Mei: Tips, Maps, Counters, Abilities, and Ultimate

Key Takeaways

• Mei is best on maps that have forced and narrow choke points, allowing her to use her Ice Wall to disrupt the enemy team and cut off frontline tank and damage (DPS) heroes from the support backline.
• Mei struggles on maps with easily accessible high ground, which negates the effectiveness of her Ice Wall, and long sightlines, which forces her to rely exclusively on her secondary fire.
• Mei counters heroes with basic or weak mobility, such as Cassidy and Reinhardt, due to how she can isolate these heroes through use of her own abilities.
• Mei is countered by heroes like Hanzo, who do more damage at a similar range. Mei is also countered by heroes like Winston who can easily avoid her abilities and use his own abilities to reduce their effectiveness.

Mei Quick Tips

• Mei has 250 health, with no armor or shields. Her high total health pool and ability to self-heal makes her one of the tankiest damage (DPS) heroes in the game.
• Mei synergizes well with teammates who can follow up on her abilities, especially Ice Wall. However, due to her wide range of abilities, she can also play independently, and slots in decently well to a wide variety of team compositions other than dive.
• Download the Z League app to find aware teammates who follow up on your ability usage as Mei.
• Mei is one of the few heroes who can annoy teammates with misplaced Ice Walls and even get her teammates killed. Before using Ice Wall, be very careful to ensure your teammates won’t get trapped in the enemy backline.

Mei Abilities Explained

Img via Blizzard Entertainment

Endothermic Blaster (Primary and Secondary Fire)

Mei’s primary fire is a beam weapon which slows enemy movement speed by 40% and deals 100 damage per second. Her secondary fire is a fast-moving projectile that deals 75 damage upon impact.

Mei’s primary fire is easier to use and aim, but has a short range of 10 meters. Her primary fire is much harder to hit, but has no damage falloff and is effective even at longer range. Skilled Mei players achieve respectable damage output through her secondary fire, using her primary fire mostly on tanks, to slow their movement speed and allow teammates to follow up and secure the kill. 

Many damage (DPS) heroes can output more than 100 damage per second, meaning if Mei relies too much on her primary fire, she may find herself getting outclassed, especially in higher ranks. 

Cryo-Freeze

Cryo-Freeze literally freezes Mei in place and prevents her from using any of her weapons or abilities. While active, the ability heals about 50 damage per second, for a total of around 200 damage. Cryo-Freeze allows Mei to play independently and heal herself even without help from her allied supports. Cryo-Freeze also has niche uses to block sightlines—for example, if Mei uses Cryo-Freeze right in front of an enemy Reinhardt using Earthshatter, allies behind her will not get damaged or knocked down by the ability.

Ice Wall

Ice Wall allows Mei to fittingly place a large wall of ice on any horizontal surface. The wall is divided into sections and each section can be destroyed by enemy damage. Without being destroyed, Ice Wall disappears in five seconds and has a 12 second cooldown.

Ice Wall allows Mei to transform the map to benefit her team. She achieves this mostly by either isolating the tank, or splitting up the enemy team in general to prevent their abilities from synergizing. Ice Wall can also block damage from enemy ultimates, such as Tactical Visor, providing a window of opportunity for her team to get behind natural cover.

Blizzard (Ultimate)

Blizzard is a highly impactful ultimate that slows, then freezes, all enemy players within its 10 meter radius. It also deals a small amount of damage to players (20 damage per second). Its radius is just large enough that many heroes can escape it if they have movement abilities off cooldown, such as Hanzo and Genji. If Mei is able to track enemy cooldowns and use Blizzard during a moment of opportunity, freezing enemies in place is all but guaranteed, which makes them very easy to kill. The ability is also incredibly useful to lock down an objective, especially in overtime when enemy players are forced to congregate near the objective.