6v6 vs. 5v5: The Verdict (Full Dev Blog Reaction)

[@CoachSpilo]

Regardless of your stance, there's a TON to unpack here- what was your favorite "tidbit" from this blog?

[@ILOVEDRAINDRAINLOVESME]

hi

[@spookiboys]

the bit about thinking about making team comps more flexible has me really excited. maybe a true "flex" queue role where you can play any role (1 per team) or something?

[@dongdoodler]

Q ratio looks good after they gigabuffed the whole role to an unfun extent, it is most likely not indicative of the long term q ratio

[@mattgeffery8577]

the most interesting thing is that they dont take into account that there are just way more dps heros than the other roles. it makes sense that they would be the most qued role in a "hero" shooter. likewise most people would agree that support characters are more attractive on average than the tank, which leads to people picking them more. it just is strange that it is never discussed on a face, not gameplay level. i mean face in a literal sense when looking at psychology (look at who is more likely to be hired, based on looks, with similar qualifications)

[@tjfkc]

giving us hard data on the queue times. pretty hard to argue it

[@Jamesington]

Thank you for being a defender of Role Queue. Best change in the game's history for sure. The frustration of so many games being lost right out the gate because 5 of your teammates locked DPS characters and left voice chat was immeasurable. I put hundreds of hours into characters I didn't even like just because I was sick of losing. And I played up to mid diamond before role queue came out.

[@deathb1ossom]

Yup, if role queue had never been implemented I would have stopped playing such a long time ago

[@awarepillow1180]

I can hardly play DPS in Paladins because I actually want to win so I usually get stuck with Tank

[@Doople]

When the 4th DPS player tries making one of the other DPS go mercy while you wait on tank wondering if the game is over. Peak OW1

[@pippo17173]

Unfortionly the devs never stop to think that maybe they should now focus on pushing out content for the roles to avoid reaching the point that people miss it. Like seroulsy they left the other roles hungry while shoving all the dps love in their fat bellies.

[@ooooswain]

Yay now instead of 5dps you get 1 role sucks and nothing anybody can do about it gg go next. Role lock benefited nobody. In fact I believe it just gave everyone more unwinnable games. 5dps games were always more winnable than getting a game where 1 role sucks. Role lock just makes you feel better.

[@IsleOfHopelessMinds]

BRO Spilo: Guys I’ve been married for 10 years Chat: !age 😂😂😂😂

[@Disappointed_Philosoraptor]

also just arrived there, comedy gold.

[@runaway74]

I've been wondering his age myself

[@neilmallick20]

@@runaway74 he's 30 i think

[@runaway74]

@@neilmallick20 thank you stank

[@cocoapuff_x]

⁠@@runaway74his name is neil 😠😠🤓

[@TheBigLime111]

Saying "thanks, man" to your wife is so funny.

[@argo_ii3114]

He’s married?

[@venatise]

Imagine they don’t do it because of performance concerns for Nintendo switch 😵‍💫

[@smpltxt.]

BUT OVERWATCH 1 WAS ON SWITCH I WAS THERE WHEN IT HAPPENED I HAVE 500 HOURS ON OW2 ON SWITCH, ITS MOST DEFINITELY POSSIBLE

[@lemonpulp5640]

They’re gonna put overwatch on switch? 🤦‍♂️ dumbest thing I’ve heard today

[@DrowningKraken]

@@lemonpulp5640 It's already on switch

[@its_lucky2526]

honestly that's very fair from a business standpoint, they will get screwed over even more that they already are. but the mistake was putting it on switch in the first place. i tried it on switch, frames drops below 30, textures sometimes don't load in, and good luck aiming on joy cons. if you want to disable crossplay, have fun with 10 hour queue times.

[@Kintaku]

@@lemonpulp5640it’s already on the Switch. The concern here is that if the Switch can’t handle 6v6, they won’t be able to make the change because they don’t want to remove it from the platform.

[@Falloutx360a]

Regarding role queue: I understand people being opposed to FORCED 2/2/2 in the main modes, but 2/2/2 was pretty widely preferred even in open queue; players just didn’t wanna be the person to swap off DPS

[@drjonathan7286]

I remember me and my friends typing 2-2-2 in the chat each and every match. Glad that is no longer necessary. Although a way to implement more varied comp structures could be really cool if possible.

[@bodacious12]

in practice that almost never happened, the most common comp i remember was 4 dps 1 tank and 1 support

[@LuigixD]

I think I mostly only had fun playing with a balanced 2-2-2 comp, but even with that structure, you still needed a decent tank, DPS and support duo synergy, specially tank synergy. I'm glad I don't have to play with more Hogs that won't ever synergize with any tank and only have to worry about not having Mercy/Moira/Lifeweaver

[@aurens.]

whenever i see comments these days about 'we never needed role queue, every match was 2-2-2 anyway' i just roll my eyes. yea dude, it's because a ton of those tank and support players were basically bullied into those roles. role queue was a godsend and i feel like most people that opposed it were either oblivious DPS-only players who never switched no matter what or people who already wanted to play tank/support regardless.

[@chiefinasmith]

I remember pre role queue where you’d have 4-5 dps. You’d have to decide if a support or a tank was more important. If the other team actually wanted to win and played real comps, it was an auto loss.

[@AutumnReel4444]

It was mad, but dope. Won many an unlikely game with those comps! We all did. Goood times. Role queue is better though, probably

[@blackout995]

They had to introduce Ball exclusively because they needed a tank who could play without his team 😅 4 dps + ball & mercy was fun but not healthy for the game in the long run

[@Tynine]

Exactly, Role-Queue + 5v5 offers (obv) less freedom. But if freedom means not being allowed to play the role I wanna play or auto lose, I don't want that kind of freedom.

[@chiefinasmith]

@@Tynine keep role queue, bring back 6v6

[@SunderMun]

Eh, it was bad but not auto loss. I won a number (it at least felt like majority, but idk the real number) of those games thanks to being a full flex player that could adapt to the situation, often going solo heal since they can't do a thing if they're just dead.

[@cdt5559]

“Thanks man” is an even bigger controversy than the video 😂. Love it. Been married 15 years. Just giving you crap Spilo.

