Now your friends will think your “offline” when you were supposed to be hanging out with them.
Rumors had been spreading that Blizzard was going to implement more Social Features in Battle.net. It turns out those rumors were correct. As per their announcement:
Introducing new social features now available in the beta version of the Blizzard Battle.net® desktop app: the new Social tab, BlizzardGroups, profiles, avatars, and the ability to appear offline! To help get these into as many players’ hands as possible, starting today the beta version of the app is open to you and your friends—no invitation required.
Most of the new features are found under the new Social tab. Groups allow you to connect with friends and plan based on shared interests. Groups can have multiple text and voice chat channels, and administrators have a number of tools at their disposal. Looking at it might put one in mind of Discord, to some degree…
You can also make a profile page, letting you pick an avatar and give a bit of personal information about you or your interests. You can also send offline friends messages. But the biggest new feature allows you to appear offline:
Appearing offline will show you as offline to everyone in your Blizzard friends list. Once you have joined a game, the experience of appearing offline might be slightly different depending on which game you are playing. In the case of World of Warcraft, your guildmates will see your character come online and enter WoW’s in-game chat channels, and anyone who has you as a character-level friend will see you online on their friends list. Everyone outside of the same game as you will not see you online or playing any games.
The changes haven’t rolled out to Battle.net proper, yet. They’re still being tested out in beta. But, assuming all goes well, they’ll probably roll them out soon enough. Likely on a Tuesday.
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