The Mercy Problem, and potential solutions (I would love some player/dev feedback on this!)

[Yara-11173]

@Yin-1797

This is hilariously false. No healing performance has changed in years - well before GOATS - Moira’s healing saw a recent reduction and only her healing over time output was increased just before double barrier.

The timing doesn’t matter if they are in the game now. None of the changes are by themselves super important, but when combined, they paint a picture.

And it is absolutely a lie that healing performance didn’t change. There have been dozens and dozens of consistency buffs, would you like me to list them or the patch notes will suffice?

@Yin-1797

The exception, of course, was increasing the potency of Inspire and re-tooling Repair Packs for Brigitte. This is hardly an increase in consistency.

Lie. Ana increased ammo, nano buffs, shots going through allies and nade radius all increase consistency all make Ana’s healing easier to apply.

Brig went on to be one of the most consistent healers in the game thanks to patch 1.31.0.1 and then her rework. Inspire triggers faster, lasts longer, Armor Pack are consistently available.

Moira had buffs to her lingering effect, it lasts longer and her juice regen increased.

@Yin-1797

Decreased from 30 meters to 10 and then later increased to 12/13.

Which makes his effect easier to apply.

@Yin-1797

Not duration, healing output.

Wrong.

1.34.0.1

Biotic Grasp

• Heal over time duration increased from 3 to 4 seconds.

@Yin-1797

All fine-tuning just months after he was released.

Cool. Does that somehow make it not relevant?

@Yin-1797

Repair Packs became a heal over time and heal less now than they did before, but an increase in charges. Barrier was reduced, flail did see a speed increase.

I am aware of what the changes were, thank you.

@Yin-1797

Inspire did not see a duration increase,

Wrong again.

1.31.0.1

• Duration increased from 5 seconds to 6 seconds.

Not only its duration was increased, the triggering cooldown was decreased.

@Yin-1797

and Repair Packs.

Wrong. Repair Pack was always 6 seconds CD. That did not change.

@Yin-1797

All of this - save for Nanoboost - happened before GOATS.

Were they somehow removed from the game and thus aren’t relevant anymore? I guess not.

@Yin-1797

There are two healers that have burst healing; Ana, and Baptiste; all other healers focus on heal over time with high end outputs in some cases.

Moira’s Orb is burst healing as well.

@Yin-1797

Not a good one, and would simply create a problem where Mercy would be picked even less because that decayed healing is too unreliable.

Unless you make it valuable, then she be picked just fine.

@Yin-1797

Keep in mind that any changes or suggestions need to factor in player behavior and what players tend to do or will do based on the performance of said changes.

A good example is how many low-skilled or low-ranked Genji players love to jump and spam RMB because it’s faster, even though it’ll take longer to kill an enemy than running around with poorly aimed, but stronger LMB shots.

Or how players play Sombra now, counter to what Blizzard originally intended when Sombra was first released.

Or how Mercy players played when Revive was an ultimate.

If they want hard pocket and get less value out of a decaying beam that’s their problem, bad players will be bad.