Blizzard have released a patch to the Public Test Realm (PTR) that focuses on improving the man who punches like a steaming train: Doomfist. Many of these changes, like making his attacks break breakables again, should make him a more satisfying character to play, but there’s also a push to make the effects of his actions more predictable.
Overwatch’s principle designer, Geoff Goodman, explains in a blog post that the patch improves wall slamming, saying that “The wall slamming logic has also been simplified so players should find that a 45 degree impact angle is the cutoff between the target being slammed into the wall, or sliding off.” This simplification makes it much easier to understand the repercussions of your moves.
Excitingly, “Rocket Punch now breaks breakables again.” Goodman explains that it was a bug that prevented breakables breaking but, as well as fixing that, “the system we have in place now should break them much more consistently than before.”
Goodman also lays out some small changes to Seismic slam, saying that “Seismic Slam being canceled when landing too close to a wall should be fixed” and “Seismic Slam will now ‘slide’ a small ways up ramps instead of instantly triggering.”
There are a number of things the team is aware of, Goodman says, and is working on fixing, such as Seismic Slam sometimes not finding enemies as valid targets when they’re near a corner, or when Rocket Punch can sometimes go straight through an enemy, and a strange bug that “happens if you use Rocket Punch near a corner or edge, and it causes you to ‘bounce’ off and slide quite a ways away, probably messing up your punch.”
Then there are things the team know about and are still looking into: “Rocket punch vs. Rocket Punch/Charge” and “Aerial Seismic Slam sometimes causing Grounded Seismic Slam”.
Whether these PTR changes roll out to the official servers isn’t clear, it may be as players get their hands on them they’re found to not quite be right for the general population. We’ll know more soon.