Overwatch Mercy Guide

(Intro)
	This is not a pro-level guide, the goal of this is to get the most out of Mercy. This is not a guide for people wanting a quick tip. You will get that, but the guide will be for people willing to invest time into improving at what they enjoy spending their time doing; Playing Mercy.


(What I feel to be a very important setup for the rest of the guide)
	Just because you have ridden a bike hundreds of times doesn't mean you know how to ride a bike like a pro does. This is how you should think of Mercy. You can play her for literally thousands of hours and still perform poorly at the fundamentals of the Hero. I know many players who have played Mercy for over 500 hours, but play her exactly the same as they did 20 hours in. Imagine how well they would play if they spent that 500 hours striving to be better? Instead they just "played" her. They went with the flow. This guide will be about going against that flow. Improving yourself will mean going against the flow of how you know to play Mercy at a basic level.



(Script's skeleton)
Mercy's kit, and why this makes her unique
	Mercy is a unique support in that her functionality is channeled, so she can only do one thing at a time. This means that making the correct choice on who to tether to can win or lose you fights. She's a support hero at her core, supporting other people in performing their roles; this generally means she won't ever be directly contributing damage to a fight.
	Mercy's Primary fire is her healing beam, which heals consistently 60 health per second. For quick context, Zen heals 30 health per second. Her secondary fire is a Damage Amp, it will Amp damage by 30%. For a quick example, a Pharah rocket does 120 damage, when Amped it will do 156 damage. The Amp does not need to be applied when the rocket is fired, but when the rocket hits. Both the primary and secondary fire have a 15 meter range.
	Her (only) ability is her Flight; Guardian Angel. This allows her to fly to any teammate in line-of-sight up to 30 meters away. We'll get more into this later.
	Mercy, unlike many other heroes, has two passive abilities. Angelic Descent is the name for both. First part being while holding Jump, Mercy while in the air will glide slowly, making it very useful when combined with Guardian Angel. The second part being Mercy's passive health Regen. Similar to shields, only it's applied to Mercy's entire health pool. After Mercy has not taken damage for 1 second, she will start to heal for 20 health per second.
	Mercy's ultimate ability is resurrect. Resurrect will revive all fallen teammates within 15 meters of Mercy in every direction.
	Also, her gun exists.

Mercy-specific settings + sensitivity and how this affects your play (Speed of turning, Not having to look at who your are tethered to, learning what is going on)
	Like many other heroes in the game, Mercy has a few Hero-specific settings. Only in Mercy's case, she has 5.
	"Toggle Beam Connection" Means that instead of holding down Primary Fire to heal someone, when On you can simply click on the people you want to heal or Amp once.
	"Guardian Angel Prefers Beam Target" - This being default on, meaning that you can only Guardian Angel to whoever you are tethered to even without looking at them. But with it off, it allows you to tether to anyone you want, and fly to anyone you want. Giving you immense amount of freedom.
	"Toggle Guardian Angel" was a setting added a couple months after the Game's release. Instead of using Guardian Angel to where the person was when you flew to them or activating the ability again to cancel it by default, having this Off allows for you to hold and let go whenever you are done using it. We'll get more into this later.
	"{Ability} Sensitivity" Sensitivity in this context is used for the Diamond reticle that is displayed over your Teammates, whether for aiming your Guardian Angel, or your staff's lock. Reducing this means that you have to be more accurate over the people you want to use your abilities on. Instead of flying to the wrong person, or tethering to the wrong person in the middle of your whole team.
	"Sensitivity" You might be thinking we just covered that, but this is in regard to your actual view. Find a sensitivity that is high, but that you are comfortable with. Mercy is a hero that doesn't require precise aim, but benefits from high reaction time greatly, between going in for a res and getting back out, to observing an the map and seeing where your team is around you.

Why your pistol should be used almost never
	Mercy's pistol should never be your first choice. Mercy's whole kit is designed to support her team, and using her pistol is meant as a last resort. Whether you are "going to die anyway" or you need that last few percent of your ult, neither of those cases are default situations you will be in.
	Some like to use their pistol before enemy pushes to get free ult, but keep in mind how much ult likewise you will be giving their supports.
	There are those who say you get more ult charge from it than Amp, and you "do more damage than damage amp would" - But keep in mind, yes damage amping gives you less ult charge than shooting, but by you damage amping someone who doesn't have their ultimate on your team helps both of you get your ults, rather than just you, while allowing you to stay in better positions. Swapping to your pistol just generally wastes time where you could otherwise be healing or Amping your team. Lastly don't use it or tether when you are hiding; a single shot will give away your position.

