Genshin Impact is bringing back its prop hunt-inspired Windtrace event for two weeks, and developer MiHoYo has updated the event rules to work around the dirtiest cheese in the entire game.
Windtrace drops teams of rebels and hunters into cordoned-off maps for a game of hide-and-seek, with rebels disguising themselves as objects, and hunters using special abilities to point them loosely in the direction of hiding rebels. It's every bit as fun as prop hunt, which has become a mainstay across many multiplayer games, but the first run of the event was sabotaged by a game-breakingly effective exploit involving the five-star character Mona.
Mona's unique sprint animation makes her virtually impossible to see as long as you're standing still – you just have to hold sprint without actually moving – and if the hunter is looking right at you, you can even temporarily sprint toward a wall to become completely invisible. Genshin Impact has since released Ayaka, another five-star character with a similar sprint animation, meaning players only have more ways to completely obviate the hiding part of Windtrace. So it's no surprise that the patch notes for the next round of Windtrace make it clear that Mona and Ayaka's special sprints will be disabled this time around.
Windtrace has seen some other improvements, too. Hunters will now have increased stamina to chase down any rebels, but at the cost of having their vision obscured during the initial hiding countdown, giving rebels more lead time. This ought to improve the flow of both roles by emphasizing hiding over simply out-running the hunter.
