[2.5.9] Pestilence

[PowerBro]

Man, I was gonna try to answer you in a real way... than I realized it would just lower me to your level of refusing anyone else' points, but pretending that the hero is fine.

Anyway, the issue pestilence suffers is a 2 way thing.
Either A:
-Too many heroes are way too strong as of now and Pestilence is balanced
Either B:
-About 1/3 of the pool is balanced and everything else is too weak to different degrees of weakness.

[GregerMoek]

And yet he is sometimes picked, must be so damn bad right?

[lolb0t]

and yet, he is only been picked 4 times in last 6 months in comp play. must be pretty bad for comp play

[Fen__]

and yet WB got picked probably less than 10 times during whole hon competitive history. He must be worthless :/

[GregerMoek]

and yet, he is only been picked 4 times in last 6 months in comp play. must be pretty bad for comp play

I'm guessing you think Hag is underpowered too? Or Master of Arms, or Scout, or Andromeda, or Voodoo Jester, or perhaps Flux? Nomad? Martyr? Gauntlet? Pyromancer?

There are lots of more or less balanced heroes that has just not been picked because of trends, not only power but trends.

At first Cthulufant wasn't picked for a long while, now he's picked up despite seemingly no big changes to him, same went with the new iteration of Kraken. He wasn't picked up untill someone discovered him during a big event, after that he exploded into the scene. Does this mean Kraken was underpowered before he was discovered?

No it doesn't.

[PowerBro]

I agree greger... but at the same time, pestilence is a hero that was tried and played a LOT. It isn't like he just appeared in a flash or disappeared in a flash... Pestilence was 1 of the go to carry in the early stages of HoN.

He died because of powercreep and metagame change... and the weird part is that he should be a great pick in the new metagame but really isn't. His ultimate should destroy tanks, but somehow there seem to be something missing to him.

Is pestilence absolute trash? NO, does he need a small modification to get to par with other carries, YES or the other carries need a nerf to get to par with pesti.

Anyway, honestly, I have fun with the current metagame so I don't really care as I feel there are more heroes 'balanced' lately than before.

[[IaF]Skyve]

I agree greger... but at the same time, pestilence is a hero that was tried and played a LOT. It isn't like he just appeared in a flash or disappeared in a flash... Pestilence was 1 of the go to carry in the early stages of HoN.

Same can be said for Wildsoul... never picked, suddenly god tier. Even though he was an old DotA hero.

[Fen__]

Tbh all arguments based on:

This hero is picked often so hes op !
Nobody is picking this one so its useless and underpowered !

Are completly invalid and are free of any constructive arguments :/ If you want to refer so much to competitive picks than wriet why the hero isnt pick competitively, because saying that hero isnt bad but "he lacks" sth is pretty meaningless.

Like we said multiply times before, our hon competitive comunity is carebear based thats why we dont see many heroes. Basically its only MSI, in the past Dirty Minds and couple of single players who tend to pick unpopular heroes and look for different strategies. Rest is just a copycat society

[[9]regin1]

Pesti is pretty much fine as is he just seems kinda weak since he has no ability to flash farm waves which is so common in newer heroes and cant get huge gpm easily.

But with any damage items at all which seem to be skipped over for helm and pk he can do huge damage for very little money.

Try playing him with steamboots insanitarius and shrunken head as core items and you will see what i mean.

At most buff his intel gain so he can skip over spending money on mana items as he is now he can never use his stun to help farm or be effective in a long battle due to his tiny mana pool as he is you are forced to buy at least a powersupply and a locket if you want to use his stun and flight to their full potential.

[lolb0t]

thing is, what he does, magmus and pebbles do it much better. as previously said he is a victim of power creep, but S2 are not willing to sacrifice their newer heroes for longer games, so it's better to slowly bring up those heroes that have fallen behind.

SImply look at arachna. she has not been seen in comp play for a year, and now she slowly geting buffs, like starting strats as well as dogkeiser mentioning her aura isw getting reworked into something useful.

This is what i would like to see happen to pesti, a small tweak here and there to bring her up a little bit in line with new heroes.

There is a number of people on this forum clutching at straws and opposed to any change, probably due to S2 previous handling of balancing issues (slither comes to mind). If we actually brainstorm and come up with decent ideas and argue our points well, there is no reason why they couldn't at least make an effort to try some proposed changes in SBT client and say how that goes in podcasts or whatever.


The general consensus is to scale the hero so he is more viable earlier, and let's leave it up to S2 to dig through all the suggestions or come up with their own tweak

[Brannock]

and yet WB got picked probably less than 10 times during whole hon competitive history. He must be worthless :/

Warbeast has been picked more than ten times. You were clearly exaggerating though.

A lot of Warbeast's lack of popularity has to do with teams being unwilling to mix up lanes to the point that they can put a carry in the jungle. It takes a lot of protection and screening to get a Warbeast jungle to go off vs aggressive gankers. Compared to a Tempest or Ophelia jungle, which don't get nearly the amount of attention that a Warbeast jungle does - part of this has to do with Tempest and Ophelia being able to stun to escape and protect themselves and Warbeast not being able to.

