Esports News
The fourth season of Overwatch 2 began on Tuesday, 11 April, as Blizzard developers have kept in line with their promises to deliver a new hero every other season by adding Lifeweaver to the growing roster.
Season 4 brings tons of fresh content for its loyal player base to dive into, including slight tweaks to a few of the Support characters and the complete removal of seasonal rank decay and map pools! Let's dive into some of the most significant changes Season 4 of Overwatch 2 will bring.
Of course, the star of Season 4 is the brand-new Support hero, Lifeweaver. This Thai character utilizes bio-light plant-based technology to heal his allies. Lifeweaver promises to shake up the meta with plenty of mobility skills to help his allies escape sticky situations, but also has plenty of trolling potential so we will see how he fares!
Here's a brief rundown of Lifeweaver's abilities - if you want a more in-depth overview, check out our Lifeweaver guide here.
Lifeweaver will be locked unless you work towards level 40 on the free Battle Pass or unlock him immediately through buying the Premium Battle Pass. Once the game progresses into Season 5, Lifeweaver will be available to unlock through Practice Range gameplay challenges or Overwatch Coins. Check out our guide on how to unlock all Overwatch 2 heroes!
With the release of Season 4, Blizzard developers have released some slight tweaks, nerfs, and buffs to their hero roster.
Notably, the Support role has gotten much attention with this new season. Mercy has had some of her Guardian Angel changes in Season 3 reverted back. Brigitte has also had her Ultimate Rally reworked, giving her more potential to be picked in ranked games as she has long been considered the lowest tier Support hero.
Cassidy
Sombra
Reinhardt
Sigma
Ana
Brigitte
Mercy
Moira
General
Hero Fixes
The original Overwatch and the first three seasons of Overwatch 2 featured the famously controversial decaying rank system. This downgraded every player's rank at the start of every competitive season or if they had a period of absence from the game.
Players became frustrated at having to graft through the competitive ranks to reach their hard-earned spot every season, so Blizzard developers have completely removed rank decay starting from Season 4. Players should now be able to log onto Overwatch 2 and be greeted with a more accurate depiction of their skill level for each role and competitive game mode.
There have also been some changes to the Competitive Points system, as seen below. If you want a more detailed explanation of the OW2 ranked system, Rivalry has got you covered!
Seasonal competitive play challenge titles have also been tweaked to reflect whether they are earned in Open or Role Queue. For example: ending in Platinum in Open Queue gives the player "Platinum Open Challenger" while ending in Platinum in Role Queue rewards players with "Platinum Role Challenger."
Players will also be thrilled to see that their updated match progression screen also displays their losses and ties, as well as their wins!
Overwatch 2 features three unique game modes and twenty-three maps in its repertoire. The latest addition is the Antarctic Peninsula. These maps have day/night configurations, too, making the environments seem visually completely different. Blizzard initially introduced the map pool with so many maps, with a select few maps on a set rotation for each season.
However, many Overwatch fans complained that map pools made the game "stale," after playing through three "push" games in a row. Blizzard has now abandoned map pools entirely, so players can expect to see the return of beloved maps like Hollywood and Eichenwalde in their games soon!
Below is a complete list of all the maps in Overwatch 2 currently and their current lighting settings.
Some players are still missing the controversial Assault/2CP maps like Temple of Anubis, Volskaya, Hanamura, Horizon Lunar Colony, and Paris, but who knows if they'll be added to the game in future seasons.
New with Season 4 is also the ability to swap spawn rooms if your character spawn changes due to the enemy capturing an objective or payload progression. This is great for maps like Watchpoint Gibraltar or Eichenwalde, where late spawners often become an Ultimate battery charge for the enemy team. This handy new feature will allow players to teleport to their new spawn room.
Blizzard has announced a series of limited-time game modes and events to keep players entertained throughout Season 4. These events will feature three free epic skins to unlock, as well as a host of other comsetic rewards like player titles and weapon charms! There have previously been the unique Loverwatch and PachiMarchi events, so what do Overwatch 2 fans have to look forward to in Season 4?
Rest assured that we will post guides on these limited game modes when we have more details, so keep an eye out!
Season 4 of Overwatch 2 looks jam-packed full of fresh content as Blizzard continues to keep to their promise of delivering a new hero each season. The limited-time modes add some extra spice to ensure players always have free rewards to work towards, as well as the new Galactic-themed Battle Pass with tons of fun cosmetics to unlock, like the Mythic Galactic Emperor Sigma skin and Bonebreaker Doomfist skin.
Bookmark Rivalry as your #1 trusted site for all esports news. If you're still craving some Overwatch 2 info, we've got a guide on the best OW2 crosshairs, an OW2 systems requirements guide, a guide on how to play Support and tons more!