I’ve gone over timing bubbles, I’ve gone over sources of energy...

Now, it might make sense that we talk about how to use these together to protect your team.

“What do you mean?” you might be thinking, as you read on with a slight annoyance that I’m using this writing style again. “I thought you’ve already equipped us with sufficient knowledge--”

Hush, you! Enough of your sass. Sit down--sit--SIT. Good.

Anyway - No, I haven’t. 

And don’t you ever assume you’re done learning from Mother Russia again.

-clears throat-

Defensive Bubbles 

Truly defensive bubbles are what the cool kids might call ‘advanced strats’. They’re what I would consider to be the final step in mastering the use of your barriers.

Let’s re-consider how I’ve taught you to use bubbles up to this point. In ZPoA #2, I try to go over the timing methods I use for bubbles, and in ZPoA #5, I discuss using them to charge up your energy, allowing Zarya to maintain the ‘offense’ in ‘offensive tank’.

Mostly, in both of those guides, the end goal of using your bubble was one thing - maintaining your energy... but most of you who really follow me, who know how I play, know that I’m not known for my energy maintenance...

Nah, baby. I’m known for my precisely timed, play-denying, life-saving defensive bubbles. ‘Clutch’ bubbles, if you will.

Knowing that, how I forgot to even bring these tips up is beyond me and I’m sorry I took so long to write up this type of guide.

Tips On Bubble Prioritization and Cooldown Maintenance

As you know already, bubbles are barriers and block most types of damage coming for you. However, they don’t block everything and are entirely useless in some situations: 

★ Teammates about to die to an environmental kill will not charge you and waste your bubble entirely.

★ Certain teammate abilities will either clash with or completely waste your bubble, if you don’t wait until after they’ve spent their ability: 

D.Va’s Defense Matrix 

Tracer’s Recall

Mei’s Cryo-Freeze

Moira’s Fade

★ Never bubble a D.Va’s mech while it’s exploding - wait a second, for D.Va herself to eject, or you’ll target the mech and lose your bubble.

★ Bubbling a Genji using deflect will waste Genji’s deflect.

★ Bubbling an invisible Sombra is a waste of a bubble. -mumbles- bubbling sombra at all is a waste of a bubble... protecting sombra is a waste of my TIME-- er, bubbling an invisible Sombra also gives her location away. 

★ Never bubble a teammate behind another tank’s barrier.

★ You cannot untrap yourself from Junkrat’s Trap, un-hack a hacked teammate, un-stun a stunned teammate, or protect teammates from displacement (Zarya and Orisa’s gravitons, Wrecking Ball, Lucio, Pharah). The only exception to this is ‘eating’ a concussion mine from Junkrat. 

With these things in mind, here are some facts about bubbles that you can use to be a better defensive Zarya player altogether. I’m going to interchange the words ‘protect’ and ‘bubble’ a few times - keep in mind that ‘bubbling’ is using a barrier, and ‘protecting’ is blocking damage with any of your means as a tank:

★ Pay attention to the abilities your teammates are using and when - Once they’ve spent the abilities listed in the second bullet, they’re safe to bubble (and one of the best things to bubble in that situation)

★ Pay attention to the blue arrows above your teammates heads - if a teammate is currently under attack, their arrow will turn yellow until they’re no longer taking damage. Move toward and save bubbles for teammates with yellow arrows when you can’t see them from spawn.

★ Protect low hp teammates who are healing or trying to heal themselves, as enemies often try to follow and pick them at this point, and the two seconds will replenish decent health.

★ Watch who Rein is trying to charge - once he’s got your teammate pinned, you have a split second to hit them with a death-denying bubble. Don’t give Rein the opportunity to wait your bubble out - the closer to the wall you wait for him to get, the better. (See the video above for some examples)

★ You can unfreeze yourself and one teammate from Mei’s icy wrath, whether she’s using her weapon or her ult. Watch for her ultimate and run for the closest edge, then bubble yourself when your running speed starts to decrease to give yourself two more seconds to escape the area of effect. Your last resort is a rocket/bubble jump to hop onto a platform or out of the blizzard.

★ Become really good at reading your enemy - many of your foes can be read like books, and it’s pretty satisfying to block flying ammo after it’s been fired. Let Widow or Hanzo aim for your head and deny them their headshot - you can even tell how close they got to your face based on how much energy you got. Two of the easiest enemies to read are Reinhardt and Genji. Doomfist is pretty easy for me too.

★ Save one of your bubbles and try using the other to do the opposite of what it’s meant to do - bubble a teammate to create a shield for yourself, and bubble yourself to shield a teammate. Two people can fit inside a barrier, so look for chances to press teammates awkwardly to walls for protection, or to throw yourself dramatically into lines of fire to save your healers - they’d like that shit.

★ Standing over (or under, as pictured above) explosives with an active barrier, like dynamite, concussion mines and pulse bombs, not only protects you from the damage, but absorbs any blasts and protects teammates around you from damage. (It functions like Winston’s barrier on top of D.Va’s ult.) 

★ Teammates who have a Discord orb, or were hit with Ana’s biotic grenade, really like bubbles. Zarya’s barrier is the only thing that ‘cures’ teammates of these status effects, and the chance of charging off of the enemy’s attempt to capitalize is pretty decent.

Note: Curing a teammate of a discord orb will make them invisible to Zenyatta again, so I recommend doing it when you can afford to spare a bubble that might not get hit by anything, simply to disguise your teammate’s movements.

★ Protect Mercy when she’s using resurrect - if you’ve read my Don’t Touch My Wife guide, you already know this though.

Aaaand I’ll be back with more if I think of anything. <3

Our Buff, Pink Play of the Game Machine, Zarya, is, at least in my expert opinion, one of the best DPS heroes in the game. She's the only DPS hero capable of protecting her teammates and saving their lives, she's extremely bulky, and she happens to posess possibly the most game-changing ultimate.

But Mars, Zarya is a tank, you might be saying to your computer screen. You've been playing her for almost 800 hours and you don't know that?

...Well, she's both. She's what you call an offensive tank.

What is the function of a tank?

Tank heroes lead the team into battle and initiate fights while assisting their teammates. They often guard the objective and stay near or on it in defense, and their ultimates generally are meant to be combined with others.

There are two types of tanks in Overwatch - Offensive tanks, as I mentioned before, and Supportive tanks. Each tank has a different balance of offensive and supportive capabilities.

For example, Roadhog is a highly offensive tank that offers a type of support - his hook, and his ultimate - that is very situational. He can do a lot of damage, but isn't the best at protecting teammates unless he uses his body (which is something he's meant to do, because he can heal himself!). Using him alone isn't really a good idea as he'd die pretty often without the protection of a second tank's barriers.

Orisa, a newer tank, is more of a supportive tank. She does decent damage, but her main focus is to boost ally damage and protect them with her barriers, along with displacing enemies with her gravitons. Winston is also supportive, because he does very little damage but has a primary role of displacing and distracting enemies by diving into their defense. He's kind of like Tracer, meant to annoy and distract (but bigger and hairier).

Reinhardt, D.Va, and Zarya, are all fairly balanced in offense and support, and can be used in a lot of different situations as the team's only tank. (Yes, Zarya can solo tank.) Sometimes players who main these tanks can solo carry their teams - I do it all the time with Zarya.

Stay on topic, Mars, you're probably saying to yourself. How do you constantly beat Genji, Reaper and Soldier for gold damage and eliminations?

All right, all right, keep your Adidas tied.

The secret is.…energy.

That’s all! Just keep your energy high and aim that molten death ray right at their trunks, and watch them fry like ants under a magnifying glass. (because Zarya can’t do critical damage. I have a habit of aiming for heads anyway  cuz I like to melt their FACES OFF--cough)

BUT MARS, you’re yelling as you punch your monitor. I can never get as much energy as you! I’m not good enough!

First of all, yes you are. With practice and perseverance, you can have average energy of over 40% per game. You just have to know all the cool places you can get your charge from!

Second of all, refer to my point of advice about barriers to learn a bit about how they work, and the three ways I time my barriers. Practicing those methods, along with timing them and switching between them in fights, is one of the simplest ways I maintain energy.

