The recently releasedOverwatch 2has proven to be very popular, with the franchise’s longstanding community being thoroughly revived by the fresh title. With a plethora of new players coming to the free-to-play game and beginning to understand its finer mechanics, the importance of understanding hero dynamics is becoming more and more clear.
Aside from becoming familiar with the individual intricacies ofOverwatch 2’smany heroes, it is imperative that players understand the best dynamics and combinations between heroes to use in-game. Of all these hero combinations, the utilization of Pharah and Mercy is one of the most useful, possessing a massive amount of combat potential for those who use it well.
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Pharah and Mercy in Overwatch 2
To understand how well the two heroes work as a combat duo, it is first necessary to fully understand the roles of Pharah and Mercy as individual playable heroes. Both Mercy and Pharah were a part of the original 12 heroes inOverwatch’sroster, and have thus been a core part of the franchise’s gameplay since its very inception.
Pharah is a rather unique damage hero withinOverwatch 2, being an Egyptian security chief who utilizes a highly advanced jetpack-aided rocket suit during combat. As a result of this, Pharah’s appeal primarily lies in the maneuverability and verticality of her main gameplay, being able to soar high in the air to escape the range of many heroes and gain a fantastic tactical advantage during combat.
Mercy is perhaps one of the most recognizable support heroeswithin theOverwatchfranchise. With very little damage output, Mercy can be said to possess the most healing-oriented skill set out of all ofOverwatch’ssupport hero roster. Being able to heal, revive teammates, and fly toward them, a well-playing Mercy can easily make all the difference inOverwatch 2’sintense PvP gameplay.
The Pharmercy Combo in Overwatch 2
Considering just how healing-oriented Mercy is compared to the otherhealers ofOverwatch 2, she is the character that most falls into the often-used gaming support role of a pocket medic. This essentially means that Mercy can stick close to a chosen teammate, providing a near-constant amount of dedicated healing or damage boosting that will greatly increase the combat effectiveness of her chosen teammate.
While this chosen teammate is often a tank, especially withinOverwatch 2’sunique single-tank team makeup, this technique of pocketing can also be used to great effect when aiding damage dealing heroes. This is where the commendable duo of Pharah and Mercy, or Pharmercy, comes into play, with the two characters' shared level of high mobility only being strengthened when working together.
As Mercy is able to fly towards a teammate as a core part of her move-set, this can be used to allow Mercy to take to the skies with Pharah, providing an unparalleled level of verticality for the duo. While in the air, Mercy can negate a lot of the resultant damage that Pharah will receive from distracted enemies, creating the perfect distraction for grounded teammates to take advantage of. As well as this, the damage boosting effect that Mercy can then place upon Pharah can lead to devastating offensive output, withPharah’s powerful rocket barrage ultimate abilitybecoming an even more threatening possibility that the opposing team will have to take into account.
Of course, having a team’s most dedicated healer be relegated to the sky to focus on a single teammate has its downside, with the team’s other support hero then having to single-handedly manage ground healing and a lot of hostile attention. That being said, a smart Pharmercy duo can be worth the potential downsides, with the distractive nature of the two and the huge potential for damage output marking Pharah and Mercy as one of the most effective duos in all ofOverwatch 2.
Overwatch 2is out now in early access for PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
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