and looks like they're gonna KILL it:

http://www.polygon.com/2014/11/7/7174991/blizzard-announces-overwatch

Gameplay vid:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FvqZxWLnqco

Class-based PVP shooter from blizzard... holy shit take my money now

the website died the moment they put it on screen lol

the trailer made it look like a pixar movie but the gameplay video was very Team Fortress, but the characters seem to all have such over the top abilities, looks like it could be a lot of fun to use them against another player with an equally over the top trick.

this seems like a really difficult genre for them to jump into, as a fan of their rts stuff mostly (i cant afford to get into MMO) it just seems like an overly established market, if they;re as close as they say they are, there's still destiny, COD, halo, and i can't say for certain whether they're getting the shooter feel right, but hopefully.

their 'following' valve (MOBAs, now this) is frustrating as a starcraft fan who wishes rtses were better/bigger :)

>their 'following' valve (MOBAs, now this) is frustrating as a
>starcraft fan who wishes rtses were better/bigger :)

cheer up..LOTV is looking AMAZING

the computer i used to play it on is failing me so ive mostly just been watching it. finally getting the protoss campaign has me excited, but as epic as it all is the storytelling always kind of lets me down. we'll see what actually survives to the finished product in regards to multiplayer changes, i still don't know how i feel about the giant change to economy.

i wonder if they'll try to push overwatch to consoles, because if its a pc game i don't know if i'd even be able to give it a real shot. it's funny how just a little while ago there was a whole story about some new IP blizzard had scrapped that was apparently some attempt at an MMOFPS where you were supposed to play a regular person by day and a soldier/terrorist by night on some future earth or something.

But...like y'all said, more extreme.
Very curious how it plays.

i'm super down

something tells me it might not, and if it does it will be an under-supported afterthought (like TF2 was).

i'd love to play it. i never wanna play a competitive FPS with keyboard and mouse PC ass niggas, though.

Although I would be really surprised if it were PC only. There isn't anything specifically PC-ish about the game (unlike, say, an RTS) and shooters do better on consoles anyways.

Now, supposedly Project Titan was cancelled because Blizzard saw just how lucrative the F2P market was with Hearthstone. And since Overwatch uses Titan assets it leads me to believe it'll follow that mold in some fashion. This is the only thing that makes me somewhat skeptical on how it'll be offered on consoles. Not familiar with the new consoles yet, so not sure if F2P is even supported in some way on the PS4 or X1.

Good thing though is that Blizzard already cut their teeth on consoles with D3, so there is a strong precedent there already.


Sign up for the beta here:

