This. It is quite silly to disparage people for using terms “incorrectly” when said terms are fabrications to begin with.
There is only one definition - support.
1 Like
Still has nothing to do with the classification of Supports.
More inconsistency, but this, at least, has some slight logic to it. (Moira doesn’t fit).
Maybe what all of this bickering about which hero falls into which ‘role’ is just telling us that the roles themselves are kind of arbitrary and heroes can actually utilize different playstyles and synergies depending on what sort of teamcomps and strategies are at play.
Yeah Moira has always been the odd one out. No utility, low damage, but highest healing potential with her base kit.
I’ve heard some argue that she’s a flex support because her extra healing is her utility. Though I figure it’s just because she doesn’t have the CC, consistency or mobility for a main support.
Pretty sure this isn’t what main and flex supports are. Main Support is Lúcio, Brigitte, and Mercy. Flex Support is Ana, Baptiste, Moira, and Zenyatta. Also Bap has been considered as a hybrid support, but he’s mostly a flex.
The way they have characterized main and off supports in the pro scene have more to do with the actual player roles than the hero roles.
For main support (which they fit as Mercy, Lucio, Brig, and sometimes Bap), this is the player that tends to be primarily responsible for tracking enemy ult usage, coordinating the team outside of teamfights, and planning ahead. This heavier burden is accounted for by the heroes that are included, which tend to be lighter on mechanics to allow the player to focus more on the overall team tactics.
For flex-support/off-support (Ana, Bap, Zen, Moira), the focus is much more on keeping key members of the team alive and flexing those mechanics more so. This player is not as concerned with the macro of the game, therefore they can focus on the harder to play heroes (and Moira I guess).
This is literally straight out of the pro leagues so yeah…
The Main/Flex difference mostly has to do with players and how you swap compositions.
For an extreme example, say you start the game on the “zombie comp” we saw early on this OWL season with Moira/Lucio. You can easily transition from that to an Ana/Lucio dive keeping both tank ults and Lucio. From there maybe you swap to a Ball dive and keep Ana with a Brig to use nano, and then maybe you find you want to swap Ana out for Zen’s extra damage. 4 compositions, but one support player only swapped once and the other swapped twice. And from that first comp you could have gone for a rush comp with Lucio/Bap instead of dive. Or taken Ana/Mercy in a more split style for the ball comps. All while only having one player learn each hero and one support ult reset in the swapping.
1 Like
main support: a support whose primary goal is heal the team and play backline.
Off support: a support that has abilities that enable the team to secure kills and is in general more reliant on mechanics.
Lucio, Mercy, Brig, Moira = main supports
Ana, Bapt, Zen = off supports
It is possible that a hero is main support in 1 comp and off support in another, however if you were to dumb it down massively so that even you OP could understand it, then the list above shows which are generally ms and which os.
/thread
the main support and off support labeling system isnt used competitively.
That person is using main support/flex support labeling, which actually is a better way to look at support from a choice in game standpoint and designing them standpoint.
This is not true at all. I gonna explain why:
First of all its inportant that you know how the term Mainsupport even came up:
Mainsupport was a term firstvused in pro play. This was before high healing supports were added makingnit highly ublikely that the casual community used it before already. The Mainsupport was the role of a player:
The Mainsupport was the player who always played Support, while the FlexSupport was the player who occasionally played something else if the comp only included a single Support.
At the very start Lucio was the Hero used by the Mainsupport because yiu always played him and the flex Support switched between Mercy, Zen and other roles. After Anas release the Flex support played Ana because you sometimes replaced her
After Mercies rework through Mercy got used a lot too, usually by the Mainsupport
I gonna skip a lot, but after time it develepoed that the Mainsupport played Lucio and Mercy, while the Flex Support switched between Ana, Zen and Dps/Tank. You can see flexsupports like Jjonak for example occasionally on Hog or Widow
So in short what it means:
Mainsupports are historically Supports who work alone, if you have a 5dps comp you in pro play would always play Lucio or Mercy with that
So there is no 100% clear definitipn of what a flexsupport is and what a mainsupport, but there are common characteristics of each:
Mainsupports dont need much peeling while offering a lot of peeling on their own. They usually have reliable healing but with lower HPS potential. They dont need much teamsupport and can potentially work on their own
Flexsupport are usually team reliant, are worse peelers than Mainsupports and rather fragile. They usually offer burst of value, like high impact bit long CD abillities or being able to deal high damage with enough aim but require team support
Not all Main/Flexsupports fall under all these points, but you can still say wich rather fits which category.
