Character tier list by importance of aiming and mouse skill. This is a rough guide to who will be easier to play for the majority of players:

Bottom: Mercy, Reinhardt, Torbjorn, Symmetra
Low: Lucio, Winston, Bastion
Medium: Junkrat, Reaper, D.Va
High: Mei, Zenyatta, Roadhog, Zarya
Higher: Pharah, Hanzo, Tracer, Genji
All About Aim: Widowmaker, Soldier 76, McCree

What heroes to start with:

Which heroes to try first depends on the map. There's 3 situations. On 9 maps you can be either offense or defense. The other 3 maps (nepal, ilios, lijiang tower) are King of the Hill where it's a symmetric fight.

Defense: Try Torbjorn first because his turret aims by itself and he can be really strong for a new player. Build his turret towards the back where it'll fight once the enemy team comes in and attacks, but they won't be able to kill it easily from a distance. Putting it around a corner the enemy team will come through can work well. Then try Symmetra, Bastion and Junkrat who are also defensive specialists that you can be effective with quickly without amazing aim.

Offense: Try Winston on teams with another tank (it's too much pressure on you if you're a solo tank). More advanced characters to try later on are Zarya (with another tank) or Pharah.

King of the Hill: Try Winston then Reaper to shoot people at close range. Zarya works here too if you've gotten comfortable with her already.

Every map: Try Lucio and Mercy on teams with another healer (as solo healer it's too much pressure on you until you get used to playing them). Lucio is preferred on King of the Hill maps and Mercy on other maps, but both are fine. Roadhog is reasonably easy to use, but at first try to have another tank on the team so you aren't under the pressure of doing all the tanking alone.

Focus on learning a small number of characters. These are suggested characters to try out. Try them and see which ones you like more and less. Then pick some to focus on. Don't play them all. If you focus on a few characters you will be able to get good with them faster. 3-5 would be a good number of characters. Try to pick one character for each type of map so you always have someone good to use. Picking one character from each of the in-game labels (Offense, Defense, Support, Tank) would be reasonable, too. You could even start with only 1-2 characters if you're careful to pick flexible characters.

Starter tips:

Duplicate heroes can be a problem: don't use a third copy of any hero on your team. Never use two Symmetras. Don't use 2 snipers (hanzo and widow are both snipers). Initially, avoid doubles of any hero except Mercy, Lucio, Zenyatta, Winston, Roadhog, Torbjorn.

All teams need to have a healer and a tank. Symmetra is a "support" but not a healer. D.Va is not really a tank and cannot be your only tank. Having two tanks is recommended unless your tank is Reinhardt in which case one tank is fine (D.Va can count as one of your two tanks). Having two healers is generally recommended but they're the least popular so you'll frequently only have one. Zenyatta heals less than Mercy and Lucio, so Zenyatta doesn't work as well as a solo healer. Note that some characters can reduce the pressure on the healer(s), especially Soldier 76 and Symmetra, and also anyone with a self-heal ability.

Don't use Torbjorn, Symmetra, Bastion, or Junkrat on offense or king of the hill.

Don't use a sniper on king of the hill maps. Don't use snipers on offense at first. The way people start with snipers is you find a spot in back and then wait for someone to come in view for you to snipe, and that only works on defense. However, as you improve, both sniper characters can actually be pretty mobile and work on offense too.

If you want a high damage hero with good range, try Pharah. Her rockets do area of effect damage, so your aim doesn't have to be as exact as some of the other long range heroes. However she's harder to use effectively than the starter heroes I suggested above. If you play Pharah, don't fly around all the time. The majority of the time, Pharah should stay on the ground and play like a normal hero. Use your jetpack to fly at key moments when the enemy is under pressure. Flying generally makes it so the entire enemy team can shoot at you, so you will die fast if the enemies aren't already really busy in a brawl with the rest of your team.

Set your mouse sensitivity in controls before you play. You want to get a good setting and then get used to it. Each time you change it you have to relearn some of your mouse skill. Here's how to get started: spin your character's view around in a full circle. So put your crosshairs on something then move your mouse sideways so you spin until you see the crosshairs on the same thing again. You can measure the mouse movement distance for this and it's called inches/360. Set it so that it's around 80% of the width of your mouse pad. In regular gameplay you want to be able to spin around half way (180 degrees) to see behind you. This will make a 180 take a little less than half your mousepad so you can still do a 180 even if your mouse is a little off center. (If you have a small mousepad, you may also want to consider getting a larger one meant for gamers.) This will make your mouse slower than a lot of people are used to, but will improve your ability to aim.

Reinhardt is pretty easy to control, but he's very central to the team. Playing him puts pressure on you similar to being a solo tank even if you have another tank on the team. Wait to try Reinhardt until you have a reasonable understanding of what's going on in the game. And when you play Reinhardt please don't use your charge ability to leave your team behind and suicide into the enemy team.

Symmetra is bad when defending the last area of the map before you lose. At that point, your teleporter won't do much. Change heroes after a death when you're defending the last area. Also when playing Symmetra you need to focus on staying alive. Your big goal is to get a teleporter up before your first death.

With Roadhog, after you hook someone you should hold down left click to shoot them in the head as soon as possible, and then hit Quick Melee for an extra 30 damage immediately after shooting.

Soldier 76 has good range but doesn't do his best work in close up brawls. He does best on high ground near some cover, a bit towards the back. At longer ranges do burst fire with his gun (if you just hold it down constantly the bullets start scattering a lot and losing accuracy, but if you shoot around 4-5 shots at a time and then stop shooting for a moment then he can maintain great accuracy at long range). Soldier 76's bullets hit instantly with no travel time. He's a pretty difficult hero to use because his damage really depends on how well you aim.

Some people think McCree is a flanker who fights at short range. This is incorrect. McCree's gun has perfect accuracy and hits instantly at any range, so he's actually one of the best long range shooters. He's also good at close range duels too thanks to his flashbang. McCree is hard to play because really amazing aim makes a huge difference. If you do try him, please stay grouped with your team most of the time.

Zarya is best on offense for taking capture points or pushing the payload to the final end point. The reason is Graviton Surge is a great ultimate ability for getting a team wipe. On Hanamura, Volskaya and Anubis the offense can win the game by winning only two team fights. Two good Graviton Surges can win the game! Graviton Surge excels at winning a teamfight to make progress at the tough spots where you might otherwise get stuck.

