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Overwatch |OT10| That'll do pig, that'll do

Veelk

Banned
The more I play Junkrat in QP, the more I'm kind of amazed at how good he can be. If you're smart about placement and patient, it's really crazy how you can almost always get one guarenteed kill off his trap and mine combo.

Problem is that it's QP, so I'm not sure about bringing him over in comp. I did encounter one Junkrat in comp recently, but this was against...honestly, kind of the dumbest batch of players I've seen in a long while. Idk, once I climb a little more so that a few losses won't sink me back down to gold.

I could totally see him having a pro-level presence with just a couple sensible buffs that would not overpower him in the least. Just let him lay down 3 traps at once and give his ult more life so it's not instantly deleted.
 

Nimby

Banned
I don't know about this game at the moment. A lot of you seem to be sure that the meta is changing with Doomfist, but so many patches before we've attempted to "predict the meta" and it ends up going in a completely different direction or not changing.

If the meta does change and it devolves into "always pick these 6 heroes" again, I'm not sure how much more of this game I can stand. Which it very well may be since some of you were talking about some Rein/Zarya comp with Junkrat forcing a team to switch off dive (I have limited internet access right now or I would have watched it myself), pre patch. So now we've got this stupid apparently OP Zarya that didn't need really any changes made to her directly which is going to dictate another meta for the next 6 months.
 

LiK

Member
The more I play Junkrat in QP, the more I'm kind of amazed at how good he can be. If you're smart about placement and patient, it's really crazy how you can almost always get one guarenteed kill off his trap and mine combo.

Problem is that it's QP, so I'm not sure about bringing him over in comp. I did encounter one Junkrat in comp recently, but this was against...honestly, kind of the dumbest batch of players I've seen in a long while. Idk, once I climb a little more so that a few losses won't sink me back down to gold.

I could totally see him having a pro-level presence with just a couple sensible buffs that would not overpower him in the least. Just let him lay down 3 traps at once and give his ult more life so it's not instantly deleted.

You're getting it.
 

I-hate-u

Member
Roadhog really was the glue holding this game together now that I think about it.

Rein's shield in the way? M2 that thing down.

Zarya too powered up? hook her in and 1 shot her.

Divers harassing your healers? hook em in and 1 shot them.

Winston being an annoying ass? hook him and you know the drill.

Blizzard, ya messed up hard.
 
On second thought

/me cuts

I read what you wrote and it seemed like that way to me, I was actually getting kinda triggered just looking at the killfeed and seeing someone dying from the spam lol

Anyway I think a pharmercy combo will most likely destroy that team comp in certain maps, no D.Va and only one hitscan won't cut it (mccree has a really severe damage drop-off and soldier doesn't have enough burst damage to kill a pharah being pocketed from a reasonable distance).


Nice, will do the same later.

https://us.battle.net/forums/en/overwatch/topic/20758226064?page=2#post-33

Basically status quo. If they are focused on making competitive and pro play successful, they have to pool information only from those modes/gameplay. Good luck trying to make everyone happy with 1 universal balance patches that addresses casual, ladder and pro all together.

Some decisions will be more targeted towards one group or another

We know what group caused hog to be nerfed.

Fucking casuals. Git gud
 

Veelk

Banned
You're getting it.

I think I am. Not that I get any appreciation for it. Not only did I get PotG, I also was the one who solo'd the 2 enemies on the payload as they were about to cap and ended with 4 gold metals. But do I get even 5 upvotes for it? No.

I'm also liking his personality more and more. His manic glee is pretty appropriate to the situation if you're doing a good job with him. He's a madman with explosives laughing hysterically as the enemy team just screams in terror. I hope the next map/event is set in Australia so we get more insight into him and Hog, since they're so outside the normal sphere of conflict going on with the rest of the characters.

Blizzard, ya messed up hard.

"But one shot kills are unfun... now please check out this hero with a one shot kill ability."

For real, Roadhog as he was before kind of would have deleted Doomfist without a second thought. I think they nerfed him to hype Doomfist up a little more. Which....you know what, fine. I argued before that you want new heroes to feel a bit OP so players can get excited about them. Sombra and especially Orisa were both far more balanced than Ana, leading to the excitement around getting a new character fizzing out anticlimactically. But they better bring Hog back to where he was after a month of Doomfisting if that's the cas
 
I don't know about this game at the moment. A lot of you seem to be sure that the meta is changing with Doomfist, but so many patches before we've attempted to "predict the meta" and it ends up going in a completely different direction or not changing.

