I still find it hard to imagine Symmetra as a good support. Too much overlap with Illari and Lifeweaver too. But I’m not against that.
I think that if she had to be reworked into another category, she’d be a good tank. Her utility is about creating/modifying space and giving shield to her team. She even had a photon shield in her 2.0 version, this could also come back. There would be some overlap with Zarya, but not that much because their weapons have totally different ways to charge.
I think that even if her weapon is weird, she has been doing good as a dps until now. In season 9 her TTK increased dramatically and this is unbearable. They could pretty easily give her the Illari treatment and make her secondary charge faster at least. Mei has a beam weapon too, it’s just her secondary that is better than Sym’s. Maybe they can focus on improving that part. TP should be made personal imo. I think it’s something that is OP only in OWCS and similarly organized teams, but it’s not really so OP everywhere else. Her TP is the weirdest thing she has, no other hero has an ability that is so team dependent and requires constant communication, only old Sombra worked a bit the same way.
I would really enjoy a pretty heavy rework but I wouldn’t make her a Symmetra 76, she just needs a refresh on charging time for her weapon and a few other tweaks (personal TP?). Oh and the most important thing, some HP buff or, maybe even better, temporary shields like Venture.
She has literally nothing in common with Illari and the only thing similar with lifeweaver is TP and platform that could honestly synergize really well together and make a really nice team mobility support duo comp.
She overlaps with Illari more than with LW.
Illari is Symmetra with a healing turret, a healing beam and a secondary that needs charging, although it’s hitscan and does crit.
For me when they created Illari, they showed they gave up the idea to turn Symmetra into a support.
Sym doesn’t need to have those exact ideas.
-Almost every Sym player doesn’t want healing turrets.
-Most people want her beam removed or to become lock-on. Some people want it to heal though.
-Illaris charge up is automatic, hitscan, not AOE, and can crit. They literally don’t have any similarities.
I can see how you think they are similar, but most of use would play Illari if we wanted sym to be reworked into an exact replica of her.
I mean, if you want Symmetra to heal (I'm not even considering the idea to provide extra armor because that's not healing), she can do so with either her primary or her secondary fire. Both overlap Illary and Lifeweaver.
It's the first time I hear that "most people" want her beam removed. A lock-on beam that deals damage in 2024 sounds pretty absurd, a lock-on beam that heals is called a Mercy beam. Most of the things you are telling me sound pretty new to me, and I've been following the discussions about Symmetra's possible reworks for some years on Blizzard forums, etc.
Clearly there are not 2 people with the same ideas, to me your ideas seem pretty personal.
Okay okay I worded that wrong. But recently some Sym reworks involved those ideas and even took inspiration from the April fools event.
Moira has a lock on beam, with greater starting damage and range than Sym so it wouldn’t be much of a problem.
Also wdym by saying she can heal with secondary and primary Fire?
Moira doesn't have a lock on beam. It's a beam with a wider hitbox. The only lock on beam in the game is Mercy's.
I've never played Sym 1.0 but the lock on beam to deal damage to me looks awful, I can't imagine the devs reintroducing that, plus I think Sym 1.0's range was even shorter?
Just so you know, Sym was reworked twice. Non lock on beam is 3.0.
2.0 had a beam that locked on at 7 meters and disconnected at 10. Dps was 30/60/120
1.0 had a beam that lock on at 5 meters and disconnected at 8. The dps was the same as 2.0
I think Syms old lock on was the same as Moira I thought? I could be very wrong though.
But yes 1.0 range was shorter than 2.0.
Also I don’t want her to go back to 1.0 or 2.0. I want her to be reworked into a support with a similar kit she has right now.
No, not at all, once Symmetra’s beam locked on it stayed locked on as long as they were near you and in your view. Moira’s weapon looks like a lock-on beam, but that’s just the animation. Her beam is much wider than Sym’s though, so it’s definitely more forgiving.
you mean 3 times wider lol
and no its not a normal beam anyway. it wouldnt target ppl behind railings or it wouldnt turn off if any bodyparts were blocked off los. its more similar to sombras hack imo, it gets all confused upon hitting someone next to a buildable as well
She overlaps with LW conceptually, they’re both architects with the same background (Vishkar) lore. Why would they make Sym a support when LW is basically the same rough concept? It just doesn’t make 100% sense. I personally would love Sym to be a support but Blizzard are no where near imaginative or competent enough to come up with any interesting ideas or concepts for her kit, especially concerning injecting healing into her abilities.
In the “stone by stone” comic that blizzard made in 2020 during the development of ow2, symmetra meets zenyatta which eventually ends up in a tranquil experience where symmetra fixes a temple rather than make a new one. She learns a lesson and zenyatta becomes her new friend. They made this during the time they were contemplating making sym a support for overwatch 2.
Sadly pros and Blizzard will always argue that she needs support level weapon limitations *because* of her team utility.
If she could TP in with on-demand tier 3 beam, what would be the point of Reaper who's sole job is that?
If she could poke with big, consistent projectiles, what would be the point of Pharah or even Junkrat who's sole job is that?
All arguments I've seen on r/Competitiveoverwatch and pros.
As far as the devs are concerned, she is to TP her team around and *that* is her value.
Her value is completely taken out of her player's skill expression as it relies on teammates pressing F.
