Want to understand the Devs' mindset on Phantom's balancing

(kirinichiban42) #1

My main purpose for posting this is to understand the reasoning behind all of Phantom’s latest reworks. More specifically, I want to understand why the focus of all the reworks have been on tweaking Phantom’s cloak visibility rather than other possible mechanics (like including a decloaking delay which has been mentioned before in one of the update videos).

I don’t want to come off as angry or spiteful, but I am honestly confused as why the Devs are seemingly changing Phantom’s cloak back to the way it was before (minus the EMP blast). I’m pretty sure they know that they are basically rolling back Phantom’s ability, right?

Is there good way to pose this question directly to the Devs? I was thinking about asking a Dev on this board directly, but that seems kind of rude. Also, I was seeing if I could get this question on a Dev update video, but I’m not sure how to get it there.

What do you all think?

(kopyright) #2

@kirinichiban42 said:
Also, I was seeing if I could get this question on a Dev update video, but I’m not sure how to get it there.

Just post it in the comments section of the latest Dev video, that’s one of the places they pick their questions from.

(Gire) #3

Plz everyone stop saying giving Phantom a “delay” would balance him so he would be a “”""“reeeecoooon”""""" because reeecon is not suppose to 1 shot people.

(BlackboltLW) #4

@Gire said:
Plz everyone stop saying giving Phantom a “delay” would balance him so he would be a “”""“reeeecoooon”""""" because reeecon is not suppose to 1 shot people.

He’s actually not, his katana makes him able to one-shot most of the time. I mean it feels totally different when you mostly use his guns instead his katana.

imo, I treat Phantom as a mobile disruptor, quickly moving while undetected and strikes the EMP in when my team starts the firefight.

I mean I’ve stopped using the katana entirely and sticking with the knife cards from Gen 1 Loadouts

(kirinichiban42) #5

@Gire said:
Plz everyone stop saying giving Phantom a “delay” would balance him so he would be a “”""“reeeecoooon”""""" because reeecon is not suppose to 1 shot people.

The reason why the decloak delay is brought up so many times is because it was mentioned in a Dev video and never heard of again. Plus, it parallels the TF2 spy’s ability which has been proven to balance out the high utility of invisibility.

(Brycko) #6

I don’t have a problem with the decloak, just the Katana. I think Phantom deserves to be able to win gunfights with smart positioning, but I can’t stand Katana rushes. Solution? Make it so he has to unsheath the bloody thing before his stabbing rampage instead of it just appearing in his hand. This is actually something I want for ALL ability weapons (except for Sparks and Hunter); equip times that match the weight and size of the weapon.

(GatoCommodore) #7

@Brycko said:
I don’t have a problem with the decloak, just the Katana. I think Phantom deserves to be able to win gunfights with smart positioning, but I can’t stand Katana rushes. Solution? Make it so he has to unsheath the bloody thing before his stabbing rampage instead of it just appearing in his hand. This is actually something I want for ALL ability weapons (except for Sparks and Hunter); equip times that match the weight and size of the weapon.

indirect nerf to rhino

i feel like these kiddies who play phantom katana already have their katana in his hand and unseathing nerf would be a nerf to other mercs and not just phantom.

imo my only gripes with phantom was he didnt decloak when he got hit multiple times except if he dies.

SD heard that decloak sound needs to exist and they delivers.
Bad phantoms would get rekt by the whole team if he uncloak and was heard by everybody while good phantom can uncloak somewhere near the team to mask the sound and then start stabbing.

This is what i think what SD probably thinking.
and it works, scrubs and kiddies arent using phantom anymore and switches to proxy and rhino again.

(Brycko) #8

@GatoCommodore true… I’m just thinking that it could be a change that not only helps Phantom issues but also Nader spam and Javs rocket issues. Devs would have to test it

(watsyurdeal) #9

The funny thing about the delay, is that all you are really doing is forcing the player to decloak. The “delay” is just you going between animations.

(l2c) #10

Apparantly, the mindset is to make him good at his job (killing), then listen to salty children and nerf him repeatedly into being worse than before his “re-work”.

(Your worst knifemare.) #11

@l2c said:
Apparantly, the mindset is to make him good at his job (killing), then listen to salty children and nerf him repeatedly into being worse than before his “re-work”.

When you realise the entire rework was because of them.