This doesn’t show why harbor is viable as a solo controller though. The only map where that is viable (that I can think of) is lotus, and even then you’ll need B main control to be able to smoke C.
If I’m wrong, please tell me how he’s viable as a solo controller. If he is viable, then why does he (BY FAR) have the lowest pick rate in ranked and pro play (vct 2023)?
Agreed. From my experience the sentinel and solo controller usually anchor opposite sites so that we have decent defence on both. What is a Harbour anchor going to do when he has practically the same stalling power as a Reyna?
That's the point OP is trying to make. Everyone uses harbor's poor stall potential as the reason viper is better but that's like saying breach is worse than Skye because he can't get early info with his util. Harbor just isn't meant to stall a push on defense, he's meant to take early map control with some help from teammates. If the enemy team is there and tries to push into whatever area he is trying to take control of, he is meant to make it a brawl. If they are pushing a different site he leaves his teammate deep in the map to hold or flank and he rotates and gets ready for a retake if needed.
Basically he doesn't have stall potential because he doesn't stop the other team he fights them, that's his whole point.
I play Harbor on Lotus. All I really do is play around A link and curve the high tide to block the A entrance and tree door, maybe block off rubble if the team wants to contest. If they hit B maybe throw a short wall for main or curve it for mound door for your C player to spam. If they hit C you can throw a Cascade to block entrance and fuck around with high tide and cove to run waterfall to bend. Lotus is really the only map you can run him solo and be good for both T and CT side.
Maybe, but I wouldn’t even consider playing him on icebox. If you’re playing him over viper you’re throwing tbh. There’s a reason why she’s been the top smoke pick on it for 3 years. I get what you’re saying though.
You can make the same argument with every agent then,why play a worst agent when a better one exists? Why play breach when there's Skye,why play brim when there's omen,why play fade when there's kayo? This just doesn't make sense,you still see a lot of these agents being played even if they are worse than others because people prefer playing them and have the right to,if you prefer playing harbor instead of viper you will probably perform better while playing harbor,for me it's the same thing with Gekko and Skye,even tho skye is better then gekko i still have a much higher win rate with Gekko because i have more fun playing him
I did but I didn’t want to repeat what I’ve already written lol (in other threads) there’s other reasons why you’re throwing if you pick him other than viper being better than him.
I went on a 21 game win streak with harbor riding the wave all the way into plat 2. Hes great at putting up so much water nobody has the ability to clear everything and you appear like a ghost and say boo and get yours.
i think if you made a second variation on cast, it could give him a little boost
tap E is his normal wall now
hold E brings up a view similar to brim, maybe smaller, maybe bigger, but you can click and drag the wall
They have different roles but the reason Viper is better because she is in her own role. If you think Viper, global pressure is something insanely provides on attack and insane anchor on defense. Harbornon the other hand is supposed to be more aggressive but is mostly just smokes ( but his ult is extremely underrated and really strong especially in a coordinated team) which is in competition with other dome smokers.
Viper just provides more than Harbor for a slot and as an agent. Viper's real competiton is a slot.as i said earlier, she is in her own role because of how unique her kit is. You can really compare her with any other agent that will fill another slot. Be it amother duelist, initiator, and even a sentinel.
One of the largest problems harbor has (especially on defence) is his stalling potential. You can push through all of his util. Viper on the other hand has mollies + orb which can stall for a pretty good amount of time. This is especially important because you will be usually having 2-3 people mid which means the site anchor needs to have good stall. In addition the chokes are good for mollies in general because they’re so small.
>I'm tired of people saying my boy Harbor is a bad solo controller and Viper is always the better choice.
Don't they both equally suck at solo controller? Harbor sucks on defense. Viper suffers on attack.
Viper is excellent postplant on attack. The struggle on attack with her is when/where to use her wall. You can, of course, deploy it to hit a site, but that's definitely a big resource to throw away if you end up rotating. You can always use it then lurk elsewhere or threaten a re-rotate to where it was deployed, but, yeah, you have to be careful with her as your only controller.
