Welcome to part three in our series on Stadium, Overwatch 2’s newest way to play! Upgrading your Hero with Items and Powers to their maximum potential is your best chance of winning, so in this blog we want to explore some key strategies and ideas that may help you emerge victorious in Stadium.
There are four key pillars on the road to victory: Developing a Power Strategy; Making a Quick Buck; Spending Wisely on Items; and Watching Your Opponent's Strategies. Each of these work in tandem to help you become the MVP of every round. Let’s dive into the playbook!
Develop a Power Strategy
Each Hero will have 12 different Powers to pick from, and you’ll select a new Power ahead of rounds 1, 3, 5, and 7. This means if the match lasts until the seventh and final round, you’ll have unlocked four Powers. Powers typically complement an ability, weapon, or aspect of your Hero’s kit, and choosing Powers that complement each other can really open up new possibilities.
For example, Kiriko can duplicate herself using the Clone Conjuartion to attack in two places at once. Mei can roll into battle by powering up her Cyro-Freeze with Coulder. D.Va literally turns the floor to lava with every use of her Boosters enhanced with the Ignition Burst power. The choices and combinations are nearly infinite, but understanding how Powers complement one another is a key factor for winning.
Spend Wisely on Items
Where Powers support you in a unique way, Items give you the means to adapt to the evolving battle with a variety of interchangeable upgrades. Unlike Powers, Items can be sold for the same amount of Stadium Cash you initially spend on them, meaning you’ll be able to utilize your entire budget to adapt your strategy in every round.
Items are organized across three groups:
- Weapon - Great for upgrading Heroes whose gameplay is heavily focused on their weapon, such as Cassidy or Widowmaker.
- Ability - Great for heroes who depend on cooldown abilities like Orisa, Mei, or Moira.
- Survival - Great for nearly all heroes, but Support heroes like Mercy or Ana might opt to stay alive longer if they get caught by an opponent.
When equipping Items, you can open the stats panel to see how strong your hero becomes with each Item equipped, including total health, attack speed, cooldown reductions, and more.
Items will have different tiers organized into Common, Rare, and Epic .
Common Items will be the most affordable, providing a small buff to one of your different stats. Use Common Items in the early part of the game or to round off your budget for any open slots you may have left.
Rare Items give your stats a significant boost, and you’ll be able to start affording at least one Rare Item right after your first round. You can equip Rare Items to round out all aspects of your Hero’s stats, or put emphasis on one aspect of their kit for a high risk, high reward style of gameplay.
Epic Items are the most expensive and will often only come into play in the later rounds in a close match. Equip Epic Items to either boost your Powers strategy even more or to counter an opponent’s build.
Most Items will be available for multiple Heroes, but some Rare and Epic Items are exclusive to a specific Hero. These special Hero Items are designed to enhance a specific weapon, ability, or another part of your Hero’s identity that’s unique to them. For example, when Orisa equips Oladele-Copter Blades, she’ll be able to use Javelin Spin to literally fly short distances. Mei will be ready to speed skate her way to the front lines after she equips the Snowboots Hero Item. Ana’s enemies will think twice before diving her when she upgrades her Sleep Dart with the Tranquilizer Hero Item that increases its hit box by 500%!
Make a Quick Buck
At the start of the game, you’ll receive 3,500 Stadium Cash, which is enough to equip three Common Items for your Hero. You will earn additional Stadium Cash after every round , regardless of a win or loss. The better you play, the more Stadium Cash you’ll earn, as you deal damage, heal, provide assists, or secure eliminations. After each round, whomever performs the best and scores the most cash will be the round MVP and earn a bonus of 1,000 Stadium Cash.
