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[Discussion] Why competition in the Overwatch clos

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#1
FishStix

Hey ya'll, made a short video to put together some thoughts on why I believe running tournaments in the OW closed beta is important. Would be interested to hear your thoughts!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XiJdlj_wJQE

~fishy

#2
PapaSmurf323
6
Frags
+

You know this already, but we are not the ones that need convincing. That subreddit continues to downvote any matches. I think for your next vlog you should try to address reddits concerns. Lot of these people just downvote because "im not in the beta".

You had ppl who got upset cause there was a prize pool of $33 per person for first. Then you got rid of that and people still complain. The comments are the most toxic and selfish things ive ever heard. If it was up to reddit, we would be forced to pub only. Can't be scrimming or 6 stacking that would give you an advantage when the game comes out /s ! People complain cause they "only let streamers in", but refuse to believe that they let in some of the best tf2 players to test the game. Why wouldn't you want the best players testing your game?!

Reddit downvoting your streams/matches/tournements is hurting the community a lot. I've seen comments that say fishstick is some evil selfish guy only having these events for his own personal gain and exposure. Its really saddening. I hope you keep up the good work.

#3
Bren
-1
Frags
+

The subreddit is actually worse than the tf2 one, got downvoted the other day for suggesting the putting hero limits on comp games is necessary, otherwise you get the old 6 dva last strat.

#4
Beta
7
Frags
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It's not necessary though?

#5
Bren
-4
Frags
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Enjoy your 6 hero cheese strats

#8
Beta
1
Frags
+

You know it actually brings a twist to the game.

Me and Arx were on public Sunday and our whole team went Winston. After a couple of minutes, the other team quickly adapted and went Reaper's and Lucio's. In turn, we went Pharah's, countering the counter (all be it too late)...quite funny instead of a predictability on what to come up against.

Give me an argument as to why you think it's necessary. Give me the name of the hero, which if you had 6 of, couldn't be beaten.

PS. For the record, I didn't down vote/frag you. You're allowed an opinion and I welcome your argument for it, just don't expect everyone to agree with it.

#9
Bren
2
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Hey if everyone had the same opinions there wouldn't be much of a point for a discussion board ;)

The first and only instance I've seen of it so far was during one of the weekend tournaments, team NotEnigma going 4 dvas at the end of the game scurrying towards the point desperatly trying to stop overtime. I'm sure as the game progresses and the meta develops maybe it won't be as feasible but mainly I think its a product of the shit respawn system. Rather than waves of respawns you spawn one at a time which leads to that sort of gameplay, think I've seen a few "pro" players comment on this as well.

A few other "pros" from of other games (WARHURYEAH comes to mind) have also made comments on the whole no hero limitations; the argument that it slows the game down from a spectator viewpoint, I mean there is a reason the classes are limited in TF2 6s otherwise you end up with 4 heavies 2 medics cheese strats.

#10
Taimou
1
Frags
+

It's not the "no hero limits" the game is suffering from. It has more to do with the defense spawn being so close to the last objective and spawn times being very short, not that you couldn't play around them and the better team wouldn't win the game overall in stopwatch mode.
Also D.Va might need some balancing since she is very strong in the current meta, but we shouldn't be drawn into conclusions too fast.

4 Heavies 2 Medics in TF2 Comp? You really haven't played TF2 at all have you lol.

#11
Bren
0
Frags
+

Re read my comment

#12
Beta
3
Frags
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Slightly incorrect, it was introduced to stop primarily Demoman spam in early TF2 forms. See WoTR/TCM Season 1/2 ETF2L with TopGear and Byte - maybe a little before your time ;)

That said, yes a team running 4 heavies on TF2 today would slow the game down...but it's not unstoppable/unbeatable. I would probably go 2 sniper at least and consider more focused spam using Demo/Soldier.

#13
Bren
1
Frags
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Yeah I've only been playing comp for 2 years which is nothing in the grand scheme of things lol, the four heavies may have been a bad example but it doesn't invalidate my point.

In regards to the 4 dvas counter, it didn't stop shit. It just stretched out the game longer than is should have, wasn't very entertaining to watch at all seeing them spawn dvas one at a time and die 20 seconds later.

Early days yet, we'll see if its as bad as I'm making out or if I'm just overreacting :)

#14
Shun
1
Frags
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Maybe you missed part of that game or it was a different one, but Hubris did the same thing at that last point and it won them the round/match. It wasn't just 4 d.va's, it was 6.

The reason it worked and they did it is a mix of things you've already mentioned, plus the spawn doors on that map are very small and many heroes can be blocked from even getting out of there. In other comp games announcers have mentioned the ease of attacking team blocking the small doors. It also highlights d.va's need for an ultimate build nerf. I'd expect the map and the hero to be fixed somewhat due to this comp example.

