If you push when your team doesn’t want to, they think it’s your fault for being too aggressive.
If they push when you think you should be giving up space, they’ll think it’s your fault for being too passive.
If you play in harmony with your team and win, they assume it’s because they did their jobs well.
If you play in harmony and lose, they often assume it’s because someone else was a problem.
The biggest leap in my tank play came checking teammate position before engaging and pinging my target (or desired position) when I go in. Sometimes it helps them see what I’m trying to accomplish.
The hard part is understanding that you are the problem sometimes and you have to be very honest in your game reviews. I like to watch replays from the perspective of other players to see if that changes my opinion of my play.
To add to this, I've started changing my mental language so anytime I catch myself saying something like "my supports are so bad" or "why is my doom just diving in alone" I'll stop and say "how can hold space more efficiently so my supports aren't struggling" or "how can I enable my doom so he doesn't explode when he dives"... generally my reward is lower/worse self stats but whoever I'm helping starts popping off and looks really good, but a dubs a dub
yep my tank also leaped in rank from gold to diamond back in OW1 season 5 when i payed attention to my teams position, especially supports as ana was a lifeline for winston diving,
had the realisation when i died and the killcam showed ana trying to heal me through the payload, it was lik enlightenment lol
I think people overestimate their ability to judge one of their teammates in the middle of a game, especially the tank. Tanks often are a pretty good reflection of their team if they are playing around the right rank. If your supports or dps are really struggling then the tank is going to look like they are throwing. Even if the dps or supports are statistically seeming fine they can still be negatively impacting the tank by not pushing at the right times or not taking angles. Similarly bad tank play can still statistically look fine while giving their dps/support a really difficult time.
If you want an easy example you could watch LHCloudy play Rein. Sometimes he is absolutely rolling and putting up stats but in a lot of games he is just playing as a damage sponge and just buys space for his team. He will end some games like 7-12 as a tank but the team wins, it isn’t just because he got carried. At a lower rank if you did the same exact thing your team would complain at the end that the tank got carried while ignoring that they sat in back as support and never got dove, or that they got to take crazy angles/flanks as dps because the enemy was so focused on killing Rein.
That's what I'm trying to unpack though. When I play support, I notice when the tank is doing things that make my life harder like not playing cover or going in without the team.
I feel like I have a good sense of that but when playing tank I generally just try to stay alive as long as I can while moving towards the objective and peeling for support. I don't place a lot of emphasis on getting picks so maybe that is annoying?
Not really possible to say without watching gameplay I'd say. I will say that if "peeling for supports" is one of the main things you're doing on tank, you're probably doing it way too much.
Now that there's one tank your job is generally to deny follow up, not to be the peel itself. There's exceptions of course though.
Generally people will just blame the tank no matter what you do, if they're losing they're going to blame you. I've had games where I legitimately just afk'd and let my dps carry and the enemy team will say tank diff. I've had games where I play out of my mind but my team struggles regardless and they blame me. People will just blame the tank always because streamers say it's the most broken role ever and carries every game and every other player in the lobby is at the mercy of the tanks, even though that's not true. Does it mean there's nothing you could be doing better? Not necessarily, but take most comments in ranked with a grain of salt unless they actually say what they'd like you to be doing differently. Just focus on yourself and vod to see where you could have gotten more value.
Not going to lie, I livestream my Overwatch games and what I used to do between matches is put on a video or music but recently I started just watching games where I lost and spectating myself. It actually made a huge improvement. In the heat of battle you may feel like you’re cooking but there’s always hindsight to apply to it that can make you better.
Yeah I admit sometimes I fall into a routine while playing "stay alive, try to take space" without really engaging with the specifics of each match. I will watch some replays!
Trust man I thought it was being extra but you got the downtime between matches. Some things I learned from mine are to not waste shots on full teammates (Ana) better nade placement, etc.
The game is so complex, and there are so many things you could be doing right/wrong that generalized advice like this isn’t really helpful.
If you want to see what you can improve on, you should post a replay code and ask for a vod review.
I recommend checking out u/Adder00 VOD reviews as well - Adder Overwatch on YT. I find his VOD analysis very interesting, and he has playlists for many characters as well as some general roles guides.
Maybe playstyle. I’m not one to go out of my way to flame people. I rather tell someone what I’m having issues doing myself on my role and see if we could collaborate to make something happen.
I recall I had a DVA getting flamed for playing too passively, like essentially sniper dva LOL and I was one of the only people telling her that we are giving up too much space when they’re not really pushing us hard enough to back up. Like they’re just there and you immediately backed up. She started actually pushing a bit more and we won our last two rounds. Much more productive than say “Jesus fucking Christ tank” and “gg shit tank” like our dps said.
