The Great 6v6 Debate (Iron vs Jake)

[@AnimeOtaku56.]

I think a moderator would’ve been good for a debate like this.

[@qualityart4004]

facts, this debate was trash

[@prestigiouschili7911]

SVB is a good moderator. He has his own series where he has debates like this. He has one called “The Great 6v6 Debate”

[@AnimeOtaku56.]

@@prestigiouschili7911 yes I watch it regularly and he is a great moderator.

[@blacksheep4021]

EDIT: 6v6 playtest is out and i am having a BLAST on tank. Queue times for tank since the start of the playtest have been significantly higher than for dps aka there's a lot of people queuing tank. It was a format issue. Jakes first argument is kinda a pro 6v6 argument for me. As the average player there's a handful of heroes i like and lock in every match. I don't want to play meta picks or be forced to learn heroes i don't enjoy. As a tank player that was possible in 6v6 but not in 5v5. In 5v5 I have to learn the counters of my counters (which are often characters opposite to the playstyle i enjoy) and meta picks. I've had *quickplay* matches where the enemy tank saw me, turned around to walk to their spawn and counterswapped. The average experience nowadays is being forced to switch atleast once per match to a predetermined hero which is required in the certain scenario. That's not fun to me and i started playing more dps and supp and less overwatch as a whole. The even bigger argument for me though is that this issue has become an issue for EVERY rank whilst affecting the lower ranks even more than the higher ones(aka affecting the average players who just want to play their fav heroes). I was masters in ow1 so i know that good tank synergy is important but when playing with lower elo friends they all just kinda did whatever they felt like and it worked for them. Now even bronze players know which tank counters who and feel pressured to switch or it's a "tank diff". I think experienced players forget that the casual player doesn't think about strategies and how to adjust their playstyle to deal with their counters. They just saw a tiktok of their favorite streamer showing what heroes counter other heroes and then pick those. A lot of my casual friends stopped even queuing for tank because this pressure and the inability to play what they want isn't fun. Not every player plays to get better or to have full control over the outcome of a match and "hard carry". For some people this is just one of many games they play and those casual players deserve a better experience where they have the freedom to play what they want. In my opinion this was possible in 6v6 and isn't possible anymore due to the format. TL;DR: Basically 5v5 sucks for the average tank enjoyer and it's a format issue

[@reginozarate4601]

100 percent agree. With two tanks, I had the ability to play a few different tanks based on what my other tank was playing. The other tank helped cover the weaknesses of my tank or its play style. Without that other tank, I am forced to play the optimal tank to have some value. If I'm simply not on the right hero, I automatically have negative value, and have to play perfectly out of my mind to *maybe* break even on value. That's not fun. And it's not rewarding to play characters I like. It's better to be average at all tanks, than it is to be insane at the 1-2 tanks I enjoy. And the swapping/countering heavily allows worse players to close the skill gap between better players than them. So you aren't being rewarded for understanding the game better, you just have to be on the right hero. It doesn't take skill to hit H in spawn.

[@MrBreakdownx]

Let a pro 5v5er talk long enough and you'll notice the don't have an argument or they are arguing for 6v6.

[@marvynjeanbaptiste3206]

@@MrBreakdownxnah fr. Jake was arguing having to rely on your teammates is a bad gameplay experience but this problem is even worse for one tank

[@CROSSFADE69]

I wish Iron would have called Jake out on this but he contradicts himself several times. 1. Jake believe that casual players only play one to three heroes and they typically don't play any other roles. 2. Jake believe that counter swapping is a good thing and he believes that the ideal state of the game is to where every role needs to counter swap or you'll just lose. ____ You can't have a game to where anyone can play anything and a game to where everyone needs to constantly counter swap each other all the time to win, it's a paradox. ___ 3. He constantly talks about how you can't prove anything with data. Then tries to sight data about player numbers that was vaguely sited by the devs but won't allow any other data like twitch viewership, KZbin viewership or even accounts from former players as evidence because they're too niche or a small minority of the population. ___ 4. He talks about how tank synergy is extremely oppressive. But constantly avoids the idea that supports are also extremely impactful if not more. Literally one of the most common complaints that DPS players had in OverWatch one was when the support threw an immortality field or any kind of saving utility and especially shield bash from brig. You almost never heard DPS players complain about tanks unless it was dva. Furthermore the only time in all OverWatch history that tanks dictated support picks was during double shield even during goats tanks were replaceable examples of this is when people would play variations of goats and they would replace the zarya or dva with a somber, Mei or doomfist. The only reason supports are not overpowered right now is because blizzard gave DPS an ability to negate their healing rather than actually nerfing supports. It's also really interesting that blizzard is willing to rework all the tanks because they're complained about but are not willing to change supports even though DPS and tanks constantly complain about the immortality abilities or there cheap mechanics, Interesting..... Thank you for reading my wall of text! ;DD

[@Drew-fn6rq]

Exactly

[@lrmcatspaw1]

The largest mental gymnastic you can make is to say that 2 tank synergies are more oppressive than having your tank being much worse or getting hard countered by the enemy tank. If you are going to state that differences in skill make things worse or better you NEED to make the same assumption in the defense of your own argument. That is the BASIC FUCKKIN rule of devils advocate and science research. You try to prove your OWN point wrong with the same weapons to see if it has a strong leg to stand on. Yes, I agree that in top500 tank synergies CAN be stronger than 1 tank vs 1 tank, because as a dps you only have to consider how to counter 1 tank, but that is just saying "F tanks as long as I am happy".

[@Doople]

"Supports aren't overpowered because they heal less. Blizzard hasn't really nerf support!" Literally nonsense. Making counterplay and buffing other roles is a nerf

[@nahaight1373]

If you haven’t noticed he’s a little blizz puppet😂😂 he wants to keep being invited to exclusive events.

[@LadySniperSwaggYT]

Can we have Overwatch classic? I just want to be able to play 6v6 again

[@megamecha100]

Would love to play it, but in theory all of the tanks would leave normal qp for it lol

[@ytk3797]

On the oct 2020 patch peak ow 🥲

[@libertyprime9307]

It would depend on which patch they used.

[@ThisIsExile91]

Why do you want to play something that heros aren't balanced for?

[@LadySniperSwaggYT]

@@ThisIsExile91 they would be reverted to the state they were in ow1?

[@michaelc7418]

There were several things that caused long queue times in 2-2-2 that had nothing to do with the format itself: (1) CC stacking from multiple roles in the match, and Tank is the role most hit by CC because they're in front. Blizzard did not address the CC issue back in OW1, and DPS & Support CC should still be reduced further than the devs did for OW2. -100% Anti-Heal is also a big head-ache for Tanks, especially with the new Tanks in OW2 that would be in 2-2-2, because they are very vulnerable to Anti-Nade. All Anti-Heal in the game should be -50%, and the duration would stack on other Anti-Heal, but not the %. Ana & Junker Queen can receive compensation buffs. (2) The severely imbalanced hero roster of 8 Tanks, 17 DPS, 7 Supports. A lot of people fail to realize that we did not get a SINGLE new Tank or Support hero after 2-2-2 released on September 1, 2019. Only new hero we got was Echo, our 17th DPS hero. With a hero roster and release schedule like that, it's no wonder DPS was the most popular role by a lot in OW1. (3) Roadhog & Wrecking Ball were never reworked to at least provide a little bit of sustain to their team. The game in general suffered, but also was too difficult to play Roadhog or Wrecking Ball whenever you wanted because you really always needed a main tank alongside Roadhog or Wrecking Ball. (4) Not shifting the perceived meta fast enough. Orisa + Sigma was meta for too long, not to mention they had way too much sustain when Sigma was released, which made the perception of playing Tank bad. (5) Too few players in the highest ranks. High rank streamers can still get long queue times in OW2, this is because there are so few players able to be matched up. The devs really need to merge ranks together if they want the high rank players to not have very long queues.

[@pvyj]

Also, there were way more characters on dps than any other role

[@jorrellrichardson3181]

​@@pvyj because tank and support weren't as fun. They can fix that

[@S3nCh4n]

now that they reduced cc for tanks why not bring back 2 tanks lol. anti-nade is gonna be harder to land with 2 tanks due to zarya cleanse+shield or dva matrix+shield etc, more people to shoot=less oppressive dps passive for tanks. and tbh it doesn't take that long to balance them in 6v6 as most of the roster was already designed for it plus you can see how fast they can do entire hero redesigns with the april fools/arcade modes.

