Both 6v6 and 5v5 have their own pros and cons

General Discussion
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I’ve mostly been a defender of 5v5, but now lately, I’m slowly swaying back to wanting 6v6 again (in a perfect world, I’d like to have both). However, I think even if you’re someone who wants 6v6 back, it’s still important to note 5v5’s advantages. And vice versa if you’re someone who thinks 5v5 is better.

I’m gonna avoid mentioning double-shield since that point has been brought up to death already, though I am gonna mention a more general point that loosely relates to double-shield.

PROS OF 5V5 AND CONS OF 6V6:

Individual power: Yes, Overwatch is a team based game where you’re suppose to work together with your allies. However, I think one of the most historically frustrating aspects of it is how utterly hopeless your match might be due to your overall team, no matter how well you’re performing on an individual level. It’s not a good feeling experience. While this is still a thing that happens in Overwatch 2, I think it’s less so compared to Overwatch 1. This comes down to simple math. In a team of 5, you are 20% of the team, and so, you have 20% of the power. In a team of 6, you are 16.66% of the team.

Chaos and clutter: The matches in Overwatch 1 were very cluttery. The screen was a chaotic light show, and I think deaths tended to be a bit more random. It was much more difficult to track what was going on on screen, and this also made it worse as a spectator e-sport. This also promoted less skilled strategies like spam, because you’re shooting into a larger cluster of enemies. I also think the size of most of the maps are more appropriate for 5v5.

Role power is more even: This might be much more debatable. This is a more generalization of the issue we saw in double-shield. Abstracting that away, there were a lot more comps where tanks and supports had far more power than damage (Goats anyone?). Playing DPS felt like you had to thread the needle constantly. This is mainly because all roles can do damage. But DPS ONLY does damage and nothing else. I think with one tank now, it’s a bit easier for DPS to get value while supports and tanks still have the potential to be powerful in their own right.

PROS OF 6V6 AND CONS OF 5V5:

Counterwatch (mainly among tanks): In 5v5, if one tank is a hard-counter against another, well you have to switch. It means there are certain tanks that are at the mercy of a hero switch regardless any skill difference. Where as in 6v6, if one tank counters another, you still had the second tank that mitigated this. I do think this is an issue that could be solved without returning to 6v6. Doomfist against Orisa was a major issue, but this has somewhat been mitigated with Orisa’s recent nerfs. This tells me that the issue is solvable within 5v5. D.va, from my observation, is the only tank left that really suffers from this issue (though I am kind of worried about Mauga, but he hasn’t been around long enough to make any definite conclusions).

Killing a tank is too valuable in OW2: In 5v5, if your tank dies, you basically have to reset. Compared to another hero type dying. Being down a tank and having 2 dps and 2 supports is far worse than being down one of any of the other roles. Where as in 6v6, if you’re down a tank, but the other team is down a DPS or support, both were still pretty even.

Two tanks is just plain more interesting and allows for more possibilities : Seeing the variety of tank pairs in 6v6 gave the game another layer of gameplay and possibility. Seeing the different ways two tanks synergized with each other made the game a ton of fun. Not to mention, we miss out on the two tank dialogue we use to hear in the spawn room before the match starts. However, I grew tired of the off-tank/main-tank design philosophy. If 6v6 were to ever come back, I’d want any pair of tanks to be just as viable as any other pair. E.g. Dva/Roadhog should be just as viable as Rein/Zarya (obviously no two pairs will ever be exactly even, but discrepancies should only come down to the individual pairs, and not down to the fact that two are off-tanks while the other is main-tank/off-tank).

UNKNOWN VARIABLES: Overwatch 2 massively reduced the amount of CC. I think this is a good thing, though this is a thing independent of 5v5 or 6v6. If 6v6 were to come back, I would not want it to come back with the amount of CC that existed in Overwatch 1. With that said, it’s difficult to predict how things would play out with 6v6 but with Overwatch 2’s reduced CC.

Anyway, there’s probably more pros and cons I’m forgetting. Feel free to bring up some, or counter some of the points I made (just don’t be a jerk about it).

