By Jacob Miller | Sep 14, 2026
Blizzard's annual convention was full of talk about the popular hero shooter. Overwatch's opening ceremony unveiled its latest hero, Doctrine, a vampire-themed support hero that's launching alongside Season 5. The game is also celebrating the convention with a special reward, giving all players a free Mythic skin just for playing a single match sometime in the month after BlizzCon. Alongside these announcements, Blizzard also gave fans a detailed breakdown of two major hero reworks heading to the game soon, completely redesigning the kits for both Sombra and Roadhog.
Sombra's Rework Turns Her Into A Support
Of the two reworks revealed at BlizzCon, Sombra's have been the most radical, taking her out of the Recon Damage role entirely and into a new Tactician Support role. A lot of her core skills have been shuffled around in this transition. Her signature ability Hack has been replaced with a new ability called Hotfix, which allows her to heal allies, and also hack health packs and enemy deployable equipment. Her "Virus" ability has also been reworked into "Cyberspace," which creates an area-of-effect zone that weakens enemies caught inside, while also healing nearby allies. Sombra's Perks have also been updated to reflect her new kit, including one that automatically applies Hotfix after she uses her Ultimate, and another that doubles the amount of healing she gives to weakened teammates.
Roadhog gets a new ability and perk changes
Sombra's rework was a massive overhaul, but Roadhog's changes were smaller, though the changes will still make players think about how they play the Bruiser Tank. The rework adds a brand-new third ability called Trash Compactor, which lets Roadhog absorb incoming enemy projectiles and then shoot them back out in an explosive burst. His "Scrap Hook" Perk was also buffed hard, now restoring four ammo when the hook hits successfully, up from the previous two. His "Shrapnel Launcher" Perk has been replaced with a new ability called "Here, Piggy, Piggy," which reduces the cooldown on Scrap Hook dramatically while his Ultimate ability, Whole Hog, is active. Trash Compactor also has its own dedicated Major Perk, Toxic Exhaust, which slows and damages enemies while the ability is actively in use.
While Sombra's overhaul is clearly the more transformative of the two reworks, this isn't the first time Blizzard has fundamentally changed a hero's role in Overwatch. Doomfist also underwent a similar change with the reboot of the game into Overwatch 2, moving from a Damage hero to a full Tank hero. Symmetra has also undergone multiple sweeping redesigns throughout the game's history, with Blizzard shifting her between Damage and Defense roles over the years.
These new reworks give Blizzard a chance to fix two heroes who have long been seen as controversial within the Overwatch community. Roadhog has been criticized for his hook-centric playstyle that in the past let him delete low-health characters with little room for counterplay. Sombra, meanwhile, has been one of the most commonly banned heroes in the game's history, largely due to her heavy reliance on stealth and hacking abilities that can throw entire team compositions off-kilter. With these ambitious changes now out in the open both Sombra and Roadhog players will soon need to re-learn a new set of abilities as the reworks make their way into the game.
