Please Nerf Power Creep instead of Nerfing Defense/Support

General Discussion
397

When you look at pick rates, do you only look at when the hero is picked for the majority of the match? What if someone plays genji for a minute and then swaps off to a different hero for the majority of the rest of the match, does that still count as a win for genji’s pick? If you look at the total play time of heroes, do genji still lie in the middle of the bracket?

From my personal experience, Genji is extremely weak right now, but I am not surprised if it has still reasonably high pick rates, but mainly because many consider it the most fun and interactive heroes, and are willing to play it even though he is very weak. On the contrary, I think a lot of people don’t find mei to be interesting to play, but they are simply playing it so that they can win. These two types of polar populations could be the explanation of the similar pick rates.

The other thing to consider is heroes like Mei, Doom and Reaper requires so much less skills and practice to excel compared to heroes and Tracer and Genji, where you can make so much more mistakes on the former heroes and achieve the same impact as the latter ones. That’s probably why heroes like genji are perceived as super weak right now, because it is completely unplayable unless the player is EXTREMELY skilled. I think this is one of the result of the so called “power creep” that everyone is complaining about - the game just added so much more CC (almost every new heroes added has some sort of CC, Sigma’s rock (which I am still not sure why Genji cannot deflect it) and ult, Sombra, doom, brig, orisa…), and that hurts a lot of the vanilla heroes (especially the mobile ones, which happen to be the most fun ones to play) that were designed without taking account into all the new cc’s added. If Genji was released today, do you think he would be a reasonable design? He is almost never able to pull out his ultimate without being stunned and cc’ed to oblivion.

I think a lot of the cc abilities that impact movements need to be really re-considered and toned down. Sigma’s rock needs to be deflectable, orisa’s pull needs to have smaller range or less slow time, changes similar to those made to doomfist a few patches back which makes heroes impacted by doom’s ability able to move faster. These mechanics are very unfun and uninteractive and I think is what is hurting the game the most. Once they are gone or tone down to longer cool down or less cc time, mobile heroes will be able to be decent again and that may make heroes like widow and hanzo less oppressive.

398

Oh my, I didn’t expect to touch a nerve. I posted yesterday this thread, went to bed then off to work to come back and find nearly 400 replies and 14K views! Thank you all for posting replies especially from the Devs, because I am learning a lot about “power creep” and the issues from the community.

In a way I feel good about Overwatch because of this reaction, because it shows a lot of people do care about this game despite its shortfalls, and maybe it will lead to something good! :blush:

399

literally your own alt… no face no one

400

Thank you for reaching out to us, that is much appreciated .
From my humble pov the main issue leading to power creeps is indeed the oppressive nature of a few heroes or more specifically abilities , most of these abilities are mostly defensive, and put a stop to the flow of the game, such as immunities, CCs and excessive survivability, that pattern is repeated among all the currently ‘problematic’ characters such as Mei, Moira, Bap, DF, Reaper, Sigma etc… Some more than others of course, mostly all changes made during the GOATS era and still not reverted afterwards.
It is this constant feeling of kill denial and slow pacing of the game alongside the abundance of ‘Oh Crap’ buttons, those factors are making the game slow and slightly heavy, too Low Risk > High reward, and in a certain way stale.
Thank you for taking the time to stop by, wishing you all the best and great future updates similar to the last patch (shield nerf).

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401

great post. I like hearing from you guys,.

402

And word on Hanzo changes?

Here’s the idea I like best so far.
Cuts Hanzo’s bodyshot DPS down from 279DPS to 177DPS. (For a normal Arrow+StormArrows combo of 475 damage over 1.7sec, down to 300 damage over 1.7sec.)

Hopefully these changes don’t dumpster the hero.

I’ve been working on a variety of ideas for that

403

Now is the time to ask for 1 extra ammo for Lucio. He is a high skill hero so deserves 24 sound waves in his gun. Too often my teams DPS are truly garbage and I just need that extra shot to finish off enemies at distance before they get healed.

People will say switch off Lucio and heal more but if the enemies DPS are simply better than yours it makes no difference and the fights snowball. So I think if you can’t beat them, join then and give Lucio an extra round of ammo!

404

I think something you also need to take into consideration in regards to this is how some people just get bored of having to play the “must pick” hero from the meta and just flat out refuse to play them after a while which could lower pickrates to some extend. However it could also be a minor group which doesn’t reflect on the stats.

