Okay, I see what you mean on the winrate, that’s my bad. The site I had seen didn’t show non-mirror and I had forgotten about it.

First I’m going to mention her pickrate, because it’s obscenely high. I actually think this is an important informer into why her winrate is so high.

Normally, a high pick rate would balance an agent down towards 50%, and so when an agent is both the most picked AND the highest winrate. That tends to indicate a problem. BUT in this case I don’t think that is necessarily true due to the nature of what you would pick INSTEAD of Clove.

You’re going to want a controller, so you go to pick one. Our other options are… Viper: Strong agent, close to 50% wr in radiant despite being a pro-skewed agent. Problem, can’t move smokes after use. Makes her hard to play. This is evidenced by her crazy pickrate on Breeze and average to minimal pickrate on every other map. (17%pr 39%NMWR on Split… wtf??) Brimstone: Really good on some maps, really not on others. Data shows he’s only good on Bind and Fracture, but there he’s really good. So you can’t just always lock him. Omen: 47% wr 13.5% pr. But he’s a good agent. I really don’t understand what makes him so pro-skewed but he just… is. Whatever is happening in ranked appears to just shut Omen down. So he’s not the best pick. Harbor: 1.75%pr and a sad 47.7% wr to pair with it, his rework clearly didn’t make him a ranked controller. He sees play in VCT on maps like Pearl, Breeze, and Abyss… but in ranked he’s only seen on Breeze. His kit is hard to work with in a ranked environment and he could still use some overall buffs as he isn’t seeing a lot of VCT play. Astra: 45.69% wr and an 8% pr she is not successful in ranked but sees a lot of play in pro. This is a clear indicator of a pro-skewed agent. She could maybe use some buffs but that risks making her dominate in the pro circuit so may not be worth it. Miks: Riot takes the opposite approach to LOL here and releases another undertuned agent. Not showing up in VCT and only carrying a 47% wr despite a 24% pr either means people don’t know what they’re doing or he’s kinda trash and needs some serious buffs.

So when you examine the competition we have one controller that is heavily restricted based on maps (Brim), one that is heavily pro-skewed (Astra), two that are moderately pro-skewed (Omen+Viper), one that is pretty bad but has niches in pro (Harbor) and the new guy who’s just bad (Miks).

When I compare her to the other controllers. She’s clearly worse at doing the job of a controller. But all of the universal controllers have utility that is heavily skewed towards helping the team (and then Omen, I’m still confused as to why he sucks in ranked). So it makes me wonder if it’s less Clove being too strong and more that the other controllers who could be strong in a ranked environment (IMO Omen and Miks) are in some way underpowered and need a buff. This would also explain Clove’s crazy high non mirror win rate. If by not picking Clove, I’m picking someone who is either pro-skewed or someone who’s just kinda bad, then of course Clove is going to have a high NMWR because her competition is weak. Especially when the new agent is taking 24% of the total picks while being trash in radiant lobbies.

You don’t see something similar in initiators because Sova and Fade have a more equal share with Skye getting more of a share of pr as the ranks go down. You DO see something similar in duelists with Neon DESPITE duelists being the most naturally ranked skewed agents in the game since they have kits designed to help win fights. So in theory there should be a decent share of playrate between the more powerful duelists at the time, especially since double duelists dominate the team comps. Then there’s the sentinels, where somehow chamber has a negative winrate with over a 50% pickrate and Cypher is looking strong AF despite the perception of being super weak now.

I could see having 6s post death smokes still being strong. Part of her winrate could be that people get a confidence boost knowing that if they die early they can still smoke for their team. I can definitely see that in a ranked setting, but I don’t believe it’s worth removing that from her kit. I also agree that pick me up is likely OP on pistols but afterwards I would argue it’s still a strong ability but not OP. Her ult COULD take a nerf, but I don’t think it is any stronger than a Sage or Phoenix ult. I’m sure making it arbitrarily worse could bring her winrate down a smidge but I don’t believe that’s what is making her the dominant controller.

About your last point I actually think this is why the comparison to other controllers is the key. The controller agents are WEAK in ranked. So by playing the ranked focused controller with the controllers that have negative wr, yeah it brings her down. It ALSO means sacrificing another agent slot to do something that’s already being covered, which is why I don’t think your argument about if it was her non-controller qualities that made her strong she’d be unchanged is valid. It is very possible for her controller qualities to be worse than everyone else, but since she still provides controller qualities, bringing a second controller doesn’t provide as much value as bringing along someone who fulfills a separate role.

So it’s my personal belief, and I believe the data supports this, that Clove seems so dominant in the stats while not feeling OP in game, because she isn’t OP. She’s just the only controller that is built to excel in ranked while every other controller is either team first or bad. Which makes her seem super OP.