Lets have a Legitimate and Respectful Discussion about 'One-Tricking'

General Discussion
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One-Tricking is a very contentious subject among the Overwatch community.

It isn’t against any rules, and it isn’t bannable.
However many argue it is equivalent to intentionally throwing a match.

I see too many forum threads either rudely insulting people who fall under this category, or people defiantly defending them.

  • Both of which result in an echo-chamber of opinions on both sides, and don’t really yield constructive results in my opinion.

For anyone unfamiliar with the term;

One-Tricking (short for One-Trick Pony) is when a user either only plays, or is proficient with, one particular hero and is not of much use to their team playing any other hero.

(Not to be confused with Maining)

I personally am not one of these people, however I understand the philosophy behind it:

  • Some players prefer to master one individual hero, and consider putting their skills as other heroes on the sidelines, a worthy enough sacrifice
  • Some players are not interested in any other heroes currently available to them, and simply have no intention of learning any other heroes
  • Some players find other heroes too challenging, and are comfortable having found the one hero who makes them feel useful

That said, I also understand the perspective of those weary of it as well:

  • It can make it difficult for these players to understand other perspectives of the game, that could potentially require more diverse experience
  • These players can become a negative influence to their team as, depending on who they play, they may be easily countered by the enemy team
  • It can create additional problems if the only hero they play has already been chosen, or perhaps another One-Trick of the same hero is present.

As an Ice-Breaker I propose a few question…

My goal with this post is not to send hate to users like this, but to give them a healthy, non-hostile platform to defend themselves. While opening the conversation to opposing perspectives as well.

My opinion on the matter, personally:
Blizzard's opinion on the matter:

Source:

[EDIT LOG]
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To be fair lately I have been playing with some OTs and omg… It was horrible.

They get destroyed, countered and still playing the same hero… Sometimes they shine but when they don’t, they just turn into free Ult charge to the enemy.

I don’t report them but they (or at least a lot of them) ruins my comp experience.

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I am a Master OTP tracer, if OTP’s had a place to be we wouldn’t need to be playing ranked and making people frustrated.

Unfortunately Jeff decided to remove the only somewhat competitive game mode that we had that we could OTP, 3v3 elimination and so without any place to one trick that is remotely competitive we are forced to play ranked.

Honestly we just want to be very good at one hero and test that against other players, give us a place to be and the OTP problem is gone…

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Thanks for bringing up all of these excellent points. Personally, I don’t really have a problem with people who one-trick except if they explicitly make it clear they would throw the game if someone picks the hero they one-trick with. That’s usually where I draw the line.

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I think you may perhaps be an exception, as Tracer is far from niche;
Fortunately for you, Tracer fits in with practically what ever composition she’s asked of.

That said, I see your point. I would be hard-pressed to argue that 3v3 is a fun place to play. Its place in the Arcade rotation is a bit underwhelming.

Thanks, Love :heart:

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Tracer is basically the swiss army knife of the game. I doubt you get affected by this issue much.

Having said that, the option to be able to queue as a role, or even maybe god forbid a character while keeping the current queueing option as well could alleviate this problem significantly, but apparently Jeff and the team have a phobia of sensible design decisions.

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Anyone can one trick FFA in Arcade.

I think you illustrated the biggest problem with one trick players though. A one trick Tracer is seen as perfectly fine, generally so are Zen, 76 and Dva off the top of my head.

As soon as it is ok to one trick a single hero it is ok for all heroes. Its not ideal and you see some utterly ridiculous counters but it is what it is.

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Just to clarify, i am talking about the old 3v3 which had no lockout, lockout defeats the whole purpose of one tricking.

Ideally for me and many one trick i believe, we would have an old 3v3 style ranked mode, where we could simply play whatever character we one tricked to our hearts content and could still feel competitive.

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The main problem with one-tricking is that if the one-trick is counterable, they can be shut down to the point that they contribute virtually nothing. There are a few characters that cannot be countered (ie, Tracer), so one-tricking them has few drawbacks. However, this could easily change if the balance changes and they start to have true counters.

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The issue with a role-select is;
Assuming it would be tuned to enforce a 2-2-2 comp, Comp would lose a lot of its identity that comes with the different sorts of compositions.

