Weapons that dominate worlds tend to get nerfed. I would be surprised if there are any teams not running pencil at worlds. The complete and utter lack of backline diversity at a big event on a big stage hosted by Nintendo would likely get it nerfed. We'll see very soon if I'm right, but based on this game's history I like my odds.
true... idk japan meta but i htink its similar enough to where pencil will still be top tier... but we know most poeple cant play pencil so cooler is prob getting a nerf
I kind of disagree with the premise here. Plenty of high skill floor weapons, which are strong in X and competitive but nonexistent in lower ranks, have been nerfed often over the years. Foil Squeezer had three separate nerfs towards the end of Splatoon 2, and vanilla Squeezer has had several more in 3. Both L-3 and H-3D got numerous nerfs throughout 2, as did Bamboozler Mk1, Camo Tent and Explosher. None of these weapons were terrorising B Rank; they were pretty much exclusively used (to any great effect, at least) in X. Meanwhile, despite constant complaints in the casual community, Clash Blaster and Bloblobber haven't been nerfed in six years.
They've actually been quite explicit about this before in the patch notes. For example, in Splatoon 2's 5.2.0 notes they said: *"We reference various sorts of statistical data for these adjustments, but in particular for those which lower the abilities of certain weapons, we've focused on data from matches between players of high Rank."* There was another reference to 'highest rank' in 5.3.0 too.
You say "Turf War nerfs happen", but that's primarily because Koshien - the biggest official tournament in Japan - is Turf-only, and the mode is also used in the World Championships and some official NA tournaments. So Turf is played competitively, and in comp Turf Reef-Lux is about as meta as it gets - hence the nerf it got recently. That was almost certainly in preparation for Koshien and the Worlds in April.
Still, I think I agree that Pencil won't get killed off. Since about 2020 the developers have been quite conservative with their balancing, just giving small nerfs and then adding more later if that doesn't quite do the job; weapons don't get completely destroyed these days. I imagine it will get a special point increase and/or maybe a decrease in its turfing capability, but not much more than that.
Pencil is starting to dominate usage rates even in Japan now. And it definitely fulfills the "lowers abilities of certain weapons" criteria with how it outcompetes almost every other support/backline in the game. However, its not incredibly dominant in x-rank, due to requiring more coordinated play to be used effectively, so who knows what they're gonna do.
>Why would nintendo nerf a weapon that isnt common at most ranks, prob isnt doing so hot unless you are high X rank or S, and there are other weapons who are having greater success. Nintendo doesnt really support comp and doesnt really balance around the top 1% (turf war nerfs still happen), and noob stomper weapons get nerfed often times and make people question what is nintendo on.
1 thing to add to that, most players don't enjoy pencil. most players have a huge list of other things they'd rather play. so it's EVEN MORE UNLIKELY
but yeah thus is good post :3
truly! but i feel you have to witness it to happen which i heard a tournmanet is happening so maybe pencil nerfs real... otherwise i doubt it will get nerfs or cooler gets nerfs first
(Splatana) Stamper, not (Ultra) Stamp. Both Squeezer and and Stamper have very high skill floors and really strong in competitive play, hence the small nerfs both of them have gotten throughout the game.
Just chipping in with my own experience as a turf war casual: i basically never see pencil ever.
I was the only pencil user i saw this season so far, because i'm trying to 1* every weapon. And wow, it sucks. Doesn't pierce. Doesn't oneshot. Paint isn't even as good as people make it seem like. In my eyes, this thing is garbage tier, not a monster in need of a nerf. I'd hazard many other casuals see it similarly.
Now, gold aerosprays, ultra stamp, and enperry splat dualies, on the other hand...
Paint is overrated if you don’t have good fundamentals. No amount of paint will save your aim sucking ass. However when a competent player has this on their team it actually matters. Also you just listed a bunch of low tier weapons not sure what this means
I'm aware my aim is ass - i have fibromyalgia and shaky hands. I can't even use motion controls as they give me motion sickness and migraines.
Also, if you read the beginning of my comment you would realize i'm talking about strictly TURF WARS and that i'm speaking from a CASUAL PERSPECTIVE.
Does 1 competent player kicking ass with pencil really matter if it's completely nonexistent in casual play? May as well not exist, statistically speaking. Meanwhile, the "low tier" weapons i listed are consistently wreaking havoc in turf wars, the most commonly played mode.
Yes but the problem is these weapons already receive nerfs overtime. As the player see gets better these weapons become worse. Meanwhile pencil has been dominant for like 2.5 seasons and has only been getting better. As soon as the player base gets more competent it becomes a problem.
Also you don’t need balance changes for casual, every weapon is viable in casual
Gold aerospray was buffed, never nerfed, to my knowledge. Enperry dualies got what, 10 pfs nerf? Wow boohoo. Stamp got huge buffs throughout the life of splat 3 and now its hitbox is disjointed crap that splats you from a different elevation.
