In a previous thread, I posted about the psychological issues present in OW that make DPS the most satisfying heroes to play. Full disclosure, I work in education and most of my working life is spent essentially doing behavior modification. If I want one of the students I serve or teachers I supervise to be excited about doing something, I have to work to make it appealing to do so. Also full disclosure, I play supports and only supports in comp. My skill level is much higher on those heroes than tank or DPS and my sense of duty to my teammates is such that I don’t play anything else.
All that is to bring up this experience I shared in the other thread:
Breaking 100 assists had long been a low-key goal of mine. If a DPS player were to put up something equivalent, he or she would be on fire the whole match, have POTG, a post-match card upvoted to legendary, several angry messages accusing him of smurfing, and a youtube video to commemorate the occasion. The in-game feedback I received for such a performance was nothing close to that. (In fact, I received such little feedback I didn’t even realize until our final attack in 2cp OT that I even had a chance at breaking 100.)
So this post is my encouragement to blizzard to begin to take a look at the psychological rewards they offer to support (and tank) players. Shouldn’t the games sound cues, cards, and incentives make me feel like a god after I put up the support match of my life? Wouldn’t more people play support if it did?
Like I said in the previous post, This I think is the fundamental problem with Tanks and supports, but tanks especially, the feedback just isnt there to tell you if your doing your job properly or not, as a tank your job is to make space for your team but how do you track that, what is the “space made” stat? Most people dont even know what that means let alone how to do it
People may think oh Damage blocked is the tanks main stat, but any shield tank worth their salt knows how little value that stat really is.
I agree with you. I wish I could offer a better solution, but I’m not a dev.
I often say about people that for most of us, the best thing about a person can also be the worst thing about them.
The best thing about Overwatch is that it can’t really be captured in stats, but the worst thing in this case is also that it can’t really be captured in stats.
I do know for sure, however that when healers heal, and when tanks move forward, there is more that can be done. When a team takes point on 2cp and rein and mercy aren’t on fire…something in the design was missed.
That IS NOT at all what I’m advocating for. I’m not talking about stats. I’m talking about the sound effects and displays that give a hormonal rush to a player when they succeed.
Those rushes are what DPS players are after; many crave it so badly, they’re willing to de-rank to get that rush again. Give it that same rush to all roles, and the queue times will balance out.
Exactly, all you have to do is watch an OWL match, who gets the first person cameras spotlighting, who gets the most comments from the commenters? And why did they think Goats was a huge problem for the league?
The same things that make DPS interesting to play make DPS interesting to watch
So let’s brainstorm!
How about if tanks had sort of an aura/area around them, and whenever any ally inside that area gets on-fire points, a % of those on-fire points counted towards the tank’s on-fire counter?
If I wasn’t too clear I apologise.
I’m happy to see that you made the thread and I think it’s a great idea to look towards giving other classes the kind of psychological rewards that dps players experience as a means to make them feel more rewarding to play.
Edit: This makes me wonder, does lifesaver contribute to “on fire” status/points? Because if it doesn’t, it totally could.
I’m guessing it’s more of a venn-diagram kind of situation…saying that some/many of the factors that go into lifesaver, or potg, or other highlights also go into on-fire, but I would guess that on-fire doesn’t necessarily add points in and of itself.
(That’s a kind of convoluted way of saying that I think the two are likely to occur together, but one probably doesn’t contribute to the other.)
It’s harder to provide tank and support players with such rewards. Say, I play Sigma and can eat/block with shield enemy Gravitons, or stun an ulting Genji the moment he engages. Or hooking enemy Rein who’s pinned your teammate, thus saving him. Or stunning ulting Rein mid-animation as Brig. Moments like these are gamechanging, yet my team will probably not even notice them. You can’t make POTG system clip a moment of you eating Graviton while enemy Hanzo uses Dragonstrike; in theory that would be a big play, but again, POTG system won’t consider it worthy.
