There is a difference between a "fix" and a "nerf" when it comes to competitive gaming. In Overwatch, many people complained daily about Roadhog's hook, which allowed him to grab a target up to 20m away and bring that target toward him, and Blizzard officially announced yesterday that they will be rolling out major changes to this maneuver, calling it "Hook 2.0."
While it seems most everyone has universally approved of this change, I'm here to tell you that Blizzard went too far, so far, in fact, that they are now punishing skill, timing and reflexes – all qualities you typically do not want to punish in a competitive game.
Full disclosure: I've described myself as a Roadhog main, so, while you can certainly dismiss what I have to say outright based on that fact alone, allow me to say something that I don't think other Roadhog mains would say: Roadhog's hook absolutely needed to be fixed. Where I draw the line is that I don't think his hook needed to be nerfed.
Let's look at the entirety of the changes upcoming to Roadhog's hook, which is easily broken down into three main changes.
1. No More "Hook and Look"
This was an exploit that allowed a Roadhog player to hook somebody and immediately look to the side. Instead of going right in front of Roadhog, the hooked player would move slightly over, throwing off any attempts they may have at defense. This was a popular method for Roadhog's to deal with Ana because it made it more difficult for her to land her sleep dart.
This obviously needed to be fixed. It was such a powerful exploit that literally every time you see a hook in competitive or tournament play, the Roadhog was trying to take advantage of it.
2. No More Hitbox Hooking
Hitbox Hooking is a relatively simple concept. Everything in the game, or in any game that involves interaction between virtual objects, for that matter, has a hitbox – an invisible box around that object. When one hitbox interacts with another hitbox – not necessarily the object itself – the game considers them to be touching.
In Overwatch, this played out in such a way that I could hook someone without necessarily seeing them, as long as I knew they were there. I could hook just above their heads or just to the right of them around a corner and grab them as long as I could get my hook's hitbox to touch that player's hitbox.
Again, I have no problem with this being fixed. It's an obvious exploit that logcially shouldn't be in the game. And up until this point, even as a Roadhog main, I have no problem with this fix – mostly because it was just a fix.
3. Persistent Line-of-Sight Check
This is a more complicated change. Directly quoting the forum post "This means if you get hooked and move out of LOS quickly (either you dashed, were falling, were pushed, etc), the hook will now break early and not pull the target." Up until this point, Blizzard was merely fixing exploits in Roadhog's hook that never should have been there in the first place, and I agreed with all of them.
This is going too far. A very common thing that happens all the time is that someone will dart in and out of cover while facing a Roadhog. This is a risky maneuver, but it can allow you to fire off quick shots, zoning the Roadhog and charging your ultimate, while making it difficult, but not impossible, to be hooked by Roadhog.
According to the purported changes, that hook in the picture above wouldn't land. Roadhog would hook Reinhardt as he is charging, before he gets behind cover, but Reinhardt's momentum will carry him behind cover before Roadhog starts the pull, breaking line of sight and breaking the hook. That makes what kind of sense? If I literally had a huge hook around someone, it stands to reason that I could pull that person around a corner
Hooking someone under those circumstances is difficult – it requires great skill and reflexes to time a hook on someone moving quickly in and out of cover, or even more so a dashing Mercy, a charging Reinhardt or speeding Lucio. Blizzard is actively punishing that skill by rendering it ineffective.
This even appears to punish more spectacular, skill-based hooks, such as jumping off a ledge to get a better angle on someone and hooking them as you fall. This makes it so you're a moving target, and they're a moving target, so landing that hook is incredibly difficult, but since you will likely fall out of LOS before actually pulling the target, the hook will break.
Conclusion
Blizzard completely crossed the line when they decided to render skill and impeccable timing a useless attribute. People will now be able to easily exploit any advancing Roadhog by dashing in and out of cover, charging their ultimates, with no fear of being hooked while they're outside of cover. They started off fixing unnecessary exploits, a move with which I agreed, but went on to shut down his effectiveness entirely.
These changes are just in the PTR stage, at the moment, but mark my words: If this third change gets implemented into the main game with no alterations, Roadhog will fall off entirely, especially in competitive play. When fixing exploits goes too far and becomes punishing skill, we have a problem.
Perhaps if Roadhog's hook either stopped momentum or if Roadhog pulled the target in more quickly – without delay – then this Persistent Line of Sight Check would be OK. Short of that, this needs to be removed from the changes to Raodhog's hook.