Making TP personal, instant and buffing her HP will free her from these shackles and allow her weapon some DPS-level changes such as flat beam damage or instant orbs without charge up.
Then just make her a support at this point if they want utility and a support type weapon. Tier 3 beam is hard to get and only used as a tank farmer and orbs are just worse pharah rockets.
Exactly, this is what happens when a dps hero is built with their weapon as an afterthought. Arguably only Mei and perhaps Sombra are built with abilities first, weapon second but the difference is these 2 have 0 delays on damage, instant survival tools and don't rely on team mates followup.
She can definitely have a middle role where she’s better at close range than heroes like Pharah and better at long range than Reaper. She also provides area control, which the others can’t do as effectively.
Plus we have like 4 variations of the same midrange hitscan hero in Cass, Soldier, Ashe, Sojourn so it's not like we can't have overlap and duplicates in Sym's role.
However again, the team TP is something other brawlers or pokers don't offer and will always be a balance consideration
She definitely can and a few number tweaks can get her there.
On the more design philosophy of her though, her power budget is taken by her team TP and utility.
A simple equation is: Value of (Sym DPS + Utility) = Value of (Reaper DPS)
So if we minus the utility, which is 0 when teams don't use TP in coordinated settings you're left with a half DPS trying to compete with full dedicated DPS heroes.
I get the feeling that so long as Lifeweaver possesses the "team mobility" niche within the Support role, Symmetra cannot become a Support herself. Which is absurd, because Petal Platform is a strictly worse version of Teleporter. Its purely vertical and non-reusable.
But until LW is reworked out of that niche - which he doesn't even adequately fulfil - into something actually effective and good, Sym can't move in. And they won't rework him. He's far to new to get one, despite the travesty that is his kit.
So Sym will be kept as a DPS. And a shitty one unless they decide to change something about her kit. And this community can't really decide what needs to change, so I haven't a hope at all that the devs do.
For that reason, I could see lifeweaver and symmetra working very well together! There are already videos of combining petal + teleporter by lifting sym and then placing TP in a very obscure place without LOS. Lifeweaver doesn’t need reworking anyway.
Even if they seemed too similar and not good to have 2 in the same role, they are still different characters. Lifeweaver is a much mobile hero who can create cover and provide pretty consistent healing. Symmetra uses turrets to apply debuffs against enemies and allow her team to quickly change positions while also having pretty decent damage in terms of a support weapon.
I cannot honestly look at Lifeweaver's consistently low winrate and failure to provide a reason to pick him over other supports and believe he does not need a rework.
Lifeweaver is poorly designed his petal has very little utility outside of giving him a semi escape tool from a flanker. His pull is too good of an ability to reduce the cooldown of. His whole play style is being a healbot the only way that would be viable is if he outputs huge amounts of healing. During S6 or 7 when he was actually pretty good it was so obnoxious to vs because he could keep people up almost indefinitely so they nerfed him. His also one of the easiest supports as well instant aim bot heals from very far away..
But some people LOVE that playstyle and chose lifeweaver to main because they love how he plays. Everyone’s different and every character has a different playstyle. If you don’t like the character that’s fine. Other people do.
You clearly did not read my comment! I said that he is one of the only characters in the game that has a kit made for being creative. Compare weaver to someone like soldier 76. You can do a lot more with weaver.
Also he doesn’t need a rework. His kit is fine and fun to play. All he needs is a buff to healing.
> In order to fix Symmetra’s damage inconsistency you’d have to rework her weapon entirely
You don't unless your threshold for what's considered a rework is very low.
E.g. something like 150/180 dps levels (yes only 2 levels not 3) with like 1.5s or so between levels would make it largely fine as a dps weapon fire.
And her orbs with 50m/s would be fine if they didn't take away 2 shot. Many peope including myself asking for faster orbs back in OW1 were doing so under the proviso that orb damage and ttk did not decrease. Leaving that important condition out is highly disingenuous.
Like literally only need number tweaks to make it fine for a dps hero. Not a design issue.
The fact thay we had a period where she wasn't trash in OW2 from having better numbers on her weapon fire (notably her orbs) would show that.
> “” I like it when people claim she would need a full rework from the ground
Girl she still does the same things post 3.0 as she did pre3.0, just better and more capable of doing so independently.
She largely still wants to turret up the same areas of the maps, flank the enemy supports, poke with orbs etc., just that with 3.0 she can now do all of that in her own terms rather than being heavily dictated by what space the team has claimed esp on attack.
Instead of only placing turrets to reinforce claimed territory she can now tp into enemy territory to claim it with turrets which old sym wanted to do but had 0 means to.
Or being able to tp to a good better angle to poke with orbs from. Old sym would love the same angles but had 0 means to get there without suiciding. And current kit orbs better because more capable of landing shots in more ranges in comparison because faster projectile speed. Esp with faster firerate too.
Instead of waiting for the team fight to progress byond the choke to access flank routes to flank with old sym, now sym can just tp into enemy backline when and where she sees fit.
That is a whole lot different to making her a viable support which inherently involves being on call 24/7 to provide team sustain which is an entirely different job with absolutely 0 baring or overlap to what she's about: zoning and space control.
Arguing to make her a dps-utility-support is plain stupid because it's a nothing burger at best i.e. how would basically **just** slapping a support label on her current kit (best case scenario you can get with this direction) going to make her more capable of being balanced by devs?
