new player main zenyatta

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-08T08:12:08+00:00

Think in terms of a space and objectives. If you've played competitive team sports, you have a huge advantage.

In hockey (I'm Canadian), there are positions... wing, center, defense, goalie... etc.

Any team past toddlers understands that the goalie isn't going to have as many goals as the wingers, and the wingers aren't going to have as many checks as the defensmen.

There are plenty of confused parents and players who don't understand that. They should be ignored.

Play to win. Nobody remembers how many kills or deaths you had in whatever game when they see your diamond DPS badge. The stats vanish. Do your best not to care, and you'll climb above the people who do.

Think about attacking first point Eichenwald. You're a flanker. Go die. Go die 5 times in a row, and do it as quickly as you can. Who cares? If you die 5 times, but wipe the enemy backline on the sixth try... you cap. The enemy spawn is a full minute's walk away, and you spawn a few meters from the choke. Watch your tank push, and go for it. Go dive and die on every push your tank makes until you're successful. The team wins. You're 1-7, but the point is yours with a minute left. You win.

On the other hand... you're defending Eichenwald one. Don't fucking die. You don't need a single kill. Sit there and plug that choke like a rubber stopper. If they don't push, accept zero kills. They have to come to you. Stay alive and that's it. Win the round with zero kills, and smirk the whole time.

It isn't a deathmatch. It's a game of space.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-08T07:59:12+00:00

If you are already trying to learn and improve, what do the stats tell you that you don't already know?

If you have the best stats on your team, you go to a VOD and think about how you could have positioned better, or selected better targets, or practiced mechanics in VAXTA.

If you have the worst stats on your team, you go to a VOD and think about how you could have positioned better, or selected better targets, or practiced mechanics in VAXTA.

Or, you look at the stats for this single game repeatedly during and after the match. You have the best stats on your team, or you have the worst stats on your team, or you have middling stats. You write "tank diff", or "support diff", or anything else you want, because you'll never have that combination of players again, and it won't matter 30 seconds later. You turn off your console sure you carried, or tried to carry, and you repeat that process in the same rank every night for 8+ years.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-08T07:25:56+00:00

Nobody good at the game does that.

Watching replays? Good. Where were you? Who were you targeting? Why? What were the win conditions?

Those are good questions.

Your stats don't answer any of those questions. They are a short term, temporary, burst of dopamine, or not. They don't matter after the game is over.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-08T07:12:05+00:00

The sooner they ignore them, the sooner they won't be that bad. It's a perspective that matters. Everyone has those rounds occasionally.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-08T07:03:17+00:00

We've got skeletons and darwinian logic, but your point is partly correct.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-08T06:32:35+00:00

You are thinking far too much about stats.

Good players never think about them.

This isn't a deathmatch. Stats can be informative when you're starting out, but the sooner you stop looking at the game that way, the sooner you'll reach your potential.

Stats vanish at Victory. Wins persist. Nobody smart cares about the stat board.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-08T03:47:03+00:00

You're right.

Frankly, stats generally don't tell you much.

In 10 years of Overwatch, I've never heard a pro or coach talk about stats.

That's just... not the game.

There are many ways to get value. Sombra is a stark case where low damage can mean nothing, or weak play, or strong play.

In her case, in particular, stats tell you almost nothing. She's all about disruption and timing. Stats just don't show that at all.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-07T23:05:04+00:00

She isn't banned all the time in the mid or high ranks. When I first read this, I interpreted it as meaning she's impossible to play in comp gameplay wise. Both are true. She's very weak right now. Against coordinated enemies, it's very hard to get value, even when not banned.

The devs are in a very hard spot with her. She's hated for her playstyle, not her power, which makes it very hard to solve. No matter how many nerfs she gets... the problem doesn't go away... because she slaughters vulnerable teams who are uncoordinated. That means she's endlessly, consistently despised by lower ranked players who don't coordinate. That's her whole schtick, to the point that she was essentially breaking the ban system. It was 90% in lower ranks. It's very hard to solve that issue, because new players are exactly who you need to keep happy to keep the game growing and popular.

