Sombra has been referred to as the Overwatch 2 roster’s “problem child” because of how difficult it is for the development team to find a tuning and kit for the hero that fits well with the overall game.
But that may change soon with a rework that developer Alec Dawson teased in an interview over the weekend. Speaking with Karq and Eva Langwin during a Twitch broadcast, the Overwatch 2 lead hero designer discussed numerous tuning changes the team is looking into, and Sombra changes are among the hot-button topics.
With invisibility and “hacking” as two of her flagship abilities, playing against Sombra is often a frustrating experience for players, but at the same time, Blizzard has regularly tuned the edgie Mexican hacker in a way that makes her end up underrepresented on the competitive ladder.
In March, Dawson referred to Sombra as the roster’s “problem child” in a separate interview. Despite Sombra getting a rework headed into OW2 that was followed by some more tuning changes, Dawson said that the hero is once again in line for a rework.
Related: Overwatch 2 fans beg Blizzard to bring classic Sombra design back—but not for her
Talking to Karq and Langwin, the team is looking to make Sombra more “lethal” while making some changes to her escapability. The way he described changes almost made it sound like Sombra could be getting some adjustments that might make her play a little bit more like a more traditional dive hero like Tracer of Genji.
“When we do finally talk about it, it will be interesting to see how everyone reacts,” he said. “But we’re leaning into her capabilities a bit more in terms of how she can fight more … She is going to be a bit more lethal, but that’s going to come with other things and drawbacks to some of the rest of her escapability.”
Dawson noted that the team is “putting the finishing touches” on the exact design, but players shouldn’t expect to see anything on that front anytime soon. Dawson said that it will be a “while” before this rework gets added to the game. Presumably, there is some amount of internal testing that the team plans to do before making it available to players on live servers.
Based on his statements, one could anticipate that this rework won’t be during the mid-season four balance patch. Instead, players might anticipate something coming sometime in June or later during a new season update like the start of season five or six.
