I am not a Tank player but nonetheless still am one of those who still like the role.
I simply switch to Zarya in those cases. Get free beam charge since everyone is shooting everywhere and I end up being useful just because the enemy decided to make me useful by giving me free ult charge and most definitely not because of my awesome Zarya play.
You have to play the cards you were dealt with on Tank. If you manage to be like 1% smarter than the enemy it is like an instant win in low ranks. And not to mention you might end up being called a Smurf by those same forum players who blame their entire OW existence on “I cannot climb due to teammates and smurfs”.
Yup. I am was a Diamond ranked tank (was about 150 SR from breaking into M). As a person who like variety I have mained damn near every hero in the game at some point. Eventually I settled into the role I enjoy most, tank.
All the experience helped develop my game sense. Especially when it came to paying attention to my own team and their habits/play style.
You can climb with any tank but I learned really fast that certain tanks are easier to climb with depending on what is currently strong and what rank you are in.
This doesn’t surprise me. Especially pre-2-2-2. Zarya was the best tank (outside WB) for open cue. Not only does she synergize with almost any tank, she has really scary dps when charged, and is able to peel with a click of a button (no aim required)
As a tank you need to pay attention to what your team is doing and how they are playing and adapt to have the best chance of winning. Notice how I say “chance” because sometimes your crummy team is beyond saving.
Some teams almost never group others while others group up too much (not being aware of Ults and essentially giving the enemy free team wipes that coulda been avoided by spreading a little).
There is also an order you want to keep in mind.
Your fellow tank partner. This is your most important homie so trying to play with them is important. Even if that means using their dumb, uncooperative butts as bait or a distraction. I’m an aggressive player but if my tank partner is passive and doesn’t know how to play aggressive I have to slow down to try to match their tempo for instance.
Supports. You got to know how much healing/support to expect. Some supports play aggressive and if you don’t match that aggression they often get themselves killed first. Not only ending most fights but also potentially staggering your entire team. Better to die with your dumb healers then die outside their spawn cycle for the entire game.
Enemy team. Knowing enemy behavior allows you to predict and react to them. In GM players often flank in coordination with their team and then only do it so often. For example, In lower ranks there’s people who do nothing but flank. If you notice this you can kill them and gimp the enemy 5v6 for the majority of the game.
Your own dps. Not much you can do but bad dps playing badly. The best you can do with them is often just try to combo with or around their own Ults. It’s the small windows of value poor players often find.
Players do so much dumb things at lower ranks and mitigating the damage from those mistakes is how you climb. Unless ur a M/GM player who can just crush games with mechanical skill. The rest of us have to improve and min/max every game and situation
Very deep and insightful.
One thing I will say is I have gone too deep to try and save my very deep supports to try and bail them out. This puts me out of position as a tank in hopes of saving them, then we both get punished and the roll that fight. I’ll do this once or twice in a session then realize I can’t keep trying to bail them out like that.
Recently in OWL I have been watching some beautiful coordinated flanks that I want to try with my tank partner. Those double shields where like a Sigma and McCree flank is so unique!
When it comes to DPS, I almost always give a Doomfist nearly all my bubbles. It almost always gets value and makes sure he gets out alive.
I have seen most of this video and subbed to flats pretty quick. I have always wanted to git gud at Rein. He is a fun character when you get the headgames down and learn to make good plays and how to play.