I’m a bit concerned that if they keep introducing new heroes every season or two, we will eventually have too many. OW1 launched with 21 heroes, and we’re now up to 36.
With every new hero, the game gets a bit more complex and the learning curve steeper, especially for new players. It’s true that players aren’t required to learn to play as every hero, but we do have to learn to play against every hero. Also, to even remember which hero is which when making or receiving a call-out can become difficult.
Too many heroes also make the game harder to balance. Even with the current 36 heroes I’d say the devs have basically given up on achieving true balance, and are instead aiming for an ever-shifting meta, constantly changing which heroes are OP rather than aiming for them to all be equal.
What do people think? Is there a point at which there would be too many heroes, or is it a case of The More the Merrier?
For reference, Heroes of the Storm launched with 22 heroes, and capped out at 90.
Not even close! As long as the artistic quality stays consistent which it will (this is Blizzard we are talking about) the more the merrier
League is approaching 200 champion roster and doesn’t feel like too many most of the time (altho its a different genre)
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Overwatch was fine with the original 21. But of course too many Fortnite kiddies cried because they wanted to make OW a live service game.
They should’ve gone the TF2 route and given every hero a different number of unlocks and playstyle changing weapons.
No. It gets easier to keep things balanced the more heros you have. You can make more, fine-tunes adjustments.
It’s too many heroes for this balancing team. I think at it’s current state, it can only handle 3 of each class. I will not change my mind so long as the person who thought Mercy only needed 5 extra bullets still has a job that makes choices like these for the game. Even if it was an objective help, the level of tone deaf in how that would look to people craving mercy changes would see them and lose more trust in their competencies.
On a more serious note, it seems the more heroes you have, the more some just get casted off to the way side because other heroes would be objectively better. We’re slowly seeing that between 76 and soujourne.
Paladins has 57 and is doing just fine.
More heroes makes it easier to balance. Not harder. You have more you can fine-tune with.
I disagree with that. Every time a hero is added the games balance changes. Just look at kiriko. It would be easier to find balance with no new heroes. But the game would get dull so not the route I’d like to see.
It’s less of an opinion, so much as game-design philosophy that applies to any game.
If you give one type in Pokemon an advantage over another, it wouldn’t be too bad. However if you were to do the same thing in Rock,Paper, Scissors you would break everything.
Its the same mechanics with different skins.
Nothing new at core.
Tank you have shield dm or now block.
the things they customise is mobility and weapon.
Everything else is primarily the same.
The only real exception was ball .
rama is nothing more than orissa with a shield at his core, and rein df hybrid in nemesis.
Aren’t philosophy’s opinions though? Because it’s not held in facts. It’s what people think is best. Not actually what is best.
In theory yes, but I’ve heard the opposite experience from games like Paladins and Garden Warfare 2. Limitations breed creativity after all but this is best case scenario. Not feasible for Blizzard. It’s much easier to say “Whose currently doing the best” and slap a hero to counter them down and worry about consequences in twice delayed patches. Triple A developers shouldn’t have the “Easy” route if it hinders the overall experience of the game.
Not really. An idea can just pop into existence at any time. A philosophy takes time to develop and refine. They get put to the test.
Having more options, gives the developers the ability to find tune things more easily. It’s something that end up being the case over and over again.
Pretty there will be such a thing. MOBAs have already that ; some heroes are rarely picked, rarely performing just because of different popularity.
It’s already kinda happening with Supports though. Bap afaik had always a lower pickrate than Mercy.
You’ve also already that feel that new heroes are mixes from previous ones : Kiriko has a quicker immortality field and a mix between Moira dash and Mercy guarding angel ie. Ram feels like old Orissa in his first form, etc etc…
Balance wise, it depends on what devs aim. You could have balanced heroes but the pickrates would always be imbalanced.
Games like Street Fighter also show that characters can be fine but just rarely seen at top level ; just because they’re harder to master or not that fun to play but they’re still balanced.
But anyway, one day, OW2 will reach that point where adding ONE hero won’t be enough interesting for players to come again to play.
But heroes are the main reason to make people to connect and/or pay. So we might get a lot of heroes just for the sake of keeping the game alive, not for the sake of stability/balance.
There’s no such thing as too many heroes, but there is such a thing as too much Sojourn
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MOBAs can do it. Street Fighter, Tekken, Soul Calibur and so on can all do it. I think Overwatch would be quite interesting in with 90 Heroes.
Many will overlap in playstyle or counter-playstyles allowing for a bit of diversity even if the meta is set on a specific mechanic.