A
Aadil Saqib
Guest
(WARNING: Long ass post ahead. Only read if you're in the mood for an interesting and well thought out debate)
So guys, today I'd like to discuss a topic that is fairly common in the OW community. Its regarding the freedom of hero choice.
Before I say anything, let me give some context to where I got the idea from. Two days ago, rank 1 player, Dafran (and Shadder2k, his duo), got grouped with a masters player in one of his comp games. The masters player, while completely outclassed in the average SR of the game insisted on playing DPS even tho his team had Dafran and Shadder2k, two incredibly talented DPS players in the world. After some discussion, Dafran gave in and let him play. The master players' claim was that if he doesn't play DPS at ranks above him, he'll never get better. Dafran said that that wasn't how it worked. If he isn't even able to beat players at his own rank, he isn't ready to play at this level. Keep in mind, while we tend to lump masters, GMs and top 500s together as the best players, there was a staggering 700 SR diffeence between the masters and the rest of of the top 500s in the game. But anyway, the match happened and Dafran's team lost. During the match, the masters player did eventually give in and swapped to support. Here's a couple of points about the match:
While the masters player did indeed get some kills, and the chat said that he did his job, two of his mistakes actually cost the entire match, one of which Dafran showed later on. The first was swapping to healer in the middle of a crucial push, probably because he felt he couldn't keep up anymore. Second was rushing into a completely unmatched fight because Dafran said it was winnable. If you look at the stream, the fight actually was winnable. But in the sense that if the team attacked together after respawns before the final tick, they could have won. The masters player only heard "winnable" and instead of waiting for his team, ended up pushing 3v1 and dying. Something no GM player would have done. Finally, while the masters player might have done some degree of his job as DPS, it was nowhere near the amount of plays Dafran would have made if he had DPSed from the start. The latter half of the match showed that (when Dafran actually went DPS). Considering this is an extremely high tier game, you have to realise that mistakes stack up and EVERYTHING about the match determines who wins and who loses from the most minor details. And Dafran took it as such and even said that the guy basically threw. So here's the interesting thing, during all this, much of the chat called Dafran toxic cause of his views. They heartily showed their dsiagreement as I'm sure many of you would too with points like:
"He bought the game. It's his choice regarding what he plays"
"He did his best, he wasn't throwing"
"Its one game, he probably won't ever get a chance like this again. Let him try."
"He got matched with you cause he was good enough. Quit complaining."
Now what Dafran did next got me thinking of how biased and hypocritical some of the OW community is when they make points like this. You see, after the match, Dafran went on a whole montage of games where he played Symmetra, Hanzo and Mei over his normal heroes. Half the community watching him got outraged that he was throwing. Even his in-game teammates said the same and he did lose quite a few matches. All the while, he had his alibi that he was trying his best (he really was. His decision making was still spot on), trying to learn and paid for the game so he could play whatever he felt like playing. And well... he's right in that sense. According to the rules of OW and according the community, he had every right to play whatever the fuck he wanted without being classified as a thrower as long as he performed adequately. Even tho... and we all know deep down... he should be called as such.
So that brings me to my first point. Overwatch really needs to address this definition of what throwing really is. They keep putting forward the notion that as long as you try your best, you're not throwing. But that should also include the factor of hero choice. Because again, that's something under your control. If you aren't picking your best or most optimal heroes given the situation, you ARE effectively throwing because you're NOT doing your best. No other way to look at it. And there shouldn't be discrimination either. You see a a Gold ranked player do it and everyone is like, its his choice. When a high ranked well-known player does it, suddenly the community lynches him. That is simply not fair and if you support one belief or the other, there should be consistency. And again, in our heart of hearts... we all know certain heros are so unviable in certain situations that it IS 100% throwing. No other way to look at it.
Second choice is regarding the choice of heroes that effectively classifies you as a thrower. For example, Torb/Symm on attack. And let me be very clear here... imo, there's some very good reason for it. No matter how much you try and justify it, no matter how many counter scenarios you exemplify, the fact is that playing such heroes outside their situational roles is just as good as throwing the match. Dafran's play of symmetra proved that. He had Gold medals, he was doing his best, his team was doing their best, they played around him... but they all lost badly without even putting up a fight. Such heroes simply aren't viable in all situations no matter how good you are. By picking such a hero, you're effectively forcing 5 other players to play around you in their attempt to win. This is in no grounds, fair to the other 5 players who also paid for the game. Blizzard and the OW community need to stop excusing such behavior because deep down, we already know its wrong.
