šŸ“‹ A Manuscript of Changes I want to see added to Improve the Overall Health of the Game and it's Community

So this took me a week to write, retype, reread, revise, and rething. There are over 11,000 words, and slightly below 60,000 characters. Please, donā€™t strain your eyes, use Ctrl+F to skip to certain sections, and put some music on while you read. TO keep you from stressing out, here is some chill music to listen to while you read:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0svuurLibQ

If you expected anything less from the guy who ghostwrote both Bastion Megathreads, then Iā€™m sorry. Kudos to those who will attempt to read the whole thread.


News & Update Section

So Iā€™m adding this section to clarify some problems, like how not all of my balance changes make sense, and that a great amount of people dislike them based off the reasoning behind them.

For this reason Iā€™m reverting Sombra back to her original gun, since it does have good damage potential. Thus itā€™s unneeded to make her gun more complicated.

Another addition is a MMR reset for comp.

Iā€™ll keep you all posted.


Table Of Contents:

Ctrl+F will be your friend here. I will not condence each section because I want Blizzard to get the full understanding of how much I wrote because itā€™s the equivalent of how much I care about this game, and most importantly how much I want this game to succeed and thrive.

  • 1: General Changes

    • 1-A: Ult Autobalance System
    • 1-B: Hero Pick/Ban System above 3000 SR
    • 1-C: Reworking Assists
    • 1-D: Buffing or Reworking Projectile Netcode
    • 1-E: PTR Hybridization/New Arcade Mode
    • 1-F: Add an in-depth Scoreboard
    • 1-G: Add a Custom Map Maker
    • 1-H: Rework Temporary Armor and Shield Interactions
    • 1-I: Add a Factions System (I donā€™t like the name of Guilds, doesnā€™t suit OW)
    • 1-J: A way to select primary region languages
    • 1-K: Reworked Report System
    • 1-L: Comp MMR Reset each year.
  • 2: Hero Balance

    • :egypt: Ana
    • :us: Ashe:
    • :globe_with_meridians: Bastion:
    • :sweden: Brigitte:
    • :kr: Dva:
    • :nigeria: Doomfist:
    • :jp: Genji:
    • :jp: Hanzo:
    • :australia: Junkrat:
    • :brazil: Lucio:
    • :us: McCree:
    • :antarctica::cn: Mei:
    • :switzerland: Mercy:
    • :ireland: Moira:
    • :earth_africa: Orisa:
    • :egypt::canada: Pharah:
    • :skull: Reaper:
    • :de: Reinhardt:
    • :australia: Roadhog:
    • :us: Soldier:
    • :mexico: Sombra:
    • :india: Sym:
    • :sweden: Torb:
    • :uk: Tracer:
    • :fr: Widowmaker:
    • :full_moon_with_face: Winston:
    • :full_moon_with_face: Wrecking Ball:
    • :ru: Zarya:
    • :nepal: Zenyatta:
  • 3: General Map Changes

    • Hanamura
    • Anubis
    • Volskaya
    • HCL
    • Dorado
    • Gibraltar
    • Route 66
    • Junkertown
    • Rialto
    • Kings Row
    • Numbani
    • Hollywood
    • Eichenwalde
    • Blizzneyland
    • Busan
    • Nepal
    • Lijiang Tower
    • Ilios
    • Oasis
  • 4: My Opinion(s) regarding Future Content

    • 4-A: Lore:
    • 4-B: Hero Releases:
    • 4-C: New Maps:
    • 4-D: The Future of Balance:

This megathread has OVER 11,000 words, and 57,000 characters. If Iā€™m willing to write this much and Iā€™m not even an English major then this game needs SEVERE fixes and features that improve the health of the game.

Blizzard, the reason why Iā€™m so cynical is because I know this game can do better.

Please, work with the community and not against it. We love the game as much as you do.


General Changes:

1-A: An ult autobalance system to prevent steamrolls.

Far too often do I see steamrolls where the team that is performing better will have access to their ults faster than the enemy team. Takes a WHOLE LOT of counterplay OUT of the game.

Thatā€™s why I strongly suggest adding an autobalance system for ults, but is not the sole factor behind ult charge (in other words, performance based ult gain will not be taken away).

I havenā€™t settled on a definitive solution, but essentially a way that the NanoBlade that keeps wiping you would eventually have Trance, or other counterplay ults activate when Genji gets his blade. This makes steamrolling much harder, and I feel is necessary since Ults should not be the biggest thing that changes the outcome of the game.

1-B: Pick/ban system above 3000 SR

If Diamond is the start of SR decay, then that should be the entry level for a pick/ban system.

While a pick/ban system wonā€™t stop any meta, Goats meta, or future metas, it provides enough room to wiggle around the must-picks, and promotes variety for what top-tier plays AS and AGAINST. This neglecting to switch up playstyles is why Pirate Ship is so strong in lower ranks, where it rarely gets played, but when it does no one has enough practice to stop it, and thus it feels oppressive.

This is how I would want the pick-ban system to work:

  • Pick/ban only applies to 3050+ team SR matches.
    • Both teams have to be above 3050 for the banning to take effect.
    • Diamonds below 3050 will be matched with other 3050-sub players and plats.
    • Diamonds at and above 3050 will be matched with other players above 3050.
  • Pick/ban phase lasts 40 seconds (same at setup time)
    • Enemy playersā€™s names will NOT show up in Tab, P (team mute screen), or recent players.
    • You cannot see the enemy teams profiles, even if you get matched against a friend (so no banning torb if you canā€™t see Fuey500 get matched against you).
  • Each team bans 1 hero, for both sides.
    • This means you canā€™t ban Widow, then play Widow yourself to have an advantage against the enemy team since they donā€™t have a Widow to contest yours.
  • After 35 seconds, it will reveal what the enemy banned.
    • Both teams can ban the same hero, so if both teams ban Hanzo, then Hanzo is the only hero banned that match.
    • This means banning the most meta hero will potentially only grant 1 banned hero between 2 teams. This prevents ā€œjust ban S meta heroā€ as the ban meta because between the 2 teams, you are also sacrificing a ban slot for the meta hero. This means mind games, and weather or not the enemy team will ban the most meta hero.
    • Instead, you try and focus on what you donā€™t like playing against, or what might hurt your team the most. I.E. ban Widow because I play Pharah.
  • In game, a forfeit ban picks vote will be available, where 4 players from both teams have to agree to lift the ban on the banned heros. That way if both teams need a certain hero, they can agree to lift the ban, but at the cost of lifting the ban on the hero they chose too. Itā€™s both bans or neither.
    • This is called a barter. If the enemy team bans Tracer, and we have a Tracer OT, but we banned Dva and the enemy has a Dva OT, and both teams are suffering, they can agree to lift the ban.
  • Before Queuing for comp at the start of each day, you get a pop up acknowledging that OTing a hero can result in you losing if the hero you OT gets banned.
    • As someone who mains 3 heros and can flex onto multiple other heros, OTing a hero is not healthy nor beneficial. ā€œBut I know how to play the heroā€ is an extremely dull point, since Iā€™ve played 700 hours so far in this game, and Iā€™ve been at consistent Diamond rank, and Iā€™ve improved on all 3 heros Iā€™ve mained, and more.

Why is Pick/Bans a good idea? Because this game suffers from a stale meta. Balance moves too slowly, and thus 1 meta lasts a long time. Meanwhile a meta dies, another one takes itā€™s place. HOWEVER, with bans the meta is a secondary factor. If you are a godly Tracer player, you work with your team to ban Brig which means you can play Tracer. If you really really really hate GOATS, then ban one of the GOATS heros and you could run a more effective comp.

