Overwatch Overwatch Shion Guide and Overview

Shion is the newest DPS hero who rode her motorcycle into Overwatch in Season 3. She is a high-mobility, high-burst-damage hero armed with dual-wielded pistols.

Compared to the other heroes in the flanker sub-role, she has more respectable mid-range capabilities. Her core game plan is using Joyride to quickly traverse maps and get into flanking positions for surprise attacks. Once she's in the enemy backlines, Shion is self-sufficient, especially after you've earned both Perks.

TLDR Shion Guide

As

• Activate Joyride behind cover and engage by launching it straight at your target. Use the knockup effect to set up easy follow-up shots for the final blow.
• Execution should be used as often as possible. At close range, don't waste time charging; just tap to minimize downtime without sacrificing damage.
• The initial dash of Satsuriku Spree's Rush Burst, deals no damage. Only the explosion of pistol shots at the end. Make sure you end each Rush right next to your target.

Against

• Shion Excels in the mid to close range. Keep your distance, and use high ground to evade her pathing as she has primarily horizontal movement capabilities.
• Anytime you see a Shion player strafe behind cover, expect them to use Execution or Joyride the moment they reappear. Move position or get behind a barrier.
• Satsuriku Spree damage is fully projectile which means you can block her ult by using barriers or damage mitigation abilities like Barrier Field and Javelin Spin.

Stenghts

Excellent Burst and Pick Potential

Shion can quickly delete squishies once she gets within her effective range. Execution gives her a large burst of damage, while a direct Joyride hit can set up an immediate follow-up with Execution or her primary fire. This makes Shion especially threatening during the midfight, when enemies have already taken damage used defensive cooldowns, or become separated from their team (even more so when running X Machina).

Versatile DPS Playstyle

Shion can alternate between playing with her frontline and attacking from off-angles rather than committing to one playstyle. Her hitscan Kira Pistols provide consistent pressure into Tanks and other exposed targets during staging and poke phases, while Joyride lets her quickly transition into a more aggressive flank once an opportunity appears. This flexibility allows Shion to adapt between helping burn the enemy frontline and hunting isolated squishies depending on what her team needs and the matchups against the enemy team comp.

Strong Mobility and Self-Sufficiency

Between Joyride, Evade, the Flanker passive, and Faces of Death perk, Shion can operate quite independently. Joyride lets her rapidly reposition, disengage, or engage targets, while Evade provides temporary Overhealth to survive incoming pressure. Her increased healing from health packs also makes nearby packs especially valuable when playing off-angles, reducing how frequently she needs to return directly to her Supports.

Weaknesses

Limited Effective Range

Despite being hitscan, Shion does not have the comfortable range of heroes like Cassidy, Soldier: 76, or Ashe. Her pistol damage falls off relatively quickly, and Execution is most threatening when she is close enough to connect most or all of its spread. Against longer-range DPS, Shion often needs to use natural cover and carefully work her way into effective range before she can take a favorable duel.

Very Cooldown-Dependent

Joyride is simultaneously one of Shion's strongest offensive tools and her best method of quickly repositioning. Wasting it early can leave her without a reliable way to reach a a potential assassination target or escape a bad situation. Visually, it's incredibly obvious when Joyride has been used, so even enemies that are not paying close attention can notice and be ready to exploit the cooldown window. After Execution has been used, her lethality goes way, way down.

Vulnerable When She Commits

Shion can be surprisingly fragile once she commits to an engagement. Joyride doesn't make her invulnerable so it's not great as an escape tool, and predictable bike approaches can be interrupted or punished. Satsuriku Spree is another major commitment as she has to full commilt to point blank diving the targets. Shion isn't invulnerable during it and loses access to her normal abilities, giving enemies an opportunity to focus her if she activates it while the opposing team is healthy, or organized, or still has defensive cooldowns available.

Primary Fire: Kira Pistols

Tips for Kira Pistols

• Great close to mid-range damage.
• • Past the falloff point of 20m, damage output of Kira Pistols becomes extremely poor.
  • Ping targets or the environment near your targets to get a feel for how to space properly, and the path to areas where you can engage within your optimal range.

Secondary Fire: Execution

Tips for Execution

• Spam off cool down
• • Very short 5 sec CD allows means there is very little value in holding onto Execution for an "ideal scenario."
• Charge behind corners
• • If you are going to charge, never stand in the open where you can be attacked. Always take cover until the moment before you fire.
• Charge doesn’t increase damage like Zenyatta's; it tightens the spread
• • At close range, just tap right-click.
  • Can’t be canceled with melee or other abilities. Once activated, you are locked in the animation until you fire.