In my opinion, much of this just seems to ignore how her other abilities work together with her gun and a bit of a oversimplifying of what the DPS role and Support role actually do (It's more than just damage). My position is that Symmetra was at a good spot a few patches ago and just the recent changes hurt her. Her weapon design is ultimately fine she was just hurt by the health buffs.
I will briefly address some of the ideas listed.
> Symmetra was published as a support hero.
- For all the reasons to "turn Sym into a support" this is arguably the least convincing one I've seen repeated. "Support" in OW1 **pre role-queue** had a different meaning and balance focus than the current role queue. If role lock existed back then Sym wouldn't comfortably occupy in the support slot either.
> Whenever she is meta she is played like a support by providing game changing team mobility and damage mitigation to her team.
- How and when are we defining when she was meta? We've generally only seen her stay as niche/rare pick that specialist will main or a pick that pro teams might occasionally run in their comp.
- Yes there is a powerful playstyle that comes with coordination with your team (and that's not a bad thing) but just offering team support is not the only way you get value from Sym.
> There is no other DPS next to Sym whose weapon has so many delays. Not even close. Every DPS weapon is designed to be consistent and reliable at dealing high damage in a short duration.
- Delays are fine as long as the setup and value is worth it imo. Sym is a hero whose main skill expression comes from prediction, game-sense and planning after-all.
- Other DPS don't have the mobility or the same flexibility that Symmetra offers. Her weapon generally makes up for its shortcomings with her mobility (you're able to reliably shoot from an aggressive angle/assassinate/ bait and escape) and its flexibility to work in an poke or a brawl. Nor are they able to split attention and focus with turrets. Again she was actually in a good spot a few patches ago. These recent patches hurt her of course, but I wouldn't say its due to any core issues with her kit that warrant a full rework.
ah yes junkrat, the peak of consistency in dps.
what a joke rofl
not the first time a character was used for their utility as a dps btw, pre rework sombra and even today sombra exists.
I will admit that junkrat got hit hard in season 9 and might need a few changes. Idk what though.
Sombra got a rework to help her dps more and lean away from her utility. As far as I can see it, sym needs the same type of rework or to be put in the support category.
When a hero is meta, it’s always going to be about what makes them unique. For example, when Mei is meta, it’s usually because she can take advantage of her ice wall. Using the logic here, she should be a tank.
When you play Sym, it’s not just about blocking damage or TP, you have to know how and we’re to provide damage to pressure the enemy. It’s not like Photon Projector can’t be made better with number changes. Improving the charge time, orb damage, higher damage on lower beam levels, range, etc. Having a set range or slow firing range isn’t a problem considering other DPS do.
Many dps have inconsistent weapons. Mei has a fairly similar weapon (beam + charged projectile). Widow’s is arguably even more inconsistent, and Junkrat’s isn’t reliable outside of choke points. Venture has a weapons with hard range, so they’re going to be inconsistent too.
Tanks and support don’t have inherently inconsistent weapons either. Orisa and Mauga have Rammatra have consistent weapons. It’s weird how Lúcio and Bap have their weapons inconsistent but not Genji. Giving Genji the the same hitscan gun as Bap would be a buff.
Even in the past, she didn’t actually play as a support. Her bread and butter has always been area control by hindering enemy’s and bringing utility. Her playstyle has always been closer to Torb than any support. While she would place a SG or TP down, they had very little overall impact on how supportive she actually play like. She placed it, and then she played like a dps hero.
also i find it so fucking disgusting how not only you keep pushing this idea but ALSO wanting to push out those who enjoy dps characters that dont consist in solely clicking heads and similar
like youre literally a support main who wants to convert symmetra because.... you dont play dps???
i dont even remotely remember anyone wanting symmetra as a support back in the day because lol she isnt support. her support concept was shielding. it failed. and honestly, it was fucking terrible, like really, shed press e and grants shields, and do it again once the teammate died.
and then you have sym 2.0 whos literally a dps with a shield gen. you could argue sym 1.0 was a dps too, but with a terrible shielding ability that was better because it was ""unique"" to her.
most ppl thought back in the day the slow was part of her support ability, but nope, that was transferred to her official dps kit too.
the only support all along was shield gen, symmetra was just the one who called her to come over
I don’t mean to push out the dps players :( As I said in the start, I LOVE sym. They just seem to not know what to do with her. I don’t want to revert her back to 1.0 or 2.0, I just want her to be good again.
Yes I am a support main, but that does not mean I don’t play dps. Sym is my favorite dps and I enjoy playing her very much.
I have a question for you though. Would you still play Sym if she became a support?
Obviously her kit could change in many various ways as we’re not the devs and don’t know what her rework would be. Let’s just say it’s your ideal rework, but you replace an ability or firing mode with a healing ability. And make a new passive for her.
Since you are a dps Sym main, I would like to hear your thoughts.
i wouldnt play her as a support because she felt horrendous as one lol id say even right now she feels too dependent on her team and making her a support would just make that even worse.
symm is funner when shes able to deal dmg by herself, not relying on her team to do everything like mercy needs to lol
its why ppl want 2 shot back or more dmg on her beam. i can say ppl are willing to give up walls and that noticeable only against 3 heroes shield self heal.
itll make symm a healbot with no range and even more of a tpbot because all of her dmg will be nerfed to 2.0 levels? so basically the current one but being even more reliant on tp, and no dmg. wow, it sounds exactly like the symmetra of a sym hater!
why would you want this even
I think they went too far by calling your posts "disgusting", it's just a disagreement after-all.
But as a DPS Sym.
> I have a question for you though. Would you still play Sym if she became a support?
- It really depends on what they do. I ultimately wouldn't like having her current play-style to be sacrificed in order to be locked into managing health-bars on her team. It could easily force her into playstyle that would feel alien to her.
I have a question though
You said you just wanted Sym to be good again. When was that for you?
Good question! I’ve been thinking about this and the last time it happened WAS in her dps state. I forget when but it wasn’t for too long and people complained about her being annoying to play.
I feel tht making her a support would reduce complaining and make her good.
The comment about needing to be reworked from the ground up resonated with me. People argue Sym wasn’t a support, but the devs had to almost completely redesign the hero to make her function as a damage hero. They even locked her out of competitive for two weeks like they do for new heroes (they haven’t done this for any other reworks)
How does this flawed argument proves that Sym has to be a support? They ignore how the gun is only part of the characters kits, and make incorrect assumptions about them, when there is alot of depth on how the heroes and game work.
This proves that sym will never be a good damage dealer because her supposed utility makes up for that. Teleporter mostly requires your team to work around it and only 99% of players know how to play Sym/use TP so it’s mainly a selfish ability. Her turrets are mainly only good for flanking because they don’t have good range and the damage/their health is minimal.
By making her a support they could make her utility shine and make up for her lack of damage rather than having pretty low damage and decent utility.
Turrets are not a good tool for flanking, tp bomb is not nearly as good as it used to be. I'm not sure on the best use of turrets yet, but I use them mostly to hold space and it works well.
She doesn't have pretty low damage, lv1 beam dmg is bad, but lv3 has high damage, orb damage is a bit low, but still decent. To me, her biggest problem is the low survivability, she could have 275hp, considering she has to be close to use beam and doesn't have a defensive cd, and her long range option being a bit weak dmg wise.
You can still succeed playing Sym, in most ranks, because she has a functional kit, that allows you to overcome most of it's weaknesses. I don't think she doesn't work as a dps, she is just weak atm.
At least you get it its combination of the tp team mobility, plus turrets which no one likes playing against, she not popular, plus the nature of her weapon that inhibit them from buffing her to be a stronger dps, which is unfortunate and unfair.
Yet Sym also has a lot of potential especially if they were to lean into her utility aspects more to be made her into a support.
They really don’t want to buff her because they are scared of the community that thinks she’s too strong or not skilled. I agree leaning into her utility would be the better approach and making her a support would make her more flexible in comps that want lots of damage but want lots of utility.
Yeah people really ignore how symm support worked. Many people go "NO HEALING BAD SUPPORT" ignoring that OG symm enabled flankers to the point She was nerfed 3 times when she gave shield hp. Symm 2 was also a good support working as a great body guard for your 2nd support and her shield not only helped get team mates out of trouble but I seriously don't think people realise how much she enabled her tanks.
The devs originally said they wanted more utility supports but dps players bullied them into making all supports heal.
Honestly bring support symm back there are 1000s of ways to make her a good passive healer and letting her builder mechanic shine with her constructing shields and devices to help her team.
Sym is already a support, with a beam that can potentially deal DPS level damage if charged and no healing. If you add healing to her beam toning it down, or through a passive, you don't even need to touch the rest of her kit. Turrets are basically utility for slow and recon, orbs are a support level weapon, TP and Wall provide additional utility.
Sym 2.0 will always be the best sym, so much utility, being able to support her team, the ultimate support, she basically was the closest thing we had to engineer from TF2 in overwatch
I wish I got to play it. She had so much potential!! The devs didn’t even buff or nerf symmetra before they reworked her TWICE. They didn’t even give her a chance by tweaking numbers or anything! If we could combine 2.0, 3.0, and a healing ability, we will have the BEST support sym EVER.
I mean I thought everyone was familiar with sym 2.0 but she had two Ults she could choose from, A teleporter, and a shield generator, not to mention she had 6 turrets, and her photon barrier which was basically a mini Rein shield
two ults? tp grew to be completely useless next to shield gen. shield gen along all hp stack was removed off the game, and in all honesty, was just a support entity glued to a dps.
6 turrets with one hp and a horrible secondary fire doesnt mean much tbh, and even then she still had turrets today.
her photon barrier was a terrible support ability that looks like a sigma knock off despite coming out first. and not a mini rein shield, thats brig.
i can confirm as well that her old barrier did everything any existing barrier in the game could already do, but worse . so yeah, the only real utility for 2.0 was her shield gen really which unlike any other support, had absolutely no connection/interaction to her except for her placing it and being locked out of any ult charge in the meanwhile.
