I’ve been reading on the forums a bit recently and I see a relatively common sentiment that people think Zarya is broken, why is that? And in what rank bracket am I supposed to see Zarya more actively played and generally against which heroes (other than DVa)?
For context, currently have Tank on low Platinum and DPS on high gold. So far I have not exactly felt Zarya being oppressive to me - not that think that my experience is the only truth, but just what I anecdotally experienced.
I make it a habit to bait out bubbles and track them, then attack her relentlessly until she either falls over or has to retreat from low HP. (and I keep my distance/LOS against her beam when possible)
This really isn’t a troll post, I just wish to inquire.
She doesn’t have armour health and for effective damage (beam) she is limited by the beam’s range. Isn’t distancing (mobility), positioning and range the way to go?
And yeah I suppose if you have some projectile players just firing predictably down a hallway or have no trigger discipline, that seems to become an issue.
The beam range is a lot farther than you think, and it doesn’t take much in the way of battery charge for the beam to do significantly more damage.
Zarya with good bubble management and sufficient pocketing can simply wave the beam back and forth and melt whatever is in range, then have LW yank her back to safety to heal and give time for bubble CD’s to return. I do it all the time if a Zarya will play along.
One of her biggest strengths is the lack of battery decay.
Soldier 76 and Bastion were my to-go picks to deal with her, I usually went for highground spots and rained bullets down out of her reach. Worked well enough so far.
Bastion especially is a good enough pick against her that he can cover his own tank if they want to keep playing DVa into the Zarya. DVa is pretty necessary right now since Ashe and Sojourn are everywhere.
To answer your original question, though, Zarya is very strong right now against uncoordinated teams, which is most teams. Her perks are top-tier. She only really hard counters DVa and Sigma, though, despite what the forums think. Even Orisa has a chance against her now since Orisa can swap javelin spin for a barrier via perks.
15 meters, no? Isn’t terribly difficult to outrange if you weren’t in melee distance to begin with, at least from what I felt. Though feeling out 15-20m distance consistently may not be the easiest for some, I guess.
The lifeweaver stuff is nice, but I think this also applies generally to Rein, Ram, Doom and Ball as well to allow for more aggressive play. (shoutout to my occasional LW player pulling me back just in time o/)
Yeah, it takes like a rough minute for her to decay from 100 to 0. Could be rough after a teamwipe and you try to rush back (which is obviously far less than a minute). It’s there, trigger discipline is needed, but I can see that.
I don’t know how many meters long a payload typically is, but i’ve been hit with Zarya beam what feels like one and a half, maybe two payload carts in length away so it’s not quite melee distance. The time to melt if that battery has any charge at all is next to nothing for most targets under the Russian microwave.
When playing against her I can help knock her out with Bastion’s help as LW pretty handily unless she is being pocketed well.
Even DVa rips her apart if you can persuade your team not to shoot the bubbles and there is some high-ground to retreat to. She really is totally dependent on people shooting bubbles, otherwise she is useless.
Ram don’t do jack to Zarya lmao
She’s got higher damage and better defence.
Ram blocks and just stares at her?
Ok
She just shoots him or whatever’s behind her