Widow grapple hook nerfed, but where are her grapple's bugfixes? Or any of her bugfixes at all?

Astounds me they take a relativly balanced hero like widow and nerf her while leaving hanzo the overpowered drama queen he is

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I honestly wouldn’t mind the cooldown increase at all if they’d just fix the damn bugs while they were at it. I’m super excited to stand around for 10 seconds every time my hook attaches to a random floodlight or drops me off a ledge. Almost as good as the old days, a year ago (and two years ago), when I got to wait around for 12 seconds.

Like, does nobody on the Overwatch team play Widowmaker at all? These bugs are far from rare, aren’t difficult at all to reproduce, and are blatant, in-your-face disruptions to her gameplay that are hard to miss if you’re playing with your eyes open.

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Back to rock paper scissors balancing where any potato playing Winston can win against Widow.

I’m so excited.
Jay.

/s

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11.833 seconds.

  • 8 second cooldown is actually 9.833 seconds because of cast and reel times.
  • 10 second cooldown would end up being 11.833 seconds.
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Wow, you’re right! Damn, I’m just getting more and more pumped for this new and improved Widowmaker Experience.

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I just want bugfixes.

I compiled this list for nothing, apparently. Only cosmetic bugs were addressed except for an FFA bug with Infrasight.

I haven’t asked for a buff. I’ve just staved off a few people demanding nerfs since Widow largely hadn’t changed for so long so there’s no way she’s too oppressive. Player choice to not pick counters doesn’t mean a character is overpowered.

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I m thinking of one simple way to eventually fix the hook.
If after hooking the widow is within a certain meter range from her initial position (idk 2 3 5 meters?) After a certain time (1 or 2sec?) Then consider the hook as failed and reset the cooldown?
Hook is on a 10sec cooldown.

Good idea or?

I don’t know enough to say anything about this from a programming standpoint, but this would be a solution for only one of the hook’s many bugs.

That’s what’s supposed to happen by default anyways, but it doesn’t. Pointblank hooks are supposed to be refunded, yet they frequently aren’t.

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Fair enough fair enough . It s not much but it s still something :sweat_smile:.
Additionally they could program an automatic jump everytime widow reach the end of her hook to avoid falling into void eventually?

Two Widow nerfs now with Hammond coming out and falloff buffs for Mei and McCree and gang. Not to mention op Hanzo still running amuck. She’s going back into the dump.

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That’s ALSO supposed to happen every time she latches onto an auto-aim ledge. But it also doesn’t do that either.

The hook is supposed to work like this

  • Overhangs/eaves/ceilings where there is no ledge, you stay there for a brief moment and then drop.

  • Ledges that would proc auto-aim, swings you up and over.

  • Walls perpendicular to the ground (and also the ground), you drop as soon as you reach.

  • Jump mid-air to slingshot and course correct.

The only one that works properly is the last one.

Oh they do give a damn, remember strange objects mysteriously appearing on every map angle where there was previously line of sight?

Sometimes I just wonder if they created that hero just to please certain gamer demographics, but secretly hate her to the bone.

Is it my (totally average Widow main) fault that they hire living Korean aimbots for OW league? And now I have to play even more defensively and basically 1 shot, 1 run. Why do they hate her that much, especially when lately all I see is Barrierwatch?

Meanwhile, props to all Hanzos at large. No that doesn’t require a nerf. No no no, Hanzo is “balanced” (heavy airquoting here).

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Yeah, there’s so much crap in the game that affects LoS from trees, to phone booths, other random props, etc. So much stuff you can unintentionally latch on to. She needs her grapple hook to be available more often. She needs to be able to reposition quickly and often to do her job. They give Hanzo two mobility abilities with lower CDs than Widow’s one mobility ability. An ability she actually needs to do her job because she’s terrible in close range combat. It makes no sense. They should buff other aspects of her kit to make up for this big nerf. 2 seconds is a lot.

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Totally agree with this thread, you’d think everyone would be behind bug fixes anyway it makes the game a more real and genuine experience. I guess the Winstons that kill Widow b/c her hook failed to do what it was supposed to won’t complain but that’s a pretty terrible thing to get behind.

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grappling hook is the only ability in the game that you can fail to use and get away with it (example: im pushing widow away with winston primal rage, make he fail grapple, and after half a second she grapples away anyway) .
if you ever make it consinstent in how it works, needs a change in that terms, go on cooldown when you use it and not when the grapple lands. or at least 2 seconds cd (like sombra hack when she gets interrupted).

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This is false. If someone starts a hook (it physically latches onto an object) and you boop her away using any sort of boop (Primal Rage, Lucio alt fire, Concussion projectiles), the hook is interrupted and the ability goes on cooldown.

If you’re trying to interrupt Widow, you have to time it after the “plink” of the hook grabbing a wall. Otherwise you’re not actually interrupting them – the grapple hook never latches onto anything, and never latching is a free recast (it always has been).

(Also, Hammond has the same thing for his claw).

Failure to use is not related on latching onto air. Failure to use is everything else associated with it… the fact that it aims to the wrong object, the fact that it can’t connect to certain walls at all, the fact that it connects to a spot that is a sliding ledge, the fact that it literally just gives up and doesn’t work on cast or refuses to swing you up and over to a ledge it autoaimed for you.

The fact that every single cast has become a slingshot just to compensate for all of the above – you shouldn’t have to compensate for it… and just think of how many seconds are wasted that you could have been used sniping, how many opportunities missed by just a fraction of a second because you were airborne and correcting for the hook’s misbehavior, how many games could have come down to an Overtime frag that you missed because the hook just didn’t work properly.

And the assumption that its inconsistency is part of its balance is ridiculous. It should be consistent in the first place. Balance is wholly separate from consistency, that doesn’t ever approach consistency unless the thing in question is meant to have RNG (like weapon spread).

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uh, guys, did you miss the fact that she’s second only to hanzo among dps and was one of the most played dps in dive since with mercy pocketing her and the grapple she’s next to undivable?

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Being meta does not mean you aren’t plagued with problems.

Furthermore, her pickrate in GM does not affect the rest of the ladder. GM is just 1% of the population.

Grappling hook was given a shorter cooldown partially because it was plagued with problems. Taking that back without bugfixing is shameful.

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Earthshatter? Charge? Anything doomfist has?
Widowmakers grapple is FAR from the buggiest ability in the game and is super good with super long range. I find it works 99% of the time I use it