Common arguments against it:

ā€œItā€™ll solve nothing, a new meta will just take itā€™s place.ā€
Yes/no. If Rein gets banned, then you play Dive, GOATS with a Winston, or a bunker comp like Orisa and Hog. Banning doesnā€™t solve the meta, I agree, but it opens up possibilities. Thatā€™s far better than a stagnant comp, imo.

ā€œJayne already did this, they just ban the #1 meta comp and play the #2 meta comp.ā€
This is a side effect. If you have everyone meta slave and Meta is #1 over picking heros that youā€™re good at, then yes. Jayne only tested this with pro and semi-pro players. These players typically practice the meta, and slight variations of the meta, per map. They donā€™t factor in individual skill in the same way ladder does. But this is also where we can see a slightly different pick/ban system for esports, since you know what team youā€™re going against.

1-C: A Rework to Assists

Assists in this game areā€¦ flawed. Genji can get his dash reset by simply grazing an enemy, meanwhile people are making memes out of Moira having gold elims when simple she is just tickling the enemy to recharge her healing, and an ally does more damage while then kills the enemy.

I believe that Assists should only happen when you do 50% of the damage to 100 HP heros (which would be 100 damage), 40% of the damage on 250 HP heros (also 100 damage), and 30% on tanks (180 damage on 600 HP tanks, 150 damage on 500 HP tanks, and 120 on 400 HP tanks). Then add another medal stat for assists, so you can still track how much youā€™ve helped on stuff like securing kills.

Assists would also include stuff that amplify fights, like Orisa using her B0ngo, Mercy Damage Boost, Zen discord, even some ults.

Even though it directly impacts Genjiā€™s easy to ability-reset his dash, it helps reduce the inflation that players get when they simply help damage an enemy, which is unsubstantial, and thus gets credit for the kill when they did basically nothing.

1-D: Rework/Buff Projectiles Netcode:

Meiā€™s ult entering the 4th dimension, Tracer and Zaryaā€™s ult joining snowball, and those weird situations where other projectiles randomly disappear too. Something is wrong with the netcode of projectiles, because far too many times do my projectiles disappear, which is especially frustrating when itā€™s an ult.

ā€œFavor the shooterā€ needs to be carried over to projectiles and projectile ultimates. It seems like the game doesnā€™t favor them, but favors everything else.

1-E: PTR hybridization (lolwut. Basically make an arcade mode where Blizzard can test balance ideas)

So MANY PLAYERS, including me, want the PTR to be used in a fashion where Blizzard attempts buffs and nerfs on certain heros. HOWEVER, the logistic of this is hard, and itā€™s abundantly clear that Blizzard does NOT want to use the PTR in this way. Instead, itā€™s basically free QA testing to make sure the game doesnā€™t break, like that 1 week where Dvaā€™s bombs would nuke the game and thus she had to be disabled.

This is why I want to hybridize the PTR. I believe that there should be a new, and permanent mode in the Arcade where balance changes can be tested*. HOWEVER, I do realize that you canā€™t just inject code into the game like that, which means you couldnā€™t do very much, outside of number crunching.

BUT THIS IS WHY I WANT IT. To crunch and test numbers.

This is because most of the balance should come from numbers being adjusted and changed, like how Soldierā€™s 17 -> 20 and 20 -> 19 buff and nerf were overall positive for the game. Or the spread adjustment. Balance should not be based around some weird mechanics like Bastion turning into a gundam where he gets a new mode that has infinite HP. From toning back Hanzoā€™s storm arrows damage to McCreeā€™s roll CD, number changes are what can make this game feel much healthier.

I want this new Arcade mode to be a preview and testing grounds for number changed between heros, this way we all can test what works and what doesnā€™t.

This way it encourages feedback aside from the forums, which Kaplan seems to make a meme out of, as well as not diversify the playebase onto 2 versions of the game.

The game browser allows you to create games where you can adjust almost everything in the game, and this mode would basically be that same concept, only testing out changes to see if they are good or not.

1-F: Add a scoreboard to competitive

Yes, it does have potential to be toxic, but as an avid Siege player, the environment there is far less toxic because you really cannot trash talk or call others out on their mistakes if you are playing FAR worse than them.

Essentially, rework Tab in competitive. QP doesnā€™t need it because otherwise itā€™ll just breed toxicity between those who take QP seriously and those who just want to practice or have fun.

Rework Tab so it shows:

Hero Kills Healing Objective Time Assists Objective Kills Damage Dealt Damage Blocked Deaths
Moira BastionBabe 2 1079 0 6 0 350 0 10
Genji DrGenjo 12 0 34s 5 3 2000 320 2
Rein ReinMainBTW 1 0 10s 6 0 600 1023 12

This scoreboard shows what matters via each hero. I am CLEARLY not doing enough healing, so thus it shows red because I am doing less healing than the average healing at my rank. It also shows that I am not playing on the objective and my high amount of deaths means I am probably feeding.

My teammates have the right to call me out for that, since I am not playing towards winning.

Looking at our Genji, he has above average kills, has all of the objective time, is dealing great damage, and even has low deaths. HOWEVER he has low damage blocked because heā€™s not using deflect enough.

But do you want to know WHY Iā€™m feeding as Moira? Iā€™m TRYING to heal our Rein that keeps charging in too deep into the enemy team. He has SO MANY DEATHS, all while having below damage blocked.

These kinds of stats are to give feedback on how you play and how your team plays. You have every right to respectfully call out a teammate if they are not performing well. This kind of system is to get those people to play better.

Heck, you can even integrate this system into the reporting feature so you can easily tell if someone is throwing or not.

This is also not a saving grace for OTs. If you are getting less kills as Torb vs the average Torbs in your rank, then your team will look to you as being the weakest link. HOWEVER, IF YOUR ARE PULLING YOUR WEIGHT AS A OT THEN YOUR TEAM HAS NO REASON TO FLAME YOU.

This removes medals completely, since the Moira who has gold kills is ONLY getting gold kills because the current assist system gives her credit for a kill, when all she did was tickle them to refill her healing.

Show positive reinforcement for those who are doing good, and give players who are underperforming a reason to step up their game.

Also, side note: Iā€™d even include # of ults and ult kills in the scoreboard, Iā€™m just too lazy to add more HTML onto the current example. This should be an idea, not the verdict.

1-G: Add in a Custom Map Maker

Honestly, thatā€™s the reason behind TF2 being a classic, heck, even L4D2.

Adding a map maker adds a WHOLE NEW dimension for this game, as it gives the community the opportunity to add maps that are lore-friendly, but not cannon. Or they can make cool new modes, or vise versa where maps are made for existing modes, like Ana paintball.

New maps take a while to develop, I get that, but with a map maker we can at least have maps released at a faster pace without straining the dev team.

You could even add highly acclaimed maps to the QP rotation, Arcade/Game Browser options, or even add it to the full game where it gets played in Comp, even as high as OWL.

A game browser should be the next focus after the Game Review system that we all know is coming via the feedback from the OWL viewer.

1-H: Rework to Temporary Armor/Shield Interactions

The current problem I have with armor is that temporary armor gets put before shields and temporary shields. As nice as it looks, it becomes a problem when a Zen or Zarya get Rally armor, and become 300 and 500 HP targets. This then becomes a problem because itā€™s unreasonably hard to deal enough damage to remove the armor.

Temporary armor should be put before shields, so it gets destroyed first.

This would reduce the tankiness of GOATS, since Zen and Zarya canā€™t be stacked with HP that is inflated with Temporary armor that isnā€™t so temporary.

1-I: Add a Faction System (Guilds) so people can formulate communities.

Originally I was against guilds, since it seems more like a MMO/RPG type of feature. Howeverā€¦ LFG bombed. Endorsements really arenā€™t accurate. If Iā€™m going to promote a Custom Map Maker, then I would like a community that can playtest my maps I make with me, so I can see what works or doesnā€™t work, as well as fix stuff if it needs fixing.

