Role queue can't come soon enough

General Discussion
62

Well your just playing the wrong game if thats how you feel. Hero swapping “is overwatch” all the best players usually play 2-3 different heroes per match, because different parts of the map are better for others or to counter pick.

In a game where you cant customize the hero skills themselves like say paladins where they have powerup cards or something like that to change THAT Hero’s playstyle in-game hero swapping is a must.

We have no way to make the heroes themselves “dynamic” and change how say genji plays in game from how some other Genji player may customize him. They are always in a “static” state in Overwatch, your genji will always be the same exact genji I can use myself.

So what happens when genji gets hard countered by say winston or brig. Well in the current overwatch that genji can and should switch to a new hero since they provide little value now. If your locked in that hero your just screwed at that point. Other games like League of legends, SMITE, and even Call of Duty have ways to modify one item for multiple players or multiples items to modify one player in a game.

Examples:
SMITE has item shops. Your Artemis and My Artemis will not be the same in game. We may have the same abilities but our items change theirs power/cooldowns/etc. directly changing how we impact that particular game. There no hero swapping becuase you swap out items instead.

Call of Duty
Your AK-74 and my AK-74 are not gonna be the same in game. There are different gun mods you attach before a match starts and even then you have multiple loadouts to swap to. If you took a sniper rifle in an urban map cause theres a few spot you can farm kill but later on your getting ran over but a guy with a shotgun who knows your spots. You need to change guns and tactics.

Overwatch
There is no way to modify your guns and skills. We all use the same heroes. How they change in game is when we use them on what maps. If the you want to play winston but the enemy has bastion. You will never contribute to your team, winston will be shutdown by bastion everytime. UNLESS, his team hard counters the bastion to the point bastion has to switch off, thought winston wont be contributing to that, he’ll be trying to be useful anywhere the bastion is not cause he’s a fuzzy tank configuration farm.

Back to role queue and hero swapping. No one has a detailed model for how to implement it in overwatch game mechanics. They cant just lock it in as 2/2/2 there are viable 3 tank 3 support 3 dps comps people like to play. Me personally though i hate it being used on me double sniper works great. Keep a main tank with a burst dps at choke and 2 supports you can lock down open space hard Like Eichenwald or Volskya.

Overwatch was made for hero swapping role queue is alot trickier to implement once you start drawing plans on paper.

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63

Thats not true, not really. I mean all things being equal? Maybe, but I dont think its auto loss territory.

64

Try playing them.

I used to play Orisa until I just got disgusted at how even a mediocre Rein could just walk all over me.

65

I do play them, when my comp wont support Rein. TBH though I’m not a big fan of Orisa outside of very specific points.

66

This is why I think a role queue would do well, because I agree that this is game is full of selfish players, myself included. When I log on, I usually don’t have a big span of time I can play, and honestly I really just want to play the heroes I enjoy most. It’d be nice to queue up as a solo player into the Support role so that I know every game I’ll get to play a hero I want to play, and more importantly that all my teammates are in roles they want to play.

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67

I understand that and have a rotation of heroes myself. I just believe that a more standard mechanic would have heavily benefited this game long-term. I do not even support role queue; however, the entire balance of the game has to be uprooted for them to even attempt it.

68

Really the main solution i’ve felt for year is that theres need to be more then one ranked mode. Just about every game has it i think even starcraft has rank 2vs2 and rank 3 vs 3. Granted they are not as popular as the solo ranked games but it keeps a majority of the players happy in the long run.

If they had a “Locked” Ranked mode along with the main mode it would solve alot of problems. 1 hero 1 team hero swaps only between maps. Or even a staight “Ranked 2/2/2” along the current ranked.

69

That just amplifies the queue time issue. Not a lot of people will play the role queue mode relative to the original. I assume a lot of tanks and supports go to role queue which helps mitigate DPS queue times; however, the quality of games would substantially drop and encourage people to flood role queue which just leaves us at square one. At least in theory. I am not really sure how it might hypothetically play out alternatively. But I just feel it makes it more of a mess.

70

This automatically makes me think of playing card games such as MTG or HS where you have “Standard” (2/2/2) and “Wild” (everything else) ladders. I like it, but the resulting segregation of comp-players might make the increase in queue times even longer.

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71

I meant it that apex did it right, you don’t need tank and heals to win.

Even with OW, you don’t need tanks or heals if you work as a team and use what is in the map.

Forced role que will not make the game better, it will make it more toxic because people will change from what they know to what they don’t, people will go nuts because there will be people playing tanks that never do, people will play heals etc that they never do.

But hey, this community is all about forced everything.

72

Then why was goats an issue?

That is the beauty of a role queue… If you dont want to play tank/heals dont queue for those roles. Problem solved.

Nothing is forced in this community. If that were true one tricks would exist, no one would be set to private profile, and everyone would use lfg. But please do tell me about what is forced.

73

No tank and no support is all this playerbase deserves nowadays

74

I mean, you are wrong, objectively, about several things here.

You do need Tanks/Heals. No team of equal skill that is 6 dps, will beat a balanced comp, unless you are in the sub-average ranks where literally anything can work.

This is intended as a point of balance.

