Mauga got some nerfs ahead of his Competitive debut in Overwatch 2, but some players felt that the character was hit a bit too hard. As a result, he’s getting some additional adjustments before players will get their hands on him in ranked matches.
Tank is a rather divisive role in Overwatch 2. Despite the transition from two tanks on a team to just one being made over a year ago now when Overwatch 2 released, tank mains have still been left reeling from the lack of another tank on their team.
Existing tanks have had to be rebalanced to fit the role, and there have certainly been some growing pains as the dev team tried to redefine the role. While balance is much better now than it was at OW2’s launch, developing entirely new tank characters for the game is a challenge.
Ramattra’s kit landed well, though he’s a support who fills a much more defensive role and is a general jack-of-all-trades character. For Mauga, a tank who lacks a shield and is more offense-oriented, balance has proven a bit trickier, and some of the nerfs he’s received have since been reverted as the devs balance him.
Mauga nerfs reverted ahead of Overwatch 2 Competitive debut
After some time in the wild outside of Competitive, Mauga’s Quick Play data led developers to nerf a few parts of his kit to bring his overall power level down a bit.
He’s a tank that’s more oriented toward dealing damage and taking his opponent down rather than someone who’s meant to protect the team and keep them alive. As such, dealing and healing damage is his whole deal.
The amount of shots Mauga had to land to ignite an opponent and begin healing from them & dealing more damage was increased, and the devs have since walked back that change while promising even more adjustments.
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Last set of Mauga changes gave us a clearer look at his positioning and we'll be making some more adjustments before he enters Competitive next week. We'll be rolling back the ignite change on the left-click and tuning up his survivability further.Should go live Tuesday.
— Alec Dawson (@GW_Alec) December 15, 2023
The full nerfs from the patch Alec is mentioning are as follows:
Incendiary and Volatile Chainguns
- Chaingun damage reduced from 5 to 4.
- The number of shots with the Incendiary Chaingun to ignite enemies increased from 10 to 15.
Cage Fight (Ultimate)
- Duration reduced from 10 to 8 seconds.
So, the Incendiary nerf is being reverted, but the other nerfs are sticking around but with the aforementioned survivability changes sticking around.
As it stands, Mauga is a tank that deals a ton of damage but can be easily focused down by the right team composition or if he steps out of position. It remains to be seen just how competitively viable he is.