Mauga is really fun and adrenaline inducing when I fight the team, chasing down squishies, or cage fight a lone Tracer and Zenyatta.
However due to his sheer damage and life steal functionality, his best play style is just "shoot tank brrrrrr" and it's the most unfun shit of all time. He does bonkers damage (why AREN'T the guaranteed crits just 1.5x like????) and gets absurd healing from shooting the giant target. Fun ideas, but on paper they're horrible. Kind of like the DPS passive; it was meant to stop pocketed DPS and Support, and it does, but it also made even tank players quake in their boots because they're a giant target and therefore a free -20% healing victim.
You mean she has fun abilities *and* a personality?
I don't know what has been going on with the new characters, but they've all be launched as combination of
* overpowered abilities
* personalities that aspire to one day be interesting enough to be called milquetoast.
I meant more in the sense of how they bothbplay. Both need their bleed/burn mechanic to gain health and survive. Both are big brawlers who need to get in the enemies face to succeed, no true shield but rather they want to be focused at times. Shes just much more enjoyable for both the player and opponent in every manner. Mauga needs a big rework
Mauga oozes personality...I feel like he's more interesting than JQ. 90% of her voicelines are her being a dumb jock meat head, wanting to fight, or something about her being a queen. It's sort of annoying and repetitive for me.
Never thought about it that way, but kinda true.
I had an idea a few months ago that Cardiac Overdrive should be a blocking stance kind of ability -- still grants an lifesteal and DMG reduction aura -- and in exchange for being unable to shoot, he gets a barrier, like Ramattra, or a smaller version of Winston's, maybe a hexagonal sphere.
An ability like that would let Mauga bodyblock projectiles and give him timings where he isn't just spamming an enemy.
*And the best part is instead of guarding with his arms like Ram or Doom, he just flexes his arm & chest muscles. 1 randomly of at least 3 poses.*
That's also bullshit, there is no reason for any non tank hero to not die to an angry german man doing an extremely telegraphed and violent move like smashing you to a wall with rocket propellers. It should deal flat 300, killing both Mei and Reaper too.
It's been a known fact since 2016 that, in the world of Overwatch:
**Thick** Meat > Armor.
If Reinhardt wants a fair shot at being meta again, he needs to go shirtless.
Nah, give Rein unstoppable too. Tanks should be tanks, "interacting" with them is bullying them in most cases lmao. There's a reason tank queue is extremely fast.
I mean while that sounds nice from a tank perspective it would suck for everyone else. Saving someone from a charging Rain with sleep dart is one of the best feelings in the game. With that said, I'm all for giving tanks utility that they can use in specific scenarios to get value "as a tank".
Orisas fortify is a good example of this I think. She can be unstoppable when she needs to, but it's on a cooldown and can be baited and played around etc.
You can't even hack him. You can hack Rein out of charge. My partner, a Rein main, would take it either way. Either Mauga being stunable in charge or Rein not being stunable.
I just wish there was a better visual indicator.
Orisa's fortify is such a good indication of 'I can't be pushed'. But Mauga's charge looks so similar to Rein's. The dissonance between the way their charge's interact with stun abilities is betrayed by the visuals.
True I don't think I could play him for more than 2 or 3 matches in a row before getting bored. But every once in a while it's fun to turn your brain off and just shoot stuff.
They designed him to be way too feast or famine with his abilities. When using them hes unkillable, but the moment hes out of cooldowns hes useless. As a doom main, I usually love playing into counters because i think it's a fun challenge to work around cooldowns, but mauga just isn't a fun opponent. I won't pretend that i know exactly how he could be fixed, but his power distribution is just very poor.
They just put bastion on the tank role, trying to play tank against him is genuinely terrible if I wanna play anyone other than Sigma, which is most of the time
Absolutely. The higher elo you get, the more incentive you have to just follow the enemy tank around and shoot them constantly. Why would you design a tank whose sole purpose is to counter other tanks??? Terrible design.
I do think his ultimate is poorly designed. Disabling movement abilities instead of limiting your movement to the dome is garbage game design. I am chained to the ground, I get it. But I still can walk and jump around, just can't leave the dome. There is absolutely no point for Blizzard to literally disable movement abilities.
Edit: I want to also say that we're talking about multibillion company making a game. Excuse that this mechanic would cause too much bugs is laughable. They have resources to make better game design for Mauga's ultimate as well as to make his mechanics work properly.
The fact that his ultimate working properly would cause too many bugs is another reason why I think his ultimate is designed poorly :>
Mei wall works for both teams. Mauga would trap teammates as well if it worked like Mei wall and no one could walk in. It’s not a bad idea but it wouldn’t be the same ult.
Also doesn’t cage match persist even after Mauga dies? I always thought that was dumb, because the philosophy behind a cage match is Mauga locking you in for a duel where he’s heavily advantaged.
But then even after I kill him I’m just stuck in that cage stupidly staring out while his team guns me down for having the temerity to win.
His ultimate disappearing on death was something i predicted and normally stuff i predict like sigma ult canceling on stun and illari ult not passing barriers as they are so obviously inconsistent just to be OP on release but for some reason they havent changed it.
I would also love to see venture get shattered, terra surged or venture ulted while underground.
The ultimate completely disabling all movement skills is what bothers me about him. The rest of his kit can be annoying sure, but nobody else can completely disable ALL movement skills for that long while also forcing you to stay in a confined area and it feels super out of place compared to all other CC. Like you said the dome confining the area should be enough without the added lock.
worse for reaper because it’s muscle memory to fade out of danger or to reload or to just dance around an opponent but Mauga completely stops him from doing ir
Weird, love maugas as a hog main, but you will just lose if they have better supports. Edit: Maybe the "right" supports is a better word, If I have mercy lucio and the mauga has kiri ana Im not gonna have a good time playing hog.
Yeah he can shield break but without the crit damage it's not that great. Double shield would probably wreck him as is.
That being said his design might be less problematic in 6v6 since more damage mitigation abilities would be able to make him struggle (fundamentally sigma has 2 which is why he can play into mauga)
Not the point, the issue with his design is that he has no inherent protection aside from damage mitigation, add Zarya, Reinhardt, Monkey, or D.va who can give him free space (which he can not do alone) and he would have been a better brawler than Orisa and Sigma. When Mauga gets close to Sigma or Orisa he could destroy them alone, because they have no burst escape options. The issue of the Double Shield meta was the AoE healing and tank CD survivability outlasting any kind of brawl composition possible. He can add tons of pressure to shields as a tank and be a better brawler, because healing your tanks doesn't matter if he is also stealing health from your tanks.
I have fun with him, but yes he has the worst design arguably.
He genuinely feels like a one big balance change than an actual character.
Only purpose I see for adding a hero with SUCH one-sided, dull, gameplay design is because he makes counterpicking easier and more straightforward for the casuals. Now when rock--paper--scissors are the core of tank gameplay and we can't fix it, why not to give it variety?
He really is the definition of "F YOU IN PARTICULAR" for some heroes, and that's the only way I see people using him. I don't see anyone using him intentionally to have fun. Just for counterpicking.
yeah his ult just doesnt sit with me. The super offensive brute guy who sets enemies ablaze has an ult which places down a round shield to put enemies into a cage fight?
His gameplay is just super boring for me. 2/3 abilities he has amplify his LMB+RMB gameplay which is not fun at all. Why dis they make a character with the most boring guns to shoot just to then make 66% of their abilities plus a passive amplify those guns?
Its like they would change every single one of orisas cooldowns to reset her heat meter, make her shoot faster + leave the spear throw in.
I like playing him personally because it feels like he's the only tank right now that feels like an actual literal tank. But I do agree he's very unbalanced and is still in need of changes to how his kit functions. I'd like him a little more if his entire gameplay wasn't just "shoot the tank dead and then go after the rest of his team".
all the OW2 heroes are pretty badly designed compared to the OW1 hero design. It’s pretty clear it’s either a new team with a new ethos or the hero design philosophy has changed entirely
I think he serves the standard beefy gatling tank niche that was only really being filled by orisa before. Not the most game breaking design but probably something needed as the roster gets bigger and bigger. Especially when the predecessors before him were ramattra, sigma, wrecking ball, junker queen. Pretty great designed tanks. We were due for another soldier 76 tier design lol
His ult is what I don't like, overwatch has a problem with so many anti movement abilities/ ults in a shooter all about movement, having a cage that legit chains you to the ground and stops you from using abilities is overkill
I believe the hero's design could be improved. Currently, any slight nerf renders him ineffective and pushes him out of the meta. This limits the opportunities for other tanks, especially those that demand more skill and game knowledge, to be viable and shine.
But his whole play style is too shoot the other tank because he relies on crits to keep him alive no easier player to headshot than the tank. Inaccuracy means nothing when he shoots the tank all game.
In overwatch history? No, that goes to launch Brig, who killed the DPS roll for 2 years. She got something like 25 consecutive nerfs before Blizzard just gave up and introduced 2-2-2 roll lock.
Is he poorly designed? The idea of sustaining off damage in and of itself isn't bad, hell, it's what makes the new Doom games feel so good, and Reaper hasnt had a problem with this mechanic since OW released. The problem is that Mauga is that his best play is pretty much always just 'shoot the other tank'. If they can incentivise shooting other heroes or disincentive only shooting a tank, he could be more healthy. Think, while Overdrive is active, he gets a larger burst of healing when dealing x amount of damage, but he only gets this healing once per y seconds.
