Hanzo has lengthy been the butt of Overwatch gamers’ jokes, a restricted character wielded repeatedly in Quick Play, however not often in Competitive – and even then, not with out admonishment
Maybe Blizzard ought to department out, and make an Overwatch single-player game.
Every component of his toolkit is finished barely higher by another person. Need a sniper to choose off healers? Widowmaker has higher mobility and her pictures are hitscan, not projectiles. Want a frontline DPS? McCree and Soldier: 76 deal extra constant injury and have higher help choices. Want a scout to disrupt flanks and determine targets? Sombra can go invisible, run sooner, and hack medkits.
Blizzard have lengthy been conscious of Hanzo’s failings from a design perspective. Scatter Arrow, a capability that was initially designed for capturing round partitions and in enclosed areas, is used nearly completely as an affordable one-shot kill. When requested about the potential of eradicating the flexibility, Overwatch director Jeff Kaplan admitted that vital modifications could be wanted to make Hanzo viable with out it.
And vital modifications have now come. In yesterday’s patch, Hanzo’s Scatter Arrow was changed with Storm Arrows, a capability that quickly fires six arrows with decrease injury however full distance. He additionally picked up a brand new mobility possibility: a midair horizontal sprint. These modifications will almost definitely handle a lot of the frustration of taking part in in opposition to Hanzo, however does it make him a extra viable choose normally?
Well, probably not. Blizzard wished to keep away from eradicating his solely trump card, however they might have ended up doing simply that. Storm Arrows has probably larger DPS than Scatter Arrow, however requires sustained accuracy, making certain that higher ability is required to get good outcomes from Hanzo. This is nice, after all, but it surely doesn’t change Hanzo’s elementary drawback: he doesn’t have a distinct segment that he can carry out in higher than anybody else. He’s in the identical area of interest as earlier than, simply with a much less poorly-designed core capability and a barely larger ability ceiling.
He’s nonetheless not remotely viable in Competitive, and he’s most likely much less more likely to be performed in Quick Play as a result of raised ability ceiling. With the redesign, Blizzard have turned a low-tier irritating character into only a low-tier character.
So how can that be fastened? It’s tough to say. Let’s be clear: the latest modifications are a superb begin, they take away reliance on Scatter Arrow whereas giving Hanzo some further mobility as well. But if Blizzard need Hanzo to be a viable choose within the long-term, a extra drastic redesign is likely to be crucial.
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