Overwatch: Doomfist Discussion

[Epyc Wynn]

Overwatch: Doomfist Discussion



So Doomfist has been introduced to the game, and I gotta say, this is going to have serious repercussions. The design is fantastic, the character has a power about him akin to Kratos that I respect, and his anime short is top quality. In every aspect but the gameplay, I see no flaws with this man.

But he seems completely over-powered in all aspects and this is definitely going to result in either him being significantly nerfed, or the heroes around him being significantly buffed. He one-shots like Roadhog used to, in a game where Roadhog was nerfed specifically because he could one-shot. Maybe Roadhog was nerfed, because Blizzard wanted to instead make Doomfist the only character who could go off on his own and one-shot heroes. His mobility is better than Tracer's, in a game where Tracer's mobility is normally king. His charge is far easier to use than Reinhardt's, in a game where Reinhardt's charge is slow and high-risk. His defense passive promotes going after the enemy team relatively on your own, in a game where only Winston and sort of D.Va were known for doing this. His temporary flight gives him a good view of the enemy, in a game where Pharah stands out specifically because she can do that.

In short, you have the observance skills of Pharah, a low-risk version of Reinhardt's charge, a mobility better than Tracer's, the one-shot ability Roadhog used to have, and a passive defense which promotes diving into enemy teams on your own. And on top of all of this, his ultimate is limited teleportation which upon landing results in nearby enemies taking significant or deadly damage.

Besides Sombra, I cannot think of many heroes to effectively counter this man.

 

[Bobular]

Not played against him yet but I think that Pharah will blow him up easily enough from out of his range, Mei will freeze him in place and then finish him off same as she does anyone, Widowmaker can probably snipe him before he gets in range as I don't think he'll be particularly mobile until he's actually in the fight, as you said Sombra will just stop him in his tracks same as she does with Tracer and Junkrat will root him in place and blow him up. I do see him being a really effective counter to Reinhardt though which is a good thing.

I see him being fun to play as and against and adds something new to the game but I don't think he's going to single highhandedly change everything due to being OP.

As I said though, I've not played against him so this is all just my theory.

 

[McElroy]

Why are Tracer's pistols so useless in-universe? They do nothing. In that trailer he just stood there and let Tracer shoot away.

 

[IceForce]

He has a massive hitbox. Like, his hitbox is the size of a tank (or at least the size of mobile-mode Bastion), but he only has 250 base HP. So he's actually surprisingly squishy if you're not good with him.

Speaking of Bastion, Bastion counters everything in Doomfist's arsenal barring his ultimate. None of Doomfists abilities are enough to one-shot a Bastion, and Doomfist's stun abilities do not work on Bastion when he's in turret mode.
So yeah, Bastion is a nice counter to everything except the ultimate. (Speaking of which, Doomfist's ult is a nice way of killing a turreted Bastion who's hiding behind multiple layers of barriers. So it's nice to have another option when fighting something like that.)
For just raw damage and killing power, Reaper is probably the best counter. As mentioned above, Doomfist's hitbox is the size of a tank, and he has to get really close to do any damage. This means Reaper absolutely shreds him.

The only thing that bugs me a little is Doomfist's ultimate. There doesn't appear to be any counter-play to it. He can't be killed or stunned out of his ultimate (he actually completely de-spawns off the map while the ult is active), and he can move anywhere with it, even through walls. Looks like it has the potential to be really obnoxious.

All the other high-damage-dealing ults all have ways to outplay or counter them, McCree/Pharah/Reaper/Hog can all be stunned out of their ults (or simply killed), D.Va can eat plenty of ultimates whole, Rein can block another Rein's ult, Orisa's ult can be hacked/EMP'd by Sombra or simply destroyed, Junkrat's tire can be destroyed before it blows up, Ana can sleep-dart an ulting Soldier (and other ulting heroes too), Zen/Lucio ults can counter Genji's ult, Zarya can bubble a Tracer bomb victim, etc, etc, the list goes almost on forever.

But Doomfist's ult? About the only counter to it is Lucio ult (Zen ult will not heal through the burst-damage), orrrr you can simply just run away from it, but that seems a bit silly.

 

[Epyc Wynn]

Why are Tracer's pistols so useless in-universe? They do nothing. In that trailer he just stood there and let Tracer shoot away.

Noticed that too yeah. I imagine he just feels shocks of hard pain rather than taking much damage from them. Literally give her a real-ass gun like, it's impossible to actually believe someone like her would be a remotely effective hero.