I like the sound of Factions much more than Guilds, because OW is a team, but Blackwatch was a faction of OW. This can cohere to the lore since people can create sub-factions of OW, Blackwatch, or even Talon. Heck, give people the ability to side with MEKA, Omnics, and Junkers.

There is so much potential behind a Faction system, just make sure you integrate a lot a features with it, like a better LFG system, moderator and overall permissions, so you can host custom games and itā€™s not just the Faction Owner who can create and host games.

1-J: For my friends in Europe to my friends in South America and Australia, a way to select your primary region languages, so you can actually communicate with your team.

Please, for the love of god, give everybody the option to select what regions they want to play on as well as what language they want to play with.

A UK player cannot communicate with a German player, unless either knows the otherā€™s language.

As for South America, I donā€™t know if they got servers and thus donā€™t know if the Brazillians who speak Portuguese can play separately from everyone else who speaks either Spanish, English, or any other language.

As for Australians, did the Oceana servers ever cut ties with West-Coast-US servers?

Either way, a way to lock in primary launguages and regions would help toxicity in EU and elsewhere greatly, as communication can be more open and inviting.

1-K: Rework the Reporting System

The current report system still feels problematic. I donā€™t know if there will ever be an ideal system in place, but there are flaws still exposed in the current system.

Put your foot down on One Tricking. Either say itā€™s acceptable to play what you want, or that OTing can get you suspended for being uncooperative with your team.

Trying to appease BOTH sides clearly isnā€™t working since OTs are still getting -falsely- reported and banned.

Meanwhile XQC has moved onto other games since he himself is toxic, but stream sniping goes unchecked.

There should be more options available too, as well as more transparent actions.

1-L: Comp MMR Reset each year.

SO it came to my attention that I didnā€™t cover a MMR reset in comp.

I feel 18 months is too much, which is why Iā€™d drop it down to 1 year. This way you play the year at your rank, with the current SR system. Then every year, it gets reset so itā€™s a fresh start.

This could potentially make smurfing less rampant, as there is no need for an alt account since you could get a fresh MMR. HOWEVER this could promote deranking where a GM/M level player throws their placements and thus starts playing at lower ELOs.

While I strongly agree with an MMR reset, the repercussions should not be overlooked. Iā€™d like to dive deeper into this.


Might wanna take a break, because this next section is gonna get LOOOOOOONGā€¦


2: Hero Balance Changes:

The rundown starting from Ana:

:egypt: Ana:

  • General:

    • 200 HP, 250 HP, and 200 HP ally hitboxes increased to the size of tanks.
  • Biotic Rifle:

    • Ammo reverted back to 10.
    • Healing nerfed from 75 to 70
  • Sleepdart:

    • 20 damage threshold before it wakes up the slept target
  • Biotic Granade:

    • Anti-heal decreased from 100% to 50%
  • Nanoboost:

    • heals nerfed from 300 to 150
    • heals Ana for 100
    • In setting for Ana, an option for Nano Target Prioritization, this way you can set who you want to be the target for nano, if in a group. By default this setting is to disabled, but upon enabling it, you can give priorities based upon 6 tiers.
    • Option to hold Q to see who the nanoed target will be (will not disable press Q to nano) This also has the option to disable the nano target prioritization, so this acts as an override to that.

The goal of these changes are to make Ana more useful with healing lower HP targets, because Ana is geared too much to helping tanks, and many 200 HP heros struggle when Ana is on the team. In return for taking away some of her strengths with pocketing tanks, she gets several benefits and buffs, like a damage threshold on sleep, advanced Nano settings and usage, as well as healing herself when nanoing. Anti-nade nerf is more or less because there are so few counters to it in this game. If a support with a clense effect gets added, I wouldnā€™t oppose the return of 100% anti-healing.

:us: Ashe:

ĀÆ_(惄)_/ĀÆ Too soon to tell is she needs any balance changes. HOWEVER, I am starting to believe she needs a slight damage nerf because she is outputting more damage compared to McCree and 76. While damage isnā€™t the end-all, she feels far more powerful compared to both McCree and 76.

:globe_with_meridians: Bastion:

While his spread got addressed on the PTR, he still needs some QoL stuff to flesh him out.

  • General:

    • Select CCs while transforming will not be applied, or work in different fashions:
      • McCree FB will not stun him back to recon if transforming
      • DF will not knock him out of transforming if hit with RP, RP will not stun Bastion when in sentry mode,
      • Hack will auto-cancel his transforming because currently he goes through BOTH animation cycles,
      • Brig will not bash him out of transforming
      • Halt reinstated as a Bastion-displacement mechanism.
  • Ironclad:

    • Replace the DR with flat out 50 armor.
    • Tank mode gets his 150 armor BACK, which gets applied at the START of his transformation like it used to.
  • Self-repair:

    • Remove the cast time on using his self-heal
    • Remove the delay between stop healing and firing
    • Will not use healing resource if HP is full
  • Tank:

    • Gold Tank Cannon when?
    • Can choose if he wants to leave Tank into Recon OR Sentry.

All I ever wanted for Bastion was less spread, and we got it. However, Bastion still suffers from a janky nature especially now that IC exists. These details often get overlooked, and it makes it hard to communicate with the devs about these issues plaguing Bastion.

Iā€™ll say this in big bold letters:

DR IRONCLAD MAKES MORE PROBLEMS THAN IT SOLVES. THE DR MAKES HIM EASIER TO POCKET, WHICH PROMOTES UNFUN STRATS LIKE PIRATE SHIP. GIVE BASTION DURABILITY, NOT SUSTAIN. GIVE HIM ARMOR AND NOT A DR THAT DOES NOTHING FOR HIM, EXCEPT MAKING HIM A GOD (shush Chibi, am speaking to the masses to make Bastion better) ON PIRATE SHIP WHERE HEALING MAKES HIM HARDER TO KILL. DR ALSO IS USELSS ON TANK MODE, BECAUSE HEā€™S IMMOBILE FOR 3 SECONDS WITHOUT IT

:sweden: Brigitte:

Oh boyā€¦

  • General:

    • Health nerfed from 200/50, to 150/50.
  • Rocket Flail:

    • Damage 40, up from 35
  • Repair Pack:

    • Now triggers inspire.
    • only overheals for 50 extra armor, rather than 75 armor
    • 60 M/S cast time/projectile speed (same as Bastionā€™s Tank shell speed)
    • Can now throw out Repair Pack while barrier is up, or if it interfears with the animation, increase the animation of her dropping her barrier, sending out RP, then putting barrier back up.
  • Whip shot:

    • Removed.
  • Shield Bash:

    • 75 damage
    • Cannot go through barriers
    • Range buffed to 7m, from 6m.
    • Duration upped from 1s to 1.25s
    • applies a 3.5m knockback/ā€œboopā€
    • No longer stuns, but locks out movement abilities
  • Barrier:

    • 500 HP
    • Does not immunize Brig from forms of CC (she canā€™t facetank a Hog ult, then bash him to cancel his ult, Lucio can boop her back, Pharah with conc blast)
  • Inspire:

    • Active: When doing damage, she heals her team for 15 HPS, herself for 10 HPS.
    • Passive: When standing with her barrier up, a cone behind her applies 40 HPS to any target standing behind her within the cone.
    • When Barrier is up, her FOV camera zooms back a little more than it does currently.
    • Can also see the names of allies behind her pop up in her HUD, much like Zen with which targets have harmony and discord orbs.

