I know it's long and probably said, but Immortal Hulk; One Tune-Up Away From Viable (In my opinion)
Hello forums,
Thanks to the Epoch Crystals, i had the good fortune of pulling a 5 star version of Immortal Hulk, something, unlike most of the community, I saw as an absolute win. I really like the champion when he gets put in the right situations, which unfortunately, do not happen too often. The recent buff that pauses his RAGE stacks during specials is quite the improvement from before, where anyone that did not have fast specials caused you to lose all those stacks you work so hard for (intercepting like a madman, 3 hit combos, etc.). Unfortunately, while he is now better, he is still a ways away from where he deserves to be; a suicide friendly, raw damage god. I feel like he needs just a touch more before he goes from needing to be situational to being viable. What I suggest is as follows;
1. Treat his RAGE stacks like She-Hulk Furies: She-Hulk is an amazing champion with at ton of usability in tough content, for 3 reasons; her easy access to Slow Debuff, her massive damage, and the Induce Panic passive ability. The Induce Panic passive allows She-Hulk to increase the chance of her opponent throwing special attacks by 15% per passive Fury on her. This allows her to consistently keep and build her Furies, as they refresh each time the opponent throws a special attack. Immortal Hulk needs this type of mechanic BADLY. The minute that an opponent starts playing passively, you've lost your stacks. I suggest that for each RAGE stack on Immortal Hulk, the opponent starts playing 2% more aggressively, stacking up to 50% once you have max stacks. This allows for Immortal Hulk to play aggressive and keep his RAGE stacks a lot easier, making his damage more accessible and making him more viable.
2. Give him access to Slow: The Slow mechanic is insanely useful and is becoming pretty common among Science Champions in particular. Immortal Hulk needs a way to counter some of the powerful defenders of the game, such as Dr. Doom, Thing, Wolverine (Weapon X), Sasquatch, The Champion and Annihilus. I know he gets a chance to Petrify with his Signature Ability and Special 3 attack, so Doom technically gets countered, but it's too difficult to get to that consistent Petrify. I suggest that while RAGE is active, the opponent has a passive Slow Debuff active on them. This would allow Immortal Hulk to remain able to play aggressive, preventing having to lose all rage while waiting for unstoppable to fall off (or Doom's aura).
TLDR: Immortal Hulk is a fun champion that definitely feels better to play after the Tune-Up, but I feel that he needs a mechanic that makes the opponent become aggressive and access to Slow in order to become viable for tough content.
If you read the whole thing, thank you. If you have any alternatives, questions or rebukes to my arguments, I'm welcome to hear them and reply. Please share this around; I'd love to have someone from Kabam read this.