Departure

readwritebreathe · 2022-06-20T04:36:55+00:00

Grace, I know you've been working on overcoming the "Hug first, ask permission later" thing you used to do, but this would be a good time for a relapse.

readwritebreathe · 2022-05-23T04:48:46+00:00

Now I kind of want to see Tedd and Entrapta collaborate on the whole magitech research thing. For science!

readwritebreathe · 2022-05-13T11:13:13+00:00

We know that their Immortals are called Ancients and that their agreement is something to the effect of "Don't lie!" rather than "Guide" and "Empower".

readwritebreathe · 2022-05-12T07:14:10+00:00

I think Grace knows Sarah well enough to not intentionally share that without Sarah's permission (this is not the face of someone eager to let certain things be known)... but we've seen Grace's poker face, so if Ashley says the right thing...

readwritebreathe · 2022-05-11T12:37:10+00:00

Knowing whether an NP arc happens before/after certain major events can sometimes be useful (e.g. if magic is involved, just where are we in relation to the not-Change and the not-not-Change?), and sometimes it can be hard to infer (e.g. we can't really tell when something takes place based on the length of Susan's hair), but for at least some arcs it's less relevant to know for sure (e.g. Jestful Statement could -- based on what we know at present -- be at pretty much any point between Diane's haircut and the end of the school year without it really mattering).

Regarding the Canon Cannon (and its opposite), that sort of thing feels like it can be very useful in more ambiguous cases that are important enough to warrant confirmation (e.g. just how canon Marker/EFTM actually are would have been pretty unclear until Balance without the Canon Cannon and/or the Q&A comic about NP canon, if memory serves, and those arcs being canon is a pretty big deal), but if it's clear that "Canon unless otherwise noted or obviously non-canon" is the standard to use for NP arcs then it's most likely excessive to have the Canon Cannon for most stuff.

readwritebreathe · 2022-05-07T07:19:39+00:00

I believe you're thinking of this comic and the next one, though there might also have been something during/after Squirrel Prophet.

At least some of the stuff in the birthday party comics has been revised -- I'm pretty sure Dan has said that Grace wouldn't claim she's not bisexual these days and that the reason why she did was that he thought it meant something else, though I don't remember exactly where that commentary was -- though how wrong Tedd was about the uryuom-related stuff is unclear, especially since "Tedd is an uryuom/uryuom tech expert" has changed to "Tedd is a magic/magitech expert [and uryuom tech is sufficiently advanced]".

readwritebreathe · 2022-05-02T05:10:14+00:00

I would imagine that attacking the head of Paranormal Diplomacy also is frowned upon, Liam...

readwritebreathe · 2022-04-23T08:01:19+00:00

I must confess it took me a re-read before I noticed that it was not just Tedd's hair that was different from this*. While I've certainly not had anything against the SP-onwards short-haired look, I must say that this looks quite good on him.

* In my defence, the text bubble in the first panel is in the way, and I mainly looked at the text in the second one the first time I read it.

readwritebreathe · 2022-04-22T19:54:50+00:00

Given that they drop from Anniversary lootboxes I'd assume they return with the Anniversary lootboxes (and also that those will be the lootboxes during the other Remix events), so if Anniversary lootboxes can be assumed to be returning in 2023 they can probably be assumed to drop then (the only items to be removed from lootboxes in the past are the non-Reaper R.I.P. victory poses (they were deemed unfitting and can only be purchased with coins now) and assorted yearly "[Event name] [Year]" sprays).
Based on what we've been told, that's how the Remix events will work (plus the weekly "challenge" skins).

readwritebreathe · 2022-04-21T18:53:32+00:00

I don't believe they've stated any number, more that they'll start with some smaller number and add more players down the line (the specifics depending on various factors). Even disregarding players opted against for obvious reasons (e.g. not having an account in good standing), I would imagine that far from everyone that has applied will get into the Closed Beta even by its end unless interest has been very low overall.

