Anran: First Impressions
Anran is a new damage Hero in Overwatch. This is a hero that a lot of people were excited to see added to the game once they were introduced as part of Wuyang’s backstory.
As soon as Anran and her fire-based abilities were shown, it was pretty clear that she would likely be added as a playable hero in the future.
Now with the major refresh coming to Overwatch, Anran is being added sooner than many expected, along with four other heroes and a host of changes and improvements.
Having had a chance to play some Anran during the hero trial and the launch of Season 1. I’m sharing my thoughts on her abilities and how she fits into the ever-expanding Overwatch roster.
All weapon and ability graphics from here:
Abilities
Anran’s Inferno Rush, a forward movement ability with two charges feels very similar to Tracer’s blinks. It even has the charges shown on your crosshair. This similarity to an existing hero’s kit made it easier to get used to the ability, s a lot of the muscle memory carries over.
However unlike with Tracer, Inferno rush can be used to dash upwards, gaining height and unlocking new avenues of approach on certain maps. For a flanker type hero like Anran the ability to appear and attack from more angles can be a major advantage.
The Dancing Blaze ability could be overlooked, but I think it will be a very important part of Anran’s kit. Not because of the damage it can deal to grouped enemies, but because it’s another phase type ability. Similar to Reaper’s Wraith Form and Moira’s Fade, the ability to negate any attack that would otherwise hit you is extremely powerful. Particularly when used on damaging single effect ultimates, think Cassidy’s Deadeye or D.va bombs. With good timing a player can avoid being killed by high resource ultimates with just a cooldown ability.
Passives
The fire damage effect from Anran’s attacks is a potentially powerful tool. Since damage over time effects continue dealing some damage even after a fight has concluded, including situations where Anran is dead. Leading to some post death fiery revenge.
Ultimates
One of the more unusual things about Anran is that the hero has more than one ultimate ability.
In the current state of the game the only other hero with multiple ultimate abilities is D.va . And Remech is usually not impactful enough to be considered a real ultimate. In order to see another true dual ultimate we have to go back to the early Overwatch days and support Symmetra. The Symmetra’s Teleporter was an ultimate ability, and you could choose between that and a Shield Generator. Ah memories.
An instant revive can be a powerful thing and help tip the scales on a losing fight back in your favour. But the trade off of losing a powerful damage ability and potential multi kill is a big one. It’ll take some smart tactical thinking and game sense to know which one to use. I’m looking forward to seeing how the pro players handle this.
Unfortunately there’s always the chance that her ultimate will be used by players greedy to grab all the glory for themselves to self revive when waiting to use the offensive ultimate would be a better move for the team overall.
Hope you’re having fun playing Anran and all the other heroes added to Overwatch with Season 1.