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1.32.9 PTR PATCH NOTES UPDATE

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1.32.9 PTR PATCH NOTES UPDATE

Blizzard said: blizzarrow.gif

October 6, 2020

Lok’tar!

We would like to thank everyone for providing very valuable and passionate feedback. Going into the first iteration of the PTR, the Warcraft 3 team knew some of the balance changes may have been too extreme. However, we wanted to test the impact of the changes and gauge community feedback.

In today’s iteration of PTR, we’re scaling back on some of the changes, as well as including some additional changes that were highly requested. Please remember these changes are a work in progress and subject to change.

We plan to do one more balance pass before this patch goes live.

Thanks!


HUMAN
  • Arcane Tower
    • Increase Summon damage reverted from 25 to 20.
      Developers’ notes: After careful observation and playtesting, we feel this change didn’t accomplish what we originally intended. We are reverting this change in favor of buffing peasant HP and increasing repair speed on towers slightly. See below for more info.
  • Peasants
    • HP increased from 220 to 230.
      Developers’ notes: Increased HP should give peasants more survivability before an arcane tower can be built. We thank the community for this suggestion.
  • Scout Tower / Guard Tower / Cannon Tower / Arcane Tower
    • Reduce repair time by 5 seconds.
      Developers’ notes: A slight survivability increase to help humans mitigate certain mid game pushes
  • Spell Breaker
    • Armor reduced from 3 to 2.
      Developers’ notes: The goal here is to try to get away from the mass Spell breakers in Human Mirror.
  • Rifleman
    • Attack delay reduced from 1.4 to 1.35.
      Developers’ notes: With the additional changes to Human, we felt that this change needed to be reverted.
  • Mountain King
    • Thunder Clap now has a max damage cap of 8.
      Developers’ notes: If there are more than 8 units within the AOE range, it’ll still damage all units but with a decreased damage on each unit. Custom Maps shouldn’t be affected by this change, but map makers can modify the new field in editor to change the maximum damage if they want. This feature has been requested for a while, and we’re thankful for your patience. We look forward to your feedback on the exact number here.
  • Sorceress
    • Slow Movement Speed reduced from 60% to 55%.
      Developers’ notes: A slight movement speed reduction of Slow. This is to improve the Orc vs. Human matchup and to slightly improve the Human vs. Night Elf match up to compensate for the lack of dispel.
  • Siege Engine
    • Tank experience bounty increased from 60 to 85.
      Developers’ notes: Recent changes to Undead repair rate could potentially increase the viability of Siege Engines, so we are increasing the experience bounty, which we feel is too low. We may also reduce the health in the future.
  • Gryphon Riders
    • Build time reduced from 45 to 40 seconds.
    • Gold cost reduced from 280 to 260.
      Developers’ notes: To promote usage of late game air, this applies to all races.

ORC

  • Great Hall
    • Supply granted increased from 10 to 11.
      Developers’ notes: This should help provide an early scouting option for the Orc vs Night Elf matchup.
  • Tauren Chieftain
    • War Stomp stun duration against Heroes increased from 1.5/2/2.5 to 2/2.5/3 (2/3/4 originally)
    • Shockwave mana cost reduced from 100 to 90
      Developers’ notes: We have scaled back our changes to War Stomp change and reduced Shockwave’s mana cost to 90 to make it a viable alternative.
  • Wind Rider
    • Gold cost reduced from 265 to 245.
    • Developer Notes: A slight cost reduction as Wind Riders are fragile and we could perhaps see most usage out of them at this cost.


