Overwatch 2’s patch history reveals which heroes are the hardest to balance

An Overwatch 2 player has accumulated the number of changes made to heroes since the franchise started, showing which have been the most problematic and which have been the least.

Overwatch 2 is a complex game. The mix of tanks, damage and support heroes, all with their own identities and weaknesses creates a tangled meta of interactions between all the characters. Because of this, the game has frequent balance changes to bring down the strongest, and bring up the weakest, as well as shake up the meta.

Sometimes, this can make a wholly enjoyable sandbox that’s fun to climb the ladder with. Other times, it can be a little bit of a mess. But you can be sure that the status quo won’t stick around too long, as new balance updates come twice a season, with some outlier updates here and there too.

However, which characters have proven the most problematic and received the most changes? One player has done the work to accumulate all of the changes so we can see just that.

Which heroes have changed the most in Overwatch’s history?

In a Reddit post with over 3.1k upvotes, user DizzyColdSauce shared an infographic tallying up every character change to date.

The most changed characters were Sombra, Symmetra, and Orisa, who all had over 80 changes. After those, Doomfist, Mercy, and Roadhog received 70-79 changes. In terms of the most changed, this all makes sense. All six of those heroes have had reworks – if not multiple. Sombra in particular seems the most problematic of all.

I’ve seen a lot of speculation in the past about which hero has received the most changes, so here’s a list. byu/DizzyColdSauce inOverwatch

On the other side, Illari and Tracer have seen less than 10 changes. Illari makes sense as she’s a newer addition, however, Tracer having less than 10 changes since launch in 2016 is surprising. It appears she’s been the most balanced hero in the game since the start – or at least the one Blizzard is least willing to experiment with. Above that, Ashe, Rammattra, Mauga, and Echo received 10-19 changes.

Of course, none of these changes really reflect the quality of the heroes. Many of the tanks saw reworks as they entered Overwatch 2, for example. Also, Blizzard can at times buff and nerf heroes to create bespoke metas for seasons. That said, it is fascinating to see – especially as it’s fair to say, some of the most controversial heroes reside near the top.