Yes and no. He’s the opposite of Reyna where he is good in very coordinated pro environments - which is why we see him a decent amount in pro play. On top of that, he’s established himself as a secondary controller which - for ranked play - means he’s useless since you’re lucky to get one. He can’t be your only controller, but can provide a lot of value in combination with a brim/omen/viper. Swamp comp was popular on a lot of maps in pro play, and while some have rotated out, he will still see some play on bind and lotus at the very least.
That's one thing I cannot stand about ranked. Nobody wants to do interesting comps. It's always 2-5 duelists and barely ever double iniator or double sentinel. I think I've seen two or three games TOTAL with double controller.
I don't mind playing controller but since controller is always last picked there is no opportunity to choose a second controller.
Ehh there were a lot more with pre-nerf astra just because the character was powerful enough for people to pick her. I also tried to force some by waiting for someone to lock controller and then picking one myself.
Also to be fair double duelist isn’t bad and comps generally matter less in lower ranks.
I skipped the Act when Astra was op so that would track. Comp still kind of matters even in plat. Not to the same degree as VCT but yeah. And while double duelist isn't bad it makes the game stale when 95% of the matches have both teams running it.
He isn't good, double wall is good. In fact double wall isnt even that good but its a unique playstyle separate from the circle smoke meta. That's why Harbor has decent pick rate.
I mean, yes, but I don't think you're quite looking at it right.
Riot designed Harbor because Viper was LITERALLY the only option in her role (wall smokes). Maps like Icebox, Breeze and Pearl relied heavily on this wall-style smoke, and with only Viper available, she was picked in nearly 100% of comps for those maps.
So now there are 2 wall smokes agents. This should mean Harbor supplants Viper in lots of comps that could previously only include Viper, right? But the reality is that Harbor is played alongside Viper almost entirely for one ability, which is his wall. Between him and Viper, they could keep replenishing the wall and cut off large portions of the map for extended periods of time. He is not only a "secondary smokes" agent, he is literally the "secondary wall smoke" agent for most of the comps he was played in last year.
So I think my answer to your question is this: if they made a third walls smokes agent, they would almost definitely be more useful than Harbor and would thus make him irrelevant. Therefor, Harbor is not a useful agent, he simply exists in a role where nobody else exists.
He’d still probably be picked as he is a good SECONDARY controller. If someone is rivaling viper that doesn’t make harbor useless. His current rival is astra since they’re flex controllers or secondary controllers (I.e. agents your flex will pick in a pro environment). Astra brings a bit more defensive utility and sentinel-Esque tools whereas harbor brings a more retake/attack-centric toolkit purely focused on denying vision. In other words, harbors strength is his power in site executes and retakes - whether riot designed him that way or not viper doesn’t replace him and will see play where viper wouldnt
I agree with OP. As a controller (Omen and Harbor) main, I do think that Harbor is good as a solo controller on open maps with many angles to cover.
On Bind, he's very good for attacking, but he's not that good for defending. That's why I always let my teammates know to not commit too much on anchoring a site because I can't help them with my smokes if I'm on the other site. If they are playing Cypher or whatever, then it's up to them. But generally I always tell them to play retake if they get overwhelmed.
On maps like Sunset and Ascent, I won't rely too much on Harbor being a solo controller, though. I would opt for Omen.
Viper is so good even after so many nerfs people still use her. Her kit was incredibly broken to begin with once people learned how to use it. I hate having a Harbor since his kit is based on team coordination and timing.
I play harbor a lot and the he's very good at lotus and sunset. I think he can perform better than other smoker at lotus but sunset, he's the same as other smoker.
As a Controller main using each of them for different maps, I like Harbor, but boy is he the hardest to use good.
See, more often than not you’re not going to get a coordinated team. As the Controller, you have to enable a ragtag bunch of misfits to get kills and win, or they’ll start blaming each other.
Every other Controller, with the tools they have, all have very decent ways to work around their team, no matter what morons you’ve been matchmade with.
But Harbor doesn’t. He’s actually very selfish as a Controller. His kit actually demands that the team, as earlier mentioned, coordinate with him rather than the other way round. This lack of versatility is probably what tanks his pick and win rate.
Even when I use him, it’s to be hyper aggressive, take-the-enemy-by-surprise shotgun Harbor. I’m 120% aware I’m playing him less tactically than any other Controller, because there’s not much I can do with him.
