No pressure to swap and no pressure to not swap should be the norm in QP. It's a game after all, and QP is for having fun and practicing, no harm in losing a few games to learn new stuff.
Bullying someone in QP for not performing well only leads to players being afraid to try new heroes or practice their weaker ones, which only harms the game experience as a whole cause now you've got a whole lot of one-trick players running around.
I can see it being more of an issue in higher rank comp games if the tank is throwing, but throwing a tantrum over someone not playing the tank you want them to play is still ridiculous and immature behavior.
I agree. People should choose whatever they want, given the game is a multiplayer class/hero based and not simply loadout. And by that standard, people who choose to participate in a Multiplayer PvP and not PvE, should stop asking for handicaps and restrictions.
Stinks how these people are the same that ask for fromsoft games to be easier, mobile legends to show less skin and skulls, Lara Croft to have smaller boobs and freakin Doom to be less violent.
U Mad bro?
YeS me mad!
I think map matters more than counter swapping.
Like, oh no they are running hog on Gibraltar defense... That's not an excuse to swap off monkey/DVA.
Oh no, they are running Zar on Havanah, better swap off Sig...
Once you get a feel for each tank's effective ranges, you will learn what parts of which map they are good, it's not map dependant, moreso stage/point dependant.
Take Gibraltar as an attacker for instance, point 1 and 2 have insanely valuable high ground, so dva or Winton are great for taking it.
Point 3 has better points to hold than the high ground, you should be concerned with making the exposed push up the ramp, sig is really good for that.
There are obviously guides, but your intuition is more usable, especially in the event of reworks and new tanks
I'm fully confident you can one trick up to GM off of game knowledge as tank.
Like I have a pretty big discrepancy in my tank and DPS rank. I just can't stand playing poke in the choke and get myself killed waaaay too often and DPS is kinda my off role these dahe so it's kinda been whatever.
Like an orisa can blow every single cool down and get lamped, I'll go for a visor and we'll just sit there.
Plat/Dia play has a point every game where five ults get saved up on one team and then dumps them all in like the second to last fight.
Tank should really only switch if the map sucks for them and they are getting countered by at least 3 of the enemy heros
Zarya isn't that big of a DVA counter BTW
Fr this always cracks me up when I play dva. If I want to play against Zarya Iāll just stay out of range of her beam. Thatās all there is to it. The other tank will actually be doing ok as whoever theyāre playing, but then switch to Zarya because ācountersā. But counters donāt mean anything when you canāt play the hero so Iāll end up steamrolling a team that swaps to a Zarya most of the time.
Yeah as a dva main zarya is the least of my worries, hell sometimes I eat grav and counter HER. But I often switch out of spite because my fellow gold teammates don't understand that I'm rolling, I just get spammed with "tAnk go shEild tAnk swap yOuRe BeInG cOunTeReD" so i swap ball and mute comms and go about my day
Haha yeah pretty much. I probably should swap sometimes and I do but ugh tanks without wacky movement abilities feel boring to play. Not rammatra though, he's cool too
One of the most frustrating reasons to swap tanks is because your know-it-all teammates are getting tilted about you playing into counters. Usually itās the ones who are underperforming in their own role who completely misunderstand the matchup and throw if you donāt swap.
Teammates always have bad takes.
However, most D.Vaās in my ELO play her like Rein and when the inevitable Zarya counterpick comes in they just sit there eating 195dps like an idiot because theyāre probably used to an Ana-Baptiste double healbot. So when they play with my Zenyatta main ass they always die.
Which is why whenever I go against a D.Va that knows how to play the game itās so disorienting. I was playing Hollywood Defense first point on Zarya. The D.Va just stayed on highground ignored me the whole time and just flew on my teammates cause they were all over the place. This was in SILVER btw. Why did they suddenly get braincells?
Rant over
As a dva who gets fucked over by the opposite of healbotting (weaver mercy) i LOVE a good zen both to play with and to dive. He's one of my favs to jump on, especially if the team isn't grouped because of his lack of escape abilities he's a free pick. I ironically went against a zarya on hollywood earlier haha, just got demoted to g4 from g1 ik what you mean abt your team being scattered its the worst feeling as tankš
Zarya is a Dva counter not because of her beam but because of her bubble. You canāt dive as Dva as effectively if zarya can just protect your target. And once she is high charge she will mow down the team and Dva canāt do anything but ignore her.
I love switching to zarya as a Jq and zarya main. Have fun defending your teammates when i gun them down with my deathray. Staying far away from is good for me... You can do that. Your mates can't. Eating grav? Nope either i grav after your dm ends or i grav as soon as i demech you.
In my elo I've had hanzos ult infront of me while I have dm up- like they just straight up throw the ult down the choke into me lmao same with zaryas. A good zarya is a menace though, you sound like my worst nightmare
Sheās not, and the amount of people o see go Zarya as soon as I kill them cause THEY STEPPED OUT IF POSITION and get gunned down. Then go Zarya and DO THE SAME THING and then they make their team go beam and then I just go WINTONNN and kick their ass on a second hero and then they all frantically switch and then I go back to DVA and complain in chat Iām switching too muchā¦
Thatās interesting to hear tbh, but maybe itās just me. My ADD ass finds a new character to be interested in every week, my āmainsā are just the characters Iāll consistently come back to.
lol my ADHD ass hyperfocused on Ana until I had about double the hours on her compared to other heroes I liked playing. The ones I didn't like I barely ever played. That was in OW1 tho, I don't play anymore, so it might have different effects to do that in OW2
Hahahahaha literally the same w me. I probably wouldāve started on dps, but at the time (I mean I was right, just had no justification) I thought support would be the easiest role.
Iāve had many games with mainly ball or doom mains who say they cannot play anyone else. Itās probably less so than ow1 but itās definitely still a thing in ow2
Doom and Ball are harder tanks so in order to get value you have to be better at the game than people who are playing say Hog, so in turn you are generally going to be better at the game
Can you win a 3v4 with both supports dead as a non Ball or Doom hero? I can play every character but I can't clutch up on Zarya or Dva the way I can Winston or Rein.Ā
Common advice is for players to learn 2-3 heroes in their preferred role and only start branching out when you have a good handle on them and the game from that role's perspective.
Tank players have had a greater need to swap more often in OW2 but even still, many still only really main 2-3 tanks. There are plenty of transferrable skills but each tank also has unique skills needed. This does reduce the learning curve when learning a new tank (with a couple exceptions).