With that said... maybe next time someone on the offensive team will go Mei and Ice Wall the spawn doors for good measure.

#15
Bren
0
Frags
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Didn't watch the whole game only caught the last half of one map, stopped watching because it was hard to decipher what was going on but thanks for bringing that up, maybe its just the hero, maybe not? As I said early days yet it'll be a while before we see if its a problem.

#20
Arx
0
Frags
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I actually think that a hero limit of 1 is better for the game. With hero limit 1 there's still 45,000 possible team compositions as opposed to 230,000 without limits. The problem with the game we played is that the attackers can pick a cheese strat, the defenders die, lose an objective, change to counter it and the attackers then change to counter the new defense setup (and then win). You basically get a big game of rock paper scissors.

I like the idea that single players in a game can pick heroes to counter other single players. Like if the enemy team is running a WidowMaker, one of your guys can run a genji or something to put pressure on them. These mini-counters are much better for the game than being able to change the entire team comp to counter an entire team comp.

I think that the worst thing the competitive scene can do, is start to do the TF2 option of limiting specific heros to 1, others to 2, others to 3 etc... You either limit all heroes to 1, 2, or just don't limit them at all. Keep the rules consistent, keep the rules simple. I also think that this limit needs to be hard coded into the game by Blizzard so that the competitive game and the public game are consistent. Allow unlimited heroes in Custom games but in publics and ranked games, allow only one of each hero. We would probably find better public play team compositions are formed because of this.

#6
ip
2
Frags
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The r/Overwatch subreddit can complain all they want. The 2-3k viewers for all the weekend tournament streams are pretty telling; a ton of people are interested in the competitive aspect of the game.

#7
Troop
0
Frags
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A good chunk of these downvoting redditers are just salty because they're not in the beta.

#16
2c
0
Frags
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remember when dota2 had a closed $1million tournament before there was a closed beta

#17
godhand
0
Frags
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there were also more invites sent out and less idiot streamers playing it

that entire scenario isn't even relevant here because the novelty of a 1 million dollar VIDEEEO GAMES(LOOK DAD AND MOM) tournament is what made it hype.

you cannot recreate it

#18
2c
0
Frags
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there were 0 invites sent out. no one had access except Privileged Gamers at that time

afterwards dota invites followed the same trend seen here. there were people selling keys for $1000, and it slowly dropped over time as larger and larger waves of players were allowed in

#19
godhand
0
Frags
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Yeah mate because valve isn't retarded and used the international as the gameplay reveal of dota 2.

Obviously THE ONLY PEOPLE who had access were PEOPLE WHO SHOULD OF being ex dota 1 competitive players and not idiots like ellohime or lirik or insert completely fucking irrelevant 10k sub variety streamer.

After that invites RAMPED UP HELLA QUICKLY compared to OW because everyone who got invited also got friend invites which is how I got into the CB of Dota 2 in november.

That's how you utilize hype

#21
Kapowwwwww
1
Frags
+

Why do you think it's a bad idea to give a big streamer a key? (and why are you so aggressively against it)
Blizzard gets free promotion to a large viewer base that normally isn't following the game. The majority of players aren't going to play competitively. They may dabble in ranked but they're not looking towards the "next big esport". It wouldn't be a good representation if the only people invited are competitive players. I think inviting the average joe or big streamer is just as important as inviting big name players that want to play the game.

#22
godhand
0
Frags
+

The cognitive dissonance is that if Blizzard is citing numbers such as "7 MILLION SIGNED UP FOR OW CLOSED BETA" (before flags were even handed to streamers)

then why on earth would they care about marketing an unfinished game and over saturating the airspace with 24/7 footage?

these streamers actually provide little value to them and they may of lost preorders rather than gaining them... it is not like OW twitch numbers went UP over time and you never saw the viewership of those streamers permanently crossing over to OW if there was barely any conversion then it was POINTLESS.

I could understand a game from a company that has less brand recognition than Blizzard taking this approach but in this context it makes 0 fucking sense.

#23
Kapowwwwww
0
Frags
+

It'd be unreasonable to assume that the 7 million that signed up (or even close to that number) plan on playing the game or even care about the game. I've signed up for a bunch of betas and never played them. There is still room to convince people to buy this game now that it has a $40 price tag instead of the speculated F2P model. Especially for those that signed up for a "free trial" and are on the fence about buying the game.

The streamers usually play the game for a few hours and never touch it again. I don't think you can create conversion from this but I don't think that we should avoid giving them keys solely because it doesn't create twitch viewers. I think twitch numbers will go up as the waves get larger. If we don't invite streamers because they provide little value, would you say that the average player generates even less value for the same playtime?

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