The point of my take on Brig is to not reward her for being aggressive, but rather defensive. She should put herself between the enemy (flankers, especially) and ally supports. Bash should not be a combo to kill the Tracer, Genji, or ANY target that gets close to her. It should instead be a deterrent to attackers trying to pickoff the back line. Her HP nerf is to make Pharah, and burst damage more effective against her, while still retaining armor. Rocket flail damage slightly decreased, as well as her active inspire. This is to prevent her from being a tank brawler which is how she gets away with being a 3rd DPS. Armor pack is a more responsive ranged heal, with slightly less potency, also triggers her active inspire. Inspire rewards her for puttng herself in front of allies, and is her healing is no longer crippled by the fact that she needed to do damage. Whipshot got included into Bash, so Bash now bounces an enemy back and lock out movement abilities, while doing increased damage. Her Barrier is basically an ability that increases her healthpool, and so it really shouldnā€™t be allowed to facetank CC. Inspire is also geared to her being defensive, not offensive like she currently is. As much as I dislike gutting her healing while dealing damage, itā€™s necessary to not have her be able to be the W+M1 meme she currently is.

Overall, I do play Brig quiet often. Thus her biggest weakness is when the enemy is trying to poke her team. However, she is too strong when dueling which should NOT be her main role, especially as a Tracer and Flanker deterrent. Making her more of an off-healer that helps her other support(s) out, like Ana who has no mobility, and her only defense mechanism is her sleepdart.

:kr: Dva:

  • General:

    • Health nerfed from 400/200, to 200/300.
    • Critbox removed
  • DM:

    • Reverted back to itā€™s 2.0 state. Aka the state where projectiles, ults, and bullets needed to travel a certain distance in DM before it gets destroyed.
    • The longer a projectile/bullet is in DM, the less damage it does at certain ranges. (DM has a 15m reach. At the 10m mark the damage is reduced by 50%. At 5m, the projectile/bullet/ult is eaten, and thus does 0 damage.

*The current problem with Dva is that she can play aggro against snipers or enemies that try flanking alone, but has some fragility about her. This fragility is unnecessary. Thatā€™s why I feel she should lose 100 HP, get 100 HP turned into Armor, then remove her large hitbox. While the extra armor does hurt other heros that suffer from armor, she is losing her extreme strength with her DM, and thus needs some ore natural protecting. While Armor might be bad for Reaper, Hog, even Bastion, her less impactful DM means less downtime for their damage. DM nerf also means Dva is no longer a counter to Hog, in the sense that she canā€™t use DM to block his damage. HOWEVER, she can still boost and knock hog back to misalign his shots. By removing her critbox, it allows Dva to be more of a threat to Hanzo, Widow, and other snipers. *

:nigeria: Doomfist:

I mean, Iā€™m honestly speechless after his most recent nerfs. IDK how to feel about him, and thus I want to give it time to see how bad his nerfs really are, if at all.

:jp: Genji:

Nothing, since the rework to assists is suppose to combat how easy it was to reset his dashes.

:jp: Hanzo:

  • Storm Arrows:
    • Damage nerfed from 70 to 65.
    • Now has a reverse falloff, where 0m his damage is 20, and 15m is where he gets his full 60 damage per arrow.

Currently, Hanzo is fine. The one major flaw with him currently is how flexible his storm arrows are, where he can hold off a dive attack simply by using his E. His E should aid in him getting kills, not be the source behind it. Think about how Junkā€™s mine act as a followup to his primary nades or his trap. Thatā€™s where I believe his storm arrows should be. Not an independent ability that pumps out enough damage to melt Tanks. He can still fire a 125 damage body shot, but his follow up requires much more to melt tanks, especially within range of easily attacking him.

:australia: Junkrat:

  • Grenade Launcher:
    • Projectile size reverted to .3, from .2

Mines:

  • Removed second mine.
  • Minimum Falloff on mine increased from 35 to 60.

Riptire:

  • Charge increased from 1562.5 to 1700.

With Junkā€™s most not-so-recent nerfs, he became TOO inconsistent. His nade size nerf HURT his ability to land direct hits, making him more spammy since that was the only way to deal damage. His second mine being added makes NO sense when they just nerfed the crap out of both of them. Then because of his second mine, he would get CRAZY ult charge, which made his riptire become a problem because he could get it requently, and faster than most of the support ults, which made it feel too oppressive.

:brazil: Lucio:

  • Crossfade:
    • AoE increased to 15m from 12m.
    • Now provides a cylinder-based AoE, rather than his current Sphere.

Sound Barrier:

  • Cast time reduced to .6s from .8s.
  • Duration increased from 6s to 7s.
  • When casted, he is pulled to the ground so sound barrier feels more responsive to use

Lucio is in an overall good spot. These charges are geared towards working out kinks in his kit. His long cast time on sound barrier often made him an inferior pick compared to Zen, who can instantly cast transcendence. Lucio and Sound Barrier should be used against burst damage ults, like Riptire, Meteor Strike, Tank mode. This seems natural since Lucio is naturally hard to hit, so burst damage should be more ineffective against him. This is a good contrast to Zen, who does exceptional against sustained DPS ults, like Visor. Then his AoE healing is changed from a Sphere to a Cylinder because of how hard it is to heal areal heros like Pharah, or a Widow on high ground.

:us: McCree:

  • Deadeye:
    • Movement speed increased to 3m/s, vs his current 1.925
    • Targets the ā€œmost vulnerableā€ targets first, like heros not behind Barriers. This will replace his right-to-left targeting system that can crippled him in certain situations.

McCree just needs some OOMF to help him. Currently, as someone picking up McCree and learning him, I feel his ult is a big setback because of how many arbitrary laws it has. Reducing his movement speed makes him a sitting duck basically. His Christmas lights make his position must easier to spot. And his right-to-left targeting causes inconsistencies with his ult. For a marksman, he sure has a nasty habit of wasting shots on targets he wonā€™t hit, and proceeds to hit targets on his right first, over his left, which can cost him his life in certain situations.

:antarctica::cn: Mei:

NO change needed. Just fix her Snowball ult ALREADY. Aka, fix projectile netcode.

:switzerland: Mercy:

Oh boy, here we go.

  • Staff:

    • HPS increased from 50 to 60.
    • Damage boost nerfed from 30% to 20%.
  • Guardian Angel:

    • CD increased from 2s to 3s.
  • Valk:

    • Removed entirely
  • New E: Brace.

    • 6s CD
    • 1s duration.
    • 50% CC reduction.
      • Reduces the effect of CC by 50%
        • Ana: Sleep duration cut to 3s from 6s, Prevents Sleep if used preemptively
        • Ashe: Coach Gun KB halved
        • Brig: Shield Bash KB reduced to 1.75m from 3.5m
        • DF: RP will not deal wall-impact damage if the target hits a wall, Uppercut height reduced by half for the victim.
        • Junkrat: Mines KB will be reduced by half (not on self), Victim stuck in a Trap will automatically be freed.
        • Lucio: Boop halved
        • McCree: FB duration cut to .35s from .7s
        • Mei: Freeze now takes 50% longer to freeze victims, includes Blizzard (2.25s to freeze a victim)
        • Pharah: Conc Blast KB reduced by half (not on self conc blast)
        • Roadhog: Whole Hog KB reduced to 4m/s down from 8m/s
        • Sombra: Hack lduration cut to 3s from 6s
        • Winston: Primal Rage KB halved
  • Old Ult: Resurrect.

    • LoS based
    • 30m range (same as sound barrier)
    • Cast time AND DR applied according to how many targets are in range.
      • 1 Player:
        • .5s cast time, 10% damage reduction (essentially 120 HP)
      • 2 Players:
        • .75s cast time, 15% DR (essentially 130 HP)
      • 3 Players:
        • 1s cast time, 20% DR (240 HP)
      • 4 Players:
        • 1.5s cast time, 22.5% DR (245 HP)
      • 5 Players:
        • 1.75s cast time, 25% DR (250 HP)
    • If Mercy is killed before the cast time is up, all players that were going to be rezzed no longer get rezzed.
    • 1 second invuln for allies rezzed
      • They will be able to move after .25s
    • Rezzed allies will not give ult charge for 3 seconds.

