Overwatch's Bastion Buff has been Scaled Back Already

It was no surprise when Overwatch finally decided to give the official troll of the game, Bastion a buff.  It's no debate that choosing Bastion as your hero of choice is either just for jokes and laughs or just downright stupid.  He's arguably the only character in the game who isn't taken seriously.  Recently, changes were made to Bastion, making his recon mode viable, and his sentry mode being changed to act as "more of a tank buster.  Blizzard stated in the patch notes that "Overall, Bastion should feel stronger and more flexible with these changes".  While they did accomplish just that, they may have gone a little overboard.



The most controversial and complained upon change to Bastion is the introduction of his new Ironclad passive ability, which reduces his damage taken while in sentry mode and tank (ult) configuration by 35%.  This new ability was meant to make him more survivable will stuck in no-mobility mode, and while the concept makes sense, it ended up making Bastion incredibly overpowered according to players.  This change allowed Bastion to take a full clip of Pharah's rockets to the face, and even a  direct tracer pulse bomb without dying.

The issue the Blizzard faces is that Bastion is arguably the least used hero in the game, and not at all considered to be viable in any competitive or even social meta.  Blizzard is making changes to make Bastion a more viable option, and common choice, which evidently means making him more powerful.  These types of changes are almost always initially met with backlash right out of the gate, and in this situation, Blizzard has already dialed back the buff, changing his ironclad ability to 20% damage reduction instead of 35%.  We'll have to wait and see whether this version of Bastion makes it out of PTR or not.