So Boomerang is one of those gems character, hes never played but he is a great character. Is he top 10? No, but he is quite the excellent character.
And he is especially strong in defence as the AI will utilize his random effects greatly.
I am not gonna go into his comic character, to me he is a very bland and boring character, one of those better then humans but not by a lot by using something weirdly good, in his case Boomerangs.
But it does make sense that he is a Lockbox character as he just like Taskmaster and Constrictor(this actually is said in his Bio) are a villain for hire and he does not mind being hired for good. However, that is actually kinda generic, he is like most of the thunderbolts, not pure evil so well he rather good if it pays the same as evil.
That is why hes not a very interesting comic character if you ask me, if he was the only one like that, but it same with most of the human villains, except those really crazy on some ideology like Red Skull.
For example Kingpin, while super evil would rather do good, if it paid better then doing crime. Which is one of the traits I always liked about him in especialy Spider-man TAS where he would always help the good side if it was obvious it was the most profitable path.
Gameplay:
Boomerang as a game character is on the other hand really interesting.
He lacks damage but has great utility and while he lacks high damage he has really solid damage.
What I mean with that is that Boomarang damage is based around dots, so he does the same damage to everyone, he does not do any spike damage but he does equal damage to pretty much every character. Which its great, but its a little to low and that is his main issue from being a real top character.
Boomerang also is based around a lot of random chance but these chances are very high to happen my data shows that his follow up attack is around 80% while his interrupt is a little lower on around 70%
But both of these passive are insanely good in defence as the % is increased to his follow up to an almost 100%.
Passive:
Tactician +: First of all Boomerang has one Huge feature, he like some other Tacticians are not weak to infiltrators, this is just like with Emma etc so I have covered this several times before.
Simple his first passive makes all his move stealth, this menas he will not be countered by infiltrators, which is of course their main thing to do.
He also can reach Blasters over tanks etc, which gives him a 100% option to always do 2(often 4 attacks) each turn. At level 15, he can spread his debuffs around easily being stealth which is another bonus.
Then he also has the same passive that Hawkeye has that gives all his attack a 100% accuracy and that they always critical on targeted enemies.
Boomerang then also have that each of his attack have Desperation attack, which means that they all do more damage the less life he has. So while he does really low damage at start + dots, later on he can deal some moderate damage.
This is one of the really good thing with Boomerang he has a lot of passive(2 more to go) and they are very straight forward. They just add hin his damage or reach nothing weird.
Those are the 3 basic passive he always has, Tactician+, cannot miss and more damage the les life.
He then further hav ea really interesting passive unique to him that his first ability is based around
This is that each of his attacks have a very high chance to hit again. Basically he has an extremely high chance for a follow up on any attack.
That sounds quite simple but its also that each of his 1.X move are self combed.
For example his 1.2 Does Burning but it applies scorching if the opponent is already burning. This means of course that Boomerang will combo with himself, the first boomerang does burning and the second one applies scorching, he got another one that puts on electric static charge and then the next one triggers it and so on.
Its a great passive for him especialy(its clear he is designed around this passive)
Then come what makes Boomerang of of the most intriguing character in the game and a major reason I did play him a few season back, his Ultimate
Ultimate:
Boomerang does not really have an ultimate like other characters, this is a weakness as he does lack a high end damage move. If this was his third ability instead and he had a finisher ultimate he would be a top 10 character.
That being said, this passive is one of the best passives in the game!
From a first impression it looks really bad, its a very weird but super strong concept. His ultimate changes his passive, it turns of the follow up passive!
This is really unheard of as not only is this very uncommon, his 8 attacks( yeah he got a lot of utility) is based around having a follow up, so why turn it of.
Well this new passive is broken, its just broken. It makes him intercept attacks and stop them, and its not like e.g Iron Fist where he stops follow up attacks.
No Boomerang stops the first attack and the odds are very high.
Just this passive alone actually makes him one of the best defenders in the game because the AI got like a dam 100% chance to do this,
of course one cannot intercept some type of attacks like psychic(which I guess will be even more common now with Mantis+Moondragon and new agent weapons) so its not the
de facto go to passive but it completely stops many characters.
Playing Boomerang means one has to go between using more damage / more dot application or just utilizing his blocking of damage. Hes fun to play with and like I said he is very strong, much stronger then most people give him credit for because of this passives alone.
20/20 Passive power !!! And it at least 25/20 for the AI as his best passive or the other mode follow up are both way better for the AI and are truly broken
But even in attack he does really have remarkable passive, can ignore infiltrators, always reach blasters, cannot miss, does higher and higher damage, almost always do 2 attacks or almost always stops any normal attack
(I will note the ultimate as a 10/10 as its one of the best passives, it also adds in stuff like winded up(25% more damage on next attack) and it can be iso for more buffs etc)
BIG CHANGE ADD IN 3---
Abilities:
So Boomerang is one of the worst offenders of to much abilities. But in his case, its not like Jessica Jones. All of his first ability options are good, not the best but way better then hers.
However, he do have some lack of strength on his second multi function so he is not perfect. And he does just like her have to much Toolbox rather then having 1 strong ability.
