Tips on how to Phantom successfully.

(Despaniard) #1

We all know that Phantom is the merc surrounded with the most controversy. One side believes that the nerf that followed his OP level was perfect and the other side believes that said nerf was an affront to the honor of stealthy assassins everywhere. Then there are those that have no idea of what is going on.

I’m here to tell you that there is hope for both sides. You see, Phantoms armor was a very powerful asset, plus his health and the damaged output done by his signature item, the Katana.

Post nerf, his Katana is not so strong, his armor is not so invisible and his health is lowered. It was at that point that the community split into the three factions before mentioned.

So, how is Phantom supposed to be a valuable asset to his team, provide high-value-target-assassinations (here after referred as HVTA) eliminations, destroy the vital secondary objectives to the enemy team and do this all, alone?

The vast majority of players say that is is impossible, unless you do what my friends and yours truly have discovered.

  1. Invisibility: The pre-nerf Phantom could sprint everywhere while remaining decently invisible. Post-nerf Phantom… not so much. But here is the trick. Never do something with post-nerf Phantom if to succeed, you have to sprint. Phantom becomes blurry and easy to spot while SPRINTING. If you have to go somewhere out of sight, sprint. If enemies are nearby, become invisible, stop sprinting and walk. You are just as invisible standing still as walking. To get a HVTA, make sure that it’s actually vital to the success of the mission. If, in example, the HVT is surrounded by health stations and a turret, it’s not worth it. Get one of your teammates to switch to an explosives expert merc, take out the healing stations and turret and using the confusions, take down the HVT.

Thanks for reading this first installment on the “Tips on How to Phantom Successfully” series. For more information, I’ll post videos with actual raw footage of my tips in action soon.

(Tod) #2

I used to play Phantom … he’s still working very well, even after Nerf.

(k_dot) #3

The best tip is DO NOT PLAY with Phantom :wink:

(Despaniard) #4

I am so sorry you think that. Unfortunately, you are quite incorrect in your comment. Phantom is a very strong Merc, as I have personally proven to many an enemy team that freely chatted about how it would be an easy match, since their enemy team had a Phantom. Let’s just say, I’ve been accused of hacking because, and I quote: “No way a Phantom can be that good.”

(1elkubik) #5

Food for thought - the drag on the katana is still amazing. If you have the luck/skill and a high enough sensitivity you can easily hit 2 or even 3 mercs (I managed to hit 4 once… before getting promptly shot to bits by four dudes that suddenly realized “hey, there’s a phantom here! quick! shoot him!” Good times) however the katana is still very good as a weapon, dealing 60 damage on a quick and 90 on a heavy (increase to 72 on a quick and 108 on a heavy with chopper), and with the obscene drag getting two quicks in and hitting with them is not too difficult. Solo pick offs are also not that difficult - invis + walk + heavy attack + 1 round from side arm will generally have them on the floor. Literally. Unless they are rhino. But then, why are you trying to assassinate rhino? kill the medic and save yourself the hassle.

In response to soapCzar, the best HVTs to take out are generally medics, engineers that are currently repairing the objective, anyone that is currently solo and you are confident you can kill before his budies show up, or…well… Vassili. No seriously. Heartbeat sensor does not make your job any easier. You are now an invis merc with a massive red dot thingy over your head. Enjoy being targeted by anyone with more than three brain cells within the nearest mile. :smile:

(BananaSlug) #6

i dont play phantom too much but
1.katana is cool but the loadouts are useless
2.remember you arent a assault soo just do flanks
3.use the cloak as gtfo button or to sneak behind ( only if there is chaos )

i hope someone more experienced will halp ya

(darlingClaymore) #7

Phantom, a merc that is best for flanking, camping, and generally making your enemy very pissed off. I have racked up huge scores with him in min lvl 10 servers yes with lvl 40s-50s etc does he need a buff? no, people do. If you learn to longjump correctly and how to use lunge with chopper, welcome to chivalry.

(streetwiseSailboat) #8

[quote=“BananaSlug;133817”]i dont play phantom too much but
1.katana is cool but the loadouts are useless
[/quote]

Every katana loadout has undercover which greatly buffs the cloak. In addition, there is at least one other augment that makes the loadout viable. the C94 has Chopper, the CR94 has Bomb Squad and the BL94 has Drilled.

(SamillWong) #9

I have some mixed opinions on SD’s nerf on Phantom, despite the fact that he may now be one of the most hated and underrated merc these days. I may not be the most experienced player in the community, and these are solely my possibly wrong opinions.

Phantom is meant for assassinations and these are all that he can do. He can’t plant nor defuse, he can’t supply his team with anything, he can’t revive his teammates. People see Phantom as overpowered because simply of players exploiting the ‘Beyblade’ bug, and the fact that people were not able to counter Phantoms properly. Speaking of countering Phantom, there are generally two types of Phantoms, one being those who chases you around with their katanas, and those who start shooting the second they see you back-peddling. In fact, most players don’t perceive the concept that Phantoms are not forced to use the Katana, and I seldom see Phantom top-scorers these days in public matches nowadays.

The melee mechanic is broken and that is not the only thing broken in this game, with many more issues for the devs to fix in the future. That is and will always be true for all games, not only Dirty Bomb and FPS games. Bugs will only remain present, but it is the way how SD fixes them count, note that I’m not judging nor commentating on SD. The nerf on Phantom may be considered good in some people’s eyes, in the other hand, some players would be disgusted by it. These nerfs and bug fixes are merely a band-aid for DB, let’s now just hope that SD would come up with something that would fix the root itself, not just surface of it.

(ZombieVirus) #10

[quote=“SamillWong;134229”] two types of Phantoms, one being those who chases you around with their katanas"

I am so Guilty of this, i was playing Proxy when i saw one of my teammates completely destroy the other team as Phantom, and i thought that would be a awesome class for me, i was wrong, because i prefer shotguns, i never used his SMG, and i always chased players and sprinted, now i can see why they all called me a noob :frowning: