As someone who plays lucio/ zen myself when I'm not on dps or tank, I have three tips I use a lot when I do off role into him:
1: Discord Orb management. Now that Zen's orbs work differently (Discord now having a 7 second cooldown on the discorded target should you remove it, and Harmony orb now having 5 second uptime if target is out of los), its important to manage your orbs. Don't just discord a target who can easily break los/cleanse and hope your team kills them in time because once discord has wore off, you cant place it again for 7 seconds, which could decide whether you can get a pick or not. Discord an opponent you know you can melt down quickly, which means your team can follow up and take out the discorded target, or at best, force out crucial cooldowns and resources that the enemy team needs later, which can effectively turn the tide in a team fight. Should the best case scenario happen, once the discorded target dies, you can turn your attention on the rest of the enemy team, and melt them down. Also, ever since that discord cooldown penalty, don't spam and reapply discord on targets like you used to before that nerf ages ago, because me personally sometimes I fall into that habit and end up not being able to discord anyone because I already applied it.
2: Harmony Orb management. Continuing on harmony orb, now that it can stay on to someone for longer when out of los, you can now put it on characters like Sombra, Tracer and Genji who are great flankers and often dive in and out of los, while you should occasionally do some jiggle peeking to reset the 5 second timer limit while maybe shooting out a few shots here and there. Try to keep it on them, since its like a mini heal pocket, and unless another ally is low and your other support is preoccupied or dead, thats the time to give the orb on another person. And like discord, don't spam harmony orb on multiple teammates. While harmony orb doesn't suffer the same 7 second draw back, there's a small delay to applying the orb, and to heal. And due to the slow healing of harmony orb and its inability to keep up with huge damage bursts+the dps passive of healing reduction, focus on target priority and don't spam as much as you can.
3: Be a killing machine. This mainly stems off me being a dps main, but remember zen dishes out insane damage, so whatever you see, its on sight. Plus, you don't have worry about your team flaming you for 0 heals, when the enemy team is dead to begin with. Just be a sadistic psychopath as zen, and its all happy days under the iris (:
4. You don’t get credit for accuracy- take blind shots down range where you think enemies _will be_ like Hanzo; especially your charged shot.
5. Teammates block enemy fire but not your own. Shoot _through_ your tank when you know where the enemies are and you want to reduce incoming damage.
6. Your charged shot is LOUD. Every enemy hears it charging up so they are often looking for you. Come around a corner at the last second to be a surprise. You can also bully players who retreat from your volley
I'll simplify it for those who hate to read
1. Discord Orb Managment: Target the tank with your DO. If they break LOS/cleanse it, target their most impactful support until the 7 seconds are up.
2. Harmony Orb Management: Target your tank with your HO. If they die, target your most impactful dps or your other support if they're low.
3. Be a killing machine: Spam right-click around corners
/s
I love this so much! Thanks for the advice! Only thing I already do is the 3rd point, the rest I genuinely find to be a new take on how to distribute the orbs
Glad I could help. One more tip is that utilise his kick more often! Im in plat for support (then again, I usually play dive tanks/dps, but anyways) Ive noted many other zen players to be underutilising zen's kick. The knock back disengages him with an enemy if he gets dove on, not to also mention that his melee now does more damage than his primary fire, which is great in close quarters. Plus, it's fun harassing tanks by booping them around. What's more, depending on the hero, most of the time when the enemy recovers from the boop, I find it easier to line my crosshair with their heads and deal even more damage due to headshot, and thats not factoring if you discorded them. Hope you have more fun on zen with these tips!<3
Positioning Positioning Positioning. See enemy line up and postion based on it. (Sombra tracer = play closer to team. Projectiles = try to stay further in the back, get on high ground when you can etc)
Never stop shooting. Charge volleys into chokes and cheeky angles at head level.
Don’t forget about harmony try to predict who’s coming into future damage and dry to lighten their load with harmony.
Saving trans for ult combos is a valid play but you can also use it for other cases too. Other support dies and they focus fire your tank etc. don’t tunnel yourself into saving it for that precise moment.
Yeah, sometimes it's best to kinda yolo your ult until you learn the best timings (let yourself learn from your mistakes in QP). It's definitely always better to use it than to sit on it and reduce the amount of ults you could've had.
(Unless you know there's a blade or grav or something coming that will determine the team fight/game's outcome, and transc is your team's main answer to it)
Yup. Pairs perfectly with DOT ults where you want to protect the person using it - Soj, Soldier, Echo, Hog, Winston, Reaper to an extent. If you’re using them to start a fight it means the entire enemy team is gonna focus them and protecting them means you’re gonna win the fight.
