Overwatch is getting Looking for Group, other social features
Blizzard is finally ready to unveil Overwatch's long-awaited social features.
The two biggest social features in Overwatch's PTR patch 1.25 are Endorsements - a feedback tool that allows all players to commend their teammates and opponents, and Looking for Group.
To encourage and foster positivity in the game, Endorsements allow you to give feedback in different ways like 'Good Teammate, 'Shotcaller', and 'Good Sportsmanship'. All players now have an Endorsement level that increases whenever they receive any of these commendations. Endorsed players also get 50 account xp.
The idea is to be consistent, so you ideally should maintain as high of an Endorsement Level as you can, not just stop caring after reaching a certain point. By the same token, getting silenced/suspended will lose a player all of their endorsements, resetting them back to the default level.
The other major feature is Looking for Group, which as the name suggests, allows players to look for teams based on certain roles or team compositions. Endorsement Levels play a part in that, too, since you'll be able to block players below a certain levels from being in your group.
Profiles can now also be set to private, or friends-only, on top of the default 'public' option.
One other major feature Blizzard discussed is the merging of Attack and Defence heroes into the new Damage group. According to game director Jeff Kaplan, this will simplify the selection process and make it easier to set up compositions in the LFG tool.
On the balance and gameplay end, Symmetra's long-promised rework arrives as part of the same patch, alongside a rebalance of the map Horizon. All of the that is currently available on the game's PTR, part of patch 1.25.