If the meta does change and it devolves into "always pick these 6 heroes" again, I'm not sure how much more of this game I can stand. Which it very well may be since some of you were talking about some Rein/Zarya comp with Junkrat forcing a team to switch off dive (I have limited internet access right now or I would have watched it myself), pre patch. So now we've got this stupid apparently OP Zarya that didn't need really any changes made to her directly which is going to dictate another meta for the next 6 months.

You're not wrong with any of this, but the potential for this meta looks better than any we have had recently. Not to mention that naturally this game will be better balanced over time as more heroes are added and more counters are available. For example, Doomfist counters Winston and D.Va, two heroes that in the current meta seemingly don't have much that can counter them. Just by Doomfist's existence both Winston and D.Va will have reduced power levels. That's why having a large variety of heroes is so important, as it can help to balance the meta.

Roadhog really was the glue holding this game together now that I think about it.

Rein's shield in the way? M2 that thing down.

Zarya too powered up? hook her in and 1 shot her.

Divers harassing your healers? hook em in and 1 shot them.

Winston being an annoying ass? hook him and you know the drill.

Blizzard, ya messed up hard.

At least Blizzard knows they messed up and are trying to find a way to buff him. I don't have a lot of faith that whatever change they decide to make will make him truly viable again, but it's better than nothing.
 
At least Blizzard knows they messed up and are trying to find a way to buff him. I don't have a lot of faith that whatever change they decide to make will make him truly viable again, but it's better than nothing.

Doing nothing to Roadhog and figuring out what to do with him would have been better.
 
https://us.battle.net/forums/en/overwatch/topic/20758226064?page=2#post-33

Basically status quo. If they are focused on making competitive and pro play successful, they have to pool information only from those modes/gameplay. Good luck trying to make everyone happy with 1 universal balance patches that addresses casual, ladder and pro all together.

So basically, Blizzard is going to try and achieve the impossible and balance for all levels, likely pleasing nobody in the process.

Good luck, I guess.
 

Jellie

Member
This thread a few months ago was Winston sucks and needs a buff. Give him 900hp shield or shorter cd. Hog hook is BS no skill. Worse than scatter arrow.

Thread today. I miss roadhog. Fuck Winston.
 

LiK

Member
This thread a few months ago was Winston sucks and needs a buff. Give him 900hp shield or shorter cd. Hog hook is BS no skill. Worse than scatter arrow.

Thread today. I miss roadhog. Fuck Winston.

Waiting for the "Widow is must pick" posts. ;)
 

Veelk

Banned
This thread a few months ago was Winston sucks and needs a buff. Give him 900hp shield or shorter cd. Hog hook is BS no skill. Worse than scatter arrow.

Thread today. I miss roadhog. Fuck Winston.

Winston is kind of weird. I see him everywhere now and all that, but I never get the feeling that he's impossible to handle unless his team just straight up outclasses mine. He can be really annoying if a player knows how to weave in and out of his shield and disengage, but since that is meant to be his playstyle, I find it hard to fault him for that. I just mostly don't like him because I feel like D.Va does a similar job to him in a way more satisfying manner. Still, his pickrate is getting tiring. It's not fun seeing the same heroes every goddamn game.

*Turns and glares heavily at Soldier 76*

But I say we wait til the Doomfist update. It's not just Doomfist that's gonna shake things up, but other updates to Hog and Mercy and Rein and who knows who else. If Winston is still picked every game after that, then something's gotta be done.
 
So basically, Blizzard is going to try and achieve the impossible and balance for all levels, likely pleasing nobody in the process.

Good luck, I guess.

The only thing keeping me sane after reading his post is that I don't think he would outright say that the team is ignoring casual players. However, when we see some of the balance changes seemingly have them in mind it's not a great statement to see.
 

I-hate-u

Member
This thread a few months ago was Winston sucks and needs a buff. Give him 900hp shield or shorter cd. Hog hook is BS no skill. Worse than scatter arrow.

Thread today. I miss roadhog. Fuck Winston.

You don't know the value of something till you miss it.
I am all for the Winston bubble change, but nerfing he character that was keeping him in check changes things,
 

Oscar

Member
They REALLY need to add a Solo Q only competitive mode. I think that would bring back more people than a pure TDM mode.
 
Solo Q mode is cool and all but for the love of god Blizzard please just give us an unranked competitive mode.

Heroes of the Storm has it so I don't know why Overwatch can't.
 
