Plight
Posted: May 25th, 2009, 9:51 pm
I am aware that there are a million threads about Plight and fliers in general, including ones made recently, but I feel like there should particularly be a Conclave thread about Plight.
Plight, as he is, is anywhere from very strong to completely imbalanced depending on who's asking and who's playing. There's a lot of "issues" with his design in general which make him particularly strong.
1. He flies. Flying provides a lot of innate benefits:
a. no collision: he can't be trapped by creeps.
b. free pathing: there is no untreadable terrain.
c. displaced position: AoE targetted spells are more difficult to hit due to you needing to target the shadow as opposed to the model.
d. cannot be hit by certain skills: can't be targetted by ground-only skills unless netted.
e. undisrupted line of sight: it's impossible to use ramps and trees to your advantage when running.
2. He's STR. This, coupled with the following, make him benefit greatly from stat gains.
a. he flies: the fact he's a STR flyer automatically makes him extremely difficult to kill.
b. his best basic skills are all STR dependent: pumping STR into him not only increases survivability on a hero that is ridiculously difficult to kill, but also makes him much more powerful.
c. he doesn't actually need items: even if you don't get items, your STR gain by itself is enough keep you alive in the front lines.
3. His skill set is very strong. It'd be great on a non-flying hero, but on a flier it's just ridiculous.
a. Aberration: as of right now, the only natural counter to Aberration is Rend Soul, which happens to belong to a hero who's on the same team as him. Apparently the Bloat talent also makes it damage towers.
b. Terra Smash: it deals a large amount of damage, slows, and hits everything but fliers.
c. Ravenous Dive: absolutely ridiculous if you buy Zephyr Totem.
d. Stone Gaze: not so great, but if you go Smash+Dive, a point in Stone Gaze makes it that much harder to run away.
e. Ult (forgot name): absolutely ridiculous damage on heroes and buildings alike. It doesn't have that low of a cooldown (less than Icespinner's it seems) yet it takes towers down to 50% in a cast.
All in all, Plight's utility is a bit too much. He can push, he can PK, and he can siege. You can really build him however you want and still own, because it's nearly impossible to kill a decent Plight. On Stormwail, where there's plenty of cliffs, his ultimate is next to impossible to interrupt, and because channeling AoE spells don't give sight, towers won't even target him. In general, heroes with strong damaging abilities have limited vitality, making them a risk to play, but Plight is the perfect exception.
IMO, a good fix would be to either make him an INT hero and keep everything else the same, or keep him a STR and make his primary damage spells get boosted by AGI or INT. Thoughts?
Plight, as he is, is anywhere from very strong to completely imbalanced depending on who's asking and who's playing. There's a lot of "issues" with his design in general which make him particularly strong.
1. He flies. Flying provides a lot of innate benefits:
a. no collision: he can't be trapped by creeps.
b. free pathing: there is no untreadable terrain.
c. displaced position: AoE targetted spells are more difficult to hit due to you needing to target the shadow as opposed to the model.
d. cannot be hit by certain skills: can't be targetted by ground-only skills unless netted.
e. undisrupted line of sight: it's impossible to use ramps and trees to your advantage when running.
2. He's STR. This, coupled with the following, make him benefit greatly from stat gains.
a. he flies: the fact he's a STR flyer automatically makes him extremely difficult to kill.
b. his best basic skills are all STR dependent: pumping STR into him not only increases survivability on a hero that is ridiculously difficult to kill, but also makes him much more powerful.
c. he doesn't actually need items: even if you don't get items, your STR gain by itself is enough keep you alive in the front lines.
3. His skill set is very strong. It'd be great on a non-flying hero, but on a flier it's just ridiculous.
a. Aberration: as of right now, the only natural counter to Aberration is Rend Soul, which happens to belong to a hero who's on the same team as him. Apparently the Bloat talent also makes it damage towers.
b. Terra Smash: it deals a large amount of damage, slows, and hits everything but fliers.
c. Ravenous Dive: absolutely ridiculous if you buy Zephyr Totem.
d. Stone Gaze: not so great, but if you go Smash+Dive, a point in Stone Gaze makes it that much harder to run away.
e. Ult (forgot name): absolutely ridiculous damage on heroes and buildings alike. It doesn't have that low of a cooldown (less than Icespinner's it seems) yet it takes towers down to 50% in a cast.
All in all, Plight's utility is a bit too much. He can push, he can PK, and he can siege. You can really build him however you want and still own, because it's nearly impossible to kill a decent Plight. On Stormwail, where there's plenty of cliffs, his ultimate is next to impossible to interrupt, and because channeling AoE spells don't give sight, towers won't even target him. In general, heroes with strong damaging abilities have limited vitality, making them a risk to play, but Plight is the perfect exception.
IMO, a good fix would be to either make him an INT hero and keep everything else the same, or keep him a STR and make his primary damage spells get boosted by AGI or INT. Thoughts?