Some big Hydroid changes I'd like to see

[Jemmanelli]

I'll start by explaining why I'm not fully satisfied with Hydroid in his current state. 

Hydroids passive is bad. His 3rd is clunky and mostly counter intuitive. His 2nd does its best job poorly. The option to charge his first and fourth ability is a gimmick. Insufficient amounts of pirate essence.

I'm convinced I need not explain why his passive is bad, I will anyway. If I ground slam an enemy, theres a very good chance I want to perform a ground finisher, but now, there is a 50% chance the enemy will be held in place by the tentacle, this is neat I guess, but you see, if i had time to pummel an enemy for 15 seconds (Deep Tendrils duration), then I more than had the freedom to perform another ground slam as soon as they got up. The tentacle does the job better, but you see, its quite simple, it is inconsistent. Not only will it often just not happen when you want it to. In my experience, there are many weapons that will launch the enemy just out of the tentacles reach. Sure, I understand, equip weapons that compliment your abilities, but the passive serves no real purpose and often ends up doing nothing. Please give Hydroid a real passive. Hes a pirate, allow him to plunder the enemies for additional credits and ammo or maybe he gets benefits during Railjack, like shorter turret cooldowns or something of the sort.  

 

His third is to my utmost disliking. You can cast all of hydroid abilities while in it. His fourth is even modified while in it. Hes also entirely immortal while in it. So wheres the problem, right? This is a game about being a Space Ninja, you even have an animated video on YouTube about it. What part of "Space Ninja" insinuated slowly creeping around as A LITERAL PUDDLE. I fully understand and support the idea that he can turn into water, but this ain't it. 

The changes I propose are as follows: Remove it. It is incredibly unmobile, its boring to use, uses immortality as a crutch, and doesnt even cleanse heat procs. Yes you heard me right, try it. There will be a tiny little single flame above the puddle, turning into water does not keep your from continuing to burn when you turn back. 

 

I think Tidal Surge should be turned into a proper movement ability. Because as it stands, a straight line dash that is either so slow that its literally faster to roll, or so fast that you will always overshoot by a soccer field, isnt good. The fact that it cant be cancelled to land more precisely or steered makes the issue even worse. A simple fix would be to simply have it be a Toggle. 

How about this?: I activate this ability once, I am now permanently in water form until I decide I dont want to anymore. I can move with normal amounts of speed and dont affect enemies. If I Sprint while in this mode I move at 2 times my sprint speed or something of the like. Pressing space will make Hydroid bullet jump out of the ground with increased force like a projectile launched from a geyser. I wouldn't even mind if a damage resistance replaced the immortality because of the changes. This ability also shouldnt cost 50 energy, I wont argue if someone thinks diferently but I personally think that movement abilities in a game like this should be easily accesible. Oh yeah, this ability cleanses you of status effects, or at least heat, because that simply makes sense. 

 

Why do I think that the option to charge his first and fourth ability is a gimmick? In my experience its always worth it to charge the ability. So why would I ever choose not to? At that point It might aswell always be in the charged state. Its an illusion of choice. 

 

I know that this leaves one open ability slot, and I know that it would be much preferable to simply change stats and physics on a pre-existing ability, but it would simply be much better this way. This empty ability slot could very well be used to make him more of a pirate. Like how about a temporary team buff called Plunder during which killed enemies will drop more stuff, especially health and energy orbs, limitations like a hefty cost, small buff range coupled with a reduced duration on allies would all be acceptable. Obviously a super simplistic ability, but its arguably its useful, fitting, simple on the visuals and seriously can't be hard to program. 

 

As weird as I feel for saying this, I'd like to see other peoples thoughts and opinions on Hydroid right now. 

[Urlan]

One thing I would like, that I feel would really assist Hydroid is taking all of his current augments and making them built in. Give him new augments to replace the old if needed. It would let him have his niche that the augment mods allow.

[(XBOX)Seraph Wisp]

I want the hydroids trailer more

[ScytodiDaedalus]

I just got the idea that maybe they could simply(well not really) merge Undertow and Tidal Surge into 1 abilty, also considering they both turn Hydroid himself into water. Instead of having the excuse of mobility undertow provides for added energy cost we could have the following:

• Undertow allows you to move 1.5 or 2 times your sprint speed, still consumes energy per meter, albeit not as much.
• Moving while in Undertow starts generating waves, tides... you name it, knocking down enemies and maybe dragging them(?)

