Echo was first teased in Overwatch‘s Reunion video back at BlizzCon 2018. And since then we’ve gotten three new heroes, but now here she on the PTR as Overwatch‘s Hero 32. Echo is designed as a powerful artificial intelligence machine by the Singaporean scientist Dr Mina Liao. One of the founding members of the OG Overwatch. A former employee of the Omnica Corporation she was partly responsible for the creation of the Omnics (start of Omnic Crisis) and has since joined Overwatch to fight her own creations. Dr Liao created Echo to learn by observation but after she was killed in an attack on the Overwatch facility the Echo programme was shut down.
Now Echo is back as Hero 32 in the Overwatch roster and like all the heroes before her, she’s here to entirely change the game. Her moveset and abilities make her a fast-moving, high damaging hero. But it’s really her ultimate ability that’s here to mess things up. Let’s dive in.
Primary Attack – Tri-Shot
Echo’s Tri-shot should be pretty self-explanatory it shoots out three energy-blasts at once. Similar to Genji’s secondary shuriken fire, except instead of an arc the Tri-shots form more of a triangular pattern. This just means it works better from afar, you can use it as a poking tool or sweep the backline. The Tri-shot does some devastating damage but are a little tricky to land. Unlike Genji however, you’ll be able to fire five times before you have to reload though so that’s not too bad.
Secondary Fire – Sticky Bombs
Just in case your aim isn’t that great or you’re being sneaky, sneaky and flying around your second attack is the extremely useful Sticky Bombs. These fire small bombs that attach onto your opponent and explode after a short delay. Bombs are also able to be stuck to shields and the environment, a great way to set up a trap at a choke point. Best of all it only has a short six-second cooldown.
Flight
Another chick in the skies! Echo joins her flying sisters Mercy and Pharah in the air but unlike them, her flight ability sends her quickly into the sky in a horizontal arc. In the air, you’ll be able to control her position for three seconds before you come back down. Echo is a little less airborne that Pharah in this capacity but she can go a bit further, faster. Flight is on a short six-second cooldown but her passive Glide should give you some extra air-time. Hold the jump button to gain some lateral control and hit the ground slower. This makes her an extremely manoeuvrable DPS hero that’s built for flanking.
Focusing Beam
The focusing Beam allows Echo to channel a beam for a few seconds. It does relatively low damage on enemies with full health, but when an enemy is below half health, the damage is greatly increased. This principle also applies to enemy shields, meaning that once you see a barrier begin to crack, the beam is mere seconds away from breaking it fully. It’s perfect for melting shields if you use it right.
Ultimate – Duplicate
Echo’s Ultimate ability Duplicate had all the chat rooms on fire and for good cause. Unlike any other hero on the roster, her ability is to be able to copy any member of the opposing team (except for another Echo duh), for 15 seconds. In this form, she’ll be able to use that character’s abilities as well as charge their Ultimate fast. Depending on how you play you’ll actually be able to fire off multiple ultimates while you’re in Duplicate mode. Needless to say, this messes up the whole meta. It’s because of this Ultimate ability that Echo is classified as an intermediate to an advanced character. You’ll need knowledge of pretty much all the heroes as well as a good grasp of team dynamics.
Echo is currently in the Public Test Region (PTR) and her Ultimate may be toned down if it proves too powerful.
Things To Remember
Echo has an average health bar of 200HP, it’s respectable but nowhere near bulky. So just like Doomfist remember to flank in and out to avoid dying. Don’t be afraid to use that flight ability to get out of the enemy fire and of course any Ultimates coming your way. Because Echo is such an ability reliant hero a Sombra would be a good enemy counter. As well as Winston to match her mobility and of course any good DPS that can get a hit on her such as McCree, Soldier and Widow.
Now for Echo’s Ultimate, it can be quite tempting to hijack the hardest hitters such as Genji, Tracer and Hanzo. But depending on the situation you can also swap into an additional healer or tank. Duplicating an enemy Mercy and getting that resurrection in could be just what your team needs as opposed to more firepower. Echo is a fun character with a lot of physical and tactical manoeuvrability so don’t think of her as just a full DPS hero when she can flex into other roles. On the other end if an enemy Echo is doing devastating damage by Duplicating one of your DPS players, consider just swapping them out to make that Echo less effective.
Overwatch 2
Jeff Kaplan has come out publically to say that Echo will be the last hero that will be released for Overwatch, ss the team will be focused on the launch of Overwatch 2. There’s no date for Overwatch 2 yet but in the amazing trailer ‘Zero Hour’ we do get a glimpse of Echo. So looks like she’s coming with us!
If you liked this Overwatch Hero guide be sure to check out our others for Wrecking Ball, Baptise, Sigma, Ashe and Orisa.