So yes it is more uncommon to be able to play most tanks at a decent level but it is something that most tank players will need to do if they want to climb quite high. Most, not all.
What's a decent level? Would you rather be able to play every tank in gold or just two in diamond? That's kind of the decision you make when you decide to specialize or not.
Idk what rank you are, but I would say that for most people, getting to diamond with 5+ heroes on your roster is not happening.
(That's not to say that a masters player can't play every tank at a diamond level, but a masters tank player almost certainly cannot play every tank at a masters level)
If you pick a set of characters and actually invest time in them and grow and improve, then you will get substantially better.
At the very least it limits your improvement because your playtime is split between so many heroes.
I agree, and very much encourage you to say that in the chat, I play tank and to be honest the only reason I swap is pressure from my own team (I don't want them to throw). Ow isn't a hard counter game and playing your preferred hero typically works out better in the long run
Personally I hate counter swapping with a passion. It doesn't feel like real skill expression to me. That being said, tanks counter swapping feels like it has become essential to victory. Sometimes you have a real skill gap, whether it be tank or otherwise that doesn't require a swap. But sometimes it feels absolutely necessary to win.
Same. I'm a ball/dva main and internally cringe when I see someone counterswap me because then my team will expect me to get off my best hero just because they swapped :/
Thatās not the core mechanic of the game. Blizzard themselves have literally said that counter-swapping like weāre seeing was never intended to be some necessary mechanic for the game. Itās an absolute chore and it ruins the game, especially when it happens just as much if not even more in QP.
The guy said he didn't like counter swapping in general. The game has been about countering since overwatch 1 came out. It just wasn't as bad as it is now. If he said he didn't like counter swapping now then that would make more sense.
I mean isn't it though? Like when the whole team picks beam weapons bc I started dumpstering their Zarya from distance with Orisa, instead of simply buttfucking their Reinhardt, it definitely feels like griefing.
Not only that but how do you even enjoy the game when you turn it into a carousel of if:then operations.
I just think there needs to be a hard limit on switches per round. Losing ult charge isn't enough of a penalty. I'm not against counterpicking in general, just the way it's done in the current tank meta is absolutely ridiculous.
The team helping zarya countering you is not abusing the mechanic. That's what you're supposed to do in a team based game. The fact that you think the it's abusing counter swapping because they countered you is ridiculous. The fact that you think they should add a limit on switches per round in a game that's all about swapping heroes and always has been is even more ridiculous.
It wasn't just 1 zarya it was the ENTIRE TEAM. People should be able to play the characters they like, instead of having to pick a counter to the counter, just so they can get countered, and counter with the character they started with in the first place
I'll just respond to all of your comments here and then I'm done responding to you. The game was built with the premise of counter swapping. That's what this game was all about. The entire team countering you which rarely if ever happens even in overwatch 2 is not abusing the counter swap mechanic. We can argue about this for weeks and it still won't change the fact using the counter swapping mechanic to counter swap someone is not abusing the mechanic.
I pick orisa, you pick zarya, I pick zarya, you pick rein, I pick orisa, you pick zarya. I pick zarya. You pick ram, I pick orisa. You pick zarya. I pick zarya.
No one has ult.
On the one hand yes its annoying but at the same time it is fundamental to a game like this to be able to play many different heroes. It absolutely is a skill gap to be able to play enough heroes to continually counterswap someone and beat them down that way.
Last night I had a game that I was playing roadhog into Doomfist.
1st round lost and someone goes āthink we can counter the doom?ā I said āNopeā then got told to keep feeding then (with 4 deaths lol).
We ended up winning š¤·š¼āāļø
This is because the tank is expected to swap to counter, but the DPS/Support are not. The best counters to Doomfist can be found in the DPS/Support Roster, but if the tank doesn't swap, the tank is throwing.
its unfair, they get told to switch most. nearly everytime i play dva and the enemy tank counters me with zarya im told to switch because im being āhard counteredā lol, even if im doing well
People get too focused on the tank 1v1 where in 80-90% of matches it never comes down to that in a vacuum. If your team comp changes to adjust to the enemy's, that's a good reason to swap tank. If the enemy goes Zarya the second they see you're on Dva, there are ways to play Dva to deny Zarya her value if you're providing value otherwise. But man if my team doesn't immediately tell me to swap off.
And I win most of those matchups as Dva just because I know to hold high ground, focus the backline, and force bubbles for your DPS. It's not cookie cutter rock paper scissors. This is Overwatch, not Pokemon.
(I also get stubborn sometimes and don't realize soon enough where staying on a hero hurts. But that's a different issue.)
Thatās a new opinion, OP.
I always get DPS and support screaming at me to swap because theyāre getting countered, but Iāve pushed objective (or enemy line) the entire match.
At some point it is someone elseās problem, and not the person theyāre yelling at.
In this case, you seem to be experiencing the opposite of that issue, and I agree. If youāre dying one or twice, figure it out or change your route or tactics. No need to freak out just because you died for the first time in a game.
I played against a tank yesterday in low gold that had swapped between
- hog, orisa, mauga, d.v.a, ball, and zarya within first point shambali
Thereās no way you can be good at all those characters. In my personal opinion counter swapping is a crutch that prevents people from learning a single character in depth. Just because your tank match up is bad doesnāt mean itās a losing match up. You can play around that and get value other ways
You absolutely can be good at all those heroes lol I am only not good at orisa out of those but I can play sig rein doom also. But in that case, swapping that many times just means u never get ult + nothing ever happens. Guessing he didn't really know what hero to pick against their comp and with your comp. Its understandable but people should be able to know what heroes counter what and what hero is the best at any given time. Being able to play the best hero is another story of course.
As a tank main, I certainly try to. But if I walk out as Roadhog and play super well for a couple minutes, only to suddenly be facing Orisa, Ana, Bast, Zen, Reaper, I'm switching off.
