Why can't people counter Hog?

While nade is great and all, it’s not a guarantee that he’s going to die. You need both an Ana that can/does land the nade on Roadhog, and then someone to follow up with 600 damage- and that’s assuming he doesn’t get shielded or bubbled or move behind cover.

The problem is that he’s pretty hard to burst down for anyone, and so much of this game right now is about BOOM you’re dead mechanics. Because he can survive those when even characters like Reinhardt struggle to do so, he’s got a distinct advantage.

I mean, Roadhog has 600 HP, plus his take a breather right? Widow does 300 damage scoped in, fully charged, as a headshot. The most challenging shot in the game. So it takes TWO headshots to take Roadhog down, assuming he doesn’t use his breather. Compare that to Reinhardt who you can get in one headshot and a bodyshot - the difference is that Rein has a (now very weak) shield, but that’s something that’s not guaranteed to be up, meaning that Roadhog just has something that Rein doesn’t. Roadhog gets that value without holding up a shield, it’s just there, always.

Roadhog has such an intense suvivability problem that if you play him conservatively or if he’s getting pocketed by friends he’s really strong. You can’t say the same for the other tanks, which to me says that there’s a balance problem.

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Hanzo, ana, bastion (in some ocasions), junk, ashe and widow, others are more harder, like mei, sombra and reaper.
By example: Reaper dodging his hook can do fine too if roadhog won’t land at 70% of his pellets on reaper’s head.
Why? Because reaper can deal 560 damage(if headshots 100% of his pellets on roadhog) in a 1 second window. Roadhog hook takes 0.3sec + travel time, his fire takes 0.85 sec. If he tries heal himself(0.5sec) he probabilly gonna die.

Reaper can use surprise(go after he launches his hook can be the wise choice or just taunt him to use the hook) and have a smaller hitbox, so yeah. If roadhog loses his hook and reaper can hit close range, if roadhog won’t land at least 70%-75% of his pellets on reaper’s head Roadhog will probabilly will die to reaper. Reaper for sure needs be skilled to hit more than 70%-75% of his pellets in those 3 shots in roadhog’s head. Unlike roadhog who needs pellets in reaper’s head(which is smaller but in one shot) .

If roadhog uses his take the breather before fires, reaper can blow 4 shots on him (up 280 per sec up to 560 on hs per sec). Roadhog negates half so would be 4 shots with a sum of up to 560 damage. Roadhog heals around 300(taking half damage in the first shot, then starts the healing taking 2 shots, then take another shot after the healing). So his current life would be at max 480-530(530 only considering bodyshots) , his shot would be slower than reaper’s shot so he will receive another blow of up to 280. If roadhog won’t land 70-75% of his pellets on reaper’s head he probabilly will die(because reaper can land 3 shots faster than roadhog land 2 shots, if one of them it’s a headshot he will kill roadhog -> 140+140+280=560). And to be fair in 7 shots won’t land a single headshot(even with some of his pellets in each hit) on roadhog it’s almost impossible at point blank.

Sure roadhog only needs 1 shot landing at least 70-75% of his pellets in reaper’s head, but it’s one shot opportunity. Against 7 shots opportunity to land at least one decisive headshot. Before he would make 2 shots before reaper dealt 3 shots, but right now he can’t.
Reaper 0.5 sec per shot, 2 per sec (1.5 in 3 shots)
Roadhog was 0.7 sec per shot (1.4 in 2 shots), now 0.85 sec per shot(1.7 in 2 shots)

I know it’s a team play this scenario it’s not that open or free from interference for both, but him it’s not that powerful than appears, these changes made him more deadly if used in the hands of experienced players also with some degree of luckm but also made him even more slower. Right now, reaper seems more viable than before to beat him. Just surprise him avoiding his hook and make most of his pellets won’t land in your head, you can use after the hook your form wraith if you got right time to avoid his shot and then shot him in a brief split second even taking partial damage if you need to. Or just use the wraith form to avoid his hook in the first place and manage to deal with his hit

Are you saying landing nade on Roadhog is difficult when he has such massive hitbox and no mobility

Nope, one of the easiest to burst down. It just that people aren’t used to countering him because they’re used to shields too much. Any coordinated team can easily shut him down.