[@reginozarate4601]

​@@jorrellrichardson3181 But they were still fun. I personally loved playing support and tank in OW1. In OW2 support is too easy, and tank is the worst it's ever been. All I play is DPS. But this is just my personal experience/opinion. -A former Tank/support main.

[@Aquahunter3]

6v6 tank experience is 1000x more enjoyable then 5v5 tank experience at every elo

[@why8642]

Source? Because as someone that played since 2016 I vastly prefer the 5v5 tank experience

[@ProphetXO]

@@why8642 you have GOT to be coping so hard to think that. unless you play braindead orisa and mauga.

[@why8642]

@@ProphetXO I like playing: Mauga, Doomfist, Sigma, Winston, Ram, Hog, Ball and D.va. Orisa is fun if I wanna be a bully that lives forever, but she’s gets a bit boring after a while. Rein, Zarya and queen are boring, but I can play them fine. Even with the pain points of enemy team counter swapping, some tanks not being as strong as the others and the stacking of negative effects on tanks (CC, Discord and dps passive), I find that with correct positioning and playmaking I can win and still have fun!

[@Nickelback8469]

⁠@@why8642I agree, there’s a large silent majority of players who enjoy 5v5 because they have no reason to seek out these 6v6 debates.

[@yunomiko2107]

@@why8642I don’t think we play the same game then, sorry but we just aren’t. All the tank players I know, preferred to play 6v6 heavily over 5v5

[@Mr_BucketHat]

Most people agree that tanking is a terrible experience in 5v5, but there need to be two tanks in every game, one for each team. So those two players are supposed to just not enjoy the game as much as the other roles? I just cannot understand how people argue for 5v5. It seems bad faith to say that 5v5 is necessary because of queue times, but then further making tank players not want to queue. I have loved Overwatch since it came out and have played it consistently, even through the content drought, so I know what I like. I liked Overwatch 1. I liked the shooter moba style of gameplay. I hate the fragging, Call of Duty esque Overwatch 2. That's not what I paid for, but what I have played since October 2022. Me and my friends barely touch the game because it's not the same and quite frankly, worse. I used to be a tank main, but after the constant counterswap meta, I no longer want to play tank. Also, the character kits in OW2 are horrible. Rammatra is boring with his shield and block, very sleeper of a character. Mauga is the worst offender by far (AWFUL), not fun to play into or against. Kiriko has everything. Lifeweaver has been designed to deny value (WHAT A TERRIBLE CHARACTER). The other new characters are okay.

[@steffenl.5000]

The statement that more people are in favor of 5v5 makes little sense imo. Yes, some people are happy with the change and don't need to participate in the discussion online, but isn't Jake forgetting all the people who stopped playing the game because of the bad tank experience and 5v5? All these players don't participate in the discussion either.

[@gamist8166]

He thinks dead 6v6 was worse on players who stopped playing. Ow had the lowest player count ever before ow2. He blames 5v5 or at the very least sees that the devs would wanna blame it

[@S3nCh4n]

yes because he's a deathmatch/fps player. he doesn't like the moba teamwork aspect of overwatch

[@reginozarate4601]

Well most dps/support players won't really see a 'need' for a change, because for them the game is the same or even better. They have more freedom to move around and can have more impact without a second tank to peel or check off angles. But that doesn't change the fact that the tank experience is miserable at the moment, and it's unlikely that's gonna change unless the format changes. Unless there's some Holy Grail patch the devs can make to 5v5 that no one has thought of. At the center of this debate we have the tank experience. If all/most tank players are not enjoying the game, then maybe change is a necessity. You can't just ignore the suffering of one role simply because it's the least populated role.

[@garikek]

​@@reginozarate4601I'm a DPS/support player. I fucking despise the unkillable 1000hp raid boss tanks. Literal Skyrim bullet sponges. Who the fuck likes it? And like yeah, I have freedom. But then again, kiriko exists, bap exists, Moira was overbuffed with season 9. Plus you can't even oneshot anymore consistently. Or for heroes like cree you need one more shot to kill stuff which really kills the opportunity to get a kill a lot of the time. And honestly, I don't know what's fun about support in ow2. You either healbot or play bap/illari/zen and tryna get picks on top of healing. But most of the time you just farm ults because tank is unkillable in the neutral, Squishies aren't Squishies anymore and die less to random spam + there is always a bitchy hero with an immortality to save them just in case. And then you get your ults and you just do an ult exchange. It's sooooo boring.

[@weps5264]

3:48:55 bro like why are we even debating with this guy

[@dergr7283]

5v5 is a band-aid solution to revitalize this game. Shorter queue times help the game feel alive but it comes at the expense of the Tank players. You can argue that Tank is the least popular role in all games. But it’s definitely the worst role in OW and the devs are not doing enough to make the Tank role fun enough to play consistently. Queue times are suffering as a result and I don’t think we’ve reached the bottom. I can’t be convinced that 5v5 will be sustainable. Why would you main Tank when: The majority of the Tank roster can be gatekept by a handful of characters in competent hands, the DPS passive affects you easiest but you don’t directly benefit from it, the CC/mobility creep and the majority of CC focus, the responsibility of what was once two roles is yours alone and you have the balance engagements, peel, while still tracking ults cool downs, etc. What new player would want to sign up for that. Imagine a new player trying to learn Ball in QP, I guarantee you they are going to going to be hacked hindered then blamed until they never touch the character again.

[@uzifan88]

And when they try to make the tank role fun they make an overtuned character like mauga that have the opposite effect!

[@dergr7283]

⁠@@uzifan88Mauga to me is the biggest fuck you ever to Tank players and honest Overwatch. Here’s a character that’s not fun to play as but is miserable to play against as any other tank.

[@uzifan88]

@@dergr7283 fr

[@wayfer7243]

OW Tanks have the potential to be the most fun tanks in any game that exists.

[@Lingboysc2]

Jake saying "I don't care about tank players" should make any opinion he has invalid for the rest of time.

[@theredguy92]

Almost everyone agrees 6v6 had the higher ceiling. I want to make the argument that it has a higher floor too. Would you rather have to play with a less than ideal tank synergy or a solo tank being countered by 2-3 enemy players? Personally i think games with less than ideal tank synergy were still more winnable than games with 1 solo tank getting countered by the entire enemy team who wont swap.

[@theredguy92]

Also if the game is going to based around counterswapping or you lose then i should be able to report players who dont swap when countered.

[@silvergodanalyser7762]

@@theredguy92 both true!

[@Dylekt]

Yeah so the 5v5 argument really doesn’t make sense. Ow2 has the same problem but worse. At least in 6v6 I could maybe kill a tank that’s out of position. Now you just have an immortal tank in your face, with a wimp ally tank that’s getting countered

[@Shar.S]

I don’t play tank as a main role, I’m a Lucio player. I play tank and dps as a fun off role, I play tracer. I like playing Winston. When I win or lose on support or dps I feel different things I got to try different things and it was fun. But when I win or lose a game on tank and I have to play around a million things and I end of with 20-30k damage mitigated, I just feel depressed because I have to do the same thing every game. The thing is I like playing winston, baiting a sleep out of an Ana and then juggling her against a wall is a different kind of high. FYI I’m the average Overwatch player and the tank role in my rank always has the exp bonus thing on it, if that’s not an indication that even less people play tank in 5v5 because the role feels ass, I don’t know what is. I’m not saying 6v6 is the set in stone answer but what we have right now can’t be it…

[@MK-mm7ui]

Man i just want 6v6 back. 5v5 is miserable. I was a tank main, but throughout ow2 i’ve just played less and less tank, even tho i have ranked up massively since end of ow1. Tank has now become my least played role.

[@CROSSFADE69]

I recommend playing dps, it's more fun & it will make q times worse

[@denjii9]

@@CROSSFADE69 real i actually just run up support n dps games out of spite now to make q times worse

[@S3nCh4n]

both me and my off tank friend stopped playing tank completely because of how boring solo tanking has become (also we can't play together), now we play dps and support. i'm sure a lot of old tank players share the same experience

[@heiko2255]

@@CROSSFADE69 If your solution is "Just dont play one of the 3 roles" then OW2 as a game has failed As Pro 6v6er, i can say yes DPS (and to a certain extend Supp) are still playable in 5v5, some Heroes of those role might even work better in 5v5, but many other just dont. And basically saying "Fuck Tank, Fuck the way Tank used to be and what made it fun and fuck 12+ Heroes" is just proof the game has dogshit desing. How can i go from playing basically only tank and maining it in OW1 to not even touching the role since like S2, it just doesnt hit anymore, solo tanks, counterswaps and having to deal with other OP Tanks makes the role unbearable. I wish everyone would quit tank so that the Qtimes get so dogshit that the devs have to do something.

[@Drew-fn6rq]

Lets be honest. Jake is a dps player that wants tank to stay in spawn and constantly swap to counter pick while he plays play 4v4 overwatch.

[@weeknd7245]

And add that Jake works for blizzard and has conflict of interest, ofc he’s going going to be pro 5v5, he’s pro “keep paying me” I’ll say anything

[@MajoraJeff]

True !!

[@Bopek]

I think Iron didn't really handle the debate very well, I think a calm and more methodical approach for a better discussion was needed. At times it felt like you were just shouting at Jake rather than raising a counterpoint. Both played as pros and suffered equally, there's no excuse.

[@AnimeOtaku56.]

I think a moderator helps in debates. There was definitely an issue of a lack of focus and actual topics. It wasn’t a bad debate but moderators can bring topics and stability.

[@jefftist9625]

Yeah the group up podcast debate on this was far more structured.

[@JumpsOw]

Hollow knight brother I do agree with you but with Jake's arguments I would have the same reaction, it felt like he wasn't even taking it seriously.

[@roadmann6803]

Jake was contradictory, circular, talked over iron first, it would take an unreal amount of patience to be civil with this dumbass

[@JoltOfJoy]

Tanks so bad that I am a dps main now. I used to love tanking and queen and doom are my favorite to play in the whole game, but I just cant be fucked having to play beyond perfectly every game otherwise I blow up, meanwhile everyone else in lobbys gets to chill.

[@mrkizu]

I see takes like this all the time but it makes no sense... the same damage that "blows up" tanks also "blows up" the rest of us as well lol. When you play support or dps you have to play while trying to survive the same damage output that can shred heroes with 3x your health. We talk about the tanks experience, but all the roles struggle with getting "blown up".

[@JoltOfJoy]

@@mrkizu As a tank, my job is to take space and mitigate damage for my team so that we can hold that space, or push forward. We as tanks, get focused down and take everyones cooldowns, yet still die even when we were already being cautious. Theres just nothing you can do unless you play whatever is meta at the time and a lot of times, even that doesnt even matter. You are at the liberty of your supports at all moments that it’s almost suffocating. I should not have to jiggle peak as tank (the one thats frontline),while trying to maintain space and presence, to make sure I don’t pop like a balloon as I’m being focus healed. So yes, it does make sense, however you just aren’t looking at it from the perspective of tanks. Thats how I see it and I bet many others see it the same way. Good luck to you

[@marv8360]

@@mrkizu​​⁠it doesn't make sense to you because you don't understand the tank role in OW2. But to those that do it makes total sense. You're the only means for consistent damage mitigation on your team, so you're hard focused more often than every other role that doesn't have 600-700 HP and a larger hitbox. You have no one else to bounce off of and help you out with peeling and soaking in cooldowns or damage so you have to make less mistakes than every other role. Even when you pop off you're still at the mercy of your team because they can still throw the game.

[@blaine4754]

@@marv8360you just explained everything as to why tanking sucks in ow2 😂😂😂. Peak 3900 rein/winston main that now fucks around on dps. I only play open queue because at least I can get another tank with me. In ow1 that responsibility was shared between two. It’s so obvious why it’s worse as one tank. You take EVERYTHING as opposed to it being divided between two.

[@nic0856]

Am I the only one who dislikes 5v5 not only as tank gameplay but also dps and support? You just had way more options on 6v6 regardless of role, every role lost depth, tank just happened to get hit the hardest. Personally gonna protest by not Q'ing tank again until we get 6v6 back, I loved playing off tank with my main tank duo but single tanking feels awful for both of us.

[@neritantan]

every dps pro player ive heard speak on it prefers 6v6 as well, most notably even Proper who's pretty much the best 5v5 player

[@malicious8767]

Jake is just fundamentally intellectually dishonest throughout this entire video. It's "we need more data" if there's a any talking point pro 6v6 while taking assumptions in favor of 5v5 as basis enough for his opinion. He clearly did not come into this debate with an actual interest in conversation or respecting the other side. Bro even admits he just doesn't give a shit about tanks or how the game feels, as long as his role is fun and the game is profitable for people like him.

[@jorrellrichardson3181]

I don't think he's being dishonest. I think he's just putting together an argument based on data that we know exists. There are definitely less tanks than the other roles. It won't be perfectly fixed by switching to 6v6 BUT it would be better and if they balance well it could fix more of the disparity.

[@jacobbaartz7710]

Do you have examples of both parts to that?

[@malicious8767]

@@jacobbaartz7710 watch the video??

[@depthcharge5091]

Bro anytime someone tries to bring up tank Synergies and simultaneously trying to argue for the average player just flat out say “that isn’t true” atp cuz it isn’t. Gm problems from ow 1 are not plat problems. Gm problems form ow 2 are problems for plat.

[@S3nCh4n]

yeah cus 5v5 has a lower skill ceiling

[@j4mag]

You don't always need to understand the value you're getting to exploit it. You don't need to be a GM player to know that running it down mid with rein+Zarya+DVa feels really strong, or that you're entirely at the mercy of your DPS to break through chokes when you run hog + Winston. The point is that a small percentage of games actually realized meaningfully synergistic tank lineups, and every other game was two DPS players begrudgingly picking their least hated tank

[@depthcharge5091]

@@j4mag yeah duh but no average player was using those synergies (knowingly,) because the average game of overwatch was about how you played and NOT what you played and you can’t deny that ow 2 is the opposite. On top of that, the supports enabled that comp to work like that. GOATS is not specific to tanks and everyone knows this but constantly ignores the fact that AOE healing enabled multiple tank comps in the first place. Also I highly disagree with that last point. Let’s be honest and accept off tank is 75% more popular than main tanks because it’s just a funner role. People just wanted their comfort main tanks to be picked. It’s not about “oh we have 2 off tanks so auto loss.” It’s about how people didn’t like the tanks being able to play what they wanted to play. At least at the high elos because nobody cared about that in plat below

[@jacobbrady173]

I mean this in the nicest way possible cause I like Jake but dude is huffing the 5v5 copium a lot of his arguments don't make sense.

[@its-tinyavocado]

Jake, I enjoyed 6v6 way more, but I have no twitter and have no reason to voice my opinion other than in videos like this. There is no point to argue on what people prefer more, you literally won't have any accurate statistic on that.

[@jacobbaartz7710]

You actually have queue times and player numbers.

[@comareborn8734]

​@jacobbaartz7710 That isn't good evidence, though. Using the player count for 6v6 ow1 erse current 5v5 ow2 won't be useful given ow1 from late 2019 until its death was all but abandoned. Especially after Echo was released. A game carrying no new content for 2+ years will always die off.

[@projectphoniex]

As a former overwatch player 5v5 is what made me stop playing this game entirely.

[@berzerkmk]

5 minutes in, the guy debating 5v5 claimed he was going to clear up his opinion on his tweet then proceeded to do the exact opposite and just ranted on 20 different topics. It goes to show you 5v5 defenders have nothing but word soup to spit at people. 6v6 has such evident and simply explainable benefits that don't require a 30 sentence paragraph of nothings to defend

[@Dylekt]

“6v6 is not the only reason we had bad queue times, the game received no content so less ppl wanted to play” Jake: “I don’t understand the argument”

[@PainxSorrow]

Jake lost all credibility

[@TheWooly]

Well when you think about it for more than 2 seconds, it doesn't make sense. Why would a lack of content overwhelmingly impact one role over another?

[@Dylekt]

@@TheWoolyOther than general interest of the game being down and reducing overall players, they added 3 tanks in OW1. Two are extremely boring to play and the third has a niche playerbase. They were also more powerful than original tanks. Add all that up, and it’s a boring role that loses more players than the other two. If you took more than two seconds to think, you would’ve realized this

[@TheWooly]

@@Dylekt You can say almost the exact same thing about support in OW1, yet their queue times were nothing like tank. 95% of people advocating 6v6 are just throwing around confirmation biases. They want 6v6 to be superior and just fabricate causal relationships for their claims. This was an awful debate overall imo. Iron was irrational and emotional and Jake was non-committal about almost everything. But at the end of the day, one person was making sense and the other was in their feelings. Iron acting like a switch could be flipped to go back to 6v6 and calling devs lazy for not just doing it is laughable and sums up his ignorance on the subject.

