Overwatch 2 Update Makes Big Changes to Moira and More

Nerf and changes coming to the game.

By Christian Pepitoon

Blizzard has recently released a new update for Overwatch 2 PvP beta and that includes some changes to Moira and more.

Overwatch 2 Highlights

The newest update has been released based on the feedback it has received from the players who have been playing the beta version. It has made some rather significant changes to some characters, two in fact, support heroes Moira and Mercy.

Moira has been massively nerfed with the latest Overwatch 2 PvP beta update by completing changing one of her abilities. The change adds her the Enfeebling Orb and replaced the Damage Biotic Orb, which deals 40 impact damage and 10 explosion damage. The orb weakens her opponents by reducing the damage they can inflict by 75 percent for a four seconds.

The Damage Biotic Orb was powerful in the past and made Moira quite powerful, but now these changes have made her less overpowered now. Since the change is new, time will tell on how these changes will affect the gaming community.

Mercy gets some changes and are not necessarily nerfs. Her Guardian Angel ability now has a charge meter and it will not automatically make her fly toward the sky whenever she rushes to an ally in need. They can cancel the ability by just jumping and will launch her in the direction she is facing. Some say that this change just made her a bit more difficult to kill, but the patch notes say she is now in more danger instead. Depends on the player using her, perhaps?

Full Patch Notes

Check out the Overwatch 2 full patch notes below:

GENERAL

  • Added support for HDR displays when supported hardware is detected
  • Screenshot Quality now properly respects resolutions above 1x
  • Improved reflections on water surfaces for Xbox Series X|S and PS5 consoles
  • Realtime cloud rendering enabled on Xbox Series X|S and PS5 consoles

HEROES

General

  • The final hit that would deplete a Hero’s Armor Pool is now dynamically reduced
    • For example: Previously if a hero had 1 armor remaining and took 100 incoming damage, that would instead be reduced to 70 damage due to armor. Now, in the same scenario, that hero will take 99 damage

SUPPORT

MERCY

Guardian Angel

The previous iteration of Guardian Angel led to less control for the player overall, often launching Mercy into danger or out of Resurrect range. This version keeps player intent at the forefront while still allowing for vertical mobility without sacrificing control input simplicity.

  • Mercy is no longer automatically launched upward when she reaches her destination
  • The ability now has a meter that charges up while Guardian Angel is active
  • Canceling the ability with Jump now launches Mercy in the direction she is facing
    • The more charge she has, the more launch speed she’ll have when canceling Guardian Angel with Jump
  • Holding the backward directional input and canceling Guardian Angel launches Mercy in the opposite direction

MOIRA

Moira’s strengths lie in her extreme survivability, high healing throughput, and consistent damage output, but other supports have at least one utility option or play-making ability. To remedy this, Biotic Orb has been split into two abilities on separate cooldowns: Biotic Orb and Necrotic Orb. Due to Necrotic Orb’s potential to shut down many Ultimates and heavily swing duels in her favor, Moira has also received some compensation nerfs to her overall power.

Necrotic Orb

  • New ability, temporarily named “Enfeebling Orb” in-game
  • Replaces Damage Biotic Orb, with a separate cooldown of 16 seconds
  • Fires a straight moving projectile that explodes in a 3-meter radius on impact of an enemy or environment
  • Deals 40 impact damage and 10 explosion damage
  • Enemies affected by Necrotic Orb’s explosion receive the “Weakened” effect, reducing all damage dealt by 75% for 4 seconds

Biotic Orb

  • Damage Orb has been replaced by a new ability “Necrotic Orb”
    • Each orb has its own separate cooldown
  • Healing Orb capacity decreased from 300 to 250
  • Cooldown increased from 8 to 10 seconds

Biotic Grasp

  • Self-healing decreased from 24 to 20 per second

Fade

  • Cooldown increased from 6 to 7 seconds

BUG FIXES

General

  • Fixed a bug where “Leave as Group” was not working as intended
  • Fixed a bug where using the “Fall back” option in the communication wheel wasn’t functional
  • Fixed a bug where slider values could not be adjusted quickly when holding down a direction
  • Fixed a bug where the “Joined Chat Channel” sound would play whenever there was a change in the chat box
  • Fixed TE-10413 error code at startup when the user has their PlayStation set to a language that OW2 doesn’t support

Heroes

Junker Queen

  • Fixed a bug where Junker Queen’s Jagged Blade was pulling enemies further than intended

Baptiste

  • Fixed a bug where Baptiste’s secondary fire was travelling through Mei’s Ice Wall
overwatch 2 mercy

Overwatch 2 will be released on October 4, 2022. PvP beta is now available and the game will fully release on PC, PS4, PS5, Nintendo Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.