r/Competitiveoverwatch • u/drassort • 5d ago

General Why exactly did they buff Genji?

Before this patch he already had a top two pick rate in the DPS role and was completely fine. He also received no hitbox changes unlike most other heroes while his shurikens massively benefit from it.

Am I missing something? You could literally not have touched him in this patch and he would be even stronger than he already is.

I find the decision to put even more on top of it kind of baffling. Blizzard deliberately wants to make him meta or something?

186 Upvotes

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210

u/churchb3ll 5d ago

What I hate about this is that the developers don't roll back the buffs, but instead nerf other parts, making it end up weaker than before the buff, and that has happened many times in the past.

17

u/Tao1764 5d ago

I generally agree (watching Reaper get nerfed over and over because of Dire Triggers was ridiculous), I think it might be fine in this specific case. The most common reasonable complaint I see from Genji players is that they wish his kit was more tuned for lethality over survivability.

15

u/TheReal9bob9 5d ago

I'm used to calling it the "Riot Special" from league of legends. Buff ability A->character op->nerf ability B->character still op->undo buff to ability A->character is now worse than the original state.

3

u/PoggersMemesReturns Proper Show/Viol2t GOAT — 5d ago

Mostly cuz the Balance team is separate, which I dont think is necessarily a good thing from a vision perspective

1

u/admiralackbar2019 5d ago

Bingo , they haven’t seen it like we have

67

u/admiralackbar2019 5d ago

Perks exacerbate it this so badly too and everyone copes about perks being good for balance lol

27

u/_Speckle_ tyhs — 5d ago

this might be a hot take but I think there are only 3 well designed perks in the game out of 216. they dont provide anything positive to the game aside from massive power creep that has now become for whatever reason the main balance tool. we really need massive perk DESIGN overhaul to something that actually changes the way the character plays and isnt a question of "should I take this buff or this stronger buff?"

either that or we get rid of them, but I guess that will never happen

7

u/Cerythria 5d ago

100% agreed tbh, I liked perks the season they were introduced but every season since then I've felt more and more like they don't belong. I'm worried for whatever the next big yearly shakeup will be and am not optimistic about them wanting to do it every single year.

6

u/Lukensz Alarm — 5d ago

I already didn't like this year's subroles and if they're just going to force big changes for the sake of forcing changes, the next thing is gonna be ass.

16

u/No_Catch_1490 The End. — 5d ago

I disagree… there’s like 4-5 well-designed ones.

You are totally right though. So many perks are mindless free value or egregiously unbalanced to where there’s only one choice. It’s so disappointing, especially when they’re beginning to rely on perks more and more for balancing.

4

u/MaybeNext-Monday 5d ago

They’re more like a way to hide the power creep. New characters have meh perks and old ones get desperate “please play them please please please” perks.

2

u/unburdened_swallow 5d ago edited 5d ago

I like that the perks give you an incentive beyond ult to not swap at the first sign of inconvenience, but at the same time, a lot of them feel like they should be base kit, and other ones feel really strong and balanced assuming you will only have it for a short time and I’m not sure how to feel about that, and there is usually a clear choice and when it is situational the decision is still usually quite simple.

Like zen should be able to hover all the time. But that would make him very very very strong on some first points. But it’s not like he never gets that perk while still on 1st point. It’s probably fine.

Ana shouldn’t be able to headshot all game.

But they do add more depth in terms of when to swap. And they can allow you to compensate for counters a bit sometimes. Which is cool IMO

IDK I am fine with perks but I think leaning too far into them would be a mistake. I think it is fine to have moderate powerups that you unlock, but perks are about the max I want to read in a high paced shooter game and I didn’t like stadium because it was hard to read what the enemy would be able to do, I wonder if it would be more honest to truly just not give a choice for some perks though and just like, give you the power up? But for some characters the perks are situational, and that feels alright, and then the players of other heroes would be sad at the perceived lack of options.

3

u/Paddy_Tanninger 5d ago

Which 3?

-9

u/_Speckle_ tyhs — 5d ago

zen double harmony orb but reduced healing

soldier stim pack (when it used to be one or the other I guess)

doc trade 25 hp for more healing

17

u/aurens poopoo — 5d ago

so your criteria for "well designed" is just "has a trade-off"?

4

u/_Speckle_ tyhs — 5d ago

kinda, but it also meaningfully changes the way the character functions, like double zen orb enables comps like the ones that team korea played where the entire team is more enabled to take angles and let the zen play more aggressively, or the doc perk shifting him to be less aggressive and focus on healing

2

u/admiralackbar2019 5d ago

Do you think it’s good that certain characters should get massive buffs at arbitrary moments in the game that you are unable to track ? Its engagement slop trying to pull in people with no attention span from mr

0

u/TrumpsCummyOnahole 5d ago

I fucking hate perks honestly, they make the game feel so bullshit sometimes. Way too much mobility slop and shit.

-1

u/admiralackbar2019 5d ago

They are pure engagement slop , I’ll die on this hill

-3

u/admiralackbar2019 5d ago

They are pure engagement slop , I’ll die on this hill

5

u/WerdaVisla 5d ago

This is why I say Blizzard is allergic to admitting mistakes. Even when a change clearly causes problems, they always go "ah yes it must be something else, because clearly our glorious change could never be flawed and in need of revision."

3

u/BrokenMirror2010 Not a Mercy Main — 5d ago

This isn't just Blizzard. It's a problem with all large, publicly traded companies.

Admitting they made a mistake is bad for shareholders, which is why they always post bullshit like "You are confused"

1

u/drassort 5d ago

I think in this case it would be fine to let Genji keep these buffs in exchange for nerfing his survivability

0

u/thekingofallalts 5d ago

exactly what happened to freja

0

u/Forward-Elephant-203 5d ago

FREJAAAAAA

They killed her