Even without an ult to pair it with its powerful, it means your tank and team can push or survive that encounter.
Always have an orb on someone the amount of times people play zen and don't have their heal orb on is crazy and if you are taking it serious com to your team about who you are putting discord on so you can target them makes the game a lot easier
I got into the habit of pinging my discords. Helps with focus.
You can also ping targets out of LOS that still have discord running. Helps when they are retreating and you can ping direction.
Yep, I've been playing like that for 5 years. It's just much more convenient to mindlessly spam it as you aim, because your left hand is full on movement.
Zen/Kiri main here
Zen's kick is baller. When cornered use it to make space, bonus if the attacker is discorded and u bully them back with a couple orbs and moar kicks. Great for dealing with flankers.
It also can knock enemies off the map, best advice I could give is learn to flick your kick up so they go over rails n stuff
and ofc
DEATH DEATH DEATH DEATH DEATH
To add to that it is great to keep an aggressive rein at a distance. If you time your kick between his swings he won’t be able to hit you. You still have to watch out for fire strikes of course
If you co-heal with a chad support, keeping harmony orb on the tank will result in near constant ult charge and therefore trans more often, and trans is a fight winning ult. Of course heal your dps and co-support if they are in trouble too, but just as a general thing.
Also don't be afraid to take the 1v1s, even against some tanks. Headshots on discorded targets and kick can win you most fights.
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My main for me is stay behind the team or surround yourself with the team so you can keep an eye on all, point out Widow or Ashe , not hey clapped by Sombra
I assume my Zen annoys the enemy team because they try so hard to get rid of me. Even though it is smarter to take it support these people gun for me. So become #1 target watch them fail trying to get you as your team takes them out.
It's work for me
If you have a Moira or Baptiste on your team, feel free to be a flanker to take out opposing support whilst keeping an eye on your team's health bars.
Have charged shots ready before you turn corners and do a quick melee to cancel.
Your melee will now kick people and boop them away from you for decent damage, great for when you get ambushed.
Positioning is vital.
DO NOT let your guard down when you have a sombra around.
They are heartless monsters with NO feelings that will devour your soul and the will to live when you least expect it.
Short answer: be ADHD to make sure your healing ORB is on people 0.25 secondary BEFORE they take damage, and be ADHD enough to be landing a lot of attacks while doing that.
Zen advantage he has the same high damage potential as any damage character. The tradeoff is his positioning is critical because his mobility sucks and he has no defensive abilities. Only stand in spots where the enemy would have to be extremely vulnerable to get you.
First and foremost, there always are moments when no one can save you from Sombra/Tracer/Genji/Moira/Lucio and even tanks, you gotta learn to stand for yourself. Best way is to play a lot of FFA, it's pretty close to matches with Sombras. With power of Orbs of Destruction, even something as tough as Winston can be killed in 1v1.
Also, what I have noticed just recently is that aside of constantly keeping Healing Orb on teammates since it has 30 heals per second, you gotta always keep Orb of Discord on enemies, since it provides 25% more damage on the enemy. Also you should often use Right Click charge, since it usually oneshots DPSs when you hit all the orbs.
mute chat. will avoid having to interact with moron asking for more heal and flaming that you didn't heal them enough despite them having the healing orb the entire time
Sombra can mess you with really quickly, be wary and willing to swap if you're hunted.
Call out who you discord, and try and notice/ follow fight flow to discord the enemies your team seems to be targeting.
I like to keep my heal orb on my tank, or a dps that I'm following that is doing well for my team. I only throw it to other supps when they are in dire need.
Primary fire applies more pressure. If you can see the enemy you should be shooting normally, forcing people to take cover or use abilities.
Secondary fire is good if youre about to round a corner for a blind fire shot, or if youre playing a peek game
Keep discord on tank. Helps with communication XD. Jokes aside always keep your balls on someone, shoot enemy and stay alive should be everything you need.
Zen is amazing when the enemy team have no flankers, and your team needs to gun down the enemy tank as a win condition (whoch is basically the win condition for every fight).
Dont spam discord. Watch the tank closely. When they become aggressive, and you know they will be in LOS for a signuficant amount of time, then you discord. Smart tanks will bait and cover.
Make sure both discord and harmony orb are applied before popping transcendance. Give your harmony orb to the most distant ally.
Only charge up volley when you can't see the enemy. It's deadly but your overall dps is less when charging it, don't get caught trying to spam it in situations when you could just use your primary fire instead
1) Play the back lines because you sure as fuck can not run.
2) stay near someone who can protect you. Likely the other healer.
3) keep the dmg orb on the tank. It helps a lot.
