phantom vs blademaster?

[00yiggdrasill00]

ive found i really love phantom for the extra scouting but im wondering if blademaster is worth a shot. +2 damage and + 10 aim on weapons i feel underpreform and are risky to use seems very little...but ive been watching some lets plays recently where the swords have been put to huge use so...

[jmsand1]

In vanilla I prefered the phantom build, but after WotC came out the Reaper does the heavy lifting for scout duties, and the Ranger can be very effective going the blademaster route. It is worth giving a try to see how you like it!

[Vogelmeister]

Originally posted by jmsand1:

In vanilla I prefered the phantom build, but after WotC came out the Reaper does the heavy lifting for scout duties, and the Ranger can be very effective going the blademaster route. It is worth giving a try to see how you like it!

Same here! I used to train most rangers for stealth and they were really helpful if played right. With WotC I started exploring blademasters more and grew to love them.

[Supa]

I've read that blademaster is better but I like phantom more too. Its very good after you get the extra conceal ability giving you very good shotgun accuracy with almost guaranteed crits. I dont know what kind of lets plays youre watching but new players underestimate the effects of the conceal and just look at the +2 damage that is written on the blademaster.

[Vogelmeister]

Originally posted by Supa:

I've read that blademaster is better but I like phantom more too. Its very good after you get the extra conceal ability giving you very good shotgun accuracy with almost guaranteed crits. I dont know what kind of lets plays youre watching but new players underestimate the effects of the conceal and just look at the +2 damage that is written on the blademaster.

Funny thing is, I've seen both of them being called "useless" and "unplayable" quite a lot, whereas in fact both classes have their uses and benefits.

[gimmethegepgun]

Originally posted by jmsand1:

In vanilla I prefered the phantom build, but after WotC came out the Reaper does the heavy lifting for scout duties, and the Ranger can be very effective going the blademaster route. It is worth giving a try to see how you like it!

Basically this. Phantom was undoubtedly the better choice in vanilla but in WotC Reapers are SO much better at the job than Phantom Ranger that there's not much point in it so might as well just take the blade. Besides which, Bladestorm doesn't get in the way of Implacable anymore thanks to the training center so that's a huge improvement to the blade line (same for Reaper vs Rapid Fire, along with the MASSIVE nerf they gave RF)

[LonesomeSparrow]

I pretty much always go for blademaster. Bladestorm is just extremely powerful.
Don't forget that that ability basically let's you attack twice. If you run up to an enemy and hit him with the sword and your enemy still survivives, your soldier will immediately attack again as soon as the enemy's turn starts because bladestorm triggers instantly.
Assassin's Katana does 8-9 damage + 2 extra damage granted by blademaster that's 10-11 damage. Using bladestorm that way guarantees 20-22 damage (or more if you researched additional blade damage which might pop up during your campaign) since the Katana cannot miss.
So you can just let your soldier run up, hit them with the blade and let them chill right next to the enemy. Use the squad on other folks because you know that one particular enemy is going to die as soon as enemy turn starts.
That way the ability "Untouchable" can also be activated during your enemy's turn so you don't have to worry too much in case your ranger is exposed.

Such a shame tho that getting bladestorm on a templar is not guaranteed.

/edit: Also, having a blademaster with bladestorm is pretty funny when enemy reinforcements are on their way. Just position him right in the middle of the flare and wait. lol

[benr313]

Originally posted by LonesomeSparrow:

/edit: Also, having a blademaster with bladestorm is pretty funny when enemy reinforcements are on their way. Just position him right in the middle of the flare and wait. lol

I've had instances where a bladestorm character got lucky and wiped out the whole enemy reinforcement squad the moment they appeared and started to move.

[KRON]

In WotC blademaster can't be useless due to the presence of Katana, which with blademaster has more base damage than a shotgun, can't miss and is armor-piercing.
Anyway, in WotC nobody is stopping you from getting both Phantom and Blademaster.

[Eyal]

Even without taking in account bladestorm and the katana, in the early game you don't have a lot of flanking options and blademaster makes the sword attack 100% hit accurate (for the early game) which makes the Ranger as useful as a Templar in that regard.

