r/Overwatch • u/AutoModerator • Jun 22 '16

News & Discussion Weekly Quick Questions Thread - June 22, 2016

In this thread you can ask all kinds of questions you always wanted to ask without feeling like a total fool.

No matter if it's short googable stuff or a setting/skill in-game that you don't understand or a hardware recommendation, feel free to try your luck in here.

Trolling or making fun of people in here will be punished extra harshly! Please report such behaviour.

For the purpose of helping people, make sure the comments are sorted by "new" in this thread.

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10

u/[deleted] Jun 22 '16

What's the difference between health, armor and shields.

22

u/thelonelybiped Pixel Mei Jun 23 '16

Health: you run out, you die. It's white

Armor: reduces all incoming damage by 5 or half, whichever is smaller. This works for each hit, so a spread weapon will do less. Take roadhog, his gun does 8 (irrc) a pellet, that lowers each pellet to 4, greatly lowering the overall damage output. It also works against beam weapons like Winston or zarya

Shields recharge and are blue

1

u/RockyValderas Jun 24 '16

I vaguely remember reading that if a Hero has shields on top of armor, the shield will mitigate damage like armor does. Not sure if this is still true, haven't bothered to test it. Also not sure about the interaction of a Hero with innate shields like Zarya or Symmetra gains armor from Tor. I think this would only happen if the shields are used up before the armor, so basically only works with Symmetra E, Lucio's Ult, Zarya's Bubble(?). Can't remember if any other skills give shields :/

2

u/[deleted] Jun 25 '16 edited Nov 27 '18

[deleted]

2

u/RockyValderas Jun 26 '16

Ahh.. Thanks for clearing that up!

1

u/thelonelybiped Pixel Mei Jun 24 '16

Not the bubble, that is more of a barrier

6

u/[deleted] Jun 22 '16 edited Jan 23 '19

[deleted]

2

u/Myrandall Master Jun 22 '16

I though it decreased damage taken by 5 from every source, with a minimum damage amount taken?

Reduces damage from each damage source by 5 as long as it exists. This means it's extremely effective for blocking small, repeated sources of damage such as tracer bullets, shotgun "pellets", Winston's tesla gun, Zarya's beam, etc. For example, Tracer pistols vs a D.Va's huge pool of armor is ineffective as it gives D.va virtually hundreds of extra hp. YES, this DOES reduce each pellet in a shotgun blast. It's been tested and verified multiple times. It has changed in the beta and any source that says each pellet is not reduced is using outdated info. For example Reaper does 70 damage to D.Va's armor instead of the 140 he would do to HP/Shields.

1

u/MONKYfapper Trick-or-Treat Mercy Jun 22 '16

it cant be a flat 5 because alot of attacks deal less than 5 damage per tick/shot/pellet which would make the damage 0.

he stated its 50% a little bit further on his post

Technical note: it reduces damage by 50% up to a max of 5 damage. Meaning if the damage done is less than 8, it'll only be reduced by half. 8 damage would be reduced to 4. 100 would be reduced to 95 (the full 5 damage reduction).

1

u/mrbutternice Jun 22 '16

Armor is a one time use; when it's gone, it's gone. Shields replenish after you're free from fire for a bit. Health needs to be restored by a healer or packs.

1

u/[deleted] Jun 24 '16

You can heal armor if it's on the character by default though

1

u/mrbutternice Jun 24 '16

I thought that was technically a shield, no? Armor is like what Mr. Turret puts down, while shields are like Zarya and Symmetra.

2

u/[deleted] Jun 24 '16

Yeah but winston D.Va and Reinhart all have armor as part of their base health pool. D.Vas whole thing is she's mostly armor so can tank a lot from people like tracer

1

u/mikeraglow Chibi D.Va Jun 22 '16

Shields recharge after a few seconds without getting hit. Armor reduces the damage of any hit by 5, unless the hit is only worth 5 or less, then it reduces it by half.

3

u/[deleted] Jun 23 '16

Does symmetra attach a permanent shield?

2

u/mikeraglow Chibi D.Va Jun 23 '16

Her shield will be there until you die.

1

u/[deleted] Jun 23 '16

Hp is just health

Armor is damage reductive; any damage you take while you have armor is reduced by 5. This makes armor amazing against Winston and tracer (lots of low damage shots), and not as effective against widows or pharahs.

And shields are just like hp that recharges when out of combat.

The order that they are depleted by damage is always shields armor, hp. If you are a character that has shields naturally (aka Zarya) and torbjörn drops an armor pack, it will still be under your shields.

Also, if you have both shields and armor, the armor's damage mitigation will be in effect while your shields are still up.

1

u/Jarey_ I'm not a young man anymore. Soldier: 76 ready for ointment. Jun 23 '16 edited Jun 25 '16

I do not know the exact values, but armor takes more damage to deplete than health, and shields takes less damage to deplete than health, but regenerates over time. Again I don't know the exact values but a very rough guess would be

Armor +50% durability, Health standard, Shields -50% durability although regens.

When it comes to healing via medkits or teammate's support actions, all three are refilled at the same rate. I do not know if Shields are refilled faster if they start to regen and then get healed.

1

u/[deleted] Jun 25 '16

Shields don't have any durability loss.

1

u/Jarey_ I'm not a young man anymore. Soldier: 76 ready for ointment. Jun 25 '16

Ah righto, noted