The fundamental problem with current Mercy is that her healing is suffering because of her rez. Valk is too powerful in certain aspects, but can feel very unrewarding. Valk does not fit Mercy at all, either by lore or by game balance. Old Rez just needed tweaks to it, not a deletion and transference onto an E ability, which further broke her. Rez invuln was thee biggest problem with Mass-rez, and it promoted hide-and-rez because now anyone who played Mercy could get away with bad ults. It didnā€™t matter when or where you used rez, because you had the invuln to pull it off. Imagine how many Reapers or Pharahs would use their ults incorrectly or lazily if they got Mercyā€™s rez invuln. HOWEVER, the invuln was added because of problems that existed within rez itself, like how Mercy could die before her team gets brought back, only to have her team get wiped again, and feed ult charge to the enemy team. This is why I believe that there should be a compromise. Mercy should get the allocated DR and cast time based off of how many allies sheā€™s trying to Rez. The sweet spot should be 1-3 allies, and the high-risk 4/5-man rezzes nearly punish Mercy and her team for losing a teamfight, which stirs Mercys away from banking off those mass rezzes.

Her GA nerf is something I feel is needed now that she has her GA jump. She is now very mobile and slipperly with the ability to glide past her target. This puts her out of harms way much faster than her old GA. GA now takes skill, and I feel it needs a cutback on how spamy it can be. Her HPS increase helps her with healing, however the 55 HPS is to keep her up at the level of Moira and Ana, without passing them in total heals, otherwise Mercy becomes the best healer again and thus causes mass-hate to fly her way.

I did NOT want Valk on E because it provides a hero with extreme mobility, even more mobility. Instead, it is replaced with an ability called Brace. Brace reduces the KB potential for all heros, except for Tanks (excluding Whole Hog and Primal Rage, simply because they are stacked with CC). I feel most of the CC that the tanks have are fair, and offer enough counterplay. Compare that to boops, sleep, or hack and they seem like cakework. Tank CC should be used for displacement, which I am COMPLETELY fine with. This provides Mercy with the ability to aid her team with anti-CC countermeasures. This dramatically increases her skill cap, which I have decided to increase after seeing an Aria Rose poll that had ~95% of people want Mercy to have a higher skill cap.

:ireland: Moira:

100% completely balanced.

:earth_africa: Orisa:

I feel Orisa is balanced, but the problem is that Rein seems superior over her.

  • Fortify:

    • Is now a toggle
    • 2 second duration
    • 8s CD
    • 1s delay between uses (prevents fortify toggle abuse)
  • Halt:

    • Now pulls Bastion in Sentry mode.

Just like how DM was UP when it was an ability with a CD, fortify on a toggle means Orisa has more control over when and where to use it, which comes in handy when faced with CC, or potential amounts of burst damage. This would work well with her 400 HP.

:egypt::canada: Pharah:

  • Hover Jets Passive:

    • 8 uses
    • Each use gives her a ā€œbounceā€ upward velocity and negates any falling momentum.
    • 2s CD
    • in leymans terms, itā€™s 8 miniature versions of her Jump Jets
  • Rocket Launcher:

    • Fire Rate reverted back to 1 shot per .9s
    • Missile knockback nerf reverted
    • Direct hit damage buffed to 130
    • Reload speed buffed to .7s
    • Self-damage lowered to 20
  • Conc Blast:

    • Default button set to RMB (and console equivalent)
    • Applies a slight upwards KB (Map terrain is inconsistent, which makes Conc feel inconsistent)
    • 30 degrees angle from 0, when looking down, where it will knock her forward
  • New E: Superhero Landing:

    • Sends Pharah shooting towards the ground
    • Does 60 damage when landing
  • Rocket Barrage:

    • Is now cancelable

Pharahā€™s most recent changes hurt her more than it helped her. Her splash damage nerf is something I can deal with, but her fire rate and rocket KB were completely unnecessary and it only hurt her ability to withstand her hitscan counters in higher elos. Uping her damage for direct hits seems more reasonable than buffing her fire rate. With her clip being only 6 shots, reloading with her is a hassle, which is why I feel a reload speed buff would be more cohesive with her kit.

Conc Blast is far too inconsistant, and as a Pharah ā€œmainā€ with 126 hours on her, it annoys me to no end when you look down, but not all the way, and try to use your conc blast to push yourself forwards, but end up sending yourself backwards. This is why I want a 30 degree angle from her base outwards that sends her forward, rather than backwards. Something Iā€™ve also noticed is that conc has inconsistent knockbacks due to terrain, thus my desire for a slight upwards KB. Her ult being cancelable makes it less of a detriment to her, much like McCreeā€™s.

As for her mobility buffs, her superhero landing gives her extra damage, as well as a way to decend rather fast. Her passive overhaul gives her more of a repetitive way of flying, without making her micro-manage her fuel. At times, her flying can feel inconsistent, which I feel will help her AND her counters.

:skull: Reaper:

  • Shadowstep:
    • Ignores railings (will destroy them when confirming his teleport)
    • .3s duration, down from 2s
    • Regains movement after the .3s
    • Gets a Shadowstep effect for 2s after teleporting, where he cannot shoot nor ult.

SHADOWSTEP IS THE BIGGEST JOKE IN THIS GAME!!! Thatā€™s why I want to increase the speed, but allow Reaper a window on invuln to reposition, but not have him be as oppressive and teleport and start instantly killing, ulting, or being edgy. I feel this is a fair tradeoff, allowing him the mobility to get close to the enemy safely, but allow the enemies enough time to react to Reaper getting close to them.

:de: Reinhardt:

  • Rocket Hammer:

    • Damage reduced to 70 per swing, from 75.
  • Charge:

    • Damage reduced to 210, from 300.

Currently Charge is too good against the heros designed to counter both tanks, as well as it taking a good chunk out of other tankā€™s HPs. 205 damage allows the Rein to still kill 200 HP heros, but Mei, Reaper, DF, and Bastion all will be more effective against rein, and overall more effective when being played against a Rein.

:australia: Roadhog:

  • Whole Hog:
    • KB reduced to 8m/s from 10 m/s
    • Damage per pellet increased from 7 to 9

I feel that Hogā€™s recent Whole Hog buffs were a huge miss since his KB was never the problem. The farther a victim gets KB, the less pellets hit. This makes his ult more lethal in terms of damage, over clearing an area. It just seems too weak still.

:us: Soldier:

Overall, pretty balanced. I feel that every other change per hero will help him compared to straight up buffing him.

:mexico: Sombra:

I enjoy poking sleeping bears, and the Sombra banbase is one of them.

  • Opportunist Passive:

    • Now gets an extra 25% movement speed when stealthed when her Opportunist passive is active
  • Machine Pistol:

    • Spread lowered to 1.7 degrees, down from 2.7

    • No longer a hitscan

      • 45 m.s bullet travel time
    • Rate of Fire decreased from 20 rounds/s to 15 rounds/s

    • Damage per bullet increased to 10.

      This aint it chief, which is why her spread should just be decreased. Her gun has strong DPS potential, but her assassin-esque iteration really limits it, because she would be able to assassinate any enemy. However if you remove her ability to TP out and give her a stronger point-presence then her damage (via spread) can be buffed to make her a more in-line DPS.

