Splatoon 3 Update 11.0.0 brings Flow Aura farming, health bars and smaller hit boxes

Splatoon 3 update 11.0.0 has been released, and Nintendo has made some really interesting changes to the game, adding things like Flow Aura, health bars and tweaking hit box sizes.

Presumably inspired by the whole “aura farming” slang, players that are doing well in battle are now granted a Flow Aura, which grants the Run Speed Up, Swim Speed Up, Ink Resistance Up and Intensify Action abilities while it lasts. You can extend the effect by defeating more enemies, or getting assists.

Speaking of defeating enemies, you no longer have to look to see how splattered enemies are for an indication of their health, because when people take damage, they’ll now have a health bar – this is sensibly hidden when the opponent’s body is not visible, so it won’t reveal obscured people.

And then there’s a bit of give and take with hit boxes. Hit boxes for squid form are getting a bit smaller, with Nintendo reasoning that players are now more skilled with motion controls than they were a decade ago. At the same time, the projectiles are being tweaked, so that shorter range weapons have larger hit box projectiles, and longer range are more like the same. It means that it’ll be harder for snipers to hit a squid form player, while encouraging the short-ranged weapon players to really get up close and personal.

Acknowledging that these are some pretty core changes, Nintendo has noted that they anticipate having a smaller point update in the near future to tweak this new balance. In general, I think it’s probably a good update, but I know that having health bars visible is going to annoy purists, so hopefully they’re made optional.

Here’s the Splatoon 3 Update 11.0.0 patch notes:

Changes to Multiplayer

• Players will now gain a Flow Aura when they do well in battle, such as when they defeat opponents consecutively within a short period of time.
  • The Flow Aura lasts for a short amount of time.
  • While a player’s Flow Aura persists, its duration will be extended slightly whenever they defeat an opponent or their teammates defeat an opponent they damaged.
  • When a player gains a Flow Aura or extends the duration of their Flow Aura, the ground at that player’s feet will be inked with their colour.
  • While a Flow Aura persists, the Run Speed Up, Swim Speed Up, Ink Resistance Up and Intensify Action abilities will be applied.
  • Continuously getting assists with your allies or inking territory during battles will make it more likely to gain a Flow Aura when defeating opponents.
• When an ally or opponent has taken damage, that player’s approximate remaining health will now be displayed.
  • Opponents’ remaining health will display for approximately three seconds immediately after taking damage.
  • When the main part of an opponent’s body is not visible, such as when they are behind terrain or swimming in ink, their remaining health will not display.
    • When things like Thermal Ink or the Point Sensor are revealing an opponent’s position, their remaining health will display even if the player cannot see them.
• Slightly decreased the collision detection size for players in swim form to make it harder for opponents’ attacks to hit.
• Expanded the collision detection size for each main weapon’s attacks to make it easier to hit opponents with attacks. Also made it so that the shorter the weapon’s shot flight distance, the greater the increase to the collision detection size will be.
• When attempting to jump a long distance with Super Jump while the Stealth Jump ability is equipped, increased the time required to make the jump by up to one second depending on the distance.
  • When jumping from near the player’s base to parts farther in, or vice versa, this will increase the jump time based on the distance.
  • The increase is applied to the time spent flying through the air. This will not change the time spent on the ground preparing for the Super Jump.
• Adjusted the size of the circle indicating the explosion radius for the Reefslider to the radius of the area that deals 220.0 damage instead of to the radius inked.
• Specifications for some main weapons have changed.

• Specifications for some special weapons have changed.

• Points required for some special weapons have been changed.

Changes to SplatNet 3

• Changed the used weapon display under X Rankings to show the most frequently used weapon in X Battles for that mode during a certain period instead of the last used weapon.
  • Due to this change, the weapon used to determine the top players for weapons will be changed in the same way.

This update focuses on making changes to battle-related systems and multiplayer balance.

For information about battle system changes like the Flow Aura, displaying remaining health, collision detection adjustments and extended jump duration for Super Jumps with Stealth Jump, please see the news article.

Among the balance changes, the updates for the L-3 Nozzlenose and Dynamo Roller are not simple upgrades. Rather, they are performance changes to help those weapons’ unique properties stand out.

For the L-3 Nozzlenose, we raised the speed of shots to make it easier to utilise the weapon’s unique property: its ability to maximise power by successfully hitting opponents with its three shots. On the other hand, we lowered its inking ability to make it more difficult to fight by lying in wait without proactively approaching opponents or fighting in ways that rely on the rate of turnover for special weapons.

For the Dynamo Roller, in order to make each of its swings even heavier and more powerful than before, we expanded the area of inking and the area that allows players to defeat opponents with one swing and also increased the amount of ink consumed.

As for the other main weapons, we have made changes to make them easier to use or to emphasise unique traits among weapons with similar properties.

For the Reefslider special weapon, we improved its ability to defeat opponents by expanding the area of the explosion capable of defeating opponents in one hit, as well as making it harder to avoid the explosion using a small height difference. On the other hand, we reduced the maximum distance of the charge and decreased the area inked to make it harder to rely on the strategy of taking back Splat Zones using the ink from the explosion by pointing it toward a Splat Zone from a safe area and then charging.

Because this update includes changes to the multiplayer system that go beyond simple multiplayer balance changes, we anticipate that it will have a bigger impact on gameplay than the average update. For that reason, the next update will be sooner than normal and will focus on changes to multiplayer balance.

Bug Fixes

• Fixes to Player Controls
  • Fixed an issue where, when the Undercover Brella’s canopy broke at the same time as the player switching equipment to their special weapon or the Rainmaker and defeating an opponent, sometimes the brella would enter a state where the canopy recovered immediately no matter how many times it was broken.
  • Fixed an issue where, when a player in an unstable wireless environment performed a dualie Dodge Roll from swimming on a wall, sometimes the player who performed the Dodge Roll would disappear on other players’ screens.
• Fixes to Multiplayer
  • Fixed an issue where, when landing things like ink or bombs on certain positions, sometimes the inking on the player’s screen was drastically different from the inking on other players’ screens.
  • Fixed an issue in MakoMart in Clam Blitz mode where it was possible for players to linger on top of the goal.
  • Fixed an issue in Bluefin Depot in Splat Zones mode and Clam Blitz mode where it was possible to climb on top of certain terrain using unintended methods.
  • Fixed an issue in Urchin Underpass where the electronic bulletin board in the centre of the stage and its supporting pillars blocked things like Ink Storm and Tenta Missiles.
  • Fixed an issue in Urchin Underpass where, when certain walls were hit with great momentum, the player was sometimes treated as if they had left the stage and were defeated.

Source: Nintendo