Overwatch: Upcoming Bastion Changes Revealed
By Alexander Pan 02 February 2017
Overwatch principal designer Geoff Goodman reveals a number of new balance changes that are coming for Bastion, such as increased magazine size and a tweaked self-repair mechanic.
Following the release of Overwatch last May, it didn’t take long for players to declare the defensive weapon of war (and bird aficionado) Bastion to be overpowered. While numerous balance changes and updates have come to the game since launch, Bastion has remained largely untouched and this has resulted in him becoming one of the characters with the lowest win and pick rate. However, Bastion fans don’t need to worry, because there are a number of changes coming soon that should help the friendly robot become a viable Overwatch character.
In a new post over at the Blizzard Forums, Overwatch principal designer Geoff Goodman followed up on his earlier comments about Bastion getting a buff by revealing a number of upcoming balance changes for both of the character’s modes. For Bastion’s Recon Mode – where he is able to run around – the robot’s bullet spread will be lowered and magazine size will be increased in order to “help with general viability.”
Moving onto Bastion’s Sentry Mode – when he is a stationary turret – Blizzard aims to turn the character into more of a “tank-buster and barrier-buster” by testing out a number of small tweaks, such as increased spread, the removal of headshots, and taking less damage while transformed.
And finally, Bastion’s Self-Repair mechanic will be getting a major tweak so that the character can now repair himself while moving and the animation can no longer interrupted when taking damage. In order to balance out the new Self-Repair changes, the mechanic will also now be on a resource system that’s similar to D.Va‘s tweaked defense matrix cooldown, which should allow Bastion to repair himself more effectively and not be reliant on Mercy or Ana for healing. As for when players can test out these new Bastion changes, no release window was specified but Goodman hopes that a playable build will be ready by the next PTR update.
This slate of Bastion balance changes is just one of many tweaks that are still to come for a number of heroes, such as Symmetra and Torbjorn. Outside of character balance changes, Blizzard have also been working on a number of additional features for the game, such as a highlights saving feature and a reporting feature for consoles, although it is not yet known when these will be implemented into Overwatch.
With Overwatch‘s Year of the Rooster event currently in full swing, it might be a bit too much of a stretch for these new character balance changes to come before the end of the event. But with a rumored Valentine’s Day event to come at some point next month, perhaps we will see more of Bastion on the battlefield come mid-to-late February.
Overwatch is now available on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC.
