As Stage 2 of the Overwatch League kicked off on Wednesday February 21st, teams brought a variety of strategies to the new map pool. The new maps played in Stage 2 include Volskaya Industries, Nepal, King’s Row, Route 66, Hollywood, Hanamura, and Watchpoint: Gibraltar. These maps, specifically Volskaya Industries and Route 66, can be advantageous for those who include the hero Sombra in their team composition. Sombra’s hybrid role, unique ultimate – EMP, and favorable map layouts, made her play time see a drastic increase from Stage 1 to Stage 2.
Sombra’s Kit
Sombra is a peculiar hero in the fact that her hero role is classified as a DPS, but her kit has many support hero characteristics. For example, her ultimate – EMP – is charged by teammates who use her hacked health packs to gain their health back. Additionally, she can hack enemy heroes to nullify their use of abilities for a short period of time. She also gains ultimate charge when she does damage to enemies. With the current state of the game, Sombra has a poke style gameplay: where she does damage and then translocates, heals teammates with her hacked health packs to generate her ultimate charge rapidly, then uses her ultimate EMP in team fights – causing all enemy heroes within her radius to lose their shields and usage of abilities for a short duration. When executed at a high level, Sombra’s hybrid kit can bring extreme utility to teams.
Sombra on Volskaya Industries
One map that Sombra has seen frequent playtime on is Volskaya Industries. Volskaya Industries is a capture the control point map, commonly known as 2 CP. Due to easily controllable health pack locations for the defending team, Sombra is routinely a part of defensive compositions. All it takes for defending teams to get rolling is a single team fight win. When playing against a defensive Sombra, teams can expect her ultimate to be up in every team fight. The impact of this is that if she can land a good EMP, she can nullify most, if not all, of the enemy team. The clip below is from Stage 2 Week 1 of the Overwatch League, the Houston Outlaws faced the London Spitfire on Volskaya Industries.
Sombra on Route 66
Another map that has an advantageous layout for Sombra is Route 66. Route 66 is an Escort map, where teams try to push the payload to the end of the map. Due to health pack locations and map spacing around the payload’s path, Sombra’s impact can be noticed. When attacking, teams are forced to group up on the first point of Route 66, making Sombra’s ultimate – EMP – extremely effective. Defending teams, using Sombra, can sometimes even full hold the attackers on the first checkpoint of Route 66. The clip below is also from Stage 2 Week 1, but between the Dallas Fuel and Shanghai Dragons, where Dong-Jun “Rascal” Kim of the Dallas Fuel uses his aggressive Sombra to quickly end a team fight.
Looking Ahead
Even though Stage 2 of the Overwatch League has just begun, it is apparent that Sombra can impact matches within the current map pool. If teams want to be successful in Stage 2, they will be forced to adapt to the style of play that Sombra brings to the game. Moving forward, there will be no shortage or blackout of Sombra for teams during Stage 2 of the Overwatch League… unless, of course, you’re playing against her.
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Featured Image Credit: Blizzard Entertainment/Overwatch
Videos Clips: Overwatch League