[SHIFT]: Evade

Tips for Evade

• Best time to use Evade is mid-fight once the enemy has already started attacking you.
• • Generates bonus health + dodge their abilities and stuns such as Flashbang.
  • Use Evade freely compared to Joyride which you need to use more sparingly due to it's longer cooldown
• Evade can be using while charging Execution or immediately after to catch enemies off guard, or dodge their coutner attacks.
• Activating Evade during Joyride launches it forward, grants bonus health, and makes you more evasive.
• • Against heroes who have stuns like Sleep Dart, this is an important tech to have in your arsenal so you don't get stunned off the bike.
  • However, dumping both your movement abilities at once leaves you stranded. Only do so when you know your teammates are nearby to assist you, or if your target is completely isolated.
  • Best use case is to launch the bike, by Evade dashing behind cover.
• Evade is not affected by any slow debuffs, making it excellent for escaping abilities such as Ravenous Vortex.

[E]: Joyride

Tips for Joyride

• Aim + movement both affect steering and speed.
• • Hold back at the start to stay in place and gain control before driving full speed ahead.
  • Adjust "Relative Aim Sensitivity" under hero settings if you find it difficult to steer.
• 190 damage for landing a boop + explode.
• • Standard 250 HP heroes can be KO’d by boop, boop, boom.
• Jump + launch
• • Although not listed in the official tooltips, Shion can charge up dismount while airborne to aim and launch her bike.
  • Useful on flanks, or to drop in from above to set up combo against an enemy in the open.
• Joyride bike as a projectile is unique in its properties, similar to D.Va's Self-Destruct. The bike cannot be stopped by Deflect or absorbed by Defense Matrix. Unlike Self-Destruct, Joyride is not affected by knockback abilites such as Whip Shot.
• • If Shion is stunned off the bike, the bike will still launch forward and explode as usual.
• Activating Satsuriku Spree also launches the bike.

Ultimate: Satsuriku Spree

Tips for Satsuriku Spree

• Satsuriku Spree can be equally valuable for eliminating one target at a time or going for grouped up enemies.
• • Ideally, you can make full use of its AoE damage and get multi-KOs. However, doing so will often lead to dying because of multiple enemies focused on counterattacking you. Track enemy positions and prioritize vulnerable and isolated enemies first.
• When using primary fire rush burst, the initial dash animation deals no damage. Only the explosion at the end does.
• • Make sure you end Rush-Bursts by touching your target.
• Satsuriku Spree damage is projectile, meaning that it can be completly absorbed or blocked by mitigation abilites such as Defense Matrix or Kinetic Grasp.
• In case you see any tips from Shion's launch about Melee cancel tech, that has been patched out as of June 18th
• • "Resolved an issue that allowed Shion quick melee to be used during Satsuriku Spree"

Minor

• Rapid Reload
• • Having more ammo means less downtime. Evade is on a short cooldown so you will get frequent uses of the extra ammo. Rapid Reload can come in clutch when you are missing shots because the target is evasive, or when they received an instance of healing while you are attacking them.
• X Machina
• • Shion spends a good amount of time dueling, making X Machina the higher value Minor Perk. As her main objective is to set up an engage with Joyride, secure an elimination, and escape, dealing extra damage with Execution to finish off the targets health is very powerful.

Major

• Refuel
• • Generally, Shion does not use Joyride as an escape tool in a situation where the healing would make the difference between life and death. When focusing on solo play and flanking, however, the healing can be used as you set up a re-engage to ensure you can go back in at full HP without needing team healing.
• Faces of Death
• • The Major Perk choice is largely up to player preference, but we would still place gaining all subrole passives slightly above the motorbike healing. Recon in particular is useful when dueling and flanking. Combined with X Machina, you already know the enemies you can see through the wall will take the bonus damage from Execution, and you can track them while charging it behind cover. Specialist and Sharpshooter also has the potential to increase your uptime and enable more aggressive play

Best Maps

Shion is at her best on maps with short-to-mid-range sightlines, multiple angles, and plenty of routes for Joyride. She wants enough open space to maneuver her bike around a fight, but also enough cover that she can disappear from the enemy's LOS and re-engage from a different direction. Maps with accessible Health Packs are another plus thanks to her Flanker passive.

