for in spades by the damage, and isn't even bad, and relatively high shot deviation, which I'd argue
1: is just bad weapon design, though that's beside the point,
2: is completely unreliable to counter, you just have to cross your fingers that the rng is on your side, and even then its fire rate is solid
3: is not that noticeable and only starts kicking in once the gal shoots for a long time, swimming in ink gets rid of that weakness almost entirely, and that's not a difficult thing to learn
Wall as a sub also invalidates so many matchups (blasters, rollers, sloshers, brellas, even splatanas), and when you factor in its good ink efficiency, it can effectively spam it. If you don't have the mobility to get away from its range once it set up its wall, you're effectively dead. If you don't have a bomb to threaten the wall weapon, they can just set up for free
I don't like the argument that 52 is brain dead or a "free" weapon because splatoon as a game just has so much depth that every weapon requires a lot of skill to consistently win. But 52 is just easier than every other top tier weapon in the game. You can get away with a lot of mistakes because of mobility/wall/fast kill time, while your opponents have to be very careful fighting you because any of their mistakes get insta punished.
The difference between shot and 52 is that shot is picked to spam its special, while 52 is picked to fight you. The shot won't be as good at fighting as the more demanding weapons, so you can take advantage of that. You can't with 52, it's just as good if not better at fighting than most weapons in the game, while being relatively easy to use.
Squeezer I have
slightly less of a problem with because it's much harder than 52, but this weapon is also blatantly overtuned
You have ridiculous range, great mobility, perfect accuracy, good damage, as fast a fire rate as your fingers can allow, and even a paint mode if you need to paint a bit for yourself.
This is just a death laser, it's ridiculous, it has virtually no weaknesses you can exploit. It's got worse paint and ink efficiency but those don't make the weapon less good at fighting, so these nerfs don't really matter.
They've been meta in
2 games in a row, and no, that's not just because "Oh Chara said it lol", in that tierlist, jared from jackpot, the literal world champions, insisted that 52 was top tier. Go listen to top teams, go look at area cup comps, go look at top 500 takaroka div. All of them agree 52 and squeezer are top tier and most of them think it's a problem.
When they've been meta 2 games in a row I do find it annoying that nintendo is
extremely reluctant to give them any nerfs at all, it's infuriating, I think they should both get a lower fire rate, especially squeezer for accessibility's sake, or less range, or both.
And yes, there will always be a best weapon in the game, but I think the game is most fun to watch and play when the best weapons are very difficult and require a lot of skill. Obviously stamper does that well, and pencil doesn't. The game is more fun when the players using top tiers can make mistakes and get punished for it in game. To play them well, you should need to be very consistent at them, to learn their intricacies.
The game is more fun when top players use weapons that I couldn't dream of playing as well, which I can't say about 52. 52 deserves to be good, but players that use more difficult, more demanding weapons should not be completely outclassed by this one weapon.
I am so done talking about 52 lmao
