I’m just here to rant about the general character balance in Overwatch currently with more community based balancing in mind rather than top level. Also, STOP GIVING HEROES MORE MOBILITY. This doesn’t do anything but forgive bad positioning which is one of the main facets of this game. Stop.
Tracer - Near perfect in terms of balancing. From damage to mobility, squishiness and hitbox size. I feel Tracer is used as a baseline for all balancing issues considering her status as the ‘mascot’ of Overwatch. I do feel that giving her the ability to blink three-dimensionally would help considering the verticality of Overwatch and the continued changes in the game, but it may become a little too strong at the higher levels.
Hanzo - I’m in the same boat when it comes to Hanzo as the rest of the community. A tad bit too strong. Whether it be the speed he is able to charge his ultimate with little to no punishment, or the fact that his storm arrows pumps out as much damage as it does at such a fast speed, he needs some adjustment. In a perfect scenario, his charged shot to body will deal 125 damage, with an additional 420 damage with storm arrows. That is a total of 545 damage. This is definitely not as broken as McCree’s fan the hammer used to be, but this is probably the next best thing. Additionally, his double jump allows for a significant improvement in his mobility leading to a lot of forgiveness in positioning. This combined with the speed of his ult charging, Hanzo definitely feels stronger than the rest of the roster and should be adjusted. In my eyes, I see several ways this can be achieved.
- Decreasing his ult rate charge slightly. Storm arrows ult charge should be adjusted less so the rate of his ultimate charge is in line with the likes of soldier or McCree.
- Decrease damage or fire rate of storm arrows. Perhaps even a slight adjustment of both. Even drop off damage could be looked at. 70 damage is a bit too high and can even shred down tanks. Around 40 would be appropriate without adjusting anything else. This number isn’t just arbitrary, but considering kill potential with his storm arrows. This still totals out to 240 damage allowing him to still adequately deal with DPS/Squishies in a similar manner, but less damaging to barriers and tanks. This means a charged shot and 1 storm arrow deals around 165 damage, effectively 2 shotting tracer with body shots, 3 shotting pharah, soldier, mccree, etc. This ultimately will allow the likes of Winston/Dva to effectively counter him unless some skillful headshots are dealt.
Widowmaker - Far too low of a cooldown on hookshot. Either adjust Winston or increase the cooldown. Currently extremely difficult to counter properly due to all the mobility. You can’t give a high risk high reward character that much mobility without some sort of drawback. If cooldown can’t be adjusted, then lower HP. 150 would be 100% justified considering her ability to one shot so many heroes. Many people will cry and complain, but she has the deadliest weapon in the game if you don’t factor ultimates and hanzo.
McCree - Yeah, mediocre. Small buff would definitely fix his relativity again. Drop off damage is definitely too much. I’m not saying revert it back to what it used to be, but just notch is back a few hairs. Again, this has more to do with the verticality and range in this game. McCrees effective range is the same as Soldier right now(if you include rockets) which should definitely not be the case. If you look at the verticality and range of the new maps, we can see why this would make such a difference. Try to 1v1 Pharah on a map like Rialto or Blizzard World, it doesn’t take much for pharah to climb outside his effective range, rendering her near unpunishable unless you play widow/hanzo/ana. Adjusting his drop off damage would do wonders for his viability. His weapon is the peacekeeper, and ONLY the peacekeeper. Lets reward the risk for good aim/good positioning.
Brigette - Broken. Pure and simply broken. Her passive healing is fine, her healing is fine. HER CC IS NOT FINE.
- Just remove her shield bash completely. Most broken CC I have ever seen. The range of the bash is insanity and it’s on a 6 second cool down. Way too strong and interrupts EVERYTHING. I don’t know how this passed QC. She counters many heroes and blatantly just destroys in 1v1.
- Instead, add an actual shield bash. If she bashes rein, it will knock him out of shield. Genji’s deflect, symmetra shield, zarya barriers, winston barrier. No stun, just an interruption, but in the case of symmetra/zarya/winston, they will break. Any defensive skill should be interrupted or broken by shield bash. Also increase cooldown to 12 seconds. This makes her an effective anti-tank healer that synergizes well with her kit of being a frontline support. This might prove to be difficult programming wise, but her current CC is just way too broken.
Mercy - balanced well, BORINGGGGGG. Most braindead hero in overwatch. Just remove her from the game, get rid of the resurrect mechanic. You can’t fix her. She’s just too stupid. Players are affixed on the concept that you HAVE to have a mercy in every game just to play overwatch. Over shadows every other healer in terms of usefulness despite other healers being perfectly fine. But that won’t happen, and since that won’t happen and resurrect MUST stay in the game because HEROES NEVER DIE, then at least res them at half hp so it’s more punishable. The invulnerability time after Resurrection effectively makes it free after the res and also further pushes the idea mercy is a must-pick. If even that is not an option, lower the time allotted to res. This still doesn’t change the fact she’s a very boring hero to play. I don’t believe this can really be changed because of guardian angel. If you take a look at Team Fortress, you’ll notice one of the main skills for a good medic was good positioning. This is completely removed from the equation because of guardian angel. You can’t punish her for bad positioning because of, you guessed it, mobility. This leads to a very boring hero because there’s no risk. You’re out of place? Just fly away. This also leads to the nightmare known as pharmercy. Some “possible” fixes is lowering her guardian angel range more to force good positioning to an extent. Her current range should be the ult range. Same with her beams. This would make her significantly more challenging to play without changing much about her. Stop making her such an easy hero. No one likes being heal cucked. Just some food for thought.
Winston - I personally think he’s fine as he is if the aforementioned heroes are adjusted. He’s just too easily punished and countered. Why? MOBILITY.
Sombra - just lower her damage and give passive healing and call her a support honestly. Her kit is too difficult to balance as a DPS, but would be effective as an off-healer. Allow her to passively heal while stealthed because NANO MACHINES. Remove/Reduce her speed while stealthed.
That’s about it for my current thoughts on the roster. Thoughts will change if adjustments are made.
PS: Improve hitreg, kthx
TL;DR
Widow - HP from 200 to 150
McCree - Slight decrease in damage drop off
Hanzo - Storm arrows damage to 40, Lower ult charge rate on storm arrows
Brigette - Rework shield bash
Sombra - Moved to support, passive healing within range while stealthed. Decreased movement speed during stealth. Decreased primary weapon damage.