How Brigitte Lindholm Will Shake Up Overwatch

She’s smart, strong, caring, and determined to health. Brigitte Lindholm is the young blood coming to the aid of the Overwatch heroes, and her skill set is sure to change up the game in fun new ways. Let’s take a quick look at who Brigitte is, what she does, and how the game might change with her addition.

Who Is Brigitte Lindholm?

Brigitte is the daughter of Torbjorn and a fantastic engineer. She is a fantastic engineer due to the tutelage of her father, and has used her knowledge to create armor to protect her friends. As the squire of Reinhardt, she became driven and wanted to fight for justice rather than just stand on the sidelines. It is these qualities that we see reflected in her abilities.

• She has a short-range flail that she uses to strike enemies in her way (a la Reinhardt). Here’s the kicker, though: When she does damage, she also heals allies, and if allies are at full health, she give them armor.
• She can also throw down repair packs (like Torbjorn) that heal and increase armor.
• Brigitte’s next ability, whip shot, is a skill shot that can be used for crowd control and to boop enemies away from her.
• Brigitte also deploys a small barrier shield in front of her to absorb damage. Once the shield breaks, she can dash forward. If she hits an enemy, she’ll stun them. Sounds like a true Reinhardt apprentice to me.
• Brigitte’s ultimate is a speed and armor buff for any ally nearby — not too fancy, but still pretty nice.

She’s a Game Changer

Brigitte is an aggressive support who will be fighting on the front lines, reminiscent of Lucio. Like Lucio, Brigitte features a nice boop ability and looks to be fun to play. On the public test servers where people can try her out, she has already been nerfed before her official release. From initial impressions, Brigitte feels like her skills complement each other very well. While she is in the thick of fighting, the healing provided by her attacks, health packs, and ultimate seems perfect for her close range. It’s especially nice that the healing comes in the form of armor that will raise the total HP of allies. This should allow Brigitte to stay in the fight longer before having to flee.

Brigitte’s other skills are great for initiation. The whip shot is a great crowd control attack that can snowball into several kills for her team. The shield bash charge is also a fantastic ability, offering another crowd control opportunity with its stun, or allowing Brigitte a chance to escape if a situation gets too scary.

At lower skill levels of play, Brigitte offers people a support they may be more willing to play than other healers, like Mercy. She’s designed to be in the middle of a fight, while other support heroes try to stay near the back lines of a fight. The fact that her attacks also heal may appeal to lower-skill players.

At higher levels of play, I imagine Brigitte will be seen in dive compositions, which thrive on fast initiations and aggressive play. She should also see play on control point maps like Nepal, Ilios, or Lijiang, especially with opportunities to boop opponents off the edge. Depending on how strong she is at her release, we might see her played in the flex role, as an off-tank, rather than a true first or second support. It will be exciting to see how the pros manage to utilize her in new strategies. We’ve already got some exciting new highlights of her being played at high levels (the clip below is by Geguri).

Brigitte is currently available to try out on Overwatch‘s Test Servers and is expected to be released once she gets balanced a bit more (we expect towards the end of March or beginning of April, following patterns of previously released heroes). What are your first impressions of Brigitte, and how do you want to see her utilized? Let us know in the comments below, and for all of your Overwatch coverage, be sure to stick around GameSkinny.