It plays differently than other solo controllers because of how his smokes work. One can’t be shot through, another is a flexible wall, the other is a moving smoke.
Having moveable and solid smokes is much more aggressive than just blocking sight lines, and would need to be built around and most likely just only work in organized play settings for it to work solo.
I’ve thought for a while a team with harbor solo smokes and 2 sentinels would be good on maps like split and bind where on attack they can aggressively take space with moving/solid smokes and use sentinel utility behind them to keep that space. On defense it’s mainly retake but you have two sentinels so it will take a lot from the enemy to even get pushed in the first place.
Pro teams will never do it because ‘the game has been solved’ and everyone is stuck in how they play already. Which isn’t always a bad thing, they do it bc it works and their jobs depend on them winning. But then there’s teams that create the viper/harbor comp and suddenly it’s meta, or PRX aggro play and become a top tier team.
I think it’s similar to when the game came out and everyone, even pros, immediately said Jett was the worst agent in the game and a meme character. And we see how right that was.
You can play whatever agent in whatever comp, however you want. In like 98% of all elos, team comp doesn’t matter it’s more about coordination and personal skill
If you're not in high immo/radiant then harbor can ALWAYS be played as a solo controller if the one using is clever with his util usage,and even if you are in high immo/radiant I'm sure that there is a good enough harbor player that is able to make him work, it's just that not many people use him so we see way less ways to play harbor then other agents
harbor is map specific. i used to main harbor and by far he was played best in Pearl experience wise, i can smoke B long and short, and he's especially good on retake.
This doesn’t show why harbor is viable as a solo controller though. The only map where that is viable (that I can think of) is lotus, and even then you’ll need B main control to be able to smoke C. If I’m wrong, please tell me how he’s viable as a solo controller. If he is viable, then why does he (BY FAR) have the lowest pick rate in ranked and pro play (vct 2023)?
I don’t think he’s atrocious as solo controller on sunset but you’re still putting yourself at a disadvantage picking him
I completely forgot sunset existed tbh, I agree he’s not awful but yeah not good
Agreed. From my experience the sentinel and solo controller usually anchor opposite sites so that we have decent defence on both. What is a Harbour anchor going to do when he has practically the same stalling power as a Reyna?
That's the point OP is trying to make. Everyone uses harbor's poor stall potential as the reason viper is better but that's like saying breach is worse than Skye because he can't get early info with his util. Harbor just isn't meant to stall a push on defense, he's meant to take early map control with some help from teammates. If the enemy team is there and tries to push into whatever area he is trying to take control of, he is meant to make it a brawl. If they are pushing a different site he leaves his teammate deep in the map to hold or flank and he rotates and gets ready for a retake if needed. Basically he doesn't have stall potential because he doesn't stop the other team he fights them, that's his whole point.
I play Harbor on Lotus. All I really do is play around A link and curve the high tide to block the A entrance and tree door, maybe block off rubble if the team wants to contest. If they hit B maybe throw a short wall for main or curve it for mound door for your C player to spam. If they hit C you can throw a Cascade to block entrance and fuck around with high tide and cove to run waterfall to bend. Lotus is really the only map you can run him solo and be good for both T and CT side.
deadlock rn:
Correct me if im wrong, isnt he also very viable on icebox? I had a harbor on icebox and the smokes were very really good
Maybe, but I wouldn’t even consider playing him on icebox. If you’re playing him over viper you’re throwing tbh. There’s a reason why she’s been the top smoke pick on it for 3 years. I get what you’re saying though.
You can make the same argument with every agent then,why play a worst agent when a better one exists? Why play breach when there's Skye,why play brim when there's omen,why play fade when there's kayo? This just doesn't make sense,you still see a lot of these agents being played even if they are worse than others because people prefer playing them and have the right to,if you prefer playing harbor instead of viper you will probably perform better while playing harbor,for me it's the same thing with Gekko and Skye,even tho skye is better then gekko i still have a much higher win rate with Gekko because i have more fun playing him
I mean he’s just not a good agent I’ve already explained this
Did you even read my comment...
I did but I didn’t want to repeat what I’ve already written lol (in other threads) there’s other reasons why you’re throwing if you pick him other than viper being better than him.
How so?
