Overwatch 2's Most Independent Tank Is Becoming A Team Player

Overwatch 2’蝉 tenth season begins tomorrow, April 16, and it’蝉 bringing a new hero in Venture, a limited-time event that swaps the series’ good guys and bad guys, and a big balance patch to top it all off. A lot of these changes are predictably small adjustments, but one hero is getting a pretty substantial rework in season 10: the giant, mech-piloting hamster Wrecking Ball.

Introduced in 2018, Wrecking Ball is a tank character whose kit is all about disruption. His spherical mech is bulky, able to tether onto surfaces, and can swing into enemies with a lot of force. This makes him good for contesting points and causing havoc, but it also means he’蝉 one of the more independent tanks on the roster. Unlike shield-bearing heroes like Reinhardt and Sigma, Wrecking Ball’蝉 kit doesn’t interface with his own team all that much, as all his defensive abilities only help him while he barrels into the enemy backline. Until now, that is. The rework is tweaking a few of his abilities to help him bolster his teammates rather than just rolling in all by his lonesome.

The first change is to his Grappling Claw, which will now be able to retract toward wherever you attach it. This gives you a chance to close distance, allowing for tighter, more controlled movement and intentional disruption. But the more far-reaching change is to his Adaptive Shield. Before season 10, this ability allowed Wrecking Ball to generate a personal shield that became more powerful the more enemies were within his proximity. It still does that, but you can distribute this shield to your teammates if you choose to. This is up to 300 shield points, with each redistribution capping at 75 shields per teammate. This way, Wrecking Ball now has some defensive capabilities for his teammates, rather than lone wolfing every engagement. This is similar to Zarya’蝉 Particle Barriers, which can be used to defend teammates or herself depending on the situation.

With Overwatch 2 removing one tank from the standard team line-up established in the original game, the role has become far more complicated, as certain characters prioritize brawling and disruption over defense. Playing as a tank is about choosing which to focus on depending on the situation, but when some characters lean too hard into one or the other, they become suboptimal picks. Wrecking Ball has often felt like a DPS character with a big health pool. This rework makes him feel like more of a central part of the team who can help his allies, and I’m interested to see if it sticks.

The full patch notes read as follows:

Clash – New Game Mode Preview

Clash is an upcoming core game mode in Overwatch 2. Teams must battle back and forth over 5 capture points, with each captured objective adding a point to the prevailing team’蝉 score. Teams can win in two ways: either by having control of all five objectives at once, or by scoring five points total before the other team. Clash will be available as a limited-time trial through April 29.

How Clash is played

• 5 total objectives placed in a linear pattern on a mirrored map.
• Only one objective is active at a time.
• Matches start with the center objective active.
• Players capture an objective by standing on it and filling a progress bar. Capture progress cannot be made if enemy players are contesting the objective.
• When a team captures the current objective, they are awarded 1 point to their total score and a new objective moving forward from the scoring team’蝉 side, is activated.
• Objectives can be secured multiple times. If a team is pushed off an objective and the other team successfully captures it, the next active point will be in the opposite direction.

Win Conditions

Complete one of these conditions to win the match:

• A team has successfully captured 5 objectives throughout the match to reach a total score of 5.
• Regardless of score, a team manages to take the final objective (A or E) on the opponents’ side.

Hanaoka – New Map
Return to Japan in the first Clash map, Hanaoka. Explore the shops and restaurants around town or follow the scent of Sakura trees into the once-proud Shimada castle.

Mythic Hero Skin Updates

Mythic Hero Skins

• Mythic hero skins are now unlocked in the new Mythic Shop in exchange for Mythic Prisms.
• Mythic hero skins are unlocked for 50 Mythic Prisms with a starting set of customizations and then can be leveled up with 10 Mythic Prisms per level to unlock additional customizations.

Introducing Mythic Prisms

• Mythic Prisms can be earned in the Premium Battle Pass and used in the Mythic Shop to purchase the current featured Mythic hero skin for the season and select previous Mythic hero skins.
• Earning Mythic Prisms in the Premium Battle Pass is the fastest and easiest way to unlock a Mythic hero skin and all customizations each season. You can also purchase additional Mythic Prisms in game or in your platform’蝉 store marketplace.

General Updates

Challenges

• Completing Weekly Challenge milestones will now reward additional Battle Pass XP.
• Overwatch Coins that were earned in the Weekly Challenges can now be earned in the Battle Pass for all players.
• Reduced the number of Weekly Challenges.

Developer Comments: The number of Weekly Challenges has grown over time, and we are simplifying what players can aim to accomplish, while also making earning Battle Pass XP more straightforward.

Endorsement Changes

• Players who are actioned for disruptive behavior and reduced to Endorsement Level 0 cannot use text or voice chat features until they return to Endorsement Level 1.

Developer Comments: Since we added the Endorsement system to Overwatch, players who have been actioned because of social reports (Inappropriate Communication, Gameplay Sabotage, etc) have had their Endorsement Level reduced to Level 0. That part of the system isn’t changing, but going forward, Level 0 players will no longer be able to speak in voice channels or type in text chat in most modes.