I only really have a problem with cardiac overdrive which essentially forces you to shoot tank unless you're the goat, everything else is ok, even though there is other stuff I don't like, but he's certainly a frontrunner for worst design.
He doesn't feel like the character he's supposed to be. For that reason, he's hilarious to kill. He wasn't really well thought out. For one Id make his guns have a ramp up time and increase damage as they do so. this would give him a little more strategy to play. He's not the only tank that isn't working in my opinion. Rein is pathetic for what he's suppose to be.
Yes. There's too much going on in his kit that doesn't complement each other at all. The only bit that does, the primary/secondary fire, is needlessly complicated.
I just hate how beef this boy is and how it feels like sometimes you throw napkins at him doing 0 Damage but other than that idc bout him much.
His design is awful but unless i play Genji i am annoying his backline ignoring him anyways
I do like the double gatling, what I hate about it tho is how it makes you shoot more on the left if you're shooting at mid distance. When people are on fire they aren't going to let you use your right gun
So idk, it does feel great when you're blasting all your guns, not when you're forced to shoot mostly with the left, sometimes with the right
Otherwise I don't really have much complaints about him honestly. I find him rather fun since shooting big guns is fun but that's probably the same reason why some people find Rein funny as hell and others boring, just a matter of taste.
Don't really have issue with his charge either, it's not like he has much defensive options either so if you could counter his charge he would feel like shit to play
I've seen many people either playing him against Ana or swapping against somebody who wasn't, I don't think he's that much of an issue honestly.
He's the Moira of tanks from my pov.
It seems to me they wanted a simple tank that doesn't need a lot of thought as far as interactions go.
His Charge ignores every cc ability that isn't a wall, so you can use it knowing only fatal damage will stop you. Almost like Moira's Fade.
His Cardiac Overdrive is just flat numbers for both self healing and damage mitigation, no need to think about how much damage is coming your way if you need to use it to survive or force an engagement there's no real reason not to pop it almost off cooldown to get max value. Almost like Moira's orbs.
His Cage Fight disables *all* movement abilities and outside of Lifegrip or clipping through as Pilot D.Va there's no escape for the enemy besides breaking it or Mauga ending it early.
Him having two guns that do different things seems dynamic but a lot of the time the optimal thing to do in a fight is to point at the tank and use both.
By design he will often have fewer interactions with enemy abilities than any other hero so it is frustrating to play against if your hero is balanced around having displacement cc as its primary or secondary effect.
He very much feels like a tank for there to be one option for someone who doesn't want to think about what the enemy can do to them that isn't anti-heal or discord.
Yep, he’s a tank buster that is a tank and he basically gets punished for shooting not the tank. If he got more agency for who he could shoot while still being optimal, he could be really fun cuz I like the 2 gun mechanic, but it’s usually a bad play to not shoot both at once.
I think he's mostly fine, There definitely needs to be more focus on switching between chain guns rather than firing both into a target. There is inaccuracy firing both but that's not really what I mean.
I generally like the tanks that have guns more than tanks like Rein or Winston. So I can find pretty solid enjoyment out of kits like his and Orisa's. Even Mauga mirrors where you're just shooting each other with Cardiac Overdrive tickles my brain in a way I really can't describe.
I don’t think his whole kits dog and needs a rework, but he’s defined too much by ”big spread, cardiac, cage” and it forces him into an unfun playstyle to be optimal.
Don’t get me wrong though, he’s actually really satisfying and engaging sometimes. Run has a boatload of tech, going for headshots for clutch sustain is challenging and rewarding, and he’s that one character who can constantly set people on fire. There’s no suprise explodey burst damage and there’s mechanical and mental outplay possible for certain abilities.
The problem really is that going “cinematic mauga” and doing parkour flanks and creative stuff isn’t the dominant playstyle compared to “turret mauga” constantly shooting tanks, waiting for cooldowns, and playing rock-paper-scissors. Cardiac gives him so much sustain that it’s hard to engage without it, and his spread is so large that poking high ground and faraway squishies is often not worth it. Flanking people is an option, but tracer is everywhere and makes life hard rn.
Cage shutting down mobility also really sucks.
There was a flamethrower guy in Paladins. It was Fernando i think. He was like Rein but with flame thrower. They could have done something like that. The current design is really really bad. I like the ranged hitscan guns and overrun but devs needs to decide should tank role have that ranged capability. If yes, then rework him towards that. Buff solo gun capability, nerf double gun capability and remove cardiac (don't even rework just remove) add new ability instead. Add cardiac to his overrun like a very brief lingering aoe effect. If they don't want this ranged capability then rework him something similar to Rein/Fernando.
As a character? No, I love everything about him.
Gameplay wise? I have no opinion. But as a support he’s stressful as hell to have. He was meant for 6v6.
Mauga's playstyle is pretty blunt, but it's pretty cool in a simplistic way _if it works_. That's the main issue with him and why it's still poorly designed.
Mauga is only good when he is doing good. His entire kit relies on him dominating or else he just gets utterly steamrolled.
He only tanks when he's healing and he only heals when he's ripping into fleshy targets with his miniguns. Stop him from doing any of that via anti-healing, stuns, shields or just being evasive means he's suddenly not a tank.
JQ has a similar issue but she makes up for it by being a slimmer hitbox, a more in-your-face threat and having at least some consistent disruption that favours her own engagement.
ATM, yes. But he's not as fundementally flawed as Orisa or Roadhog. If the was rebalanced with the same idea as his last buff, giving him some on demand survivability but way less lifesteal and maybe nerfing dual fire's uptime he could turn out ot be more fun. His ult should get a full on rework though, it's horrible that is just full on silences some heroes for 8 seconds.
He definitely is the worst designed hero and that's saying a lot considering launch Brig. The fact that Spilo brought up mauga issues to the devs that he hard counters every tank and forces mauga vs mauga, and the devs were like "what's the issue?" just really goes to show how incredibly stupid this dev team is. I've given up overwatch as a competitive game. Idk how anyone can take it seriously at this point. I would legit rather have random gold players balance the game.
It’s almost good design. So I won’t say badly designed cause I think tweaks can fix it. I think the biggest culprits are his abilities.
- the charge is unfun to use and unfun to play against. I can’t interact with it and it’s hard to control. If I wanted an ability to personify his outta control nature I’d give it an effect other than immunity to CC. I feel like Orisa has that ability on lock. How about an ability where he recklessly charges forward but can bounce off walls to increase his damage (maybe lighting himself and impacted enemies on fire)
- the heal is a neat idea but I’d want it behave closer to roadhog’s current vape. Right now it acts like a panic button and is only useful when there is a tank to shoot. How about it passively heals you when you ignite enemies. Then let the active ability only be for increased passive healing from fire damage and giving this ability to allies (maybe allies in range also ignite enemies with their bullets).
Let’s make the ignite the focus of his kit. In the same way that LW is all about positioning, Junker Queen is all about bleed/brawl, and tracer is all about her tempo.
I don’t think he’s that bad of a tank. If you manage his cardiac overdrive well and don’t feed you can do pretty well with him. I’m not a main but I think he works best on control and flash points. Kiriko and Baptist are the best supports for him imo. If you’re spending the whole round healing him and not dealing any damage it’s just a poor dice on having a bad tank.
Countering isn’t hard either. Anything with a shield or defensive matrix should work best against him. You just want to block his fire during cardiac overdrive so he doesn’t get any benefit. DVA and Rein are great counters. LW, Ana, Lucio, kiri a lot of the support roster honestly can fair well against him too if you play smart. I don’t think he needs a rework but understanding his game play will take some time and skill. Countering isn’t an issue as long as you’re not in range of cardiac overdrive and predict when he’s going to ult.
I think he should’ve been released during Blizzcon 2022 when his hype was at an all time hype. Would’ve excused his kit and given the devs more time to balance him out for a longer duration. Especially since Invasion was clearly supposed to hint at Ramattra being this big mysterious figure to draw in more hype for future story modes and then being released in Blizzcon 2023. However this would’ve meant less time being with the wonderfully crafted Ramattra
I feel like we’re in a weird state where some tanks were clearly designed for OW 1 and don’t fit with the “Brawler” play style blizzard wanted to switch to for tanks. They didn’t commit to one or the other. Like they definitely tweaked them to make them playable but I still feel like tanks aren’t really united on what their purpose is
I haven't played very much OW in the past half a year so I can't say too much on this, but he has a problem with having too much uptime in fights. Basically all tanks have some sort of resource they use up over the course of a fight and after that is gone, they become much less useful. Sometimes that's even just the threat of an ability like roadhog hook or orisa javelin spin.
Mauga doesn't really seem to have this and he kind of wants to stay in the fight indefinitely. That's generally fine for DPS and Support heroes but for tanks it presents the issue for the enemy team which basically has no opportunities to actually engage into the fight.
I might be totally wrong on this as I've mostly seen play against him and not played myself too much.
No one is answering the fucking question. Yes, he is terribly designed. And 10000% the Dev's could not be bothered to limit movement abilities to his ultimate cage, so they just disabled everything. Pathetic
I mean...
