Dear Readers,
the synopsis would state that back in the days were Blizzard was actually fine tuning Chars instead of wildly changing everything the short answer would be “we definitely expect so”, now in times of the Bench taking a stand the short answer is “I expect not as much”.
Tracer, the iconic Face of Overwatch. The female Genji, a Char with a high win-rate (*citation of old winrates needed). One of the first super-mobile Heroes in Hots, with an until today unique playstyle. Or is it?
One of the first Major changes I experienced when I came back to hots was on 25. April 2017 with Hots 2.0. The next level of Hots. The premise? A new better then ever game experience. And to a point it was. But as always with the good, the bad follows. The new more responsive game engine many hoped for did not happen, we stayed Locked into the engine of SC2 every Step of the way, but that was to be expected, our hopes and dreams on this were unrealistic, and the engine performs more than adequately. So if the game engine was not bad, then what was? Well, someone soon decided that the AI needed an overhaul. And overhauled it was, a new decision tree for the Bots was implemented and it was a to this day catastrophic failure. After 3 years I can no longer recall what the original AI was like, but it took 3 years until 14. April 2020 to take the AI back to a level of not being a complete disaster. Blizzard rightly decided that the AI was a non-issue if players never disconnected from an active Game, but then again they might have underestimated how many people just not care and disconnect from an active game anyway and 5% of the people leaving an active game meant a 100% chance of having a Bot in every game.
The next major change I can recall came on the 12. December 2017, it was an active year after all. Stealth players were less stealthy. The decision, as always, split the community the topic. One embraced the change, now clearly able to always see the stealth hero, the side argued, it was a pandering to the casuals, that you could see the stealth hero’s but you needed to train for it. Be more aware of your surroundings and squinting at your screen. But a change with much farther consequences of which the effects would be felt much later was the introduction of Performance-Based Matchmaking and to this day, the majority still feels that it is horrible, but better than anything else (*citation: blizzard forums ^^’).
And then came another change on 10. July 2019. A change so minor, yet so big. Increasing base movement speed by 10%. A change that buffed every slow, or speed buff. A change that nerfed every skill-shot with travel time. One of the often cited winners of this change was Varian, as he speeds up while simultaneously slowing enemies and with the increase in Base speed the relative walking speed difference between his target and himself has increased tremendously. On the other side of the spectrum we had ultimate like Artanis Purifier Beam, that needed some effort to walk out under from, which were now completely ignored by players as you could still engage in a team-fight while continuing to sidestep the ultimate. It is also the first time that I heard the theory that Blizzard wants to enable less skill players, by buffing point, click and forget actions while making in harder to land skill-shots. In essence this would lessen the gap between mechanically less skilled players and mechanically higher skilled players. As usual, the reactions were mixed.
So what does all this have to do with Tracer so far. Actually very little, but sometime one should look back where we come from and what was done. The last major patch for example, made it easier to catch up with Tracer if a slow is to be had, while making it easier for Tracer to dodge everything skill-shot based that enemy heroes throw at her. And the latter change is not to be underestimated.
So, yesterday, 4. May 2020, without much fanfare tracer got her first rework. After four years of fine-tuning she was completely changed. The official reasoning is that in a Balanced state she was to reliant on an enabler.
And here is my take on the new Tracer. Maybe a bit to my background as a Tracer Player. I prefer quick-matches and my build was never the pulse bomb. I played Tracer like I felt she should feel as her character, a pistol wielding menace that sometimes gets displaced and has to find her way again.
The original popular build as far as I was told, which was the pulse-bomb build, was apparently so overpowered that Tracer is the hero with the highest consecutive patches (and also with nerf’s) in hots. it started with patch 2.31.0 where the pulse bomb damage was reduced and the ultimate health damage was decreased from 10% of enemy maximum life to 8%. To make her less jumpy her blink cool-down was increased by 2 seconds (roughly 30%) and her recal was increased by 4 seconds to 30 (roughly 15%). To offset these changes her Baseline Auto-Attack was increased by 2 (roughly 10%). And her health pool increased by 144 (roughly 10%).
It was a glorious time for me. A friendly Abby give a attack speed boost and with Untouchable Tracer Rounds (Damage increase up to 30% by killing 15 people and having them revealed for 4 seconds), my Leeching Rounds where Locked and Loaded (40% damage increase on top of everything and 20% of the damage is leeched as life) I could run into nearly anything 1v5 with Abby and take out whole teams. It was still Dangerous as a Polymorph or any other Stun could take me out, but it was hard. Silences did little to nothing, besides denying me escape, but with 82% more base damage and and then another roughly 25% damage increase via Abathurs Symbiote attack speed. I pitied most enemies.
But then came the sobering:
- 2.31.2
- Health decreased by 70
- Auto Attack decreased by 1
- 2.32.2
- Tracer still to hard to track for lazy players, thus recall location was made visible for them
- 2.34.3
- Auto Attack decreased by 1
- Blink cool-down increased by 1
- 2.35.1
- Auto Attack decreased by 1
- Ultimate Damage reduced by 1 % from 8% to 7% of maximum life
So where are we currently after the first major change? Bascially back to the same tracer we had before just majorly nerfed. Less Blink (roughly 50% increase in coold-down), slightly less recall (roughly 10% increase in coold-down), roughly the same health, less auto-attack damage (roughly 5%) and less bomb damage (3% less of maximum life damage and 15% less base damage).
So what is my take on the new patch?
It is more of my play-style but taking a sledgehammer to your hand before playing. Here’s why I think so.
- Level 1 - Tracer Rounds
- They further reduced my already small range. If I walk out of that range for a split second Tracer will often Immediatly focus a nearby minion and not refocus the hero I targeted. And since my play-style revolved around sustain burst damage I naturally want my range back, that it is my old go-to reveal now with area reveal (uselessly small) but with 25% reduction in time does not hurt.
- Level 4 - Pulse Generator / Leeching Rounds
- Pulse Generator gives a nice 25% of maximum Life back, this is not to be underestimated especially if coupled with Pulse rounds with ensure you always have nice steady 25% more life, if you play sustain damage, and you get synergy with the 1 Blink refund.
- Leeching Rounds fit my all play-style but are a disappointment. It increases my leech from 15% to 17.25% and not as I thought to 30%, unless it is a Bug reading the description I doubt it.
- Level 7 - Locked and Loaded
- Was always my pick, nothing changed.
- Level 10 - Pulse Rounds / Quantum Spike
- Pulse Rounds now give a reason to pick other than having longer Range or having a Bomb more often. It now ensure a very frequent 25% life boost.
- The patch-notes state: “New Functionality: Deals an extra 6% of maximum health as damage to Heroes.” Which made me very weary. The Damage before was 7%. A damage decrease is not a new functionality. If this is not then what is. I have not yet proven this, but I think it no longer refers to the health of the enemy as before it “deals an additional 7% of the primary target’s maximum Health” but to Tracers. If this is indeed true than this is a nerf of proportions unheard of before as it changes a Percentage based damage to a Fix based damage.
- Level 13 - Untouchable
- My play-style before, now a must. 30% Damage increase after 6 kills. Synergy required for Level 16.
- Level 16 - Ricochet
- Ricochet with Life Leech and Locked and Loaded Gun, simply fun.
- Level 20 - Chrono Triggers / Total Recall
- Chrono Triggers ensures a whole 1 second of shooting AA damage without reloading. But this play-style really requires practice, as you need to blink in range and time the blinks that you get the whole 1 second and do not decrease you ammo, because with synergy you can turn this into a nearly 5 seconds of full auto attack. 3 seconds by blink, one pulse bomb gives another blink charge thus 4 seconds, the 10 ammo themselves and by then you might have another blink and or pulse bomb ready.
- Total Recall, my ex-must in playing with randoms. Not anymore, explanation follows.
The feel of the new Tracer? I have self sustain outshining a Qhira. Locked and Loaded Ricochet ensure that I actually can handle 2 enemy heroes better than 1. It sounds ridiculous, and feels like it too, but here I am. But Tacer also feels slower, more lazy. Things I could do before I can no longer do due to one single immense nerf. Duration of recall increased from 0.75 to 1.25 seconds. This a 100% nerf, meaning that by increase the duration by 100% they ensured that a recall now sets up tracer to die. You may split second evade something, but the enemy than has a long time to ensure that as soon as you reappear they can leisurely kill you.
I preferred a 30 seconds recall, to 20 or even 10 seconds where I am trapping myself or setting myself up to be killed. Showing the enemies exactly where I reappear is just the icing on top.
This the next part is a feelings part on why I think this was done.
The 20 seconds recall was done to make the average player think its a nice buff. And the recall too. Now everyone can easily evade Pyroblast, Consume Souls or Frost Blast. But we could do this before. Recall and Blink to safety also no longer works. It takes too long for you to reappear. It even gives the enemies even 1.25 seconds on their CD which they might have needed to kill you. Tower diving and killing enemy heroes through the wall? Nigh impossible now without a wave. Why? Towers will hit you, and before you just recalled and blinked to safety. Now you recall and it takes long enough that towers will refocus you with their second salvo.
Essentially the old squishy Tracer, high risk, high reward Tracer is gone. Instead we have high sustain, but less damage Tracer with a recall that is no longer viable in the old highly mobile play-style. That on the flip side can currently 1v3 enemies and either kill some and escape or just plain escape (with Ricochet).
My predictions for the future?
Reduction of either
- Ricochet Bounce Chance
- Healing or auto-attack
I think, I might have drifted of from the original Post Titel, but I hope you enjoyed my meandering through my perception of Hots changes and Tracer in particular. If you did, leave a Like, if you did not, leave two Likes 