It’s actually unprecedented by Blizzard; they look to be beginning to reverse the power creep introduced into Overwatch. Granted, it seems to once again be a change right before Overwatch League begins, but the most recent patch will once again be kicked around in PTR for a while for users to experiment with, so Blizzard can see if the changes have the desired effect. In the PTR patch, four heroes are getting changes; three characters nerfed and one buff.
Wrecking Ball’s Piledriver move will reduce the crowd-control time period from one second to half of a second. This is an adequate nerf to the crowd control (colloquially CC) abilities that many feel has been slowly creeping into Overwatch as a whole with each new hero being released. While CC abilities may be enjoyable for the player CCing an enemy, it’s decidedly frustrating to lose control of your hero in the midst of a pitched battle. Many players in the forums are hoping this is the first in a long line of future CC ability nerfs that encompasses many heroes of the roster.
Brigitte continues to receive tuning and gets two nerfs. Her armor over-heal is being reduced to 50 armor, where it was originally 75. Over-heal is the mechanic where Brigitte throws an armor pack at a fully healed enemy and receives an armor buff. If the teammate is low on health, the armor pack will heal the player instead. While the armor decays after a while, armor pack has a penchant for making entire teams tanky, effectively increasing their health pools. A 25 point nerf may actually be sizeable, making Brigitte a bit more of a niche pick against primarily single-target enemy teams.
OVERWATCH PTR HERO PATCH NOTES – FEBRUARY 6, 2020
Brigitte Nerf 🛡️ 😥 pic.twitter.com/pouGz9qy79
— Naeri X 나에리 (@OverwatchNaeri) February 6, 2020
Her second nerf is smaller, regarding her heals per second being cut from 60 to 55. Not the largest margin in the patch by a long (whip)shot, yet it is yet another cut that fans of the tanky support will need to contend with.
Widowmaker is the final hero receiving a nerf, with her Widow’s Kiss full charge time being increased from 0.83 seconds to a solid one second. This means that players will have to maintain Widows scope longer in order to achieve a maximum damage shot, allowing her to one-shot the lower health heroes. Widow mains are mourning, everyone else is rejoicing.
The only character to receive a buff in the current PTR is Symmetra, and it’s a strange one; her charge blast (secondary fire) damage is being increased from 120 to 140. Many fans have been requesting Symmetra’s Photon Projector to have an increased projectile speed, allowing her to lock down avenues of approach easier. Instead, Blizzard increased her damage; the orb is still easily dodged if you have a bit of vision or communication, but it’s punishing if you get hit by it. While many forum members are concerned about the increase, as if every hero stacks on top of Symmetra to offer her a damage boost, the slow-moving orb could one-hit-kill the vast majority of the roster.
The chances of an entire team using their ultimates and abilities to solely boost Symmetra is slim, and the benefits of having a high-damage orb slowly crossing the battlefield are stymied by what other character abilities can do. Nonetheless, it’s a PTR patch, and Blizzard can shift these changes any way that they choose to in the future.
Hopefully, this is the beginning of nerfing the almost comedic power creep that has slid into the game while the majority of the developers have been working on Overwatch 2, from their own statement. Hopefully, the meat of Overwatch 2 has been completed, and developers are back to supporting the initial title.
