Following the Bastion/Mcree whinefest, lets talk Widowmaker

[Tharkkun]

Don't you just assume her Ultimate is always up if the other team has a Widowmaker?

[xhisors]

Don't you just assume her Ultimate is always up if the other team has a Widowmaker?

Exactly at this point you should always assume its up.

If people had a notification that widows ult was up... nobody would ever peek corners and it would be useless. They would just sit there and wait till its done.

The quickness that widow can get her ult is the problem IMO. I can get her ult within a minute casually if there is plenty to shoot at, my record is 24 seconds. That in itself is broken. I don't think widow should have her utly up 50%+ of the the match or every major engage just about. To fix this they need to nerf how much generation she gets for dealing damage and getting kills.

Her ulty is so crucial to the outcome of so many matches. People underestimate it so often.

[RuneDK]

So after the Bastion whine train and now the ongoing Mcree QQ I think some people have also mentioned Widow but shes not as discussed as the rest. I don't believe she is OP per se but I do believe she is a little overtuned. I know a lot of people are going to flame but just hear me out.

So she is supposed to be a long ranged sniper. She is supposed to one shot most squishies in one hit and that's fine, that's her niche. However I do believe she is overtuned because she has no drawbacks outside of the obvious "get in her face" which is a given but all heroes have a 'counter' like that. Her body shots pretty much one shot anything that isn't a tank even if they're not charged to 100%. The only drawback to her primary mode of fire is that it gives her position away but again that is a given. This is a counter to her niche she fills not to her itself.

She has no drawback to missing all of her shots and only hitting her last one. She can fire them off so fast and they don't need to charge to even get a kill. They will kill squishies in one hit and if they don't they will leave them almost dead. She isn't punished for having bad aim. She can fire these off way too quickly and the core mechanic of them, the charge, can almost be ignored since things drop like flies if they leave cover. Maybe I'm just a lowly noob that just needs to git gud but I am wondering what the rest of the player base thinks because I don't think I'm the only one. Anyone have any ideas as to how they could fix her as well?

I don't think she's overpowered or overtuned at all...Now if she had a one hit kill ultimate that lasted 8-10 seconds regardless of power/shot location then yes she'd be ridiculous...but she's really squishy and overall has a high skill cap mostly because sniping in most games require more skill to hit moving targets etc...So...No they shouldn't touch her...she's fine as is.

[Rudol Von Stroheim]

Exactly at this point you should always assume its up.

If people had a notification that widows ult was up... nobody would ever peek corners and it would be useless. They would just sit there and wait till its done.

The quickness that widow can get her ult is the problem IMO. I can get her ult within a minute casually if there is plenty to shoot at, my record is 24 seconds. That in itself is broken. I don't think widow should have her utly up 50%+ of the the match or every major engage just about. To fix this they need to nerf how much generation she gets for dealing damage and getting kills.

Her ulty is so crucial to the outcome of so many matches. People underestimate it so often.

It's an amazing ultimate really, especially when you've got a beastly WM. It's totally not fair. x.x; People who think it's crap, really have no sense of strategy. I don't know how many times I capped an approaching Genji or an enemy sniper in the head as they peeked around a corner with that ultimate up. In fact, I did it multiple times one game because I was somehow getting it up for almost every counter-attempt against me.

I could live with a build-up adjustment IF it was also accompanied by an increased scope-up time to mitigate the insane shit pros can do now.

- - - Updated - - -

I don't think she's overpowered or overtuned at all...Now if she had a one hit kill ultimate that lasted 8-10 seconds regardless of power/shot location then yes she'd be ridiculous...but she's really squishy and overall has a high skill cap mostly because sniping in most games require more skill to hit moving targets etc...So...No they shouldn't touch her...she's fine as is.

Er, the hitboxes in this game are enormous and in most games, snipers are cited as the most frustrating and often most OP thing to contend with. It's hard to balance them to where they're not utter shit or just outright broken. Trust me, been in gaming a long time and played just about every FPS known to man. It's why I'm baffled Blizzard even decided to add the archetype into the game to begin with. It's asking for trouble where it wasn't necessary in the first place.

