What OWL Shows about Doomfist
When I heard that Doomfist was even used in the OWL, I was shocked. But after watching a few matches, I realize that he’s being used to rush points at the last second because of his superior mobility. Yup, he used to be one of the few even REMOTELY useful GOATS counters as can be seen by his reasonable pick rate that, by the way, trailed Widow’s and Sombra’s during the OWWC finals:
Source: Reddit - Dive into anything
And now, he is good for nothing but rushing points in the pro scene which, by the way, has been dominated by GOATs so far.
What Seagull, Samito, and Brandito Think of Doomfist
Of course, a lot of high level players agree that Doomfist was overnerfed. OG DF players who have stuck with the hero through thick and thin like Chipsa, Brandito, and DanneddOTP barely touch this game anymore or have quit. That’s not all. Remember Seagull’s infamous “State of Overwatch” video (below) that preceded the sledgehammer nerfs to Doomfist and Brigitte?
His main complaint was Doomfist’s cc, which has been addressed, and now he seems to think that DF’s been over-nerfed as seen in the following Twitch video.
He said this as he saw a former DF main teammate essentially throw the game as Torb. DF is nothing but a throw pick on most maps in higher elo. The weekly Overbuff win rate, which, by the way, often sits below 50%, is probably skewed toward the positive end because people pick him to rush points at the last second when they have a decent chance of winning.
It’s not just Seagull. Samito, the former NA #1 player who was a vocal opponent of Doomfist’s design is now arguing for reverting his movement along with Brandito, one of the OG DF players. He also mentions that DF is now a niche pick for Anubis defense, which may also explain his seemingly “balanced” win rate despite extremely low pick rate:
It almost goes without saying that Blizzard was unreasonably harsh in nerfing Doomfist, and I think he needs help.
Actionable Recommendation
- Revert his Seismic Slam distance back to 20m without re-introducing CC.
- Fix his Slam bugs…some of which have been around since he was introduced…
- Make his ult reset cool-downs and reduce ult charge so that it’s roughly in line with Tracer’s.
Rationale on 1 and 2
Doomfist can’t even properly flank because of the distance nerf as seen in the following videos:
What devs seem to forget is that Slam doesn’t have the flexibility of mid-air control like Genji’s dash. Thanks to the distance nerf, if the ground is far from level as it often is in this game, Doomfist may be left simply hanging in the air, just waiting to die. When slamming across platforms, should the player’s estimation be off by a centimeter, Doomfist would simply fall to his death as can be seen in the following video. The ability is far more punishing than people who’ve never played Doomfist give it credit for. The old range gave some buffers to prevent such ridiculous events.
Plus, notice that Slam also has an indicator bug; it doesn’t always land where the blue marker shows up; the old distance gave some buffers against this:
Uppercut & slam combo now only covers a horizontal distance of sqrt(15^2 - 5^2)m + 0.5m = 14.6m, assuming that Uppercut moves him forward about half a meter. This is 5.4m off from the punch distance of 20m. This asymmetry induces an incredibly unnatural and clunky engage & disengage mechanic compared to those of other flankers with equal engage & disengage distances aka Tracer and Genji. Tracer can blink back and forth, and Genji can dash and ghost dash back. Why eliminate a part of Doomfist that even remotely resembled those?
Currently there are two infamous bugs on SS: frequent no-reg and broken physics that cause characters who were hit by it to fly high up. The latter makes combos with Uppercut very difficult. Considering that the cc is gone, I think it’s necessary that the devs fix these bugs to make him viable. Below is a video of the physics bug:
https://giant.gfycat.com/ScrawnyEllipticalIaerismetalmark.webm
Also below, please find an instance of the no registration bug. I’ve tested this one myself and it’s still there:
Another example of the no-reg bug:
Rationale on 3
His ult has become too underwhelming. The main reason for this is that the lethal zone for squishes has effectively decreased by about 80% as can be seen in the following diagram.
Source: Reddit - Dive into anything
Oh, by the way, the average hero movement speed is 5.5m/s, and Meteor Strike has a cast time of 1s. This means any character can move out of the inner diameter before it strikes… Yet Meteor Strike requires 1,500 ult charge as does Dragon-blade. Does that…make sense? I don’t think so. It’s a less effective offensive tool than Tracer’s Pulse Bomb and yet requires more ult charge… Let that detonate inside your head for a sec. And he deals less damage than does Tracer on average per game, which likely means he farms fewer ults than does Tracer.
Videos demonstrating its impotence as an offensive tool:
https://giant.gfycat.com/HospitableQuestionableAustraliansilkyterrier.webm
The main complaint that people had about Meteor Strike was that it had no counter-play for Ana and Zen. But now that has been addressed, however, at the expense of Doomfist’s utility. I think a reasonable middle-ground we can hit is to allow Doomfist to combine the ult with other abilities (with the cool-down reset) in succession so that he does have a reasonable killing potential without the help of Grav and also provide some windows for counter-play.
Conclusion
Devs, please consider at least reverting his E distance, fixing his bugs, and adjusting his ult for some of the most loyal fans of your franchise. Thanks!
![:salt:](https://d74zh8edaijub.cloudfront.net/en/overwatch/images/emoji/twitter/salt.png?v=6" ":salt:")
deal with it like us mercy mains did!