2375: Mommy Issues

Overwatch has finally seen the release of its first new hero since launch, in the form of Ana, a new Support character and mother of existing character Pharah.

Ana is an interesting concept for a support character because she’s based at least partly around sniping, which in Overwatch terms has traditionally been an approach reserved for Defender-type heroes. As a Support character, however, Ana’s role is actually surprisingly well-rounded, comprising both offensive and defensive capabilities and possessing an overall feel quite unlike any of the other heroes on the roster.

Ana’s basic ability is a sniper rifle that shoots bolts that either heal allies they hit or damage enemies. In both cases, the healing or damage process isn’t immediate — it takes a second or two for the value to affect the character’s health, though it’s not quite a long-duration damage or heal over time either.

What this essentially means is that Ana is able to heal people from a much greater distance than any of the other Support characters, though the tradeoff in this case is that you have to be reasonably accurate in order to register a hit on the person you’re trying to heal. You don’t have to be absolutely pinpoint accurate, but your reticle still needs to be roughly in the right area to register a hit, unlike Mercy or Lucio, who lock on to nearby targets and affect all targets around themselves respectively.

Ana’s other abilities throw some interesting twists into the mix. Her “E” move allows her to throw a grenade that provides an immediate burst of healing to anyone caught in the blast, along with a temporary buff to healing from all sources while it’s active. Like her gun, this grenade also has a negative impact on enemy characters, in this case dealing some damage to them and completely preventing them from being healed for a few seconds.

Her Left-Shift ability, meanwhile, is something of a game-changer: it’s a dart, shot out from her sidearm, that puts anyone it hits to sleep, causing them to collapse to the floor and be completely immobile for a few seconds. This is an absolute godsend against characters who can be difficult to push through such as Bastion, since it allows you to take the pressure off for a moment — just long enough to sneak in and finish the job. It’s also good for interrupting powerful Ultimate abilities from characters such as Reaper and Pharah.

All in all, Ana seems to be a strong addition to the roster. Her healing capabilities aren’t up to Mercy and Lucio’s standards, largely due to the accuracy requirement, but they’re solid enough, but her real benefit is the addition of some solid offensive skills. Her main weakness is in her mobility; unlike the two previous sniper characters Hanzo and Widowmaker, Ana has no means of easily getting up to higher ground, and so must either do her work from ground level or find more roundabout means of getting to good vantage points.