Overwatch 2: How to Play Widowmaker | Abilities and Role in Combat

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Widowmaker’s Abilities+−
Widowmaker’s Role in Combat

There are a lot of heroes to keep track of in Overwatch 2. With 35 playable characters and counting, it’s recommended that players shouldn’t try to master them all, instead, they should focus on getting to know the ins and outs of a small handful so that they can play to their strengths. It’s certainly a good idea to at least try out most characters to know what makes them tick if you’re wanting to successfully counter them, but you’ll want to spend plenty of time with the characters that you want to main if you want to truly succeed in the game.

Obviously, there’s no way to really improve your skills without sitting down and actually playing Overwatch 2, however, reading up on a character beforehand can do a lot to prepare you for the strategies you can use when playing them. That way, you can hit the ground running for your play sessions and you won’t need to devote quite as much time learning the small nuances of your character of choice.

Widowmaker is an extremely popular character in Overwatch 2 thanks to her versatile abilities that make her a deadly Damage hero that focuses on support.

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Widowmaker’s Abilities

Widowmaker is a Damage character, but she doesn’t belong on the front lines pushing directly back against the enemy. Instead, her kit drastically favors high damage, long-range attacks that can pick off more fragile heroes in a single shot or drastically reduce a Tank’s health, leaving them vulnerable for an easy elimination.

Widow’s Kiss

Widowmaker’s main way of dishing out damage is with her rifle, Widow’s Kiss. It has two firing modes, one that’s automatic used by pulling RT and one that’s semi-automatic used by aiming with LT and then firing with RT. The automatic mode is pretty straightforward: it’s a relatively inaccurate rifle that’s used more for spraying nearby enemies that get too close than being Widowmaker’s primary method of attack.

The main use of Widow’s Kiss is to function as a highly accurate, deadly sniper rifle. When holding LT, you’ll look into the scope of the gun and a bullet will begin to charge. It can be fired at any time, but ideally, you’ll want to shoot the gun when it reaches 100% power as that’s when it’s at its most powerful. Once you’ve fired it, the gun will need to recharge once more. Recharging is quick, but not instant, so it can’t be fired consecutively while dealing the most possible damage. It’s important, then, to make each shot count.

Because the scope on Widow’s Kiss is so accurate and able to provide a solid zoom, it’s a good idea to use it from a safe distance as Widowmaker doesn’t have much in her kit that makes her good in a close-range fight. While the automatic version of Widow’s Kiss is best at close range, it should only be a last resort as it’s much less effective than the weapon of a close-range-focused character like Reaper or Tracer, making Widowmaker an easy elimination if a character like that can get close.

Luckily, Widow’s Kiss is specialized in making sure that never happens. It can eliminate all Damage and Support heroes in a single fully charged headshot making it one of the most lethal weapons in all of Overwatch 2. The problem is that landing headshots consistently can be tricky, especially when so many heroes have movement-based abilities that make them difficult targets.

Even if you miss the head and hit their body, most characters will have a large portion of their health taken away from a fully charged shot. The only characters that might not feel it as much are Tanks who can withstand a few of Widowmaker’s fully charged headshots depending on the character. That’s not to say Widowmaker shouldn’t attack them, but that she’s not the most capable of handling a Tank alone and should focus on Damage and Support heroes if they’re around.

Ultimate: Infra-Sight

Widowmaker’s Ultimate, infra-sight, reveals the locations of all enemies through walls to both you and your team for a limited amount of time. It’s great for quickly lining up multiple targets as you won’t have to guess where they’re located. Using Widowmaker’s Ulitmate is helpful to the full team no matter when it’s activated, but it’s especially ideal when defending an objective as it gives your team the major advantage of knowing where the enemy is coming from before they reveal themselves.

Grappling Hook

Grappling Hook is an ability that’s pretty straightforward: it acts as a hookshot that can pull Widowmaker anywhere within a medium distance. It’s especially useful for climbing ledges to get to higher locations where Widowmaker will have a better, uninterrupted view of the battlefield.

The Grappling Hook is also good for repositioning to counter incoming enemies and can be used to escape a risky situation if enemies start getting too close.

Venom Mine

The Venom Mine is a poison trap that can deal small chip damage to an enemy if they walk over it. While it isn’t the most lethal ability in Overwatch 2, its goal isn’t to eliminate enemies, but rather to alert Widowmaker of an enemy’s position. The Venom Mine is best placed nearby your current sniper spot in the center of a doorway that’s a few seconds away from you. Should an enemy trigger the trap, you’ll be alerted and be able to anticipate their entrance.

Take note that enemies can shoot the trap to disarm it, but you’ll be notified of that too, so the only gameplay difference is that they’ll be storming your sniper nest with slightly more health.

If there isn’t a good place for your Venom Mine, such as with sniper locations that required you to use your Grapple Hook to reach, you can always drop it into a well-traveled section of the map to deal some chip damage to the enemy before they make it to the objective.

Widowmaker’s Role in Combat

As mentioned above, Widowmaker shines most brightly when taking out threats at a distance with her sniper rifle. Although she’s a Damage character, her main role should be supporting her team by drastically reducing their health before they can even make it to combat. She plays a much more defensive role and isn’t ideal for securing objectives, but if she can keep the heat off of her team so that they can do those things for her, she can lead them to victory.

Close-quarters combat is something Widowmaker doesn’t excel at, but she has plenty of options when it comes to avoiding those situations.

At the end of the day, Widowmaker’s role lives and dies by how good of a shot the player controlling her is, so if you want to master her, you’ll need to practice your accuracy a lot. It’s because of this that it’s recommended that Widowmaker players use a mouse and keyboard to control her as opposed to a gamepad. That’s not to say that she can’t work for someone using a controller, but that they’ll need to work extra hard to keep up with enemies using other more precise methods.