[@primalinea682]

Time stamp pls?😢

[@liv21697]

@@primalinea682 34:44

[@KKJazz]

When given the opportunity, players will _optimize the fun_ out of a game.

[@avariciousgaming1695]

I feel like there was a lot of changes that will make 6v6 more fun. Certain heroes, passives, and quality of life changes that will make 6v6 healthier.

[@donovan4222]

Yep, half the stuff Aaron cited there about stun locks in 6v6 was either removed from the game or nerfed in OW2, and you don’t need 5v5 to do that

[@jopvasquez6056]

​@@donovan4222sure but the queue time thing remains. The only way to fix this would be to make tank an equally popular class to play as dps or support, which is MUCH easier said than done.

[@blaine6207]

Tank will always suck in 5v5. you get mirrored by the enemy tank countered by their dps and hit with all the support cooldowns.

[@karl_margs]

Quinston comp is like an NFL team with only a center and QB and nine receivers lol

[@So_Stupendous]

Lmao. It might be more like 9 quarterbacks and one jacked linebacker.

[@karl_margs]

@@So_Stupendous haha! or maybe just eleven centers...

[@addvector4918]

Absolutely amazing dev blog. Great to see a bit behind the curtain on the game design at Blizzard and the technical challenges of those decisions

[@qtunicorn2123]

40:00 I remember at one point they had to adjust the matchmaking so that they match the MMRs based on roles rather than the just averaging the entire stack. This was because teams tended to lose more when there was a disparity in Tank MMRs.

[@yamchacrater2913]

Didn’t custa say there was no point talking about 6v6 and it would never happen??

[@trevorbergstrom00]

Yeah custa is a loser if you didn't know

[@kingclampz6081]

@@trevorbergstrom00agreed he’s just a loser anyone whose actually a fan of his needs to look in the mirror

[@chiefinasmith]

He needed that Porsche paycheck

[@yamchacrater2913]

@@trevorbergstrom00 I try not to judge but the way he went off on Samito was absurd and now I think it’s funny that he has to eat his words

[@trevorbergstrom00]

@@yamchacrater2913 custa is trash and completely fake and a shill that has an ego problem. Imagine how samito has felt the last few years of this shit just for custa to jump on the dog pile too. Glad samito has been proven right though.

[@pikazilla6405]

Pre role que had a massive effect on my identity as a player because I almost felt conditioned to play support for more consistent games, starting out dps was my immediate go to but when that didn't give me consistent results I almost felt bullied into support roles.

[@Xfacta12482]

Genuinely believe that anyone saying role queue or hero limits ruined the game didn't even play the game then.

[@FlightX101]

They were NOT there for OG cancer overwatch lmao……

[@lavitz3045]

Loved the vid, especially after coming from Samitos reaction which felt exhausting. I dont understand why he just told Aaron he's wrong and should play the 6v6 custom for most of the video. I also think flats made a good point about pain points, like chokes and ult stacking, existing mainly due to 2cp still being in the game. But also anyone who says que times were not a large factor in this format change is just in denial and i dont understand why it's glossed over

[@MotionCoMMotion]

15:07 "Tank players, you have more engage options. You might have fewer choices, and you might be victimized by rock, paper, scissors more"

[@bran4457]

Add the rest of the quote.

[@lukasg4807]

I hated tank in ow1...

[@Valroirr]

Now then ive only played 5v5 , never experienced 6v6 and so idm, im rather looking forward to how its gonna be in those tests, im pretty optimistic towards it and i rather like the way they expplained it to the community

[@gphonk7359]

I'm so excited to be able to play 6v6 again. There has never been a single moment of OW2 where I felt like the format change was a net positive. I'm biased bc I'm old and grew up playing lobby based games where you'd wait 5-10min for everyone to ready up before each match, but I would much rather wait a few minutes longer for a 6v6 match. What I miss most is being able to win a fight or at least fall back and survive even after enemy team gets first pick, instead of just getting insta wiped as soon as someone dies. A 4v5 feels consistently atrocious compared to 5v6.

[@魚-c3d]

You have been able to play 6v6 since March/April. Join a "6v6 adjustments" custom game, there you go.

[@Wusyaname_]

@@gphonk7359 I’m a ow2 only player and 5v5 has been pretty fun. I play lot of doomfist, but also other roles. Excited to see 6v6 and how tank duos would play together. I am a little scared that with DPS passive and 12 players instead of 10, I’m gonna have to be spamming heals as bap more because there will be more damage tho.

[@michaelpurdon7032]

The two things that really stand out to me that get handwaved in most of these discussions are that the tank experience, while important, is the least important in the big picture of decision making and that the root of the problem tanks face is most likely rooted in decisions made many years ago therefore bouncing back between 5v5 and 6v6 isn't really a solution at all.

[@D_Jilla]

How do you figure its the least important in decision making?

[@魚-c3d]

Bouncing from 6v6 to 5v5 was not the solution in the first place. It is universally acknowledged that 6v6, while not solving every problem, inherently makes the tank experience better without having to turn them into unkillable raid bosses.

[@darkrl591]

​@user-cy6xl3vd3f they literally said that they changed 6v6 because tanks were unkillable since there's two. DPS had to face 2 raid bosses and supports had to healbot those 2 raid bosses. Yeah Tank players were chilling but the rest of the roles were miserable, not even mentioning queue times.

[@zacplumridge3833]

@@darkrl591Tanks were not unkillable the power and health pool was shared across 2 of them and that meant it was easier to focus and kill one if they miss positioned or wasted their defensive abilities.

[@abudgie6909]

​@darkrl591 tanks were definitely far more punishable in 6v6. They had less HP, and if you isolated a tank, you could take them out. That being said, there were some balance/design issues that made it feel like what you're describing. Specifically the strength of sigma and orisa as well as bap's insane aoe healing and lamp.

[@zackgray7061]

I enjoyed the vid! My mind isn't nearly as analytical as yours; I wish it was. The main thing my little brain is worried about in going back to 6v6 is the lack of room to get thru chokes. There are so many choke points in OW, and picturing trying to get thru a Sigma with his cooldown loop and Dva alternating Defense Matrix on King's Row terrifies me. I feel like getting thru chokes in 5v5 is so much easier, or it at least gives the illusion of being easier. There's more room to move, and 1 giga tank feels easier to manage then 2 tanks w/ old OW1 hp.

