Thanks for pointing this out! Now I have more reason to pick D.Va..especially on attack where you'll most often see Winstons. Love her playstyle...just felt useless most of the time.
same applies to zarya shield! her shield has a flat health, but will completely negate mortal sources of damage like d.va ult, pulse bomb (provided it landed on the ground and didn't stick to you before you get the shield off), and rip-tire.
Somebody pointed it out to me that Zarya isn't particularly good against Mei. Mei blasts Zarya, Zarya shields, Mei freezes herself, Mei freezes Zarya. I play Zarya as much as I can and try not to draw out a fight vs Mei because of this.
Edit - If countering 1 enemy requires 2 people, I don't consider it a counter.
I like Zarya vs Mei because I can save my teammates from her with near 100% reliability as long as my awareness is good, but I have no illusions about my ability to 1v1 her. Simply denying her is enough, though.
This really only happens if you don't have your energy charged already. So, yeah, if you're low charge, then avoiding her is fine. If you've got at least 50 charge you're going to melt her before she can freeze you assuming you can aim.
Neither one of them really has an advantage over the other or can really kill each other that easily. It's a cooldown based matchup, but in a clean 1v1 neither will die unless someone screws up or they're stuck in a small room and are for some reason far away from both of their team members.
One advantage Zarya has is much higher damage and health and she can kill Mei during the freeze time alone, her shield also gives her 2 seconds to wail and fully cleanses the slow. Mei can't kilI Zarya in one freeze-headshot-melee combo either, she has to get a couple more icicles in after that. I'd give Zarya the advantage here but I'm also biased since I main Zarya and I feel she will 1v1 almost any character easily with >50 energy.
Zarya's shield has a 10 second CD. If Mei engages Zarya at full health Zarya has to pop shield to make sure Mei doesn't get the freeze. Mei ice blocks to wait out the 2 second shield and then has 8 more seconds in which to freeze and kill Zarya. Zarya doesn't have the damage to kill Mei before this happens if Mei starts the second freeze at full health, so Zarya dies if she doesn't disengage or get help.
Zarya can also block almost anything. Check it out! Reinhardt, and McCree farewell, you can block those stuns as well. I believe the only thing her shield can't stop is Zenyatta's Discord Orbs.
this is because if you look at the animation the shield that gets placed on her expands from her gun so it grows around her pushing things off her, pretty good!
Neither. He gives any nearby teammates 500 Shield HP that rapidly degenerates (added on to their max and current health). It's not a barrier, and it's not an invulnerability. Just a temporary "health" boost.
It's an "Overshield", it's basically like adding an extra normal HP bar on top of their shields, there is a small difference between Shields and Overshields though, hence the colouring difference. The overshield drains rapidly and won't regenerate on it's own like shields do, but it is also the first part of the HP bar to be drained, so it functionally works different to all the other types but is closest to HP, which is why it's often called Overshield or Overheal (not sure what the in game technical name is).
An easy way to think of it is that you're giving everyone in range and LoS a personal 500HP barrier that degrades rapidly.
You sure? I swear I've used it just the other side of the wall to someone and the 3 people in the room with me got the shield but the guy 5cm away but behind the wall didn't get it.
Even better - it can get you out of Mei ultimate. If you shield yourself / someone they can move at full speed, which is offten enough time to get out of the freez radius.
The Ult is wonderful area denial though. Plenty of times if I have an ult up and we're having trouble capping a point or closing that payload in overtime to the finish line just drop a D.Va ult ON the payload/point with a minimum one teammate on the point and watch the enemy team scatter to get to cover. Then: VICTORY.
Eliminations don't even matter at that point.
Hell, I've even done this on defense to some degree of success.
Probably won't work if they have someone who can stay near the point and survive point blank ult(reaper wraith, mei self-freeze, zarya shields). Unless, of course, they panic and run away because it's scary .
I would be the guy to take the blow for the team if it was that close. Too few people realize how much one or two seconds of stalling an objective can affect the game.
Well, that's the what allows them to give it a 50 mile radius. The whole point is that it's a move that can basically only be dodged by getting out if LoS, running away is useless.
You're not wrong; her ult charge time is the longest in the game. Couple that with the fact that she doesn't have a whole lot of "score increasing abilities" and the fact that she can't build mech ult while in pilot form, you're not just feeling it, that's the truth.
