That’s basically the kind of nerf you’d need to keep him in check, with a lack of hard CC options against him.
As well as a knockback resistance passive for Tanks.
That said, that kind of Tank would basically be hard throwing below Masters.
So I figure they are better off retrofitting him into the DPS role.
I literally deconstructed the changes they’ve showed they’re making and showed how he still has pretty decent counters and the things they’re nerfing don’t actually affect him much. Every thing we know about their changes leads to the conclusion that he will be slightly stronger in 5v5, but there will also be severe drawbacks to having him as the only tank on the team.
And please, pray tell… how does moving him to DPS solve any of this? He’s still mobile, and on top of that, DPS in the new system aren’t supposed to have much CC, and that’s literally most of his kit. You’d have to reduce his hitbox which makes him harder to hit and exacerbates the issue of a lot of mobility.
As a tank, his mobility makes him problematic, sure. As a DPS, his mobility AND his CC would make him problematic, meaning that almost nothing from his original kit would make any sort of sense.
Let alone, your whole “We need to make tanks more fun to play”, and now you’re advocating removing a tank option?
Sorry, but this just doesn’t make any logistical or balance sense.
Knockbacks won’t really be troubling Tanks much, with a 50% knockback passive for Tanks.
And almost all of his CC would be reduced to annoyances, rather than deadly displacement.
Additionally, 5v5 is going to have a sniper problem. And Hammond is quite well suited at hunting down snipers. Assuming he doesn’t have to steal away an entire team’s worth of tanking to do it.
Additionally the main problem with Tank synergy was overly durable compositions. And Hammond in the DPS role, would allow some semblance of Tank synergy, without it being the overly durable kind.
Also the devs aren’t just wholesale removing CC, it seems like it’s more of a focus on removing “excessively annoying CC”.
For instance, Sleep Dart and Lucio Boop are staying. Where as my guess is Mei freeze is gone, and Flashbang/Hack are removed, and brig stun either gets removed or reworked into something different entirely.
Doom, I could see them just making out all the enemy can still use their primary/secondary while cced.
So basically, “Yes, he can keep his CC, but we’ll make it suck and be worthless.” Not a great way to balance the kit.
You still didn’t answer why hypermobility is suddenly okay for DPS players instead of tanks… if anything it’s worse on them because a tank is balanced out by their massive hitbox. Tracer is a MUCH bigger balancing nightmare in this new system.
You still are arguing for the removal of a tank when the role has less than half the number of DPS.
You still haven’t given reasonable arguments to show that Hamster would be SO problematic they’d have to literally cut his HP in half–especially since all indications point to there still being ways to deal with his mobility and stop his momentum (wall, trap, dart, for example).
Hunting down snipers would be a death sentence for a Hammy with 200 or even 250 hp. The only reason he’s good at it now is because he’s bulky. It’s why dive tanks are one of the better counters to snipers–because they can eat focus fire for long enough to distract/kill them.
Look, you’re normally a person who at least advocates for making the tanking experience better, but all of this is VERY MUCH a slap in the face to tank mains.
More like worth less. And specifically against Tanks.
It would still be getting full value in DPS and Healers.
Well, I mostly just don’t foresee a situation where they can remove a lot of CC, Balance Hammond for Top tier, while making it so that Hammond isn’t a hard throwing pick below Masters.
As for what I think 5v5 would probably look like, here’s my best guess. Notice how Hog/Zarya/D.va all have a near equivalent to a barrier.
This is what happens when a hero releases OP. Sometimes it takes time to realize how OP they are when they’re as high skill as Ball. I hope he gets brought back at some point but many of his nerfs were totally justified.
They also nerfed a tech by removing it, giving Hammond 2 knockbacks in short succession.
I mean come on, being able to instantly deal 100 damage and launch people ten miles was pretty busted. It only got removed when some people found out you could even do more than two hits under the right conditions. With scripting you could even do 4 and instakill squishies.
The huge myth of the game is that Hammond’s main counter is hard CC. In actuality, even soft CC can be as detrimental because it redirects his momentum, and even that isn’t super necessary. He just needs to be focus fired. In order for Hammond to be ANY sort of effective in team fights, he needs to pull out his guns, which requires him to stop and shoot. Focus him in those moments, and he dies. Even with all his speed, he moves predictably and he’s a massive hitbox that’s really easy to hit.
The most likely thing I can see for 5v5 is them pulling damage away from pound/boop and putting more of it back into his guns, forcing him to go out of ball mode if he actually wants to hurt anything. But really, people put WAY too much stock in how you “need” cc to stop him. A good echo/tracer gives him far more grief than a good mei.
I have no doubt they could balance him for Masters and above. Easy.
The problem is the other 95% of the playerbase can’t coordinate an entire team to pounce on a half second of bad enemy positioning.
Much less the strong likelihood that the Hammond player isn’t going to be coordinating with their team at all, and just playing like a fat Tracer in the enemy backline for 90% of the match.
And having a Tank have a strong likelihood of being a throw pick at hero select for 95% of the playerbase, is intolerable, when you only have one Tank on a team. And the entire rest of the team is held hostage by a bad pick.
please, stop with this spiel, hammond is by far the best solo tank in the game. Remember 1-4-1 meta?
Tank doesn’t mean shields.
He also made the whole cast unable to get behind the Route 66 counter anymore because only he would get stuck, so he deserves every nerf that comes his way.
In Overwatch 2 if a tank player decides to play Hammond, there will be lots of toxicity coming towards that player from the rest of the team. A tank player would have to be crazy or completely bored to pick Hammond in Overwatch 2.
I also agree with what was stated here by others: 95% of playerbase will avoid Hammond, or be toxic towards Hammond picks. It’s not the hero itself, it’s the team behind Ball which will be demolished easy without a proper tank protection.
Hey, at least Hammond makes it possible to pick bad characters like Mei and Sombra and justify it.
Welcome to OW. Now you know what every hero who was meta had to go through.
He’s been getting nothing but nerfs ever since he was released. I barely see any buffs for him in patch notes that included a change for him.
Fixed bug where you can use slam with bug when you no even high from ground
-deleted, i do not enjoy playing the game anymore with the current patch and am careful about expressing my discontent-
Oh, and can we talk about how they removed being able to dangle around in crab mode FOR NO REASON WHATSOEVER?
It was a cosmetic haha-bug that merely got removed to SPITE THE FEW PEOPLE STILL ENJOYING THE GAME.
If there were other options for a survivable dive main tank that doesn’t need every team resource pumped into them he wouldn’t be used. When there’s only 1 other option for an even vaguely similar role (Winston) the term ‘viable’ doesn’t apply.
If we were talking about 17 tanks where 3-4 of them do the same job then sure.
Except Tracer, Genji, McCree, Widowmaker and Winston.
well hammond got hit with that hitscan falloff nerf and tracer didnt which didnt make sense if you think about it. shouldnt it have been dps only?
-deleted, i do not enjoy playing the game anymore with the current patch and am careful about expressing my discontent-