[@Alex_Asp]

Double bubble with Smurf and Hanbin… heaven

[@Meese12]

2:43 i think a good word to use here is intuitive. 6v6 has more intuitive solutions for the tank issues that SEEM like they would work, but we cant be sure

[@W3_Ar3_Phobos]

I knew there was a lot going on behind the curtain but dam lol. Its above my pay grade to know what’s what. Fascinating takes. Love the content , keep it up. Thanks man!!

[@hardstuck_styx]

The fact that the nintendo switch EVER got overwatch is wild to me. i heavily doubt there’s even 100,000 players ever on it, let alone that many now.

[@jonstokes1832]

I think hero perks mixed with 6v6 would work really well, for example healing more for people under 50% hp is better in a 6v6 format where there is more to do in the healing and damage category however this is specifically good because area heals are generally better the more people there are but these kinds of perks allow you to even the playing field but it won’t be easy

[@MasterMemo]

Thank you so much for the comments on needing Role Queue. I loved being able to swap between Support and a support style Sombra...but the community didn't make it viable. Glad we have role queue now. Marvel Rivals is showing how much you need it.

[@dkon1434]

Spilo: "Let's be objective here!" as he continues to throw around his opinion like it's fact.

[@MetalBuffalos]

Initial opposition to this idea would be understandably precedented, but to ameliorate the solo tank issue, rather than trying making them juggernauts, they could instead try reducing hitbox sizes slightly and reverting the insane tank buffs. I think junkerqueen serves as an example of hitbox impact with her not only being the smallest tank, but also having been a recipient of hitbox buffs/nerfs in the passive with substantive effects

[@tjfkc]

how about this as a quality of life change for tank without them feeling gigabuffed to other players: give them a minimap so they know where their allies are behind them, etc. I also think you could remove the ult retention if not for everyone that at least for tanks to help mitigate the counterswap game somewhat for them

[@rsmith8113]

Defo ult retention should be removed. Not sure about the minimap

[@RunicSoulEater]

As someone who occasionally plays OW2 on my Ps4 PRO, that system can barely handle it, can only image what they would have to do to make 6v6 work on the switch.

[@P-39_Airacobra]

I've never seen Spilo so enthusiastic

[@Sneezy_04]

I will say in silver and gold it is very common for every person to be in the same rank. I didn’t start seeing rank discrepancies until I reached mid plat and it started getting bigger and more common in plat 1.

[@GoyfAscetic]

I am one of those idiots that believes that role queue was not the best way to solve OW's composition problems, just the simplest solution.

[@wernerheisenberg8437]

Spilo’s rank idea for role impact is genius, the exact sort of thing I come here for

[@SocialDesignFlaw]

Re: How do you test which Role has the most impact? The argument falls apart around the variable of "Which Tank?" A Diamond Zarya might not be a Diamond Reinhardt/Mauga/Winston/etc. and, consequently, perform at significantly different layers and levels than if they were playing their ideal...which is not really possible in Overwatch 2, because Tank is more about what you need to switch to, as opposed to what you want to switch to. But all of that is academic b/c the design of the game has Tiers of mechanical value to it (not least of which is Design Escalation, which is the design side of Power Creep), that ensure certain heroes are going to be strong even in a relatively weak role. OW2 has, especially, made this worse. Tier 1 - Moira's Fade makes her invisible, denies most collision, increases her speed, and gives her verticality in the right circumstances as well as cleanses certain effects (not sure if they removed this last one for OW2). Each of these has small indications for how and when it can be used and might even be considered (by today's standards) "fair". Tier 2 - Baptiste's Immortality Field removes the ability to secure an elimination or even do damage if they reach that minimum. The compounding effect of denying ult charge, damage, and potential elims until Lamp is gone (which, the actual totem of Immortality Field has a significant health pool with no critical point, demanding a high damage CD or focus fire) removes fundamental mechanics from the gameplay and shrinks the enemies possible options down to a very small list of responses. Tier 3 - Protection Suzu does most of the stuff from the first 2 Tiers combined, while ensuring the enemy can continue to act normally, with a limitation defined not by what the enemy can do against it, but by how imprecise the Kiri is with the, rather forgiving, AoE and timing. Drastically different impacts for what those abilities are trying to do at any given point and I didn't even cover the fact Kiri/Ramm ult is a Tier above those (manipulating cooldowns, which are a UI element for players, not a mechanic for heroes, is next level escalation). This is why it is incredibly important to know there are two different categories of design for heroes in the game: Role Design and Hero Design And every hero can have radically different layers and values for both. Ask yourself how many Tanks actually are good at their Role vs. are Good Hero Design. Then do the same for Supports/DPS... And see how different a lot of them come across in the variables for each.

[@bored7923]

I hate how this debate started due to the hardware limitations of the rushed ow2 engine

[@donovan4222]

@@bored7923 bruh how did we get a sequel with a weaker engine that can’t even handle 12 players 🤣

[@frankie494]

@@donovan4222 this is complete bullshit, the OW2 engine is improved. We have maps WAY WAY larger than they ever were in OW1 and there is no limitation of 12 players. You can literally play with 100s of character on screen in workshop mode with no drop in FPS.

[@Teh_Duck]

@@frankie494 have you played 11kids 1 dad? the mode crashes practically every round due to the number of abilities

[@olegdusov4273]

​@@frankie494this! I play Rein zombie mode, when im waiting for a match. Ow is super optimized. Maybe dev forgot to include "Switch version" in his blogpost

[@gamist8166]

​@@frankie494are you sure the engine got more than like a 5% improvement and features like Nvidia reflex? Looks like the exact same game to me. The skyboxes on some maps like Hollywood are still super tiny in comparison to what you can get to. I just don't see the new engine in really any way but maybe the sound upgrades

[@thedofflin]

Experimentation is always worth it.