Decision making based on both your team's comp, the enemy team's comp, the map, and if you are attacking or defending (This determines everything)
	Decision making is a very key job for any hero in the game, but Mercy in particular can be punished heavily for it if done improperly.
	Making decisions based on who you need to stay near on your team, not only to pocket them, have them protect you, or you protect them from someone focusing them down is very important. From example, if they have a Widowmaker on attack, that will completely change your play-style to be more passive and careful. Knowing where to be on the map in these situations is key to surviving as Mercy. You will have "homework" on this at the end of the video.
	Understanding the heroes in the game and figuring out who on your team will benefit most from your help against their team can be massive in helping your team win. Allowing you to maybe make up for a "counter". Such as a Winston jumping on a Widowmaker, you can heal 60 a second, and he deals 60 a second, meaning you can instantly "reverse-counter" one of their players, making them useless. Making these decisions quickly can win games.

Pendulum mentality +/+ GA is your best friend, in/Res/out plays
	Guardian Angel is a powerful ability, allowing you to go around quickly helping your team. With it having only a 2-second cool-down, this allows you to be the most mobile character in the match. Use it often. This ties into knowing where your teammates are, knowing where they are means having more options to fly to when an enemy comes to kill you. When Guardian Angel is set to Hold, it allows you to instead of flying to people then tethering to them, you can simply close the distance. Guardian Angel has 30 meter range, tether has 15 meter range. This meaning you can just hold until you get close enough to tether to them and let go. Not only being safer, but also wasting less time with Guardian Angel's use. You can fly close enough, tether, and instantly look to who you are going to fly to next. Because of Guardian Angel Prefers Beam target Off, and the fact that Tether has a 2 second grace period on both distance and breaking Line-of-sight, you can fly away and for free you can heal them for 2 seconds while you are already probably at the person you are going to heal next.
	Now, there's an important factor at play here, when Mercy Resurrects, Guardian Angel's cool-down gets reset. Meaning the instant you Resurrect, you can fly away. With a high sensitivity, this makes for instant get-aways. It's a Pendulum mentality, going between your teammates back and forth, helping those in need.
	"Abusing" this to it's fullest will allow you to be a more efficient player.


Positioning in regards to your own team comp
	This is Key for Mercy in many ways. Whenever you are playing Mercy, you need to have people you can fall back on, or have your "default" - Knowing who you can pendulum back and forth to is important to making Mercy very efficient. Generally you will be going back and forth between your tanks and your other healer, giving you room and options.

Positioning in regards to the enemy's comp
	Understanding what the enemy's heroes are is very important to your survival. If they have a Roadhog, staying at a range or around a corner, much like how you would when they have a Widowmaker, can greatly increase your chances of living. Which is the point, having res available for those on your team who end up dying.
	Always try to keep your max tether range distance from your teammates. This gives you the option to as soon as a flanker comes to kill you, you have 10-15 meters to fly to your team, buying you a couple seconds, while also using Guardian Angel to evade. This is especially effective on a Genji, who uses his dash to get to you, where you can then fly away and now he wasted his dash.

Determining who is the most important on your team
	Determining who is most important on your team can affect the way you play, and it should. Knowing who you should "default" to is important. For example, Soldier 76 is a Reliable hero right to default to. He not only benefits from Amp and healing all the time, but he himself benefits from high-ground, making him great to be your Anchor, allowing you a place to run to and heal. Widowmaker is a pretty reliable option for the same reasons. It's about who you can help the most on your team at any given time, while also getting benefits from them.