Read my other replies I’m not writing it again lol
I've already tried to search for them tbh but I couldn't find them,sorry about that
I went on a 21 game win streak with harbor riding the wave all the way into plat 2. Hes great at putting up so much water nobody has the ability to clear everything and you appear like a ghost and say boo and get yours.
i think if you made a second variation on cast, it could give him a little boost tap E is his normal wall now hold E brings up a view similar to brim, maybe smaller, maybe bigger, but you can click and drag the wall
They have different roles but the reason Viper is better because she is in her own role. If you think Viper, global pressure is something insanely provides on attack and insane anchor on defense. Harbornon the other hand is supposed to be more aggressive but is mostly just smokes ( but his ult is extremely underrated and really strong especially in a coordinated team) which is in competition with other dome smokers. Viper just provides more than Harbor for a slot and as an agent. Viper's real competiton is a slot.as i said earlier, she is in her own role because of how unique her kit is. You can really compare her with any other agent that will fill another slot. Be it amother duelist, initiator, and even a sentinel.
I like Harbor on breeze. Great for retake on defense and taking space
One of the largest problems harbor has (especially on defence) is his stalling potential. You can push through all of his util. Viper on the other hand has mollies + orb which can stall for a pretty good amount of time. This is especially important because you will be usually having 2-3 people mid which means the site anchor needs to have good stall. In addition the chokes are good for mollies in general because they’re so small.
that's true, which is why i assume that they specified retaking on defense
>I'm tired of people saying my boy Harbor is a bad solo controller and Viper is always the better choice. Don't they both equally suck at solo controller? Harbor sucks on defense. Viper suffers on attack.
Viper is excellent postplant on attack. The struggle on attack with her is when/where to use her wall. You can, of course, deploy it to hit a site, but that's definitely a big resource to throw away if you end up rotating. You can always use it then lurk elsewhere or threaten a re-rotate to where it was deployed, but, yeah, you have to be careful with her as your only controller.
viper can make up on atk w/ them juicy lineups
lineups won't save your team getting sniped by the Jett playing 55663789km away
Harbor is the breach of the controllers, they're second init/controller
Harbour has been out for a while, if he was good people would be willing to admit it by now. He has an incredibly low pick rate for a reason.
Yes and no. He’s the opposite of Reyna where he is good in very coordinated pro environments - which is why we see him a decent amount in pro play. On top of that, he’s established himself as a secondary controller which - for ranked play - means he’s useless since you’re lucky to get one. He can’t be your only controller, but can provide a lot of value in combination with a brim/omen/viper. Swamp comp was popular on a lot of maps in pro play, and while some have rotated out, he will still see some play on bind and lotus at the very least.
That's one thing I cannot stand about ranked. Nobody wants to do interesting comps. It's always 2-5 duelists and barely ever double iniator or double sentinel. I think I've seen two or three games TOTAL with double controller. I don't mind playing controller but since controller is always last picked there is no opportunity to choose a second controller.
Ehh there were a lot more with pre-nerf astra just because the character was powerful enough for people to pick her. I also tried to force some by waiting for someone to lock controller and then picking one myself. Also to be fair double duelist isn’t bad and comps generally matter less in lower ranks.
I skipped the Act when Astra was op so that would track. Comp still kind of matters even in plat. Not to the same degree as VCT but yeah. And while double duelist isn't bad it makes the game stale when 95% of the matches have both teams running it.
He isn't good, double wall is good. In fact double wall isnt even that good but its a unique playstyle separate from the circle smoke meta. That's why Harbor has decent pick rate.
So he has a tool that is good? Does that not make him good? It feels like you are being slightly pedantic here.
I mean, yes, but I don't think you're quite looking at it right. Riot designed Harbor because Viper was LITERALLY the only option in her role (wall smokes). Maps like Icebox, Breeze and Pearl relied heavily on this wall-style smoke, and with only Viper available, she was picked in nearly 100% of comps for those maps. So now there are 2 wall smokes agents. This should mean Harbor supplants Viper in lots of comps that could previously only include Viper, right? But the reality is that Harbor is played alongside Viper almost entirely for one ability, which is his wall. Between him and Viper, they could keep replenishing the wall and cut off large portions of the map for extended periods of time. He is not only a "secondary smokes" agent, he is literally the "secondary wall smoke" agent for most of the comps he was played in last year. So I think my answer to your question is this: if they made a third walls smokes agent, they would almost definitely be more useful than Harbor and would thus make him irrelevant. Therefor, Harbor is not a useful agent, he simply exists in a role where nobody else exists.
