That’s already the case now…I simply switch and play something that does well against something like doom that I also enjoy playing….
Good idea, but overwatch needs more heroes (considering 6 heroes get banned at the minimum)
choosing between 5 supports isn’t exactly fun
Fair enough for doom I guess. But there’s a few DPS heroes who force me to play heroes I don’t like playing, and I’m sure that’s the same for many others. Not everyone enjoys the entire DPS role, after all.
Also a lot of DPS don’t have hard counters.
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that’s so freaking weird because for the last few days I was thinking about this lol.
It’s not the hero count that matters, it’s having similar or overlapping archetypes to fall back on should a given hero be banned out – that’s the primary issue with the concept as it applies to Overwatch.
As it is now, there are only really three heroes in the game where a hero ban can be applied without completely removing that archetype from the game: mid-/long-range hitscan (Cass, Ashe, Widow). Banning out one of the trio still has some overlap with the next, so if that role is needed, players still have an option there. Compare that to virtually any hero in the tank or support role, or the non-hitscan half of the DPS roster. Any of those heroes are banned out and that entire archetype is removed from the game.
Even when you set aside some of the other problems that come with it, like a lot of the community’s perception when it comes to the concept of counterpicks, or the eventual tactical use of bans when there isn’t a clear out-of-band hero, etc.; forcing players out of an entire playstyle is the most aggressively anti-fun and anti-player thing you can possibly do. And if you think such a thing will ultimately be good for the game, think about the times you felt “forced” to play a given hero for one reason or another (counterpicking, a strong meta comp, or back when we had global hero bans) – the end result is a lot of people will just stop playing until they can play what they want again.
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The other problem with hero bans in Overwatch in my opinion is the fact that we can switch heroes in the course of a match. Hero bans are not so much of a problem with team games where the hero/champion/agent are selected in advance and cannot be switched and in most of those games, players are expected to have already unlocked and “leveled up” a certain number of heroes/champions prior to being allowed access to the ranked game modes for that game. The reason why I see this as a problem is that it has a great chance for disruptive behavior during the pre-game, possibly incentivizing disruptive players to throw games because their favorite hero was locked out entirely. Granted, the risks of disruptive behavior should not be a deterrent to implementing features to make Overwatch (or any other video game) more interesting or fun to play, but new features should be introduced with the necessary preparation to counter such disruptive behavior.
(Disclaimer: Opinions are my own)
To help further the discussion let me pull up past Developer sentiments for the concepts of Hero Pick/Ban systems:
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You can ban 6 heroes per match in Paladins. It feels good to ban snipers.
hero bans are great and used to amazing effect in other games. at this point, i think blizz has shown enough hubris that no statements they make carry any weight. im not going to spend the time listing their numerous failings on this and other titles.
maybe if 2015 “dont force esports” kaplan had made a statement on the topic it would mean something more than “have fun the way we tell you too”
Teamwork is very important, which is why I think OW2 should have more systems and U.I enhancements to support that.
The dev’s probably already considered this, but I think it would be smart to have to have a team status screen like in PvE for PvP as well. There has been so many situations where a tank pushed in alone, but was under the impression his teammates were behind him. This lethal mistake often ends in the tank’s avoidable death to his team’s chagrin. But with a team status screen displaying HP, a glance would tell him that his team taking no chip damage, or too much damage (flanked/pressured) would raise red flags to return to his team. This is just one of the many situations where a minimalist status screen can improve teamwork by avoiding basic mistakes.
Of course, an argument could be made that they just need to have greater situational awareness. But that argument is a double-edged sword: if increasing the skill floor for situational awareness is the goal, then why have any U.I at all? You can track your own HP, count your own bullets, and use the center of the screen as the crosshair. You can communicate your HP to your teammates also via mic.
As you see, doing it that way is hellish as now keeping track of basic things require so much attention. From that perspective, I would find it hellish to not have a team status screen and force everyone on mics to communicate for a tank to fall back, get peeled, etc.
