Phantom right now.

(rotermax1) #1

After the last few Mercs have been released I feel like Phatom is just suppose to be a counter for every new Merc.
It feels forced compared to other implementations of balance, (e.g. disableing Javelins guided mode).
I don’t think Pahtom needs a big buff, but there needs to be a different way to balance him other than implementing new Mercs with only demployables (or Projectiles) to disable for Phatom. It just doesn’t feel right. Added to that Phantom is still considered a meele character by many, what he is not in my opinion.

What could be changed? My Ideas:

  1. Phantom’s Ability is supposed to be his main Focus, but your duration of your cloaking doesn’t change much if you move or stand still, my suggestion is to get Phantoms main Focus back to shooting instead of going in close range by making the bar drain even quicker when moving and make him cloak for longer while sneaking/standing still.

  2. By changeing this, his disableing abillitys would be buffed in a passive way, considering it’s more inviting to stand still and disable (and wait for the other players to come) instead of running straight into the enemy players would help their team passivley.

  3. Give him a crosshair dot when sighting when cloaked by default. This would also make his cloak more inviting (exspecially for new players) to stay at range and shoot instead of running in with his meele

I think activlely buffing Phantom is not the right way to go, but changeing little things like this would change the behaviour of Phantom players by ALOT. Phantom is not a meele charakter and he still has a gun not many people use to their advantage.

What’s your opinion on this?

(TheStrangerous) #2

Hybrid mercs are a weird mess. With Phantom as worst case scenario, Guardian as mixed bag, and Javelin as pointless mixture (ammo belt quite redundant).

Now regarding Phantom, least EMP field shoulda been a separate ability.
Imagine if Redeye smoke grenade and IR googles were the same 1 ability. Only throwing smoke when equipping IR googles and smoke only working when IR googles equipped. Very counter productive. The same analogy stands for Phantom.

(Da_Mummy) #3

When I first heard about the fact the fact that the EMP-effect of Thunders conc was given to Phantoms armor as a passive ability I kinda knew that Problems were incomming.
Seriously playing Turtle or Bushwacker while Phantoms in free Rotation is pure suicide, not because you have a lot of really professional Phantoms that actively disable your electronics and shoot you out of distance, but because they are running cloaked at you with their kitana out, disable your turret or shield apparently by accident and just swing wildly just to get you as a single kill and then die afterwards.As said already I would love to see that EMP Thing was changed into a Thing that was either a seperate ability, or a Thing that you have to avtivate for it to Count.
Overall I would love to see a more versatile and “skillbased” Version of our masked friend and something that is more than an EMP-grenade on legs.

(XSheepieX) #4

How many hours do you people have on Phantom?

Phantom has problems, but the ones you have mentioned aren’t his major issues. People for some reason refuse to adjust to his ‘new’ play style.

Phantom is a recon. Look at all the other mercs in his class. What does he lack that makes all the other recons worth playing? If you ask me it’s the killing potential. Almost every other recon has weapons that allow for doing high damage and have an ability to compliment that. Phantom on the other hand has an SMG.

Also people need to let go of the separating EMP and cloak idea. Phantom’s EMP was a deliberate decision from SD to make Phantom less of a noob-killer. He actually requires some positioning skill now and there is good counterplay with him. Phantom doesn’t need huge and/or direct buffs imo. He needs reworking in a way that compliments his current play style which is unpredictability and harassing/flanking.

Phantom’s EMP is potent but it’s supposed to be a double-edged sword. Giving him a second ability would be great, but making it the EMP wouldn’t be enough to make Phantom worthwhile imo. It would just make Phantom broken in other ways.

If the EMP was seperate, you would get a lot more Katana Phantom players like we had before the EMP. The EMP is a great way to force Phantom players to actually think about when they decloak and it discourages the cloak rush thing. If you nerf Phantom’s ability to move while cloaked you make him much worse to the point where he is even less viable a choice.

(rotermax1) #5

@XSheepieX I agree with you. Massive buffs wouldn’t help improving him or help the players adapt to the way Phantom should be played, there is a big gap between what he is suppose to be and what he is right now. But as I mentioned I think that Phantom is also more of a passive character you have to play with care (like positioning (you also mentioned that) and patients). He shouldn’t be considered a character that is bad, just a character a lot of people play wrong in the first place, which is also the reason he is even considered of beeing bad. Sure, it is a matter of getting used to getting a killing machine with SMG’s, but I think it suits him really well and doesn’t need to change.
The one thing I would like to have, would be the Corsshair in cloake to actually reward aiming and staying behind to kill then running in with the Katana.

