A new tournament cycle is upon us. The June Joust qualifiers have started and that combined with the new hero pool restrictions means a meta in flux. So let’s get started!
Meta in Flux
In this June Joust tournament cycle, the following heroes are unavailable for play:
- Damage: Tracer, Sombra
- Tank: Reinhardt
- Support: Zenyatta
In the first week of play with the aforementioned set of hero restrictions there was a increased amount of messiness in the play from the teams. Some teams opted to stick with a Winston based dive composition, others opted for a Orisa/Sigma double shield composition, at least one team played a significant amount of Roadhog.
Both Orisa and Roadhog have gotten buffs in the most recent patch that is being played in OWL leading some to speculate that we will see a return of the “pulled pork” composition i.e the Orisa/Roadhog composition making use of Orisa’s halt combined with Roadhog’s hook. So far we have not seen any use of pulled pork in the league.
One other thing that became apparent over the course of this weekend’s games is that the dive compositions that some teams played was much weaker overall than the double shield composition. In head to head matchups between these two composition the double shield proved to be far more resilient and better at winning team fights. This was especially seen in the match between the Washington Justice and the Boston Uprising where Washington exclusively played the dive composition and were absolutely demolished by Boston’s double shield composition.
Needless to say everybody’s predictions for this week were in shambles due to the changes in the hero pool, including mine. However, this makes things a lot more interesting and I am looking forward to seeing how the current meta evolves over the upcoming weeks.
The Games
This week there weren’t any games I would qualify as ‘good’ but there were a bunch that I would qualify as ‘interesting’ because they are perhaps a precursor to showing who the dominant teams this tournament cycle will be.
New York Excelsior vs Philadelphia Fusion [East]
This particular was much hyped, there was even a APEX style hype video which I recommend everyone give a watch because it is quite funny. This match proved to be interesting because for the first time this season we got to see New York’s rookie DPS talent like Flora shine. On the other hand, the veterans on the Philly squad seem to struggle in this first week leading to confusing and inconsistent play.
Atlanta Reign vs London Spitfire [West]
Atlanta Reign has always been a team that seemed stacked on paper but when it came to their in-game performances they struggled to show results. This week they sought to change their narrative by demonstrating just how scary the talent on this squad can be when they are firing on all cylinders. With two victories in their belt this week, the Reign look ready to be one of the top teams in this region. The London Spitfire on the other hand are still struggling and they took two more losses this week. I hope they can start seeing victories soon because it is looking a bit dire for them at the moment.
Washington Justice vs Boston Uprising [West]
With the recent addition of Gaebullssi in the off tank role for the Boston Uprising they look to be a team that I would give the ‘most improved’ award to this week. Their team coordination and use of the double shield composition looked good and this is the best Boston squad has looked in a while. I am happy to see this kind of improvement. The Washington Justice on the other hand struggled this week as the meta shift left them either unwilling or unable to play anything other than the Winston based dive composition which is proving to be much weaker than the double shield.
Conclusions
A interesting week for the Overwatch League to be sure. With a meta that is still yet to be completely decided and teams that have yet to play, I am looking forward to how the remaining teams in the league play in this evolving meta.
That’s all from me this week, see y’all next week!