MeinMMO editor Dariusz is having a lot of fun with Overwatch, but without a mode he would have given up the game after just a few hours.
A week ago, I wrote on MeinMMO: Overwatch 2 is currently better than ever before. I attributed this to three decisions made by Blizzard in recent months. One of these decisions was to bring back the 6v6 mode.
I want to dedicate an extra article to the 6v6, because without this mode I probably wouldn’t have been playing Overwatch every day for months and would have lost interest a long time ago.
The best gaming experience for non-pros
I always had a problem with the 5v5 mode of Overwatch: “Our tank is the worst player in Europe and we are completely hopeless without a good tank.” This is of course absolute nonsense, but it is the feeling that can arise when your tank is worse than the opponent’s.
In 5v5 there is only one tank, and when that tank dies, it often triggers a chain reaction that ends in a team kill or a panicked retreat. With the impending defeat, the team’s frustration rises, and somehow I feel like the tank is to blame. “With a better tank, we would have easily won,” I complain.
Why the tank dies doesn’t matter. Whether the opponent is simply better or my tank made a mistake is irrelevant. As Ana, I rarely respond with a triple kill and turn the tide – even if I’m doing my best. Therefore, my feeling in 5v5 is:
Victory or defeat is too dependent on the tank.
Overwatch pros might disagree with me, but in the end, this feeling is why I find 5v5 more frustrating than 6v6. The gameplay and synergies between the heroes are different there.
If an aggressive tank like Doomfist or Wrecking Ball dies in the opponent’s backline, we supporters are not defenseless against the opposing DPS, especially if we advance together with a Sigma or Reinhardt.
The death of a tank or DPS can, in my opinion, be balanced out more easily in 6v6, which in turn takes pressure off the tanks and allows for mistakes. A tank should also be able to try out things, learn, and have fun instead of sweating continuously on their main.
Finally making progress in an unknown role
What I greatly appreciate about 6v6: The mode has made me a better player. I myself had not played any tank for a long time because I feel that in 5v5, victory depends too much on the tank’s performance. I am not a good tank and do not want to drag my team into a defeat. So I don’t play a tank.
However, in 6v6 I slowly started to ease into it. That was okay because we still have a second tank. I recently played a terrible round on Mauga, but I understood how he works better and better throughout the match.
I wasn’t good and definitely fed a bit, but in the end, our second tank was there when I recklessly charged to my death. In the end, we both even dealt the same amount of damage.
I am pretty sure that the match would have been over in 5v5 before I understood Mauga. I died a few times quite quickly at the beginning, and the opponents would have likely pushed completely through without a second tank and won within a few minutes.
Now I have a small selection of tanks that I can handle when no one else wants to play tank – led by Sigma. Only through 6v6 have I started to learn a new role and new heroes that I wouldn’t have touched in 5v5.
A weakness that can be easily fixed
If there is one thing I currently dislike about 6v6, it’s the lack of role queue. Yes, its absence in 6v6 led me to try playing a tank. But at the same time, it results in my team often having three, sometimes four DPS, and no one wants to switch to a second tank, even though the opponents are beating us across the map.
That can be really frustrating, especially when our Widowmaker obviously would contribute more to the team by staying afk with a Reinhardt in the choke point and unintentionally blocking damage with their shield than dealing 800 damage in spawn after 4 minutes. If Overwatch implements a role queue for 6v6 in the future, I would be completely happy.
