Blizzard Explains Recent D.Va Nerf In Overwatch

Several characters in Blizzard’s Overwatch are getting tweaked in an upcoming patch, which is currently being tested in the public test realm. However, the tweaks that have been made have caused some backlash from fans, which has resulted in the developer coming out and explaining the changes they made and what they specifically do.

When it comes to D.Va, the upcoming patch gives her additional health at the cost of armor, as well as improved damage consistency at the cost of overall power. Principal designer Geoff Goodman begins by talking about the weapon power tweak, saying “Keep in mind her spread didn’t actually change, but her shots ‘fill in’ her spread more evenly now, meaning her damage per shot is generally more consistent,” he said. “For example, in the video provided from the live game, if you take that same shot multiple times you’ll see a greater diversity in damage results than you would on the PTR, because sometimes some of those bullets would just miss. Overall though, the change to her damage is intended to be a small nerf.”

He then goes on to the adjustments made to health and armor, saying “the bottom line is shes intended to be weaker vs faster firing weapons (and shotguns), such as Reaper and Tracer. The game is a lot healthier when heroes have strengths and weaknesses versus other heroes. As she was, it was common to hear people ask ‘What do I do about D.Va?’. People often would try to use Zarya or Roadhog, since they both have the potential to deal high damage and pierce her Matrix, but even those answers were marginal at best. Heroes like Reaper that are generally supposed to be good at taking down tanks weren’t very effective because of all the armor they had to get through. With lowered armor, she now has more legitimate counters and she still counters many heroes and abilities in the game, especially considering her Defense Matrix wasn’t touched.”

Seeing as D.Va is notoriously one of the characters that many complain having a hard time dealing with, it definitely makes sense that Blizzard would want to try and level the playing field. Keep in mind that these changes are only live in the PTR, meaning that they could still be adjusted some before the actual patch launches. Goodman even notes that if they get enough feedback about D.Va being nerfed too much then they are open to going back and making more adjustments.