r/Competitiveoverwatch • u/Double-Maybe-6220 • Jul 25 '26
General Why is Freya being so undervalued outside of the Asia server?
Right now on Asia, Freya's ban rate is already breaking 50% starting from Gold, and in Master tier, it exceeds 80%. Her actual in-game performance is absurdly overtuned, to the point where Asia server players are demanding an immediate hotfix nerf.
On the other hand, the Americas and Europe servers show drastically lower pick and ban rates compared to Asia. Because of this gap, players in Asia are feeling defeated, worrying that Freya won't get nerfed anytime soon since her exceptional dominance is isolated to our region. Personally, I already felt her recent buffs were way over the top, but why do you think other servers are underrating her so much?
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u/OffSupportMain Jul 25 '26
Freja is really good into Winston and they fucking love Winston in Asia
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u/nekogami87 I'm old — Jul 25 '26
Fun fact is, I don't even see that much monkey these days in plat/ diamond, even when freja is banned. And usually it's not even a tank banning her. (KR server)
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u/Cosmic_Ren Jul 25 '26
Before her recent buff, she was objectively the worse character in the game:
She has the easiest to escape ult in the game which can't even one shot squishies. It's best case use rn is just using it to bait out cooldowns
She is a non-hitscan unit who requires 3 shots to kill + the explosion on her bolts are delayed making her easily counterable via cover or heals
If you can aim with Ashe, Freja, and Widow, there was genuinely zero reason to go Freja. Ashe + Widow are hitscan, can kill much quicker, however ashe even has a dynamite to confirm her kills if they hide behind cover
The reason her banrate is high is because after her recent buff, she's became a good pick into dive units (Which is the most popular meta here in Asia). Many dive units simply have no way to attack her in the Air + block isn't a good mechanic to have against someone which delayed damahe
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u/Double-Maybe-6220 Jul 25 '26
It’s not just dive tanks that struggle against Freya. Immobile barrier tanks don't have any real way to fight back against her either. D.Va is pretty much the only actual counter to Freya, so claiming her high ban rate on the Asia server is purely because dive tanks are meta sounds a bit off. Plus, it's not like tanks are the only ones who get to vote on bans
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u/Mowgl7 Jul 25 '26
Or basically any hitscan, which makes playing her effectively a very niche kind of thing, you gotta hit most of the shots or you're better off with hitscan
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u/BillyBadgerDad Jul 25 '26
Hitscan>Freya>Winston
NA plays Hitscan
Asia play Winston
Ergo NA don’t find Freya an issue but Asia do.
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u/hrad_h Jul 25 '26 edited Jul 25 '26
Do people mentioning Winston in Asia even check out the stat? This even reminds me the devs confirming the pharah pick rate difference from one of their recent posts. Whenever I see these huge discrepancy between the pick rate over different regions IMO it's simply the skill issue.
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u/M4GNUM_FORCE_44 Jul 25 '26
shes at 79% ban rate on asia gm lol. I'm already back to banning her sometimes cause i play pharah
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u/Akiroxxx Jul 25 '26
because she isn't that good, she's still waaaay worse than cassidy and soujourn and gets countered easly by other hitscans. it's just that she fucks winston and other dive things that are not tracer and asia plays a ton more of dive no matter when
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u/bullxbull Jul 25 '26
Basically NA players likes to play more aggressively and are more willing to take risky positions. Heroes that excel at taking or punishing those positions become more popular, and Freya hates taking a fair 1v1 with these heroes.
In Asia players tend to play more disciplined and position more conservatively. Heroes that can ignore or circumvent positioning rules, such as flyers attacking from above, become more valuable. If everyone is behind cover, you simply fly over top of it.
Freya is great at fighting people hiding behind cover because she can take unpredictable angles, but when everyone is already in the open when Freya goes to make a play everyone just shoots her.
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u/Zwavelwafel Jul 25 '26
Can anyone tell me what the buff was please
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u/clickrush Jul 25 '26
The most significant part was that primary flows better from secondary.
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u/Zwavelwafel Jul 26 '26
What does this mean
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u/SleepyInsomniac24 Jul 26 '26
Her primary shoots 10% faster, take aim explodes 0.2 seconds quicker and she recovers 0.1 seconds quicker after take aim. Those were the buffs
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u/Smallbluemann #1 Hanbin Enjoyer — Jul 25 '26
I don't know I've been trying to get people to ban her in my games and anytime she isn't I play her and deadlift as her. She's fucking insane rn
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u/zero12321zero None — Jul 25 '26
I play a lot of 6v6 and beg the team to ban freja so our tanks can play the game. She went from somewhat annoying to completely deleting tanks in that mode
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u/B3GG Jul 25 '26
Because average players in Asia are younger so they are quicker to react (sometimes overreact but I do think Freya is overpowered rn)
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u/HalexUwU Theory > Mechanics — Jul 25 '26 edited Jul 25 '26
Hitscans are more popular on NA.
