Welcome (back) to The OverSeer everyone! After yesterday's London Spitfire review, I am all set to talk about the LA Valiant, who took 10th place in my end-of-season power rankings for 2019. Before we begin, I'd just like to say how much fun I've been having doing these roster reviews. I get to interact with a whole bunch of you in the community, listen to your feedback, foster healthier discussions, and most importantly, learn. Via the responses on my posts, I've come to realise how knowledgeable a handful of you guys are when it comes to professional Overwatch, following everything from OWL to Open Division to local Tier-3 tournaments, and I wanted to take a moment to appreciate the time you put into this game, its esports scene, and our community. I hope you continue doing so, and I'm glad to have you sharing your inputs with me and everyone else who's invested in Overwatch.
Alright, back to the topic of discussion...the Los Angeles Valiant. Changing their jersey colour from green to blue is the smallest of changes this team has made going into the 2020 season, as they're going for an almost-entirely-new look, with at least a couple of new players recruited on each role. Let's go over these players role-by-role and see what they bring to the table.
Alright, back to the topic of discussion...the Los Angeles Valiant. Changing their jersey colour from green to blue is the smallest of changes this team has made going into the 2020 season, as they're going for an almost-entirely-new look, with at least a couple of new players recruited on each role. Let's go over these players role-by-role and see what they bring to the table.
TANK
The Valiant currently have Dreamer and GiG on main tank, and McGravy on off-tank.
Picked up from the Sydney Drop Bears (Contenders Australia), Dreamer is a South Korean main tank player who has a pretty lukewarm track record in the Tier-2 scene. He's not really made any big splashes during his runs, and has only found true success in the Tier-3 scene during the Goats Meta. That leads me to believe he must be playing Winston, Reinhardt and Wrecking Ball, or some combination of the 3 to a decent level, but that's not saying much. Doing well in Tier-3 and doing well in OWL are two very different accomplishments, and I just don't think Dreamer is a player of a high enough calibre to even be noticed among some of the other main tanks in the League. GiG is another such player who, although has had better luck in Contenders with XL2, hasn't had a ton of experience or been a star player since he got into the professional scene. I think this main tank duo is just a big gamble, since you're relying on coachability more than anything to push this team forward and make them competitive at the topmost tier of professional Overwatch.
McGravy is more of a known quantity to us, as we've seen his D.Va play in 2019 when he was with the Florida Mayhem. I think he played quite well during his time on that team, but the roster overall wasn't that good at Goats, which is why he didn't have much success with them. He later joined the Valiant, and even though he didn't see much playtime, I'm sure he learnt a lot even on the bench; and with Packing10 still signed on as Head Coach, you can be sure McGravy is familiar with the Valiant's work culture, and knows what job he's expected to do in-game. Unfortunately, I can't comment on his play on off-tanks other than D.Va, since I simply haven't watched him play a lot in D.Va-less metas, but for fairness' sake, let's assume him to be average on each of Zarya, Roadhog and Sigma.
Going over the Valiant's tank line again, I'm worried. Dreamer and GiG don't seem like they can take on most other main tanks in the League, and I'm basing that on their lack of experience, lack of Tier-2 success, as well as the level at which I know most other main tanks can play in the League. McGravy can do a decent job on the off-tank position, but again, there are some fantastic off-tanks out there, and standing out among them is going to be a monumental task, which I'm not sure he can achieve. I strongly feel like this is going to be a bottom-5 tank line in OWL Season 3.
DPS
The Valiant's DPS for Season 3 are going to be KSF, Shax, Apply and KSP.
A recent winner of the 2019 Overwatch World Cup, KSF is a pretty good hitscan and sniper player. He showed us a decent Hanzo in the 2019 season, but other than that, he wasn't one to stand out to the crowd and make huge plays all the time. I don't know about the lot of you, but I don't think KSF plays a good Reaper either, and this just might be an unpopular opinion, but it is what it is. Do you guys know who does play a good Reaper though? It's the Great Dane, Shax. He was the one who came in, albeit as a Sombra player, to save the Valiant's season in 2019, and he did a bang-on job with that. He was one of the more aggressive Sombras I've seen in the League, getting the right hacks but also overstaying his welcome in enemy backlines, and sometimes getting eliminated because of it. I think he's a decent player, and can make use of a variety of flankers and hitscan heroes to a good level, but he's not a top-tier DPS in my books.