[xhisors]

I could live with a build-up adjustment IF it was also accompanied by an increased scope-up time to mitigate the insane shit pros can do now.

Yeah, currently its 1 second build up time for 100% power. You only need 70% to one shot the back line, specifically lucio/mercy. Quickscoping will become more of an issue as players get better. I think it needs to be increased to about 1.3 seconds over 1.0. This would force a 1 second ramp up time to 1 shot the squish players including if you only get a body shot on zen/tracer.

Widow can be counter pretty hard with a good genji/tracer lets not forget winston who shreds widow. So the nerf to her scope time can't be increased to much IMO.

[Rudol Von Stroheim]

Yeah, currently its 1 second build up time for 100% power. You only need 70% to one shot the back line, specifically lucio/mercy. Quickscoping will become more of an issue as players get better. I think it needs to be increased to about 1.3 seconds over 1.0. This would force a 1 second ramp up time to 1 shot the squish players including if you only get a body shot on zen/tracer.

Widow can be counter pretty hard with a good genji/tracer lets not forget winston who shreds widow. So the nerf to her scope time can't be increased to much IMO.

Her power build-up bothers me less than quick-scoping because the latter, as given players get better, will be much to deal with. We've already seen how over-the-top that shit can get in some of these linked videos. I don't mind her power so much as I'm bothered by her ability to also be nimble and omnipotent due to her ultimate as well. WM should setup and be largely immobile when using her scope. She's got an AR and other tools for when things get up close and personal as is, no need for quick-scope headshots.

[Lorianus]

I don't have a problem with Wm sniping, and I don't really play her due to carpal tunnel and a slight hand shakieness. I mean it isn't like she is any different than the letality of a sniper in any other fps game, if anything she is less lethal because other games don't have a charge up feature on sniper rifles. She could use less range on her zipline though, the go to move when she is in trouble is to zipline blindly in any direction to be anywhere but there and it pretty much will reach there.

Your comparsion would be true if Overwatch would have bullet travel time and bullet drop on widowmaker but she is pure hitscan you dont have to lead your targets, you dont have to shoot above your targets its just: is your crosshair anywhwere on the hitbox of your enemy ? when the answer is yes you have a hit marker, and that right there is the biggest problem with her and all the other non rocket/laser shooting heros in the game in my opinion.

And i know one could argue with "but overwatch is not your run of the mill modern military FPS", yes thats true but if the bullets were physicaly in the game world with travel time and drop it would bring up the skill ceiling for all classes that use hitscan currently and that in my book would be a good thing.

But it would also mean that its heavier on the blizzard servers because they then also have to calculate each bullet from every player.

[xhisors]

Her power build-up bothers me less than quick-scoping because the latter, as given players get better, will be much to deal with. We've already seen how over-the-top that shit can get in some of these linked videos. I don't mind her power so much as I'm bothered by her ability to also be nimble and omnipotent due to her ultimate as well. WM should setup and be largely immobile when using her scope. She's got an AR and other tools for when things get up close and personal as is, no need for quick-scope headshots.

Yes, but by increasing her power build up also slows down how quickly the scope damage is for quick scoping - the scoped damage is actually lower than the AR sub ~20% power. So by increasing the time slows down quickscoping arial shots which I love to do . Currently a quickscope headshot at 50% power can only one shot Tracer/Zen, by changing the time to 1.3(Full power) they would need to wait till ~65%(~.7 quick scope time up from .5%) That time difference is actually huge in the long run for arial shots.

Her AR also is arguably the weakest gun in the game, it does 15 damage per hit and the range is absolute garbage with even worse bullet spread.

[Noxina]

Maybe they should treat her weapon more like a DMR, her rate of fire of fully charged shots is way absurd and just screams to spam body shots instead of trying to get better for headshots.

What i mean with that is dmg tuning so that the 150 hp heroes would also need 2 shots.

You need to be able to kill Zenyatta (or how ever his name is spelled) in a body shot, or else you'll die instant if he gets a discordant orb on you. One of my pals plays a lot of Zenyatta, and it is crazy how much damage that zen robot got!