[@EirTheGhost]

I think that not a lot of people remember is that a vast majority of 6v6 was during a time where balancing let's be honest just didn't exist or wasn't pushing for the better of the game. As spilo mentioned a lot of the fun and probably (better heros) that should have been meta just weren't and it ultimately is what caused things like GOATs and double shield to suck so much. Let's be honest if team comps and gameplay from the apex S2 and 3 times were more meta than bunker, double shield and goats then we may not have even had 5v5 in the first place. On top of that a lot of the other issues of supports being heal bots and 2 tanks having too much sustain and too many CC's again could have been solved through balancing and changing abilities. One other problem with queue times in general is just the lack of emphasizing the impact that different roles could have. Again people didn't play tank cause getting CC'd to hell, dealing with mob boss brig, and playing worse tanks like orisa, sig, and hog just made people not as interested. But if instead the meta were Winston, Dva, zarya, Rein that tanks would have had more people interested. People didn't like support being a heal bot and weren't able to make impactful plays or do them as often. I guess the TLDR is 6v6 was never an issues if given the right balancing. That could be true for 5v5 as well however I think there's one problem with it which is the solo tank. Back in 6v6 skill would balance out in that one could pick up the slack of another or better yet one could take over the role. That isn't the case for ow2 tank. Not did those problems still happen. Yes the rein brawls. Better atleast maybe your other tank could maybe swap and do a better job or with a second tank could provide more protection and support for your main tank. But in ow2 you don't have that. In fact it's even worse now with the Super tanks. It's pretty much now just a toss up of who's the better tank and it SHOWS. I feel like 75% of time if you're the better tank you will win. Compared to support or dps where instead it's maybe like 60%. I probably ranted and got off course but I main take away is that. If the dev and balancing team pushing the better sides of the game, and the community saw the game more for what it was at the time and not solely and fps shooter that we would still be in 6v6 and 5v5 would have never existed.

[@coreylittle450]

Experimentation is crucial. I hope the community stops hating and blaming them for experimenting with stuff. We’ll never get changes if they don’t. I’m always open minded and patient. I think the root of it is that tank is NOT a fun role to play. 6v6 will NOT make the role fun to play.

[@grr-OUCH]

You can feel it when the tank sucks, especially in comparison to the other tank. On the other hand, sometimes the tank is just "there" while the DPS does the most. Support makes a difference, and can sometimes be the best on the team, but the most impactful are usually Tank or DPS.

[@Fucusasd]

It'a nice to see a new account photo.

[@arrynchaos9912]

Its one less, not one fewer. You only use fewer when you are counting multiple subjects. Since one less is followed by a singular word (Tank) that is indeed a proper use of less.

[@pikazilla6405]

I'm gonna make the controversial take that the overwatch dev team has actually gradually gotten BETTER at balancing over time, and that the problems we face in the game are a direct result of 5v5 being fundamentally flawed and that a team this good might get closer to a more balanced game than overwatch 1's team did . Dubious balancing decisions both during overwatch 1 and overwatch 2 make it pretty difficult to judge when problems are a result of the poor decision making of certain character kits or when problems are a result of the format (mauga is just a terrible design no matter what format you put him in) but I'm pretty confident on this one. Also my basis on why 5v5 is flawed pretty much revolves around ana because this character just doesn't work in an environment where one guy is the center of attention, the fact they had to make kiriko to not make every tank player mass leave is pretty evident that the problem is the format, as ana prior to all of this was never a character with any problematic meta implications except for right after she released when beyblade meta was a thing.

[@EirTheGhost]

I agree and I'll even add that there were times where OW1 was more balanced than OW2 despite the OW2 team being more capable than OW1. With time sure 5v5 could be balanced out but it's gonna be a lot harder that and on top of more heros and maps coming out. I think if they took the time to analyze the good moments and things that 6v6 had and pushed for those things that Overwatch 6v6 was always what the game should have been and that a lot of those problems would have been resolved by now.

[@snaggiz]

I honestly think if we had this balance team with 6v6 back in the day, we’d never have this problem now.

[@rspy24]

18:12 Yep, Exactly.. It was pain too, But like you said, it didnt happen all the time, in fact some of the best matches were if you get a nice 2nd tank. At least we had fun, OW2? No bro, no fun allowed.

[@traveller6yearsago869]

Just wanna doom-ball duo with my bro 🙏

[@sera48g]

I'm praying for your teammates 😂

[@Fishrah]

The tank psych thing needs to be addressed. Either way we need something to be that second tank. Either with a literal 2nd tank or enabling the other 4players to fill in that role somehow. The tank role can't afford to be afraid of one tricking.

[@ArquivosPenumbra]

What this shows is basically they made the choice of removing a tank to make the lives of everyone else "easier" and improve queue times since few people played tank, instead of trying their best to make tank more fun to play and reworking the role and the characters in it (They were still forced to do this, just not in any way that made it more fun). "Just shove all the problems in the tanks ass, people who play this role are used to it lol" (????)

[@lukasg4807]

I prefer tank in ow2, I never touched it in ow1 but it's my most played role now.

[@snaggiz]

I think the tank role in 6v6 OW1 would’ve benefited so much from the wider tank roster that exists now as well as the overall reduction (or better balancing) of CC abilities on non-tank heroes that we have today compared to back then. It would’ve made the role far more appealing to play because it would’ve had a wider, more diverse and dynamic gameplay offering. I totally agree that the issues that made tanks miserable to play in OW1 came down exclusively to design and balance issues rather than an inherent format issue. They just never bothered to fix it. And by the time role queue game around in OW1, they were pretty much ready to abandon the live game in favor of the development of OW2 (which we all know was a fiasco in hindsight)

[@GarnetDust24]

This whole thing is a mess. What a time do be alive in game history.

[@geni_fetahu]

im perfectly happy playing spiderman in marvel rivals

[@Marc-Shiru]

married for 20 years. Stones thrown

[@xSolraccarloSx]

38:17 You're probably right Spilo but I wish Blizz did it, just because peoples reactions to it would be so funny. Maybe something to test in one of these Hacked events?

[@trav8787]

I'm going to keep saying it. There are now several variables which reduce the negatives of 6v6. There's now more options for tanks. 12 rather than 8, which is 70 something combos rather than 20 something. More offensive tanks Doomfist is now a tank Flashpoint and push are wide open maps Overall less CC Orisa doesn't have a shield It's now free to play

[@opticalmoose8091]

More players is not a factor There are more tank players now, sure; but even more dps players, and the ratio stays Aaron keeps banging on this point: it’s not about total player count, it’s about the ratio.

