Pharah's ult is problematic

General Discussion
1

I dislike Pharah’s ult in it’s current state.

It’s unfun to play against, as Pharah is able to drop in out of nowhere with no sound queues (since falling has no sound attached to it) and instantly kill people before the voice line even plays, but it’s also horribly unfun to play with as it locks your movement, makes you a sitting duck, and is terrible at any range beyond point blank.

I tihnk it’s just a really poorly designed ultimate, with it’s problems so inherent to it’s core that it’s almost impossible to fix. There needs to be changes made to it, I think, major ones, if not having the whole Barrage thing reworked.

Maybe the damage could be reduced, but the shots made faster/more accurate so it’s better at range and actually barraging things. Maybe you could move during it, but slowly like you do as mercy while rezzing in valk (with vertical and horizontal movement)?

There was talk about while designing Pharah they had her concussion blast do tons of damage to shields, but found it broken. Maybe that could be reworked into her ultimate? A fast charging ult that just shoots a (or multiple) anti-shield shot (s). It’d make her a more siege/anti bunker strategy oriented hero.

What do you guys think? Do you think Pharah’s ultimate is good in it’s current state? Do you enjoy the ambush/barrage style of play and playing against it, or do you think that it’s a bad idea?

Edit: I’d like to restate, since many people seem to be under the impression that I’m just salty about dying to Pharah and don’t know how to counter her ultimate.

I can counter her ultimate. It’s really, really easy to counter her ultimate most of the time.

That’s the problem.

It’s not fun for the Pharah to use the ultimate and die, and in the rare times the ult does something without her just instantly dying, it’s not fun for the person who dies to it because they usually quite instantly get deleted with no sound queue.

The problem is, no matter what the result of the ultimate is, it’s not fun for someone.

3 Likes
2

well when that happens to me it usually ends in, justice rains from (insert dying sounds here)

8 Likes
3

Yes. That’s why it’s problematic.

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4

I think it is a poorly designed ult, you’re right.

It’s one of those cases where power wise, it is probably fine. But how it feels to play as or even against leaves the player wanting.

The player’s ult should feel good to use. Not mark you as a sitting duck where you know you will likely die if you use it.

It’s like a more problematic version of McCree ult, who exhibits some of the same issues.

3 Likes
5

It also holds ties to the old, old mass rez. Like, when you weren’t invincible during.

It’s really good and can help turn the tide of a fight, but you are going to die using it, 100%.

6

It’s quite ironic that most of the “DPS” ultimates have some of the worst and lowest killing potential in the game.

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7

I can agree with you when it comes to how silent a falling Pharah can be, I’ve been caught off guard by her quite a couple times.

But otherwise it’s a hard ult to pull off, as most players are tracking where she is and can tell when she’s about to ult.

Even if you’re not used to tracking enemy ults, you can tell if a Pharah has it if she’s playing a different position or style then she was earlier on in the round. A D.Va who is stingy with their DM and just a pinch of situational awareness can hard counter Pharah’s ult.

8

Oh yeah. It’s really easy to tell when a Pharah has barrage and just shut her down immediately.

But that exemplifies the problems more than it abates them.

9

But there is ways to help her. She can fire it behind barriers. Get boosted. Protect her from CC.

1 Like
10

If she’s behind a barrier, generally the ultimate will be less effective as an ambush attack as it’s poor at range.

Bubbles and boosting helps, but that doesn’t solve the core issues with the ultimate.

11

As a 130 hour Pharah main, I just think she needs the ability to cancel her ult.

For the damage is does, it’s high risk high reward.

The reason why it also seems to weak atm is because of all the hitscans, snipers, and the powercreep.

Just add the ability to cancel it, and it would be fine.

8 Likes
12

That’s a really good idea I didn’t even think of.

Though it would still leave the problems with the ambush-style of play being kinda unfun to go against sometimes.

13

Yeah, but that’s alike some certain other ults too.

DF and Tracer both have assassin-esque style ults, and unless you have game sense you cant know if the Tracer has ult or not. Then DF can also play aggro and ult if he goes too deep, and use it to either finish off one of his targets or escape completely.

Those ults aren’t really fun when you’re the target of them.

Pharah just has a much higher risk for hers, and thus she has a high reward if she pulls it off, OR if the enemy doesn’t counter her.

Her, Reaper, and McCree have those kinds of ults, where Soldier and Genji are more lenient.

14

Tracer’s ult is different. You get stuck and it takes a moment to kill you, during which you can use invincibility abilities or a zarya bubble or something to save yourself.

With Pharah’s ult at point blank, the death is usually near instantaneous because of how much damage it does, and you have little time to react if you didn’t see it coming.

Doomfist’s ult isn’t at all similar. It takes a while to aim (during which it’s obvious he’s using it), and it has a second of windup time before it even goes off.

15

I don’t see them allowing her to shut the ult off. Because it would just allow extreme poke damage for one second. Which could devolve into camping targets.

16

Replace Barrage with “Mercy”.

Pharah yells “Mercy, pocket something!”, a Mercy bot shows up, pockets Pharah for 20 seconds and goes away.

Then delete Mercy as hero, and officially ship Phamercy with a cinematic that deals with the age difference in the relationship in a smart, mature and respectful way.

There, two birdies, one stone :+1:

17

But the same can be said for Pharah’s ult.

Use any invincibility ability like Cryo, Fade, Shadowstep, etc.

While Barriers won’t fully protect you throughout the duration of Barrage compared to pulsebomb, it buys hitscans enough time to react to her and kill her, just like the cast time on pulsebomb.

At point blank all any tank has to do is place their barrier and she blows herself up.

Sounds like you’re suffering from low ELO if you’re finding this to be a problem. At Diamond, any Pharah including myself stays 10m or so above the ground.

At this range you still maintain high DPS with your ult, but the difference is that you aren’t a sitting duck.

My point was that it’s both an effective escape tool and a solotarget/assassin ult.

18

McCree says hi! :slight_smile:
It’s high… arglll…

19

It’s kinda like Bastion’s ult in that it is very situational and sometimes you’re better off holding onto it for the right moment (or blowing it as a solo ult to delete a very key target to ensure you survive). Bastion’s ult essentially stuns him on use and on end, everyone knows you can just run and hide from the tank mode and when it ends he is a free kill.

With Pharah I only ever go for the big wipeouts when it’s being combo’d with a Zarya ult or something. Works well with Rein as well. You can’t even rely on the hitscan(s) being dead before using it either, you’re just as easy to kill for projectile heroes. Anything with range on it will end Pharah during her ult.

Honestly I think the two acceptable changes for it are:

A) Pharah can move during her ult, maybe at like half the speed Mercy flies during Valk.

B) Double the rate of fire, cut the ult time in half, so that it is effectively the same output but doesn’t leave her vulnerable for so long. She will still be stationary and have the counterplay, but you’ll need to act a lot faster.

20

I love pharah ult. It’s great fun being sneaky with it, and even calculating when you can pull it off without dying is fun.

Sure it’s no genji ult where you plant your face on keyboard deflect if you want and ignore getting booped because superspeed and dash reset - and get ez kills - but it’s fun tho.