It wasnt people on console having a tough time (she though is literally filling the Top 500 ranks on console). It was the Aim Assistance they made for OW was terrible until the recent update (prior the Halloween update) when they reworked it and said they rewrote the aim algorithm
1 Like
It’s not even most, it’s split pretty much down the middle.
Also in the absolute best case scenario it doesn’t even benefit her that much.
But OP I totally feel the same way. There’s no real safe way to harness the new changes, even then the risk isn’t worth the reward.
“AND allowing them to more easily shoot back at you”
Forgot about that. Yeah they tried to say it made it easier for Pharah to follow up with another shot but the truth is that it just means your shots are less disorienting to the target.
You put so many hours into Pharah I think you will find a way. If you just play QP it maybe more often you get unhelpful teams. You may do well or better in Competitive? Competitive will still be hard with organized teams to counter you but it also means you will get organized team mates. I personally make it a mission to keep Pharah up when Ana and Zen. I literally sometimes just leave my Harmony Orb on Pharah and they do well. So supports will adjust or if you keep telling them but also aware when your team is needing heals so you dont just hog the heals.
1 Like
Pharah main here as well Jinx. Just posted last night about this… I’m done with Overwatch. It’s not fun anymore with these constant awful changes. The dev team is ruining the game; no clue at all what they’re doing. They’re more concerned with profit maximization vs. game balance/experience. All the other “grounded” heroes are boring to me; pharah was one of the few dps characters that was different and challenging. Time to play other characters since they’ve decided to cripple Pharah.
1 Like
Yeah. Probably the biggest thing people forget about Pharah when talking about her is how reliant she is on jostling her enemies around to keep them from shooting back. It’s her survivability mechanism.
3 Likes
That’s a good point, maybe I should do a little competitive. I haven’t played that much and after a bad internet connection dropped me from two placement matches I didn’t play again. That’s sorted now, though, so maybe it’s time to give it another go.
Well now you know how Bastion, Reaper, and Roadhog mains have felt for over a year now.
1 Like
Dunno, I’m having fun with Pharah vs Pharah duels.
I get to go up in the air and two tap the other pharah.
Boom boom.
Playing more Pharah nowadays because I can kill the enemy Pharah easier, with Pharah, over Soldier.
It’s also nice knowing I’m putting Junkrat tier hurt on enemy shields.
Frequent concussion blast means I can mess with enemy positioning, like bouncing one enemy into our team.
Or use it to deny an escaping enemy from getting to cover.
It’s also pretty glorious to have a hero that kills Pharah, Brigitte, Symmetra and Hammond, with ease.
My second most played is Pharah. I think what the real problem is, is this:
It’s one thing to have to aim, but Pharah isn’t rewarded for aiming, now is she? Hit scan like 76 and McCree are rewarded for aiming. She’s rewarded for predicting where her target will be, and the splash damage accounted for judgement errors. She’s countered by a lot of heroes now - 76, McCree, Ana, Dva… arguably hanzo. Torb can just throw a turrent on the ground behind her and she’s countered just like that. Those heroes have a much easier time lining up their shots - even a McCree. You can also see Pharah rockets coming from a literal mile away. Also, Pharah’s job is made even harder when she’s in the air because of the way she decends - by bobbing up and down eradically making it harder to aim.
3 Likes
Then it should have been a console only change… no reason to bring it to PC as well.
2 Likes
I mean, I average high gold to low plat and I think I’m awful (but surprising number of people say I’m “good” so I must be doing something right?).
I do get where you’re coming from though, the forums aren’t the best place to be looking for information of skilled players. And as a former PS4 player, I could honestly see how this might be a buff to higher levels of play on console.
However, I honestly think that the changes were put in place to raise the skill floor and ceiling simultaneously for the hero in encouraging direct hits for more damage/reducing splash damage while also increasing the fire rate to make hitting shots while holding M1 significantly harder (and in turn requiring a faster repositioning of your mouse) so that the hero requires more skill to effective in higher levels of play consistently.
I feel you man. 
I feel you so hard you might want to file for a restraining order.
1 Like
Stealth, we can argue all day about whether or not the recent changes done directly to her were “nerfs” or “buffs”. But the big issues are the indirect nerfs she’s gotten from all these hitscan buffs and stuff. Even if you consider the patch to her a buff it’s hardly enough to compensate for how hard she’s been indirectly screwed over the last few months.