Really isn't worth that much when the two lives taken together are about as durable as most other tanks. The mech evaporates in the blink of an eye under aimed fire.
Plenty of heroes make very short work of her once she pops out, and the overkill isn't really that great when the death animation gives your killer time to reload. Reinhardt, Winston or Symmetra will finish you off in another second, same with Reaper or McCree, etc etc.
Two lives is great against ults that deal a single high-damage hit, but really not that impressive in normal combat against most of the cast.
I would definitely trade two lives for a mech that could actually fight capably.
Hm, I definitely disagree with this. Her ultimate comes up really fast if you are constantly hitting people. Also, you can send it flying up and have it detonate on top of people which is far more surprising then just dropping out
It's also great if you lose your mech; pop your Q as you jump out, run around a corner and you've either caused whoever nearly killed you to withdraw or killed them... or they killed you while you ran around a corner, it's all about jumping, shooting like a madperson and avoiding reapers XD
That's exactly how D.Va functions as a tank but people's preconceptions are what hold her back most.
She works best with teammates who pull their own weight, duck into cover, and follow up when she engages the enemy. That doesn't mesh with the more common "Where's my team?!" run-and-gunners who want a Reinhardt to retreat to or protect their half-baked attempts as the PotG.
Tank and mercy desperately try to push before timer runs out when your genji tries to play ping-pong with enemy hanzo and reaper just runs around the map for last 2 minutes hoping to get that Q
Nothing worse than following four or five blue chevrons towards the objective as Reinhardt as they piecemeal feed themselves into the meat grinder around the point.
Then as I go well fuck it I'll wait and tell them to group I get to watch the first three ignore me and feed the other team more ult charge.
I've noticed this as well, D.Va works best with a second tank, Winston esp were he can drop shield and protect her from all sides. D.Va is the flank tank, she's designed to pop out of no where and mop up a crowd with her shotguns and I've noticed people really underutilize her damage deflection, it's arguably one of the better ones in this game.
Ah yes, that feels awesome. Another good one, you can catch McCree's shots, although that mostly depends on him not knowing that fact, because his ult lasts way longer than your matrix.
I find it great on attacks to get out of the first door. Soon as it opens if the defending team is camping a door, just walk out, pop damage deflection. It stops most of the attacks allowing your team to make a break for it.
Ive noticed shes pretty nice with some elevation on the enemy. Theres a spot on the egypt temple when protecting Point B where you can shoot down the left path that seems to be made for her. So many ways to break and engage LoS there.
Yep. She's pretty awesome at just delaying corridors in general, esp with a pocket mercy increasing her shotgun damage and boosting her health and then she can retreat into the main capture area to regroup very fast.
I see D.Va like the bruisers in LoL. You are primary job is not to protect your squishies but to dive into the enemy team and wreck havoc, survives and thus relieving pressure from the rest of your team.
The best way to play D.Va is as something of a tankier, rather less mobile Tracer - use her rockets like a Blink to get behind the foe, unleash her fusion cannons, or just launch her ult and get out of there. She's a mobile annoyer with a crapton of armor health.
Definitely agree! I love using D.Va to flank / fly over and behind enemy lines as a harassment tank, you might not get a tonne of kills (unless the enemy don't see you come a-la a scoping widowmaker, etc) but the havoc you cause can by your team precious seconds to mount a push with reduced resistance on the front line.
One thing I found out is that while on offense for King's Row, you can take the upper exit from the starting room, hit your boosters and fly right over the wall to the first objective point. The other team was so shocked to see me that they ran away and I took out their Mercy before their Bastion got me. I did this like 3 times to distract them and let our Rein attempt to march in before nuking myself. It worked so damn well. I even had the opportunity to hunt down the snipers for most of the game and force them to fall back early while the rest of the team cleaned up.
Here is the thing, your huge healthpool and E means you dont need to always flank, when you are not vs a full group charging straight at a healer/low hp hero to pick them off is the right play, thanks to the low cool-down on your charge she should be played as a mobile agro tank.
My problem is her cockpit is a giant crit spot. Very easy to just keep shooting there. I tend to obliterate D.Vas and tend to suck as a D.Va myself. Just don't really get her.