He isn't really comparable to Pestilence at all. It's been only recently that we've returned to a dual lane meta, which is where Pestilence excels in (he's unpickable in trilane meta). Give it some time and some nerfs to all of the abusive heroes ( etc) and we might see him get picked.

[FootLoveMan]

(he's unpickable in trilane meta).

What's so impossible about trilaning a Pestilence? A fast PK on Pestilence will turn the game into your favour immediately - similar to Pebbles who has been trilaned alot.

[lolb0t]

because most heroes that are picked have pseudo blink or extra form of survival via heals or other ways (eg zephyr, magebane, tremble, cthulu), and his damage and overall skill combos do not do enough damage to put him over picking pebbles or magmus or midas

[Brannock]

Not to mention that Pebbles has a ranged stun and ranged nuke, while Pestilence's stun is melee AOE. There's zero reason to ever pick Pestilence over Pebbles in a trilane, let alone other heroes.

IMO.

[[eR]Ekamo]

Not to mention that Pebbles has a ranged stun and ranged nuke, while Pestilence's stun is melee AOE. There's zero reason to ever pick Pestilence over Pebbles in a trilane, let alone other heroes.

IMO.

Disagree strongly :P

A Pestilence that is allowed to free farm can do a lot, even though not burst down any hero under 1000 hp on himself. He is one of the most effective and spammable initiators there are after a PK, while still having some decent semi-carry ability. He synergizes extremely well with -armor lineups, which is what really separates him from other "similar" heroes. To be honest, I don't see why a comparison between Pebbles and Pestilence is needed in the first place anyway; they both have their own niches and are in no way replacing one another when looking for a specific hero role in your team.

Also, Pestilence was in fact picked up a couple of times (even though not as much as Pebbles) during the trilane meta with usually great success.

[SirVH]

You can't compare Pest with Pebbles >_>

[Stickyrolls]

Might sound crazy but I would like to either see flight bonus damage removed or make flight toggable. Let me explain the latter: You turn flight on to get in closing range (before you have pk) stun, auto attacks and turn off...now while it's turned off it is still running it's time down. For instance you turn it off with 15 seconds left, turn back on 10 seconds later and have 5 seconds left of flight time. I think the problem with pest is that due to the negative nature of flight he can't do his job as well as a magmus and escape with out a pk. If he doesn't do well early and get his items in a timely manner he usually has a bad game where a mag or behe will be much more useful. I know that he is different then these heroes due to his ability to carry but still I think flight hurts way to much.

[Fen__]

thing is, what he does, magmus and pebbles do it much better.

Pebbels cant do what pesti does in much better way.

1. landing peb stun on more than 2 targets vs thinking players or without previous initiation is almost impossible
2. pestilence stun last a lot longer
3. thx to pestilence low cooldown stun you can cast it twice during teamfight while its impossible on peb

Pestilence initiation is superior to pebbels and weaker to magmus mostly because of the aoe dmg ultimate. Beside that after actually burning down your skills pestilence continues to be a very dangerous hero while peb and magmus are arguably a bit useless before the skills cooldown.

Might sound crazy but I would like to either see flight bonus damage removed or make flight toggable. Let me explain the latter: You turn flight on to get in closing range (before you have pk) stun, auto attacks and turn off...now while it's turned off it is still running it's time down. For instance you turn it off with 15 seconds left, turn back on 10 seconds later and have 5 seconds left of flight time. I think the problem with pest is that due to the negative nature of flight he can't do his job as well as a magmus and escape with out a pk. If he doesn't do well early and get his items in a timely manner he usually has a bad game where a mag or behe will be much more useful. I know that he is different then these heroes due to his ability to carry but still I think flight hurts way to much.

I dont rly see reason for such a change. Flight lasts long enough to help you in w/e you want to do (catch up and kill enemy/run away thx to speed advantage).

The bonus dmg on pestilence flight is only 10% thats almost unnoticable. In physical dmg scenarios i would risk saying that pesti will survive even more than magmus thx to higher agility - physical damage reduction especially when taking into consideration the core sh build.

I belive that only valid argument about pestilence being underpowered is the lack of flash farming skills, but thats not rly such a big deal as most think because:

1. There are a lot of heroes who cant flash farm neither and they are still arguably weaker than pestilence
2. Flashfarming is a problem in itself, its rather bout other heroes that shouldnt be able to do it than about pestilence who should
3. Thx to teamfight oriented pestilence nature he will focus more on fighting vs heroes and getting earlier wins rather than "afking" in jungle/lane where flash farm comes into play.

[Brannock]

http://www.own3d.tv/live/240314/NoVa_-_FnaticRaidCall

Pestilence picked by [fray]. Laned solo sidelane vs. Electrician.

[R0XAS]

Farmed Pesti so strong lol