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Hey what’s up guys. With season 9 looming around the corner, I’d figured I would do a recap of the support roles in the game. My name is cF Tempest and I’ve been playing support since early beta back in 2016. I’ve won 1st prize at a Dreamhack BYOC event in Austin and have peaked at master in my career high. Here are my thoughts on the supports in the game.

Support Heroes

Mercy — A main healer, the winged Valkyrie from Switzerland provided much needed sustainability for her team. Her all-powerful resurrect can correct the deadly mistakes of her allies and gain tempo during trades in a numbers game. Add to the swift agility of Guardian Angel, Mercy becomes a very hard target to follow. She pairs excellently with all compositions. Unfortunately Mercy is completely reliant on her teammates to dish out the hurt to the opposition. Her offensive capabilities leave much to be desired.

From a Mercy players perspective, I love playing her when I can trust my team to play well. It is satisfying to damage boost an ally who can aim his / her shots. However I become increasingly frustrated when my team does not perform. Mercy is a passive and reactionary hero. I do not make plays and put a lot of faith in my teammates. From a solo queue perspective, playing Mercy will largely depend on your ability to NOT die. She is best seen in duo queue and above with trustworthy DPS to capitalize on steady gains. Finally, she excels at maps with vertical terrain and short sight lines.

GOOD SYNERGY

Mercy + Pharah

Mercy + Roadhog

Mercy + Soldier / McCree

GOOD MAPS

Temples of Anubis

King Row

Numbani

Ana — a main healer, the former Overwatch founder from Egypt is a powerhouse that breaks through enemy defenses with her offensive support enhancements. Nano boost combined with biotic grenades enables her allies to deal massive damage and shrug off retaliation fire. Ana’s long-range biotic rifles allows her to stay safe away from the front lines providing sniper support. With the exception of her sleep dart, she is a priority target for mobile heroes to strike her down.

As an Ana player, I am hard pressed to make decisions to play on my tanks for the safety against flankers, or play further back for the safety against melee brutes. Her fragile and immobile kit forces me to constantly assess the enemy lineup and make flexible decisions in my playstyle. Yet when your team is hitting a brick wall, nobody fits the bill better than the bounty hunter’s abrasive enhancements. Play Ana when you are using brute force to break through difficult front line defenses and overcome sustainable threats.

Be warned, Ana is a high skill capped hero and will require significant patience and decision-making to be successful. Recommended for both solo and duo queue. If you are constantly being killed by enemy flankers you will have to swap to another support. Finally, she is most effective on maps with long sightlines where you can heal your allies from afar.

GOOD SYNERGY:

Ana + Triple / Quad tank setups

Ana + Soldier / Genji / Reaper / Pharah nanotargets

GOOD MAPS:

Numbani (first point)

Oasis

Route 66

Moria — a main healer, the brilliant but controversial scientist from Ireland terrorizes her enemies and nurses allies with her biotic grasp. She runs off a limited healing gauge that encourages DPS, especially on enemy flankers with small hitboxes. When faced with imminent danger, no one can escape death faster than Moria’s fade ability. Her limited spray of biotic healing can potentially pierce 5 targets at once!

My experience playing Moria is limited, but I think she is most effective breaking and defending key capture points with her Coalescenes ultimate. Because she has no mobility without Fade, Moria must stick closely to her tanks to survive. I find she is most effective in death ball compositions. I believe she is the queen support in solo queue at the moment. Fighting in small spaces will maximize her Biotic Orb value, wracking ultimate gains tenfold.

GOOD SYNERGY:

Moria + Reinhardt / Orissa

GOOD MAPS:

LiJang Tower

Temple of Anubis

Watchpoint: Gilbratar

Lucio — a secondary healer, the talented musician from Brazil brings the beat down on his foes at sonic speeds. His inspiring talent speeds up and heals allies pushing their way to victory. Through a seamless crossfade Lucio brings incredible utility to the team in his fight for social change. His greatest strength in mobility overwhelms enemies with slow reaction speed. Despite being an incredible asset with sonic amplifier boops on environmental maps, Lucio’s heals fall flat, often relying on a second support to supplement.

Playing Lucio is like being on a natural high. His upbeat personality and super-fast control lets you set the tempo of encounters. You are quickly able to isolate weak targets and punish them for poor positioning. Environmental maps with ledges and holes in the map allow Lucio opportunities to net kills on unsuspecting enemies. He excels in highly aggressive compositions and is a great resource for slow heroes without mobility.

Lucio’s biggest weakness is his lack of healing (even with amp it up) which makes him a poor pick against bursty teams. The hero is strongly recommended to be picked when mobility and positioning is a key component of team strategy. For solo queue, I recommend him as an auto-pick for any KotH map. In duo queue he pairs excellently with slow-moving tanks that can deal serious damage with the speed boost.

GOOD SYNERGY:

Lucio + Reinhardt

Lucio + Reaper

Lucio + Dive Comps

GOOD MAPS:

All KotH

Zenyatta — a secondary healer, the omnic monk from Nepal is on a mission to help others overcome their struggles and find inner peace. He possesses powerful orbs of destruction, harmony and discord that damage and weaken his opponents, and heal his allies. Zenyatta brings ultimate enlightenment with Transcendence providing the highest healing power to allies in overcoming any adversity.