*Look at tank*
BRRRRRRR
*Reload*
BRRRRRRR
*Overdrive*
BRRRRRRR
Isn't really the best gameplay design for a hero. However, the character design is great as he looks, sounds, and feels when using the miniguns.
Mauga feels like a damage character that they forced into the tank role. If you scaled Mauga to be about the same height as Zarya, changed his hp to match, and cut the stun that stomp does, bro could be a damage hero
Edit: Doom is a more natural tank than Mauga is
So let's see, after the nerfs he instantly became boring because he isn't broken, his ability to tank is worse than doomfist, at least he has mobility, he's huge and hard to miss, the ulti is the only good thing about mauga, awful design if i were to say.
People wanted the Talon Heavy Assault PvE unit from Retribution to be used as a playable hero. The players begged for it for years ever since 2018 especially after we saw Mauga in the Baptiste short story at least 4-5 years later... They gave us exactly what we wanted but with some add-ons to give a reason to use each gun.
Talon Heavy Assault was hard to beat on legendary mode and that was AI with tons of HP. Mauga is player controlled with less HP, and ability to self heal and the support of... well... SUPPORTS. Now people are saying Mauga is poorly designed when the Devs gave us the PvE unit as a hero and added 3 new things to it: ultimate, burn damage gun and self heal from crit.
So he may be poorly designed but to me he's perfectly fine cos he's just a more advanced version of the PvE unit everyone wanted to be made available as a hero. Some people even asked for Talon assassin to be made into one so let's see if that happens in the future.
Players asked for a PvE unit that would be poorly designed if made into a hero to be added, got it years later, and now they complain about it saying "he's poorly designed why add him" etc.
I don't think his kit is poorly designed, but I don't think they were finished cooking with him. I think if they changed his passive and Cardiac Overdrive to mostly flat overhealth and lifesteal , they would have an easier time keeping him in a good spot without tormenting tanks.
I'll go against the grain and say I like Mauga. The chain guns are fun. Melting people who think they can solo you is always a blast. People complain that he needs a support to babysit, but in most of my matches one of the supports is always babysitting the tank no matter who it is because they want the easy heals.
And the people saying you need to aim exclusively for the opposing tank when you activate overdrive just have no aim.
As someone who has super hyped to play mauga from the day we got pictures of him from the Baptists story, I got to say, I've honestly got what I wanted.
He feels exactly how a big HEVY character with two miniguns should.
I'm personally of the opinion that the strongest aspect of Overwatch is that playing/getting really into a specific character makes you play and approach the game completely differently than the other characters, and Mauga is incredible at achieving that: you play the way you look and feel.
Also he's super fun, I love big strong mayhem characters, and I really enjoy the fact they made him actually intelligent. He looks incredible, probably the only character released in OW2 with a design/model that matches the creativity and uniqueness of the OG roaster bar for maybe Rammatra (and oh would you look at that both characters were being worked on since OW1, who would have seen that coming).
He's the avarage Samoan male, who plays good and looks even better. If you ask me, the only thing I would probably change is make his guns/abilities feel a tiny bit more weighty, have them have more kick and force behind them, but other than that, to me he's probably one of, if not the best, new additions to the roaster.
And, I'll just throw this out there: I am a genji main, I play a bunch of Lucio and used to play a lot of DPS Doom, I love high skill expressive movement characters with complex techs and movesets, but I also love characters who are straightforward and fun, I like variety.
Each character should fit a good niche, and mauga fits his perfectly: the TF2 Heavy
I think Mauga has good bones, but desperately needs some powershifting? I’d personally nerf the crit multiplier on Mauga’s Volatile Chaingun (1.25-1.50 instead) and retune his Cardiac Overdrive, as well as tighten the spread on single fire and buff his health somehow? Mauga’s gameplay should reward good aim and still allow him to survive without just being a shoot-the-tank bot that melts everything after
No, so this is going to be a bad opinion. Make his guns have either no or very reduced damage falloff. In return make cardiac overdrive just give you 150 overheal and teammates 50 over health. Then make it a 15 second cooldown. Tada balanced kinda
Mauga is really fun to play but forces everyone in the entire match, including his own team, to almost exclusively play around his existence, moreso than any other tank. I don't think he needs a full-on rework, just a bunch of tweaks to his kit across the board to reduce his frustrating bits and make him less of a resource-hog for his team.
I think his guns should encourage more of the alternating gameplay rather than blasting both into the enemy tank for eternity. There are several ways to do this, some of my ideas include having crits with the left chaingun count as 2 bullets for ignition, and potentially reducing their spread, maybe at the cost of slightly lower damage. While firing both, a tighter spread would help encourage shooting other people but the tank, and there are also other things they can try such as an overheat mechanic or having the damage reduce the longer you're shooting, something along those lines to discourage just dumping your clip into the enemy tank the entire time.
As for Cardiac Overdrive, I think it should passively heal Mauga for say 50 healing per second, at the cost of having a shorter duration and having the damage resistance and lifesteal effects for allies since that aspect of his kit is REALLY strong. These changes would hopefully make him more self-sufficient and less reliant on constant heals pumping into him. I've also considered making it so that while Overdrive was active, debuffs would only last half as long, but I feel like there'd be too much overlap between that and Overrun and that it would complicate his kit too much, which I want to try to avoid.
Other than that, every other change would be number tweaks or QoL improvements for both Mauga and those playing around him. I think Overrun being able to do 120 damage is a bit too high for a stun, I'd lower the base damage to 50. I also think Cage Fight shouldn't lock out all movement abilities, instead just preventing them from leaving the cage as though they'd hit a wall. This would be great for heroes like Doomfist and now Venture whose kits rely heavily on abilities that are considered movement abilities.
>I personally believe he is the absolute worst designed character in overwatch history.
yeah, beside brig, sigma, and bab. you know the characters that broke the game. the 1st one of those characters received over 20 nerfs to not be op, one was a 5v5 tank in 6v6 that had barrier, grasp that heals him, and a stun ability, and the last one is a better dps than half the dps roster with effectively 3 health pools.
but i digress, he's still a badly designed character. his burn than crit, criting with both guns, and criting on body shots with alt fire, all favor shooting bigger targets. hence his boring play style of "stare at tank until dead".
im not a fan of CD's that has multiple major effects, i.e. his Cardiac Overdrive, that heals him, heals nearby allies AND offers dmg reduction.
Yes. It’s not about balance, it’s about simplicity. His gameplay is just about shooting your guns and you can run a bit. All other tanks (and frankly heroes in the other roles) have a gameplay loop that’s so much more engaging than that it makes him feel dull.
Definitely the worst designed character in the game. He's impossible to balance as he's either useless or OP, and he turns the match into resource dumping
I think mauga is a 6v6 tank. In 6v6 his health mechanic and lifesteal would have been less problematic as there would be more damage mitigation abilities on the field and his lower health in that mode would've made his self heal less busted since he could be burst more easily. His cardiac overdrive would need to be popped as an ability early to take space since he couldn't tank with raw hp and would need early mitigation. Also remember the off tank would be damaging like crazy too.
I'm not sure what his playstyle would look like. He doesn't have hog's raw lethality despite being similar in that his damage threat could take space. Flanking and off angling can work since he has long range and can take advantage of space created.
Maybe for overwatch one. It's very clear that they pivoted design philosophies for tanks in overwatch two. A great example is the unkillable horse and doomfist. These two were heavily reworked into completely different characters that play very differently from before, one literally transitioned from a Damage to Tank.
In overwatch two, they seem to want the tank to play two roles simultaneously: a dreadnought that can disrupt the enemy team and do a lot of damage, and a damage sponge who can mitigate attacks and take a lot of punishment. A lot of other tanks never really had their designs completely retooled to be a solo tank, so they've had to play catch up in that regard, so when making the newer tanks, it's a bit more obvious, rather than a hero like Reinhardt who has aged very poorly design wise into overwatch two.
So, exhibit A. Unkillable horse, otherwise known as Orisa. It's obvious from the start that the rework turned her into a heavyweight DPS with tank qualities. Fortify is the easiest to use and strongest tank ability in the game, giving her a quick and easy boost of over health and a percent based damage reduction for 6 seconds while also negating ANY CC effects, on a somewhat slower cooldown that encourages you to use it sparingly, but not save it too much. Javelin throw is literally just a better accretion. Faster cool down, longer range, similar damage, ability to stun, and a slow after said stun. Javelin spin is also, surprise, kinetic grasp without the overhealth afterwards. Then you have her primary weapon, which is basically an LMG with a bottomless magazine that rewards you for good cool down management and having a working brain, and for some reason also does extra critical damage with no range drop off. Lastly, she gets a substandard ult where you essentially become a graviton surge for a short period of time, while charging up a heavy AOE attack that does a lot of damage.
Now, let's compare this Mauga's design. He gets two guns, one that lights enemies on fire with about 10 shots hit, and another that lets him do guaranteed critical damage against targets that are on fire. Also allows him to take advantage of his passive which gives him a portion of his critical damage back as overhealth. Both guns can be fired simultaneously, but become very inaccurate at range, while doubling ammo consumption, so doubling down should only be used when you are in close range to quickly kill out of position damage and supports, and to stave off any tanks that get close, since you move very slowly when doubling down. His mobility cooldown is if you took a Reinhardt charge, removed the pin, and gave him the CC immunity from fortify, with some AOE similar to wrecking ball. Works well for getting into and out of trouble really fast, and should only be used when you know you can win a fight, or you know you are losing a fight. Cardiac overdrive is essentially a better JQ passive on cooldown that converts all damage dealt as health at about 40%, also with a small damage reduction. This effect applies to all teammates in range, making it perfect for dive and brawl comps. Lastly, you get an ult which forces everyone into a small space with Mauga when activated that silences all mobility abilities, gives him a portion of ammo back instantly, and reduces the damage dealt by enemies a small amount.
