I switched to Valorant and became a more cheerful person

General Discussion
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Even if in Valorant you CAN get annoyed, the game doesn’t feel unfair to the point of anger. Anger there is limited to losing 1 round to unpredictability, or the enemy doing a bad play that gets rewarded.

But there aren’t any unbalanced mechanics in that game (or at least, the broken aspects of the game are very minorly broken), and you also have a decent enough solo carry potential to be able to carry most games (if you are good) while still requiring your team to win.

In Overwatch, in contrast:

  • Broken heroes every patch (Baptiste for example got buffed for no reason in spite of having been extremely obnoxious in like s22, proof that Blizzard doesn’t care about having a balanced game). It generally takes forever to balance said heroes out of the meta even though after 2 weeks of meta settling it becomes apparent the game is not fun and there are (typically, at high level) 2 carry heroes and 4 spectator heroes every meta.

  • boosted players

  • players playing so bad heroes that the game becomes uncarriable even if the other 5 people are trying (this is mostly Masters+ stuff but still why keep heroes like Hog or Genji in the game if you only get flamed and reported for playing them?)

  • 6v6 format makes individual feel meaningless while at the same time small misplays carry big responsibility (basically, there is no upside, playing good doesn’t get rewarded that much but playing bad is punished immediately)

  • map design is extremely cancerous (you essentially always have to walk a chokepoint to recontest an objective, exposing you to tons of spam damage, Firestrikes and basically you often have to use 50% of your cooldowns just to survive the choke cross at which point typically 1 ultimate from the enemy team suffices to clear up your squad, which is part of the reason why the game feels so ‘steamrolly’)

  • there are modes that shouldn’t be in the game (for example, 2 CP). Also, stalling is broken in the sense that 1 person shouldn’t be able to stall 6 attackers standing on the objective, more people should be required to fully stop the timer vs a great number of attackers sitting on an objective.

  • tank as a role is too easy, yet carries too much responsibility and has too big impact (basically, it’s easy to play well on tank, but if you play badly, your team loses immediately no matter their efforts to counterbalance you playing bad). This is not to say that you can’t lose as tank, IF you play well, it could be that the enemy tanks are also playing well enough for the game to be a DPS/support diff (or hero picks diff), BUT in general tank has no skill progression to the role which is why it feels extremely unrewarding and repetitive, also it’s one of 2 roles where playing meta tanks matters the most.

  • healing is too strong in this game and in general the notion of teamfights being so drawn out because there is a certain DPS incoming and HP/s incoming on tanks is unhealthy for the game. The game should be more about using your cooldowns and aim in an efficient way to end duels fast (applies to all 3 roles). It shouldn’t take 30+ seconds to kill a Rein because he has pocket and Zarya constantly rescuing him. While you could make the argument that Rein has no business dying to DPS (which I can even approve) because tanks should be ‘tanky’, something like Rein vs Rein or Zarya vs Zarya should be over in seconds and not be a constant game of bait cooldowns, go behind cover, re-peek until one makes a mistake because both sides are playing with perma pocket. This type of gameplay is more pertinent to WoW and we saw that it’s not a good game design because it leads to teamfights being too drawn out and plays being too predictable to the point that you can’t really “clutch it for your team”, for example 1 Firestrike on the enemy Rein has almost no impact as it gets immediately healed.

These are considerations that any good CSGO, Valorant, etc. or keep FPS player would make after 2 weeks of playing this game. But for some reason, Overwatch devs and community try to shoehorn the notion that this game is “fairly well-balanced”.

I think some of these considerations are what make Overwatch ‘unique’, so I don’t think every item on my list should be addressed as problematic, but 80% of the items are surely worth thinking about.

I think also due to all these problems, OW can be very frustrating to play and this frustration is reflected by comms where (on EU at least) everyone is either silent or quick to be toxic because the game feels overall frustrating to play and that breeds toxicity.

