What I hope to see from Melee 3.0

[Ikusi_Prime]

Melee 3.0 is on its way, and there's a lot of changes coming. I'm one of the people that every once in a while goes "you know what, I'm going to do this wave/mission/session as melee-only", and I have a lot of fun with that. There's a lot that already works with melee that makes it a good experience. Aside from fixing the glaring issues with things like the Atterax clearing rooms through walls, there's a few things that I really hope to see stay and go with Melee 3.0. 

First of all, move diversity. Every stance has a set number of combos and maneuvers it can do that generally involve mashing E while holding a specific key down, or holding E at the right time. I'd love to see the button-mashing aspect be reduced in favor of more skill-based combos. With the removal of channeling, opening up the primary fire button as a melee key, it opens up a lot of room for combo diversity. If I could have my way with it, I'd want to introduce "combo trees", where each combo had certain points where you could press a different button for a different attack or different combo path. Like, at those points n the combo, you could do a light attack for a mobile strike, a heavy attack for AoE, a block attack for a status proc, and so on. 

I also feel like some moves are not used as much as others, or don't really sell the concept of a weapon. When was the last time anybody did a wall-leap attack on purpose? There's a lot of room for improvement with the lesser-used maneuvers that don't come up as often. I don't think they should be so good that people will want to run to find a wall to leap off of, but doing so should be rewarding. Also, slam attacks could use a pass. Slamming the ground and hitting everybody around me feels really appropriate for a Fragor, but not as appropriate for a Karyst. A "slam" that is instead just a downward dash that doesn't stun me in place would be a lot more flavorful and fun for a dagger. 

Next, channeling. The associated energy cost makes channeling in the early game not very attractive, and the bonus damage wasn't really that noticeable. The coolness factor is something that I think should be preserved. Channeling should be this awesome moment where you are the epitome of a badass space ninja, not just a glowing effect and damage boost. Instead of a toggle, give it a short cast animation that is triggered by holding a combination of buttons, and have it empower your weapon, with different effects based on the weapon. For example, heavy weapons could knock enemies around, daggers could give you extra movement speed or a small dash with each attack, rapiers could open up enemies for finishers when they parry attacks, etc.; something cool to make each weapon's peak moments feel unique. It could have an energy cost, or it could run off of a different meter that you'd need to build up by fighting, putting it on a limited duration. I like the idea of channeling, but the execution wasn't ever something that I found useful.

[Loza03]

I think it's a little late to be making large-scale hopes. They've already displayed pretty much what it's gonna be. Yes, they've gone back a few steps, but I don't think it's wise to really to assume large-scale alterations from what's been shown off.

So, let's run through this.

6 minutes ago, Aejan said:

First of all, move diversity. Every stance has a set number of combos and maneuvers it can do that generally involve mashing E while holding a specific key down, or holding E at the right time. I'd love to see the button-mashing aspect be reduced in favor of more skill-based combos. With the removal of channeling, opening up the primary fire button as a melee key, it opens up a lot of room for combo diversity. If I could have my way with it, I'd want to introduce "combo trees", where each combo had certain points where you could press a different button for a different attack or different combo path. Like, at those points n the combo, you could do a light attack for a mobile strike, a heavy attack for AoE, a block attack for a status proc, and so on. 

I'm afraid skill-based combos aren't what they're going for. They were initially gonna go for something like this, but then they realised that really in-depth melee combos don't really mesh well with the horde gameplay of Warframe. So, they're going with a simpler situation - standing still will produce one string of attacks, moving will produce another that's faster and simpler like current quick melee, but presumably weaker, and holding block will produce another combo string that, with a few exceptions, moves the frame forward as a gap closer as part of the first attack. As far as we know, left-click is used for heavy attacks, which seem to be generic.

10 minutes ago, Aejan said:

I also feel like some moves are not used as much as others, or don't really sell the concept of a weapon. When was the last time anybody did a wall-leap attack on purpose? There's a lot of room for improvement with the lesser-used maneuvers that don't come up as often. I don't think they should be so good that people will want to run to find a wall to leap off of, but doing so should be rewarding. Also, slam attacks could use a pass. Slamming the ground and hitting everybody around me feels really appropriate for a Fragor, but not as appropriate for a Karyst. A "slam" that is instead just a downward dash that doesn't stun me in place would be a lot more flavorful and fun for a dagger. 

We don't know what's gonna happen to wall attacks, although since they've touched up all the stances animations, it's likely they'll get their proper dues. However slam attacks are confirmed to be making a return for all weapons - they've even showed it off with daggers IIRC.

12 minutes ago, Aejan said:

Next, channeling. The associated energy cost makes channeling in the early game not very attractive, and the bonus damage wasn't really that noticeable. The coolness factor is something that I think should be preserved. Channeling should be this awesome moment where you are the epitome of a badass space ninja, not just a glowing effect and damage boost. Instead of a toggle, give it a short cast animation that is triggered by holding a combination of buttons, and have it empower your weapon, with different effects based on the weapon. For example, heavy weapons could knock enemies around, daggers could give you extra movement speed or a small dash with each attack, rapiers could open up enemies for finishers when they parry attacks, etc.; something cool to make each weapon's peak moments feel unique. It could have an energy cost, or it could run off of a different meter that you'd need to build up by fighting, putting it on a limited duration. I like the idea of channeling, but the execution wasn't ever something that I found useful.

Now, channeling is something we have no information about. And it's likely to be something similar to this. From what brief shows we have of Melee 3.0 in Devstream 116 and what we've heard, it does seem that it's something similar to this. They've said that Channeling is indeed becoming some kind of Devil Trigger situation, and in 116 we see the altered combo meter filling in a very 'power gauge' fashion. And I'm hoping that it will be per-weapon class as you suggest. Right now, the weapons don't really feel distinct.