So I have to wonder a bit why people play the same character over and over in competitive mode. I mean I get it if you have a main that you feel really confident with and you know how to play well that you would want to continue playing them. But certainly there is a point where people have to realize that they aren’t winning the fight and just throwing themselves to their deaths.
I do get communication is a factor here too. Ive heard enough times from all manner of players that X player needs to switch to X character, or that person A is doing all the work and persons B-F just are horrible players in general. Or just people not working at all as a team in general. I get it this stuff happens when you are queuing up with randoms. I honestly wish they didn’t punish teams as much as they seem to do with the wait times otherwise it would be a better reason for my group of friends to do comp together instead of in pairs of 2-3.
From what I see at least in silver/gold people will refuse to play something else when they are countered. Ive seen a people stick to a sniper class when people have 2 shield tanks guarding a bastion with no effort to flank to the side or the back of a shield. (back usually ends with them dead in seconds) Ive seen genji’s stay like they are when the team has Reind, Zarya, Junk, Sym, Brigitte, and Mercy. Only two who he would actually have some chance with. Now those were just examples of situations I have encountered and I have had plenty more than just that.
Unfortunately I haven’t really seen much higher since matchmaking rank at least to me doesn’t seem like it is based on individual skill. So I cant say if this is an issue with plat or diamond ranks. (though I imagine to a small degree it is)
To me it hardly makes sense that you would play a competitive mode to only do the same exact thing that happens in quick play or arcade. At a certain point common sense has to kick in where people realize something isn’t working. Its at that point that I wonder why people would rather take the easy way out and blame others rather than try something different. Which to a degree I think is what the hero rotation is meant to do.
Personally I play competitive for longer games, and to challenge myself to change how I play any character and I will rotate out if I see something is not working. Its just a way for me to refine how I play and use any character to get slightly better each time. I may not always be on the mic but at least I will be in voice chat listening and trying to work with others.
So I do apologize for the longer walls of text which is a unfortunate habit for me.
The tl;dr is, Why do people refuse to adapt? Id rather hear it from people who do this themselves, but suffice it to say I want to understand why this is such an issue. Because competitive is meant to be exactly that, competitive. There is no competitive aspect to using the same losing strategy over and over and generally it makes the game less enjoyable for everyone on that team. While the other team laughs at how easy this is for them thinking that they are getting better. Moreover it just seems like 1 bad team lucked out because the other team was worse, rather than 2 teams effectively trying to beat each other.
2 Likes
Because I only like playing D’Va .
Now adapting doesn’t necessary just mean switching heroes, I can adapt HOW I play D’Va to how the match is going.
Instead of focusing on what others play, focus on playing what you want with what your team chooses against what the other team chooses.
1 Like
Because I am a sym onetrick. It is better to be a master than a jack of all trades in this game. One-tricks gain mastery faster and climb up more since all of their time is put on one hero.
While people who flex usually stay hardstuck lol.
2 Likes
That is true, I’ve been diamond for 19 seasons. It’s only now that I’m starting to slowly push into masters.
Course it didn’t help that my original one trick character got severely changed in her playstyle then nerfed into the ground.
2 Likes
I think a lot of it is either what Soma said, not knowing when to swap or what a good swap is, or it’s how they’re being asked to swap. Of you say “x swap to y” it’s presumptuous, feels like they’re being singled out, and maybe they don’t know how to play that hero.
I think the better way is “hey, we need someone to deal with this z, can anyone play y type of hero to handle them?” or “hey x, are you able to dive/counter/distract z? are there any y type heroes you can play if you aren’t able to on your current hero?”
It’s about demanding less and requesting more. Plus maybe they know how to unconventionally handle a hero they normally shouldn’t be able to counter BECAUSE they can do so well on one hero.
1 Like
The game has a horrible tutorial that teaches zero teamplay mechanics for a team shooter.
The bigger problem was how they originally scored Competitive play.
Playing unselfish netted you less SR and a slow climb. Always playing with your best hero gets you out of elo faster and is the best way to play the game.
The devs changed the scoring for higher elo but the damage is already done.
Plus if you make that the rule set to play selfishly until Diamond most players aren’t going to break the habit of playing the way that got them good SR gains.
