Is it time for another Mercy rework?

Mercy has lengthy been one in every of Overwatch’s most polarising heroes, with a historical past of controversial adjustments and divisive gameplay. She was the primary hero to obtain a rework and is the topic of frequent steadiness adjustments from Blizzard. She’s additionally the goal of neighborhood hatred due to her problematic means of supporting and dangerous stereotypes directed in the direction of her gamers.

Let’s take a look at all of Mercy’s main adjustments by means of the years to attempt to see how Blizzard tuned their in style help. After taking a look at her historical past and speaking about her ache factors, we’ll hopefully know whether or not she deserves one other rework.

Mercy’s journey by means of Overwatch’s historical past is a narrative of dramatic highs and lows, formed by her polarising talents and the metas they outlined. In Overwatch, she started as a controversial determine together with her unique Mass Resurrect final, which allowed her to revive all lifeless teammates immediately. 

This means created the notorious “hide-and-seek” playstyle, the place Mercy gamers would keep away from fight to avoid wasting their final for a game-changing group reset. Regardless of that, Mercy acquired a therapeutic buff in September 2016 to stay aggressive with different helps on the time, particularly throughout Ana’s overpowered state.

The turning level got here in February 2017 with the notorious Moth Meta, a interval the place Mercy grew to become essentially the most dominant hero within the recreation. Mercy was the primary character in Overwatch to obtain a rework, shifting Resurrect to a single-target means with a 30-second cooldown, and changing it with a brand new final known as Valkyrie. Activating Valkyrie grants Mercy flight, enhances her talents, and most significantly, resets Resurrect and reduces it to a 10-second cooldown. 

Blizzard had by accident made her stronger, with Mercy doubling her resurrections in each recreation throughout all talent ranges. This iteration of Mercy boasted a close to 100% choose price in all ranges of play, particularly Overwatch esports, as groups with out her had been at a extreme drawback. 

The oppressive “Moth Meta” lasted for over 5 months. Blizzard responded with a sequence of nerfs, together with eradicating Valkyrie’s means to reset Resurrect and Guardian Angel on use. In January 2018, Valkyrie acquired a number of nerfs that lowered her effectiveness, similar to decreasing its period and making it dangerous to Resurrect in the midst of the combat. 

Mercy’s presence had stabilised, however she struggled to compete with helps who supplied extra utility and carry potential. Regardless of that, she remained a preferred choose for her distinctive playstyle and accessibility. Nevertheless, Mercy’s popularity by no means recovered due to her oppressive period and her controversial playstyle to pocket and allow heroes like Pharah, Echo, Widowmaker, and Ashe. 

Overwatch 2 noticed many adjustments to Mercy’s signature fluid motion. In Overwatch, Mercy gamers developed a tech known as “superjump” that allowed them to bounce high into the air after utilizing Guardian Angel. Blizzard applied this tech into a capability through the Overwatch 2 beta, guaranteeing a superjump that shoots Mercy into the stratosphere.

The primary iteration was clunky as gamers didn’t have any management of the peak, making them a simple shot for the enemy whereas additionally disconnecting the beam. In July 2022 (beta), Blizzard modified it by including a meter that expenses up whereas Guardian Angel is energetic, which implies that the additional Mercy flies, the extra launch pace she’ll have. These accessibility adjustments lowered Mercy’s already low talent flooring and punished veterans who mastered and adopted her fluid motion. 

From this level, Mercy felt clunkier or heavier as she wanted to depend on charging her jumps, eradicating her means to slingshot and superjump from brief distances. It bought even worse because the steadiness group added longer cooldowns to Guardian Angel and motion tech whereas making it slower.

February 2023 noticed a smooth rework for Mercy that modified her id right into a triage healer targeted on saving low well being teammates. Mercy’s therapeutic was decreased, however in return, she had 50% elevated therapeutic for allies beneath half well being. She additionally acquired a brand new passive known as Sympathetic Restoration that lets her heal herself for therapeutic executed together with her employees, letting her outheal threats like Winston. 

The triage rework was a step in the fitting path because it incentivised Mercy to play battle medic and utilise her enjoyable motion to prime everybody up. Sadly, the therapeutic output was so robust that Blizzard reverted the change two months later with out even making an attempt to tweak the numbers. The developer comment stated, “There wasn’t a satisfying center floor the place we might scale back the efficiency of this impact whereas nonetheless having it really feel impactful, so we’re reverting it.”

Blizzard has tried balancing Mercy in all the pieces besides her most polarising means, harm enhance. Sojourn dominated Overwatch 2 within the first two seasons and was balanced to really feel much less oppressive, however her nerfs had been an oblique buff to Mercy. The Swiss physician noticed an enormous enhance in playtime as a pocket for Sojourn in season 3, enabling her to succeed in one-shot thresholds but once more. 

