A future update in Season 9 of Overwatch 2 will implement passive healing for more heroes in the game, a change many fans see as a move further away from the notions of playing as a team and optimal character composition for covering healing and buffs. This will be just one tweak in a "massive set of gameplay and balance changes" for the ninth season of the game, with Tank and Damage class heroes benefitting from the update.
This big change is being made to lessen the "reliance on teammates," according to director Aaron Keller. "In Overwatch, there is a constant tug of war between the power of a team and the power of an individual hero or player. A change like this shifts that balance a bit. This is something that we are constantly evaluating. We still want Overwatch to be defined by team strategy and mechanics, but we feel this can be pulled back a bit now and possibly more in the future."
As the game was originally designed around team play and covering for your friends' in-game weaknesses by selecting an optimal hero, the update hasn't gone down well with all Overwatch 2 users. This may signal Blizzard's "new direction" for Overwatch 2 is about catering for players without a constant group of friends to play with, as the competitive Overwatch League was shut down late last year.
Once the change is made, it sounds like characters will regenerate health ala Call of Duty outside of combat, meaning they won't need to find a healer like Mercy or Lucio to get back in shape — though these heroes will probably still be able to heal them much faster than the passive feature coming soon. In a Resetera thread discussing the move, it's debated what support characters will receive to still make them viable picks. More details are expected to follow as season nine of Overwatch 2 is set to begin next month.
What do you think of this update? Share your thoughts in the comments below.
[source gamesradar.com]
Comments 18
This is just going to encourage players to run off on their own trying to be a one person army. I already get grouped with players who focus on kills closer to the enemy spawn over defending objectives and this will probably make it worse.
This might be a good change
There are games where one supports exclusively heal there irl friend
Or games where a Genji in the backline just screams "HEAL DIFF I NEVER GET HEALS BLYAT!"
But this will definitely shake up the meta in more ways than one
I never played Overwatch 2 and this won't make it happen the first one was fun for a while but after a while I got sick of the Microtransactions.
As a main healer, I don't mind this at all. Less whining from DPS heroes is a good thing. I wonder if giving it to tanks is overkill though.
Doesn’t make sense to me, but then again, nothing they’ve done since Overwatch turned into 2 has made sense to me. The game was once a 10/10 and is now significantly less fun than it used to be. I don’t even play it casually anymore when the game was previously one I purchased for every ecosystem I play on. Sort of sad.
@Flaming_Kaiser what microtransactions? you so many loot boxes playing the game you didnt need to buy anything
Paladins has self heal and works well for them.
@The_Great_WmR @Tulio517 this is a terrible change
clueless devs don’t know squat about their own game and just makes it worse with every update
This would be like having all of the classes in TF2 auto-heal, it would be a bad change.
They are trying to stop a "reliance on teammates" in a game that is literally a team-based battle arena game. Someone make it make sense for me.
As a vocational support, I think this will ruin part of the experience.
A good team should be as follows; a tank receiving damage and causing damage all over the place. DPSs focusing firstly on enemy supports and then on enemy DPSs, and, of course, the support couple healing everybody but especially the tank.
I don't think it's that hard.
But as somebody mentioned above, it seems as if the developers wanted to ruin the game. Take away the infamous loot boxes to bring in an ever more infamous battlepass. Then take away the "after-game stats" because some "paper-skinned softie" might get offended. Switch from 6vs6 to 5vs5, change Orisa so nobody uses shielded combat...
The game still kicks ass, but the question arises; for how long??
anyway....
It really depends on the exact changes. Characters already had lone wolf playstyles supported by health packs on the map, so this may not be as big of a change as you might think. If it's out of combat healing with a delayed timer, it may as well be a way to help noobs heal who don't know health packs placements.
I absolutely loved the first Overwatch but they have ruined the second game and I just don’t care for it I’m afraid.
Shame
No-one really knows how this will play out, and speculation could be wildly out of step.
What we know is it will be a weaker version of the support passive. The support passive doesn't really effect combat - it only kicks in after not being shot for a few seconds. It's also not very fast. Supports don't rely on their passive for healing - they use their abilities and the other support to heal them up.
But this could theoretically effect lone wolf DPS' and potentially encourage DPS' to duck out of combat for a few seconds to get some regen. Will it be powerful enough to bother doing that? Depends on the numbers
Blizzard make toxic changes to meta, taking the game further and further from its roots, in yet another bid to keep the cash cow spinning. Unexpected … eye roll
These little tweaks are why I quit the game. It's been a mine cart rolling down hill towards the junk heap ever since OW2 released. Kiriko was the last good thing they did for the game. I honestly can't wait till they shut the survers down for this game. That way they can stop bastardizing a game I really loved playing.
Can they just bring overwatch one back as it was before they decided to cater to the esports crowd?
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