http://us.battle.net/account/management/settings/beta-opt-in.html

War Thunder
Blacklight: Retribution
Warframe
DC Universe Online
Singstar

and stuff like Loadout and PlanetSide 2 have PS4 versions in the works.

~~~~~~~~~
"This is the streets, and I am the trap." � Jay Bilas
http://www.popmatters.com/pm/archive/contributor/517
Hip Hop Handbook: http://tinyurl.com/ll4kzz

Want to play with friends but I have zero desire to play Overwatch on PC against kb/m players.

I can see playing a game like Evolve since aiming fidelity isn't as critical, but not for true PvP.

I'll lower the sensitivity on my mouse so it'll be level playing field lol.

But seriously I've seen some people with controllers destroy kb/m players. Maybe they're not that good but still it can be done.

Usually the controller folks just turn on aim assist. I tried it with controller on pc for Titanfall and it wasn't that bad. Being blizzard though this type of game seems like its gonna thrive on PC.

Just scared to get this on console because we've seen how Team Fortress 2 turned out. It's still going strong on pc however.

Anyway I'm excited for this. Everything Blizzard touches so far has turned out great. Hell, they took the card game genre and made it into one of the most streamed games on twitch. They locked down the MMO game and Heroes of the Storm is a pretty decent MOBA. Not to mention Starcraft for the RTS fans and Diablo for that loot based top down dungeon crawler.

I'm hyped for it.

Let's be honest now... equal skill, kb/m destroys controller. Some games could mitigate the difference, like Battlefield if you don't play sniper. But in a game like COD there's no question.

I'm actually pretty optimistic for this game on consoles though. TF2 on console failed in part because the patch process is so wonky ($30k to put out a patch on 360? Yeah fuck that). But since both consoles have mature online systems this means that devs can closer emulate the PC model. And shooters are king on consoles... there's no way Blizzard ignores that revenue stream.

As far as the game? Holy shit. Blizzard has never been genre innovators, all they do is take the genre and put a shit ton of polish on it. Hearthstone is a guilty pleasure of mine and is an unequivocal hit (shit, ESPN was televising a tourney the other day). I can't wait till it hits Android tablets.

And seeing how they handled F2P in Hearthstone leads me to believe they'll get it right for Overwatch. Not sure *how* though. There's a chance they'll go the purely cosmetic 'hats' route like TF2, but they would need a critical mass of players to trust earning a profit. Super Monday Night Combat had an interesting business model that rotated certain heroes for free each week. To use them permanently, you could buy them with in-game currency or with real money. Overwatch is also similar to Super MNC in game structure, so there's that. If Overwatch ends up having a roster similar to other MOBA's then this model could be entirely viable.

http://www.polygon.com/2015/10/14/9530637/overwatch-beta-launch-date-blizzard-entertainment

Public beta starting Nov 6th

Windows PC only for now though

controller all dayyyyyyyy

This may compel me to buy the fancy Xbox controller

but I can't use a mouse and keyboard for shit.

(if you're willing to wait it's on backorder at best buy now)

it's way overpriced, but it's so good.


www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

>it's way overpriced, but it's so good.

is that despite everyone saying it's way overpriced, that shit is still on backorder. If they did anything like this on the 360 it would have sold bonkers too.

Had it since Friday and I think they opened it to everyone on Saturday. Ends Sunday night so hop on it. It's fun! Def picking this up when it drops.

I'm playing in the early access now.

This game is so fun!
Can't wait until full release and more people are up on this. Honestly feel like its the best shooter out right now.

What's your control scheme look like? I'm used to LB as my jump so I can continuously bounce while moving and aiming. Problem is I don't like Ability 1 (the movement ability) at A because I need to take my right thumb off the stick. Right now it's mapped to L3 but I'm not entirely comfortable with it there either, as sometimes I click it on accident.

I may just be rationalizing to sell myself on the OG overpriced controller though, hah

I think Reaper more fits my playstyle but while I'm getting used to the controls (because my aim is generally poor) I'm running a Support class to learn.

I tend to gravitate towards the sneaky, quick classes in these games: Assassin in Monday Night Combat, Hunter (with full invisibility skills) in Destiny, shit like that. Approach from odd angles, kill quickly (via melee or shotguns) then get the fuck out. High risk, high reward shit.

Lucio isn't sneaky, but his ability to run on walls REALLY validates my preference to map Jump to LB. His aura heal/speed gives me reason to stay aggressive and near the frontlines while his secondary attack is basically a weak shotgun blast. On top of all that, he's like a fucking EDM DJ so his gimmick is the cherry on top.

Really fun game so far. As is Blizzard's forte, super easy to get into but the mechanics run deep.

Any tips for Lucio or Reaper out there?

Lucio can be pretty nuts offensively if you use your shotgun blast that knocks enemies back to push them off a ledge. Have your tank move in and then sneak out and push them off and run back behind him. Seen it done a bunch more lately since people are getting more comfortable with the game. He's my second fav support next to mercy who can be godly and comes through with those clutch saves when she res the entire team after a wipe.

Reaper is simple, get behind enemy lines and two shotgun blast close range. Once they get low teleport behind them and hit your ult.

I've been beastin as Genji, Tracer, and Pharah. Widowmaker too.

The important thing is a good team comp. If everyone is comfortable in each role and understand that you also need a healer and tank for each map you'll be golden. So far the meta seems to be Tank, healer, 3 damage, and one defensive stationary character to stand back and pick everyone off.

I've been playing in the beta more than I have most full releases and can't wait until the 24th so me and a crew can get into competitive.

Edit: I have a buddy that refused to use kb/m on the PC so he's controller all day every day. We put him on support because it's not too dependent on kb/m if all you're really doing is keeping everyone healed and he's amazing at it. Don't get me wrong he's not shit on anything else because he moves so slow lol. Healing though, right not I haven't met another person I'd rather heal me.

was a good idea?)

but I preorderd on xbox off the strength

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

http://learnoverwatch.blogspot.com/

https://www.reddit.com/r/Competitiveoverwatch/comments/4j2evc/list_of_useful_youtube_channels_hero_guides/

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

I've watched a few matches on Twitch (still stuck with the last gen consoles at the moment) and it looks dope.

...

yeah, still as fun as the beta. The Blizzard polish is in full effect here, and I have full faith in their support for games based on my experiences with Diablo 3 and Hearthstone.

Been waiting for a shooter I can sink my teeth into, and this is it.

Played maybe an hour over the weekend.

This is Def Team Fortress 3 - which is good , but I want Unreal Tournament 2004: The 2016 edition.

I'll play more this weekend.

The only thing UT has over this is custom maps, vehicles, and crazy mods.

>The only thing UT has over this is custom maps, vehicles,
>and crazy mods.

No that Overwatch is not as good - just those features is what made UT2004 so great for many years.

Haven't played a FPS on PC for a while and coming from Destiny and a PS4 controller, so I'm pretty garbage.

Playing on PC

Few nights ago got my 100th win. This game is crack in digital form. Most fun I've had with a multiplayer shooter in a long time. Blizzard sure knows how to polish the shit out of their games.

There isn't one role in the game that I don't like playing. I'll tank, heal, damage, defend, everything! This will be around for a long time, and the one thing this company does well is support the shit out of their titles.

The Travel Guides (map walkthroughs) are great on this playlist:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLZVkseJlphu_hGVcnMbaM_uBst63cE7Q6

Another good vid for picking your hero:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34BRhqS_ibM

2 Tanks, One strong healer, and three damage.

One of your two tanks needs to be super defensive, this is where Reinhardt comes into play. Just stand their and hold up your shield, only attack when you're 100% sure you'll land the hit.

The other tank needs to be offensive. Zarya shines here, if they attack you while your shield is up it causes your weapon to deal more damage. With heals on you after your shield goes down you're able to take on anyone in the game and out damage them. Plus the fact she has a ton of HP means she'll rip through their front line pretty easy. D.va is also really good as a secondary off tank.

You should be healing with Mercy or Lucio. Zenyatta is decent but could use better heals and also has low hp and gets taken out pretty quick. I suspect they'll buff him eventually. It's best to use Lucio on maps where there are several spots for someone to fall off. His secondary attack pushes enemies far enough back you'll send them flying off the map.

The offensive guys just pick who better fits your play style. Lot of counter picks depending on who the other team has. Genji can reflect everyting Bastions sends at him killing him almost instantly if the Bastion is dumb enough to keep shooting. McCree flash bang and fan the hammer attack is one of the deadliest combos in the game, pretty much an instant kill if you can pull it off.

Interested and seeing what will happen once ranked gets released. I'm glad they're holding off until late June so everyone can get comfortable with the game first.

My Mercy is ill. It's nothing for me to heal like 8k and get 20 assists.

I'm starting to master her because I play on PS4 solo with no voice chat, so if I don't heal nobody else will.

I really just wanna play Zarya all day, tho. She's so dope.

About 5 minutes ago my group got done playing and won every single game. Her ult combos so well with damn near everyone its insane. In the right hands shes the perfect tank that can go full offensive if she wants. I love having a Mercy heal her when I go in.

I find that if you're the type of person to take charge and you go tank or heals you'll pull off a win. So many people just want to do damage, so you're better off just letting them do what they're used to and you take up the special role.

Game is so damn good!

to absorb all that damage, since eveybody will be gunning to take her down first, then have Mercy put on the damage buff?? Shieee...

>I find that if you're the type of person to take charge and
>you go tank or heals you'll pull off a win. So many people
>just want to do damage, so you're better off just letting them
>do what they're used to and you take up the special role.

I've just been picking whatever role the team needs, and 9 times out of 10 it's Tank or Support. I've found Defense is never lacking for picks, which works for me since I prefer the Offense characters.

Played a ton of Zarya and Mercy yesterday (first time using either) and yeah, these two are beast. Zarya's tough on pubbies though, because it's difficult to coordinate her super when your team doesn't talk.

>Played a ton of Zarya and Mercy yesterday (first time using
>either) and yeah, these two are beast. Zarya's tough on
>pubbies though, because it's difficult to coordinate her super
>when your team doesn't talk.

The best thing to do is play like the rest of your team are dumb as fuck. Seriously it works.

Zarya's ult when played in a pug game I save until everyone is there behind me instead of spread out so they can see it. On PC if you hit tab you can see the characters on each team in the middle of the game. If there is a check mark under a character portrait that means they have their ult charged up and ready to use. This is when I use her ult so they can hit their ult after that.

Since people are kill crazy and they see the other team huddled in one spot helpless that's when they go in trying to score kills, which works perfect for me.

>If there is a check mark under a
>character portrait that means they have their ult charged up
>and ready to use. This is when I use her ult so they can hit
>their ult after that.

around folks, but they always end up behind me...or some random schmoe gets in the way.

instead of the heals. He's really fun to play because he's the ultimate utility man...help out with healing (can't be the sole healer), strategically boost dmg + map hack (helps a ton on snipers and Tracer), contribute a few elims, use ultimate when storming a base or defending in crucial moments.

Holy shit does the sound make a huge difference.
Everything in this game deals with audio clues. To the different footsteps to what each character says before an attack. Since turning it on most of the time I can tell who's in the area before I even see them.

I totally missed it in my rush to play, but on top of global keybinds, you can also map your buttons per hero. I was going to cop the Elite controller, but I don't think there's a need for it now (at least for this game). I prefer keeping Jump on LB, so it allows me to put Ability 1 on L3 for certain characters (like Lucio) but move it to LT for characters without secondary fire (like Tracer). Blizzard knows their shit.


And on an unrelated note: Once you start getting familiar with more characters, it's time to start countering the other team:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1KGPMGT_jGWpe-jJ8hHNZBocVvlIyv0OhFbVycLGWYHg/edit#gid=551312687

my favorites so far are Pharah, Junkrat, Rein, and Zen. Pretty much every character is fun to play though, the only boring one is Bastion.

literally each one is useful in many situations/maps and there's not a single class that sticks out as OP. If anything they may want to consider slightly nerfing Bastion's minigun in the future, but it's not bad enough to ruin games and has its downsides. I think they should change it to 100 rounds instead of 200 though.

I didn't think I like the supporting classes as much as I do.
Symmetra got me taking down tanks once they hit choke-points or health rooms. She giving me GoldenEye remote mine feels.

Could you believe in the closed alpha Bastion had a shield pop up in front of him that had 1000 health? They took that off in a hurry it was so broken.

I do think his gun needs to fall off with the direct hits the further you are away from it. Other than that it can be countered.

and people get comfortable with more heroes, we're going to see more active counterpicking (especially in ranked mode). All too often in pubbie games I'm the only one switching heroes for the situation because people don't want to give up their chance of getting votes for the best player of the match.

Bastion and Torbjorn are two of the easiest heroes to counterpick, but I get why a lot of people try to get past the meat grinder.

That is if you can get in line of site, also Tracer can ult him and Reaper can teleport behind him. Genji can fuck him up too just by reflecting his shit to him. Thing is you have to have a smart enough team to distract him and not run in like idiots trying to be the lone wolf.


Trob can be taken out with the same group of people. I do feel like his auto lock on has a bit too much distance. I used him to defend Hanamura B objective and felt so dirty doing it. Got automatic kills and all I did was set back and hammer the thing when it got a little damaged. It was picking off people from outside the door which I don't think is cool.

So far none of these characters are OP... that is except on the map Anubus. That map needs a bit of changes on the B objective if you're defending. You set a Trob and Bastion up there in certain spots and have a tank that can stand in front of them and its pretty much a wrap.

it should probably become less accurate the longer you hold down the trigger just like his normal gun.

is that the competitive meta is so far different from the public meta. Bastion and Torbjorn are two of the three least played heroes (Zenyatta's the worst) but they're two of the most beast on pubbies. Hanzo is another one that's barely used on competitive but often gets the POTG in pubbies.

In the competitive meta the mainstays are (in order of importance): Mercy, McCree, Reinhardt, Widowmaker, Winston, Lucio. Most other heroes are subbed in for specialist duties depending on what part of the map, but besides the three mentioned above Mei, Hanzo and D.VA are almost never used.

Those statistics are based on PC competitive play. Unsurprisingly, there are also platform meta differences too. Torbjorn and Bastion are obviously stronger on consoles and Widowmaker is a must-have on your team on PC. Pharah is also weaker on console because of her movement style (BUMPER JUMPER).

I'm guessing once the public ranked mode hits, it's going to gravitate towards the competitive meta. There's already some grumblings from pro players about how certain areas of the map are "solved" and the top ranks of ranked mode are going to imitate professional play (much like Hearthstone). McCree is definitely getting nerfed soon (less base FTH damage) and Widowmaker is expected to get hit too (maybe less survivability up close? this one is less clear). There's also talk about buffing D.VA (damage or survivability, not both) and fixing Roadhog's hook (less buggy). That should shake things up too.

As an aside, if you haven't yet, map Jump to a top button if you play on console if you like Lucio, Pharah, Genji or Mercy, at least for their specific controls. It's so critical to be able to Jump while keeping your thumb on RS, especially for more advanced maneuvering. Even if it's not critical to the character, jumping around while shooting makes headshots on you a lot more difficult.

He seems to be one of the weakest tanks to me. Rein, Hog, Zarya all better imo.

His primary roles are as a flanker, point breaker and backline assassin.

Some caveats: I never choose him if I'm the only tank on the team and I still might not pick him if we don't have a dedicated healer. But when the team comp fits him well, Winston is BEAST (no pun intended).

