Devs please answer this about DW balance data

General Discussion
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Hello. Happy Holidays, Happy New Year’s to all. Thanks for releasing DeathWing on December 3, 2019. He is super mighty, super awesome, albeit, with some revision needed like most new hero releases.

You have previously said that you tend / prefer to incline the balance to slightly overtuned when releasing new heroes. Part of the reasoning is that you want players to actually USE and play with the hero so that you can gather more data.

You also, have previously mentioned that the game is not really balanced around Quick Match. That the better game modes to gather data from are SL and Unranked Draft.

The hero in question now is DeathWing, but I think the question applied to original release Li Ming, Garrosh, Kael,tha’s, Tracer, Genji (heroes with HIGH ban rate on release)

In the current state, it is a reasonable assumption, that DW is seeing very little Storm League and Unranked Draft play. Mostly he is seeing, because of lack of bans, Quick Match play.

So here is the question:

If the game mode preferred to measure balance with is not in the reach of DeathWing because of bans, then is it fair to say that he is being balanced with mostly Quick Match data? Are you okey with this?

In other words:

If the developers, by omission (for whichever reason, not looking to blame anyone: holidays, want to gather more data, financial considerations, etc), exclude the new hero from the better game modes to measure balance with; how do you guys know that the balance changes will work for SL and UD?

It feels like DW is being balanced in phases: release phase, QM phase, (we are here now), and eventually when he is made playable on SL and UD, then will truly see final balance changes. Is this why it takes that long to properly balance a hero?

My concern is that I think your player base actually WANTS to play with (and against) DeathWing outside of Quick Match and simply can’t at the moment because of bans. And you know, it’s been a while since release. He is pretty much out of UD and SL for over a month now.

I am writing this, very aware that another balance patch is coming very soon and that there is a high chance to see DW balance changes. From what I have read most of the community agrees that some talents and abilities need tweaking based on the numbers available (top popularity, top bans, very high win rate) which suggest revision is needed.

Please, tweak him, as fast as humanly possible so we can see him in SL and UD!!

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he s not balanced in qm simply because recall heal and reg is not accounted for any other hero.

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We get enough data over time in draft modes to balance new heroes. Even Deathwing. :slight_smile:

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keep up the good work Mr. Jackson, or however you want to be addressed

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Hey AZJackson! Thanks a lot for the response.

You get enough data even with the massive ban rate? Wouldn’t it be faster, so as in to get more data, to release a hero just “slightly” overtuned as opposed to one that gets pretty much a 95%+ ban rate?

Anyways, care to share some light on how the next balance patch is looking? What are you guys mainly looking at in Deathwing’s kit?
Maybe confirm a patch date?

Thanks again.

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Hey Calcaz!

We get enough data, even with a massive ban rate. Of course, as more data comes in we’re more confident with where things sit, but we have always had enough data to make educated changes before the first balance patch after a new hero release. After the first balance patch, we always have an even more clear picture of where things stand since we have that much more time for data to come in.

Balance patch is looking good!

For Deathwing, more general nerfs across the board, particularly to Destroyer form. Also some Worldbreaker buffs and talent tuning.

Can’t confirm dates. Confirming dates is the path to the dark side.

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I smell Star Wars reference.

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Sounds like a decent plan. Thanks for communicating with us; Deathwing has been a topic of no small debate on this forum.

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What an awesome reply. Thank you again. Buffs and tweaks to DW, exactly want I wanted to hear.

Shouldn’t be a concern. You can always be redeemed. :wink:
“Insert Kylo reference here.”

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What about QM situation. Shouldn’t he be always paired with and against healer. Right now one of his main supposed weaknesses - immunity to friendly healing does not even matter half of the time, no support = no weaknesses at all.

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So then it is true what Heroesprofile has said all along, his ban and win rate are both still massive and he deserves further nerfs.

Despite people saying “he is one of the weakest heroes in Hots, just dodge, ez”…

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Sounds more like a sponge bob reference to me.

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Working on the balance team is a pathway to many updates some would consider to be unnatural.

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The irony being that, people simply ban something they have no intention of ever fighting and yet claim OP. I mean, how exactly can you get good data on a hero through one or two games of him? People simply need to ban him less and opt to actually play against him. My crew did the exact same thing on BoE and soundly trounced him and his team. It’s amazing what you can do when cursed bullet basically puts one memeber out on the bench for the enemy team for 45 seconds.

Sure there are counterbans to play deathwing, but not many people actually do ban his counters despite how good they are. Weird really. There’s also plenty of ways to play around deathwing and not play into him. If you’re picking something with low sustained ranged damage or something that depends on simply heal tanking through stuff with meat, then frankly you deserve to be countered by something like deathwing. The rest is simply not great mechanically adept players tbh.

Only problems I ever had with deathwing were based on comp, which was literally never an issue with draft.

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How? Is the text scented for you, and if so where can I buy whatever monitor you have?

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That opens so many doors and windows that I do not ever want to know of.
Let’s not imagine what someone like mephisto smells like, or worse… Azmodan.

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dead on target.
I didnt ban Deathwing in any of my yesterdays games (whenever I got the leader title, or whtever u call it in ranked) , And im in bronze (just to let you guys know)

I lost 1 game against him, and won 3 games. as Greymane.
And I had no issues at all, even in the one i lost, it was most because we fell behind xp.

Most common explanation for banning deathwing that i got was = All heroes are OP when released, so they should always be banned :stuck_out_tongue:

I mean, at least have a go at the hero and see how threatening he is,

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His CC slows and stuns make him useful while he kites the heros that counter him he’s not very fun he has an answer for everything you throw at him

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Tychus buffs pretty please? :slight_smile:

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I actually considered this too. If Devs want to see much more faster data they could technically implement some sort of mechanic that prevents new heroes from being banned from draft modes. That way the hero WILL see draft gameplay.

A middle ground solution at the very least could be to prevent bans in Unranked Draft only until they get enough data. Then the data obtained is more balanced between QM (worst) and unranked draft (better).