My Monthly "Nerf Mercy" listings

General Discussion
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Alright. Licks his finger and flips a page to the various thesis on Mercy being broken.

Sigh. So here I am again on another “Mercy dictates too much in a fight” listings. Mercy needs some serious nerfs and here I’ll list down many of her strengths and then some various issues with her current weakness, IF you can even call them that.

  1. Ease of use - As it stands the game is being riddled with heros that are able to get huge value off easy kits that ignore many fundementals of the game, with Mercy taking this to such extremes. She is the literally desperation support pick in the support roster, as with S76 for the dps roster. Nothing to it then to spam GA and tether onto players endless. This by far is such a lack of skill expression that many support players find it embarrassing to main Mercy only, but many do not voice that concern due to how much healing and utility is being used on their own team.

  2. Too many forgiving qualities - From a two second Guardian Angel that is a Soljorn slide/jump on 2 seconds that can be used arial as well, to the infamous unhealthy rez forcing a 5v5 fight to always become a 5v6(+1 for the rez). Any opposing team needs to exude much more resources and time downing a Mercy’s team. Lack of need for proper line of sights, no healing downtime(doesn’t need to reload or wait on cooldowns), ignores basic positioning which is adjusted within a 2 second window on a two part movement ability, quick horizontal and vertical movement abilities, the ability to fly, a Baptise self heal aura on steroids in Valkyrie, a dps boosting beam that enables many non one-shots to become one shots again and helps ignore dps falloff ranges effectively turning hitscans into 50 caliber guns, a tiny deceptive hitbox on a heavily mobile hero.

  3. Her playstyle doesn’t fit Overwatch today - As it stands the meta for Mercy is tether an ally and hide behind a wall thus utilizing a small window for the tether to ignore wall physics and every so often turn on blue beam. If an enemy is nearby, spam GA, bunny hop, and save Valkyrie for when you really need it, which is never used for its healing boost, but used for the sole selfish purpose of a Mercy saving themselves. So Mercys play a game of hide and seek which is their favor for the nonstop healing and damage boosting, which then turns into a massive game of cat and mouse as she suddenly becomes a flier. As it stands their are two exploits that have stuck with Mercy that the devs know about completely. The GA superjump which was an unintentional design turned intentional and then the GA CD increase off the superjump portion, which essentially lets Mercy never touch the ground, thus turning her into a flying support hero. The CD increase for superjump was never intended and has not been addressed for months now. The only superjump exploit to stay in the game as a whole aside from WBall, who needs specific obstacles and tight timing to even replicate to do so.

Here are some basic arguements to be made by the Mercy crusade who will obviously flood this thread with the same statements time and again.

“Mercy is not even effective in high tiers” - The further you move up in rank the slimmer the population goes right down to the top 500 players. We have 100s of 1000s of players and Mercy plague every rank. To say she isn’t an issue for a couple 100 players only is only justifying the fact she is an issue. Want to know how they deal wiyh Mercy? They kill her first always in every fight. That in of itself screams how much Mercy dictates in a fight if every pro level players find the need to deal with her first before anything else. Its never the Moira or Baptise or the Sombra. Mercy is always target priority number 1 and people have yet to ask why.

“Mercy is defenseless! She needs GA!” - Does she? Or maybe she needs proper positioning and coordination. OW1 Mercy never had a superjump to her GA and she did just fine and performed just as well. Granted that version had mass rez (IE she could revived an entire team back then). Where she had massive utility back then a much longer beam. Mercys of old remember well enough that they were never without their fair share of action and every match had a Mercy utilizing their pistols. Today we see less of that and just GA spam. Famous Mercy mains have shown otherwise that its not unlikely for them to get a pick off or several in GM matches. Furthermore her power boosting blue beam emables dps to deal even more dps, in that same sacrifice which is akin to discord orb, but as a buff for heros like Bastion, Ashe, Mccree, S76, Hanzo, and more. So that power is redistributed in the worst possible way which once again just grants a 50 caliber gun to whomever she desires. No reloads, no line of sight, just more tether and the press of a single button to enable it.

“Mercy can’t do anything! Other supports are better!” - Through what? Reloads, cooldown managements, proper aiming and line of sight to both pockets and enemies? GA being on a 2 second cooldown is very forgiving and forgives frontline diving for a Mercy and ignores basic positioning or usage of cover. Even when cover is used she hides behind it and becomes nonengaging a fight completely. Yet the only way to deal with the nonstop healing/damage boosting is dealing with the Mercy…who never has to peek her head out ever. Every other support needs to at least get proper view of their pockets and may toss out a cheeky ability to provide aide and utility. From lamp, to suzu, to anti, to whipshot, to discord. There is no fighting in a Mercy’s kit and she just needs to hide and run away during any fight. Let’s not forget the almighty rez, which is the strongest non-ultimate ability in the game. It can deny value from enemy ultimates, abilities, and even possibly lead to the enemy team being wiped out with a potential ultimate from that teammate. Which turns a 5v4 back into a 5v5 which is why 5v6 is used often to explain Rez’s influence in the game. Its always a 5v5(+1) because of Mercy’s Rez.

