Does Mei need a rework?

General Discussion
1

I see Mei so little in my games, I feel like she doesn’t even exist. The few people who do play Mei are either terrible at her (like me) or are abused more than Hanzo mains. The way I see it, there are more fans of Mei as a character rather than in gameplay.

As it stands, Mei plays too slow for a fast-paced shooter. She slows the game down, and I can’t find anyone who would think of that as an appealing playstyle, besides the very few Mei mains in this world.

Let’s look at the other heroes’ playstyles. We have a healer who drains health from enemies and gives it to her allies, a giant German knight with a war hammer, 3 robotic killing machines, a CoD-esque soldier with a simple, easy-to-learn kit, 2 close-range duelists with dual-wield guns, a sniper, an archer, a demolition man, literal waifu bait, and a DJ who can heal people with freaking music. And then we have a cute girl who doesn’t look like she belongs on a battlefield, and yet she has a freeze ray that builds walls and is outclassed by every other stun in the game. Who would play that hero?

I get it, every hero has their appeal. But Mei is so unpopular that the only thing people like about her these days is her butt. If that’s the only thing a hero is good for, then what?

Yes, I know that she’s been getting buffs lately, but they are not helping with her popularity. If anything, they’re just making her more unpopular, because people still have defense hero syndrome, where they don’t want defense heroes to be good just because they’re annoying. And that’s no good.

So, does Mei need a rework? Because her recent buffs aren’t helping, and I’m afraid no amount of changes to her kit as-is will do anything to make people like her, or recognize her as a hero in the game.

-SoaringEagle :eagle::snowflake:

2 Likes
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Decrease her headshot damage and buff her in other areas.

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Nope.
(20 characters)

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Mei is an anti-mobility hero in a game where mobility is entirely ability based. I believe she needs significant changes, like her Freeze actually impacting if not outright locking out mobility heroes, but I don’t think she needs to play inherently differently, not like Hanzo, Roadhog or Mercy do when they got reworked.

4 Likes
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She needs help, for sure.
There was an idea i saw back on the old forums where her freeze beam would cut movement abilities length down by a percentage, scaling over time up to 50% i think it was? Or maybe it was 60%?
That idea sounded pretty good, and would really improve her anti-mobility. Probably shouldn’t affect fade and wraith due to how they work though.

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She got a buff and is balanced now. Stop using your last name at the end. Its cringy

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Please post with your main account… with a Level 2 Account we don’t know where you play… bronze or grandmaster… would be a great info thank you

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A rework is a strong last ditch thing; all she needs is some adjustments and maybe some fixes and she would be a good pick to at least hinder dive. Reworks never solve a hero’s issues, just make new ones/worst ones (Symettra/Mercy cough cough)

So long as they focus on OWL, real changes/fixes aren’t terribly likely since that seems to be the nature of any game with an esports scene.

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Mei might be balanced, but she’s not doing what she’s supposed to, taking mobility heroes down a notch. And that’s what this thread is about.
Also, op putting their name at the end of their posts isn’t ‘cringy’, you’re just nitpicking.

2 Likes
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no. i think she is ok, balanced. you can do a lot stuff, if you are agile and smart enough. i can do it. im satisfied with her 100%

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I mean I’d disagree. The reworks we’ve gotten have been mostly successful, Blizzard just didn’t hit the mark with tuning.

Symmetra was reworked because she was literally only good at Point A defense, her rework made her point B defense much better, and gave her far more combat viability with a shield and being able to bank more turrets.

Roadhog got turned from a glass cannon dealing OHK’s left, right and center to a beefy bruiser who brings both survivability and damage in spades, as a trade off for being the lowest utility tank.

Lucio’s rework made him far more active. It strengthened every aspect of his kit, except his ultimate, at the cost of making him far more active. He couldn’t just exist and provide utility, like he could before, and the change massively improved the impact a good Lucio could have on the game.

Mercy was running the risk of being borderline useless. She was practically never picked during an Ana meta, and adding another main healer who massively outclassed her in healing with Moira would have been the nail in her coffin. Blizzard definitely. They DEFINITELY missed the mark with tuning there, but I would argue that the rework was successful in it’s goal, even if the result is kinda boring.

Really the only hero I would argue hasn’t had a successful rework (not including Hanzo, since we don’t really know what he’s gunna be like when he drops) is Dva, and that’s mostly because Blizzard don’t know what they want her to be, and flipflop between a defensive or offensive tank every 6 months.

The goals with reworks are usually achieved pretty well. Problems arise simply because Blizzard can’t tune to save their lives.

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Most likly the most regular Mei player already quit during the last year sine it ook so long util blizzard even started adressing her many problems.

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I can’t, for some reason. Ever since I got the free trial on PC, all of my posts appear under my level 2 PC account rather than my main account on Xbox, where I’m a high gold. And yes, even in high gold I don’t believe Mei has a use. She’s that bad.

-SoaringEagle :eagle::snowflake:

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That has nothing to do with their post. Stay on topic.

OT: I do not think she needs a rework persay, but she does need a push in the right direction. For someone who is supposed to counter mobility, mobility does a good job making her feel nearly useless.

I’m not sure what the correct solution is. Perhaps ability lock outs or reduced movement from mobility effects during freeze / slow?

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Well, here’s the problem: With the kind of kit Mei has, it’s very easy to make her overpowered. Her stun ability is her primary fire, for Pete’s sake.

And with all due respect, I don’t like when people suggest to make movement abilities slower when being frozen and the more you apply the freeze, the slower they are and blah blah blah… Does it all have to be so needlessly complicated?

-SoaringEagle :eagle::snowflake:

2 Likes
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Eh, the entire character design is based around slowing and making use of CC. I don’t think there’s anything actually wrong with that, and even if she were to be reworked I highly doubt blizz would change that. It’s core to her kit and we know blizz is fine with there being CC in game.

What ideas would you suggest that would remain faithful to the character and her playerbase? She needs something she can focus on and be good at it. I think slowly reducing the effects of mobility abilities is a fair solution so Mei can feel useful. Characters like tracer would still do well against her, assuming the mobility reduction isn’t absurd.

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Well, I would make it so that the mechanics of the gun are reworked, so that the icicle is her primary fire, and her secondary fire is replaced by an ability where Mei shoots a snowball out of her gun that deals slight damage and freezes it’s target for the same duration it freezes now (1.5 seconds). That way, Mei can do her job faster, and people won’t need to feel so much stress fighting her.

As for cryo-freeze, I’d remove it and replace it with a different ability that doesn’t suck. I hate this ability.

I’d also redesign Mei so that she wears something a little thinner, but still thick enough. Does she need to walk around in all those layers?

-SoaringEagle :eagle::snowflake:

1 Like
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According to the stats of an overwatch watchsite, there are only 15k users that tried out mei. Even brigitte has 16k people trying her. Mercy had about 500k people trying her out. I think the site was overbuff.

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Do I really need to explain why an instant 1.5 second stun is a bad idea?

3 Likes
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Fine, just remove her from the game then, because there is no way Mei will ever be good with the kit she has now. I’ve got nothing more to suggest. It’s not like removing her would have any sort of impact besides a simple, “Whatever…”

-SoaringEagle :eagle::snowflake: