PTR Upcoming Hero Changes

[Greboth 2,721]

A notification of an update which should be going live on the PTR today and suggests big changes to Overwatch and team composition.

Ana

Biotic Rifle

Damage decreased from 80 to 60

Biotoc Grenade

Impact Damage reduced from 60 to 30

Impact Healing reduced from 100 to 50

 

Junkrat

No longer hurts himself from his own explosions.  (Effect added to current passive: Total Mayhem)

 

Orisa

Fusion Driver

Magazine size lowered from 200 to 150

Supercharger

Cost increase by 15%

 

Sombra

Stealth

Sound effects and VO distance for entering and exiting Stealth reduced to 15 meters

Translocator

Cooldown reduced from 6s to 4s.

 

Winston

Barrier Projector

Cooldown now starts when the barrier is placed, instead of when it ends.

 

Zenyatta

Orb of Destruction

Alternate fire recovery reduced from 1s to 0.6s

Orb of Discord

Can now target enemies through barriers.

 

So they are added another tank barrier with Orisa, reducing Ana's healing ability and buffing characters to help get through choke points.  Is this going to be the end of the tank meta? I think for defending chokes a Reinhardt and/or Orisa (when released) will still be needed.  However I am thinking if you Orb of Discord through a shield then a diving character could wreck the Reinhardt or Orisa or even Winston as his Tesla cannon goes through shields.

[tronic44 3,642]

And yet Bastion is still the same

[Greboth 2,721]

Bastion has already had a nerf on the PTR, his Iron clad was reduced from 35% to 20%.  With the whole certification thing for patches on consoles, I think we will get the Bastion nerf in the patch that gives us Orisa.  New characters are usually on the PTR for a few weeks so we should see Orisa in the next week or 2 at most.

[GazzaGarratt 11,037]

Not sure if junkrat changes will make a difference. Ana's is the big one. She still needs to be viable but that is one large nerf on paper.

i still worry about Bastion's changes. He could still prove slightly overpowerful.

[crispymorgan 1,054]

Discorb through the shield, tracer wrecks bastion.  Job jobbed.

[Greboth 2,721]

Except they have announced they are rolling back some of the changes.  Ana's grenade is going back to how it was though her rifle is still getting nerfed.  Zenyatta is going back too, so he wont be able to Discord through shields anymore.

I am disappointed about the Zenyatta roll back, I think having him be able to discord through shields would have opened the game up massively.  I can only assume they thought it would be too powerful with the likes of Tracer, Genji, Pharah or the soon to be buffed Sombra being able to get in to the back line.  Oh well, it would have been nice for the tank meta to be over but it looks like it is here to stay.

[GazzaGarratt 11,037]

Edited title and pinned so all PTR changes can be captured here.

[GazzaGarratt 11,037]

Big Lucio changes incoming on PTR:

 

Sonic Amplifier

 

Projectile speed increased from 40 to 50 Alternate fire now considers vertical orientation when knocking targets back

 

Crossfade

 

Song's area-of-effect radius decreased from 30 meters to 10 meters A temporary in-game visual has been added to illustrate this radius (it is only visible to Lúcio and his teammates)

 

Heal Song

 

Healing-per-second has been increased by 50% (also applies to Lúcio's Amp It Up ability)

 

Sound Barrier

 

Radius decreased from 30 meters to 20 meters

 

Wall Ride

 

Movement speed increased by 30% when wall riding Lúcio now receives a burst of speed when leaping off a wall

 

Developer Comments:

 

Lucio has often felt like a must-pick due to his raw healing output and the versatility of providing a speed bonus to your entire team. The goal of these changes is to keep those elements feeling strong, but making them harder to apply to everyone on your team at all times. The end result is that he should feel stronger with teams that he can stay close to but not as strong when on teams with heroes that are often spread out (such as Pharah, Widow, Genji, etc). Much of Lucio’s character power was tied up in his large passive auras, which caused other elements of his kit to be weakened over time in an attempt to balance him. Now that his auras are more focused it will allow them to be much stronger and allow Lucio to be more active in his role.

 

I think this is quite significant changes. Stronger but needs to be closer. Not sure if you can boop now too with the vertical change.

 

[GazzaGarratt 11,037]

On 2017-5-4 at 1:09 PM, crispymorgan said:

http://www.pcgamer.com/blizzard-is-testing-nerfs-to-reinhardt-and-soldier-76-on-the-overwatch-ptr/

Via the FG App
 

 

Moved to relevant thread.

I think Soldier 76 loses out the most on these changes. He was looking like the answer to solve all Pharah's so hopefully it won't impact him too much as he's the reliable back-up for most of us.

 

Reinhardt's ultimate change won't hurt too much, his shield and damage per hammer hit is worthy of his pick still. Orisa and Reinhardt could eventually be the Double Tank team rather than they expected it to be one or the other to be picked. 2 shields up is better than one.

Hanzo better not be the new sniper we love to hate. Unless its Crispy playing him that is.

 

[GazzaGarratt 11,037]

They need to something with Symmetry's gun. I really do think she is OP at the moment as the turrets are bad enough but he gun locking to anything near her really is annoying.

[GazzaGarratt 11,037]

Anyone got any news from the PTR that is potentially next up?

[Stretch616 697]

Will try and get some more info but I'm pretty sure of these:

 

Soldier - Nerf of 1 damage per bullet. I think it's currently 23 damage per bullet which will affect his viability against other 200 health characters

 

Hanzo - Big buffs. Now able to cock an arrow whilst climbing to release when jumping off. Faster cocking of the bow. Faster projectile travel.

 

Will try and get official patch notes shortly

[GazzaGarratt 11,037]

Latest PTR updates being tested change McCree, Reaper and Piggy.

McCree – Deadeye
- Targets now begin locking on after 0.2 seconds, instead of 0.8 seconds
- Damage accumulated over the first 1.0 seconds increased from 20 to 80 (damage per second after the first 1.0 seconds is unchanged)

Developer Comment: McCree’s ultimate can deal a lot of damage if it has a lot of time to build up, but it was often too difficult to get even a small amount of damage out before being stopped or killed. These changes make it more flexible and powerful.

Reaper – The Reaping (Passive)
- Removed health orbs
- Now regains 20% of all damage done to heroes as health

Developer Comment: Reaper’s old healing passive was useful if you could kill a bunch of enemies in a row. But since enemies needed to be dead for it to work, it wasn’t very helpful unless the situation was already in your favor. His new passive lets him get immediate benefit from it, especially when fighting Tank heroes, which tend to be larger targets that deal lower damage.

Roadhog
- Head hitbox size reduced by 20%
Scrap Gun
- Bullet damage decreased by 33%
- Fire rate increased by 30%
- Clip size increased from 4 to 5

Developer Comment: Roadhog’s head was abnormally large compared to similarly-sized characters, so we’re reducing its size to increase his survivability. The Scrap Gun changes reduce the power of his hook combo and alternate fire burst damage potential while still keeping his DPS roughly the same.
 

[GazzaGarratt 11,037]

 

Not much for hero changes just yet as the latest patch was updated to the live game in the last few days.

 

However, you'll all be pleased to hear duplicate loot boxes are being drastically reduced.

 

In some ways like their changes to Hearthstone, if you get a legendary in a box it should always be a new legendary you've not got yet. Also, credits on average per box will go up slightly. Good news if we get the next event and need to buy skins in time before the deadline.

[GazzaGarratt 11,037]

New updates released to PTR today. No roadhog changes yet, even though defense buff for him has been mentioned by big Jeff.

 

Doomfist

Rocket Punch

Total distance traveled reduced by about 20% (This change has been on the PTR for a little while now)

Seismic Slam

Added a new UI indicator to show how much damage it will deal, and how much it dealt. Previously this was only indicated by the default crosshair filling in, but this is only visible when using the default crosshair. The new indicator should always be visible, regardless of any crosshair changes. Also, targeting this ability while in the air is now restricted to locations lower than your current height.

 

McCree

Flashbang

Now slows targets significantly when they are stunned. This makes them less likely to slide away around a corner or something similar once they are stunned.

 

Reaper

Shadow Step

VO and SFX distance dramatically reduced.

 

Reinhardt

Hammer

Swing speed increased by ~10%. On top of the swing speed increase, we’ve gone through and tweaked many timings and other things about the Hammer to make it more responsive. Overall it should feel a lot better to swing and make contact with enemies.

Charge

Impacting another charging hero (Doomfist or Reinhardt) no longer deals damage to both characters, but still causes a knockdown on both.

 

Zarya

Graviton Surge

Now disables all movement abilities of affect targets. This is similar to how Junkrat’s trap affects abilities.

 

 

Zarya's Ultimate change is massive. That means Genji, Reinhardt, D.Va and others that can blast away from it, can't so its time to stack the ultimates around Zarya then! Also, I think its good they are supporting Reinhardt as well, his hammer needed tweaking.

[Greboth 2,721]

Doomfist changes don't really mean much as we haven't got him on console yet but good to know they are trying to balance him before going live.  Unlike some of more recent PTR changes like Bastion which just went live anyway.

 

Reinhardt - Any buff to him is always nice.  I wonder if we could see Reinhardt being used more too as, presuming you can still use the shield, he could protect the team if everyone gets stuck in Zarya's grav.

 

Zarya - Not sure she needed the buff it is what it is.  I guess we will possibly see more DVa too being she can eat the ult.

[Stretch616 697]

Good changes all round for me.

 

Doomfist's movement did need to be pulled back a bit after seeing some of the videos. Some of the bits he could do were crazy.

Glad to see McCree get a nice buff. Will really help him finish off the 1v1 duels that he sometimes couldn't seal the deal on.

Really happy to see my girl Zarya get this buff. For how long it takes to get the ultimate charged, it's quite deflating to watch 3 of the trapped people just fly away. That feels about right now for me and should put her in a nice little place

[crispymorgan 1,054]

Followed by a nice Dragon strike right through the middle

[GazzaGarratt 11,037]

D.Va Changes Incoming

 

The Overwatch meta is constantly changing and D.Va is getting a significant overhaul that will change her playstyle. Blizzard has been testing the changes internally but they will likely hit the next Public Test Region (PTR) release for the player to test.

 

The planned changes will make D.Va less of a defensive tank and more of an offensive character. Her Defense Matrix ability has had its uptime length effectively halved by an increased energy drain.

 

The Defense Matrix will remain an “extremely powerful tool,” according to Goodman, but will require a player to time it right. The lessening of the defensive ability gives rise to changes to D.Va’s Booster ability plus an all new Micro Missiles ability.

 

D.Va will be able to fire her Fusion Cannons while using her Booster ability. Additionally, Overwatch players will need to watch out for the new Micro Missiles ability.

 

The Micro Missiles ability fires a long salvo of small missiles to deal damage in a small area around the target. This can be used in conjunction with her other abilities or firing her Fusion Cannons, which should give opposing Overwatch players a reason to keep their head on a swivel.

 

“Her new Micro Missiles ability in combination with her ability to fire while flying allow for some more aggressive play, as well as opening up some new options versus heroes such as Pharah,” Goodman explained.

[GazzaGarratt 11,037]

The thing with D.Va's change is that I think she could become OP in other people's eyes. You do start to use Defense Matrix more often the nore experienced you become, however I feel it is mainly for situational events such as Soldier 76's Ultimate and eating the bullets. Sounds like she lose her mech more when ultimates happen but apart from that, giving her more arsenal for what I already do which is be aggressive at the front of the action should only be a good thing.

[Greboth 2,721]

We'll have to wait and see where things fall but I think the changes are being made to the DM because it is OP.  While it is great to have on our team, when you consider how much damage it can eat and how many ults too.  Other barriers like Reinhardt's shield mitigates ults but rarely does it stop an ult or make one useless like DVa can.  I'm not sure adding the rockets to her is such a good idea but with the nerf to her DM she would need some rebalancing else she would never get picked.  DVa was great extremely close range but useless at any other range so could be useful having a ranged ability.

[GazzaGarratt 11,037]

 

Fucking Hot Healing Chick! changes @tronic44 @Diddums

[Sennex 1,903]

Hehehehehehe

Via the FG App

[tronic44 3,642]

I like the changes, will make her a bit more exciting to use. My only issue is that I'm never getting POG now 😄

 

Only hada breif read of the changes and haven't seen the video, will check it out later and hopefully feel the same as I do now.

[The3rdWalker 1,271]

Can't wait for 3 healing teams, a person say "we don't need healers" and the Fucking Hot Healing Chick! player say "No, I'm a DPS".