Overwatch Tips: How to Play Soldier 76

Soldier 76 in Overwatch

Soldier 76 is a great character if you enjoy being able to deal out good damage, and support your team to a slightly lesser extent as well. He’s also one of the fastest moving characters in the game, meaning it’s easy for him to get in and out of battle whenever necessary. Thanks to his Sprint ability, he can chase down fleeing enemies, and even flank the enemy team if you’re quick enough. While you won’t be able to perform any other actions while sprinting, this ability actually allows Soldier 76 to jump over some large gaps, which is great for his mobility.

His heavy pulse rifle does pretty decent damage, though players should be careful with the drop in his accuracy whenever you hold down the fire button for too long. The rifle performs most efficiently when he’s in close to medium range. Essentially, you’ll want to be somewhat close to your enemies when firing the weapon, and remember to fire in burst shots to keep your sights trained on them.

Soldier 76 also has Helix Rockets, which are very handy when facing tanks and enemy clusters. These Rockets will deal large amounts of damage to whoever gets hit by it, and they even have some splash damage. It’s best to save these Rockets for tank characters with lots of HP, or when you see your foes grouping up at a control point. The Rockets are particularly effective against D.Va, whose mobility is compromised whenever she’s firing the fusion cannon, and Pharah, who remains immobile when performing her Barrage move. However, the Helix Rockets do have a long cooldown period, so make sure you hit what you aim at.

The Biotic Field can also come in handy whenever your team needs some additional healing. This will create an AoE healing effect that regenerates HP for whoever stands inside it. It’s smart to place your Biotic Field around control points where most of your teammates will be gathered.

Lastly, Soldier 76’s ultimate ability is called Tactical Visor, and this allows you to hit your targets without missing. When the ability is activated, your reload speed decreases, but be aware that your bullets will only hit the target closest to your crosshairs. This is particularly useful against fast characters like Tracer, as you only need to keep track of her location and your bullets will do the rest of the work. I advise using this ability for picking off characters with low health, as your bullets won’t do that much damage against tank characters anyway.

Abilities

Heavy Pulse Rifle

The rifle is fully automatic, but do be careful of losing stability and the damage drop-off over larger distances.

Sprint

The Sprint ability is really useful for getting in and out of battle. Even if you die, you can get back into the fight really quickly by sprinting, and this will even let you keep up with Tracer, to an extent.

Helix Rockets

These Rockets will deal a lot of damage to its target, and even cause splash damage to surrounding enemies. However, it has a long cooldown period, so watch your aim.

Biotic Field

If your teammates need some additional healing and support, Soldier 76 can step in with this quick AoE healing ability.

Tactical Visor

This ultimate ability is great for picking off enemies with low health, or attacking characters that move really quickly, such as Tracer.

Backstory

Here’s Soldier 76’s official backstory in Overwatch, straight from Blizzard: