Overwatch

[CorgiShinobi]

So no changes were made to PTR Bastion when the update went live, and as expected, he's pretty damn OP. This isn't coming from someone who plays Competitive, this is from someone who just plays and notices these things.

 

Of course, this has been the topic online in the Overwatch community since yesterday. Rightfully so because quite frankly Bastion is a beast of a character with his passive Ironclad. That's the main problem; not his mobile heal, faster transformation, or better Recon primary fire. Those I felt needed to be implemented for Bastion to be a serious contender once again. Nah, that 35% reduction of damaged combined with his healing and damage output is ridiculous.

 

I was killing it as Bastion last night. The only times I was dying were when I was in Recon mode (no Ironclad active) or the other team effectively ganged up on me when I had no one to assist me. The match ended with me in the Tank Configuration Ultimate, nanoboosted, and wiping out half the opposition. That's to be expected, but what's not is surviving an angry Reinhardt pinning you, and hitting you two times with his hammer. Mind you Bastion no longer gains armor when turning into a tank.

 

You can go onto the subreddit and read people's horror stories. There are some good videos out there too of Bastion just powering through Ultimate after Ultimate.

 

EDIT: Oh yeah, and the D.Va Defense Matrix bug that is pissing me off. So definitely don't feel like playing Overwatch until this gets resolved. D.Va is my #1 Hero and to have her Defense Matrix essentially broken any time you're engaging more than one target is no good.

 

Edited March 2, 2017 by Atomsk88

[CrowKnow]

Yeah I'd say he's kinda overtuned.  

Really damage reduction compounded with Ana's super heals makes it even worse.  Might see more DVA if the meta becomes Bastion heavy.  Hopefully Blizzard gets around to fixing that bug.. seems like it could even happen accidentally.

[Saturnine Tenshi]

At least now I can use all those Bastion skins. So many birds.

 

[CrowKnow]

Went to the training area with her... she seems really strong.  Her primary is like a strong Mercy/DVA pistol.  Alt fire is mini graviton except you can detonate it mid-air that only has an 8 sec cooldown. Tons of opportunity to use it to pull people off edges, around corners or even shift their Rein so that you can get a hook in or something. 1 Ability is a curved shield.  I think it had around 900 health but, you shoot it out like a widow mine.  I'm not sure we'll see her replacing Rein's 2k shield? Last is the Fortify ability which reduces damage taken, and makes you immune to crowd control but, I don't think you can shoot during it.  Not sure how good it'll be cause I don't think you can cancel it.  It would be more like Reaper's wraith form for baiting out hooks/flashbangs than say Mei's cryo freeze

[danielpholt]

EDIT: Oh yeah, and the D.Va Defense Matrix bug that is pissing me off. So definitely don't feel like playing Overwatch until this gets resolved. D.Va is my #1 Hero and to have her Defense Matrix essentially broken any time you're engaging more than one target is no good.

 

 

I've fallen back from Overwatch since I started Titanfall 2, but from what I can remember D.VA has been having a bit of a rough time recently. First there was that eject bug, then a pretty substantial nerf and now this. She's my favourite character too, but in recent weeks she's been damn unplayable.

[CrowKnow]

Some changes on the PTR

 

Ana

• Biotic Rifle
  Damage decreased from 80 to 60
  
  Biotic 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 increased 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

 

 

Ana definitely deserved a nerf but, I dunno how to feel about this as she's my main.  She did high dps for a healer but, every time she tried to dps that's time spent not healing.  My only real beef is that Pharah is going to be more annoying especially at lower ranks.  For the nade my issue is that it was her only way of self healing, every other support has some type of regen and even with the 100 healing it was questionable to self heal cause of how strong anti/heal buff were when throwing the nade elsewhere. Last point is that I thought the big issue about her nade was the anti heal/heal buff? Being able to block heals and full heal tanks in a few seconds was what I saw being complained about the most so it's weird they didn't touch that part of her kit.  

Rest of the changes look solid though, guess I'll go back to playing Zen.

Edited March 7, 2017 by CrowKnow

[Baconrath]

Orb of Discord

Can now target enemies through barriers

 

Since there are so many things that are stopped cold with shields I'm happy about this :^D

 

Now if only Rein was unable to render the graviton surge i spent so long getting useless by only hitting mouse 2...

Edited March 8, 2017 by Baconrath

[CrowKnow]

How are you all enjoying Uprising? Seems like a much more fleshed out version of the Halloween Event.  I got up to Legendary but, it's super brutal at that point, Rein needs to be super on point with every charge/ulting and managing his shield life.  The all heroes mode is also really satisfying in terms of experimenting with different heroes or just relaxing and playing through hard.  Too bad it's gone in May.

Uprising has also let me ease my way back into competitive which lead to a 5 game losing streak but, at least I got a beautiful clip like this. 

https://plays.tv/video/58f84b3daa94951d5a/when-your-team-forgets-hog-after-getting-hooked-him?from=user (I don't record my mic in my recordings hence the white text)

Notice the Hanzo that gets saved from the hook and then backs up into the hog 20 secs later. Or the pharah that survives the hook and then ignores the hog.

[CorgiShinobi]

Anyone maybe want to help me with this when Officer D.Va becomes available? I've never played the game, but D.Va is my #1 and dat skin.

[CrowKnow]

Yeah I'm up for grinding for the skin. For anyone unfamiliar with the Nexus challenge stuff here's the jist of it. 

