Increasing Your Rank Gain As Lucio In Competitive Overwatch Part 1

Note: This post explores how Lucio may maximise his rank gain in Overwatch through earning in-game score. As Blizzard will not reveal how exactly the game measures individual performance due to potential for abuse, conclusions drawn in this post are educated guesses based on available data.

This post will be updated as new information becomes available over time.

Lucio is quite possibly one of the most misunderstood supports in Overwatch. The ease with which most players can pick up and use him at a basic level has led to a perception that the Brazilian DJ is a low-skill cap healbot.

The truth is, if you play Lucio and only stay on healing boost the entire time, you are only using part of his kit. This means you aren't generating as much score as you could be. Generate less score than the global average for your character, and the system will punish your skill rating accordingly.

For more information on score and why it matters, take a look at our guide to score in competitive Overwatch.

In addition to receiving score for general actions that contribute toward capturing objectives, Lucio has his own unique ways to rack up performance numbers. We'll cover the known ones in this post.

Healing

Lucio receives score based on the amount of life healed. If there are injured team mates near him, the score is based on the total amount of HP healed for the entire team.

The key to maximising healing score is to wait until several team mates have taken damage before switching to healing or better, using his 'E' ability to boost healing. Typically,you get +1 to +20 per second,  while amping it up boosts it to about +15 to 45, depending on the number of team mates healed and amount healed,

To find out if you performed above average for your tier on healing, check your healing/min stat on MasterOverwatch after the match.


Speed Boost 

Lucio receives +10 Assist score for each opponent killed while the team is under the effect of his speed boost aura. He receives this score even if he does not damage the opponent.

Offensive Assist

Lucio receives extra Offensive Assist score whenever team mates begin killing an opponent while under the effect of an amped speed boost. The extra score received is based on the damage done to the opponent by your team mates.

Getting Offensive Assist score does not require the opponent to die in the three seconds that the amp is active. You get offensive assist score as long as your team mates are already in the process of taking the opponent down during the amp.

In the screenshot above, the Assist +10 score is awarded for having normal speed boost on during the kill. Lucio gets an extra +20 for the damage his team mates did to the downed opponent while under the effect of amped speed boost. Finally, he also gets score for directly contributing to the elimination of Dva's Mech.

Offensive Assist may be one of the metrics for Lucio that truly differentiates the average healbot from the truly great supports. While metrics like healing and objective time can look similar across ranking tiers, the amount of Offensive Assists done per game consistently go up the higher the rank. At Diamond tier, Lucios generate four times the Offensive Assists of Silver tier Lucios.


Defensive Assist

Defensive Assists work the same way as Offensive Assists, except they are earned by amping while on healing aura. 

Like Offensive Assists, the higher the rank of a Lucio, the more likely they are to get more Defensive Assists. The difference is not as marked, however, possibly because many Lucios tend to use healing aura and amp for most of a match.

Sound Barrier

When Lucio performs Sound Barrier, he gains score for the amount of damage his sonic shields absorb. He will also gain Defensive Assist scores if opponents are killed while Sound Barrier is active.

Despite the game tracking the number of Sound Barriers given, there is no indicator on-screen that just the act of giving out Sound Barriers generates score. Possibly because if the purpose of the scoring system is to differentiate between Lucios of differing skill, the efficiency of their Sound Barrier use will matter more than the number given out.


Maximising Your SR

Lucio gains about 20 to 30 SR when the system deems that the player had an average performance for his current rank on the map compared to other Lucios. So for example, if you are in the Gold tier and finish a match on Ilios with stats that are similar to other Gold Lucio players who have played on Ilios, you will only gain 20 to 30 SR.

However, if you have stats that are comparable to Platinum tier Lucio players on the map, the game will reward you with more SR, likely around 40 to 50 SR. On the flip side, if you had a performance that looks like a Silver tier Lucio's, you'll gain around 2 to 15 SR.

This also affects how much SR you lose on a loss. If you had an above average performance, you will lose around 15 SR. If you were average, you'll lose about 20-30 SR. On a poor performance, that shoots up to 40 to 50 SR.

Streaks appear to modify the SR gain both ways, so you might be gaining or losing up to 100 SR depending on how many games you've won/lost in a row.

For more information on the performance of Lucios at each tier, refer to Part 2 of this guide.

A Note On Scoring And Team Play

Keep in mind that these are just ways to optimize your performance when the opportunity presents itself. While increasing your score may mean you get better SR gains, there are situations where you'll have to give up on a bit of score to ensure your team wins a fight.

Don't stay on speed boost to try scoring more offensive assists if most of your team is taking damage. If they die because you're not healing them, you're not getting those Assist scores either. If you need to get off the point to help a team mate at critical hp or speed people running back to the objective, get off the point and go to them.

As always, read the situation and respond appropriately. Winning with below average scores still adds to your SR. Losing with above average scores will still cause you to lose SR.


Was there a score-generating action you've noticed that isn't covered here, or have you seen different minimum/maximum scores assigned for an action? Let us know in the comments!