The most recent balance patches have been relatively small, but with a new hero being added to the game recently, the meta has changed along with her release. Which heroes are best right now?
1) Widowmaker
- Widow’s Kiss: Left click is an automatic assault weapon. Hold right click for long-ranged sniper weapon (130 DPS on left click, 80 when scoped).
- Grappling Hook: Launch a hook that pulls you toward a ledge.
- Venom Mine: Launch a poison trap (75 DOT).
- Infra-sight: Provide your team with a view of the enemy’s location.
Hero score: 92/100
The only thing that can properly contest a good Widowmaker is a full dive comp. Otherwise, there are multiple heroes her team can pick to help protect her, so flankers trying to kill her in a 1 v 1 will usually end up with her being healed and killing them instead.
She’s a skill dependent hero, but the higher your rank is, the worse she feels to play against. It’s incredibly hard to play around a good Widow as a squishy hero, because the second you come out of cover she can headshot you and then your team is at a disadvantage.
On long range maps, she’s at her worst, because her drop off nerf didn’t really do much to stop her from playing so far away most heroes have to burn multiple abilities to reach her. In the time it takes someone to reach her, she might already have gotten multiple kills.
2) Brigitte
- Repair Pack: Heals an ally for a short duration (25 instant healing, 100 extra).
- Whip Shot: Launch your flail to knock an enemy away from you.
- Barrier Shield: Hold right click to deploy a frontal energy barrier.
- Shield Bash: Available when Barrier Shield is deployed. Dash forward to knock back an enemy.
- Rally: Gain armor, empower Barrier Shield, and provide extra health to nearby allies (also gives Shield Bash a stun).
- Inspire: Dealing damage to enemies heals nearby allies (15 HPS).
Hero score: 90/100
Brigitte is great for both enabling and countering almost every other meta hero this season. She can protect both Widow and Juno from mobile heroes like Tracer, as well as give dive DPS her packs for long range healing.
She’s also hard to kill herself, with her shield blocking up to 250 damage, her bash letting her run away or stun people when she’s using Rally and her Whip Shot booping people away. Her armour also gives her a little bit of DR, making her less squishy than other supports.
It’s best to pick her with a backline that needs protecting, since you can’t do your job properly if your other squishies are playing heroes like Pharah and Mercy, but you can get away with running her anyway if the enemy team has heroes you can swing at for Inspire.
3) Winston
- Tesla Cannon: Left click is an electric frontal-cone weapon. Hold right click to charge, release to fire focused electricity (70 DPS on left click, 15 minimum damage on right click and 50 max).
- Jump Pack: Leap forward into the air. Landing on an enemy damages them (1 minimum damage, 50 max).
- Barrier Projector: Deploy a protective energy dome.
- Primal Rage: Gain immense health, but you can only leap and punch enemies (50 damage per swing).
Hero score: 88.5/100
Winston is one of the best answers to Widowmaker in the game right now, along with multiple of his best dive partners being good and the changes to armour making it harder for his counters to burn through all his HP. He’s one of the hardest tanks, but worth the effort to learn this season.
His bubble can be used to isolate squishies, since it blocks almost all healing abilities and every hero’s primary fire other than Reinhardt’s or Brigitte’s. If you jump on someone with low mobility like Ana, the enemy team is either forced to peel for them or let them die.
His ultimate was also buffed to give him 1000 HP when he’s using it in July, so now you can distract the enemy team or juggle an enemy squishy in a corner for longer than before. If you use it badly though, you’ll give the enemy team more ult charge than before, so you need to be careful.
4) Juno
- Mediblaster: Burst fire weapon that heals allies and damages enemies (78.64 HPS)
- Pulsar Torpedoes: Press right click to lock on, press again to fire homing projectiles. Heals allies over time and damages enemies (85 direct, 50 extra).
- Hyper Ring: Deploy a ring that increases movement speed of allies that pass through it.
- Glide Boost: Glide horizontally with increased movement speed.
- Orbital Ray: Call down a ray that travels forward, healing allies and increasing their damage (85 HPS).
- Martian Overboots: While airborne, press space to double jump and hold space to hover.
Hero score: 88/100
Juno’s had multiple small nerfs since season 13 came out, but none of them have really made her any less viable. She’s still one of the most mobile supports in the game, with high healing and almost all of her abilities having good utility.
Her speed boost, burst healing and fast charging ultimate that gives everyone in the AOE a 35% damage boost are all really helpful things that make her a great general pick. She’s a little weak with poke, but otherwise any comp benefits from having her.