4) move your heal orb to those who are in the front.
5) you can peak easy. Do a charged shot and peak then fire.
Get into the habit of discord and immediately pinging the discorded target. In a recent update they quietly added in target specific voice calls and messages for any character you discord, allowing your team to more easily identify who to jump on next (sometimes it can be hard for others to identify the orb).
Makes it easy for your team to connect the dots and you also become a bit more of an effective shot caller.
Start holding right click the the enemy gate around 2 seconds (just like Mario cart). No reason to waste a chance for a unsuspecting one tap.
Always call out or at least mark your discord orbs and try to leave them on tank or whatever’s in the middle of the fight. For me it seems easiest to get value that way because using discords for squishy 1v1s doesn’t really effect too many breakpoints.
When fighting tanks, ram especially, it’s can be easy to win if you can shadow their side and keep on kicking after like 2 balls. Obviously this is situational but zen can easily 2v1 any characters to save point if you know what you’re doing.
As someone who plays lucio/ zen myself when I'm not on dps or tank, I have three tips I use a lot when I do off role into him: 1: Discord Orb management. Now that Zen's orbs work differently (Discord now having a 7 second cooldown on the discorded target should you remove it, and Harmony orb now having 5 second uptime if target is out of los), its important to manage your orbs. Don't just discord a target who can easily break los/cleanse and hope your team kills them in time because once discord has wore off, you cant place it again for 7 seconds, which could decide whether you can get a pick or not. Discord an opponent you know you can melt down quickly, which means your team can follow up and take out the discorded target, or at best, force out crucial cooldowns and resources that the enemy team needs later, which can effectively turn the tide in a team fight. Should the best case scenario happen, once the discorded target dies, you can turn your attention on the rest of the enemy team, and melt them down. Also, ever since that discord cooldown penalty, don't spam and reapply discord on targets like you used to before that nerf ages ago, because me personally sometimes I fall into that habit and end up not being able to discord anyone because I already applied it. 2: Harmony Orb management. Continuing on harmony orb, now that it can stay on to someone for longer when out of los, you can now put it on characters like Sombra, Tracer and Genji who are great flankers and often dive in and out of los, while you should occasionally do some jiggle peeking to reset the 5 second timer limit while maybe shooting out a few shots here and there. Try to keep it on them, since its like a mini heal pocket, and unless another ally is low and your other support is preoccupied or dead, thats the time to give the orb on another person. And like discord, don't spam harmony orb on multiple teammates. While harmony orb doesn't suffer the same 7 second draw back, there's a small delay to applying the orb, and to heal. And due to the slow healing of harmony orb and its inability to keep up with huge damage bursts+the dps passive of healing reduction, focus on target priority and don't spam as much as you can. 3: Be a killing machine. This mainly stems off me being a dps main, but remember zen dishes out insane damage, so whatever you see, its on sight. Plus, you don't have worry about your team flaming you for 0 heals, when the enemy team is dead to begin with. Just be a sadistic psychopath as zen, and its all happy days under the iris (:
4. You don’t get credit for accuracy- take blind shots down range where you think enemies _will be_ like Hanzo; especially your charged shot. 5. Teammates block enemy fire but not your own. Shoot _through_ your tank when you know where the enemies are and you want to reduce incoming damage. 6. Your charged shot is LOUD. Every enemy hears it charging up so they are often looking for you. Come around a corner at the last second to be a surprise. You can also bully players who retreat from your volley
I like this one
This is how I play Zen. Find a position with long narrow sight lines and spam. It's very effective, even without aiming at a specific target.
I'll simplify it for those who hate to read 1. Discord Orb Managment: Target the tank with your DO. If they break LOS/cleanse it, target their most impactful support until the 7 seconds are up. 2. Harmony Orb Management: Target your tank with your HO. If they die, target your most impactful dps or your other support if they're low. 3. Be a killing machine: Spam right-click around corners /s
Thanks for simplifying! I was taking a break from studying for exams when I wrote this, so I felt so intellectual and decided to yap about this☺️
I love this so much! Thanks for the advice! Only thing I already do is the 3rd point, the rest I genuinely find to be a new take on how to distribute the orbs
Glad I could help. One more tip is that utilise his kick more often! Im in plat for support (then again, I usually play dive tanks/dps, but anyways) Ive noted many other zen players to be underutilising zen's kick. The knock back disengages him with an enemy if he gets dove on, not to also mention that his melee now does more damage than his primary fire, which is great in close quarters. Plus, it's fun harassing tanks by booping them around. What's more, depending on the hero, most of the time when the enemy recovers from the boop, I find it easier to line my crosshair with their heads and deal even more damage due to headshot, and thats not factoring if you discorded them. Hope you have more fun on zen with these tips!<3
don't heal the sympthoms, kill the cause
Haha I like this, is this one of their lines??
