DPS will never be meta again, unless

General Discussion
1

damage dealing is exclusive to damage heroes.

There is very little reason to pick damage heroes, as they are the easiest to kill class in the game by far.
Damage heroes being able to kill each other quickly is not an issue, that’s what they are all designed to do.
But tanks and supports can just run over them too.

Zarya Dva and Roadhog are actually very high up on the damage tier list, a few heroes beat them like Bastion and Junkrat, but only a few, and only Bastion by a significant amount.
Basically the only reason not to pick a tank over a dps is sniping, a dedicated long range hero is the last thing the tank class is missing.

And like people say Moira has a low dps, but when you have a very low health pool, that damage being guaranteed is devastating.
Zenyata can one shot dps heroes. Ana is oddly enough better at killing Roadhog, because he has the best dps ability in the game: anti-heal.
Baptiste and Ana can 3 shot dps, while having self healing.

So what could be the solution?
My proposal is a blanket 33% damage nerf for all tanks and supports.

This would have many benefits in the viability of damage heroes.
Few examples:

  1. Roadhog couldn’t one shot 250hp heroes at all, so he’d stop being a simply better Reaper.
  2. Zarya would stop being a better damage hero than Symmetra.
  3. Dps heroes could contest Orisa shields significantly more effectively. (Like Bastion currently loses to Orisa in a 1v1.)
  4. You could save 250hp heroes from a Reinhardt charge with healing, and 200 hp heroes with Brigitte.
  5. Hamster couldn’t spawn camp squishy heroes, without them being able fight back.
  6. Reinhardt would have a harder time wiping no shield team comps alone.

Tanks and supports would still be required in teams, healing and soaking up damage is still important.
Objectives still need contesting, and enabled dps heroes are much better than lonely dps heroes.

Expected counter arguments:

  • Tanks and supports won’t be able to get anything alone!

It’s a team game… Currently that’s how dps heroes function.
Well, there is Doomfist that can reach 400hp, and tank for himself, but he is a weird case.

  • Supports would be defenseless

Well, a hero whose main power comes from supporting it’s team should have trouble fighting a hero whose entire kit is based around killing.

I expect this to be controversial, but quite frankly no dps team comps shouldn’t be viable, just like no tank or no support comps are.
Drastic metas require drastic solutions.

44 Likes
2

So what you’re saying is that we should have 4 people per match actually trying to make something happen and 8 people trying to stall things out for as long as possible?

Doesn’t sound very balanced.

149 Likes
3

What’s wrong with tanks tanking and healers healing, instead of all of them doing damage?

8 Likes
4

Tanking and healing don’t win objectives. Forcing a reaction at threat of death does.

82 Likes
5

Completely redesigning the game and stripping damage/abilities/weapons(?) is not the “solution” we need.

79 Likes
6

Well, despite there being no apparent reason to pick damage heroes I still have no trouble of finding people to instalock DPS in comp and play 4 DPS comps in QP.

But honestly, this idea would be insane as far as balance goes, tanks would be ult batteries and healers would be just defenseless victims if this went through.

67 Likes
7

Im sorry what? This would be a completely different game you’re suggesting. Not even OW anymore…

48 Likes
8

Im not sure why we would do this tbh

doesnt sound like a good idea but i dont know enough about balance to dispute it

2 Likes
9

That’s why you pick damage heroes.

Not entirely stripping, off tanks would still be competitive with many dps heroes as far as damage output goes, while having better shield breaking.

On average Widow does 10000 damage per game, Zarya does 14000.

3 Likes
10

although i can say that i do agree tanks should be nerfed on the damage pool slightly but i dont think 30% across the board. like let’s do a case by case basis here…

also i am biased support main but i dont think support dps is an issue. DPS mains slaughter supports if they’re good enough. i dont think we need to make it ez for them. give em a challenge

5 Likes
11

I’m very interested in the changes that you would give roadhog, since without damage he would be effectively useless; but for the most part things really need to be balanced better and this is a step towards it.

12

Because tanking means more than just being a target for the enemy team.

What you’re suggesting is make tanks a non-threat and giant ult batteries. Why would you run a tank if they help the enemy even more than them not being there in the first place?

Tanks wouldn’t be played at all, and neither would healers, because their existence would be moot when healthpack are around the map.

It makes no sense. It would kill the game. It’s a bad idea.

25 Likes
13

Im sorry it may come off as a blunt statement but you have no idea what you are talking about here mate.

The main issue I think comes from the role names. The role names are not their function, their functions (all shared, non pure, all hybrid) are Openers, Enablers and Finishers.

Not even in MMOs where the roles are quite more strict apply the same logic you have. Tanks do A LOT of damage but they have conditions to do so and mitigation. Healers can do damage and CC besides healing and Damage dealers have combos and bursts and some survival skills that allow them to tank.

One thing is the function they do at the moment and the other the role.

Its a really bad idea. Voting NOPE on this one.

46 Likes
14

Gr8 b8 m8, no h8 m8’s gr8est tr8 is b8. I r8 b8 8/8

7 Likes
15

at least be fair this isnt bait they legit are trying to discuss this proposal

2 Likes
16

But the tanks would protect the… oh wait a second… No then the dps would protect their… oh no cause then they’d be focused I the other enemy healers… yeah I’m not playing healer anymore.

2 Likes
17

Simply put, you want to make people play characters with no fun attached to them… let me stand around all match waving a shield or healing you while you have all the fun. Good luck with that. Tanks might do too much damage, but Supports have to since DPS utterly refuses outside of masters or higher level play to peel for them. Same for tanks.

Nice to see your Top500 icon over the purple lips btw.

2/2/2 is going to force the change anyhow, then a more natural balancing will take place then as a result.

9 Likes
18

most of my kills as supports are melee finishers

am gold tho

19

They know what they are talking about, you just don’t like it.

They need to reimagine the game so that tanks actually need to work with the full team, and can’t just stomp with a pocket Ana.

20

Yes let’s nerf all the characters you can’t fight against so you can win easier.

10 Likes