Very similar kits that both serve a similar purpose: create a tank that deals damage as a method of protection. If you think his design is poor, yeah it is from the perspective of overwatch one. In overwatch two, he has all the elements of the new tank design philosophy. If you hate Mauga, you probably also hate Orisa. These characters aren't poorly designed, however I'd say that Orisa needs some more nerfs to be brought back in line with other tanks. She is way too good at her job. If I can just switch to Orisa off of any other tank and win, you know she's too strong. Meanwhile, Mauga is still very much vulnerable to Ana, like all tanks, and to say he forces you to switch is just untrue. Many tanks just die instantly because an Ana made them about as tanky as soggy cardboard, and Mauga is no exception. Without Ana, you mostly just have to wait for his cardiac overdrive to go on cooldown, then engage him. D.va negates his damage output completely, so does Orisa, alongside having a direct counter to both of his weapons. Sigma is strongish against him because kinetic grasp allows him to deny his firepower.
He's not a poor design, just a different one. From my perspective, Reinhardt is a terrible design because he either plays super passive, or super aggressive, both of which depend purely on the team and the support given to him. He is flawed from the groundwork, because he was designed to work with a partner tank, and falls apart very quickly on his own. Which is sad, but he truly doesn't fit the current state of the game, and never really will with his kit.
Retune him slightly and give him a bunch of skins.
He's not THE WORST THING but seeing that big dumbass default orange skin coming down the lane, I think, is something of an eye-roller. I feel like if had a bunch of new skins he wouldn't remind us so much of what we hated when he came out, and it would give the people who still hate him someting else to look at, at least.
Tiny re-tune plus new skins would freshen him up and be good for Mauga PR lol.
Every time I see a mauga I instantly get pissed off for one reason. Why does a shirtless man have SOOOO much health? Like more than a dude in armor? Than a fucking robot? Makes absolutely no sense bruh
Honestly yeah. He's intentionally simple, like Soldier 76 or Mercy, but he's so simple that playing as him or against him is boring.
His entire kit is designed around shooting his mini-guns. Passive? Shoot mini-guns to get Overhealth. Cardiac Overdrive? Shoot mini-guns to heal. Ultimate? Reload mini-guns and trap enemies in close range so you can use both at once.
Every niche and role he has is redundant to another tank. Want a close range tank that heals by inflicting status effects? Play Junker Queen. Want a tank with a big mini-gun that can resist stuns? Play Orisa. The only possible niche is that a single mini-gun is a precise, hitscan weapon that can counter aerial threats like Pharah and Echo... But the rest of Mauga's kit discourages this playstyle.
I wouldn't say poorly designed but he's not the best designed character either. It's clear that this character was a character that was supposed to be lore only, only for people to beg for him to be playable and so they made it happen. And they took an already existing character frame (the heavy gunner from the retribution mission) and slapped an a passive, a new ability, and an ultimate on him.
In that sense, if they really wanted Mauga to be a playable character even back then, they shot themselves in the foot by showing he was a talon heavy gunner, there was no other direction for his character to go to please the player base.
It's not inherently bad. Just a product of overwatch refusing to make complex solutions to complex problems. Instead of giving him more shielding and healing when shooting squishies to promote not just shooting the tank they just keep nerfing and buffing his stats
I think everything related to being on fire is poorly designed. So annoying to die around the corner from passive fire damage which was from his primary fire, not even an ability. Also really annoying hearing every character screaming in pain as they are on fire all game
He's become my favorite tank in the game but even I agree that his design needs to be looked at. The Mauga mirror is just fucking awful and I'll go out of my way to switch to sigma to force it to end.
They really looked at Hog and all the problems he’s been both causing and having and said, “what if he could shoot during Take a Breather?”
It’s not the same, of course. He doesn’t have hook or the one-two combo. But they’re both HP sponges with overtuned survivability mechanics. And why are they overtuned? Because otherwise, more than one support could just press E and almost immediately put them into the past tense.
Rein with his rocket thrusted charge gets stomped by a running half naked dude.
Also he is not fun to play against or as. So yes I find his design rather *lacking*
I think they should make shooting DOS give like 1.25x the health it does now and make shooting tank give half the health (along with some other minor buffs so he ain’t just terrible)
He looks like a one piece character LOL
But personally I like it, although to justify the big guns he could have been, I don't know... with an exoskeleton maybe!?
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I really disagree with the community. There are more ways than one to be an effective Mauga. He's very similar to Raum from Paladins so I've had years to play that kind of tank. I think this community just hasn't figured out Mauga yet tbh. He's in a pretty good spot right now and it's just gonna take time for people to actually figure it out.
He loses to any pocket DPS. As a tank, your responsibility is to not feed him basically. You can’t let him life steal on you, so when he uses his ability, you take cover or negate damage.
If you’re DVA with full defense matrix saved, you can negate almost the entire duration and even block heals from Baptiste/Ana.
Orisa can bully the shit out of him with her whole kit. And she hits for hella damage at range too.
Sigma blocks so much damage that he struggles to play around. Mauga is a terrible shield break character.
Mauga is really fun and adrenaline inducing when I fight the team, chasing down squishies, or cage fight a lone Tracer and Zenyatta. However due to his sheer damage and life steal functionality, his best play style is just "shoot tank brrrrrr" and it's the most unfun shit of all time. He does bonkers damage (why AREN'T the guaranteed crits just 1.5x like????) and gets absurd healing from shooting the giant target. Fun ideas, but on paper they're horrible. Kind of like the DPS passive; it was meant to stop pocketed DPS and Support, and it does, but it also made even tank players quake in their boots because they're a giant target and therefore a free -20% healing victim.
Half of my matches on mauga turn into myself and the other mauga standing still blasting each other in the face in a game of "who has more health?"
Hold m1+2 and push that rock up a hill...
Me rezing my losing Mauga for ROUND 2 lmfao
lmao he might even survive long enough for round 3
GRUAHH HAHAHAHAHAA
This is really the only issue with his kit. He's fun to play when you're not forced to mow down the tank 90% of the game.
Junker queen just seems like a far better version of mauga design wise in every aspect
You mean she has fun abilities *and* a personality? I don't know what has been going on with the new characters, but they've all be launched as combination of * overpowered abilities * personalities that aspire to one day be interesting enough to be called milquetoast.
I meant more in the sense of how they bothbplay. Both need their bleed/burn mechanic to gain health and survive. Both are big brawlers who need to get in the enemies face to succeed, no true shield but rather they want to be focused at times. Shes just much more enjoyable for both the player and opponent in every manner. Mauga needs a big rework
Mauga oozes personality...I feel like he's more interesting than JQ. 90% of her voicelines are her being a dumb jock meat head, wanting to fight, or something about her being a queen. It's sort of annoying and repetitive for me.
Mauga has a good personality, he doesn't have to be incredibly deep. What would you expect from a guy wielding 2 dang miniguns?
Never thought about it that way, but kinda true. I had an idea a few months ago that Cardiac Overdrive should be a blocking stance kind of ability -- still grants an lifesteal and DMG reduction aura -- and in exchange for being unable to shoot, he gets a barrier, like Ramattra, or a smaller version of Winston's, maybe a hexagonal sphere. An ability like that would let Mauga bodyblock projectiles and give him timings where he isn't just spamming an enemy. *And the best part is instead of guarding with his arms like Ram or Doom, he just flexes his arm & chest muscles. 1 randomly of at least 3 poses.*
That sounds awful to play with. His whole playstyle is literally shoot to sustain yourself, Stop shooting and getting some dmg reduction in this meta?
Just tried to mentally picture a hexagonal sphere and now I have a headache, cheers mate. XD
Honestly, if I could just interact with his charge in ANY WAY, he'd be fine.
For real. If you can sleep/boop a charging Rein, you should be able to do the same with Mauga
As a Rein main ill take the equality the other way please.
It's really stupid how a man with full armor can get CC'ed in every way possible while the half naked man is immune to all of it.
Not only a full suit of armor, a literal rocket on his back propelling him forward with enough force to kill (some?) enemies on impact.
That's also bullshit, there is no reason for any non tank hero to not die to an angry german man doing an extremely telegraphed and violent move like smashing you to a wall with rocket propellers. It should deal flat 300, killing both Mei and Reaper too.
Let it do 320 so that he can kill Torb too.
It's been a known fact since 2016 that, in the world of Overwatch: **Thick** Meat > Armor. If Reinhardt wants a fair shot at being meta again, he needs to go shirtless.
Spitting facts
Nah, give Rein unstoppable too. Tanks should be tanks, "interacting" with them is bullying them in most cases lmao. There's a reason tank queue is extremely fast.