Give him a crosshair dot when sighting when cloaked by default. This would also make his cloak more inviting (exspecially for new players) to stay at range and shoot instead of running in with his meele

(l2c) #6

You can turn on crosshairs while ADS’ing in settings. Works when cloaked.

As for how Phantom “should be played”… Only SD knows that, and by “knows”, I mean “kinda has a vague idea they’re not sure about”.

(rotermax1) #7

@l2c
You can turn on crosshairs while ADS’ing in settings. Works when cloaked.

I said

by default
in my discussion.
Phantom is the only Merc I like to play with a crosshair while sighting (On the other Mercs it just annoys or blocks your view)

As for how Phantom “should be played”… Only SD knows that, and by “knows”, I mean “kinda has a vague idea they’re not sure about”.
I think we can all agree though that Phantom should not be a character running around and suicideing into a group of people.

(XSheepieX) #8

That wouldn’t help make Phantom more viable though and I don’t think it would help the situation much.

The problem with Phantom is that he is outclassed and/or outgunned against most opponents. Even though I don’t think it’s direct buff that he needs, I do believe he needs a series of tweaks and an extra ability perhaps, as well as refining on his current ability.

Besides Phantom isnt only about playing with the gun. The fact the you have a OHK katana on some loadouts and the ability to land your hit before the enemy can even react means that not to use it would be a waste. It’s not that the katana should never be used, just that it shouldn’t be the first choice.

People rush as Phantom because he doesn’t have the weaponry to effectively do his job as a recon with his current weapons. The only weapon that is remotely capable of doing that job his is the katana. If Phantom had an assualt rifle, (and I’m not suggesting he gets them,) people would rush a lot less as Phantom.

Besides i like the crosshair I’ve chosen I wouldn’t want a forced change when I cloak that I have no control over.

(TheStrangerous) #9

Just had a ramdom though…

If hybrid mercs suppose to be like magnets (one playstyle being (-) and the other as (+)), and SD doesn’t wanna let go of the EMP field, despised by majority. Then what if we embraced EMP, instead of replacing it?

I dare to say: BUFF THE EMP…

What madness is this?! How…

Explanation: If Javelin’s Rockets are the (+) and her ammo belt, very redundantly, the small (-). And Guardian’s Drone being the (+) with Revive Glove as (-).

Phantom’s case would be both EMP field and RF classified as (+). So we have magnet with both (+) sides… If you’d done your homework, you’d know that both (+) push each other away.
What we wanna achieve is synergy, where positive and negative abilities cling on to each other.

So firstly, SEPARATE EMP from RF.

Now here’s another case: OPPOSITES

If RF ecourages you to:

  • Crouch still and wait to pop a head
  • Play defensively

Then EMP should encourage to:

  • Running an gunning
  • Play offensively

By buffing the EMP, I simply meant ALLLOWING to fire your guns/melle attack, without turning off EMP effect automaticly.

So technically, on one side, we have an assault merc, which kicks into deployable nests, disabling them and eliminating enemies, allowing teammates to break any choke points. And on the other spectrum, we have MGS3 Snake in his camo.

This is possibly the laziest and simplest solution to his schizophrenic design.
PHEW!

P.S.
If anyone REALLY wants both EMP and RF be together, then they’d simply activate both separate abilities at the same time, or SD could release (Ability 3) button, where both abilities are activated at the same time. The more options, the better.

(XSheepieX) #10

That’s an interesting idea, though I don’t think Phantom should be over-reliant on his cloak. His cloak is pretty strong now and it all-but carries Phantom. I think it’d be nice if Phantom had an ability to compliment his cloak and, yes ,encourage more stealthy play.

Otherwise Phantom will only be used for suicide rushing or camping and not actually doing any recon stuff like getting kills, because it wouldn’t be encouraged.

Also I don’t think it’d be fun for there to be a Merc that just completely disables the abilities of other mercs. Though if it was like a short pulse it could work alright perhaps…

I’d like to see SD work on and expanding on Phantom’s current playstyle though rather than creating a whole new one for him. I feel like they need to further work on the usefulness of the cloak as well as killing potential rather than the usefulness of the EMP because those areas are where Phantom is lacking.