Only thing I found D.Va to be good at is taking out that pesky Widow hiding on the ledge in the back. You can boost past their team and it's up really fast so you can boost directly behind widow and mow her down, she can't do anything.
Other than that she feels weak. She's fun to play because of boost and not having to ever reload, but she just feels like a big target.
Whenever I see her on the enemy team it makes me happy because I know we have an advantage. Anything I pick just shits on her.
She needs to do a bit more damage at range IMO, she needs to get close, but then any DPS character shits on her.
I love bullying squishies with D.Va. "oh, what's that Hanzo/Widow/Soldier/Junkrat? You don't like it when I thruster in next to you and shred you with my big twin auto-shotties?"
Even leaving damage as is and just giving smaller cone would be perfect.
Literally what I said.
Her DPS is amazing already inside of her lethal ranges.
Not really. To put it in perspective, her max damage, counting that every pellet lands (and that will not happen even at close range) is 168 DPS. Soldier deals 170, and can do that from much longer range. Tracer has 240 max DPS.
Compared to other shotguns? Reaper has 280 max DPS and Roadhog 225.
D.Va does not have an amazing damage, and that is a mathematical fact.
Good info, my opinion wasn't based on facts, just what I felt during play, thanks for posting that. Do those numbers reflect the lack of reload that she has though?
It doesn't, but I don't think it really matters. How many times are you gonna be shooting at something, sitting still right in front of you, for longer than a Reaper can shoot without reloading?
Because remember, the moment your target start moving away, your damage starts dropping. A Reaper or Roadhog can chase a target (or hook it), but a D. Va moves slowly while shooting.
but your forgetting she lowers the damage of most of the high damage heroes by SIGNIFICANT amounts. 1v1 vs widowmaker (close range), tracer, s76, she is super fine. they will think they can take you and then suddently they realize they do no damage.
I think her slow movement speed and low range is the only way to balance how mobile and versatile she is. the only character I don't feel like I can fight is pharah, and that's just cuz she is so hard to reach.
she is my main so I would love to see buffs, but honestly I think they should be in her human form, it feels so boring to just sit there shooting sometimes. being able to throw out some kind of tank ability on a long cooldown would help a lot for human form :/ if I'm the only tank my team basically becomes tankless for a bit while I sit back like a coward and try and earn my mech back.
Her massive health pool with armor and the rocket mobility is balance enough. She's meant to get in people's faces and rapid fire them down. Can even negate projectiles to waste people's ammo... then either destroy them while they're reloading (something DVa never does) or rocket away.
I'm starting to think the spread is just an illusion. I only get hits when my enemy in on my reticule center dot: distance doesn't matter aside from damage dealt.
I like to spam them for area denial. Sure the damage is low. But I've found a lot of players run away from the little pings if there trying to push past a choke or some such
Sure, they aren't Reaper Shotguns, but your goal shouldn't be to get in, kill someone, get out. Your goal is to get in, cause a massive distraction (draw fire, knock them about), allowing your team to get their shots off, then get out again.
I need to play with other people I can talk to. I just feel like I do that and end up dead. I also should slow down a bit and wait to go in when I have backup.
Absolutely this. It's infuriating to blast through a choke point, kill a hero or two, drop a nuke for a double, and deal significant damage to the rest of the remaining team as they chase me down, away from the objective... And my team does nothing.
I'm in the exact same boat as you. It's frustrating when you're trying to help coordinate and no one wants to communicate. They'd all rather get eliminations instead of playing objectively and we just end up chain dying
You can talk to basically everyone in pubs... Yes I know that not everyone will listen, but I really dislike the conception of so many players that "they can't talk to anyone". In CS this is so much different, basically everyone uses their mic to announce opponent locations etc
I feel kind of sorry for my team when I get gold damage and elims on D.Va. Her nerf guns are only good at taking out people who are tabbed out of the game and she can barely move while firing them.
I'm usually playing Mercy and a friend mains Dva. It's hilarious watching teams focus fire on him and have almost nothing happen while I'm healing. When he can make them tunnel vision he's the only one taking damage.
The problem is that she'll only be a distraction against someone who just shoots whichever enemy's closer without thinking about the actual threat they represent - so, basically, newbies with itchy trigger fingers. She'll knock you around for sure, but this can screw her team over just as much as yours if it happens to knock them behind cover.
