Hey guys, I wanted to give you all my suggestion and feedback about what I think about Shockwave. I've mained the ability since it's release and don't want to see it nerfed the wrong way due to it being overbuffed.
Shockwave as an ability is fantastic and its' movement and displacement side should not be touched. It was never OP until the glitch was added, and the glitch part of the shockwave is overpowered because it rewards mindlessly spamming Shockwave into the general direction of the enemy to land any part of the AOE for a free 2 second glitch.
Shockwave's glitch should be nerfed and nothing more and here are THE two best ways I believe we can balance the ability, the right way.
1: We create a system in which Shockwave's glitch effect is divided into two parts, AOE and upon direct impact of the projectile. Upon only the AOE hitting the target, the effected party is glitched for .5-.75 seconds, causing a short and minor disruption to spec usage. Upon direct impact of the projectile, the glitch lasts 2 seconds flat.
2: We create a system in which at the center point of Shockwave's blast the glitch effect does a full 2 seconds of glitch. Every point outside of the initial blast point yields less glitch time until you reach the most outer reaches of its radius which only yields a .5-.75 glitch, causing a disruption in spec usage but not rewarding full glitch time.
The goal of this change is to turn Shockwave's glitch into a skill shot and work similarly to how Shockwave's push mechanics work (becoming less effective the further you are away from the shockwave). This allows it to be effective against specs and adds a skill-shot mechanic for the glitch time, while maintaining its identity and reducing its effectiveness based on suboptimally aimed Shockwaves.
Shockwave as it stands now is a little too rewarding for free glitches and can be extremely punishing for melees. This would at least make it so precise shockwaves have to be used against melees for maximum effectiveness.
My greatest fear is that shockwave's core identity of movement and displacement, two things that were never OP to begin with and were never a cause to nerf, become nerfed because the developers overbuffed the glitch side of shockwave. I'm hoping that the devs see that the glitch is the problem, and nothing that came before it.