Ying; personally one of my favourite champions - but how do you use her without your teammates spamming VHS. Well in this guide we will be going over how to maximize your Ying efficiency!
In a recent update, Ying received a buff allowing her to place illusions at a further range - this has pushed her out of obscurity and made her a much more viable Support. With Supports, it’s important to know there are two types: main healers, and off healers.
Main Healers:
- Jenos
- Seris
- Ying
- Damba
And the off healers cover the rest. Generally the ‘main healer’ tag means that they are suitable for sustaining a whole team - but keep in mind that any Support can be more than viable in the right situation - yes, even Grover.
When playing Ying there is one key thing to keep in mind; her entire build is focussed around her illusions.
Yings abilities Overview
Ability Overview: (A run through of Yings abilities, when to use them, and how to maximize their impact.)(Illusory Mirror) (LMB) (Direct)
Illusory Mirror works as a burst of projectiles; to me the attack feels more hitscan, but it definitely takes some getting used to. While you are shooting you will need to adjust your aim to continuously hit your target. When shooting, the weapon has a time between shots of 0.05 seconds. Keep in mind, there is considerable damage falloff at range. Paired with talents, the mirror can be a half decent weapon, as with most Supports.
(Shatter) (RMB) (Area) - [4S]
Shatter will cause all active illusions to chase down enemies and explode for a large radius of 500 damage. The illusions will chase for 2.5 seconds before exploding in place. In case you’re wondering - these do have a max distance, they don’t go across the map chasing a teleporting Evie!
(Illusion) (Q) (Healing) - [5S]
This is Ying’s central ability - to be an efficient healer, you will need to get a feel for the range your Illusions can be placed at, how far away they can heal from, etc. By default:- Each Illusion has 1000 Health.
- Illusions last for 8 seconds unless destroyed.
- Illusions will prioritize allies on the lowest health.
- Two Illusions can be deployed at one time, deploying another will destroy the oldest.
- Illusions heal for 420 every 1/1.2 seconds.
(Dimensional Link) (F) (Movement) - [14S]
A great ability for escaping a bad situation (or putting you into one!); Dimensional Link activates a 4 second buff, similar to Andro’s Nether Step, that allows you to teleport to the illusions furthest away from you. You can use it as many times as you want in the period, but keep in mind where your illusions are. I still make big mistakes using this ability; sometimes it can be tempting to spam F as you frantically try to escape from a situation, but end up teleporting to safety, then back into the fray. A tip to avoid this is to take a mere second to analyze the situation and move to your next illusion if appropriate.
(Illusory Rift) (E) (Ultimate)
Ying’s ultimate is arguably one of her best features - applies a buff to all her allies that heals for 600 health per second for 8 seconds. While the ultimate is active, Dimensional Link will allow you to teleport to any ally, including illusions. This means you can essentially teleport to spawn / the other side of the map as one of your allies rides in, giving you a great escape tool.
Talents
(Lifelike)
Illusions can now heal two allies at a time, but heal for 20% less. You can see it in the numbers that this is a great trade off. If the team is running two frontlines on a smaller map, I would almost definitely recommend this legendary. For me, 9 times out of 10 in Ranked, I will pick this Talent. It’s more useful for the team and makes Ying a much more viable pick - however, there are still some other talents to talk about.
(Resonance)
Essentially, if an illusion is killed or expires due to time (not redeployment) then it will trigger a shatter explosion dealing 500 damage. The Illusion will not chase the enemy, it will just explode in place. I personally don’t have too much experience with this card, but it is one of two ‘damage Ying’ builds. If your team only has one frontline or is full of flanks, you can definitely consider this card. Especially if the map is a close quarters point such as brightmarsh. Furthermore, using this card will boost the amount of healing Illusions do compared to Lifelike, which makes it more viable for healing rapidly. In my opinion, Focusing Lens seems more in your control, but you can use this if it works for you.
(Life Exchange)
I haven’t really given this legendary card a go more than once or twice, but in essence, this talent turns shatter into a burst heal. The illusions will still heal at the speed of Focus/Resonance, yet upon activating Shatter they will heal nearby teammates for 800 Health per Illusion. (The illusions will be consumed). This legendary gives Ying a much larger blast heal potential - giving her the trait she so desperately misses: saving teammates in a dire situation. Although, you have to remember this healing will be heavily affected by Cauterize, is hard to practically use, and can take away from healing to your other teammates. I would advise giving this one a go, and seeing if you can make it work for you.
