As a GM-level Rocket Raccoon main, I’ve observed that Rocket is a strong character, but his design promotes a mind-numbing, simplistic, and un-interactive gameplay loop. Rather than offering engaging gameplay, Rocket's kit forces players into repetitive actions, hoping for a dive or push to break up the monotony.

Edit: I feel like some of the discourse is largely push back on my analysis of rocket racconn's gameplay. Not disagreement on those observations, but more so defending it as an enjoyable way to play. This post is not meant to attack or offend anyone who finds rockets playstyle enjoyable despite its issues. I clearly still like Rocket myself. The ideas i present also do not get in the way of the current gameplay loop of rocket. The intent is to enhance his character in ways that would NOT alienate his current player base or change his core design principals. The changes really work for all levels of play.

Core Issues with Rocket's Kit

• Healing Orb Spam
  • Rocket’s healing orbs necessitate spam because of two mechanics:
  • 1, The orbs slow down when healing a target, including Rocket, and are body blocked by allies, causing "traffic" delays as the intended target gets their heals delayed. This results in Rocket needing to fire more than one as the 2nd one is less likely to get "caught in traffic"
  • 2, The orbs lose bounce properties the more targets they heal, which forces Rocket to spam orbs instead of allowing Orbs to increase their own value via trajectory shots. Firing an orb into a small room, does not increase the efficiency of the orb. the only thing that will increase efficiency... is firing more orbs.
  • This results in a monotonous gameplay loop, where Rocket’s effectiveness relies on constantly spamming orbs rather than using strategy or skill.
• Primary Fire Opposes His Role
  • Rocket’s primary fire doesn’t align with his intended role as a backline healer.
  • His damage output drops sharply beyond 10-15 meters, forcing him to get close to deal damage, which contradicts his role.
  • This design reinforces the “healing spam” loop, as using his primary fire often weakens the team and delays healing orbs from doing their job.
  • In high-level play, Rocket mains can reach GM without using primary fire—if you have to use it, you’ve likely made a mistake.
• Passive, Inactive Playstyle ( Tool Placement Gameplay)
  • Rocket's revive beacon, while having an interesting armor and boost pack mechanic, is tied to the revive tool, which has a long cooldown and isn’t usable when most needed.
  • For the armor packs to be effective, Rocket's revive tool must be in constant danger, which is impractical. Its actually a pretty cool passive, that is reduced to a gimmick due to useability
  • His ultimate, an offensive damage buff that doesn’t move, is best used to create space rather than push offensively, making it less valuable in higher elo.
  • Overall, Rocket lacks interactive moments in his gameplay loop, which detracts from his potential impact on the game.

Why Rocket’s Kit Feels Monotonous

• Rocket’s kit forces players into a repetitive gameplay loop: throw a revive kit, spam orbs, and wait for a dive or push.
• This passive and un-engaging cycle results in a lack of dopamine moments or interactive gameplay, which makes Rocket feels one-note and lacking in skill expression.

How I Would Fix Rocket

• Healing Orbs
  • Orbs should retain all bounces and slightly speed up their pass-through phase. This would reward skillful play by allowing well-placed orbs to heal more effectively, promoting better positioning and strategy.
  • If necessary, adjust the healing per second to balance the change.
• Primary Fire
  • Make Rocket's primary fire hit scan to give him a role as a counter to flyers.
  • Decrease the delay between switching from primary fire to healing orbs to improve fluidity.
  • Alternative change: change his primary fire’s spray pattern from a line to a cone, making him a more effective dive buster, while keeping it as a projectile. It would make him even more effective on groot team up as well
    • This is my preferred idea but could alienate some folks
• Revive Tool and Passive Changes
  • Decouple Rocket’s armor and boost pack mechanics from the revive tool, allowing more consistent access to these helpful abilities. Ideally as a new skill or integrated elsewhere (Maybe they pop out of his gun when he reloads)
  • This change would give Rocket’s passive a more constant presence in the gameplay loop, reducing reliance on the revive tool’s lengthy cooldown.

Final Thoughts

Rocket is a strong character, but his core design is fundamentally flawed. While other characters may need only number tweaks, Rocket’s core concepts either contradict or suppress skill expression.. He’s by far the least interactive character in the game, and his gameplay loop is the most monotonous.

He is kind of the opposite of Hawkeye. Hawkeye primary fire is so strong it devalues the rest of his kit. Rocket's Primary Fire is so badly integrated, it shrinks his gameplay loop dynamism to that of a heal bot.