2-2-2 would dramatically improve the game, as people could specialize all they like, blizz could actually balance hero’s within a framework of limitations, and compositions would naturally flow and evolve as counter picks would actually mean something again.

Your comments about people playing roles they dont normally is nonsensical, because 2-2-2 would come with a role queue, instantly improving the match maker, match balance, and the ladder experience literally over night.

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75

role que will not make it balanced, in wow when it was bought in, a dps player on average was forced to wait up to 45 mins minimum for a run. If more people play said role, que times will on average be higher then what they are now.
Yes, I can wait that 45 mins or more to play dps, in the mean time what do I do, at least in wow you have ample things to occupy your time until your que time is up.
So if the que times are on average to what wow is, that means, people will on average change to fill the role required, whether they can play those heros of not. If this is the case, then the quality of gameplay will go down and create an even more toxic environment.

As to what is balanced, we have seen that 5/1 dps combo does work, I have played games with 6 dps and have won, 1/3/2 combos, the combination is anything you want and if it works people are happy, we have seen dive meta, 2/2/2 meta, now its goats. there will always be a meta that the pros will use and people will try and play. Its part and parcel of this game.

A meta is not balanced, any combination can win matches, its the players themselves and how they work with each other that counts. When they introduced LFG people were over the moon about it, then when it didn’t work out, people go toxic.

most of the player base are in this category, who do we balance for, the top end the lower end or the middle. That is the problem with sr ranking, who is the game going to be balance for. that is why I am against this ranking system, as you cannot balance for one rank and over look the other ranks and vice versa.

As I said, people are either going to agree or not, if its bought in, then those of us that don’t will just have to put up with it and play if we decide to stay and see how it evolves. If it isn’t, then we will have more threads, more arguments, etc until it is… people are not going to be happy either way it goes.

76

WoW, if you don’t know then I don’t need to answer. Ask the pros I suppose, everything they do people want to use in the game.

the problem is not solved, this will create longer que times for players as there will be less tank/heals, it happened in WOW and I cant see it not happening in OW. Give incentives for those roles like they had to do in WoW and it might change peoples mind to play said roles.

As to this, if you cannot see it, then I suppose it doesn’t exist. But I would suggest you look at what is on the forums and what the pro’s want then go from there.

77

When I talk about balance, I’m not talking queue times. I could not care less if DPS have longer queue times. They should learn other roles, or simply wait.

Because LFG is still too much effort when it should be automatic. Role Queues, and an enforced 2-2-2 would provide Blizzard a framework to actually balance the game. If ‘any combination can win’ you honestly think OWL would have devolved to nearly nothing but GOATS when every pro hates it? Come on now.

You balance for those who can make the intelligent choices around team comps, and have the play skill to execute. You do not balance for anyone lower than GM+ because how can you possibly balance around people who fail to execute the game?

If you do not balance for the top end, you literally break the game, because if you balance for the low end, what happens when people (A) learn to play and (B) learn to aim?

Its nonsensical, the game breaks down.

2-2-2 with Role Queue, is the only reasonable path forward. Anything else is stagnation, and consistent decline in game experience.

78

But you said comps weren’t needed just people playing as a team. If that was true goats shouldn’t be a thing. So your now saying comp is important?

Jeff has already the devs know this to be an issue and has stated that they would need to adjust mm to account for this. So you dont want to try something simply because of a problem the devs know will happen and said they need to adjust for?..

Please inform me. I gave examples you are just giving vague statements. Please give some examples where you are forced to do anything.

79

As I said, if at the time they bring in role que with a set 2/2/2, then I either play it that way, or I move on and leave OW.

People have skills in lower elos. pls don’t put all in lower elos as having no skills, I recorded 2 seasons ago what I gained and lost in sr, I won more games then I lost but I lost more sr then I gained. Sr needs to be set at a cap, not all over the place. if I heal I don’t game as much as a dps etc…

I understand why people want it, I am not one of those people coming from WoW and seeing what its like there. If it can be done differently, then go hard. But people are not going to wait around if the que times are huge. they will look for other games to play or just give up on comp altogether. then the player base will be less so the elos will readjust to what is left in the player base.

OWL is its own game. its not what the normal player base plays. Its what the pros use as there is a monetary incentive at the end to win. so they will do whatever it takes to win, if that’s goats, then that’s what it is. We as the normal player base have no such incentives. there is nothing to even try for higher elos, apart from maybe bragging rights and a few extra weap points. now if we had a hard reset and people had to start from bottom, then those said bragging rights would mean something, but we don’t, we have placements that mean nothing as you end up almost where you left off last season.

80

I had an idea that would help with this called the “Role exchange”.

Basically, every time you played flex (in which case you just get whatever role the system needs right now) you get a token.
If you queue something else, you can use that token to jump the line in front of everyone else without tokens.
So if you flex tank, you might get to play DPS a lot sooner.
Right now I can play tank all day but there will still not be tanks when I want to play something else.

81

I believe guilds would be a better system, people will feel part of something, you can create role ques within the guilds, other comps modes need to be introduced that are permanent not just once in awhile, (I like CTF and FFA comp).

Your system could work, anything could work, but how to implement those systems when we only have one comp mode. I think people are getting over the same comp mode.

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