The key to playing Winston is to hang back and then jump in when your team fights. Never jump in alone or you'll just die to their whole team. And don't hang out in the middle towards the front of your team. With your short range you won't accomplish much, and with your big size people will shoot you. Winston has to either commit hard to a fight (which needs to be at the same time your team fights) or else don't fight at all. Winston is either in or out. (After fighting for a while, if your team is losing or you're running out of health, then it's fine to use your jump ability to run away.)

Lucio's speed and healing auras don't stack if you have 2 lucios. If both lucios are alive in the same place, one should use healing and the other use speed.

Play extra defensively when you are Mercy and have resurrection ready. You can even stop healing sometimes to stay safe around a corner if a big fight is happening and you need to make sure you live long enough to resurrect everyone.

Lucio's Sound Barrier and Mercy's Resurrect both benefit a ton from your team grouping up. Talk to them! Use the 'Z' hotkey to announce your ultimate is ready and use the Group Up communication too.

If people on your team die, try to regroup in a safe, conservative position. Don't just run in and die once the fight turns against your team too much. While waiting around to regroup, use that time to talk to your team!

Don't flank when you're new. Just stay with your team. Flanking is an advanced tactic which will hurt your team if it isn't done right. Just make sure to pick heroes that are good in the team instead of flanking heroes (tracer, genji, reaper). The flanking heroes can play with their team more normally on the King of the Hill maps, but avoid them on offense and defense for your first 100 levels or longer.

If you're the only healer or tank, switching heroes can screw your team over. Either don't switch that game or, if you want to switch, type a chat message telling your team that you're switching and someone else needs to switch too in order to take over healing or tanking for you. If you switch heroes in a way that messes up your team setup without communicating with your team, you are screwing your team over.

Try not to switch heroes when your ultimate is at 75% or more charge. It's most efficient to switch after a death with your ultimate at 25% or less charge.

On characters with slower attacks like pharah and mccree, shoot each shot individually, don't hold down left click.

V is a bad default hotkey for Quick Melee. Change it to F (easier to reach) and/or a mouse button.

Put the Effects and Model Detail graphics settings to Low. This removes some clutter so it's easier to see what's going on. For the other settings, just make sure you get plenty of frame rate (if you ever drop under 70 fps that's pretty bad).

If you play Widowmaker, go to the controls settings for her specific character and set the zoom scoped sensitivity to exactly 0 (zero). In short that makes your mouse act normally so you don't have to learn two different ways of using your mouse.

Set your crosshair color to green so it's easier to see. I also recommend setting the Short Crosshair option for all characters. You should keep Bloom enabled initially to see how it works, but then disable it for everyone except Soldier 76. Bloom makes your crosshairs expand, in order to show when your character's gun is less accurate. (Some guns are less accurate after you shoot multiple times in a row).

If you're missing lots of shots, definitely stay away from the final two tiers of characters on the aiming difficulty list. And don't play Zenyatta either because if you aren't hitting many shots with him then he's clearly inferior to Lucio and Mercy.

Feel free to try any character if you want for a game or two and see how it goes.

With any character, if it's really not working, just switch to another character mid game. You can try them again another time with different allies and opponents.

Some of these tips won't apply to you if you've already got great aim from playing another shooter like Counterstrike or Team Fortress for many years. The game also changes if you have a group of 6 good players who know each other, plan out strategies in advance, specialize with specific heroes for their team, talk on voice chat, and work as an organized team.

internetrules:

We swapped off of zarya to Orissa even tho zarya had 75% ult charge on oasis 3rd point we also had nuke, blade, and barrage

We then lost the game

We managed to take first point with no main tank tho

And our reaper on first point convinced people to do dva zarya with no main tank.

Had a leaver in numbani right after we capped all 3 points with 4 min left, the enemy team managed to cap all 3 points but i JUST managed to get them into overtime so they couldn’t do another offence

curi:

how do u like mercy in solo queue?

internetrules:

We then capped first point numbani in 3 minutes, a lot of people were switching hero’s a lot so I was worried we weren’t gonna have ult

Haven’t done mercy yet

curi:

you keep switching!

internetrules:

Yes

How important is it to just play 1 character a bunch in a row?

curi:

it’s easier to make decisions if you have goals like to try mercy and see if you like her or not

then try some brig to compare

duo queue is not representative so u need to try them solo queue too

it’s also much better to learn a character initially if you play 80% or more that hero for 10-25 hrs

so you really get a solid idea of how to play them which you can remember

like that is what i had to do to get used to sombra’s gameplay stuff

it’s how i initially learned widow, tracer and ana too. i played mostly the one hero for a while.

once you know them better, it’s easier to swap around.

some heroes are easier to pick up than others, especially if they have similarities to heroes you already know, or you know a ton about the game. i’ve watched winston streams and played over 40 hours of dva, and understand a lot about the game, so i’ve been picking up winston easier/faster.

he’s also low mechanics and reasonably simple abilities

i picked up moira and orisa super fast cuz they fit stuff i already understood. but based on trying a few games, i’m trash at rein, hanzo and hog. those heroes don’t fit my existing knowledge that well.

my genji is trash too. i’ve watched lots of genji so that might be mostly mechanics

i’m good at supports. their style fits my pre-OW knowledge the best and i played ~125 hours of ana in comp.

you are bad at supports, so you can’t pick up mercy easily.

you understand tanks more. i think your rein knowleddge helped your winston a lot for knowing when you can jump in which is similar to when rein can charge in

so your winston was already doing half the things well very quickly (but you still don’t know some other winston stuff)

your orisa is more questionable b/c she’s more of a different style

u need to understand ranged positioning stuff for her, which actually makes her fit my skills more than yours in a way

make sense?

note: for the maps where rein is really bad (like sanctum and well), monkey is totally fine in terms of map layout. monkey handles the environmental kills stuff and highgrounds fine (2 rein weaknesses). monkey isn’t bad there like rein. orisa is only rly important if u wanna play spam wars (like how ppl usually play junkertown). it’s hard to play monkey vs orisa with low SR teams that pick random heroes and don’t coordinate a dive very well, especially on the really good orisa maps like junkertown. it can be done though. rein vs. orisa if u play long range spam is just super frustrating/stupid (ur way worse than her) tho. if u get rein vs orisa u have to play a corner and then go in hard like monkey, rather than do poke war.