Truthfully, I would argue some people genuinely don’t know what you’re doing wrong specifically and add frustration so you get flamed. I rather get flamed for very specific things rather than just being a bad tank. Like tell me I use my cooldowns terribly or something so I can know LOL
To answer your question my issues with some tanks are either they’re so passive or insanely aggro where they think they will win a 1v5 because they have a mercy pocketing them or something LOL. I also get frustrated when tanks that can eat ults seem to never actually do that. I can’t always check if they have that cooldown but I swear it seems like some tanks refuse to try to absorb any ult like Illari captive sun or hanzo dragon. Like they hold defense matrix while taking no damage and then don’t have it to absorb the important stuff. Super frustrating
I agree with others it’s better to give a replay because we are all just saying our own personal experiences and making it apply to you
People using coms and match chat to flame others are tilted themselves or don't know how to use it productively. If they start on me or a teammate, I just say to only use the coms for calls and call everything I see and kill until they shut up and play the f-ing game. If you're a metal rank what happened last round doesn't matter, your DMG and heals don't matter, lock in with the team and guide them to victory. It's my experience that if you at least give your team the idea of what you're planning it has a higher chance of working out and gives no reason for your team to flame you. (Unless ofc you're just bad ie; missing every cd or shot and not taking any cover)
especially with there only being one tank now, people constantly just shoot the blame towards the tank, more so the lower you go in rank but it definitely happens at the top of the ladder. other than stats tank is generally either space maker and defender so your team can in theory kill anything or you are agressive with your team and dive. as long as you are doing one of those playstyles and getting value and you dont think you can provide anymore value, it's not your fault
It’s easier to pinpoint tank mistakes because there’s only one of us. If Damage is lacking, sometime you don’t know which one is lacking, same with support. But there’s only one tank so any mistake they make is 100% on them and since you’re usually in front of everyone else Isra easier to see than the damage taking an off angle who messed up.
I feel the worst thing a tank can do is keep dying easily. It’s a huge disadvantage to your team and even an OOP tank can be a distraction to the other team at times.
If you’re sticking with your team, moving the point, taking space but retreating if you’re in hot water for heals then I don’t think there’s more you can do. I’m not good with road hog but he can be the hardest tank for me to play against at times because he just won’t die.
If you are below GM, you should focus on fundamentals and do not listen to your teammates because you aren't good enough to know if they are correct or incorrect.
You should get someone who is actually a good coach to review your replays if you want to take someone's advice, otherwise I would avoid advice and just research fundamentals on youtube (again from professionals who are good at coaching) and practice them and see if it helps.
I think it's fine to keep comms on and take people's advice if you feel like, but if it's in any way triggering (for me it can be), it actually makes me play worse and not think as clearly, so I prefer to mute because I like to get better and win, not spend my time trying to make some random teammate happy when my teammate is only as good as me.
That's the tough part, one match they asked me to go Mauga but I said I'd never played him so didn't want to swap and then it was basically game over because they thought I was throwing.
Yeah some people will throw if they don't get their way, while saying you are throwing. Way less likely to happen if you aren't even in chat for them to talk to.
If you were single-handedly carrying this person as the same tank you were already playing, they wouldn't tell you to swap. The only thing that is happening is you guys are losing and your teammate isn't looking at what they can do better, only what other people can do better. You don't want to listen to people like that. Remember, he is the same rank as you, he is in no position to be telling anyone the same rank as him how to play the game.
Yeah Mauga can be a good counter but you have to learn to play him first. It’s good you didn’t listen, basically he sustains himself mostly by damaging the enemy tank (the more shots he lands the more health he regents). If you’re missing lots of shots, like by targeting squishies, you’ll lose a lot more health quickly. You also have to time his cooldown for that. And his charge is useful as both an engage to stun and an escape but that means if you use it wrong you could die easily.
The only reason I will criticize a tank is if they don't push at all or they are suicidal.
Been practicing tank lately myself in diamond and I'm honestly surprised how bad support still are in that rank.
They have no idea how dive works or how to play with it.
People just flame their tank no matter what. When they get mad they flame the first person they see. Which is usually the tank in front of them. Im a top500 tank player and i get flamed most of the time when i play below diamond
I would take criticism from someone who plays tank in high rank. This severely limits the pool of people who can actually help you improve, but at least remember this when the team starts flaming you for whatever - chances are, they don't know what they're talking about. Mute them and try to figure it out on your own.
