Pharah *REWORK*

General Discussion
1

Are there any other Pharah mains out there that feel as though she is a little bit clunky to play? I have over 200 hours played since Season 3 and had a light bub on some ideas that could rise her usage in the meta without turning her into a broken hero entirely. Pharah is one of the few characters in Overwatch that has changed so very minimally over the years and I would like to take this chance to suggest a rework idea. Come along for story time!
Summary Below

One day Pharah jets up to Winston’s laboratory on the Lunar Colony and says hey man, my kit needs something, what are you working on right now that can improve my capabilities for true air superiority? My flying feels slow and labored, and I just feel like I need an extra umph of killing power. What can we do?

Winston opens his jar of peanut butter and swirls his finger for a bit while pondering a solution. “I’VE GOT IT” he says. He had been experimenting with his tesla cannon and different uses for the energy beams. He asks Pharah for her power cufflink and gets to work. Hours later he comes back with her cufflink augmented with tesla capabilities. “I’ve rewired and added an extra power cell to your cufflink, if you squeeze here your normal concussive blast will still fire, however! If you squeeze HEEERE you will shoot out a lasso of tesla energy with tentacles that will latch on to an enemy suspending them in a state of paralysis for about 1 and a half seconds until the lasso dissipates. I warn you however, these abilities fire off from the same energy source so using one, both will need to recharge.”

Pharah’s eyes light up as she squeezes the power cufflink, accidentally paralyzing Winston where he stood. “OOPS”.

Her next complaint is the sluggishness of her hover jets. She feels as though toggling to stay in the air using her jump jet can feel clunky and often times cause malfunctions. Winston takes another moment to ponder, swirling his finger into the peanut butter jar, slowly slathering excessive amounts onto a tiny piece of bread. “I’VE GOT IT!” he yells. Winston disappears into his lab for another couple of hours.

Winston returns with her augmented jetpack and exclaims! "I’ve removed your jump jet capabilities and found a way to rewire the power source to give you direct improvement over your hover jet capabilities instead. There are two different ways I was able to do this you will have to fly around and decide which feels better and I will make that permanent. Firstly, you can have a direct and stable improvement to the power of the thrusters that will make you ascend faster while I’ve also improved the regeneration of the power supply to make air sustainability consistent throughout rather than relying on your jump jet to toggle regeneration. The second option I can rework is an accelerated boost as you hold down your thrusters which can reach a maximum thrust just like that of your jump jet, however this will burn the energy supply at a much faster rate once it kicks in.

Pharah stands there in awe, eager to test our her new jet pac in the field to decide which option fits her air dominance the best. As she thanks Winston and begins to move towards the testing grounds, Winston pops out of his chair nearly dropping all of his peanut butter, “OH! And I’ve also rewired your Rocket Barrage with a kill switch should you ever need to escape harm in a jiffy!”

In Summary
There you have it folks, A Pharah vet with a massive suggestion to improve Pharah.

Her Tesla Lasso ability will give her a capability to have a true one-shot kill option. And why shouldn’t she? She has a freakin rocket gun. If Mei can freeze you, and headshot dink you… If McCree can flash bang you and fan hammer you, IF roadhog can hook combo you, if DOOMFIST can punch you into a WALL… Why would it be absurd to think reasonably that pharah can project a lasso that will paralyze you in place for 1.5 seconds so she can skillfully get off two direct rocket blasts for a kill. LETS GO!

Also just a suggestion but I like the idea that using either the concussive blast or tesla lasso will put both abilities on cooldown.

Tesla Lasso will replace the Jump Jet ability.

As a long standing Pharah main this does change her kit pretty significantly but I FEEL there is a way to work around her jet pack to make her hovering feel more responsive and more powerful without having to rely on the jump jet, which I think is actually a crutch to her flying capabilities. Remove it, and make the hover jets have more powerful thrust either in balance or holding it down to accelerate to peak thrust that burns more energy, and of course regenerate the energy supply faster as you let off the thrust so you don’t need to dance around with your jump jet ability to stay in the air.

AND LASTLY, please give us a kill command on rocket barrage, McCree can cancel his ult, no reason why pharah can’t cancel hers =)

Bullet Points
–Jump Jet (REMOVED)
–Tesla Lasso (NEW ABILITY)
projects an electric lasso latching onto an enemy at range and suspending them in place for 1-1.5 seconds.

–Hover Jet (IMPROVED)
more powerful thrust with increased regeneration

–Rocket Barrage
Right-click to cancel

THANK YOU DEVS! And thank you Overwatch Community. I Look forward to your feedback

1 Like
2

I don’t main her

But I also don’t okay her because of how clunky she is to play.

To be short- I loathe her flight mechanics.

Jump jet.
Jump
Jump
Jump
Tap
Tap
Pfft
Pfft
Tap
Jump

Oh okay it’s off cooldown- rocket back up

Tap
Tap
Tap
Jump
Jump
Pfft

Ya. No. It’s the literally definition of clunky to me.

1 Like
3

I knooow right. That ability is literally used almost exclusively for that purpose. Although I would miss the sneaky jump jet / rocket barrage combo from underneath the bridge at Eichenwalde and some other spots on some maps but I’ll survive.

4

Could we get a summary of your post?
I think Pharah is fine, like some other heroes ,she often gets neglected heal wise.

1 Like
5

At the bottom there is a 1-2 paragraph summary. I’ll label it.

6

As a pharah main since S3 with 350 plus hours I can agree she needs help now. I dont know the actual season but like around S15 I believe. Is when I stopped playing pharah in comp completely. I would play her if I see the opportunity. But in essence no.