for my heroes, tracer/sombra and widow/ana have good overlap (some similar aim stuff, like i was killing that pharah with my ana on sanctum b/c of my recent widow practice, even tho i didn’t practice ana, some positioning similiarity, and recall/translocate buttons are kinda similar to GTFO), and it gives me the ability to do long range or short range gameplay to fit the situation. winston/dva also have significant similarity (both being mobility tanks who can jump in/out on similar cd, can dive ppl and context highgrounds). my other hero, brig, is easy mechanics and i found her easy to play and so far i like her more than the other healers or offtanks and she’s really useful in terms of flexibility to make team comps work (cuz she can be 2nd or 3rd support, 2nd or 3rd tank).

i find sniping and mobility fun, and they also let you do stuff with limited teamwork so you aren’t bored and waiting for your team to stop feeding.

e.g. if team is stuck at choke, widow can still play the game some (it’s harder to snipe anyone if ur team doesn’t do anything, but u can still play). tracer and sombra can go in back and play by themselves.

those are the dps. dps have a high bar for how fun they have to be b/c dps are too popular. so if i’m gonna be dps, it has to be AWESOME or it’s not worth trying to get a dps slot.

my non-dps have less ability to do things by themselves but still some. the tanks can go in and out, can dive someone for a solo kill sometimes. ana can do some sniping, or just practice aim while healing your own team.

brig has things i don’t like: low range + low mobility. she can’t flank much (no mobility to get out). so in spam wars u r helpless and waiting. but i’m liking her ok so far and finding her ez+useful. i like that she can play mini reinhardt after ur maintank feeds – i find teams often need more tanking. she can save ppl some (her E is kinda like a zarya bubble mid combat, but it also heals them if they get out of being short, and u don’t have to worry about coordinating ppl actually taking dmg on purpose to charge u.) she has some self-healing. u can save ur team from flankers. i find it interesting with her to figure out how aggro i can play, like running up and whacking enemy tanks and getting away with it.

it’s kinda like reaper where what i found fun about him was figuring out when i can walk my slow ass character into the fight without everyone shooting and killing me.

but with the benefit of not being a dps slot.

i wouldn’t wanna play that all the time tho

brig and ana also have good ability to 1v1 ppl who flank u

unlike mercy

mercy just flies away, kinda helpless on her own. which is ok but a bit team reliant for me.

i like heros with the ability to outplay ppl

sniping and mobility both offer that. u outplay with snipers by getting a good sightline they didn’t expect (or a basic one if they are bad)

u outplay with mobility by showing up at places they don’t expect, chasing htem down when they thought they could get away, finding the best place to be and being able to get there to be rly effective, dodging stuff, etc

other heroes have some ways to outplay ppl but that’s how i see it. in general mobility enhances the ways u can outplay, e.g. by reducing the risk of flanking, opening up more of the map u can go to without dying

or like u can beat someone in a 1v1 to a healthpack with any hero. that outplay is available to everyone but it’s more available to mobility heroes.

the less mobility u have, the more u need to stay with ur team so u dont get caught far away and can’t get back

why aren’t you talking?

staying with team limits your options on what u can do in the game. makes u somewhat at the mercy of what they do, just following them around.

so u can see a good opportunity but u can’t take advantage of it cuz u have to play with team.

or u can see a danger, like a reaper who is gonna jump down and blossom everyone, but on some heroes u can’t fix that problem by yourself, all u can do is talk on voice and hope ppl listen

mercy for example can’t do much about a reaper ambush even if she sees it coming. all she can do is fly away personally (but if 3 other ppl die, it doesn’t even rly matter whether u died or not) and call it out

ana can sleep it. that’s big play potential where u aren’t helpless. brig can stun reaper ult, it’s actually sad how easy it is (sleep is great but hard, high skill). brig u just put up ur shield and u aren’t taking dmg from blossom and then u stun him and just lol. ur shield is 600 hp, it takes the entire 3 seconds of blossom to do 600 dmg.

internetrules:

I got called a “fucking retard who shouldn’t play comp” cuz I asked for a main tank

And cuz I essentially in voice chat

curi:

TT

internetrules:

Wasn’t*

I then told him that people like him were why I don’t join voice chat

But then I joined voice chat and fake apologized to him and then he was really calm and chill

And thankfull at the end of the match

curi:

i don’t like manipulating assholes and i don’t want to develop those skills

internetrules:

Why?

curi:

b/c it makes u part of that world and those bad ways of living and thinking about life

internetrules:

I have not really done/thought about it befor

How so?

curi:

cuz ur trying to understand their mindset and have it be intuitive to you

and ur interacting with it, trying to figure out what ideas will make sense to him, get different reactions from him

internetrules:

It seems useful if someone’s being mean to you to calm them down and be able to talk to them

curi:

ur letting him define reality and ur reacting to that and living in his world and trying to make that work

if someone makes u jump thru 50 hoops to calm them down, it’s bad to learn how to jump thru those hoops and do it, better to just ignore them.

you aren’t seeing all the hoops b/c they are normal in our culture, on TV, etc, but they are still there.

internetrules:

I only noticed the 1 hoop of fake apologizing

curi:

ppl are very picky about what calms them down and what gets them to flame you more

internetrules:

So it would be very different for different people?

curi:

they are picky about the words you say, the tone, how quickly you respond, body language and facial expressions irl, and whether everything you say before and after fits with the statement (if they detect any kinda inconsistency and catch u being fake in some way, things can go really bad)

it varies somewhat by person and the results can be a bit random (sometimes they are having a bad day and just want to yell at someone). but also there’s just lots of stuff that’s standard hoops

internetrules:

What’s wrong with letting them define reality? And living in their world trying to make it work?

curi:

their reality sux, it’s a world of misery, and also don’t u want ur own life with ur own ideas? why let them be in charge and adapt yourself to them? be ur own person.

this asshole held your game hostage. he said basically: he will be toxic and cause a loss unless you put on a show of pretending you were the problem (you apologized to him). he said he wasn’t willing to play and try seriously unless you obeyed some orders from him about making certain statements that publicly announce he’s better than you and higher social status than you. this is all very nasty and aggressive.