[@trav8787]

​@@opticalmoose8091 I didn't say more players overall fix's Q times. More players overall affects the overall quality of life with the game.

[@ironman1458]

@@opticalmoose8091 So they should just put both queues in. Since it doesn't matter the player base there should be no reason why there haven't been both queues since launch.

[@ironman1458]

@@opticalmoose8091 Aaron also said they can't add too many queues because it splits the player base too much so which is it, the player count matters or it doesnt? Pretty sure they just say whatever bullshit sounds best in the moment but don't actually care

[@Xestern]

Bringing back swapping between different roles sounds fun but man I legit think it's safer to just stick to 1 tank and continue balacing them in a better direction. But exciting times ahead, can't wait to see what they're planning

[@nihili4196]

Problem here is that heroes weren't designed for rigid roles, and role limitations for most of the game's lifespan. Also, the role division itself is inherently flawed. This game can never be balanced, but it might be at least fun for everyone

[@OniLifes]

Tbh theyve already balanced more than ow1 could get if not just behind it. And ow1 lasted a long time so shows how little balance they got. But theyve tried all these things in 5v5 and each time its just split the community or burned them enough to really frustrate peoppe. How much more balance can they reasonably put in before we just gotta throw up our hands and accept 5v5 is just not it

[@95yazid]

It's crazy to have Aaron list everything they did to try and make ppl play tank and never was the solution "make tanks more fun to play" the closest we got was "raising the floor" so it's less painful. I know they probably are trying but it's not that easy. To me it's a two part job, first find out what makes the tank experience fun for the few who play it. Then look for ways to translate it to the playerbase of other roles. But i might be wrong or oversimplifying here

[@riverofarrows7257]

Diamond tank player here: I'm excited to see a qp hacked 6v6, but I'm not excited to see 6v6 return permanently. Theres definitely merit to hero design improving 6v6, but I'm really focused on the point in the blog about opening up the map in 5v5. I really like how 5v5 feels faster and more killing focused. The moba/tank v tank aspect of OW is fun, but having more uptime of shooting at squishy characters if fun too. Its also not like tank will immediately be fun again after 6v6. The "OW tank" experience meme will still exist, just with less counter swapping

[@Adventist1997]

Platinum here... I want 6v6 back because I reverted to Gold. 😂😢

[@trevorbergstrom00]

Go play call of duty if that's what you want!! They changed the game genre going from 6v6 to 5v5. The game went from thoughtful teamwork combos to who can kill someone on the other team faster. Lame as fk and the supports are all broken

[@Adventist1997]

@@trevorbergstrom00 It was a really bad choice to force 5v5 instead of giving us a choice like they did with Open Que. If they had done that, we wouldn't even have 5v5 now. .

[@trevorbergstrom00]

@@Adventist1997 facts

[@secretlyaslug2325]

I feel exactly the same. I'm genuinely excited if they do a 6v6 gimmick mode. Get to try out new broken tank synergies get new players to see how oppressive rein zar was etc. But I really hope they don't stop investing time and resources into 5v5 heros and balance. The format is so much more fun and free. In all roles. I'd rather be encouraged to counter pick as tank than just be told what to play because of what my other tank is playing.

[@michaelpurdon7032]

I don't see how development has any impact on these numbers at all

[@Dman1235_]

Spilo. I have a concept for a MASSIVE change in OW. Roles being swapped for Runes. I can explain more in this comment as a thread. Please like if you think this has any merit/is even worth considering. SPILO/Viewer TL;DR Roles suck. Rune good? You pick up item that gives power/passive that has a glowing aura. Hog go fast. Tracer extra health. Genji burst regen. Mercy fans cry. Quake 3 is an immortal game that truly laid every brick for modern shooters. It had a very unpopular expansion known as Team Arena. In this game, you have teams based around an objective, for times sake I won’t go into the modes as you can easily find them. Quake characters are all identical, the true power is your weapon. Overwatch characters are married to their weaponry, but I’m not sure if they truly HAVE to be married to their Roles. Runes allow you to choose a different level of power/protection. These were in the spawn room, so you picked them before you left for the objective. They are items similar to health packs, so you would physically walk over and pick it up. Here are the Runes as they were in Q3TA: Scout: Double speed for quick run-ins and 25% increased fire rate; you can also rocket jump and plasma climb without taking splash damage. Used for possessing important power-ups hastily by snatching them, also hit and run techniques for distracting. Doubler: Double damage for players who want to help Scouts running for the enemy flag, or defend own base flag. Any damage burst weapon becomes devastating when bearing this. This overpowered Rune can be the sole reason why Railgun got a damage falloff by distance as a tweak in Team Arena. Guard: Health and Armor Boost up 200 with health regen, similar to a constant Regeneration effect. Mainly used for defenders to keep attackers busy, but can be useful for attacking to run for enemy flag by withstanding their shots as well. Ammo-Regen: Regenerates ammo back to starter ammunition every 1½ seconds while increasing fire rate by 25%. Mainly used by Defenders who are planning to use single-shot heavy hitters. Obviously in OW2 these can be changed, but I think rather than pickable passives in a menu, you can choose a build for your character. These reset upon death, or by swapping characters. There can be a limited amount, or playing may choose to build as a team. I know there is drawbacks. A Winston doesn’t shrink with Scout. He’s still a huge target. But increased speed, jump distance, and weapon speed makes him terrifying, but lowering his bath health makes him more risky, but has a chance to get out way better. A Widowmaker with Guard, sitting in the back of Circuit Royale sniping you with 400 Health sounds like a nightmare. But make Guard count down. Say Widow has 200 base hp. Guard gives her 100 Overhealth, and 100 Armor. But these count down to only 25/each. So reaching 250 but with 25 OH, 25 AR. Make her grapple slower, make her weapon speed slower, yes this makes her feel sluggish and slow, but if she lands her shots, it’s better design. Similar to Cassidy’s ult change, the fact this power counts down, makes it feel like a moment maker. Ammo Regen I don’t believe makes as much sense, but there’s ways you could work it. Venture and Cassidy already have workarounds because this is a pain point. Doubler I think is interesting for a Soldier, or an Illiari. But speaking of, if Tankiness, and Speed are now linked to Runes, not Roles, what to do with healers. Personally, I think healing as a goal for the team and the players should be de-incentivized. I think it causes much more division, and lack of interactive skill. Some character defy this, Ana, even Juno, but across the board supports feel weak, useless, and overtuned. If Regeneration was a Rune, on top of Health Packs, healing becomes much more of a goal for the individuals, rather then the team. As it works in Q3 here’s Regeneration: In Quake III Arena, Regeneration is a powerup that regenerates the player's health for 30 seconds or until it hits 200 health and makes a red glow surrounding the user with each instance of healing it apply. If the possessor has less than 100 health, it will heal +15 health with every second. When health exceeds 100 points, regeneration rate will drop to +5 health per second; the player can hit up to 200 points of health, which will not drop. This can be tweaked around characters, to work more effectively. Tracer gets healed more, Winston healed less, because health values can still differ between base characters. But no monsters like 5v5 Tanks. Keep in mind Regeneration is not like the base health regeneration. It’s short bursts of healing, not a slow rise. These can be tweaked, changed, reformatted, yada yada please Spilo take it from here. I genuinely think Runes will solve so much of Roles issues. You pick it up, you die, you lose it.

[@cloud3x3]

Executive people could care less about 6v6. At the end of the day, their job metrics are about performance, whatever their targets are (and there's no way to know that, for example, maybe their highest metric, even above monetization, is player retention because there's a 3 year plan to convert game pass subscriptions). In general, leadership hires good people to make those decisions below them, because they are making more macro decisions. Just like I no longer care about my team's day to day engineering decisions. I can care, I have been coding a long time, but I don't because that's what you're paying other people to do :)

[@OverWatchMenVid]

I got married at 20. Gonna be 10 years this August. Spilo is based and a God Fearing Man!!

[@willowthywisp]

You're ten? Okay, Benjamin Button

[@OverWatchMenVid]

@@willowthywisp lol 🤣

[@SIMPLYDEVON]

what if the tank could ban and save 1 character since tanks are prone to hard counters 1 trick could save his main and ban the omega busted mauga unless the other tank wants to play him before seeing you're pick i think this would solve alot of issues and wouldn't be too hard to implement

[@xavierparker4465]

7v7 is the overwatch of the future

[@rnf123]

This is actually the gigabrain move. 3 Damage 2 Tank 2 Support would be ridiculously fun.

[@魚-c3d]

​@@rnf123it would unironically solve the solo tank problem while making queue times faster due to 3 DPS. I'm open to try a balanced version of 7v7 for real 😂

[@cl4709]

@@rnf123imagine playing support and having to heal 6 teammates

[@thenewstyle8704]

Marvel Rivals Competition can do some crazy things

[@ikczs]

The reason I quit overwatch 1 was Role Q. Sitting in a 30 min Q only for the game to get cancelled and Q for 30 minutes again. I like the idea of getting somewhere between role and open Q. I think it should be 6v6 open Q but with 1 hero (minimum) of each role. So it could be 1-2-3 or 2-2-2 or 4-1-1. At least this way you can play the game and not sit in Q all the time and you will not have 6 Dps comps and you will have some freedom switching your role in game.

[@aurens.]

that puts us right back in the situation we had before role queue came out: 5 people queue up wanting to play DPS but 2-3 of them are forced to do something they don't want to do in order for the rest of the team to have fun. in the old days it was a standoff where whoever was least selfish lost and swapped to support/tank, in your proposed solution it's just whoever has the fastest internet/PC gets to play what they want and everyone else is forced to off-role. personally, i'd rather not play the game at all than deal with the annoyance of me (and others) being forced to play roles they don't want to play.

[@pav5971]

6v6 will be better when they open up the maps. Its was having 1 choke into double shield that sucked.

[@jacobkelly1653]

I might just be bad, but I definitely do not feel autonomous when I play overwatch. I feel trapped in a box of choices and if I pick the any choice besides shoot tank I lose immediately.

[@opticalmoose8091]

Brother, you are probably not climbing rank with this philosophy. Because, at least in my rank (gold) applying pressure to the backline is the number one thing you can do to turn tides. And yes, I’ve been slowly climbing out of rock bottom bronze since about Season 5.

[@jacobkelly1653]

@@opticalmoose8091 I'm in diamond one and fighting the supports is like a death sentence, best odds are to just shoot the tank and hope one of the dps make a mistake while also hoping your tank doesn't. But it never feels advantageous to try and make a play happen

[@mikesimmerman4457]

And they balancing for the switch

[@Rusty-Scalpel]

It takes a very long time to climb in 5v5. 6v6 might be longer as you will have less impact in a 6v6.

[@OniLifes]

Nah thats honestly wrong if you played well. To put it one way, if you deserve the rank, youd fly to it in ow1. I got to masters pretty easily and fairly fast. In ow2 not only is the ranked system pretty bad after trying to mess with it originally youre also gonna have tp perform better to stand out since in 5v5 the better players can perform better so the floor for lets say DPS tp get a bit of rank will be higher

[@baboowa]

the world is healing

[@neodaltiair8624]

Queue distribution can change there have been times where support had the highest queue times in OW2

[@bran4457]

Sure but the graph is over a lifetime of both games after role que was introduced. Small snippets in time where another role is more popular really doesn't matter if we end up reverting back to the mean anyway.

[@neodaltiair8624]

@@bran4457 I'm just saying that the distribution can change if the roles become more fun. They are not set in stone.

[@eddielopez6731]

@@neodaltiair8624I hear you, it’s just doubtful. Historically speaking tank across multiple different games is just not as popular as other roles.

[@neodaltiair8624]

@@eddielopez6731 well we don’t need it as popular just popular enough for reasonable queue times

[@Avabees]

Porque no los dos?

[@Avabees]

Test out modern 6v6 with a seperate Q first

[@runawaybrick460]

Spilo, you seem very energized. What is your morning routine?

[@sawah765]

I think the game would feel better if the tank role was reworked to make them more similar to the other heroes. Smaller health pools, smaller hero models. Turn it into a role of heroes that have CC and small 'tanking' windows where they can actually face tank with their mitigation abilities. It would also free up supports to have less healing because there would be no huge HP bars and tanks would take less damage from their smaller models. This change wouldn't be popular with tank players but a lot of the frustration comes from the fact that they are big giant raid bosses. Every cooldown is thrown at the tank BECAUSE they're the raid boss that must be stopped. Lower their power level so they're just another player in the match and not the center of attention. A big ego DPS player that waves hello or shit talks all chat after dueling a DPS/Illari/Kiri etc doesn't do this to tanks. Because tanks were never meant to be fair, it's not a duel, it's just unlucky that the giant NPC raid boss decided to target them.

[@ArielHal9000]

I would hate for my role to become a glorified dps with CC. That is not what tank players want, you're just making another role for DPS. This was also a major criticism of modern support, that they have too much damage capabilities. Kiriko, Illari, Bap, are all able to duel DPS and reliably win in most cases because they have escape and support tools that surpass damage tools.

[@Valroirr]

Damage control spilo??? Genuinely not even joking I thought you were talking about your hair and went OH LORD HE KNOWS

[@courier7049]

33:10 now that's the most corporate speak I read there, so they didn't give a **** about people that bought their game and stick around even when there were no updates, but now they deeply care care about people playing the game for free from time to time, in almost 2 years they are still at stable 30k players on steam so all those "tens of millions" is just accounts not players, but they sure care about them

[@YTHandlesWereAMistake]

Rate.. 7.5/10 Just like it is a common though not permanent, thread in patch notes, and has always been so (although to a worse degree in most of ow1, this was a little too little (tank issues), and a little too late (over 2 years since beta), and a little too cryptic (of what's to come and if those tech issues really are a big problem).. my guess the servers are more impacted by that than most PCs, although if switch is being considered, yea, maybe it too is a reason for issues. The servers crash somewhat commonly even in ranked nowadays and that didnt happen as much in ow1. And I don't mean exploits like torb's most recent, I mean from genuine load by ults and abils and so on being used.

[@donutboy9851]

I’ve had 4v4 & 7v7 thoughts after this blog, and I think in a nutshell it’s like this: 4v4 would be too boring and rlly shit for both sups and tanks if its 1-2-1, 5v5 is rlly shitty for tanks, 6v6 would have the worst queue times by far, 7v7 would have the most visual clutter and lag. Out of all of these problems I think the visual clutter would be easiest to fix. 7v7 would fix quite a bit, dps q times wouldn’t be bad cos it would def be 2-3-2, 2nd tank would relieve pressure and cc from a single tank and peel which would be needed cos of 3 dps now, and having 3 dps would be able to break through heavy defences faster, sup wouldn’t suffer terribly, but they would have to heal bot more which is a downside (but passive regen wasn’t in ow1). The only huge downside I can think of is that they would prob have to end support for weaker devices like the switch (which they wouldn’t do cos of money). From a business perspective they wouldn’t do 7v7, but I think it would be very good for the player base (besides the ppl that play on switch). Yes ik flats has talked abt this but I think that it acc is a decent idea.

[@Sneezy_04]

On the impactful-ness of the roles, I think they don’t want to mention it because all it would do is hurt feelings. (I’m a support 😔)

[@GabrielxDesign]

I don't think they can bring back 6v6, they made lots of new heroes based on 5v5, it would be even less balanced than it was back in OW1, they might have to rework a lot.

[@andyboston3646]

Biggest mistake honestly is going 2-2-2 with 1-4-1 hero ratio

[@yukilemon1235]

No 6v6 bc of switch 😭😭. Its lowkey terrible on switch anyway. Just stop support for it and give me 6v6 back 😂

[@lukasg4807]

It's not just for the switch. Imagine your pc runs ow fine, you're enjoying your games, and all of the sudden an overwatch update means you need to drop 1500 on a new computer? That same thing happened to me when csgo went to cs2, trying to not increase minimum spec is important.

[@yukilemon1235]

@@lukasg4807 very true but….. nobodies playing an xbox 360 any more. At some point in order for development to advance, support for older hardware has to fall off. It sucks that we have to pay to upgrade and personally i am by no means rich or anything but time has to move on. Imagine using a blackberry from 2005 and expecting it to run even a simple iphone task.

[@Pango1028]

Spilo is by far the best streamer on leveled-headed intelligent takes and reactions. I respect Samito’s passion and talent for the game but he’s too far gone. He’s like the Peyton Manning of Overwatch. Too smart and talented to understand anyone else’s POV. Most of what Aaron said hit home for a career Plat player. Spilo connects best to all ranks even though he is high rank now.

[@donovan4222]

@@Pango1028 Samito agreed with most of what Aaron said from what I saw

[@Pango1028]

@@donovan4222 he actually didn’t. I thought he would agree with more of it but def countered most points or at least half except for lower queue times which is irrefutable obviously

[@donovan4222]

@@Pango1028 what did he disagree with Aaron about that you think was wrong

[@Greaseman762]

They say they have 10s of millions of players logging in so queue times shouldn’t be an issue right?

[@emiyaann4688]

No you dummy,read the dev blog before writing no sense,what matters is the ratio of people who play tanks not the total amount of players

[@SublimedHaze]

If you have 20 milllion players and 12 million queue DPS, 6 million queue support and 2 million queue tank how do you get everyone in a game without waiting for the tanks? That's where the queue time comes from.

[@schwolmart]

GM support with 15-20 minute queues. I could use a reason to quit.

[@TheHaloSkullMaster]

They switched engines to support a PVE mode but it is worse for PVP and now we are stuck with a worse engine with no benefit. Such a terrible fumble on all levels.

[@mr.parker8014]

Spilo water bottle coaching / critique stream?

