Changes to Overwatch 2’s Respawn Timer Increase Action in Season 12 Matches

The developers of Overwatch 2 have revealed a significant new addition to Season 12, replacing Group Respawns. This feature is expected to greatly enhance the overall enjoyment of matches.

In the seventh season, Overwatch 2 implemented a Group Respawn feature in order to discourage players from respawning and quickly returning to the objective without their teammates.

According to the developers, this feature proved effective in preventing one-sided matches and notably had the greatest impact on the top tiers, such as Champion and Grandmaster.

Despite the positive aspect of shorter respawns for players who died first, there was a concern with this feature. Some players felt “buried” as they were the first to die and then had to wait for their allies to be picked off before respawning. This resulted in the player who died first having to wait longer in the game.

Group Respawns had a big effect on Overwatch 2.

To address this issue, the developers are implementing Wave Respawns instead of Group Respawns. This change aims to expedite the process, allowing teams to quickly return to the fight.

The default spawn time in Quick Play and Competitive will now be 12 seconds instead of 10. Whenever the first player on a team dies, a new “wave”will begin and any teammate who dies within six seconds will also be a part of it. This change will apply to all future matches.

According to the developers, a hero who joins a Wave will respawn simultaneously with the hero who initiated the Wave. This implies that the respawn time for heroes joining the Wave can range from 12 seconds, if they died at the same time as the first hero, to 6 seconds, if they joined just as the Wave was ending.

In the event that a hero initiates a Wave and there are no other heroes who have joined by the time their respawn time reaches 6 seconds remaining, we will deduct 2 seconds from their respawn time. This results in a respawn time of 10 seconds, which was the default before Season 12.

Get ready for more team fights in Season 12.

This change also brings about several other factors. Firstly, respawns during overtime have been adjusted to 14 seconds, with the exception of Flashpoint maps. Additionally, Wave Respawn will not be available on Payload and Hybrid maps when the cart is nearing the end of the track.

The developers have stated that they will continue to monitor this system for feedback and make further changes as needed. They anticipate that average respawn times will be reduced. In their initial testing, they observed an increase in team fights per match as a result of this change, which is expected to enhance the overall excitement of gameplay.

Wave Respawns will be implemented on August 20, coinciding with the start of Season 12.