Blizzard turned heads yesterday by announcing that Overwatch 2’s most underrepresented support hero would be getting some much-needed reworks, as the developer strives to add diversity to its roster of support characters. Along with adding the new hero Lifeweaver to the game’s roster, Blizzard is making some significant changes to Brigitte, namely her Rally ultimate ability, that are intended to make her more “engaging and powerful” while the ability is active.
Rally’s rework includes a controversial return of a stun to Brig’s Shield Bash ability. In the transition to Overwatch 2, the stun was removed from Brigitte’s kit and replaced with a less oppressive knockback. Developers felt that Rally was missing the ability to garner impactful plays, and with the enormous buff, it appears as though that will certainly change.
Brigitte hero balance changes in Overwatch 2 season four
Brigitte is set to receive changes to two of her abilities on April 11. In addition to a massive rework to her Rally ultimate ability, developers are slightly nerfing the range of her Repair Pack to 25 meters. Given that it was previously 30 meters, players will likely barely notice it.
The decrease in range to Brig’s Repair Pack ability will likely be felt whenever she has a diving teammate that might be just a little bit overextended. This nerf could come into play if Brig is playing with a Tracer or Genji that dives the enemy backlines ever-so-slightly too early.
All changes coming to Brigitte’s Rally ultimate ability in Overwatch 2
The term “rework” truly is the case for Brigitte’s ultimate ability, six of her seven changes are related to Rally, and without looking at the patch notes, it may be different to tell what exactly remains the same from the ability’s previous iteration.
Rally will still last 10 seconds and affect allies that are within an 8.5-meter radius of Brigitte. She will still give other heroes 15 overhealth every .5 seconds, capping out at 100 overhealth.
Just about everything else has changed, however, including the way it impacts Brig herself. Along with getting 100 armor, putting her maximum potential health at 300, immediately, Brigitte’s normal shield is replaced with a significantly large one that is 750 health, up more than double from her normal shield’s 300.
On the season 4 test server, this means that if you break Brigitte’s shield and she has no shield hp remaining, all of that shield hp percentage is restored with the initiation of Rally. Essentially, pressing Q will give Brig a new shield with increased values no matter what the status of her normal shield was.
Related: Overwatch 2 season 4 full patch notes and updates
Meanwhile, the Rally shield will be able to stun enemies by using Shield Bash the same way that ability previously stunned opponents in the original Overwatch. However, with the shield’s significantly increased size, it has the surface area to stun multiple targets at the same time.
Given how many buffs Blizzard gave Rally, they had to make at least one tweak that would keep the ability from being too overly powerful. Along with the five different buffs that they gave Rally, the developers also nerfed the movement speed bonus it provided to just 15 percent, down from 30 percent. For a frame of reference, Lúcio’s speed buffing aura provides a base movement speed increase of 25 percent, and his Amp It Up boosts that aura to 60 percent for three seconds.
Overwatch 2 reaction to Brigitte’s Rally rework
Brig’s Rally rework has quickly led to a lot of skepticism and concern from fans. The stun from her Shield Bash in the original Overwatch was an ability that many gamers expressed a lot of frustration about.
Only a few other abilities in the game drew that same level of fan irritation, and one of them, Roadhog’s one-shot Chain Hook capability, was eliminated from the game in a balance patch.
So naturally, when the rework was announced players came out in droves to express their disapproval as best they knew how—with memes on social media.
Brigitte’s changes were announced as a part of a slew of season four hero balance changes that will go into effect at the beginning of the season on Tuesday, April 11. But if they become too powerful or unfun to play against, as many fans anticipate, don’t be surprised if Blizzard makes a tweak to Rally again during the game’s mid-season balance patch in about a month.