Mercy’s solely adjustment to the blue beam was decreasing its harm enhance to 25% from 30% in August 2023, which was reverted a yr later. The final enhance to each hero’s well being pool in February 2024 additional pushed Mercy away from therapeutic, cementing her standing as a problematic pocket harm booster.

Mercy stays one in every of Overwatch’s most contentious heroes because of a mixture of passive design, accessibility, and meta-warping utility that creates persistent steadiness points. Helps are valued for his or her utility and harm stress that they supply to the group. However as a substitute of whipping out her pistol, Mercy allows her teammates with harm enhance.

A lot of her controversy is as a result of the non-interactive zero-risk playstyle of pocketing her DPS within the security of the backline gives a lot worth for no talent. It’s an enormous situation in ladder matches, because it’s irritating to cope with no dependable communication. Blizzard has lowered the talent ceiling of veteran Mercy gamers by gutting her motion and therapeutic, additional encouraging this playstyle.

As a help, Mercy lives or dies by her group. A superb group feels unstoppable with Mercy, and a nasty group would profit extra from the carry potential of different helps, like Kiriko or Juno. The fixed nerfs to Resurrect additionally make it troublesome for her to drag off a clutch revival in the midst of a busy teamfight. 

When Mercy’s teammates don’t make the most of her harm enhance and she will’t discover constant resurrects, then she’s successfully ineffective. Her therapeutic can’t sustain with the excessive burst harm in Overwatch 2, even with Valkyrie.

Mercy gamers who fail to recognise that she isn’t useful within the group composition and refuse to modify are a part of the issue. Sadly, there are a massive variety of gamers who one-trick her and play different helps means under their present rank. 

There’s a stigma with Mercy that she’s boosted or enjoying above her deserved rank. There’s a modicum of reality to this relating to one-trick, however expert, versatile help gamers will rank up regardless.

Lastly, and we’ll lay it down as plainly as potential, the neighborhood hates Mercy due to the misogyny prevalent in gaming communities. Mercy is stereotyped as a personality favoured by girls and exacerbates the entire beforehand talked about frustrations of the neighborhood together with her. It even involves the purpose the place Mercy gamers are mocked and banned by their very own teammates for wanting to select her.

The primary weekly recall from Blizzard included an insider take a look at essentially the most banned characters in Overwatch 2. For PC throughout all ranks, Mercy is the second most banned help after Ana, however for console, she’s primary. She turns into much less of an issue in PC in increased talent brackets, however she nonetheless stays essentially the most banned help in masters+ on console.

Whereas Mercy could also be problematic, she’s tolerable in comparison with prime bans like Zarya, Doomfist, and Wrecking Ball. Count on her bans to rise when one in every of her greatest companions, like Sojourn and Pharah, turn into stronger. Earlier than this knowledge was launched, the outcry was so extreme that the neighborhood would suppose that she’s permabanned like Sombra, however the knowledge reveals that’s not the case.

Mercy wants a smooth rework to make her extra enjoyable to play and honest to play in opposition to. There are a number of concepts to make Mercy extra pleasant for the participant and honest for the enemy. Firming down the frequency of injury enhance, similar to placing it on a useful resource meter and gained by means of therapeutic, comes up incessantly as a suggestion. 

Mantis from Marvel Rivals has a harm enhance, however isn’t hated due to how she wants to decide on between therapeutic and harm, in addition to hitting headshots to shortly replenish stacks.

Mercy’s motion is essentially the most enjoyable a part of her equipment, and gamers needs to be incentivised to make use of it extra. The triage therapeutic was an ideal idea and wanted tuning, however was deleted prematurely. Triage therapeutic might solely apply to Valkyrie to assist together with her maintain throughout her final.

Blizzard has been experimenting with different ideas in Stadium mode, and a few of them needs to be applied in its stay model. For instance, Threads of Destiny chains to your earlier goal for 3 seconds, at 50% effectiveness, which inspires Mercy to heal and enhance a number of targets on the similar time. Triage Unit lets Mercy heal low-health allies extra after utilizing Guardian Angel on them.

Overwatch is a hero shooter, and Mercy is a singular, in style, and well-loved character. The discourse round her focuses on making her balanced and aggressive, however takes away components that make her enjoyable and distinctive. 

She has ache factors primarily surrounding her harm enhance and passive playstyle, however nerfing motion and therapeutic received’t make her extra interactive. For Mercy’s smooth rework, Blizzard must lean into her mobility and make her the angelic battle medic gamers deserve.