I've always enjoyed playing Hanzo, but knew from the community that he's very hard to be effective with, so I didn't use him in Competitive. I play a TON of Mystery Heroes (more hours in that than QP) and always did well with him there, though. I leveled up a Hanzo main alt (not 100% Hanzo as I'd switch off if it wasn't working or we're missing a key hero), and ended up placing right around the same SR as my main account at that time.

Here are some thoughts on why Hanzo may be more impactful than he's given credit for and advice for those who play him (or are picking him up after reading about his PTR changes):

• High kill confirmation: Yes, its harder to land those headshots, but when you do they can't retreat or heal unless its a tank: they're dead. 125x2 will kill any 250 HP squishy or below. Unlike Widow, you can miss plenty of times before they'll notice you.

• Nothing wrong with Spamzo into the choke during down-time: You can fire 1 fully charged arrow per second. By comparison, McCree can fire 1.3 left-clicks per second after adjusting for his reload time, but he'll need twice as many headshots to confirm a kill (assuming he's within 20 meters) and may be caught mid-reload when the enemy push starts. If you've wiped the enemy team and know from Sonic Arrow there's not an ambush waiting for you, you can even peek past the choke/ahead of the payload for a shot or two on early enemy respawns that are trickling.

• Sonic Arrow: Since it doesn't do (edit: extra, compared to the basic arrow,) damage, it seems most players overlook the benefit of a well-placed sonic arrow. Your team gets a mini-Widow ult every 20 seconds, and it lasts for 10 of those 20 seconds. If you are a Hanzo player, make good use of that arrow! For our platform, we don't have text chat and often don't have everyone in voice chat. You can use your sonic arrow placement to communicate to your comms-less teammates, giving it even more utility for us than it does on PC. On maps with two nearby choke routes like Hollywood A and the new Eichenwalde A, you can place it in the middle and cover both. If you hit an enemy tank with it, that tank is now a mobile sonic arrow and your whole team can see where they're going to push. However, if you hit Reinhardt's barrier, it'll fall off if he drops his shield (if it was high enough up on his shield, there's a small chance it'll land on someone's head and net you a surprise kill, but hitting his shield is not ideal...find high ground or an angle so you can nail him with it directly)

• Flanking: On Payload maps, if you get into a good flank position, you can fire a surprising number of arrows before the enemy team realizes where you are. Your arrows are very quiet and, as noted above, don't have the Widowmaker tracer effect. Try to focus on one person at a time, its usually the players you body-shot that will notice where you are. Take advantage of your wall-climb to flank from high ground so you have good cover when you need to retreat. Mix it up between flanking and peeking behind the payload depending on your team composition and teammates positioning.

• Its OK to Shoot Barriers: This one surprised me until I went through my spreadsheet. So if you're Soldier, you should always work down Reinhardt/Orisa/Winston barriers provided there's nothing else you can shoot at, right? Well adjusting for reload time, Hanzo works down barriers slightly faster: 125 per second vs. 115 for Soldier at ideal range (he can catch up, doing 130 per second if he uses Helix Rocket barriers as well, but when I play Soldier its rare that I'm willing to blow that cooldown on a barrier, and Hanzo could similarly blow Scatter on barriers to jump ahead of a Helixing Soldier). Junkrat is great for barriers, right? Reload adjusted he puts out 132 barrier damage per second, if the PTR change goes live you'll be above Junkrat & below a point-blank D.Va for barrier damage per second. Even if you're the only one shooting it, you can work down an Orisa barrier faster than she can place a new one, giving you time for 4 or 5 arrows into her massive slow-moving head before her barrier comes back (after the PTR change to her cooldown it'll only be 1 arrow). Just like any hero, prioritize real targets before barriers, but do work on barriers when they're all you've got. Again, your low noise & minimal arrow visuals means you're not as likely giving up your position when you work on the barriers.

