Guidelines to Timing Support Ultimates - Mercy

Introduction

Playing Mercy isn't easy. People make support out to be the class that only noobs play. It's quite surprising in fact that support is probably the most difficult class to play. If it isn't for a support hero, how will anybody else stay alive? They won't. Mercy is also the primary target of DPS heroes, so staying alive can be difficult in itself. Her ultimate may also seem easy to other people. Press Q and everybody is back alive again! Again they are wrong. If the support player just randomly presses Q, your team will lose the game. Timing your ultimates is completely game sense based. I will however, explain some scenarios in which using your ultimate is a must. I will also explain times when using your ultimate is completely useless.

After Genji's ultimate, Mercy's is the most annoying. The enemy team just completely battered everyone and are about to take the objective. But oops, the Mercy player just used 'Guardian Angel' then pressed Q and everyone on your team is now alive, allowing you to win the objective back.

Blizzard video showcasing Mercy's abilities

Resurrect is the name of Mercy's ultimate ability. It's easy to understand what it does just by looking at the name itself. When her ultimate ability is ready and Mercy is close to a teammates 'soul', she is able to resurrect them. What this ability does is bring back a fallen ally to full HP where they've previously died. An indicator on the screen signifies how many players can be resurrected at once. Mercy's ultimate can resurrect up to 5 people at any given time, which can lead to complete swings in teamfights. The ultimate itself has a whole 1 second cast time and Mercy is still able to move and heal when casting the ultimate ability. There's a catch, however. You need to be within a 15 metre radius of a fallen comrade in order to revive them. However, if your team is smart, they will all die in a similar place just for you to get that sweet, sweet play of the game.

To cast, or not to cast, that is the question

When people first start playing Mercy, they cast the ultimate as soon as they see one person is dead. Sometimes, I even see people cast it if just their friend is dead and is badgering them over voice comms to revive him. In a competitive game however, this won't fly. People will go off the rails if the Mercy isn't resurrecting at the correct times. There are some things you need to be wary of when casting this ultimate and a lot of this stuff is situational. However, some situations come along nearly every single game and I will be explaining them here.

Mercy casting her ultimate ability

Teamfights - When a teamfight is about to happen, hide. It may be difficult to think and realise when a teamfight is going to happen. But it's not. If the enemy team haven't attacked or done anything for a while, then you can bet that a teamfight is going to happen soon. As soon as you start sensing this, find a nice spot to hide in. Tell all of your teammates to die on the point or at a certain spot and wait. Don't worry about how low their HP is getting and the fact that they might die. You want them to die! The whole point of you being there is for them to die. If none of them die, great. You heal them all up and hide somewhere again. If 3 of your teammates are dead and some are still fighting, wait a little while. You have all the time in the world to resurrect as long as you aren't spotted. Try and let as many teammates die as possible before giving up your position.

Tanks - If you aren't in a team fight but the enemy team are just planning to take out a teammate here and there, it may be useful to just resurrect tanks. More often than not, using a resurrect at this point may not even be worth it, but it's all up to you and what you think will happen. In a situation where the enemy team has a Widowmaker and she's sniping teammates it might be a good idea to use it. If your Reinhardt gets taken down and the Widow just has free reign on your teammate's heads, it's a good idea to resurrect him so the rest of your team can stay alive. The majority of the time it's better to resurrect a tank or two when attacking as Mercy. When playing defense, you're better off waiting for the teamfights.

One of Mercy's many highlight intros

Number of People - As a rule of thumb, it's better to resurrect more people. This may sound quite obvious, but the amount of times I see a Mercy resurrecting a single person who is a Zenyatta or something is insane. In my personal opinion and experience, if 3 or more teammates are down you should resurrect them. Again this depends on what heroes they are, but more often than not having more people in a fight is helpful. If there's at least one tank out of the three, definitely pop the ultimate. I'd say if your team isn't that good at grouping up and are getting killed randomly, don't bother saving your ultimate for anything. They're all just going to die separately anyway. The best you can do is try and keep your numbers high at all times. If you have at least 4 teammates alive on the objective, you have a higher chance of keeping it, rather than just having yourself try and defend it.

Holding Strong - If your team is holding the objective but are dying randomly as they are spread out, keep your ultimate up until the very end. One situation where this may occur is on Temple of Anubis' first point. Your team is pushed back onto the point and trying to hold there against a crippled attacking force. Keeping your numbers higher than theirs is the top priority here. Your teammates have a longer trek back to the point than the opposing force does. Again, try and hide but keep your DPS alive for as long as possible. By this time, a few teammates may already be dead but it's not worth trying to resurrect them. As long as you are alive and have that ultimate ready at any moment you are golden. If you can keep the DPS or tanks alive, it's worth resurrecting 1 or 2 teammates just to keep the timer trickling.

Mercy ready for... battle?

About to Die - This is probably the hardest one to think about. If you are about to die and you have Resurrect ready, should you do it? In my experience, it's often a no-go. But again, this all depends on the situation. A situation in which you are about to get killed by an enemy Genji but 2 people are dead including a tank may be a good time to resurrect. If that tank is a Reinhardt, it may be a very good idea to resurrect. It all depends on how pushed the enemy are into your point. If they are about capture the objective and you are the last alive, it's a suicide mission to try and resurrect. But a suicide mission where you resurrect a Reinhardt and a DPS to hold the objective for 30 seconds longer may be the difference between winning and losing the game.

Conclusion

Most of this article is written through experience. I would say use these points as base guidelines when playing as Mercy. Like stated many times, her ultimate is completely situational. I hope that some of my explanations may give you a better insight into which situations require a resurrect and which don't. Practice pays off, however, and getting yourself into the mindset of playing Mercy may make things easier for you. Thanks for reading.

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