Balance discussion and stuff

Hello everybody, first of all, I haven't played this game for a second. Not for a single second and as much as I hate people who suggest balance from only watching, I'm gonna perform the ultimate sin myself since I think I know enough about the game.
I also acknowledge it's just a technical beta and balance is not even close to top priority, but this is just a fun banter thread to vent my frustration of not having access.

Let's talk about the current heroes first. I've made a tierlist for 6s;

Beyond broken/Must have in every composition -tier
McCree
Lucio

God tier
Pharah
Widowmaker
Mercy
Zarya

Strong tier
Zenyatta
Tracer
Soldier76

Good tier
Winston
Junkrat
Reaper
Bastion
Hanzo

Not really sure yet -tier
Symmetra
Reinhardt
Roadhog

Meh tier
Torbjörn

Balance change propositions:

• Lower McCree's pistol damage to 50/55 per shot or at least make it have a massive damage fall off from mid to long range. Maybe even make Flashbang cooldown longer.
• Reduce Widowmakers HP pool / Make her ult disappear if she dies.
• Zarya's shield is maybe a bit too strong atm and might need adjusting.
• Mercy's ult is global range atm. This might need adjusting in the future too.
• Lucio is basically a core of every line-up atm. His ultimate is way too strong for the auras he provides. Scale his ultimate down.
• Reapers shotguns do way too much damage from close range, but have a way too big of a damage falloff. A middleground should be found to this. (I do understand he's a flanking character, but it still feels a bit too extreme.)
• TBA

Tier list changes i've made during this debate:

• Named Okay tier into Not really sure -tier:D
• Moved Lucio up to Broken tier from God tier
• Moved Zarya up to God tier from Strong tier
• TBA

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UI

Everybody can agree that the UI is way too massive and has a lot of stuff that you don't need. I'm not really suggesting to remove elements, but having an option to turn literally ANYTHING off would be so amazing.
We know Blizzard doesn't like very adjustable UI's, because they want everyone to see the same, but in this case they actually want it to be a massive FPS e-Sports title and they should listen to the community.

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Stuff/Options that are a complete must and need to be added in the game

• Killfeed! Absolutely essential for players but an absolute must for spectators!
• Option to adjust the in-game music volume.
• Option to make Widowmakers alt-fire to be toggle and not having to press it all the time.
• Option to adjust the sensitivity while scoped.
• Option to hide or atleast scale the viewmodels as the players like.

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I'll edit this post later to add my thoughts of the maps and other topics, when I have the time. Thanks for reading!

Can you explain why you think Widowmaker is "God tier"?
I'd also like to hear why you think Symmetra is "Okay tier".

Not saying you're wrong but I just want to hear your reasoning.

MR_SLIN [#2]

Can you explain why you think Widowmaker is "God tier"?
I'd also like to hear why you think Symmetra is "Okay tier".

Not saying you're wrong but I just want to hear your reasoning.

• mobility -- there are a lot of maps where you simply can't get to where she can with the grappling hook, and even if you can she can either shoot you or just grapple away. this makes straight up killing her extremely hard, especially if she's being pocketed too.
• damage boost from mercy lets you 1-shot headshot anyone in the game and 1-shot bodyshot all of the 200 hp classes
• she has 200 hp for some reason instead of 150
• high-uptime wallhack ult where the team has no way of knowing until someone sees from deathcam
• doesn't have to unzoom between shots and fully charges shots in like half a second

there's certainly counter-play to her but it's really frustrating playing against a good one. from my personal experience shields (particularly reinhardt's), hard-engage, and tracer are good ways to deal with widow.

I think it was seagull, who said that if they nerf McCree then Soldier76 would just replace him because they have about the same long range hitscan damage. McCree has higher output so he is more preferable for now. These tiers do not make much sense since some classes are stronger than others depending on the map/stage/team side. Winston in most cases > Widowmaker. Also according to your tiers pharah is stronger than soldier76 but the latter is her direct counter.

I don't know what games you're watching where reinhardt or roadhog could be considered in the same tier as symmetra. In fact, that entire last part just seems like you didn't know where to put them, but I find it interesting that you put Hanzo so far above Sym when Sym can easily be much more effective.

Can you explain why you think Widowmaker is "God tier"?
I'd also like to hear why you think Symmetra is "Okay tier".
Not saying you're wrong but I just want to hear your reasoning.

Widowmaker is godtier because of her ultimate that it's global range. It doesn't need widowmaker to be alive as long as she can activate it before dying. Her damage is way off the charts with spammable shots and more mobility than most classes. Her HP should be 150~~ AND her ult should end when she dies.

Symmetra on the other hand is really niche and can be used rather rarely and even then it's even more rare to see her being effective. I appreciate direct supporting ability or straight up DPS more than her easily dodgeable balls and stationary turrets that get destroyed by any damage.
The teleport alone won't make her go up in tiers.

I think it was seagull, who said that if they nerf McCree then Soldier76 would just replace him because they have about the same long range hitscan damage. McCree has higher output so he is more preferable for now. These tiers do not make much sense since some classes are stronger than others depending on the map/stage/team side. Winston in most cases > Widowmaker. Also according to your tiers pharah is stronger than soldier76 but the latter is her direct counter.

I think your frontline should be able to take care of Winston before he can reach Widowmaker. I get that the shield is really strong against her, but it can be destroyed in a matter of seconds with some focus fire. We can't really judge before seeing really high level teams playing high skilled Overwatch against each other.

S76 is a jack of all trades. He can't maintain high DPS long range because of his weapons spread. He's more of a close/mid range hero. And just because he's a counter to Pharah doesn't really mean he's better. I think he's midway Strong/God tier but not godly enough. Ult doesn't count.

I don't know what games you're watching where reinhardt or roadhog could be considered in the same tier as symmetra. In fact, that entire last part just seems like you didn't know where to put them, but I find it interesting that you put Hanzo so far above Sym when Sym can easily be much more effective.

I've watched streams for like 5 hours worth of gameplay. Not that much 6v6 except seagulls for like 30minutes. All of my views are basically assumptions made by me and should be taken with a grain of salt. I enjoy when people debate!

Hanzo has a massive skill ceiling, but I think he's getting outshined by hitscan heroes since you can't seriously think he'd be able to outdps something like a Mccree. But I deffo think he can outDPS a s76 in close range maps with chokes easily.
I just feel like Reinhardt and Roadhog will be the pub heroes, or they will serve a very niche role of pushing through small choke points/defending small choke points in really high level comp. Especially in the Temple of Anubis map where it's impossible to get in on the last point without a Reinhardt if you all don't play something with a flying/wallrunning ability, but in the end this is just bad map design imho.

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It's really great that this thread sparks some discussion!

I just feel like Reinhardt and Roadhog will be the pub heroes, or they will serve a very niche role of pushing through small choke points/defending small choke points in really high level comp. Especially in the Temple of Anubis map where it's impossible to get in on the last point without a Reinhardt if you all don't play something with a flying/wallrunning ability, but in the end this is just bad map design imho.

You used an interesting word there, you said "Niche". In a game that tries to force character swapping as a main mechanic of it, ideally you would want everyone to be "Niche" in a sense, no? Of course you can't make a character like 76 not "Okay" in literally every situation, but most of the characters people are complaining about have options in just about every situation. For example, you'd be hard pressed to tell me that any particular situation is bad for a Lucio pick. In the same sense, Mccree has insane sniping ability and the best(?) close range dueling? (Shoot everything, roll to reload, shoot everything again, stun if you need it). The characters that people are complaining about are the ones with too many options, which funny enough, is pretty common in the MOBA genre.

Especially in the Temple of Anubis map where it's impossible to get in on the last point without a Reinhardt if you all don't play something with a flying/wallrunning ability, but in the end this is just bad map design imho.

I actually completely disagree with this as well (Sorry if it seems like I'm picking on you here, i'm not). You 100% want interactions like this in the game. Like I said earlier, this game relies on swapping as a main mechanic, if you can push through an entire map with one comp, that's bad map design. You want varied attack methods, you can't just have every single access point a choke or every single access point a wide open area, there's no diversity.