1.X The first set of multi are all excellent with his follow up passives. As mentioned above they all combo with themself for great solid damage and he will always do 20% or so of any characters health.
The first one is bleeding, this of course stacks. Second is the burning, that gives the scorching effect on hit 2 and the third one is iso corruption, this debuff that reduces all stats and damage over time as well, also it stacks just like bleeding to up to 3, so great for 2 stacks of it right away. Its also a very uncommon debuff, which menas he can be set in with other dot users easier. Lastly he can put up static charge with an electric boomerang so then the second one triggers the chain lighting effect, not so good turn 1, but really strong if you already has static charge on the others as its 2 attack then that triggers the electric discharge twice.
Because of his Tactician class bonus he can do this twice when activating it(or right away vs a blaster)
When he does this his overall passives do make quite the good spread damage or high dot damage on one individual as he can do 2 attacks on 2 opponents or 4 on one.
This is further why his 2.X ability are way better on him then on Jessica Jones. Do not get me wrong, his 2.X are weak, they could add way stronger debuffs, But being a Tactician and having anti class moves etc is way better then being a Bruiser that he is also stealth then means he can debuff 2 (on level 15 or vs a blaster right away )different opponents, sure not a lot of damage from this but this is actually excellent utility.
Doing this means you will turn of 2 classes, or prevent something like Iron Patriot ultimate while also debuffing someone else and so on.
As he can set up 2 opponents on the same time and always reach them with stealth.
Boomerang also features a huge set up for good isos, as he does double on each attack this some great isos can be very interesting.
He does also have extra utility as its double the attack, or than potential 4 if if you put it all on the same one, this works becasue he has abilities that can randomize many different debuffs. Because of this his 2.1 is actually quite strong but the others are just ok. 2.1 Does reduce potential which can lock out different stuff like melee or range, or buff actions etc. So then randomize at least twice will of course give the chance to lock out both melee and range, and so on.
However, his 2.2 has a clear unnecessary "balance" it has exhausted and neutralized so this move counters the Tacticians and Bruisers. But its only 75% chance to apply, sure he does 2 tries so the chance of applying both is very high. But it just feels so unnecessary. He should have both of this on 100% and than + some random debuffer move, so this is quite the weak ability to use. Except when just to turn of one of those classes (which might even fail, even due the chance is very low), as turning of classes is by itself just not strong enough.
2.3 works the exact same way but it turns of scrappers/infiltrator instead. So also pretty bad.
Than 2.4 is interesting its a stun 60% chance. Which is the common figure. But as he does apply 2 attacks it has a high chance for a stun, which is ok. It also does stun do, so it could be stronger. But on some occasions where stunning the agent just at the right timing could be very important, it clearly has potential.
While 1.X and 2.X are very similar its still mainly clear that the 1.X is always a solid move where 2.X can be really good sometimes, but these are some of the hardest abilities in the game to judge its freaking 4 moves each and they got so much variety, one of his other positive thing is his potential as he can e.g be used in a bleeding team but he can also support a electric character and so on.
1.X : 8/10
2.X : 5/10
His third ability is a little on the weak side its another "passive" kind of thing but its not Quick Action and not very good to use over one of his attacks.
It puts a special targeted debuff on 1 opponent. This menas this opponent will always get hit by an extra boomerang. Its a very interesting ability but not so strong as his boomerangs are not so strong with just 1 hit. It works like this, put the mark on A. Turn 2 attack B, B get hit twice by the boomerang and then A get hit once as well. Its very unique but not very strong.
The main problem is that is not Quick action, simply its better to use that turn to just attack someone twice. As it will take at least 1 turn(if using tactician bonus) to attack them twice (from targeted) or then 2 turns if exhausted or what not. It also does give them Fumbling but that just seems so insignificant.
But sure there is a cool move to do it turn 1, on A. Than turn 2, take 2 turns and attack B and C. A will also be hit each time so you throw 2 boomerangs on each opponent this turn.
But keep in mind that A could have had 2 bleeding etc, turn 1 meaning it would go in and take more damage already on turn 2.
4/10.
If this move was QA he would be amazing. Than you could use it already turn 1 and attack 2 people spreading debuffs or dots with ease.
Verdict:
Boomerang as I went over is very strong, I mentioned this several times but his only real downside is that he has no finisher move at all, not even close.
All of his attacks do very low direct damage but always add on good dots. but he still have problems finishing someone of then.
He is very interesting as he can be played with such a variety and in many different teams, he is quite defensive as he turns of potential attacks while his passive of course turns of most attacks completely.
He is also VERY, VERY SAFE. Not being countered is not only good versus infiltrator of course but a lot of characters, he never misses, as said always does the same damage, has no actual class counter and so on.
He is by far one of the safest and most solid characters in the game.
And its important to emphasis how he like some other characters e.g Hawkeye is also then way better in AI Defence.
9/10
Its a lot of things that is just so right with Boomerang, he is an unknown character so they had to make some cool stuff up that's for sure.
If there is one thing I want to say again about him is that he is just Fun, he is fun to play with. I really think he features of one the most interesting gameplays not just when the battle is on, but also that there is so many teams he can be played in.
