I get the appeal of watching the most skilled players in the world duking it out, I really do. It’s super fun and can potentially teach others more about the game and how it works (though not all synergies and stuff translates to, say, plat where the general understanding of the game is lower)
However, I think watching low ranked games is waaaaay more fun than high ranks. In low ranks, you literally never know what’s gonna happen next because there IS no game plan. There’s no meta holding the players back, bronze ironically requires a lot of individual skill expression to climb out of before you can reap the benefits of coordinated play.
I can’t guarantee we’ll get the “flashy” plays people love so much, but I can guarantee you a portion of the viewers would be more invested in knowing what the Wrecking Ball is doing in the enemy spawn than watching a Supercharger Dragonblade teamwipe for the 80th time
On a final note, having a bronze league is something more players will be able to relate to than a pro league. We can see ourselves in imperfect players, making the mistakes we make up until diamond depending on the nature of the error. I don’t wanna see this so people can point out everything they did wrong, instead it’s more to show the world how different the game is across the skill playing field. How much fun it is to play just to play, to see people resorting to wacky antics instead of highly coordinated plays most of us will never be able to replicate.
Tl;dr a bronze league would get some people pretty invested as every match has more potential to be spontaneous and unpredictable. Bronze is an environment where DVa nuke still gets 6ks, where people can aim (kinda) but position so poorly it doesn’t matter, where funny C9s happen constantly. You can’t tell me it wouldn’t be fun to make an event out of streaming low elo games. That’s where Overwatch is the most fun and carefree. There’s an audience craving casual, fun stuff to watch. This is it
Now discuss why this idea sucks, forums, do ya thing!
I don’t think there’s enough demand for public low-rank play to put up a whole league of it. Otherwise I find the idea sound - the vast majority of players is in Silver, Gold and Platinum and seeing a real competitive version of their level of gameplay could be interesting to many.
And so, I’d actually like to see public tournaments arranged for various skill ranges. I think it’d also be a better chance to see the game balance in those ranks, and would give more visibility to the competitive side of the game (which right now is pretty limited, honestly). Even the prize wouldn’t need to be that significant - Some in-game cash, a special cosmetic, or OWL tokens could be enough to attract potential competitors.
You’re not wrong - it would be funny and I’d watch it.
The catch 22 is, you couldn’t have a Bronze league, because if those players practiced and played as much as OWL pros (since , you know, it’d be their jobs), they’d quickly improve. XD
Even if they only got to say gold-ish level, a meta would still form and trends would still be set. Someone, especially coaches or team leads, would learn what heroes worked best. It probably wouldn’t be the SAME meta that the pros use, but there would be “A” meta.
i mean you could have locals where bronze players participate to be put on the squad for a way to represent the fan interaction between teams and their fans and their fans could represent their teams and play each other and swap the fans out every so often.
could call it something like “the battle of the fans!”
Might want to check out Elohell Esports on twitch. They run leagues for a wide variety of ranks and platforms. PC, Xbox and PS4 all have coverage and tournaments
I can imagine different OWL levels. Current OWL would be let’s say Tier 1 OWL (top tier), and the new OWLs would be like Tier 2 and Tier 3, as an example. It would allow people not quite OWL level a way into the league, and provide interesting content, as likely different strats would be tried as it wouldn’t be as serious, which would only be a good thing.
I used to play in amateur basketball leagues and it was a blast.
I also enjoy sitting and watching my fellow weekend warriors play because i can relate to the level of play and it is always great to see an ordinary guy who is not blessed with a 6’ 6" body frame and natural athleticism make an amazing “and 1” play or drain a clutch 3.
That said, video games are kinda different and probably if this is to be done, it would have to be by fans and independent small organisations.
Which is where guilds come in, i suppose.
That said, there is nothing stopping us, the fans and players, from organising a Bronze league remotely through social media and stream it via Twitch and YouTube, complete with brackets etc.
I wouldn’t mind seeing ladder scrims and tourneys.
Let’s say you form a static group of 6-9 players with a given average rank, within say a 250 SR spread at most. To form a tourney, you’d need at least… 3-7 other such teams within 100 SR of your team’s average.
You’d then compete against them, with your own winners and such, and your SR would be adjusted faster than most players’. At the end of the tourney period, your SR is adjusted (generally only for the higher, to varying degree), and you have to find competitors for that adjusted SR again.
Could be pretty fun to watch, especially with a good integrated stream presence from the players.
Yes! Kinda like where the NBA organizes leagues for amateurs (not the NBDL which is semi-pro).
Yes, indeed.
I think that given the huge amount of negativity recently with the current Experimental Card, Echo as a DD instead of Support, long wait times for DD in RQ QP and Comp, the OW team need to know that there are those of us who still love the game and appreciate their efforts.
In some ways, i think that us Bronzers and Silvers are probably the ones who love the game for itself because although we are “bad” players, we still hang around and the only reason we bear the mockery and disdain of other players is because we love the game, almost unconditionally! XD XD XD
Yes indeed and it was from the Contenders division where we saw GOATS surface and as SilverBlitz mentioned, it is the amateurs / semi-pros who often come up with the most interesting team compositions and strats.
TBH, i enjoy watching Contenders probably more than OWL because of this.