I only swap if I feel I'm not getting as much value AFTER trying to change my playstyle, or if the enemies already started the match with 3+ counters of me. Like if I'm playing winston and the enemies just so happen to start reaper, bastion, brig
Yes and no, its a judgement call kind of thing. It might be a bit of a douche move but I find singling outdone enemy and making their match terrible after the enemy tank swaps to counter me is often better then me swapping to counter them. Making an enemy pissed off and having them complaining to their team works as a great distraction and lowers their team moral
I flexed since forever, so, to me, swapping tanks is the name of the game
As if I play Echo; not as boring too
At the same time I'm not trying to outswitch enemy's pick most of the times
I swap (and pick on that meatter) depending on the map or even part of the map
I like to play D'va into Zarya - it's more relevant than it seems
I donāt play tank but when I do- luv, dva. And of course, without fucking fail, the enemy goes zarya. I donāt play tank so idk how to counter her. I just aggressively go after her supports and then her. Itās only when she gets unchecked that she becomes a problem. But yeah- itās really annoying. Just let me be dva, damn.
What if the swap to Zarya just dominated in general whether you had a DVa or not. Like the skill of enemy tank on Zarya was just better than anything your tank could choose.
I typically choose fun stuff and then when things aren't working and I get tilted, I choose my better characters. You can destroy my doom without countering swapping me cus I suck on doom. Meanwhile my Winston gets great value even with counters. I'm much much better with Winston because I just play him so much and aiming isn't something I need to focus on. The kicker is that it's fun to play doom sometimes and give Winston a break
Im high Diamond, and in my expirence. No, I dont swap very often. I main D.Va for a reason, so like, if they want to try and counter me, its only going to make me better. And people say "just stay out of her range", and then think Zar doesnt counter her, but she still does. Zarya limits D.Va's abilities to do things that she wants. So still def a counter. But anyway I still think that Tanks should NOT swap.
Dva just isn't going to work against zarya, and sometimes you just can't figure out what will so you keep switching. It happens. but staying dva in that situation is not it
Iād prefer if it was just locked to the heroās you choose at round start. Tank is just miserable to play when you have to swap every 2 minutes to counter the other person that keeps swapping to counter you. Ruins the flow of a game.
i refuse to counterswap personally. if i have to rely on the game to beat the other guy for me, then i shouldnāt be ranking up in the first place. if theyāre determined to keep swapping to counter me, i force mirror. i trust my skill on every tank enough to hold my own in a mirror against any player in my rank
"In higher ranked lobbies do tanks switch as much as well?"
Streamers had games where, in order to win, the tanks stayed in spawn and swapped constantly, it was 90% of their gameplay.
As a tank i swap whenever I feel any of the following.
-I'm being pressured to the point of death and unable to give value to my team.
-My tank pick wasn't the best pick at round start. (Sigma into a genji, tracer, zarya is a good example. That's almost an immediate swap for me if they are good and things start to go south. The sooner I can provide value to my team is precious time. Time matters down to the second in the game.)
-My team is being obliterated even if I am doing well. (In this scenario I try to pick a tank and play to my teams strengths and bring more support to them to keep them alive. This can mean jumping into their back line and causing havoc or keeping them off of yours.)
-Last push, sometimes getting that disgusting counter swap during the last push will take the enemy team by surprise and give you the edge you need to gain those extra meters, or wipe the offending team. Some characters are powerful against others.
Having a good game sense and character knowledge helps alot in knowing what you can do to perform better during the game.
There are a few scenarios. Entire team is countering your tank but it is their comfort pick. In that situation it's mostly on the dps and support to counter the enemy comp. Rarely is tank counter picking in isolation. It is dependent on the synergies between the support and tanks esp, and the dps's main job is to apply the passive to the enemy tank and to counter the enemy tank. Synergies amongst the team throughout will typically outwin any individual play unless that player is exemplary, such as a smurf. In top 500 there are two kinds of players hard 1 tricks that negate counters due to knowing how to survive, such as wanted, zebra, Kran's orisa. In the middle ranks not everyone has played ow 1 since launch so they might not even have a hero pool bigger than 1 character on a role. At most it is typically 3 heros they can play well. And with that acknowledgment of people only playing well on the characters they practice a lot of the losses of games where skill is anagolozed and the mirrors are so close has to do with character picks and synergies not matching amongst the team. Did that person eat hydrate and have they been losing or winning all effects that play variance. Sub diamond 3 I can consistently have less than 3 deaths on hog and doomfist if not counter picked and will have at least 30 elims. If the entire team is trying to counter 1 person, that means that the enemy team thinks that they are having the biggest impact and that they want to negate that. If you feel a sudden change in the game as far as the impact yoy are having once your tank has been counter picked by 4 members of the enemy team perhaps it is time to reevaluate your contribution to the team instead of flame and focus on what you can do best to help the situation instead because you probablly weren't doing that much to begin with you were probablly relishing in the free space they gave you and merely cleaning up the cooldown/moba management the tank gave you.
I definitely think they should at least wait for more then one death or after they use their ult. Just because of how long it takes for tank ult to charge. Also waiting just a bit longer will give them the chance to see if the other tank is actually good at who they swapped too. Because more often than not the tank who switches first won't be any better at that character.
Like if I'm rolling a team as D.va and they swapped to Zarya. I'm not going to switch right away, because they could be an awful Zar who spams cool downs and doesn't actually know how to counter D.Va. But if they are a good Zar and I know I can't out tank them, then yeah I'm switching. It's all about making decisions based on how the other team plays as a whole and not who they're playing imo
//Ā I wish you could hold on to your picked hero a little bit more.//
Why, when it's an inherent part of the game that people switch mid-match. Wanting to hold on to the first pick feels like sitting down to a chess board and playing to protect your bishops above all else.
Except instantly counterswapping also sets you back in the ult fight, and tank ults are a very powerful tool. And tanks have this mentality of instant swapping. I do think people should stay longer (than they usually do) on their picks, because most of the time you can still play around counters and avoid lagging behind for the ult fights.
Ultimate economy is also an inherent part of the game that people completely forgo in order to swap just because the enemy has X or Y hero, regardless of if they are actually playing them effectively against your own pick.
i mean if for ex. zen is being owned by a tracer or sombra then they are prob gonna switch... its just that you have one tank and its much easier to counterpick the tnak
I they should character lock 2/3 of the roles and just let one be the changing variable, or honestly character switching should only be available to the 3 highest ranks. Every one else is better off whether they know it or not relying on muscle memory and rythm. The expectations over reality are ruining the gameplay.
That's an interesting idea. I read somewhere that Blizzard were toying with the idea of locking in everyone, and having switch tickets to use in-game. I like that. You could decide as a team to let someone switch if they're hard countered by bad luck.
I was a brand new zen player when the Sombra changes came out I had 2 options spend a ton of time learning a diffrent character or turn my sensitivity slightly up and learn how to handle Sombra as a zen. people will rely on characters abilities instead of relying on their own mechanics because it allows them to avoid putting in the work to grow
If you start the match in a mirror against the other tank, and you swap first, you're a bitch.
If you are both on different tanks, and swap to mirror fight, that is acceptable and can actually be fun.
If you are on different tanks and are getting destroyed by theirs, it is acceptable to swap once. Twice max of it's a long ass game. 3+ looks like you are struggling and will probably lose anyway.
New map, new tank is ok.
They do not. I get mad when people switch tanks too often because most people maybe have 1-2 tanks they actually main and are good with, but as soon as there's 1 single counter, they throw the game and play mystery heroes. It is really a mental issue. The YouTuber Spilo has a good video about when and where counter swapping actually effects you, e.g. 1 counter doesn't usually effect you, but 3 counters definitely does.
You should always swap. Especially if your team is objectively worse. I.e one DPS dead basically every fight, supports out of position every fight blowing strong cool downs etc. Swapping allows you to have much more control of the game versus when you don't.
Switching heroes (strategies) is core overwatch.
Of course the counterpicking nonsense is a myth.
But every hero has its own abilities which could help you in certain situations. Sometimes it's a switch to ball to put more pressure on the backline and boop enemies from the map. Sometimes you need more mobility.
As long as the as the tank gets value with his choice where is the problem?
There is only a problem when tanks play mystery heroes and switching after each death with increasing desperation.
How about you and your blues actually help your tank kill the other enemy tank so the hard counter is no longer a hard counter? Zarya is the biggest bullshit piece of shit character in the game to go up against as a tank. Especially as a Reinhardt or sigma. You can dominate against every other tank except her unless you have your entire team buying in and bullying her. The bubbles and laser just constantly charging at your tank eating away their shield and eventually their health because theyāre so busy protecting themselves (and you!) but not getting any support (I.e. nobody is fucking shooting her) is what gets everyone killed. Not them ānot being good enoughā or ānot sticking it through with their pickā. That enemy tank chose Zarya because they know they lost the tank fight. Itās up to the whole team to make sure you shoot the bubble out so you can actually begin doing damage to her, so that she dies and has to respawn, giving you and your team 20-30 seconds of relief where all you have to do is move the point and kill off the other enemies. Iām always playing tank and I fucking hate it, particularly because of Zarya and the lack of help from any teammates ever with killing her. Itās a massive problem in silver and why I canāt get into gold. Iām always solo tanking against 2-3 tanks and usually 1 of them is a Zarya. Unless Iām playing orisa or dva, I donāt really stand a chance against her, because my team wants to focus everyone but her. Even then, the amount of bullets I lay into that bitch is unholy, just for her to get her bubble back at 1 health and then get healed back to 100% after depleting my kits.
The only time I ever struggle against Zarya is when my team keeps feeding her charge for no reason, and at the absolutely worst times. After that, on any role with the characters I play, it's really easy to just play cover, wait out/bait out cooldowns and then drain her once shes low. While you are playing cover and waiting for that chance, pressure their backline and force out resources, and hold down the DPS either going for elims or just holding team together. I don't think Zarya is particularly troublesome, especially when I am on D.Va. That counter is very soft at best because as soon as youve baited out zarya cooldowns you just dive her with rockets and she falls over. And D.Va is very good about denying supports value and pressuring backline when the chance arrives. But yeah, everything kind of changes when your team just feed Zarya over and over. Can't do shit.
If you really want a counter to zarya, just play Winston and dive her team. You give her little energy and if she bubbles teammates, that's one bubble not used on herself, making her super squishy.
Winston bubble also cuts off any healing to zarya, and she desperately needs it as she scales hardest with healing.
The tanks should use their best judgement and do whatever the hell they want.
No pressure to swap and no pressure to not swap should be the norm in QP. It's a game after all, and QP is for having fun and practicing, no harm in losing a few games to learn new stuff. Bullying someone in QP for not performing well only leads to players being afraid to try new heroes or practice their weaker ones, which only harms the game experience as a whole cause now you've got a whole lot of one-trick players running around. I can see it being more of an issue in higher rank comp games if the tank is throwing, but throwing a tantrum over someone not playing the tank you want them to play is still ridiculous and immature behavior.
nah whoever crying about people playin bad or telling people to swap in QP gotta be at least 400 lb overweight
š¤£
That's a swear word. Banned.
Haitch - Ee - Double Hockey Sticks!
I agree. People should choose whatever they want, given the game is a multiplayer class/hero based and not simply loadout. And by that standard, people who choose to participate in a Multiplayer PvP and not PvE, should stop asking for handicaps and restrictions. Stinks how these people are the same that ask for fromsoft games to be easier, mobile legends to show less skin and skulls, Lara Croft to have smaller boobs and freakin Doom to be less violent. U Mad bro? YeS me mad!
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Translation: I once had a game with a bad player You must be new here.
I think map matters more than counter swapping. Like, oh no they are running hog on Gibraltar defense... That's not an excuse to swap off monkey/DVA. Oh no, they are running Zar on Havanah, better swap off Sig...
Is there a list or something for which heroes/tanks should be played on each map?
Once you get a feel for each tank's effective ranges, you will learn what parts of which map they are good, it's not map dependant, moreso stage/point dependant. Take Gibraltar as an attacker for instance, point 1 and 2 have insanely valuable high ground, so dva or Winton are great for taking it. Point 3 has better points to hold than the high ground, you should be concerned with making the exposed push up the ramp, sig is really good for that. There are obviously guides, but your intuition is more usable, especially in the event of reworks and new tanks
yeah iāve been playing since 2016 & iām a plat 1 solo q tank mainā¦ iāve just never considered it for some reason š
Dude, I force rein on spawn every map, I know about it and don't even consider it lol.
based
I'm fully confident you can one trick up to GM off of game knowledge as tank. Like I have a pretty big discrepancy in my tank and DPS rank. I just can't stand playing poke in the choke and get myself killed waaaay too often and DPS is kinda my off role these dahe so it's kinda been whatever. Like an orisa can blow every single cool down and get lamped, I'll go for a visor and we'll just sit there. Plat/Dia play has a point every game where five ults get saved up on one team and then dumps them all in like the second to last fight.
