Overwatch: “Players avoiding” abolished! – Best Widowmaker could not find games anymore

Not every feature in Overwatch has had the desired effect. Blizzard is therefore removing the “avoid player” feature.

How Overwatch Blocks Its Own Matchmaking

Matchmaking is a major topic in almost every game, often leading to disputes and problems. Overwatch is no exception, and particularly because the game provides no information about how matches are actually formed, players like to speculate about how it all works.

In the official forum, Jeff Kaplan, the Game Director of Overwatch, wrote a long post and explained a few points, although the system is “too complex” to explain all the details. Yet sometimes Blizzard’s own ideas also get in the way. By allowing players to rate games and players, many calculations done by the matchmaking system were ruined.

Best Widowmaker Must Face Newcomers

A particularly catastrophic effect on matchmaking was caused by a very specific feature. Anyone who wanted could individually set that they wanted to avoid a particular player in the future. The more players used this feature, the harder it became for the matchmaking to find suitable games at all.

This was particularly serious in the case of the “best Widowmaker,” Kaplan reports. Many other players avoided him simply because he was “too good”. The result for this player was that he often had to wait many minutes for a match and then – because after a few minutes the search criteria are relaxed – faced complete beginners. It was not fun for either side.

For these reasons, the feature will be removed with the upcoming patch. Even on the live servers, it no longer serves any purpose and is only still visible due to the interface.

Finally, Kaplan made it clear that the removal of the feature has no impact on the “report player” system. Toxic players can still be reported for their behavior and must then face the consequences.

For more articles about the game, you can find them on our Overwatch game page. It might also be worth taking a look at our guide section.