With Jeff Kaplan's latest developer update, we have new information about the future of Overwatch. Hero Pools and more aggressive balancing changes to impact the meta are on the agenda. The Overwatch League isn't to be outdone and has announced the changes that will come for the new season. They will only take effect on March 7.
In order to fully understand this article, we advise you to first read the one about the developer update below.
Jeff Kaplan spoke about the future of Overwatch, including hero balancing. From the arrival of Hero Pools to the upcoming changes to the new Lab feature on live servers, read all about it in this article!
How Hero Pools work in the Overwatch League
About the basic game, there is no certainty as to the number of banned heroes. We only know that Hero Pools will occur weekly, at least for Season 21. For the Overwatch League, things are a bit different.
From March 7, the Overwatch League will ban 1 Tank, 1 Support and 2 DPS every week.
- Heroes will be randomly selected from a pool of eligible heroes based on information gathered during the previous two weeks' matches.
- Only heroes who play regularly will be able to be part of this selection.
- No hero will be banned for two weeks in a row. Hero Pool won't be used for the Mid-Season Tournament, Play-in, Playoffs and Grand Final.
- Teams will be notified of the Hero Pool for the week approximately one week prior to the games.
This Hero Pool is expected to offer a wider range of team strategies, highlighting more heroes in the competition as players adapt and teams experience new compositions.
Overwatch League patches and updates
Last month, several updates were deployed including — for the first time — a balancing update directly on the live servers. Here's how the updates will be implemented on the competitive scene:
- The main goal is to quickly implement the updates on the professional version of the game.
- A new Overwatch update will impact the League two weekends after its deployment in the game.
- Updates won't be deployed in the middle of a weekend and will only be released the following weekend.
Changes may take place in the future, including on Hero Pools, based on feedback from teams, players, and fans to best adjust this new feature.
Overwatch 1.44 patch is now available on PC, PS4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch live servers. All the hero changes and balances can be found in this article — Hanzo, Reaper, Orisa, Sigma, and Baptiste.
