Some detailed thoughts on Mercy

In a serious note. :rofl:
I actually agree, I just think it would be overall beneficial for the game to just replace resurrection entirely.

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I almost yelped I laughed so hard but then I got sad because people here actually need everything to be spelled out for them in detail.

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Have you looked at the compromise position presented by the dodo rework?

Not to be that person but if someone sees the word dodo without you putting in a link for more context, they might be thinking of something else :laughing:

Finding it hard to link when using my phone to reply…

Its okay got you fam

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Mercy is the only one who can reliably solo heal because of the nature of her kit. She isn’t limited by mobility, resource, or positioning. Moira can’t consistently take care of anyone who isn’t right next to her, Ana can’t be expected to make all of her shots, especially with other bodies in the way, and the other three just don’t have the healing output to solo heal.

Mercy doesn’t need to outheal burst damage because, if you’re fighting a comp that relies on burst damage, you shouldn’t be solo healing anyway. She’s meant to be the healing anchor while the other support works triage and focuses on utility.

Mercy might not have situational utility like the other supports, but she can be anywhere at almost any time without a huge amount of risk to herself and without worrying about cooldowns, which is where her consistency comes from. Her ult is also extremely versatile and allows her to fill whatever need the team needs most from second to second over fifteen seconds.

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This is assuming her output is high enough to actually go with this.

It is not. With 60 it was, but not anymore.

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Solo healing with anybody usually isn’t ideal, but I do it with Mercy all the time :man_shrugging:. 50 hps is enough if you prioritize correctly and are creative enough with her movements to be wherever you need to be. I even encourage people to let me solo heal in GM/high-masters comp games on some maps (Point A defense on Anubis, Hollywood, Numbani, or Volskaya). Mercy shines there. I’ll ask for a second support if they take point A, though.

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Well there’s the difference.

In higher tiers, they know how to play around a solo healer. It’s the same reason why Zen/Lucio was meta back during Dive (before the whole rework fiasco). They didn’t have much heals combined, but that was okay because higher tier players could work together and play around that.

You expect that sort of teamwork and communication in Gold or Plat and you’re going to fail. Drastically.

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girl no

So you’re telling me that the average damage amplified per match for Mercy players is 4357.3 and the top is 7353

Ok

you did the math, not me

and btw, 2*3 = 6, not 7

I will order a fake Mercy staff online and then beat you with it.

let’s triple the damage amp in the OP. make it 2400. Ana the second lowest does 4100 damage on average in comp. There are you happy? It’s still ridiculously low. Now stop derailing the thread.

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Mercy doesn’t need to put out damage and elims when she’s solo healing because that means her team has five other team members who CAN do those things. Solo healing means her team sacrificed multiple supports for more protection/damage, which should make offensive help from the lone support less necessary. I promise Ana or Moira isn’t going to get a lot of time to shoot at the enemy if they’re solo healing because they’re going to be spending a lot more time focusing on healing and just trying to get to people that need it. Ana probably isn’t going to get to use her grenade against the enemy and Moira probably isn’t going to be using purple balls if she’s solo healing.

Nobody should be solo healing when the enemy team relies of burst damage or focusing targets because even the supports who CAN heal through burst damage can’t do it consistently. Ana needs to either rely upon her grenade (which has a long CD) to heal through burst damage or make every shot, which she can only do on one target at a time between reloads and provided nothing is obstructing her LoS. Moria can’t heal through burst damage on anyone who isn’t right next to her and she can only do it as long as she has the resources to do so. If she has to keep doing it, she’s going to run out. That’s why Mercy is the only reliable option if solo healing has to be pulled off.

You’re right about all that, but balancing a hero around uncoordinated teams in gold or plat doesn’t make sense. Anybody can get better and rank up, but nobody can out-play bad balance. Balance around that tier of player would make high-level play impossible.

Worth noting that I’m only looking at main healers, as off-brands are a little irrelevant in this conversation since they’re all designed to do more damage than heals (which they do) and don’t directly compete with Mercy. That said, let’s actually go through this since you seem to want to.