Earlier I was a bit against the whole "Omg WM is so OP", but after doing some more research, seen a few youtube videos and even streams, I kinda have to agree. I don't quite understand the hit box in this game, there is so many shots that looks like they will miss, but still you hit. And headshots that looks like bodyshots etc.. However when I play him I need to hit square on if I want to hit.. Guess it is something to do with latency etc?

What they can do, imo, is to increase the charge rate, so it takes like 2 seconds for a fully charged shot. AND increase the bullets it takes, we got these 3 bars, and then just increase the bullets needed for ever bar, something like 2-4-6 bullets, so at fully charged a WM have to reload after 5 shots, sure that is still a lot of shots and in some cases enough to take down 2-3 targets, if not the whole team with lucky headshots.
And they could increase the spread in her hip firing mode.
The ultimate they could just increase the charge rate at, now you can keep it up almost all the time as a good WM.

[xhisors]

You need to be able to kill Zenyatta (or how ever his name is spelled) in a body shot, or else you'll die instant if he gets a discordant orb on you. One of my pals plays a lot of Zenyatta, and it is crazy how much damage that zen robot got!

Earlier I was a bit against the whole "Omg WM is so OP", but after doing some more research, seen a few youtube videos and even streams, I kinda have to agree. I don't quite understand the hit box in this game, there is so many shots that looks like they will miss, but still you hit. And headshots that looks like bodyshots etc.. However when I play him I need to hit square on if I want to hit.. Guess it is something to do with latency etc?

What they can do, imo, is to increase the charge rate, so it takes like 2 seconds for a fully charged shot. AND increase the bullets it takes, we got these 3 bars, and then just increase the bullets needed for ever bar, something like 2-4-6 bullets, so at fully charged a WM have to reload after 5 shots, sure that is still a lot of shots and in some cases enough to take down 2-3 targets, if not the whole team with lucky headshots.
And they could increase the spread in her hip firing mode.
The ultimate they could just increase the charge rate at, now you can keep it up almost all the time as a good WM.

Doubling the ramp up time would be such a huge nerf she wouldn't be able to kill anyone on the fly. Oh look Pharah ulty? Let me sit here for 2 seconds while she destroys my team, or any other ult for that matter. We would need to camp corners harder than we do now, I think her gameplay as it is feels good and only needs a small tweak. Read my previous posts, 1.3 seconds in almost perfect imo as well as a ulty generation nerf.

If you increase it to much, it becomes so much of a nerf that you would force widows to play another hero(most likely hanzo who currently needs a buff) that can compete at a similar level as she is now.

I'll say it again, I think people complain about widow and not hanzo because hanzo is terrible compared to widow. Bring on the hanzo buffs!

[Rudol Von Stroheim]

Doubling the ramp up time would be such a huge nerf she wouldn't be able to kill anyone on the fly. Oh look Pharah ulty? Let me sit here for 2 seconds while she destroys my team, or any other ult for that matter. We would need to camp corners harder than we do now, I think her gameplay as it is feels good and only needs a small tweak. Read my previous posts, 1.3 seconds in almost perfect imo as well as a ulty generation nerf.

If you increase it to much, it becomes so much of a nerf that you would force widows to play another hero(most likely hanzo who currently needs a buff) that can compete at a similar level as she is now.

I'll say it again, I think people complain about widow and not hanzo because hanzo is terrible compared to widow. Bring on the hanzo buffs!

If you don't nerf quick-scoping, she will remain overpowered. That is the main area of concern right now. Yes, her ultimate is a bit much, but what makes her a load of bullshit is when you're watching replays of one snapping to and fro targets while running and jumping with virtually no scope up-time. She can still counter people using alts and all that, she just won't be able to run-n'-gun and pull her scope up in an instantaneous moment. She needs to be less mobile when utilizing her scope, it's that simple.

Messing with her charge time or raw damage output will likely result in too much of a nerf.

The idea is to counter the ridiculous scaling that can occur with her in the hands of much more proficient players. That has to be squashed, much like it's going to be with McCree.

