With week three of the Overwatch League done and dusted, we’re starting to gather more and more data about teams, players and strategies. Horizon Lunar Colony, in particular, has emerged as one of the more interesting maps, with many viable strategies and hero compositions. I wanted to take a look at how the map has been played over the first three weeks and see what connections could be made between Horizon, the state of the meta and connections between the pro-scene and the competitive ladder. I also wanted to look at any emerging patterns and see how this might be applicable to the League and the teams overall.

Pick Rates

Before we take a look at trends with entire team compositions, it’s interesting to look at individual hero pick rates.

Overall, and unsurprisingly, Mercy leads the charge with the highest pick rate on Horizon at 89.12%. This is very closely followed by D.Va, who is just behind at 88.83%. Winston is next (74.11%), then Zenyatta (74.03%), Tracer (68.20%) and Junkrat (32.41%), who close out the top six picked heroes.

When looking specifically at pick rates on attack, the hero pool of the top six remains the same, except for Junkrat, who is replaced by Genji. The ordering, however, is different, with D.Va shooting to the top spot with an astonishing 98.63% pick rate. This means that D.Va was only absent on attack for 3 minutes and 44 seconds out of roughly 4 hours and 30 minutes of playtime on Horizon in the first three weeks of the OWL. Winston was the next highest(83.78%), followed shortly by Mercy at 80.57%. The last three sports of the top six picks on attack consisted of Tracer (76.62%), Zenyatta (60.14%) and the aforementioned Genji (33.13%).

Looking at defence pick rates sees Mercy back up at the top with a 97.68% pick rate. The rest of the top six picks on defence are the same hero pool as the overall pick rates, with a slightly different ordering — Zenyatta (87.91%), D.Va (79.04%), Winston (64.44%), Tracer (59.78%) and Junkrat (54.75%).

Recurring Team Compositions

These pick rates give you an idea of the kind of team compositions and play styles that are prevalent on Horizon Lunar Colony. They prove that Dive compositions continue to be extremely potent and common at the highest level of Overwatch play. However, they also don’t illustrate the whole picture — there are several strategies that have become trends on Horizon within the League that aren’t reflected at all in the pick rates.

As mentioned above, the Dive composition is one of the most prevalent recurring compositions, not just on Horizon but in the entirety of the OWL. The specifics of which heroes constitute Dive compositions have changed from meta to meta. The overall theory, however, is that dive compositions aim to kill the enemy as fast as possible by diving onto them and usually focusing one of two targets to receive a man advantage. Because of this, Winston and D.Va have remained incredibly prominent in all variations of Dive compositions, and that’s no exception at the moment. For the purposes of this study, we considered a Dive composition to be a composition that featured D.Va and Winston, along with at least two other common Dive composition heroes (Zenyatta, Tracer, Genji, Lucio etc.) That being in said, in the vast majority of cases, Dive compositions on Horizon Lunar Colony simply consisted of D.Va, Winston, Mercy, Zenyatta and Tracer, with the last DPS role being the main variable.

The other main composition that was consistently seen in the first three weeks on Horizon was the Anti-Dive composition. As the title would suggest, this composition emerged as a response to the prominence of Dive compositions. Unlike some other compositions, the heroes in an Anti-Dive composition aren’t necessarily set in stone. This is because the composition is more focused around the theory of punishing enemy mistakes or using crowd control abilities to manage enemy dive attacks. For this reason, it’s sometimes harder to define when an Anti-Dive composition is being used. In most cases on Horizon, the staple Anti-Dive heroes were Orisa, Junkrat and Roadhog. However, many variations of this composition exist. For the purpose of this study, we considered an Anti-Dive composition to be any composition which included at least 3 heroes that had the ability to crowd control (through abilities or area denial) or could easily punish enemy mistakes. Junkrat, Orisa, Roadhog, Mcree, Ana, Doomfist and Mei are all examples of these types of heroes.

A fun composition that also emerged, particularly on attack, was the Quad Tank. This involved the core of four tanks, always D.Va, Reinhardt, Roadhog and Zarya, attacking the point supported by Moira and Lucio. Many teams used this to great effect, as Lucio allows the team to quickly reach the point, often forcing the defence to rotate back around onto the point off the high ground and therefore putting them at a disadvantage. The attackers are also at a disadvantage due to the huge health pool of the tanks and the large healing output from the Lucio/Moira combo. For the purposes of the study, the Quad Tank composition was any composition that featured the six heroes mentioned above, on attack or defence.