Supports supporting the supports
	Since Mercy is the support that supports everyone on her team, that includes your other support. Knowing how to properly interact with them is important, and sometimes that should be the only thing you do. Knowing when to is key. Keeping tabs on ultimates is something you should also do, however knowing if your other support has their ultimate can change how you heal, allowing them to generate their ultimate when you can spare the time.
		Ana - Ana is a very effective primary healer, but when combined with Mercy can be very potent. Whenever Ana uses her biotic-grenade, if Mercy focus-heals them, Mercy can get her ultimate significantly faster. Damage-boosting nano-boosted targets is significantly more potent than with just nano, but also healing people while nano'd is twice as impactful, as you are "effectively" healing them twice as much, since they take half damage while nano'd.
	Lucio - Lucio is a great hero, but it's mainly for his speed that many like him. But, when combined with Mercy, it brings out many of his strengths even more. Whether it be from speed allowing Mercy to get from person to person faster, allowing him to speed even more, or soak up more healing from 200hp heroes over time while Mercy stays on your tanks, etc. Having both support be very mobile allows for the entire team to be very aggressive, not just Lucio as the only support up front. Working with a Lucio regarding his ultimate is very impactful, either by him saving his ult for after res, securing a fight, or ultimating so Mercy has time to heal everyone shielded by his ultimate.
		Symmetra - Symmetra is definitely the odd-ball here, but it's important to know how to work with her. As you will sometimes find yourself in a situation with her as the solo healer. One aspect to know and understand about Symmetra is how her main weapon works; It charges up a "level" every second it is attached to someone, from 30(7.5x4) to 60(15x4) to 120(30x4) damage per second but in intervals of 4 per second, knowing this, you should heal your Symmetra until she has been on someone for 3 seconds THEN damage boost them, you get way more value out of it that way, isn't cut significantly by armor, and she is more likely to live. Her ultimate however changes everything, but in two completely separate ways. Her teleporter can allow Mercy to either be more picky with her res, since a single person dying isn't a big deal, or allow her to be more free with it, knowing that she is solo healing; so getting an immense amount of ult charge, and that allows you to res someone in the moment. Or, Symmetra's shield gen. Her shield gen allows Mercy to take more time getting to each person to heal them, making each person on the team more effective, while alse giving Mercy more HP to heal for more ult charge.
	Zenyatta - Zenyatta is a very interesting support in that he's more of a DPS in many ways that just so happens to also heal. But knowing that, asking for a Zenyatta to pocket the mercy with healing allows Mercy to effectively be a better Solo-healer, while also having an immense amount of additional damage on the team. Amping a Zenyatta can be one of the most potent things to amp in the game if the Zen has good aim, and keeps focus on a single target at a time. Zenyatta's ultimate is unique in all this, in that it allows Mercy to focus on damage boosting, and her own positioning knowing that the team will stay alive without her healing. Whether it be after a res to "secure a fight" similar to Lucio's sound barrier example, or that it allows the Zen to ensure the Mercy stays alive to see the end of the fight after resurrecting.
	*** Show a Discorded Damage-amped zen shooting a Roadhog


Changing up who you "pocket" quickly / Why Pharmercy can be why you lose
	"Pocketting" is a term thrown around a lot in the game when referring to Mercy, knowing what it is and how to think about it mid-match can change up how you play. "Pocketting" as it is properly defines is more of a core preference to help a specific person over the rest of your team. Generally speaking, this is a terrible thing to do by default, and can cost matches. A Mercy should try to keep LoS on as many teammates as possible, if you happen to be pocketting a single person, you are limiting your impact on the team, and pulling yourself away from even the option to resurrect often times. Knowing the VALUE a person can give to a team is important, if that person can not deliver that value, you are better of leaving them on their own to do their own thing, while helping the other 4 people on your team. A good example of this is Pharmercy; It can be a powerful thing, but if your Pharah is not getting anything accomplished, or getting countered without swapping off, you are wasting your time with them.


What Armor is; Healing in regards to certain enemy heroes' damage; "Outhealing" damage - And knowing what is low priority healing thanks to Shields

	(On screen)

	Ignoring Falloff damage

	Tracer Bullet
	6 Bodyshot
	12 Headshot (x2)
	3 Armor Bodyshot (-50%)
	7 Armor Headshot (x2 --> -5)

	Soldier Bullet
	20 Bodyshot
	40 Headshot (2x)
	15 Armor Bodyshot (-5)
	35 Armor Headshot (x2 --> -5)

	Armor: Armor reduced damage by 5 unless it is below 10, in which it will cut it in half.
	Now, why is this soo important to include in a Mercy guide? Well, knowing how much damage is reduced in certain situations could help you prioritize who to heal. If a tracer is shooting your Reinhardt, keeping his armor up is important. But if a Pharah is shooting your Reinhardt, there is less you can do about that, and armor means less.


When to damage boost
	Knowing when to amp can be one of the most important things to know in moment-to-moment play of Mercy, but knowing when to amp also means knowing when to heal.
	I'm trying not to give a lot of examples here, but one is a Mccree Vs. a Soldier. If you are pocketting a Soldier, you should amp him to get the kill quicker, but if it's your Mccree, you should heal to give your Mccree more time over-all to kill the soldier because of soldier's over-time damage rather than burst damage.
	Knowing who does what damage, and at what range, will help you determine who needs amp to either be more effective, finish off a kill, or finish a 1v1 quicker. When a hero is going against another hero of the same type, more often then not it's better to amp, unless the person you are thinking of amping has shown to have poor aim, healing is likely more ideal. So while knowing damage values are important, paying attention to the performance of your teammates and the enemy can be the key factor in deciding when to amp.


Damage boosting and key heroes to do it on and why
	Knowing when to damage boost someone may be more clear cut than knowing who on your team to damage boost, two very different things. They key in most cases is knowing who on your team is in effective range on doing the most damage to who, who gets the most value out of your boost. A hero with area-of-effect damage to hit multiple heroes at once that is right next to the enemy team, or a hero with no fall-off damage that can see the entire enemy team. Seeing who benefits from what on your team will help you get the most value out of your +30% at all times.
	*** Show a reinhardt hitting everyone on Gibraltar payload defense in streets phase, then a Widowmaker getting kills on attack shooting onto that defending team while pocketted.

Using res often (And knowing when to hold onto it)
	Res can be one of the most powerful ultimates in the game, but that doesn't mean it needs to be a 5 man res, or even a 2 man res to be powerful. There is a fine balance in knowing when to res, often you can either wait for the full team to die, then the first person who died didn't make it so it becomes a 4-man res, or, there is a chance just resurrecting that first person could have changed the fight enough to not need the res in the first place.
	But, that doesn't mean a solo res is the optimal choice in all situations at all. Knowing when the enemy team has ultimates is very key in this, if you know they have team-wiping ults, save it and get cover.

When team ressing into a enemy grav can be good
	But, on that, there's another factor at play here. You could get team wiped in streets phase of a payload map, and knowing they have, say, Gravaton and Dragons, res anyway, you guys get wiped again, but if you are able to touch the point before it is capped, they should in theory have almost no ultimates left, and your team will have only spent res trading for 4 of their ultimates, maybe even more. This is a technique based on game knowledge that you will have to develop over time.

When to solo rez/Who is important, or WHEN they are important
	Knowing when to solo res can be critical to winning games, generally tanks bring more value to fights, to protect the people still alive and to generate resurrect again in the fight. Maybe you need your other healer back, someone down has their ultimate that can win that fight, or maybe you just need your damage back to deal with a specific enemy hero.


Understanding sustain on why Mercy is better than Ana in many cases (Shields/DM/Reload/Accuracy)
	Mercy and Zenyatta are the only heroes who can heal past Barriers, not including Zen's Transcendence. Mercy is the most "Reliable" healer in the game. No accuracy, reloading, barriers or Defense Matrix to worry about. So this Means Mercy can heal through things Lucio and Ana simply cannot.

Overtime ressing
	So this is where we deep dive an interesting point to be had with Mercy. In 2CP, Payload and Hybrid mode types, if the match is in overtime the respawn time goes from 10 to 12 seconds instantly for both teams, but additionally if you're the attacking team and you outnumber the amount of enemy players on the objective, the defending team's respawn time will ramp up to 18 seconds. This has an immense amount of potential if any of it is coordinated. You can tell your team to wait till overtime instead of attacking in the last 20 seconds for example, so any kill you get means a 18 second respawn instead of a 10 second respawn if done after overtime has started. While this doesn't give you the chance of more time in the next round, this will however at-least give your team a much higher chance at completing the objective. Now, this in reverse means that as a defender, you have a LOT more time to get a full team res to try and force back an attacker's push, but is not recommended unless you know your team has an ultimate to pop, or else you just ensure your team all dying at once meaning your team will no longer be able to stagger onto the objective. But, lastly this also means that it is MUCH MORE IMPORTANT TO NOT DIE DURING THIS TIME. If you die during this 18 second respawns, that means you will not be back for well over 18 seconds to be able to help your team again.

When to contest as Mercy?
	Often times it's hard as a Mercy player to know when you should be the one to contest an objective, but it's very simple when to know, but even if it is simple, it's vitally important to winning or losing matches. It's simple - If you don't think a teammate can make it to the objective in time to contest. But if you think they can make it, it's better to stay off the point, healing them as they go in. Not only increasing the time they will be able to contest, but also giving you ult charge to potentially res dead teammates on the objective in order to make a comeback.

Adapting
	Adapting is the final part in this video because it's arguably the most important. Your job as Mercy is to enable your teammates to perform their roles better, in order to do that you not only need to adapt your positioning based on the enemy team's comp in order to die less, but also adapt to your team's comp based on if you are the primary healer or secondary healer, do your tanks need more healing because the enemy has a strong frontline, or are your DPS constantly getting flanked? Is your other healer constantly needing healing? There's many factors at play, knowing what to focus on and what to balance is something that will come over time with understanding.


	One last thing before you go, down in the description there will be timestamps to the subjects in the video. I encourage all of you to remember the topics covered, then in the future come back and focus improving on each part individually.


"Homework"
- VoD Review your gameplay once a week, figure out even when you win, or when you think the match was out of your control, what should you have done better
- Read the wiki for an hour a day 3 days a week, reading up on Character's statistics, understanding the damage done by heroes and what armor is.
- Do a map walk for 20 minutes per map and go through all the maps practicing hiding spots, jumps, and positioning depending on where the flow of the match goes.