Making Phantom viable

[TheStrangerous]

Who said invisible characters can’t have bubbles?

[XSheepieX]

Phantom doesn’t turn invisible though, and he isn’t a superhero.

Isn’t his EMP already like an invisible bubble anyway?

[TheStrangerous]

@XSheepieX said:
Phantom doesn’t turn invisible though, and he isn’t a superhero.

Isn’t his EMP already like an invisible bubble anyway?

EMP field is more like hula hop

Notice how they don’t go invisible and activate bubble at the same time, even they know it’s counter productive.

[XSheepieX]

Phantom’s EMP was given to him for a reason. It is deliberately like that. There shouldn’t be an invisible character with a decent amount of health and the potential to one hit a good portion of the mercs.

Sure it’s counterproductive in some situations, but it makes the game more playable and it doesn’t completely give Phantom away so it generally isn’t a problem. Not for me at least.

That really isn’t where Phantom’s main issue is. Before the changes to Phantom, he wasn’t really viable competitively. The EMP will assist Phantom but it isn’t going to make him suddenly viable. It would be like if Redeye used smgs. You’d have to buff the smoke so much it would be silly to make him viable.

Though… Whoo hula hoop!

[l2c]

I’ve been doing alot of crouch-sneaking about and whatnot, and even crouched, even crouched and not moving, people notice me. There’s just too many cues that Phantom’s nearby. That loud noise, that super obvious shadow of the cloak, AND the emp aura.

(And while I’m mentioning the aura. Not a single teammate has the wits to actually do anything to the deployables while I’m disabling them. Whole nests, disabled, and teammates just watch like “oOo, sparkles!”).

[XSheepieX]

While I see where are are coming from in that yes it is extremely difficult to sneak as Phantom at times, I don’t think that is the only way he is supposed to be played. I think that If Phantom was able to harass, it wouldn’t matter so much that he is difficult to sneak around with. I honestly don’t think he is supposed to play as this sneaky assassin all of the time. I mean sure there are moments, but at the majority of the time, I feel like Phantom should be played as someone who can reposition and flank frequently.

I think of it like a ghost that haunts you. You are aware of it’s presence, but it keeps sneaking up on you and catching you off guard and you never quite fully know exactly where it is because it keeps shifting about. That is my vision of how Phantom should be played. It’s just at that atm he doesn’t have the tools to be like that effectively enough.

You’re so right though, it’s so frustrating to be sat deactivating a deployable only to see your team not doing anything and leaving you desperately hoping that somebody comes along and actually makes use of you.

[TheStrangerous]

@l2c said:
I’ve been doing alot of crouch-sneaking about and whatnot, and even crouched, even crouched and not moving, people notice me. There’s just too many cues that Phantom’s nearby. That loud noise, that super obvious shadow of the cloak, AND the emp aura.

(And while I’m mentioning the aura. Not a single teammate has the wits to actually do anything to the deployables while I’m disabling them. Whole nests, disabled, and teammates just watch like “oOo, sparkles!”).

That’s funny, when I was crouching on the fence at the balcony, in Underground, a lv33 Fragger didn’t notice me and threw his grenade down below.
Perhaps you were spotted before, while switching positions? You can’t fool real life human reaction.

[l2c]

I sprinted past people who didn’t notice me, doesn’t mean they’re all oblivious
I blame that EMP aura tbh.

[XSheepieX]

I play as phantom pretty much all the time I play, and if I’m ever against a Phantom, I always anticipate them attacking me. Though the EMP is is the last thing I notice. For me, the EMP has made very little difference because generally if you EMP a deployable, you aren’t in a position where you are likely to be picked off.

Anyway, for me it’s not that Phantom is invisible or hard to detect, more just that he is difficult to keep track of and doing so can distract you from more immediate threats so people often just have to let it go.

[FishRolls]

Maybe let Phantom refill his cloak when damaging enemies or deployables within his emp range?

[GatoCommodore]

@XSheepieX said:
I play as phantom pretty much all the time I play, and if I’m ever against a Phantom, I always anticipate them attacking me. Though the EMP is is the last thing I notice. For me, the EMP has made very little difference because generally if you EMP a deployable, you aren’t in a position where you are likely to be picked off.

