True, I should have said excessive powercreep. I wrote fast.
Winston bubble received a bubble buff, but he is still food for heroes like reaper, hanzo, hog, Mei. The buff was insufficient and the only reason his pickrate increased a little was because there is no bastion anymore.
What increase in raw healing output?
Mercy heals have been nerfed, Ana heals have been nerfed, Moira heals have been nerfed, Brigitte heals have been nerfed…
Please clarify where direct nerfs in raw healing output have resulted in increase in raw healing output. =)
Im glad you’re communicating at all, this gives US some insight too. Thank you for the time.
How about the Tank busting changes that crept in during Goats, changing entirely how tanking is played; hurting the viability of Tanks now you can’t stack 3 of them with 3 support?
After reading this I have to ask what exactly defines Overwatch’s core gameplay as feeling like Overwatch to you. You mentioned that GOATs was an issue, because the game didn’t feel like a shooter and that made it less like Overwatch.
I’ve never really seen Overwatch as just a shooter game, though. Overwatch to me is a first person fighting game that combines elements of many different genres into a single title, so that it appeals to all types of players even if they don’t like shooters at all. The fact that it isn’t just a shooter is what defines Overwatch’s gameplay as Overwatch to me.
By this definition Overwatch is becoming less like Overwatch with every patch. Multiple reworks have effectively deleted some of Overwatch’s most unique hero designs, changes to tanks and supports are putting more power into their damage rather than their unique tanking and supporting abilities, and the remaining unique abilities are usually left mostly ineffective due to harsh balance changes.
If that multi-genre crossover fighting game isn’t what Overwatch was meant to be I can accept that, but if it’s not I’d like to know what it’s actually intended to be. Is it just another shooter game?
Josh, I just want to say really quickly that I really appreciate you coming to the forums to discuss these issues with us. Personally I love getting any kind of feedback from developers of a game I love so much, and though I might not always agree with what they said I massively appreciate their point of view. Not all game developers are so forthcoming in discussions, so it’s always a rare treat to hear from someone on the inside.
Keep up the good work! I hope you aren’t too discouraged from posting here in the future.
Well, what’s the core gameplay supposed to be like?
It is getting oneshot constantly and melted by burst damage?
Is it getting chain CCed until you want to quite to game?
Is it to have an excessive amount of healing and sustainability?
Please do tell.
I play this game because it’s not like most “shooters” out there.
That was Overwatch’s whole appeal, that it wasn’t just a shooter. If you want to turn this game into other shooters, with a low TTK and high damage everywhere, I’m gone.
But it’s clear you balance more around your precious esports leagues. Since high damage and lots of headshots make for nice highlights for OWL.
And the fact that you think there is no power creep is kind of baffling. DPS has been buffed heavily, like Hanzo, who’s sitting at an absurd pickrate especially at the upper ranks.
The whole reason people used double shields was because of the high damage in the game now and DVA being over-nerfed.
It’s never been just another shooter. But it’s always been a shooter.
But it’s still a shooter. I don’t know where you read that Josh “wants to turn Overwatch” into anything. He simply stated he wanted to preserve what Overwatch’s core has always been…and that’s a shooter, like it or not. A high TTK shooter when compared to CSGO or R6S or whatever, but a shooter nonetheless.
I, too, would leave if they were intent on making OW a low TTK shooter, where basically no matter who you are, you die the moment an enemy sees you before you see them. But nothing he’s said has ever implied that. And Hanzo / Doomfist notwithstanding, that’s not what this game is threatening to become.
Zarya and Hammond have also both received buffs recently, Zarya specifically getting buffs and tweaks to her damage output with some minor compensatory nerfs to her RMB, as well as Zarya and Winston specifically benefitting from the beam rework.
Rein’s steadfast passive was also a recent addition, and one which I don’t see a lot of people acknowledge considering how often people use to moan about him being bounced like a pinball.
I feel like half of what people call powercreep is just the shift in play and emphasis to bursty, snowballing tactics that leave little room for recovery, as well as non-balance decisions like how the Overtime timer is handled. While that is a perfectly valid complaint it’s also completely separate from hero balance concerns and needs to be recognized as such, which I don’t think enough people do.
But that’s exactly what it is becoming. Damage was increased across the board, damage falloff was decreased significantly and Hanzo is absolutely ridiculous.
Pretty much on point on every topic! 
Very much in hate with Moiras Orb and her Ult, if you make Auto Aim weaker, then Pro Players will just insta kill you as Tracer/Genji. 
Also i wanted to add, running out of Brig heals can feel really bad. (2CP Def) 
Just trying to leave personal bias out of the equation…Frankly I think people in general are so eager to hear THE thing that we throw out context the second we hear anything that even remotely hints at it…
Context always matters…wish people were more objective in general 
Please… Please Address Bastion.
It’s all i have asked for years.
I’m losing all hope of playing this amazing game and enjoying myself like i used to, playing my favorite hero.
Don’t forget Reaper man… his self heal is too high
Thanks for taking the time to communicate here with us! We’ve been going a little stir crazy not knowing what’s going on 
Something I’m burning to know is if the devs consider damage creep a thing in Overwatch. Off the top of my head,
Soldier
Junkrat
Hanzo
Pharah
Mcree
Reaper
Mei
Roadhog
Dva
Have all gotten buffs at one point or another to how much damage they can output in a short amount of time. Most of them are flat damage buffs, but others are more indirect, like Mcree’s fire rate increase or Reaper’s insta-reload on wraith and lifesteal allowing him to keep pressuring an evemy.
Tanks and Supports on the other hand, have mostly gotten nerfs to their ability to defend teammates and mitigate damage.
The result is that the time it takes to kill an opponent in Overwatch is significantly faster than what it used to be.
Half of the game’s defensive ultimates that it had at launch (Symm’s old telly and Mercy’s old AoE Rez) are flat-out gone, and the remainder (Trancendence and Sound Barrier) take significantly longer to charge than they originally did. There’s less and less a non-dps player can do stop an evemy from tearing though their team…
…unless they want to try tearing though the enemy team themselves, but that completely defeats the point of playing a tank or support in the first place for most people. Players who enjoy protecting their teammates with defensive, strategy-oriented abilities have very slim pickings for hero choice in Overwatch these days.
With so much more damage and cc going around, playing tank in particular feels like volunteering to be a punching bag. Feeling fragile and vulnerable as a tank feels terrible, but that’s the way it feels to play tank in Overwatch now…
A hero with a cleanse ability would really help. I’m surprised Mercy (who embodies all of the character archetypes you’d expect to be able to cleanse) never got one.
On the topic of Mercy… Please, please, please tell us you guys looking at her 
Resurrect as a cooldown ability feels very clunky to use, and Valkyrie feels more like a standard ability on a long cooldown than a genuine ultimate.
I used to love playing Mercy before her rework, because she offered a fantastic challenge to players who loved strategy and made me feel like a genuine hero. Now that she can’t do anything to seriously hinder an enemy’s efforts to harm her teammates, those feelings just aren’t there anymore 
I like seeing Blizzard presence on the forums!
I have been hoping for a long time that they would tone down the damage in the game, but I also know that I would not like to be in charge of balancing heroes in this game, lol. 
that is not accurate, most pro players came from other FPS game and wanted something thats a faster pace. COD is faster paced now 
Nah, Jeff actually addressed this first and asserted he does not believe there is power creep in regards to ttk and given he did not list it as an example, he correctly ascertained it does not exist in any meaningful capacity. Such as how McCree is still worse than his launch version despite an alleged damage creep. So weird how that works out…