Overwatch Dev Tracker

going to go get some tea now. thanks for all of the great thoughts and thoughtful questions.

we’ll make changes as needed.

thanks again! <3

your feedback…

these are separate things that will not affect each other.

we’ve considered having the system only apply to players above a certain rank (diamond? masters?). it’s definitely on our minds.

totally. we’re so excited for this. we’ve wanted this for so long. it was a ton of work but it’s going to be really cool. plus i am super excited to get console players involved with testing changes (right now they cannot play the PTR)

By the ways, to make it look like you typed less than 20 characters follow this format (note the HTML comment tag just below the word), but technically you still have to type 20 characters if you think about it:

Word

1. hammond
2. mei
3. tracer

this is a very hard problem to solve but we have some ideas. any solution is more long term, though. possibly OW2 or later. sorry i know that’s not the answer you wanted but it’s actually very complicated with the way consoles work and the rules regarding account creation.

we’ll still use the PTR for major patches and major changes. for example, if we were testing a new hero or map, that would be on the PTR and not in the Experimental Card.

the experimental card uses a different data set and was engineered by people far smarter than i am. it’s going to work and be magic and nothing could possibly go wrong… right? =]

not in this version. interesting idea though.

you know that i can’t ><

ooooh sounds like fun… we should let you all try, huh?

it’s curated by us. so it will be a combination of targeting metas that players are being vocally negative about (recent examples: double barrier, goats) and slightly encouraging other playstyles (i.e. “more mobile” comps might be fun for a week…)

but i am sure we’ll refine our approach over time.

Jeff, with the implementation of hero pools, I fear this may have some amplified effect toward disruptive behavior where players may leave Competitive matches deliberately especially if they feel they can’t pick the heroes they want that they think gives them the best chance to win. So I have two questions:

1. Will the hero pool be displayed upfront each week (like how there is a pop-up detailing the season when a new Competitive Season starts) and players can check it before they queue?

2. Will there be any further plans to help deter bad leaver behavior in Overwatch?

For example, there was a game I played last night where it was very likely one of my opponents left due to rage quitting leaving an easy and unsatisfactory win for my team. I feel there still can be some stronger deterrents to bad leaver behavior (from all game modes) and discourage players from playing Competitive with technical issues.

As one of the forum MVPs, ...

we would never limit the pool to just one tank. you’ll never be forced to play a single tank, such as D.va as described above… if you love playing all the other tanks, you’ll be fine.

we’re curating the list ourselves. we have some philosophies and guidelines we’ll be following (and evolving as we hear your feedback). we will do our best to be judicious and make sure no hero is getting the “horizon” treatment, as with our map pools…

we work closely with OWL on all decisions. we’d just chat with them.

we want this too. more likely for OW2 at this point…

Historically, even when we have done consistent and dramatic balance changes, it takes the meta a long time to shift. We’d love it if balance or player creativity alone would shift the meta fast enough to meet player’s demands.