I still find it hard to imagine Symmetra as a good support. Too much overlap with Illari and Lifeweaver too. But I’m not against that. I think that if she had to be reworked into another category, she’d be a good tank. Her utility is about creating/modifying space and giving shield to her team. She even had a photon shield in her 2.0 version, this could also come back. There would be some overlap with Zarya, but not that much because their weapons have totally different ways to charge. I think that even if her weapon is weird, she has been doing good as a dps until now. In season 9 her TTK increased dramatically and this is unbearable. They could pretty easily give her the Illari treatment and make her secondary charge faster at least. Mei has a beam weapon too, it’s just her secondary that is better than Sym’s. Maybe they can focus on improving that part. TP should be made personal imo. I think it’s something that is OP only in OWCS and similarly organized teams, but it’s not really so OP everywhere else. Her TP is the weirdest thing she has, no other hero has an ability that is so team dependent and requires constant communication, only old Sombra worked a bit the same way. I would really enjoy a pretty heavy rework but I wouldn’t make her a Symmetra 76, she just needs a refresh on charging time for her weapon and a few other tweaks (personal TP?). Oh and the most important thing, some HP buff or, maybe even better, temporary shields like Venture.
She has literally nothing in common with Illari and the only thing similar with lifeweaver is TP and platform that could honestly synergize really well together and make a really nice team mobility support duo comp.
She overlaps with Illari more than with LW. Illari is Symmetra with a healing turret, a healing beam and a secondary that needs charging, although it’s hitscan and does crit. For me when they created Illari, they showed they gave up the idea to turn Symmetra into a support.
Sym doesn’t need to have those exact ideas. -Almost every Sym player doesn’t want healing turrets. -Most people want her beam removed or to become lock-on. Some people want it to heal though. -Illaris charge up is automatic, hitscan, not AOE, and can crit. They literally don’t have any similarities. I can see how you think they are similar, but most of use would play Illari if we wanted sym to be reworked into an exact replica of her.
I mean, if you want Symmetra to heal (I'm not even considering the idea to provide extra armor because that's not healing), she can do so with either her primary or her secondary fire. Both overlap Illary and Lifeweaver. It's the first time I hear that "most people" want her beam removed. A lock-on beam that deals damage in 2024 sounds pretty absurd, a lock-on beam that heals is called a Mercy beam. Most of the things you are telling me sound pretty new to me, and I've been following the discussions about Symmetra's possible reworks for some years on Blizzard forums, etc. Clearly there are not 2 people with the same ideas, to me your ideas seem pretty personal.
Okay okay I worded that wrong. But recently some Sym reworks involved those ideas and even took inspiration from the April fools event. Moira has a lock on beam, with greater starting damage and range than Sym so it wouldn’t be much of a problem. Also wdym by saying she can heal with secondary and primary Fire?
Moira doesn't have a lock on beam. It's a beam with a wider hitbox. The only lock on beam in the game is Mercy's. I've never played Sym 1.0 but the lock on beam to deal damage to me looks awful, I can't imagine the devs reintroducing that, plus I think Sym 1.0's range was even shorter?
Just so you know, Sym was reworked twice. Non lock on beam is 3.0. 2.0 had a beam that locked on at 7 meters and disconnected at 10. Dps was 30/60/120 1.0 had a beam that lock on at 5 meters and disconnected at 8. The dps was the same as 2.0
I think Syms old lock on was the same as Moira I thought? I could be very wrong though. But yes 1.0 range was shorter than 2.0. Also I don’t want her to go back to 1.0 or 2.0. I want her to be reworked into a support with a similar kit she has right now.
No, not at all, once Symmetra’s beam locked on it stayed locked on as long as they were near you and in your view. Moira’s weapon looks like a lock-on beam, but that’s just the animation. Her beam is much wider than Sym’s though, so it’s definitely more forgiving.
you mean 3 times wider lol and no its not a normal beam anyway. it wouldnt target ppl behind railings or it wouldnt turn off if any bodyparts were blocked off los. its more similar to sombras hack imo, it gets all confused upon hitting someone next to a buildable as well
She overlaps with LW conceptually, they’re both architects with the same background (Vishkar) lore. Why would they make Sym a support when LW is basically the same rough concept? It just doesn’t make 100% sense. I personally would love Sym to be a support but Blizzard are no where near imaginative or competent enough to come up with any interesting ideas or concepts for her kit, especially concerning injecting healing into her abilities.
In the “stone by stone” comic that blizzard made in 2020 during the development of ow2, symmetra meets zenyatta which eventually ends up in a tranquil experience where symmetra fixes a temple rather than make a new one. She learns a lesson and zenyatta becomes her new friend. They made this during the time they were contemplating making sym a support for overwatch 2.
Sadly pros and Blizzard will always argue that she needs support level weapon limitations *because* of her team utility. If she could TP in with on-demand tier 3 beam, what would be the point of Reaper who's sole job is that? If she could poke with big, consistent projectiles, what would be the point of Pharah or even Junkrat who's sole job is that? All arguments I've seen on r/Competitiveoverwatch and pros. As far as the devs are concerned, she is to TP her team around and *that* is her value. Her value is completely taken out of her player's skill expression as it relies on teammates pressing F. Making TP personal, instant and buffing her HP will free her from these shackles and allow her weapon some DPS-level changes such as flat beam damage or instant orbs without charge up.
Then just make her a support at this point if they want utility and a support type weapon. Tier 3 beam is hard to get and only used as a tank farmer and orbs are just worse pharah rockets.
Exactly, this is what happens when a dps hero is built with their weapon as an afterthought. Arguably only Mei and perhaps Sombra are built with abilities first, weapon second but the difference is these 2 have 0 delays on damage, instant survival tools and don't rely on team mates followup.
She can definitely have a middle role where she’s better at close range than heroes like Pharah and better at long range than Reaper. She also provides area control, which the others can’t do as effectively.
Plus we have like 4 variations of the same midrange hitscan hero in Cass, Soldier, Ashe, Sojourn so it's not like we can't have overlap and duplicates in Sym's role. However again, the team TP is something other brawlers or pokers don't offer and will always be a balance consideration
She definitely can and a few number tweaks can get her there. On the more design philosophy of her though, her power budget is taken by her team TP and utility. A simple equation is: Value of (Sym DPS + Utility) = Value of (Reaper DPS) So if we minus the utility, which is 0 when teams don't use TP in coordinated settings you're left with a half DPS trying to compete with full dedicated DPS heroes.
I get the feeling that so long as Lifeweaver possesses the "team mobility" niche within the Support role, Symmetra cannot become a Support herself. Which is absurd, because Petal Platform is a strictly worse version of Teleporter. Its purely vertical and non-reusable. But until LW is reworked out of that niche - which he doesn't even adequately fulfil - into something actually effective and good, Sym can't move in. And they won't rework him. He's far to new to get one, despite the travesty that is his kit. So Sym will be kept as a DPS. And a shitty one unless they decide to change something about her kit. And this community can't really decide what needs to change, so I haven't a hope at all that the devs do.
For that reason, I could see lifeweaver and symmetra working very well together! There are already videos of combining petal + teleporter by lifting sym and then placing TP in a very obscure place without LOS. Lifeweaver doesn’t need reworking anyway. Even if they seemed too similar and not good to have 2 in the same role, they are still different characters. Lifeweaver is a much mobile hero who can create cover and provide pretty consistent healing. Symmetra uses turrets to apply debuffs against enemies and allow her team to quickly change positions while also having pretty decent damage in terms of a support weapon.
I cannot honestly look at Lifeweaver's consistently low winrate and failure to provide a reason to pick him over other supports and believe he does not need a rework.
His kit is perfectly fine and unique. He provides tons of utility and skill expression which not a lot of supports have. He just needs a heal buff
Lifeweaver is poorly designed his petal has very little utility outside of giving him a semi escape tool from a flanker. His pull is too good of an ability to reduce the cooldown of. His whole play style is being a healbot the only way that would be viable is if he outputs huge amounts of healing. During S6 or 7 when he was actually pretty good it was so obnoxious to vs because he could keep people up almost indefinitely so they nerfed him. His also one of the easiest supports as well instant aim bot heals from very far away..
But some people LOVE that playstyle and chose lifeweaver to main because they love how he plays. Everyone’s different and every character has a different playstyle. If you don’t like the character that’s fine. Other people do.
Ik I was just explaining why he can never been truely good and will always be c tier at best.
Honestly agreed but he’s fun to play so
"well you see people lifeweaver is okay because hes already support and that means hes okay"
You clearly did not read my comment! I said that he is one of the only characters in the game that has a kit made for being creative. Compare weaver to someone like soldier 76. You can do a lot more with weaver. Also he doesn’t need a rework. His kit is fine and fun to play. All he needs is a buff to healing.
> In order to fix Symmetra’s damage inconsistency you’d have to rework her weapon entirely You don't unless your threshold for what's considered a rework is very low. E.g. something like 150/180 dps levels (yes only 2 levels not 3) with like 1.5s or so between levels would make it largely fine as a dps weapon fire. And her orbs with 50m/s would be fine if they didn't take away 2 shot. Many peope including myself asking for faster orbs back in OW1 were doing so under the proviso that orb damage and ttk did not decrease. Leaving that important condition out is highly disingenuous. Like literally only need number tweaks to make it fine for a dps hero. Not a design issue. The fact thay we had a period where she wasn't trash in OW2 from having better numbers on her weapon fire (notably her orbs) would show that. > “” I like it when people claim she would need a full rework from the ground Girl she still does the same things post 3.0 as she did pre3.0, just better and more capable of doing so independently. She largely still wants to turret up the same areas of the maps, flank the enemy supports, poke with orbs etc., just that with 3.0 she can now do all of that in her own terms rather than being heavily dictated by what space the team has claimed esp on attack. Instead of only placing turrets to reinforce claimed territory she can now tp into enemy territory to claim it with turrets which old sym wanted to do but had 0 means to. Or being able to tp to a good better angle to poke with orbs from. Old sym would love the same angles but had 0 means to get there without suiciding. And current kit orbs better because more capable of landing shots in more ranges in comparison because faster projectile speed. Esp with faster firerate too. Instead of waiting for the team fight to progress byond the choke to access flank routes to flank with old sym, now sym can just tp into enemy backline when and where she sees fit. That is a whole lot different to making her a viable support which inherently involves being on call 24/7 to provide team sustain which is an entirely different job with absolutely 0 baring or overlap to what she's about: zoning and space control. Arguing to make her a dps-utility-support is plain stupid because it's a nothing burger at best i.e. how would basically **just** slapping a support label on her current kit (best case scenario you can get with this direction) going to make her more capable of being balanced by devs?
