Overwatch 2’s new hero won’t take as much grinding to unlock

Overwatch 2‘s second season launches today, bringing with it a new map and, more importantly, a new tank hero in the form of Ramattra. Thankfully, the Omnic rebel leader won’t take as much grinding to unlock for those who don’t purchase the premium battle pass as Kiriko did last season.

Ramattra will now unlock when players reach tier 45 on the battle pass. That’s 10 levels sooner than it took to unlock Kiriko last season. Of course, players can instantly unlock Ramattra if they buy into the premium track of the battle pass, the rewards from which Blizzard revealed last week.

So why the sudden change of heart? Well, the “data” spoke. Not the fans, who have been screaming (on Reddit, at least) about the grind to unlock Kiriko. The data.

That’s straight from the horse’s mouth, with the horse in this scenario being Overwatch 2 game director Aaron Keller. According to a recent tweet from Keller, who stated that after “reviewing data for Season 1,” Blizzard made the decision to move Ramattra to tier 45 and to make “a few more weekly challenges easier to complete.”

Season 2 launches today, December 6th, and will hopefully have a far less tumultuous road than Season 1 did. Beginning with the game’s launch issues, Season 1 saw the temporary removal of several heroes, a delay to a much needed balance pass, and some harsh fan reactions to the shop prices, not to mention the complete domination of Sojourn in high ELO lobbies. We’ll see if the incoming balance changes will mix up the meta or if players will continue to get one-shot by Sojourn’s powerful railgun.

Overwatch 2 is available on Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 5, Switch, Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and PC.