[Warframe Concept] Balam, the Artillery

[CookieCutter]

The idea of this frame is to be a walking artillery, providing support fire and area control, as well as having a massive gun for long range direct damage. The frame would be tanky, more reliant on damage mitigation through shields and manipulating the enemies, with a good dose of armor to help its survivability. All numbers are purely to get a feel of how the frame could function as balance is difficult and not the point of this.

 

Armor              400

Shields            150 (450 at rank 30)

Health              75 (225 at rank 30)

Energy             150 (225 at rank 30)

Speed              1

 

Passive: Reconstructive Shielding

Balam's shields continually regenerate over time regardless of if damage is currently being taken or not. This does not interfere with, but does stack on top of, the rapid shield regeneration after a Warframe takes no damage for a few moments, or the Guardian mod from a companion. Think Nidus' passive but for shields instead. The shield replenish rate would be additionally moddable by power strength.

 

Ability 1: Flare

Balam launches a flare from a component in her forearm. The flare attaches itself to the first thing it encounters, be it terrain or enemy (passing harmlessly through allies to avoid griefing, annoyance and having a flare blazing in your face).

Once attached, it begins burning, bursting with light and dealing radiation damage (with a good chance to proc Radiation status) to the enemy it's attached to and any others in a radius around it. The flare would also attract nearby enemies within a moddable range to its location as long as it burns. Similar to Titania's Lantern ability, but immobile unless attached to an enemy and moving with it. The attaching mechanic would work like Ivara's Cloak Arrow, able to stick to anything/anyone and move with them.

Balam can have up to 2 separate flares active at the same time. This ability is meant to provide soft CC in the form of aggroing enemies into one spot, be it to kill or distract away from a fallen ally or target of interest. The radiation proc would also mean the enemies start fighting each other once they get close.

 

Ability 2: Bunker Down

Balam steadies herself on the spot, anchoring herself to the ground with four chains that shoot out downwards from her belt area. While in this mode, Balam becomes immobile, immune to crowd control effects and all status effects on her last for 50% of their duration. Upon activation she instantly gains an additional 500 shields (moddable) while remaining in this mode, adding on top of her current shields as long as she remains bunkered. The ability can be used while up against a wall to anchor to its surface instead, providing similar effect to an unlimited wall latch without having to hold down aim.

The ability could be canceled by performing a bullet jump motion in any direction, by transitioning into the leap, or by dodge rolling out of it so in a moment of panic you don't get stuck and die because you forgot to deactivate the ability. This ability could have a continued energy drain over time cost, or just activation cost. Since mobility is important in this game it'd likely be used when being overrun, needing a moment to survey the area up on a wall or shoot from a safe spot, or in need of a sudden survivability boost to gun down anything coming your way.

 

Ability 3: Barrage

Balam's shoulders open up, revealing a hidden miniature missile pod within each, which then rapidly fire energy missiles, auto-aiming at enemy targets in a (moddable) 90 degree arc in the direction of the target reticle. This ability is similar to the auto aim missiles fired from Odonata's third ability, Seeking Fire, dealing AoE Blast damage and having a guaranteed chance to proc the knockdown status effect on each missile impact.

 

Ability 4: Mass Beam Cannon (Exalted weapon)

Balam pushes her arms outwards and clasps them together, various pieces of her armor open/slide aside to reveal smaller components and cables which rapidly connect between her arms, forming into a large energy cannon. In this mode Balam can't use quick melee or swap weapons without first deactivating the ability. On click, the cannon fires a powerful, brief energy beam per shot, dealing high Heat and Puncture damage to any enemies it hits and has innate punch through, able to shoot through a row of enemies and even some walls. Using Balam's first ability while in this mode shoots out a larger flare instead, this one lasting twice the duration of the base ability and having twice its range (still being able to have up to 2 of such flares active at the same time). This weapon would be akin to a chargeless Opticor, with a wider cutting beam and a higher rate of fire simply due to being shoot-on-click, leaving behind a brief trail of heat damage floating along the path of the beam after a shot.

The ability would have an energy cost per shot fired, along with a small activation cost, similar in costs to Ivara's Artemis Bow ability.

Alternatively to this way of forming the weapon, while not in use, the cannon could be folded on Balam's back in a coil or as two jets-resembling barrels along her back. Upon activation of the ability it would rapidly unfold upwards and over her right shoulder into a solid weapon which she would hold up with her arms like a rocket launcher, but remaining connected to her on the back via movable parts and cables. The visual concept of this ability being that the weapon is a physical part of the frame, and that the cannon or the frame's own arms reshape on the go to form a big functional gun.

 

Balam's visual design would be reminiscent of a top-heavy suit of power armor, its legs being more slender and smooth in design, resembling the metal similar to Gara's design, while the upper body (particularly the shoulders and the upper back) would be more heavily armored and bulky to hold the many movable parts. She would have shoulder compartments for missile pods, four small pods on the belt/hip area for the grounding chains, and the armor on her arms consisting of many smaller overlaying armor plates starting below the shoulder and continuing along her arms. This armor would briefly pop outwards around the forearm when using her first ability to shoot the flare like a rocket, and shift around when forming her fourth ability to equip the cannon.

 

Edited January 3, 2019 by CookieCutter