There are plenty of FPS games out there designed for a more balanced, skill based 1 on 1 competition.
This game isn’t one of them. It’s designed and balanced around 6v6. I shouldn’t have had to explain this to you.
If you want something more balanced for 1 on 1 combat, Quake champions comes to mind but nobody played it even though it required way more skill than this game.
(which is probably why nobody played it)
Reading that description. Seems Moira is more of a “crutch” character than “skill gate” character.
Yeah I don’t know what skill is Moira checking, You don’t know either.
So as I understand it, we have different definition for what a skill check is. Even if we go by your definition, I don’t think that justifies Moira’s design. As I explained before having heroes get freebies simply because others make a mistake is bad design. We can have “easy” heroes, we don’t need “braindead easy” “skill check” heroes.
That depends on the meta, really. In metas where she isn’t good, then she’s definitely a crutch as those will immediately fail against better characters.
Only a fool takes “the answer is complicated and nuanced” to mean, “Oh, you don’t know.”
But if you insist on a very weak, very simple answer, then she checks aim. The vast majority of characters with aim-based abilities can kill her before she kills them, as long as they don’t miss their shots. If they miss, however, Moira is guaranteed to kill them.
But I stand by the fact that this is answer a gross oversimplification.
No, I have the correct definition of what it is. You don’t.
Don’t try to pass off your misunderstanding of a common game design concept as a mere disagreement.
The first time she really became meta was double shield. That’s what, 2 years after her release?
So she’s been more of a crutch than a skill gate.
I didn’t pass it off as anything. I read the link you provided, used that definition (even though she’s more crutch than skill gate), and argued against it.
So for argument’s sake, Moira is a skill gate hero. We don’t need a “braindead easy” “skill gate” hero.
Only time I find myself dying to Moira is if I was already half health and even then I usually almost kill the Moira.
The problem with this logic is that meta doesn’t exist at any rank below Master at most. Moira is a skill check at those ranks because she has consistently been one of the most used characters there. Further, the mistaken belief that she IS a crutch that can be used to carry bad teams is exactly why bad, low-ranked Moiras never heal while good, high-ranked Moiras do.
She’s primarily a skill gate/check character.
No, what you actually did was cherry-pick what you wanted.
Uh huh. The problem with this logic is that people will always consider anything they dislike or feels unfair to losy to “braindead easy”. Because people always tell themselves they don’t mind losing to something that takes “skill”, until they actually start losing to it.
But as Moira ranks up she becomes less viable because she can’t “keep up” with the increased power of other heroes and are “forced” to switch to better alternatives. “Crutch hero” describes her pretty well.
What did I cherry pick?
Not always. Some do. Some don’t.
In Moira’s case it isn’t because she’s disliked because most people would agree she’s one of the easiest heroes if not the easiest.
I’d agree it’s just a case of dislike when heroes like McCree, Hanzo, Genji, Reinhardt are called braindead (or easy), as they do require a high level of skills.
Not really, because Overwatch’s design tries to make every character useful within specific contexts. A crutch character is intended to be flat out abandoned after reaching a certain level of play – that is not and never has been the intention for any character in Overwatch. For example, if you’re playing a comp that needs a lot of consistent healing, Moira is still a good choice. Also, Brigitte has become a solid pick in Dive comps because of her ability to give squishy teammates like Echo and Tracer armor to bolster their health.
Like I said, whether or not these characters are “crutches” depends entirely on the meta. And in addition to that, it’s almost always unintentional.
You focused entirely on the “these characters start out powerful enough to carry your party to victory but cannot be relied upon indefinitely”. The other half of the definition is that, by the design, the game will “kick the crutch from underneath you” after you get good enough, and Overwatch isn’t really a game that does that on purpose. By design, any player can (and has) climbed to high rank with any character – a feature that the devs encourage. They welcome characters like Mercy, Bastion and Reinhardt in high level play because although these characters are meant to have low skill floors for new players, they are also intended to have some viability at the highest level also.
That is not a Crutch Character. As stated in the definition: “By quickly obsoleting or otherwise removing the Crutch Character (or perhaps making the Crutch’s later function different), the designers deter this strategy.” That is NOT what Blizzard does.
Which is confirmation bias.
“I only agree with the dislike when it’s a character I deem to have no skill”.
In my opinion it is a really healthy take to accept your loss and try to improve so it does not happen again. Overall it has made me a much better duelist and I am happier with the game because I am not constantly making excuses for why I died.
While Blizzard doesn’t intend for any hero to be abandoned at later stage (high rank) of the game, they also don’t specifically design to avoid that. For many heroes, the focus of design has been accessibility, not late game viability.
But this is moot. I took your definite of skill gate and your classification of Moira as skill gate hero anyway. And we don’t need a skill gate hero in a competitive game. It serves no purpose.
Confirmation bias is ‘people will always consider anything they dislike or feels unfair to lose to “braindead easy.”’
Sometimes, it really is just the braindead easy that causes the dislike. In Moira’s case the easiness is something that most people can actually demonstrate whereas people who say Hanzo/Widow/McCree/Genji/Tracer etc being easy are usually not good at the hero, and there aren’t many of these people, despite them (Hanzo/Widow/Genji) being hated a lot.
