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As of
25/02/23 I'll be taking a break from developing the mod for a while. I think the current version is in a pretty decent spot. My original goal was a version of the game with a more diverse meta than Doomfist, Mercy, Moira, Widow; adjusting some of them and bringing all other heroes up to their level of strength plus giving them unique identities where it makes sense. I'm sure with how crazy some of the abilities are things might turn out to be imbalanced as hell. Seeker Punch and Goal Fortify may seem frustrating to some players, but they are essentially more pronounced versions of mechanics that already existed in the game in some form at some point and they really do help the pacing I still feel pretty strongly. It's disappointing that things like a more complex Anti Camp Mechanic seem to be beyond the scope of what workshop servers can handle. I've messed up a bunch with my crappy coding, and lost a lot of the momentum the mod had, but in my defense I've encountered a couple of workshop bugs and found workarounds that even experienced modders didn't know about, and a lot of stuff isn't listed in any tutorials. If it turns out people aren't interested in the mod anymore, then I guess that's how it is.
Known Issues:
-had 1 server crash on kings row i think lobby wasnt even full
-(fixed?) sometimes seekers randomly win a round instantly, probably player ghost coordinates glitching through goal, not sure how to fix yet since fixes don't work
-zarya taxi sometimes not working correctly (already improved a bit, could try another version using closest distance between angles)
-(fixed?) soldier maybe can cleanse burn damage
-when few players, abuse of team switch to respawn
-genji: dashing through healthpack allows activating a second healthpack afterwards, might leave this in if he isn't overpowered. i wanted to genji a similar mechanic anyways, but i'm concerned about having patterns revolve too much around healthpacks.
-play of the game system doesnt always attribute kills to a runner
-afk seeker kick doesnt work always cuz they teleported to teleporter
-enable disable ability might still get bugged sometimes
Recent Patchnotes:
Patch 27/02/23: secret patch, (fixed?) goal fortify cooldown may get stuck very rarely
(fixed?) zarya can bug if transported ally right before roundend again, (fixed?)
lucio protected status needs hud,
(fixed?)
reinhardt can somehow ignore burning dot, except ray on runner damage, ramattra limit back to 2, baptiste immortality field now uses a custom cooldown system that sort of resets when he goes back to spawn. genji also uses a custom cooldown system so healthpacks can reduce his swift strike cooldown. trying out higher refreshrate on seeker laser, hopefully it wont put the server workload over its limit again. d.va speed and repair buffed. mercy ult enabled but supposed to charge very slowly, maybe it just automatically enables last 60 seconds.
Patch 25/02/23: fixed some bugs, optimized a bunch, but for now I guess we go back to the mods traditional anti-camp system, since mine seems to be causing heavy server load and crashes on some maps. the mod even before any of my changes is already close to the workload limit, it's not like i'm adding crazy expense stuff just so you know. fixed runner <90 and <60 detection, was badly coded by me before. no-ultimate zone is now 45 meters could doomfist ult could still do crazy stuff on some maps (watchpoint gibtralta ult cancels him up in the air and he just falls into goal), updated hero descriptions, tiny balance adjustments
Patch 24/02/23: D.Va can get her mecha back if she manages to heal 1111 health (takes 1 minute of standing on big healthpack spawn, or back to spawn or zenyatta ult), moira upon death now revives closest dead ally, once per round, made anti-camp more aggressive again.
Patch 23/02/23: FINALLY FROZEN MATCH TIME BUG IS FIXED FOR REAL THIS TIME, is an issue with the game, not my fault, on control maps if timer hits 0 it stops working so now game time is actually +1 secretly and everything is just displayed as game time - 1, so it never truly hits 0. cassidy now spawns with ultimate ready, which means you can swap on him constantly and bully spawn camping seekers. seeker punch now uses charges (2-3), lots of small balance changes.
