In Overwatch 2, players can choose the support character Ana. Armed with an enormous Rifle, Ana is visually identifiable by her blue and black hood with her white hair covering one eye and a tattoo adorning the other. One of the biggest changes for Overwatch 2 is the ability for support characters to passively heal themselves. Characters like Mercy in Overwatch 2 or Lucio still cannot heal themselves, so this new mechanic will not change their strategies, but it is a significant change for Ana.
In addition to automatic healing, Ana also has an ability called Biotique Rifle, which allows her to shoot a projectile-based hipshot that will cause 70 damage to an enemy player and 75 treatments when it hits a friendly player. This ability also has a secondary fire scope capability, which will turn Ana’s shots into hit scans with a large hitbox area. Another ability Ana has is Biological Grenade (E), which is when she throws a grenade that explodes when it hits any terrain or another hero in Overwatch 2 regardless of alignment. Depending on the target, the grenade will give immediate treatment to Ana's allies at a rate of 100HP as well as promote healing from any other health source by 50% for 4 seconds. Alternatively, if the grenade targets an opponent, they will take 60 damage and be unable to receive treatment for 4 seconds. Once Ana uses Biological Grenade (E), she will incur a cooldown of 10 seconds.
Sleep Dart is the ability Ana can utilize to escape. Ana will use a dart, that when it targets a hero will put them to sleep for 5.5 seconds. If the sleeping player takes damage from Ana's Sleep Dart, they will immediately wake up. After using this ability, Ana will have a 15-second cooldown. Ana's final ability is Nano Boost, which is a targeted boost of energy that she can grant to one of her teammates. Nano Boost instantly heals the chosen teammate for 300HP, boosts their damage output by 50%, and reduces any incoming damage by 50% for 8 seconds.
Overwatch 2: Ana Tips and Counters
To maximize Ana's potential, players should carefully prepare for her cooldowns after using certain abilities. Additionally, Ana needs to be able to see her team in order to use her healing abilities, but she has limited mobility to move around the map in Overwatch 2. Accordingly, players will need to position themselves carefully in corners to stay protected from characters with more damage output while still healing their team. Despite the limited mobility, Ana will still need to rotate positions often to avoid being targeted too easily. In a bind, players can also use Sleep Dart as an offensive move to remove any flankers positioned too close.
Additionally, players should note that characters who deal significant damage are the best complement to Ana's support role. For instance, Reinhardt has a shield that can protect Ana as well as a huge damage output once paired with Nano Boost. Genji can also take advantage of the output potential from Nano Boost while Brigitte can also help protect Ana from flankers. Meanwhile, the best counters for Ana are flankers. For instance, Winston can be a powerful counter, as the Overwatch 2 hero has mobility options that allow her to dive in and target characters. Additionally, Tracer and Genji can easily kill Ana if she is behind her team and on a cooldown. Finally, flanking Moira and Lucio can also be problematic for Ana.
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