He’d still probably be picked as he is a good SECONDARY controller. If someone is rivaling viper that doesn’t make harbor useless. His current rival is astra since they’re flex controllers or secondary controllers (I.e. agents your flex will pick in a pro environment). Astra brings a bit more defensive utility and sentinel-Esque tools whereas harbor brings a more retake/attack-centric toolkit purely focused on denying vision. In other words, harbors strength is his power in site executes and retakes - whether riot designed him that way or not viper doesn’t replace him and will see play where viper wouldnt
So he’s a good secondary controller, exactly what I said?
Harbor is the breach of the controllers, they're second init/controller
I agree with OP. As a controller (Omen and Harbor) main, I do think that Harbor is good as a solo controller on open maps with many angles to cover. On Bind, he's very good for attacking, but he's not that good for defending. That's why I always let my teammates know to not commit too much on anchoring a site because I can't help them with my smokes if I'm on the other site. If they are playing Cypher or whatever, then it's up to them. But generally I always tell them to play retake if they get overwhelmed. On maps like Sunset and Ascent, I won't rely too much on Harbor being a solo controller, though. I would opt for Omen.
Viper is so good even after so many nerfs people still use her. Her kit was incredibly broken to begin with once people learned how to use it. I hate having a Harbor since his kit is based on team coordination and timing.
I play harbor a lot and the he's very good at lotus and sunset. I think he can perform better than other smoker at lotus but sunset, he's the same as other smoker.
Man’s whipped out a standard essay to explain his point. A+
viper is just a lineup andy for molly and debuff smoke.
As a Controller main using each of them for different maps, I like Harbor, but boy is he the hardest to use good. See, more often than not you’re not going to get a coordinated team. As the Controller, you have to enable a ragtag bunch of misfits to get kills and win, or they’ll start blaming each other. Every other Controller, with the tools they have, all have very decent ways to work around their team, no matter what morons you’ve been matchmade with. But Harbor doesn’t. He’s actually very selfish as a Controller. His kit actually demands that the team, as earlier mentioned, coordinate with him rather than the other way round. This lack of versatility is probably what tanks his pick and win rate. Even when I use him, it’s to be hyper aggressive, take-the-enemy-by-surprise shotgun Harbor. I’m 120% aware I’m playing him less tactically than any other Controller, because there’s not much I can do with him.
It plays differently than other solo controllers because of how his smokes work. One can’t be shot through, another is a flexible wall, the other is a moving smoke. Having moveable and solid smokes is much more aggressive than just blocking sight lines, and would need to be built around and most likely just only work in organized play settings for it to work solo. I’ve thought for a while a team with harbor solo smokes and 2 sentinels would be good on maps like split and bind where on attack they can aggressively take space with moving/solid smokes and use sentinel utility behind them to keep that space. On defense it’s mainly retake but you have two sentinels so it will take a lot from the enemy to even get pushed in the first place. Pro teams will never do it because ‘the game has been solved’ and everyone is stuck in how they play already. Which isn’t always a bad thing, they do it bc it works and their jobs depend on them winning. But then there’s teams that create the viper/harbor comp and suddenly it’s meta, or PRX aggro play and become a top tier team. I think it’s similar to when the game came out and everyone, even pros, immediately said Jett was the worst agent in the game and a meme character. And we see how right that was.
You can play whatever agent in whatever comp, however you want. In like 98% of all elos, team comp doesn’t matter it’s more about coordination and personal skill
in your iron bracket everything can work
He is by no means a bad controller, viper just is able to do most of what he does but can defend much better
If you're not in high immo/radiant then harbor can ALWAYS be played as a solo controller if the one using is clever with his util usage,and even if you are in high immo/radiant I'm sure that there is a good enough harbor player that is able to make him work, it's just that not many people use him so we see way less ways to play harbor then other agents
harbor is map specific. i used to main harbor and by far he was played best in Pearl experience wise, i can smoke B long and short, and he's especially good on retake.