[thrax7545]

There's enough time in a campaign to easily train up one of both. Ranger is my fav class by far, and I usually have a couple of each, and will often use 4 rangers on a mission. Although I will admit to defaulting to a blademaster first, but I feel it's just a personal prefrence. I also actually feel like Reapers enhance Phantom Rangers by scouting the area so you can move in for a good opening flank. They both have an extremely powerful progression tree.

[gimmethegepgun]

Originally posted by benr313:

Originally posted by LonesomeSparrow:

/edit: Also, having a blademaster with bladestorm is pretty funny when enemy reinforcements are on their way. Just position him right in the middle of the flare and wait. lol

I've had instances where a bladestorm character got lucky and wiped out the whole enemy reinforcement squad the moment they appeared and started to move.

Just gotta be careful doing that in WotC. They might drop a Purifier on you, which has a 50% chance to blow up when it dies.

[benr313]

Originally posted by gimmethegepgun:

Originally posted by benr313:

I've had instances where a bladestorm character got lucky and wiped out the whole enemy reinforcement squad the moment they appeared and started to move.

Just gotta be careful doing that in WotC. They might drop a Purifier on you, which has a 50% chance to blow up when it dies.

First, that just makes it more fun :p
Second, In this particular instance I had Grimy's Loot mod installed, so the bladestorm character had armor that reduced explosion damage just in case they dropped a Purifier.

[Greb]

I've always gone Bladestorm. Never liked the stealth mechanic. Your whole squad shouldn't get revealed in the first place when someone gets detected, in my opinion. It doesn't synergise well with the rest of the "stealthy" tree because you likely want to open up out of stealth if you perform an overwatch ambush with your Ranger thanks to the skill boost when attacking from hidden.

Staying hidden when your squad is revealed also isn't appealing considering you'll just end up getting detected 9 times out of 10 when the enemy scampers, and since you're a close ranged class and moving closer will get you detected anyway, limited use there too. I guess it might be useful in Iron Man when your whole squad is revealed prematurely and you need a quick shotgun blast to avoid disaster though.

Especially now you have Reapers on the field which make much better scouts than a lone Ranger with Phantom, the whole stealth tree for Rangers is more worthless than ever to me. Just slap on Talon Rounds, a Laser Sight and you're good to go, you won't even miss the ambush boost.

...though, I'd rather use a Templar as a melee specialist, since they're better in almost every way. I guess Rangers are more easily available than Templars though. I've mostly phased out Rangers entirely thanks to Reapers and Templars, anyway...which is a good thing considering how overpowered they can be.

[gimmethegepgun]

Originally posted by Greb:

Staying hidden when your squad is revealed also isn't appealing considering you'll just end up getting detected 9 times out of 10 when the enemy scampers

They won't be spotted if they don't get flanked by the enemy movement. So stay in cover and they'll be fine. If they get spotted it means you were doing it wrong.

and since you're a close ranged class and moving closer will get you detected anyway, limited use there too.

That's what Shadowstrike exists for: getting a good shot when breaking concealment despite being at range. That or using it with Rapid Fire to obliterate one enemy, or burning the Conceal ability for a one time boost to aim for a vitally important shot.

[Greb]

Well obviously, but things don't go perfectly according to plan 100% of the time. You can't reliably predict what the enemy pods are going to do and where they are going to run when revealed. If you're keeping your squad together, there's always the chance your Ranger will get flanked during their move phase. If you're keeping them apart, when you try to move your Ranger into close enough range they'll probably be spotted, unless you shoot from a fair distance away, which sure can work, but isn't exactly ideal for a shotgun equipped Ranger.

I guess, I consider Shadowstrike more for the critical side than the bonus aim gained from it, although both is pretty hefty which can make up for the distance penalty / lack of close range bonus anyway.

I've always favoured Shadowstep though, a quirk from XCOM EU/EW where you couldn't see if enemies were on Overwatch nor could you remove it by damaging them. The safety against an overwatch was worth more to me than striking once (or twice, if you take Conceal instead of Run and Gun for whatever reason) per mission for a near guaranteed hit, with critical.

Ranger is about the only class I always follow a set path down regardless. No exceptions, usually not even bothering to train extra skills later on either. The others feel like they have uses and can be played radically different, but the Ranger stealth tree, like stealth itself, is just a gimmick to me.