 

[Bilious Green_v1legacy]

A bunch of pros were scrimming with him yesterday and they didn't seem to have much problem dealing with him, although his ult is a bit busted and abusable, but I expect there to be some refining before gives live, as he is a mess of bugs and exploits atm (Seagull using his ult to avoid a Tracer ult, for instance). He seems like a character that counters some heroes pretty hard, but is also countered pretty hard by others; so probably fairly balanced overall. His big hitbox and dependence on his abilities to do anything give him some not insignificant drawbacks. The real problem is that with his mobility he feeds into the dive meta even more, and he's another hero that can't do anything about Pharah.

 

[Wrex Brogan]

Outside his horribly broken Ult (Hopefully that gets fixed on the PTR) he's pretty straight-forward to deal with. Highly mobile mid-range attacker but is made out of paper and super-dependent on cooldowns (which made his trailer hilarious in hindsight given how easy Tracer can cut him down) means a lot of the other dps can ruin his shit if they catch him when he's unprepared. I've found he's good against tanks and supports more than anything, since his mobility and passive lets him keep the pressure up against their lower damage outputs (so long as he doesn't get stunned, that is - ripping a Doomfist out of the sky mid-uppercut with a Hog Hook is deliciously fun).

So he'll probably be a good ambusher/tank-counter to punish low-damage teams or to get in behind established lines and start wrecking shit. Hard-countered by Bastion and Pharah, and Reaper just destroys him if he gets caught in an area he can't use his movement abilities.Pro-tip: Don't take him down halls and alleyways.

 

[TheMysteriousGX]

Damn near every one of his abilities is countered in some way by Orisa, when his powers are off cool down he's not mobile, and he's got no armor and only gets shields when actively doing damage.

He's basically Tanky Genji. I'd image you deal with him the exact same way. Plus, huge hit box and short range means Reaper fodder.

 

[Epyc Wynn]

I'm not saying rip-off.

But I am saying heavily inspired.

 

[aegix drakan_v1legacy]

There's a reason he's still on the PTR. He's got some stuff that needs ironing out before he's ready for prime time. Seriously, some of his rocket punch interactions are messed up. He and Rein should both take damage if they charge each other, etc.

And maybe it's just because I'm a filthy silver, but I didn't find him THAT hard to play against on the PTR last night. Discord shreds him, Sombra makes him a sitting duck, Roadhog can still hook him for large damage, Tracer's not too bad against him, etc.

Either way, once he's done being refined and smoothed out on the PTR, I can see him being a VERY solid pick, and being the death of the deathball strat for some time (Seriously, when paired with Zarya, he basically destroys a Reinhardt deathball. Total RIP.)

Haven't used him outside of the training room, but he seems like a flanker I might actually like to play.

Oh, and while I enjoy his voice a lot, I'm a little sad it's not Terry Crews, he showed such passion and energy. XD

Why are Tracer's pistols so useless in-universe? They do nothing. In that trailer he just stood there and let Tracer shoot away.

Noticed that too yeah. I imagine he just feels shocks of hard pain rather than taking much damage from them. Literally give her a real-ass gun like, it's impossible to actually believe someone like her would be a remotely effective hero.

I was weirded out too, then I saw his Passive and was like "OH. Now it makes sense. She was just plinking the barrier, not actually hurting him. The animators kinda dropped the ball on that one, it wasn't really clear what was happening.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

His Ult seems pretty bullshit because it's the only Ult in the game with seemingly no counter and no possible way to interrupt it.

I also think that his shots do too much damage considering he's supposed to be primarily a melee character, and the hand cannon is supposed to be more of a backup weapon.

As far as counters go, bastion, pharah, reaper, sombra and tracer all seem like they'll do pretty well against him.

I do think he needs a bit of a nerf, but not a giant one.

To me he almost seems like a Genji with a more consistent damage output and more sustain, but less defensive options.

 

[Epyc Wynn]

His Ult seems pretty bullshit because it's the only Ult in the game with seemingly no counter and no possible way to interrupt it.

I also think that his shots do too much damage considering he's supposed to be primarily a melee character, and the hand cannon is supposed to be more of a backup weapon.

As far as counters go, bastion, pharah, reaper, sombra and tracer all seem like they'll do pretty well against him.

I do think he needs a bit of a nerf, but not a giant one.

To me he almost seems like a Genji with a more consistent damage output and more sustain, but less defensive options.

To me he seems like a rehashing of previous character abilities just like Orisa is; only major difference being the ult.

But seriously, it is absolute bullshit he can one-shot but Roadhog no longer can. That is imbalanced and an insult to the very nature of Roadhog as a psychotic scary assassin.

 

[aegix drakan_v1legacy]

But seriously, it is absolute bullshit he can one-shot but Roadhog no longer can. That is imbalanced and an insult to the very nature of Roadhog as a psychotic scary assassin.

