Hero Killers Are Useless

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Hero Killers Are Useless

#1 Post by Tehw00tz »

Like the topic says, heroes like Infiltrator, Swashy, Fenris, and Harpy have become increasingly useless in actual games. The way it seems is if you pick a right amount of support it doesn't even matter how much damage you do, you're going to lose based on the fact that you aren't buffing your creeps. This is mostly attributed to how ungodly bad these heroes do in the beginning phase. Most heroes can bide their time because they know that once level 30-level 40 rolls around they can easily start cleaning house (DW, AC, Oracle, RK, etc). The beginning of the game is a race for the hero killers to get as much stats and money as possible before these lane pushers/support heroes pull away from you because they are owning the control battle. Only one of these heroes has any means of getting a good amount of gold quickly, and that takes inf laying downs mines for a few minutes. Even getting a team of 4 support and 1 antihero completely destroys your chances, these antiheroes are basically played to how bad your opponent is, which is a horrible mechanism for a hero to work as (AoO/Swoop, anyone?). Once this experience difference begins to grow the hero killers cannot do that which they are supposed to anymore, which is fine if you're going intelligence on Harpy or Infiltrator, I guess. Heroes that can push lanes are a bigger part of the game because the hero killers have such a hard time getting to start and they easily fall behind after obs have been taken. Support heroes need not to spend their money on items for the most part, so they can just fortify their positions and not worry about anything happening. With recent updates to TC and BP they've become better (Which is not a bad thing), but it's made me realize that heroes with a focus on killing can barely do that, and even if they do get hero kills, you have to pump money into yourself to keep your nukes up, instead of helping the team out (building, mercing, etc). The whole killing heroes specifically thing becomes counter productive, while it may stop someone for 30 seconds, you're doing very little to helping your team out.
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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#2 Post by Discombobulator »

How do you reconcile that with viewtopic.php?f=12&t=1649 and viewtopic.php?f=12&t=1658 ?
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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#3 Post by Tehw00tz »

I don't know who he is but I know that he doesn't know what I know.
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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#4 Post by DarnYak »

Curious to see more comments on this, I'm about to sleep for now though.

Just a quick list of who we're talking about:

Swashy
Inf
Fenris
Harpy
Martyr
Incarnation? - Sort of, since he doesn't have that much spawn support or aoe, and was suppose to be more dangerous to heroes than he is currently

Harpy arguably doesnt belong on that list since she can go a support build with blade rain/blind. But by that measure more belong on there since they can go builds that focus more on pk'ing (Dwarf, Bane come to mind but I haven't even tried to go through the whole list)

Plus the other half of this discussion is that AoE heroes are often too good at pk'ing.

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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#5 Post by SuIIy »

heroes with a focus on killing can barely do that, and even if they do get hero kills, you have to pump money into yourself to keep your nukes up, instead of helping the team out (building, mercing, etc).
How is this a bad thing? You want to put all heroes into a one-size-fits-all category. Not all heroes need to hire, to support troops, to repair. Granted, all should contribute to the team beyond item upgrades. But seriously, hero killers have to focus on themselves more than others.
The way it seems is if you pick a right amount of support it doesn't even matter how much damage you do, you're going to lose based on the fact that you aren't buffing your creeps.
This is so wrong. I can't count the times I've seen a hero killer jump into a scene, dismantle the surrounding creeps, and slaughter the enemy hero (usually troop support) within seconds. Fenris can do this with Dire Howl, Swashy with ult and Dash, Harpy with Blind, Nephilim with Retaliate, Forlorn Martyr with Polarize/Thunderstrike, comon man...
This is mostly attributed to how ungodly bad these heroes do in the beginning phase. Most heroes can bide their time because they know that once level 30-level 40 rolls around they can easily start cleaning house
Yes, you're right. Most hero killers, melee in particular, have a distinct disadvantage early game. This is to offset the rate at which they are capable of killing other heroes. And to be fair, I'll admit some of the hero killers need some working...Harpy in particular is still weak imo and Swashy is still insanely powerful. Yak is planning to fix that so calm down and report complaints after?