  • 3 apples is an arbitrary baseline that corresponds to Mercy’s average 817 damage boosted, and is meant to keep the numbers in more understandable and relatable terms. That much is obvious, at least I hope it is.
  • You’re saying top players boost 1800 damage, which is 2.20318237 times more than 817.
  • 3 apples * 2.20318237 comes out to 6.60954711 apples. Let’s just round that up to 7 since you obviously can’t have 0.61 apples and I’m talking about one specific person here, not an overall average.

So like I said:

With me so far?


Now compare that to the other main heals and the damage they deal in comparison to Mercy’s contributions.

  • Ana is in second with damage dealt, coming in at 4100 according to the OP, which is 2.277778 times more damage than the top Mercy boost estimate you gave of 1800
  • Apply that to the corresponding estimate of 7 apples, and you get the second to last place coming in at 15.944444 apples in the Ana-Basket. Again, round that up to 16 because 0.94444 apples is ridiculous in this scenario.

As I said


  • And then we look at Moira, who deals about 6800 damage on average, again, according to the OP (ironically, I’m too lazy to look up the exact value)
  • 6800 damage is 3.7777778 times your highball estimate of 1800.
  • Apply that multiplier to the corresponding 7 apples, and you get 26.444444 apples in the Moira basket. I bumped that up to 27 purely because it makes more sense to me in this specific scenario of having whole, complete apples, but I get that the appropriate rounding is to keep it down at 26, so if you want to berate me for being off by 1, go for it.

And so in the end, we have…
3 apples in the average Mercy basket
7 apples in the “best Mercy picker around” basket
16 in the Ana basket
26 or 27 in the Moira basket, depending on how you choose to view it.

And what did I say?

So yes. I did the math.

Also, as I said initially

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I don’t think Mercy need to be the best healer, but she needs to be a fun hero to play just like every hero need to be fun to play. I know a lot of people find Mercy really fun to play as she is now, but personally I find that Valkyrie ruins my enjoyment. I don’t like how for 15 seconds I am hardly needed. Valkyrie dumbs everything down and takes away what little need for skill Mercy had (unless you go Battle Mercy), and it does this for over 10% of your total playtime. I don’t think Mercy need a buff, I think Valkyrie needs a rework (or shorten it to 5 seconds)

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I disagree. The stats might show a discrepancy, but Mercy’s contributions on paper are very different than what they are in practice. The stats can’t help us here. I’d be much more interested to see stats for heals per match in matches where Mercy is paired with another support. In those matches, assuming supports were correctly chosen around the team comp, the other supports’ healing is going to be lower than their overall average per match and Mercy is going to out-heal them. They’ll be more free to focus on utility and offensive support due to Mercy keeping most things healed before they get a chance to do anything about it.

Mercy doesn’t have to kill things (though she can) to contribute as much as the others. Having her pocket a teammate while they secure a kill is just as good (sometimes better, sometimes worse) than having another support help secure that same kill offensively. Like, I know McCree would rather have a damage boost beam on him (that can become a healing beam instantly if it needs to) to secure a kill than have to rely on an Ana helping him shoot at that target. Supplemental damage isn’t always what you need. if it is, then Mercy isn’t the best pick. As always, it’s going to depend on the team comp. What I’m saying is Mercy works well in more comps than she doesn’t. That’s not true for any of the other supports except Zen, though he obviously isn’t picked for his healing output.

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Well, ok.
But I was talking about damage amplified not dealt.

So
x: 1 apple
3x = 817 => x = 272.333…

16 * x = 4357.333…
27 * x = 7353

Why do it the hard way when you can do it the easy way.
EDIT:
Just checked Overbuff (figured OP has their stats from there) and average damage amplified sits right at 817, so they obviously were talking about damage amped.

Additionally

(I didn’t say that I specifically have that amount, but just for the sake of it)

7 * x = 1906.333…
Oops I overestimated myself a little

So apparently the average stats aren’t useful because casual players don’t count when it comes to balance.

Just show the stats for GM or T500 vs the other supports instead of talking about fruit ´ - ` We’re getting nowhere.

They’re useful for reference, but not for the purposes of balancing. You can’t balance around casual players or there won’t be any high-level players.