Highlights
- Overwatch 2's latest update includes significant balance changes for several heroes, such as Zarya, Mei, Bastion, and Orisa.
- Zarya receives a buff with increased health and reduced cooldown for her Projected Barrier, potentially making her even more powerful.
- As of the update, support passives have an increased activation time.
Blizzard has released a new update for hero shooter Overwatch 2 that makes some big balance changes for heroes like Zarya, Mei, Bastion, Orisa, and others. Overwatch 2 is a game that is constantly being updated, and this latest update could have a big impact on the heroes players pick for the rest of Season 6.
One of the most notable hero changes in this new Overwatch 2 update is a buff for Zarya, a move that might prove controversial with some fans as she is generally considered one of the stronger Tanks in the game already. Blizzard is increasing the health of Zarya's Projected Barrier from 200 to 225, reducing the cooldown from 10 to 8 seconds, and increasing the size of the bubble by 15%. The idea is that this will encourage Zarya players to use bubbles on their allies more often than on Zarya herself, but it could make an already-powerful Tank hero that much more unstoppable.
As far as other Tanks go, the new Overwatch 2 update is buffing Junker Queen by increasing the impact damage of her Jagged Blade from 50 to 65. Orisa, meanwhile, is getting a nerf. As of the update, the cooldown for Orisa's Fortify ability will start when it's activated instead of when it ends. The cooldown timer is being increased from 12 seconds to 16.5 seconds, and her overhealth is being decreased from 125 to 100.
On the Damage side of things, Mei is getting a buff that will increase the damage of her Endothermic Blaster, while Bastion is getting a nerf that will see the impact damage of his A-36 Tactical Grenade decreased from 30 to 15. Furthermore, Bastion's Configuration Artillery ult will no longer deal critical hits.
Support heroes across the board are getting nerfed in the new Overwatch 2 update, as the duration until their passive activates is being increased from 1.5 seconds to 2 seconds. As far as specific Support hero changes, only Baptiste and Kiriko are getting tweaked. Baptiste's Regenerative Burst is being nerfed so that instant healing is decreased from 50 to 40 and heal over time is being decreased from 50 over 5 seconds to 40 over 4 seconds. And finally, Kiriko's Protection Suzu is being changed so that it now passes through enemy heroes.
Of course, the new Overwatch 2 update will see a variety of other changes as well, mainly in the form of bug fixes aimed at the new Flashpoint maps and other issues that have been plaguing the hero shooter game. Overwatch 2 is a constant balancing act for Blizzard, so fans can expect future hero adjustments, especially if the community doesn't respond well to these changes.
Overwatch 2 Update Patch Notes
PING SYSTEM UPDATES
● Owned entities (such as Torbjörn's Turret, Symmetra's Teleporter, or Illari's Healing Pylon) now have a lower priority as ping targets than enemy heroes.
HERO UPDATES
TANK
Zarya
Projected Barrier
● Health increased from 200 to 225.
● Cooldown decreased from 10 to 8 seconds.
● Size increased 15%.
Developer Comment: Zarya often spends both barrier charges on herself as it is usually more consistent for building energy. The change to Projected Barrier incentivizes using the barrier for her allies more often.
Junker Queen
Jagged Blade
● Impact damage increased from 50 to 65.
Developer Comment: This change rewards throwing accuracy with the Jagged Blade without directly affecting Junker Queen's self-healing.
Orisa
Fortify
● Cooldown begins when the ability is activated instead of when it ends.
● Cooldown increased from 12 to 16.5 seconds.
● Overhealth bonus decreased from 125 to 100.
Developer Comment: The Fortify cooldown has been adjusted so that the effective uptime remains the same. However, Orisa is no longer incentivized to cancel the ability early to begin the cooldown immediately, which makes the interval between uses consistent and more susceptible to counterplay.
DAMAGE
Ashe
The Viper
● Reload time decreased from .25 to .2 seconds.
Developer Comment: Ashe has the longest total reload time of all heroes to balance out the advantage of being able to shoot after a partial reload. However, we are shortening it slightly to make the full reload from empty less punishing.
Bastion
A-36 Tactical Grenade
● Impact damage decreased from 30 to 15.
Configuration Artillery:
● Can no longer deal critical hits.
Developer Comment: The A-36 Tactical Grenade is now more reliable after having its projectile size increased recently, so it doesn't need to be quite as damaging. The change to Configuration Artillery is a bug fix from what was intended for the ultimate, and we’ll monitor to see how this impacts Bastion’s performance.
Mei
Endothermic Blaster
● Damage increased from 65 to 70 per second.
● Duration before slow falls off between primary fire hits increased from 0.5 to 0.6 seconds.