UNDEAD

  • Destroyer
    • Cast point time increased from 0.5 to 0.66 (0.83 originally).
      Developers’ notes: We liked the direction this was heading, as it improved response time for the destroyer when Devouring Magic. However, at 0.5 the ability was an almost an instant dispel. At 0.66 we have improved responsiveness without losing counter play.
  • Crypt Lord
    • Level 2 and Level 3 Carrion Beetles hit points increase from 275/410 to 330/490.
    • Movement speed reduced from 290 to 280 (all levels).
      Developers’ notes: After evaluating the recent changes, we felt the movement speed of the Carrion Beetles needed to be brought down slightly, but we’ve decided to compensate this with a HP increase. This should make it slightly harder for Carrion Beetles to get surrounds but should increase their viability in the later parts of the game in direct battles.
  • Death Knight
    • Unholy Aura movement speed changed from 10/15/30 to 10/17.5/25 (10/20/30 originally).
      Developers’ notes: Adjusting scaling to feel more appropriate. Level 1 remains unchanged.
  • Ghouls & Abominations
    • Cannibalize researched by default.
      Developers’ notes: This is an experimental change to see if this promotes more ghoul play and creates more variety of UD openers.
  • Gargoyle
    • Now has a new toggle ability “Prioritize” which will allow the Gargoyle to Prioritize flying units over ground units.
      Developers’ notes: Something that was requested by the community to improve the useability of this unit. When turned on the Gargoyle will prioritize air units over ground units but will still attack ground units if the player force attacks a unit.
  • Necromancer
    • Unholy Frenzy HP drain reduced from 3 to 2 HP/s.
      Developers’ notes: A minor change to try and promote Undead usage of support casters.
  • Spirit Tower / Nerubian Tower
    • Repair rate reduced from 60 to 45 (35 originally).
      Developers’ notes: There was a bit of confusion around this change. The repair rate is how long it takes for a building to be repaired, so the higher the number, the longer it takes. We original dialed it up to an extreme number to see how it would feel, but after numerous playtests, we’ve decided to settle it at 45. This is 5 less than an Orc burrow, and taking into consideration that there will usually be a maximum of 5 acolytes repairing it, we feel this makes the most sense.
  • Frost Wyrm
    • Buildtime reduced from 65 to 60 seconds.
    • Gold cost reduced from 385 to 355.
      Developers’ notes: To promote usage of late game air, this applies to all races.

NIGHT ELF

  • Wisp
    • Detonate mana drain increased from 25 to 35 (50 originally).
      Developers’ notes: We knew that reducing the mana drain on wisps to 25 may have been too extreme, but we wanted to see how it would feel. We have decided to increase the drain amount to 35 (from 50).
  • Archer
    • HP reduced from 260 to 250.
      Developers’ notes: This is a slight calibration on a past change to archers, since right now they are a little too durable, especially considering the Elune’s Grace passive ability.
  • Chimaera
    • Build time reduced from 60 to 55 seconds
      Developers’ notes: To promote usage of late game air, this applies to all races.

ITEMS

  • Tome of Retraining
    • Cost reduced from 300 to 200.
      Developers’ notes: This is an experimental change, but we hope to encourage some new builds and potentially create more ability variety throughout the different phases of the game.
  • Wand of the Wind
    • Cooldown increased from 0 second to 5 seconds.
      Developers’ notes: The power to instantly Cyclone 3 units with 1 item was too much. The Cyclone ability now has a 5 second cooldown, so this change brings this item more in line with the ability itself.

CUSTOM GAMES

  • Fixed a bug with custom units in Classic Mode that was causing shadows to not display.

 
Level 2
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Wow, another great patch!

Maybe they gonna fix netcode issues, crappy servers, crashes, desyncs, split game list, pitch angle bugs and button stacking in another 10 month at this rate!
 
When we go create a game in single player, go online for customs , or go play campaign :

Can we get a tileset info in map description under minimap ?

139092.jpg


As you can see this existed back in classic days. I wonder why reforged/new classic doesnt have it yet 8 months after official release ?
 
Level 18
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I'm sad not to see any editor changes.

The optimistic side of me thinks that it might be for the best: they're preparing something BIG for us...

Wait... naive? What's that word?
 
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This is a very well made patch.
Agree with the direction of the changes, just wanted to point out of a few things

Since human towers are in focus, can we see changes to the human canon tower to see it being at least occassionally, since right now it is the most under-used part of the human tech tree.

Encouraging flying units is great, since air units are basically countered by units that are lower tier than themselves, which is why they are, with the exception of the destroyer (and thus gyros to counter the destroyer), not used often.

