I dont understand OTHER Mercy Mains

General Discussion
1

Introduction:

Alright. I know mercy is a very sensitive topic right now. Everyone gets very emotional and yeah I don’t want mercy to get nerfed anymore too…
I understand that mercy mains (like me) have enough of blizzard constantly nerfing their favorite character.

Gameplay:

BUT when we look at Mercy`s current state from a gameplay perspective she IS balanced now. Her healing output is still very high, her survivability with guardian angle is insane, furthermore due to the glitchy super jumps... and she still has damage boost and rez. Meanwhile, other supports have a chance to shine. Ana is not a troll pick anymore, Lucio is super strong now aso...

Mercy is still playable, but she is not OVERPOWERED...
Healing:

I can only talk about my own experience. I am a mercy main, started in season 4 in silver and worked myself up the ladder... Now I just reached master, and there is one thing I want to notice here...
https://imgur.com/LeyOJAH.png
This is my Healing Output after my 10 Placement Matches and 2 additional ones AFTER THE MERCY NERFS in Season 12.
14522 Heal/10 Min
https://imgur.com/8vRphaW.png
This was my healing output last season. (11)
13351 Heal/10 Min
So my Healing Output actually increased. That leads me to one conclusion: Mercys Healing Output is just fine. She can nearly Heal as much as Moira! (who is known as a tank healer, so she gets some ridiculous stats..) So why does everyone complain about her current healing output? I did not notice any difference except that you need to change your heal target more often, to keep up with the heals... AND THAT'S FINE! That actually raises the skill ceiling because you need better decision making. Mercy is more fun to play because she is more of a challenge!

Winrate:

Since the last Mercy Nerf, her overall Winrate dropped significantly. Most Mercy Mains are arguing that she can´t be of any help for her Team because of her lack of healing output compared to other healers. And I absolutely disagree.

https://imgur.com/PEPwQO9.png
Well i gotta say, my Winrate with her is quite high this season...
80%
What I think the real problem is: Mercy got harder to play. Decisions about who to heal are MUCH more important now, and people are not used to this level of play. What I am saying, and that may sound a little harsh, every Mercy Main with a Winrate lower than their previous season is now lacking decision making for their elo. Or in other words, every Mercy Main who is losing too many games does not deserve to be on that Rank because higher Skill is required to stay on that rank than before... Mercy got harder to play, that's why every Mercy is dropping in Rank. It has NOTHING to do with Mercy not being viable, because she definitely is. Look at my stats and Winrate...

Furthermore Mercys Winrate is on 48.62% (20.09.2018), while Anas Winrate is on 49.94% and Moiras Winrate is on 50.40%.
How is that a problem? Why should Mercy be “unplayable” just because her Winrate is slightly lower than Anas?

Toxicity:

Most Mercy Mains claim that they get treated unfairly by the community, they are talked down by DPS players and that people are cursing at them and hating them for no reason.
I think that's not true. In my 900 Hours Overwatch, I experienced a lot of hate. But most of that was pointed at DPS players not doing their job. Only 2 times in my whole Overwatch career I experienced a DPS trash talking me for not healing him. And that was legit.
I think Mercy Mains are misunderstanding 2 things. Just because some high ranked DPS player say that Mercy needs no skill (which is true COMPARED to the MECHANICAL Skill they have...) it does not mean that the whole Overwatch Community is hating you.
And second: When they actually trash talk you it is for a reason. It is not because you are a Mercy Player, it is because it feels like you are not doing your job OR you trash talked/misbehaved first!

