Zeratul's Phase Strike

[MOTHER]

I've always felt that one of the most overlooked problems with a snowballing Zeratul is Q's cool down being reset after a kill. That feature alone is fine but against the background of Zera's other skills and the items in AoS can become ridiculously abusable, especially with some items that provide CDR. It allows him to attack with impunity when he has enough weapon damage late game and provides another escape (as if he didn't have enough already).

 

I think more than any thing about Zera (because I think he is balanced in most circumstances), that one feature should be looked into and nerfed. Perhaps instead of resetting the cooldown completely, it reduces it by a few seconds (like Dehaka's heroic), or just remove it altogether honestly.

Edited February 17, 2014 by Jessika

[jamescossey]

so they nerf his bubble more and now you want to complain about another ability which is just fine.

[MOTHER]

How is spamming a 7 range target unit burst damage ability back to back with no cooldown late game fine? How is it fair? Really? Not to mention being able to escape almost at a whim if things are not in your favor or that you leap behind the enemy automatically which allows you deal even more damage from W but that's besides the point.

 

Zeratul already gets rewarded for the kill, a complete cooldown reduction is too much reward especially if he is fully geared.

Edited February 18, 2014 by Jessika

[HarryHootie]

it should be somewhere to 5-7 secs just rikis blink strike, now that i mention that zera is a almost copy of riki

[MOTHER]

If Riki and Faceless had a kid, it would be Zera, kinda. Either way you're right. Perhaps removing the reset mechanic and changing cooldown to 28/21/14/7, or simply make it reduce cooldown by half if Zera gets a kill at all levels.

Edited February 18, 2014 by Jessika

[shogigut]

Yes pls nerf zera to death.

 

You forgot to mention the most op skill, planar. It should have 2 sec cast time to avoid abuse.

 

And zera w should be effective every 4 attack, 60% agi scale max. Its just unfair you can planar, bubble, q and attack from behind, opopop

[EterNity]

Yeah while we are on it, I think his back-stab also needs a nerf.

 

It should be based on STR instead of AGI becuase a Zera is going to get a lot of AGI anyway and that seems too convenient for him.

 

I will talk to developers about this. No worries!

[MOTHER]

Hey found this wonderful group photo of you guys, and may I say you're looking good Eternity.

 

Edited February 18, 2014 by Jessika

[EterNity]

Can I be the purple one? You can be the yellow one!

[MOTHER]

Shogigut is the yellow one silly...

[shogigut]

Forgot to mention zera ulti should also has 2 sec cast time to avoid him using as an escape.

 

Ah other than removing phase strike cooldown reset, it should stun zera for 0.5 sec to avoid abusing ocelot/bhm and allow time for his victim to escape.

 

This should fix his opness

[Zombieee]

In EU we got like 1-3 people who can play Zeratul in high level play. I dont know how many you got on NA, but i would guess theres not alot of people there who can do it either. I dont really understand why you want to nerf this hero more now.

[Hogwarts]

In EU we got like 1-3 people who can play Zeratul in high level play. I dont know how many you got on NA, but i would guess theres not alot of people there who can do it either. I dont really understand why you want to nerf this hero more now.

 

Its one of the strongest heroes in the game. Second to maar. It just over looked because only a few people who play it are good with it.

 

Im perfectly fine with the Q and its W, E, But holy crap his ult is Ridiculous. a huge aoe 5 second disable? ? ? It easily needs to be nerfed more.

 

Just because the hero has a high skill cap and isn't played to its potential often doesn't mean it isn't extremely strong.

[Einstein]

I wish players of this game would spend more time trying to help the developers with suggestions and improvements that could help this game become more successful and would spend less time bashing other players who are actually brave enough to put out an opinion.

 

Prelate.Zeratul is honestly and undeniably a game changer.

You can cause as much destruction with this hero going pure utility as you can going pure damage and any person who denies this doesn't know shap about teamwork.

Prelate has come a long way from being able to warp any ally or enemy back 6 seconds, and is almost but not quite polished. Another problem that players face when dealing with prelate is that they simply CANNOT react. If a prelate hits a planar you will find yourself stunned for one second, more than enough time for him to stun/silence you for 5 more.

Perhaps eliminating the stun on his planar would allow players an opportunity to activate an electric mantle or another counter-measure.

 

Easy ways to beat prelate are as follows:

1) Do not pick all melee heroes.

2) Stay close but not close enough where he can bubble two people.

3) Do not travel alone, but make it appear you are doing so.

 

**I am not saying he is too strong or too weak. I am providing an opinion based on the many games I have participated in. Instead of bashing my posts send me a pm and show me in a game why I am wrong, then I can fix the mistake and we can both avoid making donkeys out of ourselves.**

Edited February 18, 2014 by Einstein

[herman]

Its one of the strongest heroes in the game. Second to maar. It just over looked because only a few people who play it are good with it.