Also, sorry, I couldn't figure out how to quote you without quoting literally everything in the post... :x

You used an interesting word there, you said "Niche". In a game that tries to force character swapping as a main mechanic of it, ideally you would want everyone to be "Niche" in a sense, no? Of course you can't make a character like 76 not "Okay" in literally every situation, but most of the characters people are complaining about have options in just about every situation. For example, you'd be hard pressed to tell me that any particular situation is bad for a Lucio pick. In the same sense, Mccree has insane sniping ability and the best(?) close range dueling? (Shoot everything, roll to reload, shoot everything again, stun if you need it). The characters that people are complaining about are the ones with too many options, which funny enough, is pretty common in the MOBA genre

Your last point is certainly 100% true. I really gave it a bit of thought after reading and you're right. Heroes that can fill any role are overpowered and have too much options (Like Elise in League of Legends back in S3 comes in mind first.)
Lucio is really damn strong. Literally no reason not to run him 100% of the time atm I agree.

Yeah maybe the word niche isn't good for this game since they want all to be used, but that might just make the game a bit too hard to watch for people that don't play/watch the game normally. I'm 50/50 on this.

PS. It's fine, i'm not used to the formatting either haha.

(Like Elise in League of Legends back in S3 comes in mind first.)

Rip my editing.... Also pls don't remind me of that :C, I hate "Must ban/play" characters, and I get the feeling that Overwatch is nowhere near getting bans, if ever lol.

Yeah maybe the word niche isn't good for this game since they want all to be used, but that might just make the game a bit too hard to watch for people that don't play/watch the game normally. I'm 50/50 on this.

Right, but that's kind of the point of this very closed beta, they're getting some really good opinions on balance and I really really really hope that they show a ton of changes at blizzcon, but number being FOV/UI fixes lol.

Envy [#9]

(Like Elise in League of Legends back in S3 comes in mind first.)

Rip my editing.... Also pls don't remind me of that :C, I hate "Must ban/play" characters, and I get the feeling that Overwatch is nowhere near getting bans, if ever lol.

Yeah maybe the word niche isn't good for this game since they want all to be used, but that might just make the game a bit too hard to watch for people that don't play/watch the game normally. I'm 50/50 on this.

Right, but that's kind of the point of this very closed beta, they're getting some really good opinions on balance and I really really really hope that they show a ton of changes at blizzcon, but number being FOV/UI fixes lol.

Hahaha yeah, that's kinda the nature of mobas, especially LoL because of its meta revolved around nerfs on the champs and item changes. I played the game for 3 seasons and got to top 200 multiple times, but now that it's really really stale has less inviduality I don't enjoy the game anymore.

Yeah, it's a technical beta and balance shouldn't really be discussed. I wonder though how much do carnage and other TF2 players with beta access and blizz contacts give opinions about the game?

I think they really should give the option of hiding your weapon or at the least give the option to make the viewmodels smaller. I'll add this to my first post :-)

Yea, and I dont mind OW being like that either. HotS is already like that, where different patches enforce a shift in the meta, I think that's something people have not only gotten used to, but actually expect from a game like this to keep it fresh.

I like to think they're giving good feedback. In just a couple days, there are rough tier lists, and I've seen the streamers that I do watch basically saying that ults on the more played characters were bad or didn't matter. For example, Ster player Reaper, and literally no one is using Mccree's ult anymore.

They'll never make it hideable, then they can't sell weapon skins ;)

Envy [#11]

Yea, and I dont mind OW being like that either. HotS is already like that, where different patches enforce a shift in the meta, I think that's something people have not only gotten used to, but actually expect from a game like this to keep it fresh.

I like to think they're giving good feedback. In just a couple days, there are rough tier lists, and I've seen the streamers that I do watch basically saying that ults on the more played characters were bad or didn't matter. For example, Ster player Reaper, and literally no one is using Mccree's ult anymore.

They'll never make it hideable, then they can't sell weapon skins ;)

Sounds fair to me. I really hope the beta testers do not forget that they're there to make the game as good as it possibly can be, and they get to have a small edge compared to others for such a small "price."

Yeah ults on the most played characters are hard to use, and most of the time just not worth it.

I wouldn't really care if they made it hideable. I'll still be able to show my sick skins to others eventhough I wouldn't see it myself. I just find the gun distracting me from being able to aim(And this comes from a guy who has played the counter-strike franchise for more than 13 years.)
Also the amount of people using hidden viewmodels would be small, and saying it gives an competitive edge is just really dumb as I see it as a preference.

EDIT: Made some changes in the first post.

Theres definetly more good heroes than bad ones imo

and thats a really good thing

Taimou hype! D:

Theres definetly more good heroes than bad ones imo

and thats a really good thing

I deffo agree with you man, it seems that tanks actually are much stronger than I thought at first. Seems that the meta will be 2 tanks, 2 DPS and 2 supports for now. You can easily run 3 tanks, 1 dps and 2 supports for some capture points when attacking.