Compared to the other tanks, he's actually really squishy. No natural healing, he can be hit inside his dome and shotgun users (and McCree) melt him like no other... not good when he has no ranged weapons and his primary has super short range.

So why use him? Because his leap can clear the most ground (and height) in the shortest amount of time, his shield can absorb a ton of damage (or lasts a solid 6s) and his Ult might be the single best action to break an entrenched enemy position.

It's a different playstyle, but some tips on how to play him:

- Get in, get out. On, say, King of the Hill maps, leap in, drop your shield before you're about to land, wreak havoc, then leap out before you die. Obviously focus their backline squishies first. He's great to lead a coordinated attack because they MUST focus fire you; if not, your Tesla cannon will melt fools (IT GOES THROUGH REINHARDT'S SHIELD!!!). Your leap has a fairly short 6s cooldown; that's just enough time to break their formation then GTFO.

- Your dome can be used on offense and defense. Watch your dome barriers: if they're on the same side as you (even inside) then you can get hit. However, your Tesla cannon can go through it... work those edges. Your teammates' fire can also go through it, much like Reinhardt's shield. This is useful when accompanying the payload. Two Winstons (when there's no 1-hero-limit) are a must for payload maps in tournament play, because it's extremely difficult to break coordinated Winstons. The shield can withstand (I think) 600 damage, but there's a long cooldown.

- You're not playing Winston for POTG or a high kill count. Like Tracer, if you're harassing their heroes trickling in from spawn or pushing snipers off perches then you're doing your job. Do NOT chase if it doesn't make sense, especially against certain heroes. Shotgunners like Reaper and Roadhog WILL fuck you up. And if they're really good, then I would definitely consider switching away from Winston. A good Bastion is also murderous if you're not careful.

- When you ult, you heal in full AND get 500 more hp, for a total of 1000. So you leap in (500hp), shield (600hp), then when you're about to die you ult (1000hp). That gives you almost 2100hp of damage to soak. THIS is when you feel like a tank. Remember though, your job is to break formation, kill supports/snipers if possible then get the fuck out. Your hits have huge knockback, so if they're not in a corner it's often not worth chasing random heroes. And like always, it's better to leap away than die. Also, you cannot use your shield in its duration, so if you can, drop your shield before your ult. However, your leap auto resets when you proc your ult (with only a 2s cooldown!) then it's always active once your ult finishes. Don't ult if your team isn't attacking with you though; a single Winston will still get murked quickly.

Hope this helps... every single time the team comp favors it, I will always pick Winston. He's got such an entertaining playstyle and it's always hilarious watching people scatter when you leap in. Definitely takes practice though.

been playing him more often the past few days. Definitely a must-have for maps like Ilios and Nepal like you said. Pubbies hardly ever play him.

I've also been playing Symmetra whenever I can...I kill so many people with her short-range attack. Love how it auto-aims so you can just dodge and jump around like a madman. Teleporters also help the team greatly in bigger maps. Turrets are fun unless you're playing a really good team and they know exactly where they are and how to get rid of them.

I just dig the passive style.
It's also fun to generally cause mischief for widowmaker, hanzo, etc. if outlooks are accessible.

>Turrets are fun unless you're playing a really good team and
>they know exactly where they are and how to get rid of them.

I plant a decoy (or two) that are visible, then toss 1 or 2 behind doorways.
I played w/ another Symmetra last night and it was hilarious.
Goldeneye hilarious.

Folks haven't quite caught on to using Winston to take out sentry turrets.
I'm ok w/ this.

I play a Symmetra game or two to balance it out. It's nice.

And once you get a feel for him, there's no question he can be one of the kill leaders on the team. You know you're doing your job when you see them counterpick to Reaper/Roadhog (then you pick someone else when they do, haha).

Also one last tip: if you're really fast, you can also use your shield to block their ults. If you time it right, you can stuff ults like Lucio's or Reaper's in the bubble to protect your team.


And yeah, Symmetra is sweet. There are a lot of maps with good nest spots for her. Remember you can put turrets on the ceiling too!

against a pretty decent team too.

Nice work, 33 is impressive

he's def my best tank now. Bastion was owning me in a couple games though.

I'm using him more often now when we run a two tank comp and he really can clear a point pretty quick especially if you ult in on everyone.

Bastion can be a pain when not dealt with properly, you just need a team to know how to switch. And if he focus you when you jump in they need to burn him up. You may die but at least you don't have to worry about him for awhile longer, then your team just has to not let him set up again.

He's armored, so all your damage is reduced even further since it's "energy" based.

If you see him, only engage if he's damaged and looking elsewhere, otherwise he can just spin and cut you down. He's not considered a hard counter to Winston but if he's really good then just stay away entirely.

Winston dogg!!!

with about two weeks for testing before the release of Ranked Mode:

McCree

Peacekeeper - Alternate fire
- Recovery time (i.e. the amount of time before McCree starts reloading) decreased from 0.75 seconds to 0.3 seconds
- Bullet damage decreased from 70 to 45 (Probably reverse patch form this)

Developer Comments: McCree was performing too well against all targets, making him feel like a must-pick in many situations. By reducing the damage of his alternate fire, McCree is now significantly weaker against tanks like Roadhog and Reinhardt, but still maintains his lethality against smaller targets like Tracer and Genji.


WidowMaker

Widow’s Kiss - Alternate fire (Scoped Shot)
- Base damage decreased from 15 to 12
- Note: Scoped shot damage multiplier remains unchanged
- Headshot damage multiplier increased from 2x to 2.5x
- Players must now wait for the unscoping animation to completely finish before scoping

Infra-Sight (Ult)
- Ultimate charge cost increased by 10%

*Developer Comments: In the right hands, Widowmaker can often feel unstoppable—even when just landing body shots instead of critical heads shots. The changes to her alternate fire weaken body shot damage while leaving her headshot damage unchanged. Additionally, we felt her Ultimate ability, Infra-Sight, was coming up a little too frequently, especially considering its impact on the game. *


Bugs Fixed

- Improved stability of the High Bandwidth option in Custom Games
- Fixed a bug that allowed Mercy to gain Ultimate charge whenever damage boosting an ally who was attacking a barrier or Ice Wall
- Fixed a bug that allowed Reaper to Shadow Step to unintended locations on a certain maps
- Fixed an issue with collision on certain areas of Dorado not blocking line of sight

http://us.battle.net/forums/en/overwatch/topic/20745285677#post-12

tl;dr:

- Focused hard on Competitive mode, might do public stress test first, but somewhat different from the beta

- Working on new maps and heroes, no ETA, but as they stated those new releases will be free via patched updates (fuck yeah)

- Want to improve POTG and spectator modes, then also do more with Brawl and Custom modes down the line

- some bug fixes as usual


Good shit, Blizzard is killing it from day 1. Apparently the game has over 10mm players across the platforms and counting. Glad they went away from the F2P model and streamlined everything (as is their wont)

going HARD after cheaters too...like banned for life hard, permanently flagging your PC even if you try to reinstall, buy new copies, change hardware, change network, etc. Pretty cool. They realize that letting a single cheater through the cracks in a competitive FPS can ruin everything.

link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f3lsSwpVZvc

If I don't like stuff like Team Fortress 2 but love Destiny would I like this?

If the core of what you like about Destiny is the persistent player progression, this game isn't like that.

And if you don't like TF2, Overwatch is very much like that.

Like (classic) TF2, the entire game is available right out the box. No characters or skills to unlock, no pay walls to get past, no sense of login progression. It's all team-based class shooter, and the progression is almost entirely your skill level. There are a shit ton of unlocks via XP though, but those are entirely cosmetic.



Edit: I will say though, that part of what makes the game so good is The Blizzard Polish. Team games (shooters especially) are often toxic to newcomers but there are a number of tweaks to the formula to make things far more friendly:

- Voice chat can only go to your own team
- No KDR leaderboard; you can only view your own stats. You can see which players on either team are "on fire" though; this is to encourage counterpicking. And being "on fire" is based on a huge list of things, not just kills
- At the end of matches there's a vote system for the best player of the match, and the metrics are usually based on the role of your hero, not just kills (damage absorbed, HP healed, times your special was used, etc.)
- Kills in the game are given out generously; just participating in an elimination counts towards your KDR and Final Blows are a separate stat

Besides all that stuff, the netcode, matchmaking and transparency with the community are all absolutely stellar. The whole experience with the game is enjoyable, not just the gameplay itself. If you enjoy PvP aspects of shooters without all the griefing, then Overwatch may still be up your alley. Blizzard has always been known to make games that are "easy to learn, hard to master", and this game is no exception.

Ain't no RPG to Overwatch.

No loot. No raids. No PVE at all.

If you don't like TF2 you won't like OW. OW is TF2 2016.

It's less the fluff and more the actual shooting mechanics that make me like Destiny. I would definitely play that game if it was just multiplayer with more character classes.

You know how the SF games just "feel" right compared to stuff like MK or KI?

Destiny is like that for shooters to me.

>Ain't no RPG to Overwatch.
>
>No loot. No raids. No PVE at all.
>
>If you don't like TF2 you won't like OW. OW is TF2 2016.

Testing it

Did my 10 placement matches yesterday and so far I'm kinda meh about it. Had a few teams where you know a few people had no idea what they're doing, the fact that others can hold me back in ranking never set right with me in games. Sometimes I feel like my performance should be the think that takes me higher. Often times I was the higher level person on my team and you could tell some of the others still are not used to certain roles.

If someone leaves your game in competitive mode it doesn't replace them, rightfully so because who would want their rank fucked by joining a match that's already at a loss. The thing that kills me is the game gives you the option to leave without a penalty but it counts as a loss regardless. Honestly a huge waste of time for the team that's short a man. We had the other team who was really cool about it tell us how sorry they are that one idiot left us a man short and we'd take a loss.

The games I had where people worked together were fantastic though. I feel like once they work out a few things with competitive it could really end up being a great addition to this already fun game.

Oh, and if you're not playing Zarya as one of your tanks then something is wrong. You can combo her ult with ANYONE and destroy. If your team is smart enough to save their ults and only use them while she's in the middle of hers you'll see "Team Kill" multiple times in one match. Works best in king of the hill match where they'll all be on the point.

huh.

I'm not..sure what to do with this.

I'm only through the training though.


about to watch those how-to videos beforeI jump inreal matches

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

and still get some exp for it.

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

Depending on your playstyle, find a hero or two in each role that feels comfortable. Some recs for starting out:

Offense: Soldier 76 (closest to COD-style), McCree (short/midrange brawler)

Defense: Bastion (mobile turret), Torbjorn (builds turrets; so good on consoles that his turret is getting nerfed)

Tank: Roadhog (shotguns and hook)

Support: Lucio (aura healer, high survivability)


One other recommendation... by default Jump is mapped to A, which is extremely cumbersome for certain characters that rely on it heavily (Lucio, Genji, Mercy and Pharah in particular). That said, many other heroes also benefit from being able to jump like a madman without taking your thumb off RS. You can change your mapping per hero (and you should), but since Jump is a universal action it may behoove you to map it to something like LB from the very start to get used to it.

Once you get used to some of the basic mechanics, then you can practice against the AI. The matchmaking in the game is actually pretty good; even if you want to jump in against other people, you should get matched up with similarly skilled players.

Lucio is good in that you're pretty much always having an effect on the game, even when you don't necessarily know what you're doing.

I don't have his wall running down yet though.

also put in some work with the gorilla dude, but I got waxed when I tried to use the other tank characters

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

Most of my early games (still fairly often, in fact) the pubbies gravitated towards Offense and Defense, so I leaned on Tank and Support more often.

That being said, if you're still learning characters just learn who you want. There's the team suggestions, but you'll find that certain maps don't necessarily need a balanced comp. Winning and losing isn't that big a deal on the casual mode, so it's better to just git gud with the characters you prefer.

but I've mostly been putting in work with symmetra

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

so the first few matches I probably wasn't doing anything helpful, but this game is pretty forgiving. You pick up on the intricacies of each character pretty quck just by playing.

the thing I've probably needed the videos for, is learning what the characters I'm playing against can do

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

don't need to memorize every little detail, just gotta identify the longer, more open ones vs the small clusterfuck ones to choose the right hero.

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

i've had some clutch rezzes followed up by little kill streaks before, but they usually get swallowed up by a Bastion or Torb play.

http://xboxclips.com/Rjcc/0b16ac8c-5067-4d41-9cba-07bf824bddc5

in this one, I sparked a comeback in overtime, we were getting completely blanked to that point and got it back to 99...but we lost in the end


this was the first one I ever got I think

http://xboxclips.com/Rjcc/7f209543-5e74-46aa-bb06-4d32d947a3a1

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

I understand you want to play Hanzo and lob random arrows and hope you get hits because the arrow hitbox is so huge.

You also know that normally you do poorly with him. Don't fucking use him in competitive! Save that shit for quick match. In competitive play to your strengths. You're a great Solider 76 that can wipe out the entire enemy team? Sweet, use him! You can heal your ass off as Lucio? Then use him in competitive because you're helping your team out by playing a character you KNOW you're good at.

I placed pretty damn good in my placement matches, the few losses I did have I noticed that people on my team were not smart enough to switch characters to counter what the other team had. Someone wanting to play Widowmaker on attacking and only hitting one out of ten shots. Someone wanting to play D.Va and not switching when she's not the most effective tank in the game at the moment. All this can lead to the rest of the team hating your guts.

The great thing about this mode is more people talk. I've added so many folks to my friends list recently because of this. A team of strangers that communicate will almost certainly beat a team that doesn't say a single word and just picks whoever. Coordination is key, especially when it comes to using your ults.

>I understand you want to play Hanzo and lob random arrows and
>hope you get hits because the arrow hitbox is so huge.

When you see the kill cam and you're like, "This nigga was just lobbing random ass arrows!"

http://cinnamondisaster.tumblr.com/post/146852403362/brief-guide-to-ultimate-abilities-in-overwatch

we got our asses kicked for awhile when we started competitive, now we're finally stringing some wins together.

They have commentators, and they were putting in work talking a mile a minute! I love nerds. Those players are FREAKS btw.

We're seeing CS:GO on TBS and DOTA on ESPN2. Twitch just keeps picking up momentum and there are a fair number of folks that are professional streamers.

On a related note, if you want to up your Overwatch game, check out some of these guys:

Seagull - Soldier, Genji, pretty much anyone he touches
https://www.twitch.tv/a_seagull

Moonmoon - Roadhog
https://www.twitch.tv/moonmoon_ow

If cable TV still exists in another ten years, there will definitely be an e-sports ESPN channel.

I follow the professional Hearthstone scene pretty closely but whenever I see any other game on I still enjoy watching even if I don't know wtf is going on (DOTA and League, I'm looking at you).

and I ain't been that hype since the NBA Finals.

Watching sports and watching people compete in video games goes very well together to me. I find it a little weird when people are really into one, but won't give the other a shot.

mostly older, but some are sports fans and some aren't. It seems like such an odd phenomena (watching people video games? why not play it yourself?) but sports is always my go-to analogy.

And it makes sense. The only real difference is the medium, just one of many new industries enabled through the internet (Uber, Spotify, Twitter, etc.)

(maybe it's different in competitions, I haven't really watched esports)

you're tied to the competitor's POV.