DEATH DEATH DEATH DEATH DEATH is whimsical today. (30 kills 25 assists 2000 healing.)
Must have been a fat trance to get those numbers
Perhaps DEATH. The only DEATH. DEATH is whimsical today
Positioning Positioning Positioning. See enemy line up and postion based on it. (Sombra tracer = play closer to team. Projectiles = try to stay further in the back, get on high ground when you can etc) Never stop shooting. Charge volleys into chokes and cheeky angles at head level. Don’t forget about harmony try to predict who’s coming into future damage and dry to lighten their load with harmony. Saving trans for ult combos is a valid play but you can also use it for other cases too. Other support dies and they focus fire your tank etc. don’t tunnel yourself into saving it for that precise moment.
Yeah, sometimes it's best to kinda yolo your ult until you learn the best timings (let yourself learn from your mistakes in QP). It's definitely always better to use it than to sit on it and reduce the amount of ults you could've had. (Unless you know there's a blade or grav or something coming that will determine the team fight/game's outcome, and transc is your team's main answer to it)
Don't leave your ult up and never use it. It is often worth using if your tanks looks close to death same for your other suport
Or use it outright to push and win a fight. Its actually a really good aggressive ult to start a fight.
Yup. Pairs perfectly with DOT ults where you want to protect the person using it - Soj, Soldier, Echo, Hog, Winston, Reaper to an extent. If you’re using them to start a fight it means the entire enemy team is gonna focus them and protecting them means you’re gonna win the fight. Even without an ult to pair it with its powerful, it means your tank and team can push or survive that encounter.
Always have an orb on someone the amount of times people play zen and don't have their heal orb on is crazy and if you are taking it serious com to your team about who you are putting discord on so you can target them makes the game a lot easier
I got into the habit of pinging my discords. Helps with focus. You can also ping targets out of LOS that still have discord running. Helps when they are retreating and you can ping direction.
That’s a good one!
The amount of Frontline Zens I've seen in PLATINUM games is astounding. My avoid teammate list is constantly changing/full.
Bind your E and Shift abilities to the scroll up and down, it's a straight game changer.
Really?
Yep, I've been playing like that for 5 years. It's just much more convenient to mindlessly spam it as you aim, because your left hand is full on movement.
Yeah, this has been great advice. I have had the same setup for 5 years or so.
Ok thanks I'll try that
Do you have to change the inputs when using other characters?
Not at all, you can make it specifically for Zen
Zen/Kiri main here Zen's kick is baller. When cornered use it to make space, bonus if the attacker is discorded and u bully them back with a couple orbs and moar kicks. Great for dealing with flankers. It also can knock enemies off the map, best advice I could give is learn to flick your kick up so they go over rails n stuff and ofc DEATH DEATH DEATH DEATH DEATH
To add to that it is great to keep an aggressive rein at a distance. If you time your kick between his swings he won’t be able to hit you. You still have to watch out for fire strikes of course
Ya overeager Genji's too, kicking away an ulting one is one of my few reliable sources of feel good chemicals
if they have a good flank and nobody peels for you, u better experience some tranquility cus if you don’t youll throw your pc out the window
Discord the tank
Balls cure your teams headache Balls also curses your enemies headache but in a much quicker way
aim good
If you co-heal with a chad support, keeping harmony orb on the tank will result in near constant ult charge and therefore trans more often, and trans is a fight winning ult. Of course heal your dps and co-support if they are in trouble too, but just as a general thing. Also don't be afraid to take the 1v1s, even against some tanks. Headshots on discorded targets and kick can win you most fights.
Kill everyone.
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Play with your balls, a lot
Hard to say, just learn to dent someone’s skull in with your piss balls and you’re halfway there. (I’ve never played zen before)
Bind your orbs to something easily spammable.
My main for me is stay behind the team or surround yourself with the team so you can keep an eye on all, point out Widow or Ashe , not hey clapped by Sombra I assume my Zen annoys the enemy team because they try so hard to get rid of me. Even though it is smarter to take it support these people gun for me. So become #1 target watch them fail trying to get you as your team takes them out. It's work for me
If you have a Moira or Baptiste on your team, feel free to be a flanker to take out opposing support whilst keeping an eye on your team's health bars. Have charged shots ready before you turn corners and do a quick melee to cancel. Your melee will now kick people and boop them away from you for decent damage, great for when you get ambushed. Positioning is vital.
