Garuda is kind of amazing in her own way.

[Lone_Dude]

So I've bought Garuda because I gave up on accessing Orb Vallis due to my toaster of a PC not having enough video memory and it also blocked arbitrations for me so I had nothing to do. And formaed her 3 times for a classic "I'm lazy so I put umbra mods into tankier frames" umbral build.

While leveling her up I was disappointed multiple times.

1. Dread Mirror and Blood Altar abilities are clunky. Sometimes they wouldn't work simply because target was standing behind a ramp. Sometimes my Garuda would just "slide" around the obstacle and perform the ability.
2. Also, I once got the "ability in use" bug because I casted the Blood Altar just as the enemy was performing a jumping animation. So said enemy teleported underground and I couldn't use my abilities and melee for the rest of the match.
3. Having to stay near Blood Altar to regen HP is kind of like Nidus' 4th and provides good heals, but it doesn't provide any explosive mutant worms to control enemy agro or deal damage, so it's kind of "meh".
4. Dread Heart charging takes up WAY too much energy. It also feels kind of clunky to throw. Sometimes it would go off, sometimes it wouldn't. Why?
5. Little "hop" at the end of the Blood Altar animation caused me to get knocked down or hit by enemies numerous times.
6. Bloodletting is so forgettable I would sometimes search for energy orbs or use my operator to get energy. That might be my personal problem, but that ability is so boring that it can't even be affected by mods, so I forgot it existed.
7. I couldn't see the cone of my Seeking Talons. If it even exists. I think it does because enemies behind me and sometimes even to my sides, weren't affected by it.
8. Laughably low damage of Seeking Talons and the way you have to charge them to increase their range only made them worse in my eyes.

So yeah, things were looking rather grim and I kind of named her "Revenant 2.0" in my head. With these thoughts I went to visit Brozime Simulacrum. And oh boy did results of testing against level 150 enemies surprise me.

1. While bleed from Seeking Talons was still pretty meh with both Mara Detron and Opticor, it's synergy with the Dread Heart was simply amazing. 100k AoE bleeds (due to health scaling and damage absorption) AND a protective shield that block bombard rockets? Thank you!
2. And healing, oh the healing from 3 Blood Altars is just godly. I just couldn't die, even when I used the Bloodletting because I forgot about it existing and mistaken it's button for Blood Altar to see how it will affect my chances to stay alive.
3. I kind of warmed up to Bloodletting too, as I realized just how much it eases the energy problems that constant use of her abilities creates.
4. Seeking Talons would stun enemies allowing me to pick the best spot for the Dread Heart and increasing my survivability if I would walk out of Blood Altar range. They also affect enemies even under effect of the Ancient Healer aura, unlike certain abilities(looking at you, Nezha spears).

While boring and disappointing at first glance, Garuda turned out to be a great frame. I think she suffers from same problems that Nidus has. To be 100% effective you need to have stronger enemies fighting against you and combine your abilities. Otherwise it feels as if you play as a worse version of multiple already existing frames. She's not perfect and you have to press more than 1 button to kill stuff, but I still like her very much. I hope nerf hammer or a rework won't hit her too hard. Good job, DE.