Hide My Name

• Updated option in Streamer Protect, found in your Social Options.
• You are now able to hide your BattleTag from other players in your group and from your friends in the match as well.
• When enabled, anywhere your BattleTag is displayed to players during a match now displays a random anonymized BattleTag, instead of only to the player with the “Hide My Name” setting visibly enabled.

Developer Comments: “The “Hide My Name” setting in the Social Options now displays a random anonymized Battle Tag to all players in a match, instead of only to the player with the “Hide My Name” setting enabled. New settings have been added to “Hide My Name From Friends” and “Hide My Name From Group.” Of these two settings, “Hide My Name From Friends” takes priority when group members are also friends. A large list of hand-crafted BattleTags have been created to support this feature. Could it contain easter eggs or silly references?”

Progression

• Added progression badges/sub-badges and rewards for Venture. Rewards can be found in Hero Challenges.

Leaver Penalties

Two new thresholds for Unranked Leave Penalties have been added:

• Leaving 2 out of 20 games will result in a 5-minute suspension from queuing for most modes.
• 10 or more out of 20 games will result in a 48-hour suspension from queuing for most modes.
• All other threshold tiers are unchanged.

Leaving 10 games in Competitive Play will now result in a season ban regardless of the number of games completed.

• Players can still get banned from Competitive Play in as few as 5 games if they leave very consistently and don’t complete enough games to get back into good standing.

Games completed in Competitive Play now count toward the 20-game window of the Unranked Leaver Penalty.

Competitive Updates

Competitive Role-Specific Titles

• End-of-season titles for Competitive Role Queue now include the role the rank was achieved in.
• Examples include Champion Tank, Champion Support, Champion Damage, and Open Queue Champion.

Competitive Progress

• Each Role Rank Card now displays the associated Competitive Role-Specific title.
• Role Rank Cards can now be selected to open the Match History for the selected role.
• Match history will display the following: Map / Game Mode, Heroes / Role, Date, Score, Results of the match
• Match History can now be selected to open the Game Report for a match.

Grouping Restrictions

• All previous Competitive Grouping Restrictions have been removed.
  
  
• All groups in Competitive Play are now classified as Narrow or Wide.
• Players between Bronze and Diamond must be within 5 divisions of each other player in their group to be in a Narrow Group.
• Players at Master must be within 3 divisions of each other player in their group to be in a Narrow Group.
• Players at Grandmaster and Champion cannot be in Narrow groups, regardless of how close their ranks are. This restriction ensures that our highest-ranked players have the highest quality Narrow matches.
• Narrow Groups will always be matched against other Narrow Groups or solo players. If a group has both Wide and Narrow configurations of players, the Narrow configuration will always be prioritized.
• Any group that does not meet the criteria is considered a Wide Group.
• Wide Groups of 4 players may not queue. This restriction exists so that solo players are never required to make a Wide match.
• Wide Groups have increased queue times and reduced match quality because it’蝉 more difficult to find another group of players with the same ranks in the same roles to match against.
• The amount a player’蝉 Rank Progress changes after each match is modified by the group’蝉 width.
• The wider the group is, the less their ranks will change when winning or losing.
• The higher the rank of the highest-ranked player in a Wide Group, the less the ranks of all players in the group will change when winning or losing.
• Players will now be informed if the configuration of roles they have selected would result in a Wide Group.
• The Tier Legend has been updated, and a new banner has been added to explain the rules described above.

Rank Information

• New Modifier: “Wide”—this modifier reduces changes in Rank Progress when winning or losing matches. The wider your group, the less your Rank Progress will change with each win or loss.
• The modifier “Volatile” has been renamed to “Demotion.”
• Arrows displayed under the modifiers have been changed to point from left to right instead of right to left.
• New Modifier: Demotion Protection
• This modifier appears on the Rank Progress bar to denote when you did not go down in Skill Division because of a loss. If you lose the next match after, then you are dropped down to the previous Skill Division.
• Victory and Defeat have been added below the Rank Progress bar where modifiers are displayed.

Golden Weapons

• Golden weapons can now be purchased with either Legacy Competitive Points or 2024 Competitive Points. You cannot purchase weapons with a combination of both currencies.

Hero Updates

New Hero: Venture

• Venture has been added to the line-up.
• Venture is immediately available to play in Competitive Play.

Developer Comments: This is a pretty major change from past heroes, but we’ve always wanted to allow new heroes into Competitive when a new season for Overwatch 2 launches. In the past, we wanted to make sure new heroes were free of any bugs or outstanding balance issues, as well as giving players enough time to unlock a hero from the Battle Pass. Because of the recent hero trial, and now unlocking all heroes, we’re confident Venture is ready to jump into the action right away.

Tanks

Doomfist

Rocket Punch

• The empowered punch is no longer consumed when the windup is canceled by using Seismic Slam or Power Block.

Developer Comments: This quality-of-life improvement streamlines the transition between charging up an empowered Rocket Punch and another ability by removing the requirement of pressing the cancel input first.

Junker Queen

Carnage

• Impact damage increased from 90 to 105.

