I’ve been loving the ExC since it came out, and I’m super into the community event that goes along with it but I have to wonder that, clearly a lot of thought and work went into making this ‘for fun’ ExC card…which feels better to play than the game. I just hope the dev team is aware of how much more people seem to be enjoying themselves on ExC specifically because of how much better it feels to play, and not because they think it’s super wacky or out there…because it does not feel that way, as a whole. Some heros have a bit of a stink of meme to them, but as a whole a lot of these changes could go Live and just make the game feel better, if not just fresher.
For someone like me, who plays the game several hours a day, every day, since beta…the last ~year has been an especially rough draught. I’m cool and understanding of ‘extra’ content being pushed for OW2 like heros and maps and modes…but the general balance of the game went from ‘glacially Blizzard slow’ to just flat out non-existent. Even if there are no clear outlying ‘far overpowered’ heros or anything…if nothing is done for months to shake up a game balance-wise…it really starts to feel just bad, if not boring. I think that is one of the main reasons that this EXP has been so wildly popular; it’s like all the changes people have been asking for, at once…after practically nothing for what feels like a year.
I hope that, besides the feedback of interesting ExC cards for fun things you’re taking back from this, the dev team also realizes that the OW fans who are still playing are just dying of thirst for any real update beyond season events…even if it doesn’t pan out, at least try engaging things out to shake up the game here and there -and put it on live servers, so people can play competitive with it. The turnaround for actual Live balance is just outrageously slow, if we get anything at all, and even then it is usually the tiniest smidge of balance…but at this point, I don’t think that’s enough to keep the people still playing fully invested until the TBA date of OW2.
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It would be amazing if any changes to Mercy - Experimental Card or otherwise - were based on the suggestions of players who actually play her.
Though Mercy is an infamously controversial character to make any changes to, I would be willing to wager that there are some issues with her current state that much of the community would agree about if it was put to a poll or anything like that.
The best place to start would probably be to alleviate the “pocket bot” problem that Mercy has been saddled with for the past two to three years.
Many players (including myself) are not satisfied that the “e-girl” playstyle has been the optimal way to play Mercy for the past couple of years - where one basically must find a good “carry” player (usually a DPS) to dote on and serve extensively in order to maximize her damage boost’s output, and cannot (or can very rarely) afford to focus on general team support as her abilities to do so are too lacking in comparison. This leads to a very “sleepy”, “boring”, “mindless”, “robotic”, “AFK brain” playstyle, as many players before me have described.
There is very little stimulation in this playstyle. It’s a playstyle where you’re being encouraged to keep yourself leashed to one player like a dog and being discouraged from moving away from them to help others, as doing so is a suboptimal play, especially in higher ranks - any player who tries to support the whole team is dubbed a “healbot” in these ranks, for not knowing that they should leave the healing to the “real” healers who have better healing capabilities than her.
And this is on live, without the healing nerf.
Violet’s changes to her do not fix this in the slightest - in fact, they make it much, much, much worse. With the reduced total healing output, she is even less capable of providing team-wide support than she was before, making her even more reliant on singling out one ally to keep alive to consistently give value to her damage boost (which is still as strong as ever),
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You should fix this to point out that they are also top 500 players. Meaning they have no IDEA what it’s like to be on the opposite end of the game. But then again the dev’s seem to not care about the bottom dwellers of the game. Guess our money isn’t worthy.
@AndyB where to watch please??
Exactly my question. Where can I watch a proper (spectator) stream? There are some streams from the players directly but I did not found an professional live broadcast. Is there any with live commentary besides the players individual views?
I’m a normie player who hasn’t clocked hours in 2 years, and this update made me want to come back to the game. Blizzard probably just engages with streamers because they’re professional entertainers, and Blizzard wants their game to be entertaining. Sure, the game has problems with smurfing, but the bigger issue is a general lack of content which causes normie players like myself to checkout. These kinds of changes require less in the way of graphical assets (e.g. skins, maps, ability animations, etc.), while still keeping the game fresh. It may not be what the few remaining hardcore players wanted, but Blizzard is probably trying to revive a dwindling fan base. Let’s face it. A ladder reset isn’t going to bring back all those old players, but an exciting new character shakeup might.