Sym's new ult will be worthless

There are 6 enemies meaning 6 ults, and smart players don’t use all of them at the same time. Current Photon Barrer is much better at blocking most of them since it’s usable on a CD and casts instantly. Her ult blocking will go way down when people can just choose not to ult into the impossible-to-miss mile wide barrier.

I still think that was one of her best abilities.

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My question is… Does Sym start building Ult charge once the Barrier is deployed or is it like her current ult where there is no charging until it is destroyed.

Well the last time blizz posted about it was two weeks ago so for all we know it could be anything.

My guess is that it works like her current ults, but no way to tell right now.

Such a lack of imagination.

From what we know, the shield will be huge. Just put it at a slight angle and you should be able to cover that area, too.

You could also save the shield and use it as a reaction. D.VA ults? Shield. Pharah ults? Shield. Soldier ults? Shield.

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So, by blocking off the main approach to the point, you forced the other team to go the long way around - through a dangerously narrow, partially uphill alternate route - and then fight their way onto the point through a much tighter choke. If they refuse to do this, they instead have to force their way through a giant barrier that denies all ranged damage. This is not useful?

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Current photon barrier is too difficult to use to protect your entire team or block the entirety of certain ults though.

And it’s still on a long 10 s cooldown with very little usable active protection since it moves forward so fast.

Don’t get me wrong, I know how to use it to protect myself from Self Destructs, Deadeyes and even Rocket Barrages but like, emphasis on myself

Protecting your team will be easier with this new iteration of Photon Barrier as an ult. Symmetra will be reliant on other barrier users until she can get her ult in the meantime however.

I know we don’t have it on PTR yet but sheesh you’re all being extremely negative about this. Would it kill you to try and look on the bright side?
Or at least admit that in her current state she’s easily countered, has a bad reputation amongst the community and is even underpowered.

Not gonna lie, I’d love it if they kept Photon Barrier a regular ability and made it stationary / larger but they’re choosing to make it her ult. Maybe that’ll change but until then they’ve said this is what’s going to happen, why not try and envision all the possibilities you can pull off with the new ult.

Everyone saying Shield Generator / Teleporter is more impactful and exciting to use than this new Photon Barrier ult is lying to themselves.

Shield Gen and Tele are painfully easy to track down and destroy before they even get practical use at times. They’ve needed to go and even then they’re passive ultimate constructs that Symmetra has to walk out of battle to use and wait for results to benefit her team.

Why is everyone suddenly acting like they’re amazing ults? I’m confounded by some of you and your perpetual negativity. Blizz is busting their bums to get this rework ironed out and make her better and instead everyone is just giving them a lot of hatred.

Well, Sym’s current ults are flawed, but they at least do what ults are supposed to do and that’s to have the ability to turn the game around in your favor. Her teleport right now can bring a whole team back to the fight. Her shield gen can give your entire team a health advantage for a whole fight, even game. Personally, I’d rather just see her current ults be tweaked so that they’re temporary, and only last maybe 10 seconds each. That would force people to use Sym’s teleport properly (grouping up and taking it together from spawn for example). Shield generator could be adjusted to be more like Orisa’s supercharger, and grant extra health in a smaller radius, maybe make a bubble around its location but have that not be the only aspect to it.

However, like I linked here ( us.forums.blizzard. com/en/overwatch/t/brainstorming-ideas-for-syms-new-ultimate/105273?u=nefara-1586 ) there are a lot of cool ideas for Sym’s ultimates. It doesn’t have to be her current ones. Just, of all the things they could design for her, a barrier is just so boring and lazy. Let’s not forget that when Sym got her new photon shield, the asset they created for it is literally a turret on an oval. The whole wall idea feels like they didn’t think it through, didn’t think about how it would actually play, but the programming already existed for barriers and the art is literally just a giant rectangle. It feels like they were just like “welp, Sym needs an ult so I guess this will do”.

Please, Blizzard. Treat her right. Give her something cooler.

Well, it kinda sounds useless … or let’s not go that far(though we should if it’s exactly as it’s describe), it’s at best highly situational. They should think how to make Symmetra useful in both attack and defence, because that’s the biggest issue today(though I’d say that good Symmetra is ok in both attack/defence as longs as she can realize when she’s underperforming and switch). That wall sounds like she’d be even more regarded as a troll in attack then ever before, so that doesn’t sound like an improvement for Symmetra mains and we know there’s a lot of them.

We don’t know yet. It’s 5000 HP. Maybe it will have infinite duration, and can recharge itself. That effectively screws ranged enemies and forces them to get close, which is great for Symm. It’ll definitely help your team close distance on a heavy fortified team also. I think the ult will be fine against most heroes. There will be some counters, but that’s normal.

The purpose of this ult is for the enemy team to be forced into playing into her allies territory. No sniping from afar, you’re forced to go into potentially dangerous territory.i like this ult tbh

Yeah, I mean it seems decent as far as an anti-sniper ult, the only issue I have is just how fast the enemy can potentially take it down. It seems like it’ll be way too vulnerable. 5000 hp isn’t a lot for a wall that spans the entire map.

I wouldn’t add more barriers to the game, especially an infinite-size 5000hp-wall, without letting Ana heal through them… unless ALL HEALING is removed through barriers.

I honestly can’t think of anything that this linear, map wide barrier can do that a round bubble the size of a capture point wouldn’t do better. Imagine a mega Winston bubble with 5000hp that encapsulates your whole team from 360 degrees. Now that would actually force the enemy to either deal with the bubble, or enter your territory. It would allow you to barrier weave effectively unlike the linear one. It would protect you from all of the things that the linear barrier would, on top of being less vulnerable.

However…

Agreed. No one was thinking “You know what this game needs? More barriers”.

Only 6 of 27 characters have a barrier, I don’t quite see what the issue is. It’s for then to defend themselves, I’ve seen a lot of people asking for more shield thanks considering that Orisa Rein are the only ones and Zarya isn’t counted as one.

yeah and it’s really hard to tank right now without a shield. try picking roadhog right now. you melt.

If the enemy is on the high ground place it infront. Pulls enemys down to shoot. Blocks 60% of ult in the game. 15 seconds of free time without snipers

But that would be op. Look at my comment previously too see my points

It is actually really powerful.

  • You can force them to move to you
  • you can separate tanks from their healers, or expose the healers if they want to heal their tanks because they cant heal through the barrier.
  • Pop it mid team fight, right in the middle of everything and everyone can shield dance while fighting. That is huge. Like 2nd point Hanamura where it is one big brawl.

This ult has many applications and the 5000 health is crazy strong. It also has a crazy fast ult charge, which is awesome. You just havent had the time to see what it can do.

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I was thinking the same thing. It’s a nice concept, but the fact that the enemy team can pass through the barrier eliminates its purpose. There should be some sort of repercussions for the enemy if they pass through it. Maybe it does damage, it takes a percentage of their ult, something! But just to be able to walk through the barrier that is supposedly an ultimate is ridiculous.

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