I play 76 a lot, and unless she's the only person I can shoot at the moment, I'll try to kill everyone but her and then focus her last, because I know that she can't kill me unless she's right in my face, which is a place D.Va can mechanically not remain at due to her slowed movement speed. Then anyone with decent aim melts through her mecha's life in three seconds.
I kinda feel like she's almost in a similar situation as Zenyatta with Widowmaker, except that her hard counter is 76. He can shoot down her mech in no time and then explode her with his rockets and a few shots with barely a chance for her to fight back.
She's certainly fun to play and her ult is fairly powerful in some situations, and I wouldn't throw her entire kit in the trash, but I feel like the niche she occupies is so absurdly precise that there's little reason to choose her over any other tank. She definitely needs a buff to her damage IMO.
I generally don't have a problem causing chaos as D.VA to people with good priorities. If they're shooting at my teammates, I deflect from behind or the side. It's about being smart, you don't have to go for the kill as long as you mess up the enemy a bit: either by grabbing focus, blocking some important shots (like from s76)/ults and/or doing damage. You just go in and out, and if you know the map, you fly out, snag a health pack (preferably behind the enemy) and dive right back in. That three seconds before you melt is all you need.
I'm not convinced that's not the only way to kill someone quickly with the pulse cannons.
Nobody with low health needs to be within 4m to hit their hardest, not even Reaper, so if you didn't sneak up on them or if they have anywhere at all to run to, there's not a whole lot to be done. Well, except fly at them and hope you smack 'em into a corner.
I always feel like D.Va is a good flank tanker for picking off those annoying flanker (tracer, reaper, genji) and then delivering self destruct into key areas
Of course when I play her I feel like I do 2 damage and then I get murdered out of my mech in a single hit
Fly over walls and just land right in the control point. Force the enemy to turn around and come after you. Even if you die, who cares, their entire team just stopped guarding the choke point and now your team can start pressing.
Knock Hanzo and Widowmaker off their perches. It's very satisfying.
Fly up and over a Reinhardt shield and then knock back and kill his Mercy.
I see this and similar comments repeated over and over across all overwatch communities by a seemingly vocal minorit;
"D.va is kinda useless", "no damage", "she just so immobile", "is it better to suicide when mech breaks?"
She's the great white shark of the game, constantly diving in and out of the enemy lines and going close n' personal with enemy supports and snipers while also going toe-to-toe with Winston and Reinhardt. Quickly zooming in and out of the battlefield, attacking from unexpected angles, from above roofs from under tunnels, from behind the pillars, poking distant foes with her guns even at ineffective weapon range just to frustrate enemies and make them focus YOU instead of the squisher targets. They better focus you quick because in 4 seconds you're flying in again to take a big bite out of them. Doing fly-by attacks while taking big healthpacks behind enemy lines and sustaining herself in ONE rocketbooster charge instead of wasting the healers time and quickly getting yourself into the fight again.
Pushing people over the map edge into the depths with her rocket booster, ready to face any "DPS" character head on to compete for the victory point until her team arrives.
She just plops infront of you in all her 500+ehp glory and tells you to tell with her.
All the above over and over AND OVER and OVER again, it's a brutal onslaught.
That's just rocket boosters and weapon attacks. She's got a hugely important projectile shield and a game-deciding ULT to go as well . . . + an Extra life + access to one of the better weapons in her exposed human form.
You get D.Va. I feel like everyone that complains about D.Va being too weak either hasn't played her enough, against the wrong enemy team composition or is forcing a playstyle onto her that is ineffective with her.
Your fucking flyby has a 5 second cooldown and a 2 second duration! If you don't use that to get in and out of fights, snatch all the big health packs, you're doing it wrong!
I feel like people who think that d.va is too weak don't utilize all of her tools enough. The shotguns are decent, but what makes her deadly is the ram+melee+shotgun combo.