[Didrah]

If you don't nerf quick-scoping, she will remain overpowered. That is the main area of concern right now. Yes, her ultimate is a bit much, but what makes her a load of bullshit is when you're watching replays of one snapping to and fro targets while running and jumping with virtually no scope up-time. She can still counter people using alts and all that, she just won't be able to run-n'-gun and pull her scope up in an instantaneous moment. She needs to be less mobile when utilizing her scope, it's that simple.

Messing with her charge time or raw damage output will likely result in too much of a nerf.

The idea is to counter the ridiculous scaling that can occur with her in the hands of much more proficient players. That has to be squashed, much like it's going to be with McCree.

Players on my server have already identified the good widows (90% wm played and 80hs+) and now tend to insta quit/dodge because they dont want to deal with this absurd character making their in game experience miserable. It's just that simple.

- Her ultimate charges way too fast and provides a huge advantage for her whole team. The charge rate needs to be increased.
- Quick Scope makes absolutely no sense at all, every non-tank hero dies in a charged shot + a 0.5 sec shot afterwards leaving you no time to react/heal.
- She counters almost 80% of the non-tank heroes making her the best all-around pick.
- Above average mobility and a pretty good secondary fire mode. I'd remove that machine gun and replace it with a secondary weapon.. maybe a gun like mercy's.
- The only counter to a good WM (other than winston jumping on her face) is to have a good WM on your team.

IMO her whole design is broken and it's the only character that makes me salty. Don't get me wrong.. It's amazing what they can do with her but it's a bit too much. I'm wondering if she's the most broken sniper in recent FPS...

[xhisors]

If you don't nerf quick-scoping, she will remain overpowered. That is the main area of concern right now. Yes, her ultimate is a bit much, but what makes her a load of bullshit is when you're watching replays of one snapping to and fro targets while running and jumping with virtually no scope up-time. She can still counter people using alts and all that, she just won't be able to run-n'-gun and pull her scope up in an instantaneous moment. She needs to be less mobile when utilizing her scope, it's that simple.


Messing with her charge time or raw damage output will likely result in too much of a nerf.

The idea is to counter the ridiculous scaling that can occur with her in the hands of much more proficient players. That has to be squashed, much like it's going to be with McCree.

Really the only thing that makes her broken is her ultimate, everything else really isn't bad(Just minor tweaks I think need to change). The quick scopping players are not getting 1 shot kills with it if they are truely quickscoping like in COD. They hit the target 2 or sometimes 3 times, and when they do get 1 shot kills they held it down for at least 70% charge.. which is .7 seconds. Remember anything under 20% charge is weaker than her AR for equivalent body and headshots.

Nerfing the character because a small percentage is really good with her, is not the reason to nerf a character. If that was the case we should nerf genji, because he can be unstoppable in the right hands. Same with every other hero... we have to look at what widow brings to the table as a whole, not what can be done by .5% of the community. Also not to mention players shouldn't be running in when they know the enemy has a widow... play accordingly, hide behind giant blue rectangles ect. .

In the current meta and pugs - one player being extremely good can win team fights for the whole team. I've seen Torb completely destroy teams in pugs, yet in scrims against higher teams, he gets thrashed and does almost no damage. Should we nerf him because a set few people excel at him and his turret placement ect? (Just giving it a different perspective)

If she was as powerful and as easy to do things as bastion, i could see that argument on scaling, but because its not I can't agree with that point.

Side note - I think there is some issues with server tick rate as well being so low, it makes her easier for people to play. With a higher tick, I think that would indirectly nerf her. Maybe not though haha.

[Notshauna]

She's in the top 25% of characters, absolutely but I don't believe she needs a nerf. She has counters, Reinhardt effectively removes her ability to do anything and she incredibly weak to mobile characters and assassination, but her pick potential, range and mobility are all very high. She's not McCree who is exceptional at all ranges and has the best ability in the game and the best offensive ult. Or Reinhardt who's shield pretty much counters poke, charge one shots every non tank and has an extremely long range, instant stun as an ultimate. Or Mercy who's ultimate is so powerful that she is mandatory on every team.

[xhisors]

Players on my server have already identified the good widows (90% wm played and 80hs+) and now tend to insta quit/dodge because they dont want to deal with this absurd character making their in game experience miserable. It's just that simple.