Reinhardt

Earthshatter

• Knockdown duration increased from 2.75 to 3 seconds.
• Shockwave range increased from 20 to 25 meters.

Dev Comment: This change will improve Sigma’蝉 ability to protect allies that are further away from him.

Sigma

Experimental Barrier

• Movement speed increased from 16.5 to 20 meters per second.

Developer Comments: The general goals here are to add a direct way for Wrecking Ball to support his allies aside from purely enemy team disruption, make the hero more approachable while also adding more avenues for skill expression, and improve quality of life around the grapple.

Wrecking Ball

Grappling Claw

• Hold the jump input while the Grappling Claw is attached to terrain to retract it, pulling yourself towards the anchor point. This action can be rebound in his hero settings.
• Now has a 1 second cooldown if Wrecking Ball never reaches ramming speed before canceling the ability. Interrupting him with Hack, Hinder, and stuns will still trigger the full cooldown.
• The maximum duration timer no longer triggers unless he reaches ramming speed.

Adaptive Shield

• Can now be reactivated to redistribute up to 300 overhealth to nearby allies, capping at 75 per person.
• Enemy and ally detection radius increased from 10 to 13 meters.

Minefield

• Health increased from 50 to 60.

Damage

Sombra

Virus

• Total damage over time decreased from 100 to 90.

Developer Comments: There is now more downtime before Tracer can safely reengage after driving her away and Pulse Bomb will require more precision.

Tracer

Recall

• Cooldown increased from 12 to 13 seconds.

Pulse Bomb

• Base projectile size decreased from 0.2 to 0.1 meters. The total projectile size is now 0.25 meters.

Developer Comments: We are redistributing the damage on some of their abilities so that positioning relative to the enemy and tracking a target are more important for dealing maximum damage.

Venture

Drill Dash

• Impact damage decreased from 60 to 40.
• Damage over time increased from 40 to 60.

Clobber

• Impact damage decreased from 40 to 30.
• Damage over time increased from 30 to 40.

Tectonic Shock

• Vertical knockback decreased by 30%.

Developer Comments: We are shifting support power around for further fine-tuning after the Hero Trial last season.

Support

Illari

Solar Rifle

• Primary fire recovery increased from 0.2 to 0.25 seconds.
• Secondary fire heal-per-second increased from 105 to 115.

Lucio

Sonic Amplifier

• Damage per projectile decreased from 20 to 18.

Sound Wave

• Damage increased from 35 to 45.

Lifeweaver

Rejuvenating Dash

• Heal increased from 50 to 60.

Tree of Life

• Pulse healing increased from 75 to 90.

Moira

Biotic Grasp

• Damage per second decreased from 65 to 60.

Coalescence

• Self-heal per second increased from 50 to 55.

Bug Fixes

General

• Hero Mastery Gauntlet - fixed a bug that could cause more AI teammates than intended.
• Fixed a bug with Wall Climb that could allow Heroes with the passive to climb infinitely.
• Fixed a bug with Diamond, Masters, and Grandmaster not playing any effects when entering the Top 500.
• Fixed a bug with duplicate entries on the Leaderboard.
• Fixed the missing flash notification on taskbar when joining a game as a backfill.

Maps

• Fixed in a previous update - resolved an issue where jump pads could become deactivated.

Circuit Royale

• Fixed an issue with the payload tires launching players unexpectedly.

Paraiso

• Fixed an area near the second point where the payload dock could negatively impact Earth Shatter and Tectonic Shock’蝉 ability to hit larger heroes.

Heroes

Echo

• Fixed an issue with Duplicate that could prevent a death being counted if it was used as Echo falls off the map.

Doomfist

• Fixed an interaction with Mei’蝉 Ice Wall that could allow you to get under the map.
• Fixed a bug with Power Block sounds triggering even if it was not blocking damage.

Illari

• Fixed an issue with Captive Sun affecting targets through floors and ceilings.

Junkrat

• Fixed a bug with Riptire receiving the self-healing passive.

Lifeweaver

• Fixed a bug where some un-targetable heroes could be healed by Tree of Life.

Mauga

• Fixed an interaction with Overrun and Brigitte’蝉 Shield Bash that resulted in Mauga being knocked down with Overrun active.

Mercy

• Fixed a bug with the Caduceus Staff not opening up with the Parasol emote and Pose.

Venture

• Fixed a bug that would prevent Drill Dash from activating while underground if the input was pressed while falling through the air and Burrow was active.
• Fixed a bug where Drill Dash could deal damage multiple times with the initial impact and instantly kill targets or knock them back exceedingly far.
• Fixed a bug where certain heroes were still being pushed back even if they escaped from Drill Dash.
• Fixed a bug where Venture would sometimes launch very far if using Drill Dash off a ledge while Burrowed.
• Fixed a bug where attempting to emerge during Burrow near ledges would sometimes end the ability prematurely.
• Fixed a bug where the third-person camera would snap back to first-person instantly if you were in the air when burrow ended.

• Fixed a bug where UI prompts for emerging and Drill Dash were not visible during Burrow.
• Fixed a bug that could allow players to prevent footfall audio from playing.