Commonly its this order:
Mainsupport:
Mercy, Lucio, Brig
Flexsupport:
Ana, Zen, Bap, Moira
Mercy and Lucio have the most reliable healing in the game and all of the Mainsupports are great peelers and dont need much peeling on their own. Lucio and Mercy were also the go to supports in 5dps comps before role lock due to them working on their own
Ana and Bap have high impact abillities with long CD, Zen and Bap can potentially deal a high amount of damage and exept maybe Moira rhey all require a lot of peeling and team support, but even Moira cant peel that long for their own. All of these supports are terrible on their own and need another Support to funktion properly
Bap is also used quite commonly used by the mainsupport in some Doubleshield variants and some flexsupports learned Brig and rarely get swappednon for that, but besides that you nearly always see the Mainsupport playing Lucio, Mercy, Brig and the Flexsupport playing Ana, Zen, Moira, Bap
Now looking at your definition again:
Putting Zen into the same category as Mercy and Lucio is a crime. There are some supports like Bap where you can argue with some perks being a bit unusual for their role, but Zen and Mercy/Lucio in the same category? I think you cant be further away from each other
Zen and Mercy/Lucio got in no point of the game used for the same role. Mercy/Lucio are great peelers and barely need any peeling, Zen is a bad peeler and requires a lot of support from the team. Mercy and Lucio work on their own, Zen does not.
You can combine most Flex supports with most Mainsupports and it atleast decently works.
Brig works with every Flexsupport exept Moira but even woth Moira she isnt terrible and got used on some occasions.
Lucio works with every Flexsupport well, exept with Zen where he is only decent with
Mercy works with every Flexsupport exept Moira where she is only decent with
Zen works with every Mainsupport, only with lucio he isnt the best but still works. But if we look at Zen with Flexsupports, he only works with Bap, is okayish at best with Ana and terrible with Moira and himself
Mercy+any Mainsupport is bad
Brig+ any mainsupport is bad
Lucio with any mainsupport is bad (he got some niche situations with some mainsupportd, but its very rare) but they all work with nearly all Flexsupports
The Main/Flex declaration actually used makes sense because the Supports in category 1 work with the supports in category 2 and exept Bap+Zen there is no not extremely niche combination of Supports where you dont use 1 mainsupport and 1 flexsupport. Therefore it helps players to stick to this role, since a Mainsupport+Flexsupport player can play nearöy every comp in the game
If we go by your definition through, we would have a problem if you play a comp with Zen included since Zen gets usually played with Mercy or Brig and your “offsupport” cant play that
Therefore it makes bo sense to put Zen into the same category as Mercy, Lucio and Brig and is very hurtfull for teams using your system
If you say “Mainhealer” and “Offhealer” with this definition, fine, that woulf make some amount of sense atleast. But if you use a already existing term wrong your definition gets wrong too
1 Like
Reject support classifications and think about support and composition synergy instead.
For 90% of the playerbase though, main support/flex support means nothing. Generally they’ll gravitate towards main healer and off healer because it’s more obvious up front what those terms mean.
1 Like
I would say that the main supports are:
Moira, Ana and Bap.
Flex/off supports are:
Zen, Lucio, Brig, (Mercy)
Mercy was a flex support with 50 HPS and a main support with 60. Right now we have 55 HPS so see her as you want. I would say good Mercy players can make her an main support while bad/ pocket mercy players only count as flex supports.
Main/flex and main/off are virtually the same thing. The only difference I would say is that one system recognizes how vulnerable Zenyatta is.
Main support/Off healer:
- Lucio
- Brigitte
- Mercy
Flex support/Main healer:
- Ana
- Baptiste
- Moira
And Zenyatta is still run with flex supports despite being one.
1 Like
You were talking to an OWL fan. Just ignore their classifications as everyone, including them, knows what you are talking about when you use the standard terminology.
one thing for sure is that i consider zen an off-support and only him. the other supports are capable of outputting tons of healing
While I appreciate the effort you have put into your response, respectfully you are incorrect.
