Tier 55? Are you insane?

General Discussion
1

New characters should be unlocked at tier 10 at most, 55 is way out of line.

Though heroes should never be locked to begin with, this is completely unacceptable.

51 Likes
2

Bruh, the worst part, is that the BP is good enough to stand on it’s own without this.

35 Likes
3

All OW1 owners get her instantly for free at least.

3 Likes
4

Depends on how much you need to grind but since new heroes will be locked from comp for a few weeks anyway, I think it’s a non-issue when it comes to balancing. A few weeks is probably how long it will take to grind to that level anyways.

Despite that, I’d still maybe lower it to 35 or 40.

2 Likes
5

That doesn’t take into account people who don’t jump into OW2 the moment it launches, so anyone who comes in a few weeks late, and anyone who picks up the game later down the line. Next year, you’ll end up with a situation where players in comp just won’t have access to certain heroes, either because they’re a returning player from way back, or a newer player who hasn’t had the time to unlock all the new heroes but is a high enough level to start comp. It will always be a balance issue.

8 Likes
6

Comp is gonna be such a joke. It’s gonna be ow1 end of season quality but for the first month a new hero is released. You’re gonna have so many games that will be determined by battle passes.

Can’t wait to see battlepass diff being used as much as role diff.

5 Likes
7

Just this one time :slight_smile: ! OW1 owners won’t be getting upcoming new heroes for free. We will have to either buy the Premium Battle Pass or grind lvl 55 like all new players (if there are any).

But I’m sure they are going to ask for feedback after season 1 and hopefully they’ll reconsider Tier 55 for unlocking new heroes in the future.

Something close to the Valorant model of unlocking agents / heroes should be it. It’s the most reasonable one.

2 Likes
8

The season is 9 weeks long right? I don’t think a few weeks missed will hinder you too much. It’ll probably just mean that you won’t complete the battlepass.

There are two ways you can remedy this issue:

  1. Buy the premium pass.
  2. Get the hero post-season through free means (Devs haven’t specified but they’ve stated that you can unlock new heroes through free means after the season finishes).

Aside from that, being unable to play certain heroes has never been considered a balance issue before. If the enemy has a Pharah but our DPS can’t play hitscan, we wouldn’t say not being able to play those heroes is a balance concern that makes the game unfair. Likewise, if Kiriko counters xyz but no one on our team can play her or they just don’t own her, it’s not really that big of a deal. We’d just have to do what we’ve always been doing when we end up in match scenarios like that.

Though, given the dev’s recent statements on how they’re moving away from “counter-picks” in favour of “general viability”, I don’t think we’ll end up in a situation where teams will feel burdened by the lack of a hero to counter another hero. I’ve personally never liked the whole system because it undermines player skill way too much.

Edit:

Just to support my point. It’s quite obvious that the vast majority of players, who usually just hype up new hero releases for a few day, will not be impacted by hero locks because they quite literally only play a small handful of heroes.

9

Oh no, you have to play a video game to unlock FREE content. How terrible. :clown_face:

10

The issue with locking heroes away behind a battle pass isn’t about a single player. It’s the team issues of 10 players when after a while (more heroes) it’s very possible to get into issues of 3-5 players out of 10 don’t have access to all the heroes.

So maybe you don’t get to fight the new tank as a DPS and see how you do, being the other team doesn’t have it unlocked. You can’t combo with your fresh battle pass unlocked new DPS hero being the support or whatever on your team doesn’t have the other part of the combo unlocked.

there is zero excuses to lock heroes behind the pass other than raw corporate greed. In an IP that already made way over a billion dollars off the community it now looks to split.

1 Like
11

Look… let’s say the same time the next hero releases, my brother buys me Elden Ring. So I spend a month or two playing that. Maybe I log into OW for an hour or two to try out the new hero in the training range, but not enough to make any progress grinding.

Now, once I’m done with Elden Ring and I come back, I’m in a situation where I don’t have access to the new hero… Not only does that hinder my actual fun cos I can’t jump back into the game and play the new hero in QP to get a handle on them, but as far as comp goes I have these options:

  1. Jump into comp without the new hero
  2. Buy the battlepass
  3. Spend x amount of hours grinding before I can play comp again (again, hindering my fun)

If the new hero is pretty ‘meh’ maybe it won’t make a big difference… but if they’re JQ levels of unbalanced then not having them could make a big difference. The thing is, I don’t believe the OW team necessarily intentionally wanted to release heroes overpowered in the past, but they’ve show us what they want and what the end result is isn’t always the same. And now… they actually do have incentive to release heroes in an overpowered state to encourage people to buy the battlepass. They can claim they’ll balance everything perfectly now but I don’t buy it for a second.

That’s because what people are capable of playing themselves, and what they have the option of playing are two different things. It’s about the tools you’re provided. OW was founded on the idea of a level playing field, where each team has access to exactly the same tools, and who wins comes down to who can best utilise the tools available to win. Sometimes that’s just been super good on one or two heroes and using that to dominate. Sometimes it’s having versatility and being able to swap up your hero picks/playstyle to better suit the enemy comp/playstyle. But at the end of the day, it’s down to the players.

By locking heroes out, you are taking away options from people. Options that could give them another way to win. If an enemy Ana is absolutely popping off and landing sick anti-nades, switching to a support that has a cleanse ability that can bail your team out of that situation is a potential game-winning strat. You’re nullifying one of the things the enemy was doing that was contributing to your team’s poor performance.

Now, is that the only way to win? No. But it’s an option. It’s a pretty darn good option. Taking that option away from someone creates an unlevel playing field by giving one team more that they can do than another.

Take that data with a grain of salt. It doesn’t tell us which heroes they’re playing. It doesn’t tell us in which modes.

I mean… if you’ve tuned into OWL recently you’ll see that 95% of matches are just mirror comps where they run exactly the same heroes. So I guess they’re just playing two heroes and not switching much if at all. Is that because the players want to? Or is it because some heroes are more powerful/viable and so are picked every time? Sojourn and JQ were both must picks in OWL when they became available. In terms of locking out new heroes to players in comp… that’s not a promising sign for balance.

12

69% completion of the battlepass gets you the hero. Blizzard did this on purpose.

5 Likes
13

…all heroes are still free…? :wink:

14

You do not need to spend currency on them, but they are not free. It is going to take a long time to grind those cats.

1 Like
15

Yep I hate ppl spouting free crap. You pay with money or A LOT of your time. Which is the most valuable thing on earth

7 Likes
16

Everyone is affected by hero locks. 20% of OW players = 1 player on every team, in every single match that’s played. There is not a single match that’s played that isn’t affected by hero switching.

Gamers really need better literacy in statistics, it shouldn’t be this easy for Blizzard to scooby doo people just by showing them a big number and a small number and gesturing between them. You guys are getting played and you don’t even know it.

2 Likes
17

…so they’re free? :wink:

18

No, Sushi. Bad Sushi! Don’t make me get out the spray bottle. :triumph:

2 Likes
19

This. Mythic skin and the themed legendary skins are enough. Throwing the hero onto it just acts as bad PR.

3 Likes
20

It’s only free if you don’t value your time.

13 Likes