Overview of Overwatch’s September 24 PTR Patch Notes

Overwatch’s latest balance patch has officially been announced and is currently available to test on the PTR. Patch 1.41 brings some massive changes to heroes like Sigma and Orisa that desperately needed balancing, as well as some adjustments to some more unexpected characters. Below is an overview of the more major changes being made. To see the complete list, click here.

Hero Buffs and Nerfs

D.Va: Buff

Defense Matrix

• Regeneration rate increased from 12.5% to 16% per second
• Delay before regeneration begins lowered from 1 second to 0.75 seconds

This adjustment to D.Va should help make her matrix a more viable option and help her defensively combat damage coming from behind the enemy shield.

Image Courtesy of Blizzard Entertainment

Sigma: Nerf

Kinetic Grasp

• No longer blocks Chain Hook and Whip Shot

Gravitic Flux

• High gravity effect duration reduced from 1.2 to 0.9 seconds

Experimental Barrier

• Regeneration rate reduced from 175 to 150 per second
• Now has a 1-second cooldown after recalling the barrier
• Initial 0.2 second cast time removed

Overall, these changes are ones that the OW community have been asking for since Sigma’s release, especially as it pertains to his barrier. These should greatly help to reduce Sigma’s domination of ranked games and bring the double barrier meta down to Earth a bit.

Lucio: Buff

Crossfade

• Speed boost’s effect increased from 20% to 25%

Amp It Up

• Speed boost’s amplification increased from 50% to 60%

Wall Ride

• Speed buff reduced from 40% to 30%

Although the changes to Wall Ride are a slight nerf, Lucio overall serves to benefit greatly from the changes coming in this patch. With dive making a potential reentry, Lucio may be one of the premier healers in the coming meta.

Winston: Buff

Barrier Projector

• Duration increased from 6 to 9 seconds
• Health increased from 600 to 700

Speaking of dive coming back into play, Winston’s barrier just got significantly stronger and longer-lasting. This will give him more staying power and the ability to create more space in the enemy backline, but shouldn’t serve to make him imbalanced.

[Related: Biggest Takeaways from Overwatch’s Latest PTR Patch Notes]

Image Courtesy of Blizzard Entertainment

Symmetra: Nerf

Photon Barrier

• Duration reduced from 15 to 12 seconds
• Health reduced from 5000 to 4000

Sentry Turret

• Damage per second reduced from 50 to 40

Photon Projector

• Players impacted by the primary fire beam should now hear a louder impact sound

Overall, this nerf hits Symmetra pretty hard. Just about every aspect of her kit takes a beating here, with an especially big reduction to her turret’s damage output. She may be a much less viable option moving forward.

Conclusions

Overall, this is a patch that should be welcomed with open arms to the many adversaries of the double barrier meta and hits on a lot of the notes that the community has been advocating for. Ideally, the coming meta will be one that is less strict in its construction and allows for more malleable setups. This author personally sees this patch as a step in the right direction, but only time will tell.

As a reminder, this patch is not live yet, but expect it hit live servers sometime in the first two weeks of October. Exactly two weeks from now would mark October 7th, which would also make sense to be the beginning of Overwatch’s Halloween Terror event, according to last year’s timeline. Until then, make sure to check out the September 2019 Tier List to see which heroes are still most viable heading into this new patch and stay tuned for more news and updates!

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