Hero Bans In Overwatch Are Seemingly Not Happening, Blizzard Says

Hero bans are not in Overwatch's immediate future because "there are a number of issues" that make it more of a hindrance to the meta, according to game designer and Blizzard vice president Jeff Kaplan.

Kaplan wrote at length about the rationale behind not introducing hero bans on Blizzard's forums, explaining that he sees the mechanic as antithetical to moving Overwatch's meta. Further, he said that a system barring you from playing whatever hero you wanted is not "a good solution to balanc[ing] problems."

"As a team, we agree with and understand that players want the meta to be more fluid and move more frequently," Kaplan said. "We absolutely have plans to help move the meta more and we'll be talking about these in an upcoming developer update... But just implementing hero bans does not mean the meta will move."

According to Kaplan, Blizzard will release an Overwatch dev update sometime next week to discuss "an actual system" the team has in mind. However, he did not specify when it will be or what format it will take.

Kaplan's general opinion on the implementation of hero bans is Blizzard doesn't add features "just because" other games have them. Instead, the team assesses the problem and brainstorms a plausible solution. Since, according to Kaplan, the problem seems to be Overwatch's stagnating metagame, the team is looking at solutions not relating to hero bans.

"Information will be available next week on the plan to balance faster and keep the meta moving," Kaplan said in his statement. "We agree on the problems. That's the important thing."

While Kaplan shared multiple different reasons for the team's current stance on hero bans--including the commitment necessary to make it worthwhile and the extra time it will add to in-game matches--he said that adding the feature to Overwatch could very well happen. It just won't happen anytime soon.

"Interestingly, we don't have many people on the team vehemently arguing for the feature. More of us, including myself, are reluctant to add hero bans to Overwatch. As I've said before, we're not of the mindset that we're opposed to the idea entirely and will never add them... If we thought it was right for the game (like with Role Queue) we would absolutely make the investment."

Blizzard announced a brand-new hero for Overwatch 2 during BlizzCon 2019, with reports suggesting that at least four more could be in development right now. It's unclear if the "actual system" the studio introduces during next week's Overwatch dev update will make its way to the sequel, though a handful of content will be transferable between both games.