Yeah, you can't buy items with money, only with in-game funbucks. You can only buy loot crates with money.
I've bought a few quid's worth of loot boxes a couple of times during events not because I particularly want them but as, like, a tip. I don't know if that makes me part of some problem. I'm not doing it out of some weird love for Blizzard as a company, I'm doing it because a certain number of people have to to keep the content coming and a few quid every few months doesn't really mean anything to me.
Tafdolphin wrote:Will we be able to buy anniversary stuff after the event is over?
Nope, thats how they get you; artificial scarcity is a great way to get people to open their wallets.
I get that for stuff like sprays and skins...but that seems unnecessarily harsh for the dance emotes. Also, is the only way to purchased them with real cash through loot boxes? No way am I paying for the chance I might get something good (not that I'd pay for the certainty either).
Tafdolphin wrote:Will we be able to buy anniversary stuff after the event is over?
Nope, thats how they get you; artificial scarcity is a great way to get people to open their wallets.
I get that for stuff like sprays and skins...but that seems unnecessarily harsh for the dance emotes. Also, is the only way to purchased them with real cash through loot boxes? No way am I paying for the chance I might get something good (not that I'd pay for the certainty either).
You can earn in-game gold by either drops in the lootbox or by duplicate items. But you get so little gold you'll miss out on a load of stuff.
Casual players find it hard to build up enough gold to get anything, whereas people who play every evening will have more than they could ever use (I currently have about 8k). Seems like they could balance it a bit better somehow.
strawberry float me. Wanted to throw my keyboard across the room. Haven't felt rage like that since strawberry floating Alpha Whatsherface in Dead or Alive on the Dreamcast.
Flag returns are instant, and spawns are right next to the flag. And you can't pick up a flag when you are being damaged, so unless you get a team wipe you're very unlikely to be able to pick it up.
It highly favours defending, which is why there are so many draws.
Yeah, it's definitely ill-suited to most of the map design. No surprise that the one map I consistently had fun CTF games on was Control Centre, the one with the lowest distance between flags where there's actually an incentive to attack.
There's a bunch of other changes being tested on the PTR as well as the new map too.
PATCH HIGHLIGHTS
New Assault Map: Horizon Lunar Colony
Built as a first step towards humanity's renewed exploration of space, the Horizon Lunar Colony’s goal was to examine the effects of prolonged extraterrestrial habitation—on human and ape alike. The scientists’ research proved incredibly promising...until, suddenly, all contact and communications with the base were lost.
New Legendary Skins
Oni Genji and Officer D.Va have been added to classic loot boxes
CUSTOM GAMES AND GAME BROWSER
Player gravity and projectile gravity can now be modified Knockback magnitude can now be modified on any weapons or abilities that have a knockback effect Jump height can now be modified
HERO UPDATES
McCree
Deadeye Targets now begin locking on after 0.2 seconds, instead of 0.8 seconds Damage accumulated over the first 1.0 seconds increased from 20 to 80 (damage per second after the first 1.0 seconds is unchanged)
Developer Comment: McCree’s ultimate can deal a lot of damage if it has a lot of time to build up, but it was often too difficult to get even a small amount of damage out before being stopped or killed. These changes make it more flexible and powerful.
Reaper
The Reaping (Passive) Removed health orbs Now regains 20% of all damage done to heroes as health
Developer Comment: Reaper’s old healing passive was useful if you could kill a bunch of enemies in a row. But since enemies needed to be dead for it to work, it wasn’t very helpful unless the situation was already in your favor. His new passive lets him get immediate benefit from it, especially when fighting Tank heroes, which tend to be larger targets that deal lower damage.
Roadhog
Head hitbox size reduced by 20%
Scrap Gun Bullet damage decreased by 33% Fire rate increased by 30% Clip size increased from 4 to 5
Developer Comment: Roadhog’s head was abnormally large compared to similarly-sized characters, so we’re reducing its size to increase his survivability. The Scrap Gun changes reduce the power of his hook combo and alternate fire burst damage potential while still keeping his DPS roughly the same.