I loved it when PGR3 had a built-in TV system and you could watch from anywhere on the track, etc.

now games are like "go use twitch" and it's not really made to spectate, although RTS, moba and fighting games don't have a problem.

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

Depending on the tournament, you can get a general well rounded sense of what's going on though. Some Overwatch streams are bad though, where they switch constantly from character to character. It's a headache to constantly reorient yourself since the action can be hectic.

When it comes to Overwatch though, I'd rather just watch the top streamers for insights into playstyles rather than the tourney scene. I don't follow the pros enough, and it's tough following the action if it's not a bird's eye view style.

Depending on the tournament, you can get a general well rounded sense of what's going on though. Some Overwatch streams are bad though, where they switch constantly from character to character. It's a headache to constantly reorient yourself since the action can be hectic.

When it comes to Overwatch though, I'd rather just watch the top streamers for insights into playstyles rather than the tourney scene. I don't follow the pros enough, and it's tough following the action if it's not a bird's eye view style.

Some Enigma dude was owning as Zarya. He ended up with potg and 64% avg energy, which apparently is incredible in a professional match.

Origins:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IV9CzxZrhdU

Gameplay:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XbzRwssqMtU

http://www.polygon.com/2016/7/12/12157248/overwatch-new-dlc-hero-ana-blizzard-entertainment

The first post-launch character coming to Overwatch is Ana, a support hero who uses her sniper rifle to heal her allies, Blizzard Entertainment revealed today. Blizzard describes Ana as a "battle-scarred veteran who supports her teammates from a distance using a unique and highly specialized collection of weapons."

Ana's primary weapon is her Biotic Rifle. The gun fires long-range darts that heal her allies and deal damage to her foes. She's also equipped with a Biotic Grenade. As seen in her debut gameplay video above, Ana's Biotic Grenade, like her rifle, heals teammates and damages enemies caught in its small area of effect. For a brief period, the grenade also boosts all incoming healing for allies and prevents enemies from being healed — bad news for opposing Roadhog and Soldier: 76 players.

She'll also be armed with a Sleep Dart, which can knock enemies unconscious for a brief period. As seen in the above, expect many an ultimate ability to be summarily shut down by quick-thinking Ana players.

Ana's own ultimate, Nano Boost, sees her fire a dart at an ally and grant them faster movement, increased damage and improved resistance to incoming attacks.

In addition to showing how Overwatch's new character plays, Blizzard also delves into her backstory in a new origin video.


Players who've been following Overwatch's lore likely already know that Ana is the mother of another playable character, Pharah. Ana also has close ties to other Overwatch veterans, including Gabriel "Reaper" Reyes and Jack "Soldier: 76" Morrison, which Blizzard teased last week.

Ana clearly has some history with an Overwatch character, rival sniper Widowmaker, who appears responsible for the loss of her right eye. We'll have to wait for the release of Ana and all the colorful dialogue that characters exchange during the game to learn a bit more about her relationships with the rest of the cast.

Blizzard will release Ana and other additional characters for Overwatch for free.

For a closer look at Ana, check out a batch of screenshots in the gallery below.

I love playing support, but feeling like I'm defenseless when my teammates ain't paying attention sucks.

Ana looks like she can hold her own one-on-one.

Blizzard is fucking on top of it. On top of this, no more hero stacking on Competitive mode (ie, one hero max per team).

PC first, consoles later (and not all changes may make it to console,
it seems)

https://playoverwatch.com/en-us/blog/20178523#patchnotes

PATCH FEATURES

New Hero: Ana (Support)
After being out of the fight for several years, one of Overwatch's founding members is returning. Introducing Ana—a battle-scarred veteran who supports her teammates from a distance using a unique and highly specialized collection of weapons.

Ana’s primary weapon is her Biotic Rifle, which fires long-range darts that can restore the health of her allies or deal ongoing damage to her enemies. Meanwhile, her Biotic Grenade is perfect for a close-quarters clash, simultaneously healing teammates and injuring foes caught in its small area of effect. (Affected allies will also receive a temporary increase to all incoming healing, while affected enemies can’t be healed for a few moments.) And if the battle starts to get out of hand, Ana's sidearm can fire a Sleep Dart, knocking her adversaries unconscious.

Plus, Ana's ultimate ability, Nano Boost, empowers one of her teammates, granting faster movement, increased damage, and resistance to enemy attacks.

To learn more about Ana, click here.

GENERAL UPDATES

Gameplay

If a match goes into Overtime for more than 20 seconds, the fuse will now start to "burn down" more quickly
Players now respawn more slowly during Overtime (increased spawn time by 2 seconds)

Competitive Play

Competitive Play matches can now only have one of each hero per team. For more info, click here.

Miscellaneous

Added Ana as an AI-controlled hero in Practice vs. AI, Play vs. AI, and Custom Game modes
Timing on Zenyatta's Rapid Discord achievement is more lenient
Targeted teammates now respond by saying "I'm with you," when players use the “Group Up” communication
Renamed five sprays to avoid duplicate titles

HERO BALANCE UPDATES

General

Self-healing abilities now charge ultimate abilities. As a result, some heroes’ ultimate costs have been adjusted (see below).

Bastion

Configuration: Tank
Ultimate cost increased by 10%

D.Va

Defense Matrix
Cooldown decreased from 10 seconds to 1 second
A new resource meter has been added. This meter will deplete while Defense Matrix is active and then recharge when it’s not in use.
Defense Matrix takes 10 seconds to reach full charge from empty
At a full charge, Defense Matrix will last for 4 seconds
Defense Matrix will now remain active as long as its assigned hotkey is held
Defense Matrix has been reclassified as an alternate fire and is now bound to RMB (by default)
An option to “Toggle Defense Matrix” has been added under Options > Controls > D.Va
Self-Destruct
Ultimate cost decreased by 15%
Explosion delay reduced from 4 seconds to 3 seconds
Explosion no longer damages D.Va (the player who activates it)

Developer Notes: D.Va isn't being selected as often as our other tanks, and we feel a lot of that stems from the underperformance of her damage absorption abilities. So, we've reconfigured her Defensive Matrix, making it more flexible and giving players the ability to use it more often. We’ve also given Self-Destruct a little more oomph, because it felt slightly underwhelming when compared to many of Overwatch's other ultimate abilities.

Lúcio

Sound Barrier
Ultimate cost increased by 10%

McCree

Peacekeeper
Now maintains full damage at longer distances, but will deal less damage at extreme ranges

Developer Notes: While the game does feel better following the nerf to McCree’s close-range damage in a previous patch, it left him a little too weak. So, we're increasing his effective distance, making his range similar to Soldier: 76’s. This should hopefully give players another option for dealing with pesky long-range damage dealing heroes like Pharah and Hanzo.

Mercy

Caduceus Staff
Damage Boost
Bonus damage increased from 30% to 50%
Effect will no longer stacks with bonus damage provided by another Mercy
Resurrect
Ultimate charge cost increased by 30%
Movement is no longer prevented during activation
Guardian Angel instantly resets upon use

Developer Notes: Mercy's ultimate is one of the most powerful abilities in the game; however, players would often fly into the fray and die while using it. With this update, Resurrect will now take a bit longer to charge, but Mercy will be a lot safer when activating the ability in the middle of combat. In addition, we always intended Mercy’s Damage Boost beam to be her primary method for dealing damage, but it often felt so weak that you were better off pulling out your blaster. To help address this, we've slightly increased its potency.

Roadhog

Whole Hog
Ultimate cost increased by 45%

Soldier: 76

Heavy Pulse Rifle
Spread recovery will begin after a short delay (rather than instantly)
Tactical Visor
Ultimate cost increased by 10%

Zenyatta

Base shields increased by 50 (now 50 Health/150 Shield)
Orb of Discord and Orb of Harmony
Projectile speed has been increased from 30 to 120
Transcendence
Movement speed is now doubled upon activation
Healing amount increased from 200 to 300 health per second

Developer Notes: While Zenyatta has never had the healing abilities of Lúcio or Mercy, he made up for it by dealing more damage. However, his lack of mobility and low health has meant he’s struggled to find a place in many games. To increase his effectiveness, we've made several changes, the biggest of which is an increased shield pool. This will allow him to go head-to-head with more enemies. The Orb of Harmony and Discord changes are also a quality of life change, helping Zenyatta move his orbs around and apply their effects more quickly. And lastly, we’ve increased Transcendence’s healing throughput. This ultimate was designed to be the most effective against sustained, high-damage fire and least effective against short, high-damage bursts (like D.Va’s or Junkrat's ultimates). But, due to the amount of healing it provided, there were times when it was possible for even sustained fire to overcome Transcendence’s output. We’ve made the heal powerful and also allowed Zenyatta to move around more quickly while it’s active.

UI UPDATES

Game Options

Players can now enter numerical values for any option that also has slider (e.g. FoV, volume, sensitivity, etc.)
Controls
Mouse sensitivity can now be adjusted out to two decimals
Gameplay
Mid-match tips can now be toggled on or off (this will enable/disable tips that pop up after a player dies)
Social
Friend Request toasts can now be toggled on or off
Friend notifications can now be toggled on or off
Whispers can now be toggled on or off
Video
Added 21:9 aspect ratio support
Players can now enable a real-world clock by toggling the "Display System Clock" setting

Social Features

Certain commendations will now appear less frequently during end-of-round voting (e.g. Zenyatta’s Transcendence Healing and Zarya’s Projected Barriers Applied)

BUG FIXES

General

The Hero Gallery now remembers the last hero you were looking at and will properly highlight that hero whenever returning to the gallery
Fixed a bug that caused the “payload is nearing its final destination” music to continue playing even after the match was over
Fixed a bug that caused the UI to disappear whenever the game was forced into windowed mode by an external application
Fixed a bug that would sometimes cause visual healing effects to appear on the wrong hero whenever multiple players attempted to up a Health Pack
Fixed a bug that would sometimes cause different heroes’ victory poses to clip into each other
Fixed several lighting issues with the killcam

Maps

The payload on King’s Row will no longer retreat back inside its starting location if the attacking team fails to push it
Adjusted the Hero Select screen volume for the attacking team on Watchpoint: Gibraltar
Added Spectator camera collision to most maps
Fixed issues with player collision across multiple maps
Fixed issues with ambient lighting and shadows across multiple maps

Heroes

Fixed a bug that caused D.Va to sometimes ignore player collision when summoning her mech
Fixed a bug where Mei’s Ice Wall would persist in the game world even after the player switched heroes or left the game
Fixed even more bugs that allowed Reaper to Shadow Step to unintended locations
Fixed a bug that sometimes caused Reinhardt’s Barrier Field to get stuck in the “on” position if the player used the “Toggle Barrier” setting
Fixed a bug that sometimes caused Roadhog to accidentally Chain Hook targets standing behind him
Fixed a bug that caused Winston’s Barrier Projector shield to ignore the “Sound Effects Volume” setting

Played Ana and toyed around with a few changes in the PTR and it feels great.

She may be high skill since you need to shoot your own team to heal them. I wouldn't heal with just her, she's pretty much another Zen where you need another healer already on your team.

Her sleep shot is going to work well if you can use that to focus on a healer or tank and remove them from combat for a few seconds. He grenade is great for healing and damage as well. In the right hands she'll be a problem.

Everything else is solid, I'm glad they're listening to the (valid) complaints of the community and using them to improve the game. If its anything like the first competitive patch we should see it released sometime this week.

From my understanding they basically did it bc people were stacking Winston/Lucio/Tracers on king of the hill maps to constantly touch the point, but if they're fixing the OT mechanics anyway then what's the point? Doesn't it just remove an element of strategy?

On the other hand, I suppose it puts more focus on in-game skill and tactics which is good.

Guardian Angel having no cool down, being able to move during a rez, and the damage boost going up to 50%.

The 30% increase on her Ultimate cost doesn't even seem that bad since she'll get charge from self-healing too.

it kicks in.

they are specifically nerfing her ult because it charges too quickly and rezzes are too constant in comp play...they are only increasing the ult requirements for Roadhog, Soldier, etc. because they have active healing abilities which they will get charge from.

Losing a match and being the only person with a top performer card on your team, getting your five or six votes, AND STILL losing a full rank point is the worst.

It's why I took a break in League of Legends.

You play your ass and have one of your best games, and the rest of your team run around like they never played a video game a day in your life. If you're not rolling with a full squad it can be the worse.

Don't even stress about your rank now, Bliz system to aggressively keep you at that 50% win ratio when solo queuing is to blame lol.

I have a group of 5-6 friends who play fairly regularly, but I don't do competitive unless at least 4 of them are on at the same time. Even still, we catch bad matchups sometimes and get owned. We gotta work on communicating strategies for each map. From strictly a skill standpoint, we're good enough to be ranked in the 50's somewhere. I'm 45 at the moment.

It's communicating strategy and coordinating ultimates that pushes teams past the 40's plateau.

>It's communicating strategy and coordinating ultimates that
>pushes teams past the 40's plateau.

I still don't know why people don't understand this.

Some of these ultimates are designed so well to work with each other that if you just hold onto them and use them at once you can wipe out an entire team and buy more time to either push or defend.

When I'm in a competitive game and people use their mics and understand to wait for the perfect time to ult we almost always win every single time. Helped me get placed high when competitive started.

coordinated that combo every time?

Not impressed playing her, not impressed playing against her, not impressed with one on my team.

Her damage and healing seems real low for how accurate you need to be.

I really like following behind the offense and throwing shots and grenades into the fray. No matter who gets hit you're helping.

I expect her to be strictly Quick Plays only. I do expect more ppl to play Zen in competitive now on the other hand...especially teams that don't have a skilled Mercy. Instant orbs are pretty sweet.

People have no idea what to do with her and since she's new folks are just going to instalock and do horrible.

She should never be the only support on your team, you still need a Mercy or Lucio to fully heal your team. However her using her primary on a teammate before they jump in can prevent another healer from having to following them in and getting killed. Her bomb is great when used on your own team. Her sleep round can be a game changer if he shits the right person and your team focus everyone else down while they're still asleep.

She should be played at a distance, and then she should be on the point while one or two members of your team push out to keep them away from the point. The key is she can still heal from so far of a distance. I love using her when we have a Winston on the team because I have him jump in and disrupt their back line while I heal him and damage the other team at the same time.

Her ult is what hurts pug games at a low MMR. I find myself playing with more quality players so that Genji knows not to do his ult until I ult him first. Put it on a reaper and he should go all in and can take out an entire team. Hell, I've put it on a Rinehardt and had him go ape shit on a team before and they couldn't do anything to him. Just hope your team isn't stupid and stands back after she ults them.

(to address how low her damage and healing is)

http://www.polygon.com/2016/7/26/12291162/overwatch-patch-ana-buff-mccree-nerf-pc

Still not Unreal Tournament 2004 - but closer.

Winning is definitely predicated that your team members understand the objectives and kind of know how to work together.

I've noticed that people are not rushing into an area we don't control to contest it and are jumping near/on a vehicle before it makes the next checkpoint.

As a Bastion what I need is either someone with a shield to block damage for me, or someone with healing to help me when we are facing an onslaught of opposition.

I rarely get either.
It's all about teamwork.

I can now play competitive mode.

A lot of games have people playing offensive characters only and the other team that has a more balanced make-up will just CRUSH them.

And people don't switch characters during a game - if the other team has a good player playing Reinhardt you might have to switch from Bastion and go for someone who can flank him - or someone who can fire through the shield.

In "normal" games it's really annoying when you team has people all around say level 22 - and the other team has three 15s and two 91s.

