Overwatch Dev Post Archives & Overwatch 2 Facts & Beta Info

[VenusArmani-1354]

You probably saw this thread earlier but it just occurred to me to leave it here.

[Kaedi-11739]

Hey everyone, there is a new section added to the Archives, which is the “Art” section. The reasoning for creating this is that I discovered that PlayOverwatch.com has overhauled the Media page and the Reference Kit PDFs are no longer directly available on the site. The good news is that those PDFs are still in their original locations on Blizzard’s servers (for the moment), so I have provided the links to them here in the archive. To give the section a little more content, I have decided to go ahead and link any available panels and videos that relate to the art development of Overwatch (though mostly this is BlizzCon panels, so you will need a Virtual Ticket to access that content). Find the Art section just below the Lore & Comics sections.

On a side note, I am aware of another interview that Jeff Kaplan did at University of Southern California. There was some information informally tweeted out by those who attended including comments on why the PTR is not played a lot. I will not be posting any information from that here in the archives as it was not necessarily intended for full public distribution and the posted information is subject to personal interpretation (and may be inaccurate).

[unsaidtruth-1174]

so…overwatch is dead until 2021? not new content at all? wow…not what you expect from a AAA company… sigh destiny and fortnite it is.

[theorygeek-1388]

@Kaedi-11739

• Bill Warnecke shares that no ability branch from “Project Titan” or early Overwatch 1 development was rebuilt for Overwatch 2’s talent system - Bill Warnecke - 11/7/2019 - Reddit

This link takes me to a Reddit thread about loot boxes. Is that intended?

[Kaedi-11739]

Thanks for the heads up, I will get it fixed.

[what-21551]

• Players who own a license to both Overwatch 1 and Overwatch 2 will be able to access their collected content (skins, emotes, sprays, etc.) on Overwatch 2.

Do we know whether cosmetics earned in OW2 will cross back to OW1? Or will it be like on the PTR, where live will cross over to PTR, but PTR won’t cross over to live?

[Kaedi-11739]

Both Overwatch and Overwatch 2 will be sharing the same account and game client. So don’t worry about that.

[Kaedi-11739]

New developer post today. Game Director Jeff Kaplan responded to a thread on Reddit, hinting at possible changes to Baptiste’s Immortality Field:

@Game Director Jeff Kaplan

we’re trying out some changes to immortality field to make it less oppressive. i missed the playtest today so i’ll ask the crew how it went.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Competitiveoverwatch/comments/el30y0/the_cool_down_on_baptistes_immortality_field/fdfi699?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x

[Kaedi-11739]

Prinicipal Designer Josh Noh made a post on the forums today. Look toward D.Va getting possible changes soon.

@JoshuaNoh-1358

We’ve actually been playtesting a Boosters cooldown reduction recently.

It sounded kind of intimidating on paper (tested a 3 sec CD first) but in practice hasn’t been that crazy and allows D.Va to play the midfield more freely, which works well with the current 10 meter Defense Matrix range.

Some version should make it to the next PTR cycle.

He also address the concept of powercreep and perceptions about balance in the game:

@JoshuaNoh-1358

Dropping by with a fun fact!
Looking at GM players for the current patch (1.43), Genji and Soldier: 76 are #6 and #7 in terms of win rate for damage heroes (out of 16 total).

They’re not doing quite as poorly as the general community sentiment would imply. Game balance perceptions/opinions are often repeated and perpetuated enough that they start to become accepted as fact by many players.

We also should remember that things like win rates and hero power/effectiveness can fluctuate significantly depending on the players’ skill level. If someone complains that Reaper is too strong and another says that Reaper is too weak, they could both be correct for their current skill level.

When making balance changes we typically look at the high end potential of player skill for a hero but also try to keep in mind if a given change would be a significant detriment to the overall gameplay experience in lower skill brackets and attempt to find better solution if so.

I think in general being wary of extreme “power creep” is a valid and healthy concern if it’s causing gameplay to become too wildly distorted from the core experience. I don’t feel that we’re currently anywhere close to that with the live game.

[L3THALB0ZZ-11395]

Is it possible Overwatch 2 will be cross platform considering Blizzard working with Activision which just successfully produced a cross platform Call of Duty. Surely this would help maintain a stronger Overwatch community.

[Sasquesteve-1986]

I figure it will happen, unless the legacy code of the matchmaker and servers is that difficult to rewrite. They’ve said before it is something they want to do, and they might implement cross profession as well while they’re at it.

