Blizzard Gets Rid of Hero Pools in Overwatch

It seems that Blizzard Entertainment have decided to completely abandon the idea of Hero Pools in Overwatch. According to the post on the game’s official forum, Hero Pools will be removed indefinitely from Competitive Play and Overwatch League.

Hero Pools were introduced to the game early this year, not long after the addition of Map Pools. The feature limited the amount of heroes available for play in Competitive Play, as well as in Overwatch League. The intended goal of the feature was to shift the “meta”, and force players to try new heroes.

Over the time, the developers tried to adjust the system in various ways, including by changing the algorithm which decides the heroes to ban, and unifying the pools between Competitive Play and Overwatch League. This April the developers removed Map Pools, while in May they limited Hero Pools to the Masters and Grandmasters leagues.

The developers stated that earlier announced Experimental Card and more aggressive take on hero balancing allowed to reach a healthier meta with a good amount of hero composition diversity, thus making Hero Pools dull.