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This game was marketed to be a game that is different from other shooters games where there are diverse play styles. I am glad you are enjoying Valorant but honestly I hope Overwatch does not become like Valorant or CSGO. Currently most everything dies in seconds so I am not sure how much faster do you want this game to be.

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this is not my point. My point is that this “diverse” only brings FRUSTRATION.

For example, as per my OP, take chokepoints.

Is it more or less frustrating to walk into a chokepoint and be spammed down? Undoubtedly, MORE. So in this sense, Overwatch is doing something WRONG.

Is it more or less frustrating to play as a solo queue player with people who a) don’t speak English b) might not wanna coordinate but instalock Hog and be at the mercy of whether you get good teammates or bad ones? Most people would also agree that more solo carry potential (which does NOT mean you should 1v6!) is MORE fun.

META picks: is it more or less frustrating to win due to the right hero selects? Most people would agree that winning at hero select is MORE frustrating.

This has nothing to do with Overwatch having healing, shields etc. My OP highlights that some of the core mechanics of OW feel MORE FRUSTRATING. So if OW is doing “something differently”, that something breeds frustration and not fun (and games are supposed to bring at least some fun).

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Well I can understand that sentiment but what is fun has been a contentious topic on Overwatch.

What changes would you make? How would the different roles be changed in relation to each other. Would 1 dps be able to delete tanks or something different.

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getting a kill on a guy making an OBJECTIVE mistake and seeing that kill Rezed is objectively not fun.

Playing vs a Support hero that does more damage than many DPS, has infinite mobility, one of the best ultimates in the game and on top of that to 1v1 him you need to deal effective ~500 HP of damage is objectively not fun.

Being a tank player who dislikes Rein and having to play Rein or be flamed/reported and lose the game is not fun.

Playing 2 CP and having insane chances to win 2nd fight if you win 1st dry fight as the attackers is objectively not fun.

These are just some of the ideas that I think <5% of the playerbase can categorize as “fun”. That 5% of course being Mercy mains or so for whom Rez is a balanced and fair mechanic.

Heroes like Reinhardt and Mercy have no business in high elo, they are not that hard to play and should be more of beginner heroes/disabled from high SR Overwatch (likewise Moira, Torb etc.)

Healing should be decreased by about 30-40% across the board, and supports compensated by buffs elsewhere in their kits to compensate IF needed (either to damage, or some form of utility like smokes, slow effects, etc.).

Tanks should just basically be initiators, fat DPS that can walk in first but other than that their damage profile should be in line with most DPS as well as their survivability (of course they should have comparatively more HP to compensate for big hitboxes).

Overall the game should reward winning or losing 1v1s more and having appropriate peeks and not your team always bailing you out with 5-10 overpowered cooldowns, for example if you commit to a flank as McCree and take 3 bodyshots from enemy Genji and land only 1 shot, that should put you at a disadvantage and not be cleared away).

With 2 CP they should just do that which they did time ago with Experimental Card where after capping 1 objective you swap sides.

As for Boosted players, there needs to be SR decay re-introduced, if you don’t play for (say) 3 weeks, your SR gets hidden, and you restart climbing from 2-3 ranks below your last peak. Also “seasons” shouldn’t be a thing and placements should be removed as they are pointless.

Maps need to stop having so many chokepoints and overall all chokepoints should be widened by about 30% so that it takes about 1.5, ideally 2 Rein shields of width to cover them so that you can’t do the “just play corner” thing that makes tanks so dumb and dominant (you could still do it but to a lesser degree).

Then there should be some small changes here and there, like small McCree nerf, small Ashe nerf, but this is secondary stuff.

Overall, most tank comps should be viable and to achieve this they need to get rid of tank synergies for the most part (for example, Zarya bubble shouldn’t go in front of Rein shield and Hog should be as good of a tank as Zarya, for example through increased firerate).

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Hm yea about that, the few matches i have seen from mid tier players were quite toxic in EU, not much different from what u get to hear in OW. Maybe higher ranks are more chill cause they are good and know how to play the game properly.

