There’s been a lot of noise with Season 3 and the new patch coming up in Overwatch 2 due to some pretty significant changes and updates. Mercy was one of the heroes that got a major rework and her updates were widely discussed as she is a beloved hero often played in previous seasons.
Many players and critics called the changes to Mercy a big nerf and rendered her unplayable. But, are the reworks on her so bad that she is literally unplayable? Let’s investigate.
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Can Mercy Still Be Played After the Season 3 Patch?
First of all, let’s go through all changes that Mercy received in the Season 3 patch:
- Guardian Angel cd increased from 1.5s to 2.5s
- Holding the backward directional input and canceling the ability with Jump now moves 20% slower
- Healing per second reduced from 55 HP to 45 HP
- Healing of allies under half of their health is increased by 50%.
- The passive spell “Regeneration” is removed
- A new passive “Sympathetic Recovery” was introduced that heals Mercy for 25% of the healing that she does to others.
These changes will definitely guarantee a different and new playstyle for Mercy for sure, but the main thing that caused the uproar among the Mercy players in the Overwatch community was the Guardian Angel cd reduction.
Guardian Angel was an ability that (with the old 1.5s cd) allowed Mercy to easily jump from one critically injured ally to another (or their bodies) and heal or revive them. This was called triage healing and allowed Mercy to save many heroes while avoiding being hit at the same time.
The new and increased cd of 2.5s doesn’t allow her to do her healing like she used to. Sure, you can still jump to battle easily and maybe save one ally, but now you have that one extra second where you need to sit and wait before you can jump to another ally or to safety. Players think that this is the crucial nerf that will get Mercy killed a lot and throw her out of the meta.
New and Fresh Mercy
What I noticed when I was reading through these criticisms of Mercy was a lack of vision toward the future and the possibility of a new and fresh Mercy. Sure, she might not be the exact same hero that she was before, but is that really such a bad thing?
One of the things that will probably be discontinued or just seen on much rarer occasions is the Mercy-Pharah combo. Mercy will not be able to follow up with Pharah as she used to, but maybe this signals some new combos coming.
Looking back at previous seasons I can say that Mercy was perhaps even too easy to play. Just left-clicking and right-clicking allies to heal or boost them up, pressing Shift every time you need to jump to safety or join the battle quickly and activate the ultimate that boosts many heroes at once practically on its own without much aiming or using other skills. I should probably mention that the extra healing she gets now as 25% of the total healed amount will be multiplied by each ally healed during the Valkyrie, which is a mega boost for her if used wisely.
Whoever wishes to play Mercy in Season 3 onwards will have to be a lot more skillful and adaptable. This doesn’t necessarily read as an “impossible” or “unplayable” gameplay just a “more careful” one.
Lastly, time and hundreds and hundreds of matches played will show what new Mercy can and can not do. Until we see her on the battlefield for a while, we can’t write her off as unusable.
We hope you found our article helpful. For more articles on Overwatch 2 see how to check your MMR and if On Fire is coming back to the game. Go to Facebook and follow our page for more exciting news about the latest releases.
