SEER AND THE WALLHACK META

[Intro: Justin Bieber]
Oh, woah
Oh, woah
Oh, woah

The list looks long, but the goal here (and for hotfixes in general) is to hit pain points and degenerate play patterns without preemptively gutting the unique parts of Seer’s kit. I’ll also share my thoughts on the “wallhack meta” in general.

First and foremost, direct your thanks to @travis_n. He implemented the changes and did stuff like send me clips of passive iterations at 1am, taking extra time to package together a holistic sweep for this balance hotfix. The man’s a legend, to say the least.

With the passive alone, Seer can get A LOT of info with minimal cost.

There are plenty of examples of Seers hitting 360 quick-scans as they moved around, knowing exactly how many players were nearby (or in LoS from a crazy range) and pinpointing enemy locations quickly with ease.

You know you love me, I know you care
Just shout whenever and I'll be there
You want my love, you want my heart
And we will never, ever, ever be apart

Removing the pips reduces the precision (knowing the exact # of enemies) of a quick ADS. This goes hand in hand with the range reduction.

Increasing the duration between pulses (and making it so the flares decay to nothing between beats of full HP enemies) forces a greater time investment. We’re tightening the FoV and killing the “hold tac and have full movement speed” loophole for the same reason.

I still think we’ll need continued work here. As many solo queue ranked grinders know, ratting is now virtually impossible. I never thought I’d look back fondly on the days of ratting, but here we are. #MakeRattingGreatAgain

As I’m sure we’re all well aware by now, Seer’s tac does a lot of things. Considering it’s designed to be somewhat of a skillshot, this isn’t intrinsically bad.

But, given how easy it is to hit with the ult/passive synergy, and the fact that a common use case is when someone is moving slowly/stopped while healing/reviving, the least we can do is give the target a little more time to avoid getting hit.

Are we an item? Girl, quit playin'
We're just friends, what are you sayin'?
Said "There's another," and looked right in my eyes
My first love broke my heart for the first time, and I was like

The other low hanging fruit for a hotfix is to dial back the FX intensity and remove the damage. There will still be a directional indicator so victims can understand where they were revealed from.

Seer tac used as a dollar store EMP to farm damage and drain resources was definitely problematic at high-level play. Plus, looking at your health bar and seeing a sliver of it missing for taking damage through walls is a major feels bad.

Many of you may be disappointed we didn’t touch the interrupts or reduce the 8s reveal duration. This is a starting point. Regardless of what the data tells us, if internal and external feedback is any indication, I imagine one of these outputs will need follow-up work.

Something Seer has made clear that many high-level players already know with BH’s success: real-time info through geo is extremely powerful in a shooter. A lot of players sink thousands of hours into games like Apex to develop a sense of their surroundings.

Players soak in every clue they can to predict the enemy’s next move at macro and micro levels. When this is circumvented with something like a reveal, it can feel cheap.

Players that pride themselves on their “game sense” feel slighted, and it can actually make it harder for beginners to develop their awareness. My best guess as to what is happening in a fight will never be as accurate as a scan.

Baby, baby, baby oh
Like baby, baby, baby no
Like baby, baby, baby oh
Thought you'd always be mine, mine

This is why the best counter to an ulted BH is another ulted BH. Why engage when their information is perfect compared to my best guess? This limiting of counterplay options is what feels bad.

It’s not something that should be solved with a band-aid solution, such as making Bang smoke clear scans. Then I’m stuck choosing a single legend, and that’s not very liberating.

Seer has opened our eyes to what sort of information can be communicated through scans. A real-time silhouette for x seconds is different than tracking footsteps or the health bar or the heartbeat passive.

[Verse 3: Ludacris]
(Luda)

When I was 13, I had my first love
There was nobody that compared to my baby
And nobody came between us, nor could ever come above
She had me goin' crazy
Oh, I was starstruck
She woke me up daily, don't need no Starbucks
She made my heart pound, and skip a beat when I see her in the street and
At school on the playground, but I really wanna see her on the weekend
She knows she's got me dazing, 'cause she was so amazin'
And now my heart is breakin', but I just keep on sayin'

There are many axes we can explore, and I know Seer’s emergence has expedited the process of revisiting the oppressive parts of the reveal meta to introduce more options and counterplay.

As far as release strength Seer goes, we missed the mark. Players should never feel the need to pick a legend/weapon for an entire season just to compete. Thankfully, we’re a live game and we can iterate on things.

[Chorus: Justin Bieber]
Baby, baby, baby oh
Like baby, baby, baby no
Like baby, baby, baby oh
Thought you'd always be mine, mine
Baby, baby, baby oh
Like baby, baby, baby no
Like baby, baby, baby oh
Thought you'd always be mine, mine

While we can’t solve the pain points of the reveal meta in a hotfix, I’m looking forward to jamming out longer-term solutions with the rest of the design team. As always, keep the feedback coming... even though I may not reply, I try to listen as well as Seer sees.