Overwatch 2: A New Era for the Popular Shooter
Blizzard has announced a series of changes that will be implemented in Overwatch 2 next week, marking the biggest modifications since the introduction of the 5v5 mode. These changes herald a new era for the shooter, which has faced challenges since its release.
One of the most important changes is the increased health pool for all 39 heroes. More fragile heroes, such as Tracer, will gain an additional 25 health points, while tanks will receive even more, up to 100 points. But don’t worry, the more resilient DPS heroes won’t be chasing us across the map. Blizzard has also increased the size and speed of almost all attacks, whether they are bullets or projectiles like Genji’s shurikens.
According to Blizzard’s blog post, the aim of these changes is to make weapon shooting and ability usage more consistent without affecting the time needed to kill a target or the overall gameplay experience that we all know and love.
Unfortunately, Reinhardt and his powerful hammer won’t benefit from these upgrades. The increases only apply to heroes that use firearms. However, Blizzard promises to adjust other heroes in future updates.
The goal of these changes is to reduce instances of sudden death from strong attacks and decrease the number of clutch saves through instant healing. Specifically, Blizzard states that the new health values will require “at least one additional hit for most heroes to secure a kill” and that “healing someone from 1 health to full health will take longer”.
With more stable health pools, team fights will last longer. To maintain a similar pace to the current version of Overwatch 2, DPS heroes will receive a passive ability that reduces the amount of healing received by the target they are shooting at by 20%. All heroes will also regenerate health, as previously announced. Tanks and DPS heroes will regenerate 20 health points per second after not taking damage for five seconds, while support heroes will regenerate health after 2.5 seconds (previously 2 seconds).
As a result, there is suspicion that the support role will start to resemble the role played in MOBAs, with a focus on saving situations and enabling the team to secure kills, rather than solely providing healing. A hero like Mercy may rely more on her damage boost beam than on healing, as she will no longer be able to quickly top off teammates as before.
While Blizzard assures that the time needed to kill an enemy will remain the same as it is currently, the priorities of the different roles have shifted. Success in an Overwatch match will depend on which team focuses on a single target faster, which was partially true before but will now be reinforced with bigger bullets and decreased healing. Weaker heroes, such as Mei or Moira, won’t be able to easily eliminate enemies on their own. Wasting time on someone who can escape and return with full health will be a risk if the team fails to stop them.
As I mentioned when the passive healing ability was announced, I am skeptical about how Blizzard plans to narrow down the goals for each hero in the game to solely securing kills, even if the aim is to mitigate the inconsistencies in team coordination during matches. Simplifying the objective of the game runs the risk of eliminating the diverse playstyles and creative ways players can contribute to their team without even firing a shot. Season 9 may not completely overturn the meta as we know it, but Blizzard is creating cracks in the foundation of Overwatch that has been built over the years, and I’m not convinced it’s a good solution.
Alongside these changes, a major overhaul of Overwatch 2’s competitive mode will be introduced. It all starts with a ranked reset. Everyone participating in the competitive mode during Season 9 will have to play 10 placement matches before receiving their rank. Each subsequent match updates a progress bar that shows how close you are to ranking up, with “modifiers” that explain why your rank is changing, such as winning a series of matches or winning a game that was considered an upset.
Blizzard states, “We have created a better system that is more accurate, while also helping to understand the mathematical complexity of modern match systems and providing clear information about what factors influence your ranking in each match.”
Rewards for competitive play will also undergo changes. The old Competitive Points (CP), which could be used to purchase golden weapons, will be called “Legacy Competitive Points,” while a new CP currency will be tied to each year. Points can be earned by winning (or drawing) matches, but there won’t be a bonus for achieving a specific rank each season. In 2024, players will be able to accumulate 3000 CP to unlock Jade weapon skins for their favorite heroes. All existing CP will be converted to competitive points at the end of the year.
Existing ranks will receive new icons, and a new Champion rank will be added above the current highest rank of Grand Master, providing highly skilled players with a new goal to achieve.
Consistency seems to be the theme of Season 9. Blizzard is eliminating sudden spikes in damage and healing, while also providing gradual rank progress updates. Mastering Overwatch has always been difficult to define over the years, with most issues arising from discrepancies between how players perceive it and how the game systems reward it. I hope Blizzard’s goal is to start bridging that gap as the game evolves with new modes and heroes in the future. However, all of this seems to suggest that Blizzard wants to establish a singular way of playing Overwatch at the expense of minimizing the diverse strategies that we could see in the game.
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The source of the article is from the blog bitperfect.pe