Symmetra: Overwatch's FIRST Identity Crisis

[@PixelRory]

TP has 6 uses. This video has been out nearly a week. I get it. You can stop telling me. I'm really sorry about how I didn't find it since where I was looking it was giving me "12 uses or 6 uses" from when she was in beta. I'll make sure I don't do it again

[@byxis101]

you WILL be banned if you make a mistake again mark my words

[@MomsAgainstCatboys]

Outside of game mechanics there's one fun fact about Symmetra: She currently holds the game wide record for going the longest without a legendary skin. Nearly 3 years.

[@SugarSundust]

Doesn't the new Junker skin count?

[@MomsAgainstCatboys]

@@SugarSundust the mermaid skin that released was the first legendary she got after nearly 3 years. So this has already passed

[@MegaFreeman]

Absolutely not true. She got 3 legendary skins in Overwatch 2 so far: Art Deco (December 2022), S-900 Sentry (August 2023), and Junker (April 2024)

[@MomsAgainstCatboys]

@@MegaFreeman AS PER MY PREVIOUS COMMENT: The mermaid skin was the first one she got after nearly 3 years. That said, this transpired BEFORE Overwatch 2.

[@pepelarrza3877]

​@@MegaFreeman that was all before OW2

[@billyr2904]

I love the use of the voiceline "let's discuss your failures", because it is the perfect voiceline for the into skit.

[@MysteriousGir]

It’s also her VA’s favorite line

[@Bolt451]

​@@MysteriousGirlol

[@J6llyJ9]

The biggest slap on the face for OG Sym players is how they refused to adapt her as a Support, then they turn and make Illari. Like bruh, the experimental card where they made her a support again was so fun. With some adjustments and better AI on the turrets it would have totally worked.

[@polar6066]

yup a totally no range character wouldve totally worked when illari who got ONE healing turret and hitscan range literally is, already struggling herself to remain REMEMBERED by the playerbase yeah totally not a healer bias opinion!! edit: i have no idea wtf the people under this comment understood but basically, support sym already didnt work due to her lack of range and damage. adding "healing" and nerfing her damage wont make her any better. just actually play the game so you can notice that. a better option would be just.... buffing her damage so she can work again like she did for most of ow2s lifespan? 💀 💀 how would healer symm even deal with the global healer nerf thats the dps passive? those clowns dont even play the game yet declare sym has been f tier or something for the entirety of ow2, when thats not true.

[@oKiterrrr]

​@@polar6066hypocrite

[@J6llyJ9]

​@@polar6066 Wowie. Yeah(Reinhardt), you totally got me(Zarya), we absolutely have no heroes(Winston) that are mostly(Reaper), if not pure short-range(Tracer). Yup.(Brigitte) None at all...

[@polar6066]

​@@oKiterrrrelaborate

[@polar6066]

​​​@@J6llyJ9holy shit these heroes are nothing like symmetra!!! good job!!!

[@leedunkin3338]

It's a pretty big failure that both sym AND sombra started as unique support heroes then had to just be shoved into the already overfilled dps roster. blizzard still has a responsibility to redesign them back into being utility supports and evening out the roster sizes.

[@polar6066]

theres only healers in the support category, why would you (not) want them to heal lol

[@leedunkin3338]

@@polar6066 what?

[@PhaxtolgiaLegacy]

Fortunately or unfortunately, Blizzard is really only good at making DPS.

[@noahboddie3482]

​​@@polar6066symmetra was a support hero. Who couldnt heal mind you.

[@polar6066]

​​@@noahboddie3482 supports that cannot heal had consistently shown in the past that they cannot fill a slot in the support role, something that would apply even today yeah im aware of that too

[@alpacawizardman6778]

I find it funny this dropped around the same time as Overwatch released their Symmetra/Lifeweaver short story. Looks like Satya is having who she is questioned bit in game and in lore.

[@Hotkidkris]

What short story?

[@xavier-ns2to]

@@Hotkidkrisit’s on the ow page in media it got uploaded a few hours ago

[@ByronAndOnAndOn]

I really liked the short story, but it's a shame that it can't go anywhere. By the nature of her existing in the game and being the representative of Vishkar, she can never leave the organisation.

[@batjope23]

​@@ByronAndOnAndOn Judging from the short stories she is attempting to rehabilitate Vishkar for the better. Or rather guide it back to the vision the founder originally intended for Vishkar.

[@moonuser22]

Read the short stories! She goes to Shambali monastery for Vishkar and basically has a whole identity crisis while there because of Zen and her connecting with Aurora. You can see the shift in her character in her basic skin designs with her Ow1 skin being neat, pristine, perfect, symmetrical. While Ow2 skin is asymmetrical, loose and she has hair IN HER FACE which is something pointed out in the short story with Niran that irritates her especially if someone else can see it. She definitely is the character with an identity crisis and I thought he was going to actually talk about that. 😂

[@PlatinumAltaria]

Blizzard: "Sorry, supports have to have healing abilities!" Sombra, Symmetra and Mei: "aight imma head out"

[@mothichorror446]

Soldier 76: "We're all support heroes now."

[@xalandriel6071]

Support 76: Hold my healing field

[@BabyGhast4]

When I first played Overwatch, I played as a support the most. And yet, I would play Mei, Symmetra, and Sombra a semi-substantial amount. Knowing that they had a design philosophy of being supportive makes me realise why I liked them so much, despite being “Damage”.

[@xalandriel6071]

​@@BabyGhast4 I tried a couple different heroes when I was new to OW, I started with Genji and didn't felt well with him, later I tried Mercy and stick to her for a long time, after my Villain Arc started with Moira, now I am playing each role (mainly DPS and Sup still, but tank works fine for me) and I'm trying my best to try and learn every hero still Yet Sombra got my first golden weapon haha And yes, I can see the supportive aspect, they really are till some degree, Mei with the walls, Sombra with the hacks and abiliy deny, Symm with TP and.. Well now also the wallhacks, there are so many more really It's a interestinc concept all in all, I just wish Symm would be in a better state :/

[@lum_berry111]

mei is NOT a support she’s closer to a tank than anything

[@realsanmer]

Call me a shitty player, but I miss lock-on, Photon Barrier, Shield Gen, Support Sym. She was so fun to play imo, and I think that having a support that doesn't heal *now* , when we have more healers to pick, fits better.

[@Big_Bidoof]

Yes that was her best era imo. It was also so fun having people yell at me in rank for picking her and I'd end up being the one with most kills 😂

[@potatolord9715]

Who’s the sup who doesn’t heal?

[@polaristired5513]

Her fun levels peaked back then! Setting up her car wash and then blocking a few ults with her photon barrier was such a high

[@strawberrymolk]

No im the same way 😭. I wish they at least kept the lock-on gun.

[@leoh2251]

I loved the lock on. I'd get that thing ripping on tanks then delete the squishys in seconds. People would rage that I was throwing but it made getting POTG so satisfying

[@RoseNights]

"I can only work if people are idiots" funnily enough fits Symmetra's personality pretty well given how condescending she is

[@SimoneBellomonte]

Pfp (Profile picture) and / or Banner Sauce (Source [Artist])? 🗿

[@potatolord9715]

@@SimoneBellomonteno

[@saquial]

Symmetra has been such a mess for quite some time, Blizzard never knew what to do with her. Honestly her as a support based around turrets, teleporters and shields would had been really interesting, but they really missed the mark when they first tried. I like current Symm's kit (although she's a bit weak tbh) but it could work either way.

[@emeraldmoth3977]

The issue with original symm was really how they implemented her overhealth. Just like in mobas if you give enough overhealth it CAN substitute for healing. But symms old E both lasted forever, and was on too long of a cooldown to be used tactically to block key abilities like a fire strike or widow headshot or soldier rockets(as you would can do in Mobas which have non healbot supports). Her ult also being situational was less than great but could have been justified if her base kit made up for it (it didnt). I think if we mad a modern symm support with modern tp, tactical overhealth distribution (think old brig shield pack but without healing and the extra health only lasts for a second at most.) Combined with old noodle beam and turrets (which used to he the only reliable anti-dive tools for supports until brig) reinforcing the backline. We could have had something really unique. As opposed to Zarya's dps rework which we have now. Alas ive grown to accept that Illari is the basically the support symmetra we got teased in that experimental card in Ow1. Healing turret and laser beam in tact. After so long... having symm back in support in that experimental card patch... all i could think... the mission the nightmares it's finally over.

[@emeraldmoth3977]

I still hold out hope symm will return to the support roster one day. But im getting older now...

[@artimist0315]

@@emeraldmoth3977 Shield generator could have definitely worked with further balance. If I remember correctly, it was even nerfed at first because of shield stacking with other symmetra and Torbjorn, making it basically dis functional as a mean of healing and just unremarkable as an over health thing. The cool-down and health given used to be enough to kinda allow her to heal. While I definitely miss some aspect of her old kit, like the auto-aim on primary fire, secondary fire piercing (even if the old speed was definitely awful) and her shield generator, I am still very happy that the new rework brought us the TP ability, improved turrets and Ultimate, making her have more of a purpose, stronger, more dynamic and imo truer to her original concept as a light architect. I personally would be open to her being brought back into the support category but she'd need something else than healing turrets to be viable. I think a big problem with Symmetra as a support is that she wants too many abilities to be really viable. She needs her TP without which she has no identity, so that's one, with her TP she wants her turrets to set up TP bombs and help her defend herself, but if she is a support she also needs shield generator or any way of healing. At one point you are left with only primary fire which is not enough to make her strong. For her to work as a support she would need all of her buttons to serve multiple purpose, like turret should both heal and do damage, optimistically share the button with her TP, and her primary fire should have some means of healing too. Problem with giving her all she wants is that it would make her kit even more confusing to use, probably very clunky and very feast or famine.

[@georgethompson913]

They should've just made her overwatches engineer.

[@retrolinkx]

The teleporter could be used 6 times before it would break meaning the best case scenario would be that you would use it once per death and your whole team could then use it. Looking back, it makes sense why they thought 2CP could be balanced now as you could have a sym with a TP and get your recontest immediately after respawning. Also fun fact about Sym (IIRC) was that before we had the change to Tank/Dps/Support Sym was actually moved very briefly to defense before that entire system was scrapped and she was then in DPS. I sadly can't find any information on this but I remember a few discussions about it and how silly it was to have a change that lasted like a day or two.

[@kingofallcasuals698]

I dont' think she was ever properly moved into defense iirc

[@SimoneBellomonte]

@@kingofallcasuals698Not properly but yeah, she was moved into Defense.

[@teeteenine2222]

i love how he was like i cant find ho many uses it had and you can see in the footage the 6 next to the ult after its placed down 7:33

[@ratboygirl]

officially, the sym rework and the offence/defence merge happened in the same patch. but we knew about a month prior that she was gonna be changed - and the devs themselves labelled her a defence hero in interviews and on the forums! so that might be what you're remembering?

[@ESALTEREGO]

​@@teeteenine2222its prob laziness. He already wrote the script and then found footages but was too lazy to go back and edit a few words

[@Symphiney]

Loved the video! It's great to see someone talk about a hero that the Overwatch community generally disregards and forgets about, unless it's to complain about a Sym buff lol. But as a Sym main since 2016, I'd like to give my two cents on her design as someone that has far too many hours on her, as it feels like you're talking just from the perspective of someone that hasn't spent much time on the hero. Sym 2.0 (Shield Generator version) was a non-healing support, this is how every high-elo Sym player saw her kit. Just Stevo on KZbin has a Bronze to Grandmaster Sym only run on his channel from 2017 where he mentions this several times. He's always been Top 500 on the hero (until Overwatch 2, where many Sym content creators have abandoned the hero) Shield Generator was seriously underrated, permanently increasing your team's collective health pool by 450. This broke many break points, such as Junkrat's one shot combo and Reinhardt's pin on higher healthpool heroes. Her photon barrier was her way of blocking ultimates, damage, and giving her team space to push through choke points. Blocking a hook that would have otherwise got an ally killed was her way of peeling. They probably would've survived with the extra 75hp from Shield Generator anyway. You addressed the issue of 2-2-2 meaning only one healer, but Sym's shield generator gave the solo healer breathing space to catch up on the heals. Mercy and Symmetra had great support synergy because of Mercy's consistent healing and her OG 5 man resurrect when her 60hps wasn't enough. Symmetra was also good in Grandmaster, not just low elo. In Season 5, there was a Sym one trick called "Nut!" who got to Top 10 on the leaderboard playing Symmetra during dive meta, where she would've struggled even more than usual. www.reddit.com/r/SymmetraMains/comments/73v11s/the_time_is_now_a_symmetra_one_trick_sits_in_top/ As for Overwatch 2 Symmetra... 🤡 Sym mains have been begging for another rework that either makes her a better damage hero, or a support. Because this weird inbetween makes her extremely hard to balance (hence the constant buff reverts) but still somehow feeling underwhelming to play. Venture just adds to this feeling. A hero who is also brawly, has a high health pool, high mobility, and high burst damage. It makes me laugh that Symmetra is even in the same role as them. Symmetra's kit has become outdated and really needs an update. If you got this far, thanks for reading my essay on my favourite video game character :)

[@MrXavNiHuck]

Went to make a comment and saw you said basically everything I was to say but worded much better, I miss shield generator a lot

[@TheWayOfTheWott]

wow, i would've thought the Sym community would've been sick of reworks like i am. didn't know the prevailing sentiment was calling for one again

[@NexusBrew]

One slight correction. Sym did have the ammo shield passive in OW1 but I believe it was removed towards the end of the game before they eventually added it back in OW2

[@NexusBrew]

If I’m remembering correctly, it was added in OW1 to help combat the double shield meta

[@YellowNinja]

It still frustrates me so much that Symm 2.0 didnt get a single balance change. Instead the 3.0 rework which was very drasric was shoved on everyone. To this day the overwatch team still has no idea how to balance her.

[@polar6066]

i wouldnt take a paladins opinion too seriously tbh + you complained every single time even when she was actually good. you didnt even bother asking other symm players how to get better at her back then, you kept going at it at your closed circle hivemind on your streams

[@the_last_ballad]

​@polar6066 none of this changes the fact that Overwatch didn't even attempt to give the second rework a chance? Like, holy ad hominin attack, Batman!

[@barbietingz9758]

Great video. Symmetra absolutely needs a rework from the ground up. It’s obvious that don’t know what to do with her current kit, and frankly, I think she’ll always be stuck with either being too weak or too oppressive if they continue trying to make it work. She’s an OG hero. The devs need to show her love

[@tonythunder6048]

I just finished watching the Sombra video and swore this video was out first. And poor Sym, I remember back in ye olden days where she had 2 ults with either a permanent teleporter and shield generator with her ability to give temporary shields and the big sigma shield

[@SimoneBellomonte]

Sigma only in name. 🗿

[@desubysnusnu]

I miss shield generator so much you have no idea xD

[@tonythunder6048]

@@desubysnusnuI find it weird how Junker Queen, Kiriko and Sojourn have voicelines like “They have a shield generator. Get it!” Makes me wonder if they thought about giving it back, or maybe those 3 were planned forever ago before Overwatch 2

[@desubysnusnu]

@@tonythunder6048 Sojourn & JQ had voicelines in OW1 so i think they already recorded everything in advance. Kiriko was probably the same but as a surprise character

[@darkregin2]

Mentioning Mei as a utility dps at 20:10 When she was introduced to Heroes of the Storm, she was released as a tank not as a DPS Blizzard, her overwatch ultimate, became a basic ability in Heroes of the Storm And then she got a wall and a snowball as an ultimate instead Generally her kit in HotS was a lot more interesting than in OW2 where she just right clicks on peoples heads

[@soulreaver6546]

I still think she should've been the one to be tank instead of doom

[@michaelbowman6684]

HOTS Mei is superior to OW Mei. Cryo-Freeze isn't invincible and instead gives her a big health shield and lots of health regeneration, Blizzard and Ice Wall are still area denial tools with their power levels swapped around, she has a ranged attack where she throws a snowball that deals a bit of area damage and slows targets hit, and she has a short range dash that displaces, damages, and slows enemies hit (and is cancelable.) Mei not being converted into a Tank in OW2 is a crime.

[@QuantemDeconstructor]

HotS D.Va was actually one of my favorite characters, since you can decide between being a tank or DPS depending on what your team needed

[@SimoneBellomonte]

@@soulreaver6546100% definitely, RIP Doom.

[@desubysnusnu]

They should've move Mei to tank and Sym to support. The dps roster is still disgustingly bloated. after so many tank/supp added

[@brianna8691]

As a symmetra connoisseur the teleported had 6 uses in symm 1.0 ... it was a wild ride ... I've been her main since 2016 😂

[@noxythegreat]

remember when there were voice lines of her possibly having 10 tp charges that and the one volskaya spot for the sheild gen

[@brianna8691]

Also yes my life is pain... I just love her as a character and her game loop it's like playing 3d chess

[@brianna8691]

@@noxythegreat yes the good old days of silly fun 🤣

[@CassetteGlitch]

Fellow OG Symm main! You and I have been through hell and back lmao. Remember when you'd get flamed just for even picking her?

[@brianna8691]

​@@CassetteGlitch yes lmao people calling me the whole alphabet hahaha 😂😂

[@mirist_kalt]

I miss that one experimental card from OW1 where her turrets healed allies. It was wonky and buggy, but it was pretty fun to play since you could fully dedicate the tp for your team/dps. I often wonder if Illari was once meant to be a reworked support Sym given that Illari also has a turret and a beam based weapon..

[@polar6066]

oh so she doesnt use her tp for her allies now you say?

[@SimoneBellomonte]

@@polar6066Lol

[@LukaLolly]

@@polar6066yeah i mean not really, she mostly uses it for herself to take off angles and tp into the enemy backline. you only really use tp for your team if you’re in vc coordinating and even then it’s quite map dependent

[@AirLight1646]

That was so fun, along with Mercy’s rework with valk and rez swapping positions

[@polar6066]

and if they dont take the teleporter now, what would make them take it if symmetra was turned into a healer and got her damage nerfed as well? lol how does healing solve this.

[@darkregin2]

I remember in 2016 OW1 symmetra would often be a popular pick if you have a zen or tracer on your team as symmetras 25 shields was what those characters needed to not get 1shot by a sniper

[@umadassassin8868]

I remember the good ol days where first point anubis there would be 6 Symmetras with 5 shield generators, IN COMP

[@hekiryuu1]

OW1 at launch had 4 categories for characters: Tank (mostly shields and hp sponges), Damage (Which was mobility and high burst, low sustained damage), Defense (Pure damage hp sponges but no mobility), and Support (This is where healing, CC, and anyone built to support the team in general went). There also was no forced meta back then. Often youd have 2-3 tanks, 1-2 damage, 2 support, and then possibly 1 defense or extra support. So having someone that gives everyone 25hp shield that refills, gave every person on the team a bit of auto healing, meaning you needed dedicated healers less. Add in torb giving armor out like candy, and you have a lot of zoning potential esp since OW1 was "fight at the choke with multiple barriers" gameplay. Speaking of, her alt fire was a godsend because the game was so heavily choke dependent. It made it impossible for defenders to turtle up, since it just passed through and did good damage. And considering tanks at the time didn't have any damage mitigation tools other than barriers, it was really strong. Her primary fire ignored deflect and defense martix, and was REALLY good against super high mobility characters like tracer and genji. The only real downfall was her turrets (one of her main forms of support through the slow CC and damage) was beyond easy to accidentally kill. Either you knew the good spots to place them, or they were dead. The coolest use was creating a 6 turret deathball and running around with it. I don't think she was ever 'meta' because as new characters were constantly introduced, her strengths started waning. But er style of support is something desperately needed in the current game. A means of supporting the whole team through utility than healing. She was not super strong, but everything in her kit either added survivability to allies, hindered enemies, or straight up countered all tank playstyles. She was a better Sombra before there was a Sombra

[@retrodarktrooper6372]

That is just not correct Firstly, it was the Offense class, not Damage. The Damage class was added because they merged Offense and Defense, due to many heroes being good in either situation. Second, Defense characters were never about being "hp sponges." They were characters based on area denial: Widow and Hanzo locked down their sightlines, Junkrat had traps, Torb had a turret, Bastion *was* a turret, and Mei had walls (and also Blizzard ofc)

[@SSADO-]

8:54 “Let us win so we can go to the third map” lol

[@villagerc7130]

7:55 nah I was acc enjoying the vid but seeing how slow that elevator went up acc knocked me out 😭💀💀 I don't remember it being that slow bruh

[@grooviehoovie4179]

i really liked sym after their first rework, she was my most played hero at the time. i always viewed her as a dps regardless, especially since she was pretty much the best i could do with a dps. i would always melt back lines and it was so fun.

[@gunslinger_rafa]

These design breakdowns are super interesting and entertaining, great job dude! Please make more!! ❤

[@Big_Bidoof]

As a Sym player since 2016 with her shield gen and tp ult, I pray for the day she returns to those day. That's what made her kit so fun for me, and her character alone brought me to high grandmaster, after her rework with the giant wall shield i just stopped playing her after a year because she became really boring to me. I remember being able to sneak into the enemies backline putting up a tp and then we all rush in with ults to secure the point. I also enjoyed every game with peopke that would complain about me being a "brain dead sym one trick" just to end up having the most kills a potg. Those were the days ❤😊

[@Big_Bidoof]

I also really loved blocking every dva, cassidy, and rien ult. Also I never cared about what maps to play her on, even if they were 2cp or payload it would always work out for me in the end.

[@noxythegreat]

i honestly do sincerely miss when symmetra was a utility based hero now that shes more dps (turret doesnt slow tp doesnt last etc) she has lost a lot of her charm. like i have been playing since season one when she had pitiful sheilds and i fell in love with her conjurer design but now that she lost a lot of utility she just feels like a worse reaper / venture if i was to change id introduce utility again give her turrets slow tp lasts forever again she gains shields and amo against overhealth while these aren't damage buffs they would immensely help hetr survive and be of use to her team in more ways than just DPS but honestly as a symm main/player since 2016 i just miss her utility / supportive aspects along with sombra

[@Ghilannugs]

I semi agree with this, Id like her turret slow back and the throwable shield back. Would make her both more utility based and kinda a mix of all 3 main roles

[@Funghios]

The first Symmetra weapon is literally just the TF2 short circuit

[@matthewknight5926]

Funnily enough the current TF2 Short circuit came out after Symmetra. So because of Symmetra we got an actually useful and fun to use Short Circuit, kinda a shame Valve has decided to just not update further

[@Scarecrow2140]

You’re killing it with these vids. Incredibly charming quality that discusses topics in ways that don’t feel like they go in circles.

[@BlueZombieBlood]

The teleporter ult had 6 charges. You can even see it in the footage at 7:43

[@Jafin89]

I miss Symm 2.0's forward travelling Photon Barrier so much, I loved that ability.

[@arthuruchoa4211]

Please continue the series! It’s amazing, as a overwatch player that has been playing since beta it’s a pleasure to hear the story of the hero and your opinions on a lot of stuff, so it would be really nice to have a series like this making like the the hero and its biggest problem like this “ road hog, the tank dps “ or something like “ doomfist the character that went from dps to tank “ you know? Just throwing out some ideas. Good luck you sure have a good skills at making videos, hoping the best for your channel

[@kmk66666]

Aye, another small KZbinr popping off with OW content. Congrats on the views coming in hot. Keep it up man

[@joereed8872]

After the wall hack change to syms turrets, I want a ward based builder hero for support. Take the wall hacks off sym, make a new hero based on the concept.

[@Zipperskull_]

Same

[@KLIXORthe]

Yeah, the idea of having a placable support building that can give you intel about flanks and let your teammates know where the enemy is before they peek would be really interesting. Even better if the hero can create their own cover that's just tall enough for most non-tanks to crouch behind, like a longer lasting, mini mei-wall.

[@seamusocoffey]

I played a lot of Symmetra back in 2016 and 2017. I pretty much just played her and Junkrat, because I was playing on a Surface Pro 3 and they were the ones where I could do something with the awful framerate I had. I had a blast and managed to keep a low-mid silver rating in comp. I still have a lot of nostalgia for her original kit.

[@TheSpeedlion]

Imagine my surprise seeing you in my recommended. Great video, well done man.

[@LmaoLena]

I love symmetra as a character (me and her are autistic twins) but she feels so lost as a ow2 dps hero. I’ve personally thought of my own rework (as a ow2 player only) but even still I don’t think that would fix her place in the roster. She deserves so much more damage,utility and lore (sym cinematic when???) as a dps hero, but finding how to fit that into her kit and make her a character in top500 is hard for sym fans and probably developers

[@kingclampz6081]

Symmetra needs to be reworked back into the support category it’s perfect and makes her more relevant and more options for support players

[@ANewKindOfGamer]

I agree she should get reworks for getting her utility back, but rather than just for pushing her into the support block I'd rather we just kick off the role queue, to me thats the main source of the homogenisation in categories

[@pewnit]

IDK if this was on purpose but I watched the Sombra video yesterday and thought to myself about sym. Now, seeing your video on sym, it got recommended to me so good job on the algorithm optimization, and I immediately clicked it.

[@I_Dont_Believe_In_Salad]

they actually bring back her OG teleporter back during April Fool where she now places the exist anywhere on the map and your team can uses it by press F button

[@GarryM180]

This showed up on my homepage randomly and its wild i actually recognized your name from PUGs on the Irish Overwatch discord back in 2019 Great video btw

[@ralvo9819]

something worth mentioning that you might not have known (coming from a LONG time sym player) is that, on her initial release in the closed beta, she was one of the best characters. her shield passive she had on her e initially gave 75 shield instead of 25, which was insane with genji/tracer. she was initially viable as a support, but too volatile to mantain ig

[@xmalin1]

yeah pretty sure it was nerfed to 50 and then 25. it's either busted or near useless

[@AbzuLifeweaver]

Hey, thats me 😂. Never thought my old ass upload would be used in History vids in the future,

[@Sizzyl]

17:00 certified blozzard dev moment

[@lime8823]

This is one of the best honest discussions about a characters balance in a way that doesn’t demean either the players of the devs and instead feels more like a retrospective. I would love if you did more videos like these for EVERY overwatch character. I would love to hear you gush about the good moves on the devs part to improve a character. Fantastic video as usual 🎉 (Ps you should do one on Genji 🙂‍↕️)

[@tohstedd]

og sym was so cvnty i miss her

[@PixelRory]

this is youtube not tiktok you can say cunty don't worry! I encourage it even

[@artimist0315]

I think the goal of the turret rework was for them to act more like "security cams" that would signal which enemy is where and supposedly allow either you to tp in, an ally to dive or your team to retreat. It's more useful than just knowing where your turrets died because you'd get an information about who specifically broke it and where exactly is this person positioned, where previously it could have been destroyed by a random hitscan that wasn't even there and you'd have no way of knowing this. The problem with this is of course that she randomly loss turret damage and that the effect was not nearly long enough to be as useful as it could be, but I generally think that the overwatch community wrongfully consider wall-hacking effects as useless where in fact they are really useful in a lot of situations. I can't count the number of time I've heard people saying that widow's ult is one of the worst one in the game when it literally gives access to everyone's position on the entire map for 15 sec, denying flank attempts, sightline attempts and immensely buffing your own ability to reliably flank and take sightlines for the entire team.

[@ItsHealz]

God this brings back some MEMORIES Ive been playing overwatch since launch, and seeing this footage just reminds me of 6 syms on kings row with turrets all around the bridge. Also "FOUND YA TELEPORTER"

[@Dantayyy]

I subbed at 400 subscribers and that was like 2-3 weeks ago the fact you’ve tripled that in that amount of time is crazy dude you should be proud of the work you’re doing because I genuinely miss ow content like this it’s all just like oh here are the patch notes… or here’s a week of gameplay. Love it dude

[@SugarcideAnimations]

I have been a symmetra main for 7 years, its been fun playing the same character in different fonts every few years

[@salemstrange2091]

I have mained sym since the beta of the game, I lived for her primary fire, I loved her shield piercing balls, I loved her moving shield coz it made it easy to rush people down, also her teleporter ult had 6 charges

[@TyrWolf88]

I played Sym and Mei since day 1 (joke about my aim). Mei was an off-tank, Sym was a utility DPS (even v1), and my goal with either was to control choke points, sight lines, and movement. The main problem I had was that the "support" label came with expectations I wasn't able to meet until we got the generator, which was so strong that you were required to throw a tire at it before you could commit to a point and could be roughly equal to a Zen ult. The turrets were never about damage - Sym was an anti-flank pick, whose turrets gave vision or added to an ambush on that Genji or Tracer who wanted to get up in your business, and you didnt need to aim to beat their bunny hopping nonsense. Her utility combined with the slows, shields, and teleporter just weren't enough for people to accept that a support could be more than HP, so everyone thought you were throwing. Besides, after that, we got goats with almost 0 flanking, so they pretty much had to turn her into a shield buster or she'd never exist in any game.

[@jessk1547]

Thank you Irish Carl Grimes, very informative

[@PixelRory]

that's a new one

[@Wendigo_With_A_Bow]

I literally watched that video yesterday, perfect timing

[@ninethreefivesix]

Playing support Sym back in launch feels like a fever dream. Setting up the car wash was so much fun

[@aqueleRu]

Funny, now with Mirrorwatch, sombra support is a thing people think can work and it's healthier for the game. So the identity crisis don't stop. Fun fact too, there was a creator's patch one time and there sym's turrets healed instead of doing damage, not a oficial rework, but they tried everything with this character.