3 Likes
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5v5 can work, its just they needed to spend more time balancing/reworking heroes to fit into it. It was to rushed.

Same with 6v6 it can work but also needed more balance/reworks as well.

Currently we are this weird hybrid where some heroes fit into 6v6 more and others fit into 5v5 more.

Neither side is right its personal preference.

5 Likes
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6v6 is off the table and after a year people need to accept it or move on. I cant stand the “6v6 vs 5v5” discussions. Its not an “is better” and was always a matter of preference.

2 Likes
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Then dont join them?

People can still debate and argue what they think was better. Look at sym we still argue on what version of her was the best.

We know that the chance of it returning is slim to none, but sometimes we just wannt say are opinion.

12 Likes
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“Then dont do them” is as good of an argument.

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What your doing is like walking into a Bar and then getting mad that people are drinking alcohol at the bar, just because you dont like alcohol.

12 Likes
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More like I walk through the city, see bar advertisements everywhere and then go into the bar and say that they should stop the BS.

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You’re probably not wrong, but people insist on talking about it anyway. I figured I’d make a thread that gives a more neutral stance since I haven’t seen one like it yet.

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That sill puts you in the wrong, If you dont like something then dont participate in it.

However that doesnt mean everyone needs to stop doing it just becuase you dont like it.

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As a matter of preferance;

I do not enjoy to play DPS in any game really. I greatly did not enjoy playing DPS in the 6v6 format, but given the state of the game, I find it aceptable in 5v5.

I would play support and find enjoyment in the 6v6 format, I find it less enjoyable, but bearable in 5v5.

As someone who gravitated to, and excelled at tank in 6v6, it was my choice role and I loved to play it. In the 5v5 format playing tank is now something of a chore, with moments of gratification which are becoming less and less frequent as the game changes and new heroes are introduced.

So far, the only thing I can see, from my perspective, is that playing DPS has become better and the other roles are just playing second fiddle. Mind you, I am not talking about power or the ability to alter the dynamic of the match with good play. Only what it feels like to play the game. To that end, I am sorry but catering to making DPS feel better to play makes me not want to play at all.

5 Likes
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nope, 5v5 is a pile of crap.

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We’ve had 6 years of 6V6 and only 1 (I think) of 5V5

And the balance is still off on a couple of Heroes… also that all of the Off Tanks have issues that don’t make them fit into a Solo Tank style of play and that hurts 5V5

They should’ve had more ideas (From my understanding) for Off Tanks… either by making them separate from the Main Tanks or making them apart of the DPS Role for a 1-3-2 but IDK

1 Like
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thats not entirely correct. the First month we had no hero limits, then hero limit where introduced. Role lock/queue was introduced on Sep. 3. 2019 and in autum 2020 the balance patches began to slow down and became less and less through 2021. So we had more or less 1 and a half years of 6v6 balancing until the devs gave up and switched to 5v5.

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But it was still 6V6 right???

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while yes, its not really comparable. how do you balance a game with 6 Torbs on a team vs 3 tanks and 3 supports or 6 dps on a team vs a 2:2:2 game? Yeah, they are all 6v6 but need entirely different balance.
I would even argue, that the difference of balancing a 2:2:2 vs 1:2:2 is not as significant as in 2:2:2 vs Open or even vs No Limits.

Edit: i would not argue, its true.
I’ll now compare all four with our 39 heroes.

possible team comps factor to the previous
no limit 3.518.743.761
open 2.349.088.560 1,5
2:2:2 2.203.200 1066
1:2:2 244.800 9

As can be seen in this table, the difference between open and no limits is “quite” small. the possibilities of no limits is just 1.5 times more than open queue.
The difference factor from open to 2:2:2 is gigantic at 1066 times.
2:2:2 to 1:2:2 only has a measly factor of 9.

The difference in balancing effort and difficulty from 2:2:2 to 1:2:2 is 118.46 times smaller than that from open to 2:2:2.

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While the point you make is correct, your initial wording of it was not. It’s technically true that we’ve had over 6 years of 6v6, even if it was in radically different iterations.

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6v6 is not off the table because with these devs the one thing you can count on is for them to be consistently inconsistent.

