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Overwatch's latest PTR hero update reins in Doomfist's Rocket Punch, McCree and Zarya get significant buffs

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News by Shabana Arif Contributor
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McCree and Zarya will have more luck pinning down targets with the latest Overwatch PTR hero update.

The PTR hero changes were rolled out today and posted on the forums by principal designer Geoff Goodman.

In addition to Overtwatch's Doomfist PTR changes that gave him some fancy new skins and items, he's had some tweaks along with a handful of other heroes.

While Doomfist's Rocket Punch has been tamed a little, McCree's Flashbang and Zarya's Graviton Surge have had come much needed buffs, with Flashbang slowing targets "significantly", and Graviton Surge disabling all movement abilities of the affected targets, similar to Junkrat's traps.

Following Jeff Kaplan's comments about rebalancing Roadhog last week, it's likely we'll see changes being implemented for the tank soon, but they didn't make it to this update.

overwatch_mccree

You can check out the full list of changes below:

Doomfist

  • Rocket Punch
    • Total distance traveled reduced by about 20% (This change has been on the PTR for a little while now)
  • Seismic Slam
    • Added a new UI indicator to show how much damage it will deal, and how much it dealt. Previously this was only indicated by the default crosshair filling in, but this is only visible when using the default crosshair. The new indicator should always be visible, regardless of any crosshair changes. Also, targeting this ability while in the air is now restricted to locations lower than your current height.

McCree

  • Flashbang
    • Now slows targets significantly when they are stunned. This makes them less likely to slide away around a corner or something similar once they are stunned.

Reaper

  • Shadow Step
    • VO and SFX distance dramatically reduced.

Reinhardt

  • Hammer
    • Swing speed increased by ~10%. On top of the swing speed increase, we've gone through and tweaked many timings and other things about the Hammer to make it more responsive. Overall it should feel a lot better to swing and make contact with enemies.
  • Charge
    • Impacting another charging hero (Doomfist or Reinhardt) no longer deals damage to both characters, but still causes a knockdown on both.

Zarya

  • Graviton Surge
    • Now disables all movement abilities of affect targets. This is similar to how Junkrat's trap affects abilities.

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