[@Dylekt]

@@TheWoolyNot really, supports had boring characters yes, but they were either strong as hell (brig/bap) or good for entry level players (moira/mercy). Tank was always the least popular role yes, but let’s not act like the format was the problem. Not a single soul proposed 5v5 before they announced it. Because it’s a bandaid fix that leads to far more problems. Call it whatever you want (feelings/nostalgia/bias) but I know I’m enjoying this game far less than ow1, and I’m connecting my bad experiences to this format

[@wayfer7243]

"We have no proof people stopped playing tank" I'm right here Jake, I mained Rein in OW1 and now I barely play the game because tank is shit.

[@realth8572]

For gods sake Iron put a damn limiter on your microphone before i lose my mind!

[@aredes12]

I feel like Jake is just throwing in nonsensical arguments because he is obliged to defend 5v5. There's no way his go-to, serious argument is "Moira can heal Monkey/Dva by fading in and dying."

[@malicious8767]

Jake says in 6v6 if you get the admittedly rare non-synergistic tank combo(Roadhog & Winston ex.), it's game over and it's no longer a contest of skill just who is on the right picks. A rare scenario that makes high level play unwinnable. 5v5 amplifies this issue with solo tanks countering each other relentlessly to play optimally at highest levels. And it's even worse in the lower ranks with dps constantly countering tanks to get the most value from the least skill input possible. Now the problem of having the "right" tank(s) isn't just a high-level issue, it's a fundamental problem for ALL players of every skill level and disproportionately worsens casual/low rank play because they aren't good enough or play enough heroes to swap constantly to try and play around it. Ruining the experience for casual players as a whole.

[@reginozarate4601]

Just had a game on my Gold account where every player was the same rank. I was on DPS. We kept swapping, as a team, to counter their tank. Meanwhile, their tank was swapping, but the rest of his team was not. The game was a stomp in our favor. Game ends and their whole team is crying out "tank canyon". I feel bad for that guy because it wasn't his fault. He did the best he could and he lost because we countered and his team didn't. This is most games nowadays in all the 3 skill tiers I play in. And tank always gets the blame. This is torture for tank players. Why would anyone play that role? Something needs to change and anyone that disagrees probably doesn't play tank much.

[@Ali_TheGreatestt]

@@reginozarate4601 totally agree tank is just an anxiety fest as u click the play button u get hit with anxiety cause u know what could happen, u know that u will get flamed get countered by the whole team and u know that theres nothing u can really do, tank is miserable.

[@IcySniperr]

im honestly fine with either, it looked like overwatch was dying before ow2. you can argue that it went free to play, which couldve saved it; but i think its just easier to pick up and easier to understand the game for new players, leading to better growth.

[@S3nCh4n]

I would say it's marginally easier as the pace of the game has become so fast that people died without knowing why or what they could have done better. Adding 50hp to everyone is once again a band-aid solution. Also you get more people through the door but how many people are going to stay in the game long term? 5v5 gets boring quicker because of the lack of depth comparitively. People are still playing games like League because of the depth. Blizzard seems to have prioritized new players compared to Riot who prioritized regular players, and League has a way better esports scene because of that

[@beeree14]

It was “dying” bec they neglected OW1 balance for many months to work on OW2 lmao. OW1 wasn’t given a proper chance

[@weasyll_]

​@@S3nCh4nThe lack of depth in how you can construct your team composition is completely made up for it the depth of how you can now play in the map itself. So much more of the match is determined by how a team actually uses/abuses map geometry and proper positioning/timing in 5v5. If you go back in 6v6 so many fights completely ignored map control and using proper angles/peek timings because you had 2 layers of defensive util that cover up your mistakes. Even looking at high level/pro play 6v6 fights devolved into two team smashing into each other until one tank died and then the two tank team steamrolled.

[@weasyll_]

There are so many different positions/sections of maps that went completely ignored/unused in 6v6 because of the overwhelming Tank util that could escort ppl through chokes. The way players move through and use the map now in 5v5 is way more interesting/dynamic to me personally.

[@its_lucky2526]

everything that people say is good about 5v5 exists with 6v6 as well imo. it's just more

[@S3nCh4n]

Jake's just mad he can't play CoD in his cartoon shooter like he said he prefers deathmatch

[@JumpsOw]

This stream was iron spitting facts and giving a solution while also making this face 👁️👄👁️ because of Jake's arguments, bro... "Stop playing tank" he has to be trolling.

[@jptrady1997]

hes a dps player doesnt matter if hes a pro he barely plays tank he doesnt know anything besides its good now casue he can pew pew

[@JumpsOw]

@@jptrady1997 Yeah but I don't play tank and I see the problems I'm affected by the problems even without playing tank, I think they are just paid actors at this point even jay3 who preferred 6v6 said he prefer 5v5 out of nowhere right when all the other blizzard affiliated streamers started defending 5v5.

[@davidhamid8025]

I thought 7v7 was the next step forward. 5v5 is a step backwards.

[@viettran-sp1nt]

4 HOURS OF FOOTAGE WITH 1080 jesus

[@Drew-fn6rq]

Jake's points are soo cooked. 6v6 Tank synergies were a result of hero design and balance issues not because there were 2 tanks. The choice for 5v5 was purely made because que times for tanks were so low compared to the other roles because the devs abandoned the game to work on Overwatch 2 pve and never added more heros or major balances changes like role passive. Orissa doesn't even have a shield now and doom is a tank. There are not any good excuses for not making theses change earlier other than bad management, wasted resources, and an incompetent balance team.

[@Drew-fn6rq]

at this point Jake's circular reasoning is just annoying.

[@kennethnoisewater4423]

synergies aren't necessarily THE issue, part of the problem is that there will always be tanks that work well together and those that don't and the disparity there ruins too many games. hog ball v double shield is the example right? tank heroes would have to be super samey for that to not happen. the other part of the problem is that tanks are too valuable and significant. so when you get 2 tanks together that have synergy it's exponentially increasing their already higher than baseline value, and it's why tanks getting countered in 5v5 is such a big deal. Blizz need to make tanks less significant by making it so they're no longer huge outliers with 1000s of EHP and giant hitboxes. then the tank v tank matchup matters less, there's less pressure on the tank and less tank diffs in general. it's the same core problem in 6v6 as it is in 5v5.

[@christian2463]

please tell me how you would balance the tanks to avoid tank synergies please go on tell me because i bet anyway you try there will be synergies. You can’t perfectly balance overwatch and you cope anyway you want but it’s true 6v6 is never coming back it’s been a year and half get over it.

[@Drew-fn6rq]

​@@kennethnoisewater4423the problem is actually worse now if you get a one trick tank that is getting countered. 2 tanks can split aggro even without synergy. Hog on the flank with a dps and Winston with 2 support pockets

[@Drew-fn6rq]

​@@christian2463the dps passive can easily keep tanks in check

[@filipesimoes1343]

2 top ranked players argue about what they guess the low elo experience is... Both clearly out of touch.

[@depthcharge5091]

Iron is actually right tho. It’s one thing to mouthpiece for the community and be right but Jake,spilo,Avrl and SVB all try to speak for us and are wrong.

[@filipesimoes1343]

​@@depthcharge5091dont feel like he is, to me this is a debate between the two people who are worse at argumentation in the ow content creator scene

[@depthcharge5091]

@@filipesimoes1343 fair. He does have weird takes. But personally I’m tired of this 5v5 argument because the whole thing is a contradiction.

[@ultraviolenc3]

Good points from both of them, but I have one fundamental disagreement with Jake on his point he keeps making through out the whole debate, one example is on 1:22:20. Assuming Devs made their decision based on stats going 5v5 is way too big of assumption. The same way we can assume rational dev team wouldnt have wasted 4 years of dev time on a pve that was scrapped later, but killed existing game. Or held on brig for so long that all they had to do is just put her in a vault till the can fix her. He shouldn't assume all the game decisions are based on rigorous stats. 5v5 decision might be made bc of a business goal to change SOMETHING for the sake of a change and sell the sequel, or sell the idea to the investors. Or maybe one of top tier managers decided so for their own personal career reasons? Or maybe bc the former Devs just weren't competent enough and didn't know how to balance the tank, since initially ow supposed to be a just a casual game. There are probably a number of reasons why they went 5v5 that contributed in this decision with different proportions, but we shouldnt assume it was highly calculated only possible decision for the games prosperity.

[@gusstabithc]

Sad to see the former god gamer JAKE become a Blizzard corpo shill.