Widow mine should drain health until you either get a health pack or a teamate uses an ability to heal you. Imagine the panic of people scrambling to get back to safety
 

Cappa

Banned
Doomfist is not going to drastically change the meta in anyway.

Overwatch needs more than just a new meta anyway. Competitive needs some sort of overhaul and stricter penalties and the ability to avoid playing with people(yes even if that means the poor Widow maker mains have to wait 30 minutes for a match)
 
Doomfist is not going to drastically change the meta in anyway.

Overwatch needs more than just a new meta anyway. Competitive needs some sort of overhaul and stricter penalties and the ability to avoid playing with people(yes even if that means the poor Widow maker mains have to wait 30 minutes for a match)

Every pro player I have seen has said that the meta will change at least initially with the Doomfist patch. Keep in mind it's not just Doomfist being added, but buffs to Zarya, McCree, Reaper, and Reinhardt that will help change the meta.

You're not wrong about the second part though.
 

Jellie

Member
Waiting for the "Widow is must pick" posts. ;)
May that never happen.
Winston is kind of weird. I see him everywhere now and all that, but I never get the feeling that he's impossible to handle unless his team just straight up outclasses mine. He can be really annoying if a player knows how to weave in and out of his shield and disengage, but since that is meant to be his playstyle, I find it hard to fault him for that. I just mostly don't like him because I feel like D.Va does a similar job to him in a way more satisfying manner. Still, his pickrate is getting tiring. It's not fun seeing the same heroes every goddamn game.

*Turns and glares heavily at Soldier 76*

But I say we wait til the Doomfist update. It's not just Doomfist that's gonna shake things up, but other updates to Hog and Mercy and Rein and who knows who else. If Winston is still picked every game after that, then something's gotta be done.
The problem is dva Winston too good.
You don't know the value of something till you miss it.
I am all for the Winston bubble change, but nerfing he character that was keeping him in check changes things,
Hog before the nerf didn't deal with it anyway. He can only focus one person so dive him with more than one and he's dead. Plus DM.
 

Cappa

Banned
Every pro player I have seen has said that the meta will change at least initially with the Doomfist patch. Keep in mind it's not just Doomfist being added, but buffs to Zarya, McCree, Reaper, and Reinhardt that will help change the meta.

You're not wrong about the second part though.
To be fair they were saying the same thing about sombra when she was released back in November(?) and she really didn't change much.

I think he'll be more of a factor than sombra or orisa when both were released but I just don't see him drastically changing anything hopefully I'm wrong.
 
To be fair they were saying the same thing about sombra when she was released back in November(?) and she really didn't change much.

I think he'll be more of a factor than sombra or orisa when both were released but I just don't see him drastically changing anything hopefully I'm wrong.

I didn't follow the scene as much back then so correct me if I'm wrong but I don't think teams were having as much success using her during scrims than teams are now with Doomfist / other buffed heroes.
 

IKizzLE

Member
Competitive needs stricter punishments and reporting for throwers and leavers and greater rewards for doing well in comp to incentivize serious play.

And they need to do something about the Smurf situation. First and foremost, a Smurf accounts SR should not be tied to the main account. I have a friend who has 6 Smurf accounts with 3 of them in the top 500. It's ridiculous.
 

Mutombo

Member
This meta talk only applies to Diamond and above. On silver nobody heals. On gold nobody tanks. On platinum everybody is Genji.
 
This meta talk only applies to Diamond and above. On silver nobody heals. On gold nobody tanks. On platinum everybody is Genji.

This is true, I was stuck in platinum the whole first year of the game and it's how I think I got good at Winston. Genjis and Lucios everywhere all the time
 
Lol @ ppl thinking old roadhog was more "skill based" than he is now. He was ez mode, and now he's shit.

There is a middle ground that isn't reverting the nerf.
 

Blues1990

Member
The more I play Junkrat in QP, the more I'm kind of amazed at how good he can be. If you're smart about placement and patient, it's really crazy how you can almost always get one guarenteed kill off his trap and mine combo.

Problem is that it's QP, so I'm not sure about bringing him over in comp. I did encounter one Junkrat in comp recently, but this was against...honestly, kind of the dumbest batch of players I've seen in a long while. Idk, once I climb a little more so that a few losses won't sink me back down to gold.

I could totally see him having a pro-level presence with just a couple sensible buffs that would not overpower him in the least. Just let him lay down 3 traps at once and give his ult more life so it's not instantly deleted.

