Hey there!
I’ll organize this post into different sections for ease of access and easier reading. I will begin by prefacing who I am and what knowledge, experience, and game sense I have with Symmetra. By the end of this post, I hope we can all see the unique, game-changing potential Symmetra could have if she has shield augmentation abilities.
NOTE: I go in-depth about Symmetra’s old kits, if you are just interested in the hero concept, please feel free to read over the other parts!
About Me
Ever since the release of Overwatch Beta I have been playing Symmetra, and have continued to play her in QP and Competitive matches regularly. However, I regularly fill as a Support role because her playstyle was very slow and niche during her 1.0 and 2.0 build. Symmetra is much more viable in her 3.0 build, but I think she still lacks something other DPS choices have.
Collectively, I have about 450 hours of playtime on Symmetra and will always to continue to play her 
I don’t think rank is important, but since this is an about me… I play on two different systems Xbox and more recently PC. I am currently a regular GM player on Xbox and a developing Masters player on PC.
The failure of Sym 1.0
Photon Shield:
NOTE: This is a super brief section, but I think it’s important to acknowledge the impact of an extra 50HP that’s permanent until death and regens!
Before the official release, Symmetra was able to provide all of her team an additional 50HP as shields. The devs determined that this would make flanker heroes much too strong especially Tracer and Genji.
Let’s keep in mind that no one knew how to really play the game and from the big picture they were right to be scared of giving flankers too much power, they pretty much ruled the entire dive meta for a few seasons.
Supports and Utility:
When the game released, everyone was learning how to play the game and develop team strategies and combos. Notably, there was always discussion on why Symmetra was the only support who didn’t actively heal. The community continued to debate on how and where she would be useful but eventually ruled her out of every single meta and strategy due to her underwhelming kit. Her turrets were low damage, fragile, and took quite a bit of setup, being able to only hold three at a time and a long cooldown. The teleporter was quickly located and destroyed often, and the biggest culprit of her failed kit was Photon Shield.
I get it; the devs needed to make a quick fix to her before the official release. But I still have to ask, “They had to have known that 25HP in Overwatch is literally nothing, right?”
Almost every attack in the game does more than 25HP of damage, so Symmetra’s damage mitigation was extremely low to the point it was negligible. The best way to mitigate damage in OW is to either have it healed away or blocked with a tank’s shielding ability.
Symmetra was the worst damage mitigator in the game.
There was no reason you would ever pick Symmetra for her “supportive” utility because there was another hero who was better at it. There was either a healer to recover the teams lost HP or a tank to prevent HP loss in the first place. Symmetra’s Photon Shield could never compete with active healing or a 2000HP Rein barrier.
Sym 2.0 - The attempt to make her viable
The addition of more utlility:
About 7 months after launch, the devs finally wanted to help Symmetra out:
We wanted to address two main issues with Symmetra. First, on the whole, we felt that she didn’t feel active enough. Second, due to the nature of her Teleporter, she felt weak in certain situations on different maps and game modes.
To address the first point, we replaced her more passive Photon Shield ability with a much more active ability: Photon Barrier. Now, Symmetra can help lead the charge on offense or help shut down a big push on defense by actively blocking damage for your team.
On top of giving Symmetra a shootable barrier, they gave her a Shield Generator as her ultimate ability. Unfortunately, as time went on, the Photon Barrier with Sym 2.0 was very impractical to use for your team especially with the speed it was shot out at.
Sure we could block shatters, barrages, and many more things, but those shields were far and few in between.
In the end, Symmetra did mitigate more damage and had a bit more utility, but it was still overlooked by the Quad-Tank meta currently prevalent at this time.
Pseudo-healing:
By giving Symmetra a Shield Generator that provides 75HP, she was a passive healer and fit in the support role a bit better.
It’s an undeniable fact that if you lost the 75HP in shields and they regenerated, Symmetra’s kit healed you for 75HP.
Think of Lucio’s Sound Barrier, his ult effectively overheals you for 750HP instantly with a decay rate.
The extra health was nice and very noticeable on the 200HP heroes; however, when a tank was shielded for 75HP, it suddenly seems negligible for them.
Surprisingly, Symmetra’s heal rate of 30HP/s every 3 seconds for a max of 75HP was outnumbered by any support in the game.
A DPS without a DPS ult? (Sym 3.0)
As of the date of this post, Symmetra was most recently re-worked to dish out more damage, and her role as a support hero was officially over and announced by the devs on 06/26/2018.
This may be an unpopular opinion, but I feel that this version of Symmetra is a decent contender for a DPS slot. She has the teleporter which grants both her and her team instant mobility to wherever the TP can reach allowing for strategic plays and locking down an area with turrets and her team very quickly.
