Zenyatta?

[SaneyBoo]

I've tried him multiple times and every time i just feel so underwhelming, i feel like i am missing something crucial.

Keep 1 orb on ally, 1 orb on enemy and then shoot stuff?

I feel like i should be able to have more than one healy orb up, it just seem so underwhelming the amount of healing i do on Zenyatta outside the ultimate.

Why would i pick him over Mercy or Lucio? - I just don't understand where his strength lies.

[Arkthensis]

You pick him if you already have a support.

[Zoibert the Bear]

He destroys tank heroes and is specially good when you've got a Mercy/Lucio in the team as well.

[-Gr-]

Your orbs leave your ally/enemy if you lose line of sight with them. You will destroy tanks but you will get rekt against a sniper so try to stay away from any long corridors or isle of LoS.

You should have a Lucio on your team as well for the speed buff, or a mercy for the rez if you end up getting one shot. You can pick people off from the back of your team and hurt them very hard with the debuff charge combo.

It just takes good aim and situational awareness and you should be golden. You won't be doing amazing healing but you don't need to when you do just as much damage and can stop nearly every ult with yours. Don't use it on cooldown, but wait for a junkrat or reaper etc to use theirs then pop it.

[Endus]

Mercy is a bigger single-target healer, but if she's healing, her offensive power is zero.
Lucio's a bigger healer if he's next to two or more players. If everyone's scattered, he's got little opportunity to do much healing. Also, his weapon works best in relatively close range; the knockback has hugely short range, and the travel time on his pulses makes them easy to dodge at long range.

Zenyatta's a stronger long-range offense than either, particularly when you include Orb of Discord and the effect it has on the team's ability to take down a hard target. He's got less straight-up healing, in exchange for more offense. I'm fine with that tradeoff; if I think he needs anything, it's more HP. At least 200. 150 just seems way too flimsy, even if most of it is shields.

[Naxere]

As someone that mains Zenyatta, he shines against teams with multiple tanks or slow-moving characters (Hanzo, McCree, etc.). His orbs have no drop-off damage and he can sit back behind your pushers and put out decent damage at mid to long range with his Orb of Discord on targets. Not very good at point capture maps and not good if you get caught out in the open by a decent WM or constantly harassed by a Tracer/Genji. Works well with other Supports as others have mentioned. On average, I put out about 4k healing/damage a match with him. Not as high as a Mercy or Lucio will get for heals, and not as much damage as others but solid middle numbers for both.

[SaneyBoo]

Thanks for the tips and info, he is my least played character and wanted to get some insight on him.

[DeadmanWalking]

I use Zenyatta when I want to heal and do great ranged damage from behind my group to make the chances of a reaper/McCree melting me less of a problem.

He also works well on Snipers if you know where they are before they know where you are. In the temple of Anumbis on attack we had a Sniper over the first archway trying to pick us off coming out the door so I targeted her through the door, slid to the side so I couldn't be sniped until all 5 balls charged up and then slid out and threw everything at the sniper and her corpse fell off the archway. Bingo bango, problem solved.

He also works well at taking out turrets. If you are behind a large friendly character you can still aim through them as enemies will have a diamond with an E on it, allowing you to know where they are and you target that spot.

On temple of Anubis I use him on the first control point to push offensively while keeping people healed, his heal is much faster than Lucios and has a longer range so long as they stay in line of sight. The distance between the long ramp on the second objective isn't good for Zenyatta as his ult to keep everyone alive won't last long enough, that is the point I switch to mercy to do her table flipping ult of resurecting everyone in the control point B.

He also works well for Route 66 attack as it has several areas that allow someone with long ranged weapons to take out those snipers/turrets that people always put up defensively.

Also of note is that he has no footstep sounds, so you can sneak up on people easily.

Personally I would like to see a 5 man zenyatta + 1 Rhardt team with each one healing another at all times.

[Dug]

You pick him if you already have a support.

Pretty much this. I only play him as a support for the support. Throwing out off heals and dealing mad damage with discord orbs. I absolutely hate when people use him as a main healer/support type. He's just not built for it.

[Morae]

I also seem to main Zenyatta these days. You need to be very careful with him. Very very careful. You need to let someone else move into area before you since there could be a sniper. If there is a sniper, you don't go in. Does enemy have flankers? If they got good ones, you need to be even more careful or even possibly switch to another hero.

His healing is low so basically your job in a fight is to keep people alive by keeping them high enough that they don't die to stray damage. If people are topped, you put orb on people that you think are about the get damaged. Zenyatta isn't someone who can keep people alive in a fight, you are there to fix them so they can go back into fight as far as I understand.

