Valkyr QoL changes/ rework suggestions

[ZincKie]

I was thinking about how Valkyr could be improved. My main concerns are that her kit feels old and in some cases has parts that could synergise really well but don't (ie: Hysteria's invincibility doesn't compliment Warcry's armor buff). I came up with a few minor quality of life tweaks as well has some larger changes that could help her feel more like a melee berserker. I've tried to order this list based off of priority, highest to lowest, but I might group some things together based off of synergy. The only part of her kit that I haven't talked about is her Warcry, because I feel like this ability is fine for her and serves a good purpose.

 

QoL change 1: Paralysis should cost 0 energy.

This has no major gameplay impact outside of a few edge cases but it strikes me as something that only exists due to old system limitations or hesitancy. Either way, we now have abilities that don't cost energy and instead use alternate resources (see Nidus) and Valkyr's paralysis feels like an ability that should work like this too. I have more ideas on how to improve this ability but I'll talk about those separately as this could be a quick fix without further changes happening.

 

QoL change 2: passive is now "restores 25 hp and 50 (over)shields on melee kill. Doubled on finishers and enemies affected by Valkyr's abilities." 

Outside of Hysteria, Valkyr has no innate sustain which is a problem/ limiting factor for a tanky melee frame. This change would mean life strike is no longer a must have mod for her. The shield gain is to provide a synergy with Paralysis as I'll mention below.

 

Minor change 1: Paralysis now uses 100% of Valkyr's shields.

This might just be me but I have never felt like Valkyr's shields were there for any reason other than "we've never made a frame with no shields and that might be too big of a leap for now". I used to think that Valkyr would just be better with no shields but it's kind of part of her identity now and one of the main things separating her from Nidus or Inaros. I feel like it's a good way to express her berserker nature by having her build up shields with her passive (see change above) and then sacrifice it for a strong attack. This is intended to be a simple buff to Paralysis' damage and scaling whilst also providing a way to easily remove all shields and allow rage/ hunter adrenaline to kick in if needed. 

 

Major change 1: Hysteria no longer provides invincibility and innate lifesteal, instead offering health regen that ramps up based on time/combo/kills (any one of those would be fine imo). Hysteria augment now replaces the health regen with lifesteal for her and any nearby allies.

This is probably the most controversial change I'm going to propose. I've always felt that Valkyr doesn't need literal invincibility and giving it to her is wasting her high base armor stat and half of Warcry's buff. The idea here is to retain high survivability but to be more interactive/ dynamic. I personally felt that health regen is the best way to compliment her high armor but my main goal is to just get rid of the clunky "invincible but if an enemy sees you when you turn off the ability you take damage" condition. The augment suggestion is mostly to allow players to choose which form of health gain they want with the added bonus of providing a party buff. The existing Hysteria augment would be pretty redundant if the change below is also implemented.

 

Major change 2: Ripline is now a pounce ability.

Rip line has always felt pretty inconsistent to me, no matter what it's used for. Making a pounce ability that functions more like Slash Dash, such that it can be freely aimed for mobility or as a targeted leap that knocks down an enemy, achieves the same things Ripline does but with more predictable movement. This has the added benefit of allowing Valkyr to quickly leap into a crowd which is usually where she wants to be.

 

QoL change 3: Paralysis is a full radial AoE and removes negative status effects on Valkyr and nearby allies.

I consider both of these changes pretty minor but worth mentioning as potential buffs. The status cleanse could be a replacement augment or ignored completely but I feel like it bears mentioning as a possibility.

 

I don't think Valkyr is in dire need of a rework but I'd still like to see some improvements made to her as right now it feels like there's other frames that just do what she does but better. 

[FreeWilliam]

16 minutes ago, ZincKie said:

Major change 2: Ripline is now a pounce ability.

Rip line has always felt pretty inconsistent to me, no matter what it's used for. Making a pounce ability that functions more like Slash Dash, such that it can be freely aimed for mobility or as a targeted leap that knocks down an enemy, achieves the same things Ripline does but with more predictable movement. This has the added benefit of allowing Valkyr to quickly leap into a crowd which is usually where she wants to be.

I'd also be fine with a toggle like with Ivara's arrows...but yeah, SOMETHING should be done to make ripline consistent.  It's just a pixel's difference between you flying to the batch of mobs and one random one flying behind you.

Also: Let's change the scream when Prolonged Paralysis is equipped!

[GPrime96]

11 minutes ago, ZincKie said:

 

QoL change 3: Paralysis is a full radial AoE and removes negative status effects on Valkyr and nearby allies.

I consider both of these changes pretty minor but worth mentioning as potential buffs. The status cleanse could be a replacement augment or ignored completely but I feel like it bears mentioning as a possibility.