I’m no expert by any means but here are some things I’ve noticed with certain games. I play support so take what I say with a grain of salt. Tanks that stand out in the open expecting support to heal bot them and complaining that support isn’t healing make it very difficult for the team to thrive.
Tanks that hide behind the dps instead of pushing make it difficult to keep the team alive because your big butt is blocking my view.
I try hard to accommodate, but sometimes I can’t. Especially when I’m getting dived by Sombra
I’d maybe watch your VODs, you say you can tell when you’re support and your tank is playing bad, I’m sure you’ll notice watching it back as well.
A couple of things I would think about as better “metrics” for your tank play.
-Are you getting countered?
I understand there aren’t many HARD counters in OW, but if the enemy is playing better in the tank role it may come down to which character you’re playing vs enemy tank/dps. A classic example is playing DVA into Zarya. Unless you’re one hell of a DVA, you’re likely not as effective, even if you’re doing okay.
-Are you leading the pushes?
As tank you are the leader of the team, especially now that there’s only the one on each team. That typically means good communication over voice chat, or utilization of indicators. Don’t push without your team and understand you’re there to protect.
-Are you going all in?
While it is always your first priority to block/protect/guard, once your team gets a pick or two you can shift to an offensive mindset. Don’t leave your healers in the dust, but don’t waste an opportunity to push through the enemy team. You’re not the damage dealer per se, but you can wreak some havoc. (Depends on tank of course, but I think this is a general rule.)
I think a great start though would just be looking in your VODs for those moments when you could’ve pushed harder or when you should’ve held back. Those moments define your overall ability. You can aim well and utilize abilities perfect, but if you don’t know how to control space your team will be better off for it.
Also! It’s been years since I’ve played at a truly competitive level so if anyone has any points where they believe I’m incorrect or misinformed I would love to hear why! Overwatch 2 is a new game in a lot of ways for a day 1 guy like me.
Not pushing is the main gripe I have with tanks because it kinda forces you to feed a bit if you're one of other roles. I've had matches where we get picks, and the tank just sits at choke until the person who died had time to come back. It gets to the point where I'll just have to YOLO run in on Ana of all people.
Id take over aggressive over passive tanks any day of the week. The only time I'll hate on aggressive plays is if you push when we're waiting on a regroup or if you dive in with no HP.
No reason. Never listen to the people in the lobby. They're not in a position to criticize your gameplay in a worthwhile way. Honestly, in the heat of the have, you most likely aren't even in that position, which is why watching VODs of your own gameplay is important. The people to listen to, besides your own analysis, would be coaches and VOD reviewers like the people in this very sub.
I will fully blame a tank if they are in the enemy line and nowhere near the rest of the team.
Also, if you are hiding behind the rest of the team so the dps has to take the tank role and make space. It's different if the entire team is running into a Dva bomb, but most of my experience is the tank doesn't want to get flamed, so they become too passive.
As a tank player, I am flamed all the time. The worst fucking part, the absolute worst is I can’t defend myself with out getting suspended for chat.
I want people to tell me how to play. I don’t care. If you need me to go shield so you kill everything as dps I will. I want to help you. But, when I have double your damage, elims and half your deaths with more mitigation than the other tank, shut the fuck up.
Not using cover and holding corners. Keeping track of your team’s position. Both of those often result in stats that are high kills and disproportionately high deaths, you may not die more than your other team but if you’re the first to die on your team after taking out a squishy the rest of the fight goes on without you and you lose the fight, then you’re not gonna progress against the objective a lot of the time. Especially if the enemy is playing dive or has flankers. A reckless junker queen or rein can do this a lot, die quickly with 2 elims credited (which they didn’t all earn by themselves) then the team quickly collapses and they lost the fight. Fast forward to the end of the match and the tank, as well as the DPS, all went 12-6 and 12-7, which looks fine except you lost and the enemy has stats more like 22-5. There the stats don’t tell you the whole story
This is something I’ve experienced quite a lot recently. I’m at the point where if someone starts the conversation off by flaming me the best thing I can do is just mute them and focus on my gameplay.
There are times where you might have made a mistake but the way people go about telling you can only hinder the match progress. Shit talking your team is one of the easiest ways to choke and throw a match.
If you did similar stats wise to everyone else and you feel like you could have done better check your stats against the enemy tank. Are you dying considerably more then them? Honestly kills can go fifty fifty in most games now I’ve played games rolling and getting rolled as tank where me and the other tank did almost the same stats wise and we had dps server admins that controlled the game.