    • Spread lowered to 2 degrees from 2.7

  • Stealth:

    • 30 damage threshold before she gets knocked out of stealth
    • Cast time/destealth time lowered to .25s from .7s
  • Translocator:

    • Removed
  • Hack:

    • Renamed to Ability Hack
    • Duration removed
    • Can no longer disable passives
    • Can no longer disable healthpacks
    • 30 damage threshold before hack gets canceled
    • Instead of having a set hack duration, it puts all abilities on CD
  • New ability: Passive hack

    • 6s Duration
    • 10s CD
    • .9s cast time
    • 70 damage threshold
    • Is not canceled when LoS is broken
    • Disables all passives on victim:
      • Bastion no longer has IC in both Sentry and Tank
      • Brig no longer had inspire
      • Dvaā€™s ult charge for mech call is disabled
      • DF loses all passive shields, and cannot regain them when hacked
      • Genji loses cybernetic abilities
        • Cannot double Jump
        • Cannot wallclimb
        • Cannot reset dash CD when getting a kill/assist
        • Movement speed reduced to 5.5 m/s from 6m/s
      • Hanzo cannot wallclimb
      • Junkrat will not spill nades from his corpse when hacked prior to death
        • Also will do self-damage to himself again
      • Lucio can no longer wallride nor change his crossfade option
        • Heal/Speedboost will not be diabled, only his ability to swich between the 2
      • Mercy no longer self-heals, and cannot float
      • Moira cannot self-heal herself while doing damage
      • Pharah cannot hover
      • Reaper cannot life steal
      • Reinā€™s barrier will not recharge
      • Sombra herself cannot use her opertunist passive
      • Sym cannot recharge her shields
      • Tracerā€™s movement speed is reduced to 5.5m/s from 6m/s
      • Hammond cannot change between ball form and his walking form
      • Zarya cannot charge energy
        • Also Shields will not recharge
      • Zen cannot recharge his shields
      • Armor does not work on ANY hero

(Hack is now bound to E, and when pressed it pulls up a menu, RBM for Ability Hack, LMB for Passive Hack)

  • EMP:
    • Now provides a ā€œjumpā€ into the air
    • Will provide both types of hack
      • Ability Hack will put all abilities on CD
      • Passive Hack will last 6s, does not stack if an enemy is already passive hacked
    • Can no longer disable ult usage (pressing Q)
      • Still cancels enemy ults if they are being actively used.
    • Does not hack healthpacks

The current problem with Sombra is that her hack is too bloated with things it can do. This causes balance problems for her, because she rides the line between too powerful and too weak. We saw the problems that came from her hack nerf, which came shortly after her hack buff. Streamlining hack makes it feel both better to use, as well as play against. One of her hacks strictly targets abilities by putting them on CD if it applies. Her Translocator was removed because it promoted unhealthy poke-retreat playstyles, because it makes her feel like an assassin. To compensate her for this, her stealth cast time is greatly reduced and includes a damage threshold to prevent certain heros from spychecking her, like Dva or Bastion.

Since she traded in a vast amount of power from her primary hack, she gets a secondary hack option that strictly disables passives. The passives include hero-specific passives, like how Mercy, Brig, and Moira all have self-heal passives, as well as general passives like how Armor passively reduces damage or how shields recharge over time. This secondary hack option (both hacks cannot be applied aside from her ult) gives her more control over which type of targets she is hacking. For example, an ability hack on genji only disables his dash and deflect, but disabling his passives makes him a sitting suck. Disabling Passives on Zen means he canā€™t regen his shields, but he can still discord and heal others so hacking abilities is the better option. This also opens up complex situations, like disabling Reinā€™s barrier, or disabling his ability to recharge it.

With these changes to both her hack and stealth, her damage is too linear. It needs to be good enough to pick off vulnerable targets, but good enough to not feel wasted in close ranges. Changing it to projectile but reducing the spread, RoF, and upping the damage means sheā€™s losing 10 DPS, from 160 down to 150, however she has far more accuracy while doing so. This gives her SMG more power, but requires enough skill to master it (think about a DPS Orisa). In leymans terms, sheā€™s gaining more accuracy and damage for a more dynamic gun that rewards skill. Without her ability to TP out of a fight, her stealth and passive support an infiltrate and assassinate, where she can stealth in and kill a low HP target, and deter her away from her poke-and-run playstyle where she would constantly die from having her TP removed, and not enough time to escape with stealth.

Overall, this would make her a supportive/utility DPS, where she can reliably defend backlines and her supports, but is given opportunities to infiltrate and assassinate low HP targets. This gives her an actual role, and not a solo-kinba-flanker that canā€™t secure kills, and hack is borderline useless.

:india: Sym:

  • Primary Fire:

    • 3.5 Degrees lock-on added
    • 7m range
  • Secondary Fire:

    • Charge rate nerfed to 2s from 1s
  • Turrets:

    • CD lowered from 10s to 7s.
    • Health lowered from 30 to 15
  • Teleporter:

    • HP lowered to 50/150 from 50/250
    • No longer has a duration
    • Cast time lowered from 1s to .7s
    • Deployment cast time lowered from 2s to 1.5s
    • Can no longer place in Blizzards and Gravs

The biggest problem with Symā€™s rework is that it doesnā€™t feel like Sym. It feels like a new hero who uses Symā€™s body and cosmetics. These are changes to turn her back into Sym. Her laser identity is her lock-on, so adding it back but with a degree of lockon will make it feel like Sym again, and make it feel fair to those playing against her. Her secondary is easily exploitable, so increasing her cast time makes it less of a spam problem. Her turrets have less HP, but have a faster reload rate. Her teleporter trades HP and misc utility like being placable in a grav/blizzard for more substancial QoL buffs, like it having infinite duration with a lower cast time. This is to make her tele as a portal to higher grounds or for flanks, that allows her team easy rotations when pressured.

:sweden: Torb:

  • Overload:
    • Extra Armor decreased to 100 from 150
    • CD lowered to 9s
    • Heals Torbā€™s turrent for 50 HP.

Overall the Torb rework was a success imo, however Overload feels extremely iffy. It has too long of a CD, but buffs Torb too much. I feel trading armor for a lower CD will help him more. This also helps him heal his turret when he cannot reach it.

:uk: Tracer:

  • Blinks:

    • .7s CD between uses.
  • Recall:

    • CD decreased to 10s from 12s.

While Tracer is in a weird spot due to Brig, many fear she will become unstoppable again. I feel she is in an overall balanced spot, however one huge problem with her is that she can consistently outplay her counters for minimal effort. This is why I want to target double blinking, as this means she canā€™t bait out CC that would otherwise kill her, but she can still play around it. Since her primary way of baiting attacks is being nerfed, I feel lowering recall CD gives her more sustain as well as a better chance of escaping if the enemy messes up their attempts of countering her.

:fr: Widowmaker:

  • Widowā€™s Kiss:

    • Damage decreased from 120 to 90
    • SMG spread decreased from 3 degrees to 2
  • Venom Mine:

    • CD lowered to 10s from 15s
    • Damage increased to 100, from 75
      • DoT increased from 15 to 20

While these changes seem unnecessary, these are targeted at removing her crutch on bodyshots. However, these changes flesh out her kit more, like making venom mine more useful as well as her SMG spread.

:full_moon_with_face: Winston:

Needs no changes.

:full_moon_with_face: Wrecking Ball:

  • Adaptive Shield:

    • No longer knocks Hammond out of ball form
  • Piledriver:

    • Damage decreased to 85 from 100
  • Grappling Claw:

    • Damage increased to 75 from 50
  • Minefield:

    • HP of mines reduced to 25 HP from 50
    • Damage increased to 150 per mine

While Hammond is mostly fine, he needs a few bits ironed out. His shields knocking him out of ball form can sometimes hurt him rather than help him. Piledriver damage got nerfed but damage moved to his claw. Minefield does more damage but is easier to destroy, as it helps out lower damage heros for them to destroy and is more lethal against Rein being the mine destroyer.

:ru: Zarya:

Seems fine to me.