Where Zenyatta really shines is obliterating tanks. Discord orb is powerful. Roadhogs, D.vas and Winstons melt when they got orb on them. Reinhardt is harder since he often has shield up and even if you managed to get orb on him, he doesn't take extra damage unless he personally gets hit. Zarya is also annoying. You just feed her cannon, if you shoot her when shield is up. That is as far tanks go. You see enemy, discord orb, shoot them. Nothing lasts long under the effect of discord orb.

An important note is that Zenyatta is extremely accurate and as far as I know doesn't have damage fall off on range. Basically a sniper. On defense during hollywood map, I have killed lots of people from that little gap when they come down the stairs near the entrace to the capture point.

My usual playstyle is that I sit inside my team (hopefully behind a tank... preferably Reinhardt or Roadhog with his large model). Any enemy comes into vision means discord orb and start shooting while healing your meat shield(s). When there are multiple targets, try to discord orb priority targets.

Something to remember. You are dead alone. You should never be alone. If you are alone, you retreat, if you can. You die, if you are alone. Did I mention that you can't be alone? You can't survive against anyone alone unless you are lucky and manage to land head shots while the got discord orb. Anything will kill that 150hp in a moment.

[DeadmanWalking]

He works very well if your enemy decides to go angry agressive monkey.

[Drutt]

Zen is basically a 50/50 hybrid damage dealer/healer, with incredible burst healing and point contesting ability via transcendence.

He's a really good option when the opposing team has 2+ tanks and you already have a Mercy/Lucio support.

He's a potentially bad pick if the enemy team has a great Widow and/or Hanzo, because they can 1 shot him with a bodyshot.

I think Zenyatta definitely needs some buffs to bring him in line. I feel he needs a health buff to not get instantly 1 shot by sniper body shots and a minor healing boost of some kind outside of transcendence (he should be lower than Mercy/Lucio, but right now he's too low). I also feel like Harmony orb needs to have a 5 second drop off time, not 3; it falls off allies too easily when either of you seek cover. Discord is perfect at 3.

I'd actually really like it if they gave him a small heal buff via a new mechanic where his attacks into a discorded target trigger a heal on the hero he currently has harmony orb on. It would be a nice skillcap additional in the form of microing orbs, offer a bit more healing output, and work really nicely with his yin-yang theme. He's very much a character who is set up to both heal and DPS and it would be nice if he had some direct synergy with those two roles, as it would make him really unique.

[Naxere]

Managed to get POTG as Zenyatta once last night. Other team had 2 Pharahs, both popped their Ults within a couple seconds of each other as I was running up to the point. Discorded the first one, killed him mid-air, switched to second and Discorded and killed him too. Ended up killing one other rando for the triple.

- - - Updated - - -

I think Zenyatta definitely needs some buffs to bring him in line. I feel he needs a health buff to not get instantly 1 shot by sniper body shots and a minor healing boost of some kind outside of transcendence (he should be lower than Mercy/Lucio, but right now he's too low). I also feel like Harmony orb needs to have a 5 second drop off time, not 3; it falls off allies too easily when either of you seek cover. Discord is perfect at 3.

I kinda like that he has low health. Makes me more careful when running through open spaces. I'd rather see a slight movement speed increase personally.

[Drutt]

I kinda like that he has low health. Makes me more careful when running through open spaces. I'd rather see a slight movement speed increase personally.

Low health and not getting killed by a Widow body are not mutually exclusive. For example, 175 HP is still second lowest in the game but would remove Widow bodies as death sentences. Widow counters him far too hard at the moment, and given that he has no mobility that's a big problem.

Widow bodies also kill Tracer outright, but she's so mobile that it's not a massive problem for her. A hero with no mobility really shouldn't be able to be killed by a body shot from an enemy sniper, it makes you far too fragile.

[Naxere]

Well, I used to play WM throughout the beta, so I have a good idea on where their sniping spots tend to be and avoid LOS to those. Also, Zenyatta takes so long to run back to the action when he does die, you can usually see/hear the WM shots long before you're back into the thick of it.

[wiggletard]

He is heavily comp/counter comp and map dependent. Imo, best with ranged and builders. Very good at payload.

Not good for capture or melee/short distance classes. Too much los going on.

[Saverem]

He's basically a support support. You support/supplement the support of your team by filling in heal gaps or debuffing people attacking them and such.

His ult is also a pretty good counter for those mass death ults like McCrees, Reapers, DVAs, Junkrats, Roadhogs, Hanzos and Bastions.

[Sky High]

Zenn is a secondary healer/ hard support character. his discord orb and his power means he's best at chewing up harder targets like tanks and stationary defenses. plus his ult is one of the best pushing tools in the game. but he lacks the mobility and healing output to keep up with mercy or lucio. stay in or near the main group with the tank and heals mowing down the tougher heroes and looking out for people trying to flank you.