Shion especially likes maps where fights naturally become spread out. She can start alongside her team and pressure the enemy frontline, then use Joyride to quickly rotate onto an isolated Support or DPS once attention shifts elsewhere. Control maps and more open sections of Hybrid/Escort maps can suit this playstyle particularly well because there are often several ways to approach the same fight.

Worst Maps

Shion is less comfortable on extremely long-range maps where traditional hitscan, sniper, and poke heroes can pressure her outside her effective range. Kira Pistols have relatively short falloff and Execution becomes less reliable at distance.

She also struggles in tight, linear sections of maps with limited flank routes. If there isn't enough room to hide her Joyride approach route, Shion becomes much more predictable and may be forced to send the bike directly into enemies who are already looking at her, giving them an easy opportunity to properly defend.

Shion is flexible enough to work in several team compositions, but she particularly benefits from teammates who can draw attention, create openings for Joyride, or enable her aggressive Ultimate. She doesn't need the entire team to dive with her, and she's not a tradional full-on flanker like Tracer or Genji. In fact, she can begin fights alongside her frontline before transitioning onto an off-angle once the enemy's attention becomes divided and she spots a vulnerable enemy out of position or at low HP.

Tanks

Mauga and Zarya have particularly strong Ultimate synergy with Shion. Cage Fight and Graviton Surge prevent enemies from escaping while Shion uses Satsuriku Spree, making much easy for her to fully hit with each burst. Zarya can also use Projected Barrier to protect Shion when she goes aggro.

Tanks that want to dive or flank, like D.Va, Winston, and Hazard, can also complement Shion's playstyle by forcing enemies to split their attention and isolating targets for her. Shion can pressure from main or a nearby angle while her Tank initiates, then use Joyride once the fight becomes chaotic to collapse onto the isolated target. The maing component of synergizing with Tanks as a Shion player is your timing. Shion generally wants to follow the Tanks initiation rather than being the first player the entire enemy team sees coming.

DPS

Shion works well alongside DPS who complement her short-to-mid-range pressure or help divide the enemy team's attention. Reaper is a particularly notable pairing and has seen competitive use alongside Shion. Both heroes create enormous close-range pressure, while Shion can provide more consistent mid-range damage before transitioning into the brawl.

More broadly, Shion can pair well with long-range DPS who can control the sightlines where she is less effective. A ranged teammate can pressure enemies who try to keep Shion at a distance while she handles flank.

Supports

Ana and Nano Boost is one of Shion's strongest enabling combos. When using a Nano'd Satsuriku Spree, Shion is much more far more lethal, and has a better chance of surviving the enemies coutner attacks. Although ranged healing from a Support like Ana can be nice to have, Shion is relatively self-sufficient doesn't require a Support to constantly track her every engage.

Shion also benefits from Supports who can enable aggressive positioning or quickly follow her engagements. Lúcio's speed and mobilility can help the entire team keep pace with the space Shion creates. He also has an overall similar gameplan of positioning near your Tank and matching their timing.

Track Joyride

• Joyride is central to Shion's ability to create picks. If you see her use it without securing an elimination, there is a window where she has significantly less mobility and burst threat. Evade can help her survive damage, but it doesn't move her far enough to reliably escape a team that catches her out of position. Punish Shion aggressively when her bike is unavailable.

Watch Your Flanks Once the Fight Begins

• Shion is considerably more dangerous when she attacks someone who isn't looking at her. A common Shion gameplan is to initially pressure alongside her team, disappear from your attention, then reappear on Joyride from an off-angle once the fight becomes chaotic. Keeping track of where she went and warning teammates when she disappears will take away much of the surprise factor that makes her lethal.

Force Her to Fight Outside Her Effective Range

• Shion's pistols are hitscan, but she doesn't have the effective range of more traditional hitscan heroes. Use natural cover and longer sightlines to force her to approach before she can threaten her strongest burst. Heroes like Cassidy can be particularly dangerous for Shion at the edge of her preferred range, especially if Flashbang is available to completely neutralize her aggression.

Don't Isolate Yourself

• Shion is an excellent 1v1 duelist, and is near impossible to beat if she catches you isolated from the rest of your team. Staying within peel range of teammates makes it much harder for her to secure the elim even if she landed a clean Joyride explosion.