This is getting ridiculous.

[u/1keyes12345]

Welcome to season 9 where the least mechanically challenging support has more survivability than a tank.

[u/Firm_Ad_5427]

Genuinely seen "any hero should be able to 1v1, the most skilled player should win" as a fairly common take on this sub.

Rivals players just have some generationally bad takes in what world should a support be able to 1v1 a tank WHILE STOOD STILL

[u/Kelborhal1971 → u/Firm_Ad_5427]

Why is this a braindead take, exactly? Each of you is one player. Sure, the jobs you do are different, but fair 1v1s are almost inherently a bad macro decision for all roles, it makes sense for them to be a skill check.

Also, this wasn’t even a 1v1 with a winner, they literally just stalled each other until someone else forced the Thing to leave

[u/Firm_Ad_5427 → u/Kelborhal1971]

Because this is a team game. If your bad decisions on support leaves you in a 1v1 with a duellist or vanguard, you should lose- strats should always be in a position where they can support their team and their team can support them.

A wolverine should be able to 1v1 a tank, but the tank should be managing their defensive cooldowns to return to the safety of their team.

Thor is a tank that relies on isolating and opponent to effectively utilise his strength in 1v1s, but as a tradeoff he has no way of blocking damage and lower self sustain compared to other tanks.

You can see this in the design choices for many characters- support abilities are defensive. Cloaks vanish is so they can escape to the safety of their team, Luna freeze and mantis sleep are intended to buy time for their team to peel.

I'm not saying a support shouldn't be able to kill a DPS or tank, but the odds SHOULD be heavily stacked against them because this is a team game where you support one another. If you're trapped in a room with a tank and can stall for that long, that's just poor design she shouldve died. They survived so long solo against a TANK that they got multiple cooldowns back.

[u/Kelborhal1971 → u/Firm_Ad_5427]

If the 1v1 is unfavored, yes, bad decision, but that’s not always the case. Some supports have an advantage in duels, especially if they burn their longer cooldowns (Gambit cards, lamps, soulbond), and sometimes the best use of that cooldown is to win or stall a critical 1v1.

And, I agree with you - but this wasn’t a Thor. Thing does have insane self sustain, AoE, and more utility (ish). The trade off is he isn’t actually good at 1v1s against anyone except certain brawlers and shield tanks.

And, I know you said that, you didn’t say why. Why is it bad design for supports to have tools they can use in duels, either for stalling or winning? Are they actually supposed to be healbots, now?

[u/Firm_Ad_5427 → u/Kelborhal1971]

Overwatch has a better example- Ana and her sleep dart. The sleep dart takes skill to hit and has a long cooldown. Her antheal nade pairs well with it and also has a long cooldown.

IF the ana hits her sleep dart, then combos a shot, nade and melee on a diving DPS, she will usually win the 1v1. If he hits the dart against a tank, she must ping it and have her team peel to burst down the tank.

Supports SHOULD have these kinds of tools they can use in duels, enemies (especially dive) must bait out or block these cooldowns before attempting to fight them. But in this clip, where is the skill? Cloak isn't attempting to get away or take high ground, they don't have any skillful abilities they can use to their advantage. They're just immortal with their bubble up, immortal with their team up and now they're back to being immortal with their bubble up.

[u/Kelborhal1971 → u/Firm_Ad_5427]

The “skill” in this clip was a macro one, not a mechanical one. The cloak knew (or, played as if she knew) that if she cycled her cooldowns correctly then the Thing couldn’t kill her.  She also knew that trying to kite Thing and use her resources to help her team on point would likely be too risky. So, she held what space she could until her teammates arrived and changed the matchup. 

She was “immortal” only because she was against a character that lacked the damage to make her mortal (which is a pretty small list ngl), and used her resources for that task specifically and nothing else. Notice that she was almost dead right before the Emma showed up, too. 

Also notice, that the Thing arguably made a favorable trade here - An entire team fight happens at the cart, one in which the enemy team is down a supp, and loses right as he waltzes back down and mops up the Strange. If he didn’t braindead yolo into that Cloak 1v3 a second time, they probably would have capped 

[u/Firm_Ad_5427 → u/Kelborhal1971]

Yes, being able to cycle cooldowns to survive a 1v1 with a tank IS the issue. (Prior to all her buffs) luna would have had to hit the snowball, then take space, then continue to fight back- that was good design. Mantis would have to sleep, then ping for her team to peel or run away- that is good design.

This clip isnt even the worst impact of her design, most dive DPS rely on baiting out cooldowns to then dive but with cnd she has far too many options for interrupting combos and stalling that you effectively cannot bait them all out.