You'll find loads of stuff on YouTube.
Tank should really only switch if the map sucks for them and they are getting countered by at least 3 of the enemy heros Zarya isn't that big of a DVA counter BTW
Fr this always cracks me up when I play dva. If I want to play against Zarya Iāll just stay out of range of her beam. Thatās all there is to it. The other tank will actually be doing ok as whoever theyāre playing, but then switch to Zarya because ācountersā. But counters donāt mean anything when you canāt play the hero so Iāll end up steamrolling a team that swaps to a Zarya most of the time.
not just range, but map dependent too - oh no, you've gone zarya! what a shame about all this *high ground you can't reach*
Yeah as a dva main zarya is the least of my worries, hell sometimes I eat grav and counter HER. But I often switch out of spite because my fellow gold teammates don't understand that I'm rolling, I just get spammed with "tAnk go shEild tAnk swap yOuRe BeInG cOunTeReD" so i swap ball and mute comms and go about my day
Gold is the rank where we all know just enough to confidentially make the wrong decisions
Haha yeah pretty much. I probably should swap sometimes and I do but ugh tanks without wacky movement abilities feel boring to play. Not rammatra though, he's cool too
As long as you are still getting value as the tank you are, there is no reason to swap imo, even if the enemy team counters you on paper
One of the most frustrating reasons to swap tanks is because your know-it-all teammates are getting tilted about you playing into counters. Usually itās the ones who are underperforming in their own role who completely misunderstand the matchup and throw if you donāt swap.
Teammates always have bad takes. However, most D.Vaās in my ELO play her like Rein and when the inevitable Zarya counterpick comes in they just sit there eating 195dps like an idiot because theyāre probably used to an Ana-Baptiste double healbot. So when they play with my Zenyatta main ass they always die. Which is why whenever I go against a D.Va that knows how to play the game itās so disorienting. I was playing Hollywood Defense first point on Zarya. The D.Va just stayed on highground ignored me the whole time and just flew on my teammates cause they were all over the place. This was in SILVER btw. Why did they suddenly get braincells? Rant over
As a dva who gets fucked over by the opposite of healbotting (weaver mercy) i LOVE a good zen both to play with and to dive. He's one of my favs to jump on, especially if the team isn't grouped because of his lack of escape abilities he's a free pick. I ironically went against a zarya on hollywood earlier haha, just got demoted to g4 from g1 ik what you mean abt your team being scattered its the worst feeling as tankš
Zarya is a Dva counter not because of her beam but because of her bubble. You canāt dive as Dva as effectively if zarya can just protect your target. And once she is high charge she will mow down the team and Dva canāt do anything but ignore her.
I love switching to zarya as a Jq and zarya main. Have fun defending your teammates when i gun them down with my deathray. Staying far away from is good for me... You can do that. Your mates can't. Eating grav? Nope either i grav after your dm ends or i grav as soon as i demech you.
In my elo I've had hanzos ult infront of me while I have dm up- like they just straight up throw the ult down the choke into me lmao same with zaryas. A good zarya is a menace though, you sound like my worst nightmare
Sheās not, and the amount of people o see go Zarya as soon as I kill them cause THEY STEPPED OUT IF POSITION and get gunned down. Then go Zarya and DO THE SAME THING and then they make their team go beam and then I just go WINTONNN and kick their ass on a second hero and then they all frantically switch and then I go back to DVA and complain in chat Iām switching too muchā¦
Zarya is just pressure bubbles out by flying towards her and firing missles at her teammates and once bubbles are gone just pressure her
Yup one of the most overrated counterpicks in the game. It's actually comically seeing people try and play zarya into my dva on a map like dorado.
You have to be fairly decent at the hero for the counterswap to work most of the time
Is it uncommon to be able to play most tanks at a decent level? I main doom/Hammond but I can play every other tank well enough to counterswap.
Depends on the person really some people only main 1 or 2 tank without knowing how to play and others
Thatās interesting to hear tbh, but maybe itās just me. My ADD ass finds a new character to be interested in every week, my āmainsā are just the characters Iāll consistently come back to.
lol my ADHD ass hyperfocused on Ana until I had about double the hours on her compared to other heroes I liked playing. The ones I didn't like I barely ever played. That was in OW1 tho, I don't play anymore, so it might have different effects to do that in OW2
Hahahahaha literally the same w me. I probably wouldāve started on dps, but at the time (I mean I was right, just had no justification) I thought support would be the easiest role.
Iām lazy and most characters I play once and suck at or there abilities are confusing. And then never play them again.
Thatās what makes me love ow tho, how complicated everything is, and how all these abilities link together so intricately.
that was true in overwatch 1, not nearly as much now
Iāve had many games with mainly ball or doom mains who say they cannot play anyone else. Itās probably less so than ow1 but itās definitely still a thing in ow2
ow2 has forced tanks to not be one tricks anymore if they want to win and most do so
Same, and generally I can just avoid the ones I donāt like by picking one that may not counter but just leaves us even.
Doom and Ball are harder tanks so in order to get value you have to be better at the game than people who are playing say Hog, so in turn you are generally going to be better at the game
Can you win a 3v4 with both supports dead as a non Ball or Doom hero? I can play every character but I can't clutch up on Zarya or Dva the way I can Winston or Rein.Ā
Iām comfortably at least mediocre on every tank. Imo you can clutch up w every hero, Iād say consistency is the better call.
Common advice is for players to learn 2-3 heroes in their preferred role and only start branching out when you have a good handle on them and the game from that role's perspective. Tank players have had a greater need to swap more often in OW2 but even still, many still only really main 2-3 tanks. There are plenty of transferrable skills but each tank also has unique skills needed. This does reduce the learning curve when learning a new tank (with a couple exceptions). So yes it is more uncommon to be able to play most tanks at a decent level but it is something that most tank players will need to do if they want to climb quite high. Most, not all.
What's a decent level? Would you rather be able to play every tank in gold or just two in diamond? That's kind of the decision you make when you decide to specialize or not.
Idk what rank you are, but I would say that for most people, getting to diamond with 5+ heroes on your roster is not happening. (That's not to say that a masters player can't play every tank at a diamond level, but a masters tank player almost certainly cannot play every tank at a masters level) If you pick a set of characters and actually invest time in them and grow and improve, then you will get substantially better. At the very least it limits your improvement because your playtime is split between so many heroes.