[Kaedi-11739]

Is it possible Overwatch 2 will be cross platform considering Blizzard working with Activision which just successfully produced a cross platform Call of Duty. Surely this would help maintain a stronger Overwatch community.

It is far too early to say if it will or not.

[DrCalixxxNA-1195]

WIll OW2 have A soundtrack?

KF2 is a great game that I feel doesn’t lose its repetitive partially thanks its amazing soundtrack that plays while you mow down zeds… also the difficultly, perk system design, dosh value and other various factors…

[Kaawumba-1133]

I’ve reposted legacy MMR/SR/Matchmaking posts at Legacy Forum Posts.

[Tenra-11709]

Rio De Janiero

Rio De Janiero

Sir, it’s Rio de JANEIRO.

[ARUBA-21268]

Overwatch Materialization

There are no options for each player to materialize one player once for the players in the team. For each materialization the players selected characters changes style and gets certain improvements. This would be very helpful for the team to select a libero for the game and decide if one player has 5 materializations to become the ultra boss for the enemy team to defeat, and when a player chooses to materialize another player the player has to increase the ability cooldowns with 1 second.

By having using the game idea which is meant to be in the Overwatch gameplay, from what it seems and feels like. I suggest that this is applied to the game, for a merrier and greater time to play and battle against other players.

Kind Regards, Alex Stenberg. (ARUBA)

[AmserCranc-2481]

Tom Powers details the Console Aim-Assist changes in patch 1.28

Please, just remove aim assist. Controllers aren’t this terrible chunk of clunk anymore. We could contest mouse users of we were given a chance to actually improve, especially on a non-aim heavy game like Overwatch. Please just remove it so that everyone has the oppertunity to improve and get skillfull themselves.

[Kaedi-11739]

Hello everyone! Long time catching up on this thread. First, I got all of the recent posts from Jeff Kaplan, Josh Noh, and Bill Warnecke throughout the month of January caught up (see below for the summary). Secondly, I think I have figured out how to recover all of the old forum posts from the Internet Archive even though the pages do not load correctly. I hope to have something completed by the end of this month if all goes well. Again I hope this archive is a great help to everyone!

Overwatch 2 Developer Responses

• Jeff Kaplan explains that Overwatch 2 will bring new gameplay for both PVE and PVP. - Jeff Kaplan - 2/3/2020 - Official Forums
• Jeff Kaplan hints that match-specific stats is likely to come with Overwatch 2. - Jeff Kaplan - 1/30/2020 - Official Forums
• Jeff Kaplan states they want to provide more helpful statistics to players in Overwatch 2. - Jeff Kaplan - 1/30/2020 - Official Forums
• Jeff Kaplan hints that they are discussing on adding a proper scoreboard for Overwatch 2. - Jeff Kaplan - 1/30/2020 - Official Forums
• Jeff Kaplan confirms that every story mission with have an intro and an outro. - Jeff Kaplan - 1/14/2020 - Official Forums
• Jeff Kaplan explains that the Rio De Janeiro Mission Intro and Outro from the Overwatch 2 play demo at BlizzCon 2019 are planned to be longer. - Jeff Kaplan - 1/14/2020 - Official Forums

Competitive Play

HERO POOLS

• Hero pools may change to where they only affect upper ranks of Competitive Play. - Jeff Kaplan - 1/30/2020 - Official Forums
• Hero pools will not vary at each skill tier but might in the future. - Jeff Kaplan - 1/30/2020 - Official Forums
• Jeff notes the approach to the heroes decided will be refined over time. - Jeff Kaplan - 1/30/2020 - Official Forums
• Hero pools will never be limited down to 1 selectable hero per role - Jeff Kaplan - 1/30/2020 - Official Forums
• Hero pools will be decided by the development team and there will be some guideline to deciding what heroes are rotated out of the metagame each week. - Jeff Kaplan - 1/30/2020 - Official Forums
• Jeff Kaplan explains they are still introducing hero pools even if they are going to be more aggressively tackling hero balance and the perceived metagame for Overwatch as an effort to introduce player creativity. - Jeff Kaplan - 1/30/2020 - Official Forums
• A season-long (2-month) hero rotation is unlikely for hero pools. - Jeff Kaplan - 1/30/2020 - Official Forums
• Jeff Kaplan explains the reasoning for introducing Hero Pools and confirms it may not return for season 22 if it does not work out well for season 21 of Competitive Play. - Jeff Kaplan - 1/30/2020 - Official Forums
• Hero pools starting out may have a variable range of heroes restricted from Competitive Play in the first five weeks. - Jeff Kaplan - 1/30/2020 - Official Forums
• Hero pools may rotate faster than a week if needed. - Jeff Kaplan - 1/30/2020 - Official Forums

