Rogue: Balance Proposals
Balance Proposals:
First and foremost, REMOVE Hearts as One. Having her balance tied down to a Team Up is ridiculous. Season 8.5 will be the third season since her release (12/12/2025).
To be clear, I would never expect multiple of these to be implemented. Rogue, as a Brawler, doesn't quite have the staying power other have to remain in a brawl. The following are not intended to be added all at once but reflect potential resolutions to each ability outside of "Lower Rogue's cooldowns."
Tenacity, as a whole, needs to be revisited (remove it in my opinion. Tanks aren't the ones benefitting from this nearly as often as Duelists and Strategists). I mean, come on. Tenacity was highlighted in her new skin reveal... That... was just embarrassing.
1. MOVEMENT SPEED:
- Increase her base movement speed from 600 → 650 (matching Thor and Hulk).
2. POWER SURGE PUNCH:
At present, she has to exhaust a CHRONO KICK COMBO, a 10s cooldown, and land each piercing projectile for +50 Bonus HP/target hit.
Apply the following to the third hit of POWER SURGE PUNCH combo:
- NEW: +50 Bonus HP for every third hit of POWER SURGE PUNCH.
- Increase the damage from 45 damage to 60 damage (matching CHRONO KICK COMBO: RANGED ATTACK; this includes the AOE spell field for the primary target ONLY while the AOE damage itself deals only 15 damage).
- NEW: Empower her third hit to deal 15 damage in an AOE spell field. Additional targets hit inside of the spell field grant +25 Bonus HP; hardcap Bonus HP gained to +125 Bonus HP (Base HP of 675 + 125 Bonus HP = 800 Max HP).
- Optional: Increase the ATTACK SPEED from 0.73s/hit → 0.53s/hit.
- NOTE: For reference, The Thing gains +100 Bonus HP for landing his Secondary.
3. ABILITY ABSORPTION:
I mentioned it earlier but Rogue is often vulnerable to damage during the 0.75s absorption.
- Add Bonus HP to Rogue during the animation lock so that she isn't killed during the animation or exit with ~20% HP.
- NEW: Grant Rogue +250 Bonus HP that rapidly decays over ~1.5s if the animation lock vulnerability cannot be fixed.
- Remove the internal timer for USING any stolen ability. This would allow Rogue to use the stolen ability at her leisure. The 25s cooldown can begin once the ability has been used.
4. HEARTSEEKER
- Increase the radius for the spell field from 8m → 10m.
5. CHRONO KICK COMBO
- Lower the cooldown from 10s → 8s.
6. FATAL ATTRACTION
- Reduce the cooldown from 14s → 12s.
7. DEFENSIVE STANCE
- Reduce Energy Cost to use Southern Brawl from 30 → 20.
- Reduce Energy Cost from 60/s to 40/s.
Obviously, Rogue can use a lot of love. Freeing her from Team Up dependency and improving her sustain as a melee Brawler is crucial. These changes are intended to lower the barrier for entry. Rogue is a highly skill expressive character (especially with how we've adapted to the Tenacity mechanics). There's much more that could be done but I feel like this let's the team up live on to a small degree while serving not as a large damage boost but as a means of sustain.
Thoughts and considerations? Outside of cooldowns, I feel like Chrono Kick Combo and Fatal Attraction are fine. Increasing the ring's range to match the proposed Heartseeker range of 10m was a consideration but I decided against overwhelming you all with my proposals. Attached images included so that new players could take a look at and reference her kit.
EDIT: Corrected Movement Speed buff to match Thor and Hulk.