The only flex DPS added to the team this year is Apply, who plays projectile heroes for the most part, and has seemingly been playing a good Mei in the recent Orisa-centric metas. Other than that, he's not had a very good professional record. He spent a lot of time with Mayhem Academy, and has spent a few months here and there with other Contenders teams, but hasn't really found a lot of success, which is surprising, because he's been in Overwatch's pro scene for about 3 years now. He didn't do very well even on the main Florida Mayhem roster, and I don't think he's going to go places with the Valiant either. I think his saving grace could be his Mei play, which is at a good enough level for the League, but if and when the meta deviates from our Devilishly-OP Ice Queen, I think most other flex DPS players in the competition can outclass Apply by different margins. The final damage dealer on the Valiant's roster is KSP, a British hitscan player who, as of late, has become quite the playmaker. His tracking and crosshair placement are amazing, which makes him deadly at aim-based heroes like Widow and McCree, but he's also decent at Reaper, which is the go-to hitscan pick for high-sustain comps. I think if enabled well enough, KSP can be the carry DPS the Valiant need to rack up some extra wins and improve their record.
All-in-all, the Valiant's damage dealers don't look too bad, but they don't look too good either. I also think it's rather odd that this team has 3 hitscan players on their side. They could've traded out one of them for another flex DPS, since Apply might not be able to pull his weight throughout the season. I wouldn't place this DPS line in the bottom-5, since they don't have any weak players, but they're not good enough to earn a top-10 spot from me either.
SUPPORT
The Valiant's backline for 2020 consists of RaiN on main support, and Slur and Lastro on flex support.
RaiN was on the Florida Mayhem in OWL Season 2, and he didn't see much playtime because Kris was integrated into the roster. As a result, we haven't got an idea of how well he can perform in top-tier Overwatch. Based on his Contenders runs with O2, he seems to be good on Mercy and Lúcio, but I doubt he matches up to a horde of other main supports in the League.
I'm not going to lie, I hadn't heard of Slur before I saw the announcement of his signing. He's seemingly a very new name to the competitive Overwatch scene, and he's actually not done too badly in European Contenders. He's got good records during the Goats Meta, and seemingly plays a good Zenyatta and Moira, so just based off of that, I think he's a decent pickup, but again, how many good flex supports are there in the League? The answer is 'plenty'. Does Slur match up to their level? The answer is 'probably not'. I think it's genuinely a bad sign when I see a player that I've never heard of before getting signed to OWL, because even though I don't follow Contenders as intently as I do the League, I know the players here and there, and know who stands out among the others. I may just be ignorant here, but it is what it is. Lastro is being touted as one of the better flex supports being picked up from Contenders this season, and I've seen bits of his gameplay here and there. I think he's good, but again, the flex support market is so stacked that I wonder if he'll stand out to us.
Overall, I think these 3 pickups are okay, but I don't think they're going to impress, so I'll say they're probably a bottom-5 support line in comparison to their opponents.
THE RAW LOOK VS. REALITY
On paper, the Valiant look like a bottom-5, or maybe even a bottom-3 team to me. This roster is full of inexperienced and unproven players, and although their DPS line doesn't seem too bad, they'll be of no use with poor tank and support players backing them up. I'm just wondering whether I'm being a little ignorant here, and if I'm underrating them because I haven't seen some of them play at all; so to average things out a little, let's consider the Valiant's best-case scenario. Let's say all the new players are unaffected by their lack of Tier-1 experience, can communicate well since most of them have been on mixed rosters before, and actually perform as well as they have in Contenders. Despite all these assumptions, I don't think this team can even make the Play-Ins. There are just so many potent players out there that can easily outplay those on the Valiant, which is why I think this squad won't go any better than #15 this year.
If you agree with my opinions about the LA Valiant, please share this post around with other Overwatch League fans, and if you want to read the 9 remaining roster reviews without fail, don't forget to subscribe to my blog (button on the top right part of the page). My next review is going to be about the Shanghai Dragons, so if you want to read about them, stay tuned to The OverSeer! Cheers, have a good one!
Comments
Post a Comment