:nepal: Zenyatta:

  • Orb of Discord:
    • DI reduced from 30% to 20%

This is gonna catch some controversy, but I do feel Zen is balanced. The reason why I lowered both Zen and Mercyā€™s DI is because of the power both can hold. Mercy can make certain DPS heros too powerful (like Pharah, Ashe, Widow) while Zen can melt stuff both in a 1v1 as well as if his whole team focuses down an enemy, like a tank per se.


3: General Map Changes

Hanamura:

Overall, Hanamura is fine and feels balanced. My one gripe with it is how the Defenderā€™s left exit is a death tunnel when respawning while the attackers are on the point.

I suggest extending the Left Exit further left, so it lines up with the stairwell. This is because there is no cover when exiting spawn, so any Sniper that is set up on the high ground directly in front of the main entrance can continually shoot into that hall. By extending it left it gives the defenders a safer option to regain high ground, as well as preventing Attackerā€™s choke spam into the spawn.

Also, on point A can you lower that high ground on the gate so itā€™s easier for some heros to access, either attackers pulling strats like rocket jumping onto the platform (itā€™s a tad too high) and itā€™s hard for some defenders to jump the gap onto it.

Anubis:

I might be a little baised, since it is my best map to play on, but I donā€™t see anything that needs to be fixed with it. However I am open to ideas and discussion about it.

Volskya:

Point A feels fine enough, but point B can either feel like a stranglehold to attackers, or impossible to regain control as a defender.

Unlike Anubis, Volskya point B really forces you to go down main. On Anubis, you can go Mid, Left, or Right. It can also promote cheese strats like a Bastion Pirate Ship set up on the rotating conveyor belt.

Which is why I want that right side (from the defenders side) of point B either reworked, or streamlined so itā€™s a viable attack route.

In return for this, the defenders should get a better spawn exit on the right side, so they donā€™t have to go through those office spaces.

HCL:

Oh boy, this is a tough map. It just feels unfun to play on, which is a byproduct of both itā€™s design and map flow.

With Point A, remove the staircase on the Defenders side, because it promotes easy high ground access. With this, in the center of no-mans-land on the Attacker side, there is a little half-wall. I would like that raised up so it promotes more cover.

As for point B, Absolutely remove the sniper perch all the way back in the corner by the defenders spawn. There is no way for attackers to contest that high ground, and thus requires a counter-sniper when attacking. Then for the attacker side, on the main path that leads directly to the point, replace that tree there with a car or moon vehicle. This way there is solid cover when pushing left as an Attacker.

Dorado:

I feel like Dorado is a fine map.

Gibraltar:

I also feel like itā€™s a fine map.

Route 66:

For the most part I like this map, but point C feels unfun to play when that section of the map needs to be played on. I think the biggest issue is that the Semi Truck by the end needs to have more anti-sniper measures, like making the Trailer and Truck bigger, thus making it impossible to stand on it. This makes that back route by the health pack, strictly a way to the health pack.

Junkertown:

OH boyā€¦ Where to startā€¦

DO I want to dismantle Pirate Ship for this map? Yes. The attackers spawn A needs to be moved back a little to make it farther away. Think of Route 66 payload distance from attackers spawn.

Later on during point A by the big open field, add 1 or 2 more building to build up more high ground. This is why Route 66 point A feels fine to me, as there are plenty of high ground options to drop onto the attackers, or vice versa.

Point B feels fine, but point C needs the whole section cut off from both attacker and defender spawns, up until the shaft of the fidget spinner. The shortcut between the attackers side and defenders side makes poking too easy, and itā€™s very easy to abuse the high ground. Thatā€™s really my only gripe with point C.

Rialto

I have started out despising this map, but it has since grown on me, and there are only a few features that irk me.

Point A feels fine, but the start of point B on that bridge is a problem. Allow the railings to be broken. Further along on B, rework those arches by the doc. Itā€™s so frustrating having to benny-hill your way around them if youā€™re trying to finish off an enemy.

As for point C. Remove. The. Pillars. As I said above, itā€™s nothing but Benny hill. It feels too easy for one side to abuse them by running around them.

Kings Row:

Feels great to play on.

Numbani:

Feels fine for the time being

Hollywood:

My only gripe would be to remove the sniper perch and elevator on point A.

Elevators are something I feel should be on more maps to reach the high ground. I LOVE playing point B on Hollywood.

However with point C, Iā€™d make the highground in the hangar lower. This way itā€™s easier for attacking heros to reach it. Otherwise they have to run around just to flank up onto the high ground. The rule of thumb should be 1 Junkrat mine to jump onto it. Currently he needs to use 2 OR stand on the payload.

Eichenwalde:

Point A is fine, but throughout point B I ALWAYS seem to get held up on the bridge. Itā€™s too easy to abuse envornmental kills, and with how linear the path is, you just have to ram both teams into it each other. Iā€™d like for a Junkenstien-type of filler on the side of the ramparts (left side of bridge on defenders side), but lowered to the level of that wooden scaffolding, with a collapsed wall leading to the far end of the bridge, where that Bastion omnicā€™s corpse is. Maybe even turn that corpse into more cover.

As for point C of Eichenwalde, rework the high ground to the defenderā€™s left, so itā€™s not a sniper perch, but rather a way to flank and get the healthpacks that are back there/ Think of Kingā€™s row Defenferā€™s left side. Itā€™s a flank, but doesnā€™t lead to high ground.

Blizzneyland:

Like Rialto, I started off hating this map, but itā€™s actually growing on me. My only gripe with it is both point B and C.

Point B and itā€™s high ground feels too claustrophobic, and the bridge connecting both sides of the high ground should be removed.

With point C, Remove the ability to fly over the end walls, and lower the high ground on the inside of the C bend (Aka the pillar with the health packā€™s high ground). Then also extend the small defenders fall up until it reaches the pillars by the attackerā€™s left.

Busan:

I was looking forward to this map but it just turned out to be a snipers paradise.

This map needs every sniper perch cut from each point.

On the Downtown point, Extend the 2 buildings with standable roofs up into the skybox. Think of Lijiang Towerā€™s Night Market. where there is high ground, but it is not on the tops of roofs.

On Sanctuary, raise the skybox, add more vertical cover, and remove the drum on the point. Honestly, either of the other 2 center buildings could have made a better point than the current one. Replace the current point with a Well.

On MEKA Base, Remove those 2 hallowed out sniper points on both sides. I can live with the raising Walls on the objective. Also add a jump pad in that one elevator shaft to reach the high ground.

Nepal:

Is an OK map, but itā€™s flaws donā€™t always bother me.

Lijiang Tower:

One of my favorite maps, I have no problems with it.

Ilios:

Just cut down with the sightlines on it, by removing or blocking LoS on the highgrounds, like on the Parthenons and the walls above the tunnels that go behind the point.

Oasis:

On City Center, open up either the doorways into the center building on the point, or add 2 more doorways via the 2 solid sides.

On University, rework the underground system so it leads to the stairwell by the back of the point, and not the healthpack room.


4: My Opinion(s) regarding Future Content:

4-A: Lore:

Out of everything released, lore has been at the bottom of the priority list it feels like. When was the last comic? Do we even know if they canceled the Comic line?

How many characters are leaked but not in the game? Junkertown Queen, Echo, Liao, Dvaā€™s Mech Squad, and SEVERAL OTHERS are all added into the universe but we know N O T H I N G about them. At this point, they have the hero-character concepts lined up for the next 10 years, That is very disheartening when so many people are hoping for one hero over another, or how about Ashe that teased Echo when she herself was new to the universe?

This ties in with the next point: Hero releases.

4-B: Hero Releases:

Since launch weā€™ve gotten 1 new hero every 3 months or so, which equates to a total of 8 heros in the past 2.5 years of this game being released.

