Overwatch League has begun. The greatest endeavour of Blizzard in the eSports scene has started and the first day was a success, resulting with huge viewership and blessed with good matches.
But Overwatch League is more than the celebration of a great game where people watch the best players. It's greatest contribution to the playerbase it the knowledge that the matches provide. There are already very informative streamers that play in the highest skill level but it's not every day that we can enjoy well coordinated teams that play the game as it's supposed to be played.
So, some of the things that we learnt from the first day of the Overwatch League might already be known to the audience that already follows the competitive scene. But for a new viewers pov there are some key points I want to highlight.
Not all the heroes are efficient to be played at all times but almost all of them have a place in the game. Mercy is still the queen of the meta, there was almost always D.Va, Zenyatta or Tracer in both teams but there was a strategic reason to pick some more niche heroes too. We saw Lucio for attack in control maps as he can boost the speed of his team and rush to the point. We saw Torbjorn in defense, mainly in Numbani and of course we saw the pirate ship, where Bastion sits on top of the payload during attack. Sometimes one team would pick Genji to counter the opponent Widowmaker instead of picking a sniper themselves. There was a cause and an effect that prompt those strategic decisions and understanding them is a great lesson for the players in regard of each hero's strengths.
We also watched a lot of different strategies and most importantly for the average Overwatch player, we saw different pathing and positioning from the players. Flanking heroes like Tracer and Genji approached the enemies by different paths in each map, getting advantage of their mobility. For any aspiring Widowmaker main, I would strongly suggest to watch the second game of the Dallas Fuel vs Seoul Dynasty. Fleta has an amazing positioning as Widowmaker and he would often create a crossfire situation as he was grabbling behind the enemy team, sniping behind their backs.
The biggest lesson from the Overwatch League though was how to attack and defend as a team. Both teams tried to bait the enemies ultimates, to out-think them and force them into a bad spot. They stayed their ground if they could win a fight or for contesting an objective but they wouldn't overcommit if it wasn't necessary. How many times we saw the players that were on defence to jump of the cliff if they have lost a checkpoint? They were doing so as they could reset their position and group up at the respawn room but also, as to not give ultimate charges to the enemies. We also saw that some times, when a sole enemy (usually a D.Va without a mech) was surrounded, a team would delay the killing blow, as to laso delay the regroup of the enemy team.
Those were just some examples of what we got from the first day of Overwatch League and for people that want to get better at the game, these matches were just what they needed. Pros have optimised the heroes of their lineups, the whens and hows to use them effectively. And this knowledge, is the most important thing that we can get from Overwatch League.
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