Overwatch has a new hero, Orisa, today—but that’s not the only update Blizzard pushed live.
Adjustments to other Overwatch heroes have been in testing on the game’s public test region. Blizzard’s been doling out both nerfs and buffs across its hero spectrum, including to Ana, Winston, Bastion, and Sombra. Those are now live on Overwatch for all systems.
Here’s the breakdown.
Ana
- Biotic rifle
- Damage decreased from 80 to 60
Ana’s been a tough hero for Blizzard to get just right, with players deeming her overpowered. To fix her a bit, Blizzard reduced the damage her biotic rifle does to enemy players. A previous PTR patch had impact damage from her grenades reduced, too, but that got reverted.
Bastion
- Ironclad
- Xbox One and PlayStation 4 players will now see Bastion taking 20 percent less damage in Configuration: Sentry or Tank.
This went live for PC players early in March.
Junkrat
- Total Mayhem
- Junkrat can no longer hurt himself with his explosions
Junkrat was often too difficult to use at close range, given the damage he did to himself when using his explosive weapon. Now, he takes no damage from himself, giving players room to explore new strategies, Blizzard said.
Mercy
- Caduceus Staff
- Blizzard will now track increased damage that’s done when Mercy is boosting another player. It’ll be displayed under the match statistics and on the career profile page.
Sombra
- Hack
- Teammates can now see hacked health packs through walls
- Stealth
- Sound effects and voice over distance have been reduced to 15 meters when Sombra enters or exits stealth
- Translocator
- Cooldown reduced from six seconds to four seconds
This is actually big: Her stealth ability makes her invisible, but her super loud voice lines make it very hard to be sneaky. This change will make a bit easier to get around unnoticed as Sombra.
Winston
- Barrier Projector
- Ability cooldown now begins when Winston’s barrier is placed instead of when it ends
Zarya
- Particle Barrier
- No longer protects Zarya from knockback
- Projected Barrier
- No longer protects allies from knockback
Zarya’s new adjustment reverts a change Blizzard made a few patches ago that made players immune to knockbacks, even if they pierce her barrier. That was unintended, and this fixes that: Zarya and her allies in barriers will now be affected from knockbacks like Reinhardt’s charge and Winston’s punches. Stuff like Pharah’s blast still won’t affect her, however.
Zenyatta
- Orb of Destruction
- Alternate fire cooldown has been reduced from one second to .6 seconds
- Weapon spread has been removed
By removing weapon spread, Zenyatta’s shots are now a bit more accurate.
Route 66 also saw a slight adjustment with patch 1.9. Now, the attacking team on Route 66 is given 60 additional seconds after pushing the payload to the first checkpoint. “This change will bring Route 66 in line with the other Escort maps,” Blizzard said.
For custom games and the server browser, players are also now able to disable or modify abilities activated with the secondary fire button.
Such extensive changes, while they may seem small individually, have the potential to really shake up the Overwatch meta. Add in new hero Orisa, and Overwatch could be looking like an entirely new game.
Blizzard still has some massive Lúcio changes in testing on the Overwatch PTR, but there’s no update as to when those will go live.