Lowering DK speed buff is a great way to encourage cryptlord + dreadlord, since both of them (impale and sleep) help catch units, since right now DK speed buff was one of the only ways to catch/catch up with units. (Cripple is master training for necros, so it is too unreachable in early game).

Perhaps consider lowering fiend HP and possibly consider web as a tier 3 upgrade, to make it less of an omnipotent unit. If there was an upgrade for ghoul HP at tier 2, it would solve the issue of no melee unit for t2 undead (skeletons don't count). Right now, fiends are only option until tier 3 because of lack of HP on the ghoul, which could change if there was a HP upgrade for them at t2.

Cannibalise change is interesting, and makes the meat wagon more important for its corpse related abilities. It also might force human to not always choose archmage first against undead, since stormbolt or holy light might be needed to nuke ghouls down early to stop them from running back and healing.

Since this patch is so willing to make changes, I hope blizzard will consider making changes to units/heroes/abilities that are rarely used.

DH-immolation buff
POTM- searing arrow buff + a little bit for owl scout
Bloodmage- slight hp boost + make flamestrike instant cast/cannot be canceled + slight damage boost (since right now bloodmage is just used for banish/mana drain)
FS- farsight (needs longer reveal time)
Tinker- slight damage boost to normal auto attack
Dark ranger-- make the drain take one second less for a full cast (and thus do more damage/heal per damage). Also make it so it can heal allies, but heal them for double of the life draining from the ranger. (so "healing" an ally for 200 hp only takes 100hp from the ranger).
Firelord- incinerate buff
Cryptlord- make the carapace passive effect the small beetles
DK- make his death pact give him a damage boost for 60 seconds in addition to healing himself.
Paladin- slight increase to normal attack damage.
Pitlord- make reign of fire non-channeling.
Alchemist- buff his chemical rage
Panda- buff his passive.

Sorceress polymorph
Talon crow form
Glaive throwers/demolishers/meat wagons hp boost.
 
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Chaosy

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What other minor patch (0.0.1 increment) came with modding/editing features?
Admittedly I was not around for 1.24 release and before that but last I checked the whole point with a minor patch was to add.. you know.. minor things.
It's not like I expect a new raid in WoW in patch 8.3.1

I'd like to point out that this patch does not contain bugfixes for melee gameplay either so it's not preferential treatment.

One logical assumption is that the code-related dev time is being used for the ladder changes showcased a few weeks back. I don't really play melee but it was player profiles I am pretty sure?
You can of course question if this is more important than fixing bugs though.
 

Chaosy

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1.32.2, 1.32.3, and 1.32.6 added some new common.j natives.
So let's assume they added a native for changing a framehandle's position by pixels instead of whatever nonsense the current unit is called.

Would this turn all the responses in this thread into positive cheers of encouragement.
I doubt it.

Anything short of bringing back custom campaigns would not get praise and even then it would probably be like "Finally took you long enough"
 
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So let's assume they added a native for changing a framehandle's position by pixels instead of whatever nonsense the current unit is called.

Would this turn all the responses in this thread into positive cheers of encouragement.
No because like in the patches I listed, the devs would probably forget to mention it in the changelog and it'd go unnoticed lol.
It also really depends on what native(s) would be added, the example you gave would obviously be meh, but if it were something often-requested that exposes new functionality that wasn't possible before, I'm sure at least some people would be positive about that.
 

~El

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Desperate WC3 modders really _do_ grasp at straws when trying to push the engine to its limits to make it do what it was never meant to do. Every native, however insignificant it may be, might open up new opportunities to explore.

Been there, done that.

With that said, these patches have really dragged out. It's almost a year since Reforged release and we're nowhere near the level of features that were being requested and promised.

Sad.
 
Well, it looks like they finally fixed the shadows on the classic render mode after I personally messaged one of the developers and said that since last December when they broke those, I have been rewriting the game in part so that I can have my shadows back, and shared with him videos of my replica game and how it has shadows.

Inspiring really. Apparently if you to go great enough lengths, anything is possible.

Edit: Also, hats off to @d07.RiV
In order to implement custom shadows in the game I'm writing, all I did was copy his code from the online Warcraft 3 map viewer he had been developing. Turns out... these things aren't really new concepts.
 