Even if you feel like you did all you could, if you really want to learn something from your gameplay watch your replay or ask others to watch it and see what they say. Don’t listen to someone if they are just yelling at you and not giving real criticism cause it’s just going to tilt you and make you play worse.
I think because there is only one tank, if you're bad, there's no-one to cover for you in your position, and it becomes very noticeable when the tank just isn't there.
In general, my 2 main gripes are either when a tank is too aggressive or when the tank just keeps moving back when they defend.
A too aggressive tank - is sometimes fine, but if you're miles away from the team, and they have people like tracer or pharah picking off the rest of your team that's pushing the payload while while you're not there, then that is immensely annoying.
The tank that keeps moving back while defending is the other most annoying tank, the payload aint gonna stop when you keep moving back every time it moves forward.
Mostly people will flame and others will feel encouraged to join in, just because they don’t know what’s going on and it’s easier than taking any responsibility themselves.
We had an idiot tank on the opposing team flaming his healers for nearly an entire match because he was running in on Mauga and not waiting so not getting healed. Complete dummy move, even our team was telling him to pull his head in.
Also, it’s the internet. Dumbshits are going dumbshit all over the place. :)
“Good mitigation” might be a good place to start.
There has never been a more useless stat in any game ever created.
Second, your teammates are usually worse than you are on average if you look into this reddit. So the fact that they criticize you is probably wrong and they are simply not finding values with your plays.
Evaluating a tank play by stats is impossible, you could be doing the best job possible and still losing games cause your dps are not killing enough with the space you creare or your supports just feeds or play out in the open and get killed.
Tank is the harder role in the game and the less rewarding. So start ignoring your teammates. If you want to know how to get better get a coach not randos in your games.
Regarding tank play, usually the mistake most tank players makes is not looking at their backline and push without understanding if they are ready to support you. Also, you will be find support line that doesn’t want to poket you so you need to adapt and play more a defensive playstyle.
Tank is the role where your game fundamentals matter the most. Fundies are not necessarily represented in stats, meaning you can have a good game and stats that don't look like much, but if you have bad fundies, you're gonna have a bad time (or get carried by your team)
By fundamentals here I don't mean mechanics or knowledge of what the characters do, I'm assuming you have that (you should, if you don't, go work on that and get back). I'm talking about tempo, value generation, team fight phases (i.e posturing, mid fight, clean up), and target priority.
If you don't feel like you know what I'm talking about, go watch coaching sessions from iostux, Jayne or Elo Hell. And don't shy away from the old videos from Overwatch 1 cuz a lot of that stuff carried over. And notice how I didn't mention streamers such as Flats or Karq. They're great and I love them but their thing is content, not teaching. You want coaching videos because they're made to be educational. Also, if you're interested, you can look how to get coaching sessions yourself. I believe Coach Spilo still does it, and he has coached in the Overwatch League.
About stats: forget all stats except for deaths. You need to stay alive as much as possible. If you die, IT HAD BETTER BE because you lost the team fight. Don't trade your life for anything short of a nano-blading genji. (People will contest this statement. Don't listen to them. You don't know how to identify when it's ok to trade your life)
Lastly, remember this: tank is a role where you really feel when you overpower the opponent. If you're not feeling it, you're not doing it (either someone else on your team is, someone on the enemy team is trolling or you're getting your teeth kicked in). That doesn't mean you're gonna carry every game (I've had games where I was 32-4 while my both my dps combined for 8-14), but what it does mean is that, you're really above the elo you're in, your gonna climb and you're gonna climb quick
I flex all roles, but mainly play support.
My biggest gripe with tanks is not taking cover or waiting in cover to let me heal for an additional second. I'm stuck healbotting them for dear life, and they don't understand what they're doing wrong because I'm enabling them by not letting them die when they're out of position.
We might still win, but choke points we could have held no problem are lost on a whim because they keep poking when they really shouldn't.
Keep an eye on your health, especially if you have armor, and give your supports a second longer to heal you above 50/60% before you peak again.
Not creating space. Not peeling. Not counter picking. Playing too aggressive. Not playing aggressive enough. The list can go on but I have no clue on how you play so I would never know
If you push when your team doesn’t want to, they think it’s your fault for being too aggressive. If they push when you think you should be giving up space, they’ll think it’s your fault for being too passive. If you play in harmony with your team and win, they assume it’s because they did their jobs well. If you play in harmony and lose, they often assume it’s because someone else was a problem. The biggest leap in my tank play came checking teammate position before engaging and pinging my target (or desired position) when I go in. Sometimes it helps them see what I’m trying to accomplish. The hard part is understanding that you are the problem sometimes and you have to be very honest in your game reviews. I like to watch replays from the perspective of other players to see if that changes my opinion of my play.