The incredible power of discord orb allows his team to quickly focus down targets, tearing through the defensive nature of tanks. He shines strongest against multi-tank compositions and denies multi-heal strategies the enemy may employ. Zenyatta’s long-range fire and surprise burst makes him a formidable enemy to fight. Despite his great offensive power, he brings slow healing to single targets with this exception of his emergency ultimate. He is also the most fragile support with the least HP, supplementing with shields instead.

In addition, flankers will absolutely destroy Zenyatta as he has no evasion. The hero is still considered a top tier pick for bursting through strong front lines in extended fights, and countering devastating enemy ultimates with his Transcendence. Useful on any maps, pair Zenyatta with the right protection and he will support the team.

GOOD SYNERGY:

Zenyatta + Reinhardt / Orissa

Zenyatta + Torbjorn

GOOD MAPS:

Any

Symmetra — a builder, the sophisticated architect from India is able to bend light to her will. She draws on Vishkar tech to create protective photon barriers, deadly sentry turrets and microwaves any that would oppose her with a photon projector. Symmetra brings a unique level of utility to the team with powerful shielding and teleporter capabilities. She relies heavily on preemptive defense and surprise traps. Sadly, Symmetra is fragile to enemy tanks.

This hero is my favorite one to play but she is a niche pick godlike on certain maps, and inferior on others. It takes a certain mindset to master her turret placement and only through countless hours of experimenting and experience will you discover her strength to the team. She is classified as a support hero but plays much like a DPS destroying low HP targets that try to flank. On the other hand, multi-tank compositions shrug off her turrets and deny the all powerful teleporter.

To find the most value out of Symmetra you must learn what maps she can be effective on with turret and teleporter placement. The hero works best on 2CP and some payload options, and becomes useless in KotH setups. Use her on the right map and significantly increase your win percentage.

GOOD SYNERGY:

Symmetra + Torbjorn

Symmetra + Junkrat

Symmetra + Mei

GOOD MAPS:

Hanamura

Temple of Anubis

El Dorado

Watchpoint: Gibraltar

Brigitte — a secondary support, the engineer from Sweden protects her allies with a barrier shield, bashing away enemies that would dare get close. She provides relief with repair packs healing and giving armor to those behind her shield. When others are discouraged, Brigitte rallies them together pushing forward with renewed speed and armor to victory.

The little time I’ve spent on the PTR has been very fun with the new peel support. Her ability to create preventive damage adds much needed durability to fragile heroes that could easily get picked by burst or one-shot snipers. Brigitte excels at defending a backline against flankers. Her major weakness is in sustainable heals during extended fights and the useless protection against long-range targets. Brigitte’s shield is for self-protection, not nearly the incredible length Reinhardt has to offer. However her ultimate helps gain an edge in covering ground quickly akin to Lucio.

I recommend playing Brigitte when your tanks are unable to peel for the backline and their are multiple flankers harassing your more fragile supports and DPS. I think she shines most on KotH maps. She is a better attacker than defender.

GOOD SYNERGY:

Brigitte + McCree

Brigitte + Bastion

GOOD MAPS:

All KotH

One final note I want to make is support combinations. I think two supports is the ideal setup in a 6 man team. That way if one is being locked down, or picked, there’s still some sustainability to be had until the respawn occurs.

SUPPORT COMBOS:

Lucio + Zenyatta — Your YOLO combo that is constantly diving and putting pressure on the enemy. Only advised for KotH and coordinated discord target.

Lucio + Mercy — The most balanced and classic recipe for sustainability and utility. Use this as a standard combo.

Lucio + Moria — Powerful multi-tank combo for getting into position quickly and in one piece. Use this in destroying enemy backlines without dying.

Lucio + Ana — Multi-tank combo when enemy sustain is keeping the opposition from dying. Ana MUST play close up to be useful.

Zenyatta + Ana — Long-range barrage of heals and damage. Use this when sight lines are long and you can kill the enemy a mile away.

Zenyatta + Brigitte — Protect the Zenyatta so he can weaken the enemy for maximum destruction. These two were born for each other.

Mercy + Symmetra — Resurrection ensures teleportation. Mercy heals will let Symmetra do what she does best, microwave puny enemy supports.

Moria + Symmetra — Multi tank defense can shine when you keep throwing bodies at the enemy, combined with insane healing capability. This is the ultimate F you to flankers combo.

Brigette + Ana — Similar to Zenyatta, Brigitte is amazing at protecting low mobility heroes so Ana can safely heal from a distance without worrying about flankers.

Moria + Ana — The ultimate tank healer combo. When you want to play an aggressive slow push this is the go-to. Ideal for deathball teams without the classic speed boost, you are gaining anti-healing for the enemy.

Well that’s it for my recap of the supports in Overwatch. I’m super excited to climb the competitive ladder as as a support main and reach my personal goal in Grandmaster (that’s the top 1% btw!) There have been a lot of changes to heroes, and our newest support Brigitte is sure to change the meta.

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