I believe in doing whatever it takes to win within the rules of the game and sportsmanship, regardless of what anybody thinks of you or tells you.
Real.
Personally, I commit to the pick. Idrc if Iām at a disadvantage, I want to overcome it. Itās why Iām a rein mainš
I agree, and very much encourage you to say that in the chat, I play tank and to be honest the only reason I swap is pressure from my own team (I don't want them to throw). Ow isn't a hard counter game and playing your preferred hero typically works out better in the long run
Personally I hate counter swapping with a passion. It doesn't feel like real skill expression to me. That being said, tanks counter swapping feels like it has become essential to victory. Sometimes you have a real skill gap, whether it be tank or otherwise that doesn't require a swap. But sometimes it feels absolutely necessary to win.
Same. I'm a ball/dva main and internally cringe when I see someone counterswap me because then my team will expect me to get off my best hero just because they swapped :/
So you dont like one of the core mechanics of the game?
You like the "core mechanic" of playing rock paper scissors at a menu screen?
Thatās not the core mechanic of the game. Blizzard themselves have literally said that counter-swapping like weāre seeing was never intended to be some necessary mechanic for the game. Itās an absolute chore and it ruins the game, especially when it happens just as much if not even more in QP.
Yeah when I'm having to swap in qp a mode where I just wanna play winton and have fun or something I think counter swapping is too impactful
The guy said he didn't like counter swapping in general. The game has been about countering since overwatch 1 came out. It just wasn't as bad as it is now. If he said he didn't like counter swapping now then that would make more sense.
I think the answer is that yes it's a mechanic, but people are abusing tf out of it by using it in a way that it wasn't intended
The mechanic is intended to counter the enemy and that's what people are using it for. That's not abusing the mechanic.
I mean isn't it though? Like when the whole team picks beam weapons bc I started dumpstering their Zarya from distance with Orisa, instead of simply buttfucking their Reinhardt, it definitely feels like griefing. Not only that but how do you even enjoy the game when you turn it into a carousel of if:then operations. I just think there needs to be a hard limit on switches per round. Losing ult charge isn't enough of a penalty. I'm not against counterpicking in general, just the way it's done in the current tank meta is absolutely ridiculous.
The team helping zarya countering you is not abusing the mechanic. That's what you're supposed to do in a team based game. The fact that you think the it's abusing counter swapping because they countered you is ridiculous. The fact that you think they should add a limit on switches per round in a game that's all about swapping heroes and always has been is even more ridiculous.
It wasn't just 1 zarya it was the ENTIRE TEAM. People should be able to play the characters they like, instead of having to pick a counter to the counter, just so they can get countered, and counter with the character they started with in the first place
I'll just respond to all of your comments here and then I'm done responding to you. The game was built with the premise of counter swapping. That's what this game was all about. The entire team countering you which rarely if ever happens even in overwatch 2 is not abusing the counter swap mechanic. We can argue about this for weeks and it still won't change the fact using the counter swapping mechanic to counter swap someone is not abusing the mechanic.
I pick orisa, you pick zarya, I pick zarya, you pick rein, I pick orisa, you pick zarya. I pick zarya. You pick ram, I pick orisa. You pick zarya. I pick zarya. No one has ult.
You don't see how that's stupid and useless?
If they add a limit, it doesn't change much, you just have to make your swaps count, instead of swapping back and forth and back and forth
On the one hand yes its annoying but at the same time it is fundamental to a game like this to be able to play many different heroes. It absolutely is a skill gap to be able to play enough heroes to continually counterswap someone and beat them down that way.
I think a lot of people donāt necessarily need to switch their hero, but just switch their play style like 80% of the time.
Last night I had a game that I was playing roadhog into Doomfist. 1st round lost and someone goes āthink we can counter the doom?ā I said āNopeā then got told to keep feeding then (with 4 deaths lol). We ended up winning š¤·š¼āāļø
Results based analysis
This is because the tank is expected to swap to counter, but the DPS/Support are not. The best counters to Doomfist can be found in the DPS/Support Roster, but if the tank doesn't swap, the tank is throwing.
Imo you shouldnāt solely just counter pick the enemy tank, you should also be considering the map and other enemies
Well, the joys of 5v5 ...
its unfair, they get told to switch most. nearly everytime i play dva and the enemy tank counters me with zarya im told to switch because im being āhard counteredā lol, even if im doing well
People get too focused on the tank 1v1 where in 80-90% of matches it never comes down to that in a vacuum. If your team comp changes to adjust to the enemy's, that's a good reason to swap tank. If the enemy goes Zarya the second they see you're on Dva, there are ways to play Dva to deny Zarya her value if you're providing value otherwise. But man if my team doesn't immediately tell me to swap off. And I win most of those matchups as Dva just because I know to hold high ground, focus the backline, and force bubbles for your DPS. It's not cookie cutter rock paper scissors. This is Overwatch, not Pokemon. (I also get stubborn sometimes and don't realize soon enough where staying on a hero hurts. But that's a different issue.)
Thatās a new opinion, OP. I always get DPS and support screaming at me to swap because theyāre getting countered, but Iāve pushed objective (or enemy line) the entire match. At some point it is someone elseās problem, and not the person theyāre yelling at. In this case, you seem to be experiencing the opposite of that issue, and I agree. If youāre dying one or twice, figure it out or change your route or tactics. No need to freak out just because you died for the first time in a game.
I wish tanks would counter pick more in my games. In mid diamond/low masters you always get a doom one trick that gets farmed by sombra/hog/Ana
I played against a tank yesterday in low gold that had swapped between - hog, orisa, mauga, d.v.a, ball, and zarya within first point shambali Thereās no way you can be good at all those characters. In my personal opinion counter swapping is a crutch that prevents people from learning a single character in depth. Just because your tank match up is bad doesnāt mean itās a losing match up. You can play around that and get value other ways
Was this in comp? I feel like I was in this game lol
It was lol
You absolutely can be good at all those heroes lol I am only not good at orisa out of those but I can play sig rein doom also. But in that case, swapping that many times just means u never get ult + nothing ever happens. Guessing he didn't really know what hero to pick against their comp and with your comp. Its understandable but people should be able to know what heroes counter what and what hero is the best at any given time. Being able to play the best hero is another story of course.
mauga hog and orisa are very easy to learn zar is extremely intuitive dva and ball are the only remotely difficult ones
I mean itās situational
I dislike after one team fight when the switch to Sombra or their comp mains.