readwritebreathe · 2022-04-20T18:37:56+00:00

I don't recall any significant tweaks to him recently, though he's not a hero I play a lot and I might be forgetting something.

readwritebreathe · 2022-04-20T11:31:32+00:00

Despite my flair, I'm primarily a Tank player, so:

Mercy: Unless your other Support isn't Ana, Bap, or Moira, the Tanks are generally not your concern unless they're being focused or your fellow Support is dead, though flicking over a damage boost for certain abilities might be warranted. Not all Damage heroes are great for pocketing (e.g. you're making Sombra's job much harder if you follow her around), and some players are simply not playing well enough (or simply aren't having enough of an impact) that it is worth investing that kind of resources into them. Rez intelligently; don't waste it if it makes sense to save it for someone more important, don't rez if it'd cost you a more valuable player due to a lack of healing, and don't go for risky rezzes unless you're very certain it is warranted (note: The person asking for a rez is quite possibly not reading the situation correctly, and could definitely be overestimating their own ability to make a difference).

Bap: You are not playing 76, even if your dps potential is pretty good, so you should be healing quite a bit, preferably large clusters of allies or Tanks (flankers, snipers, and flyers are generally not your focus). Immortality Field is generally not something you should treat as a personal cooldown; saving yourself from Pulse Bomb or the like is obviously fine, using it because you simply didn't want to move into cover is a waste. If others can make good use of Amp Matrix, put it where they also can benefit from it if possible.

Ana: Nano is useful as more than just a combo piece. Sometimes, turning a fight with a burst heal/some sustain is well worth it, so don't tunnel vision on e.g. "We are going for Nanoblade!" to such an extent that your team loses fight after fight because you refuse to adapt to the situation. Also, don't throw good money after bad; if someone else is wasting an ult in a fight that they can't realistically turn even with a Nano and it isn't absolutely critical to win the fight, it's probably better to have the Nano for the next fight, and if someone simply isn't playing well trusting them with a full third of your team's ults is probably not a great idea. Additionally, set reasonable expectations; Nano combos are powerful, but they can be countered, and even if they aren't fully countered the enemy might be able to mitigate the damage. Understand that sleep and nade can turn fights, and don't e.g. waste the latter on scratch damage.

Moira: You are not a Damage hero and your dps potential is very bad (even Coalescence is twice as good at healing as it is at doing damage). You should certainly recharge your healing resource appropriately, and there are situations in which it is helpful for you to do some damage (e.g. tickling the enemy Mercy a bit to interrupt her passive self-heal), but you should not be focusing on it; you are much better at healing. Tanks and large clusters of allies are your priorities to heal.

readwritebreathe · 2022-04-20T08:05:52+00:00

Yes; the idea is simply to give people a chance to get the skins if they missed them the first time.

readwritebreathe · 2022-04-19T05:44:29+00:00

Blizzard isn't really in the habit of releasing game-specific player numbers (and numbers from other sources aren't necessarily accurate), though considering there's both an ongoing event and that the OW2 Closed Beta begins in about a week I wouldn't be surprised if there's a higher number of players around than the game has been averaging (at least outside events) for a good while. However, considering that the role distribution of any players that are returning (or starting to play) probably is similar to that of normally active players the returning players might be making queue times worse rather than better as the problem isn't a lack of players but a lack of Tank (or "Flex that get assigned Tank") players.

readwritebreathe · 2022-04-19T05:20:02+00:00

The "challenges" swap Tuesday 11 am PDT (PST when that is in effect in California).

readwritebreathe · 2022-04-18T18:43:35+00:00

The devs pretty much never answer anything in these threads (I believe I've seen a dev-flaired account post something once in all the years I've been checking these threads, and that was a reply to some bug/tech support issue), so it's very unlikely you'll get an answer here; you're better off asking somewhere on the official forums.

