Phantom all but a fun merc / lacking an identity

(Amerika) #41

@Ronan Exactly why would a merc, with a Kek or Crotzni, sit behind walls and do nothing? And why would they die quickly? He has 110 HP before he puts up the shield which is higher than a lot of the mercs in the game. I’m confused. You do know he has a gun, right?

(BushDweller) #42

I’ve read everyone’s opinion and I agree that players need to learn to use a gun.

BUT

After listening to what everyone had said, I agree that lowering his health, removing cloak noise, and MAYBE decreasing visibility would make him more viable

(Kaori1) #43

How dare people wan’t to improve the game by making it’s characters more unique!


You two must REALLY hate phantom I guess.

(watsyurdeal) #44

Honestly after playing him for a few hour straight…I can’t see a reason to use him over Sawbonez, Nader, or Bushwacka.

All 3 of those have abilties that benefit the team…Phantom simply doesn’t, even if he is good at killing, I can do the same if not better damage with other Mercs.

He really needs a second ability to add utility to him, and if the turn speed stays, at least up the attack speed of the Katana, or offer some sort of damage bonus on attacks from behind. Also liked how they nerfed it’s range, as if that wasn’t one thing about it that stood out from the other melees…

(Ronan) #45

@Watsyurdeal

Dirty Bomb streams said to expect some news on the melee changes, or even the changes this upcoming week!

(Ottah) #46

Phantom is really uninteresting now, I’m literally pulling off more succesfull flanks as sawbones because i have a great gun that is equal to the kek, i have the same hp pool and my class ability is reliable and has 3 stacks instead of 1.

(Ottah) #47

He is pretty trash tier atm yup.

You can still make him work by using the cloak to flank and shoot people in the back with your kek-10, but i agree with you that its pretty sad to see this cool melee concept class with lots of potential being reducing to a ‘smg warrior’ and how everyone on this forum will tell you that’s the way you are suppose to play him now.

You cant even disagree with those people because that really is the most efficient way to play him now, gotta work with the tools you are given. And even then, a sawbonez doing a quick flanking and ‘backraping’ the other team is a better choice because his gun is better then the kek, has the same hp pool, a reliable class ability with 3 charges instead of 1 and is generally usefull throughout the entire game.

(Kaori1) #48

Reddit now decides what is and isn’t balanced in DB now, please refer all comments to them.

Joking aside though, no matter how you feel about phantom, don’t let your lowbie community decide how to balance the game for you…there’s a reason no one used phantom in competitive before the great nerf: because anyone half paying attention could see and or hear him coming from across the map.

(Lumi) #49

[quote=“Watsyurdeal;58966”]
He really needs a second ability to add utility to him, and if the turn speed stays, at least up the attack speed of the Katana, or offer some sort of damage bonus on attacks from behind. Also liked how they nerfed it’s range, as if that wasn’t one thing about it that stood out from the other melees…[/quote]

You’re right, other than damage values it feels the same using the bat. At least using knife and stiletto radically change the distances.

(deerMirror) #50

I relate him a lot more to bushwanker- I mean bushwhacker because they both have the same stats, around the same weaponry just… ya’know.

Bush brings a turret and object specialist.

Phantom just turns into a big dark blur that everyone shoots at. Sad times.

(gg2ez) #51

From everything I’ve seen on this discussion it seems a lot of us would like his melee abilities buffed. Cool cool. Might add, if melee is the big issue with Phantom wouldn’t it be an easy solve if Phantom had a secondary ability that delivered a temporary melee buff? That way Phantom wouldn’t be able to always use it so all these l33ts won’t go have a whine about Phantom being too OP.

(watsyurdeal) #52

That’s kinda stupid since one of the more distinct things about Phantom , IS the Katana, so why not just buff the Katana instead of tacking on some ability? If anything he should get an ability that does something to deployables, since no other recon class will have that.

(Ardez1) #53

That’s kinda stupid since one of the more distinct things about Phantom , IS the Katana, so why not just buff the Katana instead of tacking on some ability? If anything he should get an ability that does something to deployables, since no other recon class will have that.
[/quote]

More mercs then Phantom will receive the katana as a melee option in the future.

(Lumi) #54

[quote=“Ardez;59169”]

More mercs then Phantom will receive the katana as a melee option in the future.[/quote]

Considering what Ardez said I believe gg2ez’s idea to actually be a good one. I’d like to see some ability like brick from Borderlands, where you get a big HP pool and huge melee damage. That could be a way to solve Phantom. Separate shield and cloak. Leave the shield for an offensive backstab spree. would definitely give him an identity.

(Reddeadcap) #55

Being someone who’s gotten him from the hype of how people complained about how powerful he was in the last iteration I Have to admit the following.

The increase to the cooldown on his cloak and making it less effective against high damage abilities was very necesary, I can understand the frustation of him getting hit by an airstrike/grenade with maybe a slither of his cloak remaining and taking no damage.

Nerf to the KEK and Crotzi too, Both were seen as objectively the best SMGs in the game, but I ask why the Crotzi was nerfed more than the KEK.

The Katana’s RMB stab hands down needed fixing, it had too many frames and the complete control one had was just too much.

As Ronan said the nerf to his invisibility while moving was a bit much, its understandable that he shouldn’t be completely invisible while moving but with how visible he is now you can see him with little effort, It’s more of using it as a shield to run away or to run somewhere without taking too much damage to your health rather than a possible cloak, I understood that on higher setting he was less visible than on lower settings but even then in the earlier iteration, with a melee that was insanely powerful I had no trouble looking for something that I needed to look for hidden in plain sight, Now even on higher settings He might as well just be bigfoot in those old grainy pictures circulating of it and as for the -10 health, in many cases people will be on either side of the fence about it, 10 health isn’t a big deal or the end of the world for them but I don’t understand why it was decreased since the main issue of him was the effectiveness of his shield and the katana, which the boys at Splash Damage were mentioning right away didn’t work as intended on release.