On the other hand, you can't expect anyone to be nice to you when YOU are not nice to them!
To prevent toxicity YOU can get proactive!
As an example: before every match, I start a chat with... well... someone in the chat. I praise enemies when they land a sick shot and I am telling my teammate when I can heal them or not, so they don't overextend or expect healing where I can't provide it. And the response is really positive!
https://imgur.com/Jko6kCb.png
https://imgur.com/Tp98FRY.png
https://imgur.com/9yKqNuZ.png
Those are some chat messages I got, only today! How is that toxic or unfun to play?
Constant Tweaks and Nerfs:

A lot of Mercy Mains complain about her constant tweaking and nerfing.
To be fair, it was very frustrating to play an overpowered character that was a lot of fun, just to nerf him over and over again.
But as I stated above: she was overpowered. So overpowered that she was a must pick and THE strongest healer until the last patch. What Blizzard did was actually really intelligent. They knew they had to nerf Mercy so they had 2 options. Either they make a ridiculous nerf that will put Mercy on trash tier or nerf her just a bit every here and then, so people can get used to the changes.

Putting Mercy on trash tier instantly would be much worse because she is such a famous character. So i agree how Blizzard managed to nerf Mercy. You may not like it but it had to be done anyway.
Summary:

So what actually is your problem?
I think Mercy and every healer is in a very balanced and enjoyable spot right now... What's your experience with all that stuff?
I will try to reply to everything, but let's stay civilized and have a good argument :slight_smile:
55 Likes
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I agree that she is balanced but her mid-fight potential is garbage. Her ult isnt useful unless 3 or more team members are alive even then its not a guaranteed win. Her 50hps makes it more difficult to rez due to how much healing you need to pump out. She dosent feel impactful at all. Only reason why i say shes balanced is bc from my experience i still do get gold healing at the end of the game and thats due to good positioning and about 200 hours of experience on her. Other than that everyone still counters her and its not worth picking her bc of what other healers can provide.

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I do understand that her midfight potential is weaker than before.
50hps instead of 60hps will make it harder to keep up. To counter that, I learned how to super jump so I am always above my team and can provide healing when needed. It is actually not really hard to keep up with the heals, you just can’t full heal someone like you used to earlier, but you need to switch your target sooner.

As you said, not only her gameplay difficulty increased but also her rez difficulty. The purpose of rez just changed from a midfight-saving ability to a early-pick-denying ability. In addition to that it is still really easy to rez midfight when you ult, and lets be serious, you have your ult every 1-2 pushes…

As long as she still gets gold healing her healing output is still viable. And i did not get silver healing since season 7… (seriously…)

I disagree with the statement that “everyone still counters her”.
Because of her insane mobility she is actually impossible to kill when you use her kit to the fullest extend! Today i had a qp match with a former top 500 tracer, and we made a challenge, just for fun. I told her to try to pick me, and i will try to have less than 5 deads at the end of the match. I ended the match with 0 deads.
MERCYS SUPER JUMP IS BROKEN, she can escape everyone. The only hard counter to MY Mercy Playstyle is a hitscan sniper like Widow/Ana/McCree… But that is legit…

I think Mercy found her place. She is not an all around hero like she used to. Moira can heal much more, but she cant follow onto highgrounds, so Mercy is now THE healer to go in the very popular DIVE Comp.

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Actually you’re probably better off running the usual Lucio + Zen with dive.

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The “usual”? Because of their low healing output i never really see a Lucio and Zen in Dive…

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Mercy has two concurrent problems: Balance and Fun.

Mercy has been Overpowered for a long time, making her a must pick as a healer - when they came out with Valk it was so crazy OP it was laughable, which is surprising since they were supposedly fixing Mass Res for being ‘too powerful’.

The problem is they can do whatever they want to Valk to tweak her power level, but it’s still going to be Valk, which is a fundamentally boring ult because it is the same thing you were doing before, just now it’s chain healing instead of single target healing. Woop de do, so different.

I think everyone can agree that the Ultimates in this game are meant to be both a different experience from your primary time playing the character (even Widowmaker doesn’t get infrared sight 24/7, so playing her with sights on is a different feel during ‘the hunt’, though I would argue it is the second most boring ult in the game I can understand it’s strategic uses outweigh it’s excitement factor, and Widow’s natural excitement factor as a sniper is already incredibly high.) and something that makes you feel powerful or heroic in some fashion.

