Yesterday, I had a game on Kings Row. I played DPS which is my least played role. We won. The enemy team blamed their tank in team chat. But honestly, their tank did fine. I am a tank main and I watched what they did. I didn’t think the enemy tank in that game was doing anything wrong exactly. That doesn’t mean they made no mistakes, but they didn’t do anything particularly horrible or obviously wrong from my perspective.
Why did they get the blame even though they weren’t playing poorly? It seems to happen all the time. Sometimes the enemy team just does well. Sometimes, it isn’t really anyone’s fault specifically.
One time in Esperanza, I was playing Sigma and enemy tank was OW1 skin Rein, and like I think the tank was a new player, we pushed the bot from start to finish without any obstacle, and almost at the end of the match, someone says “tank canyon” I didn’t know what “tank canyon” meant, then I searched and it was basically “tank diff”, Idk, it was funny to me.
Maybe people blame the tank more cuz he’s basically the “team leader”, you start fights, and there’s now only 1 tank.
This may sound unfair but honestly, I do think that up to diamond most games are “tank diff”.
Reason: winning matches doesn’t really revolve around elims as much as people think - but point/payload management.
So even if you’re on a better team by all means - if your tank doesn’t properly contest the point/stop the payload - and the other does, you’re probably not gonna win.
Most tank up to diamond play like they’re plying dps and never focus on the objective and their actual job. You can have perfect mechanical skills but you’d be surprised how easy it is to (accidentally) throw on tank.
I remember one game where we had numbers advantage every single fight but our Zarya just held S to survive, moving into the open instead of playing on payload - and the enemy, even with less players every fight, just pushed the payload for free.
You are not entirely wrong, I am probably one of those tanks that does this when I have absolutely no faith in my team. That being said, there are “contest” characters in DPS and support. It is not a tank diff even if it would be more logical for me to contest. It would also be more logical for DPS to off angle and for my supports to heal me. They did not do that, they do not get to cry tank diff. They can get on Mei or Lucio and do something useful. That will buy me time to kill them my damn self and heal my own booty. Team diff if they refuse, uwu.
i have voice and chat off so yea i can never say anything but i always believe that it wasnt my fault. even when i know it is my fault its THEIR fault for not carrying me
Yeah but they lose out on impact when playing payload. A Mei is not going to solo hold the payload without a tank, same with Lucio/Brig - they are all gonna die with a tank derping behind them.
That is also a problem, when dps force all the damage your way due to being positioned on lowground, in the open. But still - a tank has survivability no dps or supp has.
My point is that it’s easier ton win a game with badly positioned dps than it is with a badly positioned tank
Honestly, this is no different that any role diff.
I got called tank diff a while ago when I was getting no heals and getting melted. When I replied, the Mercy who was permanently glued to a soldier (that was not getting any kills) said it wasn’t her job to “pocket” the tank. Yet she was pocketing a soldier not getting any picks the whole match when he had literal free reign as I was getting focus fired by 5 people. The other healer was a dps moira trying to make up for the lack of dps, so obviously no sustain there either.
As also a support main, it’s your job to heal who NEEDS it most. It’s called prioritizing. If your dps is playing with their feet, you either dmg boost the other dps or if the tank is getting focused, you help sustain the tank.
I find in my experience most tank diff comments come from supports who like to focus on dps, then when the tank (or even dps) gets melted blame them for dying too quickly or not getting picks because we have to go for cover every millisecond due to lack of sustain.
I’ll say this, as a tank you know when you have good healers and it’s obvious very quickly. It’s also very much appreciated and makes the role actually enjoyable.
You’d be surprised how many plat and below tanks think contesting aint their problem. The worst part is when they lose a fight and instead of dying on payload/objective they run away, use up all surival balities just to make sure they die as slow as possible (but not on the objective) in order to stagger their team further.
I just feel like good positioning and “when and where to die” is tanks biggest value. The best dps isn’t going to have space to do anything if the tank doesn’t enable him with his.
After the tank it’s support diff imho, and above diamond it’s purely support diff. Dps is the least impactful role I’d say
Realistically it just boils down to tank mistakes being easier to see. If they tank is in a bad spot they die fast and its hard for your team to take and hold space. If a support uses all their cooldowns too early and throws a fight they can still heal you as you die but its harder to notice its their fault. everyone can kill people so dps dont get blammed unless their kd is just real bad
If Supports screw up, Tanks don’t perform. If Tanks die because of that, DPS can’t perform. So both of the roles simply blame the Tank and call it a day.
What you “see” and what you “know” are fundementally two different things on a very different spectrum.
Its usually the tank that is front of the tean and therefore when things start to go south it starts with that tanks death, mistakes, and so on, which is viewed by the entire team of that tank. Whereas the backline is heavily overlooked, and since their mistakes go unnoticed, it becomes unclear of who made what or who should have done something besides “the tank died that why we lost said fight”.
Which is not always the main reason why a teamfight turned out so bad, its just what everyone “sees first”. Therefore players are quick to judge that specific witnessed event rather than honing in on the actual issues.
Maybe the supports used their utility wrong or didn’t use it all? Maybe the dps focused the wrong target or weren’t quick enough to delete the main threat?
Either way its inexperienced players blaming something else, rather than seeking their own personal improvement.
I had one game (in OW1) where our Junkrat cried for a Reinhardt and then when I played Reinhardt he cried because I wasn’t saying anything in chat and because I was the MT I supposedly “have to lead the team and tell everyone what to do”.
It’s the easiest role to blame. When the team does bad, the tank will look the worst.
Supports pocketing their already topped off DPS duo buddy while the tank is taking a lot of damage?
Tanks fault.
DPS being out skilled entirely and getting killed by the enemy DPS? Well if they’d had a better tank they’d have lived and would’ve been able to kill the enemy. Tanks fault.
I always blame myself (i main dps and hanzo)
it doesn’t matter if i have 40 elims while everyone else on my team have below 20 elims. my tank could be having 8 elims. i still blame myself and know i could’ve done better in certain situations. i missed shots on an important target. if i hadn’t missed those particular shots, we could’ve won. i don’t see the point in blaming anyone else.