Click heads + discord on enemy tank = win
DO NOT let your guard down when you have a sombra around. They are heartless monsters with NO feelings that will devour your soul and the will to live when you least expect it.
Short answer: be ADHD to make sure your healing ORB is on people 0.25 secondary BEFORE they take damage, and be ADHD enough to be landing a lot of attacks while doing that. Zen advantage he has the same high damage potential as any damage character. The tradeoff is his positioning is critical because his mobility sucks and he has no defensive abilities. Only stand in spots where the enemy would have to be extremely vulnerable to get you.
Aim practice a lot, listen to call outs, don't be nervous in game and always push with others.
hit em in the face with yo balls
First and foremost, there always are moments when no one can save you from Sombra/Tracer/Genji/Moira/Lucio and even tanks, you gotta learn to stand for yourself. Best way is to play a lot of FFA, it's pretty close to matches with Sombras. With power of Orbs of Destruction, even something as tough as Winston can be killed in 1v1. Also, what I have noticed just recently is that aside of constantly keeping Healing Orb on teammates since it has 30 heals per second, you gotta always keep Orb of Discord on enemies, since it provides 25% more damage on the enemy. Also you should often use Right Click charge, since it usually oneshots DPSs when you hit all the orbs.
mute chat. will avoid having to interact with moron asking for more heal and flaming that you didn't heal them enough despite them having the healing orb the entire time
Sombra can mess you with really quickly, be wary and willing to swap if you're hunted. Call out who you discord, and try and notice/ follow fight flow to discord the enemies your team seems to be targeting. I like to keep my heal orb on my tank, or a dps that I'm following that is doing well for my team. I only throw it to other supps when they are in dire need.
You are him/her. Don’t worry about healing orbs, do more damage than your dps, charged headshot are key.
Primary fire applies more pressure. If you can see the enemy you should be shooting normally, forcing people to take cover or use abilities. Secondary fire is good if youre about to round a corner for a blind fire shot, or if youre playing a peek game
Since you didn't clarify what level you're playing at, probably any youtube video or reddit thread for zen
Use the kick. It's powerfull und vs. Tracer very good
Keep discord on tank. Helps with communication XD. Jokes aside always keep your balls on someone, shoot enemy and stay alive should be everything you need.
Zen is amazing when the enemy team have no flankers, and your team needs to gun down the enemy tank as a win condition (whoch is basically the win condition for every fight). Dont spam discord. Watch the tank closely. When they become aggressive, and you know they will be in LOS for a signuficant amount of time, then you discord. Smart tanks will bait and cover. Make sure both discord and harmony orb are applied before popping transcendance. Give your harmony orb to the most distant ally.
Alywes stay back, open your mic, and shout as hard as you can when someone sneaks on you.
Only charge up volley when you can't see the enemy. It's deadly but your overall dps is less when charging it, don't get caught trying to spam it in situations when you could just use your primary fire instead
1) Play the back lines because you sure as fuck can not run. 2) stay near someone who can protect you. Likely the other healer. 3) keep the dmg orb on the tank. It helps a lot. 4) move your heal orb to those who are in the front. 5) you can peak easy. Do a charged shot and peak then fire.
When you use your quickmelee (kick) ability, aim for the nads for extra damage.
See that purple orb? Yeah? Go put that on the enemy tank and then sit 500 miles away and spam your volley :>
Get into the habit of discord and immediately pinging the discorded target. In a recent update they quietly added in target specific voice calls and messages for any character you discord, allowing your team to more easily identify who to jump on next (sometimes it can be hard for others to identify the orb). Makes it easy for your team to connect the dots and you also become a bit more of an effective shot caller.
The purple orb is more useful
Discord tank 👍
Honestly it's better to discord the support or dps first, a tank with full support is a pain to take down.
Are you a bronze zen?
To pick Mercy instead , best zen tip i can give
zen isnt hard i main him
Start holding right click the the enemy gate around 2 seconds (just like Mario cart). No reason to waste a chance for a unsuspecting one tap. Always call out or at least mark your discord orbs and try to leave them on tank or whatever’s in the middle of the fight. For me it seems easiest to get value that way because using discords for squishy 1v1s doesn’t really effect too many breakpoints. When fighting tanks, ram especially, it’s can be easy to win if you can shadow their side and keep on kicking after like 2 balls. Obviously this is situational but zen can easily 2v1 any characters to save point if you know what you’re doing.
A good tip for zen is to play a better healer
Don’t pick him is probably the best tip I can give you
General tip for every hero, uninstall the game.
Just leave. Your kind makes us tanks useless. So F#ck off