If you hate watching GOATS, then nerf Widowmaker

General Discussion
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I think Widowmaker (along with post-rework Hanzo, to some extent) has warped the high-level meta around her for a long time, and is long overdue for changes.

Widowmaker is partly to blame for the current dominance of GOATS in tournament play. There are team comps that can beat GOATS (namely, Quad DPS), but as you can see in this video, Quad DPS immediately becomes much less effective if the GOATS team brings out a Widowmaker of their own:

For those who are too lazy to watch, the Quad DPS team (Stormquake) wins the first few teamfights against Busan Wave without taking any significant losses. Then, one of the players on Busan Wave switches to Widowmaker. The fights immediately become a much closer affair (since the only counter to Busan’s Widowmaker is Stormquake’s Widowmaker), until Busan Wave switches to a Dive comp with Widow in the back, and quickly cleans up Stormquake.

There are counters to GOATS, but all of them can be quickly shut down by a swap to Widowmaker. Thus, it’s safer for pro teams to just stick to GOATS instead of swapping to one of its counters and running the risk of losing a fight to Widowmaker. And that’s how we ended up with an entire year of nonstop GOATS mirror matches, despite the multitude of nerfs.

Widowmaker has played a major role in shaping the meta for ages. Countering Widowmaker is usually a team effort that requires an entire team comp to be devoted to killing her, even though dominating as Widowmaker is a solo effort. Triple tank, Dive and GOATS all became popular in part because they have a fighting chance at beating a good Widowmaker.

Heck, at the peak of Dive’s popularity before Brigitte was introduced, Widowmaker actually had a higher winrate than Tracer and was one of the most-played characters. In a meta that was built to counter Widowmaker. (Source: Winston’s Lab)

Grandmaster is a slightly different story, but the meta there is also warped around Widowmaker. She is the most-picked DPS by a huge margin, easily outclassing McCree, Soldier, and Ashe, and rendering most of the other DPS characters invalid. (Source: https://www.overbuff.com/heroes)

A character’s pickrate in Grandmaster is largely determined by how good they are at countering or synergizing with Widowmaker.

Tanks dominate most of the top slots because none of them can be one-shotted by Widowmaker and many of them have tools to reduce her effectiveness somewhat. Supports dominate the rest of the top slots because the top supports can enable a dive onto Widowmaker, harass Widowmaker from behind a shield, keep the tanks alive, or give a damage boost to Widowmaker. And right below the tanks, snipers and supports are flankers (Genji, Tracer, Sombra); the only DPS characters that are a less-than-ideal matchup for Widowmaker and have a good shot at killing her.

A good Widowmaker has a winning matchup against nearly every DPS character on the roster, even if a support is helping them. She profoundly alters the rules of engagement anytime you play against her. At the GM level, you can learn every trick in the book to deal with her, and build your entire team comp specifically to counter her, and you’ll still struggle against her. Pros have been complaining about her for years.

Why pick Ashe, McCree or Soldier when Widowmaker can do what they do, but better? Why pick any DPS other than snipers or flankers? Why pick a DPS at all when Tanks can walk around in the open and fight on the objective without the constant risk of being one-shotted?

Blizzard keeps nerfing the methods that pros use to check Widowmaker’s power (Triple Tank, Dive, GOATS) in the hopes of changing the meta, when the simplest way to fundamentally change the meta is to change Widowmaker. If you’re sick of watching the current GOATS meta, then you should be advocating for nerfs to Widowmaker. So long as Widowmaker can invalidate most of the other DPS characters, the GOATS meta won’t be going anywhere for a good while.

110 Likes
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So we should nerf someone F tier just cause of goats? Do you even know how balancing works on this game mate?

Widow beeing nerfed doesnt do nothing about goats.

Also goats are rarely played on ranked. OWL only plays it cause its their strat, etc.

Ps. Stop complaining about widow & that how she should be nerfed. Shes fine.

Edit: Since people have read my answer more than 2x wrong Im just gonna say it now. With F tier I meant that those nerfs what people are suggesting would make her F tier. Not that she is F tier now. Learn how to read things right pls.

