To explain why Mercy is unfun, you must first understand what dopamine is, and also why videogames are fun to begin with.
When we face a challenge in a videogame and conquer it, our brain releases a chemical called dopamine. Dopamine gives us a sense of reward, and makes us feel good. The harder the challenge is, the more dopamine is rewarded to you.
Now what does this have to do with Mercy? Let me explain.
Mercy players have to constantly provide healing to their teammates. It can be rather stressful, especially if youāre the only healer. You do alllll this healing for minutes at a time, basically being a slave to your team. But you know what made it all worth it? MASS RESURRECTION. When you finally pull off that triple rez, or that 6-player rez, you say to yourself āYESSSSSS!! LETS GOOOOOā. An extreme amount of dopamine gets released into your brain, and you feel awesome!!
Now lets look at todayās Mercy. Mercy 2.0. Itās true 90% of her abilities are still the same. But the reason sheās not fun any more is because thereās no sense of reward when you play her. When you pop your ultimate (Valkyrie), all you do is more healing. Youāve been healing your team the entire match, so doing 10hp extra healing to your teammates isnt going to suddenly make you think āAHHH GO CRAZY. AHHH GO STUPID.ā That satisfaction is just not there anymore. Little to no dopamine is released into your brain when you play Mercy, even if you play her in the highest tiers of Overwatch
Meh, mass rez was cool and all, but as a Mercy player Iām not really using her for the glory of one moment. A big ult shouldnāt make or break a heroās fun factor. When Iām Mercy, I get fulfillment and enjoyment from what youāve described, in your own words, as slavery: Keeping everyone alive and the stress, challenges, and choices that come with that.
At no point do I feel like a slave or like Iām doing something I donāt want to or not enjoying what Iām doing. I picked Mercy precisely because I get enjoyment out of her. My reward for playing her is doing an efficient job and helping my team win. Heal, stay alive, make smart revives, play my healing and boosting strings like a magical guitar. And I love every second of it. As I always have.
If anyone who plays Mercy feels like a slave while doing so, then, Iāve got news for them, Mercy is just not the hero for you. Move on, branch out, experiment with other supports. Find what you enjoy and stop saying a hero is unfun just because you personally donāt have fun using them.
I absolutely abhor playing as Rein, and while many enjoy him, to me he is the epitome of boredom. But Iām certainly not going to try convince others he is unfun just because heās not for me.
I love the sensation of flying/soaring.
Also owning flanks with a dinky pistol is fun.
Mercy is not for everyone and Iāve personally been enjoying bap more recently.
But your āscienceā is flawed, when people get rushes from different things. Some people like playing horror games and some donāt. And some games of mercy feel like a horror game, depends on the enemy flanks.
Felt more like chore to me. My team was expecting that phat Rez and didnāt like my 2 man tempo rezs even if controlling the pace of the fight with numbers helped us win faster and more efficiently.
Weāre really stretching this far into the discussion, huh.
I mean if you want an argument for dopamine release ā of all things weāre left to talk about, I guess ā then perhaps I can vouch that some sort of chemical must be leaked from my brain when I play Mercy because I consistently have fun with her. Iād almost go as far as to say that sheās my consistently most fun hero to play.
Beam juggling is fun. Tracking which allies are being focused down and keeping them supported, while on-the-fly switching targets to give them important boosts. Ressing is fun. I love the thrill of surveying the battle, figuring out when my opportunity to catch a res comes, or organizing with teammates on how it can be done, and I love that excitement of bringing someone back and negating whatever play it took to get that kill. Flying is fun. Guardian Angel is my favorite mobility in the game, I really enjoy soaring over to someone when even theyād least expect it and giving them the boost they need, or using GA maneuvers to stay a hard target to hit and finding places I can heal myself up while not forfeiting my teamās support.
And I love Valkyrie. I love getting the birds-eye view of the battle and using unique geometry to stay out of harmās way. I love getting the team together and feeling the huge boost Iām offering them. I love popping it early to ensure we can use it to push in successfully, I love popping it at a momentās notice to flip around a battle. I love using it just to make sure I can get a vital res off. And if I loved GA before, I love it even more now ā moving that fast and zipping between allies makes me feel too good, I love how near-limitless GAās range is, allowing me to cut across huge stretches of the map and immediately be in the battle. And I love whipping out the pistol and chasing down someone who thought they could get away.
If your only rush of dopamine came from Mass Res, then I really do feel bad for you. Thereās so much fun to be had with Mercy, but I think itās telling that people consider her job āstressfulā or āboring.ā To me, it sounds like a lot of people inherently donāt like the hero Mercy is meant to be, and then wonder why theyāre not having fun. If beam juggling and target prioritization and positioning management isnāt a thrill for you, then Mercy isnāt going to be a load of fun.
But itās not just 60hps itās a potential 300hps along with the new damage boost mechanics that favors flicking between the beams (at least with projectiles). And I disagree, most people feel they should go crazy when thereās a Mercy beam attached to them.
So since itās explained with science, I suppose you have isolated many test subjects to test on them the level of hormones in the body while playing current mercy and while playing an hypothetical buffed mercy to assess that there is indeed a link? Can we have the result of this experiment? It sounds fascinating.
Otherwise, itās science of wild guesses
And I can explain with science why she was not fun to play against for the other 6 players in the enemy team.
Juts copy paste the same wall of text and apply it for the other team.
This is what gives me satisfaction. If I can manage to save both a teammateās and my own life from a dangerous situation, I feel great. There are real, tangible results that donāt involve mass res, theyāre just harder to see.
Honestly, I get plenty of dope just maintaining my teams health. ESPECIALLY if they have next to nothing left, or theyāre about to die and I swoop in and turn the fight. Thereās something in me that just loves it.