Invisibility / Smokescreen Not Doing 4X Damage When In Physical Contact With Enemy

[shut]

When I was playing with Loki in the new Breeding Grounds missions, I noticed that stealth multipliers were appearing very inconsistently for some reason (in Solo mode). Shuuro was able to pin down what appears to be the cause of the apparent inconsistency.

https://forums.warframe.com/index.php?/topic/251348-when-does-smokescreen-invisibility-trigger-4x-damage/

 

 

Basically, when you're in Invisibility or Smokescreen, melee attacks will only trigger the 400% Stealth Multiplier if the player's body is not physically in contact with the enemy's. This makes Invisibility and Smokescreen incompatible with very-short-ranged weapons such as fists and dual daggers, while remaining difficult to manage with medium-length weapons like Longswords.

 

With the update regarding enemies' reactions to Invisible players (i.e. they now respond to loud noises from invisible players), I think this may be a bug that was accidentally introduced with the change, since body contact from visible players already had the effect of alerting previously-unalerted enemies.

I really hope that this is a bug, since there are ways of making Invisibility / Smokescreen more skill-oriented without removing physical contact from melee. While it makes sense realistically, it doesn't help with the game experience at all and actively discourages players from using close-quarters melee weapons such as fists (which already generally suffer in comparison to larger weapons like the Dragon Nikana, Orthos Prime, and the Bo Prime).

 

 

 

If this is a bug, then it would be great to see it fixed.

If this is an intended change, then it would be great to see it reverted.

[Phobose]

The loss of the stealth damage makes perfect sense in all honesty. When enemies come in contact with you physically they become aware that you're there thus a loss in damage multiplier.

 

I use fairly short ranged weapons with my ash, daggers to be specific and I come across this situation a few times but it makes plenty of sense.

 

I'd assume this was intentional

Edited June 23, 2014 by Phobose

[Eyeless]

Whether it makes sense or not doesn't really matter. From a gameplay perspective when Loki and Ash are supposed to be able to kill swaths of enemies while cloaked from their stealth multipliers, this is cruelly limiting considering how close you have to get to large groups of enemies to dish out the pain.

 

Hell it's Loki's only means of actual offense. 

 

I hope this is a bug and something they fix, or if it isn't, something that gets changed back. I don't mind enemies hearing me shoot and orienting on that, or that Infested can potentially smell me. 

 

What I do mind is being punished because of movements that aren't entirely in my control. Warframe's melee and animations in general simply aren't intimate and thorough enough to justify a change like this if it was intended. Not precise enough. 

[YashiroSora]

I feel it shouldn't behave like that, and is probably a bug.

[Shuuro]

As someone who lives by update 13's name:  The Sword Alone, I can say this could become problematic.

 

Once you're knee deep in limbs and gore at 40~60 minutes survival, you're pretty much fighting for elbow room while taking down enemies with melee. If this means that the damage output becomes lower, then that could prove to be a fatal downside.

 

I just hope it doesn't turn out to be as bad I think it is.

 

Edit: I have a feeling it isn't as bad as it seems. If the enemies attention is focused on your team-mates and not you, you probably still get that multiplier since they aren't paying attention to you.

 

I'd have to try it, but it's late, and I'm tired.

 

Edit 2: I think it is as bad as it seems from what I've tested so far.

Edited June 23, 2014 by Shuuro

[Shuuro]

Alright so. I just fought against Phorid. A pretty good test since he doesn't die in one hit (usually).

 

As we all know. When we use melee, our Tenno move forward, slightly, or by large margins when using melee, depending on the weapon/stance.

 

I was using the Dragon Nikana, and it seemed that even though there were other Tenno around, the stealth multiplier was gone as I was inevitably too close to Phorid now due to the forward momentum like nature from using melee.

 

This really can prove to be hindering, as far as making Loki's best offensive/defensive  ability, invisibility, lose quite some merit in the late game with melee. As well for other characters like Ash, and even Excalibur, who tend to enjoy taking advantage of the stealth multiplier attacks.

 

If anyone is willing to help me with more tests. That would be wonderful. Would like to test this out a bit more.

 

 

Edit:

 

Did another test against a heavy gunner in nightmare mode. First hit was in stealth, and the rest were all non stealth multipliers due to the inevitable closing in with melee attacks. This ruins the DPS, and makes melee even more farther inferior to guns.

Edited June 23, 2014 by Shuuro

[Shuuro]

Further clashes with enemies in nightmare mode prove to make stealth melee less lethal than it used to be. If you are not acurate with your attacks in a group of enemies, you'll just end up not getting multipliers at all. For enemies that do not die in a single hit, or in a situation where you're faced with a large group, this becomes problematic.

 

I'm fine with enemies knowing where I am if I'm going all BRAKK BRAKK BRAKK like nobodies buisness and making enough noise to shatter windows, but when I so happen to collide my body with a grineer or something else, does NOT give them 100% Insight that a razor sharp blade is about to slash their face/arm/leg/thigh. 

 

Edit:

 

Pasting pictures I put into the other thread into here for clarification.

 

Picture when I'm attacking an enemy from a melee sweet-spot (not in contact with the enemy)

 

Picture while attacking an enemy while walking into him (in contact with enemy)

Edited June 23, 2014 by Shuuro

[[DE]Rebecca]

Some degree of this is intended and it will be fully stated in the coming hotfix thread for maximum exposure. What (as you can see) appears to be happening here is basic enemy awareness on contact or sound of invisible units will trigger a response of some kind instead of full ignorance. The intent is to add a level of fine-control skills to the Invisibility mechanic. You've raised very valid points about how different ranged approaches make this fair/unfair, and I'm hoping to get clearly insight shortly to intent.

[Shuuro]

Some degree of this is intended and it will be fully stated in the coming hotfix thread for maximum exposure. What (as you can see) appears to be happening here is basic enemy awareness on contact or sound of invisible units will trigger a response of some kind instead of full ignorance. The intent is to add a level of fine-control skills to the Invisibility mechanic. You've raised very valid points about how different ranged approaches make this fair/unfair, and I'm hoping to get clearly insight shortly to intent.

 

Thank you very much. The clarification is much appreciated!

[unknow99]

Some degree of this is intended and it will be fully stated in the coming hotfix thread for maximum exposure. What (as you can see) appears to be happening here is basic enemy awareness on contact or sound of invisible units will trigger a response of some kind instead of full ignorance. The intent is to add a level of fine-control skills to the Invisibility mechanic. You've raised very valid points about how different ranged approaches make this fair/unfair, and I'm hoping to get clearly insight shortly to intent.

Is...Is it the beginning of Stealth 2.0?! :o

[Kaotyke]

Is...Is it the beginning of Stealth 2.0?! :o

We dont even have....

Edited June 25, 2014 by Kao-Snake

[FoxFX]

This enemy awareness thing in retaliation to invisibility is perfectly logical and quite fair to me.

[Pendragon1951]

So it seems if I understand all that is being said, they are trying to add a sense of realism and logic when in stealth mode so that if you come in physical contact you basically have alerted your target thus not able to gain the stealth multiplier. Now if we are talking single target then this is hogwash and here is why. The number of times I have used Loki to kill a single target no matter which weapon I have used the death has been either instantaneous with a direct thrust or a crushing of the throat area thus cutting off any alarm he might sound. So losing your stealth multiplier on a single target for the above reasons is flawed. Now if we are talking in a group, after the first target is taken down, then yes it makes sense to lose your multiplier to some extent but I do not see it lost completely because the enemy is still at a disadvantage, the attacker is invisible, you can't hit what you can't see.

[Shuuro]

So it seems if I understand all that is being said, they are trying to add a sense of realism and logic when in stealth mode so that if you come in physical contact you basically have alerted your target thus not able to gain the stealth multiplier. Now if we are talking single target then this is hogwash and here is why. The number of times I have used Loki to kill a single target no matter which weapon I have used the death has been either instantaneous with a direct thrust or a crushing of the throat area thus cutting off any alarm he might sound. So losing your stealth multiplier on a single target for the above reasons is flawed. Now if we are talking in a group, after the first target is taken down, then yes it makes sense to lose your multiplier to some extent but I do not see it lost completely because the enemy is still at a disadvantage, the attacker is invisible, you can't hit what you can't see.

 

You can't block a blade you can't see either.

 

This becomes a bigger problem on enemies you can't one shot, so in higher tier waves of Defense and Survival this starts to become a problem.

[NikolaiLev]

Some degree of this is intended and it will be fully stated in the coming hotfix thread for maximum exposure. What (as you can see) appears to be happening here is basic enemy awareness on contact or sound of invisible units will trigger a response of some kind instead of full ignorance. The intent is to add a level of fine-control skills to the Invisibility mechanic. You've raised very valid points about how different ranged approaches make this fair/unfair, and I'm hoping to get clearly insight shortly to intent.

 

Ooo, that's awesome.  I hope this is fleshed out more as a mechanic.

[Claden]

You can't block a blade you can't see either.

 

This becomes a bigger problem on enemies you can't one shot, so in higher tier waves of Defense and Survival this starts to become a problem.

True. I noticed this as well when when I played T4 Defense yesterday. I played Loki with Dragon Nikana and couldn't 1 hit the enemies. In the end, I was stuck in the enemy crowd and was either gunned down or KO from melee by them. Hope DE at least make it x2 damage multiplier if the enemies were alerted. 