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Nerfing Widowmaker/ Hanzo actually lets other DPS be playable beyond Plat without the risk of being instantly removed from the fight because a character half-way across the map hit them

Quad DPS was actually picking up traction as a strat against Goats until the team running Goats swapped in a Widowmaker; and made the entire thing moot

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  1. Since when is the best DPS F-tier?
  2. Meta isn’t like “this is the strongest”. It’s like “this thing counters the strongest thing but gets countered by this third thing which in turn is countered by the fourth. The fourth is harder to counter so we will run it”.
    Widow is the first thing in this example and GOATs - the fourth.
    I’m not saying it’s the only reason GOATs is meta. Just that widow’s strength is important.
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This is comical. In case you didn’t know tanks and supports are guaranteed an average pick rate much higher than dps. They will always lead top pick rates

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This is the most elaborate widow nerf thread I’ve seen in a while

And yet the result is still the same. She doesn’t need nerfs.

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Widowmaker has always been bad design for overwatch imo and was only added because they wanted to have a sniper because overwatch is an fps.

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Or people on that level should get better, improve, be smarter etc instead of nerfing few silly balanced heroes for everyone?
Poor you. Its not the end of the world if you die for them. You could always learn not to die for that hero/pick counters but I guess some people are too stubborn to learn how.

Also r you sure that 33 meta is problem in ranked anymore? Cause hell even I havent seen that meta long time in there. Just every now & then. And if you look top500 lists this season you clearly can see that dps are coming back.

Best dps? I think you understood me wrong. I said/meant that those nerfs what people are suggesting for her would make that hero F tier. Never said that this hero is F tier btw did I?

And goats arent end of the world. Its just 1 meta. Is there really a meta what people havent complained about?

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She’s not F tier.
Nerfing 1 shots will mean there’s less need for shields (goats)
She’s not fine.

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Yet again. I didnt said that shes F tier anywhere did I?. Maybe read what I said right next time?
I said/meant that those nerfs what people are suggesting would make her F tier.

Nerfing a balanced hero doesnt do nothing against 1 meta. It just makes that 1 hero worse.
And she is fine.

1 Like
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Telling people to get better wont make widows less powerful.
He didnt actually MAKE any suggestions for nerfs. If she was nerfed, obviously she’d be buffed elsewhere to make up for it.
Goats is pretty much the only thing pro players play. Its boring to watch, and therefore bad for OWL.

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Sorry, your English is a bit confusing, i misinterpreted what you said.

She’s not balanced and she’s incredibly annoying to play against.

She is not fine for anyone but widow mains.

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Sorry, i missunderstood you.
Most nerf suggestions are ridicolus. I hate her design but taking her oneshots away would just destroy her. I’d say, giving her reverse falloff and slightly longer charge time would leave her almost as good at her job while actually weak to flankers / dive. No more point blank snipes.

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  • Widow can’t wreak havoc when she’s getting showered with damage all the time, because she either a) would die all the time or b) would have to scrounge for healthpacks every couple of seconds. Their lack of self-sustainability has always been a sniper’s biggest weakness after all.
  • But you need burst damage to get rid of her because half of her team stands ready to heal her back to full in 1-2 seconds all the time.
  • Burst damage and one-shot have become a necessity because it’s too damn hard to die in this game otherwise.

But go ahead, nerf everything that kills you and enjoy 6v6 supportwatch where people die even less than in GOATS.

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It actually does. She even has plenty of counters, ways how to play around her but people are still too stubborn to learn how/what they are…

And he actually did since he said nerf widow.

Awh poor you. You know that theres plenty of other things to do/watch if you get bored. No one is forcing you to watch it. Also you can do something else at the same time if youre watching it so you dont get bored but idk if complaining about how bored it is really helps you.

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Nope. Telling people to do what you want them to doesnt fix the problem. She doesnt have effective counters she cant deal with or at least escape from. Even if she dies, she can respawn and get an instant, low commitment pick to turn a fight.

Yeah, he said nerf, but didnt say how. You over-reacted and said F tier.

I dont actually watch OLW, but it is a major money maker. People constantly complain about goats being everywhere. I’m not concerned for me, i’m concerned for the guys who, y’know, make the game :wink:

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Here’s what the effects of nerfing widow is going to be on goats.

You know that one random game from time to time that people decide to go snipers instead of goats for a round or two? That’ll also become goats instead.

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Nerfing Widow will not change anything. GOATS will still be played. The reason why they will be played is because it’s effective.

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Its effective against long range damage.

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Isnt that more like
Nerf widow and Goats?