New Overwatch Patch Notes: Anniversary Skins, New Chat Wheel

Overwatch turns four years old this Sunday, May 24, and Blizzard is releasing some new content to celebrate. As part of the game's latest update, Patch 1.48, Blizzard has introduced some new skins and anniversary challenges, including Carbon Fiber Sigma and Masked Man McCree. During this event, players can unlock items from past events with credits, or by opening lootboxes.

Among these festivities, the patch introduces a few changes to the game. Chief among these is a complete overhaul to the communications wheel. Players can now customize the location of key commands and call-outs. Blizzard has also removed the limit that previously prevented players from using multiple commands in a short timeframe, although spamming commands will cause delays. The patch also marks the start of Season 3 of the game's competitive deathmatch.

Overwatch's previous big patch added a new hero to the game, the robotic Echo, who can duplicate the abilities of any hero in her sight. Game director Jeff Kaplan indicated that Echo will be the last character added to Overwatch until the game's sequel is released. Though Overwatch 2 is confirmed for current platforms--including Playstation 4, Nintendo Switch, PC, and Xbox One--there's no word on a release date yet. The first new hero for Overwatch 2, Sojourn, was revealed back in November 2019.

Full patch notes below:

Overwatch Anniversary 2020

Overwatch turns four this year and we’re celebrating with brand new items, including new Legendary skins like Masquerade Reaper, Dragoon Mercy, Little Red Ashe, and more! Participate in the weekly anniversary Challenges for even more epic rewards, such as Carbon Fiber Sigma, Fleur de Lis Widowmaker, and Masked Man McCree. Did you miss any Overwatch festivities over the previous years? Don’t worry—you’ll be able to unlock items from past events using credits (or by opening Loot Boxes)! Relive the thrill of previous seasonal brawls in the Arcade, with a brawl of the day rotating throughout the Anniversary celebration.

Thank you so much for playing Overwatch with us over the past four years! Your continued support and enthusiasm help drive us to keep creating. We look forward to celebrating with you in-game!

General Updates

Feature Update: Improved Communications Wheel

Added many more communication options so you can customize your interactions in Overwatch! To help you pick your favorites, go to Options, then Controls and scroll down to the Communication Wheel section. From here, you can choose from one of 26 different options for each sector of the wheel. You can change out your choices and swap around their positions within the wheel. Now, you can still tell your team “I Need Healing,” but you can also tell them you are “On My Way” so they should “Press the Attack!”

• New options are now available to customize the Communications Wheel
• Shortcuts are now customizable; pick from a set of 26 different communication options
• Additional keybindings are now available to support more voiceover lines
• We've changed how communication wheel throttling works in the game. You can use up to 3 communication wheel actions in rapid succession but there is now a delay between subsequent communications (similar to how Tracer’s blink ability works in the game)

Feature Update: Patch Notes In-Client

Players are now be able to read about the latest changes to Overwatch from within the game. We wanted to players across all platforms to have convenient access to this information, and it’s now easier than ever to stay up-to-date.

• Selecting the Patch Notes button on the main menu will display the patch notes in the client, and no longer requires a separate web browser
• Patch Notes will show as “new” whenever a game update is available

Custom Games Updates

• Existing Share Codes can now be re-uploaded with new Custom Game Settings (requires same original owner)
  • Developer Comment: When choosing to create a share code for your Custom Game Settings, we've added the option to re-upload the new settings to an existing share code (assuming the owner is the same). This should make it easier for content creators to update existing modes, even if the codes have already been shared. Note: One may also re-upload settings to a code that has expired (assuming the owner is the same), and the share code will become valid again.
• Skirmish can now override which Control Points are valid on Control Maps

General

• Players will now receive an in-game notice thanking them for their cheat report when their report has resulted in an action
• Added buttons to Control map dropships to allow players to reset basketballs
• Play of the Game - Retuned a number of scoring factors to emphasize more active participation in fights

Competitive Updates

• Competitive Deathmatch Season 3 has begun! Now through June 10, 2020, compete in Competitive 8-player free for all Deathmatch to earn a rank and rewards.

Hero Updates

Ana

• Biotic Rifle
  • General
    • Healing reduced from 75 to 70

Ashe

• The Viper
  • Secondary Fire
    • Now reaches max zoom halfway through Ashe's aim down sights, instead of at its conclusion

Bastion

• Configuration: Sentry
  • Spread decreased 10%
  • Shots until max spread reduction lowered from 60 to 40
• Self-Repair
  • Resource drain rate increased 20%
  • Healing per second increased from 75 to 90

D.Va

• Restored functionality allowing D.Va to maintain her current aim pitch when de-meching

Doomfist

• Seismic Slam
  • Can now hold down the Ability 2 button to use Seismic Slam as soon as able (and valid, if using the aerial version)
  • When landing very close or on top of enemies, the enemy will be pushed in front/away from Doomfist slightly, instead of sometimes having then end up beside/behind Doomfist
  • Aerial Seismic Slam no longer has a slight acceleration time, which should make it arrive at the destination more reliably

Echo

• Reduced the height of Echo's head hit volume

Junkrat

• Frag Launcher
  • Primary Fire
    • Projectiles maintain slightly more velocity on ricochet
• Concussion Mine
  • Projectile speed increased from 20 to 25
  • Ricochet distance off of enemy players greatly reduced.

