Being a Support means being an unsung hero. Though lately, when it comes to Overwatch it feels like people just can't stop talking about them. Today I'd like to break down who's who and what's what when it comes to the current balance of the Support class. Who's the strongest, who's the weakest, and who pairs well together.





THE LIST (from strongest to weakest)

1. Zenyatta

In the current dive meta, Zenyatta reigns supreme as the strongest Support. He offers effective healing with his Harmony Orb (30 HP per second) and effective utility with his Discord Orb (-30% damage resistance). Zenyatta can place a Harmony Orb on his friendly diver (Genji, D.Va, Winston, etc.), a Discord Orb on their target, and as long as line of sight isn't broken, Zenyatta can support his team and create pressure on an enemies backline without being anywhere near a fight. Moreover, his ultimate ability Transcendence may be the most powerful support ability in the game. It can complete negate an entire teams worth of offensive ultimates just by itself. Zenyatta also offers the highest DPS of any Support, giving him high kill potential and making him one of the hardest Heros to dive.

Zenyatta usually pairs best with Mercy. Mercy's high mobility and effective healing complement Zenyatta's relatively low single target healing and mobility.





2. Moira

Though Moira doesn't heal as effectively from range as Zenyatta she offers, overall, the highest area of effect healing of any Support. Her left click in combination with a healing orb can fully heal her entire team if they are stacked up close. Moira also has relatively high mobility. She can slide in and out of fights staying rather safe while pumping out plenty of healing. Moira can also supply her team with an honestly annoying amount of damage as well. Though she still doesn't really match up with Zenyatta's Discord Orb, Moira offers a large amount of very consistent, sticky damage from orbs of her own. Lastly, Moira's ultimate isn't as catastrophically effective as other support ulitmates, but its quick charge time more then makes up for it.

Moria pairs up best with Lucio. Moira's powerful healing plus Lucio's powerful speed boost make for a very overwhelming, heavily offensive, combination.





3. Lucio

Lucio's strength lies in his high utility abilities. It terms of healing Lucio gets outpaced by almost all other supports, but to make up for it Lucio has a unique kit that passively helps his team in other ways. Lucio's speed boost is his most important asset. Amping up speed boost as your team runs for the point makes for an overwhelming force, especially if the other team is spread too thin. Lucio also has high kill potential with his right click boop. It's a low cooldown AoE push that can send entire teams off a ledge. Couple this with Lucio's innate speed and mobility and you are left with an offensive powerhouse. Lucio by himself can dismantle entire defensive setups all while supporting his team in more ways than one. Sound Barrier, Lucio's ultimate, is also one of the strongest defensive abilities in the game, second only to Zenyatta's Transcendence.

As stated above Lucio pairs best with Moira. Their synergy and ability to enable offensives is extremely valuable





4. Mercy

Mercy is an interesting case study on how good a Support can be before things boil over into a fiery vat of chaos. Even now, she could still be placed up higher on this list with the right team and the right players. Mercy still has insane, consistent healing, and a very powerful damage boost (+30% damage). On top of this, she still has her game changing Resurrect ability. Mercy is a safe pick that works better than most into any team comp and against any team comp. Mercy's one glaring weakness is that she herself offers no damage or kill potential. She essentially has a damageless kit and without Valkyrie she can only damage boost a single target. When against a damage heavy team, Mercy doesn't bring enough to the game. She can only heal so much before someone gets Discorded and blown up in .2 seconds. A good Mercy can be annoying, and slippery, but this sort of acts as gimmick that players have gotten better at dealing with.

As stated above Mercy works best with Zenyatta. Zenyatta's quite frankly absurd amount of damage helps make up for Mercy's lack thereof.





5. Brigitte

Brigitte is the Support role's answer to a dive focused enemy team. She is quite tanky and can help peel for her other Support. She has a lot of tools in her kit besides healing to keep people alive, but is it enough? To put it bluntly - no. Brigitte can deal with diving Tracers and Genjis quite well, but is still overwhelmed by the classic Winston and D.Va dive. She offers a middling amount of heals and a middling amount of damage. She is in essence Lucio, but with less mobility, more tanky, and a worse ultimate. Brigitte offers a very interesting amount of utility to her team. Supplying a balance between armor and healing is an interesting concept, but I feel on launch she will be considered a little weak. I hope that before she goes live Blizzard buffs up some of her numbers and lowers some of her cooldowns. With a tune up, she could easily climb up this list and maybe even shift the meta away from this dive focused Zenyatta mayhem.

In a perfect world, Brigitte would pair well with Ana. As a short-range Hero that is supposed to counter dive, Brigitte would probably find a lot success pairing with a long range healer, like Ana, who needs lots of protection.





6. Ana

I love Ana. She feels so unique to play and has such a well-designed kit. That being said however, she is by far the weakest Support. On paper, Ana seems like she's still pretty darn good. She offers good healing, she offers good damage, has powerful crowd control, and her ultimate combos so well with so many other abilities. And yet, Ana has such a large margin for error and a low return on investment. Picking Ana means picking with confidence that you will play extraordinarily well and be an extremely valuable asset to your team. If you pick Ana and are playing just ok, you are probably doing more harm than good. Moreover, Ana is very susceptible to dive. Her only defense is her Sleep Dart, and even if you manage to hit someone with it while getting dove, there is almost always going to be more than one person in your face. Ana has no escapes and doesn't do enough damage anymore to reasonably be able to duel someone that comes looking for an easy elimination.

With luck Brigitte will make Ana a stronger, safer pick.... Or maybe Ana will just be perpetually bad until the end of all conceivable time.





7. Symmetra

Let the record show that, in my personal opinion, Symmetra is not a Support but rather a powerful, situational Defense Hero. That being said she is classified as a Support still, so a power ranking wouldn't be complete without her bringing up the caboose. As a Support, Symmetra offers literally no healing, and a minimal amount of utility excluding her ultimate. Much like Ana, (sadly) Symmetra is very feast or famine. If you get an early Shield Generator or Teleporter, Symmetra can make defensive full hold substantially easier. In most cases however, if your team is selecting Heroe and you have to fill Support, and you pick your trademarked 20% winrate offensive Symmetra, you may or may not get reported for throwing... However, Symmetra can bring some pretty hefty damage to a team. If your turrets stay alive for more than .5 second in a team fight, or if you juke around long enough, Symmetra's noticeably annoying damage can put even the best player on tilt. Again though, in most cases you'll get one-shot and flamed by your teammates.

Contrary to popular belief, Support Symmetra pairs well with - nobody (but really if you are trying to play Support Symmetra Mercy probably works best with her).

When it comes to Support there is an obvious power scale, but that should not dissuade you from picking who you like and who you are comfortable on. Power ranking exist merely as a reference for people looking to learn a Hero or for people that really like analyzing the game on a deeper level. They are an important resource but should also be taken with a grain of salt.

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