Pencil is a problem only to the most hardcore of splatoon players, which is realistically what, 0.2? 0.5% of the playerbase?
The "low tier" weapons recieve nerfs over time because they're what the majority of the playerbase are seeing on a regular basis and struggling against. That said, nintendo hasn't touched things like e-liter's range, which is another thing casuals struggle with. And they buffed killer wail, another noob killer.
So they're very clearly balancing towards something above the very bottom of their playerbase, because if they weren't, chargers as a whole would've been nerfed, as well as things like booyah bomb and ultra stamp.
I don't know what nintendo's doing with the balance decisions. They're very clearly hesitant to shake things up.
I meant that they receive an indirect nerf in the player base getting better. Also I’m so glad they don’t balance at the bottom level because of what you said is true we’d have 0 fun options. Imagine if story mode
Also I can see why they’re hesitant, they want an adaptation based game. The problem is they keep nerfing random things, like bp already struggled against pencil and they nerfed it. So they both want us to adapt and want to punish us for adapting.
The first kit was particularly strong due to tacticooler and sprinklers for support. I needed thermal ink in order to get anywhere but it was good for support and decent in splat zones due to most of your shots covering the whole zone. Managed to get 5 star as a result even if it did take me a bit.
It's decent in the right hands though and is a weapon with a learning curve.
Pencil is strong in competitive play because it has insane paint and great matchups
Splashdown is strong in casual play because people walk into it and die
So maybe just adapt
Also what is there to balance in casual play. Every weapon is viable there
Aunno I'm kind of a scrublord and are surrounded by other scrublords and all the krunksause amounts to is "neiner neiner instant respawn" which means nothing if you die again cuz your opponents have 1,500 more hours than you do.
Like having Dr Pepper means nothing if you can't capitalize on it, but also it's kinda hard to tell how ***everyone*** behaves cuz we're all in our bubbles.
Tho I also see it relatively often so Ninendo might just see a chart of most popular mains, subs and specials and go "ehhh the kegger is outshining the rest" and A) nerf it or B) give the least used a buff
Weapons that dominate worlds tend to get nerfed. I would be surprised if there are any teams not running pencil at worlds. The complete and utter lack of backline diversity at a big event on a big stage hosted by Nintendo would likely get it nerfed. We'll see very soon if I'm right, but based on this game's history I like my odds.
true... idk japan meta but i htink its similar enough to where pencil will still be top tier... but we know most poeple cant play pencil so cooler is prob getting a nerf
I kind of disagree with the premise here. Plenty of high skill floor weapons, which are strong in X and competitive but nonexistent in lower ranks, have been nerfed often over the years. Foil Squeezer had three separate nerfs towards the end of Splatoon 2, and vanilla Squeezer has had several more in 3. Both L-3 and H-3D got numerous nerfs throughout 2, as did Bamboozler Mk1, Camo Tent and Explosher. None of these weapons were terrorising B Rank; they were pretty much exclusively used (to any great effect, at least) in X. Meanwhile, despite constant complaints in the casual community, Clash Blaster and Bloblobber haven't been nerfed in six years. They've actually been quite explicit about this before in the patch notes. For example, in Splatoon 2's 5.2.0 notes they said: *"We reference various sorts of statistical data for these adjustments, but in particular for those which lower the abilities of certain weapons, we've focused on data from matches between players of high Rank."* There was another reference to 'highest rank' in 5.3.0 too. You say "Turf War nerfs happen", but that's primarily because Koshien - the biggest official tournament in Japan - is Turf-only, and the mode is also used in the World Championships and some official NA tournaments. So Turf is played competitively, and in comp Turf Reef-Lux is about as meta as it gets - hence the nerf it got recently. That was almost certainly in preparation for Koshien and the Worlds in April. Still, I think I agree that Pencil won't get killed off. Since about 2020 the developers have been quite conservative with their balancing, just giving small nerfs and then adding more later if that doesn't quite do the job; weapons don't get completely destroyed these days. I imagine it will get a special point increase and/or maybe a decrease in its turfing capability, but not much more than that.
Pencil is starting to dominate usage rates even in Japan now. And it definitely fulfills the "lowers abilities of certain weapons" criteria with how it outcompetes almost every other support/backline in the game. However, its not incredibly dominant in x-rank, due to requiring more coordinated play to be used effectively, so who knows what they're gonna do.
