Why I don't want 1-3-2

General Discussion
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So, Jeff had a very lengthy and detailed forum post yesterday about a development experiment they are doing that exchanges 1 tank for 1 DPS with the goal of reducing DPS queue times. Here’s my take on that.

Obviously, I don’t like the idea very much. I’m a tank main. It’s my favorite class to play. And when I don’t play tanks, I play healers. It’s rare that I play DPS. I do sometimes. I enjoy Mei quite a bit, Soldier. Sombra is one of my favorite characters in the game (from a personality perspective) despite me not really playing her much and hating being hacked. But my real love is tanking.

My favorite hero is D.Va. I love playing D.Va. She’s my main. And at times, I have 1-tricked her. Though, over time I have branched out and gotten some decent playtime on other tanks. I also absolutely love playing Orisa and Zarya. And while I’m not great at Ball, I like playing Ball and Winston. I’ll begrudgingly play Reinhardt, but I refuse to play Hog or Sigma. They don’t fit me.

The point is, most of the tanks that I prefer to play are not really suited for solo tanking. Orisa used to be, but after her nerfs she definitely isn’t. And I don’t see how Zarya or D.Va could solo tank. Ball can solo tank, but I can see myself getting yelled at for that one because he doesn’t have a shield. And while I have played my fair share of Reinhardt, there’s only so much of that I can stand. He’s fun, but only for a time. I can’t play him for multiple games without going nuts. Orisa is actually way more fun to me.

So, if we go to solo tank, what’s going to happen? Are D.Va and Zarya going to become DPS? I wouldn’t want that. That would be extremely frustrating to me. I don’t want to play DPS, so please don’t even think of moving my favorite heroes into the DPS category. Not to mention you’d have very few actual tanks left for the few people willing to go there after this change.

Are Orisa and Rein going to have to be buffed into God tier heroes? How do you survive focus fire and constant CC from 5 other players if they aren’t? If you do keep D.Va and Zarya in the tank class, how in the world do you make them into main tanks?

To me it creates a real balance problem, possibly an intractable one. And it also means that we have a hero identity issue for the off tanks. And you lose all the synergies and strategies that we’ve been working on as fundamentals for the tank role for the last 4 years.

I know some people want to be the stalwart tank propping up the entire team. But I like to share that role because I don’t want the full weight of that responsibility on me all by myself. It’s too much pressure. And if you don’t do exactly what the other 5 people on your team want you to (the right pick, the right plays, etc) then you are going to be reported. It’s going to happen. The report system will become a way to punish tanks for not being ‘obedient’.

I was drawn to Overwatch because it wasn’t a typical FPS. I want tanks to be tanks. And I don’t want them to go down fast. I want them to be hard to bring down and to be a legitimate threat to your life if you are in their zone of control. I want healers to heal. I don’t want a game where everybody just becomes slightly different DPS. And I don’t want a game with lots of solo carry potential. I really don’t. I want this to be a team game. I want this to be Overwatch not Apex Legends with map objectives.

In short, I don’t like the idea of being a solo tank. My favorite tanks will basically be ruined through balance changes or lack thereof. The entire category will feel bad to a player like me. And I don’t see a reason to continue playing the game if this kind of a change goes through.

One final thought. Jeff says the reason 4-1-1 felt bad was the solo healer. I actually submit to you that having a solo healer is actually better than having a solo tank. In either case, if that one person goes down you lose though. So, I don’t think being a solo tank is really any more fun.

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Any thoughts on

3DPSorTank,2Heal,1Tank
With a maximum of 2Tank per team.

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Two thoughts:

  1. how would you have 3 dps OR 2 tanks?

  2. variability will make balance a huge issue: remember, tanks will needs to be rebalanced (again) for a hypothetical 1/3/2

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More like

  • 2DPS-2Heal-2Tank
  • 3DPS-2Heal-1Tank

Depending on if one of those three DPS feel like going second tank.

3 players would have access to both the Tank and DPS roster, but if one of them picks Tank, then the other two get blocked from picking Tank.

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Ok that explains the how, but that leaves the bigger issue.

Tanks would need serious buffs if 1/3/2 became the norm. How do you keep 2/2/2 comps from being OP? We are literally in a double shield meta right now.

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With Role SR, you cant have role switching mid game.

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I’m saying they should try it as an Arcade mode, then the feedback will be more relevant…

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On the other hand,
321 could make it so you have the whole MEKA squad as simultaneous playable heroes.

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Ya I’m hesitant about the idea because I’m wondering how some of the characters would have to change. It’s one of those changes much like role queue that works best very early on, before people adjust to something comfortable.

However I’d still be willing to try. I would have to reserve judgement until I see what they do with characters like Zarya, and how they still pair with their counterparts like Rein.