• Total Mayhem
  • Bomb detonation time reduced from 1 sec to 0.7
  • Bombs spread increased 50%

Mei

• Cryo-Freeze
  • Now behaves like Mei’s Ice Wall when it comes to interactions. Cryo-Freeze will block line of sight and collision in much the same way

Mercy

• Caduceus Staff
  • Primary Fire
    • Healing per second increased from 50 to 55

Moira

• Biotic Orb
  • Damage radius reduced from 5 to 4 meters
  • Projectile speed increased from 16 to 20
  • Projectile duration reduced from 10 to 7 seconds

Reinhardt

• Reduced the height of Reinhardt's head hit volume, making it harder to hit him in the head from behind

Zenyatta

• Orb of Discord
  • Damage amplification increased from 25% to 30%

Workshop Updates

New Workshop Features

• Allow strings to be stored as variables
• Allow no string reevaluation in Create HUD Text, Create In-World Text, and Set Objective Description
• Added Player Dealt Knockback and Player Received Knockback Events
• Conditions and actions are now displayed using C-style syntax. This new syntax is used when copying to text, and both new and old syntaxes are supported when pasting from text.
• Nulls at the end of a String or Custom String value are no longer displayed (or required when pasting from text).
• Adjusted syntax coloring for conditions and actions to make it more consistent.
• Relaxed type restrictions, allowing Boolean values (such as Compare) to be used where numbers are expected, and vice versa.
• Added support for the new communication types to related actions and values.
• Added nighttime versions of the Workshop Island and Workshop Expanse maps.

New Workshop Actions

• Break
• Continue
• Set Crouch Enabled
• Set Melee Enabled
• Set Jump Enabled
• Declare Round Draw
• Set Ability Cooldown
• Cancel Primary Action

New Workshop Values

• Is Meleeing
• Is Jumping
• Event Direction
• Button
• Event Ability
• Ability Cooldown
• Ability Icon String
• Array
• If-Then-Else

Bug Fixes

General

• Fixed a bug that could allow voice lines from opposing teams to be heard at Hero Select screens on certain maps
• Fixed a bug where some arcade game modes were not storing or displaying stats correctly
• Custom Game Filter - Changed the custom game filter "Only Show Games with Space For Party" in 2 ways:
• The names have been changed to be more descriptive: "on" is now "room in game" and "include in queue" is now "room in lobby". "off" is still "off"
• The filter's default has been changed to "room in game" (previously "on") instead of "off"
• Fixed a bug that caused per-hero Friendly Outline settings to not apply properly in some cases

Maps

Busan

• MEKA Base: Fixed a bug that allowed Sombra to traslocate to an unintended location near the capture point
• Downtown: Fixed a bug that allowed Sombra to place her translocator in several unintended locations

Havana

• Fixed a bug that prevented Genji and Hanzo from consistently being able to wall climb in several locations near point A

King’s Row

• Fixed a bug that caused Orisa's Protective Barrier to fall through the floor when deployed at a specific spot close to Point B

Heroes

Baptiste

• Fixed a bug where people could stand on immortality field
• Immortality Field can no longer be exploited by swapping heroes to reset the cooldown

Doomfist

• Fixed a visual issue with Doomfist's primary fire animation while in a Graviton Surge
• Fixed a bug where McCree's roll could cause Uppercut to not lift him to the correct height
• Fixed a bug where hitting Sombra with Rocket Punch would not put hack on cooldown if she was using it at the time
• Fixed an animation pop when doing an aerial slam at certain range
• Holding secondary ability will now also trigger the ground version of Seismic Slam when it becomes valid
• Fixed a bug where sometimes Seismic Slam would not trigger if Doomfist was on a slippery surface

D.Va

• Fixed a bug that caused D.Va to not gain full health when spawning into her mech in Total Mayhem

Echo

• Fixed a bug where some effects caused by Duplicated heroes were not always removing themselves after 3 seconds
• Fixed a bug where an Amplification Matrix wouldn't boost damage during the 3 second linger window after Duplicate ended
• Fixed a bug that caused a Graviton Surge created by clone Echo to stop displaying visual effects when Duplicate ends
• Fixed a bug causing Echo to be credited with a "Double Kill" on a single kill, when playing with a damage scalar > 100%
• Fixed a bug where kills done by cloned heroes after Duplicate had ended were not counting towards the Duplicated Kills stat
• Fixed a bug where the Hacked effect on health packs that were hacked by an Echo Duplicating a Sombra would be colored wrong after her ultimate ended
• Fixed a bug where Sticky Bombs could sometimes deal damage through shields
• Fixed a bug where after using Call Mech, a Duplicated D.Va would use incorrect voice lines

Genji

• When Genji reflects Reinhardt's firestrike, it will now swap team coloration from Reinhardt's POV
• Fixed a bug where Genji did not receive credit for kills done by a deflected Hanzo Dragonstrike

Mei

• Fixed a bug where enemy Mei’s Icewall would appear the incorrect color in FFA modes
• Fixed interactions between friendly Mei's Cryo-Freeze and various abilities

Mercy

• Fixed a bug that caused player nameplates to be invisible when Mercy's beam target is afflicted by Ana's Biotic Grenade and ally colorblind colors is enabled
• Fixed a bug where Mercy could lose ultimate charge in custom games with a damage scalar under 100%

Torbjörn

• Fixed a bug allowing turrets to be teleported into invalid locations in rare instances

Zarya

• Fixed a bug where Zarya's bubble doesn't purge the visual effects of someone hit by a Venom Mine

Zenyatta

• Fixed a bug that could cause a pink object to appear at the top of the screen for Zenyatta while wearing his Zen-nakji skin

Workshop

• Fixed a bug where values were often being counted multiple times towards a script's total element count