It'd be nice if it allowed you to drag them as Surge is supossed to so you can shove enemies against your Barrage, Swarm or wherever you like, while also being able to reposition with it.

Now with this Hydroid has an open ability slot which I have not even half a clue what it could have, I don't think he really needs a new ability overall but really, Surge and Undertow are really gimmicky abilities now, specially since Surge's gfx don't tell you anything about the actual wave radius, you just move like a weird wad of water going very fast or very slow, weird nonetheless.

[Naneel]

vor 5 Stunden schrieb Jemmanelli:

Please give Hydroid a real passive. Hes a pirate, allow him to plunder the enemies for additional credits and ammo or maybe he gets benefits during Railjack, like shorter turret cooldowns or something of the sort.  

I like the idea for Railjack, would be very fitting, but shouldn't be his only passiv, as it would be useless in the rest of the game. More credits or ammo drops sound nice, maybe give him ammo mutation, or would this be to good ?

Merging his 2nd and 3rd Ability into one would be nice, but could possibly be an overload. Maybe if you make it equivalent to Tailwind, tap to dash and hold to submerge it could function. 

The question is what do you want as a new ability ? As it is mentioned that he is commanding, maybe a buff for allies like Reload speed. Or something like a Whirlpool to suck enemies in.

[Nyraxx]

Not all Warframe are meant to be played the same way. I really like Hydroid the way he is now. His tentacles give some nice crowd control and deal true damage. Additionally his "puddle" is part of his theme. He isn't just a space pirate, he's creepy. He is like the creature from the horror movie that seeps under your door when its locked and reemerges on the other side, waiting for you. Additionally, the "puddle" is his own dimension, from there he lurks in his lair and affects the world we're in. To me, it seems as though your issue with him is that he doesn't fit the particular play style you want. That's fine, but there are other frames for that. Hydroid is a creature among himself, asking to change him because he is slow or different to the "space ninja theme" is akin to asking to change Ivara because her prowl is slow. Those abilities are part of the arch type of the characters and provide variety in a game already packed with incredibly fast warframes. 

[(PSN)LoisGordils]

6 hours ago, Urlan said:

One thing I would like, that I feel would really assist Hydroid is taking all of his current augments and making them built in. Give him new augments to replace the old if needed. It would let him have his niche that the augment mods allow.

That would greatly assist any Warframe. Then the new augments come out and people like you will state that these should have been part of the base ability. It's not a solution in the slightest, unfortunately. 

[(XBOX)Knight Raime]

I like hydroid as is.  Only improvements he really needs is a better passive and more control over surge.  I personally love puddle play.  Nothing is more fun to me then snatching people into my puddle and then corrosive barraging them.  Or comboing my 4 with my 1 for chaotic cc.

[Urlan]

31 minutes ago, (PS4)LoisGordils said:

That would greatly assist any Warframe. Then the new augments come out and people like you will state that these should have been part of the base ability. It's not a solution in the slightest, unfortunately. 

I wouldn't say any, I would get little to nothing off of Oberon's Reckoning augments being merged into the move base. No, some warframes, their entire niche requires augments to function. People like me though, I like that; it shows you know little about me but that is fair - we haven't been formally introduced after all. Its as much a solution as any option and indeed takes less effort than most pseudo reworks we have had visited. Think more mechanically, and you will find that Hydroid's augments would easily be merged into their base, and thus allow for more flexibility in what DE can allow Hydroid's augments to do. No, what is more good but not currently a possibility is taking augments from the mod screen and making them an aspect of the ability screen.

[Jemmanelli]

2 hours ago, Nyraxx said:

Not all Warframe are meant to be played the same way. I really like Hydroid the way he is now. His tentacles give some nice crowd control and deal true damage. Additionally his "puddle" is part of his theme. He isn't just a space pirate, he's creepy. He is like the creature from the horror movie that seeps under your door when its locked and reemerges on the other side, waiting for you. Additionally, the "puddle" is his own dimension, from there he lurks in his lair and affects the world we're in. To me, it seems as though your issue with him is that he doesn't fit the particular play style you want. That's fine, but there are other frames for that. Hydroid is a creature among himself, asking to change him because he is slow or different to the "space ninja theme" is akin to asking to change Ivara because her prowl is slow. Those abilities are part of the arch type of the characters and provide variety in a game already packed with incredibly fast warframes. 

