Reaper is actually a tankbuster after Overwatch’s latest patch

Sure, Reaper’s blazing shotguns have always been a little bit scary, but Overwatch’s latest patch made them even more powerful.

And Blizzard didn’t even have to adjust the damage done by his dual-wielded guns. Patch 1.12 boosted the DPS hero’s survivability by upgrading his passive, The Reaping. Though his healing health orbs have been removed, they’ve been replaced by something better—automatic healing. Reaper will now regain 20 percent of all damage done to heroes as health. That’s huge.

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Reaper

• The Reaping (Passive)
• Removed health orbs
• Now regains 20 percent of all damage done to heroes as health

The adjustment makes Reaper particularly scary against tanks that have a lot of health for Reaper to soak up—so that’s D.Va, Winston, Reinhardt, and Roadhog. Winston players, in particular, need to be wary. New Reaper isn’t exactly a nerf to dive compositions, but playing with Winston as a solo tank is going to be much more challenging. D.Va will likely see more play, as she’ll be essential in protecting herself and others with her defense matrix from taking damage and giving Reaper health.

Now that Roadhog can’t actually one-shot heroes too often anymore—he, too, got slight nerfs—he’ll be susceptible to Reaper’s weapons once again. He’s just got so much health to give back to Reaper: And with less damage dealing ability, it’s going to be harder for Roadhog to take Reaper on.

Roadhog

• Head hitbox size reduced by 20 percent
• Scrap Gun
• Bullet damage decreased by 33 percent
• Fire rate increased by 30 percent
• Clip size increased from four to five

Roadhog did, however, have his head hitbox size reduced by 20 percent, which should, in theory, help him stay alive. Blizzard said his head was “abnormally large” compared to other heroes of a similar size.

Trying to balance out the nerf to Roadhog’s Scrap Gun bullet damage, Blizzard increased Roadhog’s fire rate by 30 percent and increased his clip size from four to five. The development team maintains that his DPS output should remain “roughly the same,” but Roadhog players aren’t convinced.

Roadhog could notoriously one-shot many of Overwatch’s squisher heroes—like Tracer—and that’s no longer an option. Gone are the days of flanking, one-shot hooks.

Despite this all sounding like a major nerf, it technically evens out. Roadhog shoots faster and has more bullet capacity. But will that be enough to see him played much more, especially now that Reaper is stronger? Probably not.

McCree

• Deadeye
• Targets now begin locking on after 0.2 seconds, instead of 0.8 seconds
• Damage accumulated over the first 1.0 seconds increased from 20 to 80 (damage per second after the first 1.0 seconds is unchanged)

Overwatch’s 1.12 patch is rounded out by a buff to McCree’s Deadeye ultimate. Previously, Deadeye was useless as anything besides a zoning tool—which hardly made it seem like an ultimate. Players had more than enough time to remove themselves from McCree’s line of sight, making any big plays a rarity.

Not only does his ultimate ability begin ramping up faster, but it does more damage over the first one second after locking on—and that makes him pretty scary. Likewise, players can also use McCree’s Deadeye as a super quick reload by canceling it early on in the animation. Before the adjustment, canceling the animation was much slower. It’s not always worth wasting your ultimate for a reload, but in certain instances, it’s powerful.

Players are still getting used to the adjustments, so this patch’s impact on the Overwatch meta is still yet to be seen. But given how major a few of these changes are, we’re likely to—at least—see a slight change.