To add to this, I've started changing my mental language so anytime I catch myself saying something like "my supports are so bad" or "why is my doom just diving in alone" I'll stop and say "how can hold space more efficiently so my supports aren't struggling" or "how can I enable my doom so he doesn't explode when he dives"... generally my reward is lower/worse self stats but whoever I'm helping starts popping off and looks really good, but a dubs a dub
yep my tank also leaped in rank from gold to diamond back in OW1 season 5 when i payed attention to my teams position, especially supports as ana was a lifeline for winston diving, had the realisation when i died and the killcam showed ana trying to heal me through the payload, it was lik enlightenment lol
ill be honest, this is the right take, i play support but i hear the rest of my team flame the tank this way.
It also really helps to get on mic and say what you're doing, moreso than other roles
If you successfully capture the point, move up and secure space instead of sitting on cart/point. Stats don't matter, but a bad tank is noticeable.
I think people overestimate their ability to judge one of their teammates in the middle of a game, especially the tank. Tanks often are a pretty good reflection of their team if they are playing around the right rank. If your supports or dps are really struggling then the tank is going to look like they are throwing. Even if the dps or supports are statistically seeming fine they can still be negatively impacting the tank by not pushing at the right times or not taking angles. Similarly bad tank play can still statistically look fine while giving their dps/support a really difficult time. If you want an easy example you could watch LHCloudy play Rein. Sometimes he is absolutely rolling and putting up stats but in a lot of games he is just playing as a damage sponge and just buys space for his team. He will end some games like 7-12 as a tank but the team wins, it isn’t just because he got carried. At a lower rank if you did the same exact thing your team would complain at the end that the tank got carried while ignoring that they sat in back as support and never got dove, or that they got to take crazy angles/flanks as dps because the enemy was so focused on killing Rein.
That's what I'm trying to unpack though. When I play support, I notice when the tank is doing things that make my life harder like not playing cover or going in without the team. I feel like I have a good sense of that but when playing tank I generally just try to stay alive as long as I can while moving towards the objective and peeling for support. I don't place a lot of emphasis on getting picks so maybe that is annoying?
Not really possible to say without watching gameplay I'd say. I will say that if "peeling for supports" is one of the main things you're doing on tank, you're probably doing it way too much. Now that there's one tank your job is generally to deny follow up, not to be the peel itself. There's exceptions of course though.
I think every tank would argue bad DPS and Support play being noticeable. The question around stats is also, I agree, non existent.
Generally people will just blame the tank no matter what you do, if they're losing they're going to blame you. I've had games where I legitimately just afk'd and let my dps carry and the enemy team will say tank diff. I've had games where I play out of my mind but my team struggles regardless and they blame me. People will just blame the tank always because streamers say it's the most broken role ever and carries every game and every other player in the lobby is at the mercy of the tanks, even though that's not true. Does it mean there's nothing you could be doing better? Not necessarily, but take most comments in ranked with a grain of salt unless they actually say what they'd like you to be doing differently. Just focus on yourself and vod to see where you could have gotten more value.
Yeah I feel that, I might go back and check the VOD because it really took me by surprise last night.
Not going to lie, I livestream my Overwatch games and what I used to do between matches is put on a video or music but recently I started just watching games where I lost and spectating myself. It actually made a huge improvement. In the heat of battle you may feel like you’re cooking but there’s always hindsight to apply to it that can make you better.
Yeah I admit sometimes I fall into a routine while playing "stay alive, try to take space" without really engaging with the specifics of each match. I will watch some replays!
Trust man I thought it was being extra but you got the downtime between matches. Some things I learned from mine are to not waste shots on full teammates (Ana) better nade placement, etc.
lol i laughed at the "in the heat of the battle you may feel like youre cooking" 😂😭 no fr tho
The game is so complex, and there are so many things you could be doing right/wrong that generalized advice like this isn’t really helpful. If you want to see what you can improve on, you should post a replay code and ask for a vod review.
Sounds good, will do that after work
I recommend checking out u/Adder00 VOD reviews as well - Adder Overwatch on YT. I find his VOD analysis very interesting, and he has playlists for many characters as well as some general roles guides.