(Focusing Lens)
My #2 pick after Lifelike, Focusing Lens deals an additional 150 damage to the last pulse in each weapon shot you fire. This means you can deal 600 Damage per shot, if each pulse is landed - this is pretty hefty damage for a Support. Overall, the tips I mentioned in the Resonance section generally apply to this Talent, however it should be noted that there is large damage drop off on Ying’s mirror, at range the additional damage dealt also decreases, to the point where it is negligible. If you want to more consistently output more damage on a map such as Serpent Beach or Jaguar Falls, this can be a sensible pick.
Itemization
Crosses - Represent Items I would not recommend buying under any circumstances.Hearts - Items that you can safely buy in most situations.
Ticks - Items that are decent or conditional and depend on what the enemy team is running. An explanation of when to use the ticked items will be included in our planned item purchasing guide.
Thanks to all of you who made suggestions on this; here will be a new section on which items we prefer to buy and in what order. Keep in mind that this can vary greatly depending on your individual loadout, situation, or playstyle.
- Utility - Morale Boost (Upgrade to level 2 or 3, depending on how successful the game has been so far, who has pushed/defended.)
- Healing / Attack - This is mainly up to you and the situation, but I recommend running either Kill to Heal if you are frequently escaping on low health. It is important to keep in mind that your teammates kills will count as Eliminations when playing Support, this healing you. You could alternatively pick up Cauterize, a general item. (If your team hasn’t already bought 2-3+ Cauterizes.)
- Defense - Generally my last priority on Ying and most other Supports. I recommend assessing your situation, and buying Blast Shields, Haven or Resilience.
Loadout
(Focusing Lens / Resonance)
The loadout below is used primarily for Focusing Lens / Resonance - it should help you to get more Illusions out and focus doing damage. Of course, like any loadout feel free to edit to fit your individual playstyle. You can import loadouts from me in game (my IGN is Creeves).
(Lifelike)
My normal loadout - spams out those illusions for as much healing as possible. It does kind of rely on your team getting a decent amount of Slays/Elims, so you could switch 'Encouragement' for level 5 in 'Carry On' and 'Spring Blossom'
(Life Exchange)
Just a loadout built around Life Exchange, not really much else to say.
Hints & Tips
Hints and Tips: (Tips on how to use Ying, special circumstances, etc.)When playing Ying, your main focus is your illusions - as you play more you will get a general nack for it, but here’s some general tips and ideas of where to place them:
- On The Cart: will be carried with the cart, so it continuously heals. It can be hard to place, don’t get yourself killed trying.
- Highground: placing an Illusion on higher areas can help them from getting killed, heal your Frontlines on point and heal your team who are on the flank routes.
- Over objects: as you might know, you can place an illusion in the sky, it will slowly float down. It will still heal while floating, this means you can place your illusions in locations such as behind this wall on Splitstone quarry: one of my favourite places to chill as Ying.
Use your ultimate when most of your team has taken damage, or a large team fight is about to take place. I normally judge this by watching the top left of my screen (you should definitely have the team health bars enabled).
I personally don’t shatter… unless you’re team gets wiped and you are in a safe position, and want to do some damage, I wouldn't shatter. It can get your teammates killed, and as a Support your priority is healing not doing damage.
When you are low teleport out ASAP, it can really confuse less experienced players. Ying will sometimes iterate voice lines like ‘You got me!’ even when she’s still alive and an illusion is killed. What a prankster...
Ranked
Ranked: (Ying in ranked, when she is banned, who she might counter.)In my time of playing Ranked, I don’t think I have seen her banned. She is, however, picked a decent amount. Me and my friend Xemor used to use a technique at lower ranks (Gold), where we would ban 2 Supports (Normally Jenos & Damba), then take Seris, or if she was banned; Ying. This strategy worked very well for us, forcing the enemy team into using an off-healer or a Support they were uncomfortable with.
Overall, a competent Ying who knows where to place her illusions will not let your team down. In many ways she can be better than Champions like Seris, not for her healing potential, but the fact that you don’t have to be so undefended, and can position yourself in a more discreet manner. I myself die a lot less when playing Ying than Seris or Damba in Competitive, purely due to the fact you aren’t flanked as much. Besides that, remember to consider which loadout and talent to use, and what map it is before picking Ying - keep in mind that picking a champion you feel comfortable with is more important than playing a champion that is meta, but you have 0 experience with - this won’t get you wins.
Guide authors: Creeves and Xemor
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