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idk if they are “toxic”, but the way I mean it is not toxic in comms (you can always mute people, mute button is there btw you should learn to use it). The toxicity of OW is more tilting because you feel powerless if one of your tanks is Hog and he is stubborn about his pick, or if you get an Ana player vs Dive, and so on.

Toxicity is present in all games, I guess I’m talking more about does this toxicity linger after the match ends? In case of Valorant or CSGO, the answer is no because the experience feels fair, so a**holes in the game (which are in every game and also in life) are “just variance”. In Overwatch in contrast, even picking the wrong hero, or not playing with the team etc. is toxic in the sense that it creates a negative experience for the other 5.

Incidentally, I’m not sure why a feature like “thank you for reporting” card is even in the game. It’s to reward the kind of people who like to feel better about themselves? This is literally a “feel good” card and incentives you to report more. Reports should still be filed no matter what but you shouldn’t be notified if someone got punished or not, that’s none of your business.

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So you don’t like the MOBA/FPS style with completely unique heroes and want more of a generic “purchase the same guns every round” CS:GO type of experience.

Good for you, many of us don’t. I personally find Valorant a complete snooze fest and far more frustrating with all the camping.

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you are gold/silver, you play this game casually and many of the things I wrote don’t apply to you because in your rank people don’t play as a team or rely on teammates. As a result, I figure your gold games feel like “a random interaction of abilities and you win sometimes and lose sometimes”.

You need to get to masters+ to realize what I’m saying and how it makes the game frustrating and no btw, it’s not MOBA related, many of the items on my list are not MOBA-related, for example there being heroes that are much better than other heroes in the same class is not MOBA-specific, that’s bad balancing.

Bad map designs is also bad balancing, nothing to do with MOBAs.

which I never wrote, I pointed out that

a) Overwatch feels too frustrating

b) other games give a more FAIR experience (again, unrelated to the game being a MOBA).

If you want examples as to point b), for example the game being a 6v6 and not a 5v5, along with Tank being too strong of a role mean that most games are won by the better tanks and your impact as support or DPS is negligible, which can make you feel bad because generally humans don’t like playing well and losing or playing bad and getting carried.

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Wait Torb is labeled easy now?
Since when?

I mean I get it, you have your definition of “easy heroes”. As do I, but In general I don’t think torb is “easy” just because his turret

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Absolutely pathetic. Immediately go to a “rank shame” argument.

Judging by your troll of a topic to begin with and your whopping 14 posts total, I’m not going to waste my breath other than saying being good at PLAYING the game and understanding how to DESIGN a game are completely different.

Most DEVS in competitive games aren’t that high ranked, because they are busy understanding the game not playing it 24/7.

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slow claping

aw, rank shaming. classic.

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I mean it was pretty much the same like in OW. If things go smooth = positive resonance. If things go bad = kys, you all trash and whatever else. Again, this was mostly in midranks + the usual toxic suspects the few times ive seen Dafran playing the game (very bad attitude).

Maybe the game has got better ways to handle such ppl.

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Balance has been pretty good lately. I do agree about the game usually being a tank diff and supports are overtuned.

This game used to be in way worse shape with double shield and GOATS.

The queue times are the worst part, if this game was 1-2-2 i’d love it even more. Better queue times and less throwing tanks

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thats a first

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Valorant is a new game, and like cars you always have a new mindset when you get behind the wheel. As time goes on and your mileage increase your mindset will change. That’s why you are different in Valorant. You will probably reach the same competitive grit you had before eventually.

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nothing wrong with playing valorant…except for the part where its an inferior much slower paced and boring game (that has existed for about 20 years now really) :sweat_smile:…

…but by all means play it if you want

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I prefer my games with some character, thank you.

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Apparantely being bottom pickrate and winrate across most ranks is no reason

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No one knows you, weirdo, you don’t have to make an exit, just leave lmao

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