One of my favourite streamers (who was a former Demoman player back in the TF2 days) primarily plays Junkrat in the higher levels. I'd recommend watching this vid if you want to hear more about his thought process about playing the character:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xUt0LDEcdDU
 

rulerk1

Member
This game is too team oriented for there to not be a scoreboard. Whats the point of PTR if they arent making any drastic changes?

This thread a few months ago was Winston sucks and needs a buff. Give him 900hp shield or shorter cd. Hog hook is BS no skill. Worse than scatter arrow.

Thread today. I miss roadhog. Fuck Winston.

i was always on the Winston doesnt need a buff and his barrier is dumb train lol.
 

LiK

Member
All I asked for with Winston was a slight 10% increase to attack. The barrier buff made him much stronger than expected.
 

Manoko

Member
Lol @ ppl thinking old roadhog was more "skill based" than he is now. He was ez mode, and now he's shit.

There is a middle ground that isn't reverting the nerf.

He was "ez mode" because people made blatant positioning errors, and he had many drawbacks: he's an ult charge battery for the enemy team and is actually pretty damn vulnerable if he misses his hook, his E is pretty poor defensively too because it makes him not able to move while doing it.

Roadhog was fine, I'd say slightly change the hook combo so that some characters (like Reaper) don't die to it, but otherwise he was in a good place.

People who are bad at the game felt like he was overpowered. He wasn't, you just didn't know how to deal with him correctly.

The suggestion I've seen on the official forums to revert the nerfs but instead add a 1-2 sec delay before his hook launches after you press shift (him swinging his chain, with an audio cue) so that you actually have to predict movement even more and the enemy team is alerted, would have been the best kind of "nerf" to him.
It would have made him more skill-based, not weaker.
 

Veelk

Banned
All I asked for with Winston was a slight 10% increase to attack. The barrier buff made him much stronger than expected.

Without the buff, unless it was caught in an ult of some kind, Winston's shield usually lasted it's entire 5 seconds, meaning it had an 17 second cooldown, the longest in the entire game.

I guess people just didn't think about it that much, but even though the CD is still fairly large, 5 seconds is a lot to shave off a character.
One of my favourite streamers (who was a former Demoman player back in the TF2 days) primarily plays Junkrat in the higher levels. I'd recommend watching this vid if you want to hear more about his thought process about playing the character:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xUt0LDEcdDU

Yeah, I know of Chro. I've seen that video and it's a really good rundown, though I play Junkrat a little more sneaky than him. (In particular, if I set up a mine/trap that I feel is in a good spot, I'm going to resist resetting it unless I really need to do it because it usually nets me a free kill) It's pretty informative nevertheless.
 
Just had a phenomenal competitive round on Hanamura as Zen. Took one push each to take both points on Attack and did it in a little over 2 minutes. Then only died once in Defense at the very end, had 76% kill participation card with assists. The only other guy in voice chat was an awesome Genji who just kept saying how great I was doing as Zen. Felt really good. If only every comp game was like that.
 
Winston bubble cooldown starting when it was destroyed was dumb and hopefully it will never be like that again. It's nice to use our abilities by instinct after playing the characters for a long time and not having to worry about checking the cooldowns every single time, and that's only possible if they are fixed.

If Winston turned into the best thing ever after that change then they can just mess with the cooldown (it's 13s atm, maybe increase it to 15s or so).
 

jviggy43

Member
Doing nothing to Roadhog and figuring out what to do with him would have been better.
Yep. He was a nice option to have at higher level player but was rarely picked out if the gate and certainly wasn't an issue at the pro scene. The current version of him has to be a bottom 5 character in game (which no duh, did they not see the feedback on PTR?).
He was "ez mode" because people made blatant positioning errors, and he had many drawbacks: he's an ult charge battery for the enemy team and is actually pretty damn vulnerable if he misses his hook, his E is pretty poor defensively too because it makes him not able to move while doing it.

Roadhog was fine, I'd say slightly change the hook combo so that some characters (like Reaper) don't die to it, but otherwise he was in a good place.

People who are bad at the game felt like he was overpowered. He wasn't, you just didn't know how to deal with him correctly.

The suggestion I've seen on the official forums to revert the nerfs but instead add a 1-2 sec delay before his hook launches after you press shift (him swinging his chain, with an audio cue) so that you actually have to predict movement even more and the enemy team is alerted, would have been the best kind of "nerf" to him.
It would have made him more skill-based, not weaker.
So much of all of this. Had he been an issue at high level play id maybe consider he was an issue. But he wasnt. Because people didn't run squishy characters out of position and made picks to mitigate hog's usefulness.
 
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