Valk fails quite spectacularly in both categories IMO, which is going to cripple her ‘fun factor’. So, no matter how power balanced she is, she’s still going to be as boring as beige to play compared to the original Mercy I fell in love with. That is inherently a problem for me as a player, because I see it as an overall detraction to the character and game itself, and I will say as much and continue to say as much.

People are free to disagree and enjoy Valk, I just personally find it boring as beans. I’m not saying we have to have mass res, but having it as a 30 second ability that is rewarded equally no matter how good you’re doing and the fact that your ult is the same thing you were doing before is just too much to be ignored. I think she needs addressed in some way, because as she is I can’t imagine why anyone would bother playing her.

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Thats not a counter thats running away from a fight. Her GA is super useful but its not a self defense tactic in a 1v1 therefore she is countered by the other player.

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Alright :slight_smile: I absolutely agree that being balanced does not mean mercy is fun. Valk IS incredible boring as is and they really need to change that.
What compensated her “boring ult and gameplay” for me was her guardian angle buff. Being able to fly further in any direction by pressing space is an insane ability and is incredibly fun to play around. Even until now I don’t get sick of evading and dodging enemies while providing support for my teammate. So while I do agree that Valk is too boring as is I do not think Mercy is boring as a whole, but hey :wink: good to hear your opinion, actually opened my eye :smiley:

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Her mobility and self heal is really good though, she is very hard to kill and can easily escape to teammates that will protect her. Her pistol does a surprising amount of damage and any flankers that think I’m going to be an easy pick when I play her are in for a surprise :stuck_out_tongue:

3 Likes
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Being able to fly around and get shot by good hitscans is meaningless to me. I often have to force myself to stay low to the ground or basically fly where I would be standing. The additional mobility is nice and all, but it certainly does not make up for the absolute snorefest that playing her is. She’s basically a walking healbot, especially now that her healing is nerfed and you’ll have virtually no time to damage boost ever, because you’ll be doing nothing but healing.

1 Like
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So you mean Mercy is countered by everyone because she is unable to fight them in a 1v1? I don’t think so. I think Mercy is countered by those who can prevent her from playing and kill her. She is not supposed to fight in a 1v1, but to heal while evading the fights.

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Mercy is objectively underpowered as a main healer, perhaps she would be balanced if we pretend that she is an off-healer; however, I prefer not to do that because that is not her role. It is really not a matter of opinion, the stats speak for themselves and perhaps you are confused because you have yet to check them.

I am glad that you do well with Mercy. I do well with Reaper. It does not magically make him balanced.

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They were used all the time in dive until the release of the Mercy rework hit and turned her into the probably the most broken hero of all time.

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With her regen it is easier i forgot about that in all honesty however with her pistiol being her only defense item she can be easy to pick off if your not careful.

Im aware but if you compare her to other healers they all have a way to defend themselfs in their kit and Mercy relies on teammates so if her healing cant keep them alive whats the point?

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This is also true, statistically Moira and Ana can now output more healing than Mercy, which is absurd to me since they both offer DPS utility to their teams and Mercy does not.

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Yeah if your healing can’t keep her team alive she is useless. Her way to defend herself is to escape the enemy and heal the whole time. That’s why you can’t do any clutch plays like ana, but that’s also the reason why mercy will still have the highest healing output in most matches, as you said…

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But Mercy has rez, which is a ridiculous ability. Also, damage boost.
Even if they have DPS utility, Mercy has broken support utility. It’s ok for them to heal in equal or more numbers.

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I am fully aware of the stats, I adressed them in my long text above. What i disagree with is that her healing output is too weak now, because most Mercys still have the highest Healing Output, even though Ana and Moira CAN output more.

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Oh lord I’m out of breath! I’ve had to yell “SHINAYYYY!” for so many Mercy threads. Why are we talking about her so much today?!?

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Hahaha :smiley: don’t worry, we will keep our cool :wink: