[quote=“SonataDusk;126666”][quote=“Amerika;126633”][quote=“blisteringOwlNest;126364”]@derpypenguinz19 sums up my point exactly. The katana should be a high risk high reward weapon, but the reward is just not enough right now, for me personally at least. And don’t get me wrong, having some of the best smgs in the game shows phantoms supposed to be a gunner too.
But the katana is why people buy him. Nothing is cooler then bringing a knife to a gun fight and winning. Just make it a little bit more rewarding for that extra effort put in to get within range. I’d like to see heavy attack be reduced to 1.5 secs, and dmg up to 110. Then it’s good for snipers and pheonix too, leaving sawbonez (I think?) still good.[/quote]
Phantom’s refractive armor without intelligent use yields poor results. You aren’t supposed to chase somebody across the map trying to melee them. You use his abilities wisely which includes knowing when to melee and when to shoot. Setting up kills for yourself while also leaving escape routes is how Phantom is played successfully. Running into a group of people to get a melee kill and immediately dying yourself is not intelligent play yet that seems to be the dominant strategy for many Phantom players.
He’s not a melee only or melee focused merc and has no special abilities that are melee. Also, the melee system in this game isn’t exactly deep or unique from merc to merc. He has access to a Katana instead of a Cricket Bat on his loadouts. The Katana is going to be given to other mercs in the future as well.
Learn to play Phantom properly as opposed to chasing people around the map and you’ll find him to be much better than you thought and a lot more satisfying overall.[/quote]
What you are saying about his tactics is correct. Finding and killing stragglers is where Phantom excels. Groups bigger than 2 his killing ability diminishes dramatically.
However, melee is how he gets those kills. Each of the slayer mercs has an ability that has a dramatically lower time to kill than their primary weapon, or aids them is killing much easier, for example Fragger’s grenades. For Phantom, it’s the katana. A combination of two attacks will kill any merc in the game save for Rhino, and if you have the C94 you can kill Rhino with two stabs. SMGs, even with the element of surprise, are not enough to make Phantom something to be afraid of.
The issue with his balance is that, while the katana was always a high risk-high reward weapon, as it stands now the risk greatly exceeds the likely hood of any reward. It is true that a stab will instakill any merc with 90 health or less (100 or less with chopper), but the combination of the extremely short damage window, the punishing turn speed limit, and the speed of the target mercs makes this an extremely situational tactic. The only way to land a stab is to wait until the target is standing still or running straight at you, and any strategy that relies on your opponent making a mistake is neither fun nor rewarding.
The devs did say that other mercs could get the Katana in the future, but they will most likely not use it like Phantom can with his cloak. [/quote]
He doesn’t do anything special with the Katana. They are just normal melee swings. It’s just a swap for the cricket bat much like the Kukri is a swap for that on Redeye. He is not a melee-centric merc. He’s also not an assault merc…he’s recon. But instead of you sometimes easily seeing them like on the snipers you are the one who is hard to see/nearly invisible.
Rushing in to try and melee when you could have lasered down somebody’s head with a gun from range and leave yourself an escape route is just not a good play. It’s flat out the wrong thing to do if you want to succeed with the class. If you find yourself in a CQC situation there are times when the Katana comes in handy as it can save time and ammo. But it’s not a primary weapon or even smart to use in most situations. Everything from the sounds Phantom makes coming out of his ability to the hum of refractive armor while running and simply being way out of position makes using melee the wrong way to use him.
People who try to melee with him find him extremely weak…and for good reason. It’s because he’s not meant to be a melee merc. If you use his whole kit and only use his melee when it makes sense, like you do with any other merc, he’s much better. That Katana is a good melee weapon. But it’s not a primary weapon or even an ability. Learning to use him properly is hard and requires a few different skillsets which is why I consider him one of the hardest mercs to learn.