I undertsand how you could think thats was my issue, but, you see, Tidal Surge is bad, except it you want to cover a 100m gap on open ground like PoE or the Orb Vallis. You know, the places you can use your Archwing? Making movement abilities obsolete. 

Ivara is 100% synonymous with Stealth (Cloak Arrow, Sleep Arrow, Dashwire, Noise Arrow, dont need to be explained, Navigator can used to hit enemies around Corners, Prowl makes you invisible and lets you steal from Enemies, Artemis Bow is a Bow that deals high damage and is absolutely silent). It makes sense for her to be sort of slow, Loki already has "Fast Stealth". But you see, what part of Water elemental says slow? Or pirate? This is a mobile game, you can't deny that, if a Warframe is gonna have a movement ability, it shouldnt be worthless.   

Additionally, Undertow can be utilized effectively by simply staying in your safety bubbe and staying immortal, which is not only slow as hell, noone can tell me that this is riveting gameplay, staying in your bubble until the time runs out, dont tell me that ill get energy to support this playstyle by killing enemies, Hydroid has poor damage, which is fine. Not even the Finisher damage from his 3 and 4 can save this, because it is simply too low to have an effect on anything outside of the star chart. Like, a Hydroid 244% Power Strength will not damage lvl 105 Heavy Gunners, or Techs, at least not as much as any old gun will if you mod it with any reason in your mind. Sure, on the star chart it suffices, but on the star chart a Loki with the same Power Strength will one shot infested Chargers up around lvl 30. 

Something dealing damage on the star chart does not mean it deals any damage or that it is efficent to do so. 

I understand and respect that you like him the way he is, but you see, his kit simply isnt as effective as other Warframes, alot of Warframes need changes to be effective outside of the Star chart, I simply chose Hydroid because I like pirates and he recently got a Prime. 

Im not saying Hydroid is absolutely unusable in his current state, nor do I really think that, but there are simply alot of Warframes that do his Job better, his Pilfering Swarm augment is the only thing keeping him relevant, and this I really dont feel I have to argue, when was the last time you saw someone use Hydroid without that augment in a high level mission, a Sortie alone. 

[Jemmanelli]

2 hours ago, (XB1)Knight Raime said:

I like hydroid as is.  Only improvements he really needs is a better passive and more control over surge.  I personally love puddle play.  Nothing is more fun to me then snatching people into my puddle and then corrosive barraging them.  Or comboing my 4 with my 1 for chaotic cc.

I respect that you enjoy Puddle play but on the flip side you probably understand how I am unsatisfied with it. I simply think that there are so many Warframes that do his Job better whilest their method is far more flexible as their dont look them to the floor. 

[Urlan]

2 hours ago, Jemmanelli said:

I respect that you enjoy Puddle play but on the flip side you probably understand how I am unsatisfied with it. I simply think that there are so many Warframes that do his Job better whilest their method is far more flexible as their dont look them to the floor. 

I think that is perfectly fair, as is, even if his augments were merged into his abilities base, he would be a sound all-rounder rather than have a dedicated role in a team. Without augments, he doesn't do anything well - even his Crowd Control being highly unreliable. Changing Undertow to allow more freedom of movement might be involved, but would greatly assist his ability to trap locations with himself post range nerf he got last touch-up. The illusion of choice deal does often become a trap for designers, not just with Warframe, as you want there to be reasons to use both design options, but without hands-on to understand how the moves work in game, it can quickly become a good choice versus lackluster choice rather than two choices that each have a purpose.

[(XBOX)Knight Raime]

On 2019-01-20 at 8:58 AM, Jemmanelli said:

I respect that you enjoy Puddle play but on the flip side you probably understand how I am unsatisfied with it. I simply think that there are so many Warframes that do his Job better whilest their method is far more flexible as their dont look them to the floor. 

I understand and respect your viewpoint.  I had to argue against it when his rework was relevant.  I can only say that what you and others might desire out of him are not what i'm looking for when I play hydroid.  So it's hard for me to get behind changes that move him away from the enjoyable gameplay for me.

[AzulMage]

I chose Hydroid because I tend to like water elementals in games. I play him even though he has a reputation of being mediocre at best (outside of his farming augment which I find extremely niche at best). Personally, I think his 2 seriously needs a rework. I basically never use it.  

