Overwatch 2 Season 12 is set to arrive in August, so here is everything you need to know about the upcoming season.
We’re at the end of Season 11 and it has already been dubbed one of the “worst” by fans, especially after it brought several controversial changes to Tanks.
If you’re one of the players unhappy with how the current season has shaped up so far, you may already be looking forward to Season 12. After all, there’s already been several teasers.
So, here is everything we know about what is coming in Season 12 of Overwatch 2.
Overwatch 2 Season 12: Start date
Season 12 of Overwatch 2 will kick start on August 20, 2024. This has been confirmed by Blizzard in the reveal trailer of Juno.
The release date is also in line with the Battle Pass timer, so the season’s launch is running on time.
Juno arrives
First teased back at Blizzcon 2023, Juno is the second hero to be released in 2024, just after Venture in Season 10.
With Juno’s gameplay trailer out, we not only know how she will play, but we have an actual name for her instead of simply “Space Ranger”.
3, 2, 1, blast off with our newest Support hero, Juno! 🚀Hop in and play as her for a limited-time July 19 through July 21 👩🚀✨ pic.twitter.com/NFAt0wThAp
— Overwatch (@PlayOverwatch) July 18, 2024
Juno is a Support hero who has a lot of verticality, alongside the ability to speed boost allies – becoming the second hero able to do so after Lucio.
Just like previous hero releases, Juno was available to try in a limited-time trial from July 19 to July 21.
Reaper gets the Mythic treatment with new Mythic Ana weapon skin
With a new Anubis-themed season, Overwatch 2’s devs announced Reaper will be getting the Mythic treatment with the Mythic Anubis Reaper.
Inspired by the Egyptian god Anubis, and the namesake of both Temple of Anubis and Throne of Anubis, it sees Reaper transform not only into the God of Death but also Ra, the Sun God, depending on your customization choices.
Additionally, Ana will be receiving Season 12’s Mythic Weapon skin, named the Midnight Sun Weapon. Just like Reinhardt’s Mythic, it’ll grant new special effects and sounds.
Both Reaper’s Mythic skin and Ana’s weapon skin will cost 80 Mythic Prisms in the Mythic shop. If you need a refresher on how the Mythic system works, you can read about it here.
Clash mode arrives with Hanaoka and Throne of Anubis
After almost a year of teases, with a limited-time trial back in Season 10, we’re finally seeing the official launch of Clash with Season 12.
During the limited-time trial and its announcement at Blizzcon 2023, we only knew of one map, Hanaoka. Now we know a second map is also coming, Throne of Anubis.
Just like Hanaoka being a successor to the old 2CP map, Hanamura, Throne of Anubis is a successor to the 2CP map Temple of Anubis.
If you don’t know what Clash will entail, you can check out our explainer here. The mode is slated to release with Season 12 on August 20.
Flashpoint spawn room changes
Announced in the Competitive dev update, Flashpoint’s spawn rooms will give you a speed boost when exiting its doors.
Essentially, because of how big Flashpoint maps are and how long it takes to get to the point, the devs saw fit to give players a speed boost to get them there faster.
The speed boost will activate once you exit the spawn doors, but the buff will deactivate if you either take or deal damage.
Speed buffs are still capped to the 75% boost, so that means you can’t exactly go at the speed of sound if you have a Lucio/Juno backline, but you can stagger them.
New Competitive Drive event and new ranked cosmetic
Coming around late Season 12 is the new Competitive Drive event.
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Functioning as a mini-Battle Pass players can complete while playing ranked, it will give ranked grinders a chance to earn free rewards.
It also brings with it a new cosmetic, the Competitive Signature. Signatures is a visual that will go on your BattleTag, being visible to all player anywhere a BattleTag would appear in.
The event is slated to run sometime late in Season 12 for a weekend. There’s no concrete date for it yet, but we’ll be sure to keep you updated. So, keep checking back.
Reworked respawn timer
In Season 12, Overwatch 2’s devs will be introducing a new reworked respawn timer to help players regroup faster.
A Group Respawn mechanic had already been added in Season 7, but now the mechanic has been revamped and worked into Competitive.
The system will work roughly the same, with players who died a few second away from each other spawning together.
If you would like a full explanation of the new mechanic, you can check it out here.
Reaper rework
As has become a tradition in the past year, every season has a hero rework to update some of Overwatch 2’s older characters and get them up to snuff for the modern game.
Reaper’s rework has been in the pipeline and has been teased by devs for some time. Now, we are finally getting it as part of Season 12’s fresh overhaul.
As explained by OW2’s Lead Hero Designer Alec Dawson, they are focusing on updating his Shadow Step but didn’t reveal how exactly it would change, other than that it would be a “large technical challenge” to implement.
As we get closer to Season 12 and get a better look at what’s in store for Reaper mains, we’ll be sure to update you right here.
Returning event modes
In Season 12, the devs are bringing back fan-favorite event modes from past seasons for a limited time as part of the annual Anniversary event.
So far, the modes teased to be coming back are the Mirrorwatch and April Fools events, however, we can expect other event modes such as the Cosmic Crisis mode.
Mid-year rank reset
Season 12 will bring another rank reset as part of the annual mid-year reset.
The last rank reset the game saw was in Season 9 with its large competitive overhaul, this time it’s just a regular reset to give players a fresh new start.
Once Season 12 hits, players will need to redo their rank placements, needing to complete 10 placement matches to determine their new rank.
Larger avoid slots
Originally teased by devs back in Season 10, there will be several updates to Overwatch 2’s report system and the avoid slot feature.
Starting in Season 12, the avoid slots will now be increased to ten players, be able to pin three specific players as perma-avoids, and rank the rest based on how likely they’ll be avoided.
This would mean that any particularly toxic player you’ve queued into multiple times can be permanently avoided by pinning them on your list.
With this update, you’ll be able to prioritize your list, ranking your avoided players based on how likely they’ll be avoided. In short, the top players are who you’ll never queue up with.
However, according to Senior Systems Designer Gavin Winter, for most players below Grandmaster, you’ll pretty much never encounter anyone on your avoid list.
If you are GM, since there aren’t a lot of players in that skill range, it will slowly ignore your list from the bottom to find the best matches for you.