Patch 20/02/23: gave sombra invisibility when grabbing healthpacks, soldier gets quick speedboost from healthpacks and medfield, genji gains 10% ult charge from healthpacks, made brigitte ult nerf seeker laser range, made mei iceblock slide forward, lucio ult briefly gives allies protected. cassidy ult: if fully charged teleports seekers hit 75 meters in goal direction, at least half charged +1 sec stun, hanzo ult: maybe roots or freezes seekers , wreckingball can now either hold crouch or ability 2 optionally. fixed bug with sombra/tracer ability disable/enable affecting abilities on all heroes. disabled "recently been within 20 meters of runner" notification and increased range of "runner nearby" sign from 3.4 to 5
Patch 19/02/23: seekers now get teleported to the seeker teleporter when round begins. tracer while burning can now find a healthpack to enable recall and cleanse herself. genji ult: just increased speed and swiftstrike reset as normal, d.va respawn exploit removed, knockback abilities on players with sphere of protection exploit removed
Planned Changes:
Considered Changes
-might give custom abilities custom cooldown visuals
-kiriko spawns with ult and ult gives allies in range and herself impulse in facing direction
-junkrat ult: maybe ends early and teleports jr to wheel position
-sigma ult: maybe custom flight that isnt as awkward to use, or maybe hitting stone briefly gives invis and speed
-might try out different fancy versions of moira passive,
either upon death she herself takes control of the ally hero, or she
forces the dead ally to become a new moira, not sure if the chain should
continue or end there.
-might make hitboxes of big heroes smaller
-eichenwalde antiskip maybe, not sure, probably not
-maybe game mode: if i see you fly, you die, only pharah & kiriko & mercy
-maybe single hero game mode
-finish reverse maps version (where team 1 and 2 are swapped, and have to walk the other way), gotta add teleporters tho since some spawns are closed off and work around other bugs by the overwatch devs
-future hero might attach to allies, or be played by two players
-version of roadhog that just disables seeker ray around him and he then tries to stick around seekers for a while until they can escape
-seeker ability reworks
-some fancy camera movements for different situations
Maybe Eventually:
-system that fills empty seeker spots and balances game
instantly, but attempts so far have lead to bugs that put people into
queue for some reason
-some stuff will get rebalanced if playerbase (if one exists) becomes better
-if a troll sits on the maps normal objective for ages then the match time will be reset i think?
-play of the game shows only a later portion of the runners sprint towards the goal (can't be fixed i think)
-daily leaderboard: cant be done, information cant really be stored between matches
-why am i seeker again? it's random, again: information cant really be stored between matches
-future hero might get ally copycat ability
-echo ult: actually trasnform into hero, update: tried was buggy
-torb ult: maybe roots, maybe his ult makes him a giant, resets his ult a bunch so he shoots lava from the skies, update: tried, crashed server even with just me and 3 bots on it.
Q&A: Recent Feedback & My Responses:_____
reinhardt overpowered: i'm not sure I agree. high skill seekers shut down his movement a huge amount, he's pretty loud too so they can easily find and punch him even if they don't monitor him constantly, i can increase his charge cooldown slightly for now but in general i don't see him as a problem atm
______
-bastion wonky grenade cooldown: overwatch devs need to fix it
-short sleep when seekers use teleporter: it has a stun, made it slightly longer, but its supposed to be strong
-game modes needing fewer votes: nah just ask players to vote in chat i think, democracy is work. (update: there is a setting now for lobby host to enable permanent mystery heroes in server settings, so you can create your own undemocratic server)
-sombra translocator normal power but disabled next to goal and high self damage: i considered stuff like this for sombra, but she'll quickly become stupid to play and limited, i mean we can try small buffs plus self damage, update: focused her gameplay more on stealth healthpacks now
-custom seeker abilities, specifically sombra disabling health packs: i want to hold off from too crazy seeker ability stuff like that since it becomes too much too learn for new players for little gameplay gain,
enabling seeker symmetra turrets: i did want to have these enabled but increasing cooldown didn't work? might revisit this once i give seekers in general another look
-runner ability suggestions: status that makes seeker laser length shorter, or disables laser while around hero: good suggestions for ways heros could effect runners, i considered these, for example recently for roadhog poison cloud, for him it could be cool since he can hook heroes to himself and then try to stay close to them. they could find a home eventually for sure. a risk to the former is that it could make some seekers without reliable quick movements a lot less attractive to play, update: brigitte ult now works like this
-runner ability higher movespeed the further away from goal: considered this for sombra a while ago. i didnt commit to it because i was worried the constant distance&variable checks would strain the server
-ashe ability, resurrects after a while and quicker if conditions are met: this anivia egg kind of ability is definitely on the list and junker queen isn't too far off, but idk i think ashe is a pretty cool hero that people will start to appreciate once they get more experienced with the mode, don't think she needs big changes atm.
short delay before seeker punch triggers: i've been meaning to do this, i agree, thanks.
symmetra underpowered: idk, i think she might be insanely broken actually once the playerbase grows in experience, update: d.va now has a mechanic like this
-runner start advantage if few players: considered this, ideally i would want to balance by having only 1 seeker if few runners exist, but i couldnt get that too work without bugs yet, so in the mean time for sure, very easy to implement, another good suggestion thank you.