That’s right.
I’m not complaining about balance right now…
I’m looking to learn from Tracer mains how to perform better on the hero.
I’m a high platinum (Nearly diamond) Console Bastion, Mccree, and Widow main.
And yet, for whatever reason… i just never seem to play this game’s mascot.
I think it’s mostly that i feel like i will perform badly, and only be a liability to my team if i get killed too easily.
I’m pretty confident in my mechanical aim, But i struggle most with her play style… i just can’t grasp what i’m supposed to do…
(Other than stick Bastion’s and tanks with pulse bombs. Lol)
Let’s spread some positivity for once, and talk about the good aspects of this hero. The play style, the strategies… I want to hear it all.
So… Tracer mains.
Teach me.
I want to hear your tips, tricks, and secrets about playing Tracer.
(I would also love to hear what kinds of music you people listen to while playing/maining this hero.)
Videos, clips, or anything else related to better understand the hero would also be appreciated.
You may as well be asking a dead fish when it comes to me, i’m just a gold tracer scrub and a terrible teacher lol.
Although i’d say she fits my play style more then any other character in the game.
For advice i’m not sure if i can help, but i at least know that tracer is all about target priority, squishy’s are number one on that list, especially healers.
If you can bait out or don’t have any trouble dodging roadhog’s hook then he’s basically the easiest ult charge battery in the game, of course that could be said for roadhog in general but i find tracer te be the easiest character to get charge out of him.
Beyond that good cooldown management is a must, i usually try to keep a spare blink at all times unless i use that blink to get a finishing blow on a enemy.
Sadly i may not be much help with advice since i’m terrible at advice, i’m sure the stuff i just named are on the common knowledge side for example.
I thought about it and here’s more specific advice.
It may usually be better to pulse bomb the tank but sometimes it’s better to pulse bomb other characters such as the mercy for example, their only mobile ability is flying into their team so you can imagine how that goes sometimes.
Watch out for mei, after the the damage drop off removal she can one shot tracer in the head at any range.
On average try to bait out abilities that that would usually kill you if you’re going in for the kill on that specific target, examples include flashbang, helix rocket and storm arrow.
Beyond that there’s using melee while blinking to finish of low health targets easily.
On contrary to popular believes your first priority isn’t to actually kill things, it’s to stay alive.
The longer you’re alive the more of a nuisance you are to the enemy team, they’ll be wasting time and resources on you to manage and take you down hence distracting them enough for your team to actually do something.
Killing a Zen and then dying hence 1 for 1 isn’t actually worth it when you can do much more by staying alive.
I can give a few pointers I think. I am not the best Tracer but can play her at a mid Diamond level.
The most important skill to learn as Tracer isn’t aim, it’s movement. Aim is pretty low on the list, actually. Someone above mentioned that the best skill you can learn as Tracer is to stay alive and the best way to do that is to get into the habit of moving unpredictably in duels and teamfights so that you do not have to waste resources to stay alive. Tracer has very good animations that you can and should use to make your model hard to hit. She gets particular use out of crouching unpredictably, and because she moves so abruptly you can also throw in some standstills to throw people off once you get the hang of how she plays.
Resource management is the next most important part. A good rule of thumb is to enter a fight with less than two blinks at your disposal only with extreme caution, and never use all 3 blinks to enter a fight, as this leaves you with no way out unless you Recall.
With all this in mind it is important not to overdo the survival portion. A lot of Tracers fall into the trap of being evasive but not using their cooldowns efficiently enough or knowing their engage timings, so they never really accomplish anything either. You want your enemy to have a reason to constantly check their backs for you. This is hard to explain but you get a feel for how aggressive you should be based on the playstyle of the enemy, what heroes they have, how tightly they play together, etc.
Know your blink distance, you get a feel for this as you play and it is important to quickly snag a health pack in a skirmish so your enemy can’t use them and for some animation cancels that you can use (more on this in a bit).
Blink-melee is a good way to close out those almost-oneclips and I find even now enemies don’t expect you to do it. Melee recall is pretty risk free and is literally 30 free damage. Blink-pulse lets you instantly stick someone if you’re accurate without them having any time to react, though you should only do this on a full tank of blinks as you will want to blink back instantly afterward (it is wasteful to recall).
If the enemy has a Brig you should not worry instantly but you also should have a plan as to what you are going to play next. If you treat Bash like Flashbang you should very rarely get hit by it, but once Rally comes out your effectiveness will be severely dampened unless the enemy team is playing very spread out.
Deathmatch really helps if you want to improve your 1v1 scenarios and mechanical skill. You can practice dodging abilities, landing your pulse bombs, blink movement to put yourself in favor, etc.
Try your best to alive more while also being in the enemy backline, annoying them.
Like what he said.
