On Purifiers

I noticed in the Test 182 feedback that several people (myself included) made comments about Purifiers becoming overbearing and just kind of un-fun to play against as certain squads, as they feel like they remove a lot of options for map movement and engagement angles as soon as they siege up, and I recall hearing a lot of similar feedback during the 1k weekend tests.

So I got to thinking about why Purifiers feel so oppressive compared to their friendly Starcraft analogue, the Siege Tank. The biggest factors I could identify as to why Tanks don't feel the same way were twofold: first, tanks can blow each other (and other friendly units) up, and second, they're weak to air units which don't exist in Atlas, and I don't foresee being added as a generally-available unit type.

Continuing the thought process, I asked myself what could be done to allow Purifiers to still do the long-range splash damage thing without entirely shutting down parts of the map. Of course, they could be given a similar friendly fire splash treatment to Siege Tanks, but that doesn't feel like a super great solution given the presence of two teammates who may not enjoy being blown up.

Instead, I would propose/suggest/muse upon the idea that rooted Purifiers instead target a cone-shaped area. It could be fixed based upon an initial angle, or able to be slowly rotated by ordering the Purifier to move while rooted, and it could be 45 degrees or 120 degrees or whatever. What matters is that it could add more depth to the Purifier interactions for both sides. It could also open them up for a variety of other meaningful upgrades (increased cone width, increased turn speed, allowing turning, melee-resistant plating, returning the root/unroot speed, etc) and just overall unit buffs. They don't need to be as squishy then, they could do more damage then. They would also have a degree of counterplay around them as well then, which seems sorely lacking for certain squads.

Hell, it might even encourage someone to build a Precognitor. Maybe. (I have literally never seen a human player build a Precognitor).

I don't know if Purifiers are under the microscope at all internally, or if perhaps this was tested many cycles ago and found to not work, I just had the thought and wanted to share.