Why has Genji fallen out of the meta?

I haven't been playing too much Overwatch this past year but I still watch tournaments pretty regularly.

That said, why is that most once Genji specialists have started to migrate away from playing Genji? Been seeing a lot of big name players swapping over to Tracer, Pharah or hitscan in place of the ninja.

Is this due to balance changes I haven't been keeping up with or players/teams adapting?

Junkrat counters him hard.
Mercy is also hard to kill as him.

Theres just many better picks against stuff like that in current meta.

Like #2 mentioned, Junk is hard to deal with now as Genji so unless the team is focused around giving him all the resources kind of like FaZe is you might be better off going McCree or Soldier to deal with Mercy, Junk and the occasional Doomfist.

That being said, top tier genjis can make it work, they’re just playing a lot more around blade now.

the only top team I can think of that doesn't run genji often is envy, and I don't think it's a bad thing that more heroes are seeing play time, it's less stale that way.

It's just hard to play him in the current setting of the meta, and unless you're a god, it's hard to get great value out of his blades.

every hero comes and goes when it comes to genji we had:
hard genji meta (nano genji win team fight)
than came triple tank and genji dropped out
than was dive/triple dps genji was back
now we have weird meta or more like there is no new meta established because of many changes in short time (doomfist came and disapeared now junk is op soon we'll see how mercy changes affect meta)
its not new thing that genji is not meta it happened before and will happen in future thats just the way meta fluctuates

Valkyrie and double mines, basically like everyone said.
Junkrat and new Dva are kind of pushing Rein, and therefore Zarya, more and more into the meta. Roadhog is viable too. There are better options with what's coming to play after dive.

TBH i think it's more teams learning how to play around genji blade, like you don't see 4-6K blades anymore except from time to time when we see agilities, but other then that, teams use support ults better, they just kill him in the blade, etc. also, with the new moth Mercy, you need long ranged hitscan like Mccree or widow to kill her, or at least limit her options, and with more Mercy, there's more Pharah, which genji isn't that strong against, and Junkrat is difficult to play genji against, same thing with a good hog, plus genji can't kill junk tires too well.

ThisOldDog [#9]

TBH i think it's more teams learning how to play around genji blade, like you don't see 4-6K blades anymore except from time to time when we see agilities, but other then that, teams use support ults better, they just kill him in the blade, etc. also, with the new moth Mercy, you need long ranged hitscan like Mccree or widow to kill her, or at least limit her options, and with more Mercy, there's more Pharah, which genji isn't that strong against, and Junkrat is difficult to play genji against, same thing with a good hog, plus genji can't kill junk tires too well.

people really didnt need over a year to learn how to counter blade (and as i already said, its not first time he fall out of meta, during tank meta he was completly gone compared to limited use now) its because nano boost doesnt make blade so strong now

remiska [#10]

people really didnt need over a year to learn how to counter blade (and as i already said, its not first time he fall out of meta, during tank meta he was completly gone compared to limited use now) its because nano boost doesnt make blade so strong now

Well, lessening the impact of blade has always been a thing, but now teams can do it so effectively and consistently, that not even the best Genji players like Shadowburn can make it work at times, SDB has been playing a wide veritety of heroes with mixed success, and that's not the only reason for Genjis decline, but with teams playing against him so often and having tons of experience, it's not helping genji.

ThisOldDog [#11]

Well, lessening the impact of blade has always been a thing, but now teams can do it so effectively and consistently, that not even the best Genji players like Shadowburn can make it work at times, SDB has been playing a wide veritety of heroes with mixed success, and that's not the only reason for Genjis decline, but with teams playing against him so often and having tons of experience, it's not helping genji.

they couldnt make it work during triple tank meta either and nearly no one played him back then
compared to back then now genji is much more effective so did teams forget how to play against him or did meta change?

teams can really quickly adapt to heros it really doesnt take them 2 years to be able to learn how to counter hero
teams know how to play against genji for years they havent invented anything new and we have just good old meta shift

remiska [#12]

they couldnt make it work during triple tank meta either and nearly no one played him back then
compared to back then now genji is much more effective so did teams forget how to play against him or did meta change?

