In competitive matches, is Phoenix the new Sawbonez?

(ProfPlump) #1

It’s been pretty clear that for a long time Sawbonez has been the best choice of medic (in the majority of situations) for competitive teams. What I’m interested in is whether the competitive meta has changed since the introduction of Phoenix. Will Phoenix see competitive play?

(Grave_Knight) #2

I’m sure he will but not as a replacement for Sawbonez. If anything he’d fill that need for something between a medic and an assault. Sawbonez health packs are just too good to be replaced by Healing Aura.

(XavienX) #3

Mhm, cause if you miss your teammates for the healing aura, there’s a cooldown, unlike medpacks where you get to just throw another down or one in advance before you leave.

(HeadStrikeR !) #4

Phoenix works very good with another mainmedic as backup, on his own his heal CD is just too high, one failed heal and your back to rez only and shooting.

Sawbonez and the other medics still have their medpacks, or one medstation they can place on strategic locations and players can use or pick them up without the supervision of the medic. Phoenix only has one healbubble which requires line of sight and a has spinup time and has a pretty steep cooldown if you wanna heal for more and at the same time exposing yourself to the enemy for longer.
The self rez can be useful if you get downed in a hard to reach area, but that’s about it, people gib very efficiently in high level comp, negating this skill severely.

Watching competetive streams, i found Phoenix extremely lackluster and people still stick to Aura/Sawbonez and occasionally Sparks.

(Yoshimoto) #5

penix is probably the merc that uses mounted turrets the best. get the augment that allows you to shoot longer and win. if people down you behind turret (and if it wasnt a vasili headshot), you just get yourself up and keep shooting. i would also reccomend trying out a selfish playstyle. group up with others only if you need to, but otherwise, act on your own and spam shotr heals on yourself while pressuring everyone. i also wonder if it would be a viable tactic for people to stick around you for the heal, istead of you running to people to heal them. that way you’re sort of a walking health station. but weaker.

(ProfPlump) #6

yeah, it definitely doesn’t always play out well for phoenix to hang back and wait for teammates to get hurt - it’s much better for him to just get in combat and try to kill enemies, while keeping a close eye on the health of any nearby teammates. He definitely doesn’t provide the same kind of support role that the other medics provide.

Although I have to say that Rhino and Redeye are still the best turret users.

  • Rhino because of his tankiness + since the biggest weakness for turret users is a MOA headshot, which Rhino can obviously tank.
  • Redeye because he can throw smoke to hide himself while shooting through that smoke with his IR goggles (which recently got patched so that they CAN be used while on a turret)

Meanwhile if phoenix is on a turret he can easily get killed/gibbed by an enemy Vasilli and even though he has the ability to self-revive behind the turret, it’s still not much better than just having a competant medic on the team who will revive turret users when they go down.

(LifeupOmega) #7

Seen him used a ton in PuGs, seems pretty damn solid and his weapon choice is definitely not bad. For those times when you can’t utilise Sparks or Aura properly.

(ProfPlump) #8

Well I was starting this thread to decide whether I should buy Sawbonez or Phoenix next, but just now I opened up a Gold Crown CR73 Sawbonez so I guess that decides it =P

(Szakalot) #9

that doesn’t sound very strong, except for some situational cases. you are immobile, and as soon as you get hit, enemies will have your hp bar hovering in the smoke, making you an easy target.

(ProfPlump) #10

[quote=“Szakalot;89381”][quote=“ProfPlump;89089”]

  • Redeye because he can throw smoke to hide himself while shooting through that smoke with his IR goggles (which recently got patched so that they CAN be used while on a turret)
    [/quote]

that doesn’t sound very strong, except for some situational cases. you are immobile, and as soon as you get hit, enemies will have your hp bar hovering in the smoke, making you an easy target. [/quote]

It’s still better than a simple Phoenix on the gunner - there’s no real benefit to having him there if your team has a good medic on the team anyway. Plus Phoe can only revive himself once, so his self-revive doesn’t exactly make him invincible - it just gives him a second chance. And since most turret users are most vulnerable to Vasilli’s headshots, he will most likely be insta-gibbed and unable to revive himself anyway. Meanwhile Redeye and Rhino do not have to worry so much about enemy Vasillis.

(avidCow) #11

Self-rez seems meagre when the avg i.q in a match is above room temp. As others have said his heal has a long cool down, charge time, and requires proximity (grenade fodder). Overall it is unreliable and fairly gimmicky.