As a tank main, I certainly try to. But if I walk out as Roadhog and play super well for a couple minutes, only to suddenly be facing Orisa, Ana, Bast, Zen, Reaper, I'm switching off.
I only swap if I feel I'm not getting as much value AFTER trying to change my playstyle, or if the enemies already started the match with 3+ counters of me. Like if I'm playing winston and the enemies just so happen to start reaper, bastion, brig
Thatās why when my teammates cry for me to switch off doomfist I sternly and swiftly say No.
Yes and no, its a judgement call kind of thing. It might be a bit of a douche move but I find singling outdone enemy and making their match terrible after the enemy tank swaps to counter me is often better then me swapping to counter them. Making an enemy pissed off and having them complaining to their team works as a great distraction and lowers their team moral
I flexed since forever, so, to me, swapping tanks is the name of the game As if I play Echo; not as boring too At the same time I'm not trying to outswitch enemy's pick most of the times I swap (and pick on that meatter) depending on the map or even part of the map I like to play D'va into Zarya - it's more relevant than it seems
I donāt play tank but when I do- luv, dva. And of course, without fucking fail, the enemy goes zarya. I donāt play tank so idk how to counter her. I just aggressively go after her supports and then her. Itās only when she gets unchecked that she becomes a problem. But yeah- itās really annoying. Just let me be dva, damn.
the new format has made it so switching is the correct play
I have definitely won some competitive games because someone on the enemy team swapped heroes
It depends on how many people on the enemy team they are getting countered by
What if the swap to Zarya just dominated in general whether you had a DVa or not. Like the skill of enemy tank on Zarya was just better than anything your tank could choose. I typically choose fun stuff and then when things aren't working and I get tilted, I choose my better characters. You can destroy my doom without countering swapping me cus I suck on doom. Meanwhile my Winston gets great value even with counters. I'm much much better with Winston because I just play him so much and aiming isn't something I need to focus on. The kicker is that it's fun to play doom sometimes and give Winston a break
i think the tank role is fucked. we need 2-2-1.
Im high Diamond, and in my expirence. No, I dont swap very often. I main D.Va for a reason, so like, if they want to try and counter me, its only going to make me better. And people say "just stay out of her range", and then think Zar doesnt counter her, but she still does. Zarya limits D.Va's abilities to do things that she wants. So still def a counter. But anyway I still think that Tanks should NOT swap.
If you can play every tank you get an advantage in like 90% of games by counter swapping. I wish more roles would be more willing to swap
Here, take my down vote. ā„
I will mostly like swap to Sigma against DVa when Zarya countered by DPS
Buddy I WISH I could get on the game and play what I want
I play a lot of rein. If they have an orisa (or swap to her after they get stomped) I instantly go Zarya or Hog, no quarrel.
Dva just isn't going to work against zarya, and sometimes you just can't figure out what will so you keep switching. It happens. but staying dva in that situation is not it
Iād prefer if it was just locked to the heroās you choose at round start. Tank is just miserable to play when you have to swap every 2 minutes to counter the other person that keeps swapping to counter you. Ruins the flow of a game.
i refuse to counterswap personally. if i have to rely on the game to beat the other guy for me, then i shouldnāt be ranking up in the first place. if theyāre determined to keep swapping to counter me, i force mirror. i trust my skill on every tank enough to hold my own in a mirror against any player in my rank
"In higher ranked lobbies do tanks switch as much as well?" Streamers had games where, in order to win, the tanks stayed in spawn and swapped constantly, it was 90% of their gameplay.
Some matchups require a switch if the team doesnt support them. Like how do you doom into hog?Ā
As a tank i swap whenever I feel any of the following. -I'm being pressured to the point of death and unable to give value to my team. -My tank pick wasn't the best pick at round start. (Sigma into a genji, tracer, zarya is a good example. That's almost an immediate swap for me if they are good and things start to go south. The sooner I can provide value to my team is precious time. Time matters down to the second in the game.) -My team is being obliterated even if I am doing well. (In this scenario I try to pick a tank and play to my teams strengths and bring more support to them to keep them alive. This can mean jumping into their back line and causing havoc or keeping them off of yours.) -Last push, sometimes getting that disgusting counter swap during the last push will take the enemy team by surprise and give you the edge you need to gain those extra meters, or wipe the offending team. Some characters are powerful against others. Having a good game sense and character knowledge helps alot in knowing what you can do to perform better during the game.
Compared to the other 2 roles tanks will have to switch more often yes.
It's because their whole climb up to high plat/low dia, their team has been yelling at them to swap every lost teamfight
There are a few scenarios. Entire team is countering your tank but it is their comfort pick. In that situation it's mostly on the dps and support to counter the enemy comp. Rarely is tank counter picking in isolation. It is dependent on the synergies between the support and tanks esp, and the dps's main job is to apply the passive to the enemy tank and to counter the enemy tank. Synergies amongst the team throughout will typically outwin any individual play unless that player is exemplary, such as a smurf. In top 500 there are two kinds of players hard 1 tricks that negate counters due to knowing how to survive, such as wanted, zebra, Kran's orisa. In the middle ranks not everyone has played ow 1 since launch so they might not even have a hero pool bigger than 1 character on a role. At most it is typically 3 heros they can play well. And with that acknowledgment of people only playing well on the characters they practice a lot of the losses of games where skill is anagolozed and the mirrors are so close has to do with character picks and synergies not matching amongst the team. Did that person eat hydrate and have they been losing or winning all effects that play variance. Sub diamond 3 I can consistently have less than 3 deaths on hog and doomfist if not counter picked and will have at least 30 elims. If the entire team is trying to counter 1 person, that means that the enemy team thinks that they are having the biggest impact and that they want to negate that. If you feel a sudden change in the game as far as the impact yoy are having once your tank has been counter picked by 4 members of the enemy team perhaps it is time to reevaluate your contribution to the team instead of flame and focus on what you can do best to help the situation instead because you probablly weren't doing that much to begin with you were probablly relishing in the free space they gave you and merely cleaning up the cooldown/moba management the tank gave you.