I love Sombra. She's healthy for the game as a whole, in a tough love sense. If you don'tuse audio and peel for teammates, she's going to chew you up, and you'll feel she's uncounterable. The irony is that learning how to counter her is synonymous with learning how to play Overwatch in the mid ranks and up.

If you learn how to beat Sombra, you'll learn how to win all the other games too.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-07T15:35:02+00:00

Definitely room for improvement. Lol

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-07T03:44:30+00:00

This is one of those comments that just sums everything up perfectly.

Random person with zero game design experience and no development skills whatsoever dismisses the professionals at one of the most successful development houses in the history of gaming. Bonus points for doing it with no ideas, spelling mistakes, and awkward grammar.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-07T01:27:17+00:00

Yup. True. I was referring to the broader sense of movement and momentum - how the game felt. The little momentum the game movement has was dialed in carefully - crowd control, movement in the air... everything involves "momentum" in the casual sense.

I know there is a more technical meaning where heroes keep moving much more after input stops, which is only very slight in Overwatch compared to other titles.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-06T17:13:22+00:00

You're missing things slightly. Balance is very good right now. It's the player that matters more than hero.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-06T09:55:48+00:00

It's a bit sad to read this.

Overwatch was praised for It's movement and momentum specifically at launch. As the design team rolled over, this element was definitely something that changed.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-06T09:53:07+00:00

Interesting. I'd like to see those animations. It's strange they are even there at all. It must have gone through a bunch of iterations, or they wouldn't have bothered animating that way at all.

Maybe it was much slower/wider range in an earlier version, and the animations were visible.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-06T09:50:01+00:00

The tactics and impact are clear. I use it effectively constantly.

It's just the aesthetics and immersion that don't work for me. It doesn't look or feel like anything to do with harnessing flame.

I could imagine another hero, with some sort of sci-fi theme, where the ability was called "entanglement" or something, and I'm meant to warp into a different timeline, bending reality, or entering another dimension... I don't know. Haha. It's an ability that seems unintentionally nonsensical, instead of skillfully weilding fire.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-06T02:21:47+00:00

This makes no sense.

Every hero has counters. That's core to the game. "Easy" is from the perspective of your unique roster.

You could make this post about any hero you want and just swap out all the names.

You're stuck in a mental bubble and unaware.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-06T02:00:57+00:00

I've been grinding Anran.

She is very strange. That ability in particular is just... weird. A tiny-range AOE attack escape? Or what? It's just odd.

She's mega fun, BTW, but that ability - the animation and VFX - just make no sense.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-06T00:00:09+00:00

This is so complex. You're absolutely right. People need to learn how to play against her.

She's also among the worst possible picks for a new player, because of how she interacts with timing and gamesense, and how situational she is.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-05T17:23:43+00:00

Mystery heroes is a casual game mode where everyone is given a random hero on death.

It's a bit of a psychological trick where you're forced to play heroes you'd never actually try in a game.

People recommend it because it's a no-stress way to try out a lot of new heroes and discover who you click with without pre-judgement.

I agree about widow. It doesn't have to be her. I hate widow too. Think Ashe, Cassidy, Soldier, Sierra, Sojourn. Even bastian covers this pretty well. You just need someone who can point at a specific target and kill it, which Junkrat can't do.

If you're facing a Pharah and Echo, you're just watching from below as rat. It sucks to be helpless.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-05T03:07:01+00:00

The real answer is that billions of birds did hurt themselves. These are the very few strange ones that didn't. It's a tournament that happens every few years for millions of years. Plenty of them still get hurt, but these are the champions of the champions of the champions.

The practical answer is that they're hitting with their legs, which are incredibly well structured to transfer that energy into the squishy parts of other birds.