The next two points are directly related to the masters player mentioned beforehand. First of which is the whole scenario about him improving, and letting him have his chance. While it's true that at time's when you expect more from a person, the person may rise to those expectations... that isn't always the case. Especially in OW. If you allow a lower ranked player play over the high ranked player in terms of hero specialty, who's to say the reverse doesn't happen? What if the player cracks under pressure and actually ends up performing even worse? Which is what might have happened in this master's case. By the second half of the match, he realised he couldn't keep up and cracked. This imo, debunks such an argument. And I also agree with Dafran here. If you haven't even proven yourself against players of your own rank, and have still have trouble winning games at that level, you have no right to even try at anything higher. The results are always the same and I haven't seen any situation to think otherwise. EVen if YOU have, you can't deny it's a gamble. 99% of the time, you bring yourself and your team down and prove to yourself only that you aren't ready yet. Here, I'm sure you will all say the thing that highlights my last point "But dude! He was put in the match! That shows he was good enough to be there!"
I'll just skip the bullshit here. No. No, it doesn't. You and I both know the only reason he got put into a high ranked match like that was because matchmaking couldn't find 10 other top 500s to balance the game. It made do with favoring the other team with more GMs/Top 500s in response of Dafran's team having the rank 1 and rank 8 players. They were legit there to gain SR by making up for shortcomings of the masters players. He was just a tool in balancing the match. He got chosen cause of the lack of players queing at the time. It wasn't because he was skilled enough or anything. He was just lucky and happened to be queing at off hours. Nothing more.
So these are some of the things I've started thinking about after having experienced the whole thing. My views are still optimistic and are open to change. But so far, it is as I've said: The current general definition of throwing that we have is inaccurate and needs to be changed and accounter for accordingly. Let me hear your thoughts on the matter.
So guys, today I'd like to discuss a topic that is fairly common in the OW community. Its regarding the freedom of hero choice.
Before I say anything, let me give some context to where I got the idea from. Two days ago, rank 1 player, Dafran (and Shadder2k, his duo), got grouped with a masters player in one of his comp games. The masters player, while completely outclassed in the average SR of the game insisted on playing DPS even tho his team had Dafran and Shadder2k, two incredibly talented DPS players in the world. After some discussion, Dafran gave in and let him play. The master players' claim was that if he doesn't play DPS at ranks above him, he'll never get better. Dafran said that that wasn't how it worked. If he isn't even able to beat players at his own rank, he isn't ready to play at this level. Keep in mind, while we tend to lump masters, GMs and top 500s together as the best players, there was a staggering 700 SR diffeence between the masters and the rest of of the top 500s in the game. But anyway, the match happened and Dafran's team lost. During the match, the masters player did eventually give in and swapped to support. Here's a couple of points about the match:
While the masters player did indeed get some kills, and the chat said that he did his job, two of his mistakes actually cost the entire match, one of which Dafran showed later on. The first was swapping to healer in the middle of a crucial push, probably because he felt he couldn't keep up anymore. Second was rushing into a completely unmatched fight because Dafran said it was winnable. If you look at the stream, the fight actually was winnable. But in the sense that if the team attacked together after respawns before the final tick, they could have won. The masters player only heard "winnable" and instead of waiting for his team, ended up pushing 3v1 and dying. Something no GM player would have done. Finally, while the masters player might have done some degree of his job as DPS, it was nowhere near the amount of plays Dafran would have made if he had DPSed from the start. The latter half of the match showed that (when Dafran actually went DPS). Considering this is an extremely high tier game, you have to realise that mistakes stack up and EVERYTHING about the match determines who wins and who loses from the most minor details. And Dafran took it as such and even said that the guy basically threw. So here's the interesting thing, during all this, much of the chat called Dafran toxic cause of his views. They heartily showed their dsiagreement as I'm sure many of you would too with points like:
"He bought the game. It's his choice regarding what he plays"
"He did his best, he wasn't throwing"
"Its one game, he probably won't ever get a chance like this again. Let him try."