1 Like
She could use a new ability, a right click ability. Or move Concussive Blast to right click and give her an E ability. I can imagine a temporary forward facing Barrier as an E ability that looks somewhat like two folded wings, with an open space in front of her head allowing headshots to still get her but negating front facing body shots, or if a Right click then I can imagine her firing a miniature micromissile flurry of 2-4 micro missiles that lock on with a soft lock that can be avoided with cover or dashes (Genji, Tracer), while at the same time still helping her somewhat against mobile targets without curbstomping them.
The micromissiles wouldn’t be a huge buff so much as a sideways buff, because she wouldn’t be firing her normal rockets while using them. The E ability could make her stationary so she sacrifices mobility and being harder to hit (To compensate a little, when the barrier breaks it might give her a short dash in a direction she’s facing or where your movement keys are directing her).
I’m pretty fond of either idea. The barrier + the dash break could make for a much more engaging playstyle particularly syngergizing with her ultimate which is often regarded as “JUST-AUGH” (Imagine Concussive blasting out from behind a corner, shielding, pressing Q to rain missiles.
When your barrier breaks, it triggers a dash in a direction of your choice similar to another concussive blast, interrupting your ult to end it early and help get you out of the situation, basically you swoop in and dive like a raptor. However you’re still vulnerable to headshots, sides, back, and so on, and because it’s not a complete cover you could still be flashbanged for example. If that’s too strong you could make the dash not interrupt your ult (You wouldn’t move at all if your ult is still going), or the dash could be removed.)
Meanwhile the micromissile burst would be another thing to do besides M1 spam which would be nice.
1 Like
If you think it’s hard for a pharah to survive, imagine Ana who gets dove by literally everyone. I play Ana a lot and most of my games I get dove by upwards of three people at one time. I can only sleep dart one person. It’s also one of the hardest abilities to land and has a long cooldown.
2 Likes
I play on console and the biggest problem was not Pharah herself, but Pharmercy. Pharmercy has become less of a problem tho since they nerfed Mercy and no one wants to play her anymore. Leaving Pharah as an easy target for hitscans and even Moiras…
I was always really annoyed by Pharah, but it’s true that without Mercy she is rather weak. But you have to be careful with buffs for her cause she is still the only hero that can stay in the sky for that long.
As much as I love Pharah and her design, she unfortunately has always been pretty difficult to be successful with. I like her attack speed increase and I’m fine with the splash damage nerf, but I really hate her complete lack of survivability—survivability that seems to be getting worse with each patch. I just don’t know how they could buff it without creating a monster. The Pharah-Mercy combo is so strong that it pretty much defines the character’s place in competitive scenarios and it’s basically what people are thinking of when they refer to her in balance discussions.
I can just agree
Over 300hours on the Queen split between arcade/ competitive/qp.
I feel like Pharah herself lacks of autonomy
Her reliability to healers to survive is blatant, more than any other flankers that have strong abilities.
When you look at her kit, its pretty poor:
-
10sec jumping jet for a boost that has a predictible path and situationnal. For instance this cd is legit useless to escape firepower, thats why she would need a second ability to land quickly as her highlight intro
-
9sec concussive blast, well reducing from 12 to 9 is a quality life change Pharah mains were asking for a long time. I dont think it’s justified to come 2years after and make it like its the only buff she gonna get, when actually she should have get this buff for a long time
Since the movement changes it has been very frustrating to see people get knock back just a little or manage to recover from it -
Barrage is still one of the most punished ult of this game. There is no other ult that freeze you DURING 4SEC, not even a tank could handle the firepower Pharah is about to receive. No healing can save her, not even a zarya bubble.
I dont know what they need to realize this ult has serious problems for a long time now. It should be 2sec-2.5sec maximum or make her immune to headshots and has damage reduction during it if they want to keep the 4sec -
hover makes her move slow. The straffing in the air is horrible, it feels like you have almost no impact on your enemy aims other than pressing jumping jet or concussive blast.
It kills me she doesn’t have a piece of armor like 50 or something to at least mitigate the entrance damage she can take from poking or in diving phase. With recent hitscans buffs, it clearly shows they want you more to take another character than strive to work around your counters (which was the case before)
Then you play into Blizzard hand. Rather than out right remove Rez and face a huge backlash, they just sabotage her working kit to the ground so people would eventually beg to get Rez removed.
Yes I agree the Pharah’s update is overall net nerf and you lose more utility and exposed to hitscan wars…which isn’t in your favor as bird in the sky with no cover. Blizzard wants a precise AOE for Pharah, which is an oxymoron.