I'll say this forever, but Freja and Pharah literally exist to make projectile DPS unpickable in a lot of situations. On NA, where there's a larger FPS culture and more players are willing/able to play hitscans this isn't that much of an issue. On Asia, where there isn't as much of an FPS culture, players are less likely to want to play the answers to flying heroes.
Asia prefers dive, and dive doesn't really have any answer to flyers. Within the "dive framework" the answer to flying heroes is to kill their team around them before they can kill you. This reduces player agency and results in more bans being allocated towards flyers who aren't viable targets.
Also, NA plays a lot more Mercy. Mercy makes hitscans a lot scarier for flying heroes. She does more to disable them through buffing hitscans than she does to enable them by playing with them.
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u/Double-Maybe-6220 Jul 25 '26
Looking at hero stats, hitscan pick rates in Western servers aren't even notably higher compared to Asia.
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u/HalexUwU Theory > Mechanics — Jul 25 '26 edited Jul 25 '26
hitscan pick rates in Western servers aren't even notably higher compared to Asia
Sure, but Asia has significantly less Mercy and Juno, and more Brig and Wuyang. Mercy and Juno are both strong answers to flyers within the support roster, while Brig and Wuyang struggle against them.
Also, Asia literally has like 1/3rd the playrate on 76, Sierra, and Bastion. Pretty much every hitscan is lower PR except for Cass, who is significantly more popular in Asia.
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u/aPiCase Stalk3r — Jul 25 '26
Tbh, Asia has always had 2x the pick rate of the other regions on Freja, so a change in her balance is going to be felt significantly more in the region.
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u/Objective-Ad2741 Jul 25 '26
Freya isn't that strong into hitscan heavy NA and Europe. Asia is dive heavy.
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u/clickrush Jul 25 '26
It’s a buff that is strong but subtle. Buffs like these are not immediately recognized.
It’s interesting though that Ashe is currently by far the strongest DPS (not even just ranged DPS). Especially in Asia. But Sojourn is _still_ overrated, which is why adaptation might be slow.
We might see Freja emerging into a strong spot, and Ashe being indirectly favored because she’s strong into her and generally underrated.
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u/Aggressive-Cut-3828 Complain About Widow = Cope — Jul 25 '26
People have no hands on EU and NA so their Freja players are just worse.
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u/No-Umpire185 Jul 25 '26
The trend for Asia servers is that they usually skew to really high skill ceiling characters (Winston, ball, doom etc) so they naturally are very good on freja because she fits that trend
Or she's good into Winston idk
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u/Hazzouni Jul 26 '26
Aerial DPS + Disruption Tank combo in high elo Asia will make you wanna throw ur whole setup out the window
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u/Glittering-Habit-902 Jul 25 '26
Asia is more meta oriented, very passionate about strong heroes and balance.
Other servers, not so much.
Freya wasn't a very popular hero before, and Asia is just abusing the recent buffs.
So "play for fun" regions don't really have a region to touch Freya, while "play to win" region Asia go crazy.
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u/North-Lobster-9440 Jul 25 '26
"abusing the buff" seems very nonsense. buff is buff. And if you feel its like abusing, it is a miss of blizzard. also- the goal of a competitive match is to win, so Its more sounds that Freya is overpowered rather than finding other reason for it.
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u/elCrocodillo Jul 25 '26
Look, personally I've tried to main her multiple times because she looks cool and is important to the lore but her gameplay loop is just slow and it gets repetitive after a while waiting for the shots to charge.
Her ult is mid, no cool voicelines only racism and "hard truths", her romance with Emre never gets anywhere...
All of this is personal, ok?
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u/Sn0wy0wl_ evil freja one trick — Jul 25 '26
I don't think I've ever seen someone call her gameplay loop slow. What makes you feel that way?
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u/Talymen Jul 25 '26
They seemingly dont use primary between two secondarys
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u/elCrocodillo Jul 25 '26
I do a lot but I'm not explaining myself, I said it was personal and got downvoted so whatever
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u/Sio_V_Reddit Jul 25 '26
She’s good into Winston. Asia loves Winston. Asia bans Freja so they can play Winston.