The simplest solution to counterwatch

General Discussion
1

At the start of the match both tank players pick one hero

The 2 chosen tanks (or 1 if you picked the same tank) are the only ones that are allowed to be played for the rest of the match, all others are disabled

So if you picked rein and they picked orisa, you can avoid being trampled on by swapping to orisa and having a fair mirror match, but you can’t swap to say zarya to melt down the orisa.

There can’t be any more leeway than this. Since as long as there are at least 3 tanks you are allowed to swap between, there is a high likely for one of the infinite swapping cycles that make tank unplayable to be present (e.g. D.va → zarya → rein → d.va → …).

Dps and support counterswapping would still cause some problems, but isn’t nearly as problematic, so I don’t think this system would need to be implemented for those roles.

Perhaps you could get an opportunity to swap inbetween rounds in round based modes, but that could also lead to some annoying mindgames, so I’m not sure if it’d be for the better

And for the clowns who defend counterspamming on the basis of it requiring “skill”, you can’t complain about this solution, because it would be the highest skill version of tank ever. There is around a 50% chance (slightly lower because of even matchups) that the enemy picks a tank which wins in a matchup against yours, in which case you have to be as skilled at that arbitrary tank as the person who willingly chose to play it to have a higher chance of winning

Now there are better solutions to counterwatch, this is just, as the title says, the simplest one. A system where you can ban the hardcounters before they’re even picked could work, but there’d be a lot of kinks to figure out with that one. Of course the ultimate solution would be to just balance the game to the bare minimum extent that there are no forced to swap tank matchups anymore, but considering we’re nearly a year and a half into Overwatch 2 and they haven’t even made one balance change that attempted to do this for any of the problematic matchups, that does not seem likely

1 Like
2

I’d subscribe to this. I don’t want to swap anyways. Such a crutch move.

3

Make it so swapping tank, gives Ult charge to the enemy team Tank

4

I think the problem people (me included) have with counterswapping is that your choices on what you get to play are being heavily limited. I think this system would limit you even further : /

Imagine you are a roadhog player and they go orisa. Now your options are either still playing hog and not having any fun, locking a different tank in even though you wanted to play hog (in case you can see what they lock in before the game starts) or having to play the orisa mirror which would be unfavorable since you might not be an orisa player but they are. Especially with high skill charas like doom or ball it would be difficult to get anywhere close to the value a doom/ball main would get in a mirror so you would feel pressured to start learning every tank even more than you are now

Additionally it would result in a lot of pressure on the tanks picking the meta tank and the dps and supps adjusting their comps to counter the 2 (or even 1) tank options and you will now be even more dependent on if your team and the enemy team counterswaps. Playing a zarya mirror with a lucio/mercy/torb/genji will not be fair if the enemy team has weaver/kiri/pharah/bastion

idk i personally think it’s a 5v5 issue but it doesn’t seem like they want to go back to 6v6. I think they will probably go down the route of hero bans and making tanks generalists which i’m not a fan of but will atleast help with getting hard countered as easily

5

Simplest solution:
play a different game.
OW has been about counter swapping since day 1 in 2016.

1 Like
6

Yeah, because this game doesn’t already have an issue with trolls/throwers. Might as well give them more tools.

7

Its never been this bad tho, thats the point

8

Perhaps, but you start with a mechanism, then work from there.

9

and that is a Blizz balancing issue they don’t care enough about to fix.
In other words, the only way to fix this problem is if they start actually balancing it.
Which we all know isn’t happening because they care more about selling skins than their players.

10

Sad mindset. Adapt, and overcome.

11

do i know what tank the enemy picks?
can i beg my team to counter pick so The enemy tank is more likely to swap to my tank pick?

can the enemy dps still counter pick me after the match has started?

just assuming the scenario that i pick ball enemy picks hog.
i don’t play hog enemy tank doesn’t play ball.
is it now dps and support counter swap watch?

12

tanking already feels extremely miserable. Adding more restriction isn’t going to make it any better.

13

Overwatch is what “Counterwatch” has been from since day one. Who woke up one morning and started this weak-minded mentality of needing to have counter-swapping stopped?

You can swap off to something else to “counter” what the other team swapped to. Complaints to change the game from its day one identity are so lame. And I say this as a day one tank man who still enjoys tanking to this day. Is it because I main multiple tanks? Maybe. Either way, I don’t have a quitter mentality and I know how to adapt.

14

That won’t be anywhere near enough. It doesn’t matter if you get some ult when you’re going to lose the next 3 fights from being hard countered.

15

Well yeah…

The real answer is to nerf Antinade and tone down the BarrierBreak on Orisa/Mauga.

Also nerf Hack on Tanks