Overwatch’s new PTR patch brings Paris and health pool changes

We received an unexpected treat with Overwatch’s latest PTR update: the new assault map, Paris! This is the first new map since Busan, and we’re looking forward to fighting our way through lovely shops and charming streets. It’s certainly much lighter as a setting than Horizon, the assault map set in a location where monkeys pulled a coup and murdered their scientist overlords.

There’s also an interesting change to the way health works. Non-recoverable shields, health, and armor, are consumed by damage before recoverable shield, health, and armor. That’s a little opaque, so to put it more simply: If you have a buff to your health pool that doesn’t automatically reapply, that health will now be depleted first, in the following order:

• Previous priority order: non-recoverable shields, recoverable shields, non-recoverable armor, recoverable armor, non-recoverable health, and recoverable health
• New priority order: non-recoverable shields, non-recoverable armor, non-recoverable health, recoverable shields, recoverable armor, and recoverable health

The developer comments on this patch explain what this means further:

Developer Comments: In Overwatch, a health type order determines the prioritization of subtracting health, shield, or armor types when a hero takes damage. For example, if a hero has recoverable shields and takes damage, the damage taken will diminish the recoverable shield before recoverable health. Previously, it was possible for heroes’ recoverable shields to be prioritized for damage and regenerate, allowing their non-recoverable armor to persist. With the order adjustment, heroes who have been granted non-recoverable armor or shields will now consume those resources before recoverable health, armor, or shields.

This is one of those changes that won’t seriously shake up competitive Overwatch meta, but it will make things work in a clearer way to players — if you do enough damage to remove extra armor, it’ll stay off for good.

There are also a host of smaller changes, most important of which is the fact that players can now grant lobby ownership to other players in custom games. There are also some bug fixes, including a lot of cosmetic fixes to Ashe, and a tweak that stops certain D.Va skins from making her invisible to her allies. The full patch notes can be found on Blizzard’s forums.