At long last, Overwatch 2 will finally be introducing a 5v5 team queue in Season 5 that won’t have any limit on SR restrictions.
Overwatch has always been a team game, but it’s never committed itself to group play in any meaningful way. Grouping as 5 was always limited by SR and there was no guarantee you’d play against another stack.
That all changes with Season 5’s upcoming Team Queue that will only allow stacks of five to compete against other squads who have found five friends to join the ranked season.
In a blog post, the devs delved into the new feature and even addressed problems that players have experienced when attempting to group together and climb the ranked ladder.
Overwatch 2 Team Queue revealed
One of the big things the devs touched on was that GM-ranked players can never queue with more than just one other friend and other SR restrictions have made it difficult for some buddies to game together.
“Playing together with friends is the best way to enjoy Overwatch and we are exploring new ways to get friends together for a fun competitive experience,” the devs said.
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Coming in the mid-season patch for Season 5, players of all skill levels can queue together regardless of their SR rating, but it will only work with a group of 5.
“Here it will take more than just raw mechanical skill to help score a victory—good team coordination and communication will be more important than ever. In this mode, there are no skill restrictions for your team either, allowing friends to compete and climb the rank ladder together!” Blizzard explained.
Right now, it sounds like players will still have their own SR for the ranked mode that will go up or down regardless of who they play with and there won’t be an individual team’s SR.
Nonetheless, this could very well be a precursor to an eventual tournament mode or even a permanent team queue if the feature proves popular enough.