If your team is falling behind, you can get back in the game quickly with a huge boost to your bank when you eliminate an opponent with a high bounty. All Heroes begin with a bounty value of 300 and if you eliminate an opponent, your own bounty increases by 75. Anyone that has a huge impact in the game will quickly raise their bounty value. If a Hero has a bounty value of 750 or more, they are marked in the team bar on the top of the gameplay HUD. The maximum bounty is 2,000. You can also check the scoreboard to see what the value for each Hero is at any time. Should you participate in the shared elimination of an opponent, a portion of that bounty is added to your Stadium Cash total based on how much you contributed to that elimination.
After being eliminated, your bounty value will reset down to 300. Don’t worry if a teammate is being heavily targeted—heroes who are at 300 bounty value when they are eliminated will lose 100 bounty (and go down to 200) as a result.
Earning as much Stadium Cash as possible will not only help you unlock more Items between rounds, it’s also your key to increasing your survivability each round. In addition to your Items and Powers, you’ll gain 1 max health for every 500 Stadium Cash earned, including what you have spent on items. All heroes can add a total of 300 additional max health through the full match, and Tanks will also gain speed and strength for every 250 Stadium Cash earned.
Watch Your Opponent’s Gameplan
Throughout the game, you’ll be able to see what Powers and Items your opponents are picking. This information will help you decide what Items and Powers you should be equipping. You won’t be able to actively see what abilities are picked during the Armory phase of each round, but once selections are locked in, you’ll know what tricks everyone has packed.
If Mercy is focusing on maximizing movement speed and cooldown reductions with Guardian Angel, she can be a menace to catch. Powers and Items like Juno’s Pulsar Destroyer, Soldier: 76’s Super Visor, and Cassidy’s Quick Draw can enable abilities that auto-lock onto her. If Ashe is burning up the field with a Dynamite build causing multiple enemies to catch on fire, equipping Kiriko’s Talisman of Life Item and Two-Zu Power will really help extinguish the flames. Finally, if Zarya is focusing on a build that powers up her Particle Cannon’s primary fire, Orisa would normally be at a disadvantage. But when you combine Orisa’s Powers that enhance Fortify with the Ogundimu Reduction Field Epic Survival Item, Orisa will be able to tank through just about anything Zarya throws at her.
Different heroes will have different solutions, so check the scoreboard to see how your enemies are building up their heroes and work with your teammates to find powerful strategies that can counter them. While Overwatch 2 has always been about good skill and smart positioning, Stadium requires strategic planning as you progress through each round to make sure you come out on top.
Putting It All Together
Now that we’ve gone over key things to remember about using Powers, Items, and Stadium Cash effectively, let’s dive in further into two examples of how you can combine them together to create whole new ways to play your favorite Heroes.
Soldier: 76 - When you focus on Solider: 76’s Sprint and Biotic Field, you’ll be spinning your enemies around in circles. Throughout the round, select Powers that transform your Biotic Field into a powerful AOE weapon—Track and Field, On Me!, Back Off, and Frontliners. Combined with Hero Items like Compression Fatigues and Rapid Response Radius, you won’t need to shoot your enemies, just run around them in circles as the Biotic Field sends damaging waves of energy on your foes!
Kiriko - If you are a projectile master, then you’ll slice your way through the competition when you focus on powering up Kiriko’s Kunai. Powers like Foxy Fireworks, Keen Kunai, Triple Threat, and Spirit Veil will reward high-skill play with auto-reloading and explosive impacts. Combined with Hero Items like Tailsman of Victory and Cyclist Gloves, you’ll be able to jump into the front lines with boosted attack speed and dive on targets alongside your Damage role teammates.
These are just two strategies among dozens you can try out, and we can’t wait to see what combos you’ll come up with.
Get Ready to Climb the Ranks
We can’t wait to see what exciting builds you’ll come up with, but we’ve got one more blog coming out your way. Tomorrow, we’ll take a dive into the exclusive rank system that Stadium will use and we’ll take a look at all of the cool rewards that you can earn in game as you climb your way to the top. Don’t forget, we’ll see you in the Stadium starting on April 22.