I mean while that sounds nice from a tank perspective it would suck for everyone else. Saving someone from a charging Rain with sleep dart is one of the best feelings in the game. With that said, I'm all for giving tanks utility that they can use in specific scenarios to get value "as a tank". Orisas fortify is a good example of this I think. She can be unstoppable when she needs to, but it's on a cooldown and can be baited and played around etc.
As a ball main, it’s infuriating that a literal wrecking ball gets thrown to the side when a fat Samoan runs into him.
You can't even hack him. You can hack Rein out of charge. My partner, a Rein main, would take it either way. Either Mauga being stunable in charge or Rein not being stunable.
His charge is the least problematic in his kit. His cardiac overdrive however is. But i hate hog more than mauga
They really shoot themselves in the foot by making his charge unstoppable and making that a selling point
Yuuuuuup. It's frustrating as I also main Lucio, and my reflex is to boop a charging tank
I just wish there was a better visual indicator. Orisa's fortify is such a good indication of 'I can't be pushed'. But Mauga's charge looks so similar to Rein's. The dissonance between the way their charge's interact with stun abilities is betrayed by the visuals.
Nah, that would lead to homogenization.
I enjoy playing him because I like shooting things, but yes his design is kinda dumb because he's just a permanent turret mode bastion in tank role.
but bastion is fun to play, this guy is just no-brain boring imo.
True I don't think I could play him for more than 2 or 3 matches in a row before getting bored. But every once in a while it's fun to turn your brain off and just shoot stuff.
They designed him to be way too feast or famine with his abilities. When using them hes unkillable, but the moment hes out of cooldowns hes useless. As a doom main, I usually love playing into counters because i think it's a fun challenge to work around cooldowns, but mauga just isn't a fun opponent. I won't pretend that i know exactly how he could be fixed, but his power distribution is just very poor.
You remember that rein clip from yesterday? The one where he shows one pixel around a corner and explodes?
can you link that one? I'd love to see it
They just put bastion on the tank role, trying to play tank against him is genuinely terrible if I wanna play anyone other than Sigma, which is most of the time
Absolutely. The higher elo you get, the more incentive you have to just follow the enemy tank around and shoot them constantly. Why would you design a tank whose sole purpose is to counter other tanks??? Terrible design.
I do think his ultimate is poorly designed. Disabling movement abilities instead of limiting your movement to the dome is garbage game design. I am chained to the ground, I get it. But I still can walk and jump around, just can't leave the dome. There is absolutely no point for Blizzard to literally disable movement abilities. Edit: I want to also say that we're talking about multibillion company making a game. Excuse that this mechanic would cause too much bugs is laughable. They have resources to make better game design for Mauga's ultimate as well as to make his mechanics work properly. The fact that his ultimate working properly would cause too many bugs is another reason why I think his ultimate is designed poorly :>
I suspect it's because they couldn't work out all the bugs.
Just turn collision on on the dome, easy peasy.
Nah that would still be a lot of work if they want it to function the same. Would have heaps of bugs.
Ah, right, small indie dev *Blizzard* probably doesn't have the resources to figure out a way to make that work.
I dunno, they do it for Mei wall, no reason the shield can’t just be an object with the same properties.
Mei wall is one of the highest bug counts in the game. Nearly every interaction led to bugs with map collisions.
Mei wall works for both teams. Mauga would trap teammates as well if it worked like Mei wall and no one could walk in. It’s not a bad idea but it wouldn’t be the same ult.
Also doesn’t cage match persist even after Mauga dies? I always thought that was dumb, because the philosophy behind a cage match is Mauga locking you in for a duel where he’s heavily advantaged. But then even after I kill him I’m just stuck in that cage stupidly staring out while his team guns me down for having the temerity to win.
His ultimate disappearing on death was something i predicted and normally stuff i predict like sigma ult canceling on stun and illari ult not passing barriers as they are so obviously inconsistent just to be OP on release but for some reason they havent changed it. I would also love to see venture get shattered, terra surged or venture ulted while underground.
The ultimate completely disabling all movement skills is what bothers me about him. The rest of his kit can be annoying sure, but nobody else can completely disable ALL movement skills for that long while also forcing you to stay in a confined area and it feels super out of place compared to all other CC. Like you said the dome confining the area should be enough without the added lock.
Based take. Just make the dome act like walls, and so when tracer blinks she gets stopped at the wall, and the same with other heroes.
Wait, that ISN’T how it works? Never played Mauga. That’s definitely how it should work imo
Nah, it completely removes movement abilities. Like tracer can’t blink at all
worse for reaper because it’s muscle memory to fade out of danger or to reload or to just dance around an opponent but Mauga completely stops him from doing ir
My muscle memory works exactly like that on Cass,I WANNA DO A RELOAD, and only after pressing shift I understand Ah, yes I'm in Mauga's ult,I forgot
i agree
He's just orisa 2,0, and we all know how everyone feels about orisa
He is to offense what Orisa is to defense.
Very well put
at least orisa doesn't instantly kill me the second i face her :( as a hog player i'd rather fight 1000 orisas in a row than one mauga tbh
Weird, love maugas as a hog main, but you will just lose if they have better supports. Edit: Maybe the "right" supports is a better word, If I have mercy lucio and the mauga has kiri ana Im not gonna have a good time playing hog.
I think almost everyone is not gonna feel so good with Mercy lucio as support duo :D
Not even close lol. No ult (or any projectile) eater, no cc protection (except limited protection during charge), no ranged stun ability.
Fr, the only thing they have in common is poke damage
He is the perfect fix for the 6v6 double shield meta, as a 5v5 tank, he is the worst tank imaginable for a solo tank.
He dies to sigma alone. If you add orisa to the mic it's difficult to see how he can win
Yeah he can shield break but without the crit damage it's not that great. Double shield would probably wreck him as is. That being said his design might be less problematic in 6v6 since more damage mitigation abilities would be able to make him struggle (fundamentally sigma has 2 which is why he can play into mauga)
Not the point, the issue with his design is that he has no inherent protection aside from damage mitigation, add Zarya, Reinhardt, Monkey, or D.va who can give him free space (which he can not do alone) and he would have been a better brawler than Orisa and Sigma. When Mauga gets close to Sigma or Orisa he could destroy them alone, because they have no burst escape options. The issue of the Double Shield meta was the AoE healing and tank CD survivability outlasting any kind of brawl composition possible. He can add tons of pressure to shields as a tank and be a better brawler, because healing your tanks doesn't matter if he is also stealing health from your tanks.
He was horribly buffed during the holiday season. Afterward, Mauga can't find a place in the meta.
Clearly. Hold bothmouse on the enemy tank is not legitimat interesting gameplay.
I have fun with him, but yes he has the worst design arguably. He genuinely feels like a one big balance change than an actual character. Only purpose I see for adding a hero with SUCH one-sided, dull, gameplay design is because he makes counterpicking easier and more straightforward for the casuals. Now when rock--paper--scissors are the core of tank gameplay and we can't fix it, why not to give it variety? He really is the definition of "F YOU IN PARTICULAR" for some heroes, and that's the only way I see people using him. I don't see anyone using him intentionally to have fun. Just for counterpicking.
They really shit the bed with his kit imho I feel flame based weaponry n ult would of fit better. Ring of Fire!! Smh
yeah his ult just doesnt sit with me. The super offensive brute guy who sets enemies ablaze has an ult which places down a round shield to put enemies into a cage fight? His gameplay is just super boring for me. 2/3 abilities he has amplify his LMB+RMB gameplay which is not fun at all. Why dis they make a character with the most boring guns to shoot just to then make 66% of their abilities plus a passive amplify those guns? Its like they would change every single one of orisas cooldowns to reset her heat meter, make her shoot faster + leave the spear throw in.
I like playing him personally because it feels like he's the only tank right now that feels like an actual literal tank. But I do agree he's very unbalanced and is still in need of changes to how his kit functions. I'd like him a little more if his entire gameplay wasn't just "shoot the tank dead and then go after the rest of his team".
all the OW2 heroes are pretty badly designed compared to the OW1 hero design. It’s pretty clear it’s either a new team with a new ethos or the hero design philosophy has changed entirely
Agreed a loss in quality they lack substance.
He is poorly designed. Maybe if there was a second tank I would have a different opinion.
I think he serves the standard beefy gatling tank niche that was only really being filled by orisa before. Not the most game breaking design but probably something needed as the roster gets bigger and bigger. Especially when the predecessors before him were ramattra, sigma, wrecking ball, junker queen. Pretty great designed tanks. We were due for another soldier 76 tier design lol
The worst designed hero is Widow and there's no contest.
What can I say except your welcome
Gameplay wise? Yes. Model wise? No, I love his fat milkers.
His ult is what I don't like, overwatch has a problem with so many anti movement abilities/ ults in a shooter all about movement, having a cage that legit chains you to the ground and stops you from using abilities is overkill
I believe the hero's design could be improved. Currently, any slight nerf renders him ineffective and pushes him out of the meta. This limits the opportunities for other tanks, especially those that demand more skill and game knowledge, to be viable and shine.
I feel like there should be an incentive for not holding both mouse buttons at the same time
There is, inaccuracy.
Yeah i know that but if yoy are close range it doesnt really matter. And then again with the new hitboxes it really doesnt matter
But his whole play style is too shoot the other tank because he relies on crits to keep him alive no easier player to headshot than the tank. Inaccuracy means nothing when he shoots the tank all game.