As it stands theres nothing to manage on Mercy. Movement? Dive tanks and flank dps have movement but never as much as Mercy. Echos and Pharahs need to at least land every so often. The other support healers have healing down time which offsets their healing tempos and gives a chance to fight back. Her short beam is overcome by the massive boost to movement that is under exploit right now, and her damage is regulated into an nonengaging manner by providing others with more damage while she continues to hide behind cover and avoid confrontation.

Mercy is a mess that doesn’t show any skill expression and is easy to utilize to emable a team and makes it horrible to fight against with her lack of meaingful gameplay to engage with, Rez completely denying the hard work of a pick, and a self defensive mobility ultimate that other supports wish they had.

After all of these reasons and explanations we will still get players who will claim Mercy is fine and bring up the top 0.1% who can deal with her through organized player conpositions, voicechat callouts, and heavily experienced players who already can play well together.

Mercy needs a nerf. If anything give her something proper to manage like how Pharah has a fuel gauge or a Moira with limited healing. Even Kiriko has cooldoens to manage properly, needs to maintain proper aiming and line of sight all while her ofuda have travel time before they come into effect.

This needs to end. Nerf Mercy.

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hahahahahahahaha top tier whining :rofl:

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Resurrect is massively over-rated, it’s actually a weak ability, and I’m being serious. You gotta factor in the 31.75 sec cooldown (1.75 sec cast time adds to the cooldown), loss of healing output during the cast time, the likelyhood of dying before or right after a Rez, getting Rez interrupted by any knockback, stun, or hack (no value & goes on 30 sec cooldown), & that most Rez’s are not on a tank.

Even if you can Rez the tank in a match, you could’ve just played another support that prevents that tank from dying in the first place, like Ana, Moira, Kiriko, or Baptiste.

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Yeah no, we are not embarrassed to main Mercy, but we don’t want to be harassed by people like you telling us that we suck at the game for playing a hero we like.

That’s not how this works.

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Rezzing a Reaper who can cast Death Blossom after you die and get rushed is not a value I think you understand here.

People are not going to use Rez so openly because its the only skill she has to manage. And a Rez every 30 seconds is somehow not OP to you?

How long does a round last? Minutes right? So if that Mercy spams Rez every 30 seconds, they can maximise the uptime for a hero and force a res almost every fight which makes the fights 5v6 quite easily.

Of course basic understanding of gameplay suggests a Mercy won’t ever just dpam it, but the potential to even do that is absurdly strong.

That’s basic math. Read above. You can argue with numbers all you want but 5 minus 1 equals 4 rez plus 1 equals 5 again. Its simple. Nothing to it.

I may be talking about Mercy, but not address Mercy players there. Addressing other support players whom avoid Mercy due to that fact.

You guys get it easy with the loss of an offtank hunting you down.

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Skimming through that you really contradicted yourself. You open by saying that there’s nothing more to Mercy than spamming ga, but then say that Mercy’s play style is unhealthy because she hides behind walls and pockets.

To be honest, the only way your post makes sense is if you fundementally lack any idea of how Mercy plays as a hero. It also only makes sense if you have an irrational hatred for her, since most of your complaints aren’t even balance issues, they’re just assumptions you have about a hero that you dislike(ie she’s “easy”) that even if true don’t justify nerfs.

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There is a difference between being able to make a 5v4 back into a 5v5 vs making it into a 5v6…
Ashe is able to make it into a 5v6 if you wanna go whine about her next.

You guys have it easy, hunting down Mercys without an offtank to protect her.

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Don’t mind me, dominating in duels against DPS and even the occasional tank on Ana/Bap/Kiriko/Zen, while outputting massive amounts of heals and outright denying multiple kills rather than just resurrecting a single player every half a minute.

Err, what I mean to say is, oh yeah, Mercy is TOTALLY overpowered and definitely the support we need to be nerfing…

Cackles Evilly

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Um…yes. Bob counts as an entity in a lot of circumstances where turrets don’t…

Its still a plus one. No matter how you roll it. Rez=plus one. That is still an extra player to kill and threat of another player to clear.

Rose glasses here. Nice to see you again Paws. Shall we dance once more?

Anyways if you don’t see it then Idk what to say. The post mentions her absurd mobility that outclasses dive tanks and flank dps. The hiding part is the fact that her nonengagement playstyle is highly unhealthy where other supports need to peek or engage showing a massive difference in how these utilites are employed. Its comparing other supports through ease of use and requirements needed to manage their abilities.

Oh as a reminder to readers the onky ability manageable on Mercy to show skill is Rez.

I what-?! Never thought about that. Almost had me there. But still higher mobility than any single character. Whike being in your backline or having the ability to zip back and forth between frontline and backline. Which…no tank can keep up. Exceptions being WBall, the biggest hitbox in the game, and Tracer, who is the squishiest hero in the game.