...This again?

Doomfist is DESIGNED to one shot. He's got a somewhat small health pool that he can only buff up temporarily if he's always in the fight. He's able to move around and ACTUALLY flank and has some counterplay when he goes in.

Roadhog on the other hand is a big fat pig who is a super slow massive target and who just happens to have an ability that lets him reel people in for one hit kills. Going on mad flanks with him to get assassination kills was a terrible idea because in the full minute that it would take you to go on that mad flank by slowly waddling around the map you could have gotten WAY more value by working with your team on the front line.

Seriously, Roadhog was never meant to be an assassin. He's supposed to be a "radius of death bruiser" character who sticks with another tank or DPS. He's a big fat guy with the ability to yank you out of position and kill you with impunity if you're not careful, as well as wear down barriers and tanks from midrange.

If he was ACTUALLY meant to be an assassin, he would not be slow and unable to get into a fight properly, and he would not be a massive easily noticeable target. And he definitely wouldn't be both at once.

Saying he's meant to be an assassin character based on his creepy mad-max looks is like saying that Mei is supposed to be a support because she's Moe as fuck.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

His Ult seems pretty bullshit because it's the only Ult in the game with seemingly no counter and no possible way to interrupt it.

I also think that his shots do too much damage considering he's supposed to be primarily a melee character, and the hand cannon is supposed to be more of a backup weapon.

As far as counters go, bastion, pharah, reaper, sombra and tracer all seem like they'll do pretty well against him.

I do think he needs a bit of a nerf, but not a giant one.

To me he almost seems like a Genji with a more consistent damage output and more sustain, but less defensive options.

To me he seems like a rehashing of previous character abilities just like Orisa is; only major difference being the ult.

But seriously, it is absolute bullshit he can one-shot but Roadhog no longer can. That is imbalanced and an insult to the very nature of Roadhog as a psychotic scary assassin.

I think the difference is that Doomfist's one shot isn't anywhere near as safe as roadhog's was.

Roadhog could stand behind the rest of his team and pull someone in with his hook to one shot them from complete safety. Doomfist can't do that, he has to charge into the enemy in order to one shot anyone.

 

[IceForce]

His Ult seems pretty bullshit because it's the only Ult in the game with seemingly no counter and no possible way to interrupt it.

Yeah, that bothers me too. I'm surprised there aren't more people pointing that out.

Sombra's ult is like that too, - it's practically impossible to stop a Sombra from tp-ing into your team and EMP-ing everyone.
However, EMP requires Sombra's teammates to deal follow-up damage after EMP goes off, because Sombra herself cannot do so with her low damage. So even though EMP technically can't be stopped, most EMPs go to waste due to poor team coordination, which makes EMP not quite as overpowered as it might seem.

DF's ult though? There's literally no stopping it, and the low-mobility heroes can't move away from it faster than DF can move it around the map. It's just silly.

I get the feeling the devs are running out of ideas for new ultimate abilities.

 

[IceForce]

Still on the subject of the ultimate; from the streams I've been watching, it seems DF charges his ult insanely fast. So if nothing else, THAT needs a huge nerf.

Also, the ult can be used a bit like Winston ult. When DF is close to death, you just pop ult (giving you invulnerability) and then slam it down on someone so you get the instant health/shield increase, giving you enough survivability to get away and/or get healed.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

Discord shreds him

Yeah, problem is Zenyatta is going to be the recipient of pretty much every Doomfist ult. He's a healer so he's already a primary target, and he's slow with no mobility options, and low enough health be be one-shot by the Ult.

As someone who plays a lot of Zen I'm really not happy about it. Your team can't even do anything to protect you since the ult can't be interrupted. The only thing that will save you is a Zarya bubble, but that'll be somewhat hard to time since Doomfist can so easily delay his Ult, and I have yet to figure out what part of the Ult actually does the damage (seems like you take damage a little before Doomfist actually hits the ground).

 

[IceForce]

But seriously, it is absolute bullshit he can one-shot but Roadhog no longer can. That is imbalanced and an insult to the very nature of Roadhog as a psychotic scary assassin.

Hanzo's scatter arrow is still a thing. Until that gets removed or nerfed, I have to conclude that the devs have absolutely no problem with abilities that can one-shot with minimal effort on a short cooldown.

 

[Bob_McMillan]

Wasn't he supposed to be Terry Crews?

Yeah, sorry, I don't play Overwatch.

 

[Hawki]

Wasn't he supposed to be Terry Crews?

Only in the mind of Terry Crews himself. And, I guess, everyone else rooting for Crews.

Still, Crews gets to tear up cities in Crackdown anyway, so he'll get his urge for mayhem satisfied to at least some extent.