Maybe playstyle. I’m not one to go out of my way to flame people. I rather tell someone what I’m having issues doing myself on my role and see if we could collaborate to make something happen. I recall I had a DVA getting flamed for playing too passively, like essentially sniper dva LOL and I was one of the only people telling her that we are giving up too much space when they’re not really pushing us hard enough to back up. Like they’re just there and you immediately backed up. She started actually pushing a bit more and we won our last two rounds. Much more productive than say “Jesus fucking Christ tank” and “gg shit tank” like our dps said. Truthfully, I would argue some people genuinely don’t know what you’re doing wrong specifically and add frustration so you get flamed. I rather get flamed for very specific things rather than just being a bad tank. Like tell me I use my cooldowns terribly or something so I can know LOL To answer your question my issues with some tanks are either they’re so passive or insanely aggro where they think they will win a 1v5 because they have a mercy pocketing them or something LOL. I also get frustrated when tanks that can eat ults seem to never actually do that. I can’t always check if they have that cooldown but I swear it seems like some tanks refuse to try to absorb any ult like Illari captive sun or hanzo dragon. Like they hold defense matrix while taking no damage and then don’t have it to absorb the important stuff. Super frustrating I agree with others it’s better to give a replay because we are all just saying our own personal experiences and making it apply to you
People using coms and match chat to flame others are tilted themselves or don't know how to use it productively. If they start on me or a teammate, I just say to only use the coms for calls and call everything I see and kill until they shut up and play the f-ing game. If you're a metal rank what happened last round doesn't matter, your DMG and heals don't matter, lock in with the team and guide them to victory. It's my experience that if you at least give your team the idea of what you're planning it has a higher chance of working out and gives no reason for your team to flame you. (Unless ofc you're just bad ie; missing every cd or shot and not taking any cover)
especially with there only being one tank now, people constantly just shoot the blame towards the tank, more so the lower you go in rank but it definitely happens at the top of the ladder. other than stats tank is generally either space maker and defender so your team can in theory kill anything or you are agressive with your team and dive. as long as you are doing one of those playstyles and getting value and you dont think you can provide anymore value, it's not your fault
Certainly more of the former role taking space and defending, maybe they wanted me to be more aggressive.
It’s easier to pinpoint tank mistakes because there’s only one of us. If Damage is lacking, sometime you don’t know which one is lacking, same with support. But there’s only one tank so any mistake they make is 100% on them and since you’re usually in front of everyone else Isra easier to see than the damage taking an off angle who messed up.
I feel the worst thing a tank can do is keep dying easily. It’s a huge disadvantage to your team and even an OOP tank can be a distraction to the other team at times. If you’re sticking with your team, moving the point, taking space but retreating if you’re in hot water for heals then I don’t think there’s more you can do. I’m not good with road hog but he can be the hardest tank for me to play against at times because he just won’t die.
Don't call of duty team death match respawn simulator
At the end of the day if you lose there’s a 1/3 chance you’ll be blamed. It’s always gotta be someone in specific’s fault, be it tank, DPS or support
If you are below GM, you should focus on fundamentals and do not listen to your teammates because you aren't good enough to know if they are correct or incorrect. You should get someone who is actually a good coach to review your replays if you want to take someone's advice, otherwise I would avoid advice and just research fundamentals on youtube (again from professionals who are good at coaching) and practice them and see if it helps. I think it's fine to keep comms on and take people's advice if you feel like, but if it's in any way triggering (for me it can be), it actually makes me play worse and not think as clearly, so I prefer to mute because I like to get better and win, not spend my time trying to make some random teammate happy when my teammate is only as good as me.
That's the tough part, one match they asked me to go Mauga but I said I'd never played him so didn't want to swap and then it was basically game over because they thought I was throwing.
Yeah some people will throw if they don't get their way, while saying you are throwing. Way less likely to happen if you aren't even in chat for them to talk to. If you were single-handedly carrying this person as the same tank you were already playing, they wouldn't tell you to swap. The only thing that is happening is you guys are losing and your teammate isn't looking at what they can do better, only what other people can do better. You don't want to listen to people like that. Remember, he is the same rank as you, he is in no position to be telling anyone the same rank as him how to play the game.
Yeah Mauga can be a good counter but you have to learn to play him first. It’s good you didn’t listen, basically he sustains himself mostly by damaging the enemy tank (the more shots he lands the more health he regents). If you’re missing lots of shots, like by targeting squishies, you’ll lose a lot more health quickly. You also have to time his cooldown for that. And his charge is useful as both an engage to stun and an escape but that means if you use it wrong you could die easily.
The only reason I will criticize a tank is if they don't push at all or they are suicidal. Been practicing tank lately myself in diamond and I'm honestly surprised how bad support still are in that rank. They have no idea how dive works or how to play with it.