What I didn’t really go into with that post is how these barriers turn damage into energy. They’re pretty simple, though, so I’ll just go over it real fast:

Bubbles and Damage-to-Energy Conversion

Zarya’s bubbles have 200 hp each, but deal with damage dealt to them in two ways. 

The first way is essentially giving yourself or your ally 200 extra hp for 2 seconds. If depleted of their hp with 200 damage during these two seconds, it is ensured not only that the barrier is destroyed, but that Zarya gets a full 40 charge for her energy reserve.

No matter what or how, if your barrier is destroyed (it will actually make a crumbling noise if you’re listening for it) you win 40 points of energy - and you probably just blocked a fatal shot for someone, so good job.

However, let’s say someone uses an ultimate that can do over 200 damage with one blow. Even if you’ve taken some damage to your barrier before that blow, you will absorb damage that transfers into energy, and negate any extra damage. 

Example: Pharah uses her Rocket Barrage on you. Each rocket does 40 damage, so when 5 rockets hit Zarya’s bubble, it pops.

Let’s say D.Va uses her ultimate. Instead of multiple small blows, it’s one large blast of 1000 damage. 

"Nerf this!”

Notice that the second D.Va tries to activate, she starts to shoot you. If she’s a good D.Va, she knows you wanna block the damage and she’s going to try to bust your bubble early - but even if she gets a shot or two off and damages the barrier slightly and does one damage, it will still absorb 199 damage and negate the other 801 damage from her self-destruct.

In other words, Zarya’s barrier is the biggest reason she’s considered a D.Va counter, because her ultimate is useless against them - and two well placed barriers can save your entire team from her ult’s blast.

“Consider it nerfed, bunny bitch.”

This works on anything that does more than 200 damage, as long as it does that damage with one hit. Keep that in mind and practice protecting teammates from D.Va and Reinhardt.

Sources of Energy

Symmetra and Torbjorn turrets Time your barriers and damage to turrets by letting them destroy your barriers, then blowing them up with their own juice. One well-placed shot of Zarya’s secondary fire, even with low or no energy, can clear a minimum of a 2 meter radius of Sym turrets.

Genji Deflect Ever see a Genji try to deflect at you as Zarya, when you’re using your primary fire? Consider tossing a grenade at him as you barrier yourself. -wink-

Dead Junkrat Bombs When I have bubbles and am about to finish Junkrat, I just stand over his body and activate them. I’ve saved allies who were too slow to react to such a situation as well. This gives a full 40 charge. Dragonstrike You can let the dragon consume you safely for 2 seconds - cross the area Hanzo’s trying to zone you away from in style

Molten Core Torbjorn’s ult can be a pain - but can be walked over with your bubbles and give you a nice charge.

Dynamite Ashe’s dynamite will burn what it hits over time - a simple bubble can cure you or a teammate of its effect. However, if you manage to use your bubble before the dynamite explodes, standing over it to cover it, you can protect everyone within its radius from its burning effect and get some charge from it. (Curing a burn post-explosion doesn’t give you energy.)

Dealing with Minefields When Wrecking Ball ults, you can take out and absorb damage from two bombs with your bubble before it breaks. You can also ask a teammate to clear two more of the bombs while bubbled for some free charge. If they’re not cleared right away by someone else, they usually stay in play long enough to do this twice. Dealing with Sombra’s EMP Sombra’s ultimate is special in that it depletes enemies with shield HP, like half of Zarya’s HP, in one shot. (Zarya’s shields will still regenerate naturally if she avoids damage while hacked)

The other thing it does is destroy Reinhardt, Orisa, and Winston’s barriers in one blow if they’re active. It also deactivates D.Va’s, and of course, Zarya’s... but only Zarya has a last ditch defense when EMP activates.

Sombra’s EMP doesn’t simply deactivate barriers - it in fact destroys barriers by depleting them of all of their HP, then deactivates your abilities. However, this instant depletion of HP counts as damage toward the barrier - which means if Zarya’s barriers are active before EMP activates, she has the opportunity to add up to 80 to her charge, giving her a strong self-defense while she’s hacked. 