A DPS without a DPS ult:
Her turrets are powerful, but I think they are the most substantial part of her kit sadly. Each little turret damages 50HP/s while applying a slow effect at the same time, and you can have a max of 3 deployed. Everything that was changed about the turrets is excellent, she doesn’t feel slow and clunky like in previous iterations.
Her turrets and the new gun, allow her to play as a strategist, if you can predict the enemy’s movement, you’ll be able to lock them out with high amounts of damage and crowd control.
Her primary fire does A TON of damage, but the trickiest part about it is not only getting it ramped up to level 3, but rather the tick rate of the damage. The secondary fire is great, especially the new projectile speed, however, I really feel that orbs should penetrate shields, even if it does reduced damage.
Penetrating orbs were a great, unique thing about Sym that no other hero could do, and I think that should come back.
Finally, her Ult…
If you look at any DPS on the roster, (really any of them), they all have an ability that helps in securing a kill whether it’s Infra-Sight, B.O.B., or High Noon.
Yet if we look at Symmetra… it’s just a giant shield. A 5000HP wall for 15 seconds is great… as a tank/support ult.
A simple buff to the shield that would be consistent with her kit would be to slow the enemy’s movement speed when they pass through it. That small change alone would make it a more offensive option.
Symmetra the Shield Augmenter/The Architect she was meant to be
If we look at the identity of most Supports in OW, their ideologies revolve around helping others and doing what they can to help humanity. By making Symmetra a DPS, we are going against her identity. If you can recall in the comic she says:
“You know I don’t kill if I don’t have to.”
And trust me hoo boy… she can melt faces now.
So why did the devs abandon the idea to make her a hybrid tank/support? There might have been several project constraints, (time being the biggest one I assume, they spent so long trying to figure out what to do with her), that we as the players are unaware of but, I feel as if her identity needs to be maintained.
Symmetra is a hard-light architect, so she definitely has advanced knowledge with the technology. Here are a few thoughts for a passive ability since she currently doesn’t have one:
New Passive Ability:
Hard-light Architect:
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Symmetra’s advanced knowledge of hard-light allows her to do 25% extra damage to all barriers
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Symmetra’s Photon Gun (both primary/secondary fire) penetrate barriers, however, any damage dealt behind a barrier does -50% of the damage
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Symmetra’s Photon Gun generates temporary shields for her and her team at a rate of 20HP/s for a maximum of 75HP when attacking a barrier. Radius of effect: 15m
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Symmetra grants a 25HP shield to all allies within 15m of her every 10 seconds for a maximum of 75HP. If allies leave the radius of effect, for more than 1 second, their shield will be lost.
Barrier Repair:
- Symmetra can use her Photon Gun to repair any ally’s barriers at a rate of 100HP/s (only applies to hard-light barriers)
Here’s an idea for a new ability that could possibly replace teleport, or be used alongside it:
Shield Augmentation:
Cooldown: 10 seconds
Duration: 8 seconds (6 seconds if temp shield is cast)
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Symmetra casts a buff on any allies with shields (including temporary shields). The buff grants CC immunity, and a 20% damage mitigation to shields only.
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If your ally does not have a shield to augment, this ability will instead cast a temporary 75HP shield on your ally. (Decay rate would be a bit faster than Doom’s)
Shield De-Augmentation:
Cooldown: 8 seconds
Duration: 12 seconds
(Cannot be applied to the same hero twice until the first effect wears off)
(If cast on a barrier effect is instant)
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Symmetra casts a debuff on enemies with shield health, thereby causing their shield HP to take 20% more damage from any source.
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Symmetra casts a debuff on an enemy barrier within 12 meters of her, causing the affected barrier to lose 20% of it’s effective HP immediately.
As you may notice, a lot of these things would require Symmetra to be closer to the fight, but I would definitely be willing to swap some of her power for a mix and match of one of these passives and abilities. This would help her stay truer to her initial role as a tank/support hybrid.
In Summary...
Symmetra’s current state is strange; although she has an extremely high output of damage, her ult simply doesn’t fit one of a DPS. I think if enemies that pass through the wall are debuffed that would possibly help her role as a DPS, and possibly could nerf the GOATS meta.
BUT, what I would rather see is Symmetra being more designed around her lore. She’s an expert hard-light architect so let’s give her something in the game that reflects this!
I know that these concepts are complex from what Overwatch usually does but, Symmetra is a complicated hero by default anyhow.
I hope you guys enjoyed this read; I did have fun coming up with these concepts, a few of these concepts were inspired by other MOBA mechanics that I have played/seen elsewhere.