Ivara Changes/Rework discussion before her eventual Prime

[Titanxo]

I'd like to discuss potential changes should Ivara have a rework before her prime released. She's my favorite frame, so I'm biased. But having over 700+ hours, I like to think I know a bit about this topic.

Sentry:
A fine mid-ground passive. Knowing where enemies are located is always good, especially for squishy, sneaky frames.

Quiver:
Ivara has four arrows that she can use. Each has a decent starting AOE and duration, making this my personal favorite ability to build around.

Cloak
Ivara's arrow that makes an AOE invisibility sphere.  This arrow is arguably her best support ability because it allows the players to revive allies, rescue targets, and pets in peace. It also provides cover for hacking consoles too. It gets more useful with the 100% status resist augment as well.

Sleep:
Ivara's arrow that causes enemies to fall asleep within the AOE area. This is her second best support ability, and with the right build, one can easily put a large room to sleep with 3-4 arrows. And we all know a CC'd enemy is almost as good as a dead one.

Dashwire:
Ivara's arrow that creates a dashwire between two surfaces. There are a few rooms this ability is useful. Otherwise, it's faster just to use parkour. The 100% crit damage from the augment is nice for some builds.

Noise:
Ivara's arrow that is probably the most useless, both in squads and in solo play. It makes a sound that the enemies slowly walk towards. While it doesn't fully alert enemies (only putting them in minor alert), it might as well make the enemies in full alert with how easily they can spot players in this state. Minor alert is only useful if everyone in a squad is invisible because they will ignore the sound if they see one player. Her cloak arrow and her prowl ability are more useful for getting around enemies.

Navigator:
Ivara takes control of a single projectile. This ability is fun for a niche build. Projectile speeds can make it hard to use, however. Energy use is extremely high.

Prowl:
Ivara goes invisible and can steal items out of enemy pools. While the slow movement of this ability is a drawback, the pros definitely outweigh the cons. The extra headshot damage can make any gun stronger. Her ability to walk through laser tripwires with the augment makes spy missions trivial compared to her base invisibility. While invisible, she also has a pickpocket mechanic. While it is a fun mechanic, it currently has some issues. Although, I like the fact that Ivara has to stay near an enemy to steal an item, the time it takes to steal anything is too long. Also, if another enemy walks too close while she is pick pocketing, her tether can switch to the new enemy stopping her current progress in favor of the new enemy. Although this can partially be mitigated by building for steal speed, I believe fixing the speed and the tethering of this ability is much needed and will help put her on the same playing field as Nekros or Hydroid.

Artemis Bow:
Ivara calls her exalted bow, Artemis. It has extremely high damage per use and has the ability to use her quiver arrows from it as a secondary fire. It doesn't get much better than a bow that fires either a single nuke arrow (with an augment) or up to ~15 arrows per shot. It is a great ability when built for damage even in sortie levels. Even when it isn't build for damage, it is a great weapon for pre-sortie enemies.

Overall, I think Ivara is one of the best well-rounded frames. While she has never been the best in any category in terms of what she can do, Ivara is definitely good in every category (except tanking) and every mission type available. With that in mind, I believe there are only a few changes to her noise arrow and prowl that would be welcome.

First, remove the noise arrow or change the arrow to something more useful. My suggestions would either be a silencing arrow or a cypher arrow. The silencer arrow could silence enemies and guns within the area of effect. The cypher arrow could hack terminals or doors from a distance when you shoot it. Either option makes more sense for a stealth/sneaking frame that doesn't make much noise anyway. Personally, I would like to see the cypher arrow that hacks terminals from a distance as it would mesh well with navigator. It would be fun running that in spy missions as well. Making the timer decrease at a quicker pace or having less time at the start might be a way to balance this arrow.

Second, prowl needs to pickpocket from multiple targets at once. The ability is too slow to be on par with Nekros or Hydroid. Even if Ivara is built for speed pick pocketing, she will never keep up with the other two. Also this would fully mitigate the tethering issue that she currently experiences. If DE added a flat cost per target or increased the time overall to accommodate this change, Ivara would be much more useful for farming resources.

Just as a bell and whistle change, it would be nice to have an effect to see the range of Sleep Arrows and have better speed control on her Navigator even at the cost of more energy.

