The Overwatch 2 community isn’t too pleased with the direction the devs have taken Zenyatta by nerfing him in the latest patch.
The Overwatch 2 mid-season patch arrived on July 11, featuring quite a few changes from big Soldier 76 and Symmetra buffs to a long-awaited team queue mode.
However, one of these balance changes is rubbing players the wrong way. Zenyatta’s Discord Orb, which amplifies damage done to a target to which it’s been applied, saw its range and duration weakened.
While many agree that Zenyatta needs some adjustments, players are unhappy with this update, leaving many hoping that the devs revert the changes in favor of something else.
Overwatch 2 players blast new Zenyatta Discord orb nerfs
Right after the patch went live, players began to debate the update, with content creator Spillo calling them “extremely concerning.”
“This is just a quality of life decrease without addressing most of the problems with Discord,” he said. “This just makes it so you can Discord tanks in the front line, but now you can’t Discord squishies or DPS that you’re dueling at range.”
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On Twitter, some users remarked how getting the Rapid Discord achievement would now be a lot harder, remarking how they were lucky to have already completed the rare accomplishment.
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After seeing todays changes made to Zenyatta, I sure am glad I unlocked Rapid Discord before today.
— EVE zombiePwnr 🏳️🌈 The Slayer (@zombiePwnr08) July 11, 2023
Taking to Reddit, players gathered to discuss the Zenyatta changes and how they may not have the affect the developers were hoping for.
“Tank gonna be perma discord now since they will be the only one in range,” one remarked.
“Honestly, the Zen nerf to me seems weird. I was thinking they’d touch up the damage to discord, or make it more Tank specific kind of like the nerf to Sleep Dart,” said another.
Others started talking about how they’d balance the Omnic monk, suggesting that there should be a cool-down after a target is eliminated or Discord is swapped to another enemy.
Another idea floated was for Discord Orb’s power to ramp up the longer it’s applied to a target – something that players felt could be a good compromise.
That said, for some Zen mains, they felt that the new LOS changes will help tone down the hero’s effectiveness by no longer having “basically a wall hack” on targets.
Depending on how the patch plays out, it’ll be interesting to see if the devs reevaluate the changes to Zenyatta in time for Season 6 and the start of Overwatch 2: Invasion in August.