📝 OWCS China Stage 1 Week 1 review

OWCS China is doing something new this year. Rather than the typical Round Robin format found in other regions, China is structuring its regular season in two stages: a Swiss Stage and a Round Robin stage.

Two teams will be eliminated in the Swiss Stage, allowing for the region to comfortably field eight teams at the start of the season without forcing the teams to play too many matches. The new format will also hopefully lower the number of one-sided 3-0 matches played throughout the season.

Game of the week: Milk Tea 2 - 3 Homie E

In the first match of the regular season, Homie E were coming off an undefeated run in Open Qualifiers, while Temporary OWCS Partner Team Milk Tea sought to answer the questions raised by their role-swapped players and near-total roster revamp.

Homie E took Busan relatively easily, with their players often diving on rookie Chen “Hypnos” Yu’s Mizuki. Esperança, in comparison, was a slugfest. For much of the map, Homie E seemed to have the upper hand, and their DPS line pulled off several highlight plays without a D.Va on the other side to pressure them. Ultimately, though, Milk Tea got the robot over the line in overtime after Ou “Eileen” Yiliang seized an opportunity to corner Yin “Remedy” Jiajun’s Kiriko and Yi “Lilko” Jinlin’s Vendetta in a small room.

Havana felt like a throwback to metas of yore, as both teams ran Genji. Milk Tea quickly completed the map on their attack—a rare sight on Havana—but they seemed to collapse on their defense, only stabilizing at the very end of Point C. Fortunately, they managed to pull together a two-minute defense for Point C, winning the map. Compared to Homie E, Milk Tea looked more comfortable overall on the Sigma comp.

Numbani was another map of unconventional hero picks. Both Chen “feiyang” Shihang and Wen “9TRIBEZ” Shihai found success on the Hazard before inevitably switching to Zarya on Point C. Milk Tea’s fatal error on this close-fought map was perhaps taking too long to cap Point A, putting their time bank at a disadvantage. (In another world, maybe feiyang wouldn’t have wasted a minute running out on Roadhog.)

Finally, on Aatlis, Homie E and Milk Tea returned to the standard Zarya rush. Both teams had their fair share of highlight-worthy plays, but Homie E were more coordinated and more measured with their ult usage. The team had a big ultimate advantage coming into the final fight, allowing them to take the map and the series.

This match showcased Homie E’s ability to square up to more established teams with veteran players. On the other hand, it was a disappointing result for Milk Tea, a team which was securely within the top four of the region last season. Now, with its two-match losses this week, Milk Tea faces swift elimination from the Swiss Stage.

Player of the week: Lee “LeeSooMin” Soo-min

Every team needs a Lucio player. After their middling performances in international competition last season, Weibo Gaming made the bold decision to bring in Korean import players for the first time in the team’s history. So far, Weibo’s new support line of Oh “MAKA” Eun-seok and LeeSooMin has been a resounding success.

Throughout Weibo Gaming’s two matches this week, LeeSooMin did an excellent job of matching the team’s aggressive tempo and enabling Huang “Leave” Xin’s Vendetta. He’s turned teamfights with decisive Sound Barriers and even forced an Ajax out of Homie E’s Ren “Unkn0w” Yanchao. LeeSooMin’s support play will be a cornerstone for Weibo Gaming as they look to surpass their previous season’s results.

Week 1 in review

All Gamers 3 - 0 DEG

DEG’s Vendetta player, Wang “Wangming” Ming, is a streamer and content creator with the following catchphrase: “To be honest, it couldn’t be helped” (说实话 没有办法). In All Gamers vs. DEG, it really couldn’t be helped, as the OWCS Partner Team with several veteran Overwatch esports players predictably steamrolled the streamer team of mostly one-tricks.

Unless hero bans made their one-tricks impossible, DEG ran Vendetta, Doomfist, and Brigitte, while All Gamers countered them easily with more standard Zarya or Orisa rush comps. That said, All Gamers did goof around a bit on Busan by letting Chen “Lengsa” Jingyi get into airborne shenanigans on Jetpack Cat.

Weibo Gaming 3 - 0 Naive Piggy

As expected for the top dogs in OWCS China, Weibo Gaming swiftly dispatched Naive Piggy with a 3-0 win. Although Naive Piggy had some bright spots in Ma “Lateyoung” Tianbin’s off-tank play and Gong “JAYA” Jun’s Vendetta, the team couldn’t match up against the strength of Weibo Gaming’s roster. Huang “Leave” Xin is explosive on Vendetta, and Weibo’s new tank player Chen “Sunzo” Cheng has flourished in the current off-tank meta.