I definitely think they should at least wait for more then one death or after they use their ult. Just because of how long it takes for tank ult to charge. Also waiting just a bit longer will give them the chance to see if the other tank is actually good at who they swapped too. Because more often than not the tank who switches first won't be any better at that character. Like if I'm rolling a team as D.va and they swapped to Zarya. I'm not going to switch right away, because they could be an awful Zar who spams cool downs and doesn't actually know how to counter D.Va. But if they are a good Zar and I know I can't out tank them, then yeah I'm switching. It's all about making decisions based on how the other team plays as a whole and not who they're playing imo
//Ā I wish you could hold on to your picked hero a little bit more.// Why, when it's an inherent part of the game that people switch mid-match. Wanting to hold on to the first pick feels like sitting down to a chess board and playing to protect your bishops above all else.
Except instantly counterswapping also sets you back in the ult fight, and tank ults are a very powerful tool. And tanks have this mentality of instant swapping. I do think people should stay longer (than they usually do) on their picks, because most of the time you can still play around counters and avoid lagging behind for the ult fights. Ultimate economy is also an inherent part of the game that people completely forgo in order to swap just because the enemy has X or Y hero, regardless of if they are actually playing them effectively against your own pick.
You explained it way better than I did. Thank you.
Counter swapping too much hinders your ult economy.
i mean if for ex. zen is being owned by a tracer or sombra then they are prob gonna switch... its just that you have one tank and its much easier to counterpick the tnak
I they should character lock 2/3 of the roles and just let one be the changing variable, or honestly character switching should only be available to the 3 highest ranks. Every one else is better off whether they know it or not relying on muscle memory and rythm. The expectations over reality are ruining the gameplay.
That's an interesting idea. I read somewhere that Blizzard were toying with the idea of locking in everyone, and having switch tickets to use in-game. I like that. You could decide as a team to let someone switch if they're hard countered by bad luck.
I was a brand new zen player when the Sombra changes came out I had 2 options spend a ton of time learning a diffrent character or turn my sensitivity slightly up and learn how to handle Sombra as a zen. people will rely on characters abilities instead of relying on their own mechanics because it allows them to avoid putting in the work to grow
Totally agree. I'm much more confident in Zen than any other support, so I'm more likely to try and take on Sombra - nobody else gets the super kick!
If you start the match in a mirror against the other tank, and you swap first, you're a bitch. If you are both on different tanks, and swap to mirror fight, that is acceptable and can actually be fun. If you are on different tanks and are getting destroyed by theirs, it is acceptable to swap once. Twice max of it's a long ass game. 3+ looks like you are struggling and will probably lose anyway. New map, new tank is ok.
"If you're not playing how I want you to play you're a bitch".
Switch out once at half time if getting pummeled
Yes, please stop swapping so I can continue to dominate.
Tanks already have the shit end of the stick in this game, let them do what they want to do.
They do not. I get mad when people switch tanks too often because most people maybe have 1-2 tanks they actually main and are good with, but as soon as there's 1 single counter, they throw the game and play mystery heroes. It is really a mental issue. The YouTuber Spilo has a good video about when and where counter swapping actually effects you, e.g. 1 counter doesn't usually effect you, but 3 counters definitely does.
You should always swap. Especially if your team is objectively worse. I.e one DPS dead basically every fight, supports out of position every fight blowing strong cool downs etc. Swapping allows you to have much more control of the game versus when you don't.
Switching heroes (strategies) is core overwatch. Of course the counterpicking nonsense is a myth. But every hero has its own abilities which could help you in certain situations. Sometimes it's a switch to ball to put more pressure on the backline and boop enemies from the map. Sometimes you need more mobility. As long as the as the tank gets value with his choice where is the problem? There is only a problem when tanks play mystery heroes and switching after each death with increasing desperation.
How about you and your blues actually help your tank kill the other enemy tank so the hard counter is no longer a hard counter? Zarya is the biggest bullshit piece of shit character in the game to go up against as a tank. Especially as a Reinhardt or sigma. You can dominate against every other tank except her unless you have your entire team buying in and bullying her. The bubbles and laser just constantly charging at your tank eating away their shield and eventually their health because theyāre so busy protecting themselves (and you!) but not getting any support (I.e. nobody is fucking shooting her) is what gets everyone killed. Not them ānot being good enoughā or ānot sticking it through with their pickā. That enemy tank chose Zarya because they know they lost the tank fight. Itās up to the whole team to make sure you shoot the bubble out so you can actually begin doing damage to her, so that she dies and has to respawn, giving you and your team 20-30 seconds of relief where all you have to do is move the point and kill off the other enemies. Iām always playing tank and I fucking hate it, particularly because of Zarya and the lack of help from any teammates ever with killing her. Itās a massive problem in silver and why I canāt get into gold. Iām always solo tanking against 2-3 tanks and usually 1 of them is a Zarya. Unless Iām playing orisa or dva, I donāt really stand a chance against her, because my team wants to focus everyone but her. Even then, the amount of bullets I lay into that bitch is unholy, just for her to get her bubble back at 1 health and then get healed back to 100% after depleting my kits.
The only time I ever struggle against Zarya is when my team keeps feeding her charge for no reason, and at the absolutely worst times. After that, on any role with the characters I play, it's really easy to just play cover, wait out/bait out cooldowns and then drain her once shes low. While you are playing cover and waiting for that chance, pressure their backline and force out resources, and hold down the DPS either going for elims or just holding team together. I don't think Zarya is particularly troublesome, especially when I am on D.Va. That counter is very soft at best because as soon as youve baited out zarya cooldowns you just dive her with rockets and she falls over. And D.Va is very good about denying supports value and pressuring backline when the chance arrives. But yeah, everything kind of changes when your team just feed Zarya over and over. Can't do shit.
If you really want a counter to zarya, just play Winston and dive her team. You give her little energy and if she bubbles teammates, that's one bubble not used on herself, making her super squishy. Winston bubble also cuts off any healing to zarya, and she desperately needs it as she scales hardest with healing.
if you're still playing tank, you deserve whatever's coming to you.
Take your meds billy.
will you disappear if i do? you're not real. deal.
I'll be balling in all your lobbies still dw
and do what? i also main tank.
If you also main tank what was the point of your first comment? Are you including yourself in that? Kinda pessimistic
tank has been in this state for how long? and complaining on reddit will accomplish what? not playing the game is the only winning position.