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Level 19
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With that said, these patches have really dragged out. It's almost a year since Reforged release and we're nowhere near the level of features that were being requested and promised.

hey, it's coronacrysis, small indie team can't afford keeping extra staff. The Janitor will back once offices are opened and continue work on those features. Just be patient.
 
Someone asked me to see if Prioritize skill was customizable, so I set "Targets Allowed" to Ancient.

unknown.png


This works, so then my gargoyle priotizes Night Elf Ancients as targets.

zzzzzzzzzprioritizeancient-gif.365697

zzzzzzzzzprioritizearcher-gif.365698
 

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Level 18
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Hey there :)

I didn't see the "Prioritize" new skill at first read (hmm okay, I didn't really read once I've seen there was nothing related to the editor).

But it actually seems like a crazy addition for the modding community.

And I see you've already done some tinkering with, it's really impressive! The possibility of this ability for strategy maps is completely insane!
Or even for "AI Commander" maps (maps where you'd handle large amount of AI armies).
It would be crazy to be able to "modulate" your strategies through this skill and a smart categorization systems (infantry / archery / cavalry / artillery etc.).

Do we know if we can add multiple instance of this ability to the same unit and still get it work separately? (IE: have a unit focus flying OR ancient OR buildings with three instances of the ability).

Do clones of that skill work? A pitty that it is not visible , in the editor, on default.
What do you mean? We are not able to duplicate the ability? Or to even find it in the first place?
 
Level 10
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I really like the functions of the targeting toggle. I will tinker sround with it when i got time. Honestly ivm not sure how exactly it works. Does anybody knows what happens if you set the targets to some invalid combination, like self+ward? Does something like this deactivate the auto attack or simply make the unit target everything like normal? Would be a nice workaround instead of adding a custom permanent invisibility or the worker-classification.
 
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In terms of natives my #1 and #2 wishes would be:
1) Provide decent ways to sync data, such that you could sync save strings and such without relying on, admittedly excellent and impressive engineering, but high-overhead and super hacky user mode solutions. Also, some built in throttles mean that using some of the current custom syncing libraries inexpertly or to sync more data than expected can lead to lag and/or game freeze for literally a minute+. (I have a particular, specific, syncing prototype that got dropped in mind, not wild rumor, thus leading to autoload functionality being delayed on a certain map by several years)
A decent start would be making SynceStoredString and friends actually work, but perhaps taking inspiration from one of the current jass libs for a new api would yield better results.

2) A proper local storage api so that we would not have to abuse preload natives as much. Currently the api is overly-powerful for the purpose of simply storing a small bit of (save) data locally, and blizzard has been paching it (read: breaking naive usages) way too frequently lately. A simple and secure-by-design approach that has a stable api and does not needlessly expose arbitrary filesystem traversal would be nice.

Nice to haves:
3) Proper hashtables. (current implementations have most draconian api ever seen, need special handling from user in case 2 non-integer semantic keys have the same hash)
4) Removing non-orthogonalities:
  • allow us to have code arrays. Yes i understand why they did it this way, but its not impossible, simply extra work, and would make certain code oth easier and more efficient to write.
  • Allow us to put data structures (arrays, hashtables, etc..) inside other data structures. This would naturally allow for multi-dimensional array syntax (At east for usage, but thats the one that really matters). Also, mappings from string or units to hashtables or arrays making certain metadata tracking easier.
5) Make calling a native JASS2 function a natural GUI action such that I could create a library in JASS (for flexibility or efficiency) and then expose it to users with different expertise for safe and familiar usage. Currently having to use triggers is unnatural and actually directly invoking functions from GUI is prone to lead to errors that can be annoying to track down if not caught immediately.
 
Level 12
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Hello there, is there any chance Custom Campaigns will ever make a comeback at all? I mean I understand they have to "add it", but I simply can't understand how you fuck up something that worked perfectly fine before you decided to improve it? And now it takes several patches of adding chicken footprints to add back an amazing feature which, again, worked perfectly!
 
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I think I am less sure about giving ghouls a proposed HP upgrade at T2. But there still needs to be a legitimate t2 melee for undead, either by making necro skeletons last longer/easier to make/give less XP, or by allowing ghouls to be sacrificed at the pit to become a stronger unit (zombie?).