Just some thoughts of mine as a consumer. Since teamwork is so vital, which I like, it just makes sense to me to feed more basic information to improve basic teamwork.
Other competitive shooters such as valorant have a match status screen to track everything for you. Enemy ults to your team’s health and vision. The valorant devs clearly saw the value in feeding basic information to you so your precious attention is not consumed by mundane things such as counting enemy kills to ult track, yelling out the enemy position in your los (gets shown on minimap), doing 180s to check on your team, etc.
Now, copying what Valorant does would go too far, tracking ults is a valuable skill and we just truly need basic information about our team automatically fed to us.
I noticed that the dev team added a teammates death noise in the OWL demonstration, tbh that’s too intrusive on the ears. Just a simple team status screen and your teammate’s portrait fading to grey is all you need. Perhaps keep the sound as an option for the visually impaired, as Overwatch can afford to be inclusive without compromising competitiveness fortunately.
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This has been my position too
Hero bans works in a game like League because there’s 150+ characters to choose from, and like 8-10 choices for any given job or specialty you need in your team
It doesn’t really work in OW when you have only 2 or 3 supports who can keep up tank’s health, only 2 or 3 dive tanks, only 2 or 3 main shield tanks etc
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that + locking anything that may be advantageous against you on a particular map
e.g. you rolled a sniper map but don’t want to play against snipers on it? yeah ban it.
hard counters don’t exist there, but there’s still soft counters or so.
e.g. playing 2 tank comp? probs want to ban bomb king (who’s like similar to junkrat) or any other damage hero that’s got high damage output who could get wrecker (item that boost primary fire damage against shields) to shred barriers (if you do run a double barrier 2 tank comp).
sometimes some toxic people ban a hero just so their teammates can’t pick them too.
i am 100% opposed to hero bans. balance means moving away from the way some heroes dominate, as class passives show this is doable. the only reason people think hero bans are needed is because they don’t have the imagination to believe the game can be balanced. it’s a shortcut that would be an excuse for less and less frequent balance patches and would make everything way worse.
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I will NEVER get behind hero bans. I hate it in every game I’ve played that has it, and I hated it when my amateur tournament did it as well. It’s not up to you to decide what I get to play or not.
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exactly! all it would lead to is not the strongest heroes being banned, but the most hated. i expect onetricks to be singled out for bans for no reason.
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Ban systems only work in games where you can’t swap mid-round…
Ban systems in this game end up forcing a new hard-meta, because said hard-meta lacks any countering due to them being banned…
Which is exactly what we saw when bans existed in this game.
Plus… people just flat out didn’t play the week their favorite hero got banned, which was noticable near the end of the hero bans.
When cree or ana or mercy would get banned, the ques were noticably longer tbh…
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updates (period) are nice.
I don’t support hero-bans. But like the idea of soft-bans, or better yet a semi-open format like 121+1 for 5v5 ow2.
Hard-bans are hard to implement, are abusable, seem out of touch for many normal players and normal ranks, and don’t seem to fit the current roster numbers. Soft-bans like 121+1flex are easier to pull off. Stuff like “too many shields” or “too many builders” means tough luck for those who are last to pick, but they could be offered first dibs the next match (a better kind of prio token is letting ppl pick first in soft-lock system).
Finally you have the 121+1 where devs can swap heroes in/out of the 4th channel to control representation and metas without tuning the heroes themselves. By simply changing up what comps can occur they can get the equivalent of hard-locks but with less toxicity.
That just means theres a lot of disparity in supports/tanks when compared to DPS who all do basically one thing…
So some supports/tanks would need changes to bring them more in line with either more favorable options or the least favorable options. So that these two roles are more prevalent on their own…
And this is why we don’t have hero bans.
Agree and this is why there shouldn’t be hero bans. At least not while hard counters are a thing.