How was this Overwatch 2 support practically untouched after a year’s worth of game updates? This Overwatch 2 Hero Did Not Get a Single Buff in 2023..

Overwatch 2 has seen many of its characters fall out of the meta due to the game’s regular balance changes. These serve to mix up the current state of the game so that it never feels stale, and they’re felt majorly whenever a new season comes along. Here, a big patch introduces bug fixes, quality-of-life (QOL) changes and major buffs and nerfs to many of Overwatch 2’s iconic heroes. But there was one hero who received a total of zero power-ups in the entirety of 2023.

This Overwatch 2 Hero Did Not Get a Single Buff in 2023..

Overwatch 2 has three types of heroes in the game. There are the Damage dealers who devastate your foes and keep them away from important objectives. There’s the Tank, whose main job is to mitigate the most damage for their team and deny enemy plays. And then there are Supports, heroes that try to keep the rest of their team alive amidst the chaos of every game.

Considering how Supports are a vital part of the Overwatch 2 match experience, it’s odd that one of the most versatile heroes from the original game didn’t get a substantial buff.

We’re talking of course, about combat-medic Baptiste.

Now I know what you’re all going to say. Baptiste actually got an improvement to his Immortality Field in March as well as a 2-second reduction its cooldown back in May. Don’t get me wrong, these changes do technically count as buffs. But if you consider all of the nerfs that the ex-Talon operative received in the months since then, the scale gets moved into the negative. Here’s how this Overwatch 2 hero did not get a single buff in 2023.

Balance change-wise, Baptiste got absolutely sidelined for 3 months in the patch notes (save for some bug fixes to his kit). Afterwards, he got his most powerful healing ability “Regenerative Burst” neutered with a 20HP healing reduction. To make matters worse, his next hero change significantly weakened Immortality Field with another harsh nerf that also added 2 seconds to its cooldown, effectively negating his mini-buff back in May.

But the final nail in the coffin was the December 5 update for Season 8, which decreased Baptiste’s primary fire ammo, lessening his lethality and self-peel on the battlefield. So not only were Baptiste’s most important Support abilities scaled back, but the developers also took steps to limit his unique burst-fire DPS that used to rival Soldier: 76 back in the day. But hey, at least his Immortality Field — a completely stationary projectile generator  — retains more HP now!

Blizzard’s team-based shooter recently came out of a Support meta, meaning that the popular focus at the time were new healer characters and their impact in each game. The release of Lifeweaver and Illari, two high-utility supports, completely changed the way Blizzard is releasing new characters for Overwatch 2. So its weird how Blizzard seemingly overlooked a versatile healer — one whose story is deeply connected with the game’s newest (anti)hero — during the role’s most prominent meta to date.

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Season 8 marked the last major balance patch of Overwatch 2. The holidays are here, and another year of game changes lie ahead. It’s been a rocky year for the Overwatch sequel, but if we’re lucky, we’ll be seeing more focused improvements on heroes that contribute to the betterment of the gameplay experience, and less of the wishy-washy “balance changes” that were made on one of Overwatch 2’s most underrated Support heroes this year.

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