JUNKRAT NERFS - WHERE ARE WE GOING?
So, A couple seasons ago, Junkrat got a very needed buff to his mobility. It was a great decision. Junkrat had a fighting chance to escape attackers, or make a hail marry against an agressive opponent. It actually gave him a fighting chance against Phara in a 1v1… barely, but it was a risk the more skilled players were willing to take.
Since then, Junkrat has seen immediate nerfs:
- A once reliable mine is now vaguely effective even at close range.
- It's even less effective against one of the classes that was meant to at least be careful around him, Flankers.
- On top of that, the mobility update in December has made it easier for everyone to recover from an already meandering push from Junkrat's mines, allowing them to basically land right back where they started.
- Mines and Grenades have been failing to deal damage even on successful hits at random intervals, registering Zero.
- With no fix in sight or even the problem being acknowledged in an official manner theres question as to weither or not this was intended
- Even Traps seem to allow characters to simply hop over them...
- The Tire has continued to get slowed since its innitial buff, making it more mobile than its old self, but now just as predictable.
The latest example a 66% reduction in the size of Junkrats primary fire. For a character with such a low success rate in skill shots, the introduction of this change was understandably confusing:
That… does not add up.
Its an intresting statement, because it very clearly hurts the players who attempt to lead shots , rather than the ones who spam.
For a character who’s accuracy is notably abysmal, and dodge able at 10-15 meters, it doesn’t make much apparent sense to point out Junkrats will have to " aim a bit more carefully" when it specifically effects the people who already have to deal with aiming carefully the most, and the uncaring spamming players the least…
The grenade is now 1/3 its volume it once was, meaning those sliver of a chance collisions with tracer are going to be all the more unlikely.
So , that brings us to now. The patch will likely go live by next season as per the usual, and Junkrat is one of the only characters in the latest roundup to not be even mentioned in talks for reversion or adjustment despite the clear problems experienced on PTR, and all we have to ask is…
What are we, the community of players, going to see the devs doing with Junkrat as this trend continues? I surely would like to know from them what to expect in season 10 , 11, and beyond…