It’s definitely a difference in the balance philosophy rather than just technical limitations. Blizzard repeatedly states that they are careful of making changes out of a fear of the community developing a meta naturally. They also have a tendency to ignore simple number changes for more extravagant changes like the Roadhog rework, the Sombra rework, or Brigitte’s new ultimate.
I’m sure it’s not as simple as changing an integer pressing the “GO LIVE” button, but that’s not the fully story.
Holyy
The first person to ever post a samito video and actually type something besides the link 
And the high ELO community gets bored if metas go unchanged for over a month.
If they did faster balance patching then these types of things aren’t actually issues. More frequent smaller changes allow them to nudge things instead of risking completely breaking things. If they push something too far, they can also correct it a lot more quickly.
Imagine instead of nerfing Sojourn and giving her like 15 compensation buffs, if they just made a single minor nerf, and if that was too much, change her again a week later. Instead, they make sweeping changes and keep her broken for months at a time while everyone complains.
5v5 completely destroyed the game.
Bring back OW1, bring back 6v6!
I agree, I’m a huge fan of a more iterative balance. I just don’t think that’s how Blizzard sees it.
That’s true, but a week is also not always long enough to properly gauge if changes have been effective or not.
Doomfist is a good example. At the start of Season 1, consensus was that he was terrible. By the end of the season, people had actually learned to play him and the consensus had changed - he was considered somewhat underrated; he still needed buffs, but only minor ones.
Metas often have monetum and can take some time to shift, even after a hero is buffed/nerfed. Forcing frequent balance changes for the sake of change would result in some crazy, erratic balance decisions. It woukd also be super confusing for the vast majority of the playerbase that doesn’t follow this stuff daily.
That’s why they hold that philosophy, yes. The problem is that most of the time heroes don’t sort themselves out over time. Under an iterative balance system they could change the hero if it turns out their buffs were unjustified, but under the current system we’re stuck with mistakes for months to years at a time.
I don’t think that actually matters much. If a hero isn’t an obvious problem within a week of data and feedback, then tuning over time is fine.
In your doomfist example, if people didnt really know how to play him well at the start of the season and he received a buff, it would still become fairly apparent as people did figure it out and they can nerf him again. Doomfist being a little overpowered in the hands of the best doomfist players for a week or two as the data rolls in and people give feedback isn’t really a big deal. The following week they can make minor adjustments in the other direction.
This example is also based on a very drastic change. Tank doomfist is totally new - this isn’t really true for other heroes. Most heroes in the game have been the same for years at this point. Soldier underperforming? Buff damage from 18->18.5. If such a change was really that problematic, you’ll definitely know within a week. But if it takes 3 months for people to gradually shift to a Soldier-based meta because of that (and maybe other synergies)… no big deal. Give him a tiny nerf again.
The WORST thing you can do is large sweeping sledgehammer changes. This just produces huge swings in the statistics that makes it take longer for the data and feedback to stabilize.
I’ve been saying this since the betas, but nah, why do what makes sense and is easier to balance when you can completely ruin the game instead?
I feel like the balance patching has gotten faster…but the actual quality of the balance patches have been terrible. They fail to address the really problematic heroes - especially Sojourn. The fact that she’s still as she is, is beyond a joke.
I feel like it’s the opposite.
The quality is fine, is just so ridiculously slow.
Aside from Sojourn stuff, that’s just dumb.
Ah yes. Blizzard’s “famous” testing of changes before they push them out.
A real knee slapper there.
I don’t think you get how patches/hotfixes happen in other games 
if there’s issues that cause community outrage, other devs will drop what they’re doing to release a fix ASAP to avoid bleeding their player base. Happened with the revolver in CS:GO and games like callisto protocol that had to rush out a performance patch. These happen within a day or two.
Also to those discussing how long it takes to update. I don’t know how blizzard updates games, but I have a game on steam. It takes 2 minutes to change a variable as it only needs to upload what has been modified.
Half of those patches did nothing. What’s your point? The January patch should not even be called a patch.
Thanks for saving me the time. I just sort of write off everyone who cries about Sojourn being the way she is while moaning about how Genji was addressed.
They can hotfix MIDMATCH via DDA rigging as per the patents.
Since 2019 btw.
