without any kind of rank shaming here, i think a lot of this comes down to what rank people are playing at. its not until diamond and above people really know how to play together with hammond and make use of the space hammond creates. its not that hammond doesnt do anything to help the team, its just that even when he does people often dont even notice, or know what to look for. (then ofcourse there are also those who just arent good at playing hammond as well, but that goes for all heroes in the same way that you might get a widow who never lands a shot).
it takes practice to be able to play together with hammond and capitalize on the work he is doing. with shields its much more straight forward, its basically just “is the tank holding shield up and pressing w?” -then we are pushing in.
or “am i currently standing behind a shield?” -then im being protected.
but you can prevent loads of damage by just pulling the attention of the enemies, or by pushing people into unfavorable positions. its not as easy to see as a shield but it still makes a big difference.
Rank has NOTHING to do with this, simply because I don’t care about Comp, at one point I did, but the 6 stack group I belonged to fell apart through Egos. That’s when I realized I don’t want to end up like these people, and stopped caring about “Rank”. The fact that you go there 1st already showed me what type of Argument you were going to put up. Rank has NOTHING to do on Opinion of Game play. Tanks are there to Help your team, Hammond rarely does this, period.
Hammond is a pretty interesting dps hero. You can even counter him pretty nicely if you commit 3 or 4 cc counterpicks to it. Or alternatively you can hope he counters himself by denying his own team a precious utility tank slot.
that seems very narrow minded to me, but you dont need to like playing together with hammond. after all it generally takes more effort to play together with hammond than with the shield tanks. by playing hammond you need your teammates to have better positioning than they otherwise would need to. the more protective tanks can make up for that more easily.
but to say rank has nothing to do with it is just plain wrong, its more like “common knowledge” or whats the word. widely accepted knowledge? i forgot the term im looking for here, its too late. but he is basically seen as one of those tanks you may want to avoid playing at lower ranks because your teammates may not know how to play together with him. rank has lot to do with it, probably even the main thing that has to do with it.
I think you make a good point about him being independent. With his self shields, he can bully enemies up close without worrying about giving them ult charge. Other tanks like Winston are very fragile in comparison, and even Rein relies on team mates being grouped up in order to tank properly (like having a Mercy or Zarya pitching in let’s say).
I don’t hate Hammond. I want team mates to pick a character they feel they’re good at or at least a character that they want to play as. Rein helps team mates in an obvious manner when they see him hold up his giant shield, but since Hammond is off on his own a lot of the time, it’s hard to really know exactly what he’s contributing other than looking at the kill feed and if he’s on fire.
I’m not a Hammond player, but I believe Hammond fans deserve to pick him if they want to.
Most damage heroes do nothing of what you probably consider “helping” the team, yet I hear nothing about that.
And also, he does. He draws fire from dps and allows them easier aiming opportunities through pile driver.
If this is not a joke then you have clearly never played against him. He is so f**** annoying that you need at least two stuns and lots of dmg from different different DPS +healers/tanks, etc., to even attempt to kill him. AND that is IF he is not triple armor packeted and pocketed by his own healers…
When I play Hammond, I feel like I don’t give a sh*t about my team. I guess this kinda explains all. My role is to disrupt, disrupt… finish off low hp or an isolated target, grab mega packs instead of wasting time and let healers charge their ultimates while there’re other teammates need healing as well.
Hammond can be unfun to play against because he is the “Doomfist” of the Tanks:
Tanky
Hypermobile
Able to gain shields
CC-based attacks (Knockbacks & an airlock type of CC)
Pfffff. People hate everything tanks do. Everyone gets to play as fun heroes, so it shouldn’t matter that what X likes is unfun for Y to play against.
What’s important is that Hammond is a super fun and flexible tank, and that kinda got overshadowed by GOATS when he came out, but its never too late to talk about it
Unlike Reinhardt. A literally punching bag character for every hero except Rein himself.
Being a slow, melee character also makes him 90% harmless. Massive hitbox is another bonus to increase shooting heroes’ accuracy, including Rein’s teammate Ana & Baptiste.
Even good hammonds have a tendency to throw their brains out, and it is the least teamwork heavy tank. Most hammys just mind their own business and don’t actually help or peel for others.