(the good news is they are frequently bluffing, and if u ignore them they just play somewhat badly instead of throwing on purpose.)

internetrules:

Can’t I be my own person while pretending they are right?

curi:

realistically, no.

it’s hard enough to be your own person if that’s all you do. it’s much, much harder if you have a dual life.

ppl mostly FAIL at being their own person. u have to take it seriously and really try or you will fail at it too

can’t just make compromises and half-assed effort and expect it to work out anyway

internetrules:

And so being your own person means thinking for your self? Instead of just being like “Elliot said X so I’m not gonna think about X and just agree with what Elliot said”

curi:

btw the books which explain these things are called Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead, both by Ayn Rand. but to understand them you have to think a lot about what you read and discuss it (realistically that means FI posts).

internetrules:

I feel like I agree with you and [someone's name] a lot without thinking about stuff on my own, or asking questions about stuff I’m not sure about

curi:

yes, thinking for yourself, making our own decisions, living according to your own ideas (e.g. that you didn’t do anything wrong in that OW game)

if society thinks u are wrong to do X, but u think ur right … it’s much harder if ur also lying to everyone that u agree with them that X is bad.

u gotta stand up for your values and make them a visible part of your life or they will not be much of your life.

this is easier for the ones society agrees with and harder for the unpopular ones

I feel like I agree with you and [someone's name] a lot without thinking about stuff on my own, or asking questions about stuff I’m not sure about

i know u don’t do enough to learn it yourself

the way to judge competing ideas is to

• figure out what the alternative ideas are

• figure out what the issue is (what are the ideas for)

• get all the ideas clear, so u know what they say

• criticize them, look for problems

in other words, judge ideas by how they do in argument. the ones that lose the argument are wrong. (why? cuz of the reasons the arguments said about why they are wrong. what’s wrong with them gets explained in the argument.)

doing all this thinking takes time/effort/etc. it can be fun.

internetrules:

I’m kinda tired right now so I’m finding it harder to think about these things, but I feel like I might be using that as an excuse to not think about them

curi:

did you sleep?

internetrules:

But I am actually tired I’ve been awake for like 20 hours or more

curi:

you can maybe tell if it was an excuse by whether you continue the discussion later

did u read msgs about overwatch heroes?

that is an easier topic

internetrules:

Which ones about hero’s? The one about which ones we play the most or a different one? An is it in this chat?

curi:

i wrote like 30 messages in chat and you didn’t respond

and i asked why you didn’t respond and you didn’t respond

right before the stuff about that toxic guy

internetrules:

Oh I did not read all of those messages but I thought I did

curi:

why did you think you did?

internetrules:

I think it made sense but Im not sure about how the playing 1 character a lot in a row is more helpful than playing 2 different kinds of characters an equal amount

curi:

b/c u get in the mindset of the one character

and remember things and build on it

u can think “i did X wrong. next game i will try to fix that”

if ur swapping all the time u have way more things to think about, so it’s way harder to learn. the other heroes are distractions

internetrules:

It makes sense to me that playing 1 character in a row a lot would better but I don’t know exactly why it makes sense

Ok those follow up messages make me realize why it makes sense

curi:

and when u get used to a hero enuf

u can do advanced stuff

u have to get the basics really solid – so u can do them without thinking much – and then u can refine some details and add extra stuff

if u play a hero enuf to get the basics good, it’s easier to go back to them later and still do fine. but when ur first learning the basics it’s hard to switch, it disrupts the process of creating habits

if ur trying to improve with a hero that u already know – add some new things to ur gameplay – then it also helps to play them a bunch in a row

but the amount of games can be shorter

like to first learn a hero to get the foundation, maybe u need 30 hours. but to add one little thing later, maybe you just play them for 12 games in a row (~3 hrs).

it’s easier to learn heroes u can pick every game

rather than the situational ones

i talked about why i like particular heroes and think they’re fun and stuff

do you have any thoughts about that or any ideas about why you like heroes?

internetrules:

A reason I like genji is cuz blade is fun and I have to be very careful about who I dive, how I dive them, and when.

curi:

ya genji gets to press lots of buttons and each button is a decision about what to do, and if u make good decisions u have a big effect like winning a teamfight

internetrules:

Cuz like if there’s a more near the person I dive he could roll towards me the. Flash bang be befor I kill someone to get a swift strike reset

Mccree*

curi:

he can play forward cuz he has 3 mobility abilities + deflect to get back to team with. and he has one of the two hardest ultimates in the game i think (blade and pulse are hard to use, all the rest are a bit ez)

what about other heros

internetrules:

With rein getting charges are really fun, cuz it’s risky if I go to deep cuz I could like die instantly if they have like mccree reaper

And also I have to predict movement to get charges

And finishing people off with long range fire strikes is super fun

Or predicting where someone will be then fire striking there

curi:

how aggressive to be is a skill thing which is rewarding if you get it right. too aggressive = dead, too passive = don’t control objective. but if u go in hard without dying, u can have a big effect. it’s a lot like monkey i think.

it’s also the thing i think is most needed at lower SR – someone to lead the way so ppl aren’t just sitting around passively.

in plat most ppl need someone to follow

and most of the main tanks don’t know what to do and wait for something to happen instead of making it happen

rein and genji seem like ur clearest hero picks that u will keep

what about the other ones?

why aren’t you responding? is this hard?

internetrules:

Yes

curi:

what’s hard?

just take the next hero and say ur thots?

is ur answer “i don’t know” for all the other heroes?

internetrules:

No, i have some thought but I’m not saying them

curi:

why

internetrules:

Thought like : hanzo is fun to 1 shot and 2 shot people with

But I didn’t say that

I guess I thought it was to low quality? But even if it was its better to start somewhere than no where

curi:

there are other heroes which do that, like widow, mccree, and basically doomfist. even ana is 2 shots + nade, or 3shot.

if u prefer hanzo, what’s the difference?

internetrules:

Projectiles

curi:

zen has 1shots with orb volley

those are projectiles

pharah and junk have 2shots

and with junk, u do grenade + mine and u can kill someone almost instantly

internetrules:

Junk rats seem to slow

curi:

what is slow

internetrules:

His projectiles

The grenades

curi:

ya

he has to flank for 1shots

or get dived or something

internetrules:

Maybe I would like pharah more than hanzo tho

curi:

i think the big difference with hanzo is headshots

which in the past it seems like u didn’t aim for headshots much

internetrules:

Cuz getting direct hits with pharah rockets seems super fun

curi:

also hanzo just got rework/buff and u didn’t start playing him a lot which i thought might mean u don’t care about him much

pharah is a very high mobility hero, like tracer and genji. if u watch pros play pharah, they use it really well. they hover around tall buildings and stuff.

but they only play her on maps with the right terrain to give them cover up in the air.

cuz at higher SR she gets shot down too ez without cover

the two things i don’t like about pharah (besides my own lack of projectile aim) are the situationalness and the need for healer support

u can probably play her on every map in plat and diamond if u have some heals

and u can outplay hitscan heros by using your mobility to sneak up on them from a way they weren’t looking, and then u can beat them

internetrules:

I probably want to stop playing hanzo and do pharah instead

The main thing I’m worried about thonis the situational thing

curi:

u can try it. my concern is you will go back and forth like you have with healers and some others.

i think forcing pharah on all maps is less hard than widow

at least if you aren’t GM

i used to force widow everywhere

i think u can predict things less so u have to play more to see. also cuz u figure less out from streams.

compared to me.

but the amount of swapping u’ve done overall is a lot. like u used to play tracer zarya for ur first 100+ hours and u don’t play either now.

the main heroes i dropped are 76 and zen. i think they are the ones i had over 20 hours on and stopped playing.

and zen is partly just cuz ana came out and i like her more.

i’d prob play him if ana didn’t exist

for tank i can’t tell if u actually wanna play orisa or not

i tried her and she’s relatively ez+good but i decided i don’t like her spam gameplay

i think u actually like monkey?

internetrules:

I prefer rein but I think monkey is necessary some times

curi:

for healers u’ve done lucio zen mercy and now brig is out too (i thot u would like her, and i think u did too but u haven’t played her much yet). u also played roadhog a while. and some bastion, torb, a few dva games, various things at different times.

yeah i think rein just doesn’t work well at all times

but if u don’t want to play monkey or orisa u can potentially just pick a different hero on those maps

u don’t HAVE to play them

there are maps where swapping in the middle is good. ppl have done that on hollywood. rein on 1st, monkey on 2nd for the big buildings. but u can just try to make rein work now and then, take elevator up, walk up stairs for gibralter 2nd, etc. also new sym will be able to teleport u up!

also i like monkey ok so we could hero + role swap sometimes maybe

he’s my preference of the main tanks and i want to have a main tank i can play

cuz games can be boring when u have no main tank and ppl just feed

internetrules:

Yeah that sounds like it would work

curi:

and going main tank can save the game

so do u actually not want to play monkey or orisa?

internetrules:

I would really like to just be able to rein all the time for main tank

curi:

if u can’t, do u want to play monkey or orisa some or just not main tank?

like i think u shouldn’t play rein on well or sanctum, but u could switch in spawn

internetrules:

Probably just not main tank.

curi:

or the oasis one with the thing in the middle

and the jump pad

rein is god awful there

where ppl run in circles around point

and sombra or whatever stands on the highground in the middle of the point or the highground by jumppad and shoots u

or hacks u

ok so then

off tanks

do u prefer

road zarya dva brig?

or none

also do u appreciate this? i hope it’s helping u organize how u practice and getting u onto the heroes u want + good at them more.

rather than e.g. u feeling pressured to play or not play stuff.

internetrules:

Yes I do very much

curi:

or finding decisions hard/stressful

ok good

i have been working on it a lot myself b/c i have 7 heroes currently which is kinda a lot

and i was trying others in the past and also recently to compare

and try to get it right

i kept playing 76 cuz he was useful and stuff but finally decided to stop

and i especially kept trying all the tanks to find one i liked

internetrules:

I prefer zarya the most as off tank but I feel like the maps I could play zarya are also the ones I could rein

curi:

and recently decided monkey is ok (originally i thought he was boring cuz u just run at ppl without aiming)

yes that’s true that zarya is bad on the maps where rein is bad

at high level, currently zarya is only used if u have rein

not used with orisa or monkey

in the past there was monkey+zarya, but now they just do dva instead

internetrules:

I don’t think I like dva

curi:

this is partly a meta thing, and u should try not to chase the meta

zarya is gaining in meta and dva losing cuz brig

2 rly good comps now are

rein zarya brig zen hanzo + healer (mercy, ana or lucio)

orisa brig zen mercy junk widow

b4 brig patch dva was played so much, always with monkey (so most of the time) + reasonably often with other tanks too

but u gotta try to pick by the hero design, not current meta

so u aren’t changing everytime there is a patch

do u like road or brig more?

did u try brig enuf to see?

zarya hog and brig are also similar maps to rein. which is actually most maps if the meta favors them. if they are strong, then they can be OK on most maps, just not some with the most highground and environmental kill stuff.

internetrules:

I don’t like brig that much but I have tried her that much either

curi:

u should try her more b/c she’s sorta similar to rein

internetrules:

I would like just rather play rein than brig

curi:

with shield + melee weapon

internetrules:

She’s not as big and clunky as rein

curi:

u can play brig when u have a different main tank

internetrules:

And she doesn’t have charge

curi:

u don’t wanna rein+monkey or rein+orisa generally

also u can play her when u need 2nd healer

so those are upsides

ok what about healers

mercy zen lucio? any ideas?

i guess not ana or moira?

in the past whatever ur healer was, u never played them that much and never played them enuf to get good at them.

too on and off

internetrules:

I’m slightly interested in Ana but it’s about as much as I am with lucio and zen

curi:

and healer is ur least played type

ana is the hardest healer by a lot cuz of the aim stuff

internetrules:

So it would be better to not have that hero conflict I think

curi:

how did u like mercy yesterday

internetrules:

I liked playing her but idk if I will continue to like playing her

curi:

FYI what’s fun about moira is she has the mobility to play forward and then get back. i’m not a big fan of her. she’s reasonably ez. lucio and brig can also play up. ana zen play back, and mercy flies around.

