And it has little to do with his balance as an individual character. Rather, he’s one of the characters that makes the game better when they’re strong due to the things they bring to the team.
There’s a few aspects to this:
- he’s the only flanker that is team dependent(i.e. not Tracer), doesn’t use the team as bait to run off and do their own thing(i.e. not DF) and doesn’t require people to completely change what they’re doing (i.e. not Sombra)
- his kit specializes in confirming kills off team damage, which makes it easier on many trash tier DPS
- deflect
It’s probably worth going over what Genji brings in a team in 2021- deflect, dash, and blade. His kill potential is mediocre as he lacks the burst or damage throughput found in other DPS, but he can draw fire with deflect and confirm dash kills off teammate damage. This makes him incredibly team dependent- He’ll never compete with Tracer or DF for assassination nor should he- it’s not what his kit is suited to.
Most other team dependent characters are also bad like Genji, but unlike the others, Genji has dash, meaning that he makes things better for the many DPS that have high damage throughput but struggle with confirming their kills, which are also usually the ones that have difficulty being viable or breaking into the meta. Focus fire is more strictly mandatory for Genji than it is for other DPS, and really, anyone who still plays him knows this.
Deflect prior to the hitbox nerf used to be amazing at saving tanks from burning their damage mitigation early, enabling teammates that struggle to push themselves, or pulling off clutch saves. The pre-OWL Mainland Chinese meta even used to center around this, and there’s definitely potential to bring back that team aspect here.
It’s been a long time since blade was useful by itself, but it combos well, even beyond nanoblade, which is only special because it doesn’t just confirm kills but can actually lead the charge for once. A naked blade effectively changes his kill confirm potential from 50+30 to 50+120, so anything that draws out CC and does 30ish damage can be followed up upon. This means that it would help DPS that do tons of indiscriminate damage and lack reliable single target burst.
I’m not going to throw out concrete numbers since any buffs that don’t overcompensate with nerfs or change his playstyle should help reach these goals- the point here is not to suggest Genji buffs, it’s to show that buffing Genji is good for the meta, and should improve the experience and viable hero selections for non Genji players.
Someone out there is going to lose their mind because a Genji thread dares to exist, so I guess this would be a good time to say that my mains are Ana, Zen, 76, and Brig.
ing is about to happen 