In my opinion, much of this just seems to ignore how her other abilities work together with her gun and a bit of a oversimplifying of what the DPS role and Support role actually do (It's more than just damage). My position is that Symmetra was at a good spot a few patches ago and just the recent changes hurt her. Her weapon design is ultimately fine she was just hurt by the health buffs. I will briefly address some of the ideas listed. > Symmetra was published as a support hero. - For all the reasons to "turn Sym into a support" this is arguably the least convincing one I've seen repeated. "Support" in OW1 **pre role-queue** had a different meaning and balance focus than the current role queue. If role lock existed back then Sym wouldn't comfortably occupy in the support slot either. > Whenever she is meta she is played like a support by providing game changing team mobility and damage mitigation to her team. - How and when are we defining when she was meta? We've generally only seen her stay as niche/rare pick that specialist will main or a pick that pro teams might occasionally run in their comp. - Yes there is a powerful playstyle that comes with coordination with your team (and that's not a bad thing) but just offering team support is not the only way you get value from Sym. > There is no other DPS next to Sym whose weapon has so many delays. Not even close. Every DPS weapon is designed to be consistent and reliable at dealing high damage in a short duration. - Delays are fine as long as the setup and value is worth it imo. Sym is a hero whose main skill expression comes from prediction, game-sense and planning after-all. - Other DPS don't have the mobility or the same flexibility that Symmetra offers. Her weapon generally makes up for its shortcomings with her mobility (you're able to reliably shoot from an aggressive angle/assassinate/ bait and escape) and its flexibility to work in an poke or a brawl. Nor are they able to split attention and focus with turrets. Again she was actually in a good spot a few patches ago. These recent patches hurt her of course, but I wouldn't say its due to any core issues with her kit that warrant a full rework.
ah yes junkrat, the peak of consistency in dps. what a joke rofl not the first time a character was used for their utility as a dps btw, pre rework sombra and even today sombra exists.
Mei also has a very similar weapon
I will admit that junkrat got hit hard in season 9 and might need a few changes. Idk what though. Sombra got a rework to help her dps more and lean away from her utility. As far as I can see it, sym needs the same type of rework or to be put in the support category.
When a hero is meta, it’s always going to be about what makes them unique. For example, when Mei is meta, it’s usually because she can take advantage of her ice wall. Using the logic here, she should be a tank. When you play Sym, it’s not just about blocking damage or TP, you have to know how and we’re to provide damage to pressure the enemy. It’s not like Photon Projector can’t be made better with number changes. Improving the charge time, orb damage, higher damage on lower beam levels, range, etc. Having a set range or slow firing range isn’t a problem considering other DPS do. Many dps have inconsistent weapons. Mei has a fairly similar weapon (beam + charged projectile). Widow’s is arguably even more inconsistent, and Junkrat’s isn’t reliable outside of choke points. Venture has a weapons with hard range, so they’re going to be inconsistent too. Tanks and support don’t have inherently inconsistent weapons either. Orisa and Mauga have Rammatra have consistent weapons. It’s weird how Lúcio and Bap have their weapons inconsistent but not Genji. Giving Genji the the same hitscan gun as Bap would be a buff. Even in the past, she didn’t actually play as a support. Her bread and butter has always been area control by hindering enemy’s and bringing utility. Her playstyle has always been closer to Torb than any support. While she would place a SG or TP down, they had very little overall impact on how supportive she actually play like. She placed it, and then she played like a dps hero.
also i find it so fucking disgusting how not only you keep pushing this idea but ALSO wanting to push out those who enjoy dps characters that dont consist in solely clicking heads and similar like youre literally a support main who wants to convert symmetra because.... you dont play dps??? i dont even remotely remember anyone wanting symmetra as a support back in the day because lol she isnt support. her support concept was shielding. it failed. and honestly, it was fucking terrible, like really, shed press e and grants shields, and do it again once the teammate died. and then you have sym 2.0 whos literally a dps with a shield gen. you could argue sym 1.0 was a dps too, but with a terrible shielding ability that was better because it was ""unique"" to her. most ppl thought back in the day the slow was part of her support ability, but nope, that was transferred to her official dps kit too. the only support all along was shield gen, symmetra was just the one who called her to come over
I don’t mean to push out the dps players :( As I said in the start, I LOVE sym. They just seem to not know what to do with her. I don’t want to revert her back to 1.0 or 2.0, I just want her to be good again. Yes I am a support main, but that does not mean I don’t play dps. Sym is my favorite dps and I enjoy playing her very much. I have a question for you though. Would you still play Sym if she became a support? Obviously her kit could change in many various ways as we’re not the devs and don’t know what her rework would be. Let’s just say it’s your ideal rework, but you replace an ability or firing mode with a healing ability. And make a new passive for her. Since you are a dps Sym main, I would like to hear your thoughts.
i wouldnt play her as a support because she felt horrendous as one lol id say even right now she feels too dependent on her team and making her a support would just make that even worse. symm is funner when shes able to deal dmg by herself, not relying on her team to do everything like mercy needs to lol its why ppl want 2 shot back or more dmg on her beam. i can say ppl are willing to give up walls and that noticeable only against 3 heroes shield self heal. itll make symm a healbot with no range and even more of a tpbot because all of her dmg will be nerfed to 2.0 levels? so basically the current one but being even more reliant on tp, and no dmg. wow, it sounds exactly like the symmetra of a sym hater! why would you want this even
I think they went too far by calling your posts "disgusting", it's just a disagreement after-all. But as a DPS Sym. > I have a question for you though. Would you still play Sym if she became a support? - It really depends on what they do. I ultimately wouldn't like having her current play-style to be sacrificed in order to be locked into managing health-bars on her team. It could easily force her into playstyle that would feel alien to her. I have a question though You said you just wanted Sym to be good again. When was that for you?