Rein has a barrier, means he can save himself if he’s low, and instantly gets pocketed by his team, making him nearly impossible to kill. He can block sleep dart, anti nade, unlike hog.

Which can easily be ruined by a coordinated team having proper use of CC. There’s a reason why flanking Reins became too common nowadays. Flanking for team shatter almost guaranteed a team kill. Rein also gets pocketed by his team (through Ana, Zarya, Bap etc). This pretty much tells why he was the most picked tank until hog was buffed. Hog simply counters his flank strategies, which is why people hate playing Rein against him.

The bionade stops healing, but not the damage reduction. So even if he gets anti’d at 300 HP you have to cut through 600 effective HP if he TaBs to kill that Hog… before he gets into cover, bubbled, shielded, etc.

Their is never any reason to NOT TaB, even if you know the enemy can stun it… you just forced their cool-down too.

People making it so hard. I play Zen and discord him while he’s being attacked.

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tell that to owl teams getting 3-0d by Washington justice

just go Mei 4head

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He is right about hogs current state being good for sombra though. I farmed EMP in a a game the other day, before anyone else on my team had even got to 40% ult charge.
It just takes coordination to take him down.

Because he literally makes no noise, his footsteps do not exist.

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Exactly. Sure, nade is great against Roadhog, but it’s far from an instant-win button. You need competent teammates that have an opportunity to follow up on that damage - I’ve seen Roadhogs playing with Zarya’s conservatively and they know to NEVER overextend or put themselves in a position where they can’t just instantly duck away for cover.

It’s sort of the Mei problem, but MORE, because Mei only has 250 hp and she’s not that lethal unless she’s really good at landing those wonky icicles. Compare her lethality to roadhog and it’s no contest, Roadhog wins out easily. Plus he has 600 HP to start off with. He’s the stall champion of the world atm with even one competent teammate making sure that whenever he is really focused down he gets bubbled or healed. And that’s just like, a lot to contend with in a game where teamwork is a rarity.

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The biggest problem with his flanking is the fact that 50% plus can’t hear him coming. Biggest bug in OW right now is footsteps from behind and the lack of them for many players.

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that is a good point, you think they would have fixed that already tbh

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Why go Mei or Sombra when you can go Ana? She is the best support and completely shuts down hog.

I think they don’t want to. They have a “fix” for it according to a ticket earlier this year, but it never made it’s way into the patch that it was supposed to be in.

but why wouldnt they want to fix a bug? i mean i am not doubting you but seems very odd, but considering some of the poor decisions made by blizzard over the years i can see this being a thing

He is one of those heroes where you need your own Roadhog to balance it out. He’s not that hard really to shutdown, but it takes more effort to shut him down than to just run your own Roadhog.

All of Hog’s hard counters (excluding Ana) are HARD shut-down by the power of snipers. Mei, Sombra, Brigitte. All of them useless in current meta.

This also being said, people like to forget that a good Hog doesn’t exist alone. The flanking Hog isn’t OP. Once you noticed it and watch for it? It’s useless. Hog being able to pluck a player from your front-line from 22 metres and basically broadcast to your team to follow up on that 210 damage hook combo (accounting for the EXP nerf)

That, is why he is powerful. Not to mention shield tanks are unreasonable to play, giving even more space for this character that was already power-crept to hell, to rule even harder. Point being, EVERYTHING falls into Hog’s favour right now.

I think that they are afraid that flanking heroes will be at a disadvantage further especially against players that use headsets. If they aren’t trying to avoid fixing it, then the only other reason is that they don’t know how. If that’s the case then wow, that’s bad development. Just so you know I’m not crazy, here’s the bug ticket below where they had the fix.

Hog is easy to kill. Keep your distance and bait hook when you know he has it. Just don’t let him hook you. Hog dominates cqc. You can make him useless by just staying at long range. Widow, Hanzo and Pharah are good examples of heroes Hog struggles to beat because of their ranged capabilities

Well the point is kind of moot now, the experimental changes are likely to hit live and Road will probably not be meta anymore.

:man_shrugging:

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Mei’s ammo got nerfed, so it’s harder for her to freeze someone.

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