He’s only dominating because the other two shield tanks are pretty bad.
3 Likes
What of Winston and Wrecking Ball, though?
I would say he’d dominating because he’s a bit too good, Sigma and Orisa are hilariously bad, and Winston is a bit bad as well. So it’s some from both sides, really.
Winston and Wrecking Ball are not shield tanks.
Yeah, i know what you mean. I am increasingly becoming a Hammond “main” myself and would have loved to see him in a “meta” just for the thrill of seeing him played more in OWL and tournaments.
However, things are the way they are at the moment, especially on Ladder Play.
I can understand your frustration and that is the reason why you have created this discussion but well, to me, it is definitely less of Reinhardt being “oppressive” than the other main tanks were utterly gutted.
I do think Winston could still use a couple little buffs (i.e. change his health from 400/100 to 300/200), and I dislike how power is distributed on DVa (they’ve taken the route of loading a lot of power into her mobility, at the cost of power in DM and her damage), but I agree on Tracer and Zenyatta.
2 Likes
Winston is not a shield tank? I mean, he kind of is.
But also dive would be viable if Reinhardt wasn’t too strong and Winston wasn’t too weak.
Sigma is quite literally the hardest tank to learn and got trashed for the effort.
The longer duration on his shield was definitely an adjustment in the correct direction and i agree, if he is gonna be a face tanking like Hammond, he needs some kind of buff to either his HP or reduce the CD on his bubble shield or just flat out increase his dps.
He’s technically a shield tank but should never be used as your main shield tank role.
Just like Sombra is technically a hitscan but should never be used for a main hitscan role.
Winston does not count as a shield tank despite having a shield. Just like Sombra does not count as a hitscan.
The thing is if Mercy had 55hps or 60 hps back, his and D.va’s survivability go up significantly as well as the general ability of any team to play more spread out.
So I think that we would need to start with Mercy and Genji buffs. And then go from there. We don’t want a Rein situation where they get overtuned just because other heroes around them aren’t there to support them being meta.
Right now Winston feels like he is pretty good on maps that favor him. Which is a sign he could be even better if the meta did.
I think a buff to his health normally like I described, and a buff to his health in Primal are all that are really necessary (i.e. from 900/100 to 900/300). His damage is low but pretty good considering it’s an AOE cleave, and while his Jump doesn’t do a lot of damage, it’s great mobility.
Sadly, I don’t think 55 HPS would change much for Mercy, and because of recent nerfs to other supports, 60 HPS might be over-the-top (because of interactions with damage breakpoints).
Also, even with Mercy at his heel, Winston’s going to have a hard time dealing with Mei and Reaper, who have been considerably buffed since Dive. Same for DVa, though I don’t think DVa’s issue is being too weak so much as her strength comes from an unhealthy internal balance within her kit.
I do agree that Winston is mostly fine, which is why I don’t think any buff to him should be very large
1 Like
Well, regardless, I think if it was just Sigma/Orisa being bad you’d see a resurgence of dive, but that hasn’t happened. Either Rein is too good, or all four of the other main tanks are bad. And I think the general popularity of double main tank suggests that the main tanks are too good if anything.
Honestly Sigma and Orisa did get nerfed to the ground. Orisa is now considered a worse Rein and Sigma the worst tank in the game.
Reaper, Hanzo, Mei, and McCree are all quite punishing to Winston, and they’re all fairly viable whereas during Dive and Moth Dive none of them were especially good. In a neutral matchup, Winston’s mostly okay, but he’s got a lot of strong counters who shut him down pretty easily
Also Mei pretty much singlehandedly shuts down Hammond
Winston doesn’t have much trouble with Mei, imo. The dive heroes have a fairly easy time ignoring her wall. Reaper maybe but then you would just swap in Brigitte.
I really think the primary thing holding dive back is that it lacks a main healer that doesn’t empower something else harder.
Like Ana can be okay in dive but she’s phenomenonal with Reinhardt. So why on Earth if you’re running Ana would you be running dive unless something is off with balance?
Take away steadfast, there is no reason he should have that. I know he’s a melee ranged character but you don’t see Reaper or Hog getting steadfast, so why on earth should he?
Also I want to boop him again, he just plain doesn’t move and is impossible to peel off of my team.
You mean Hammond is bit too good? Because that appears to be somewhat of a forum thing at the moment.
The short answer, after OTP playing him in QP for almost 20 hours in the past month to the tune of 95 wins, is “No”.
If you go to the dedicated WB reddit on OW university, the (true) Ball mains are kinda sad over the nerf to his piledriver cc. So his effectiveness has been reduced.
Only the really good and above average Ball mains are unaffected by this and that is not many.
Plus, the myth about him having 500 hp + 100 armour + 700 shield = 1300 hp is just a myth. That occurs rarely and even #1 Ball mains like Harbleu and Yeatle do not get that all the time. Plus, in order to get that 1300, Ball has to right in the middle of the Red Team which he would get FlashFTH-ed, Frozen, Hacked, DFisted, Slept and then focused on. If Rein’s current or even 2000hp Shield gets decimated under focus fire in 2-3 seconds, what more that 1300 hp (usually less) Hammond?
The ones which you see rolling around in your games probably may look good because they have been practising and working on their game with Hammond for a very long time. Otherwise, Hammond is just not very good and certainly not as suitable as Rein which Puffy Pony had said it best:
While Hammond can be played in all situations and i had been trying in my QP sessions, he is just not as optimal as Reinhardt and can be really difficult to get value out of.
P.S. By the way, Mitrovarr, i have always found it to be useful to (test) play characters after their adjustements in QPC because that is the best way to figure out if they have been become “OP” because in QPC, well, one does not have the benefit of balanced team compositions in 2/2/2, despite of character kit synergy.
You can try playing Rein in a few QPC games and you will find that he definitely is not OP.
Yes i totally agree.
Rein thrives at chokes and corners. He does not like to be poked from range and he darned sure does not like to be flanked by a solid subset of the DPS roster. In almost any situation, you should be finding these locations to set up at. On attack, push him forward to the next choke / corner and let someone else move the payload. On defense, retreat back to the last choke / corner, even at the cost of giving the enemy some payload movement. There are exceptions to this of course.
You need to let the cover do at least some (50%?) of the job of protecting yourself and the team. In these situations it is pretty easy to have your barrier do the other half of the job. Also people coming around corners or through chokes are the most ideal targets for his hammer swings.
Also, be sure you are not just holding the barrier up until it fails. It’s a resource that needs to be managed. It’s not there to block spam damage that your team can easily dodge / outheal, it’s there to block burst damage and abilities that your team can’t easily dodge / outheal.
Last, I can’t help but toss in this key piece of advice anytime I’m trying to help someone with Reinhardt. Charge is a positioning tool, not a damage tool. Obviously if you can get some damage (or a kill 
) done with it while re positioning, that’s fantastic, but never charge to a position that you don’t want to be in. Again, there are exceptions to every rule.
GLHF! Rein is a blast to play, and fun to figure out how to maximize.
1 Like
Actually I meant Reinhardt. Sorry. I think Wrecking Ball was about right pre-nerf, and post-nerf I don’t know, but I have absolutely zero idea why they nerfed him.
1 Like