@Ronan
Why not add something as Ronan is suggesting?
Why not have him in one hand cloak and be very invisible but without any protection and on the other tank some damage, along with spotting enemies near Phantom?

Why not have his stealth work as it did in early alpha? So far he looks to be the only merc in Dirty bomb who’s ability was changed somewhat, if someone’s familiar with TF2’s Cloak & Dagger watch, that was pretty much how it worked.

(Lumi) #56

@Redcap

It’s not really about how he was too nerfed or not. I agree that many things needed to be changed. The point is though that what is left is a merc that always under achieves compared to other 110HP mercs, Ability wise.

(Ronan) #57

@Redcap

For once, the type of answer I’ve been looking for, instead of the whole stereotypical “phantom is bad remove lul” nonsense. At least someone has the ability to have a form of sense.

For me, personally. If they removed the shield on his cloak, and maybe bumped his health to where Fragger’s is, I’d have no problem. Meaning he wouldn’t be soaking up so much damage, but for me, for him to have no shield on his ARMOR. And let me reiterate the name of his ability. Refractive ARMOR. Meaning it’s made to soak up damage, the cooldown would need to be around 8 seconds. Putting it inbetween 10 and 6. 8 would make it a comfortable medium for getting in, spotting, killing, and then getting back out. Because right now, you can hardly do that. Which is where in my eyes, maybe a health buff wouldn’t be bad. 130 maybe? Not necessarily 150 where Fragger is sitting.

(BushDweller) #58

[quote=“Ronan;59204”]@Redcap

For once, the type of answer I’ve been looking for, instead of the whole stereotypical “phantom is bad remove lul” nonsense. At least someone has the ability to have a form of sense.

For me, personally. If they removed the shield on his cloak, and maybe bumped his health to where Fragger’s is, I’d have no problem. Meaning he wouldn’t be soaking up so much damage, but for me, for him to have no shield on his ARMOR. And let me reiterate the name of his ability. Refractive ARMOR. Meaning it’s made to soak up damage, the cooldown would need to be around 8 seconds. Putting it inbetween 10 and 6. 8 would make it a comfortable medium for getting in, spotting, killing, and then getting back out. Because right now, you can hardly do that. Which is where in my eyes, maybe a health buff wouldn’t be bad. 130 maybe? Not necessarily 150 where Fragger is sitting.[/quote]

Shield+fragger health…wut

(Reddeadcap) #59

[quote=“BushDweller;59211”]
Shield+fragger health…wut[/quote]

[quote=“BushDweller;59211”][quote=“Ronan;59204”]@Redcap

For once, the type of answer I’ve been looking for, instead of the whole stereotypical “phantom is bad remove lul” nonsense. At least someone has the ability to have a form of sense.

For me, personally. If they removed the shield on his cloak, and maybe bumped his health to where Fragger’s is, I’d have no problem. Meaning he wouldn’t be soaking up so much damage, but for me, for him to have no shield on his ARMOR. And let me reiterate the name of his ability. Refractive ARMOR. Meaning it’s made to soak up damage, the cooldown would need to be around 8 seconds. Putting it inbetween 10 and 6. 8 would make it a comfortable medium for getting in, spotting, killing, and then getting back out. Because right now, you can hardly do that. Which is where in my eyes, maybe a health buff wouldn’t be bad. 130 maybe? Not necessarily 150 where Fragger is sitting.[/quote]

Shield+fragger health…wut[/quote]Insane but Hypothetically speaking if he had the same loadout as he had in closed beta, only consisting of a semiautomatic silenced pistol and a Katana as a melee.

What Ronan means is that the more armor a character wears the higher his/her health but less mobility, in that case Phantom would fit somewhere between Skyhammer and Fragger if he didn’t have the armour effect to his cloak, maybe 125-130 health.

In a case like so Phantom could take some damage, the idea of JUST like Fragger is a bit too much but he should somehow be able to survive some damage, more-so than Vasilli and be stealthy.

With the lower speed Phantom could reach people if they’re lagging behind or alone, but not fast enough to reach people he can kill easily unless they’re actively behind the front lines, letting him either snipe them with his pistol or go in with his sword.

(Amerika) #60

[quote=“Kaori1;58946”]How dare people wan’t to improve the game by making it’s characters more unique!


You two must REALLY hate phantom I guess. [/quote]

I play him all the time. In fact, he’s one of my most frequently played Mercs. So please do not assume anything and dislike posts based on false assumptions. Ask me and I’ll tell you my thoughts which is always better than assuming.

I do not like the idea of a merc, regardless of strength, that will always get the first shot in and pretty much have no way to avoid a death. This game was not about that style of gameplay before Phantom and I don’t want it to ever move in that direction. I see unavoidable hits as cheap and I do not enjoy playing as that nor do I like being hit by it. Sure, you can die to random things in DB but Phantom being incredibly strong in both cloaking and melee won’t be random at all.

I want DB to be a gun game. Aim wins. Not a game where you might or might not die at any second with almost no way to see it or avoid it. That might be fun for you playing it but it’s not fun for me playing it or dying as it.

I also use Phantom mostly as a gun merc and abuse the hell out of his shield on his cloak to win firefights easily. If you aren’t doing this you should try it as it’s incredibly powerful to the point of it being nearly too powerful. That’s why I like him. I can get into flanking situations without taking damage or very little damage compared to other mercs and do it more consistently and more often while also making firefights go my way a lot more often when played this way. That’s why I like him and play as him a lot and have had a huge amount of success as well. Not using the Kek or even a Crotnzi is just a crime.