Enforcing one particular meta isn’t how they game should balanced, as seen by Dive’s prominence for the past year. It should be incentivized to explore new metas, not force-feed players into one.

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Personally I have nothing against one tricks. There is nothing inherently wrong with OTPs.

One tricking is someone who only invests time in one character only, and presumably is exceptionally good at that character. There wouldn’t be much point to this discussion if the One trick sucks at the hero he onetricks.

My first point is, I would largely prefer him to stay at the hero he is best at. If some person has 80% win rate on Torbjorn and 0 hrs on everything else, you bet my a** that I would like him to be on Torb and for the team to build around him. Having one person on his best hero and everyone else on their second main to cope with him in the team is infinitely better than having everyone on their main and one person having no idea what he is doing. 5v6 matches will never end well.

Second, there is nothing to ensure that not-one-tricking produces better players. For instance, Sym players and rein players usually have insane gamesense and generally poorer aim. Asking them to try out Soldier 76 for 10 hrs accomplishes absolutely nothing. They need more perspective? They can watch other people play, and they can gain perspective when fighting AGAINST said heroes. One tricking doesn’t impede your ability and gamesense, or knowledge of how the game works.

Third, I agree that one-tricking CAN be easily countered, but the team can also easily adapt to said counter. I know that a lot of people think that this isn’t fair. If your team has a OTP Doomfist and the enemy changes to Pharah, many people think the Doomfist should change to hitscan and be responsible for his counter.

My point in, THAT perspective is unfair. Overwatch is a team game, and we should be playing with team countering team, not individual brawls. If the Doomfist is performing perfectly at assassination, there is NO REASON why the Genji on the team should stay Genji and the Doomfist should be forced to change off the hero he is good at, simply because a pharah is existing. The Genji can change to 76, the Reinhardt can change to DVa to cope with the Pharah.

Direct counters exist even in pro games. Winstons and Zenyattas can often be found in the same game although Winston counters Zenyatta very hard. That doesn’t mean the Zenyatta should change to Moira or Mercy, it means the team should focus the Winston more.

It also isn’t very applicable to some one tricks who are in fact performing to the best of their ability. I main Reaper by a significant amount, and I can assure you that I deal with Pharahs better than I can do with 76. It isn’t a matter of whether the hero is suitable or not–I simply cannot aim with 76 but I can with Reaper, and I can catch the Pharah when she drops down far better than I can shoot her out of the sky. Just because Reaper is countered by Pharah doesn’t mean that I would perform better against pharah using something other than Reaper.

For the final questions, just the clear it up:
Am I a onetrick?
For each class, yes. I can only play Reaper, Reinhardt, Ana (oh look, all the off-meta heroes), and Mercy. If you want me to take the dps slot, someone else will need to deal with Pharah, because I simply can’t play any hero to deal with that.
However, I have no trouble switching off if the team wants me to. If we need a tank, I can do that (AND I PLAY A MEAN REIN RARRRR). If we need a healer, I can switch to that. It’s just that I have a very limited number of heroes that I can play within each category.

I don’t think One-tricking is a problem at all. I have some friends who onetrick certain heroes. I have no problem playing competitive with them. Most of the time, we just build the team around them.

At the end of the day, most of the people complaining about onetricking are the people who are unwilling to be the one to switch off and adapt a onetrick to a team.

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What is your opinion on One-Tricks?

I think it’s a little damaging to the game.
If someone already picked your hero or they themselves are a one-trick, you’ve gone from a teammate to a liability. There’s no saving the game.

Would you consider yourself one? If not, are you friends with any?

I don’t think so. Sombra IS the only DPS I can play reliably well, but if that doesn’t work I’m still a VERY proficient healer and an average tank. I do have other heroes I can turn to.
I don’t know any OTPs and, tbh, I wouldn’t risk playing with them. If they have NOTHING else they can play well, it’s going to be a waste of time.

How do you think they influence the game? For better? Or for worse?

Well, that’s the question, right?
Is it a Genji-OTP? 7/10 times he’ll hard carry. Widow? Depends on if they get focused. Torb/Sym? 7/10 times instant loss.
It all really depends on the hero.
So, right now, they harm the game. IMO. But I think it’s on Blizz to rework the heroes that harms the game if they’re OTP’d.

