// KOTAKU — GAMING
Overwatch’s Latest Patch Kills One Of The Most Fun Team-Ups In The Game
Overwatch’s new season launches today, and it brings new hero Doctrine, reworks Sombra and Roadhog, and leads us into the final chapter of Blizzard’s year-long narrative arc. It also, like any other season, has a big balance patch that flips switches and dials knobs on multiple heroes in the roster. It has, sadly for some, mercifully for others, killed one of the most fun character synergies we’ve gotten this year.
Jetpack Cat was one of the first heroes Overwatch added this year as part of its year-long push to bring 10 new characters to the roster. She’s a Support character whose most unique mechanic is that she can tether herself to a teammate and fly them around the map. This is great for getting unprecedented high ground, and as a Soldier: 76 player, I love when a good Cat can fly me above the enemy team as I rain down fire with my auto-targeting Ultimate.
First jetpack cat + Cassidy ult 😭 #overwatch #overwatch2 #jetpackcat #OWSpotlight2026 #overwatchtiktok
One character who also makes good use of this tether is Cassidy, the gunslinging cowboy whose Ultimate, High Noon, locks onto enemies’ heads and pops them off in a clean headshot as long as they stay in his line of sight. Well, it’s hard to get out of someone’s line of sight when they’re flying above you. Blizzard, however, doesn’t seem too keen on players doing this any longer, and has specifically made it so if Cassidy uses High Noon, he will detach from Jetpack Cat’s tether and fall to the ground.
Jetpack cat Cassidy ult combo was annoying, but so so funny byu/bearman-bao inOverwatch
“Lifeline can create unique interactions with several ultimates, but its combination with High Noon has proven too powerful at repositioning Cassidy to eliminate targets,” Blizzard writes in the patch notes. “High Noon will now prevent Cassidy from attaching to Lifeline. We will continue evaluating other interactions on a case-by-case basis.”
It’s odd to me that this is the only interaction of its kind that has been changed. Soldier’s Ultimate also locks onto enemies, and Ashe’s deployable bodyguard B.O.B. can also be carried across the map on a tether and wasn’t changed. I suppose those aren’t instant kills the way High Noon is. I do fear we’re getting to a point where Jetpack Cat’s tether might end up getting some kind of timer on it, as Overwatch loves to patch out infinite states like Sombra’s invisibility and Wrecking Ball’s tether, making it harder to use those characters’ base abilities in the way they were once intended to be used.
Developer Comments: We had two main goals with this Roadhog rework: to reduce the frustration that comes out of how lethal Chain Hook ends up being on most heroes, and to give Roadhog a new tool to help him aid his team as a more traditional Tank would. Changing his primary fire to shoot in a 2-burst cadence alongside slight adjustments to Chain Hook should preserve the ability’s strength as a displacement tool while dampening its lethality. Meanwhile, Roadhog’s new ability, Trash Compactor, brings new utility for him and his team that feeds back into Roadhog being a lethal force on the battlefield. While Trash Compactor is active, Roadhog vacuums up projectiles in front of him, converting them into an explosive projectile to fling back at enemies. Operating as a strong defensive and offensive ability, Trash Compactor should help point Roadhog towards making game-swinging plays with more vectors than just trying to one-shot-combo heroes.
Developer Comments: Sombra is being brought into the Support role with this latest rework. In the past, her identity as a disruptive mastermind was at odds with the value a Damage hero was expected to bring. Moving Sombra to the Support role should allow us to fully lean into her hero fantasy while keeping important pillars of her gameplay intact.
One notable change of the rework is the removal of Hack as an ability. Facing Sombra often meant being unexpectedly locked out of your abilities from time to time.