In a recently published TwitLonger, Lane “Surefour” Roberts outlined how post-launch Support heroes have affected the competitive balance ofOverwatch. The Canadian DPS player, who currently plays for the Toronto Defiant, highlighted how the abundance of healing has made his role frustrating to play.
WhenOverwatchfirst released back in 2016, only three Support heroes were available: Lucio, Mercy, and Zenyatta. Of those three Supports, only Lucio could provide area-of-effect healing. With Mercy and Zenyatta only being able to focus their healing on a single person, this meant that damage to anyone without a “pocket healer” would stick.
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More Support heroes with area-of-effect healing in their kits were added as time went on, with Roberts citing the releases of Baptiste, Brigitte and Moira as examples of this phenomenon. As Roberts states, this resulted in the meta shifting towards “a battle of attrition” that diminished the value of DPS players like him since the damage output from heroes like Widowmaker and McCree would not stick. This problem is compounded further with howSupports can provide more than just healing, a major indicator of their considerable power.
Roberts highlighted three potential fixes for Blizzard to consider in order for a more competitively balanced game: capping area-of-effect healing, adding burst damage, or reducing healing in general. The Canadian player who represented his country at the2019 Overwatch World Cupstated that he “would much prefer” the former option, citing the reason that there should be the ability to react to oncoming damage which is not possible if being bursted.
Issues surrounding the competitive meta ofOverwatchhave taken its toll on the game and its community, most notably with2019 Overwatch League MVP Jay “sinatraa” Won retiring from the Overwatch League (OWL)to pursue a career in Riot Games' recently-released competitorValorant. Blizzard has taken many steps to alleviate the diminishing influence of Damage heroes, from 2-2-2 lock to Hero Pools, which were cited by Won as reasons for him losing his passion for the game.
These fixes were later overturned with theaddition of Open Queueand the removal of Hero Pools. Whilst these structural changes have aided players like Roberts in being able to play their preferred DPS role without havingabysmal queue times, the actual problem of playing a Damage hero in a Support-centric meta remains and it is more than likely that it will takeOverwatch2for Blizzard to come up with a fix, if any.
Overwatchis available now for PC, PS4, Switch, and Xbox One.
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