[@szunaloneheart3148]

In all honesty, i am happy for everyone who enjoys DPS Sym. I was a Support Sym main back the days and let me tell you... If she just would have gotten a tiny heal, it would've been enough. She could be played as bodyguard Support the entire time before this kind of gameplay in the support category even existed (yes, way before Brig existed). People just recognised her dps capabilities, but personally i think she should have been balanced as a bodyguard support (her lore literally saying she is a Vishkar employee which deal with security stuff). Changing her into a dps just deleted my main and most enjoyable playstyle: protecting with barriers, helping out tanks (like literally saved tanks TONS of times) and push together with my team when situations allowed. She really just needed a heal and she would've been fine as support. Quick Edit: Before people tell me: "Just play Brig instead" -> I do and i really like her bodyguard playstyle, but nothing feels as good as Symmetra V2.0 with her flying barrier and shield gen

[@polar6066]

so i take it you didnt feel that bodyguard feeling from the very first symmetra then

[@kazuthecreature]

u sold so hard at the end, bro touch 😭

[@eoat9531]

I love the background music used 🥺

[@PuppetSquid]

I've played every Sym, and i've had a fun time as all of them too. The thing is every change to her feels like they've moved her further from Order to Chaos. Exploding projectiles? Shield stripping? Where's my girl!? But I do have some hot(?) takes/ideas: 1) New Passive 'Order From Chaos': Shields Symmetra grants convert into healing at a rate of 5 : 20 per second. This passive would've worked well with her original E as a quick health burst combined with a decent heal over time (at +25 over-shields initial burst it'd become 100 raw health over 5 seconds if the target takes no additional damage), since the decay means it's no-longer a one-and-done buff, but could still be used as a new core element of her kit if we; 2) Change Secondary Fire to a single-target shield-application: There's plenty of options, but to keep work down and uniqueness up this could honestly just be removing the splash from the current orbs and having them able to hit allies to apply shields. Kind of like a slower, burstier, chunkier Ana primary. A damage/+shield of 25, with a cap of 50 sym-shields added, I honestly don't think would be as OP as it sounds since any additional healing is directly dependent on the shields not being stripped away. They could even revert to going through barriers to differentiate them even more, maybe losing 5 points as it does so if it's deemed too strong. But if we want to make the most of her passive we can also; 3) Bring the Shield Generator back as a Teleporter Altv. You already have to click-to-place the teleporter it so it's not like bringing back the left/right option would make it more cumbersome, and throwing out a medium-AOE shield-supplier to provide a little sustain in a brawl would be a great support ability even without the above passive. WITH the passive, though, it becomes a fantastic downtime defensive utility, bringing your team back up to full+over health ready for the next fight (so long as you time it right). It definitely needs to share the limited duration with the teleporter - it's mad they ever made it unlimited. Speaking of - 3.5) Teleporter Placement distance should increase while you're moving forward: You know how you come out of spawn and try to place a TP but everyone runs past it? Including yourself if you keep moving forward? The TP placement distance should scale based on your current forward speed, so that even if you have Lucio and Queen pushing you forward the majority of the team be able to hop into the TP straight away. Maybe this can be limited to out-of-combat to keep it usable in high-stakes environments (I'm not fully sold on this one if just for the consistency reason) Now Obviously this whole kit is built on taking her back to support (where I think she rightly belongs by lore alone), but it also makes her sort of offtank-like. Which, y'know what? 4) Fuck it. New role. Utility Take some of the old defense heroes and maybe even some of the support and weaker tank characters and stick them in a new role which is effectively built for off-tanks. I don't have specifics, but Sym, Torb, Sombra, Brig, Mei, maybe Zarya, Bastion, and even Doomfist could all transition to this role with some tweaks. Maybe we bring back 6v6 with +1 Utility hero, or we allow 1 player of any role to swap into utility (with a buff to their or their allies stats and abilities if they were queued as Tank) It's super dumb, but i'd love to explore the idea.

[@darcidious99]

The best part about sym's first rework is that this was before hero limits existed... Meaning yes, you could run 6 syms with 6 shield gens, giving you if I recall an extra 450 health... You could run 6 symmetra's all having 600+ health, on 2cp it was virtually unbeatable if you were defending the last point.

[@ANewKindOfGamer]

The real sauce was 5 Syms, 1 Torb. because I think it was worked out that having the armour pack under your shields gave your shields the armour damage reduction, or maybe we just thought that but the pre-rework torb was also handy for throwing up that lv3 turret ultimate when the enemy tries to push

[@Sandvichman.]

yk the excuse of forgetting symmetra makes complete sense

[@mushublaze]

Something i struggled with in ow1 was trying to get people to use tp on console. Some people were so oblivious that they never had interact set up to a hotkey, so they were literally unable to use my tps. My success was player dependent, i needed somewhat knowledgeable players who could actually use the off angle or could best case scenario, surprise nuke with it. Reminiscing about auto lock beam, it was so fun to ambush mercys. If i remember correctly, sym and mercy's beams were about the same range, and if mercy was attached to someone, it was easy feed for the beam rampup, and id turn into a bloodthirsty demon. It was also super fun to use the slow, piercing orb in small, tight rooms and/or around corners. There was just interesting strategies and positioning that was unique to sym. With the new and current beam, sym is more focused on being a shield burner/ tank targeter. Its a lot harder to ramp up the beam on small, mobile targets, and sym does not have the durability to 1v1 dps without some sort of ambush or position advantage. I know this is kind of long, and having dropped ow ever since i got lifeweaver, its nice to talk about syms history again. She was one of my top played heroes, i loved her design and creative playstyle. I wish she wasnt so situational, but its hard to keep her unique and also well-rounded. Shes not a typical ranged shooter, and thats the main focus of ow

[@wallycola5653]

Sym wasn't totally useless at higher ELOs. Stevo managed to stay Top 500 with Sym 2.0 consistently for years

[@nadavg1176]

The mini rework in mid-season 5 gave her the ability to 2 shot squishies, which was very useful and did actually made her less niche. However in season 9 her 2 shot got effectively removed due to the health changes and that's why she feels so situational again

[@Lakatha13]

Old symm traumatized me as I was begining to play the game in old time 2016, I couldn't aim so fighting her was like horror xD I like the actual symm, I find her pretty useful and relatively fun (: Great vid !! Gave me old ow1 memories !

[@xlevii]

Great video man! first time watcher and you’ve got yourself a new subscriber. Love to see some other irish talent :)

[@TheWayOfTheWott]

to go more into my thoughts as a Sym main since 2016: i think Sym has always been a DPS character with utility, the game has just gotten faster and her tools have just changed to go alongside that. i still get to get my team back from spawn or to sneaky flanks with TP, i get to place down turrets into key areas, and i get to charge in with my team behind a barrier as i ramp up a beam of death. to me, Sym doesn't need to be a Support to have supportive capabilities. i think giving utility and set-up potential to DPS heroes is needed to distinguish the roster. do i miss Sym 2.0 some days? absolutely, i have fantastic memories of doing hilarious Sym on Attack strats with the teleporter and not having to worry about aim. when Sym 3.0 released i was NOT happy that they changed my favorite hero so much. now, I'm at the point where i realize that the changes were necessary for the evolving game and i do actually enjoy the new Sym, usually even more than the old Sym! which is why i get so heated when i see people suggest *another* Sym rework. why roll the dice on trying to change this hero's entire kit again? also, my hot take is that Sym 1.0/2.0 should've been able to build up ult charge with TP/Shield Gen active to increase its charges/health. encourage the enemy team to have to destroy it, plus you wouldn't have been forced to generate no ult charge while your TP sat there with only 1 charge left. was easily the worst part of old Sym.

[@vladdreemurr40]

You know, while I often can't do much playing Symmetra, but om-nom-nom-ing enemy shields and then om-nom-nom-ing tank and some other enemies in advance give me so much pleasure! And it gives me the moment of the match)) Sym is my favourite character!

[@silenthills3801]

Persona and Overwatch? You've earned my sub

[@S85B50Engine]

Sym's Shield Generator was fun in no limits because it stacked. So on some maps you could do some goofy stuff with it since you could get up to 450 shields on top of your health pool. You could basically run a team of 6 Symmetras that had more hp than Roadhog, and it was so funny.

[@zacharyrussell6851]

The loss of the auto target was the worst change they gave to sym. Rest in piece ghostbusters cannon

[@kokostale3080]

I liked playing support sym a lot back in 2016/2017, tp was a satisfying ult and the lock on pissed people off so bad lol

[@cromanticheer]

Great overview! I do like the design discussion and would love to see you do more of these. You expressed wanting to be more positive in future videos, and I think maybe the best method would be to seed in positive examples of hero design when you're critiquing the more "mechanically troubled" heroes? It's tricky to discuss in Sym's case because I don’t really feel like OW has any real "utility DPS" success stories, but I think it's interesting to look at how later support heroes were influenced by Sym's failure as a support hero. I was playing OW from launch, but only really played casually so I missed a lot of the toxicity around "throw Sym" and whatnot. And I was a flex main that really tried to make support Sym happen when I could. I understand the theory behind her 1.0 design: she's a support without healing, so she deploys temp HP and helps mitigate running back from spawn. But her kit was a weird one, with the only real synergy of "make a teleporter nest." I do like her 3.0 rework the best and I like the flavor of her being a "shield master" that recharges ammo when attacking shields and temp HP, but I do really wish we could've seen Sym pushed in a more supportive direction.

[@NoshuHyena]

I mained Sym after the DPS permatele rework, all the way in until OW2. That was the most fun I'd had with her, probably because 2CP was still a thing and she was great on defense AND attack on every 2CP map. In OW2, it's tough to apply the same frontline pressure she used to, with only one tank. I do appreciate the faster tele build time, though. Thats a deceptively huge buff and sorta turns her into a mobility hero.

[@that1tuba84]

I missed when her tp back when it was permanent. It had skill and had more depth. Lots of players did just leave it at spawn if they felt like tying their shoelaces together, but when you have the permanent angles your team can take as well as all the other things you could still do, it made me feel like a genius 🤓

[@jumpywizard7665]

I used to be an og symmetra main until her 3.0 alterations. I used her all the time except for some maps like junkertown. Was high gm every season with a win rate of over 68% in comp and 400+ hours on her. I also loved her in ffa deathmatch. Smurfing with her was super fun too. All the different shield generator locations you had to know. KZbinrs like justStevo, Luminum and Hoshi were at their peak. I didn’t mind her being situational, nor did any other sym player, it was everyone else’s problem including Blizzard, they watered her down so much with their obsession of cookie cutter roles, and over time all the heroes somewhat lost their uniqueness, like Mei too. Now I don’t play her whatsoever, I just use junkrat or widow instead since those are still fun. They did ruin junkrat with the last health pool changes too though :(

[@RiyDogg]

I’d love to have seen an alternative version of early sim that sort of took after modern day Illari. She could’ve been able to switch her turrets from healing and damage, which would’ve provided much more depth and complexity to take advantage of. This way she could’ve stayed in support, still applying shields, and would’ve found an actual identity that fits with her lore.

[@lee0495]

I think you missed some other elements on why Sym is in such a bad spot right now and what was the reason they changed her. - The change in July also increased the damage to her primary fire from 90 to 100. This shifted was intended to shift her power away from turrets and more to her other abilities. This made he have the ability to "two tap". A similar thing happened to Torb as well. - A few patches later she had her heath reduced by 25 back to 200 like other heroes since she was more "range focused". - Then we had the major health and sustain rework... Now everyone has 250 HP or more and Sym not only can no longer "two tap" her time to kill with her orbs are lower than ever. Also her sustain ability (HP Regen in shields) is on everyone so you can't have an attrition advantage anymore. The support/DPS hybrid nich is fine imo and I say that as a hard Sym main. She was actually decent before the July changes.

[@polar6066]

yeah that sucked so much. they justified changes then took out the reasoning behind it like nothing

[@inundertow5638]

I was an og sym main and i often miss her old kits. Shield gen sym was just so much fun

[@asdfniofanuiafabuiohui3977]

With Sym, her turrets can be used on a choke point, so the enemy team has to go in to turn around and damage them to get rid of the annoying turrets- supporting the team through that, or putting them on a flank route as a "camera", supporting the team by calling out flankers. Ow1 was originally designed not to be just 6v6 choke-point team fights, where flankers could split off and get random picks, or do duels. Sym's gun also isn't good for solo kills outside of flankers, but its good for cleaning up, making it a support weapon. In this case, support is more like support in other fps games. The shield is good if characters are doing a 1v1 or 2v1/1v2 some random part of the map, or constantly weaving in and out of cover, which is how blizzard intended the game to be played.