Meat wagons should have a dispel so UD has a double dispel like all other races which doesn't force it to rush T3. It can be based on an ability that consumes corpses.

Also still hope at the start of melee maps there can be a countdown since load screen doesn't show how close game is to starting. I.e like using the Blizzard-made Grandprix start countdown of "3-2-1" with the sound effects.
 
Provide decent ways to sync data

I literally played a map of Minecraft where you could place blocks and make a custom 3d world, exit the Warcraft III Single Player map, join an online game with a friend, and then load the minecraft world you were building. It was made using the new sync natives which appear to be straightforward. Wasn't this the entire point of all the new sync natives? Could you be more specific about how these new sync natives fail to achieve what you are looking for?

Code:
native BlzTriggerRegisterPlayerSyncEvent           takes trigger whichTrigger, player whichPlayer, string prefix, boolean fromServer returns event
native BlzSendSyncData                             takes string prefix, string data returns boolean
native BlzGetTriggerSyncPrefix                     takes nothing returns string
native BlzGetTriggerSyncData                       takes nothing returns string

Proper hashtables. (current implementations have most draconian api ever seen, need special handling from user in case 2 non-integer semantic keys have the same hash)

Isn't it guaranteed because of JASS2 string ordinals counting upward that we can always get a unique number for a string and we don't have to do whatever nonsense you are implying?

See the hashtable string native that was added along with the hashtables to solve exactly this problem in a straightforward non-draconian way:
Code:
native StringHash takes string s returns integer
 
Level 14
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What I would like to know, is exactly how this "Prioritize" toggle skill works for Gargoyles.

Presumably, it doesn't disable their ground attack (as it says - they can still attack ground units), but it does make them prefer to use their air attack.

Does the ability make the gargoyle prioritize air units because: The ability makes them prioritize air or the ability makes them prioritize a certain weapon index?

Knowing exactly how it works would be extremely useful, as it can definitely be used in custom maps for various uses.

EDIT: Oops, looks like people already answered that on the page before.
 
What I would like to know, is exactly how this "Prioritize" toggle skill works for Gargoyles.

Presumably, it doesn't disable their ground attack (as it says - they can still attack ground units), but it does make them prefer to use their air attack.

Does the ability make the gargoyle prioritize air units because: The ability makes them prioritize air or the ability makes them prioritize a certain weapon index?

Knowing exactly how it works would be extremely useful, as it can definitely be used in custom maps for various uses.

EDIT: Oops, looks like people already answered that on the page before.

Based on my tests, so it might be wrong:

The "Prioritize" skill has a very noticeable effect when you order the gargoyles to move to a target area, as opposed to ground-target. Once the gargoyles reach that area, they will normally look for ground units to attack first. With "Prioritize", the gargoyles will instead look for air units to attack first.

The quirky behavior of the "Prioritize" skill is (mostly) lost on an attack-move command when factoring in the gargoyle's position, as well as the enemies' position, since in certain cases, the gargoyle may encounter ground units first and will instead attack them.
 
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So maybe I’m completely wrong here, but it seems to me that Blizzard is interested in boosting the popularity of WC3 competitive melee games... and that’s it. I feel like they want to bring up to par with SC2, but that’s not going to happen. This hardly justifies the things they messed up. The biggest one to me (personally) is the fact that there are not custom campaigns. That is outrageous to a large portion of the community. For primarily that reason I still haven’t updated to Reforged and don’t plan to until we at least get back what we had. Even a show of faith would be something, but it’s always balance updates that don’t mean anything to me. (Not saying they don’t mean something to others) it would just be nice to have something to look forward to again...
 
There are different branches of DotA in warcraft 3, you have to check for the Author/Version. Tufuuu "makes" it for reforged. I think his version is 6.85ne x although he has included some changes from dota2 6.86, confusing. DracoL1ch "makes" one for V1.26 only, with a higher version numbers it has quite many features but only works on that specific version.
Then there are is an older version, 6.83 from Icefrog which should work on any version above 1.24a.
 
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