Is balance even a Priority?

so now you’re claiming the game is going to be well balanced at launch with little or no testing of 3 new heroes and I’m just butthurt that the game isn’t how I prefer it?

Again, just because you aren’t testing it doesn’t mean nobody is testing it. Almost 100% of the balance issues that get uncovered aren’t found in two weeks of play anyway, especially around new heroes (unless they’re hilariously broken).

I’d like to remind everyone that the beta impression of Brig was that she was kind of high B, maybe A tier. How wrong we all were.

again, the more people testing it the better. The number of people in internal testing can’t do nearly as good a job as the community can when something is publicly available.

Because every time they release a DLC support they’re utterly broken and completely upend the balance of the game (see Ana, Brig, Moira, and Bap for details).

A new support will have playtesters and pros livid at the in game balance, and folks will start calling for delays.

Wouldn’t be surprised if nobody gets to test the new hero and she just drops at launch so that the balance team and design teams don’t undergo more deserved scrutiny.

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It’s funny because it’s true, and because people’s initial feedback during beta testing for each of those heroes was “this is weak, needs buffs”.

It takes time for players to learn how to use a hero and figure out how to play around it or incorporate it into a comp, and to think you can achieve perfect game balance in two weeks of cold experience is a really hot take. The only things you’ll catch in short testing windows like that is something like moth Mercy or immortal Bastion, where it was immediately obvious the game would be ruined if you let those changes go to the main game.

that’s exactly my point. a short beta won’t balance the heroes. We need a prolonged public experience with the new heroes to balance them. So objectively the game is going to be in a bad state at launch.

If I remember right they said that while testing Orisa they were using Zarya’s model with a Bastion gun attached just as an example of what you mean.

By that definition every single time they add a new hero the game will be in a bad state, but we still have to add heroes. The same argument can also be mad about new maps as well and we still have to add those.

Yes, that’s what every day after October 4 will be. Even if Blizzard started beta 3 tomorrow, it still wouldn’t show all the potential damage to the meta fox girl will bring because it will be months before people start really exploiting her.

it will be in a worse state balance wise then before it. The amount it will negatively impact the balance would be driminished the longer it spent in a public beta before it. Also, doing one at a time would diminish this. Adding 3 new heroes one with absolutely no public testing, and 2 with very limited publish testing, right as the game launches, is intentionally launching the game in a broken state.

It wasn’t a priority when hero limits was introduced. It wasn’t a priority when role queue was introduced. 5v5 will be the same.

balance will never be in a perfect state. but the more they allow testing of each hero, the better a state will be in. Them keeping the heroes away from public testing is them prioritizing things other than balance.

Yes because the reality is that 95% of the population doesn’t understand this game.

If they did, they’d be high Diamond at worst, but instead Silver sports the largest percentage of the playerbase.

Just look at how broken and dominant support has been in OWL. And I know you’re thinking “That’s only 3-4 heroes” but that’s literally half the support roster!

It’s ironic the community blames Blizzard for balancing around the 1% when half the roster is braindead heroes designed for the 99%. It’s one of the contributing factors of why the game’s balance sucks.

Most of the players are right at the summit of Mount Stupid on the Dunning-Kruger curve, yeah. I, myself, am a noted simpleton that only knows how to press W and M1.

That said, I still think the best policy for balance adjustments is “wait and see”, rather than “change everything every two days because someone got d-dunked in a game”.

gold-plat is average, not silver

That must be new then.

Late 2021 Silver had actually shifted to 31% of the playerbase while Gold and Plat were both in the mid 20’s.

I remembered seeing a post on it and there being jokes about how 6 years later players have actually gotten worse at the game. :joy:

Edit:

Note I said percentage, not average.

The cumulative average SR is mid gold. That doesn’t mean it’s the largest rank by population, which is what I’m arguing here. There’s more players in Silver than any other rank.

mids 20s% plus mid 20s% equals about 50% or about average…That silver is the single largest population group, doesn’t make it the average…

Is balance even a Priority?

Nope, it’s far from being a priority, just like adding lots of new content is far from being a priority too.

Selling lots and lots of cosmetics at a high price though :+1:

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Balance? Remember how DVA had an aprox 99% pickrate for the entire last season of 6v6 in OWL?

There’s also Tracer having an aprox 80% pickrate in every meta other than GOATS and double shield.

We’ve known for a while already, blizzard has a select few heroes kept in their favor

while the rest of the cast can rot

their balance team don’t strive for balance, they simply buff their favorites over and over

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