Deep Chill
● Bonus damage can now also be triggered with Mei's quick melee.
Developer Comment: Mei is still underperforming after her last set of changes, so we are increasing the effectiveness of primary fire and improving the quality of life to Deep Chill.
SUPPORT
Support Passive
● Duration until support passive activates increased from 1.5 to 2 seconds.
Developer Comment: Support heroes have received individual improvements to their survivability and are quite strong overall, so we're reducing the impact of the role-wide passive.
Baptiste
Regenerative Burst
● Instant healing decreased from 50 to 40.
● Heal over time decreased from 50 over 5 seconds to 40 over 4 seconds.
Developer Comment: Regenerative Burst’s overall healing output has been too effective after gaining the bonus instant heal for low-health allies, so we are reducing its total healing slightly.
Kiriko
Protection Suzu
● Now passes through enemy heroes.
Developer Comment: The Protection Suzu no longer knocks back enemy heroes, so the projectile doesn't need to impact them either. This quality-of-life change prevents accidental activations when thrown into groups with both enemies and allies.
BUG FIXES
GENERAL
● Fixed an issue with the Daybreak challenge being reset to 0 and not receiving progress after completing games.
● The Save-a-Mari challenge now specifies the difficulty requirements for completion.
● Resolved an issue where the Progression Level badge wasn't promoting. Players who have already reached levels where the badge should now be promoted to the correct badge now.
● Fixed a bug with the Option 'Relative Aim Sensitivity' not accepting a value of 0%.
● Fixed an instance where equipped Competitive Titles would reset after a relog.
● Fixed a bug with Matches Played showing as abandoned for matches played on another platform.
● Fixed gaps and other environment issues in Mischief and Magic.
● Fixed navigation issues that could occur with a controller in Winston's Lab.
● Fixed the missing sound effects for Training Bots respawning.
● Fixed a bug on controller/gamepads that prevented some characters from flying diagonally.
● Resolved a bug with the Overtime bar not burning all the way down in Competitive, making it difficult to tell when the round is over.
● Fixed an issue that prevented players from immediately equipping Golden weapons after purchase.
MAPS
Dorado
● Fixed a bug in the environment near the final point that sometimes allowed Mei's Blizzard to go
through the environment.
New Junk City
● Fixed areas on the map that players could become stuck in.
● Fixed lighting issues in specific areas on the map.
● Added the intro when loading into the map. You will now be greeted with 'Welcome to New Junk City.'
Suravasa
● Fixed some fountains on the map that allowed some turrets to be hidden.
● Fixed a few areas that did not have correct lighting.
● Fixed areas on the map that players could become stuck on.
● Fixed areas on the map that allowed players to stand outside the playable space.
● Fixed gaps in the geometry in several areas across the map.
CO-OP MISSIONS
Rio
● Fixed a bug that could occur after the Artillery lands that resulted in your camera looking at the sky after regaining control of the camera.
Toronto
● Fixed an interaction with the train that could force players outside of the map boundaries.
● Fixed a bug with lighting that could occur on this map when changing graphics settings.
Gothenburg
● Fixed a location in spawn where players could become stuck.
HEROES
Bastion
● Fixed an error that resulted in the vertical knockback on Bastion's Tactical Grenade being reduced.
Echo
● Fixed a bug with Duplicated Illari's displaying the incorrect VFX colors when casting Captive Sun.
● Fixed an interaction with Duplicated Symmetra turrets persisting through the duration of Duplicate.
Illari
● Fixed an interaction with Genji's Deflect and Illari's Healing Pylon. Deflecting the pylon should now correctly heal Genji's allies.
● Fixed a bug that prevented the Stay Dead voice line from being equipped.
● Resolved an interaction that allowed Illari to see underneath the map if they were slept by an Ana Sleep Dart while using Captive Sun.
● Fixed an interaction with Illari's Pylon indicator being disabled if it was Hacked by Sombra.
● Fixed an interaction with Symmetra's Teleporter that allowed Illari to place a Pylon in mid-air.
● Fixed several instances that resulted in the Pylon being destroyed instantly after deploying.
Junker Queen
● Fixed a bug where Junker Queen recalling Jagged Blade in the same frame as it stuck in an object (by holding Secondary Fire and aiming at an object the same distance away as the Knife's recall range) would cause a pingable knife to be stuck in the world.
Kiriko
● Fixed a bug that made it difficult to Swift Step to allies in rooms with low ceilings.
Lifeweaver
● Fixed a bug allowing friendly EMPs to destroy your Petal Platform.
Ramattra
● Resolved a bug that prevented the damage increase from Zenyatta's Discord from being correctly applied while Ramattra was Blocking.
Overwatch 2 is out now for PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