HOW LEAVERS AFFECT COMPETITIVE MATCHES

• Jeff Kaplan explains that Competitive matches are cancelled early when a player AFKs or disconnects early - Jeff Kaplan - 1/23/2020 - Reddit

Matchmaking | Role Queue

ROLE QUEUE

• Jeff Kaplan teases that the 1-3-2 role lock might be tested on the Experimentation playcard sometime when it comes out - Jeff Kaplan - 1/30/2020 - Official Forums
• Jeff Kaplan shares an extended experiment of the development team running playtests using a 1 tank, 3 damage, 2 support role lock and shares the benefits and disadvantages that system had. - Jeff Kaplan - 1/14/2020 - Official Forums

General Game Features

REQUESTED GAME FEATURES THAT ARE NOT LIKELY TO COME

• Jeff Kaplan gives a very detailed post about a Hero Pick and Ban System and why Overwatch is not likely to use one any time soon. - Jeff Kaplan - 1/22/2020 - Official Forums
• Jeff Kaplan explains that it would be extremely difficult to change Overwatch’s game structure to support more than 12 players. - Jeff Kaplan - 1/14/2020 - Official Forums

OTHER GAME FEATURE RESPONSES

• As of January 2020, there are no plans for new portrait borders beyond the Diamond 5-star - Jeff Kaplan - 1/30/2020 - Official Forums

DEVELOPER VIDEO UPDATES

• Introduction of the Experimentation Card and Hero Pools. Updates on anti-cheat intiatives, updates to Replay System, & minor Career Profile updates - Jeff Kaplan - 1/30/2020 - Developer Update Video

Public Test Region

• The Experimentation Play card is not a substitute for the Public Test Region and that major patch changes will still be tested on the PTR - Jeff Kaplan - 1/30/2020 - Official Forums

Hero Design Balance

General Hero Balance

• Josh Noh explains that the game at the time was not demonstrating an considerable amount of Power Creep versus that of the GOATs team composition from 2019. - Josh Noh - 1/8/2020 - Official Forums
• Josh Noh explains the importance of looking at Stats versus that of Player Feedback when determining hero balance changes for the game. - Josh Noh - 1/8/2020 - Official Forums

Reporting | Account Actions | Community Behavior

SMURF/ALTERNATE ACCOUNTS/BOOSTING/THROWING

• The development team is looking to find ways to control alternate accounts on console platforms but any solutions are still a long way out. - Jeff Kaplan - 1/30/2020 - Official Forums

Development Challenges

• Bill Warnecke explains the version number hierarchy. - Bill Warnecke - 1/24/2020 - Reddit

Development History

• Bill Warnecke shares how much the Overwatch Team has grown. - Bill Warnecke - 1/9/2020 - Reddit

Overwatch Esports

• Hero Pools in the live game will not be the same for during the 2020 season of the League. - Jeff Kaplan - 1/30/2020 - Official Forums
• Jeff Kaplan that any change that affects the Overwatch League is discussed with them. - Jeff Kaplan - 1/30/2020 - Official Forums

Non-Game Related Posts

• Jeff Kaplan confirms which hero is the best “waifu” - Jeff Kaplan - 1/30/2020 - Official Forums

[Kaedi-11739]

Alright everyone, I have some really good news regarding the Dev Post Archive.

I have just completed the first step of a major project toward this archive. As you know at the beginning of this year, the old Overwatch forums was closed. Now the Internet Archive has these posts documented but due to some weird error, the pages will not display properly. I can however go in and look up the HTML of those pages and I have figured out a system to extrapolate the key posts and place them in a dedicated HTML page (which for the time being is setup on my personal website).

This is going to take time to complete all of the posts, but I now have the Competitive and Matchmaking responses now online for access. I encourage anyone who has time to check them out and let me know if you find any errors or if the pages are not displaying properly. Here is a couple of screenshots of how the new archive pages look:

[LaUry-2756]

Activision is a publisher… not a developer… Activision ruining Blizzard atm with: max profit with minimum invest mentality… I hope they wont touch Overwatch let our Jeff daddy handle OW things… we saw what happened to W3