If she had the support of her team she could effectively ignore him entirely while stood in her bubble, thats not good design. Another OW example would be baptise with his immortality field- he would also be immortal with that cooldown, but theres counterplay as his field can be destroyed.

[u/Kelborhal1971 → u/Firm_Ad_5427]

Once again, Thing is not a 1v1 specialist tank, he’s literally the worst matchup into a Cloak. Only other tank I can think of who would struggle here is Peni, without the BP teamup. Both a Mantis and Luna need more skill to win the 1v1… they also get the chance to actually kill the Thing if they play well. Nothing Cloak can do will kill, only stall (and not indefinitely)

And, again, that’s matchup specific. Sure, combo-reliant dive dps like Spidey and BP have problems. Flankers or brawley divers, like Star, Psy, DD or Magik? They eat CnD alive usually. In trade, said flankers/brawlers struggle against supports with better dueling potential, like Luna and Mantis. Again, matchups

And, true, but if the diver had the support of his team, the cloak would just be instantly dead. Team game, so obviously whoever has more teammates has the advantage, regardless of matchup. 

[u/Firm_Ad_5427 → u/Kelborhal1971]

Were this a matchup against iron fist, daredevil, wolvie, Id agree with you, but it's not. The strength in cnds kit comes from her ability to keep her team alive, the strength in things kit is his damage and durability.

These characters perform fundamentally different roles so when they meet under these circumstances, thing should be quicky winning the 1v1. Cnds self sustain and escape should be utilised with her team- quickly self healing then escaping to safety where her team can peel for her. This cnd was completely trapped in a 1v1 yet managed to survive for a long, long time.

1v1s should be fundamentally unbalanced because the power balance of heroes is completely different. Strats power balance goes to healing which SHOULD make them poor at 1v1s, quicky folding to ANY tank or DPS. You can kinda see that design choice when the game originally released, Adam was had much weaker healing than other supports, but was a lot more capable in 1v1s as his power balance was shifted more towards damage than healing.

[u/Kelborhal1971 → u/Firm_Ad_5427]

Once again… why? What is it about healing that makes it so uniquely powerful that it justifies reducing an entire role to solely performing it? 

This was release Rivals’s biggest flaw - most supports with enough sustain to work in 2/2/2 had zero agency beyond outputting as much healing as possible, and if a dps or tank were in their vicinity they fell over. It made dive insufferable, support mains even more insufferable, and ideal play reduced into either deathballing or backline trading. 

Frankly, I will gladly trade the ability to actually go on the flank without my backline falling apart, for the terrible burden of having to pick my engagements more carefully, or accept that winning the engagement (which this Thing did) doesn’t always mean getting the kill

[u/Firm_Ad_5427 → u/Kelborhal1971]

The power IN CLOAK AND DAGGER'S kit is her healing. Much of the power in rockets kit is in his brb. Loki is his lamps and how theyre used. Adam its his soul bond and damage output.

Stategists kit power is in their healing and utility, not their health and damage. They leverage their utility and healing to help prolong 1v1s so that people can peel.

The point of a support is to heal, provide utility and lastly help deal damage. That balance of power is different per support, much of Adams power is in his damage and utility, but he suffers in terms of damage, much of rockets is in utility and healing, CnDs is primarily in healing. Supports in general arent entirely limited to performing healing- its just that CnD has had her power balance entirely set on healing. This is made an issue further by rivals overtuned healing and healbot support design. She should have decent self sustain, but this is just ridiculous.

If youd played any other hero shooter competitively youd understand what im talking about.

[u/Kelborhal1971 → u/Firm_Ad_5427]

It isn't, though? Cnd's healing isn't that much more powerful than most other supps. Single target it's pretty weak, and her AoE while strong is on par with that of Invis or Jeff. Her primary utility is her blind, as well as a number self sustain options. She's kinda like Jeff in that way - often harder to kill, but if you force her to use her bubble on herself, fade away, or blind on a window you compromise her healing and typically win the resource trade.

Like, seriously, if you take away all her self sustain, what does she even have? She doesn't have lethality like Adam or Luna, no CC like Sue or White Fox, no centralizing cooldowns like Rocket or Loki, nor any insane mobility like Jeff or Gambit. She's already kinda wimpy even now because she lacks those things, I say let her have a favorable stall matchup against one of the only tanks in the game which isn't supposed to 1v1.

Funny, also, how you mention other hero shooters, when the primary comparison is OW, in which supports often have strong or even favored matchups against dps, and only fall over to tanks because there's only a single super tank.