The latest Support hero to join the roster, Kiriko is one-half of the current Support meta. She dishes out a significant amount of healing, can deal extreme damage if you nail the headshots, and teleport around, making her very tough to kill. Her Ultimate, Kitsune Rush, is also one of the best in the game, even after the nerfs.
First up is her Kunai. Like Genji’s Shuriken, these have a travel time and deal 40 damage to the body. However, the critical multiplier is 3x, meaning headshots can deal 120 damage. It’s pretty insane for a Support, and if you can nail consecutive headshots, even Tanks will go down in a hurry.
Healing Ofuda is her means of healing, throwing up to ten talismans towards allies. These have a travel time, and you must keep the ally within your crosshairs, lest they go astray. The latter makes it a bit tough to heal characters constantly moving around, but you get used to it after some time.
Protection Suzu sees Kiriko throwing out an item that makes allies temporarily invulnerable for about 0.85 seconds. While this can be decent for negating some Ultimates or giving her some breathing room, it’s also the only Support ability that can cleanse debuffs and negative status effects like anti-heal, burn, hack, freeze, and so on. There’s a small window after throwing it before it’s applied to allies, so try not to throw it when they’re in the middle of combat and 1 HP.
Kitsune Rush creates a path for allies, buffing movement speed and rate of fire while reducing ability cooldowns. While not everyone makes the best use of this, the applications are insane. Zenyatta fires like a machine gun, Reaper’s shotguns fire much faster, and he can close the distance quicker, and Roadhog’s Whole Hog is devastating. The list goes on. It’s that good.
Of course, Kiriko can Wall Climb like Genji and Hanzo, and Teleport to an ally. While the former is good for repositioning, the latter is potent for staying alive. You can teleport out of Ultimates like Terra Surge, or onto allies that are out of the way and need healing or damage support (like flankers). While you could heal allies and build up Kitsune Rush, her entire kit is useful in several situations, and she’s good against almost every hero in the game. Just make sure you hit those kunai shots on airborne heroes.
How to Play Hanzo
Hanzo has always been an interesting character, whether it’s the random “logs” that can one-shot, headshot players out of nowhere, the sheer randomness of Scatter Arrow, or how OP Storm Arrows were with his rework. Unfortunately, he’s in an uncomfortable position in today’s meta where a Roadhog could easily flank and kill him, or a Doomfist and Ramattra can tank his Ultimate with little trouble.
Using a bow and arrow, Hanzo doesn’t need to reload. Hold the fire button down and release it. The longer the button is held, the further the arrow will travel and the more damage it deals. There’s still a drop-off that must be compensated for, but it’s not too harsh. Storm Arrow readies four arrows that can be fired without charging, but they each deal less damage. Sonic Arrow reveals the area around its point of impact, showcasing enemies behind walls. Meanwhile, his Lunge is good for quickly dodging to the side and acting as a double jump. Like Genji and Kiriko, Hanzo can wall-climb.
Dragon Strike is his Ultimate and fires two spiraling Dragon Spirits in a straight line, which can also go through walls. It’s pretty potent, capable of killing several heroes who can’t move out of the way, if not severely weakening them. A good way to use it is when you’re behind a wall, but next to the point or payload since this affords less opportunity for targets to escape. Use a Sonic Arrow to see your target’s positioning. It can also funnel enemies into areas where you can finish them with Storm Arrow.
The problem, at least in the current meta, is that several heroes like Tracer, Sojourn, Kiriko and Lucio can quickly evade Dragonstrike. Aside from his Lunge, Hanzo is also a sitting duck, making it difficult for him to escape. Good players can instantly one-shot their opponents, but they may go down quickly given the opposition. There’s also this awkward animation added to Hanzo when he unleashes an arrow. It doesn’t seem to affect his aim or damage but feels awkward.
How to Play Lucio
While he’s one-half of the current Support meta with Kiriko, Lucio has always been a valuable hero. He provides a constant area of effect healing and quicker movement speed to surrounding allies, the latter helping to reach the point faster and dive onto targets. Crossfade allows for switching between the two modes, and using Amp It Up lets you increase the healing or speed offered.
While Lucio’s primary attack fires a burst of projectiles, his alternate fire, Soundwave, is a short-range attack that can blast enemies back. It’s good for slaying low-health targets and amazing for booping enemies off the map. If that weren’t enough, Lucio can wall-ride, presenting some insane mobility options and increasing his survival even more.