I end up playing Bastion , Pharaoh and Reinhardt the most.

He back!

https://youtu.be/9Ngw1JxlopA

And the summer games one is her best skin and I can't use the credits to get it.

My gothic skin Zarya is one of the best NA!

possibly another change to Mercy too.

new ranking system, new queuing system, no sudden death, new time bank system for payload maps, etc. New map in the works too I guess.

I made rank 53 right before it ended...pretty proud of that considering I didn't even play many comp matches and my group got slaughtered in our placement matches at the start. Think I went 3-7 in those, pretty big hole to dig out of.

you guys move on to a different game already?

But I pretty much suck at the game.

I haven't even had time to play Eichenwalde yet.

But there's a lull when the seasons aren't in session. Still fun as shit though, trying to improve my play with some of my lesser used heroes from last season (Zarya and Genji mostly).

I really hope they release the new map and character soon though... with season 2 would be PERFECT.

since every team will have a Hanzo.

I'm really good with Bastion in QP's too...good enough that I've been debating trying him at times in comp, but I prob won't have the balls.

Hasn't gotten old yet. Hit my 1,000th game last night. Can honestly say this has been my fav shooter in a very long time. Also not to toot my own horn but my Zarya is legendary lol.

Ranked really frustrated me. Getting top performances but still losing points almost every match sucked.

And the stingy unlocks don't help either.

The game is still hella fun in small doses for me.

>Ranked really frustrated me. Getting top performances but
>still losing points almost every match sucked.
>
>And the stingy unlocks don't help either.
>
>The game is still hella fun in small doses for me.

Ranked is hell in any competitive game if you solo q for your matches. You need to make your match making rank high enough so you're not stuck with brain dead partners. This game has a hidden MMR for quick match that bleeds into competitive. The better you play, the better team mates you acquire. Got myself to the point where I couldn't lose in quick play, I then started competitive mode and steam rolled most teams.

Of course nothing beats getting in a que with people you know and that play good. Communication is key. The team that talks normally wins.

The unlocks never bothered me because its all cosmetic, and can be earned with the games credits if you want something bad enough.

Started last night to everyone's surprise, I think it wasn't suppose to start until sometime next week.

I didn't play in the PTR this go around so I hopped in on the weekly brawl which has the new map only. My god is this thing hard to attack on!

Played for hours and defense won every single game, didn't see attack finish the map at all no matter what side I was on. While the new map looks great I feel like some paths could have been added to help with flanking. A lot of times we held the other team up so much they couldn't even make it to the first point, and if they did we mopped them up quickly after before they made it anywhere else. First map that I instantly feel bad for the attacking team.

Not sure how good this is for competitive mode and honestly hope its not in the competitive rotation because whoever is defending is pretty much going to win as long as no one on the defending team is brain dead. It's cool for quick play where it doesn't really matter.

I really hope it isn't in comp but it's gotta be, right? Can anyone confirm?

However, Anubis used to be considered impossible to attack on until ppl started figuring it out...maybe the new map will be similar?

>I really hope it isn't in comp but it's gotta be, right? Can
>anyone confirm?
>
>However, Anubis used to be considered impossible to attack on
>until ppl started figuring it out...maybe the new map will be
>similar?

If anything I've learned from the past you do NOT start any game with a rank system on a 3 day holiday weekend because Kids lol. One can only hope new map isn't on it though.

Anubis wasn't impossible to attack just hard. This is harder! I've honestly won more on attack on the Anubis map than I've lost. I played for about a 4 hour block last night and man I'm telling there was no winning on attack. It got to the point where I didn't even care if the other team won on attack I just wanted to see if it was impossible. Nope! Didn't happen.

The sad thing is I tried to spawn camp the other team to see if it would work, something that doesn't really work at all on any of the other maps. It worked here perfectly. I used McCree and kept them locked in to the point that they couldn't even leave out of the door.

I think some timing issues are in order or payload speeds increased as well as the time decreased on how long it takes to capture the point. Beautiful looking map, just not fair to attack team.

>The sad thing is I tried to spawn camp the other team to see
>if it would work, something that doesn't really work at all on
>any of the other maps. It worked here perfectly. I used
>McCree and kept them locked in to the point that they couldn't
>even leave out of the door.

I had a Pharah and a Hanzo doing it last night (desperately on different games) and it was difficult to kill them - I re-spawned like 4 times before I was able to do it.

It's that bridge with the high walls and the opening - they would pop back in.

I guess a fast charter could have gotten around it better - so I eventually switched to Pharah and did a high jump, then used the blast weapon to get them out of position.

Or is that just on the new map?

I'd be willing to try that, or 3 tanks/2 support/1 offense.

I could def see a team of Rein/Zarya/Winston/Zen/Ana/Lucio or Mercy working more often than not. Seems to me that Pharah would be the only real problem with a setup like that.

already an improvement over last season, lol. I'd be happy to go 6-4.

Had a friend go 2-8 and got placed gold because him getting majority of the gold medals on his team. Kinda like the system knows you're good you just got placed with shitty team mates.

I'm almost at Platinum myself, prob like two wins away.

You have a hidden MMR that you never see.

It bleeds over from quick match as well. If you're absolutely horrendous in QM then you'll be sort of placed with people along those lines in competitive.

Have another friend who went 3-7 and got low silver. The man can't buy a win. Why? Because he's not that good. When we que up with him in QM we get the worse teams sometimes because its taking into account his hidden MMR. Sometimes we play with people that are like just level 20, this dude is level 160. When he leaves the team and we que up again we're playing at people who are around our level again.

The system knows just how good you are solo even though they still want you to win games as a team. I will say that it can balance it out for the most part.

A few tips on competitive that I'll tell anyone is avoid weekends and holidays. The kids being off and also the adults who can only play a game or two on the weekends are out in abundance and can hurt your chances of having a decent team that doesn't troll. I only play competitive on the weekdays and have been really fortunate to be on great teams where everyone works together and knows how to counter pick other heroes.

They fixed a few things including having the payload move a bit faster on the latest map. I remember saying how this could be an improvement even posted a few things on their forums. Glad they listened to reasonable request.

For that type of map its hard as hell to attack on anyway and the payload moved way too slow, speeding it up should balance the map so attack doesn't get shit on so much. I bet they looked at the win percentage based on what side you were on and came to the conclusion that something had to give.

One thing I love about Blizzard is they don't cave on everything but they do listen to their fan base and makes changes that are much needed.

>A few tips on competitive that I'll tell anyone is avoid
>weekends and holidays. The kids being off and also the adults
>who can only play a game or two on the weekends are out in
>abundance and can hurt your chances of having a decent team
>that doesn't troll. I only play competitive on the weekdays
>and have been really fortunate to be on great teams where
>everyone works together and knows how to counter pick other
>heroes.

I only play comp when I group with 2-3 friends that I trust. No more 5 or 6 friend groups though, we got stomped out doing that. Groups of 3-4 is pretty ideal I think. I don't want to rely on 4-5 pubs.

>I only play comp when I group with 2-3 friends that I trust.
>No more 5 or 6 friend groups though, we got stomped out doing
>that. Groups of 3-4 is pretty ideal I think. I don't want to
>rely on 4-5 pubs.
>

You should be even. If your MMR is horrible you'll be a horrible team facing other horrible players. Then it depends on which team is smart enough to get the job done.

The advantage of having a higher MMR is that now you don't have to worry so much about your team being complete idiots. If you lose you know you lost because the other team was a just a little better.

Grouping with a full team of six will often times have you face another full team. The reason you might be losing those is because the other team is completely coordinated. I've climbed up solo q which is the hardest but I also don't face full teams of six. I did this last season and the guys I played with didn't listen. They were the "use your ults as soon as you get them" type of guys, that never works.

If you want to roll with a full six do quick match until you can consistently win majority of your games together. Blizz tries to keep you at a 50% win rate, I moved up past that by the grace of god and I can tell by type of people I'm playing with that I moved into another bracket. I was playing with diamonds in my promos.

It's levels to this shit man lol.

Finished placements 8-2 and got 2765, won another and got to 2826 or something like that. Looking like diamond is achievable this season!

Went 4-2 in comp, 2 of the wins were absolute blowouts, both of the losses were very close, and I ended up LOSING like 6 rank points overall. I was playing Zen most of the time and my team was pretty good so I wasn't medaling in any offensive categories, which probably screwed me a bit.

new hero(es), I think 4 new maps, new game modes, skins/Halloween event, the Widow/Junk changes should be hitting very soon, Symmetra is apparently going to get reworked sometime before the end of the year. What'd I miss?

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

Some of the skins are cool, others underwhelming or lame (bastion). I like the brawl a lot personally, but one of my friends was pretty bored by it. Did 3 or 4 rounds yesterday.

If we're trying to capture an area - STAY IN THE AREA. Like the blue lines.

If we're trying to defend an area - STAY IN THE AREA. Like in the lines. And die in the area.

If we're trying to move a payload the STAND NEAR THE PAYLOAD.

If we're trying to stop a payload then STAND NEAR THE PAYLOAD. And die on the payload.

If your playing MEI then be near the payload and freeze for max time when your health is getting low.

If the other team has a healer then kill the healer. No sense in killing everyone else to have a Mercy resurrect them.

If you play DVA then boost into people and knock them away from where they want to be.

If you play Pharaoh then knock people out the way with the thing that does that.

After a match don't say "We needed a X" just switch to X during the game.

Who's got more?

The game has been out long enough to where if anyone doesn't know this already they have no reason to play this game anymore.

Shit like this has been a staple in team based games for years. Thank god I play at a level where I don't have to see these things anymore lol.

if someone is a level 9 I get it - but I see a bunch of people who are like level 30 not getting near payload during overtime (like in a doorway) and the clock running out.

Whats your competitive ranking if you play it?

I played with people like that for awhile but dragged myself through the rankings to where I play with people who don't really ignore objectives. It's like any other team based game though someone is always gonna try to be the super star of the team that doesn't really have the skill to carry.

Those are the people that wonder off thinking they can 1v6 an entire team. What I do if I'm healing is let them know up front I'm not leaving the point unless we have a huge advantage and we want to push them back more. If you want heals then stay on the point, I'm not gonna chase you all over the place only to have both of us die. Once they get the point they tend to stick to you.

This works sometimes, you'll always run into some idiots that refuse to follow objectives. Just rare once you crawl out of a certain MMR.

>Whats your competitive ranking if you play it?

And it's not like I'm good - but I know the basic rules.

I've ended up playing D.VA almost exclusively the last few weeks and I do go 1v6 sometimes - more to try split their group up. If I try it and all 6 focus on me I'm super dead - but a lot of times you can divert 3 from point or a choke point and the rest of your team can get to the point. Really depends on who you are playing.

If not I'll hang back and try to provide shields when needed.

Also I'll stay on point or on the payload to keep it moving and then use my shield and boost to cause trouble for defenders and then go back to the payload or point.

And I bounce people out of the way during overtime - a lot of times that will end the match.

I should probably get a headset and try talking and co-coordinating my game play - but that seems like a lot of work.

The game doesn't do a good enough job telling people how to play it when they start.

And the matchup system is not great still. I had 3 people on my team under level 15 and the other team's plays were ALL over 50.

Guess what, we lost.

unless it's a smurf account...so that was probably the closest the system could do. It would make sense that a free weekend would make everything kinda screwy though regardless. Also, now that there are multiple ways to play this game, the player base in each mode at a particular time has shrunk. 3v3 and mystery duels will take a lot of players away from QP.

Friend of mine told me a lot of ppl were making smurf accounts this weekend (experienced players disguised as low level) to pub stomp everyone in Quick Play...my first thought is...really? Gaming the system just to win Quick Plays?

after a great start to the season getting up to 2900+, I've been on an awful, awful losing streak the past couple weeks down to 2500+. I've had all kinds of shitty teammates in this stretch, but I also know realistically I can't blame everything on them...mofos just play this shit 10x more often than I do and are better.

I've tried groups of 2, 3, and 4 in this losing stretch...nothing is working. Going to experiment with solo queue before the season ends but I know that'll be a shitshow as well. Think I'm gonna need to master a few more heroes for next season to fill in any gaps from shitty team comps/stubborn pub players.

It's always good to point the finger at yourself and ask what can you do to improve. You have the right attitude. Sometimes tho man its not you, it's the other people on your team. You could be the best, but if you're surrounded by shit team mates then no matter what you do you cant win.

The one thing I notice in this game is that if you want to truly carry your team then you almost HAVE to pick an offensive character and just keep the other team so busy and stay killin them that they can never recover.

It's a game where you have to rely on 5 other people, and if a few of them are having an off day its going to reflect on you as well. Then the more you play after that the more you tilt because you feel as thought you have to make some insane play to save the game. That's when the mistakes come in. Just take a few days off from competitive and come back to it.

strategies and comps. Take the initiative to organize attacks and ults instead of leaving it to someone else or just expecting shitty teammates to know what to do in a certain situation without saying anything.

The other day my team had 1 minute to take point A in Volskaya, and I convinced everyone to try a left flank rush with DVa, Reaper, Mercy, etc. and it worked beautifully. Felt very satisfying.

next season, and admits the system is flawed this season. Too many people were placed higher than they should have been based on luck/overperforming in placement matches (aka me going 8-2), resulting in such a wild fluctuation of skill and brains in the majority of gold and plat matches where like 75% of the player base meets. Mid to low plat is probably my correct rating, but I've been stuck with teammates lately who have not yet free-fallen to where they should be like I have. Now it makes sense.

I saw USA vs Chile and Sweden vs Brazil. Both blowouts.

I guess USA, S Korea, and Sweden are supposed to be the top 3 teams?

Wow her kit is something else

Able to hack health kits so they spawn faster and other team cant use them. Able to hack other players to stop them from using any of their abilities for a short amount of time (start using this on healers and tanks people!)

Can go invisible for a period of time, can see critical health through walls. Can throw a grenade and teleport to it. Ult is a huge EMP that just shuts down enemy team from doing anything.


Tried this out last night and was super fun if your group is coordinated. From what I've seen put your teleport grenade on top of a health pack away from other teams view, jump in and release your ult on top of team then port back to grenade. Your team should be smart enough to let loose then since they can't counter it at all, no more mercy rez or Zen keeping people immortal.

Something tells me they'll tone her down a bit later, but was still super fun playing such a high mobile character that can honestly bounce all over the map. Now to find some counters for her.

McCree, Winston, a really good Roadhog, etc.

Winston mostly shuts her down if she ports away. You can see her grenade placement since it shows red. If shes being chased have someone waiting there for her, soon as she pops up you can shut her down easy. Seems like I recommend doing this before you ult so she can't shut your team down.

