New Deadlock patch notes reduce lethality across the board

Valve has released the latest Deadlock patch notes, as it continues on the road to the full launch. The Half-Life and Team Fortress 2 studio has made a plethora of changes with this update, as a global reduction to gun and ability damage take centre stage. So whether you're still active or fancy diving back in, these changes to Deadlock make now the ideal time to get playing.

The first change Valve makes to Deadlock in this newest patch is to bullet cycle time, which has been increased by 5% for every single hero. Developer 'Yoshi' explains that this will effectively reduce all gun damage per second by 5%. This should put more weight into how and when you use skills, changing the flow of battle ever so slightly and impacting the fight for minion kills.

Yoshi also says "Ability base damage and AP bonus damage [are] reduced by ~8% (spirit power growth unaffected)," which means everyone should also find their abilities to be slightly weaker moving forward. Combined with the changes to DPS, it looks like Valve wants to reduce lethality across the board in the game, which should give you more chance to turn fights around. While Deadlock is already one of our picks for the best MOBAs on PC right now, it's worth noting that Valve is still deep in development, so a lot of this could change again.

Your overall Spirit gains from leveling have also been reduced from 1.25 to 1.1, while your Spirit bonus based on souls spent in the tree is increased by a whopping 25%, changing the way we power up throughout a match. Speaking of which, the team is also increasing Ultimate cooldowns by 10%, which it says "affects base and upgrades, so the total CD with AP is 10% longer."

While we don't know when the next Deadlock patch could be, I'd expect some big stuff on the horizon. Earlier this year the studio completely reworked the shop, introduced new items, and made some major visual changes, all of which almost made Deadlock feel like an entirely new game. With the Deadlock release date still on the horizon, I can't wait to see what comes next.

Valve has now released the Friday July 4 Deadlock update. You can go through all the changes right here.

As you dive into all of these changes, make sure you check out our tier list of all the Deadlock characters. We've also got a very useful look at Deadlock crosshairs, which will help your shooting.

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