• Dragonstrike Baby!: Most people already know this but its worth repeating: you charge your ult very fast, just 1500 points. You don't pause to reload, don't be afraid to work on an easy large tank target if you're not in a good position to land headshots on the squishy targets. Because it charges fast, don't hold on to it too long either unless you're saving it for an upcoming overtime or to combo with a Zarya ult. You can apply your ult to zone a long section of payload route, to zone a long approach from the enemy spawn (sometimes both, like the Eichenwalde approach to the giant doors across the bridge), as a surprise through a wall from very close to the enemy, as a surprise from behind the enemy team, to zone out the control point itself (of course) or finally as a delayed surprise by firing at the objective after you respawn if the rest of your team is still in the fight and contesting (situational though, this one isn't always worth it). When shooting through a wall, note that the dragon doesn't start at point blank from you currently even if you're up against the wall, but it sounds like that may be an unlisted fix in the PTR right now. D.Va can eat the arrow you fire if she's close enough to DM it, and Genji can deflect the arrow, be mindful of their positions if you use it in plain sight.

• Tilt, tilt, tilt: Hanzo is a double-edged sword when it comes to psychological effects. You run a high risk of your teammates tilting immediately upon seeing your pick. Make it clear over voice (to those in team chat) that you will switch if it doesn't work. However, few things tilt people more than getting killed by what seems like a stupid lucky Hanzo shot (see above, if you're not flanking and in down time, its OK to Spamzo the choke). Yes, most of your kills will be done at mid-range, behind but close to your team or on high-ground, but those cheeky picks on the tricklers who peek or that probably-lucky headshot on an airborne Pharah will frustrate enemy players. The more times an enemy player says "WTF THAT'S BULLSHIT", the worse their play will be.

• Scatter: Its a 10 second cooldown, so be a little bit mindful of how you use it. Yes, shooting at their feet will one-shot many characters (and incur the psychological effects above), which can be great at the start of a team-fight. I'll use it to ensure I'll nail a healer, or to finish off a retreating enemy I only got a body-shot on, but if the enemy team starts focusing me early in team fights I'll tend to hold on to it to deal with people who dive me. Bodyshot Scatter Melee will kill an unhealed Winston. Headshot Scatter will de-mech D.Va.

• Limp Arrows: It takes practice to get used to it because they arc considerably compared to a fully charged arrow, but tapping R2 and aiming roughly 2 pips higher on your crosshairs spits out 29 damage arrows twice as fast as you can fire a fully-charged arrow or melee, with higher speed/damage and less droop/lower firing rate the longer you charge. You don't need a full charged arrow to confirm a kill after body-shotting a 200 HP squishy. If they're nearly dead and close enough to you that you'll still hit despite the loss of projectile speed, it can be worth it to loose the arrow early before a flanker finishes you off or manages to retreat behind cover. Of course, for a flanker in your face, don't forget melee as well. If Tracer jumps on you and scatter is on cooldown, one body shot melee is all it takes. Land the melee first if she's close enough, and she doesn't get the choice to recall after you land one body-shot as she'll be dead. (She tends to blink around you in a triangle, predict her next blink and loose when she pops in)

• No healer/tanks: If there are no tanks and/or no healers, switch. If you're not good at the tank role/healer role you can ask on team chat "Is anyone good with [character]? I'm lousy at them but I'll switch if no one else can." to see if someone else will step up first. Because you will generally be playing farther back than most heroes and not every enemy can reach the places you can, its not hard to sit on plenty of golds & silvers on a tankless or healer-less team simply because you're able to stay in the fight longer and get out safely. If you have a reasonable composition and are rocking on medals, good job! You deal so much damage in a single hit that any eliminations you get credit for you are ones you definitely helped in (vs. say someone using splash damage or spray&pray at long range). But don't read into them too much, especially if your composition is whack.

• Are you being countered?: Finally, this one ties in to the psychological effects of moderate to awesome Hanzoing. You know you're rocking them psychologically when they switch to specifically counter you. They may not be good at those counters, so can wait a team fight or two. D.Va should be able to wreck you, but if she's not actually jumping on top of you or fails to DM you on her way in, she's just a barrier-less 600 HP ult-charge target. Pharah is a real pain to hit, counter her with Widow (if you're great with her), or go Soldier/McCree/Ana/Bastion to help whichever other hitscan on your team is working on her. But if you already have the ingredients on your team to deal with her just one body-shot from you will be more than enough for your hitscans to work down her remaining 75 hp, and she's not going to notice any of your arrows that miss unless she's already focusing you. But generally if they're competent at a hero that counters you (D.Va, Winston, Genji, Widow) you'll need to switch...but that last piece of advice should apply to everyone, Hanzo mains just have a reputation for not following it.