Overwatch Competitive Mode will soon have a one hero per team limit

A big change is coming to Overwatch competitive play in the form of a one-hero-per team limit that will ensure players will no long end up facing off against squads loaded with multiple instances of the same character.

"The big thing for Competitive Play is we're going to turn on one-hero limit, so players will not be able to stack more than one of the same hero within a Competitive match,” Blizzard Principal Designer Scott Mercer told GameSpot. “It's not going to affect Quick Play at all, but it is something we're going to turn on for Competitive." 

That last point is important: The player limit will apply only to Competitive Play, so you can still throw up a wall of Mercy (or whoever) in Quick Play matches, if that's your thing. 

Mercer also touched on the coming end of Sudden Death in the second season of Overwatch, which will allow matches to end in ties. Blizzard is still looking for the "sweet spot" between giving players a proper sense of reward from matches that end in a stalemate, while at the same time avoiding “situations where players might collude and create some nasty situations.” 

Finally, he teased an upcoming patch, which will make balance changes to “quite a few of the heroes,” particularly Zenyatta, who's getting a shield boost and increased speed with his ultimate, and D.Va, whose defense field will no longer run on a simple timer, but be toggled on and off until depleted, if we're reading it right.

Blizzard revealed the new Overwatch hero Ana Amara earlier today, and even though she's not Sombra, she promises to be a very interesting addition to the game. Get a closer look at the talents she brings to the table right here.
 

Andy Chalk
US News Lead

Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to legal disputes, Twitch beefs, esports, and Henry Cavill. Lots of Henry Cavill.

Latest in FPS
Destiny 2 Rite of the Nine: The Emissary, massive, ominously standing at the edge of a water basin.
Oops! Bungie rolled out Destiny 2's Rite of the Nine event three weeks early, and new loot is already dropping
A soldier looks out over the Verdansk map, as a single tear rolls down his cheek.
The original Verdansk map is returning to Call of Duty: Warzone, to celebrate which we get a soldier crying to Nat King Cole
FragPunk codes - A close-up shot of a mercenary wearing a mask with glowing eyes.
All FragPunk codes and how to redeem them
An evil-looking demon with red eyes and horns
You can theoretically beat Doom: The Dark Ages without using a gun, but 'You'd have a hard time, that's for sure,' says the game's director
Official Doom Guy art superimposed over Vault 666 Fallout-themed background.
Fallout-themed Doom mod Vault 666 has multiple endings, an OP Dogmeat companion, and a Ron Perlman-impersonating narrator so good, I was worried it was AI-generated at first
The Doomslayer in armor
Doom: The Dark Ages won't end with the Slayer in a coffin waiting for the start of Doom 2016: 'That would mean that we couldn't tell any more medieval stories'
Latest in News
A masked man with an axe in the woods
Rebellion CEO seems kind of awed by major studios making massive videogames: 'How do you organize a game that has 2,000 people working on it?'
A young witch watering a smiling mushroom in a magic garden
Here's a roguelite dungeon crawler Steam reviewers call 'a botanical Diablo' and 'like Cult of the Lamb' except you manage a mystical garden
Destiny 2 Rite of the Nine: The Emissary, massive, ominously standing at the edge of a water basin.
Oops! Bungie rolled out Destiny 2's Rite of the Nine event three weeks early, and new loot is already dropping
Chatacabra from Monster Hunter Wilds
The latest Monster Hunter Wilds event quest gives piles of Armor Spheres for hunting a Chatacabra, making this a very bad week to be a frog in the Forbidden Lands
No Rest for the Wicked Steam early access screenshots
No Rest for the Wicked developer Moon Studios is now 'fully independent' after acquiring the rights to the game from Take-Two
A hunter posing with an absurd Blangonga outfit in Monster Hunter Wilds.
Attention, fashion hunters: There's a Monster Hunter Wilds mod to disable all those obnoxious glowing buff effects that distract from your fits