With Season 2 of Overwatch 2 now live, a lot of new changes to both heroes and maps are here, listed in the latest patch notes. This includes the addition of new tank hero Ramattra, along with big changes to heroes like Doomfist, Sojourn, Kiriko and more. Keep in mind, Ramattra will not be available in Competitive until two weeks from now.
🗣️#Overwatch2 Season 2 Patch Notes, anyone?
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We’ll be discussing Season 2 Patch Notes with Lead Hero Designer @GW_Alec & The @MattMrX!
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Hero balance changes for Season 2
Here are all the hero balance changes in the Season 2 patch, starting with some of the weakest heroes from Season 1 of Overwatch 2.
Doomfist is back
There are a lot of changes for Doomfist in Season 2, with his abilities staying the same but getting a lot of tuning. For example, his well-known Rocket Punch does more damage when it hits enemies but does less when that enemy hits a wall. The stun doesn’t last as long but now has a minimum stun time, even if the punch isn’t empowered by his Power Block. Plus, both the cooldown and cancel time of the ability are shorter, meaning players can make quicker decisions and punch more.
Other big changes coming to Doomfist include his ultimate Meteor Strike, which guaranteed empowers his next Rocket Punch alongside slowing enemies hit by a second longer. Lastly, his passive ability The Best Defense is stronger, giving him up to 200 health of extra shielding and an increased amount per ability hit.
Junker Queen buffed
As for Junker Queen, the nerfs that hit her kit back at the start of Season 1 proved to be too strong to make her viable. Now, in Season 2, she is a little better. The team made her torso and head easier to hit for enemies, but also slightly adjusted her ultimate Rampage. The bleeding effect from it lasts half a second less, but her ultimate is now 10% easier to get. Her Commanding Shout ability has a second less cooldown, and her Adrenaline Rush passive ability heals her for 25% more than it used to.
Bastion’s ultimate gets better
Bastion’s rework put him in an interesting spot, but players quickly understood to avoid his ultimate. With how easy it was to do so, the team made it so his artillery drops 0.4 seconds faster. It does 50 damage less, but the delay between placing shots is also faster. This essentially means that his ultimate has a better chance of landing on enemies now, but doesn’t do as much damage as before. On top of that, his Eeconfigure ability has a 2-second shorter cooldown now.
Sojourn gets her railgun nerfed
The change everyone in Season 1 was waiting for, Sojourn is finally getting nerfed. The delay in which her railgun charge takes to drain is 3 seconds shorter, with more damage falloff at range. The railgun’s critical damage goes from double damage to 1.5x, meaning the charge you get is exactly how much damage extra you are doing on the base shot. To compensate for those changes, the team made her primary fire a little stronger, 1 extra damage per projectile, and her Overlock charges 20% faster.
Kiriko gets some balance changes
As for Kiriko, the team remarks that she is relatively well-balanced, but implemented some minor changes. On top of an auto-wall-climb hero option, her ultimate gets the biggest change. Kitsune Rush’s cost is now 10% increased, reducing both the movement speed and cooldown rate bonus it gives. However, her Protection Suzu takes even less time to cast now, and she has 15 kunai instead of twelve. Plus, with a new hold-to-activate option for Swift Step, her kit hasn’t changed much.
Best of the rest
That’s all for major changes, but other heroes did get some updates. For example, Mercy’s Caduceus Blaster is now better and takes less time to swap to. Ana’s Sleep Dart has a 1-second shorter cooldown. Tracer’s Pulse Pistols do more damage but are now fixed from the recent bug that made her falloff damage disappear.
Last but not least, Symettra’s beams now charge up faster, but also disappear quicker. She takes more ammo to use her beam, but shooting it at barriers recharges it like it used to.
New map pool and other updates
As for Season 2’s map pool, we already knew which maps were coming in. Now, we know officially which Day/Night cycles each map will have, officially from the patch notes.
Push
New Queen Street – Morning
Colosseo – Evening
Esperança – Morning
Hybrid
Blizzard World – Overcast
Eichenwalde – Evening
King’s Row – Evening
Midtown – Morning
Paraíso – Morning
Escort
Dorado – Evening
Junkertown – Morning
Circuit Royal – Night
Rialto – Morning
Route 66 – Night
Shambali Monastery – Night
Control
Busan – Night
Ilios – Evening
Lijiang Tower – Dawn
Nepal – Evening
Oasis – Morning
As for other general fixes in the Season 2 patch, the Control game mode had a bug that resided for all of Season 1 of Overwatch 2. When a team was retaking the point and would normally trigger overtime before winning the map, overtime would be skipped. That is gone, now reverted back to the original version of Control, where a team retaking the point and getting it to 99% will trigger overtime no matter what.
