Symmetra by Nima Nightmare

D (Trait): Photon Shield
Simply put, I think this design is untennable. First and foremost, it might as well not even have a cooldown for how easy it is to upkeep. Everyone just needs to come within walking range of Symmetra every time they die. If it's the result of a single pick, then it's only a small diversion on the way to their destination, and if it's the result of a teamwipe, Symmetra will likely be right there with the rest of the team, ready to reapply the effect in almost no time. Nothing short of an imminent game-winning push could apply enough urgency to where Photon Shield won't be applied to the entire team and promptly forgotten about.

But even with that in mind... I don't think a 20 second, or even a 60 second cooldown could ever make the move balanced. If you'll recall, Alextrasza is another character who can grant extra health, providing 500 max health to everyone on her team until they die. However, that ability is only unlocked at level 20, and provides a flat 500 health. Your Symmetra, on the other hand, can provide a Chromie with a 278 health, self-regenerating shield at level 1, that surpasses Alex's level 20 bonus as early as level 15.

An argument could be made that Symmetra is just a different hero, and so naturally she's going to be balanced differently, but an ability this strong is naturally going to dominate her 'power pie', and require everything else to become trivial for her to still be balanced, and all this in trade for an ability that she only gets to cast when someone dies, that requires very little thought or planning from her part.

Personally, I think the effect should either be A) Symmetra passively provides shields to nearby allies who haven't recently taken damage (that fades after leaving her side for X seconds), or B) Symmetra has a large, permanent shield, similar to Fenix, but unlike Fenix, she can activate her trait to pass the shield on to an ally instead, with the trait having a very short cooldown, allowing for the shield to be passed rapidly, but with only so much health, she'd need to find downtime to let it regenerate.


Q: Photon Orb
I have no problem with this ability. It's simple, it's sensible in how it's channeled... but I do think the cooldown being as low as it is creates several problems for balance. For one thing, a skillshot like this could easily be spammed near a channeled objective from a relatively safe location in order to stall for an unhealthy amount of time.

Additionally, some of its talents, like Chaining Orbs, become incredibly dangerous. A 1.75 second root on a spammable ability isnt going to be fun to fight, even if the move is easy to dodge. In order for such a thing to be fair, the root would need to be shorter, the cooldown on the ability longer, and if the talent is going to come in this early, it should at least require Photon Orb to be charged to full.


W: Sentry Turret
Again, no real problems. Though I have one small issue, where while I really want Symmetra to have indefinitely lasting turrets (it's a niche not really seen in HotS yet), I think the only fair trade-off for such a thing would be for them to only target heroes. Maybe a level 13+ talent could let them target minions, but the ability to soak from a lane you're not even in should only be given to characters very much dedicated to that concept (Abathur, Azmodan, Vikings, etc.). It'd require someone to go wipe out her turrets before every big team fight, which she can set up again in the time it takes for that character to return.

Other than that, they're fine.

E: Photon Barrier
This one is the big stumbling block for a lot of character, and it's really just a design space that's untennable. The devs have actually gone through why attack blocking barriers can't be implemented, though even if they hadn't, it's pretty easy to step through why they can't work.

To wit:
Even if you were to implement the shield as a pseudo-hero, only about 31 out of all 240~ basic abilities in the game would actually be affected by the move. Most moves in HotS tend to be AoE, splash, pierce, or bounce between targets. If implemented as-is, Symmetra could realistically go for several games without this ability ever being functional. BUT, of course, one could suggest that the ability be designed with special rules where it just absorbs abilities that normally couldn't be absorbed. Well, one big problem with that is that it would require the dev team to code new interactions between this ability and almost every ability in the game, and every ability not yet in the game. The workload would be immense, all for one little ability. BUT you could suggest that HotS Concepts are just fantasies, and that budget can just be ignored. Unfortunately you then run into the problem of... what should the interactions be? Jaina's Frostbolt just disappearing on hit makes sense, but what about if it has a piercing talent? What about her Cone of Frost? Would it apply to that? What if the barrier gets between Azmodan and his laser target? What if Tassadar's Q hits it, does he just stop channelling? Ana's Healing dart? What about Greymane's Cocktail? When you introduce new interaction-specific mechanics, you require both Symmetra and her opponent to remember lots of brand new rules that only apply to one very specific situation.

It's one of those things that sadly cannot be implemented the way it was done in the source material, simply because the divide is too steep. I think right now the only realistic thing to do if you were to keep it is to apply it as a travelling AoE that provides armor to heroes within its radius. It's a little less interesting, but with the right talents, it could be the foundation for something better.

R1: Teleporter
I don't really have much to say on this one because it's a largely unprecedented mechanic. The only equivalent would be Morales's ability to create a Medivac at the Hall of Storms at level 20, and as such I think it should be balanced around that move. It is somewhat problematic in nature, because I have no idea what the consequences would be of letting a team hearth part way through an objective fight, only to warp right back in fully topped up.

R2: Shield Generator
I think the way this is currently implemented it's just an inverse Lucio Sound Barrier. Shields that grow over time instead of decay and require you to be around a specific location for the duration, instead of the beginning. Personally I think you could afford to just let this ability function as an ongoing source of shields that the enemy must destroy first if they realistically want to kill anyone. Even if you provide a considerable amount of shielding over a long period of time, having a counterplay option as simple as 'destroy the power source' means you're at far less risk of creating something unbalanced. Probius can already create an effect similar to this one, but here you'd just be putting it on a Heroic, and increasing the overall value.



As it stands, I think your Symmetra design suffers a bit from trying to be too faithful to the source material. She's a natural fit as a Support character, but I think some abilities need to be translated with an increased concern for what would be fun to fight both as and against.

Hi again! Thank you for your answer!
I like the idea very much and I think it is something new added to HOTS, which is always good.

I think it is always nice to leave a comment if you like the build or it least give a thumbs up :)
If you like, you can visit my concepts for Xe'ra and Mannoroth and tell me what you think!
I'd be happy to have some advice.