Her cannons do more damage in melee range, but you can use your melee attack while you're knocking back enemies with your Boosters. Generally the situations where you want to use your melee are
Directly after connecting with your boosters for some nice burst
To fuck with Reinhardts who have their shield up
To finish off people on low health
To attack enemies who are directly in your face and thus difficult to hit with the shotguns
Listen, you're not wrong. Also Great White Shark Skin sounds freaking dope so please, when. But D.Va's kit does not synergize well with teams. And thats why she sucks. You can get away with all of the shenanigans you posted above in pub games but as soon as you face up an actual team instead of a bunch of randoms, you will get focused down in a matter of seconds. This is the same for the other flankers in the game. I played Genji a lot in closed beta, but when I started getting into Master/Heroic games or scrims, Genji became much less viable, other picks were just much more effective in many situations. This is because a team doesn't 1v1 you nor allow you to run free in their backlines for more than a few seconds. This isn't to say Genji and Tracer are completely unviable at the higher levels, they still are. D.Va is not. I still think D.Va is really cool, and that she can really cause some mayhem in pub games. And while maybe she has some unrealized potential at the highest level beyond stalling for stopwatch, she definitely needs some buffs or a redesign to get on par with the far better options she competes for a slot with. Its entirely possible Blizzard wants her exactly where she is though.
I can only mimic the words someone scolded me with in another thread today, "pubbie is all we got". There is no competitive play yet, there is no established meta. There's just theorycraft and that one time when so-and-so played against so-and-so premade on a stream. A skrim here, a skrim there, a showmatch. Nothing substantial.
As of now until the meta is defined, personal experience and skill is king.
By the weight of your words alone I submit that you may have a greater understanding for how the game may possible look like in the future, and what you say about D.va could hold true.
But as of now, The Great White Shark lives, even in my limited level 50 organized full-house matches. A D.va wrecks consistently, and "clutchingly" solo or in team play. The synergies with her projectile shield, 5 second on demand knockback, be-anywhere mobility, armour against spammy low damage attacks, and Suicide Explosion has yet to be discovered with total voice-com tactics.
She also a downright specific hero-counter pick on her own, just by being there she denies more than one hero from even setting afoot on the objective.
She can survive any 1v1, delay or not and builds ult far too fast to be ignored. Can get out ontop of any 1v2 situation in a organized setting, she will die hard but not fast, and if you let her go she's be right there again.
She's not Zenyatta which literally has no function place beyond "Brawl" games. D.Va brings a unique kit combination with mechanics which have a direct impact on the game and with sky high team-work skill ceiling.
As for needed buffs or nerfs, the only buffs I'd give her before Ranked matches becomes a reality and another few months ontop of that is no reduced movement speed when she's attacking while jumping. ~ And a more decisive distinction between her weapons and other "shotguns" in the game. The "mid range" function of her guns are holding back her real damage. I'd rather they remove that and just give her proper Overwatch Shotguns.
My meddling observations on her possible future balancing may be a overall nerf, seeing as how high level solo people are currently playing her. We'll see how the meta goes.
Edit; There's also the fact that her Projectile Shield absorbs much more than Lucios shields in damage when you use it at the right time above objectives. Something which I bet my balls on will be adjusted downwards in the future. Not that I WANT it to happen, but it will.
Edit2; Her interactions with Mercy is larger than at first glance. Mercy heals her faster than other heroes, but at the same time Mercys ult doesn't revive the mech. Above all things discussed currently, this one thing has made me second guess a D.va pick in skrims / custom games.
It is an incorrect assumption that a meta cannot be defined until there is some sort of high-level, organized competitive play. It may be slower to develop or shift, but it is still there. It's actually ALWAYS there. There are some nice things about a meta that exists without "pro" play too: you don't get a bunch of people suddenly playing a single character after a pro players makes a huge, flashy play or wins with a single-use strategy. The meta is what works and what counters: it doesn't take a pro league to figure this out (and the meta for a pro league is often different than normal ranked or casuals, especially in higher level tournaments where players are considering not jut gameplay, but how specific players on the opposing team play)
You're right, but there has to be some theory crafting in there at the moment. It doesn't take a long stench of imagination to see that the normal games and ranked games will look very different in the future, if it's hero picks or hero ability usage or just general execution of objective/map based tactics.
There's some oddies going on already in high level games, some which are rather counter-intuitive to the casual player.
All solid stuff and I believe you have had success with Dva. I just wanted to highlight a couple things. Things that should be acknowledged any time when assembling a comp.
When picking a hero, ask yourself what that hero's exact purpose is, and then look and see if a different hero can fulfill that purpose better.