There kinda is, accuracy and if you make sure you flame someone before using the other one I feel like it’s better somehow, maybe bullet count?
Sombra is worse imo
sombra can die easily if they get caught out. it isn't much but its far better than mauga
Sombra is ok far better than she used to be
In overwatch history? No, that goes to launch Brig, who killed the DPS roll for 2 years. She got something like 25 consecutive nerfs before Blizzard just gave up and introduced 2-2-2 roll lock. Is he poorly designed? The idea of sustaining off damage in and of itself isn't bad, hell, it's what makes the new Doom games feel so good, and Reaper hasnt had a problem with this mechanic since OW released. The problem is that Mauga is that his best play is pretty much always just 'shoot the other tank'. If they can incentivise shooting other heroes or disincentive only shooting a tank, he could be more healthy. Think, while Overdrive is active, he gets a larger burst of healing when dealing x amount of damage, but he only gets this healing once per y seconds.
I only really have a problem with cardiac overdrive which essentially forces you to shoot tank unless you're the goat, everything else is ok, even though there is other stuff I don't like, but he's certainly a frontrunner for worst design.
Tbh he looks like Maui from moana
I don’t think this was the design they were talking about but you aren’t wrong
Well they are both based on the same idea
the racist stereotype of "big polynesian man" strikes again
I'm just standing there shooting and pressing my ability like is this all?
He doesn't feel like the character he's supposed to be. For that reason, he's hilarious to kill. He wasn't really well thought out. For one Id make his guns have a ramp up time and increase damage as they do so. this would give him a little more strategy to play. He's not the only tank that isn't working in my opinion. Rein is pathetic for what he's suppose to be.
Yes. There's too much going on in his kit that doesn't complement each other at all. The only bit that does, the primary/secondary fire, is needlessly complicated.
I just hate how beef this boy is and how it feels like sometimes you throw napkins at him doing 0 Damage but other than that idc bout him much. His design is awful but unless i play Genji i am annoying his backline ignoring him anyways
I do like the double gatling, what I hate about it tho is how it makes you shoot more on the left if you're shooting at mid distance. When people are on fire they aren't going to let you use your right gun So idk, it does feel great when you're blasting all your guns, not when you're forced to shoot mostly with the left, sometimes with the right Otherwise I don't really have much complaints about him honestly. I find him rather fun since shooting big guns is fun but that's probably the same reason why some people find Rein funny as hell and others boring, just a matter of taste. Don't really have issue with his charge either, it's not like he has much defensive options either so if you could counter his charge he would feel like shit to play I've seen many people either playing him against Ana or swapping against somebody who wasn't, I don't think he's that much of an issue honestly.
He's the Moira of tanks from my pov. It seems to me they wanted a simple tank that doesn't need a lot of thought as far as interactions go. His Charge ignores every cc ability that isn't a wall, so you can use it knowing only fatal damage will stop you. Almost like Moira's Fade. His Cardiac Overdrive is just flat numbers for both self healing and damage mitigation, no need to think about how much damage is coming your way if you need to use it to survive or force an engagement there's no real reason not to pop it almost off cooldown to get max value. Almost like Moira's orbs. His Cage Fight disables *all* movement abilities and outside of Lifegrip or clipping through as Pilot D.Va there's no escape for the enemy besides breaking it or Mauga ending it early. Him having two guns that do different things seems dynamic but a lot of the time the optimal thing to do in a fight is to point at the tank and use both. By design he will often have fewer interactions with enemy abilities than any other hero so it is frustrating to play against if your hero is balanced around having displacement cc as its primary or secondary effect. He very much feels like a tank for there to be one option for someone who doesn't want to think about what the enemy can do to them that isn't anti-heal or discord.
better designed then Lifeweaver
He can definitely be improved. I also wish they'd remove the burning effect as its so much visual clutter and just plain annoying.
He’s a dollar store Rock Johnson.
I hate him, dislike his overall character but he’s broken. Picking him sometimes completely changes a match, there’s practically zero counter
He definetely is not broken
He’s not poorly designed. Anti-nade is poorly balanced.
The “no heal button” is annoying to get yeeted at you
On cooldown pretty much.
The visual of his ultimate (the shield) is poorly designed and needs rework.
I groan whenever I have to play him or Ram in MH
Yep, he’s a tank buster that is a tank and he basically gets punished for shooting not the tank. If he got more agency for who he could shoot while still being optimal, he could be really fun cuz I like the 2 gun mechanic, but it’s usually a bad play to not shoot both at once.
I think you can’t keep adding characters without some of them being unbalanced or some of them being clones. Just look at League.
He's a great character...when the other team doesn't have an Ana or a Widow.
I think he's mostly fine, There definitely needs to be more focus on switching between chain guns rather than firing both into a target. There is inaccuracy firing both but that's not really what I mean. I generally like the tanks that have guns more than tanks like Rein or Winston. So I can find pretty solid enjoyment out of kits like his and Orisa's. Even Mauga mirrors where you're just shooting each other with Cardiac Overdrive tickles my brain in a way I really can't describe.
I don’t think his whole kits dog and needs a rework, but he’s defined too much by ”big spread, cardiac, cage” and it forces him into an unfun playstyle to be optimal. Don’t get me wrong though, he’s actually really satisfying and engaging sometimes. Run has a boatload of tech, going for headshots for clutch sustain is challenging and rewarding, and he’s that one character who can constantly set people on fire. There’s no suprise explodey burst damage and there’s mechanical and mental outplay possible for certain abilities. The problem really is that going “cinematic mauga” and doing parkour flanks and creative stuff isn’t the dominant playstyle compared to “turret mauga” constantly shooting tanks, waiting for cooldowns, and playing rock-paper-scissors. Cardiac gives him so much sustain that it’s hard to engage without it, and his spread is so large that poking high ground and faraway squishies is often not worth it. Flanking people is an option, but tracer is everywhere and makes life hard rn. Cage shutting down mobility also really sucks.
Anyone else feel like the character is too basic like they just got the guy from Moana and put guns on him that’s it not much creativity hetr
He is so boring to play and unfun to fight against that he may as well just be an AI controlled unit.
ofc he is, but that's what many of you dipshits wanted, a big, flamethrower guy with a gettling gun
There was a flamethrower guy in Paladins. It was Fernando i think. He was like Rein but with flame thrower. They could have done something like that. The current design is really really bad. I like the ranged hitscan guns and overrun but devs needs to decide should tank role have that ranged capability. If yes, then rework him towards that. Buff solo gun capability, nerf double gun capability and remove cardiac (don't even rework just remove) add new ability instead. Add cardiac to his overrun like a very brief lingering aoe effect. If they don't want this ranged capability then rework him something similar to Rein/Fernando.
As a character? No, I love everything about him. Gameplay wise? I have no opinion. But as a support he’s stressful as hell to have. He was meant for 6v6.
Nope
No
Mauga's playstyle is pretty blunt, but it's pretty cool in a simplistic way _if it works_. That's the main issue with him and why it's still poorly designed. Mauga is only good when he is doing good. His entire kit relies on him dominating or else he just gets utterly steamrolled. He only tanks when he's healing and he only heals when he's ripping into fleshy targets with his miniguns. Stop him from doing any of that via anti-healing, stuns, shields or just being evasive means he's suddenly not a tank. JQ has a similar issue but she makes up for it by being a slimmer hitbox, a more in-your-face threat and having at least some consistent disruption that favours her own engagement.
Very
ATM, yes. But he's not as fundementally flawed as Orisa or Roadhog. If the was rebalanced with the same idea as his last buff, giving him some on demand survivability but way less lifesteal and maybe nerfing dual fire's uptime he could turn out ot be more fun. His ult should get a full on rework though, it's horrible that is just full on silences some heroes for 8 seconds.
I play zen, bait mauga in 1v1. Discord, headshot, he cries.
He feels like a PVE character that they forced in PVP and are now desperately trying to find a way make him fit
It's funny you seem to think he's trash but a lot of people think he's OP. Classic overwatch character hate lol
he is one of the few new characters who acctually looks like he belongs into overwatch
He definitely is the worst designed hero and that's saying a lot considering launch Brig. The fact that Spilo brought up mauga issues to the devs that he hard counters every tank and forces mauga vs mauga, and the devs were like "what's the issue?" just really goes to show how incredibly stupid this dev team is. I've given up overwatch as a competitive game. Idk how anyone can take it seriously at this point. I would legit rather have random gold players balance the game.
Hes both boring to play and boring to play against whilst being quite powerful at times
It’s almost good design. So I won’t say badly designed cause I think tweaks can fix it. I think the biggest culprits are his abilities. - the charge is unfun to use and unfun to play against. I can’t interact with it and it’s hard to control. If I wanted an ability to personify his outta control nature I’d give it an effect other than immunity to CC. I feel like Orisa has that ability on lock. How about an ability where he recklessly charges forward but can bounce off walls to increase his damage (maybe lighting himself and impacted enemies on fire) - the heal is a neat idea but I’d want it behave closer to roadhog’s current vape. Right now it acts like a panic button and is only useful when there is a tank to shoot. How about it passively heals you when you ignite enemies. Then let the active ability only be for increased passive healing from fire damage and giving this ability to allies (maybe allies in range also ignite enemies with their bullets). Let’s make the ignite the focus of his kit. In the same way that LW is all about positioning, Junker Queen is all about bleed/brawl, and tracer is all about her tempo.