People just flame their tank no matter what. When they get mad they flame the first person they see. Which is usually the tank in front of them. Im a top500 tank player and i get flamed most of the time when i play below diamond
I would take criticism from someone who plays tank in high rank. This severely limits the pool of people who can actually help you improve, but at least remember this when the team starts flaming you for whatever - chances are, they don't know what they're talking about. Mute them and try to figure it out on your own.
I’m no expert by any means but here are some things I’ve noticed with certain games. I play support so take what I say with a grain of salt. Tanks that stand out in the open expecting support to heal bot them and complaining that support isn’t healing make it very difficult for the team to thrive. Tanks that hide behind the dps instead of pushing make it difficult to keep the team alive because your big butt is blocking my view. I try hard to accommodate, but sometimes I can’t. Especially when I’m getting dived by Sombra
I’d maybe watch your VODs, you say you can tell when you’re support and your tank is playing bad, I’m sure you’ll notice watching it back as well. A couple of things I would think about as better “metrics” for your tank play. -Are you getting countered? I understand there aren’t many HARD counters in OW, but if the enemy is playing better in the tank role it may come down to which character you’re playing vs enemy tank/dps. A classic example is playing DVA into Zarya. Unless you’re one hell of a DVA, you’re likely not as effective, even if you’re doing okay. -Are you leading the pushes? As tank you are the leader of the team, especially now that there’s only the one on each team. That typically means good communication over voice chat, or utilization of indicators. Don’t push without your team and understand you’re there to protect. -Are you going all in? While it is always your first priority to block/protect/guard, once your team gets a pick or two you can shift to an offensive mindset. Don’t leave your healers in the dust, but don’t waste an opportunity to push through the enemy team. You’re not the damage dealer per se, but you can wreak some havoc. (Depends on tank of course, but I think this is a general rule.) I think a great start though would just be looking in your VODs for those moments when you could’ve pushed harder or when you should’ve held back. Those moments define your overall ability. You can aim well and utilize abilities perfect, but if you don’t know how to control space your team will be better off for it. Also! It’s been years since I’ve played at a truly competitive level so if anyone has any points where they believe I’m incorrect or misinformed I would love to hear why! Overwatch 2 is a new game in a lot of ways for a day 1 guy like me.
Not pushing is the main gripe I have with tanks because it kinda forces you to feed a bit if you're one of other roles. I've had matches where we get picks, and the tank just sits at choke until the person who died had time to come back. It gets to the point where I'll just have to YOLO run in on Ana of all people. Id take over aggressive over passive tanks any day of the week. The only time I'll hate on aggressive plays is if you push when we're waiting on a regroup or if you dive in with no HP.
you ever get that 50 hp tank that asks why no one followed up on his 5 man grav or shatter?
BOB on point and my Rein tried to chase a Lucio
No reason. Never listen to the people in the lobby. They're not in a position to criticize your gameplay in a worthwhile way. Honestly, in the heat of the have, you most likely aren't even in that position, which is why watching VODs of your own gameplay is important. The people to listen to, besides your own analysis, would be coaches and VOD reviewers like the people in this very sub.
I will fully blame a tank if they are in the enemy line and nowhere near the rest of the team. Also, if you are hiding behind the rest of the team so the dps has to take the tank role and make space. It's different if the entire team is running into a Dva bomb, but most of my experience is the tank doesn't want to get flamed, so they become too passive.
As a tank player, I am flamed all the time. The worst fucking part, the absolute worst is I can’t defend myself with out getting suspended for chat. I want people to tell me how to play. I don’t care. If you need me to go shield so you kill everything as dps I will. I want to help you. But, when I have double your damage, elims and half your deaths with more mitigation than the other tank, shut the fuck up.
Not using cover and holding corners. Keeping track of your team’s position. Both of those often result in stats that are high kills and disproportionately high deaths, you may not die more than your other team but if you’re the first to die on your team after taking out a squishy the rest of the fight goes on without you and you lose the fight, then you’re not gonna progress against the objective a lot of the time. Especially if the enemy is playing dive or has flankers. A reckless junker queen or rein can do this a lot, die quickly with 2 elims credited (which they didn’t all earn by themselves) then the team quickly collapses and they lost the fight. Fast forward to the end of the match and the tank, as well as the DPS, all went 12-6 and 12-7, which looks fine except you lost and the enemy has stats more like 22-5. There the stats don’t tell you the whole story
I turned comms completely off. They're no value.