internetrules:

I like the guardian angel, and trying to get tears while not firing

curi:

ana and zen need help if they get dived. no mobility. the other healers have more chance to take care fo themselves

tears?

internetrules:

Trying to get rez while not dieing*

curi:

ana and zen can fight some flankers tho. not monkey or dva very well tho

ok so let’s summarize

rein: yes. genji: yes.

pharah: try her and compare to hanzo (play him a little if u need to compare) and see how u like her.

zarya: try playing her a bit when rein isn’t a good option (someone already took a main tank)

mercy/zen/lucio/ana/brig: try them all and figure out at least one u like play (being unable to pick healer sux and throws games)

moira hog dva monkey orisa: no

other dps: is there anyone u would really love if you were great at? or just no to the others?

internetrules:

I might be fine with prods if we are doing like a full on spam/shield war comp

curi:

prods?

internetrules:

Orissa

curi:

what an autocorrect lol

ok add orisa with zarya, to play sometimes when rein is a bad option.

internetrules:

I’m gonna blame my self for those auto corrects and not the software

curi:

but no monkey, right?

internetrules:

No monkey

curi:

also “fine with” doesn’t sound good. u should actually like heroes

internetrules:

I like seeing the enemies all die slowly from a sustained spam

curi:

spam wars are a bit boring for most heroes IMO. but some of the heroes are more fun for it, like roadhog has high shield damage + chance to hook something. dva has high shield dmg + matrix + chance to fly on someone once some ppl die.

orisa the most fun part i think is halt

internetrules:

Yes

curi:

u can halt ppl so ur widow can shoot them or hog hook them or something

i am going to try the sym rework

she may be good in spam wars + i like her utility

ok anyway u should prioritize playing the heroes u need to figure out

and play the decided ones only if u need to fill with them

and then when u decide some, e.g. a healer, u should play them a bunch to get basics (fill with ur good heroes when ur team rly needs it)

internetrules:

I’m gonna do 1 more genji game to see if I can get into diamond on internet

I’m 21 Sr away

curi:

sure

so:

T Mains: rein, genji
T Flex: zarya, orisa

Choose 2nd dps: Pharah?
Choose 1-2 supports

now let’s analyze this to see how well u cover situations

internetrules:

This seems really fun I want to get good enough at life so I can do this kinda stuff on my own in an organized manner

curi:

spam war: rein zarya genji pharah are all kinda bad. so u would have orisa or a support (only some supports are good at this. zen has best spam, mercy has dmg boost on ur best spammer. ana can shoot. brig lucio moira can’t do much)

great!

i’m glad

i have been telling ppl u can learn life stuff from video games

if u try to get rly good u need to organize and think and stuff

and also learn from criticism

we did that b4 when we analyzed our deaths and stuff after each game

and that helped us climb

internetrules:

I realized recently that I was getting tilted from losing cuz I was focusing on my wins and losses more than my personal skill

So now I’m just focusing on my skill and how well I’m doing mid game and I got a lot happpier

curi:

situation: your team wants to dive: genji and pharah great, but what if u can’t dps? zarya is playable but not rly a dive tank like dva monkey. also u maybe ur support could work with dive

yeah u need to play to learn

internetrules:

Mid game will text more later

curi:

situation: enemy team diving u: rein is pretty good here. zarya orisa genji pharah are all ok.

situation: sniper killing ur team. genji is great option, only problem is if u can’t swap to dps.

there’s rly not much u can do about sniper if ur support and can’t swap off. for tank that can’t swap roles, monkey and dva help. otherwise the best u can do is try to help ur team with rein or orisa shield, which can work.

situation: enemy team has pharah

(and the pharah is doing well, probably has mercy pocket)

rein, genji, orisa, pharah, zarya are all bad here. they do not solve the problem. the dps at least can try to fuck the enemy team as hard as the pharah fucks ur team and it’s hard for the pharah to kill u ( u have mobility, she will probably shoot someone else like ur supports)

the supports that help vs pharah most are zen (discord her helps ur dps handle it, assuming they go hitscan and try) and ANA (helps a ton if u can aim, plus u can sleep her barrage)

the other 4 can’t do anything

the list of heroes that are best at fighting pharah: ana, sombra, mccree, 76, widow. some others help some: zen discord, hog hook, dva fly+shoot can actually do good dmg to pharah, if she doesn’t have mercy pocket or someone else is shooting pharah then it does a lot (and matrix pharah’s stuff). tracer can do pretty well vs pharah if u catch her low enuf. hanzo with new rapid arrow has a decent chance against pharah i think.

also u can just stick up orisa shield, pharah isn’t very good in orisa spam wars, has to flank or just be a lower dmg junkrat.

oh i forgot BASTION, also a pharah killer.

pharah is interesting cuz half the heroes are pretty useless against her.

internetrules:

I have had some success against pharah as genji

curi:

u can do SOME but it’s not very good

it works better if they are bad.

there’s other notable counters in the game. like it can be hard to play flanker like tracer, genji vs. a torb who puts turret in back. u have pharah to spam down torb turrets from out of their range tho.

internetrules:

If you like wall climb, swift strike to the pharah, double jump, you get like 1.5 seconds to do damage to her

curi:

or like what if ur team is feeding to bastion, what do u do?

genji can spam shuriken from good angles if there is no shield and has deflect. pharah is pretty bad tho if u get long enuf range + no shield u can spam the bastion, but realistically if ur team is feeding both of these usually won’t work great

zarya maybe if u get charged up u can do something

rein u can play a corner and then go in hard. orisa buys ur team some time but if they aren’t on spam heroes it can be useless.

internetrules:

With genji I could try to get blade then attack the bastion, depending on how good the bastion is they will expect me to deflect so they won’t be shooting me very heavily

curi:

lol

that is like a plan to salvage the situation if ur already genji

just like fighting pharah with genji

u can try. don’t give up.

but it’s not a very good play if u could pick any hero

internetrules:

I really like fighting pharah with genji and hanzo

curi:

i see how doing that aim is fun

ur at disadvantage tho

(unless new rapid arrow is super OP)

what about supports vs. bastion? mercy boost helps if someone else is actually being effective (common theme with mercy that someone else has to do good to make her good)

sleep is great if his shield breaks

lucio can help ur team rush him

internetrules:

Woah we could do like a lucio speed boost to rein charge on the bastion

Cuz speed boost increases charge speed

curi:

zen can spam his shield i guess. moira brig pretty useless.

the bastion is usually on the cart so u can’t charge him

anyway rein isn’t so bad vs bastion if u can just get ur team to hide around corner and then take a close range fight

and orisa good if ur team has proper spam heroes

internetrules:

If you can angle a price of high ground (like first point Route 66) then you can

curi:

rit

another thing to look at with ur heroes is synergy

like skill overlap

like brig/rein have a lot

for me, monkey/dva, tracer/sombra and widow/ana have significant overlap on how to play them

genji and pharah are commonly heroes someone is good at both. some aim similarity (hanzo and junkrat go with them some too for that reason, some of those ppl also like zen for the projectile shots)

and they also have some similiarity with mobility (both vertical and horizontal)

and in wanting to flank and kill supports

and having some long range poke that is OK and lets u play with team, but not amazin

and they have ability to shoot from various good angles, not just straight on like a 76

so there’s solid similiarities there

rein zarya have a bit of similarity with positioning (both lack much mobility, especially vertically) and understanding how aggressive u can be without dying.

they have very different aim tho

which is also different than genji and pharah.

rein aim is pretty ez, not a big concern. zarya requires good tracking tho + her balls are a projectile but a slow arcing one so it’s quite different

u will note the only projectile on my heroes is ana non-scoped.

i have lots of hitscan overlap

orisa is projectile aim so that’s a positive for you. however she plays pretty differnetly than the others.

if u play mercy, u get to play and see both sides of the pharah/mercy combo. that’s an upside. u will be extra familiar with it and understand it more, like as pharah u will know what actions will get ur mercy killed or when to expect her to go help others. as mercy u will know when ur pharah really needs u to stay or not.

lucio zen have projectile aim. moira aim is similar to zarya. ana is mixed + harder aim.

brig is just big rein overlap

overlap gives u less stuff u have to learn. if my heroes were all super differently i would definitely have to pick fewer.

u r looking at 6-7 heroes (given 1-2 supports)

also my policy is i don’t play other heroes like at all, period. this helps me play a bigger number cuz i don’t use the others. i will never swap orisa/zen/moira/76 to try to win the game.

i currently won’t even swap lucio on a point stall. if i have to get off ana i can sombra/tracer/dva/monkey, good enuf.

i will only ever play other heroes on purpose, e.g. i tried hanzo after rework.

for like 4 games in a row

to understand him more and see if i liked him

it was good to help me see his strengths and weaknesses a bit more

i noticed it’s easy for him to shoot a specific location, like if someone is peeking a specific corner

and ez to shoot ppl who aren’t moving

even at longer ranges

but if someone is moving around and u can’t predict where they will be in 1 second, it’s rly hard to shoot them at long ranges

so being in open can be safer than predictably by corner

internetrules:

Would it be fine to swap between hanzo and pharah allot to see the differences better?

curi:

(plus they will sonic the corner)

yes try them both now to compare

as temporary learning thing

do like 5 in a row of pharah first

to get back into her

another way to look at heroes is how hard they are in what ways

i have a lot of heroes with hard mechanics

tracer and widow are SUPER hard. sombra and ana are hard, like genji. dva, winston, brig are easy, require way less aim and reaction time, like rein, orisa. however there’s also strategy, which i’m good at personally so it’s easier for me to put a low mechanics hero on list, i want to have some of them for when i’m tired or rusty or whatever.

for supports, if u play ana or zen they are a really BACKLINE hero, very different than ur used to on other heroes. they will have less strategy overlap, take more learning.

brig, lucio, moira can play up more instead of u needing to learn long range positioning. and mercy is her own thing with flying around to teammates (kinda her own skill that u have to learn separately)

also some supports are more voice chat heavy to be effective. zen, ana u can do good by shooting stuff. lucio u really need to talk and get ppl to work with u, him the most.

cuz of speed aura + grouping for heal aura and ult

lucio requires a lot of paying attention to ur team and figuring out who to help. this is something u don’t know a lot about from non-supports. big separate thing to learn

u get it a little with saving ppl with dva matrix or zarya bubble

also a bit with just everyone, like a tracer tip is look for what teammate needs help and go blink over there.

and u can do that somewhat with everyone, esp ppl with mobility

genji can do it. find ur teammate in a 1v1 and go make it a 2v1. or rush in front of them and deflect. it’s not that common tho

mercy also has a lot of watching team, knowing what they are doing, who needs help. moira does it too but for her it’s a bit more obvious what to do. she can reposition less than mercy and she wants to heal tanks, that’s kinda her thing

zen has a lot less watching allies. harmony orb is limited attention. he plays the most like a dps of the supports.

ana has limited mobility to choose who to help outside her sightlines. has to understand who will make a big play to nano, and who to heal first.

and when to go in close and follow someone around instead of staying back

another thing with supports is tracking enemy ults and trying to see their dps ults coming and prevent wipes or warn team

and watching for flanks

supports generally have the most chance to do these things

dps too busy and tanks are in front and able to see overall view of fight less

as u’ve noticed from my ana callouts when ur holding up rein shield and i’m telling u what’s going on and what to do

so with supports it depends on what skills u want to learn and how much effort u want to put there. since u seem to like support the least, maybe u should try brig+mercy for now. reasons:

don’t have to learn backline positioning like ana/zan/76/etc

don’t have to try to organize team like lucio

u seem to like mercy more than moira.

brig and mercy will be relatively easy to learn

mercy doesn’t overlap a ton but she’s considered pretty ez

brig u can just have as a backup hero who doesn’t take much work due to rein overlap

and u already like that style (just not as much as actually being rein, which u can’t always be)

but try them all some. understanding backline ranged hero positioning is a good thing to know if u want to. significant part of the game.

i think mercy will be less frustrating than lucio with teams not listening or being bad.

lucio really needs teamwork to get good value from speed aura since nerfing its range

but u should just pick the ones u’d be happy with if u were good at them

and then make it work. u can learn any hero.

