The next heroine of Overwatch will be the omnic lady Echo – but she is another damage dealer. Meanwhile, the shooter needs more tanks and healers …
Overwatch has introduced its latest heroine. The omnic lady Echo was teased years ago at BlizzCon in a cinematic featuring McCree and Ashe. Now the developers finally fulfill the players’ wish and bring the omnic lady into the fray.
However, this does not only bring joy. Many players had hoped for a tank or healer to improve the waiting times before matches. But Echo will be a DPS hero and primarily deal damage.
Echo’s abilities – what the new Overwatch heroine can do
What can Echo do? Echo has a wealth of abilities that will challenge DPS players and likely shake up the Overwatch meta considerably. These include:
- Tri-Shot (Primary Fire): Echo fires three projectiles in a triangular formation.
- Sticky Bombs (Secondary Fire): Echo shoots a series of bombs that stick to the target and explode after a short delay.
- Flight: Echo dashes forward a few meters and can briefly fly.
- Glide Flight: While Echo is falling (like during a flight), she can activate Glide Flight to slide quickly in one direction.
- Focused Beam: For a few seconds, Echo channels a beam that deals high damage to targets with less than 50% of their health. This also applies to barriers.
- Duplicate (Ultimate): For a few seconds, Echo transforms into a copy of the targeted enemy hero. She gains access to all of the hero’s abilities for the duration of the transformation. The charge rate of Echo’s copied Ultimate is drastically increased.
Echo promises to be a fast, varied DPS character. With her ultimate ability, she could turn many team fights if she copies the right enemy heroes to perfectly complement her team in the given situation.
What is the problem with Echo? In most major modes of Overwatch, there has been a “Role Queue” for quite some time. This means players must indicate before the match which role they would like to play, i.e., tank, healer, or DPS. Typically, the wait times for tank and healer players are short. But DPS must wait particularly long, as there are too many of them.
That’s why many players believe Blizzard should have designed a new tank or healer to make the queues for damage dealers more pleasant. Another DPS, on the other hand, will ensure that even more people want to play this role (especially just to test the new character).
The result will likely be that the waiting times for DPS players will continue to grow. That’s exactly why many players would have preferred to see a new tank or healer.
Overwatch will soon probably have its own series – will Echo play a role in it?
When will Echo be released? There is still no exact release date for Echo. However, Jeff Kaplan revealed in a Developer Update on YouTube that the testing period will likely last a bit longer. Heroes simply need a bit more time to be balanced. If desired, players can already try Echo on the PTR.
What do you think? Do you find it good that Echo is finally coming and will be a DPS hero? Or would you have preferred to see her in a different role?
Echo could be one of the last heroines, as work is already feverishly underway on Overwatch 2.