Her damage is and never will be a problem, too much or too little. I dont think giving her an ability like that is necessary, the skill to flank a widow or a healer and two shot is where the skill comes in and is fun.

What I think she needs, I’ll try to sum it up quickly. She needs a shield for health to help her self sustain. Like symm. Lower the cooldowns for conc blast and jets, like to 6 or 7 secs. I use these mainly for mobility and survivability. Cancel her ult is a good idea too. Or some rework to her ult all together so you’re not just sitting there while a dva dms you and some hitscan kill you. Maybe buff her jets to add more mobility in air?

One thing is pharamercy. I personally never really needed a pocket mercy but nowadays, its probably for the better lol. But tbh, if they have to buff pharah and nerf pharamercy. I’ll do it like this. 15% dmg boost and like around 35 or 30 hps for pharah only. Itll decrease pharamercy effectiveness but not by a huge margin.

Tldr: Buffs to her health, decrease cd on abilities, rework or buff ult. In order to keep these buffs, you have to nerf pharamercy and doing that has to decrease dmg boost and heals to pharah only.

1 Like
7

Did you see that Valkia’s doing an unranked -> GM stream series?

8

These are really cool ideas. I just dont see the devs changing mercys healing on pharah, since that would seem a bit arbitrary and difficult for players to understand if they dont make a point of reading all the patch notes.

That said, I dunno if pharmercy is a big deal anymore. Between having Dva and Bap being so good against pharah now, even low level teams should be able to answer a low level pharah mercy.

1 Like
9

I think they mean like a couple of bullet points, cus even the summary is a lot to read XD

I’m not the biggest fan of this I have to say.

Firstly I’m not really clear on how your proposing changing the jump jets, your language is a little confusing, like I love the lore focus but it makes it very difficult to follow your proposal.
Her mobility is the area she most needs work though. I think the answer is a sort of hover mechanic in the vain of the clone jetpack troopers from battlefront 2 (the old one) or the Falcon/Hornet from Halo. Like she naturally holds altitude with abilities to ascend or descend all on a fuel resource (though the key bindings and configuration for that would be a nightmare to work out).

As for this lasso thing its more CC, I do not want more CC. Never mind that 1.5 seconds is a crazy long period of time, Doom got a 0.3 seconds added to his self stun and its nearly killed the hero. CC is just not fun and many of us think we have too much of it already, yeah Mei can CC then 1 tap but that’s not good, it’s not something for other heroes to get, its something to nerf. Pharah’s kill potential is decent, fix her mobility and that may well be enough.

The kill switch on ult though is fine like that should just be added.

10

i’m proposing to remove the jump jet entirely as an ability, instead potentially making it a thrust option with space bar the longer you hold down your hover jets will increase your acceleration in the sky and burn energy supply faster… Or just get rid of it and make the overall hover jet ability with more powerful overall thrust for faster mobility and climb.

11

Well ex-pharah main. I dedicated about 12000 posts towards trying to get her buffs and 500 hours on her before I threw in the towel, it’s a lost cause, Blizz isn’t even aware she exists

Don’t let me dissuade you from playing her though, go right ahead sky sister :slight_smile:

3 Likes
12

TBH I think the fix she needs is to stay as she is (with an ult cancel option) but somehow give her an option to hold altitude automatically, rather than jump a bit, fall a bit. Maybe use the use key (same button as using Sym’s teleporter) and then she just stays at her current height, burning a bit less fuel, until you use another flight ability (boosters or jets).

13

I’m 2.9 - 2.8 dps rn and played against diamonds. Pharamercy isnt really a problem to deal with if you can counter and have your team help too lol. Especially nowadays, you shouldn’t have a problem dealing with pharah. It’s literally all on you if you able to counter her. Too many counters and buffs to help hitscans.

The reason I suggested that so theres a middle ground with pharah players and hitscans I guess. Buff pharah and in turn lower help from mercy but not deleting mercy or ruining her kit completely. It might be weird or whatnot for newer players. But idk, I thought that idea is a good way to be in the middle.

1 Like
14

Exactly Outlasted… Pharah gets a buff to her ability to kill as well as her mobility without having an arbitrary ability like jump jet to use as a crutch.

15

I’d rather they remove the jumpjet ability and replace it with an omnidirectional dash that uses jet fuel. Think a Hanzo lunge that can go in any direction and uses up a chunk of the resource Pharah uses to stay airbourne.

2 Likes
16

Shes not a Space Cowboy [CowGal*]…

Doesnt have that Cowboy Bebob vibe

1 Like
17

What if Pharah Movement speed was faster than tracers… Rocket Jumping would be fun … OFC the problem is healing , Mercy beam or zen orb…

18

I don’t think the problem is healing at all. I was 3900 on pharah and if you plan on being good at the hero you need to assume at all times you are an easy target flying around, I countered this by staying next to walls and buildings at all times and almost never boosting into the open unless I knew my counters were either dead or I had a chance to get on top of their heads.

19

As a former pharah main:

she needs a tighter hitbox, and a 50 armor boost to her health. She doesn’t take cover much so she needs some sustainability. Maybe shields instead of armor?

Her weapon should not self damage, sense characters in the same role don’t injure themselves with their own explosions. Maybe have slight projectile speed enhancement.

She should be able to move while ulting, bare minimum horizontally and at 20% speed.

Her over all flight speed should be enhanced a little. As of right now she is slow in air and very easy to pick off.

The above changes should help make her at least slightly more viable. There is no way to make her a must pick when most of the roster can body her from extreme range.

1 Like
20

Shes not a Space Cowboy [CowGal*]…

Doesnt have that Cowboy Bebob vibe

Wonder woman has a lasso =P

1 Like