Maybe something like popping a small healing cross sign as you’re healing a low-hp hero (akin to the elimination skull) might make the difference, but either way, tanks’ and supports’ impact is harder to notice (up until the end of the game).
It may be harder, but from what people are posting, it sounds to me like the work might be necessary. If the POTG system is essentially a point algorithm, it seems obvious that kills (especially solo) are weighted most heavily. Adjustments to that algorithm would not create astronomical work.
Further, those plays you descrive are what make this game great. They should be highlighted.
Or, we can just say “this is too hard” and the dps can continue to have long queue times.
(Though I secretly laugh at those effers for all the 4 and 5 dps games they put me through.)
I think it’s because those assists wouldn’t exist at all if the dps hadn’t done their job right. Kinda like watching an Ana push Q on Genji for nanoblade a bunch will give assists but that’s pretty much it because he dashes into the fight away from her. He gets 100 kills for the fighting, she gets 100 assists for the Q.
First of all, I wasn’t Ana.
Second, I love that when DPS get kills it was all them, but if their team blames them in a loss, it wasn’t really their fault.
Either your healers are important, or they’re not. You can’t have both.
I can assure I did plenty to keep those teammates alive, both damage boosting and healing to EARN those assists. Your suggestion that I did nothing to support that DPS (though it was actually a tank doing most of the work in that match) proves the mindset that has created these long queue times.
And, your comment was fully off-topic. We’re talking about finding a way to create the same kind of endorphin rush for tank and support players that comes from a kill streak, not how measly supports are really just there as decoration for the DPS.
I never said you were. “kinda like” is pretty obvious I’m using a comparison. It’s a support who can get lots of assists that entirely rely on the Genji being good and there’s not a whole lot Ana does to get them.
Healers cannot get assists if the dps don’t get the kill. The dps don’t always need the supports but the supports always need the dps.
Have you not seen all of the posts talking about how people instantly blame dps for everything? Because it’s quite true. If I do well on Bastion, which does happen, people still blame me for a loss. Things are dying and I’m killing them but if we lose it’s blamed on me no matter who wasn’t doing well.
It’s quite on topic. You asked why supports aren’t rewarded/praised as much, I gave a probable explanation. Well I guess it was more of a statement but it’s still an answer to it.
Again. This is not about praise. I’m not talking about what people SAY. I’m talking about the feedback the game gives. Your post suggests that I did nothing to ASSIST my teammates to win those fights, even though many of those assists came from well-timed valks in which I had to balance keeping two separated groups up. The game made no note. I was not shown to be on fire, even though I was most certainly on fire. And, as I stated before, the game gave so little feedback to that contribution that if I hadn’t pressed tab to look, there would have been no note of my career high in assists. That’s not okay. And, that absence of positive reinforcement for a well-played support game is why people continue to choose DPS over and over. They chase that rush–if that rush existed in other roles (which it totally could with solid dev attention) then people would play those roles.
Positive reinforcement is playing dps, not the flashy fire bar. Remove the elim sound and it would be hard to tell if things are dying, but that’s not a reward thing, that’s a functional thing. There also are sound effects for healing and giving full health to teamates. Playing a shooter, no matter if it had moba type things, means it will attract players that like shooters. So what do the shooters pick in the shooter? The shooter characters. Because that’s what they like. Shooting things in the shooter game as a shooter character is the reward.
Nice job putting words in my mouth. You’re great at that. It is extremely obvious what I am talking about. The fire bar, the sound of the elim, the “double kill”, are not the rewards that make people want to play shooter characters. Playing the character is the reward.
Nice to know someone else sees this. When basically all of the motivators are built for DPS play*, it’s hardly surprising that DPS is the role that most people find fun.
*it might be more accurate to say that there’s equivalents for support/tank play, but the DPS-focused motivators are far more effective.
You’d be amazed at how effective those kill/damage/dink noises really are as motivators.