Then why do people always switch to Mei, Sym, Brig, and Zarya, often 2 of those at once, to try and counter me?
She needs a little something but is close to being well balanced I’d say. Tanks should strive to be where Zarya/Winston are now IMO as far as balance goes.
That is the impression I get, but I am also optimistic and consider the fact that maybe I’m just bad and that there is hope for our girl. In which case, I want to know how to play her in the most effective way.
But most dva mains seem to think she needs buffs of some sort. Idk if that is biased or not.
Those first 3 counter nothing.
Brig was an ow1 thing my bad. Mei isn’t really an issue in ow2 either. But Sym could counter and Zarya certainly can. Either way I see people switch to these characters really frequently when I play dva.
And even if they’re not effective anymore, I imagine players think they still can be. It’s pretty clear when someone is just playing the hero and actively counter picking
My go-to tank when the enemy tank is playing Winston because I don’t trust my team to shoot the bubble.
I miss when dva could boop Winston out of jump. It was really funny 
Spread changes, and defense matrix range increase is what she needs. The only major thing would be Defense matrix.
Spread changes would help her weapons and damage feel more consistent.
Sym is better against shields, dva can just fly away denying the charge up. Zarya doesnt require the charge up, just use bubble to deny missiles, and push forward. Dva has to be able to contest the other tank, and dva’s effective range is within zarya’s primary range and so zarya can just bully the dva out of the match.
I didn’t use her much in oldwatch, but I use her allot in newatch.
Depending on the need I like to swap between Dva, Sigma, or Remattra.
I find her useful in a variety of situations, but she can get burned down so quick. I have long advocated for a reduction in her crit box size.
I mean, as D.Va, you have to dive in and get close to be effective, and not every team comp can follow her around or wants to go in with her. Not all supports can focus healing her enough. When up against a team that does support their tank properly, then the outcome is obviously going to be in their favor over the one that isn’t, even in an even-skilled matchup.
You can be team-diffed despite being #1 at D.Va, because you can’t hard carry as D.Va. It’s arguably true for any tank, but definitely more noticeable on her, compared to, say, Orisa, or Ramattra. Which is why a number of us D.Va mains are asking for some minimal buffs that we hope the community would find reasonable. We don’t want her to be meta, but just in a little bit better of a spot than the one she is in right now.
You can have amazing aim and have perfectly mastered your ability timings on D.Va …but if you have to navigate around shields and away from your supportive teammates while having no way to support yourself for an extended time, then you’re better off swapping to a tank that either has the durability (e.g., Orisa), or a similar shield + area denial pattern that better enables your teammates (Sigma). A deep diver like Winston might be out of the question, unless the enemy supports are low mobility and not anti-dive. Winston is also good for pestering snipers (in both cases he’s a better pick IMO than D.Va).
Up against beam heroes? D.Va’s only defense is flying away (which isn’t attacking or standing her ground) and shooting from afar, and we both know how effective that is. Best to go long range damage-dealing tanks that don’t mind beams: Orisa, Junker Queen, a hybrid of mid-range damage and personal shielding (Sigma), or maybe Winston if you can shield dance the beams (good for knocking out Sym turrets).
I find D.Va is good against some forms of projectile damage spam comps, like against Junkrat and Bastion… unless it is just a constant endless damage stream that overwhelms D.Va’s 4-sec Defense Matrix, or they are ramping their damage output to 11 with Zen or a carry DPS with pocket Mercy, or running anti-Dive heroes like Brig to keep you away. D.Va is good at dissuading Pharah, better than the other tanks, IMO, but she’s not “the solution” to a Pharah problem that needs to be handled by a DPS swap or against a Pharmercy duo. D.Va can be decent at pestering a lone sniper, but again, that usually is a task that should befall your DPS, as you are needed for tanking up front.
Believe me, I prefer one-tricking D.Va and used to do so all the time in OW1. Going up against determined enemies, these are my experiences when trying to fruitlessly one-trick her in OW2:
- My friends who are awesome healers (Ana, Bap, Kiriko) can try to keep me up while I bash my head against a wall. These sorts of fights---against shields, damage spam, beams---tend to be stalemates for a hot minute, until our abilities run out and we simply are out-manuevered or picked off by a sniper.
- I play into the aforementioned comps with amazing supports and amazing carry DPS mains, but then I'm not really doing anything of importance on D.Va; just surviving, and being hard-carried while feeding my brains out.
- I play with amazing carry DPS mains and crappy healers, which tends to end disastrously in my experience. Because DPS still need appropriate supportive tanks to make openings and be disruptive or at least cause enough distractions for them to make enough effective picks.
3 Likes
True but in some cases it doesn’t feel that simple.
a. You are contesting the enemy tank and the Sym just comes up and beams you. Are you supposed to just abandon the front line?
b. Or if you dive anyone, that Sym will be there unless the person you dove was out of position or isolated.
It isnt smart to dive in with dva anymore, you should only chase down low health targets if you are able to boost in and out quickly, long before sym is able to get full charge on you.
Yeah pretty much. It’s quite a puzzle playing dva. Brawling with just about every tank is not a great idea, diving leaves you without support or an escape, peeling makes it easy for the enemy to collapse onto your team. It just leaves me wondering how to play this character when there aren’t obvious dives where people are out of position and not getting healed.
Cause even if you see someone out of position, you will not be able to kill through the healing no matter what. And in the mean time the enemy tank is at the front line so your backline can’t just move in to help you.
4 Likes
Nah. People hadn’t worked out that Roadhog was good yet, and D.Va is hard countered by two hitscan Heroes that aren’t standing next to each other.
3 Likes
She was literally the second strongest at the time…
You saying nah doesn’t hold any weight when in reality it went Zarya at the top and then dva.
I can confidently say as a gm/top 500 tank player she was definitely the second strongest behind Zarya in season 1.
There’s just nothing Dva offers compared to other tanks that justifies using her over them so you don’t see her being played anymore.
The only people who can even play her properly in this state are her mains and I can tell you that if I’m having problems, everyone else is too, much less the people that don’t have hundreds to thousands of hours on her.
There’s so many things they can do…
Spread back to 3.5
15 meter DM
3 second cooldown boosters
20 dmg boosters
Micromissiles with tracking
More armor
She needs something and the question is what can she get as a buff that doesn’t make her too strong.
If I were Alec, I’d go for 3.5 fusion cannon spread and 325/325 hp/armor.
If not that then I’d seriously like to see 3 second booster cooldown make a return.
3 Likes
These seems like a good deal it will help the bunny a lot.As a support currently I feel like d.va is no threat, it’s actually kind of fun to go 1v1 if she doesn’t have good aim or missles ready it’s pretty easy to destroy meka.
I can already hear dps crying 
I wonder what would be like if booster duration was increased. Does 3 seconds sounds good or bad?
“Second strongest” means literally nothing when the game is 5v5 and people were still working out what was good. Perceptions of Tank power levels changed pretty dramatically even within Season 1 (for example, Doomfist went from F tier to being considered “underrated” as people bothered to actually learn him instead of just complaining).
Season 1 D.Va would’ve still been bad against the Season 2 Roadhog/Sniper meta, just less-so.
3 Likes
Dva is fine where she’s at right now. No changes are needed.