Eviction Notice

Remember the Valve’s Great Balance Proposal of Summer 2017? Well, after tearing my hair out about the proposed DDS buff (screw you, Sniper), I scrolled further and saw this:

Oh bother, Valve’s going to ruin this for me. I knew there’ll be karmic backlash for the Quick-Fix and Scorch Shot buffs coming my way some day, even though the Scorch Shot buff is totally uncalled for and really doesn’t concern me that much. I might just be scaring myself, and nothing bad for me is going to happen towards the Eviction Notice. But anyways, I’m going to write this article chronicling my love for this Heavy melee, so if things do go south during the patch at least I have an article about the good times I had with this thing. And so I can use less space in the upcoming rant article describing how it was in the past and give myself more room to yell at Valve.

The Eviction Notice is a pair of brass knuckles that allows the Heavy to punch faster while dealing less damage per hit. This is absolutely ridiculous since he’s holding a pair of metal things with spikes. The only possible explanation I have for this is that Heavy is just flailing his arms madly in front of him and scratching his opponents with the barbs in the manner depicted below:

Now, let’s go through the Eviction Notice’s current stats, at the point of writing:

Now, the first thing you’ll notice is that this is essentially GRU Lite. For a lesser amount of damage vulnerability, you’ll get a lower speed boost. The only unique feature it has is the modified Disciplinary Action mechanic: punch an enemy and you’ll get a speed boost for 3 seconds. I still remember back in the days when people ask for bleed on hit for the EN, because it was really underpowered and the weapon has sharp pointy things sticking out of it. Bleed on hit just made sense as a mechanic to add onto the EN back then.

So yes, here’s the question: If it’s just GRU Lite with some gimmicky speed boost mechanics, why do I use it? More to the point, why don’t I use the GRU?

The main thing I like about the EN is that once I switch away from it, I have no passive effects on me. Since I normally play as a flanking Heavy, I normally scuttle along the flanking routes quickly with the Eviction Notice out. If I face a flanker from the other team and I have the GRU on instead, I’ll be dead since I’ll be taking Mini-Crits for three whole seconds after I put it away to take out my gun.

Aside from that, not being marked for death is pretty good, since Mini-Crits negate damage falloff. Thus, someone taking potshots at me will be far less annoying for me with the EN on. So yes, although the GRU gives me a larger speed boost, the Eviction Notice is a safer option for me, which is why I like using it so much. Not to mention, since I mainly play KoTH, the GRU’s larger speed boost isn’t exactly significant.

And now, onto the proposed changes. Since low mobility is the Heavy’s main weakness to balance out his high health and damage, it makes sense for Heavy to be more vulnerable when he’s moving quickly. So yes, I can support Valve’s decision here. What I really worry about is the regenerating health on switching out. If Heavy gets all the missing health back in one go once he puts it away, I’m fine with that. But if the health returns in the same rate it depletes that’ll make it rather pointless for me, since it means I’ll remain out of action longer than if I were to just run there with my Tomislav out, as I need to wait to get all my health back. I’m all for trading survivability for mobility, but I do not want to remain vulnerable when I am in position and ready to attack, since that is what made me give up the GRU in the first place.

I get that people will say that since I can now get to places faster than I normally should be, the vulnerability after holstering is fair. But answer me this: what is the point of being able to get to the front quickly when I need to hide near the enemy waiting for my vulnerability to pass, hoping that the enemy doesn’t push through and find me weakened and defenseless? Not to mention, I’ll still be slower than any class with speeds faster than 100% and above, which is 6 out of the 8 other classes. And I am still an extremely large target, hence I need to use my game sense and map knowledge to make the most out of this boost, or the cover of my teammates. The vulnerability when the speed-boosting melee weapons are active should be enough.

So yes, Valve, I’ll be keeping a close eye on what you’ll be doing to the Eviction Notice. And the Darwin’s Danger Shield, because that proposed afterburn immunity is bullshit.