Overwatch: the next update will likely nerf Mercy and buff Ana

The team at Blizzard will continue their ongoing pursuit of perfect balance with the next round of Overwatch character nerfs and buffs.

The good folks at PCGamesN have noticed some posts by director Jeff Kaplan on the Overwatch forums that hint at some upcoming changes that we're likely to see introduced into Overwatch.

First up is Mercy, who recently received a major overhaul that completely changed the way she can be played. Players have loved the change, and the fan-favourite recently received a small buff to her Valkyrie ability, but Blizzard may have overpowered her a bit.

In his post, Kaplan admitted that the team felt that Mercy's resurrect was a bit overpowered, and is "still playing out like an ultimate ability". He went on to say that "the tuning of resurrect is off currently and needs to be brought in line".

Later in this same thread, Kaplan turned his attention to Ana, who will be tweaked on the PTR soon. "Yes. We're increasing her damage", Kaplan said. "We've been testing it internally for a while. Last night, we threw our competitive group at it (Masters/GM level players) and they really liked it also. So it will probably make the PTR soon."

With a game like Overwatch, even minor changes like this can shift the meta in big ways - some characters fall out of focus, others rise up and take their place. Mercy, in particular, has become much more popular since her overhaul. Whether or not any changes made to these characters will result in significant shifts remains to be seen.