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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#6 Post by Dekar »

Inf is on a list of useless heroes. :o

Non-PK heroes are indeed often not helpless when dealing with other heroes, as they have high damage and easy to hit ranged skills or good snares/stuns/heal/whatever support abilities.
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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#7 Post by SeasonsOfLove »

I completely disagree with this. Even if you think they are "useless", certain hero killers are incredibly useful in being able to harass enemy heroes, even if it's hard to get the actual kill. Swash is great at that, and is also great at chasing down enemy heroes to kill them. The Harpy may be "easy" to dodge when you're skilled, but you can still get swooped out of nowhere. I can't speak much to the other heroes here, because I haven't played a ton with or against them, but they are far from useless. Being able to harass the support/weak casters away from a lane can be just as effective as a kill. Just sayin'

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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#8 Post by Tehw00tz »

I'm posting about this from experience playing the past few weekends, so it's not like I'm making this up or anything.
How is this a bad thing? You want to put all heroes into a one-size-fits-all category. Not all heroes need to hire, to support troops, to repair. Granted, all should contribute to the team beyond item upgrades. But seriously, hero killers have to focus on themselves more than others.
I'm not saying they should be put into the same category, I'm saying that these heroes put your team at a distinct disadvantage for anything later than level 40. Hero killers focusing on themselves is a fault within the game, every hero should be constantly trying to take obs, fortify obs, secure bases, repair infrastructure, etc. Guess what PKers can't do because they are too busy spending money on themselves? These heroes pump money into themselves in the hopes that they kill more heroes and therefore help the team. The problem with this, as I've said earlier, is that they simply don't get the job done against competent teams. You're investing money into yourself and you're getting little to nothing back for it.
This is so wrong. I can't count the times I've seen a hero killer jump into a scene, dismantle the surrounding creeps, and slaughter the enemy hero (usually troop support) within seconds. Fenris can do this with Dire Howl, Swashy with ult and Dash, Harpy with Blind, Nephilim with Retaliate, Forlorn Martyr with Polarize/Thunderstrike, comon man...
The only one of these that has any grounds for being an actual build is Swashy using mockery and dash, and that'll do about 40 to 60 damage. I've never seen a Harpy use Blind while trying to be a relevant hero in the game. If you're playing Fenris as a PKer and you choose anything but lunge and hamstring you're doing it wrong. I said that these hero killers can't kill heroes, not that there aren't builds where they can be used to stop creeps
Being able to harass the support/weak casters away from a lane can be just as effective as a kill.
I'm glad someone tried to say this, because I didn't want to point it out. Almost ALL the "weak" casters have abilities that heal for 1000+ in the part of the game that PKers should thrive in. These heroes don't even scale well in the late game, the only one that comes close to scaling well is Swashy because he has two skills that can disarm people and give him a chance to do serious damage before they can bust off their heal and then fight back with an offensive spell, forcing you to run away.
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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#9 Post by DarnYak »

I'm posting about this from experience playing the past few weekends, so it's not like I'm making this up or anything.
To be fair, you've been mostly harpy (who we know is eternally broken in one way or another, hopefully her revamp will finally end that). And you've spent a good chunk of your time harrassing specific heroes in each game, ie that last Kedge game where you just kept killing Sparda over and over. To make it worse, jamn's usually with you on these endevaors, so when you have half of your team spending their time killing one of our heroes over and over its a pretty damn good deal for us in terms of time lost.
I'm saying that these heroes put your team at a distinct disadvantage for anything later than level 40.
I'm unclear on whether you are saying hero killers can't kill heroes past 40, or if you're saying they just end up helpless to impact the flow of battle.
Almost ALL the "weak" casters have abilities that heal for 1000+ in the part of the game that PKers should thrive in.
TC, AA, and Dryad are the only casters i can see approaching that amount. Dryad's doesn't self heal instantly, TC's front heal won't get that high, and AA can't self heal. Adding tank self heals into the mix you'll get Dwarf, SB, and possibly Reek. Dwarf's broken, Reek might be broken, and SB has a hard cap so has to actualy take level 6.

Relavent to this discussion I think is trying to figure out exactly what the role of hero killer should accomplish, beyond the obvious answer of killing heroes. The answer should obviously not be an endless stream of hero kills because that would just suck for the other players.

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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#10 Post by Tehw00tz »

I've played more games as Inf than Harpy, and an even amount of games as swashy/fenny as Harpy. This is more of a general problem, not a Harpy problem.
I'm unclear on whether you are saying hero killers can't kill heroes past 40, or if you're saying they just end up helpless to impact the flow of battle.
Essentially both, with the exception of mines being ready and harpy ult being off cooldown. I mean, I guess Fenris ult works on spawns, usually I just get dream run instead.
AA can't self heal
Familiar root and mass haste pretty much gets you away 90% of the time. SB can just decoy out of bad situations anyway.
Relavent to this discussion I think is trying to figure out exactly what the role of hero killer should accomplish, beyond the obvious answer of killing heroes. The answer should obviously not be an endless stream of hero kills because that would just suck for the other players.
That isn't what I want, because, yes, that would blow. It just seems like all the later level buffs can outweigh much of anything these heroes can do. Maybe it's because I'm so used to playing HoN, which has a level 25 level cap and late game is dictated by the pace of the 'carry' heroes you pick. It seems like the hero killers don't exactly thrive in any stage of an EotA game, which makes them seem out of place and useless sometimes.
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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#11 Post by DarnYak »

Familiar root and mass haste pretty much gets you away 90% of the time. SB can just decoy out of bad situations anyway.
So should we be talking about escape mechanisms, which are far more widespread, and not just those that can heal? And/or 'fuck off' moves to give certain heroes breathing space (ie Vengence)

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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#12 Post by Tehw00tz »

Honestly I'm not sure which is more of an issue for these heroes to deal with. Most of them just have one move and if it didnt work you better hope you can autoattack the hero down before they A. Escape B. Heal or C. Turn around and fuck you up.
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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#13 Post by Mills »

Interesting topic.

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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#14 Post by Dekar »

Healer on a team can reduce the impact of PK heroes A LOT, with Dryade being the most annoying healer for she can root you, knock you back while dealing good damage, instantly heal other heroes and heal herself for a lot. AA probably comes to a close second in terms of annoyance but cant heal herself at least.

All the good healers have 2+ escape skills and can also deal large amounts of AoE damage and thats just too much.
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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#15 Post by SuIIy »

TC, AA, and Dryad are the only casters i can see approaching that amount. Dryad's doesn't self heal instantly, TC's front heal won't get that high, and AA can't self heal. Adding tank self heals into the mix you'll get Dwarf, SB, and possibly Reek. Dwarf's broken, Reek might be broken, and SB has a hard cap so has to actualy take level 6.
Bane's Encouragement and Fugly's Eat Tree both top 700 hp self heal.

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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#16 Post by DarnYak »

Healer on a team can reduce the impact of PK heroes A LOT
To be fair that is their purpose, beyond the fact that by its nature you end up discussion situations as a 2v1 since most of them focus heals on others. I don't really want to use some RPS comparision where AoE is killed by PK who is stopped by Heal who is ineffective against AoE but it does sort of apply.

I'm wondering if Swashy is really lumped into the rest of these heroes in terms of both effectiveness in pk'ing and effectiveness in the overall game (I dont feel he is, others may dissagree). If he's different, the main reason I can see for that is all of his skills are dual use - dash is movement+damage, pilfer is stun+extra random item effect, demo blow is damage+aoe debuff, mockery is aoe disable. Only Keen Blade stands out and it's useful for killing spawns as well.

Compared to the other heroes, they all have distinct pk spells vs support spells. Inf mines sort of stand out from this, as does all aoe damage effects. Dwarf, if going a pk build, also sort of stands out with his stun also reducing evoc (and thus negating aoe abilities), and an AoE effect.

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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#17 Post by Dekar »

Its always easier to run away than to chase, and when you add healers with 2 disable skills each to both sides it wont make killing heroes any easier.