[@eggsby27]

god forbid a man have a different opinion

[@S3nCh4n]

He's using a lot of game dev buzzwords but doesn't understand it on the same level as actual devs. Which makes him seem like he's talking out of his ass. Also him talking about the business model over the competitive integrity of the game is very weird since he's kind of insinuating that Blizzard went 5v5 for monetization reasons

[@S3nCh4n]

@@eggsby27 it's good that we get an opinion from a tank player and a dps player. we also need a perspective from a pro support player

[@PainxSorrow]

That’s what I’m saying

[@agenzmain6146]

the flaw in jake's argument is that he is saying that synergy is bad for casuals??? but it's the opposite quite literally. Synergy should be rewarded, synergy requires skill. A winston and dva executing their synergy well SHOULD be rewarded. But in ow2, the tanks don't need synergy to be oppressive. They just have buttons that cover their weaknesses. in ow1, u needed synergy to cover weaknesses. in ow2, u press fortify, or vape, or overdrive. if the casuals didnt even pick the synergistic tanks, how does the oppressive tank synergy even affect them?? what affected them was easy heroes being op at their skill floor instead of the skill ceiling. No silver player in the history has ever complained about tracer being op, or winston dva synergy being op. you know what they complain about? Free value heroes like moira, brig, orisa, hog, mauga that press buttons and get value. and when you remove tank synergy, u need oppressive free value abilities so the role isnt unplayable. tldr - 1 tank demands for broken, all rounded tanks that don't have weaknesses, or all in or nothing tanks like mauga otherwise the tank just gets shit on. There's no in between here. the 'in-between' in ow1 was the synergy required to execute tank combos. this is why dive wasnt oppressive for 99.99% of the playerbase even when it was hard meta at pro play. but ow2 tanks like orisa, mauga, ram are oppressive when meta EVEN at low ranks. 6v6 is strictly better for everyone, pro play, casual play, whatever

[@Rexjimmy]

I think you meant to say 5v5 is strictly better for everyone, pro play, casual play, whatever

[@agenzmain6146]

@@Rexjimmy 6v6 is what i meant to say and what you did as well. Lmao

[@Biggun3567]

I think the reason why the devs made overwatch 5v5 was because they knew they messed with 6v6 and thought that it was too hard to fix and literally ignored the community. in both sides a common hatred is toward the support role indeed. Remove immortalities from the game and super healing and you got a better game.

[@UrumaJr]

3:48:55 no wonder why they were arguing for so long that’s your answer

[@heiko2255]

Thats fucking cooked Sure everyone has their biases, but if you try to find a consenus you try to take how the other side feels into account. Jake saying "Yeah i dont care for like 1/3 of the roles and like 10-20% of the playerbase" is insane in a debate about the GENERAL STATE OF THE GAME

[@mafikdew78]

This is pretty much Blizzard's mentality as well. Watch OverWatch 3 won't even have tanks

[@marvynjeanbaptiste3206]

@@heiko2255Yea I’m not gonna lie he lost a lot of credibility from me because how can anyone think their opinion is valid IN A DEBATE when you won’t even bother to try and reason with the other side.

[@Daniel-gg3ew]

A structure would ve made this more entertaining and easy to follow. Iron kinda went in circles a couple times feels like he has some good points but doesnt have the words or vocabulary to explain his thinking.

[@Dezatron-]

Hero design is the biggest issue for overwatch.

[@MK-mm7ui]

Blizzard should gather content creators that want 6v6 back to make a patch for 6v6 QP Hacked.

[@marvynjeanbaptiste3206]

I didn’t think that’d be likely but they made an entire balance patch for an April Fools event.

[@GraphiteBlimp27]

SOLUTION FOR QUEUE TIMES ISSUE: Open Queue Role Limit -one queue in which you can play any role -maximum 2 tanks and 2 supports on a team -max 6 damage a team -instantly solves queue times issue -prevents cheese AOE stacking comps like quad tanks or GOATS -Allows for comps like multi DPS ball and I’m sure tons of creative ones with the new OW2 tanks -competitive depth -casual freedom, diversity, and wackiness -makes the open queue format easier to balance by limiting tank and support synergies to one other for the class -everyone likes playing DPS so you can always swap to that and with the new OW2 tank/supports those roles will be far more appealing with their FPS elements -to prevent people being locked out of their favorite role you could add a preferences feature that utilizes role and hero preference or even just use the existing hero levels system and match players with different pools -you could literally just make tanks/supports outright better than DPS (like they already are for most of 5v5) to ensure people desire to play them but that would be ok because you could not stack more than 2 and DPS will always be played

[@AFa-e6i]

This is a very bad solution. What would happen there is exactly what happened before role queue: Most games would just be everyone playing DPS and creating awful games. The main purpose of role queue wasn’t really to put a maximum number of a tanks and supports. It was to put a minimum number of tanks and supports, because prior to role queue most lobbies were just DPS clown fiestas, where virtually no one played anything but DPS (which also made it drastically less fun for the players who did play tank and support, because, for instance, tank is not fun if you do not have any supports, and that was typically what would happen).

[@GraphiteBlimp27]

@@AFa-e6iDo you really think with new Doom, new Orisa, Queen, Ramattra, and Mauga that nobody would queue tank? Or now that we have more FPS supports like Kiriko and Illari (plus another pacifist option in LW) that people would not play support either? The playerbase has been trained on the “right” way to play this game with role queue for nearly 5 years. Plus, you could explicitly design tanks/supports to be more powerful than DPS so that people will play them. It’s already been the case that DPS were weakest for most of OW’s life, but with this direction we can lean into that fact in order to spur players to choose those roles. DPS can be solely better at dueling or raw damage output, or you can have specialists like Sombra or Mei who have more utility. Having a bad tank game and just can’t get it done? Go DPS and let your teammate fill that spot. There are so many players who have hero pools like junkrat, hog, mercy and don’t play any other heroes in their role, so they only queue the one they’re most comfortable with or the one . There are tons of people who would play Hog/Zarya (as Jake says he would) if they didn’t have to hard commit to playing tank and entire round. Also, you act as though the 30/30/40 rule in OW hasn’t always been true- 30% of your games are auto losses and 30% of your games are auto wins but the other 40% your impact matters. That’s true regardless of format, 6v6 or 5v5, role queue or open queue, or even my proposed open queue role limit. I also suspect you didn’t read one of the points, you can implement a system where players select their preferred role and heroes in order for the matchmaker to pair you with players with different preferences or they could even just utilize the existing hero levels. Also, with the lessening of stacking restrictions and (hopefully) additional teamplay features, OW will become a more competitive and teamwork oriented game, making it both more necessary and easier to work together to create valid comps. I think you are forgetting that in those days tanks were team oriented (Rein/Winston MT’s, Zarya needs to build charge, Dva damage isn’t accurate) or Hog. Not everyone liked Hog. Also, supports were originally just 3 heroes, one of which is a pacifist archetype, one who speeds and isn’t much of a damage threat if you don’t have his mechanics down, and Zen who was appealing to DPS players but is a glass cannon. Like the game would just not be the same game as it was in 2018. Also being able to play all roles is a true measure of OW skill. On the casual front, the most common complaint I hear from people I meet in real life social settings who used to play is that when they added the role thing they hated having to select what they want to play and liked having the freedom. I’m actually pro 6v6 222 role queue, but if the queue times issue is such a big deal and is the only real argument against 6v6, this is the way to have our cake and eat it too.

[@theredguy92]

I also want to say the devs set a precedent of not being able to balance the game and having to switch formats to change the meta. That was Brig. Common sense says that the reason they went to 5v5 was to balance double shield rather than Jakes ghost statistics. Imagine OW2 releases and its still double shield meta? They couldnt have that at any cost.

[@malicious8767]

The argument against 6v6 that it's not as "casual friendly" as 5v5 or too punishing to have Tanks that don't synergize vs. those that do is just so intellectually dishonest. 5v5 doesn't mitigate or solve that "issue," it heightens it. OW2 supp synergies are incredibly potent, putting OW1's OP supp synergies to shame and deciding the vast majority of the match. Dps synergies/covering weaknesses to a lesser extent because it's more about having counters, but still it's a world of difference when one team has a cohesive damage comp or is locked into something that counters the enemies' picks. In 5v5 picks and synergies matter exponentially more than 6v6, people just don't understand it as much as OW1's tank synergies because it's not happening right in front of them 24/7. The format forces a more serious tone of play and try-harding even in QP because of how stompy games are off of single kills- which is usually burning down the tank in 90% of games. 5v5 is inherently more toxic competitively and demanding of casual players, while also being less expressive and severely punishing. Solo tanks have more pressure than ever to perform perfectly and are completely at the mercy of their dps comp and support synergies. It's also more punishing than ever to make a single mistake as tank since you get blown up so easily once you don't have 100% of your defensive cooldowns or most of your team's resources shoved up your ass keeping you alive through any downtime. How is that more casual friendly? Hell, how is that even a welcoming or FUN experience to players? It's NOT and that's why more people than ever have dropped the tank role entirely. Tank is not appealing in 5v5. It's a fundamentally awful experience most of the time, and I can't blame people for not giving it a second glance after loading in and getting counter-swapped by half the enemy team then flamed for dying by your team that has no hit-scan players into Pharmacy and locked Mercy/Lifeweaver hoping to afk healbot their way through the game. Why would anyone want to play a role with little to no impact? The role that can only help win more while being able to completely throw a game off single mistakes or not having the answer to a counter? No one playing for fun, that's for sure. Especially solo players lol.

[@moonpig660]

i like the argument about 5v5 solved queue times, when the game went f2p which just that could have been the sole reason queue times got better, and the reason queue times were bad was ppl didnt want to play tank so their idea was to remove a tank so everyone focuses the sole tank which makes them not want to play tank anymore instead of making tank fun for ppl so more ppl play tank and boom queue times fixed.

[@Feintyyy]

Jake's points are weak, bla bla, bring back 6v6!!!

[@Grux_ASG]

Jake is the dps my tank duo farmed, giving him tank PTSD. We left the game after ow2.

[@nahaight1373]

6v6 was built from the ground up with 6v6 in mind. 5v5 was not and is literally an experiment that already has proven itself to be 1000x times worse. These creators parroting the 5v5 wagon are going to be the reason this game will die. All for that blizzard money😂

[@lr15overwatch62]

This just feels like tank player opinion vs dps opinion to me. Of course jake likes one less tank in his face in ow 2, but to me that doesn't even make total sense because most metas have been hard rush down with kiri lucio or some shit that shuts down every dps but tracer anyways so it feels a little silly. Take current NA meta for example, entire point is to speed orisa onto soj and shut her down, thats not fun from soj (dps!) perspective. And i assume that wouldnt be fun for the orisa either apparently. I think thats the main point they didnt rly go over, is why it feels better to play dps in ow2, or if it even does at the end of the day (I dont think it does).

[@Dreigonn]

5:10 “The synergy between two tanks is so powerful, that if your using it, it’s like ruining the game for the other team.” Pure DPS brain bias take. He’s saying that as if heroes like, cree, widow, sombra, and brig didnt exist in ow1 Also watching more of this, this exact argument can be said about the synergy between two supports. If the enemy team is running Ana mercy, and your team is running zen lucio, then that synergy of supports is ruining your game too. That is a very weak and nitpicky point to make.

[@dannyhernandez112]

I like Jake, I think he’s a smart guy and he does most of the time have good takes on meta and stuff. With that being said I will never find Jakes points in this debate valid because unlike some other people arguing for 5v5 Jake actually doesn’t care at all about the tank experience making all his arguments one sided. He doesn’t consider any of the problems tank players have to matter. Based off of his mindset on the game we might as well just eliminate the tank role all together and tell tanks players gg go away you don’t matter anymore.

[@okami7847]

Its crazy how I thought the same thing. So long as we remain in Role Lock 5v5 Tanking will be miserable. So either we make a change in the format or just cut out the Tank role altogether.

[@ozman5466]

5v5 created SwapWatch and it ruins the Tank role. Even in Quickplay, I always get hard-countered after a team fight by the enemy tank and at least one dps and support. In OW1, I can still play the game without all of the enemy team swapping to hard counter me due to another tank being in the game. It's so dumb and I actually uninstalled the game over a month ago because of how horrible the Tank experience is. There is more CC in OW2 than OW1 too...can't do it anymore.

[@TheeRedNight]

Responses to Jake will edit as we go. Can't design tanks without thinking how it will affect current tanks. This is true for dps and support and thus a bad contradictory argument. People won't comment on 5v5 if they like it. This is simply untrue. More and more people will be on social media talking about their points and opinions. Acting like people don't discuss online is dishonest and a boomer take in this day and age. 13:07 "Brig enabling goats" this shows Jake knows it wasn't a tank issue and I predict later in the discussion he'll claim it was tank synergies that broke the game when it was op supports. (Brig got nerfed around 25 times in a row and was still meta ) Jake brought up q times to be discussed later. Q times is a losing argument when q times are around the same for my friends and I in today's ow as it was in 6v6. As well ow is now free so it's not a fair point to try and compare in the first place tbh. Bad tank picks are game over immediately. This argument is weird since it's the same in 5v5 except there is no chance since tanks are designed now as do it all machines. While in 6v6 they had counter play. In addition I would argue that having more options with possible lose options is better than less options not even accounting for the fact you still have lose cases in today's ow. Jake response to low ranks can play whatever you want is wrong. In low ranks we could play whatever we want. This is purely incorrect to claim by Jake. Jake pretending that tank synergy was more important than support is purely hyperbole and incorrect. The amount of games that felt lost because Lucio zen or zen mercy got picked is massive. (In low rank) I may be done lol. We're 30 minutes in and Jake hasn't presented one honest argument and he has talked the vast majority of the time. I genuinely think he is being a mouthpiece for blizzard. I do not believe he believes these things because his rationale for them are so flawed.

[@theredguy92]

I agree with Jake saying we went to 5v5 bc the ratio of tanks to dps and supports was off to the point we probly needed it for que times. However i would offer the counterpoint that during OW1 there were hardly any new tanks added and the ones they did add (orisa, sigma particularly) were boring as fuck. If they added Ram or JQ during OW1 there would have been more tank players bc there would be fun engaging characters drawing ppl to the role.

[@dogs-game-too]

Insert "why cant we have both?" meme here

[@GraphiteBlimp27]

Off the bat, Jake’s argument regarding gameplay is that FPS games are better if you can just do what you want and don’t rely on a teammate. Has he tried to solo push a site in CS without team utility against competent players? That’s like THE FPS game in the most pure sense, and you still need teammates to do stuff. The game is good because of utility, it’d be so basic if that wasn’t an aspect. And Jake is saying that Overwatch, an FPS MOBA, has too much teamwork? Smh… Ok so if tank synergies are so OP and we don’t want the RNG of having the wrong pair, then has Jake considered the RNG of getting a tank one trick that doesn’t want to counterpick? Consider this, in OW1 you needed both of your tanks to be non cooperative AND for the enemy tanks to be using a synergy, that’s multiple variables that have to to against you. For OW2, all it takes is your one tank player to be on the wrong hero, so instead of you having a Rein one trick and a certain % change to get like a Zarya or Dva with him, let alone the other team also has a chance of not being synergistic, in OW2 that Rein can just be countered and it’s the one variable you need to go wrong. He could even be countered by their DPS swapping so they don’t even need to have a good tank matchup. It’s just a bogus argument and it’s simply easier to be in an unplayable match when only one player can make or break it on their own. Also Jake acting like trying a 6v6 patch by changing hp values would be such immense work when they literally just did that for the new 250 hp standard season 9 patch… Jake also thinking we need casuals and can’t design the game for competitive so we have to do 5v5. Ok so you mean to tell me OW wasn’t incredibly popular with casuals when it was peak? Also OW is a completely unique experience you can’t get it anywhere else, but now OW2 is half unique and half like everything else so yeah, people will leave and play other games. But before OW was so unique people were willing to sit in queue to get to play. And I honestly think with the new tanks it wouldn’t even be that bad. All the data from 222 role queue is double shield so we can’t see how enjoyable tank was with that data, and before that it was open queue where you couldn’t even get a functional team comp to take advantage of a tank’s value so people wouldn’t select those heroes, plus almost all the tanks were either main tanks or balanced off tanks that couldn’t just go frag, only Hog could do that. We now have double the tanks (and actually fun ones unlike the OW1 DLC tanks) so that plus being able to pick synergies people will flock to 6v6 tank. It’d be like dropping reworked Orisa, tank Doom, Queen, Ram, and Mauga in one patch. 5 new heroes essentially for the tank role at once and Jake is telling us people wouldn’t want to play that? You can easily argue that they’re the silent majority too and aren’t involved since they left the game. You can’t argue imaginary voters, the people that actually show up to these debates and answered the polls show a pretty even split, and that’s indication to me that roughly half the people still prefer 6v6 even considering the content drought and that it’s been years since it was good (Oct 2020). People remember.