 

There are tiers of rewards that will unlock over the next 4 weeks

Week 1 Rewards = Genji Oni Skin, Icon and Spray.  You're required to play 5 games(either vs AI, Quick Match, Ranked, Unranked) with a friend

Week 2 Rewards = Offier DVA Skin.  You're required to play 5 games(Quick Match, Ranked, Unranked) with a friend

Week 3 Rewards = Offier Icon/Spray.  ^

Week 4 Rewards = 10 Lootboxes.  ^

They're tiered rewards so for example: even if it's week 2 you gotta play 5 matches and unlock the genji skin before playing another 5 to get the DVA skin.  So if you're busy you could just wait until week 4 and burn through all 20 matches in one go if you wanted all of the rewards.

 

For those who can't get a group/friend to play you can join the two chatrooms below to find randoms to group up with.  Just add the randoms on bnet and remove them when you're done getting your loot.

Type "/join nexuschallenge" or "/join lfg" in the ingame chat.

 

I only played against easy AI last time there was a challenge but, the game seemed on the forgiving side of Mobas.  There's map objectives that can help you out if you're feeling lost. Your team levels up together so you aren't as likely to get left behind... that kind of stuff.  Too bad after week 1 they require you to play against actual people but, at least winning is a requirements so even if you lose you're gonna get the skin eventually.

[danielpholt]

Naturally. 

I've waited almost a year for a DVA skin that I genuinely thought was cool, and then they finally give us one that requires me to play a game I've no interest in playing.

 

Any chance this comes to the game as an item you can buy?

[CrowKnow]

13 hours ago, danielpholt said:

Naturally. 

I've waited almost a year for a DVA skin that I genuinely thought was cool, and then they finally give us one that requires me to play a game I've no interest in playing.

 

Any chance this comes to the game as an item you can buy?

Quote

We completely understand that there are some players who do not own or have access to a PC to play Heroes of the Storm. Because of this, we plan to add both the Oni Genji skin and the Officer D.Va skin to the normal, base Overwatch loot box at some point in the future.

Source

So that's a yes.. eventually.

[deanb]

@danielpholt

 

[CorgiShinobi]

After Uprising, I only got the Mercy skin twice and Bastion skin by free loot boxes. I don't even play as her much at all, but the Bastion one was alright.

But I did end up buying some loot boxes. I mean, there are some really great skins and items, but nearly every skin I was getting normally were the vanilla game skins, and half I already had! It would have been cool to get some more, but at the end I had enough currency to get the Blackwatch Genji skin because that was the only one that wowed me. The Orisa skin is cool, but I barely play as her so whatever. Same goes for the Widowmaker skin.

Now comes the time to attempt the Nexus Challenge. I look forward to combining the new Highlight Intro with Officer D.Va!

EDIT/UPDATE: Oh god I hate MOBAs... Like, even just the interface is pissing me off. I've only done one match too, and of course it isn't much fun to get stomped on by all the vets.

Edited May 3, 2017 by Atomsk88

[deanb]

Official drop rates have been released so Blizzard can comply with Chinese gambling laws
https://www.keengamer.com/article/16190_blizzard-reveals-overwatch-drop-rates

[CrowKnow]

Some new PTR patchnotes

Quote

New Assault Map: Horizon Lunar Colony

Built as the first step towards humanity's renewed exploration of space, the Horizon Lunar Colony’s goal was to examine the effects of prolonged extraterrestrial habitation—on human and ape alike. The scientists’ research proved incredibly promising...until, suddenly, all contact and communications with the base were lost.

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

• Chain Hook
  • Targets are now pulled directly in front of Roadhog (rather than straight to him), except in cases where Roadhog drastically rotates
  • Hooked targets are now released if they leave Roadhog’s line-of-sight before being pulled
  • Line-of-sight checks (which detect if targets should be initially hit by the hook) are now done from Roadhog’s position, rather than the hook’s position

Developer Comments: The hook should now feel more consistent for Roadhog players, but it should also feel more reasonable to his enemies, as they cannot be hooked or pulled around corners anymore.

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.

Really nice change for reaper since before he was kinda just a bad hog.  Hog's Hook combo looks like it won't be able to reliably 1 shot 200hp heroes.  Seems like he'll kinda be a bad reaper now? McCrees ult needed the buff, as long as it doesn't become like... an instant DVA bomb. Lastly, moooon map. Not that interested cause it's a 2cp map but, I'm curious about the lore behind it.  

 

[Mal]

I don't think many of us care but Mercy rez is now an ability with a 30 second cooldown. You just revive one person. Her ult is now the ability to fly and with some enhanced abilities. Seems like if you use rez before you use your ult, you get another rez.

 

Not sure how I feel. Isn't Ana the preferred healer now? This change seems to be make Mercy even more useless. I guess flying is cool... and it makes battle Mercy a bit more viable? I guess she's meant to be offensive now?

Edited August 24, 2017 by Mal

[CorgiShinobi]

Mercy has been the one-trick Comp healer for a while. Ana doesn't get much love, and from videos of Mercy's change, I don't see that changing.

 

Mercy is actually pretty formidable now. Like, people were joking that Blizzard is making everyone DPS. Junkrat gets more landmines, D.Va has micro missles, and now Mercy can become a god of war when she ults. The missles aren't as bad as everyone thought they would be, but it does enforce the idea that Blizz is just giving out more damage moves now.

Edited August 25, 2017 by Atomsk88

[CorgiShinobi]

I feel so done with this game now. Too many throwers and lack of any game sense. I almost got the The Path is Closed achievement, but there was only 16 secs left and a Junkrat thought he'd be an asswipe by stopping me.

 

But chances are even if I did get the third generator, it probably wouldn't have unlocked the achievement as it seems shield generators maybe occasionally count. So it's bugged. I mean, I've never cared for the game's achievements, but when you're just lucky enough and so close, only to be denied, it pisses me off just right. The same feeling you get when you've missed out on something and you have a parent or friend say "I guess you missed out there, huh" with the utmost snark.

 

Thank you Destiny for coming back to take me away from all this salt.