Let's put the Engineer's Fang nerf into perspective

This is a dramatic overreaction, the Engineer's Fang nerf was the single nerf on the list that was unobjectionably necessary. That addon was incredibly strong, and still is incredibly strong, they just gave it a downside.

You can run it with the purple addon that spawns an additional chain, or you can not, because a ranged injure through walls is really strong even if that's the only thing his power gives him- which it isn't, Chain Hunts are unaffected by this nerf.

I guess I disagree with some people about Engineers Fang being too strong, I think it was fine before. Against a solid swf at max mmr you needed this addon just to have a chance at competing.

Could it have been maybe too strong against average-bad survivors? Maybe, but we shouldn't be balancing around them in the first place. It's also an ultra-rare addon..IE you aren't getting that many of them anyway...it should be strong.

Also, Pinhead is a very high skill cap killer anyway, so only really good Pinheads would be utilizing this addons to those high levels anyway. IE not as oppressive at low mmr because it can't be fully used to its highest extent.

I don't agree with nerfing it, or his other addons for that matter. Most his addons are bad and I would've been closer to giving quite a few of them buffs.

Pinheads current state is a very skill and high risk killer for low reward with a map pressure ability that is realistically never happening unless you give up 2 of your perk slots and even then against actually good survivors can be very limited. His base kit could use some QoL changes.

I could see an argument more so if this was on a low skill requirement killer but the fact that he requires a high skill level makes it more acceptable. Essentially a similar argument as to why we don't complain about Nurse and Nurse is just like that base kit, no ultra rare. Not saying he's as hard as Nurse, but I definitely think he's up there as one of the top few as far as skill requirement.

I think the problem is that the nerf didn't actually target the possible problematic part (shooting through walls at long range with hard to dodge chains and always getting a hit), it just made his followup garbage.

Like, of all the parameters of range/chain speed/portal time/cooldowns to tweak, it was instead the number of chains that got the chop?

Let's crack into that, shall we?

The flaw in your logic here is that you're working from the premise that the only thing this addon does is reduce chains. You're also putting far too much weight into the possessed chains as his "main" power, but you're not technically wrong with your phrasing there so I'll let it slide.

What the Engineer's Fang actually does is injure someone at range, through walls. The tradeoff for this ability is that the possessed chains are less effective on already injured targets, meaning that by using it, you are changing the way you play Pinhead to put more weight into regular looping with a one-shot down and the Chain Hunts, which are completely unaffected by this nerf. It's still very strong if you know how to use it, all they've done is make it something with a downside instead of just objectively making his power ten times stronger at no cost.

People who are mad about this nerf may understand maths, but the people who aren't mad about it understand game design.

(Though I won't argue with the other commenter who pointed out Clown's oneshot bottle, that addon is busted)

The nerf did nothing to that addon, chains no matter how many are useless at almost all times, all it does is 0.1s interrupt before they break over terrain.

The addon though was never a problem, pinheads power is too hard to hit with no reward at all, this addon solved that issue for the first hit at least. You can't down with it anyway and survivors in injured state are stronger.

Do you just forget the fact that the addon still gives him a better damaging potential than any other killer? It should have a tradeoff like it does now, and it is the only nerfed addon that makes sense lol

Ok it did have a downside it took 50% longer to exit the possessed chains animation even if you didn't fire it off plus there a cooldown before you can do anything but move after using his power.

If iri addon can't be strong then they need to change the cost because it 7k bp for just one iri and thats alot.

Oh yeah not disagreeing with the fact that you still need to get a follow up hit, but with engineer's fang he not only had a better chance to get a first hit more than any other killer, but also still had a very strong slowdown ability.

Iridescents with very strong effects should have drawbacks, for two reasons:

1: To allow them to have actually strong and powerful effects without becoming OP.

2: To inform and influence the way that you play with them, so that they're more for defining the playstyle than being the unambiguously best option.

I don't think this downside really is equal. Ranged damage through walls, at the cost of having less utility in looping. He can still loop just as well as any M1 killer, and he still has the Chain Hunts to help him out- all this addon means is that you have an easy injure and have to work from there with other tools. If you don't like the idea, don't run the Engineer's Fang? It's not like it's his basekit, you don't have to play in that "injure at range, down up close" style if you don't want to.

Been an m1 killer is really bad the are the weakest killers in game. Chain hunt is only strong because survivors don't want to get the box. I played against him a pretty decent amount and only died a few times to him(I play solo) if you just get the box his power is pointless.

I don't run it because I'm on console and that 50% adds alot distance if you don't hit or have to cancel. If you hit ever chain then its strong but if you miss the w is real.

So what add-on are you going to use instead of Fang? I’m curious to hear what add-on you think is better.

Except that you can hit them a second time. I’ve been watching a lot of Pinhead matches and it’s not common to see a chase on someone where the extra chain lost on an injured target would have made a difference. Most of the time the survivor is healthy (in which case the chain still injures them) or the killer would have hit them regardless or still not have hit them regardless.

I’m not saying the loss of a chain literally never makes a difference, but it’s not as big an impact as you’re making it out to be.

Worse Legion? The ability to injure at range, through walls, without the punishing cooldowns and penalty for using M1 attacks afterwards? No, I'm not buying that.

What it does is shift him to a Huntress that can't down but doesn't have to care about LoS, if we're going to draw weird and slightly awkward comparisons to extant killers.

You're right: you don't use your M2 on injured survivors with the Engineer's Fang on, because the addon changes his power to have strength elsewhere. Something as strong as a ranged injure through walls warrants some kind of downside, and this is as good a change as any; this makes him more of a one-shot looper and encourages him to use his Chain Hunts more.

The box has a predictable spawn pattern that isn't random. As far as I can see, The Thing that will separate merely competent Pinhead players from actually great ones is how well they can track down the box to get themselves a chain hunt, and then use that pressure to get some downs.

Of course, nothing about Pinhead changes the fact that if an iridescent is that strong, it deserves a downside to balance it, ideally one that informs the way you play while you have that addon equipped. If you think Pinhead really needed to use old Engineer's Fang to stand a shadow of a chance in a match, that is the problem, and that is what should be changed- bad addon design doesn't get a pass because the killer its associated with is weak, Clown still needs his fixed.

The spawn pattern is predictable but taking advantage of it is not. You need to know where every survivor is (and yourself) as soon as the box spawn sounds and be able to guess which of the spots on the map are more than 16m from a survivor (and nowhere near you). You also need to get there first and grab the box (or hope you get extra lucky and intercept a survivor).

Of course, the biggest problem is those 45s of downtime where there's no box. Tracking all the survivors at that point? Eh.

His passive is lopsidedly out of his control with the way spawns work and who gets what info, it's silly. Like, survivors can know exactly where pinhead isn't from where the box spawns.

You know what? I agree with you. At his core, he's got a bad design. His active power is too difficult to execute, too easy for survivors to dodge, and too punishing for missing, for how little advantage it actually gives you on a hit. And his passive is too survivor-sided to be reliable without addons (which now have been nuked.

At its baseline, every chain should take 1.25 or 1.5 seconds to remove, and the lament configuration should ALWAYS be invisible until a survivor is within 24 m until the chain hunt starts.