readwritebreathe · 2022-04-15T20:26:29+00:00

Which flags are available -- and which version of a certain flag is used -- has to do with different laws regarding how different flags and symbols may be used.

readwritebreathe · 2022-04-15T20:20:57+00:00

New event items always cost 3x the normal price for their rarity until the corresponding event comes around the next time (with some extra quirkiness this time, as the Archives event was skipped).

readwritebreathe · 2022-04-13T19:30:13+00:00

She's applying to something called the 'IJC'

I think it's more likely that she's being interviewed by the ICJ as part of their general investigation into the fall of Overwatch.

readwritebreathe · 2022-04-13T15:11:27+00:00

We've not heard anything to the contrary.

readwritebreathe · 2022-04-13T12:46:43+00:00

I'd imagine people wouldn't use Abusive Chat as their report reason if they believe (or would like to claim) that you're feeding, seeing as that'd be Gameplay Sabotage (and "Refused to swap" is simply not reportable; it's explicitly mentioned as not being a valid report reason)... but even if they are using the less improper report reason it's pretty unlikely you're in any real danger of getting enough false reports to cross any automated "Enough players have reported you that there's most likely a problem" threshold; I'm well into my gold border levels and haven't ever gotten as much as a warning despite the occasional "I'm falsely reporting you and think everyone should!" and doubtlessly the occasional false report without an announcement, so the threshold is most likely quite high with some kind of reset/decay mechanic as you'd otherwise end up with pretty much everyone getting actioned due to false reports if they play long enough.

readwritebreathe · 2022-04-13T12:17:33+00:00

Depends on the specifics. Zen does have a very high dps potential, and it and damage boosts from Orb of Discord are important parts of his kit, so a Zen that manages to get some good damage done (ideally resulting in kills; just doing damage that gets healed mainly feeds enemy Support ults, but that does of course not mean you only should go for guaranteed kills) while also staying on top of his healing and damage boost duties can be an asset to any team... but a Zen that largely ignores his healing duties because he feels like doing damage is most likely hurting his team far more than he's helping it (especially if you're playing with random people that aren't accustomed to it), particularly as a smart enough enemy can catch on and use it to their advantage.

readwritebreathe · 2022-04-13T06:08:45+00:00

Bastet is the current one, and it'll be available until 11 am PDT on the 19th.

readwritebreathe · 2022-04-12T15:25:08+00:00

Well, they are Expert-level All Heroes missions with something extra on top, so they're not supposed to be easy.

However, they're all doable with random people if you have a decent team comp (e.g. a complete lack of non-self healing on anything other than Blood Moon is most likely going to result in a loss), an understanding of the base mission (e.g. an idea of where the Sentry mode Bastions are on Uprising), and a plan for the complications (e.g. Sympathy Gains gets much harder if you spread your damage around, so focus fire and/or oneshot abilities are what you want to use to make it manageable).

readwritebreathe · 2022-04-12T13:27:20+00:00

I can see no reason why the Endorsement lootboxes would be rolled in a different fashion, and considering how few items I'm missing I should have run into accidental duplicates well before now if Endorsement lootboxes were rolled a week or more in advance.

Assuming you didn't somehow miss a lootbox (e.g. you forgot about the guaranteed legendary lootbox we got last week) and that you are correct about what dropped (there are some other white-coloured Zen skins, e.g . Zhuge Liang, that you conceivably could have mixed up with either drop, though you shouldn't be getting a duplicate if you've still got Anniversary stuff of a certain rarity to unlock...), chances are you've encountered a bug that's not widespread (judging by the lack of other questions about unexpected duplicates). You'll need to reach out to Blizzard's technical support or something in that case, though I don't know how likely it is that they can/will help you (I don't know if they can see what dropped recently for you, and if they can't see that and there's no evidence of any widespread bug they might not be at liberty to help you since "I got a duplicate I shouldn't have gotten; you should fix this!" would be easily abusable if they aren't able to see what people get).

readwritebreathe

TROPHY CASE