Also no team creation means we will always que with randos unless 5 of our friends can miraculously group up to play together and adapt.
Competitive and most of OW is individual different playstyles put together in a group against another random group to see who are the best randos at suboptimal teamwork.
2 Likes
Overwatch teaches you the basics of how to play CoD lol.
2 Likes
You do not understand… if I play only one hero without difficulty in over 90% of my matches, and all of a sudden I am having an awful game… it literally IS because of you and the team that I was stuck with. I would rather lose that game fast and move on to a winnable game.
I know a lot of times in plat, the tanks and healer players really don’t know what to swap to when we’re getting rolled, and it gets especially troubling when the other players are throwing suggestions at you that really highlights how little they understand basic compositions.
Just last game, our Genji kept demanding me to swap to Orisa against a Junkrat, Hanzo, and Hog, and he was being extremely toxic about it. I’ll give you three guesses what happened to my shield the second I plopped it down.
It’s because people are used to playing hero-based games by just playing the heroes they like, which isn’t how Overwatch was designed.
To me, refusing to learn and use multiple heroes is the same as refusing to use the right tools for a job. It doesn’t matter how much you want to be a hammer main. Sometimes you need a screwdriver.
People don’t want to win and it’s not in the rules that you have to care about winning. Soft throwing is not a reportable offense.
Or the contrary, a team could be not enabling you, for example if you’re any support that has to get close to heal, such as Moira’s charge needs to DPS to get more charge or Brigitte’s inspire has to be proc’d. For DPS if symmetra never can get close for a charge or reaper can’t get close then gg… Why tanks are very important in a team comp.
Basically your tanks can destroy these characters from being played:
Bastion, Doomfist, Junkrat, Mei, Reaper, Symmetra, Torbjorn
Brigitte, Lucio, Moira, Zenyatta
So does the enemy Zarya feeding of you.
Yes Zarya makes a great ult battery 
much ult for D’Va
This game wasnt made with the intention of someone always playing one hero. They added this to help solidify that so kudos to them. People will adapt or simply wont play.
Lucky they have lamp post in this game. Cant say those also save me from a grav every 1-2 mins.
If you cant play more then 1 hero you good at 1 hero but not this game.
I’m bad at all FPS games
Thank you captain obvious, I may not be really good at D’Va but I enjoy playing her and will continue to do so and adapt to situations I get into.
Then do not pretend u can adapt with only dva. Some heroes simply hard counter other heroes.
If i play Zarya i eat Dva’s.
Well, the solution is to make hammer less viable in all situations and make alternatives to screwdrivers so that if you dislike screwdriver, you can still access that tool. Another great option would be to unlock roles so that more players can use the tools and help. But until then, I am just going to bash my hammer into the wall and see what happens.
But ypu can use a hammer todrive a screw it will be messy but will work just like you can use a screwdriver to hammer in a nail it will take a while but will work
Oh no I get adapting is more than just character based. The example of the 2 snipers with the shield tanks were an example to highlight that. Shooting at a shield endlessly instead of going around it isn’t adapting how you play a character.
I also agree being a jack of all trades isn’t good for ranking up. You become average at everything and good at nothing. However if I for example am going to play tanks this season or support I usually stay with that selection throughout the season. This season and last it was support, with tanks as a breather in between heated rounds.
I usually have at least 1 main from each class that I have invested time in. Something that I am comfortable with and can at least stay alive long enough to get a decent amount of ult charge. I may be far from the best at anything but if I have something I excel at I will play that first. But when everything I were to try fails even though I excel in doesn’t mean I cant try something else to adapt and switch back later. Even if I am worse off with the newer character in terms of how effective in general than the one I constantly frequent if the change helps get past a point where we couldn’t I consider that a small win there.
Though again this is my view as someone who is usually stuck in gold or silver. Where the majority of people seem to be. Even when I use a main and have nearly 2/3rds of the match where I am on fire and keeping point/staying alive it seems like that effort can be wasted if people cant adapt in general. IMHO in team based games change is constant and adapting is a key to surviving. Especially if your character you main gets a nerf/buff that adjusts how it functions people need to be capable of changing either how they play that character to suit the change or find a way around with another.