Duelling a support sounds awesome. Meanwhile Mercy with the dps boosted Ashe…wipes the field before any duels occur.

Oh wait lets change it up. How about Bastion to delete tanks and shielfds.

Lets change it up further. Have a Mercy boosting a Junkrat to drop nukes.

Lets change it up again Pharmercy.

Yeah…we know how the community feels about the last one.

OK Hand sign.

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Mercy needs a buff in reverting that dumb ga nerf why do the devs punish skilled players

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People are ignoring it already.

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You say this like there isn’t a bunch of players here who constantly call Mercy players bad/delusional and beg for mercy nerfs (like at least 5 threads a day, despite her rarely ever being meta or even that good).

Almost feels like there’s a bigger anti-mercy crusade than there are actual mercy players around here. If anything I think the ‘mercy crusade’ is justified since y’all can’t stop attacking mercy players and trying to get the hero nerfed into the dirt.

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Mercy has never left high tier in every meta for seven years.

That says a lot. Despite the constant “Mercy isn’t that good right now.” From content creators, Mercys have shown otherwise why they need to be respected. Not in the same manner of adjusting as Torbjorns or Symmetras, but through constant sheer spamming of the same old tricks that continue to annoy the playerbase.

We have memes and songs about player begging for a Mercy player based off of how potent she is in a match.

Why do people never ask why the Mercy hate is probably justified because she has to die every pro match or how she is a difficult target for metal players to where they need to spam hitscan or turrets to deal with her?

Did you even read my suggested change? No changes to healing or her utility. Just something proper to manage to make Mercy rewarding and not so much an endless GA jumper.

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You are absolutely wrong and the fact that you’d even say that is laughable.

Wtf does this even mean? No, the mercy hate isn’t justified. Every support has to die in pro matches and the fact that people can’t hit her in metal ranks isn’t a problem to her design. They can’t hit genji/tracer/etc either.

No because she doesn’t need nerfs and I’m not picking through your massive block of text to find them.

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Retell the periods when she left high tier.

Those flankers don’t have self healing or half of Mercy mobility. Some of them have bigger hitboxes. Also most of the player population are indeed casual and metal ranked…

Then I ask that you please stop replying if you refuse to read my case but feel the need to present your own.

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What is ‘high tier’ to you because she’s been scarcely picked in OWL for the past forever outside of her few times needed to boost an already broken hero. When she was at 50HPS was probably when she was at her lowest.

  1. Tracer has recall
  2. Both of those heroes can kill you in under a second. Mercy cannot.

Mercy sacrifices any offensive power for her mobility. She doesn’t even have great healing either, just consistency.

You can stop answering me if you don’t want a conversation.

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It doesn’t outclass them, it’s a side grade to most flankers and dice tanks due to it’s ally requirement.

And as has been stated previously in many other posts, her mobility is needed since she can’t defend herself like other supports. Her mobility is her self defense.

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We will remember you as a hero.
They are getting close…

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That is like the top 0.001% of players. That is so irrelevent to the game as a whole because those players act like a pack of coordinated raptor wolves. You cannot be seriously saying the rest of the playerbase need to play as such or expect them to suddenly become that good.

High tier meaning always has been a relevent healer in every meta. Like how often is Mercy a nonmeta healer but then picks back up to a relevent meta healer. Its every time. Every time people think they can drop her she climbs back up to relevency.

Tracer also has 150 HP, Mercy has 200, and we can count many more things that can one shot a Tracer or down her quickly. For example. Four guns aimed at the Tracer.

Then for WBall…I main Ball. Do you know how quickly she can zip away from my effective range. Then a piledriver which is usually never a full 100 dps due to drastic range falloff into some rain of bullets always makes her activate her GA so I can get a few shots off, but never enough to heal through her support partner’s sudden healing while trying to dodge and weave the three other guns aiming at the very obvious big metal hamster ball that presented itself just then.

Then read everything please. I certainly do.

Its literally 2 seconds for a two part mobility Soljorn slide/jump that can be used in the air. -and that’s the short explanation. With an exploit to ignore the GA cooldown increase that allows Mercy to turn into a flier that never has to touch the ground.

The only abilities that compete is Ball form, no cooldown, Tracer’s blink, three charges only.

No hero should have that extreme of an ability in mobility. The average players reaction time is 1.5 seconds which leaves a 0.5 adjustment period for aiming. Through training you can make it 0.75 reaction with 1.25 time left to readjust sights. What cannot be adjusted to match is how Mercy can GA away from an enemy’s effective dps range. Which inquires even more chasing and dps.

Guardian Angel is similar to a pinball machine. The bumpers for the pinball make the game and can be frustrating, but it there to direct the pinball and obviously control the game entirely because it boosts the pinball in many directions. In this case bumpers don’t sling Mercy around randomly. She has full control over those boosts and can propel herself.

Her mobility is hardly limited with player souls even acting as slingshot points to double her GA range distance.