[@pphaver871]

Goated comment. The 5v5’ers aren’t wrong in liking it, but it sucks that off tank players like myself got shafted so hard. The way I enjoy the game most was removed, and it hasn’t felt the same since. I think the problem is that we are thinking we have to choose one, so the 5v5’ers are fighting tooth and nail to keep it. We can have both. We can definitely try out a 6v6 arcade and see if there is an audience. 5v5 and 6v6 like all things is a matter of preference and taste. Though I do think 80% of OG tank players will prefer 6v6, and maybe even the supports too.

[@GraphiteBlimp27]

@@pphaver871Yeah idk who got shafted more the offtanks whose role doesn’t exist or the classic main tankers who can’t play Rein/Monkey without being counterpicked into Oblivion. Iron makes a good point how there’s a difference between swapping to negate someone else or swapping when it fits the scenario better. To your last point, if 80% of tanks would rather play 6v6 and the 5v5 queues are no longer viable, they can just make a mode that has no tanks for those players who want to do a more shallow deathmatch type game without any strategy.

[@jptrady1997]

the fact that this is a debate is crazy, 5v5 is not something the game needed or fixed anything besides q times

[@MK-mm7ui]

I’d honestly rather try 7v7 (2-3-2) than playing 5v5 for the rest of ow2

[@vpl9863]

???

[@iTs_HeavyKev]

Jake is so deluded it’s outrageous

[@themystikone]

3:37:30 dude I'm sorry but your hypotheticals sound unrealistic. And they are also just that Hypotheticals and to me (Super casual) there are possibilities for a lot of things. There was a possibility for overwatch to fail at launch. There are possibilities we face every day and I honestly don't think people will mass leave the game because of an extra minute in que I highly doubt that.

[@reverb2516]

This was a very interesting discussion as a lot of the 5v5 vs 6v6 (vs roll lock) discussions have been. In my opinion, the best compromise between all of them is: 5v5 with 1 tank, 1 support, 1 dps and 2 flex rolls. The 2 flex rolls can pick any character however when they pick a 2nd or 3rd tank, the max HP of each tank is reduced by a percentage, and that percentage stacks for 3 tank picks. Similarly if you only end up with 1 support then that support has a percentage buff to their healing and if you have 3 supports then all 3 supports have a percentage debuff to their healing. I'm not sure what the exact buff/debuff percentages would be (maybe around 15-20% ish), that would take practice to figure out. The benefits of this is... you get to experiment with more comps which 6v6 used to provide. you get the faster que times that 5v5 provides. you get to continue to que for the rolls you intend to play, allowing hyper flex people to que for the flex roll. counter picking becomes less a problem just for the tanks, since now the flex rolls can lend more of a hand. Hopefully with the buff/debuff system games won't feel too unplayable based on team composition, and the guaranteed 1 tank, 1 support, 1 dps will add some stability. The downside is though that balancing is harder to figure out, since maybe some combinations will be too strong and the buff/debuff system wouldn't be a good fix all solution to some broken comps.

[@malicious8767]

"Being so reliant on your teammates to pick the right heroes and to do their job, so that you can do your job is a bad gameplay experience." Kinda like how tanks in OW2 can't do anything without being handheld by supports? Or how all tanks in 5v5 are forced to frontline 99% of the time so it's completely out of your hands to control to off angles away from point or take flanks? What about your hero pick's playmaking being entirely at the mercy of your dps comp's ability to follow up? Isn't that pretty heavy "RNG" that leaves the tank role completely "reliant" on other roles to "do their job?" Jake's right, he's pretty "talented" ...at arguing in favor of 6v6 lmao

[@Max_0ut]

In regards to some response. I play a good amount. I'm a full time student with other interests who strives to do well in school first so I don't play like 10 hours a day but I put the time in because I enjoy spending the time with my friends online and getting better at something I'm half decent at. With that being said I play in low GM - high diamond the majority of time. I played tank in overwatch 1 and once I dedicated myself to improving on that role first as an off tank player (mostly duo queued with my brother on tank) I climbed from plat - 4k and every game I lost made sense, I either wasn't good enough at negating off angles on dps or winning the sigma battle, or synergizing with my other tank. This was over the course of season 20 something to the end of the game. This was the peak of any pvp gaming experience for me, the improvement, the details, the team play, and all the dynamics was so interesting and rewarding to get better at. In overwatch 2 I mainly play dps, although I enjoy support more (support queues are 10+ minutes bc its such an easy role bc I actually swap unlike 90% of the support players base and for no real rewarding reason I'm like mid GM) because tank is so dumbed down. On dps, unless I'm in a party with my friends who are boosted, I will win most games I deserve to win, similar to tank in ow1. However, I do still play tank, mostly in hope that I will feel something like I did a couple years ago (I don't) and I can be so much better than the other tank: every shout is better, my matrix use is better, my winston play is better, etc. and I am losing rank. Either the other team swaps better, or I try and force queen too long bc that hero actually requires some skill (long cd, knife) cus the other tank switches to something better, or I do play the rock paper scissors switching nearly every life and still I'm reliant on my team more often than not bc tank players in masters know to switch. I feel like I've improved on living as tank and finding openings to go backline instead of just tank trading, but instead of that being reflected in my rank my rank is still just the same. 6v6 made the tank role actually real and interesting. 5v5 tank is just who can live better (on every new hero) + finding a gap if u actually have a lucio player on ur team in ranked (rare).

[@Max_0ut]

Also new tank design is really ugly - one big CD that makes u invincible is really bad - Orisa (especially ugly cus spin gold is impossible to not always have), Shout (less so cus it goes away really fast now), Mauga (literally invincible every 12 seconds w/ a kiriko), Ram (same as orisa but with shield + block). Also block is really unfun to play as and against its just an ugly ability that has limited counterplay for most of the cast. Plus the queue times aren't that different... I think the only queue time that has changed is the dps and maybe by a minute to three minutes.

[@alias1448]

Iron is so emotionally attached to the idea of 6v6 he can’t see the pros and cons of each side clearly

[@alias1448]

Also no one wanted to play tank before double shield and before role lock

[@DruidOneTrickDnD]

@@alias1448No one wants to play Tank now either, sooo…

[@nahaight1373]

Jake loves playing stupid😂

[@michaelmassari39]

Well done, I'm a 5v5 guy but Iron raises a lot of great points and the queue times argument I'm just watching this like what is there not to understand about the point, Jake?

[@kianpettersen2400]

Dps q time in diamond for me is around 10 min

[@S3nCh4n]

Queues in diamond for me was around 5 minutes usually (up to 10mins if it was a weekday morning) in OW1. Blizzard just claimed that they have reached an all-time peak of playerbase which means the bulk of the players are just playing QP. this is what the devs wanted

[@alias1448]

And before 5v5 it was 20mins

[@Aquahunter3]

tank synergies under masters just did not matter you could almost always play any tank you want and get value

[@alecfrancis5631]

Jake dosent understand the lives of us Plat Dia players.... in ow2 if I have idiot monkey we are screwed but ow1 maybe I get my other tank to get more value...

[@theredguy92]

Agree

[@kruiser6666]

couldn't agree more, I can be having a good game and feeling good about myself but the tank is throwing the whole game and no space can be generated - having that off-tank created a good system where the pressure all doesn't rely on one, it can fluctuate as it should, all other classes get this debrief.

[@KingDanOfBarr]

It literally can't be both that tank has low impact and that you can't win with the worse tank. One of these gotta be a skill issue.

[@christopher7692]

M​@@KingDanOfBarrnah that's how tank goes. Tanks usually can't carry the game even if you're good. But can hard throw

[@SauceSlave]

In the lower ranks. Ow2 is a game about who can counter the other tank harder.

[@SauceSlave]

I'm currently plat 1. I was silver 2 two months ago. I will walk back to spawn and switch even if I have ult any time the enemy tank switches. The only ults I'll keep are flux, big suck, and grav. I'll swap no matter what otherwise

[@mrpetebojangles21]

Oh man, 4 hour debate, what have I got myself into.

