What is Overwatch’s bunker composition, and why is it so hard to deal with?

If you’ve been watching season two of Overwatch League or have been playing Overwatch yourself in the past few months, there’s a high chance you’ve played against a bunker team composition.

You often see teams utilizing this composition to defend a map, although some attacking teams have made it work while sitting on a moving payload. The team comp forces you to coordinate attacks because so much of it is designed to melt your team in seconds. The other issue is that it’s fairly easy to play yourself, so it makes it unevenly difficult to counter for the opposing team.

What is bunker comp?

Bunker comp is the name of the team composition that consists of primarily an Orisa, Bastion, and a Baptiste. These three form the core of the composition because they all three work together and keep each other safe from attackers. Orisa has shields on a low cooldown that protect that incredibly high-damage output of the Bastion. And on top of that, if anyone enters the team’s space, Baptiste can drop an Immortality Field to prevent their deaths.

Orisa, Bastion, and Baptiste are only three out of six heroes that make up a team. This is where the team comp varies a lot. A lot of teams will run a sniper hero like Widowmaker or Hanzo with a Mercy, or something like a Pharah or a Sombra. It kind of doesn’t matter what else you pick as long as it synergizes with the core three heroes. The goal of the comp is to protect them.

Why is it so hard to play against?

Bunker comp is nearly impenetrable by standard tactics. Because Orisa’s shield is so frequently available and Bastion outputs so much damage, it’s nearly impossible to get close to this comp. And when you finally do, there’s a Baptiste that’ll make everyone invulnerable.

One key thing to note about bunker comps is that — unlike GOATS — they can’t be mirrored. When a team is using a bunker comp to defend a point, they don’t have to worry about the lack of mobility in the core heroes. Orisa and Bastion are pretty stationary characters. If you flip that over to the attacking team, it’s extremely hard to move into an enemy bunker comp with the same limitations.

Will 2-2-2 role lock fix this?

As you’ve probably seen in Overwatch League, no it won’t. The forced 2-2-2 composition of two Tanks, two Support, and two Damage heroes only fixes the 3-3 composition that was GOATS. Bunker works perfectly inside the new enforced role lock.

Balance changes like a nerf to Orisa’s barrier and the new introduction of Sigma might help with bunker comps. Rewarding teams for destroying a barrier quickly should help less-coordinated attacks against these types of comps, and Sigma’s ability to soak up all the damage and lift them all up and over the shield with his Ultimate might prove to be essential. The other solution is to give players time so let them adapt and try more ideas against it. After all, metas are intrinsically linked to player behavior and tendencies, not necessarily raw game balancing.