Blizzard is considering new ways to prevent players from leaving Overwatch 2 competitive games to improve the overall experience of the ranked mode. Leavers have been one of the biggest plagues of Overwatch 2 ranked games, often resulting in a loss for the team left at four players against five.
Blizzard’s FPS changed the original formula from the initial Overwatch to swap from 6v6 to 5v5 games, resulting in faster gameplay with intense team fights. Overwatch 2 game suffers from the same competitive issues as its competitors: leavers. Whenever a player leaves a ranked game before the end of the match, it hinders their team who are left at four players against an enemy team of five. As Overwatch 2 heavily relies on teamplay with different roles for each player, leavers can ruin the competitive experience for the remaining players on their team.
In a recent Reddit AMA, Blizzard developers revealed their intentions to improve the quality of competitive games on Overwatch 2 by implementing new ways to punish players who leave their ranked match early, especially at the end of competitive seasons when players try to improve their rank before the season is over. To do so, Blizzard is considering making ranked penalties partially carry over from one season to the next so that leavers have a penalty going into the new competitive season. The company is also working on ways to ensure that leaving a game is never optimal for players who want to complete challenges featured in their Overwatch 2 battle pass.
While punishing players who leave their competitive games early may be a solution to prevent game sabotage, some Overwatch 2 players worry that this could also apply to involuntary server disconnects. Blizzard’s FPS makes no distinction between a player voluntarily leaving a ranked match before it is over and someone losing their connection to the game due to internet or server issues. In addition to a 75% penalty to all XP gains, players who leave a game early are restricted from joining a new competitive game for a short amount of time and could eventually lose their skill rating and end up getting banned from the current Overwatch 2 competitive season if they leave several ranked matches.
Blizzard also announced that SR decay will disappear from Overwatch 2 in Season 4, meaning that players will no longer lose their competitive rank when they stop playing for an extended period. Some players already noticed that it was easier to climb the competitive ranks in Overwatch 2 Season 3 than it was before, and the removal of SR decay should help players stay in a higher competitive pool no matter how often they launch Overwatch 2.
Overwatch 2 is out now in early access for PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
Source: Reddit