Edited June 25, 2014 by Claden

[-HAKUNA-YOUR-TATAS-]

This enemy awareness thing in retaliation to invisibility is perfectly logical and quite fair to me.

 

Anyone want to hear the Grineer mutter a "huh?" like in the old MGS games?  That would be awesome.  XD

[crazylazy]

if enemies are alert loki's invi won get multipler dmg, does tat mean if my teammate make enemies alert ,and i won get multipler dmg when invi? if this is real then what is loki's invi mutlipler for? for solo usage only? body contact alert them make sense,but come on at high wave(like t3 survival) there is ton enemies, do you expect we lokis gonna walk slowly to not getting body contact with enemies and get mutlipler dmg 1 by 1? some time you do not have to make thing become so realistic, realistic some time kill the joy of gaming!!! joy of gaming are you can do something you are unable to do in realistic and able to do in the game to justify your despair..

(sorry for bad english)

Edited June 26, 2014 by crazylazy

[shut]

if enemies are alert loki's invi won get multipler dmg, does tat mean if my teammate make enemies alert ,and i won get multipler dmg when invi? if this is real then what is loki's invi mutlipler for? for solo usage only? body contact alert them make sense,but come on at high wave(like t3 survival) there is ton enemies, do you expect we lokis gonna walk slowly to not getting body contact with enemies and get mutlipler dmg 1 by 1? some time you do not have to make thing become so realistic, realistic some time kill the joy of gaming!!! joy of gaming are you can do something you are unable to do in realistic and able to do in the game to justify your despair..

(sorry for bad english)

 

You can still get the multiplier if enemies are alerted. It's only body contact that disables the multiplier.

[shut]

Some degree of this is intended and it will be fully stated in the coming hotfix thread for maximum exposure. What (as you can see) appears to be happening here is basic enemy awareness on contact or sound of invisible units will trigger a response of some kind instead of full ignorance. The intent is to add a level of fine-control skills to the Invisibility mechanic. You've raised very valid points about how different ranged approaches make this fair/unfair, and I'm hoping to get clearly insight shortly to intent.

 

Thanks a lot for the clarification!

I'm not quite liking this particular change, but it's nice to see some AI improvements being made in regards to invisible players (something that I've been vouching for for months now). Hopefully we can see this mechanic fleshed out some more for better balance in due time.

 

While I always appreciate realism in games, my main concern with this change (as mentioned in the OP) is inter-weapon balance. As stated in the OP, a huge number of short-ranged melee weapons are already relatively "useless" compared to the larger, more popular choices, and are generally only able to be used with full effectiveness by the three Frames that can induce stealth multipliers; but this change now actively discourages players from using the smaller weapons, which are now major downgrades because the multipliers are effectively disabled.

 

 

Several overly-simplistic (bandaid) changes off the top of my head that may or may not work:

- Give the enemies a "reaction time" of sorts; i.e. the stealth multiplier will only be disabled about 0.3 seconds after contact. Players are rewarded if they can get a hit in before that timer is up. (This may require a speed boost to various melee weapons, especially single daggers. However, it doesn't really help regarding followup hits.)

- Disable the new mechanic for short-ranged weapons. From a realism view, small short-ranged melee weapons are more capable of fine control and can easily deal critical strikes on an alerted target that can't see you. From a gameplay view, it gives players an actual reason to use smaller weapons over larger (and, in most cases, better) choices.

- Scrap the change entirely, and improve AI in a different way that doesn't have a profound effect on inter-weapon balance. I personally think that we need to encourage melee usage, not discourage it.

 

Hopefully we can see some pro-balance improvements in due time. Thanks! XD

Edited June 26, 2014 by SortaRandom

[crazylazy]

You can still get the multiplier if enemies are alerted. It's only body contact that disables the multiplier.

bro if this system have been start now, i have playing survival on griner map, if i cant 1 hit kill them in invi mode, my 2nd hit even i din have body contact it dun get any multiplier anymore,been trying hunt crimson dervish, bombard is the 1st enemy i cant kill in 1 hit, others i try not to have body contact to get the multiplier dmg, and i tried to make a few shot on them to have them alerted after they are alerted i cant do the multiplier dmg...

to me this system are killing loki/ash main advantage, on highwave you don't expect me to kill them in 1hit or hitting them continues without having a single body contact? that kinda Mission Imposible

[.-KG-..-LivingLegend-.]

Its really impossible with this touching body thing. Let enemies maybe react to dead ones, so that you have to keep moving or whatever. That would be a plausible reaction, i can throw all my short weapons away now when using ash or Loki! Glide Attack is also mostly impossible because in most glide attacks you hit the enemy with your body before you hit him with the weapon. please change that asap until you have found a good solution for general stealth damage.