NYXL used the Quad Tank composition with Lucio and Moira to quickly take Point A against Seoul Dynasty.

Another common strategy that appeared throughout the first three weeks was a variation of the Dive composition used on attack for Point A. The composition swapped one hero from the usual Dive line up, usually either a DPS or a support, and used Sombra instead. This would serve two purposes — to use Sombra’s invisibility to reach the point unseen and force the enemy to split up or relocate onto the point, as well as to hack one or several of the health packs around Point A, allowing the attackers to extend the lengths of fights and quickly build up EMP to help capture Point A. For the purpose of the study, this strategy was any standard Dive composition that also used Sombra to attack Point B. Also of importance, the study considers the Dive+Sombra composition as a subset of standard Dive compositions, and therefore counts towards overall Dive statistics such as frequency of occurrence.

Frequency and Patterns of Recurring Team Compositions

After grasping a basic understanding of these common strategies and compositions used in weeks 1–3 on Horizon Lunar Colony, I went through every round played on Horizon in the season thus far and categorised the compositions used on every team’s attack and defence. This was done to understand what compositions were being used in which situations, and to see if any of these patterns could be representative for patterns in the OWL overall. Here are some of the statistics and patterns I uncovered:

There were 59 total rounds of Horizon Lunar Colony in the first three weeks of the Overwatch League. (See note at the end for further clarification).

Dive compositions were used to attack Point A in 42 out of the 59 rounds (71.2%).

The Sombra+Dive strategy accounted for 20 of those 42 Dive compositions (47.6%).

Rawkus from the Houston Outlaws uses the Dive+Sombra attack strategy to take control of the large health pack outside Point A.

The Quad Tank composition was used 13 times to attack Point A (22%). 10 out of these 13 attempts were successful in capturing point A (76.9%).

Anti-Dive compositions were used to defend Point A in 32 of the 59 rounds (54.2%)

Of the 59 rounds, 38 of them continued onto Point B (64.4%)

In 28 of those Point B defences, the defenders opted to use Dive compositions (73.7%). Somewhat ironically, this often meant defenders using Anti-Dive compositions on Point A would quickly switch over to a Dive composition to defend Point B after they lost Point A.

The LA Valiant defend Point B with a Dive composition.

On attack, 2/2/2 (two DPS, two support, two healer) compositions were used 72.09% of the time. This was followed by triple DPS, two tanks and single healer compositions at 15.87% and quad tank compositions at 9.22%.

On defence, 2/2/2 was used in 95.04% of playtime. The remaining 5% probably accounts for last minute desperation switches in an attempt to contest a point.

So, what do these statistics tell us? Well, as mentioned earlier, it primarily confirms that Dive compositions are consistently popular and successful at the highest level of play. Interestingly, however, is the juxtaposition of the Anti-Dive defences on Point A with the Dive defences on Point B, sometimes straight after the other.

The prevalence of Anti-Dive on defence of Point A is no doubt a response to the closed in nature of the first point — some crowd control abilities, particularly Junkrat with his grenades and mines, work well in enclosed spaces and allow for strong area denial against attackers. The Anti-Dive is also very good at stopping attacker engagements before they even begin, usually with an early pick. This play style benefits the defenders, as it mitigates the long distance back to Point A from the defender’s spawn by either preventing defender deaths as much as possible or simply giving themselves more time to come back to the point after preventing an enemy push.

Florida Mayhem set up their Anti-Dive defence on Point A.

On the other hand, the frequency of Dive compositions used to defend Point B is rather telling of the point’s playstyle. Where Point A is quite closed in and surrounded by small chokes for the attacker to push through, Point B is rather open and provides much wider spaces on each side of the point through which the attackers can approach. Whilst this gives the attackers more room, it also means they’re more susceptible to being dived on by the defenders. Notably, the moving orange platform, which gives the defenders a significant high ground advantage, is accessible by many heroes who also fit into dive compositions — namely, D.Va, Winston, Mercy (through Guardian Angel) and sometimes Junkrat, who is sometimes played as the DPS in a Dive composition.