[@wyattwren2102]

jake is mad because he is bad

[@Dario11457]

Jake is rly great at arguing for 6v6 lmao

[@kevlowry]

Bring back 6v6

[@jacobbaartz7710]

My big points of contention: Tank has never been up to ⅓ the playerbase. Players never enjoyed playing tank in 6v6. We have both bad extremes of tank representation even before double shield, in open queue. We had either arguments about who was tank, a miracle, or a team abusing goats. Even if we argue that goats was because of supports, we can still see that tanks were always either less popular, or primarily used in busted comp synergy scenarios. *If* we claim that tanks were never in a good state, and that they would be more popular if blizzard balanced them, the problem we run in to is that blizzard is under far more work and restrictions to balance the role. Tanks also need fixing in 5v5. I think tanks are more easily fixable in 5v5, than fixing them for 6v6, then ensuring that each existing and new tank are designed around the *potential* of their synergy with every other character. When jake defers to authority it is because that authority has every incentive to make the game as appealing as possible. If they could make 6v6 more appealing than 5v5 they would and will do it. Jake is totally right that tanks can be in a state of balance with ubiquitous counterpicking, but i *do not* agree that this state of balance is an enjoyable one. He kinda a wackjob team coach for this opinion, lol. Something i dont like about both sides is that they both claimed both sides of "low rank players are/arent affected by higher level gameplay". They need to settle on a single lane. I think lower ranks are affected by things like stronger tank pairings, its just going to be a smaller portion or frequency as you trail down the sr ladder.

[@berzerkmk]

The dude arguing 5v5 got destroyed

[@masisf]

You can tell Jake has been coached up by blizzard

[@malicious8767]

If Blizz only cares about queue times, it'd make way more sense to revert back to open q for all. 5v5ers genuinely only have one argument in "meh, q times" but choose to ignore the nuance of why q times were bad and Jake's "I only want to defend the arguments I actually make" to shut down the discussion about long q times, when using the point of long queue times in your argument shows that he doesn't care about the conversation or even his own points. Like you're the one who brought them up? Now you're mad context is being added to your point that doesn't support your narrative?? Again, Jake sure is 'talented' at this

[@Backfired]

Tank is actually just.... Not enjoyable. Even good games make you feel worn out where nobody you queue with (homies) can relate. Everything effects lower ranks. Even buffing bs simple characters hurts low ranks. Make them better before making them get free value because it scales. Jake is... Wrong. The game is much more punishing, pick wrong and it's almost assured that an L is coming for you. 99% quit rate before harsh harsh quitter penalties. Well clearly Jake is right and no issues there. Seriously the disconnect is astonishing. As if DPS/SUPP queue times aren't on 5-10 mins. Good fix tank is sub 1 min since launch/Mauga. Funniest part queue times wouldn't suck if the game was balanced. 6v6 and good balance. Makes the game way more casual than even buffing hog through the roof. Also Jake is fr saying OW1 -> I picked what I want it's not my problem. OW2 -> Oh yeah you can't do that. Tank is always at fault. Like what?!

[@josephdavis3472]

"In mobas, you buy items" -Blizzard cries in HoTS

[@tareq1lee]

i overwatch 1 i always play tank fo 7 years in overwatch 2 i only play sombra an hack the enemy tank 😂😂 i never play tank in overwatch 2 ever

[@Mr_SamuelAdam]

Where is SVB when you need him!

[@AFa-e6i]

We can generally be virtually certain that there were substantially fewer players wanting to play tank compared to the other roles even before role queue and Sigma came out. This is because the fact that no one wanted to play tank (and to a lesser extent support) is the main reason role queue was put in place in the first place! There was a side benefit of doing away with GOATS at the highest levels, but the main reason (as the devs have repeatedly stated) was that without role queue you didn’t have enough people playing tank and support. It made the games very often awful to play, because it’s a game designed around having all the roles be played but that frequently was not happening. I feel like anyone who was playing Overwatch back then and denies this is just rewriting history in their mind. Tank being unpopular was a constant throughout the lifespan of Overwatch 1 (and it is similar in essentially every game that has the tank, DPS, and support roles-people just don’t generally like the tank role in games as much). It was unpopular before double shield, it was unpopular during double shield, and it was unpopular after double shield (and, by the way, talking about “double shield” as a significant era of the game is really high-elo specific-the vast majority of the player base was absolutely not constantly playing double shield, which means double shield obviously wasn’t causing them to stop playing tank). Before role queue, the issue that that caused was that it made most games bad because people weren’t playing all the roles. So they added role queue to deal with that. However, that shifted the problem. Now that people had to play a role that they didn’t want to play, this made the queue times for other roles sky high-which was a massive problem for the game because people don’t want to play a game where they spend half their time waiting for a game. The devs tried to fix that issue by adding that “ticket” system, which was essentially designed to incentivize people to play tank more. But even that didn’t really move the needle much. So they dealt with the queue-time issue by making it 5v5. This has fixed the queue-time issue while also still fixing the pre-role-queue issue. It is objectively the best solution, unless you cling to a fantasy that people will somehow consistently flock to a role they never flocked to if only the devs just made your preferred balance changes or added more heroes in the role. It is a role that has always been unpopular in Overwatch and has always been unpopular in essentially every game it exists in. There’s no good reason to believe we were just some balance tweaks or hero releases away from changing that. And once you acknowledge that, then the best solution for the health of the game is obviously 5v5.

[@RandiOW]

I can safely say after over 1000+ flex ques 99% of them were 1 minute tank ques. Something is clearly broken. Must be format issue 🤔

[@TierBelowPro]

Im at minute 39 absolutely bewildered this went for 4 hours. Not complaining just amazed, no way jake has this measured experienced debater approach the whole time

[@sonalex137]

Iron, thank you for making such a banger debate and speaking for the people and going against the biggest blizzard shill out there

[@BumpyGrimes]

Knowing you are going free to play live service and the playerbase will balloon from ow1 end count. The only justification of shifting it all to 5v5 is you know the games count will sustain longer after you abandon it again because you have the data from doing it previously. Why else would you strip away a tank when you had multiple tank heroes ready to go and you know ppl will play them

[@konradnemeth9789]

I wish Iron learned how to act as a normal adult in a debate

[@Itz_Hawks]

Iron: *Drops the minerals* Jake: We need more data😊

[@jorrellrichardson3181]

The intricacies of the game are a huge part of what makes it fun 1:59:01

[@rizaadon]

3:30 this belief is directly contradicted by the balance philosophy of 5v5. How does the average new DPS player win a fight against a super Tank on their own if even high ranked players can't do it because of an insane stat gap 💀

[@pristineo]

i think the 6v6 fun was about net value + chaos management. you could create pressure and die but know you won the teamfight. 6v6 is 100x better if you remove CC + cancer heroes. the APM possible + net pressure you could create was unreal. decision making and map control feel way more impactful in 5v5. it generally feels worse. casual players don’t like stuns + losing to torb bastion hog. they have zero counter-play available to them.

[@laughingnotlooking]

Welp, let's put all our hopes on Samito. Jake once again cooked with this one! He gave Iron the ammo to debate some of his takes. But in the end, not sure our 6v6 representative was prepared for this debate. It was almost as if, a fan was talking to the person they idolize. Still love that this was a 4-hour session.

[@_-_Bungus_-_]

It’s always been obvious to me why Blizzard reformatted to 5v5. Money. Blizzard failed to create a PvE sequel to OW1 but wanted to release something lucrative anyway. Since they had no new content for consumers, they decided to make the game free to play with expensive cosmetics, hero paywalls and a costly battlepass. However, if new free to play gamers ran into long Q times, they would ditch the game quickly (meaning less in game purchases/player retention) and go back to valorant/cod/apex, thus, 5v5. Blizzard flooded their game with new players (who could now play for free), gave them short Q times and turned OW into a casino. The 5v5 move wasn’t based on q times (alone), having enough tank players or making a better game. I think they’ve done their money grab and need to revert to 6v6.

[@jbdbesen]

Jake: "I think you are deeply misguided, but that's ok."

[@b23beatz]

One thing i think is over looked is that tank has no answer for widow at high elo, if they play widow and i go winston or ball theyre just going to play mauga hog bastion widow or some form of that to where i either swap back to sigma, or orisa for the tank but theres a top 100 widow piecing my team up and i have no answer. In 6v6 at least i would have chance with winston dva, or ball dva whatever to be able to zone out the widow and still be able to handle a bastion hog etc. its very boring that i need to answer 3 players that no matter what tank i pick somebody is countering me fully. I shouldnt have to rely on my entire team to swap to help me out it feels shit at least having a 2nd tank even if it isn't optimal they can tank resources allowing me to do other shit. I dont really care if its 5v5 or 6v6 since i play every role but tank gets extrmely boring at the highest level especially because some dps players are good enough that either the tank is hard countering you or dps are popping off because I'm countering their tank and cant interact with ranged hitscan and hope and pray my team doesnt peek and die before i have a chance to do anything