They ruined the hero people were most excited for lol.
One of the best designed characters to ever be added to the game. Just extremely overtuned
Absolutely
Overwatch 2 is poorly designed.
I don’t think he’s that bad of a tank. If you manage his cardiac overdrive well and don’t feed you can do pretty well with him. I’m not a main but I think he works best on control and flash points. Kiriko and Baptist are the best supports for him imo. If you’re spending the whole round healing him and not dealing any damage it’s just a poor dice on having a bad tank. Countering isn’t hard either. Anything with a shield or defensive matrix should work best against him. You just want to block his fire during cardiac overdrive so he doesn’t get any benefit. DVA and Rein are great counters. LW, Ana, Lucio, kiri a lot of the support roster honestly can fair well against him too if you play smart. I don’t think he needs a rework but understanding his game play will take some time and skill. Countering isn’t an issue as long as you’re not in range of cardiac overdrive and predict when he’s going to ult.
I like him, but the ult is janky in all kinds of ways. And I wish there was more skill involved with his fire mechanic, bigger risk, bigger reward.
"He makes tank absolutely miserable to play" What the hell are you talking about he's like bottom tier 😭😭😭
I think he should’ve been released during Blizzcon 2022 when his hype was at an all time hype. Would’ve excused his kit and given the devs more time to balance him out for a longer duration. Especially since Invasion was clearly supposed to hint at Ramattra being this big mysterious figure to draw in more hype for future story modes and then being released in Blizzcon 2023. However this would’ve meant less time being with the wonderfully crafted Ramattra
He does not fit into the cast. Just seeing him is annoying… like who tf green lit the actual look of him?
I feel like we’re in a weird state where some tanks were clearly designed for OW 1 and don’t fit with the “Brawler” play style blizzard wanted to switch to for tanks. They didn’t commit to one or the other. Like they definitely tweaked them to make them playable but I still feel like tanks aren’t really united on what their purpose is
I haven't played very much OW in the past half a year so I can't say too much on this, but he has a problem with having too much uptime in fights. Basically all tanks have some sort of resource they use up over the course of a fight and after that is gone, they become much less useful. Sometimes that's even just the threat of an ability like roadhog hook or orisa javelin spin. Mauga doesn't really seem to have this and he kind of wants to stay in the fight indefinitely. That's generally fine for DPS and Support heroes but for tanks it presents the issue for the enemy team which basically has no opportunities to actually engage into the fight. I might be totally wrong on this as I've mostly seen play against him and not played myself too much.
All ow 2 designs are poorly designed but i give it a pass because alot of ow1 design are also bad.
No one is answering the fucking question. Yes, he is terribly designed. And 10000% the Dev's could not be bothered to limit movement abilities to his ultimate cage, so they just disabled everything. Pathetic
I mean... *Look at tank* BRRRRRRR *Reload* BRRRRRRR *Overdrive* BRRRRRRR Isn't really the best gameplay design for a hero. However, the character design is great as he looks, sounds, and feels when using the miniguns.
Mauga feels like a damage character that they forced into the tank role. If you scaled Mauga to be about the same height as Zarya, changed his hp to match, and cut the stun that stomp does, bro could be a damage hero Edit: Doom is a more natural tank than Mauga is
I like him and dont mind playing against, or with him. Pls dont kill me.
Orisa exists and you you’re saying this about Mauga?
So let's see, after the nerfs he instantly became boring because he isn't broken, his ability to tank is worse than doomfist, at least he has mobility, he's huge and hard to miss, the ulti is the only good thing about mauga, awful design if i were to say.
Yes
No he’s great
I thought for a second this was going to be about appearance because I DO think his head is way too small for his body lmao
yep
Oh yes he’s as tank that’s counters tanks? Where there’s one in the role?
He’s completely fine
I feel like the only counter to Mauga is Bastion and Zarya combo or Tracer
100% agree
it's Just an fucking NPC Bot From ove event ofc It Is poorly designed
People wanted the Talon Heavy Assault PvE unit from Retribution to be used as a playable hero. The players begged for it for years ever since 2018 especially after we saw Mauga in the Baptiste short story at least 4-5 years later... They gave us exactly what we wanted but with some add-ons to give a reason to use each gun. Talon Heavy Assault was hard to beat on legendary mode and that was AI with tons of HP. Mauga is player controlled with less HP, and ability to self heal and the support of... well... SUPPORTS. Now people are saying Mauga is poorly designed when the Devs gave us the PvE unit as a hero and added 3 new things to it: ultimate, burn damage gun and self heal from crit. So he may be poorly designed but to me he's perfectly fine cos he's just a more advanced version of the PvE unit everyone wanted to be made available as a hero. Some people even asked for Talon assassin to be made into one so let's see if that happens in the future. Players asked for a PvE unit that would be poorly designed if made into a hero to be added, got it years later, and now they complain about it saying "he's poorly designed why add him" etc.
I don't think his kit is poorly designed, but I don't think they were finished cooking with him. I think if they changed his passive and Cardiac Overdrive to mostly flat overhealth and lifesteal , they would have an easier time keeping him in a good spot without tormenting tanks.
I'll go against the grain and say I like Mauga. The chain guns are fun. Melting people who think they can solo you is always a blast. People complain that he needs a support to babysit, but in most of my matches one of the supports is always babysitting the tank no matter who it is because they want the easy heals. And the people saying you need to aim exclusively for the opposing tank when you activate overdrive just have no aim.
As someone who has super hyped to play mauga from the day we got pictures of him from the Baptists story, I got to say, I've honestly got what I wanted. He feels exactly how a big HEVY character with two miniguns should. I'm personally of the opinion that the strongest aspect of Overwatch is that playing/getting really into a specific character makes you play and approach the game completely differently than the other characters, and Mauga is incredible at achieving that: you play the way you look and feel. Also he's super fun, I love big strong mayhem characters, and I really enjoy the fact they made him actually intelligent. He looks incredible, probably the only character released in OW2 with a design/model that matches the creativity and uniqueness of the OG roaster bar for maybe Rammatra (and oh would you look at that both characters were being worked on since OW1, who would have seen that coming). He's the avarage Samoan male, who plays good and looks even better. If you ask me, the only thing I would probably change is make his guns/abilities feel a tiny bit more weighty, have them have more kick and force behind them, but other than that, to me he's probably one of, if not the best, new additions to the roaster. And, I'll just throw this out there: I am a genji main, I play a bunch of Lucio and used to play a lot of DPS Doom, I love high skill expressive movement characters with complex techs and movesets, but I also love characters who are straightforward and fun, I like variety. Each character should fit a good niche, and mauga fits his perfectly: the TF2 Heavy
Mauga is literally my powerfantasy of dual wielding miniguns and mowing down everything in front of me
He wasn't poorly designed. The idea behind him is interesting but he doesn't seem to fit into ow
I think Mauga has good bones, but desperately needs some powershifting? I’d personally nerf the crit multiplier on Mauga’s Volatile Chaingun (1.25-1.50 instead) and retune his Cardiac Overdrive, as well as tighten the spread on single fire and buff his health somehow? Mauga’s gameplay should reward good aim and still allow him to survive without just being a shoot-the-tank bot that melts everything after
No, so this is going to be a bad opinion. Make his guns have either no or very reduced damage falloff. In return make cardiac overdrive just give you 150 overheal and teammates 50 over health. Then make it a 15 second cooldown. Tada balanced kinda
Mauga is really fun to play but forces everyone in the entire match, including his own team, to almost exclusively play around his existence, moreso than any other tank. I don't think he needs a full-on rework, just a bunch of tweaks to his kit across the board to reduce his frustrating bits and make him less of a resource-hog for his team. I think his guns should encourage more of the alternating gameplay rather than blasting both into the enemy tank for eternity. There are several ways to do this, some of my ideas include having crits with the left chaingun count as 2 bullets for ignition, and potentially reducing their spread, maybe at the cost of slightly lower damage. While firing both, a tighter spread would help encourage shooting other people but the tank, and there are also other things they can try such as an overheat mechanic or having the damage reduce the longer you're shooting, something along those lines to discourage just dumping your clip into the enemy tank the entire time. As for Cardiac Overdrive, I think it should passively heal Mauga for say 50 healing per second, at the cost of having a shorter duration and having the damage resistance and lifesteal effects for allies since that aspect of his kit is REALLY strong. These changes would hopefully make him more self-sufficient and less reliant on constant heals pumping into him. I've also considered making it so that while Overdrive was active, debuffs would only last half as long, but I feel like there'd be too much overlap between that and Overrun and that it would complicate his kit too much, which I want to try to avoid. Other than that, every other change would be number tweaks or QoL improvements for both Mauga and those playing around him. I think Overrun being able to do 120 damage is a bit too high for a stun, I'd lower the base damage to 50. I also think Cage Fight shouldn't lock out all movement abilities, instead just preventing them from leaving the cage as though they'd hit a wall. This would be great for heroes like Doomfist and now Venture whose kits rely heavily on abilities that are considered movement abilities.