Likewise, the emergence of the Quad Tank composition is a response to the map design of Point A — the closed-in point suits the brawling style of the quad tank composition, allowing them to quickly get to the point and work in close quarters whilst they lay damage onto the enemy, who usually have to reposition back to the point through the chokes. Although the Quad Tank composition was sometimes continued onto Point B after a successful Point A capture, this was to varying success. Teams who captured Point B with Quad Tank usually did so off the momentum and staggered defender respawns from Point A. Those who didn’t capture Point B with these advantages would often switch off for subsequent pushes.

Casual vs Pro

I’ve often seen Horizon Lunar Colony lamented online as a terribly designed map and not one that many people enjoy playing. This image seemed very much at odds with the data I had found — the map seemed to encourage different strategic approaches in the OWL and gives players the most options, especially when anecdotally compared to the other Assault maps. To confirm my suspicions, I tried to contact several OWL players through their team discord servers.Houston Outlaws players Muma, Bani and Linkzr all agreed that Horizon was the best Assault map in the game. Linkzr expanded, explaining that he thought Horizon gives you much more space to work with and is open for using different strategies, much like what the data seems to imply. Likewise, the Los Angeles Gladiators player Hydration stated that besides the moving orange platform on the second point, he feels it’s a great map. Los Angeles Gladiator player Shaz agreed, stating he thought it was the best Assault map.

In an attempt to solidify my anecdotal findings of the online community’s opinion of the map, I created a survey which was distributed through the Overwatch League team discord servers, general Overwatch discord servers and the r/Overwatch and /r/CompetitiveOverwatch subreddits. I only managed to receive 163 responses, a far-cry from the 35 million players of Overwatch around the world, however I do feel it shed some light on the difference and similarities of opinion between OWL players and the general community. 55.2% of respondents said they enjoyed playing Horizon Lunar Colony in the Competitive game mode, with 44.8% saying they did not enjoy it. 62% agreed that Horizon Lunar Colony was more open to different strategies and approaches than other Assault maps, however an overwhelming 93.9% disagreed that Horizon Lunar Colony is the best Assault map. In a follow up question, 34.4% indicated Temple of Anubis was the best Assault map, with Volskaya Industries in second at 31.3%, Hanamura at third with 28.2% and Horizon Lunar Colony last with only 6.1%.

Thus, it’s clear that whilst competitive players and OWL professionals mostly agree that the map lends itself to more strategies than other Assault maps, they disagree that it’s the best Assault map. Perhaps this is because whilst OWL players can enact these teamwork-dependant strategies a lot easier, most competitive Overwatch players find them a lot harder to implement with the luck of the draw players in matchmaking. Admittedly, the sample size was small and limited. In the future, it would be good to get more player’s opinions on the map from both professional and casual players

Conclusion

Overall, it seems that the first three weeks of play on Horizon Lunar Colony in the Overwatch League gives us a good understanding of some wider trends. We see that standard Dive compositions, used frequently throughout the League, are extremely prominent on both attack and defence on Horizon. On the other side of things, the more specific situations, such as a Quad Tank attack on Point A or Dive defence on Point B, highlight some of the advantages and disadvantages of the map itself.

At the end of Stage 1, I might write a follow-up article to see if these trends continued in the last two weeks or if any other new trends emerge. Please let me know if you’d like to see more!

To finish off, here are some facts that didn’t fit anywhere else, but are fun to read nonetheless:

Dallas Fuel, in traditional EnVyUs style, are the only team to have run an Anti-Dive composition on attack

People who say Boston only play dive aren’t joking. Dive was the only type of composition Boston used at all in their 3 matches on Horizon. Additionally, the entire team stayed the same heroes the whole time, except for DreamKazper, who player mostly Genji with a little bit of Mcree and Soldier: 76 here and there

in their 3 matches on Horizon. Additionally, the entire team stayed the same heroes the whole time, except for DreamKazper, who player mostly Genji with a little bit of Mcree and Soldier: 76 here and there Although the Dive+Sombra composition became quite a legitimate and recognised strategy, Widowmaker actually shares almost the exact same pick rate on attack in the OWL on Horizon as Sombra does.

Thanks for reading!

Note: This number includes extra rounds in any given map as separate rounds to the original two, i.e. a HLC match ending in 2–1 adds two rounds to the total score of round played. A HLC map ending in 4–3 adds four to the total score of rounds played.