Referencing early OW for what these terms mean means nothing in the game’s current state.
Mercy was at one point in time a viable main support for an entire team and is now nothing more than a pocket for a singular DPS hero. There’s a multitude of reasons why, but the primary reason lies in the addition of new tanks and new supports.
“Flex support” is the idea of a support hero who is interchangeable within a team composition- not fundamental to the comp itself.
I’ve explained this multiple times in the thread, but here we go again:
For example sake (as this is the clearest most consensual example to build from) one does not play a Monkey Comp without Ana. Ana is the center piece of the supports, as Monkey is the center piece of the Tanks.
If you’re playing a Monkey comp and have Ana (as 9/10 you will), then the other support has the freedom to “flex” to various complimentary support heroes to the comp- ie Brig, Mercy, or Lucio. However your Ana is fully locked into Ana until unless your Monkey decides to switch. If your Ana decides mid-match she is swapping to Moira, the comp fundamentally breaks. Even worse would be her deciding to switch to an off-support such as Lucio or Mercy.
Because there is so much that the class entails, what is most important in defining the differences within the class is examining what fundamentally makes or breaks a comp.
Bap, Ana, and Moira are all essentially “non-negotiable” supports. One of them must exist, and once chosen, they will dictate the playable tanks within the comp. Lucio, Mercy, Zen and Brig are all fairly interchangeable within team compositions. This allows for players who are on them to “flex” amongst these heroes throughout the course of a match without fundamentally breaking the team composition.
This is truly the most accurate and consistent way to define “main supports” vs “off-supports/flex supports”.
While your main support might swap from Ana to Bap, it will fundamentally change the available playable tanks and the playstyle of your team. This influence and control in addition to their powerful stats is what defines them as Main Supports.
I hope this clears things up. OW is not the game it was when it was released nor are it’s heroes.
I literally said the same
Even after Goats and Baps release you still had situations where teams played Mercy as solo heal
You dont get my point. If you play Monkey+4 dps Mercy and Lucio will fit way better than Ana can do because Ana cant funktion on her own. Being a Mainsupport doesnt mean being unreplaceable, it means that you can work on your own
This is just plain wrong, we had countless of Metas wizhout any of these. So many Zen/Mercy, Zen/Brig and before role lock OrisaHog3dps+Mercy and Goats you ignore here
No, this is just called synergy and isnt even true.
Lucio for example: You cant play Rein without Lucio for example, while Ana works with nearly every Tank.
If I change from Ana to Bap the thing that changes is that Winston comps will be harder to play, while Orisa comps will be easier. Of I switch from Lucio to Mercy Rein comps will be useless and I need to play something more spammy
This is just synergy and this happens with both Mainsupports and flexsupports
So in short:
Mainsupport doesnt mean being unreplaceable, it means that you dont need teamsupport to funktion.
You also failed to exaplain why Zen is in the same category with Mercy
Good luck playing Spammy Doubleshield with Lucio, or Brawl with Mercy
I don’t understand why people try to put supports into categories. Choose by need and ability rather than label. Flow charts only get you so far.
The categorisation exists to make synergy easier. It started in pro play so 2 supports will always play the one the other player cant
Since from the real categorisation of Main and Flexsupport (Mercy,Brig,Lucio Main, the rest flex) there is only a single not very niche support combo (Bap/Zen) used where this synergy gets broken
If a Mainsupport player gets matched with a Flexsupport player they will be able to play nearly every viable comp with their comfort Hereos
If you have 1 support playing Lucio, Ana, Bap and the other Support playing Moira, Mercy, Brig, Zen through, your team will steuggle with Bap+Lucio comps because the 2nd support needs to play a Hero they are not comfortable with, same with Brig+Zen
Thats why you have these 2 categorys, so you can put 2 support players together in organized play and will be able to play every single viable comp with comfort hereos
.
Its also may be helpfull for balancing. Mainsupport competr with other Mainsupports and Flex supports competr with other flexsupports, so if you Buff Lucio you will likely never see Mercy or Brig again because Lucio takes the role of them away, while you will still see flexsupports getting played