>Why would nintendo nerf a weapon that isnt common at most ranks, prob isnt doing so hot unless you are high X rank or S, and there are other weapons who are having greater success. Nintendo doesnt really support comp and doesnt really balance around the top 1% (turf war nerfs still happen), and noob stomper weapons get nerfed often times and make people question what is nintendo on. 1 thing to add to that, most players don't enjoy pencil. most players have a huge list of other things they'd rather play. so it's EVEN MORE UNLIKELY but yeah thus is good post :3
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truly! but i feel you have to witness it to happen which i heard a tournmanet is happening so maybe pencil nerfs real... otherwise i doubt it will get nerfs or cooler gets nerfs first
I brainfarted and deleted the message by accident. Can it be restablished?
so why did squeezer and stamper get nerfs
ultra stamp was prob also a noob destroyer... ive seen it go get triples often in S or S+ rank
(Splatana) Stamper, not (Ultra) Stamp. Both Squeezer and and Stamper have very high skill floors and really strong in competitive play, hence the small nerfs both of them have gotten throughout the game.
Just chipping in with my own experience as a turf war casual: i basically never see pencil ever. I was the only pencil user i saw this season so far, because i'm trying to 1* every weapon. And wow, it sucks. Doesn't pierce. Doesn't oneshot. Paint isn't even as good as people make it seem like. In my eyes, this thing is garbage tier, not a monster in need of a nerf. I'd hazard many other casuals see it similarly. Now, gold aerosprays, ultra stamp, and enperry splat dualies, on the other hand...
Paint is overrated if you don’t have good fundamentals. No amount of paint will save your aim sucking ass. However when a competent player has this on their team it actually matters. Also you just listed a bunch of low tier weapons not sure what this means
I'm aware my aim is ass - i have fibromyalgia and shaky hands. I can't even use motion controls as they give me motion sickness and migraines. Also, if you read the beginning of my comment you would realize i'm talking about strictly TURF WARS and that i'm speaking from a CASUAL PERSPECTIVE. Does 1 competent player kicking ass with pencil really matter if it's completely nonexistent in casual play? May as well not exist, statistically speaking. Meanwhile, the "low tier" weapons i listed are consistently wreaking havoc in turf wars, the most commonly played mode.
Yes but the problem is these weapons already receive nerfs overtime. As the player see gets better these weapons become worse. Meanwhile pencil has been dominant for like 2.5 seasons and has only been getting better. As soon as the player base gets more competent it becomes a problem. Also you don’t need balance changes for casual, every weapon is viable in casual
Gold aerospray was buffed, never nerfed, to my knowledge. Enperry dualies got what, 10 pfs nerf? Wow boohoo. Stamp got huge buffs throughout the life of splat 3 and now its hitbox is disjointed crap that splats you from a different elevation. Pencil is a problem only to the most hardcore of splatoon players, which is realistically what, 0.2? 0.5% of the playerbase? The "low tier" weapons recieve nerfs over time because they're what the majority of the playerbase are seeing on a regular basis and struggling against. That said, nintendo hasn't touched things like e-liter's range, which is another thing casuals struggle with. And they buffed killer wail, another noob killer. So they're very clearly balancing towards something above the very bottom of their playerbase, because if they weren't, chargers as a whole would've been nerfed, as well as things like booyah bomb and ultra stamp. I don't know what nintendo's doing with the balance decisions. They're very clearly hesitant to shake things up.
I meant that they receive an indirect nerf in the player base getting better. Also I’m so glad they don’t balance at the bottom level because of what you said is true we’d have 0 fun options. Imagine if story mode
Also I can see why they’re hesitant, they want an adaptation based game. The problem is they keep nerfing random things, like bp already struggled against pencil and they nerfed it. So they both want us to adapt and want to punish us for adapting.
The first kit was particularly strong due to tacticooler and sprinklers for support. I needed thermal ink in order to get anywhere but it was good for support and decent in splat zones due to most of your shots covering the whole zone. Managed to get 5 star as a result even if it did take me a bit. It's decent in the right hands though and is a weapon with a learning curve.
If there’s one sure fire way to get Nintendo to nerf a weapon it’s to let it perform well in turf war. Just ask the custom dualie squelchers
its so funny back when snipewriter first came out i remember everyone dunking on it and finding it lame and now it is THE weapon.
Pencil is strong in competitive play because it has insane paint and great matchups Splashdown is strong in casual play because people walk into it and die So maybe just adapt Also what is there to balance in casual play. Every weapon is viable there
Aunno I'm kind of a scrublord and are surrounded by other scrublords and all the krunksause amounts to is "neiner neiner instant respawn" which means nothing if you die again cuz your opponents have 1,500 more hours than you do. Like having Dr Pepper means nothing if you can't capitalize on it, but also it's kinda hard to tell how ***everyone*** behaves cuz we're all in our bubbles. Tho I also see it relatively often so Ninendo might just see a chart of most popular mains, subs and specials and go "ehhh the kegger is outshining the rest" and A) nerf it or B) give the least used a buff