[@Switch_X_Back3884]

Can someone please tell me what "Balancing" really means? Is it all roles are equal in strength? Is it all Heros have the same HP pool or Damage players deal all take the same amount of HP? I mean if all had the same HP. Then , roles is irrelevant. If all damage weapons deal same damage then making different weapons is irrelevant

[@philpeters3689]

In a game like overwatch it means nothing. All they need to do is make sure heroes aren't over and underperforming. And overwatch will always need balancing, it will never end. 1 balance will lead to another and another. There will always need to be improvements generally due to the multifaceted depth of expression during play

[@secretlyaslug2325]

In a hypothetical any game situation a 'balanced' game or format is just when as many options are competitively viable as possible. That's essentially it. If you look at a game like Smash Brawl. It's not 'balanced' because characters like Meta Knight are overpowered and thus overrepresented. OW2 is generally well balanced. Some heros are over represented at different skill teirs, rein in low ELO, tracer in high ELO etc. But you can arguably pick any hero and 1 trick them and see success. It's when heros OP that people complain the most. Not when they're too weak. Ball was and arguably still is unplayable in 5v5. But that gets less complaints then when genji had speed boost on kill. They still want hero niches and identities, as well as role to mean something. And they've been successful with that so far.

[@gottaxgofisher6181]

4v4?

[@BinatLoves]

I really like your comment about entitlement. I worked for a game company in SimRacing for some years and when the whole community grew more and more mature a lot of people forgot about this fact. Everyone was somehow entitled to force their vision of things into the mind of everyone with the believe that this 100% correct. Whilst the developer had a complete different idea. Which I found very difficult to work with. Its nice to see you being so analytic about Overwatch and still make this statement. Thank you for that.

[@HelloFellowMellowMarshmallow]

Hopefully there’s no conspiracy sht and bias when it comes to the testing phase.

[@PandaVsGames]

For whichever side of the fence we fall, we can surely agree that the chat member 49min in bringing up dictionary definitions or whatever is a dingbat and contributing nothing😂😂 Good vid, i agree with vast majority of your views on this topic

[@KingOfNebbishes]

No offense to Spilo, but Ana was absolutely relevant during OW1, which is why she was the #1 pick for most of the game's life after her release, and the only time she wasn't the most picked support were Moth Mercy and release Brig. She was so terrible everyone played her.

[@emiyaann4688]

We aren't talking boblow bronze,bap replaced ana in High ranks

[@GarouOfficial]

15:39 there’s more “space” in overwatch 2 because the time to kill is so much higher. This makes denying space much harder in overwatch 2 with more immortality and get out of jail free abilities, along side with higher health pools. But this is also a symptom of not having a second off tank to contest off angles, and shows one of the deficits if 5v5, which was exacerbated by the balance and hero design of overwatch 2 heroes. I’m sure that anyone who played overwatch 1 can relate to exploding on tank instantly, or seeing their tanks explode when their mistakes are punished. Taking space used to have a much higher skill ceiling.

[@Postcards]

If the dps queues are decent for 6v6, I will still play it. Otherwise, I just won't bother.

[@donovan4222]

To be honest, the only place I think 5v5 legitimately improved was DPS queue times…but I simply don’t believe that’s a good argument. 1. There are other ways to improve queue times than removing a role. 3v3 would further improve queue times, that doesn’t make it a good idea. 2. Queue times were never a big issue for most players in metal ranks anyways. 3. Most people would rather wait an extra minute or two for far better gameplay quality.

[@ReaveIdono]

The. You would be incorrect and they discussed just that as to why it did more than improve queue times.

[@lostmycat5671]

it effects people more and more as you go up, yes even in metal ranks around plat/diamond where you would get queues about the length of the game you just played, not very fun for anyone

[@guilhermedecarvalhofernand1629]

Ok let's go, and stop gaslighting. 1- they tried in game incentives for items inside the game, in 2 they have been introducing more characters to reduce the oversaturated dps role problem, tried ways for players to find groups to play in ow1. Then we all remember that in gaming in general tank is the least popular role. 2-Metal ranks had stuff like 7 to 8 min, as the ranks progressed this would go to 15min, 30min and in top ranks even 1 hour. The more the player enjoys the game casually the more queue times will stop/reduce their play time... Why ? They don't have much time to play the game due to real life work, responsibilities and studies, it does not matter if colleague, middle or high school. If someone has 1 hour for playtime and has to stay in 8-to 15minutes queue they are gonna lose half that time in queue 3-the're is a limit you can increase queue times that players are whiling to withstand before just saying fuck it, l gonna play another game. You being fine doing 15-to 30min queue is not the majority's opinion IN PRACTICE. Don't trust me? Then look around all the players that said they gave up on the game due to queue times for damage being that high. Saying you prefer the MOBA aspects and tank interactions of old 6v6 and ignoring this problem introduced in role queue won't get you to reduce the queue times nor make the devs think it is a feasible solution to due without elegant ways to mitigate it or outright fix them.

[@nihili4196]

​@@guilhermedecarvalhofernand1629 "In gaming tank is the least popular role" The fuck does that mean. It's a meaningless blanket statement. If you'll say "in FPS tank is least played role" that would be a sentence that applies to something. Also, the problem here is applying RPG role differentiation to FPS game. In RPGs that role divide happened naturally, it created over time. Here, we have three roles like that because Devs worked on WoW. There are other role divides in other games that more often than not work better than this arbitrary division Overwatch put itself into. The biggest problem with game is that, as well as the fact that heros originally were meant to not be forced into role limits. There was no thought to anything, and now Devs are trying to arbitrarily rebalance everything to the point where bunch of random concepts work.

[@guilhermedecarvalhofernand1629]

@@nihili4196 its not blanket. have you ever played mmos, RPGs and other genres ? you ignoring this fact because it does not align with what you want does not change it being a thing.

[@evanjackson3576]

Ah yes, my opinion is here

[@AgnesRonan]

I propose flex-lock queue The system looks and functions the same as 6v6 role lock at the queue screen. If players queue any single role or queue dps/support, the game functions the same. They will be restricted to either dps OR support. However, instead of the game finding 4 players on each role, it finds 4 dps, 4 support, and 2 pairs of matching flexers. If a player queues tank/dps, tank/support, or all three roles, they will be a flexer, restricted only to their selected roles. If the match maker is struggling to find a game, it might eliminate the flex options for flex players.

[@flutelover8637]

If youve been married for 10 year, that means hes bare minimum 28