My first OW2 backcap

Ahhhh I'm so excited right now! Okay, bear with me: if you've never played Overwatch 2, it might be difficult for you to understand why I'm excited. But I'll break it down for you if you're curious, and I'm assuming you're not a gamer.

Okay. So Overwatch 2 is an online-only multiplayer First-Person Shooter (FPS). You play games of 5 players against 5 players (it used to be 6vs6...) on different "maps" that are fictional, but loosely based on futuristic versions of real-life locations like Toronto, Havana, and Chongqing, China.

Different maps have different objectives. For the Toronto map (New Queen Street), you're trying to push a giant robot in a sort of tug-of-war battle against the other team. In Chongqing (Lijiang Tower), you're fighting for control of a specific area in a king-of-the-hill style battle. In Havana, you're trying to push a payload into the enemy's base and they're trying to stop you (or vice-versa).

One of the best parts of Overwatch 2 is the cast of characters. During a standard game, you can play and switch to any character in the role that you queued for, and there are three roles: Tank, Damage, and Support. I tend to play either damage or support, because I don't like the added pressure that comes from being the only tank (it's always 1 tank, 2 damage, 2 support on any given team).

This is more advanced tactical discussion, but one way to look at the roles is that tanks create space for the team, damage maintains the space, and support, well, supports these 2 roles in doing that. Creating space means taking tactical and strategic positions on the map to make it easier to get eliminations, and eliminations are how you get rid of the enemy team before they inevitably respawn and try and stop you from completing objectives.

ANYWAY. With that gloss-over of the game over with, I just finished playing a Quick Play (the non-competitive mode that I prefer) game on King's Row (based on London, England) as Zenyatta, a support character that does high damage and good utility, but with very little mobility. As Zenyatta, you're really reliant on your team to not get ganked. So on King's Row, I was on the side trying to push the payload, and I had a really good team so we got through the first 2 checkpoints without anyone dying (which is pretty rare: dying happens a lot in this game). King's Row, however, is notoriously difficult on the last checkpoint because the defenders respawn pretty much right next to where you're trying to push the payload. If there's even 1 enemy player near the payload, it doesn't move; so it's difficult to eliminate the entire enemy team faster than they can eliminate you on checkpoint 3.

Overwatch 2 is a game of teamfights. These are battles that happen naturally as the game progresses, and it's not uncommon for a team to get a "team kill", which is when everyone is dead at the same time before anyone has a chance to respawn.

My team fought a hard teamfight and used their "ultimates" (a powerful but rare ability unique to each hero), trying to push the payload the last few few metres, but everyone on my team finally died - except me. Usually, you want to get eliminated with your team when this happens so that you respawn as a team. But in this case, I saw the opportunity to hide behind enemy lines. The enemy had a burst of confidence from having eliminated my team, so they pushed forward, leaving the payload (and me!) behind.  One thing you should know about Zenyatta is that because he floats, he actually doesn't make footstep sounds, which is one of the best tells that an enemy is nearby.

So the enemy team forgot about me, and can't hear me. I sneak up behind the payload and get it moving, while my team distracts the enemy team by trying to push forward through the front line... the payload slowly moves toward the goal line. I eventually see the enemy's tank realize I'm about to cap the point, and they rush back but it's too late: I cap the point and win the game for my team. My team is ecstatic and thank me profusely in the in-game chat, and I cannot believe that I managed to pull it off. It was a hell of a rush because these kinds of wins are really, really rare. Someone on the enemy team usually notices and then the entire team can easily pick you off the payload.

I tried to make a video clip of all this from the replay file, but it seems I can't through GeForce Now, so the best I can do is a screenshot of the setup.

Red circle is the payload and the direction I need to push it in, green are the outlines of my teammates, and I'm in the blue circle. Notice the enemy team focusing their attention toward the green.