Considering the historical radio silence from the developers, your recent communication with the forums is much appreciated. I think this is the first time that a representative has A) repeated the community’s sentiments back to it in a manner true to the feedback, and B) stated exactly what information was relayed to the developers, and it really shows that you are listening. Excellent work. Please continue.
12 Likes
What was the fall off change? Just noticed experimental is down so can’t read patch notes anymore.
Yay! Communication!
It’s great to get some reassurance, that giving feedback on the forums isn’t in vein and actually reaches the devs 
The reason people say his skill ceiling was lowered is due to pop up plays using mine followed by long range primary hits. By giving the projectile fall off it results in junkrat that hits flying opponents losing out on kill potential. The patch rewards direct hits up close which is a tactic used at lower ranks with barrel stuffing.
2 Likes
Compared to what? To human aim possibilities? MOBA is consistent, it is scripted. You just need once to learn how to use it. If you don’t talk about bugs and stuff, he is consistent.
Open up a calculator and calculate self-sustain+damage against your aim on Cree, pretend to miss 1 headshot of two in a row.
How about the team effort in a team-based game, because Cree also can’t kill those two if they are not stupid. But they can kill Cree 1v1 and that is considered a norm. I don’t play Cree because of that, being a hitscan w/o sustain is a pain. Sometimes I see even Wanted struggles against some QuakeON guy. Both are masters of their craft.
When it was first announced it was billed as an actual experiment where the devs would try out cool new ideas. Remember the 1-3-2 experiment? That was awesome.
Somewhere along the way it became a preview for changes that were going to go through anyways. That’s why alot of players started to become skeptical over the exc
7 Likes
Many things you say are academically consistent… like textbook-style to management theory and leadership.
Are you familiar with the Vroom-Jago contingency model? This began to remind me of it.
I know many theories are ways we define behaviors within organizations, but I always find relevance and inspiration in the way you speak.
Thanks for the update. It shows lines of communication are open. Even Chro, long time Junkrat content creator, posted here about the changes. I guess he recognized there was a chance it would be seen and possibly acknowledged.
A good thing, I think.
3 Likes
I’d say people just didn’t want any sort of survival/lethality buff for McCree, if it’s not paired with nerfs.
However you got people like me who are waiting for confirmation about what’s going to happen to flashbang.
And if devs are going to address how Flash+FanTheHammer+Roll+FanTheHammer is 625 damage in 1.7sec, with 0.8sec stun.
And how that’s not really compatible with a 1 Tank per team future.
But yeah, if the changes seen were
Cassidy
- Can roll midair
- Deadeye is faster to deal with Tracer
- Flash does something that’s not a stun
- Fan The Hammer has a 3-to5sec cooldown
You’d probably get a much warmer reception than just buffing a hero that’s only slightly below being the best DPS in the game.
To me it just felt like we were seeing only half of a rework.
Feels more like increasing risk to yield greater reward and cut down the reward for spamming at greater distances.
Doesn’t feel like it’s too much of an issue for Torbjorn, but admittedly, it does put his RMB in a better position to fight off Tanks especially with the new Overload cooldown and cheaper RMB shots. I’m still in favor of this change.
Cassidy could already be a strong counter to Wrecking Ball and Doomfist as is, without the Combat Roll changes, so this feels a little irrelevant. I’m still not too sure about the Deadeye change. Healing is so infrequent and so inattentive (as is a lot of teamwork) in experiment that it’s hard to evaluate this.
I think there’s quite a bit of misperception - in these forums especially - with regards to how the balance in the game stands, and understanding what Experimental Cards are for.
It’s probably not a big surprise that most players think that Experimental Cards are future patch changes when most Experimental Cards do in fact become patch changes a week (or two) after they’re introduced, as is, with no future changes despite commentary. Even through all the hyperbole, there are some concerns about some past changes that made it through, and there are concerns that have been repeatedly stated (hyperbolic or not) that are never tested or brought up by Blizzard.
That said, I don’t think every repeated concern is warranted a change, but at least some deserve some kind of communication or acknowledgement about said concerns. Again, lots of misperceptions, and lots of hyperbole tends to exist here and it may be best to setup some kind of baseline discussion in addressing those concerns.
Many years ago, Ghostcrawler directly interacted within the WoW forums and set the tone and relevancy of forum discussion. It greatly improved the level of “talk” in those forums by several leaps and bounds. It wouldn’t hurt to try that here and reduce the amount of hyperbole and misinformation that continues to roil these forums.
thanks for this summary, i’m only sorry i didn’t play the experimental before posting about it (telling people they’re overreacting, but I still should have played first), and before it went offline. looking forward to future changes.
1 Like
Between 15 to 25m, impact damage reduced to 20% (18)
That is exactly what most people in here believe, no offense but you arent really paying attention brother.
2 Likes
Can we all just appreciate how nice it is for this level of transparency and effort in keeping us up to date? 
I am still a little concerned that these changes were thought of as a net buff to Junk when they appear to be a nerf in almost every situation. But it’s great to see the main concerns being communicated to the devs.
14 Likes
AndyB, really, I want to express here so the Blizzard crew sees it that you are invaluable to the Overwatch experience and team right now. The difference from before you started posting regularly to now is night and day with the sentiments towards ‘the dev team’ (which, I understand, you’re a community manager and have no direct impact over balance changes etc).
I hope they realize what a great pick you were, and how necessary you are to the players!
4 Likes
It was a buff to Bronze-Plat Junks
And a nerf to Masters/GM Junks
ELOs where you could get away with yolo-barrelstuffing the enemy. It would be a huge buff.
Heck, 195 damage grenades with a Mercy boost would be cheesed like crazy
3 Likes
Exactly. It’s the opposite result to what the hero needs 
3 Likes
Honestly man this type of communication that you’re bringing and the devs working with our community is amazing. THIS is what is going to give people hype for overwatch 2, as well as keep playing when it inevitably hits a rough patch.
As for the patch, I think there’s rly only 2 options right now. Buff the weak or Nerf the meta. I don’t think this patch rly did either correctly. I’m really happy it’s being reverted.
That being said, is there any info you can give about another patch. Seeing as this one didn’t come out, will there be another follow up experimental to test different changes for the same heroes, as well as different ones?
im just replying to say i like this post…though i like to imagine this type of stuff happened before anyway (just not verbalized on here)
1 Like
Can I just take a second to comment on how awesome this is? Not just the memo itself, but you guys in the community team sharing it with us here? This is super cool. I don’t know if it will put a dent in the mistaken impression that the forums are ignored, but it’s a great step.
Also, it’s fantastic to get a look at how internal stuff like this is managed. A peek behind the curtain.
Additionally, mad respect in terms of dealing with the hyperbole and frustration. I’m guilty of it a time or three myself. Though I try to always be rational with my balance arguments, I’m rarely shy about how proposed changes FEEL, which isn’t always the same as how changes ARE. I don’t envy you folks having to wade through the swamp.
Keep the up the awesome outreach work, these last few weeks have felt really refreshing and open in a way that the OW community/dev relationship here on the forum hasn’t in a long, long time.
4 Likes