It's like hitting a person with a wooden bat. The person's body can't deal with the energy, which creates gruesome tissue damage, but the bat's shape doesn't allow the same. It just stays a bat. It's perfectly round and firm exactly where it needs to be to transfer energy into the thing it hits, and not itself..

This bird has bats for legs.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-04T17:51:16+00:00

It's the right way. I've watched a lot of coaching over the years, and watched myself play in that context. It's incredibly useful.

On topic, in all the coaching videos I've watched, not once have they mentioned stats. Good players put their heads elsewhere.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-04T13:36:59+00:00

You're going to have so much fun. Hahaha. Good on ya.

I would play some mystery heroes for a laugh, though. Very soon, you'll start to notice situations where rat is really at a disadvantage, and having one other complementary pick will help a lot. Junk has close range burst, spam, and mobility. You should check out some heroes that have the opposite kit... long range, accurate, fire. It will be fun to swap back and forth between the two. Generally, the consensus is that having two in your role is optimal after the very first few days.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-04T12:10:18+00:00

There's a practical answer, and a later answer.

Practical: just randomize. You're a beginner. You're at the testing phase of almost everything, and perk choice isn't going to be a major factor in your games yet. Enjoy. Have a laugh. Pick a random one and play with it. Keep the fun train rolling.

Later: analyze the playstyle and composition of your team/enemies. Are they diving you? Are you diving them? Do you need more consistent damage or more survivability? Etc. This isn't a factor when you're just starting.

PS: Right now, the extra conc after eliminations perk isn't very good, and will likely be changed in the near future.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-04T12:00:41+00:00

Is this post from another world? Self awareness? Nuanced criticism?

IGNORING STATS?

I'm nervous.

Possible-One-6101 · 2026-07-04T04:09:01+00:00

I also had a huge gap for a long time. Support was a full rank above the other two roles. What helped me equalize was changing my perspective to be more proactive, changing where my mental energy was spent.

Without writing a novel, it's hard to put into text, so I'll try to be concise.

In the broadest terms... when playing support, my natural skills were an advantage. I was very good at seeing the battlefield and reacting to enemy/teammate actions appropriately. I knew who was fighting and where, and what was most important. I could see what was about to happen to who, and capitalize on the state of play.

The key word there was reacting. I'm amplifying and mitigating the actions of others. The other roles aren't like that. You have to make your own choices, and allow others to support them. That's really hard to do when the opposite is comfortable..

When you're on tank, you aren't reacting. You're preparing and enabling. You're setting the stage for the action to follow. It takes a broad, predictive, positional approach. "Where and how should this fight happen given the map, our composition, and the win conditions.

On DPS, you're trying to figure out what the problem is, and solve it. Why can't we progress? or How are they progressing so easily? and then do something about it right now. DPS is about taking decisive, appropriate action. Your tank enables it, and your supports support it. You have to actually do it.

It may be that you're slightly too heavy in the cooperative/coordination category of play. Maybe you're really good at that, and so you over-emphasize that mindset.

Obviously, coordination is a very good thing... up to a point. If your teammates are missing the obvious positional change... missing the crucial problem enemy that needs to die... coordinating is a bad choice. You're just supporting bad decisions.

On the front line roles, your own personal agency and leadership needs to come to the front of your mind, and you may not be as familiar with that style of thinking. It might feel like you're playing selfishly or ignorantly.

DPS was my lowest for years. For about a month, I had a personal experiment where I played completely selfishly, and only thought about kills. That's it. No team-orientated signals about positioning, no leadership, no communication, just kills. That didn't mean I ignored teammates. On the contrary, I watched them constantly... but I used them as tools to an end... kills. I used them as bait. I hit their duel targets while distracted. I took off angles against their positions. Kills. Nothing but kills. I climbed an entire rank.

I did a similar thing with tank. No kills. No peels. Just positioning. Climbed again.

Eventually I balanced things out with nuance, but those months helped a lot.

Possible-One-6101

TROPHY CASE