I already have a note to poke Geoff and Co. (Hero Balance and Design) this week to ask if we’re entertaining the thought. I’ll let you know if I can share what we discuss.
There is nothing wrong with a bit of active gatekeeping.
To quote the top reply to the post you linked on Reddit because I agree:
“The person (sending that message to Flats) being really stupid aside, I feel like people would have gotten the “over-the-top” message a bit clearer if all the changes were actually over the top lol.
You’ve got stuff like Rein and D.Va becoming full on raid bosses from the tank changes, which are amazingly fun, but then you have stuff like Brigitte just losing all of her self-healing and becoming a spam bot.
Feels like the three creators didn’t coordinate on what level of ridiculous they wanted to go with, so the tank changes are absurd and OP and just fun, but the DPS and healer changes have a lot of stuff that feels more like potential real balance changes or just frustrating nerfs, which doesn’t make it much fun for the people wanting to try out stuff with those heroes compared to tanks.”
10 Likes
I think they all got the idea that it was supposed to be “over the top” but still were a little cautious of keeping it mostly playable.
Just look at these support changes that didn’t make it in for reference (Especially the Mercy ones 
)
1 Like
Ouch, brig was going to be even worse
I still think the experimental should have overall been more towards the “make everyone OP” side of things (which is clearly possible when you look at rein and D.va.)
The changes for some heroes were too realistic and cautious and nowhere near “over the top”
6 Likes
This is a fair bit of critique and is something I’m happy to take accountability for. We’ve been discussing themes internally, and will do so with the next group of creators we work with.
This first iteration has been a great proof of concept. We’re going to continue to improve and iterate on these, and other community events, as we go.
27 Likes
Thank you AndyB, greatly appreciate the reply and looking forward to what’s to come!
3 Likes
Is it safe to assume the real, actual balance patches/PTR stuff is done for OW1 at this point and we will only be getting exp “fun” cards until OW2?
Because what’s the point in putting in/working on new balance updates to live game when they’re just gonna be thrown out/replaced with OW2’s reworks and 5v5 balancing?
1 Like
Prolly cuz that’s what you’ll be playing for the next year.
For those still playing this game.
1 Like
I appreciate the response, I suppose you’re right about the negative impact it could also have. Maybe there’s a middle ground I’m not seeing.
Regardless the cons would outweigh the pros here.
1 Like
You’d have a really hard time making Overwatch unplayable. The bones of the game are some of the most well-designed out there. They should have gone wild with making every hero powerful, but these YouTube/twitch people are compelled to cater to their biases.
Doing God’s work here.
Mercy would like to have a word with you
2 Likes
For a future experimental, especially if it is more focused on balance, it would be very interesting to let people from the other 2 roles come up with changes. So a tank and support player think up changes for DPS heroes, DPS and support come up with tank changes, etc.
I think even though this experimental was a little all over the place, it is informative because it teases what players from particular roles want the game to feel like for themselves. It would be really informative to see how players who don’t primarily play in a role would change it.
I wish they bring the Lucio’s ultimate instant kill change to Live, same for Reinhardt ultimate instant, but with damage adjustment where they can’t delete the target but can do a follow-up attack to finish them off like the roadhog combo.
They definitely need to implement’s Winston ultimate change where he gets more health and not deleted so easily when focus on. The double damage on object will be an amazing buff to him.
That 3s sprint for auto-reload on 76, please bring that to live, massive QoL change.
Moria experiment just needs the hp drain to be more severe, and (without the cleansing,) it’s perfect for live. Also, bring that mercy change too!!! lol
Can we at least agree that nerfs are not “fun, over the top balance changes?”
It’s been really frustrating for those of us who play unpopular heroes as our favorites keep getting dumpstered. Flats himself explicitly said he didn’t want Orisa to have “fun” changes, he wanted her nerfed.
Can y’all make it fun for everyone and not just the “in” heroes?
10 Likes
Hey Andy, i was planning on making a thread on this but if you are taking the feedback might as well do it rn.
I think 2 important things for these next pro patches are 1) all changes should follow the same line of thought, either over the top for everyone or attempts to balance everyone, no inbetween. Using the tanks as an example (Mostly since is the one role i play the most) most of the heroes did get over the top changes but then you have instances like sig, ball and hog. Sig seemed more towards “Balance him as an off tank”, while with Hog and ball it felt a little bit more like a power shift with hog getting the short end of the stick.
- Reduce hero bias, like, i know these pros favor heroes they like but if the patches dont have anything meaningful for all heroes then its not fair for those that enjoy these less mainstream heroes. Tracer got mega buffed while poor sym only got the TP speed increase (Granted, Sommju did adress this and added the fourth turret but you get the point).
A small disclaimer for anyone else reading this, no particualr hate towards any of the streamers, is just that these 2 things were also present in the april´s (?) pros patch and i think solving these 2 issues would make these patches better.
3 Likes
andy im begging. PLEASE ask them about goomba stomp lucio or at least some form of it.
The most hated change of all? Nah
1 Like
If the team changes around some of the numbers, the Experimental could legitimately be a contender for a good balance patch