My idea would be that instead of becoming a water wave, he instead creates a ridable water wave and moves forward. From there, you have two options: 1) ride and steer the wave for mobility, it's faster than running but you can actually turn it and maybe even shoot enemies while on it or cast 1 and/or 4. Obviously ,any enemy you run over takes damage and is dragged. 2) At any point you can jump off the wave and it's will continue to move forward in the direction you left it until it hits a wall while dragging and damaging enemies. 

I think that gives him more of a Water pirate motif as he can be "Captain" of a ship made of water.

As for built in augments, I think his 3 augment would be the best to be built in. Gives him plenty of utility from the start and it's makes sense with a water theme to have healing from the get go.

The passive could may have the same idea of spawning a single tentacle up to 3 times but instead of having a chance to proc on a slam attack, instead it can proc on being hit by a melee attack or something. Additionally, all mods that are on his 4 should affect the spawned tentacle from his passive, not just the augment.

I do have other ideas but I think those are really the ones I would like to see most.

Edited January 24, 2019 by (NSW)SantCruz
Correct grammar, elaborate on my ideas

[SkyWitch]

I'm pretty much always pro remove the piddle puddle. I think they could even enhance it a bit further to maybe make both camps happy.

How about his puddle is instead changed into a summon that with a large(ish) base radius (affected by range mods) summons some kind of water-like graveyard? Just a big ol' puddle, but with sinking ship parts sticking out (very slightly) and a very thin layer of mist over it. The water grave could slow enemies, low impact damage, and give corrosive procs (rusted ships) on it's own. But, allow Hyrdroid to crouch on the ability while in the water to go under. Now the water drowns enemies and functions similarly to how it does now, Drowning enemies, able to kind of move, able to grab ememies, ect. 

This way the ability isn't seen as a boring ability for people that don't like going underwater, but still offers the current gameplay for people that enjoy it. Could be too much for one ability! But, I'd be pretty happy with that extra layer. Just me dreaming! Hyrdroid is one of my top 10 frames. I even have a playlist dedicated to playing him. Especially with the Zarr! A very thematic frame, but could potentially be pushed a little bit further. Otherwise he really is currently "fine" in any regard. One of the stronger frames in the game, aside from the godlike frames such as Saryn or Mesa where it feels unfair to even consider them. 

Just kind of having fun with the ability, I wouldn't really think DE to like this idea. I do enjoy the thought of Hydroid bullet-jumping up, casting his new water graveyard on the ground, then holding crouch to dive in (instantly going in when he hits the ground). Kind of a funny mental image of him just disappearing below the surface. 

I'm also aware there would be people unhappy with having to crouch to enter the puddle, even though it would be instant. It's okay!

Edited January 24, 2019 by SkyCakeLight

[Naneel]

vor 39 Minuten schrieb SkyCakeLight:

I'm pretty much always pro remove the piddle puddle. I think they could even enhance it a bit further to maybe make both camps happy.

How about his puddle is instead changed into a summon that with a large(ish) base radius (affected by range mods) summons some kind of water-like graveyard? Just a big ol' puddle, but with sinking ship parts sticking out (very slightly) and a very thin layer of mist over it. The water grave could slow enemies, low impact damage, and give corrosive procs (rusted ships) on it's own. But, allow Hyrdroid to crouch on the ability while in the water to go under. Now the water drowns enemies and functions similarly to how it does now, Drowning enemies, able to kind of move, able to grab ememies, ect. 

This way the ability isn't seen as a boring ability for people that don't like going underwater, but still offers the current gameplay for people that enjoy it. Could be too much for one ability! But, I'd be pretty happy with that extra layer. Just me dreaming! Hyrdroid is one of my top 10 frames. I even have a playlist dedicated to playing him. Especially with the Zarr! A very thematic frame, but could potentially be pushed a little bit further. Otherwise he really is currently "fine" in any regard. One of the stronger frames in the game, aside from the godlike frames such as Saryn or Mesa where it feels unfair to even consider them. 

Just kind of having fun with the ability, I wouldn't really think DE to like this idea. I do enjoy the thought of Hydroid bullet-jumping up, casting his new water graveyard on the ground, then holding crouch to dive in (instantly going in when he hits the ground). Kind of a funny mental image of him just disappearing below the surface. 

I'm also aware there would be people unhappy with having to crouch to enter the puddle, even though it would be instant. It's okay!

+1 this just sounds awesome