#Toothless Towers

31 messages · Page 1 of 1 (latest)

old marten
#

I have played this game since Paragon but it is the only MOBA I have 100s of hours into. I played for 5-8 hours a day back then, and sometimes just as much now. Ive discussed this topic with players of all skill levels back during Paragon and now during predecessor. This post will attempt to account for the opinions of different player demographics (casuals/HC/sweatlords/etc.) and draws on their knowledge of what effect different types of tower balancing has had on the success of other MOBAs.

The issue: Towers are made of cardboard and shoot baby food. Getting hit by a tower should be a universally terrifying and punishing experience. These characters are out here killing each other with god level powers and weapons. Yet the towers constructed to defend against them are essentially operating at a "Scares away 70% of small children" level.

#

Side A - Fragility:
If the enemy makes a play that gives a 10-15 second window that should earn them a chunk of the towers health, of course. Most often however, you'll see the enemy portrait pop up on radar for less than 1 whole second and the full health tower you've defended perfectly all game has completely evaporated.
Not only that but in your rush to get back you reach the T2 tower to defend it at the same time as them, with good gear and high clear, yet your second tower goes down somehow faster than the minions (1-2 seconds typically)

This could be addressed by spending months fidgeting with health/armor values of the towers, or just making it so any heros basic attack does a predetermined % of the towers health and cannot be improved so it becomes how many hits instead of how much damage. This would make all heros 100% balanced in terms of what they can do to a tower offensively.

#

Side B- Impotence:
In the early game the towers are functional. However as soon as people start to get their second item built/the transition from early to mid game the game goes to favoring abuse over skill. This is because certain heros and builds can use a combination of their abilities and items to dive into a tower with zero friendly minions, take 3-4 hits from it, and leave with 100% of their health (rampage greystone and khaimera being the worst offenders but definitely no the only ones) Not only does this ruin the very essence of a tower based battle, but is further worsened by the fact that heros either benefit wildly from abusing the arbitrage between their abilities and tower lethality or are being fully abused by it with no viable counter behavior.

This is easily fixed by making the towers do an escalating % of max health (as a concept example, not recommended values: 25% of max life on shot 1, another 50% on shot 2, 75% on shot 3, instakill on 4) as true damage that ignores all mitigation and shields. So if Rampage jumps in a tower lvl 1, hes lost 75% of his health in 2 shots from tower. If he jumps in fully kitted, lvl 18, ult active.....he loses 75% of his health in 2 shots. This still leaves the door open for a calculated, but not without risk, tower dive to finish someone off, while negating an abuse pattern of repeatedly diving in on someone full health until they are dead or in the most abusive cases, take turns jumping in between greystone/khaimera for example. Some characters have a response for this, many do not.

summer panther
#

T2 towers do not go down in 1-2 seconds 'typically'. Thats only if there's 4+ people or one or more has prime buff

summer panther
#

But 25 then 50% hp true damage is the worst idea ive ever heard
Tower diving is meant to be high risk for the reward which it already is. You cant expect it to defend you from a full hp jungler who is good at tower diving. Its also partly up to you to be able to escape, and kite under the tower. If you can survive a few seconds, hitting the enemy with abilities, you will survive it and get a free kill

#

Making attacks do a set% of a turrets health also isn't fair, characters with attack speed do it much better than mages for example

old marten
#

I think youre making the point, "being good at tower diving" should not be a strategy. A method of getting the last 1 MAYBE 2 hits to finish off an escaping opponent, yes. A sustained and repetitive behavior to poke a defender down from full health without the assistance of a single friendly minion being near the tower, no.

#

As it is, with the right character/gear, being shot at by an enemy tower is not dangerous.

Also, characters with a high attack speed already do a disproportionately large amount of tower damage as it is. So it wouldnt be possible to create an imbalance that already exists. But the general idea would be to increase the TTK on a tower for all heros.

summer panther
#

You shouldn't be positioning in a place you can get poked out by melee heroes ever

tranquil breach
#

@summer panther idk about 4 people usually about 18ish minutes in as a carry you should be able to kill t2 in 6-7 seconds without contest

old marten
summer panther
lyric spear
#

Towers shouldn't be a "safe zone" but they currently don't do enough damage IMO. It's one of the contention points my League friends hate about Pred. Towers in Pred are not as high risk as they should be. They definitely need a damage buff. I don't agree with OPs percentages, but they definitely need a % health damage, per shot, buff.

devout drift
#

Agreed. In LoL, especially in the early game, taking even 1 tower shot can instantly be the decider for losing or winning the next fight. I've seen so many people eat tower shots and it just not mattering. Tower diving is a high risk high reward strategy. In pred it's like a mid risk high reward strategy which shouldn't be the case

summer panther
#

Tower shots 100% decide a fight in equal situations

old marten
# summer panther Tower shots 100% decide a fight in equal situations

Diminishingly so as the game goes past 20 minutes/when it starts to get good.

And the point is that there are characters and builds which negate the risk to a near non existent factor, mitigating the majority of the towers damage.

Also the whole point here is that the way the towers are currently designed opens the door to using certain characters and builds to avoid there ever being "equal situations" to the point that tower shots decide 0%.

summer panther
#

Tower shots make a big difference. If you are dying to someone diving you under tower multiple times especially, that's not a fight you should be taking

old marten
summer panther
#

Then please explain what you mean

old marten
#

I keep trying but you keep thinking the same thing.

Tower shots do not make a difference, especially against specific heros and builds, from mid game on who can cycle through jumping in, doing burst damage, jumping out, and doing it again without any consequence to their health from the tower. Whether that be 1 or even sometimes 4-5 hits, their health is just unaffected whether that be due to shielding or healing or just straight up armor it's the same result.

And beyond that, you keep insisting this is somehow related to anything Im doing in any way, when its clearly not based on what I have already explained. This behavior is by the opposing offlane is not a fight that im "choosing". Its a toxic behavior enabled by the way the towers assign/receive damage and how it interacts with with the general game flow in that towers become irrelevant when the very instant a large team fight happens at one it melts before it can even fire off one shot, and some heros can jump in and drop a tower from half health without losing any of theirs.

summer panther
#

could u send me a clip of someone killing a tower from half health without losing any of their health? im assuming you mean with no minions but i could be wrong

old marten
#

I cannot easily from console.

summer panther
#

could you find any clips of it online, or in media, or anywhere to support your claims

old marten
#

I honestly could, but I see no reason to go through all that effort just to satisfy you.

summer panther
#

then next time it happens to you, dm me the pred.gg link

old marten
#

Are you a developer for this game?

summer panther
#

im not, but without some way to show that ur frankly ridiculous claims are true nothing will change

old marten
#

I did go into practice and slap a bunch of phys armor and some attack speed on greystone without thinking too hard about it and got a full tower to a little over half health before dying. Ive encountered people who seem to specialize in the behavior that can do better than me. Youll have to go experiment for yourself if you need more than that.

summer panther
#

tower damage increases over the course of the game so that makes sense

old marten
#

Can you cite your source on that?

summer panther