No, they have flat out said they want every character to be viable at every level of play. So you’re wrong on that.
It serves multiple purposes. One, as you said, is accessibility. Another is diversity in play style. Third is to promote team play over individual play.
For instance, as many people have noted about the OP’s post, the reason Moira was able to outplay them is because their team made many uncoordinated mistakes. Skill gate/skill check heroes excel at punishing bad teamwork, and the developers have ALSO said that encouraging teamwork is the core of Overwatch.
I’m not arguing this point with you any further.
You are proving my entire point and simply refuse to see it.
Wrong on what?
I agree they don’t intend for heroes to be abandoned at higher ranks or that they want all heroes to be viable at every rank, but what I said is they don’t design heroes that way especially when it comes to accessibility heroes.
We already have accessible heroes since release and a bunch of play style, but neither should come at the expense of competitive nature of pvp.
Team play is already heavily promoted by how the game is designed to be played. However I think Jeff has said they want to focus more on individual play which was part of the reason why they nerfed tanks/supports.
The point is, those things can be satisfied without a hero like Moira.
Just because you can’t see it a different way doesn’t mean there is only your way to see it. I’ve been killed more times and more frequently by McCree and Widow (“unfair” to fight for any support) than Moira and I don’t call them easy heroes.
Yes they do. They have specifically said that they want ALL of their heroes, including accessible ones like Mercy, to be viable at all ranks. When those characters are bad, that isn’t an intentional design choice by Blizzard.
It doesn’t come at the expense of competitive PVP, though. Only in the mind of people who think that someone who misses 1 or 2 shots in a row against a character that doesn’t require aim shouldn’t die for it.
Hypocritical. Your entire argument is trying to justify your personal biases as being “competitive balance”.
Ok? I already said I agreed they “want” all heroes to be viable.
That’s why it comes at the expense of competitive pvp, because one side doesn’t need to do much. If his opponent misses shots, he wins, if not, he loses. (it’s more complicated than that but that’s the gist of it) That’s not competitive.
If basketball was played so one team (or player) gets free 2 points (but no more than that) every 24s while the other team (player) can potentially score 2-3 points several times in the same 24s, it is not a competitive sport. It’s stupid.
“Competitive balance” is a more justifiable reason than “accessibility” and “skill check.”
You also said “they don’t design heroes that way especially when it comes to accessibility heroes”.
It’s right there in quotes.
Yes it is. Choosing between less risky consistency and risky high skill play has been part of competition since competition existed. Fighting games have combo-based heroes versus mashable heroes. Racing games have fast cars with difficult handling versus slow cars with easy handling. Sports have three-pointers versus dunks.
Basketball is a terrible example. For one thing, it has dunks and layups which, statistically, are the EASIEST shots to make in the game, versus three-pointers, which are the most difficutlt.
In addition, basketball has a history of changing its rules if one team or player becomes too good at it. The three-second rule was put in place specifically because of Wilt Chamberlain’s dominance. Shaquille O’Neal forced a change in the foul rules. Even three-pointers were created because the game had become so dependent on height that shorter players needed something to help them stay useful.
You literally could not have picked a worse example to try and strawman your point.
Accessibility and skill check are both examples of competitive balance, though. No matter what you have to say about it.
Not replying to this subject again.
Who said anything about breaking through healing? It’s a 1v1, which usually means a battle of attrition.
If you’re the person who posted this stupid GIF a long time ago, I even told you the answer. You recall in that specific moment and have more than capable ammo to finish her off with. Because Tracer is that stupid of a hero.
And? That means their design doesn’t reflect their want.
Without getting into which fighting/racing/sport games and their specific mechanics, they can’t be compared to how Moira works in this game. We already have equivalent of “mashable heroes/easy handling cars” in Reaper, Junkrat and Brigitte etc. Moira is like an easy handling car with invisible railing that prevent you from going off road or crash into other cars.
Shots under the baskets are statistically highest % shots, not easiest.
Not really, this part is just a strawman.
NBA rebalances the game when one team/player becomes too good at it. That’s fine. A hero in this game gets rebalanced if it’s too good.
Also, the creation of 3 pointers, while may have helped short players, it wasn’t a freebie. Just because you were short doesn’t mean you get to score 3 points on your possession. There are skills involved.
Moira gives what? Bad aimer a chance to win duels without requiring a different kind of skill. That’s just a freebie.
There are already accessible heroes and skill check in place without a hero like Moira. We don’t need to justify personal bias (in favor for Moira) as being “skill check” or “accessibility.”
What are you even talking about now? What does this have to do with whether or not their characters are Crutch Characters?
You cannot be serious with this statement.
That is absolutely NOT how basketball, nor sports metrics work.
I’m ignoring these points from here on out because it’s just you repeating your biases about what are “freebies” and whatnot.
It’s more like a preference, not bias per se, that I have for a competitive game where both sides require a certain level of skill, and Moira is just below that level of skill, even for an “accessible” and “skill check” hero.