My experience as a player. Top
[skip to paragraph 4 for the guide part. P 1-3 are my stream of consciousness] Okay! I used to be a super tryhard in vainglory, but quit the game because of school. When I quit, foretress was not yet in the game. After stabilizing myself, i Found that many of the strategies and builds that helped me to reach my prior rank in Pinnacle of Awesome were ineffective or off-meta due to updates. I quit the game maining skaarf, Koshka, and Catherine. I had Glaive, adagio, and petal as secondaries. From my main heroes, you can kind of tell that I liked to win in the first 20 minutes. I also, however, only played solo que, So I needed some reliable secondaries if my team was going for more of a mid-late game strategy. But I return to find that Skaarf, low-mid tier hero (at best) in the old meta, has now been nerfed to the ground in the new meta. His fire, which used to do 36% of health as a DoT at 4 stacks was apparently nerfed to 24%. He was a little ridiculous, so fair enough. But then it was nerfed AGAIN to 12%. WHAT THE HELL?!
Why it matters Top
As a veteran player of this game, I find that the ratio of skilled players to unskilled players (in my 500+ wins in solo que) is about 1:1. This is actually pretty good for a moba. But these players view the game differently. Half the community walks into a bush, gets owned by Cath stunning them into Skaarf's goop and getting fireballed and exploding and it's ugly. They say, "that was a poor choice to face-check that bush, I need to adapt and use flares." Then they never make that mistake again. The other half walks in, gets stunned by cath and skaarf blows them up. They say, "WOW, that is so OP. This game is broken, can we nerf skaarf, like, what the heck?! Where was my team?! Im downvoting all of them for unskilled play after this." You can guess which half is which. And I suppose you can also guess which half bombs the devs on the forums, saying they will drown themselves in their bathtubs if Skaarf doesn't get a nerf. Obviously the devs hear half the community complainining and decide that that is enough to constitute a change. But making a change to an individual hero, when really the cause of the problem is lack of knowledge or poor fundamentals, makes Vainglory a one-dimensional, simple, newb-friendly game. This game is gaining momentum in the tournament scene. It breaks my heart to see heros that used to be, although not great, good enough to be used to win 8/10 times, being nerfed to the ground because of how they perform in low-tier matches.
The thing Top
My point is that the thing that makes this game so awesome is the small attention to detail and balancing that you guys do. When a hero (like Phinn) seems to be falling out of the meta, you guys publish a highlight video or some advanced level gameplay to hype up the community and bring them back in. Skaarf is falling WAAAYY out of the meta. It has been a while since any lf your top faces like Shinkaigen or Rumblysuperset have dared to use a hero with as many bad matchups as Skaarf. He is becoming obsolete for two main reasons:
Too many bad matchups, and lack of utility (he only works with very specific team comps necause his skills just don't do a lot). I've never seen a Skaarf, in tournament play. Even heros like Vox that received serious nerfs are still being used just because of their synergy.
How to play skaarf (new meta) Top
Skaarf has a long range, powerful fireball. This is his primary skill. Skaarf (in this meta) must be olayed very defensively. You must predict the enemy's movement and hit them with a fireball. These hit so hard now that you honestly can't take more than 2-3 without being in danger. Use them to check bushes and poke enemy heros. Make sure to use BOTH your vertical and horizontal positioning relative to the lane minions to keep the enemy in fear. Try to observe where the enemy likes to move, and adjust your fireball angles acclrdingly. If my opponent likes to dodge by moving up and down, shoot diagonally. If he likes to run straight back, overshoot the fireball. After your opponent is at 50% he will be nervous. Use flares to checl bushes for his team at this stage. Consider calling up your guardian to help you gank. Hit him with the fireball, auto attack, dump the goop, auto attack, run away. That usually amounts to 50%. If a guardian stuns him in the goop it is more like 80%. Only use your ult to help allies chase or retreat. The ult is highly situational, sometimes it is wise to use in team fights but very rarely.
Matchups Top
Here's what bothers me. Every melee hero except Joule and Krul just absolutely take a dump on Skaarf. So you are forced to played from very far away. This limits his effectiveness in team fights because he is walking on eggshells trying not to get killed in two hits. In a team fight, what he is best at is fireball + goo on who ever the guardian chooses to stun. Skaarf has the effect on the enemy team where if they ever stop moving, they are in danger. So heros like Ardan can put down the ult, take two steps towards skaarf, and just stand still while auto attacking. The enemy hero will at first think you are unskilled for not moving around like everyone else does when they melee to try to cover your movement, but then they have to take Skaarf's burst. I like to use Skaarf when I play with a jungler like glaive, who ends up doing good cleave damage to the whole enemy team. This leaves them at about 80%, the danger zone for Skaarf's burst.
Why did I publish this guide? Firstly, Skaarf mains need to unite and bring this hero back into the meta. The problem is that I don't know if he is viable. I think that because his early game was completely nerfed to the ground, he should at least get some more health or some passive lifesteal or something. I also have not played for a while and find Skaarf falling out of my interest. Now I main Cath, Adagio, and Ringo. If I am playing skaarf wrong, please publish a guide for his new strategy, because I looked for one :(
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