even if ur bad at one early on, it’s better to start getting practice on them rather than playing a hero u care about less. (this assumes u will keep playing OW longterm, which i think it’s a promising game for)

can i post this chatlog to FI?

from today

i’ve looked at the heroes i’d most like to be good at thing. i might like mccree and hanzo, but i like widow more, so i’d rather be a god at her.

i might like being a great zen, but i like ana more, so i don’t need him.

the ones i’d like most that i don’t play are genji and maybe pharah.

plus i’m interested in sym rework. we don’t know anything about torb rework yet but i predict i won’t be that interested.

i don’t like building a turret which is way better against bad players than good players.

with sym, i rly like the new teleporter as regular ability for moving around within a fight, rather than longterm building. the giant shield ult and 3 stronger turrets sound ok. and her guns sound good for a dps that’s less mechanics and can do well in spam wars.

i see significant outplay potential there.

looking at ur heroes for outplay potential: genji, and pharah have lots. rein has great outplay potential as long as u actually get heals and ur team follows u some (pretty low bar on this, they don’t have to do this great, they just have to do at some) so u can do stuff.

orisa i consider pretty low outplay potential, u just do ur gameplay (shield+shoot) and the results are pretty consistent instead of being able to make high skill decisions to win.

she does have some outplay with halt

internetrules:

45 direct hits in 5 min

Full held first point Hollywood then took it in 1 push

curi:

idk how good that is but i remember u had pretty good pharah when u didn’t play her much, u seemed to already know how to aim her

i tried pharah a little and my aim sucked

i don’t have prior FPS experience and only learned to aim with widow and then tracer

zarya outplay is on lower end. u just play good and stay alive and plz dear god use grav quickly. i had game the other day, zarya held grav for 3min. i asked him to use it after he held it for 2 fights and he said he was holding it cuz enemy zen had trance. so he was just gonna never use it T_T

he only used it cuz after hearing that i killed zen :D

he didn’t seem to be trying to kill zen himself and no one else was either

@pharah note u should pick the heroes u wanna be good with longterm, not the ones that come more naturally. but if ur more of a natural with someone and u like them, great!

@support outplays: brig is limited, u just stay alive and do ur stuff like zarya. play good and it’s rewarded but u don’t get BIG plays besides boops or stun a tracer/sombra/blading-genji etc

ana has them. sleep. 2shot+nade. big offensive nades. big defensive nades + mass burst healing. 1v1 a flanker. shoot down pharah.

mercy doesn’t have much. u can 1v1 ppl with battle mercy for an outplay, esp in valk on enemy sniper. she’s more stay alive and play consistently with good strategy and it helps ur team a lot overall.

u can dodge flankers who are putting effort into killing u

so they waste their time

u can get off a big rez

lucio has outplays esp with speed aura and boop

moira has very little

u can catch and 1v1 ppl with moira

but mostly that’s from them being bad

u do fixed 50 dps with ez aim

i’m not a moira fan

lucio has has outplays iwth sound barrier at key moment to save ur team from a barrage or something

zen outplays are orb volley kills, beating a flanker who comes at u, and building trances fast enuf to have it rdy for blade/barrage/grav/etc

for comparisons, in general the dps heroes have lots of outplay potential to go get lots of kills, and also hog has it with hook. other heroes tend to have more limited amounts, e.g. monkey and dva can solo jump and kill someone sometimes but have less ability to make things like that happen.

another way i analyze heroes is how much fun they are, or how helpless, if team is being dumb

brig is bad here, the rest of my heroes are specifically chosen to be good at that.

the tanks aren’t ideal there but at least have mobility, more options with low team support

compared to rein orisa zarya

and i also look at just plain “is it dps?” cuz teams really want non-dps more

so like if reaper is a little more fun than brig, brig wins cuz if i get a dps slot i can play tracer, and i need some non-dps

i don’t just wanna force dps and throw games all the time, tho i will sometimes and having a smurf is good there

actually i’d like to blog this rather than just FI post. is that ok? i can remove ur name or only put Internet Rules

internetrules:

Yeah just having my name as internetrules is fine

I’m fine with you posting it

curi:

another idea i had about my heroes is if i practice tracer and widow, then i can play the rest pretty easily

something interesting is we might not play any of the same heroes

another thing about supports is it’s good to be able to play a MAIN support, cuz teams need one of those. 2 supports with low healing is a problem, also u can solo heal with a main support if u have to. main support means the ones who can put out strong heals on a single target, like they are capable of pocketing a tank: mercy, moira, ana

similar to how i wanted a MAIN tank on my roster

not just dva

with double off support, u see tanks feed way too much, don’t know what to do or how to deal with the low heals.

it can be worse than solo strong healer. (the thing with solo healer is enemy team can focus them and if they die u have NO heals)

but if solo main healer stays alive it sometimes works better than double off healer

if i had to cut down my roster i’d probably go: tracer, widow, monkey, ana (so i have main tank and main heal).

sombra i just don’t wanna cut. brig and dva are currently pretty easy for me without needing to practice them, and are very useful sometimes

sombra is fun

and shares aim with tracer anyway

and recalling b4 u die

so i feel ok keeping both

i’m trying to figure out if i would drop brig if she was nerfed tho.

not sure if i should play her

she’s still in maybe mode

i kinda like having a strong short range person with low mobility. winston and dva have to be balanced for the fact they have jumps.

it’s interesting to me to play different styles.

my other issue is i’m trying to figure out how to make my widow aim easier for me and more consistent

with tracer, i can now aim OK without it feeling hard

and when i took a break i kept a lot of my tracer aim

but my widow is more of a problem

a lot of it is headshots. i actually need to aim for the head more with tracer.

headshots are hard

another thing about hero choices is to have someone good and fun for FFA

and 3v3 and stuff

i got tracer, and on some maps widow

u got genji. i not sure about pharah.

mccree is pretty popular in deathmatch and u don’t get heals

other major DM heroes are doom, junk, hanzo, hog. sometimes moira, brig

if it’s not a sniper map, then pharah is pretty good vs non-mccree so she might work pretty well.

she’s great in 3v3 and 6v6 and stuff cuz u get a healer + they might not pick hitscan that round

is a bit unfair how pharah can matchup vs some heroes there, lol

they go rein reaper lucio, u go pharah, lol rekt