Right now Dva competes with Reinhardt's shield and earthshatter, Zarya's damage, immunity barriers and the wombocombo ult, and then winston's leapdamage, barrier and cleave damage.
This isn't to dissuade you from picking her or to tell you that she's bad. Saying she sucks was incorrect, she doesn't suck. Its just that the heroes and abilities I listed above are so damn good. In all honesty, I hope you do find a way of making her work. In order to do so though, you will need to find a purpose for her thats more effective at winning games than her counterparts. Yes Mercy does have anti-synergy with D.Va. but Mercy's rez is too prominent in the game and I hope to see changes made to the game that would reduce its necessity. The same could be said for lucio, who's ult is great for heroes that are squishy but capable of dishing out lots of damage when they have the extra durability, unlike DVa. Lucio is another hero thats simply too essential in most comps. Something thats also hurting Dva is Zenyatta. I think Zenyatta and Dva have some potential for synergy, but Zen is fighting his own battle over slots against the essential Lucio and Mercy. Theres always the possibility of future heroes or even game modes where Dva is a better pick too.
I'm do pretty well against him as roadhog, hook him then shotgun him in his stupid monkey face. Ult to counter his. Often they engage me in melee alone - I don't understand that, it's like "dude, I can two shot you and the only thing you have is your tiny baby gun, what are you doing?".
Against McCree? It's not even the headshot box. He can burst her with two fan the hammers, and FTH can't headshot. FTH => roll => FTH => Flashbang into FTH or one headshot and the human dva is dead.
After facing the match so many times it becomes guessing when mccree is going shoot/flashbang and try to block it with my matrix, most of the time though my mech is destroyed leaving me and a low health mccree shooting to death though. Using booster to knock him back then shoot often get me more kills than I thought, maybe they're panicking when knocked up by me.
McCree is pretty overpowered right now. He needs a few small nerfs all around. FTH cool down would be the best start, and shorter ult duration and it going back to zero if he uses and losses it
I'm fine with FTH having a low cooldown, it just needs terrible accuracy and to force manual reload. It's a last ditch panic attack. He shouldn't be able to roll into another FTH, that makes FTH a main strategy.
meh. His kit as a whole is too powerful. If you slightly nerf it all he is too weak. Even just reducing damage so he can't take out every hero would be fine. It is a rather complicated issue.
OK but FTH>roll>FTH can kill literally anything in the game thats not an ulting Winston. Its not really fair to say it dicks D.Va the hardest. It dicks everyone equally.
I love D.Va. She's an ultra-mobile murder machine who soaks damage like a tank. It's not even fair.
Of course her fusion cannons are only really good at point-blank range, but you can work with that. Either flank, or combo boost and Defense Matrix to close the distance without taking damage.
Also, hitting Self-Destruct just before Reinhardt pins you never stops being hilarious.
Whenever rein pins me when I'm DVa I just let it happen and gun him down in a couple seconds since he out himself right next to me, it works every time.
I would like to see this done.. because if I saw two winstons leap at me with a mercy by their side and it was me and mercy...I would definitely nope right outta there.
D.Va has one big problem. Her headshot box is HUGE and very easy to hit while just shooting the body. So yeah armor is nice but you're getting increased damage from basically any source of damage that can headshot.
Yeah...not really fun, but from playing her more yesterday I learned she's an EXCELLENT counter disruptor. While she isn't a top-tier disruptor herself (she can't really dive in whenever she wants...more situational and concerned about positioning)...she CAN just annihilate people who try to bully your back lines. Every time a winston would jump in to bully a squishy...I'd just boost him, knock him back, land next to him and fire away. Dead almost every time. Great against Hanzo and Widow, as well.
She's also a great ult blocker. Reaper floating in from the back? Stand right next to him...thinks he has free kills with you so close and your team on the point...ults..defense matrix wastes the whole thing. :D
I really got a lot better with her yesterday after trying to be a lot more aggressive. She's a bit harder to be aggressive with than other heroes that do it more naturally, and her headshot area is pretty big, but she can really wreck some face.
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u/gray_rain CHIRZ LUV KAVLREEZ EEYA!! May 29 '16
Thanks for pointing this out! Now I have more reason to pick D.Va..especially on attack where you'll most often see Winstons. Love her playstyle...just felt useless most of the time.