The more I play with Sombra’s current iteration the more I dislike it. My overall consciences is that they did not make her better, they just made her more streamline, AKA less micro intensive.
My biggest gripe is with Stealth, this is her most important ability but as a passive you have no control over it. This has always bothered me because their are instances where it is better not to be in stealth and having it as a passive makes controlling it very clunky.
Despite Sombra being a stealth character, her attacks are easy to telegraph before they happen all because she likes to blur out her presence when coming out of Stealth. Out of stealth makes a very distinct sound and Sombra even likes to say “and I’m back” as if trying to be noticed. Prior to Stealth being a passive, it was a good tactic to de-clock away from a target and attack them while not cloaked. You can still do this to some extent by hitting the melee key to de-clock but that still means you need to keep hitting the melee key to keep being uncloaked.
There are instances where not being cloaked is actually stealthier anyway. Sombra makes almost no footstep sounds so as long as the enemy does not look behind them (which they often don’t) there is really no reason to be in stealth. If I try to approach an enemy point blank or try to pass though while cloaked the detection radius will be set off and ruin my flank. In contrast I can easily walk to an emery right in their face and start pelting them with bullets while un-cloaked.
Another reason why it is undesirable to always be in stealth is because coming it and out of it has a delay. It is a very small delay, but it is still a delay and every second counts on Sombra especially when facing the edgy Irishwoman or crazy cat lady. In this instance as well having Stealth not as a passive would be handy because then I can go behind a corner to active it and slip away, but I know I have to wait 3.5 seconds to do that. It just feels very clunky at times.
Lastly, why does Stealth need to be a passive ability? Virus could have easily been incorporated as a passive instead. As it stands, Stealth was made into a passive in favor of a generic “Press X to Deal Damage” button. Virus itself just feels lazy, and putting Stealth as a passive feels lazier. This is a problem I also have with the new Translocator too, many of its options being dumbed down for the sake of simplicity. Sombra’s kit was never seen as too complicated to play to warrant streamlining, so I am not sure why this path was taken.
I always liked Sombra for the amount of options she gave as a flanker, the last thing I want her to be is a Tracer clone on autopilot.
TL:DR: Passive Stealth is clunky, annoying and limiting
. Sombra used to have some pretty amazing stall moments in OW1.