Also saw someone get her with McCree's stun. Gonna try some of Tracers counters tonight so we know how to deal with her. So far people are not that really good with her but I have seen a rare few that can rip your entire team apart with her. I can't wait to get her kit perfect she's a huge threat when used right.

That forces each team to have unique characters.

Because I'm pretty good with DVA and suck with all the rest - so if someone gets DVA before me I will literally not be able to help. My Pharoah and Bastion skills are below average but that's what i default to.

Didn't mind it in competitive play, but in quick play it should be allowed.

That forces each team to have unique characters.

Because I'm pretty good with DVA and suck with all the rest - so if someone gets DVA before me I will literally not be able to help. My Pharoah and Bastion skills are below average but that's what i default to.

Didn't mind it in competitive play, but in quick play it should be allowed.

I would say pick at least 4 that you can learn to be really good with. You may be good with Dva but they may have a comp where she doesn't fit well. You gotta be able to adapt if not you become a weak link for your team.

I love the new quick match changes so we don't have to deal with shitty hero stacking anymore. This is when people have to show their true skill.

Quickly should be less strict than competitive mode.

I use quick play to get better not to do dumb things like troll games.

They built a mode that allows you to play whoever you want and stack multiple people if you want.

Or ya know, continue to only learn one character when the game has multiple that can counter *shrugs*

I believe. Which heroes are you guys gonna play in the next season?

Still think she needs to be in the defensive category but they like to place her with the healers for some reason. Maybe they could have added a healing turrent that you had to be right up on to get your health back.

I'm still gonna main Zarya in the new season. I'm pretty good with everyone, and I've gotten devastating as Mei recently. I'll try to do more Solider 76, McCree, and Genji because I carry hard as fuck with those and I realize in a lot of my games I can't rely on my team to get the same amount of kills as I would. Even though I can Tank my ass off I feel like if I can keep killing the other team off they can't recover and regroup.

I normally just fill whatever is needed, this season I'm going heavy offense.

to her bubbles, says he doesn't enjoy her much anymore. Luckily he's also a beast with Soldier so I hope he mains him this season.

I'm gonna play a lot of Winston and bring Zen back. Looking forward to a lot of 5 or 6 stacking this season with friends, even though the games will be harder. Much prefer to just play the game the right way and control everything.

I'm playing the season.

But remember:
If you're playing a round where the opposing team is moving the payload and they are less than 1 meter from winning you have to get your ass out and stop the payload form moving.

I see so many people with a sniper or a character who can only take low damage stay away from the payload and shoot at people - that doesn't work unless the opposing team are all down to 1% health.

Ducking in/out of a door from 20 meters away isn't going to stop the payload.

Hmm. Next Tuesday I guess?

I don't even remember the last time she got an upgrade.

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

How's everyone doing this season? The matchmaking in comp seems to be a hell of a lot better than last season.

Had some aggressively toxic players on my placement matches and ended with 50%. So I'm like 1500.

The play is fun though - except when the other team has 2 people at 300+ and everyone else on both teams are in the low 100s.

I did buy a headset but have not chatted yet.

I'd be up for some OKP games at some point.

Overwatch Name: RockRock

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Wv2Bkh2hJk

We had point at like 98%. The other team at 99% and we were contesting. We were JUST ABOUT to take over the point.

We had killed almost all of the other team like 5 seconds ago ago and were their lone Mei . I play DVA so MEI melts me one on one.

MIE's almost down to no health and she does her ice block thing.

And my team TURNS AWAY!!!!!!

She's the only thing contesting point. When she wakes up and I do some damage to her with shots and bumping into her - but she freezes me, then puts a wall out in front of her at an angle that we can't get through, so we have to shoot it.

Well by then ALL her other team shows up and quickly slaughters us all.

I think one of the recent DVA nerfs added with a Pharah buff made killing Pharah with DVA much harder.

During an ultimate my defense matrix also doesn't kill Pharah as much.
Boosting into the sky and shooting her doesn't work as well anymore either.

And strategy to get her now with DVA? Or do I just have to switch to someone else?

But you shouldn't have to. Your Soilder 76s and McCrees should be taking her out or at least lowering her enough to keep her out of the sky for long periods of time. DVA should be on the ground mostly unless you boost to get to another position.

Get close enough to her to chip away. Try to scare her, poke at her a bit then get back into healing range. After that hopefully the rest of your team is smart enough to take her out.

If you have a Widow pray she's not trash (pray hard because most of them are useless)

even before the buff...if I saw a Dva...I could script how the Dva was going to attack me and just destroy em 9/10
I think now you have to blind side and kind of be stealth
most of the time I get killed by a Dva now...its usually getting blindsided while im engaged with someone else
but I don't care how good you are with Dva....if you come at me from the front....I will at the very least get you out the mech

>.if you come at
>me from the front....I will at the very least get you out the
>mech

Did they lower the amount of damage you get when you fire your own rockets near yourself now? Like if you stand next to a wall and fire a rocket and get damaged?

I have played this weekend and there were 4 round where not a SINGLE person in our group killed ANYONE in the other team - my self included. (And in the entire match with all rounds we had a team total of killing like 3 COMBINED.)

Our team(s) were fine - and the opposing teams were ranked almost exactly the same.

The teams on each match didn't seem any overlaps.

Did I just randomly play with some AWFUL people PLUS I became super awful?

Did the similarly matched teams just have 6 PRO players?

I get 1 round going like this - but it was like 10 rounds in 4 games of it. Seems improbable.

Or is there some new hack in the system people are exploiting?

and was pleasantly surprised or how good it is even though I've never played anything like TF in my life. I did okay with Roadhog but understand I need to switch if it ain't working or my team isn't working.

had some friends playing finally talked me into it

im a traditional fps guy so soldier works well for me, i like mcree too


still a noob though

I really dig her kit, has a little bit of everything

A shield she can throw that has HP, sort of like Rinehardt. An alt fire that sucks people into it sort of like a mini Zarya ult. She can fortify herself to take more damage for a short period.

Her ult places down a small totem that boost the damage of everyone within its line of site. Think a mercy damage boost that hits all players. This can be taken out so best to be protected or placed somewhere hard to get to.

Overall I really like her. Love how they took some characters abilities and put them on her. Since the game doesn't have loadouts its almost like they took the best things from a few other characters and placed them on here for a different feel.

I play with Roadhog and she's even harder to kill than Bastion once I grab her with the hook.

as long as my primary targets arent around (other solider, pharah etc..) I'll try to keep pressure on her

she seems to die fast to soldier and his gun works to keep constant pressure on her shield


then they always seem to hide behind the shield with their back to the wall, so i just hit the rocket on the wall behind them lol

I fell back in hard during Year of the Rooster. After the Sombra buffs and the addition of Orisa, I'm sorely, sorely tempted to fire it back up. But I'm like halfway through ME2, and I just got Andromeda in the mail yestreday..... fuuuuuuuuuuuck


(my current rationale for not unwrapping Andromeda is that I'm going to wait for the first major bugs/feature patch... not sure how long my resolve will last)

i really didnt think i was gonna like it but its very enjoyable

DVA main.

Gamertag: RockRock (Spelled like that, not the Ultravox! song title way.)

I just got a headset - if anyone wants to join up I'm down.

didnt do too well, won 4 out of 10


https://www.overbuff.com/players/pc/Potamus-1983

the cross promotion thing has got me, im playing heroes of the storm for those swanky skins

probably will play HOTS all 4 weeks to get the goodies

hollar if anyone needs a friend to play some rounds with

https://www.overbuff.com/players/pc/Tatsuno-1652

Took a break for a minute due to all the other games being out, came back full time like two weeks ago and haven't lost a step lol

https://www.overbuff.com/players/pc/rockrock-11116

Feel free to friend request.

the only uprising skins i dont have are mercy and genji, if i dont loot it ill probably buy the mercy



I'll add both you guys!

Pretty cool!

https://www.polygon.com/2017/5/11/15615146/overwatch-game-of-the-year-edition-anniversary-update

Seems that about 50% of the time I'm on a team that does not understand geometry at all.

Like the opposing team has an Anna set up to shoot at us from a long ways away and at a slight angle so she uses obstacles near us to give her cover when she shifts her position slightly.

This sort of computational geometry is completely lost on the team and it seems like they RUN into the bullets as fast as they can.

And they do it each time they respawn.

Also will have a Rhein with a shield and Hanzo or McCree will jump in front of the shield to try to shoot people and end up being killed by a barrage from all 6 of the other team who are trying to break Rhein's shield by all aiming at it.

or when i say SHIELD IS ABOUT TO GO DOWN

even though theyshould already be able to tell

and then they charge forward lol

Group needs a healer or tank? Why not go sniper?
If I'm Tanking and we need a healer? Pick a sniper because you're an asshole.

I told group we need a tank. The Hanzo said "You want a tank then you switch". I was the healer. So I switch now we have no heals. I proceed to not heal him the entire match.

Then you hear " I paid for the game I can play who I want". This is an objective based team game asshole. It's not CoD team death match where kills matter. Plus you can't snipe worth shit, missing every shot.

Look, I'm all for some picking Widow or Hanzo. Thing is if you notice you're not helping the team and you're being countered then you need to switch. Can't tell you how many times I see the point being contested and they just sit back and miss their shots instead of helping on the point. Mostly you'll see them both on each team. It's an instant lose like 90% of the time. I either dodge the game so it's not a waste of time or me and a buddy will instalock them both just so no one else can use them then switch once everyone is out of the spawn.

Sorry had to get that off my chest lol.

Looks like we get Doomfist announced sometime in June


good times

Secrets about...


Defense

https://youtu.be/dLRSsg-gkVw

Tank

https://youtu.be/kzbNZCISJVU

Support

https://youtu.be/huS4_V4e3h0



Event info...


https://www.reddit.com/r/Overwatch/comments/6cmxxv/overwatch_anniversary_event_time_revealed/




Other info


https://gamerant.com/overwatch-new-event-year-2/


Theres a bunch of videos of skins and emotes and junk on their twitter

https://twitter.com/PlayOverwatch

But good lord they know what they're doing with this loot box system. You pray you get what you want by leveling up (you'll get duplicates) and then you break down and play the lottery by buying them. Blizzard knows they're getting that money through the gamble since you can't buy the skins you want outright with real money.

I've become a Soldier 76 God. I can shove my helix rocket up a healers ass like you wouldn't believe. Had a Mercy yell at me the other day because I focused her down non stop.

The McCree changes with his recoil compensation makes me even better with him. Not sure if they did this on consoles too but it makes the recoil so much smoother now. One of the better feeling revolvers in a video game.

But, credit to them, this is how you monetize a game. Make it cheap up front, all future gameplay updates for free then let people gamble for shiny objects.

I bought some crates when the game first came out but not for any events since... I'm really, really, really tempted to jump in for the anniversary boxes. I *NEED* that Sombra dance emote but I don't want to use credits on it because skins are rarer. And Genji stays having the best overall skins but holy shit Tracer has the best new one.

to where the skins are kinda fun to look at

ill drop 10-15 during an event to buy some loot boxes at the end

https://youtu.be/7XEneyfgCp8

graphically it looks cool


thematically i feel like i should be offended

i feel like its doing way too much

As said earlier in this post, understanding the nuances of this game isn't very apparent early on. I've been playing (on the PC) more in the past week and I get it now. This game is dope! I mostly play with Junkrat, DVA, Rocket girl and "freeze everybody" girl (Sorry, haven't memorized all the names yet). If anybody is on the PC and wants to get it in, hit me up. steely is the name in the blizzard app.



http://www.twitter.com/steelysteel

Tatsuno#1652

If you have any questions just ask. This is pretty much the only shooter I play now and its one that I'll stick with for a long time. I absolutely love this game and despite its art style and characters its a very deep game when you get competitive.

A lot of people play mystery heroes which is fine when trying to get used to different characters play style. My best advice is to only do that for a few hours. After that I recommend quick play. Know that every team SHOULD have a Tank and a Healer. If your team doesn't have at least one of these your chance of success gets drastically low unless you play a completely brainless team. Later on when your get in higher levels you could run with anywhere up to 2 to 3 tanks, or maybe even 2 healers.

Pick a character you like and get really good with them. You want to be godly with at least one character. Sometimes you're not going to be able to pick them because someone else did or the other team picked your counter. Be great with two characters from each category. I'm a God with Zarya and Solider 76. I'm pretty damn good with a few others.

If you need health ALWAYS go to your healers. I never want mine to risk their life for me, and I wont charge in to heal someone that pushed too far and run the risk of me dying and not being able to heal the rest of the team. Good comps now will run a Lucio with a Mercy, Zen, or Ana to pocket heal when needed. Positioning is everything in this game. If you aren't Genji, Tracer, or a quick thinking 76 then stay behind your Tanks until the other team breaks their position. Tanks are big for a reason and that's to take the hits so you don't have to.

Welcome to Overwatch!

If you're smart you'll leave it alone the first day. Imagine everyone showing up for football tryouts on the first day. Some really shitty folks that may drag you down. I'd wait until Friday honestly so most of the crappy folks are done their placement matches are so far down in bronze that you might not get matched with them.

And for the love of god do not do your placement matches on the weekend. Might as well give yourself silver and be done with it.

The perfect day would be the following Monday if you want less trolls and more people serious about the game.

Copy and paste this advice for all upcoming seasons.

We started on defense and we got RAILROADED but held the second point for like 8 minutes.

The other team was good, but I had DVA ult and my team rushed the point together.

I'd have gotten 3 kills and 7 turrets on my own, but with coordination I got a quad kill and then 1 more kill during the POTG.

Here it be: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ey9HtQWWlso

Did very well in 7 of the 10 games - several more quad kills :)

The game we lost was 28 minutes long, went to 5 rounds, and we lost 99% to 100%.

Ended up at 1510 SR, which seems low - but probably using last seasons score as a baseline.

I wonder where I'd place with a new account and the same performance?

You'd be in high gold or low plat, maybe even higher.

They use your MMR and SR from the last season you played competitive and base it around there. It takes account in your winning and also your personal performance. You play 76 and constantly get golds with him then your SR will raise because they trust your ability with that character.

There was a video i couldn't find earlier of a guy who won all ten placements and it got him a rank of around 1700. I'm guessing was around that rank the last season he played and it still kept him there, possibly a bronze.

New account winning all games or losing just one will be placed really high due to it not being able to judge you because that account has never played ranked before. The system will place you high due to your placements and hidden quick play MMR and feels that if you deserve to be there you'll stay and if not you'll tank down to where you actually belong.

I still don't know how I really feel about this system, you technically can be punished by being on troll teams, which is why my recommendation is to pick someone you're a beast with and spam them.

>I still don't know how I really feel about this system, you technically can be punished by being on troll teams, which is why my recommendation is to pick someone you're a beast with and spam them.

Is started playing during second season and was worst than I am now, lost 4 of 10 placement and got set at 1900.

This time I AM much better, won 9 of 10 matches, did very well in all and got put it 1500.

Next free weekend I'm creating a new account and seeing where I get placed.

But 1500 seems really low to me.

You're not alone from what I understand a lot of people are going down from 200 to 400 than they were last season despite doing better.