Also always go for making good plays even if it cost your life but that means you didn’t execute that play well which you could improve with practice. The best to practice is to play comp and grind her. Vod reviews always helps so you can look for mistakes and fix them as well as your bad habits. To fix your bad habits, write them on the post it note and stick it on the side of the monitor. Take them out once you don’t make them anymore.
For streamers, Kabaji helps a lot. He even has his own discord server as well as IoStux which he can answer your question if you put it in the ask-stud question. Also In both of these servers, you can ask other players there to help them out.
Other than good luck and just keep playing her until you get good at her. Despite of the meta not favoring her, she’s a good pick once you master her kit to its fullest. Sooooo…yeah, you got this ^^
Tracer, Widow, Hanzo, Doomfist (working on adding Sombra to that list) main. I can’t play McCree to save my life. If I divulge some super secret Tracer club secrets, will you share some of that juicy McCree wisdom?
Watch Kabaji instead; he actually explains really well why he’s doing what he’s doing.
You are more than likely ranks above me when it comes to Tracer though.
Playing on Console as i do, and having mained Widow and Mccree i think i can work out something with movement, Especially since i’ve got the superior movement platform-wise. (Pc/K&M movement sucks tbh.)
I do make this mistake more often than i should… Thank you for bringing that up.
I think i’ll start using some of that Widow training to help with this, as i really haven’t figured out Tracer’s timings yet… But i’m getting there.
Having played more hours of mccree than i should admit to, I don’t think this’ll be a problem for me, As i often use Mccree’s roll in a similar way.
Be it, different… But yea, i’ll need to work on that too. <.<
I have attempted this… But have yet to really figure it out to any avail.
Most heroes i play don’t have that many animation cancels, if any at all…
So this will be a harder thing to learn. let alone master.
Would you have any suggestions on how to practice this?
I may not have played Tracer competitively that much yet, Tho… i actually have a harder time with Mccree’s than i do Brigitte’s.
I’ll have to do this a lot more often… Usually i just pick Bastion and bang my head against the wall until my mind goes blank, and everyone dies.
It’s fun.
This is really good advice! I’ve done the post it note thing before, and it did help me improve.
I feel inspired now.
I’ll be sure to make you all proud by mastering this hero.
HMMM…
Mccree Wisdom?
Let’s see… There’s not a ton i can think of, since most of your impact will come from mechanical aim alone, But when it comes to play style, a lot of people will try to tell you that his Ult is “Useless” and basically just a reload, To that… I say:
SURPRISE THE ENEMY.
Most people think they should try and “High noot” Mid battle, standing right in front of the genji they couldn’t flashbang…
If you excel at flanking at all whatsoever, Try to do so when the enemy think you obviously couldn’t be where you now are, Wait for them to engage your team, (Probably after a reset, from either side) Then… and only then… Should you declare the current time.
Such as this:
I got lucky here, since no one below heard my footsteps, and i wasn’t willing to walk slowly crouched, and caught them off guard at a nearly perfect time, when they had assumed my entire team had fallen back to regroup… and i simply stayed hidden in their backline.
That, or…
If you notice clear sightlines, and any of the enemy team (Especially healers) are lower than half health, you should probably try to catch them off guard with a speedy high noon.
(Roll can be very useful to instigate this, Or even from around corners. Here’s a random old video that may explain this better than i can:)
(A point that can be made about this specific clip is that even though an enemy is locked with a red skull, the shots still take time to fire… Giving them a small window to escape, as you can see i nearly had three kills, but the target inside of the building moved behind cover before the shot aimed at them ended up going off)
Otherwise, here’s a secret tip that i learned not long ago…
The red “Deadeye Skull” Indicates the damage of the bullet not the assumed damage that will be done to the specific target.
Aka, Someone can run in front of their teammate, when the red skill is locked onto them, and tank the damage. (Or die to it, if they are below the health of said target that was locked in the first place.
That, and many people seem to forget, (Especially when playing Junks revenge) That even if a target isn’t fully locked on, it will deal damage.
Sometimes extremely useful amounts of damage, depending on the situation.
Otherwise, here’s another insanely useful tip:
Mccree’s flashbang is the weirdest projectile to ever exist.
As far as i know, it is thrown the moment you press the button, But… due to multiple animation issues it can act very strangely.
So be cautious when using flashbang, one of the best strategies when being dived upon, by heroes like tracer… Is to Flashbang the ground.
You will have time to aim/reposition your crosshair most of the time, even on Tracers. If you are quick.
Chibi is quite tired, so…
That was all i could remember right now.
I think Jelly could help you with this.
He’s a tracer main on console and was a high Diamond and one point, He might have some tips…
it’s just that he has to wake up first
![:stuck_out_tongue:](https://d74zh8edaijub.cloudfront.net/en/overwatch/images/emoji/twitter/stuck_out_tongue.png?v=6" ":stuck_out_tongue:")