But the balance is fucked anyway since everybody always plays AP games, there is worse stuff to care about like double air or Ember + Inf or proably just taking every healer in the game on a team. :P
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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#18 Post by Tehw00tz »

The thing about swashy is he is the best at PKing, but the worst at actual lane control. What he lacks in AoE he makes up for with two disables, a critical, and a nuke.
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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#19 Post by jamn455 »

I would like to say that Swashy is the only useful late game hero killer because mockery last a very long time in a pretty big AoE to stop creep waves, critical strike snowballs late game, and dash can somewhat kill waves over time, but when you nerfed the amount of gold per hero kill, you effectively nerfed hero killers for the entire game when they weren't really useful after a certain point anyway. The way I see it, hero killers such as inf and harpy are most effective at level 27, when you have your main skills maxed and probably like rogue gloves +5 and possibly flute of the winds or agi rings, but the longer the game goes, the less useful you get, the more you have to chase certain squishy heroes around which with the hero kill system nets you less gold for killing the same squishy targets over and over again. Whilst hunting down these heroes you aren't in lane gaining experience like all of the AoE heavy heroes and tanks so you fall further and further behind in that regard as well.

So the way I see it, you hit level 27, and your use in the team slowly starts to diminish after that other than their ultimates.
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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#20 Post by Mandein »

I'd like to say pkers are great, because they are fun to play (when successful). However, AoE gets more gold per minute by killing off all the mobs then pkers trying so valiantly to finish off a hero. And AoE doesn't miss any of the experience from mob deaths.
With this gold and mob support it is easy enough to get the crystal you might lack from hero kills by controlling the obs and getting generators. Pkers are probably more useful on the smaller maps where crystal is determined by hero kills (even Kedge's for dominating the moontear and the Falls to some extent for removing opposing heroes from the altars/shrines).


PS: Has anyone else noticed that you seem to get more experience from the uppermost and bottom most lanes then in other lanes (Peak) or am I just imagining?
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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#21 Post by Tehw00tz »

Mandein wrote: (even Kedge's for dominating the moontear and the Falls to some extent for removing opposing heroes from the altars/shrines).
Actually, this map creates a giant mismatch for PKers especially. Essentially the lanes should be 2 and 2, 1 and 3, or 2 and 3, always having more heroes in the moontear lane. You cannot PK heroes in a fight with more than one of them there, it just wont happen. The support heroes can easily help each other out and make you lose out on a kill and possibly kill you instead. Along with their buffs and creep heals they can keep the lane pushed past the moontear, allowing them to grab it more easily.
Now, killing heroes that hold the moontear is a different thing all together, I have yet to see a team's coherent response to someone taking the moontear. The only coordinated attack I've seen for sniping heroes with a moontear has been me and jamn utilizing both flying heroes to take the hero out, get the tear, and get away. (We lost that game in about 30 minutes anyway) But this is a different mechanic all together and should be discussed elsewhere.
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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#22 Post by DarnYak »

when you nerfed the amount of gold per hero kill, you effectively nerfed hero killers for the entire game when they weren't really useful after a certain point anyway
This actually raises an interesting point. I'm not willing to conceed it was in itself a wrong decision, because a few early kills had far too much benefit and its at a stage in the game where even aoe heros can't really farm gold themselves, but I am willing to agree it might be too low now. Further, since we're discussing this I do wonder if the current cap is also too low. It would be easy to change it to something like capping out at 600g at 25 instead of the curent 400g at 15 (or whatever else may be appropriate), espeicaly since later game aoe heroes can easily slaughter entire waves for good chunks of gold.

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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#23 Post by Discombobulator »

You should abolish tower cores, since everyone "has to" use them.
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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#24 Post by Mandein »

Discombobulator wrote:You should abolish tower cores, since everyone "has to" use them.
You should abolish heroes, since everyone "has to" use them.
and I'm not talking about the merc heroes in the tavern idc about those.

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Re: Hero Killers Are Useless

#25 Post by DarnYak »

Discombobulator wrote:You should abolish tower cores, since everyone "has to" use them.
I think you put this troll in the wrong thread =P

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