Sometimes I do think they taint the system to do this because they know people will play more if they have to reach a goal they had last season. This is what kinda pisses me off about competitive anything. That's why it's good every now and then to skip a season. Far less frustrating taking a break.

So I went down even further into 1300 range - and the mixture of COMPLETE incompetence and stubbornness is amazing.

If the other team has more than 3 people who have any idea what they are doing I've been losing at a higher than 50% rate. (Compared to a 67% win rate for last season.)

This morning I was on a team that literally died before they could defend or capture the point. They never considered for a moment to group up or change strategy. Like running to it they could not avoid dying. And they'd never change their route or their character.

And we had a good Mercy. She ended up sticking with me (DVA) a lot because I was staying alive, and when I could find another player i'd provide shields and bumps to make sure they stayed a live for a bit.

So I got 4 gold metals, 20 kills, and lost a bunch of SR because as a team we could not accomplish the goal.

Something is different about this season.

I might actually be a 1300 player - but I've been on team where only members SHOULD be ranked at 300 - or maybe- just maybe - opposing team members should have been ranked 3000. (Seems like both at once right now.)

... and, apparently, an Arcade mode enabling it across all the maps.

https://youtu.be/PY3gN7v8Ehg?t=1m53s

Fuck yeah, I'm all in this season. Sombra's golden gun is gonna get some work in...

Seems gimmicky now - maybe they'll fix it.

Unreal tournament 2004 had map mods with it too and it slowed the game down more than anything.

Played the new map on the PTR yesterday. That patch has a crazy memory leak so folks might want to wait until they fix that problem.

New map is kinda just ok with me. I with the group of people that feel like this game didn't need another 2 capture point map but time will tell if it grows on me.

I don't even mind the new map being in the competitive rotation if that's what they're going to do out of the gate. I just feel like any part of that map that is low gravity should be turned off for that mode.

I play on PC... soulpro#1740

I'm an okay player (:P), but really enjoy running with folks on a team.

After my placement matches the normal season matches are really fucked.

I'm around 1500, whcih is a LOW silver.

I think I'm playing mixtures of folks who SHOULD be golds and silvers who should be LOW bronze.

Because there's times where the team composition is WILDLY WILDLY wrong - we'll be defending and they'll be no shield, and no healers, and 1 tank. It's Tracers + Genjis + McCrees.

The other team will come in with a more balanced comp - say a Rhein, a mercy and a soldier and we'll get our clock cleaned right away. I'll switch off to something I suck at that is needed - but not a single other person will change. Or if they do it's a bad change.

That says inexperience to me.

So if you get a team that is inexperienced vs. a team of experience gold people who lost SR because of placement then it's a BLOW OUT.

I think it'll settle in a few weeks - but this is bad right now.

Also - I can't prove it, but I think some of these matches actually have people who have not placed yet - is that possible?

You can have people who haven't completed placements in comp games with people who have completed them. Normally the folks still in placement are going to be playing with ranks where the system feels they should be at anyway.

Now if you're having teams where no one selects a healer or no one wants to be a tank then unfortunately you're having troll games. The game literally tells you what roles your team is missing. By now even the level 5s know you absolutely need a tank and healer. That's shit luck man and unfortunately in any competitive game it's going to happen in ranks like bronze and silver. People think they belong in Grand Master rank, get silver, and say fuck it and decide to throw games or just act ignorant and it only hurts the rest of the team who wants play the game.

Systems like these work great if the user base 100% wants to cooperate. Unfortunately not much is in place to force them to act with some sense. I told a buddy of mine who placed in like 500 bronze last season I would either say fuck it and just play and not even care where you end up, or do another account. If you make another account and the same thing happens then you wasted the money for nothing.

I think this is happening because:
New players are being placed above where they should
and
Old players are being placed below where they should .

I think this is leading to a mixture of troll teams (maybe they just don't understand what's happening) playing teams who have their shit together more.

Things like people not getting on the payload to move it faster - over extending crazily, and not standing near the payload to stop it.

As a DVA main i'm pretty much dead if I don't have a few people around me shooting at people.

50% of the time the match goes as expected.

50% one team DOMINATES HARD. I'm rarely on that team.

I was on a team last night that could NOT get past the choke on Eichenwalde.

As a DVA main I can block projectiles and give DPS or just people with weapons that fire a long distance - cover to duck in out - or to help set up speedy charters to get behind choke and help from there. And when we push I can shield or bump the enemy out of position.

Well NONE of that happens - NONE. We got 2 snipers, both who don't setup on high ground and just keep walking into death. I swap to Zen after a while think a discord to help others kill the people easier- it's just the team is not pushing the point - they are ducking in/out door ways even when we kill enemies so we never have a numbers advantage.

Then chat starts with "Hey, I got a GOLD so I'm not switching.' I look and they have a Gold with 1 elimination. 1.

Pathetic. I switch back to DVA and flank and get on point like 5 times - each time drawing half of the enemy team to me - but for some reason my team NEVER - I mean NEVER EVER makes it past the choke. Like when the see the enemy run away they don't push in - they immediately instead bring up their stats and see if they have more golds.

When we are on defense I see we have a Rhein (good), Symettra (can be good) - two snipers and a mercy. I stay DVA because I can provide shields - but shields for what? A single McCree? Attack Mercy? And two lame ass snipers who are in the center of the choke but back - so they can be easily shot at most angles? Plus SYM sets-up turrets where they are protected - her job is to get her first turrets killed immediately and then place new protected ones - it builds her ult much faster that way.

I predict we all die quickly and never make it back on point by the time they capture the 1/8th that they need. That's exactly what happens - plus I lot of people telling me I'm 'salty" and hey - you didn't kill 80 people so shut up. I'm like - that's not DVA's role - a DVA going 1v6 is dead against 99.9% of teams, and even 1v2 dead against most without support. I'm there for tanking.

Anyway - I lost a bunch of SR.

Next game with different people we win Watchpoint: Gibraltar with a good fight. As DVA I get a POTG where I kill 5 enemies - 2 with an ult, and 3 when back in mech. I can only do that because our DPS is using me for shields and we are attacking in groups of 2 or 3 - which is how you actually win. When the team attacks together you have a better chance of winning.

>When the
>team attacks together you have a better chance of winning.

This is Overwatch in a nutshell.

People love to trickle in one at a time and die to a 1 or 2v6 because the other team knows to stay together and assist each other. It's mind blowing but you'd be shocked at how much of the player base doesn't understand that letting your tanks go up front and follow in behind almost guarantees a win. You're taught early in video games that tanks go up front to take the damage, the dps stays behind them, and the healers are protected by everyone. Thinking you just got shit luck when it comes to teams.

Have you tried using dive comps? Me and a friend have been doing this recently and its been so successful its not even funny. It's nothing new but I expect more of it this season in competitive. You basically dive the points so hard the other team has no idea what to do. Lets you melt them pretty quick and keep a very aggressive charge. You need...

2 Tanks: Winston (a must), then either D.va or Zarya

2 DPS: Genji, Tracer (one of each or both) also if you pick just one of the two feel free to substitute with another good dps such as Solider 76 or Pharah.

2 Healers: Lucio (a must), Zen, or Mercy.

Rush to their point, Winston goes in with a heal or bubble on him, or both, rest of the team follows up. Everyone is pretty much too fast to hit. Winston focuses on healer and once they are melted you go ape shit on everyone else.

I've capped points so fast with this comp and it's been winning me games left and right. If your group is willing to do this there is no way you should be losing a ton of games.

Requires the other team to either play a dive comp themselves or else play some heroes that many ppl think are still troll picks (Torb, Junk, etc). Just saw a Your Overwatch video (best Overwatch youtubers around btw, everyone should check out their videos if you haven't already) about how Junkrat was being used by a pro team on ATTACK to help fend off the divers since he can't damage himself anymore.

The competitive system still has many flaws, but the balance of the game itself has never been better. Dive is pretty dominant, but it requires alot of skill and probably wouldn't be as dominant if more people were willing to experiment with unpredictable comps.

For one, I dig how so much different it feels from the other maps. Hanamura and Volskaya felt same-y in their structure: worthless area -> choke -> point -> worthless area -> choke -> point.

This one has so many ANGLES. Snipe spots, hallways, wide open areas, flank routes all create crazy ways to get targeted. Playing Pharah feels like a duck in a shooting gallery, and Hanzo/Widow/Ana should shine here.

I think the best way to defend the points is to fall back and let the attackers come, since there's no easy choke point to congregate around. If that's the case, Torb/Sym/Bastion will be a nightmare to deal with on console.

Either way though, I do appreciate that Blizz is improving their map design. Oasis is great in how it doesn't feel like other KOTH and I suspect this one will be received similarly as well.

I didn't mind the hook and shoot combo that would kill you. It taught you to play your positioning right when the other team had a Roadhog and if you got caught out there then that was your fault. Why does Hanzo get to shoot a bullshit scatter arrow at your feet and have it count as a head shot, at least Roadhogs hook takes skill.

So you can nerf him, but you won't nerf bullshit Sym with her no skill auto aim gun that sticks to you while she jumps up and down, and she also has one of the smallest hitboxes in the game? I don't even play Roadhog like that but that nerf was unnecessary. I suspect it was from a bunch of bad folks that didn't know how to position properly.

not lately, but that's because they got her so many times early on.

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

Obviously sniper classes need to have 1 shot capability to not be completely worthless, but to have a 600 hp hero with self heal in the game capable of that every 8 seconds seemed out of balance. The nerf is to force Hog players to stick with their team like a tank and hook enemies into the team for a group kill. Plus, Hog is more balanced against dive heroes now with the faster shots and extra round. He actually has a fighting chance against Tracer now if you happen to miss an extremely difficult hook.

I dunno if there's a reason to complain about Symm, she's not played much and if so everyone should know how to counter her now.

gonna have to hold off Comp for a bit until I at least know something about the map, lol.

I feel like defense should utilize the high ground on A but then probably just play the point on B. Pushing up a bit further on defense can be catastrophic if the other team has at least one flanker to get on the point, because the map seems HUGE and it takes awhile to run back if someone sneaks in. Unless someone on D stays behind and just guards the point (risky), the enemy's sombra or tracer could get a tick before anyone even deals with it.

Early impressions:

-He's gonna destroy in KOTH and 2 CP points that are surrounded by walls

-He'll be close to useless in payload maps with lots of high ground

-His mobility is pretty damn OP. Definitely the strongest asset of the hero. Can cover more ground than Winston in short bursts.

-I don't think his ult is all that great unless you catch people sleeping or combo it with Zarya or something else. If you're sharp with the audio and visual cues, you can pretty easily evade the big damage with the vast majority of heroes due to a full second landing delay. The damage in the outer fringes is pretty weak.

-It's interesting that his most powerful ability has the shortest cooldown

-Sombra counters him HARD. It's like hacking a Tracer only easier to do.

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

if i can rez five teammates individually in the time it would take the rez ult to charge, then i think this is fine. the new ult sounds fun, with the flight and the buffs. i haven't played in a hot minute, but Mercywatch might be back in effect.

player.

I still play lucio a bit, but tbh at this point I'm mostly only on him in mystery heroes when it switches me, and suddenly I can push the game bc I'm actually good with him.

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

also I just needed a change, I'd stopped playing for a few months and when I came back I just didn't dig lucio anymore. I'm basically a torb main all the time now, with symmetra and mercy as backups



www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

love it


i do mostly QP though

With this change and DVA's new rockets, there's a not-so-subtle shift to adding more DPS into the metagame. Is this a good thing? No idea. The idea of a more active Mercy is pretty sweet (and I dig the concept of a reusable res ability with a huge cooldown), but Valkyrie will also encourage people to go Rambo when they shouldn't be. I've never been a Mercy player and this won't change that, but I like that Blizz is willing to do daring changes alongside the incremental ones.

That said, I'm in the camp where they need to increase the hero release schedule and just focus on tanks and supports for a while. I'm primarily a flex player and I'm tired of playing tank because no one else wants to (although I'm REALLY looking forward to the Orisa projectile speed buff).

the only tank I'm any good with is orisa. I can't get the rhythm of reinhardt, I've had a little success with roadhog but I don't "get" him, I'm trash with d va and just useless with zarya.

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

Don't have stats, but there's a lot of complaining on the OW forums about the game being dominated by dps heroes and dive comps. Especially now that Doomfist is here, healers and tanks have just devolved into punching bags. Orisa kind of counters him, but is so bad against the rest of the roster that she's still a bad pick in most situations.
I mostly stick to quick play, where this issue always has been more pronounced, but I pretty much always have to choose between being the only tank or the only healer in a team full of dps, and I can't even really blame people for it, since Blizzard has been inundating the game with anti-tank and anti-heal and nobody wants to look on helplessly while the dps on both teams get to have their fun.

Reinhardt is currently the worst. You just stand there looking dumb with your shield, getting flanked on all sides by Tracers and ran over by a schoolbus with a Nigerian accent every four seconds.

Until they fix this mess.

A lot of the top Overwatch streamers have stopped playing also. This so called meta is shit now and so boring. You have 4 healers in this game. Mercy, Lucio, Zen, and Ana. Everyone wants to instalock DPS even if they're not good at the role because it looks cool. They nerfed Roadhog into the ground to the point he's one of the least picked heroes now.

As far as viable tanks you have D.va, Winston, and Zarya. All of them fit the dive comp meta. I can be a beastly Soldier 76, but I don't get to use him much because people lock in DPS the instant you get on the character select screen so its either pick another one and deny or team a tank or healer, or you pick a tank or healer to fill and watch the rest of your team do shit on DPS.

Really wish they'd add at least two more healers are exciting to play to encourage other people to do that role, we also need more tanks. DPS has to chill for awhile.

I'm always in the wrong place, and tbh I rarely see anyone else (it's happened, just not much) playing him well.

I really don't think roadhog has gotten too bad of a deal, I still see people choosing him (at least in pickup games) all the time.

but winston needs...something

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

it was always hard to find people willing to heal/tank

but now I'm tanking at least a third of the time (when I'd probably play support most of those) just because no one will, unless you chance into a decent d va.

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

BTW for Winston, a tactic that I found very useful is to get to high ground before a team fight, drop on the enemy's backline from there and use your jump to get out when you either score a kill or are about to die. If you use your jump to engage, you run the risk of getting killed before another jump is available. I only do that to catch stragglers or when I'm very confident my healers will be able to sustain me until I get out.

If you want to see great Winston plays, check out videos with Miro on YouTube. He's a Korean player with very good positioning and timing. Although his healers tend to be very good as well, so your mileage in pickup games may vary.

A Zen or Ana will help him big time since they can heal him from far away. The key to Winston is to dive in and attack their back line healers, put your shield up, then jump out and regain all your health. Wash, rinse, repeat.