teams can really quickly adapt to heros it really doesnt take them 2 years to be able to learn how to counter hero
teams know how to play against genji for years they havent invented anything new and we have just good old meta shift

yes, true, but when was the last time you've seen a genji get more then 2 kills with a dragon blade? Other then like twice from agilites, it's not that teams don't know how to counter genji, they've perfected it, to the point where it's nearly impossible to get value out of a blade, this is why Shadowburn has been playing less genji over all even before these Mercy and D.va changes, i'm not saying it's the only reason, obviously projectile players picking up Junkrat since he's risen to the top of the meta is a factor, along with all the other balance changes, but it's still hard for even the best genjis in the world to get value out of genji now, if you watch a tournament with SDB a year ago on genji compared to now, it's evident his playstyle has changed, teams punish risks and don't allow genji's to get aggressive, it could also be the fact that Zen is alot more meta and his ult counters genji, that could be it actually.

Surprising to see Junkrat as a main reason why Genji isn't such a popular pick in the professional scene D:

I really had no idea he was as viable as he is since I only see him in every other match.

ThisOldDog [#13]

yes, true, but when was the last time you've seen a genji get more then 2 kills with a dragon blade? Other then like twice from agilites, it's not that teams don't know how to counter genji, they've perfected it, to the point where it's nearly impossible to get value out of a blade, this is why Shadowburn has been playing less genji over all even before these Mercy and D.va changes, i'm not saying it's the only reason, obviously projectile players picking up Junkrat since he's risen to the top of the meta is a factor, along with all the other balance changes, but it's still hard for even the best genjis in the world to get value out of genji now, if you watch a tournament with SDB a year ago on genji compared to now, it's evident his playstyle has changed, teams punish risks and don't allow genji's to get aggressive, it could also be the fact that Zen is alot more meta and his ult counters genji, that could be it actually.

contenders season 1 here or here
contenders season 0 its more rare now again coz his blade is weaker and he rarely has nanoboost coz no one playes ana and nano is weaker but it happens

and why do you think genji players changed their playstyle? sdb could be more agressive year ago for obvieus reasons (which i mentioned) and are all due to meta and hero changes:

ana had op healing, able to heal even triple tank team alone so keeping genji alive when ulting, or healing him with nade when he was low was easy

nanoboost reduced damage taken plus you were faster, so it was really hard to kill nanoblading genji, not because teams didnt know how but because meta was different

so now let me ask you a question, during triple tank meta genji was pretty much not played (not like now more rarely but not played at all in pro matches) so back than teams really had to know how to counter him if he waas not played at all, so did teams forget how to counter him?

spoiler: no and again you really think teams need 2 years to adapt to something? np genji has multi kills with dragon blade when meta favors it (nanoblade meta) ut when it doesnt he wont (triple tank meta)

remiska [#15]

contenders season 1 here or here
contenders season 0 its more rare now again coz his blade is weaker and he rarely has nanoboost coz no one playes ana and nano is weaker but it happens

and why do you think genji players changed their playstyle? sdb could be more agressive year ago for obvieus reasons (which i mentioned) and are all due to meta and hero changes:

ana had op healing, able to heal even triple tank team alone so keeping genji alive when ulting, or healing him with nade when he was low was easy

nanoboost reduced damage taken plus you were faster, so it was really hard to kill nanoblading genji, not because teams didnt know how but because meta was different

so now let me ask you a question, during triple tank meta genji was pretty much not played (not like now more rarely but not played at all in pro matches) so back than teams really had to know how to counter him if he waas not played at all, so did teams forget how to counter him?

spoiler: no and again you really think teams need 2 years to adapt to something? np genji has multi kills with dragon blade when meta favors it (nanoblade meta) ut when it doesnt he wont (triple tank meta)

Well, it's obvious you will never understand my point of view and this conversation is going no where, i give up.