Now that the weekend has passed, I felt that it was time for me to give my thoughts on Symmetra’s rework. To introduce myself, I am a Symmetra main. I have been playing Symmetra since before her first rework and have put in over 150 hours on her as my most played hero. The goals I wish to accomplish in this post are 1) Identifying why Blizzard’s current method of reworking is flawed, 2) Identify the aspects of a successful rework, 3) Compare Symmetra’s current kit to the most recent proposal, 4) Detail how the rework should proceed, and 5) Encourage Bizzard to communicate openly and frequently with us on every stage.
FLAWED REWORK
Before I officially start this section, I would like you all to keep, what are in my opinion, the two most important aspects of a successful rework in mind. They are 1) The rework improves the selected hero (buffs them), and 2) The rework does not alienate long time users of the hero.
TURRETS
To begin on why this rework is flawed, it is my opinion that Blizzard has skipped a crucial step in the rework process, improving on Symmetra’s current kit. Geoff’s comments highlighted some information about their rework ideology. He stated that they tried Symmetra with healing turrets. He described this as awkward to use and not better than damaging turrets. After that they began testing a new deployment method, projected turrets. In addition to that change, several other change were made. The new version of the turrets have increased damage, slow potential, health, and the amount of turrets Symmetra can hold has been reduced to three.
Lowering the amount of turrets is where the rework begins to go south because this reallocates the functionality of her turrets rather than increasing their functionality. With half as many turrets, Symmetra’s application of them changes. The new turrets will devalue flank monitoring, anti-stall, and distraction. The use of a single Symmetra turret on a flank patch can provide a team with the information needed to change their current strategy. A dying teleporter or shield gen can do the same. A flanker after a far off ult leaves their team in a 5v6 situation. With less turrets, the ability to protect flanks and backlines is diminished.
If you’re like me and routinely play Attack Symmetra, you probably understand that she is the best anti-stall hero in the game. A Symmetra with turrets on the point creates a challenge for the defending team because they won’t always have the time to focus her six turrets and the enemy team. The new turrets would be easier to focus down due to their limited number but wouldn’t necessarily kill faster. I really want to highlight the distraction aspect of her current turrets because it’s more influential than people give it credit for. Time and resources (ammo) spent on the turrets is less on Symmetra’s team, weighting fights in her favor. A McCree using 2 shots to take out turrets are shots not put into a healer or a tank. What I would recommend is adding the new projecting functionality onto her current turrets, improving their flexibility.
TELEPORTER
Building off of increasing, rather than reallocating functionality, lets focus on the teleporter next. The change to the teleporter is right out of the Mercy rework and turns her ultimate into an ability. However, unlike how resurrect is still resurrect, the function of the teleporter will be changing completely. The teleporter, as is it on live servers, functions as a delayed Mercy resurrect. It allows Symmetra to bring her teammates back into the fight, keeping the pressure on the enemy team. It can also be used to make high risk plays such as backcapping. The new teleporter functions solely as a repositioning tool with the added bonus of teleporting unconventional things such as D.Va bombs. The problem I wish to address is not the new teleporter, but the abandonment of the old teleporter. There seems there is no reason to discard the older original ultimate. Certainly the new teleporter can be added to Symmetra using the second weapon system Torbjorn and Mercy use. This iteration of Symmetra needlessly discards a useful, powerful, and very balanced (in my opinion) part of her current kit.
PHOTON BARRIER
Having read the section on the teleporter you’re probably wondering what will happen to the Photon Barrier if the new teleporter shouldn’t replace it. It is my opinion, that the Photon Barrier should stay and functionality from the Shield Generator be added to it. My proposed change is that when damaged is blocked using the Photon Barrier, all of Symmetra’s allies close to her (think Lucio aura radius) gain decaying shields similar to Doomfist’s passive. The amount of shielding increasing with the amount of damage blocked. This would provide a skill (gamesense) based trade off between blocking damage and key abilities. Having said that, let me make a case for the why the Photon Barrier even in its current form should stay.
The Photon Barrier is one of the most versatile, skill requiring aspects of Symmetra’s kit. It is key to not only Symmetra’s survivability, but her teammates as well. The barrier can be used to block more than just pure damage. It can be used to block hooks, sleep darts, flashbangs, sniper sightlines, Earthshatters, D.Va Bombs, and Barrages. It can be used proactively to help facilitate a push or win the shield war, or it can be used reactively to block key abilities. In my opinion, Photon Barrier needs only a few tweaks to improve it. First, lower the cooldown from 10 to 8 second, Second, spawn the barrier closer to Symmetra to fix issues of certain projectiles bypassing the barrier, and Third, upon pressing E the Photon Barrier stays in place for up to 1.5 seconds. While that number is subject to change, I chose it to prevent Symmetra from turning into a budget Reinhardt and to allow for Symmetra and her teammates to get more use out of the barrier.
PHOTON BARRIER ULTIMATE
Since this is the new suggested ultimate for Symmetra, I want to go over it. The new suggested Photon Barrier Ultimate is an infinite in size 5000 health barrier. It would be placed similar to Mei’s wall and the orientation could be changed similarly. It is obviously, very dramatic, but how could it be applied. The most immediate use that comes to mind is winning shield wars. It has the potential to allow lower damage team compositions to win against those with higher damage outputs. The other outstanding application is splitting fighting zones into two. The barrier would heavily disrupt enemy fire and provide Symmetra’s team to shield dance.
While the ult is interesting, there are questions that have to be answered. How would EMP affect it? What are some changes we could make to the barrier? Can we give it thickness?
SECONDARY FIRE
I don’t actually have much to say regarding the secondary fire. The proposed speed increase looks really good. It will make her better at range and allow for skillshots. I only wish it still pierced because it was good at pressuring Bastions and Torb turrets. The interaction with draining barrier health sounds interesting but I’m concerned that it will hurt tanks, namely Reinhardt too much.
PRIMARY FIRE
There is no way to sugar coat this. The lock-on aspect of the primary fire should not change. Overwatch was designed with accessibility in mind. A fact easily supported by Overwatch’s accessible cast including Junkrat, Reinhardt, Winston, Brigitte, Lucio, Mercy, Moira, and Symmetra. And yes, while some of these heros require more aim than others, the reality is that they provide for disabled gamers. Removing Symmetra, as an accessible hero, when she has been accessible since launch, is inane. Do I want a better, more viable Symmetra? Of course I do. I have mained her since I got the game before the first Halloween Event. I played her through her first rework. I took her into comp and climbed to mid Plat. I played her through dive. I even played her when Moira orbs destroyed my turrets. I want her to be better, but not at the cost of alienating my fellow Symmetra mains. I want disabled players who’ve been playing her since the beginning, like I have, to keep playing her. I don’t want to hear that a disabled player had to stop playing their favorite hero because her accessibility was removed. PLEASE, don’t limit the options of disabled players. I’m not asking for every hero to become highly accessible. I only want the heroes that were designed to be accessible to remain accessible.
To finish off this post, all I can do is ask the devs to seriously consider what I’ve written. Try to improve on Symmetra’s current kit rather than overhauling it from the beginning. Try out some of my suggestions and record some video for us or better yet, put these changes on PTR so we can all try them. Let the players be a part of the balance process. I know you’re going to read this post, so please respond to it. If there are problems with my suggestions, say so. PLEASE communicate with us openly and frequently.
TL;DR
- Improve on Symmetra’s current kit before overhauling it
- Add projection to current turrets
- Keep old teleporter and add new one
- Keep Photon Barrier with improvements
- Secondary fire looks good
- Keep the lock-on
- PLEASE communicate with us