The reason he's the key component in this bullshit ass dive meta is because when he jumps in you also have a Tracer and Genji going in with him as well, they shred the other teams healers. Put him with D.Va while she puts her Defense Matrix up the entire time (getting nerfed soon) now no one can hit Winston, Tracer, or Genji. Mercy and Lucio are great for this, but throw a competent Zen in there that can discord the squishes and they drop like flies. People are sick of this meta and the best way to counter it is to use damn near the same comp. He's really good now because of the team that surrounds him. Put him with a screwed up comp and if you're not a pro Winston you'll likely get tore up, more than likely by a Reaper who is a huge counter to him right now.

First big break I took from this game, I MIGHT come back full time once they fix this shit.

I still suck with d va although I'm like...functional with her

can't play zarya at all

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

Not too reliant on healers or dps being around, and pretty much everyone is scared of your hook. Genjis hitting 'deflect' as soon as you round the corner feels good.

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

Because of the people playing it.

It's gotten so toxic and stupid - so many quitters - so many teams where people instalock Hanzo/Genji/Anna/Widowmaker.

It's too toxic now.

50% of the games I play have a leaver. That's a shit ton of leavers.

Blizzard's too busy making tweets to fix the underlying problem - the community.

My strong suggestion is to immediately forfeit the game whenever any team member leaves by exiting game. Allow a 2 min reconnect for dropped completely - but game ends when someone quits - PERIOD.

It's total shit now. That comes with a game being popular enough. Throw in a competitive mode and throw in "e-sports" (big fucking lol) and this is what happens.

Know why PUBG is so good? Because people just play. There are leaderboards but no one really cares enough about it they're just there to have fun. I'm playing against other people but the mood is far more relaxed. If you're looking for a good multiplayer game to offset Overwatch being in a bad spot right now then I highly suggest PUBG.

and its been great


even just going solo in QP is such a nice change

and there were so many shitheads in there.


www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

It's still a great game despite everyone's complaints, but I'm definitely not as addicted as I once was. Nobody playing tank anymore is definitely one of the game's biggest issues. Also agree that it's the developers' fault with Rein and Orisa being sitting ducks and Zarya and Winston being hard to play/master. Roadhog isn't a real tank, never has been, so it leaves only DVa.

Honestly we can't complain too much though that dps gets their time to shine for awhile when the previous meta was triple tank and infinite healing. Perfect balance in a game like this will never be achieved, certain heroes and comps will have their day in the sun, gotta live with it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQ6CEjuif8I

If you haven't seen this guy's videos, watch them all immediately.

Right down to the dolphin sounds

was my first win


heres some fun stuff from that round


https://www.twitch.tv/videos/171169021

where a top team wrecked with Bastion as a surprise pick. Really great video showing a lot of the subtle dynamics of top level play:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hCmx4mRrwOI&feature=youtu.be

are exactly what we were talking about re: Twitch and being able to see what's going on.

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

She seems incredibly easy to use on a mechanical level, obviously team coordination to get the most value out of her will be the tricky part.

Ana is in a really, really, tough spot right now. Damage buff back to 70 is cool, but man it's gonna be even harder to justify picking her now. Bummer since she's still the most fun support to play, like by far imo.

its kinda ridiculous

I'm not touching this garbage again until they make major changes like role queue or removing performance based SR. Solo queue is such a fucking random, depressing waste of time.

Luckily I still like QP and arcade.

I bought a new copy Overwach when it was 50% off, got up to level 25 using DVA only in the last few weeks.

Finished the season 8 placement today and my SR is now: 2539

My "normal account" never crested above 1900 no matter what I did.I averaged around 1450 most days.

So I'll play with this one for a while and see if I sink back down, or - as some suspect - that climbing is nearly impossible with some characters in the lower levels.

Edit: Just played 1st real season game. We had a guy using the "n" word on our team against other team mates. Guess what: WE LOST!! So it's toxic at this level too.

FFA and QP and it so nice


the thing is im getting really good with lucio and would like to see how i do in comp but i dont like the other supports and people would expect me to do mercy most likely

id rather just do rein or lucio so i dont think that would work very well

Now that I'm placed more where I thought I should be it's the same problems : toxic people and people CLEARLY at much higher skill levels smurfit' in my level.

I guess THE ONLY way to make it good is to have a defined team and play only with them.

Because solo queuing is garbage :)

anything else

but then basically are you playing QP at that point hahah

the games are serious, which is a bonus, but everyone's so tied to the meta, while I just want to play torb (not on every map/situation/comp) but god forbid you pick any off-meta character.

plus everyone's so god damn tense
www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

That's why a lot of people just buy a new account. One season of trolls and ragers will ruin it for you. You can climb but it's hard as hell sometimes when you're decent and have to depend on 5 other people to not be assholes.

Comp is great if you have a six stack of people you know and can trust, anything else is like you're going to the casino.

I hate this fucking game.

I hate it because of the people playing it being assholes and not trying to remotely play the game like decent human beings.

I hate it because you'll pick Widow Maker, not get a single pick for your team, then refuse to switch to better assist your team in a TEAM game.

But I swear fo' God I'm so damn good at it, and then I hate myself because I can't let it go. Why am I getting gold damage consistently as healer? I don't have a true main because I can step up and fill any role. I just can't depend on anyone else on the team to do the same.

Curse this good and yet awful game.

"try harding" even though we dont care what anyone picks and are rolling with a lucio solo healing but still winning...


so with that said, if you ever want someone to play with hit me up

Potamus#1983 (if we are already friends shoot me a message!)

I'm Tatsuno on your friends list

couldnt recall your battlenet

ill give you a sho ut if i see you on!

I'm like 50/50, half the time I'll get a few people, half the time *nothing*

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

People are way better at avoiding her ult now - they scatter when they here the voice line.

So I get kills mainly in these situations:
1)Their team is grouped and does not want to scatter - like on a moving payload near a checkpoint.

2)When I can throw the ult from somewhere not visible to them - like over a building, or through a window or stairwell.

You basically only get kills when you THROW the ult into an area - almost none when simply running to a spot and detonating.

What it can be useful for is when your team momentum is not going well and you need to provide a way for your team to get their shit together - or to try to hold the point while your team runs to it.

I also think DVA is great for divign and having the enemy team focus you. That way your team mates can stand back and shoot into their group. But rarely does that happen - most of the time I'll dive as DVA and my team mate stare stupidly at the ground -or fall back for some stupid reason.

Monkey can do this too.

even when I haven't gotten kills I've had success in breaking up the enemy line w/ a d va ult.

and especially on offense, as a tank, I feel like it's my job to move the line forward, and diving in with her jets accomplishes that super well. unless it's against a very, very well coordinated team (like I played last night in a match) it's easy to get busy without getting killed right away

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

>I also think DVA is great for divign and having the enemy team
>focus you. That way your team mates can stand back and shoot
>into their group. But rarely does that happen - most of the
>time I'll dive as DVA and my team mate stare stupidly at the
>ground -or fall back for some stupid reason.
>
>Monkey can do this too.

Either your team will trickle in on the point thinking they can 1v6 the other team and you watch them drop one by one. Or you'll rush in with your ult as a tank, hit it, and watch them stand way back or run away scared to death to commit like its a no respawn game.

I'm watching the fucking meter be an inch away from us grabbing a notch on the final point and there are THREE PEOPLE standing next to but not on the point after I dived and cleared out all but one defender.

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

hollywood


we had just wiped their team


every single person on my team is on high ground not on the pay load, im standing there its barely moving ....


right as the other team starts trickling in and is able to contest

guy on my team is like "im covering the payload"

im like if it never makes it to the checkpoint...

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

If I need them off the payload or off the point its perfect time to launch it, even if you get no kills a successful capture is worth it. Unfortunately you have to rely on the rest of your team to see this and capitalize.

Zarya and D.Va combo is nasty.

If they have a shield tank what I like to do is rush in with the mech and land right on top of the tank then ult so they can't really block it unless they move, and when they do move the rest of their team will be on full panic mode.

took me 60 hours tho haha

I do better than I thought I would with torb

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

maps like hollywood and kings row and im very good on offense without environmentals

i have several wins on those maps as well!

to get a second free skin

https://www.reddit.com/r/Overwatch/comments/7pdcov/free_100_tokens_for_signing_up_for_owl_news/

Is OWL talk gonna be a thing? Is it a Sport or should it stay in High Tech? Because... I wanna rep the Valiant.

I've always been a TviQ fan but Soon and Envy are the shit.

And I'd rather rep a "smaller" team than one owned by the Kroenkes.

enjoyable

1)Let's say our team is absolutely STEAMROLLED in round one on defense - like we lose almost as quickly as possible - they ALL blame the lowest account.

Not that the other 5 suck too, it's one guy.

2)They think DVA can get stats on her own in a game where we are steamrolled.

DVA will have the worst stats if there are no supports or ops alive to work with her. DVA's hitbox is HUGE, and if all their Genjis and Ana's are being slaughtered then DVA will be too.

DVA can not be alone.

3)They don't try to break shields at this level still. Like we'll have an Orissa shield a turret and a mercy against us and they somehow think chasing people to the sides is a good idea. Break the shield or flanks.

The worse the team the more team chat is going on telling other people what to do. They never say "I'll change to X if you can back me up" just "You change!"

Also I think people are cheating.

communities outside the game that arent toxic (like discord)

or roll with a 6 stack of friends

It's a shame the game has gotten so toxic, it's also a shame that people generally don't give a fuck about even trying to win in competitive. We all know that you're not going to win every game. We all know that some days you're just going to be off. But to join competitive and refuse to switch or play some stupid ass comp that you know will get smoked easy is absurd. At that point you're wasting everyone one your team's time.

If you want to try to advance in this game my only recommendation would be to find at the very least two other people to play with so you can join games as a 3 stack (play your part, play your part).

Your group can try to carry your team if you have total idiots playing with you. I'd recommend if playing in a group that one person goes tank, the other heals, the other damage. That way you don't leave specific roles in the hands of someone that will mess it up. Solo Q is garbage now and they'll spend more time fighting with each other than playing the game.

Edit: and yes finding outside communities in the game works wonders. My discord used to be poppin when this game first came out and we always had a six stack of people to play with, that helped me enjoy the game so much more. If anyone is on PC and wants to group up let me know, I'm normally available after 6pm EST. I have one other dude that can always play if needed so they'll be at least 3 of us, more if you bring some friends.

grouping up id love to play


I have 100 + hours in lucio and 80 or so in rein


im also on in the evenint late at night so hit me up

its really the main reason i even play any more

i mix in QP with a few friends every now and again

I got lost in the back dungeon section on defense a couple times. This is yet another map with extremely long sight lines, so another good one for range heroes. Lots of high ground and flank routes to open up lots of different strategies.

cause i hate junkertown

https://discord.gg/HrGX8w

Good for a day if you don't catch it let me know I'll repost a new one. I try to play a bit every day.

Lost 8 of my 10 placement matches because it's filled with Lucio + Moira+ Ana + Widowmaker comps.

Anyone want to start a team? If we're not good at least we won't be morons :)

The only reason I still play this game is it gives me a reason to talk to my friends on discord while playing.

It's become one of the most toxic games I've ever played. Even if you disable chat which I did you still run into comps where everyone things they're a god tier sniper on maps where you'd be a fool to snipe on. I've had 99% to 0% on capture maps and people on my team purposely throw the game so their own team can't win.

I'm ready for another game to come out at this point lol.

AND NEVER EVER TOUCH THE POINT AT ALL

every time I'm looking at this motherfucker missing snipes on my deathcam

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

I'm looking at our Widow miss something standing still out in the open.

Then I'm watching the other teams widow maker headshot me while I'm playing Tracer and in the middle of a recall. Or headshot our Lucio while he's wall riding with a speed boost. Or headshot a Moria when she comes out of her little phase. WTF?

How about when its one person on their team that is on our point and they refuse to drop down to contest it?

Every quick play game has a Widowmaker, she's the highest pick percentage right now. That means she's almost in every game, yet these bastards can't hit anything with her. At this point the game needs a banning phase where each team can lock out a character.

when they take 30 shots to kill the enemy widow which has already sniped the rest of your team twice and didn't even notice they were being shot at.


www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

I think one reason her pick rate is so high is because she's one of the few true carry heroes in the game, so everyone has dreams and delusions of carrying themselves to diamond and above with her.

Another reason is alot of pros play her because they have world class aim, and idiot casual players think they can be as effective.

That being said, I welcome a widow pick on my team if the other team has a good pharah, granted they actually aim for the pharah and kill her occasionally. Sometimes it's better for one person on your team to go widow instead of one or two people going soldier/mccree and still not hitting her.

completely lame. This better mean BIG changes ready for season 10.

my main (Pharah) has been out of the meta for awhile
started playing with Ana...then Bridgette made her obsolete
started playing Orisa....and mostly have to solo tank (which is infuriating)

hovered around high gold low plat and im just stuck there
every 10 games is good comp and people communicating on mic

straw that broke the camels back
got looped into a 4 stack game who were just throwing
IN COMPETITIVE
3 STRAIGHT GAMES

HAD 4 GOLDS AND POTG IN THOSE 3 GAMES AND LOST ALL OF EM

shit is a wasteland of 13 year olds kids fucking around

need a new game

>shit is a wasteland of 13 year olds kids fucking around
>
>need a new game

Getting cursed at by a 3 stack all of which sounds like their balls are nowhere near close to dropping.

They always have these sales on the game during a free weekend, it makes it so people that have been banned will just buy another copy to fuck around with. Why would you purposely try to lose while playing competitive and screw your team over? Because people are assholes behind a computer screen, that's why. Same kids probably out here getting their ass beat every day at school and instead of confronting the bully they take their anger out at randoms so they can't get touched.

Can you tell that shit gets on my nerves? Love the game, hate everyone playing it.

without punishing it by matching you with higher skill opponents, alot of this could be improved.

Every game -- EVERY game has a Moria and a Lucio. EVERY GAME.

And each game without 2 dps is a loss. ALWAYS.

They pick Junkrat to solo dive against a team with an Orissa, a Monkey, and a Sym.

Then they talk about it one voice chat - like "someone change to a tank!!"

Tanks don't destroy shields, DPS does.

Also these idiots don't leave the door together, some are 10 seconds behind getting to pint - at which point we've lost a pick

All of it, but mainly still a severe lacks of dps killing folks.

she's been mixing up training and quick play lately, I think she'll enjoy the new modes coming out next week.

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/242236502

www.engadgethd.com - the other stuff i'm looking at

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ptSP9MeOVyU

Activision Blizzard cuts hundreds of jobs despite ‘record revenue’ year

800 affected amid company-wide restructuring

https://www.polygon.com/2019/2/12/18222096/blizzard-layoffs-february-2019#503091331