Hey, Challengers!
Cloud Crashers launched two weeks ago, and it's been really amazing to see so many people enjoying the game. Honestly, the reception was so much larger and more positive than we were expecting, so a huge thank-you to everyone who's played, and especially to those who have shared any thoughts and feedback.
In today's update, we have a couple of small changes based on some of that feedback.
Balance Updates
Soldier
Knockback to self from Rocket Launcher increased from 5.0m/s - 20.0m/s to 5.0m/s - 25.0m/s.
The Soldier's rocket-jumping capabilities were too small to feel practical. This change should help make rocket-jumping feel more consistent and useful in-game. Note that the range of values listed is based on proximity to the impact.
Viking
Lunge cooldown reduced from 7.0s to 6.0s.
The Viking has felt underpowered—particularly in their ability to get in range of more mobile opponents, given the character's reliance on chaining high-damage melee attacks. Reducing the cooldown of Lunge should help improve the Viking's diving capabilities. We may also increase this ability's jump distance or add an additional ability charge if this change doesn't bring Viking far enough in-line with the rest of the roster.
Feature Updates
Power-Ups
A big change is coming to power-ups! Instead of one power-up spawning at the center of the map, multiple power-ups will now spawn at random locations. A new power-up has also been added: the "Overhealth" power-up grants 75 temporary overhealth to whoever picks it up. Whenever a power-up spawns, the type will be selected at random.
Other Changes
An additional indicator has been added to the Soldier's HUD to indicate the availability and cooldown of Rocket Boots. Since you're typically using this ability midair, it can be really difficult to quickly check if/when it's available. The goal of this change is to make it easier to know when your next jump will activate Rocket Boots and how much time is left on its cooldown.
Bug Fixes
Viking can no longer pick up ultimate charge power-ups while Bloodlust is active.
Power-ups now continuously check availability on overlapping players. This eliminates an edge-case where, if players activated/ended their ultimate ability while touching a power-up, they would be unable to immediately collect that power-up. With this change, if a player uses their ultimate while touching an ultimate charge power-up, they'll immediately pick it up for an instant ultimate recharge.
This bug occurred because players cannot pick up ultimate charge power-ups if their ultimate is already fully charged. But this was previously only being checked when the player first came into contact with the power-up. If they used their ultimate while still touching that power-up, the power-up still wouldn't be collected. This is the primary situation that this bug fix aimed to address.
Please let us know what you think of these changes, and feel free to share any other thoughts and suggestions (and bug reports) on the discussions page!