[Wishko]

Разработчики Overwatch опубликовали новую статью из серии "Еженедельный сбор", в которой регулярно делятся разной информацией о своих подходах к работе над игрой, успехах и неудачах, новинках и прочих волнующих их и игроков моментах. В свежей заметке авторы рассказали о положении дел баланса героев во 2 сезоне "Правления 'Когтя'" и поделились некоторой статистикой.

Weekly Recall: Charting The Summit

Hi, everyone! Season 3 is around the corner and we know that you’re eager to play evil with our newest Hero and hop into Neon Junction. Catch us in the cat café reading up on the latest Shimada drama.

Before we start the descent from Season 2: Summit, though, it’s time for one of your favorite Weekly Recall topics: data, data, data! Our data analyst Ben Trautman provided us with some glorious charts about a particular feline meta and mode popularity, along with a few bonus tidbits hidden in the numbers.

Cat Bastion Stat Station

Let’s start with the cat-shaped elephant in the room. If you’ve watched any Overwatch Champions Series or Overwatch World Cup matches over the past month, you’ve undoubtedly noticed the presence of Jetpack Cat’s devilish alliance with Heroes like Bastion and Cassidy.

The feisty feline carries damage dealers through the air, where they’re free to pop an Ultimate ability or send destruction on unsuspecting enemies below. Many of you have likely been personally victimized by a Sky Noon in your own matches and have called for the immediate “spaying” of this meta.

Data brings good tidings, though. It turns out “Catstion” and its derivatives are only a near-constant in professional play, not your average Overwatch match.

Jetpack Cat Ban Rates over Time for Ranked Role Queue on PC in All Regions, Split by Rank

Jetpack Cat's ban rate steadily decreased in all Competitive ranks throughout Season 1 and into the start of Season 2, which is standard for most new Heroes. A massive spike in ban rate hit in mid-April at the Champion rank and was swiftly copied by subsequent ranks above Diamond. It’s not a coincidence that Crazy Raccoon first debuted the Jetpack Cat/Bastion strategy around this date and most of the pro scene followed.

Consistent Jetpack Cat bans at high ranks have mostly kept that strategy quarantined to professional play. That said, our balance team recognizes the prevalence of aerial feline shenanigans in high ranks and you’ll get some relief when Season 3 drops. Jetpack Cat’s Frenetic Flight fuel regeneration penalty will be increased and Transport Shielding (a Minor Perk) will lose some of its staying power, among other changes. Lifeline will remain a useful tool for Jetpack Cat, but upcoming changes should keep its ability to cause meta mayhem relegated to the pro scene.

More Like Phar-nah

Speaking of ban rates, we wanted show you how rates can differ from region to region depending on what their community picks up on.

Sierra and Pharah Ban Rates over Time for Ranked Role Queue on PC for All Ranks, Split by Region

Historically, Asia has picked up on possible ban rate trends a bit earlier than other regions thanks to the prevalence of pro players on the servers. When Season 2 kicked off, Pharah had a few Perks integrated into her base kit that gave her serious firepower and a chance to rule the skies. Asia immediately sent her to timeout with a double-digit increase in ban rate over mere days. Europe steadily hopped onto this trend, but gamers in the Americas apparently didn’t see her as much of a threat.

Instead, the Americas apparently had a vendetta (not that one) against one of their own in Sierra, whose ban rates have steadily increased since her release. Interestingly, Sierra’s ban rates on Asian servers never peaked above 28%. Ban priorities can differ widely based on what a regional community is the most annoyed about at any given moment; you can check those out at any time on our Hero Stats page, which now shows ban rates!

Wuyang Win Rates, Wow!

Sometimes we find fun little storylines in these piles of data. In our May 12 patch, we fixed a bug that was doubling the standard damage reduction from armor onto Wuyang’s primary fire, his Xuanwu Staff. This bug was inadvertently insuring he did half damage to tanks and other armored Heroes. If you aren’t a hardcore Wuyang enthusiast, you may not have even noticed this fix. But our stats did.

Wuyang Un-Mirrored Win Rate over Time for Ranked Role Queue on PC for All Ranks in All Regions

After the bug was fixed, Wuyang’s win rate went up a respectable 0.8% over the course of several days across all PC ranks, at least when the other team wasn’t also playing a Wuyang to cancel out the difference. That may not seem like a big number, but a win rate increasing by a full percentage point in a short time is extremely rare. What’s even more fascinating is that this win rate bump has yet to move the needle on Wuyang’s play rates. Maybe this is a sign to incorporate Wuyang into your Hero pool?

Spin The Map Roulette

The Overwatch community has been fiending for more numbers about our maps, so we dove into the data depths with Antarctic Peninsula’s adorable penguins to fetch some charts about the most popular modes and the effect of several new features.

Chosen Rate for Map Types when Shown in Map Voting for Ranked Role Queue on PC for All Ranks in All Regions

When the reworked Antarctic Peninsula debuted at the start of Season 2, we increased XP in Quick Play and lowered negative progress on a loss in Competitive Mode. While this helped Control (as a mode) maintain an equal pick rate with Escort maps throughout the feature, another Season 2 addition had a strong effect on the entire system.

Every map mode takes a nosedive in voting rate at the start of the season. Why? The thrill of leaving map selection to fate must’ve called to our community and the “Random” button became an overnight hit. So many of you rolled the proverbial dice during Season 2’s launch week (20-25% of all map votes were Random!) that it tanked the average pick rates of every other mode. Things have evened out over the course of the season, but an average of 18% of all map votes are still going to that tempting button.

We also wanted to provide some data to hopefully settle mode-related arguments on social media. Folks in some ranks are convinced they never get to play a certain map type while those in higher (or lower) ranks feel overwhelmed by playing that mode repeatedly. Guess what? Both are right.

Chosen Rate for Map Types when Shown in Map Voting for Ranked Role Queue on PC for Masters+ Ranks in All Regions

Hybrid and Escort are the top map types when all ranks are considered, but those at the higher tiers of Competitive mode prioritize Control maps. In fact, Control is voted nearly a full 10% more often than any other map type at the highest ranks. Flashpoint is also a big hit at Masters+ along with Push, but both are the least-voted map types when all ranks are tallied up. Random doesn’t seem to tempt the upper echelons of Competitive as much, which makes sense: they’d rather take fate into their own hands instead of playing map roulette.

If you’re in Silver and think you’ve never played a Flashpoint map in Competitive, you’re probably right. If you’re in Champion and missing Escort maps, you’re also probably right. No more fighting in the comments, y’all. Everybody gets an A+ this time.

That’s all for now! Thanks for appreciating the art of charts with us. See you in Season 3![Источник]