This is just a short little blog post since I had some spare time this morning, and everyone seems to be doing them.

I actually think a lot of the categories in Overwatch are pretty close races, but they do all have a clear winner from my point of view. While I contributed to the GosuAwards which covered these categories as well, I didn’t actually do any writing for them, so I thought I should make my own thoughts apparent here.

Best Overwatch team of 2016

I think that you have to go with Team EnVyUs here, but it’s not by a wide margin. Rogue could easily have taken this award because they were certainly the best team in the world for a reasonable amount of time. To illustrate this, I categorize LANs in the following way:

Tier 1: Atlantic Showdown, Overwatch Open, APEX

Tier 2: APAC Premier, MLG

Tier 3: TakeTV, DreamHack Winter

Rogue took home a victory at the Atlantic Showdown, APAC, and TakeTV, but their period of dominance was only about one month. Rogue might have won the Atlantic Showdown, but it was not decisively, and I only think they really “peaked” in terms of having clean play about a week after the conclusion of the Overwatch Open.

Misfits won two of the tournaments on the list, but it’s hard to consider DreamHack Winter as a “true” LAN victory given how small the field was. The Overwatch Open victory was legitimately very impressive, but it happened without Misfits’s own team, as they had two subs at the time. It really feels like Misfits were a good team, but also a beneficiary of circumstance.

Team EnVyUs was known to pretty much the entire world as the best team during the online era, and the legendary 57 match win streak is still a figure that people will cite to this day. While they did have a rough time at the earlier LANs, EnVyUs’s solid wins at APEX and MLG after resolving their roster issues add enough to the win streak to justify a choice as “team of the year.”

Best DPS player of 2016

While a lot of people would likely pick Taimou or Surefour, I think that TviQ was the DPS player of 2016. TviQ showed a versatility that only Surefour, Mendokusaii, and Seagull could match within the scene, but he did so while winning the huge events, which is the key distinction. TviQ is well-known for his Genji play, but he’s also pulled out Hanzo, Mei, Reaper, McCree, and Soldier: 76 in recent times. The ability to transition from projectile to hitscan seamlessly without a drop in performance is what makes TviQ so special in my eyes, because he can play whatever a team needs without impacting the performance of his teammates (in terms of forcing them to switch or compensate).

It has to be said that DPS is one of the most stacked roles. Off the top of my head, I haven’t even mentioned ShaDowBurn, Nevix, iddqd, EscA, SoOn, or other big name DPS players, but I think that only highlights how important TviQ was this year.

Best tank player of 2016

There are a lot of really good options for best tank player of 2016, and it’s extremely hard to pick one out of the group, but I think Miro’s performance this year is worthy of the award. Before digesting this argument, I do have to mention that he is by no means the winningest tank player of the year—those awards go to cocco and Reinforce, who are essentially the standard for defensive and offensive play respectively. However, Miro’s performance is completely different because he manages to blend the two styles, especially on his signature pick, Winston.

Miro’s play at BlizzCon was nothing short of exceptional, and it was clearly recognized given that he won the MVP award for the exhibition tournament. While it was, for all intents and purposes, a meaningless tournament, Miro’s play demonstrated something that was honestly a bit scary: ingenuity. Nobody else abuses positioning like Miro on Winston; his abuse of small ledges and windows of opportunity is unique. What makes him so special, though, is that he plays his abilities in whichever style he needs to. I’ve seen Miro use his shield to save his team, like Winstons tend to do—but I’ve also seen him use his shield to output as much damage as possible and shut down a key threat. This dichotomy is what makes him so impressive to me, and what makes him my best tank player of 2016.

Best support player of 2016

No one is more deserving than chipshajen for this award, even though a lot of people would argue for Ryujehong. My one problem with giving this sort of award to Ryujehong is that he has not demonstrated versatility to my knowledge, and while he is an exceptional Ana player (especially offensively, as seen when shutting down ShaDowBurn), I’d also classify chipshajen in the same tier overall.

chipshajen was first known for his Mercy back in older metagames, and he stood out from the pack in that he would always have insane resurrection plays. Whether that came down to his ability or the team’s ability to play around shot-calling is irrelevant, because chipshajen had one of the best western Zenyattas too. The transition to Ana was natural, and while you might not notice it, all you need to do to see chipshajen’s effect is to look at his surroundings. Mickie’s performance on D.Va has been insane, as he repeatedly dives backlines to neutralize DPS players—the only reason this works is because chipshajen keeps him alive. Taimou pulls out some of the best performances on Roadhog, but only because chipshajen keeps him alive. While he might not be flashy, chips is the best support of 2016.

Most promising team for 2017

This is a hard category to award, given that no one really knows what’s happening in Korea. If KESPA teams get involved, Korea could very easily become the best region in the world, but with the knowledge I have currently, I think that Misfits is the team that looks best moving into 2017.

It says a lot about a team when you have so much talent that you have to move Nevix off of DPS—of course, while he was originally a support player, Nevix was also one of the best western DPS players, and certainly part of the argument for most flexible. Still, Misfits’s all-Swedish roster is loaded with talent. If Manneten can pull his weight on hitscan duty, this is a world-beating team. We’ve seen four of these players take home multiple majors already, and know that at least TviQ, Zebbosai, and Nevix are three of the most versatile players in the world. If I had to bet on a team to be successful in an ever-changing game, Misfits would be my choice.