405

Is it the best idea to patch using stats from the top 1% of the player base? Although they may be able to provide the most comprehensive stats and feedback as they have a better understanding of the game, I believe that it’s easier to tell of a heroes base utility and power level with statistics from the lower levels as they haven’t mastered every ability. Of course, Genji players in Top 500 are going to have more success simply because they have mastered that hero. If you look at the heroes base power level, then you can see how much power creep effects the game. I.e: A platinum Baptiste can get more value by simply pressing E than a Genji can by farming a blade for two minutes. THAT is power creep. Genji used to be good at any level, and one of the best heroes when mastered, but with no changes, he is now lower than average in terms of power and only even slightly usable by the highest level players in the game. That is power creep. A hero with no changes power level shouldn’t change.

Mei is not fun the play. Along with Reaper. And Orisa. Eventually, even if a hero is the best in the meta, the player base will get bored of playing them as it simply doesn’t make for an enjoyable experience. I think this is one of the reasons the meta and changes in Overwatch are so stagnant and slow. The players no longer play the meta, and therefore it becomes harder to balance, which I think is what’s happening now. For instance, I am a Reinhardt main. Most of the time, both the enemy and my team will run Rein Zarya as a tank line. This isn’t the most effective tank line, and both the enemy and I know that, but that’s the only way as tank players that we can enjoy ourselves when playing the game, even when it means that we lose more often. Winning by playing Sigma or Orisa simply isn’t worth it.

Professional play and Ladder play are different stories as they are entirely disconnected from each other since what wins isn’t fun. People playing for fun don’t play to win anymore, so the environment in the different scenes is entirely disconnected. There are the players that do play the meta, who are in top 500 which is mainly Doomfist Mei and Reaper players, as well as Orisa and Sigma players, with Baptiste at support. And there are people who play for fun, which forms some of GM and everything below. They play what they want to play. There are two metas. The pro meta and the ‘I’m fed up’ meta. You can’t balance based off of the ‘I’m fed up’ meta, which is why you can’t balance off of stats.

A few seasons ago I got Diamond for the first time. I was so excited and barely played for like 3 weeks because I was afraid to lose it. Eventually, I did play, and eventually, I did slip back to platinum. I was utterly devastated to the point where it affected my daily mood. Last season, I got to diamond with support. At the time I was in Platinum for both DPS and Tank, so this was a big deal for me. Or at least it should’ve been. I fell to 2700 mainly because I was playing Ana who was slowly slipping from the meta. Unlike the first time I fell from diamond, I genuinely didn’t care. I felt like I should, but I didn’t. Winning doesn’t mean anything to me anymore as it isn’t fun. If I wanted to win and stay in diamond I could’ve played Moira or Baptiste, but winning with those heroes doesn’t feel good. Which is why you get these backwards stats. People don’t play good heroes anymore, but still have their games ruined by the few who do. So you get negative reports of heroes, but the stats don’t necessarily reflect that.

406

It’s bad that you use bare statistical data without understanding what’s going on in the field. That’s bad.

It means that your regulations need to be amended. How will the players find any fun if you take it away from them? Who will have fun? There won’t be anybody. Nobody will enjoy Overwatch at their spare time. Then, you’ll have a zero in those statistics. Nobody finds it enjoyable to play Overwatch.

It’s right. They don’t find it enjoyable because Blizzard took the fun away from the game.

Fix this. Play Overwatch and try it out for yourself for a couple of weeks. It’s just ridiculous.

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407

Do what the playerbase wants.

If something feels bad to the vast majority, then its unhealthy for the gameplay as a whole. Don’t justify bad design with “balanced” pickrates

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408

Btw.
Power creep doesn’t equal damage being too strong. Power creep is just escalation of power level which incluedes tanks and supports as well. For example, healing being too high is also power creep, as is tanks being unkillable etc.

409

Mei overpowered? How about Doom and Hammond?

410

Any changes in the foreseeable future for Brigitte or Pharah…?

TY for engaging with the forums, its a breath of fresh air

411

Maybe some positive changes to Symmetra? A flat one second between damage ramps? 90/135/180 beam damage so she can actually 1v1 without her turrets? Faster orb speed. Faster shield regen passive?

412

Do you have a link to that?

413

First, thanks for taking the time to reply and give such a detailed response. It’s always nice to see things from the developers’ perspective, and I’d love to see more of this

I wonder, in the case of mei, if there’s not some bias in play. Unlike tanks and supports, there are a lot of DPS options, most of which are at least somewhat viable. A lot of DPS players (or at least streamers) at the GM level seem to prefer to play something they like that’s viable, over something they consider boring but OP, and I feel like Mei probably falls into that category for a lot of people. Obviously this isn’t something that can be seen in stats, but I feel like it’s got to be a factor on at least some level.

414

So, Blizzard just seriously comes in with one of those damage mitigation posts just to satisfy the masses.
Honestly, at this point I don’t even think you play your own game anymore and are just too focused on Overwatch 2 at this point, Blizz. Even I, who have been away for a few months DUE to your poor balancing (but came back due to the update that shields would get nerfed), can tell that the balancing is just still off and powercreep exist, but still you refuse to admit that your balancing is just not done well.

The first step to fixing a problem, is actually ADMITTING there is one. Saying winrates are high on Soldier/Genji was the same bull that you fed us when you said winrates on Symmetra and Torbjorn were high. It’s called PICKRATE. 50 games played on one hero with a high winrate vs hundreds of thousands games played by other heroes with lower winrates doesn’t mean that higher winrate means the character is balanced.
Like, this is even something you have recognized in the past… how can you fail to recognize this now is beyond me. I understand that you have a need for keeping the masses happy and making sure everyone can enjoy heroes, but making heroes more powerful every single time is not the way to accomplish that.
Take Baptiste, a healer cough that does more damage than Soldier, does more healing than Soldier, has a better utility than Soldier and oh wait, also has a better ultimate than Soldier.
Take Sigma, an off-tank that does more damage than D.Va, does more damage mitigation than D.Va due to having both a shield and damage mitigation once the shield goes down which BOTH are better than D.Va, has a better ultimate than D.Va.
IN WHAT WORLD do I ask you, does that not qualify as powercreep? Legitimately if you say that that isn’t powercreep, you should go back and take some more math lessons. Reaper, Mei, Doomfist, Baptiste, Hammond somewhat due to his extreme knockback abilities, Sigma, Orisa… they’re all busted in one way or another. Some do too much damage. Some do too much healing (or self-healing). Some absorb too much damage making other tanks basically unplayable. Obviously you can still play other characters, but NOT if you want to stay competitive.

Honestly Blizzard, with posts like this and the fiascos and mishaps from last year, you’re beginning to lose me as a customer. I actually was thinking about also investing in OW2 (after the literal hundreds of euros spent on OW1), but now? I really don’t think I will. And sure, to you that won’t matter I guess. Consumers are no longer important within Blizzard, it’s all about the quick buck. Trying to make the easiest heroes have the most value rather than having a good risk/reward system, just so more and more people will play.
Idk what else people can say to make you understand. Every pro I watch that is asked about the state of Overwatch and they all unanimously agree on which heroes need work or a straight nerf.

I don’t think buffing heroes that underperform is currently the issue. Start with nerfing the problems, and stop with bringing out heroes to counter other stronger metas.

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415

Devs being so out of touch with their game that they think Mei and Genji are on the same power level just because of pickrates and winrates.

Oh boy, where to even start…

Even in quickplay, Genji is a bladebot and it’s rare to see genji get value outside of big blades. Genji has to be exceptionally good or the other team has to be badly coordinated. As much as I despise genji and his stupid weeb blades, I can recognice that it’s a lot harder to bring value with Genji nowdays rather than just going some random cheese character… or other Shimada. Why bladebot when you can go Doomfist anyway? He basically does the same thing but far more efficiently and doesn’t need to farm ulti to do so and he can’t just be succed from afar by random support played who had enough of genji shenanigans.

Genji is a character who has literally been powercrept. But the powercreep keeps on going.

Meanwhile Mei is the ice devil that makes tanks so frustrating to play the whole role has stopped queuing. It’s just a nightmare to play against Mei in levels where she can icewall off your whole team because map geometry and then freeze the rest if her cheese wall isn’t working.

Mei can bring value just by walking into enemy team and wildly spraying her freeze, even in top 500 and there’s nothing nobody can do about it because there’s no counterplay after Mei walks past the shield.

Harbleu is right to call the devs out for being so out of touch with their game. But then again, most people knew this already from how they managed to trash dva, symm, sombra etc. heroes for no reason.

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416

Why are you talking about GM like it isn’t ladder? and the people that will care most about how effective a given hero may be are more than likely going to be the ones who want to climb in ranked.