JD Gaming 3 - 1 Solus Victorem

In the first map of JD Gaming’s first match of the season, Li “Mewtwo” Xianyao hit the server with a map-losing Ajax. After that shaky start, JDG gradually picked up steam as the match went on, with standout plays by Li “Pineapple” Zhuo on Emre and Hwang “Belosrea” Gyu-tae on D.Va and Sigma.

Still, we can’t discount Solus Victorem’s win on Control, or their solid performance throughout the rest of the series. SV is shaping up to be a serious mid-tier contender, and 18-year-old rookie DPS player BABAYAGA is one of the most exciting young prospects in the Chinese region.

Milk Tea 0 - 3 Naive Piggy

As the team that came up through the Last Chance Qualifier, Naive Piggy overturned everyone’s expectations with their statement win over Milk Tea. Throughout the series, Naive Piggy mostly ran D.Va comps and focused on shutting down Feiyang’s Zarya. Milk Tea had a chance to turn the series on the final map, Esperança, but Naive Piggy clutched out the lead in overtime with big plays from their DPS line.

DEG 0 - 3 Solus Victorem

DEG placed first in their group in Open Qualifiers, but Open Qualifiers did not have hero bans. In this scrappy, chaotic series, Solus Victorem banned two of DEG’s one-trick heroes across two maps, while DEG stubbornly banned support heroes to protect Li “Saya” Yi’s Brigitte. With their pick-focused comp, DEG often came close to winning the dogfight and clutching out a point or even a map, but ultimately they were no match for Solus Victorem’s better coordination and more viable heroes. As BABAYAGA said in his post-match interview, “If you can only play one hero, and that hero isn’t that strong in the meta, you’re putting a lot of pressure on your team. It’s a tough problem to solve. All you can do is expand your hero pool.”

JD Gaming 3 - 0 All Gamers

JD Gaming vs. All Gamers featured an entertaining variety of main tank heroes—a breath of fresh air in a world where D.Va and Zarya run amok. JDG’s Belosrea had a grand old time finding the maximum possible value with Wrecking Ball and Winston in the first two maps, creating space for Pineapple’s Sojourn to get kills.

On Gibraltar, All Gamers capped all three points on their attack using a bold Symm-Rein rush comp, with the Symmetra teleporters compensating for Reinhardt’s lack of verticality. For AG’s defense, Kim “Mag” Tae-sung returned to his Rein after spending Point A on the meta-mandated D.Va and even managed to turn a fight with a sick four-person Earthshatter. As reflected in the scoreline, All Gamers still seem to be experiencing growing pains, but they’ve been playing and experimenting with Symmetra comps more than any other team in the region.

Weibo Gaming 3 - 0 Homie E

In Map 1, Weibo Gaming gave up a bit of control percentage because they’d been spawncamping too much. In Map 2, Weibo Gaming full-pushed Esperança in less than three minutes. In Map 3, Weibo Gaming finally lost a handful of teamfights—their first teamfight losses in the series—but they still won Flashpoint 3-0. What more is there to say?

Hero bans and map picks

Data sourced from OWCS 2026 Hero Bans / Metas.

China featured a grand total of 27 maps of Overwatch this week. Despite the small data pool, a few clear trends are already starting to show:

• Only two game modes were played in every match: Control, which is required as per the rulebook, and Flashpoint.
• Of those eight flashpoints, 88% of them were played on Aatlis, with only one brave team (Solus Victorem) choosing to play Suravasa.
• Control has similar favoritism, with six out of the eight maps being Lijiang Tower. Oasis has not been played thus far.
• Push appeared in 67.5% of matches, but only Esperança has been selected.
• Hybrid is by far the least popular of the modes, only being seen twice.

This week, we saw 54 hero bans in China. This sample size is incredibly small, especially on the scale of full seasons, so expect any takeaways to shift as games get more important. As the season goes on, we can use these data to see which teams and regions favor banning certain heroes. Some key takeaways from China’s Week 1 dataset:

• Mercy is the most banned support in China. In fact, she was the first ban in three straight matches, and Weibo Gaming banned her in both of their games.
• Support has the most unique heroes banned, with eleven heroes sitting on the sidelines for at least one map.
• Zarya leads the way for tank bans, with D.Va following in second. These two have been at the top of the ban list in all regions this week, and will probably remain so until the meta shifts.
• Echo got her first two bans of Stage 1 here, once by Weibo and another by Solus Victorem.
• Symmetra’s high ban rate is a departure from the other regions. In China, most teams have avoided playing her in favor of the Vendetta-Sojourn DPS lineup.