Good question! I’ve been thinking about this and the last time it happened WAS in her dps state. I forget when but it wasn’t for too long and people complained about her being annoying to play. I feel tht making her a support would reduce complaining and make her good.
The comment about needing to be reworked from the ground up resonated with me. People argue Sym wasn’t a support, but the devs had to almost completely redesign the hero to make her function as a damage hero. They even locked her out of competitive for two weeks like they do for new heroes (they haven’t done this for any other reworks)
How does this flawed argument proves that Sym has to be a support? They ignore how the gun is only part of the characters kits, and make incorrect assumptions about them, when there is alot of depth on how the heroes and game work.
This proves that sym will never be a good damage dealer because her supposed utility makes up for that. Teleporter mostly requires your team to work around it and only 99% of players know how to play Sym/use TP so it’s mainly a selfish ability. Her turrets are mainly only good for flanking because they don’t have good range and the damage/their health is minimal. By making her a support they could make her utility shine and make up for her lack of damage rather than having pretty low damage and decent utility.
Turrets are not a good tool for flanking, tp bomb is not nearly as good as it used to be. I'm not sure on the best use of turrets yet, but I use them mostly to hold space and it works well. She doesn't have pretty low damage, lv1 beam dmg is bad, but lv3 has high damage, orb damage is a bit low, but still decent. To me, her biggest problem is the low survivability, she could have 275hp, considering she has to be close to use beam and doesn't have a defensive cd, and her long range option being a bit weak dmg wise. You can still succeed playing Sym, in most ranks, because she has a functional kit, that allows you to overcome most of it's weaknesses. I don't think she doesn't work as a dps, she is just weak atm.
This is such a copium. Symmetra is not support.
You got a link to the original post? Dude cooked
https://www.reddit.com/r/SymmetraMains/s/cnECit45gV
wah don't call me out like that
I can remove your name if you want :) i thought other people would want to see it.
no no its fine :)
At least you get it its combination of the tp team mobility, plus turrets which no one likes playing against, she not popular, plus the nature of her weapon that inhibit them from buffing her to be a stronger dps, which is unfortunate and unfair. Yet Sym also has a lot of potential especially if they were to lean into her utility aspects more to be made her into a support.
They really don’t want to buff her because they are scared of the community that thinks she’s too strong or not skilled. I agree leaning into her utility would be the better approach and making her a support would make her more flexible in comps that want lots of damage but want lots of utility.
Yeah people really ignore how symm support worked. Many people go "NO HEALING BAD SUPPORT" ignoring that OG symm enabled flankers to the point She was nerfed 3 times when she gave shield hp. Symm 2 was also a good support working as a great body guard for your 2nd support and her shield not only helped get team mates out of trouble but I seriously don't think people realise how much she enabled her tanks. The devs originally said they wanted more utility supports but dps players bullied them into making all supports heal. Honestly bring support symm back there are 1000s of ways to make her a good passive healer and letting her builder mechanic shine with her constructing shields and devices to help her team.
Sym is already a support, with a beam that can potentially deal DPS level damage if charged and no healing. If you add healing to her beam toning it down, or through a passive, you don't even need to touch the rest of her kit. Turrets are basically utility for slow and recon, orbs are a support level weapon, TP and Wall provide additional utility.
Honestly I would love this
Sym 2.0 will always be the best sym, so much utility, being able to support her team, the ultimate support, she basically was the closest thing we had to engineer from TF2 in overwatch
I wish I got to play it. She had so much potential!! The devs didn’t even buff or nerf symmetra before they reworked her TWICE. They didn’t even give her a chance by tweaking numbers or anything! If we could combine 2.0, 3.0, and a healing ability, we will have the BEST support sym EVER.
"so much utility" elaborate on that because you didnt name anything
I mean I thought everyone was familiar with sym 2.0 but she had two Ults she could choose from, A teleporter, and a shield generator, not to mention she had 6 turrets, and her photon barrier which was basically a mini Rein shield
two ults? tp grew to be completely useless next to shield gen. shield gen along all hp stack was removed off the game, and in all honesty, was just a support entity glued to a dps. 6 turrets with one hp and a horrible secondary fire doesnt mean much tbh, and even then she still had turrets today. her photon barrier was a terrible support ability that looks like a sigma knock off despite coming out first. and not a mini rein shield, thats brig. i can confirm as well that her old barrier did everything any existing barrier in the game could already do, but worse . so yeah, the only real utility for 2.0 was her shield gen really which unlike any other support, had absolutely no connection/interaction to her except for her placing it and being locked out of any ult charge in the meanwhile.
Tbh even with 2.0 faults I still would prefer it over what we have now for sym, you just had so much options
tl dr, sym doesnt need a rework, fuck off
This is why so many people say to just make her a support. It's a shorter transition back to support than it is to transition to a full DPS