This would definitely help her because of Slash and Puncture. Slash ignore Armor and Puncture does extra damage to Armor (which Valkyr relies on 95% of the time). Those Physical damage types could kill you at high level Survival Runs (Since she got as much health as Banshee but less Shields) and removing debuffs would help her with the Team and herself.

He main reason i rely on her Invincibility is the obvious OSs. Something Armor can’t deal with at all. Corrupted Nullifier at Mot, Juggernauts at lvl 100, Corrupted Crewman at Mot, Toxic Ancient at lvl 200+, those enemies can OS you as Valkyr/Prime. So that’s something to watch out for without her Invincibility but that dosen’t mean the other are bad. The other changes looks good.

[ZincKie]

10 minutes ago, VPrime96 said:

He main reason i rely on her Invincibility is the obvious OSs. Something Armor can’t deal with at all. Corrupted Nullifier at Mot, Juggernauts at lvl 100, Corrupted Crewman at Mot, Toxic Ancient at lvl 200+, those enemies can OS you as Valkyr/Prime. So that’s something to watch out for without her Invincibility but that dosen’t mean the other are bad. The other changes looks good.

This is a fair concern and I do rely on the invincibility too, but if Valkyr is being one-shot killed then so are a lot of other frames. I don't think justifying an ability by saying it's one of the few things that'll survive a specific endgame environment is something we should encourage as that just leads to less frame variety for those missions. I do think DE should be very careful if/when removing Valkyr's invincibility as it is something she currently relies on.

My intention is that using armor mods (and maybe the new Adaptation mod) you push back the window in which she can be one-shot. Hysteria allowing Valkyr to rapidly regain hp makes it so the only possible way to kill her is either to one-shot her or consistently damage her at a rate greater than she's regaining hp because otherwise she'll always be at (or close to) full health. Basically, compensating for her low base hp (compared to other tanky frames) by giving her ways to constantly heal means her hp in practice is a lot higher than what her base stats would show. I personally think this solution fits better than just buffing her base stats as it lends itself to the berserker archetype.

[peterc3]

4 hours ago, ZincKie said:

QoL change 2: passive is now "restores 25 hp and 50 (over)shields on melee kill. Doubled on finishers and enemies affected by Valkyr's abilities." 

This is not QoL. Slapping "QoL" on an idea does not make it an actual quality of life change.

4 hours ago, ZincKie said:

Major change 1: Hysteria no longer provides invincibility and innate lifesteal, instead offering health regen that ramps up based on time/combo/kills (any one of those would be fine imo). Hysteria augment now replaces the health regen with lifesteal for her and any nearby allies.

This is not Valkyr.

4 hours ago, ZincKie said:

QoL change 3: Paralysis is a full radial AoE and removes negative status effects on Valkyr and nearby allies.

This is a complete and total buff to the Ability and doesn't even remotely qualify as QoL.

[ZincKie]

1 hour ago, peterc3 said:

stuff

So you have nothing constructive to say, you just want to argue semantics? I honestly don't understand what you intend by your comments as you seem more interested in how I've labelled my suggested changes rather than the changes themselves and I'm not sure how that adds to the discussion. If I've misread something please let me know.

Edited October 19, 2018 by ZincKie
elaborated, tried to sound less provocative

[peterc3]

3 hours ago, ZincKie said:

So you have nothing constructive to say, you just want to argue semantics? I honestly don't understand what you intend by your comments as you seem more interested in how I've labelled my suggested changes rather than the changes themselves and I'm not sure how that adds to the discussion. If I've misread something please let me know.

The changes are terrible and remove Valkyr's identity. You've tacked on part of Inaros' passive, removed Valkyr's signature ability, somehow turned Hysterical Assault into a team buff, turned Paralysis into a proc strip and, for whatever reason, made it radial - calling both minor changes, btw.

These aren't minor changes. These aren't, save for the change to Ripline, QoL. What exactly do you think you've improved?

[WhimsicalPacifist]

14 hours ago, peterc3 said:

The changes are terrible and remove Valkyr's identity. You've tacked on part of Inaros' passive, removed Valkyr's signature ability, somehow turned Hysterical Assault into a team buff, turned Paralysis into a proc strip and, for whatever reason, made it radial - calling both minor changes, btw.

These aren't minor changes. These aren't, save for the change to Ripline, QoL. What exactly do you think you've improved?

This.  Health Regen???  I really like the way that I've modded Valkyr's Hysteria to raise two middle Talons to most of the annoying mechanics in the game ie Scorpion Pull, AoE knockdown/staggers and AoE aura's through walls.  Doesn't scale her to infinity (no frame should be able to) and comes with very significant downsides for the situational power it provides.