Overwatch 2 Update Promises Ranked Changes, More Frequent Balance Updates

Overwatch 2 Season 3 has been a frequent topic of discussion as of late with Blizzard saying it has plans to change how ultimate charges work among other things, and this week, the Overwatch 2 team offered a brief overview of some of the things it has in mind for next season and the one afterwards. Those changes include a commitment to more frequent balance changes thanks to some work done on how the team hotfixes things as well as plans to make the game's competitive mode more favorable for those who've been frustrated by it.

The ranked mode was one of the first topics of conversation in the blog post penned by Overwatch 2 game director Aaron Keller. Keller acknowledged some of the confusion and frustrations around this more competitive experience and said that there are plans to change things in Season 3, but we'll have to wait for Season 4 to better understand Blizzard's plans for the mode.

"The new Ranked mode suffered from poor comprehension. There was confusion around players' real rank and how that translated to their skill level, difficulty forming groups with friends, and a negative impression of the matchmaker when players of different ranks were put in the same match (even if their skill levels were similar)," Keller said. "We will be implementing some changes in S3 and quite a few more in S4 all aimed at creating more clarity in the system. More details on short-term changes and long-term vision will be coming soonTM."

Balance updates were something else that came up in the discussion, a topic that's been talked about often recently due to the Roadhog situation. Nerfs for that hero were supposedly going to come through earlier than they did, but it wasn't until just recently that the hero's one-shot powers got nerfed. Keller said that the team's worked on its hotfixing systems and hopefully will be nimbler with changes like those that come between the bigger updates.

"Balance frequency is a big topic," Keller said. "Bug fixes to hot fixing should enable us to address balance faster and would have enabled us to tune Hog earlier in S2. We're still planning an initial and midseason patch each season, but now have the full ability to fill in between those as necessary."

Overwatch 2 Season 3 does not yet have a set start date but is expected to get underway in February.