On Playing Mercy

The other day, I was playing Overwatch 2 with the boyfriend, and I decided to play Mercy for a change. Normally I play Lucio with a bit of Moira depending on my mood, but I thought it’d be good to give Mercy another try. After all, Mercy has changed a lot since I played her back in the now defunct Overwatch 1.

Did I enjoy playing Mercy?

Not really.

I was doing basically nothing but healing. Considering that Mercy has two forms of magical beam energy in her staff, I never really had a chance to use the damage-boosting beam. Everyone was taking damage too often for me to really switch and focus on one player,, especially since tanks are far more aggressive now. Even with the vast number of shields available, that damage still gets through somehow.

However, we did get a game where one of the DPS characters was a Pharah. Which meant that I could just pocket her while we both somewhat floated in the air. I don’t know why this seemed so common, because I always found that you can look up and shoot them down. I tried sticking with the Pharah for a bit but decided it was much better just to heal our tank and our other healer, who was doing the same amount of damage the Pharah was. I’d like to try Pharah for myself but the queue times can be insane for damage dealers.

What annoyed me a ton though was Mercy’s constant optimism. She’s far too happy to be fighting alongside everyone else. Even when she has to pull out her little pistol. I find it so weird that Mercy has a gun that she can manually switch to. It doesn’t do amazing damage but it is kinda solid. Which surprises me. Okay, sure, it’s not as amazing as the Crusader’s Crossbow, but it’s still good enough. Especially for a support class. And while Medic and Mercy do seem to take some glee from all of this, Mercy is supposed to be a good guy, while Medic just oozes sheer evil and joy in his work.

As an aside, Ana really does feel like “Crusader’s Crossbow, the class”.

But the biggest thing Mercy made me do was to make me want to play Team Fortress 2 again. Mercy’s play style feels a bit like Medic’s but worse. You’re charging up something powerful, an ultimate of sorts. But Mercy’s ultimate just makes her fly around, while Medic gives invulnerability for 8 glorious seconds.

Sure, it’s unfair to really try and compare, after all, the games are very different. But Mercy’s gameplay is just so damn close to what you’d do while playing as Medic in TF2. Just with a little more aerial gameplay, where you float up and pocket one person. Then again, Medic and the Quick Fix kinda do the same thing if you are pocketing a Soldier. And Medic holds way more power compared to Mercy. Supports feel like an afterthought in Overwatch, only there to keep the rest of the team to stay alive while hiding behind a tank, while Medic hides behind a Heavy, Demoman or Soldier because he is the most important person on his team.

I suppose there is some good news though. My skills playing Medic do heavily influence my skills playing Mercy in Overwatch. But when it comes to support characters, Lucio and Moira don’t feel like a cheap rip-off of the TF2 Medic and have some genuinely unique elements about them.