What do you think “applying patch” was originally for? Basically, a custom workshop code (initialization) for the masses, with some tuned in-game params as the match progresses, so people don’t feel completely oppressed.
They have the tech filed and it’s absolutely in-use during xplay lobbies.
Harder to show/prove in comp especially when replay codes are bugged.
But most of the sus/cheating? Yeah that’s rigged hitboxes/aim for artificially close “engagement” → retain and monetize.
I think it’s extremely falsifying for the entire gameplay experience if people just pop off or don’t based on what some tech/algs decide. We absolutely don’t want this (in the spirit of legit, ethical competition). Even if it means most of you need to quit because you’re actually not good at aiming.
Was identified why the quickness wasn’t originally there. It is now. We’re staring down the barrel of a third update in one season which is most certainly frequent. Effectiveness is another debate. Whilst somethings should probably be more aggressively touched mr. content creator has to be aware that the devs prioritize average play over high level play. So as gross as Sojurn still wrecking T500 is expecting most updates to be game changing at top level is to gently put it, optimistic.
I mean, Look what happened to Sombra. Quick and aggressive adjustments aren’t always great.
If you’re a top 500 player yes. If you aren’t no. Context matters.
It’s debatably easier to address a left click than it is to completely change an identity of a character. Not to mention that a significant reason why Hog can even run around is because of meta shift. Not because Blizz intentionally gigga buffed him in a single go and then left him to fester.
More like another example of what listening to the loudest people and adjusting way to quickly looks like. Tracer was also on this list and they were going to play it cautiously and see where she shook out after other heros were adjusted. Then they said F that and listened to the people whining about her not being good enough and reverted the nerf she took from OW1 to OW2.
No, I agree the consistency is lacking and that’s an issue. I disagree with that speed being a good speed.
Doubt.
No, that’s just a balance problem. Not the lack of an extra tank.
The tank role in general enables RPS style because it’s one character “playing” as two characters. This is solvable with decent balance and a removal of 30% ult keep on swap. Also hard disagree on the diversity claim. It only feels diverse because 6v6 isn’t wide spread and only in customs. If you had regular 6v6 scrims with only T500 players/OWL players there would be one dominant setup with maybe another that can play if the team doing it is good enough at executing.
Implying OW1 wasn’t boring for 2 years after it had been solved to death.
lmaoooo.
L take. Doesn’t matter how much of it goes back into the game. The game’s monetization and lack of free to play paths for skins isn’t acceptable. Honestly sounds like the guy can actually just afford to throw money at the shop thus isn’t bothered by the prices.
Probably the most agreeable statement stated.
Pretty much agree with it all. I personally don’t care about one shots. However I think Sojourn ONLY needs the rail gun ability to take longer to build up. They never should of nerfed anything else of hers. Just make the player have to put in more work to build that ability up than it is now.
All I want, which will never happen, is Blizzard to admit they were wrong, and put it back to 6v6. 75% of the problems will be gone. Then just polish up evening else afterwards.
I want them to stop trying to make this a COD game, because it isn’t, and put almost everything back that they removed or changed. This is not a K/D game, we need back the stats of who was on point longest, bring back the medals. Why is the score bored not spelt out? E, MIT, all that is nonsense. Put the full word, this is not Reddit with a bunch of teens who refuse to spell out full words for no apparent reason.
Bring back the voting cards at the end, bring back the ability to vote, and endorse, for enemy team members. They really need to bring back everything it was, just polish the looks, but don’t change the stats of what it used to be. Hell they’ve even made it harder to use, stay as a team. (For Xbox) the RB button prompt is no longer there, I have to open up chat!? Like what?
And for the love of God, fix the damn endorsement, I cannot move left to right after endorsing a person once battlepass crap has come up. I have to click out of the Battle pass, and only then can a go back and endorse the person I wanted to. WTF is this bad game design. This was the worse copy and paste system ever. I really wish it truly was just Overwatch 1 with a new coat of paint, but they’ve just ruined so much that worked.
Someone should make a poll for Blizzard, Bring back 6v6 or keep 5v5.
Even Team death match doesn’t feel the same when you’re just missing one player. When 6v6 was around, jumping to 4v4 on team death match felt like a huge difference. It made it feel more fun and made you play differently.
Well he can’t be right about everything.