I've written about one-tricks before.

And then, I wrote about one-tricks again.

And then, once more, I wrote about how hate over one tricks are dividing our community.

It seems I can't escape this topic. Once again, it has become something worth talking about.

It has come to light that, Hyeon "EFFECT" Hwang, star player of the Overwatch League team Dallas Fuel, was suspended this week from online ranked play due to his supposed abuse of the reporting system.


Seems like a cut and dry case, right? Not exactly. 

On Twitter, EFFECT released the e-mail he received from Blizzard, confirming the date and reason for his online suspension:

"Reporting other players for the express purpose of restricting their gameplay" is the reason for the ban and, admittedly, EFFECT was reporting a player in his game who was trying their best to win.

But, they were trying their best to win by one-tricking with Symmetra. For those who aren't aware, this is an extreme taboo in competitive mode. Symmetra is rarely a competitive pick and her presence on a team, at the highest levels of play, is almost never a helpful one.

And thus, the great debate wages on and it doesn't seem like a solution is possible. On the one hand, Blizzard cannot be in the business of limiting player freedom and they have made it very clear that reporting a player based on their hero selection is not ok.

However, even Jeff Kaplan admits this isn't an easy problem to fix. Just four days ago, Jeff Kaplan wrote this open letter to EFFECT, trying to ease the pro's vocal frustrations. 

The most important excerpts below:

"Fixing the one trick issue" is extremely complicated for a lot of different reasons. There is a spirit, freedom and creativity to the game that we are eager to protect. But I also believe that (especially at your level of play) other players can cause a detrimental experience.

I don't have immediate solutions to your problem that don't drastically change the face of Overwatch. But I do want you to know that we care and that we are very engaged in brainstorming solutions."

And, as you would expect, the competitive overwatch community is not happy about yet another pro player being disciplined for, what they feel, is totally justifiable reports.

There are just some of the top voted comments in the Reddit thread made informing the public about the suspension:

"He literally lost 4 games because of that One Trick, how is NOT reportable? Also what exactly is "poor teamwork" in the report section?"

"You have selfish assholes ruining the game because they only want to play one character. So you report them. And you end up being banned while they're the ones ruining the competitive experience? Good f*cking joke Blizzard."

"Slowly beat down the pros until they slip up a little, then f*ck em up with the ban hammer. Amazing."

Is it possible to find a common ground?

I honestly can't imagine how Jeff Kaplan and this team plan on addressing the growing resentment competitive players are harboring against "one-trick" players.

Over the months, my opinion on the matter seems to keep changing. At first, I was firmly against Blizzard enforcing which hero a player is able to select.  But, as time goes on, it seems as though the reality of high-level Overwatch demands some level of incentive to not stubbornly pick, by Blizzards own admission, niche heroes that aren't always effective.

What do you think? Will the one-trick debate ever subside, or has Blizzard backed themselves into a corner by designing niche heroes that are only balanced by players abilities to switch off of them?