But, I also think OTPing should be reportable. Not because they’re only good at that hero. But because they REFUSE to switch to something that might help more than their precious.

So what if you’re bad at healer? Play Lucio, at least you don’t have to focus on healing teammates. Just be near them. Or play Rein and shield your teammates. (I’m not taking a dump on these heroes. I know it takes skill to be GOOD at them.)
I don’t care that you’re bad at them. Right now, your hero is not working. You might as well switch to something that has a BETTER chance of working.
If anything, at least it would show that you care about winning a little bit.

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I really don’t have anything against people one tricking. It’s their game. They can play it however they want, they paid for it after all.

That being said, I can still have absolutely 0 respect for them as a person, and simply avoid them at all costs. Humans are meant to adapt–and that’s what this game is about. If they can’t adapt, let Darwin-ism take it’s place and just cut them off.

TL;DR Best to avoid them if you don’t like them, support them if you do. Simple as that.

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I think you have a very fair perspective on the matter, frankly. It’s definitely difficult not to acknowledge the issues that come from having a One-Trick as a teammate. You put it best when you said:

However I’m going to have to disagree with you here:

I think its entirely in their right to play who they choose to.
Whether their playstyle choice is optimal, is arguable.

But unless a user’s sole intention is to lose the match for their team, on purpose, they do not deserve to be reported.

To put it bluntly;
Being stubborn in your match-decisions, is not reportable. Throwing is.

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One tricking can also hurt the team composition, so thats anther problem that they cause. And since almost all OT’s are dps players (exept maybe some mercy OT’s) its safe to assume that even OT’s won’t like a team built out of 6 OT’s.
They rely that other players will fit into some roles. and that can cause a loss.

I think its just that most OT’s would prefer fun over victory. and the more ‘competitive’ players (flex players) prioritise vicotry over fun.
(It is wrong to say there are only flex and ot’s, there also players who have more than one hero that they are good at, but all those heroes are in the same role, those create the exact same problem like OT’s.)

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This

That mentality is a bit harsh, but a healthy way to go about it.

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It depends on who the character is. If it’s Mercy, for example, then it’s close to throwing, because she doesn’t play like and other characters and doesn’t have the same mechanical and aiming requirement. If all someone plays is Mercy and someone else has already picked her and you don’t have a reliable tank or DPS to fall back to, it’s still kind of throwing because you know that is alway a possibility in this game.

If you can only play one character it’s very close to throwing because even if you try your best with the character you pick when your main isn’t available the fact that you don’t have another solid character in the other two classes is you not caring what happens to the rest of your team in that very predictable situation.

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Technically, yes.

Certain heroes fall ineffective in particular situations, leaving them helplessly futile. Symmetra is a good example in terms of providing no utility.

The game is built around switching heros that accommodate to a given situation. One tricking is the exact opposite and widely considered as a selfish act.

Not to forget to mention that the ‘‘I paid for this game argument’’ is upright flawed.

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The fact is that the vast majority of us are holding back our teams more than a T500 one trick is, that is why they are T500 and we aren’t.

When they cause a loss because of one tricking, most of us have at least two if not more things that we did to cause our team to lose.

People are targeting one thing causing losses, when doing that thing has made some of these players able to win more than the other 99.9% of the playerbase.
If they got that good BECAUSE they aren’t diluting their time, then maybe switching around IS throwing, if a lot of flex players in master would be T500 if they stopped diluting their time, how are they not intentionally making their teams lose more, if their flexing around is weakening their skill that much then they are putting their team at a disadvantage by switching.

As long as one tricks can achieve T500 the issue will be more complicated than “one tricks put their team at a disadvantage”.

Clearly more than 500 people dislike one tricks, can’t all of T500 just get good and push these one tricks out of T500 so we can actually start saying “hey, one tricking is actually so detrimental to the team that not a single one can achieve the highest rank”.

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I think you need to make a better distinction between “Throwing” and simply not being an optimal teammate. Throwing implies the player is going out of their way to intentionally lose a match for everyone present.

Opinions on One-Tricks aside, Its important to acknowledge they have the mutual goal of success as much as anyone else. Which isn’t reportable.

That said;

This message was very condescending, and whatever it is trying to accomplish isn’t very constructive.