Overwatch's Mercy is Dead

Overwatch’s Mercy is dead. And Blizzard has killed her. Mercy was killed slowly, meticulously, as if with malice. Mercy, one of the most popular characters in Overwatch has been reduced to a shadow of who she is, so far removed from the character that many fell in love with. The worst part is that this is all an odyssey that never needed to take place. This was a senseless murder.

In August of 2017, Blizzard announced that Mercy’s abilities would be undergoing a massive rework. This was a change that no Mercy players asked for. Most didn’t want any changes to the angelic healer. A small few suggested adding another ability to her arsenal, to bring her in line with the number of regular abilities other characters had. Though this would complicate the control scheme on console, but that’s an unnecessary digression.

The Rework

Instead, Blizzard did something much more drastic. Mercy’s iconic ultimate ability Resurrect—which allowed her to bring back up to 5 dead allies in a certain range—was turned into a regular ability on a long cooldown. The longest in the game. And rather than being able to revive up to five teammates (often called Mass Rez) was limited to 1 singular ally.

In Rez’s place, Mercy was given a new ultimate ability. This new ult, Valkyrie, allowed Mercy to fly freely in any direction at almost twice her walking speed. Mercy’s healing beam and damage boosting beams, normally only usable on one ally at a time, would now chain between allies in range. The beam range was also increased. Mercy’s passive ability, where she regenerates her own health after not taking damage, has its cooldown eliminated in Valkyrie form. While still in Valkyrie (often Valk) for short) Mercy’s pistol, usually only used in self-defense, had unlimited ammunition without needing to reload, an increased fire rate, and increased damage. Guardian Angel, the ability that lets Mercy glide to a targeted ally (or the location where a dead ally lays) had extended range in Valk. And finally, critically, Valkyrie reset the rez cooldown and reduced it to 10 seconds during Valk. Resurrect’s radius also decreased to 5 meters.

What this last part means is that when timed right, a Mercy could Rez, activate Valkyrie if available, use Rez again immediately, and then also Rez once more in 10 seconds. This took Rez from being able to restore up to 5 allies to essentially 3. And it was fun! Flying around the map to downed allies and bringing them back up was a blast, and it felt natural.

The Rationale

Blizzard’s original stated goal of the rework was to reduce a tactic called the “hide and Rez.” As game director Jeff Kaplan explained in the developer comments, the idea behind hide and Rez was that the Mercy would stop healing her team, let them all die, hide from the fight, and use Mass Resurrect to bring them all back. They believed it was antithetical for a healer to stop healing and hide away from a fight. Meanwhile, decent Mercys would only step back or take cover when a fight was lost and would then use Rez to turn the tide. Most of the time it wasn’t feasible or useful to wait until all 5 teammates were dead. Rez 2 to 3 while the rest of the team is still fighting to flip the odds was almost always the better play. Like I did here a long time ago on a server far, far away. So, they made all these changes to alter player behavior. Alright. We’ll come back to that.

Demoralizing

Blizzard also said that it was demoralizing to play against Resurrect. You worked hard to kill the other team, so it’s not fun to have them be brought back. Okay, so what? It’s a PvP game. Getting killed is demoralizing. Watching a Junkrat wipe your team is demoralizing. Any game changing play is demoralizing. That’s the whole point. That’s the point of ultimates. They are supposed to be able to change the outcome of a game. And when it happens to you, it’s going to feel bad.

And why stop there? Doesn’t it feel bad when you’re killing a Reinhart and he’s getting healed so you can’t finish the elimination? Let’s just get rid of healing altogether so no DPS player ever feels bad. They’re a sensitive bunch, you know. Come on, this is the game that turned an aim bot and wall hacks into ultimate abilities. This is the game where Roadhog used to be able to hook you through buildings and time and space itself.

Many Mercy players adapted, some probably more quickly than others. In this state, Mercy’s ultimate was still pretty much Resurrect though. This was a problem. A huge problem. Because while it was enjoyable to use, Rez as a regular ability doesn’t work. That’s why it was an ultimate in the first place. Rez as an ability is broken. Mercy was grossly overpowered.

Thus, the nerfs began.

The Nerf Express

Since the rework, Mercy has received 13 consecutive nerfs. 13. Thirteen. XIII. That is insane. Not just in testing. Those are 13 changes that affected the live game for one character in a calendar year. No other character has been changed anywhere close to that much. Not even Symmetra, who has now been given two whole reworks two years in a row. 13 consecutive nerfs to one character in a game’s short lifespan would be unacceptable. But in a year? Absolutely ridiculous.

I won’t go through all the nerfs, because it would be tedious, draining, and most of all pointless, other than to illustrate the above. It is a total development failure that a character rework would need that many changes after being put in place. Mercy was beta tested for a year, two years after the game was released, on live servers and in esports competition. Even for the sake of argument, let’s say Mercy is in a good balanced spot that everyone is happy with (hah), it would still be a failure for taking so long to sort out for any developer. One with the history, talent, size, and pedigree as Blizzard? Laughable. A joke

Instead, let’s see how Mercy currently looks: a useless skeleton where a competent, fun healer used to be. Valkyrie is now 10 seconds, down from 15. Guardian Angel no longer has increased range or speed in Valk.

And then Rez. Hooboy. Deep breath. Rez has a 30 second cooldown, doubling the next longest in the game. Rez has a 1.75 second cast time that feels like an eternity, can be interrupted, stopped, frozen, hacked, and otherwise impeded if Mercy feels a slight breeze. Getting killed or interrupted before the Rez gets off starts the cooldown no matter what. During the Rez Mercy is also practically immobile, as movement is decreased by 50%. Move out of the 5 meter range? Rez doesn’t go off and you lose that cooldown. Oh yeah, the Guardian Angel cooldown doesn’t reset with Rez now, so you can’t get away even if you manage to Rez anyway.

I feel gross just writing all of that down. How about one positive thing to cleanse the palate? Mercy is able to glide past the targeted teammate if you jump midflight during Guardian Angel. Originally a bug, it was retained and implemented as an actual feature after monumental support, the lone instance of Blizzard listening to Mercy players. What a concept. Frequently called the “bunny hop,” this allows the player to do some really neat things with Mercy’s movement. Her mobility was always the most engaging part of her kit, and this addition only increased the variables and choices at Mercy’s disposal. For example, at the right angle, Mercy can skyrocket straight into the air like a missile, getting her out of harm’s way. It’s difficult, takes some practice, but is very satisfying to pull off. As ideal abilities should be.

I Need Healing

But now for the most recent change, the killing blow. Last month, Mercy’s healing was reduced from 60HP per second to 50HP per second. Blizzard half-walked this back by giving Valkyrie 60HP/s again. Not only did they call it a “buff.” But also “amazing.” To go along with it, Mercy’s ultimate charges slightly faster, but this is only to compensate for her crippled healing output. It needs to charge faster because it’s harder to get the ult through healing now. This is not a buff. It is a slight correction. It is not amazing. What is amazing is how patronizing this change is.

This last nerf is just a gigantic slap in the face and really, makes no sense. Mercy had 60HP/s before the Valkyrie rework. It was never a problem before. Why now? Why now when Rez is still the most problematic ability in the game?

Now it’s almost impossible to use Mercy as a healer. Think about how ridiculous that sounds. It’s not hyperbole either. It’s even more of a joke considering the latest patch notes insist that Mercy is still the go-to for raw healing. And that couldn’t be further from the truth. Mercy’s healing is now officially lower than Ana and Moira. Even on console, where aiming with Ana is much more difficult. And Ana’s current pick rate is higher than Mercy’s ever was at her broken, overpowered state. Mercy is my second most played character and I’m pretty sure I can get my healing higher on Lucio. Same thing with Briggite in the right context. Of course those are area-of-effect heals. But that “raw” healing is still higher. Mercy, who is supposed to be the pure healer, is near the bottom of support heals. Need to solo-heal? You cannot, under any circumstance, use Mercy right now. You’re better off with 6 DPS characters.

If you needed raw healing, why wouldn’t you play Moira, who easily heals more and can only heal or do a generally negligible amount of damage? All the other supports offer way more utility. And believe me, the last thing I’m calling for are support nerfs. Leave the other supports alone. Ana is finally viable on console. But this just illustrates how far deep in the ground Mercy is right now.

The Current Problems

Okay, so Mercy has been radically altered. So what exactly is the problem? Aside from her gimped healing, Mercy is not currently the character Blizzard claims she is. She is not the character her core design is supposed to be. Mercy is meant to be a mobile healer, dodging attacks, flying all over the battlefield to help allies in trouble. That’s why Valkyrie with multiple Rez uses was fun:

It fit the core design. It was too much, it was too powerful. What doesn’t fit the character is freezing, standing in place to try to bring up one ally in the slowest of slow motion.

Rez sucks to use. You do not feel powerful using it. You stand there as still as a statue, a sitting duck no matter what you do. In order to have a successful Rez you either need to be vigorously protected by your team (good luck there) or you have to guess what? Hide. You need to turn a corner and hide away from the fight to Rez. And you know what else you aren’t doing while you’re locked into slow Rez? You sure as hell aren’t healing your team. Odd how that’s the case, isn’t it. Blizzard replaced Hide and Rez with Hide and Rez where the Mercy isn’t engaged in the fight, isn’t healing, and lets her team die. Only now they stay dead.

Valkyrie

Then Valkyrie itself. After the nerfs Valkyrie serves no purpose. It is straight-up not an ultimate ability. It was only an ultimate ability when it enhanced Resurrect. Because Resurrect was always the real ultimate. In its current state, Valkyrie is the weakest AoE heal, greatly surpassed by Zenyatta’s Transcendence which heals at 300HP/s and also gives Zen invulnerability. A quick High Noon or Tactical Visor gets rid of Valkyrie Mercy in about half of a sneeze. Unless the Mercy is hiding. Which she isn’t supposed to do according to Blizzard. But don’t worry, Valkyrie is also a weaker version of Orisa’s Supercharger which has the distinction of being the most boring ultimate in the game. And that’s only because Orisa cannot currently fly. I haven’t checked the latest PTR, maybe they slipped that change in. Supercharger increased damage by 50% and somehow has better range than Mercy. Mercy’s boost is only 30%.

But Mercy can fly, right? Isn’t that fun? No, not really. Popping Valk means heading as high in the sky as you can and just waiting there for 10 seconds, alternating between healing and damage boosting. The same things you would be doing anyway. Valkyrie, with its increased beam range, encourages you to get as far away from your team as possible. Most likely still hiding because the other team wants to kill you. And while you’re in the sky or hiding you might get a great view of your team dying, as a 60HP/s AoE heal is not near enough to keep them alive through coordinated efforts like an enemy Graviton Surge. Zen’s Transcendence and Lucio’s Sound Barrier can actually accomplish that. Moira’s Coalescence at 140HP/s can too, depending on the situation. And Mercy’s damage boost was even stealth-nerfed recently too. Damage boost now no longer affects Hanzo’s ult. To go along with Junkrat, D.va, and other character’s whose ults cannot be combo’d with Mercy’s blue beam. Blizzard thought Hanzo was too strong, so in lieu of changing him, they nerfed Mercy and called it a bug fix. For a bug that was in the game since launch. Sure.

The Fun Factor

Valkyrie is lame and supports the exact playstyle Blizzard said Mass Rez encouraged. Congratulations, Blizzard. Mission accomplished. Blizzard’s true reason for hobbling Rez is because they wanted to limit its effectiveness, and really limiting its potential in their true end game: The Overwatch League. The development team caved in to esports teams and Twitch streamers that propagated the idea of Hide and Rez. The League isn’t as big as they thought it would be. Those same streamers all abandoned the game for Fortnite anyway. So they made it as inconvenient, next to worthless as possible to appease literally, by Blizzard’s own numbers, a vocal minority within 1% of your userbase. Sound logic. Make one of your most popular characters unfun and ineffective. Don’t worry, Mercy’s win-rate is 50%, so she has to be balanced. That math checks out. You know what math also checks out? Mercy’s pick rate dropped like a lead balloon after the 50HP/s nerf across all skill levels and systems.Mercy is not fun or engaging to play and is only effective when you’re pocket damage boosting someone else like a Pharah, Widow, Hanzo, or Soldier. They get to have fun while you fly around. It’s also next to impossible to get a “Play of the Game” as Mercy now. Every other character at least has a chance, even Ana and the other supports. “Play of the Game” is broken in general, but Mercy is no longer capable of plays that are worthy of it. Unless you pop Valk and go on a killing spree. Again, antithetical to the core of the character. Trying to play Mercy goes unrewarded. She should not have to be overpowered to be rewarding, or at the very least, interesting to play.

Solutions

I have become radicalized. I have read the Mercy literature. I am now part of the resistance. Revert Mercy.

Blizzard can’t possibly keep toying with one of their most well-known characters, a character they could have easily put on the box art. I know that Jeff Kaplan said they won’t revert, but how about you meet us halfway then. Return Mass Rez but remove Mercy’s invulnerability and allow it to be interrupted, hacked, CC’d to hell. Even give it a line-of-sight requirement so you cannot Rez through walls or other big obstacles. Put Valkyrie as an additional ability, where Rez currently is. Have it last only 4 seconds or so. This gives Mercy a small little escape as well as a short burst AoE heal. Something like a 9 second cooldown. Torbjorn’s recent rework just the other week accomplished almost the same thing. His ultimate Molten Core was renamed and placed as an ability with a cooldown that gives him increased firing/movement speed and armor for a very short duration to increase his survivability. I can easily see Blizzard doing the same thing for Mercy.

To rub it in Mercy players’ faces just a little bit more, the dev team decided not to remove Mass Rez from the boss version of Mercy in the Junkenstein’s Revenge PvE Halloween mode. Meanwhile Symmetra has her new ultimate in that mode, and her ult was changed so much more recently than Mercy’s. Hilarious, Blizzard.

The official Overwatch forums are bursting with creative suggestions if Blizzard really just wants to finally remove Rez as well. And there’s a ton of great thoughts on how the rework truly hasn’t worked, like this awesome post that goes even deeper than I did. And Aria Rose on YouTube has an excellent series of videos that got me angry about Mercy all over again.

Resurrect Mercy. Heroes don’t have to die.