His Ultimate is Sound Barrier, which grants a large amount of temporary health to allies within line of sight. That latter part is important, by the way. If you or your teammates are behind barriers, walls, or out of range, they won’t get the benefits. Also, Lucio executes a hop before dropping the beat and can be killed mid-animation, resulting in the Ult being cancelled and lost.
Usually, you can stand around and get some value with Lucio. However, he’s important in this meta, and not in a Reddit Lucio way where you dive on the enemy’s backline and attempt to take out their Supports/Snipers. Speed Boost is invaluable for helping your team escape from enemy Ultimates, while Healing Boost keeps them in the fight longer. Amping up the healing isn’t the best substitute for the main healer, but it’s still helpful when multiple allies are low. The value of booping enemies away also can’t be overstated enough, especially if you send them off the map, like in Rialto, Ilios, Nepal, etc.
Sound Barrier is great when lots of burst damage is incoming, whether it’s a Whole Hog and Kitsune Rush combination or Sojourn’s Overclock. He also works great with Ramattra, providing more speed and survivability when Annihilation is used. If you have a Reaper, Speed Boost him in and watch as his Death Blossom rips the enemy team apart. The possibilities are nearly endless. The meta may shift this way and that, but Lucio always finds a way to creep back in and is well worth mastering.
How to Play Mei
Mei has been underappreciated since Overwatch 2 came out for several reasons. Her primary attack, Endothermic Blaster, no longer freezes enemies. Instead, it slows them and deals damage. Her alternate fire still shoots ice projectiles which can crit on headshot, and she can still use Cryo-Freeze to go invulnerable and heal. Ice Wall creates a wall of ice, which can access the high ground, block chokepoints, and section off teams.
Her Ultimate, Blizzard, creates a dome of frost that will freeze enemies caught inside long enough. Ideally, she can then follow up with headshots. Good for seizing control of a point or locking down an area, stalling, and whatnot.
Despite so much good utility and hard CC in her Ultimate, Mei is just…fine. When she’s coordinating with her team to push in, cutting off targets with Ice Wall and scoring some kills, or using Blizzard to lock a point, she’s quite good. Not quite as dangerous on the flank as in Overwatch 1, but you should still ignore her in your backline at your peril. Plus, her alternate fire can result in some nasty long-range kills if you’re not careful and she’s tankier than the average DPS.
Nevertheless, her lack of freezing on primary attack makes it even easier for heroes like Reaper, Roadhog and Tracer to duel her. Doomfist is also a better matchup than in the first game, and she’s vulnerable to long-range Damage dealers like Ashe, Widowmaker and Sojourn. Still, she’s not the worst to field against, say, Ramattra or Sigma, given their limited movement options; D.Va since Defense Matrix can’t block Endothermic Blaster; and Junker Queen, who has no damage mitigation or barrier.
How to Play Mercy
One of the more iconic Supports in the game, Mercy is often hailed as the easiest hero to grasp. Her Caduceus Staff has two functions – healing and damage boost – and all you have to do is keep a button held. Upon healing a target, you don’t need to keep looking at them to continue healing or damage-boosting them.
Over time, Mercy’s Resurrect has been reduced from an Ultimate that can bring the whole team back to a single-use ability with a long cooldown. It’s still potent, but resurrecting an ally slows your movement speed and has a channeling time. The movement speed debuff is removed when in Valkyrie form.
Valkyrie is Mercy’s Ultimate, allowing her to fly and enhancing her movement, healing and regeneration (while also giving her Caduceus Blaster unlimited ammo). Guardian Angel lets her fly to a targeted ally (even those dead), and Angelic Descent allows her to fall slowly. With Overwatch 2, the super jump tech has been incorporated into Mercy’s kit. Pressing Guardian Angel, and then Crouch at any point, allows her to jump high into the air, making her movements more unpredictable and increasing survivability.
When you compare Mercy to a hero like Kiriko or Lucio, her utility and damage seem very limited. There’s also the fact that she can’t both heal and attack – you need to switch to her staff or blaster. Nevertheless, even if she’s not the tip-top of the meta, Mercy is finding use these days by damage-boosting Ashe and Sojourn. Given the latter’s nerfs, Mercy helps offset the damage fall-off of Railgun.
At lower ranks, her mobility and constant healing flow can make her a big menace. Mix up the Guardian Angel and super jumps, combined with the environment, and opponents will have a tough time killing you. Of course, you could also go with the tried-and-true Pharah-Mercy combo, damage boosting and healing Pharah while staying in the air.
For more details on Overwatch 2, check out our review here. It’s available as a free-to-play title for Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, PS5, PC, and Nintendo Switch.