Anyway, for me it’s not that Phantom is invisible or hard to detect, more just that he is difficult to keep track of and doing so can distract you from more immediate threats so people often just have to let it go.

how i play phantom is like this

find their best player, usually its an aura or a medic.

then kill him/her.

its easy to run around when people cant see the cloak from medium-long range.

[XSheepieX]

I play phantom in the same way. But at the same time, it is better to just pick a different recon and kill the majority of the enemy team rather than picking out just one and then needing to run away. (However I know that is a bit of an oversimplification)

Also Phantom’s weapons aren’t that great at longer range so I end up having to recloak a few times before getting the kill… (I try to reposition before they get chance to return fire)

@FishRolls said:
Maybe let Phantom refill his cloak when damaging enemies or deployables within his emp range?

I think idea is actually quite interesting and perhaps a step in the right direction, though I think it wouldn’t fit with how the game is at the moment. I mean… How would you even explain that ability? Though I feel like an idea like that help Phantom play like the harrasser I imagine him as. Though… It probably still wouldn’t leave him needing some tweaks.

[FishRolls]

@XSheepieX said:
I play phantom in the same way. But at the same time, it is better to just pick a different recon and kill the majority of the enemy team rather than picking out just one and then needing to run away. (However I know that is a bit of an oversimplification)

Also Phantom’s weapons aren’t that great at longer range so I end up having to recloak a few times before getting the kill… (I try to reposition before they get chance to return fire)

@FishRolls said:
Maybe let Phantom refill his cloak when damaging enemies or deployables within his emp range?

I think idea is actually quite interesting and perhaps a step in the right direction, though I think it wouldn’t fit with how the game is at the moment. I mean… How would you even explain that ability? Though I feel like an idea like that help Phantom play like the harrasser I imagine him as. Though… It probably still wouldn’t leave him needing some tweaks.
Maybe enemies and deployables that die within a certian range of him could drop batteries that he can pick up to refill some cloak. An enemy would only drop a battery if they were finished.

[XSheepieX]

Maybe… But I honestly really don’t think that makes all that much sense. I mean… I don’t carry batteries on me all the time. I don’t know why they would…

Additionally, if you have to kill them it’s not really that useful. Just because often against good players, it’s hard to get the kill on someone who has full health because they bolt as soon as you start shooting and try to lure you into 3v1 situations or whatever. That’s what I do, and at that point, the fact that you have full cloak wouldn’t make much difference as you’d be gunned down.

[Hartor]

Someone in this thread had already said that giving Phantom a recon ability is useless since the other 3 does the job so well. How about rather giving Phantom the ability to spot enemies, give him the ability to spot deployables when he is uncloaked. The spotting range is the same as his EMP. This will make Phantom a true recon class/team player while retaining the option for people to flank

[TheStrangerous]

Well, soon enough we might see the moment of truth.
SD plans a balance update, heck, Shoe even made his own Phantom thread.

[XSheepieX]

@Hartor said:
Someone in this thread had already said that giving Phantom a recon ability is useless since the other 3 does the job so well. How about rather giving Phantom the ability to spot enemies, give him the ability to spot deployables when he is uncloaked. The spotting range is the same as his EMP. This will make Phantom a true recon class/team player while retaining the option for people to flank

Spotting deployables is pointless I almost always play Phantom with bomb squad which basically is the same as spotting deployables. If you are good, you can get an idea of where deployables are anyway from knowing when you disable something. Additionally I disagree on your definition of what a “true” recon is. I see a recon as a Merc that can hold a position and lock down and area on their own in certain conditions. All the other recons have this ability, they just happen to have spotting abilities imo.

As I’ve said before I feel that Phantom’s main issue is his killing capability. Even in the best situations, Phantom does not have the killing capability of other recons.

@TheStrangerous said:
Well, soon enough we might see the moment of truth.
SD plans a balance update, heck, Shoe even made his own Phantom thread.

He did? I honestly hope they do something because I’ve been tiring of DB. As you can tell from my late response I’ve bearly had anything to do with the game recently.