I have recently watched a video by Hitscan on Harbor and am confused about something. In the video Ryan states that Harbors High Tide duration is 15 seconds. After playing Harbor for a bit, I have come to find out this isn't true. It's actually 12 seconds, which is incredibly surprising. For context, here are all the controllers smoke abilities durations:

- Brimstone's Sky smoke: 19,25 seconds

- Astra's Nebula / Cosmic divide: 15 seconds / 21 seconds

- Omen's Dark cover: 14,25 seconds

- Viper's Toxic screen / Poison cloud: 16 seconds (or 8 seconds if used simultaneously

(Most information gathered from Agents/Controllers | Valorant Wiki | Fandom )

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Brimstone's Sky smoke and Astra's Cosmic divide being 19,25 and 21 is understandable: Brimstone is a hard execution smoker and Cosmic divide is an ultimate. Nebula, Dark cover and Toxic screen / Poison cloud all having a duration of about 15 seconds makes sense. As to why High tide is 12 seconds; I have no clue. I can only speculate that Riot thought Harbor would be over tuned at launch, thus deciding to deliver him slightly weaker at launch than the other controllers. This is supported by the fact that Harbor will be meta. Riot has stated that they want Harbor to be a viable agent. They haven't given up on him (yet). Omen's dark cover used to also be 12 seconds but in patch 0.50 Dark cover's duration was buffed to be 14,25, the same duration as Sky smoke at the time; the reason being was *Brimstone'*s dominance in the meta over Omen especially in pro play. I believe that if Harbor gets outshined by Viper on maps where he is supposed to be meta (such as Breeze, Icebox and Pearl), Riot will be forced to increase High tides duration since that is the same reason Omen was buffed. I would suggest buffing High tide to be the same duration as either Dark cover or Nebula (around 15 seconds).

High tide's cooldown being 40 seconds seems fair to me. If we compare him to the other controllers that have rechargeable smokes (Astra, Omen (and Viper)) we can see that the cooldown is greater than all three of the agents' primary smoke cooldown. Nebula has a 25 second cooldown, Dark cover has a 30 second cooldown and it takes 20 seconds for Viper's toxin to fully recharge. I believe 40 seconds is a fair cooldown because High tide (on certain bombsites) can be used to cover multiple entrances. On Pearl's B-site High tide can cover the same spaces that 5 orb smokes can cover. If curved properly High tide can cover B link, B tower, B tunnel and both entrances to B hall. If Riot did buff Harbor by decreasing High tides cooldown, I don't think this would make too much of a difference other than making it more likely the Harbor can use a second cast of High tide during post plant. This first cast obviously being used to take control of the bombsite. A cooldown of 40 seconds is fair, 35 seems generous and 30 would be bordering the overpowered region in my opinion.

As for High tide's slow being slightly ignorable, this is intentional. Riot has stated that Harbor is not supposed to be good at stalling; even less being a site anchor.

This concludes my opinions on Harbor's High tide. I thank you all for taking the time to read this! I wish you the best of luck in your ranked games and in life in general.

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Last notes: In this post I focused on High tide instead of Harbor's kit in general as I didn't want to come up with stupidly overpowered buff suggestions like some people on the Valorant reddit or in YouTube comments. I am not a game designer, just a logical thinker. As for buffs I could see Cascade being made bulletproof (12 vandal bullets) or Cove's smoke staying for a duration after the shield is broken or Harbor's ultimate's zone having a slow effect, but again, I am not a game designer and maybe these buffs could make Harbor incredibly overtuned. As a small bonus, here are some videos about Harbor that I think are interesting (I highly recommend the last one):

- (10) Devs Reveal All About Harbor & Balance Updates - YouTube

- (10) We Were WRONG About Harbor + How Pros Play The New Agent - YouTube

- (11) Where Does Harbor Fit In VALORANT's Pro Meta? - YouTube