"He got matched with you cause he was good enough. Quit complaining."
Now what Dafran did next got me thinking of how biased and hypocritical some of the OW community is when they make points like this. You see, after the match, Dafran went on a whole montage of games where he played Symmetra, Hanzo and Mei over his normal heroes. Half the community watching him got outraged that he was throwing. Even his in-game teammates said the same and he did lose quite a few matches. All the while, he had his alibi that he was trying his best (he really was. His decision making was still spot on), trying to learn and paid for the game so he could play whatever he felt like playing. And well... he's right in that sense. According to the rules of OW and according the community, he had every right to play whatever the fuck he wanted without being classified as a thrower as long as he performed adequately. Even tho... and we all know deep down... he should be called as such.
So that brings me to my first point. Overwatch really needs to address this definition of what throwing really is. They keep putting forward the notion that as long as you try your best, you're not throwing. But that should also include the factor of hero choice. Because again, that's something under your control. If you aren't picking your best or most optimal heroes given the situation, you ARE effectively throwing because you're NOT doing your best. No other way to look at it. And there shouldn't be discrimination either. You see a a Gold ranked player do it and everyone is like, its his choice. When a high ranked well-known player does it, suddenly the community lynches him. That is simply not fair and if you support one belief or the other, there should be consistency. And again, in our heart of hearts... we all know certain heros are so unviable in certain situations that it IS 100% throwing. No other way to look at it.
Second choice is regarding the choice of heroes that effectively classifies you as a thrower. For example, Torb/Symm on attack. And let me be very clear here... imo, there's some very good reason for it. No matter how much you try and justify it, no matter how many counter scenarios you exemplify, the fact is that playing such heroes outside their situational roles is just as good as throwing the match. Dafran's play of symmetra proved that. He had Gold medals, he was doing his best, his team was doing their best, they played around him... but they all lost badly without even putting up a fight. Such heroes simply aren't viable in all situations no matter how good you are. By picking such a hero, you're effectively forcing 5 other players to play around you in their attempt to win. This is in no grounds, fair to the other 5 players who also paid for the game. Blizzard and the OW community need to stop excusing such behavior because deep down, we already know its wrong.
The next two points are directly related to the masters player mentioned beforehand. First of which is the whole scenario about him improving, and letting him have his chance. While it's true that at time's when you expect more from a person, the person may rise to those expectations... that isn't always the case. Especially in OW. If you allow a lower ranked player play over the high ranked player in terms of hero specialty, who's to say the reverse doesn't happen? What if the player cracks under pressure and actually ends up performing even worse? Which is what might have happened in this master's case. By the second half of the match, he realised he couldn't keep up and cracked. This imo, debunks such an argument. And I also agree with Dafran here. If you haven't even proven yourself against players of your own rank, and have still have trouble winning games at that level, you have no right to even try at anything higher. The results are always the same and I haven't seen any situation to think otherwise. EVen if YOU have, you can't deny it's a gamble. 99% of the time, you bring yourself and your team down and prove to yourself only that you aren't ready yet. Here, I'm sure you will all say the thing that highlights my last point "But dude! He was put in the match! That shows he was good enough to be there!"
I'll just skip the bullshit here. No. No, it doesn't. You and I both know the only reason he got put into a high ranked match like that was because matchmaking couldn't find 10 other top 500s to balance the game. It made do with favoring the other team with more GMs/Top 500s in response of Dafran's team having the rank 1 and rank 8 players. They were legit there to gain SR by making up for shortcomings of the masters players. He was just a tool in balancing the match. He got chosen cause of the lack of players queing at the time. It wasn't because he was skilled enough or anything. He was just lucky and happened to be queing at off hours. Nothing more.
So these are some of the things I've started thinking about after having experienced the whole thing. My views are still optimistic and are open to change. But so far, it is as I've said: The current general definition of throwing that we have is inaccurate and needs to be changed and accounter for accordingly. Let me hear your thoughts on the matter.