- Her ultimate charges way too fast and provides a huge advantage for her whole team. The charge rate needs to be increased.
- Quick Scope makes absolutely no sense at all, every non-tank hero dies in a charged shot + a 0.5 sec shot afterwards leaving you no time to react/heal.
- She counters almost 80% of the non-tank heroes making her the best all-around pick.
- Above average mobility and a pretty good secondary fire mode. I'd remove that machine gun and replace it with a secondary weapon.. maybe a gun like mercy's.
- The only counter to a good WM (other than winston jumping on her face) is to have a good WM on your team.

IMO her whole design is broken and it's the only character that makes me salty. Don't get me wrong.. It's amazing what they can do with her but it's a bit too much. I'm wondering if she's the most broken sniper in recent FPS...

-Ulty does charge to fast - needs to change

-Every hero should die with a headshot full charge except tanks. So if you got hit twice, my question is after being hit the first time, why didn't you get behind cover? There is plenty of time, I get hit by widows and don't die after it all the time... You should always be careful when you know theres a widow. I don't think this is a valid point "sniper can kill me in one hit as a squishy caracter that can kill everyone else in the same amount of time, therefore nerf widow" I just don't follow. You can't make her useless to the point where nobody picks her just because your team isn't countering her.

-She is not a counter to 80% of characters. Sorry, but shes not. She is strong against a few and weak against a few and neutral with most.

-Decent mobility escape, but once its on cd.. good luck. Also her secondary fire mode is the worst damage of every gun in the game. It does 15 damage per hit, and its spread makes the range on it horrible. It does damage yeah, but in no way is it good compared to any other weapons.

-Counters to widow: Genji, Tracer, Widow, Winston, Reaper(most overlooked flanker, widow can't take him on in close range.. ever), Reinhardt(Literally protects his whole team and widow can do nothing about it)


It sounds like your team just isn't countering widow at all and just giving up free kills. I can understand the frustration, but any character can dominate a match.

[Sky High]

widow herself is incredibly weak when put up against other heroes toe to toe. really I put her in the same category as bastion and McCree. 10% are actaully good at them, 90% pick the obvious spots and never move, eagerly awaiting a flank or hook to the face.

[Tharkkun]

It's also highly possible some of these Widowmakers are cheating. We'll see when the first ban wave goes out in North America.

[Jester Joe]

The only thing I consider extremely strong about Widowmaker is, like most people said, her ultimate. And even then, she can't snipe through cover and she can be taken out quite easily with Winston (Or, if you really wanna play risky, try reflecting the headshot you know is coming back at her as Genji.)

The only character(s) right now that I see are really problematic are Junkrat and Tracer...I think both are way too strong and they have no weaknesses

For some reason people think backing up against Junkrat is good, or running in close.

You back up just to get hit by the bombs he missed with, you run in close and he'd have to be blind to miss. Stay at a range and chances are you can dodge the shots, as long as you're not in a small hallway.

[Jessicka]

I've not seen anyone run a full game as a WM today, been playing D.Va and Mercy myself, but when one shows up everyone just pounces and makes their life hell until they switch. She is very easily neutralised out the game, and pretty much unplayable because of how everyone reacts.

Meanwhile, I've come to the conclusion McCree does take down tanks far too easily.

[Rudol Von Stroheim]

Honestly, I'd rather deal with the best McCree versus the best Widowmaker, any day. I can often counter the former versus the latter a bit more efficiently, even though the former can still be a whole lot of bullshit.

If she doesn't get nerfed(mind you in not just a silly, stupid manner like a tiny uptick to her ultimate as that'd do fuck all) and the skill of WM players continues to climb, good chance, I'll just stop playing. I'm not even kidding. I've started dropping out of rooms after the first round if it becomes evident they've got a carrying WM. That isn't fun. That is far removed from anything being even remotely fun. There is often little to no counter to it save for another WM.

I've got other shit to play after all, not like I'm chained to this game. You guys can continue playing your "Cod-Sniper-Highl33t-R33ls-OMGISOGOOD" tripe until the end of time. I've already dealt with that enough as is in my gaming career and better balanced in those cases more often than not.