 

Im perfectly fine with the Q and its W, E, But holy crap his ult is Ridiculous. a huge aoe 5 second disable? ? ? It easily needs to be nerfed more.

 

Just because the hero has a high skill cap and isn't played to its potential often doesn't mean it isn't extremely strong.

 

Completely agree. I brought this up in another thread on chronosphere. I think Zera would be fine with a change of some sort the Chrono. I like that the devs decreased the duration a bit, because it shows they understand the problem, however I dont think its enough. As I said before the threat of chronosphere does more than the threat of Zera. The size and length of Chrono offers way too much utility.

[NeVeRWiN]

If Riki and Faceless had a kid, it would be Zera, kinda. Either way you're right. Perhaps removing the reset mechanic and changing cooldown to 28/21/14/7, or simply make it reduce cooldown by half if Zera gets a kill at all levels.

 

Well if you nerfed q, his problem is still with his ulti. Also on a side note, nerfing q would essentially imo, nullify saber being a viable option early on for Zera. At least in a sense of maxing it uber early. I think keeping phase strike and either changing ulti, and keeping phase strike as is would balance him out. I never used Zera in Sotis, though I was around a bit in sotis by why hasn't the thought of going back to his old ulti been done to attempt to nerf him? Forgive this question because I don't know how his old ulti worked, but I can't imagine it was a large aoe disable.

Edited February 18, 2014 by NeVeRWiN

[ginosaji]

I agree with Einstein actually. Removing the stun on planar might actually help alot.

[Ancientmagicks]

All of zeratuls skills are by themselves great skills with a good balance, but it's the culmination of all of them together that makes him ridiculous in most respects. Any one of his skills can easily be countered, but not all at once with out great expense or difficulty. In terms off synergy he is the perfect character.

 

And for all that I hate him with a passion. I think he should be put up on the shelf with the rest of relics of OP, reimagined into something more original.

 

P.s. I'm biased against all perma cloak sissy characters. Full frontal combat ftw.

[Apocalyptic]

I agree with Einstein actually. Removing the stun on planar might actually help alot.

 

I agree, but think it should be changed to 0.2 seconds or something tiny instead of removing it.

[NeVeRWiN]

What of increasing time scale on hero's in his bubble? Trying to remake an ulti could be a daunting task to fit his skills sets, why not reworking chronosphere some how? Any thoughts on this? What if we increased move speed on hero's trapped in bubble to give some escability, but keeping weapon speed the same? Would that be worth anything? Combining with a nerf to planar's stunner is this a feesable or worthwhile idea?

[thomulf]

Should only proc on non-heroic units

 

/thread

[MOTHER]

That also works.

 

@Neverwin

 

The skill is fine really, it's just the radius needs to be reduced slightly more than anything.

 

An alternative would be reducing the silence of Chronosphere to half the duration of the bubble. So a 5 second bubble would have only a 2.5 second silence.

 

On another note, I really think Electric Mantle should activate automatically. The old mantle's passive unique was perfect.

Edited February 18, 2014 by Jessika

[ShadowFlame]

My real thing about Zeratul is just that there is simply no way to defend. Most heros I can dodge or do something, worst case getting 1 item counter. But to counter zeratul you need a whole build, which makes you worthless. I don't really know the solution but this is my thoughts.

[Jaysi]

I guess I haven't seen a pro Zeratul played in IH before so maybe my opinion is skewed but... I feel like there are enough things a team mate can do to save you, between lockbox, impact, bola, pluck, dehakas pull, etc. The amount of good zeras out there is so low that the amount of good counterers is even lower. As more zeras get better, more counterplay will come up. At least that is my belief.

[ANARCHY]

I guess I haven't seen a pro Zeratul played in IH before so maybe my opinion is skewed but... I feel like there are enough things a team mate can do to save you, between lockbox, impact, bola, pluck, dehakas pull, etc. The amount of good zeras out there is so low that the amount of good counterers is even lower. As more zeras get better, more counterplay will come up. At least that is my belief.

zera planars you

places bubble right on the edge of you

 

if you go out their side you are greeted with 5 enemy heroes

 

none of your allies can help because the size of the bubble is around 10-12 units and nothing has that much range

lockbox is out of range

dial is out of range

you can only bola or pluck if you have that specific hero & this only helps in a draft, any pub or casual IH its still an issue

oh yeah thats right then he just planars the hero with the pull instead...

 

i think reducing the size of the bubble is the most viable option

but the timescale debuff you receive in bubble should be increased relative to the size of the bubble decrease, thus that the hero caught in the bubble still takes the same amount of time to escape the smaller bubble as it did before the nerf

it promotes teamwork yet still makes zera good at 1 on 1