Overwatch artwork for the new main tank Sigma

[Update]: Role Queue has now been officially released for both Competitive and Quick Play!

A little while ago Overwatch has received what is likely to be one of its most impactful updates ever - a brand new main tank called Sigma and the long-awaited introduction of Role Queue. As you might imagine from the name alone, Role Queue made it so you can queue as any (or all) of the three roles and guarantee you'll end up in balanced matches with exactly two supports, two tanks and two DPS. Best of all, each of your roles has a separate matchmaking rating, so you're pretty much always going to play with people that are around your skill level!

Naturally, given the severity of these changes, there is still quite a lot the community doesn't understand about the new Role Queue system and the intent behind it. In order to clarify some of this, as well as dispel some of the most prevalent misconceptions, Blizzard has now released a lengthy developer update on Role Queue.

A lot of the comments are highly specific and interconnected, so trying to summarize the whole post would be a bit of a pointless task. Instead, allow me to highlight an answer to a question I've seen pop up over and over again throughout the years: why isn't Blizzard doing a full SR reset?

"We’ve actually tried in a few seasons doing something that amounts to a partial SR reset across seasons, but the results were pretty horrible," reads the developer update. "When you queue for a match with an SR that doesn’t accurately reflect your skill, the quality of the match drops tremendously."

"Therefore, we try to quickly change your SR as a new player to more accurately determine your SR, and we can’t ever really consider implementing a full SR reset. Match quality would be harmed for months until everybody played a lot of games and the matchmaker could properly identify everyone’s skill again."

It's also worth mentioning that returning players would further throw the system into chaos, even once the core playerbase has managed to regain their proper ranks. Each returning player would essentially ruin a few dozen matches before the system figured out where they belong, and that just wouldn't be fun for anyone involved. So I do hope this developer update will end the whole SR reset debate, because even though it sounds like a brilliant idea that would finally get people that one rank they truly deserve, in reality it would just be a bit of a mess.

Whatever your stance on the topic may be, you can read the full developer update over at the Overwatch forums. Enjoy!