I'm having some real problems adjusting to the phaseshift, and wanted to ask if there's a certain trick to using it.
Step 1: Stand completely still and charge it up. Step 2: Find other enemies that are standing completely still and headshot them. As you can see, it's the cleary best weapon for killing stationary enemies. Seriously though it's not that good. I found that it was really hard to use while moving because of the shot delay + scope sway making it impossible to aim correctly. And the low velocity, especially suppressed, makes it even harder to hit moving targets. It seems best at medium-long ranges, but it's an tiny effective range between the Parallax etc. and the close range scout rifles/bolt actions.
I can only imagine the pain trying to aim the alpha strike on a wasd'ing target. This is such a dumb concept that i'm pretty sure you're supposed to use it like a Nyx or something, spamming shots. Seriously, lol, a charge up sniper rifle.
The basic idea of a charge up rifle isn't a problem. If there's one thing in the game that really rewards pacing yourself and firing slowly it's sniping. But it really needs to be long-distance sniping. If the VS had gotten something like the Parallax except with a charge rather than a magazine, that could be charged while cloaked, and the charge could be held, it'd be at least on par with the Railjack (the TRAP not being easily comparable).
Does it do more damage charged up than a regular BASR? Or is the drawback of requiring a charge the balance for infinite ammo and no drop?
If i remember correctly the selling point is that it has an infinite ammo pool, resulting in it being less of a parallax type of rifle. So, like a mid range rifle with long range capacity, I suppose. At long range the alpha strike is completely lost on anybody that isnt standing still. So you only get the infinite ammo, and that makes engineers very sad. Maybe if at full charge you could like, do some damage to vehicles, then the charge up mechanic could be useful, but unless you're mid or short range I just dont see anyone hitting anything with it, so then, why put it in at all? It MIGHT be a fine rifle on its own, its just... charge up mechanic was cool on the lancer. On a sniper rifle, its just being lazy.
The Phaseshift is a Guerrilla rifle, use it in abandoned positions to take out enemies who are busy fighting your comrades. The charge is ready to go at the first pitch change if you are good with sound, or when the indicator just barely is visible. The bullet velocity is pretty average, so you should snipe in the 180 meter range, and only if the player jitter bug is not plaguing you. But the most important thing to remember is that you have infinite ammo, which means take any and all shots. You can operate away from all allies and effectively open up new fronts if you can cause enough havoc. If you find a target running across the field or fresh off a fight put semi auto into him as they can be used to get a lead on him and put him down. It isn't the best sniper rifle, but for what it gives you with infinite ammo, no bullet drop, and semi auto fire mode more than earn it a place in the arsenal.
I use it exactly like the semi auto Spectre but with infinite ammo. The charge-up I use only against stationary enemies at long range, which means I'll be firing in semi auto 99% of the time. In semi auto, it is a 2 hit kill on stationary enemies (head + body) which you can pull off reliably up to a good distance.
The main benefit of the Phaseshift is that it has no bullet drop and can headshot in one hit. While landing headshots on moving targets is slightly harder, It can be done with a bit more leading of the target. The Phaseshift does shine in areas where targets are doing stationary tasks. Remember these things: With no Silencer, The Phaseshift has a max One HeadShot Kill range 230m. Anything beyond this will require an additional uncharged shot to the the body. With a Silencer, The Phaseshift has a max Headshot range of 190m. Anything beyond this will require an additional uncharged shot to the body. As soon as you see the three bars in the scope light up, You have reached max charge and can fire, Additional charging does not increase damage. The Phaseshift has no bullet drop, Do not attempt to account for bullet drop. Make sure you remove your Ammo Bandolier as it will not be used with the Phaseshift. Flak Armor is recommended in its place. Equipping the fore grip does allow you to make slightly easier follow up shots. It is recommended you choose this over the dark light. You can fire a maximum of two fully charge shots OR five semi auto shots before the battery is overheated.
I'm not the best sniper by any stretch of the imagination, but I had a couple of nice streaks with the Phasesh1t once I figured out how to use it efficiently so I think I can leave you some advice. First off you want to line up your shot preferably in a cloaked state, or at least find a convenient, as in stationary, target BEFORE you decloak and charge your shot. Then it is important to know that it's totally sufficient when you charge your shots for only roughly a second to have enough damage for a one hit headshot. Finding the right timing is a matter of practice. When in doubt VR. As for engagement distances, I find ~40-200m to be convenient with the Phaseshift. That of course is a matter of preference. More important though is the situation you're in. It's best used when your team is advancing, for instance when you're defending a base and you're at a point where your team is making a push for the enemy spawnpoints. Or in other words you want to have allies in front of you serving as a distraction and keeping all the enemy snipers busy. Also you want to cloak right after you've fired a shot to stay concealed and immediately change position unless you're at a safe distance or the enemy is apparently completely oblivious of your presence. Then you might be able to afford to stay at one spot for extended periods of time, possibly even in a decloaked state. Otherwise it is always good to use your cloak excessively and change position as often as possible. Final edit: Enemy snipers should be your primary target because they're obviously you're #1 threat. Fortunately snipers are also the guys who tend to stand still for longer periods of time by nature so many if not most of them conform your predator prey-system anyways. (sorry if sloppy translation but you should get the point )
Well most of the time i use it as semi-auto rifle (silencer+6x+grip or 8x+grip). Then you try to double tab with headshots. Charge i use only if i need a quick finisher in a 200m (OHK-range) range or if i can affort it, that my shot(s) could be heard (Of course that doesn´t count if you are not playing without silencer to begin with). Also remember remember that you have not to fully charge the shot for it to count as "charged shot". A training session in the VR can help you get a knack for the time needed to become count as charged. I would not recommend to spam with this weapon, because it can only fire 6 consecutive shots in semi-auto mode. All in all it´s not really bad but also not good. It´gets outclassed by every other semi-auto and BA rifle. But if you are precise, if you can stay long enough alive to actually benefit from the infite ammo, if you are not new to sniping in Planetside 2 and don´t mind a maximum OHK-range of 200 meter, well this weapon could be for you. Maybe you want to check out a video from a outfit member of mine:
I found excellent video that shows how to phaseshift. As you can see you: 1. Take scythe to area where it's TR vs NC (twice the afk targets) 2. Wait until they start to look at the map and redeploy 3. Aim for the head 4. ??? 5. Auraxium //Edit: you can also camp vehicle terminals and reskill BR<10 snipers that don't know they should move after cloaking, all the fun stuff !!
Right now, it is a novelty item. I use it when I don't care about results, and just want to live in a personal little bubble where the empires still had different kinds of weapons across factions. Any of the T1-3 BASR rifles will yield much better results.