[@thaddycat5295]

i honestly love the turret change because now my team can know who killed my turret and where they are coming from instead of just me knowing that someone is coming and having to remember where i placed all my turrets to determine where idk who is coming from.

[@datsuspicious]

As someone who played a lot of Symmetra 1.0/2.0, I feel like it’s not that her identity was non existent, but she had a very weak one. Symmetra’s main goal is to build that TP asap, Symm can simply set all her sentries on the enemies spawn door, shoot one orb through about 3 people and her ult is up. I get around 80% ult the moment the attacker’s door opens on nearly every 2cp playing on defense Again, not saying she was at all good, but she did had a “purpose” in her kit. Which also means her only peak gameplay are during the few first seconds of the game on 2cp defense, aside from that….nothing much to offer

[@joereed8872]

I would absolutely love you to go through the tanks at some point. Though that might be more drama than it's worth, they have some of the most interesting and complex design simply because no one agrees on what a "tank" should be in ow.

[@AwesomeMissB]

lets go dude another banger PixelRory video !! ❤

[@dutssz]

Symmetra is an example of how Overwatch tackles gameplay issues, change the core function into something unrecognizable and take the most obvious route. We didn't manage to make a non-healer support? Throw her to the DPS role, we didn't figure out how to make utility useful? just Increase that default flat damage. hate aside I like the way her portals work now, it's a great increase on skill expression, though I wish she kept any form of overhealth supply to allies, to tie that mechanic to the concept of hardlight with Lucio and Lifeweaver, but whatever that last part

[@Misciagna31]

Back in the beta of Overwatch 1 Sym’s original photon barrier actually gave 50 extra shields instead of the 25 it gave at OW1 launch. This combined with the way Zen’s harmony worked back then (it wouldn’t fall off an ally regardless of LoS or distance) created a hilariously good comp of 2 Tracer, 2 Zen, Sym + any other hero where the Tracers would be running around with 200HP getting permanently healed.

[@SmugMatty]

I’m glad she doesn’t have the auto aim beam anymore lol But I do miss the voice lines for when the enemy Symmetra has a shield generator up

[@Grafii2198]

One thing I wanna add, originally in overwatch there were no restrictions to characters, so multiple players on one side could play as same character and what would happen with Symmetra would be that everyone picked her and would stack the shield on everybody making it just ridiculous as it was hard to kill them, they could pierce through entire teams on some choke points and have 36 turrets set to defend objectives and ofc 6 teleporters to make sure they will always be ready in battle, tho iirc if one teleporter was then you either couldn't place second one or the first one would break so you couldn't spam it, tho you wouldn't need to spam it in 6 symmetra comp lol

[@Tipsychilds]

worst part of sym rn is everyone straight up ignoring my well thought out teleport placement and getting rolled

[@willsmith5519]

Sym has always been such a fun dps to me and my primary main along with Torb. I’m not a super high level player but I feel a bit above average. Sometimes I think she is just more misunderstood than she is actually bad. I just think she takes a long time to get good with then you can see her skill ceiling.

[@drakath5727]

As someone who used to play symm before the dps rework, I never found her useless. She had a niche of poking out shield tanks due to the pierce of right click, and if there was anything brig and early OW2 season 9 taught everyone, a 275-300hp zen is TERRIFYING making shield generator an incredibly powerful ultimate that you could realistically build halfway through the first teamfight with a carwash. The flaw with her dps rework in OW2 is the fact that theres just no need for the teleporter when they keep increasing the amount of mobility, and that the turrets are still pretty much useless against anything that isnt a doomfist turbo feeding, and the timing of the dps rework in OW1 was so horrible since double shield tormented EVERYONE for multiple years and the only hero with remotely meaningful poke pierce in the game was just reworked to not have that. I'm still waiting for that return to support rework that they promised near the end of OW1 for OW2, because as far as I'm concerned she does not exist on the roster on any map that isn't night market. The identity crisis for Symm didn't end, it's still going. so much effort put on a hero that had its singular niche place in the game ripped away from it, and for what?

[@timwolfel659]

I hope in the future of Overwatch the devs are reusing shield gen as an Ability. In my opinion it was very unique and allowed sym players to adapt to a flexible playstyle and use the ult that suited your current situation best. I also miss Eichenwalde first point 6 turret carwash moments.

[@mcbuttons]

Rein! All of of his counters keep getting buffed! While he's falling behind and getting very little!

[@robertgardiner7709]

Symmetra and Torbjorn are solid reasons to bring the Defense role back. It has merit, There are heroes who rightfully belonged there, They just crammed a ton of random heroes in there.

[@Blamowizard]

Keep in mind additional context. When OW1 released, the split was Tank/Offense/Defense/Support, no role restrictions, no passives (Mercy had what is now the support passive), *and* you could have any number of the same hero on your team. So, "support" didn't have any weight to it beyond the hero select screen and a general identity of "help teammates with utility and be squishy." 1 hero limit was implemented pretty soon, role queue came some time later. It was always clear Sym expanded the idea of what Support could be, but neither she nor the game was initially designed for these systemic changes, where now if you picked Sym the burden of healing was going to a single Zen or something. They had to pivot and adapt her to what became the merged Offense/Defense role known as Damage, INSTEAD of reworking her into a healer, because a) she was designed specifically to provide non-healing utility and b) her identity & achievements were tied to the turrets + her unique weapon.

[@kierancalverley220]

Playing no limits and having 6 shield generators was peak overwatch

[@MoonlightBrillance]

These videos are so interesting!! Would love to see more :)

[@PixelRory]

Give me like.. four hours from now

[@MoonlightBrillance]

@@PixelRory looking forward to it!

[@mooby1721]

I mained her a few seasons ago when the dive meta was replaced by orisa doing horse things. I'm bronze/silver dps, so my experience reflects that. But it was the first time i started climbing on dps. My main problem with her is... she's just boring? Other than some funny tp tricks, she just doesn't do anything interesting. Plus the 'stand still and outlast the other team' meta ended, meaning she just stopped being as useful. Id honestly be interested in seeing her go back to a support, just to shake things up. Id actually love seeing "support" become distinct from "healer". I know that can't really happen with the game as is, but it seems like it could be interesting to experiment with