More minor stuff in the spoiler.
USER INTERFACE UPDATES
A quick summary of each player's most-played heroes is now available by highlighting the player in the Groups section of the Social menu (statistics displayed will dynamically change based on the mode/ruleset) A new "All Modes" option has been added to the Career Profile that allows players to view combined stats from all game modes A new "All Competitive Seasons" option has been added to the Career Profile that allows players to view combined stats from all Completive Play seasons The “Damage Done” statistic has been replaced with “Hero Damage Done” in multiple locations A new “Barrier Damage Done” statistic has been added to the Statistics section of the Career Profile, as well as an “All Damage Done” statistic, which combines damage done to barriers and heroes Averages are now calculated in 10-minute slices, rather than by the number of games played “Rate This Match” option no longer appears at the end of a match
Developer Comment: The new “Hero Damage Done” statistic is the same as the old “Damage Done” statistic, but it doesn’t include damage done to barriers, only damage against heroes and placed objects (e.g. Torbjörn’s turret). That number can be found in the new “Barrier Damage Done” or “All Damage Done” statistics. However, since “Hero Damage Done” and “Barrier Damage Done” are brand new, their averages will only be based on time played since they were added.
Also, the old statistics were calculated by taking total damage inflicted and dividing it by the number of games played. This resulted in an average that didn’t accurately reflect the underlying performance, because it didn't take into account the length of the games. The new averages are calculated in 10-minute slices.
BUG FIXES
General
Fixed an issue causing players to lose progress on their On Fire meter, after the meter had been completely filled
Arcade
Fixed a bug that could cause the announcer's “select your hero” voice line to play during the end-of-match screen after Elimination games Fixed a bug that prevented the Z’s from appearing above a sleeping enemy during Elimination games
Competitive Play
Fixed a bug that caused your first win to appear as a loss in your Career Profile
Custom Games and Game Browser
Fixed a bug that prevented some settings from being properly displayed in the summary when viewing 3v3 Elimination presets Clarified an error message that appears when a player attempts to exit the Settings page with an invalid combination of settings Fixed a bug that caused the lighting from health packs to appear on Capture the Flag and Elimination maps even after health packs had been disabled Fixed a bug that allowed Torbjörn’s Armor Pack ability to function even after being disabled in custom settings
Heroes
Fixed a bug that prevented players from hearing the voice line that typically accompanies their ultimate if they executed the ultimate after being stunned Fixed a bug that could cause D.Va to become stuck if her mech was killed just as she summoned it Fixed a bug preventing Genji’s sound effects from playing if he used his primary attack immediately after a Swift Strike Fixed a typo in Orisa’s “Satisfied with Protection” voice line Fixed a bug that prevented Orisa’s Supercharger from being destroyed if run over by the payload Fixed a typo in the description on Roadhog’s Junkenstein skin Fixed a bug that allowed enemy players to detect Sombra (while Stealth was active) if they were within a certain distance Fixed a bug causing Symmetra’s hair to take on an unnatural appearance when her Vishkar or Architech skins were equipped Fixed a bug with how Widowmaker’s Grappling Hook interacts with the flying drones on Oasis
Maps
Fixed a bug on Volskaya Industries that prevented the ice from appearing broken when players fell off a ledge to their death
User Interface
Fixed a bug that caused the Heroes of the Storm promotional portraits to appear locked, even after being unlocked Fixed a bug that could cause an error message in chat if you attempted to spectate a new player while already spectating another player Fixed a bug that could cause the chat window to be placed too high on the main menu, blocking menu options Fixed a bug that prevented text from wrapping in the Report Player text box
The changes to Reaper look a lot of fun but I think those Roadhog nerfs will be a bigger help to him.
Extremely glad to hear CTF is shite. I was trying to get the Loot Box reward for it, which would then have gotten me another Loot Box for three wins. But god, it was tedious in the extreme; shite loads of Bastions and Dva's.