Taimou hype! D:

Hello Admirable!:D Surprised to see me here?;p

taimou boys

How is winston good tier? >.< He's probably most OP atm.

enigma [#3]

• mobility -- there are a lot of maps where you simply can't get to where she can with the grappling hook, and even if you can she can either shoot you or just grapple away. this makes straight up killing her extremely hard, especially if she's being pocketed too.
• damage boost from mercy lets you 1-shot headshot anyone in the game and 1-shot bodyshot all of the 200 hp classes
• she has 200 hp for some reason instead of 150
• high-uptime wallhack ult where the team has no way of knowing until someone sees from deathcam
• doesn't have to unzoom between shots and fully charges shots in like half a second

there's certainly counter-play to her but it's really frustrating playing against a good one. from my personal experience shields (particularly reinhardt's), hard-engage, and tracer are good ways to deal with widow.

don't you take this away from me before I even get to try it...

2Easy [#17]

How is winston good tier? >.< He's probably most OP atm.

If we're being sarcastic here, Hell yea, gorilla power :D

If you're not, Idk what game you're watching/playing :C

Envy [#19]

If we're being sarcastic here, Hell yea, gorilla power :D

If you're not, Idk what game you're watching/playing :C

I am not being sarcastic, he has a massive shield which absorbs bullets but allies can shoot through, auto-aim, tanky and decent damage. so ye

I'd like to know about the enemy having wallhacks without watching myself die in the killcam. Widowmaker is usually so far back when she uses it you don't hear the voice line and it really hurts trying sneaky positioning if you never know when it's active.

Maybe an EMP style wave animation sweeping once across the map?

2Easy [#20]

I am not being sarcastic, he has a massive shield which absorbs bullets but allies can shoot through, auto-aim, tanky and decent damage. so ye

The shield is really strong but can be broken by some spam. I value his tanking ability more since his ult tops him into 1k instantly and he can create a lot of space fast.
The lack of range and inconsistency of his melee doesn't put him into beyond broken tier. I'll be sure to put him into strong at the very least ,but i'll have to review my tier list anyway later on. I'm at my phone and can't edit;p

taimou boys

Good to see you too Jason:--) !

Aura [#4]

I think it was seagull, who said that if they nerf McCree then Soldier76 would just replace him because they have about the same long range hitscan damage. McCree has higher output so he is more preferable for now. These tiers do not make much sense since some classes are stronger than others depending on the map/stage/team side. Winston in most cases > Widowmaker. Also according to your tiers pharah is stronger than soldier76 but the latter is her direct counter.

Tier lists don't generally take counters into account. You could have 2 amazing heroes that just happen to counter each other and they can both be tier 1. The only case where counters are taken into account in my experience is if any hero(es) are so prevalent that they are in every game then heroes that they counter are going to be inherently lower tier.

Its fair to remember that Jeff Kaplan (Game Director) said that they are keeping track on everything on the beta, just to make it easier to balance the game.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PnRpV4V5H0w

Widow really needs slower powerup/firing speed in scope.
Also, Mccree's flashbang is fucking dumb. I played a game where 90% of my deaths were being flashbanged followed by the Mccree pressing m2 on me while I couldn't move. Cool.

This is how I see the current hero list.

Essential in almost any good composition:
Reinhardt
Pharah
Mercy

Great composition fillers:
McCree
Lucio
Zenyatta
Widowmaker
Junkrat

Situational but still can work well:
Zarya
Tracer
Soldier76
Winston
Hanzo
Roadhog
Reaper
Bastion

Rarely used:
Symmetra
Torbjörn

symmetra is good when it comes to countering shields but its still meh in open areas but what makes her shine the most is the fact that she has a teleporter which comes in handy whenever theres a long way to run from spawn which makes defending or attack extremely easier to just keep lemmings in to get ultimates faster than your enemies
other than that shes meh

Can we really make comments on the way balance is when the comp scene hasn't really kicked off yet, its all well and good making tier lists but as far as I am aware each "hero" is situationally good at certain points in different maps.

well atm 2 pharas 2 winstons 2 mercys is extremely efficient as a starter comp

imo give torbjorn teleporter and make symmetra ult similar to hanzo's to make her useful except for utility