This trickle of new heros now becomes a problem because so many players want so many different things. We want more supports, but also an alternative to Dva. We want more DPS, but we have enough DPS heros.

When you combine this trickle system with the fact that there are more teased heros than heros added, it makes me dread the next hero release. I was so moot about the release of Ashe and Hammond. Either Speed up hero released, or make Lore a higher priority so this playerbase can dabble in lore outside of playing, because even balance is so slow that it causes flame wars and witch hunting.

Dropping hero released down from 3 months to 2 would help keep this game and metagame fresh.

Jayne himself said that THEE best time to play OW is when a new patch (especially a hero release) because there is no definitive meta yet, so everyone is throwing stuff at the wall and seeing what sticks.

Iā€™d especially like to see a dual-release of 2 heros, that way the gameplay can progress more. Trust me, polish is something I care about, but at the same time Siege can pump out 8 Ops a year for a set $30. It is very possible.

4-C: New Maps:

By adding a Map Maker, Blizzard can take more time off of working on maps, since they can work with the community to develop new maps. Iā€™d much rather have new heros over new maps, simply because most of the post-release maps I find have some problem to them, like how Busan is a Sniper Paradise.

Please just give us a Map Maker :heart: .

4-D: The Future of Balance:

Thee biggest hurdle for this game is itā€™s balance. If you want OWL to be serious, then you gotta make more changes to hero balance. Each patch with hero balance that comes every 2-3 months should not just change 6 heros. It should be at least 1/3rd the roster, because a vast amount of the DPS roster needs MINOR changes. But yet you donā€™t bring it to them.

It seems like youā€™re afraid of micro-balancing heros, but hereā€™s the thing: The Pharah jetpack buff was a great change, and it was very minor. Or how about Soldierā€™s 17 -> 20 (now 19) damage buff? Mercyā€™s 50 -> 60 HP buff that you reverted? Or her self heal reduction from 3 to 1 second?

Where are the old days where balance consisted of minor adjustments to multiple heros, and werenā€™t as extreme as using the Nerf Bat and Nerf Hammer?

Even with the current rate of balance, why was Brig and DF nerfed twice on the PTR before their first nerfs went to live?

It seems like Balance has no rhyme or reason. It feels like a game of darts because LITERALLY EVERYTHING ABOUT REAPER HAS BEEN BUFFEDā€¦ Except his Shadow Step. The 1 ability thats holding him back.

If you make Balance changes more frequent, it prevents periods of staleness where Snipers and Goats are meta, and you end up buffing the wrong aspect of McCree. Meanwhile Pharahā€™s changes completely hurt her and no one seems to care. Or how Sombra is the new Bastion, meanwhile Bastion still needs QoL fixes?

Please, reassess your balance philosophy for 2019, because itā€™s hecka frustrating the way this game gets balanced currently.


TL;DR: Overbuff is actually only 1% off. Itā€™s an accurate source, but not 100% correct.

Fact check me:

Go to:

https://www.calculatorsoup.com/calculators/statistics/average.php

And enter in this data, which is all of the hero winrates for this week:

56.32, 55.84, 54.46, 53.32, 52.86, 52.55, 52.44, 51.99, 51.88, 51.73, 51.26, 51.07, 50.93, 50.83, 50.63, 50.53, 50.52, 50.25, 50.13, 49.98, 49.79, 49.54, 49.50, 48.61, 48.59, 48.37, 47.77, 47.58, 46.68

Youā€™re Welcome.

27 Likes

Look, I donā€™t mean to be an a**, but thatā€™s way too much to read on a forum. I write for a living, and for anthologies I am under contract for for short stories, the word count cap is around 6k words.

Thatā€™s a massive post, and it is an eye strain on these forums. At least for me.

9 Likes

And I donā€™t write for a living, so me, a dyslexic, pumping out 11k words, shows how much love and care this game actually needs.

I am 100% expecting this kind of response, which is why Ctrl+F should be your friend. I donā€™t expect everyone to agree with every single one of my points. But at the end of the day, this is all geared towards getting OW to a better state.

9 Likes

Or, let me put it this way for size: in publishing the industry average is 300 words a page. So, at 11k words, that would be around 36 to 37 printed pages.

Yikes!

4 Likes

And my hat is off to you for the dedication. And I mean that sincerely. But letā€™s be honest, many of us here at the forums will read it, and will even debate it amongst ourselves, but Blizzard isnā€™t going to take notes on it. They have their own vision of what they want, and Blizzard has proven for the past 6-8 years that only their vision matters. This has become an axiom in all their games.

6 Likes

You could easily write manuals for the military, all the primary data is easily digestable with very little excessive wordage. I will definitely have some ideas of my own once ive read the post a few more times.

7 Likes

I agree. I skimmed it at least (it is 1am here) and it is well written.

3 Likes

Itā€™s basically the book of War and Peace of these forums.

Which is why this needs to be the first time everyone comes together, not fight with each other.

Currently, the planets are aligning. and the YT/Streamer, Pro, and base community all agree that OW needs extensive work.

If anything, this thread is to be a house for that discussion, much like the Bastion Megathreads with Bastion.

Yeah, but the problem is I have short-term memory loss, ADHD, and dyslexia. Like I should not be able to do the things that I can.

1 Like

Yep, we do all agree. Now people need to speak with their wallets. Overwatch remained flat last quarter and showed no growth. If it does that for Q4 2018, and Q1 2019, or even shows a decline, thatā€™s when Activision-Blizzard will notice something, especially with so much investment also riding on the OWL.

But the revenue needs to decline, first. Until that does, they wonā€™t really see an issue.

1 Like

My responses to this beast of a thread may take a while considering itā€™s size, so please continue holding said equine of which you are in possession.

5 Likes

my god phar, dont you have a life? how much time you spent on this?

6 Likes

A week, and not just ā€œoh haha 1 hour a day,ā€ but rather 40 hours and then some. Between writing and thinking and formatting, it took a while.

For comparison, the BMT took a little longer to write, but only has 4000 words, not 11,000 like this one has.

Technically it took longer than a week, since this started from the BMT#3.

4 Likes

like, i talk alot, and i mean ALOT, but THIS is something new, THIS is something
inhuman. im scared on the size of this, and thats something to say.

2 Likes

Hey man, can I read your stuff? I read for a living, and I actually like to read short stories.

For the record, i may hang around a lotā€¦ But i highly respect the effort and dedication present here.

This thread is deserving of a Developerā€™s response if not only for the amount of time put into itā€¦ let alone the problems that are pulled into the light, and the points raised.

7 Likes

Have you heard about our lord and savior, Ctrl+F?

He makes reading less stressful.

The current climate is the best chance we have.

The timing is awful, however since itā€™s midnight for me, and Xmas is a week away, less than a week, and so Iā€™m sure the devs are on break.

But when they get back, oh boy.

2 Likes

As hard as you try you cannot ignore the loudest of silencesā€¦ If they decide to ignore this specific thread, it would only spell worse for the climate of Dev/Player relations.

Imagine this becoming another one of the largest megathreads, showing each new forum member who loads up this website just how bad things have gotten.

1 Like

Pro tip: use the spoiler function to tidy up your thread some.

Also, Iā€™m generally on board with your feature suggestions (not 100%, but good enough). Your balance suggestions, though, leave a lot to be desired just from what I covered (about half). Iā€™d get more specific but Iā€™m working on other stuff right now, and I donā€™t really want to scroll through thousands of words on this thread to respond to every item ATM

1 Like

Catch 22, because the forums are also filled with selective bias and so Moira, one of the most balanced heros IMO, is still being complained about by Genji mains.

Thatā€™s why I made this thread to stand out for the rest.

1 Like

Exactlyā€¦ There are thousands of random threads, but in the ocean the largest of fish stands out clearly.

1 Like