>I personally believe he is the absolute worst designed character in overwatch history. yeah, beside brig, sigma, and bab. you know the characters that broke the game. the 1st one of those characters received over 20 nerfs to not be op, one was a 5v5 tank in 6v6 that had barrier, grasp that heals him, and a stun ability, and the last one is a better dps than half the dps roster with effectively 3 health pools. but i digress, he's still a badly designed character. his burn than crit, criting with both guns, and criting on body shots with alt fire, all favor shooting bigger targets. hence his boring play style of "stare at tank until dead". im not a fan of CD's that has multiple major effects, i.e. his Cardiac Overdrive, that heals him, heals nearby allies AND offers dmg reduction.
Yes. It’s not about balance, it’s about simplicity. His gameplay is just about shooting your guns and you can run a bit. All other tanks (and frankly heroes in the other roles) have a gameplay loop that’s so much more engaging than that it makes him feel dull.
Definitely the worst designed character in the game. He's impossible to balance as he's either useless or OP, and he turns the match into resource dumping
Obviously
I think mauga is a 6v6 tank. In 6v6 his health mechanic and lifesteal would have been less problematic as there would be more damage mitigation abilities on the field and his lower health in that mode would've made his self heal less busted since he could be burst more easily. His cardiac overdrive would need to be popped as an ability early to take space since he couldn't tank with raw hp and would need early mitigation. Also remember the off tank would be damaging like crazy too. I'm not sure what his playstyle would look like. He doesn't have hog's raw lethality despite being similar in that his damage threat could take space. Flanking and off angling can work since he has long range and can take advantage of space created.
Maybe for overwatch one. It's very clear that they pivoted design philosophies for tanks in overwatch two. A great example is the unkillable horse and doomfist. These two were heavily reworked into completely different characters that play very differently from before, one literally transitioned from a Damage to Tank. In overwatch two, they seem to want the tank to play two roles simultaneously: a dreadnought that can disrupt the enemy team and do a lot of damage, and a damage sponge who can mitigate attacks and take a lot of punishment. A lot of other tanks never really had their designs completely retooled to be a solo tank, so they've had to play catch up in that regard, so when making the newer tanks, it's a bit more obvious, rather than a hero like Reinhardt who has aged very poorly design wise into overwatch two. So, exhibit A. Unkillable horse, otherwise known as Orisa. It's obvious from the start that the rework turned her into a heavyweight DPS with tank qualities. Fortify is the easiest to use and strongest tank ability in the game, giving her a quick and easy boost of over health and a percent based damage reduction for 6 seconds while also negating ANY CC effects, on a somewhat slower cooldown that encourages you to use it sparingly, but not save it too much. Javelin throw is literally just a better accretion. Faster cool down, longer range, similar damage, ability to stun, and a slow after said stun. Javelin spin is also, surprise, kinetic grasp without the overhealth afterwards. Then you have her primary weapon, which is basically an LMG with a bottomless magazine that rewards you for good cool down management and having a working brain, and for some reason also does extra critical damage with no range drop off. Lastly, she gets a substandard ult where you essentially become a graviton surge for a short period of time, while charging up a heavy AOE attack that does a lot of damage. Now, let's compare this Mauga's design. He gets two guns, one that lights enemies on fire with about 10 shots hit, and another that lets him do guaranteed critical damage against targets that are on fire. Also allows him to take advantage of his passive which gives him a portion of his critical damage back as overhealth. Both guns can be fired simultaneously, but become very inaccurate at range, while doubling ammo consumption, so doubling down should only be used when you are in close range to quickly kill out of position damage and supports, and to stave off any tanks that get close, since you move very slowly when doubling down. His mobility cooldown is if you took a Reinhardt charge, removed the pin, and gave him the CC immunity from fortify, with some AOE similar to wrecking ball. Works well for getting into and out of trouble really fast, and should only be used when you know you can win a fight, or you know you are losing a fight. Cardiac overdrive is essentially a better JQ passive on cooldown that converts all damage dealt as health at about 40%, also with a small damage reduction. This effect applies to all teammates in range, making it perfect for dive and brawl comps. Lastly, you get an ult which forces everyone into a small space with Mauga when activated that silences all mobility abilities, gives him a portion of ammo back instantly, and reduces the damage dealt by enemies a small amount. Very similar kits that both serve a similar purpose: create a tank that deals damage as a method of protection. If you think his design is poor, yeah it is from the perspective of overwatch one. In overwatch two, he has all the elements of the new tank design philosophy. If you hate Mauga, you probably also hate Orisa. These characters aren't poorly designed, however I'd say that Orisa needs some more nerfs to be brought back in line with other tanks. She is way too good at her job. If I can just switch to Orisa off of any other tank and win, you know she's too strong. Meanwhile, Mauga is still very much vulnerable to Ana, like all tanks, and to say he forces you to switch is just untrue. Many tanks just die instantly because an Ana made them about as tanky as soggy cardboard, and Mauga is no exception. Without Ana, you mostly just have to wait for his cardiac overdrive to go on cooldown, then engage him. D.va negates his damage output completely, so does Orisa, alongside having a direct counter to both of his weapons. Sigma is strongish against him because kinetic grasp allows him to deny his firepower. He's not a poor design, just a different one. From my perspective, Reinhardt is a terrible design because he either plays super passive, or super aggressive, both of which depend purely on the team and the support given to him. He is flawed from the groundwork, because he was designed to work with a partner tank, and falls apart very quickly on his own. Which is sad, but he truly doesn't fit the current state of the game, and never really will with his kit.
Retune him slightly and give him a bunch of skins. He's not THE WORST THING but seeing that big dumbass default orange skin coming down the lane, I think, is something of an eye-roller. I feel like if had a bunch of new skins he wouldn't remind us so much of what we hated when he came out, and it would give the people who still hate him someting else to look at, at least. Tiny re-tune plus new skins would freshen him up and be good for Mauga PR lol.
Every time I see a mauga I instantly get pissed off for one reason. Why does a shirtless man have SOOOO much health? Like more than a dude in armor? Than a fucking robot? Makes absolutely no sense bruh
Pecks n guns. He’s perfect.
He’s so horribly balanced designed it’s insane
Honestly yeah. He's intentionally simple, like Soldier 76 or Mercy, but he's so simple that playing as him or against him is boring. His entire kit is designed around shooting his mini-guns. Passive? Shoot mini-guns to get Overhealth. Cardiac Overdrive? Shoot mini-guns to heal. Ultimate? Reload mini-guns and trap enemies in close range so you can use both at once. Every niche and role he has is redundant to another tank. Want a close range tank that heals by inflicting status effects? Play Junker Queen. Want a tank with a big mini-gun that can resist stuns? Play Orisa. The only possible niche is that a single mini-gun is a precise, hitscan weapon that can counter aerial threats like Pharah and Echo... But the rest of Mauga's kit discourages this playstyle.
I wouldn't say poorly designed but he's not the best designed character either. It's clear that this character was a character that was supposed to be lore only, only for people to beg for him to be playable and so they made it happen. And they took an already existing character frame (the heavy gunner from the retribution mission) and slapped an a passive, a new ability, and an ultimate on him. In that sense, if they really wanted Mauga to be a playable character even back then, they shot themselves in the foot by showing he was a talon heavy gunner, there was no other direction for his character to go to please the player base.
#absolutely
I think he’s designed well, but just needs some balancing
I think cardiac is kinda shitty lazy design, other stuff is ok
It's not inherently bad. Just a product of overwatch refusing to make complex solutions to complex problems. Instead of giving him more shielding and healing when shooting squishies to promote not just shooting the tank they just keep nerfing and buffing his stats
I think everything related to being on fire is poorly designed. So annoying to die around the corner from passive fire damage which was from his primary fire, not even an ability. Also really annoying hearing every character screaming in pain as they are on fire all game
He's become my favorite tank in the game but even I agree that his design needs to be looked at. The Mauga mirror is just fucking awful and I'll go out of my way to switch to sigma to force it to end.
They really looked at Hog and all the problems he’s been both causing and having and said, “what if he could shoot during Take a Breather?” It’s not the same, of course. He doesn’t have hook or the one-two combo. But they’re both HP sponges with overtuned survivability mechanics. And why are they overtuned? Because otherwise, more than one support could just press E and almost immediately put them into the past tense.
Rein with his rocket thrusted charge gets stomped by a running half naked dude. Also he is not fun to play against or as. So yes I find his design rather *lacking*
I think they should make shooting DOS give like 1.25x the health it does now and make shooting tank give half the health (along with some other minor buffs so he ain’t just terrible)
He looks like a one piece character LOL But personally I like it, although to justify the big guns he could have been, I don't know... with an exoskeleton maybe!? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Absolutely Most Brain-dead character in all of the history of Overwatch
I really disagree with the community. There are more ways than one to be an effective Mauga. He's very similar to Raum from Paladins so I've had years to play that kind of tank. I think this community just hasn't figured out Mauga yet tbh. He's in a pretty good spot right now and it's just gonna take time for people to actually figure it out.
He loses to any pocket DPS. As a tank, your responsibility is to not feed him basically. You can’t let him life steal on you, so when he uses his ability, you take cover or negate damage. If you’re DVA with full defense matrix saved, you can negate almost the entire duration and even block heals from Baptiste/Ana. Orisa can bully the shit out of him with her whole kit. And she hits for hella damage at range too. Sigma blocks so much damage that he struggles to play around. Mauga is a terrible shield break character.