In just one year they have brought back a lot of features from Ow1.

Hell just look at Mei’s patch cycle from October 2022 to 2023. Back to where we started.

It is a definite possibility. At some point especially after going full circle with a hero like Mei and none of the previous patches fixing problems players address it could come down to 5v5 isn’t working or what players want.

The devs change their mind. They said PvE was going to be the big feature of Ow 2. We see how that played out.

That kinda waffling history you can’t act as if 5v5 is here to last.

5 Likes
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Dive tanks also suffer from specific counterpicks like Sombra. Also, consider that ususally multiple people swap to counter you until they completely shut you down.

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5v5 has its problems, that I will never deny, but I much prefer it over the 6v6. I joined overwatch 1 in 2017 right before ashes release. I fell in love with the game instantly, but got so bored after a couple years. Two tanks was just unbearable. I couldn’t stand playing tank because it always felt like someone else was hijacking’s half of my job. I couldn’t play dps because que times were so long and half the time was spent shooting shields. I only played support. I did live support, but near the end I was so sick of being a heal bot. I has become very skilled at dps on hero’s like ana and was constantly getting picks for my team, but it never mattered. The only way to win was to constantly baby sit two tanks with heals and it was BORING. I didn’t even play the last 3 months of overwatch 1 after being a diamond level border prior to that. 5v5 came and reinvigorated my love for the game. This is the game I wanted all along. I fell in love with overwatch because I loved the characters, but now I love overwatch because of the gameplay too. I get it’s a personal preference, but honestly if overwatch ever went back to 6v6, I’d just quit the game entirely. I don’t ever want to play 6v6 ever again

1 Like
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I always appreciate this type of topic: the game isn’t “worse”, but it has different problems to deal with than before.

One thing that many 6v6 advocates forget (or want to pretend to forget) is that tanks were overly nerfed in every single way to destroy the synergies between them, but in reality it only made them more mandatory to work. remember when they nerfed Orisa’s shield excessively? she had become so weak in defending the team that she could now ONLY work if you created continuous replacements of shiled with sigma, while with any other tank you paired her with she was terrible. or when there were nerfs for reinhardt, winston, d.va and zarya in turn all the time. and last but not least, the off and main tank cataloging was downright toxic to manage along with the off/main support.

on the contrary, 5v5 demonstrates how counterpicking is very strong in the game, and Mauga’s recent testing is a perfect example of this problem. and even if we have now well exonerated the concept of off and main hero, the tank is burdened with an enormous responsibility for the strategy of the whole team: if he makes a mistake, everyone dies.

one thing that in my opinion 5v5 has a better advantage than 6v6 is the passive role: in my opinion Overwatch in its old formula never took the definition of uniqueness seriously, also due to its origins from “you can choose whoever you want to any role”. do you remember that out of 21 heroes only debuting and they were healers and over half of the roster was designed as a MOBA? defenders and non-healing supports are just a few examples of what we have abandoned in the past. the role rules are excellent, and frankly I don’t understand why they never applied them in open queue: does the enemy team use two tanks instead of one? here’s a nerf to that class’s passive and its health. do they have 3-4-5 dps? a general nerf to their overall damage. in short, we could really create a synergy of “those who don’t sacrifice themselves for the group must accept these conditions for everyone”, and then perhaps we would have avoided things like goats or the initial stress of the role queue. I would apply a test like this today, because I find it really ridiculous that there are tanks nerfed on principle in the open queue. nothing fits.

but I digress, let’s talk about 1-2-2: it’s a very reasonable choice, but it works thanks to the passives. passives which however in ow1 and his 2-2-2 would not have solved anything, and indeed would have made the matches longer and the tanks more op. on the contrary the lone tank had both a passive… and all the most unthinkable buffs in ow2. people forget all the huge buffs there were for tanks to the point that the most problematic role at launch were the supports which had received very little new.

I think the developers will want to test passives again, they’re the perfect way to help entire categories instead of targeting some hero un particular. but they should ease the stress of the “I want 6v6 back” community a bit with arcade modes, so that there is always a reminder of which problems we have abandoned. tital mayhem with its free picking is an example of this.