I’ve written a document on some of my ideas for a Revamped Practice Range, as I believe the current Practice Range is heavily lacking in features that could greatly benefit new and experienced players alike.
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The Practice Range in Overwatch 2 is a direct port from the same map seen in the first game. While this map is good enough for what it’s meant to do, I feel like there’s a lot more Blizzard can do with it that will make the Practice Range a more useful and accurate training experience. These are some of my ideas for a Revamped Practice Range in Overwatch 2, ranging from simple quality-of-life changes to new features that are absent from the current map, and could be very helpful in training.
New Customization Bind
My first idea is a new bind exclusively for use in the Practice Range that, when aimed at a Training Bot, will open up a menu that lets you adjust certain sliders and togglers such as the bot’s health, damage output, firing speed and general behaviour. This bind will be mentioned a lot in this concept, so from here on I will refer it as the Custom Bind.
This bind would have various other uses when used on different things. For example, pointing it at an unoccupied place on the floor could let the player spawn a Training Bot or Health Kit, and pointing it straight down could let them give themselves Infinite Ammo and Instant Ability Recharge and have the option to change their team, which would be extremely useful when practicing with friends.
Another idea I had for this bind is to be able to turn scripted Training Bots into Hero Bots. Certain Training Bots have set paths they walk through or the command to keep shooting. This would be nice to have for Hero Bots to give a more accurate training experience, though I can imagine it’s not easy to let the player create custom paths for Hero Bots. That’s why I believe a clever alternative would be to be able to replace these scripted Training Bots with Hero Bots, while still keeping their scripts and behaviours.
Complete Rework to Hero Bots
The current Practice Range has a small corner outside of the spawn room that spawns an idle bot of any given Hero in the game, which can be switched using a computer next to it. This is a good feature that helps determine how long it takes to eliminate various different Heroes, but I feel like that’s all it’s good for at the moment.
My idea is to remove this corner, and have the option to spawn Hero Bots anywhere by using the aforementioned Custom Bind on the floor. Using this bind again on a Hero Bot will give you the option to switch the Hero, change its behaviour to be constantly shooting (think of training modes in most fighting games), enable certain status conditions such as Nanoboost or Kitsune Rush, etc.
You are also given the option to change the Hero Bot’s team. This way you can spawn friendly Hero Bots, which would be especially helpful for Support players. For example, they could use this feature to get a feel for how long it takes to heal a Tank as opposed to squishy Heroes, see how much damage a certain ability does when damage boosted or see if they can outheal a teammate while they’re being attacked.
Objective Points on Map
Considering the size of the current Practice Range, this idea will be impossible unless the Practice Range map is either expanded or redesigned completely. The idea is that on different points on the map there will be a Capture Point (Control), Payload (Escort), Push Bot + Barricade (Push) and 2 Flag Points (Capture the Flag) to simulate the gameplay of each of those modes.
Using the Custom Bind on these objects will reset their position and/or capture state. It will be a relatively small area as there is no need to have an entire payload route on a training map, but I feel like it will provide some insight to these modes regardless.
Miscellaneous Changes
There are a few other things I would like to mention that are not of any necessity, but are worth mentioning regardless
- On the current Practice Range map, there are a few points outside of the intended play area with janky collission where the player can stand, while I assume they’re not supposed to. One example is on the far end of the mountain ridge behind the Hero Bot corner. This is not a major issue but it displays a lack of polish.
- In the files, there are tons of interactive voice lines for the Training Bots, but as far as I’ve been able to tell, the only one that’s actually used in-game is “Hello!”. I can imagine that constantly hearing the Training Bots talk would get annoying, but I think it would at least be nice to have the option to turn these voice lines on or off.
- With the Practice Range map being a direct port from the first game, the visual quality of the map does not reflect that of Overwatch 2. Despite being a minor part of the game, I believe the Practice Range could do with the same OW2 makeover every other map received.
Feedback is heavily appreciated!