While she’s a little squishy and needs protection if the enemy team is focusing her, the amount of things she brings to the table makes peeling for her worth the effort. You might have a little difficulty if you run her with someone like Ana though.
5) Tracer
- Pulse Pistols: Short-range automatic weapons (220 DPS).
- Blink: Teleport in the direction you are moving.
- Recall: Travel back in time to your previous location and health.
- Pulse Bomb: Throw out a powerful sticky explosive (350 damage).
Hero score: 87/100
High mobility, high damage and self-sustain all add up to make a hero that’s always going to work. As one of the least changed heroes, Tracer is usually one of the best DPS, since her kit has been in a consistently strong state.
Multiple of the meta supports are good dive targets, like Juno and Ana, along with snipers being some of the easier DPS for her to flank. Her blinks have a bit of verticality to them if they’re used near ledges too, so you can get to some high ground places they might not be expecting you on.
Running her with Brigitte and Juno can also work well, since Brigitte’s packs and Juno’s missiles both have healing over time so she can take advantage of them to take aggressive off angles while she’s still being healed.
6) Ashe
- The Viper: Left click is a semi-automatic rifle. Hold right click to zoom in, increasing damage and accuracy but slowing rate of fire (131 DPS on left click, 115 when scoped).
- Coach Gun: Blast enemies in front of you and knock yourself backwards.
- Dynamite: Throw an explosive that detonates after a short delay or immediately when shot (20 to 50 damage explosion, 100 damage burn).
- B.O.B.: Deploy Bob. He charges forward and knocks enemies into the air, then attacks with his arm cannons (136 DPS, auto aim and shoots same target as Ashe).
Hero score: 85/100
She’s not quite as annoying to play against as Widow, but Ashe is still a sniper that can play pretty far away and force you to play cover unless you want to take a lot of damage. A headshot from her gun does about 150 damage, which is more than half of the HP of most heroes.
Her dynamite can also hit up to 5 people at once, so they’ll all take at least 120 damage from the explosion and burn if they step on it, as well as having their healing lowered for 5 seconds.
If you’re on a good sniper map but you’re playing into a dedicated dive comp, Ashe is less vulnerable than Widow or Hanzo because of her Coach Gun. She can use it to push away flankers or interrupt Winston’s jump, although D.Va can eat it, along with her dynamite.
7) D.Va
- Fusion Cannons: Automatic short-range spread weapons (146 DPS).
- Light Gun (Demeched): Automatic weapon (98 DPS).
- Boosters: Fly in the direction you are facing (25 damage).
- Defense Matrix: Block projectiles in an area in front of you.
- Micro Missiles: Launch a volley of explosive rockets (93.5 DPS, can do up to 153 damage).
- Self-Destruct: Eject and overload your mech, causing it to explode after a short time (100 minimum damage, 1000 max).
- Call Mech (Demeched): Call down a new mech (250 damage).
- Eject: Eject out of your mech when it is destroyed.
Hero score: 83/100
D.Va’s a little more team oriented than Winston and she needs less resources, along with having higher burst damage, but a little less mobile and easier to counter outside of her best maps to compensate.
She’s got some of the best peel out of all the tanks, since she can boost back to chase away flankers and Defense Matrix any damage her teammates might have taken, even if playing defensively is pretty situational since she’s missing out on pressuring the enemy team’s backline.
Her ultimate is also a free second life, since you can use it for a free remech once you get demeched, unless you want to try and use it offensively. If you do, it’s best for zoning during overtime or right before you cap a point to get the last few bits of progress.
8) Cassidy
- Peacekeeper: Left click is a powerful, accurate revolver. Right click wildly fires remaining rounds (140 DPS).
- Combat Roll: Roll in the direction you’re moving to take reduced damage and reload (50% damage reduction).
- Flashbang: Hinder enemies in front of you, slowing them and disabling movement abilities.
- Deadeye: Face off against your enemies. Press Q to lock on, Then Q or ability 3 to fire.
Hero score: 82.5/100
When dive is meta, Cassidy will probably be a good counter pick, unless he’s been nerfed to the point where he’s hard to run. He’s best with brawl and poke, since he can’t keep up with dive heroes, but if your supports are struggling you can still get away with picking him.
He’s particularly helpful against Tracer, since there aren’t many other counters to her in the first place, and his hinder can stop her from blinking away for a little while. He can also counter an unpocketed Echo or Pharah, if the person playing him has good aim.
His range nerf made him a little harder to run on long range maps, but with a speed or damage boost, he can get himself into places he can do consistent damage quicker. Along with that, he’s also one of the best DPS against Juno, since he can cancel her movement and ult her out of the sky.
9) Kiriko
- Healing Ofuda: Channel a burst of healing talismans that can seek targeted allies (76.5 HPS).
- Swift Step: Teleport directly to an ally.
- Protection Suzu: Throw a protective charm to make allies become briefly invulnerable and cleansed of most negative effects (80 healing normally, 110 when debuffed).
- Kitsune Rush: Summon a fox spirit that rushes forward, accelerating the movement, attack speed, and cooldowns of allies that follow its path.
- Wall Climb: Jump at walls to climb up them.
Hero score: 82/100
While not working quite as well with Brigitte as Juno, Kiriko is still good with dive because Swift Step lets her keep up with more mobile heroes. Her healing also has decent range, so she can use her wall climb to play from high ground and heal from safe positions.
It’s also helpful for setting up flanks, because she can use cover to follow after her DPS while they distract the enemy team, so she can try to get a kill or two before needing to teleport back to her team.
The cleanse from Suzu and multiple different buffs from Kitsune Rush are also great, since they’re strong abilities that can work well with every other hero, so you can pick Kiriko in almost every single situation.
10) Sojourn
Railgun: Left click rapid fires projectiles that generate energy on hit. Right click is a high impact shot that consumes stored energy (144 DPS, 100 damage on max charge railgun headshot).
Power Slide: Ground slide that can cancel into a high jump.
Disruptor Shot: Launch an energy burst that deals damage to enemies within it (80 DPS).
Overclock: Railgun energy auto-charges for a short duration and charged shots pierce enemies.
Hero score: 81/100
Out of all the hitscan DPS, Sojourn is the most flexible, since she can be run with both poke and dive. While she’s best with other mobile heroes, she can stay back with a poke comp and farm the enemy tank to get free railgun charge and use it to headshot squishies.
When you’re playing her with dive, you’ll want to slide in after your other DPS, since Tracer or Genji are faster and can set up the flank first. If you have enough charge on your right click, the squishies you go for won’t have much time to react.
Sojourn can also spam her disruptor down the middle of chokes to try and charge her railgun up faster after the new buff, along with getting more ultimate charge from it, so she has more uptime on Overclock than she did before.
11) Baptiste
Biotic Launcher: Lob a healing projectile that heals all allies near the impact (55.55 HPS on splash, 77.77 HPS on direct).
Regenerative Burst: Activate to heal yourself and nearby allies instantly, with additional healing over time. Instant heal is doubled for targets less than half health (40 instant healing or 80 if under 50% HP, 40 extra).
Immortality Field: Toss a device that prevents allies from dying. The device can be destroyed.
Amplification Matrix: Project a matrix that doubles the damage and healing of allied projectiles.
Exo Boots: Hold crouch to jump higher.
Hero score: 80.5/100
Since dive is meta, Baptiste isn’t as much of a general pick as Kiriko or Juno, but he’s still a great pick with both brawl and poke. If you’re running Ramattra or Reinhardt, his high AOE healing and utility makes him great for enabling them.
If the enemy tank is playing something like D.Va or Winston, he might struggle to do much once his Immortality Field is broken since both of them can block his healing and kill him quickly, but it can be a little map dependent.
His field is one of the best abilities in the game, since he can give multiple people immortality in an AOE, along with his burst giving up to 120 healing if the people near him are under 50% HP. It can feel like he’s got three HP bars when playing against him as a DPS in a 1 v 1.
12) Sigma
- Hyperspheres: Launch two charges which implode after a short duration, dealing damage in an area (73.3 DPS).
- Kinetic Grasp: Absorb projectiles in front of you and convert them into extra health.
- Accretion: Gather a mass of debris and throw it at an enemy to knock them down (80 damage on direct hit, splash does 12 damage minimum to 40 max).
- Experimental Barrier: Hold to propel a floating barrier; release to stop. Press again to recall the barrier to you.
- Gravitic Flux: Manipulate gravity to lift enemies into the air and slam them back down (50 damage on lift, 50% of max HP on slam).
Hero score: 79/100
Sigma’s a particularly strong pick on his best maps, because he’s got decent enough range to take advantage of high ground and his shield can be helpful for poke DPS that want to sit in certain places and spam at the enemy team.
Widow, Baptiste and Ashe all benefit from playing with a Sigma, since he can let them stay at beneficial off angles. He’s also pretty self-sufficient, with his grasp and shield HP letting him regenerate HP when he hasn’t been shot for a little while, so his supports don’t need to focus on keeping him alive.
Outside of the places he’s good in, he can be a little underwhelming. His damage is low and brawl comps can give him a lot of trouble on short range maps, so it’s not great to pick him in every situation, but he’s the best tank to enable poke.
