This would tank a lot of player's frame rate. Tentacles, like Vauban's Vortex, are oddly GPU intensive from what I can tell. ...Given how often I cast Hydroid's 1, there would be tentacles *everywhere*. Even if the frame rate weren't impacted, it'd be real easy to make the battlefield a total mess with this.. snaring targets and making them harder to shoot, I can imagine making many enemies out of teammates with this. Frankly, it would stop me from using Hydroid entirely, and he's my main, so I gotta hard-pass on this one.
I'd support ending the ragdolling, and knocking enemies cleanly prone. That would be ideal. Full support there.
Again, the passive, especially with the guaranteed impact? OH no. lol Absolutely not. He'd be more hated than Limbo in terms of messing up people's aim.. Everyone would be all noodlin' around and too wiggly to shoot at, it would slow and complicate kills for team mates, and likely yourself as Hydroid. Can you imagine trying to hit a crowd of enemies with Nanchaku when they spend 1/3rd of the time above your hitbox, and the rest of the time flailing in random directions? This right here is why I removed his ult for a helminth ability. the tentacles are entirely too awkward, and need to be reworked to hold things stationary, squeezing and maybe sometimes slapping against a wall or floor.. but otherwise making easier targets, rather than harder unpredictable ones.
10 meters in all directions feels like a held-function to me, but I've also thought about Tidal Surge being a cast wave instead of a movement function. Currently, I do use Tidal Surge to move around a lot, and that would take considerable getting used to, 'cause I've been doing it for.. 9 years now? That said, I'd be fine with it being a directional wave that pushed enemies away.
Slash is a good damage type, but feels thematically off, unless there were some sort of sea junk in the wave. I would perhaps suggest True damage and impact, though. Blast, Cold, and Puncture would be good additions for their status effects of lowering accuracy, damage, and movement speed.. each helping to stunt the enemy response
Yes. I've also thought this should be a thing.. Rather than tentacle swarm, a Kraken in the Undertow pool. The tentacle grab that you can do is extremely inconsistent for some reason.. and as much as I've played him, I have no idea why sometimes I can grab things (at steep energy cost mind you) and usually it just won't do anything.
One thing to consider is that this vastly increases the range of the puddle, and there wouldn't be a way to turn off the Kraken. Why would this matter? Stealth missions. ....Yeah, I know, he's not a stealth frame, but... hear me out... Undertow is a perfectly valid stealth ability, so long as enemies don't survive falling in.
LOL Dude, we share a brain cell on this one. I wrote almost exactly this in a rework concept of my own a while back. Channeled Hydroid form with higher survivability. 2 Puddles like portals. Kraken under the water. Would be pretty sweet.