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Maybe if “off tank” was a role in itself, but with the tank pool already the lowest of the current group, splitting the tank pool even more would not be good.
If Overwatch was 40 characters with a severe increase in tanks, maaaaybe an idea.

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Just chatting here…

RQ “feels” broken (to me). They traded one set of problems for another set. And now it sounds like they are trying to find ways to salvage it, but they are not really addressing the issues with their game that forced the need for RQ in the first place (IMHO).

The three rolls should feel completely separate/different, and give people a real reason/desire to play them.

Primarily, Tanks should be about protecting their team, making and holding space.

Primarily, Supports should be about healing, buffing, and debuff removal.

Primarily, DPS should be about damage, debuffs, and ways of denying space.

Each should have the ability to DPS or heal or protect outside of their main roll, but never to the extent that those abilities can supersede their chosen roll.

The issue is, they’ve painted themselves into a corner with all the new hybrid characters, that can wear two hats at once. Moira, Bap, Brig, Sigma, Ham, Ori are the main offenders that I see people posting about. And all of them have been, or are able to function outside of their main roll, and to the extent that many players chose to (rightly or wrongly).

In my opinion, until they fix that, all these 2-2-2, 1-3-2, 1-4-1, whathaveyou, are just bandages trying to fix the wrong thing.

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I am with ya 100% as a tank main i feel like for one my life would become much more stressful and toxicity would climb back up to where it was with Old OW.
Also moving tanks to DPS would be the worst thing because your moving a hero from one class that they have been in for ever and moving them to a class that does not fit a tanks play style.
I LOVE hog on my bad mental days where my brain is not working 100% and being able to just enjoy the hero is part of what i play OW for.
DO not get me wrong i play main tanks the most and enjoy them a lot but this 321 come would change that 100% for me.

This change would flip tanks and healers upside down and make the game very stressful for people and seeing as both healers and tanks are the smallest classes of people the game comes to a end very fast because no one wants to play the two classes besides hardcore fans.
I also want to point out with the lack of a off tank to peel for heroes like Zen and Ana these healers will be trash because the main tank does not have the movement ( even if they buff the crap out of them ) to get back to the healers in time to help making the meta Lucio and Moira.

This change is in good thought but not the right step for the game and players and i hope the Devs see that.

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One of the things I really like about 2-2-2 is that, at the moment, any hero you choose to play has the chance of teaming up with every other hero in the roster. If you limit the role que to 1 tank only, Blizzar would be effectively removing the possibility of playing any of the tanks with every other hero in the game. As a clear example, you’d never see Winston and D.Va together anymore.

In this sense, Tank synergy, which was the “real” synergy, would be off the table forever.

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Agree with you OP. My opinion is below

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2-3-2 is the best option. This “the cost would be extremely high” excuse is unacceptable. You’re telling me the company is not willing to pay the cost to make a better game…

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And what if it isn’t the best option? You think it is but there are no guarantees. They don’t want to do a big rework and reoptimize entire game only to find out it didn’t help at all.

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Never getting to play Reinhardt with Zarya again would suck. Never getting to play a tank that isn’t Orisa would suck. The old tanks that became DPS becoming mandatory because of their durability would suck.

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Yeah, and even if you could play them, who knows how they’d have to change because that would inevitably mean that Zarya had become a DPS. It would just remove such a big aspect of the game for me.

Exactly. I don’t want that added stress in my life. Nor do I want my old heroes to lose what makes them them.

I hadn’t considered this, but I agree with you.

Agreed

I think you are right about this too. 1-3-2 feels to me like they are trying to address 2 things that they are struggling to find a better way to address. First, they want to address queue times. But I think secondly, they are trying to address double barrier. And I just don’t think this is the solution.

Only if they A) introduced the entire meka squad and B) moved D.Va to DPS which would tick me off massively. Because D.Mon is obviously a main tank.

Yep

I agree. I think they would. Even Reinhardt and Orisa would feel pretty weak in 1/3/2 without buffs.

I don’t think you can have a flex slot for a couple reasons.

  1. It causes a balance issue. A tank might be balanced if there’s 1, but completely OP if you have 2. The same could be true for some DPS heroes where the synergy behind 3 heroes causes way too much damage, but only 2 leaves your team anemic.
  2. Role Based SR precludes this. It just flat won’t work unless they abandon that. At which point, they might as well abandon Role queue.

All, Thank you for the responses and the conversation. This post is mostly just about how I feel about the concept. It leaves me with a lot of anxiety and also concern and frustration. So, even if you disagree, I appreciate you hearing me out.

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I might have an interesting idea:

What if Sigma couldn’t use his main fire while Experimental Barrier was up?

He could still use Accretion and Kinetic Grasp could still be used.

I think this gets Sigma’s play style closer to Reinhard than to Orisa.

Thoughts?

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before swaping cue at 1-3-2 mabe ban all fu*%^$ aimbot of this game is very patetic