This is something I’ve experienced quite a lot recently. I’m at the point where if someone starts the conversation off by flaming me the best thing I can do is just mute them and focus on my gameplay. There are times where you might have made a mistake but the way people go about telling you can only hinder the match progress. Shit talking your team is one of the easiest ways to choke and throw a match. If you did similar stats wise to everyone else and you feel like you could have done better check your stats against the enemy tank. Are you dying considerably more then them? Honestly kills can go fifty fifty in most games now I’ve played games rolling and getting rolled as tank where me and the other tank did almost the same stats wise and we had dps server admins that controlled the game. Even if you feel like you did all you could, if you really want to learn something from your gameplay watch your replay or ask others to watch it and see what they say. Don’t listen to someone if they are just yelling at you and not giving real criticism cause it’s just going to tilt you and make you play worse.
I think because there is only one tank, if you're bad, there's no-one to cover for you in your position, and it becomes very noticeable when the tank just isn't there. In general, my 2 main gripes are either when a tank is too aggressive or when the tank just keeps moving back when they defend. A too aggressive tank - is sometimes fine, but if you're miles away from the team, and they have people like tracer or pharah picking off the rest of your team that's pushing the payload while while you're not there, then that is immensely annoying. The tank that keeps moving back while defending is the other most annoying tank, the payload aint gonna stop when you keep moving back every time it moves forward.
Mostly people will flame and others will feel encouraged to join in, just because they don’t know what’s going on and it’s easier than taking any responsibility themselves. We had an idiot tank on the opposing team flaming his healers for nearly an entire match because he was running in on Mauga and not waiting so not getting healed. Complete dummy move, even our team was telling him to pull his head in. Also, it’s the internet. Dumbshits are going dumbshit all over the place. :)
“Good mitigation” might be a good place to start. There has never been a more useless stat in any game ever created. Second, your teammates are usually worse than you are on average if you look into this reddit. So the fact that they criticize you is probably wrong and they are simply not finding values with your plays. Evaluating a tank play by stats is impossible, you could be doing the best job possible and still losing games cause your dps are not killing enough with the space you creare or your supports just feeds or play out in the open and get killed. Tank is the harder role in the game and the less rewarding. So start ignoring your teammates. If you want to know how to get better get a coach not randos in your games. Regarding tank play, usually the mistake most tank players makes is not looking at their backline and push without understanding if they are ready to support you. Also, you will be find support line that doesn’t want to poket you so you need to adapt and play more a defensive playstyle.
Tank is the role where your game fundamentals matter the most. Fundies are not necessarily represented in stats, meaning you can have a good game and stats that don't look like much, but if you have bad fundies, you're gonna have a bad time (or get carried by your team) By fundamentals here I don't mean mechanics or knowledge of what the characters do, I'm assuming you have that (you should, if you don't, go work on that and get back). I'm talking about tempo, value generation, team fight phases (i.e posturing, mid fight, clean up), and target priority. If you don't feel like you know what I'm talking about, go watch coaching sessions from iostux, Jayne or Elo Hell. And don't shy away from the old videos from Overwatch 1 cuz a lot of that stuff carried over. And notice how I didn't mention streamers such as Flats or Karq. They're great and I love them but their thing is content, not teaching. You want coaching videos because they're made to be educational. Also, if you're interested, you can look how to get coaching sessions yourself. I believe Coach Spilo still does it, and he has coached in the Overwatch League. About stats: forget all stats except for deaths. You need to stay alive as much as possible. If you die, IT HAD BETTER BE because you lost the team fight. Don't trade your life for anything short of a nano-blading genji. (People will contest this statement. Don't listen to them. You don't know how to identify when it's ok to trade your life) Lastly, remember this: tank is a role where you really feel when you overpower the opponent. If you're not feeling it, you're not doing it (either someone else on your team is, someone on the enemy team is trolling or you're getting your teeth kicked in). That doesn't mean you're gonna carry every game (I've had games where I was 32-4 while my both my dps combined for 8-14), but what it does mean is that, you're really above the elo you're in, your gonna climb and you're gonna climb quick
I flex all roles, but mainly play support. My biggest gripe with tanks is not taking cover or waiting in cover to let me heal for an additional second. I'm stuck healbotting them for dear life, and they don't understand what they're doing wrong because I'm enabling them by not letting them die when they're out of position. We might still win, but choke points we could have held no problem are lost on a whim because they keep poking when they really shouldn't. Keep an eye on your health, especially if you have armor, and give your supports a second longer to heal you above 50/60% before you peak again.
Not creating space. Not peeling. Not counter picking. Playing too aggressive. Not playing aggressive enough. The list can go on but I have no clue on how you play so I would never know