Blizzard Entertainment has followed through with Jan. 21’s Experimental Card and tuned down Echo, Tracer, and Zenyatta in last night’s Overwatch live patch.
The three heroes have been performing “too well” against high health targets, working together to dish out absurd amounts of damage in seconds to tanks, according to the developers.
Here’s the full list of patch notes for Overwatch’s Jan. 28 update.
Hero changes
Echo
Tri-Shot
- Ammo reduced from 15 to 12
Focusing Beam
- Duration reduced from 2.5 seconds to two seconds
The patch aims to reduce the maximum firing duration of Echo’s primary weapon and Focusing Beam to “lower her sustained damage output” without impacting her “burst damage potential against squishier targets,” lessening her effectiveness against tanks.
Tracer
Pulse Pistols
- Min-Max damage falloff rescaled from 12 to 23 meters down to 12 to 20 meters
The nerf, while on the lighter side of things, will cause the damage of Tracer’s Pulse Pistols to “scale down faster” when targets are outside of her optimal distance, according to the devs. This should make her less threatening at mid-range.
Zenyatta
Orb of Harmony
- Projectile speed reduced from 120 to 90
Orb of Discord
- Projectile speed reduced from 120 to 90
- Damage amplification reduced from 30 percent to 25 percent
With Zenyatta’s effectiveness to enable team-wide damage output, the devs are taking “some power” out of the Orb of Discord by “reducing both its total damage amplification” as well as the “speed at which it can be applied over long distances.” This change will make Zenyatta’s projectile speed match his primary fire.
The patch is now live on Windows PC, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One.