Use that opportunity to distance yourself and try to do some tanking before you likely get wiped (because emp’s frickin’ devastating regardless if Zarya gets hacked and focused so good luck) 

(That’s it for now - If I think of more I will update, of course. Please reblog and share this around if you learned something!)

(If this taught you anything, follow @buff-pink and check out my other tips.)

I see so much shipping of Overwatch heroes on Tumblr and guess what, mother russia be shippin’ too.

I personally don’t talk about the ships I like, but I’m gonna share them with you just this once, because being aware of this totally completely canon, non-self-indulgent fact about Zarya is gonna help your games go a lot more smoothly.

A little known fact about Zarya is that she’s actually married. Who’s the lucky wife? 

That should be obvious...

NO GOD DAMMIT IT’S NOT MEI. 

It’s Mercy. IT’S MERCY OKAY? DEAL WITH IT.

Gosh.

So let’s talk about the fact that if Mercy is one of the healers on your team, a lot of Zarya’s job is to make sure nobody touches her wife.

I want to talk to the Mercy mains in the audience for this. -takes a knee-

In quickplay or arcade, do you ever feel like a slave who never gets sincere gratitude? (yeeees)

Do you feel like that healing card just gets obligatory votes at the end of the game because you were the one who ‘took one for the team’ by playing Mercy? (yeaaaaup)

Do you want to enjoy being the healer and feel like a real asset to the team? (uh huuuhhh)

Then my advice is to stay in sight of your barrier bitch wife, because only Zarya can protect you while you’re flying all over the objective trying to heal, and if she wants dinner after work is over, she won’t need reminding to watch for you and react before you even knew you were about to die to that Mei icicle that you can literally see stuck to the barrier. 

Try not to make her come looking for you, because she has other things to do just like you, but remember to keep track of where she is and visit every now and then so she can see you’re okay, like a good heal slut wife would do. 

If she bubbles you, take that as a warning that she needs her space now and you better use that bubble to fly to someone else before you waste it and piss her off. You just cost her ten seconds of cooldown on a squandered barrier, and on top of that, you’re dead now and have to take the walk of shame back to the--

Wait, who’s that who came out to meet you halfway so you can get back faster? 

Awww it’s your wife!! 

Bet you’ve never been picked up from spawn before. 

Though other heroes can easily do the same if they notice Mercy died, Zarya’s the best to send out for multiple reasons - she can protect both of you in case of any problems, she can easily fight or escape if she wants(Because she’s fucking Zarya that’s why), and if she disappeared from the objective, the enemies wouldn’t exactly miss her if they wanted to do something to the rest of your team while she’s gone (who would miss being burned out of existence constantly by that molten death ray?) 

Think about the protection it offers if Mercy has to ressurect the team upon her return as well - it’s pretty much the fastest and safest way to get her back if she’s picked off. 

Just... try not to get picked off. This isn’t a Mercy point of advice, so I’m gonna trust you know what you’re doing from here.

Stay tuned for part 2 of this point of advice, going over the specifics of Zarya and Mercy’s marriage - specifically that they’re in an open relationship........ BUT WITH WHO? NO IT’S NOT MEI RFHVKLDGHb

You can check Part 2 to find out, though...

WEAPON BASICS ◆ Zarya's primary fire is a beam weapon that requires tracking aim. It does 95 dps at 0 charge and 190 dps at 100% charge. This is best used to burn down an individual enemy within 15m of you. A full charged Zarya can do 950 damage with one clip over 5 seconds. ◆ Zarya's secondary fire is an arcing projectile that also does splash damage. A direct hit explosive will do 46 damage per bomb at 0% charge and 92 damage per bomb at 100% charge. Each explosive uses 25 ammo, HOWEVER, if you have under 25 ammo, you can still shoot one. So it's a good habit to get into using secondary fire right before you reload. Secondary fire is useful for getting some early ultimate charge before you're close to the enemy, up close in combo with a melee to burst down an enemy (but be careful as this can kill you), in a graviton (splash damage <3), or to try to catch retreating enemies.