[KnossosTNC]

Ivara is my favourite frame, also. I agree that I hardly ever use Noise Arrow or Navigator, though I have used the former to combo with Sleep Arrow to create a nice death ball for my Gas Redeemer Prime, and the latter to turn the Zenistar into a flying saucer of doom. Both fun, but ultimately niche uses.

And while I did use Prowl's pickpocket to get the toroids for my Garuda, I wouldn't rely on it for the long term. I would never see Ivara as a farming frame like Old McNekros, more of a kill stuff and be invisible kind of frame. That said, shorter steal time is always appreciated.

Overall, I don't think she needs a major rework, just a few tune-up here and there, at most. Maybe instead of a Noise Arrow, I could see a more aggressive version of the Sleep Arrow combo I just described - say, a Pull Arrow? Navigator can just be single-cast with a duration instead of channelled, but I'm fine with it being for niche use. Pickpocketing could be a little faster, but I've always seen it as a nice little extra to an already useful kit, and don't really see Ivara as a farmer frame.

And if my little prediction calender is right, Ivara Prime is due this December. Can't wait.

Edited January 25, 2019 by KnossosTNC

[Hestia_Hearthstone]

14 minutes ago, Titanxo said:

Noise:
Ivara's arrow that is probably the most useless, both in squads and in solo play

Her noise arrow isn't useless per se, it can be useful in some situations. Interception missions can be completed really easily.

 

Prowl is decent, I think changing the pick-pocketing mechanic to allow for faster loot drop could be a little game breaking. Survival missions can be much easier than it is now

 

[AzureTerra]

In your typical bounce off the walls gameplay of pug warframe noise isn't useful, in a nice steady solo environment being able to herd things where you want them is a great ability. I use her a lot these days for the nice slower placed gameplay she is good at and really the only thing i dont use much is Navigator because i find it drains too much for hat little use i get from it. I make heavy use of all the Arrows and even use the bow sometimes.

[Rakosta_Kai]

Love Noise Arrow and use it all the time when I'm on Ivara.

Don't use Navigator at all as it makes me nauseous.

I use Artemis Bow so little I can't honestly remember if I've even modded it.

[Arniox]

1 hour ago, Titanxo said:

First, remove the noise arrow or change the arrow to something more useful. My suggestions would either be a silencing arrow or a cypher arrow. The silencer arrow could silence enemies and guns within the area of effect. The cypher arrow could hack terminals or doors from a distance when you shoot it. Either option makes more sense for a stealth/sneaking frame that doesn't make much noise anyway. Personally, I would like to see the cypher arrow that hacks terminals from a distance as it would mesh well with navigator. It would be fun running that in spy missions as well. Making the timer decrease at a quicker pace or having less time at the start might be a way to balance this arrow.

Second, prowl needs to pickpocket from multiple targets at once. The ability is too slow to be on par with Nekros or Hydroid. Even if Ivara is built for speed pick pocketing, she will never keep up with the other two. Also this would fully mitigate the tethering issue that she currently experiences. If DE added a flat cost per target or increased the time overall to accommodate this change, Ivara would be much more useful for farming resources.

Just as a bell and whistle change, it would be nice to have an effect to see the range of Sleep Arrows and have better speed control on her Navigator even at the cost of more energy

I like these changes. Small changes, but really good changes 

[Guest]

I feel her arrows should fly faster, just so you can deploy things like the cloak or sleep sphere slightly more effectively over long ranges.  Would help a lot on concentrated arrows builds so you can sleep + shoot more efficiently without going invis.

[Marvelous_A]

Navigator is the only ability which needs a change and you are only giving 3 lines about it 

[(XBOX)zThulsaDoomz]

Ivara is arguably the 2nd strongest frame in the game right now.  I'm having an extremely difficult time not erupting in laughter that this is even a subject.

[Xzorn]

Literally the only thing I can think of with Ivara is a bug fix with rolling and switching Quiver arrows.

If you press and hold too soon after a roll the client thinks you simply pressed the button and changes the arrow you're using. Drives me crazy.

[DerGreif2]

My most played frame is Ivara and also have to say that Ivara is fine as she is. Every arrow is usefull. Even the noise arrow is usefull for reposition enemys when they are blocking your way and you dont want to kill them.

Her 2 is sometimes even used to kill Eidelons. So even tho I never use it some people do.

Her 3 is also fine. With a lot of range it even CAN be a farm build and also used for endless survivial.

Her 4 is on of the things I really like on her and also a extremely powerful weapon.

 

All in all she is fine and dont need any changes. Vauban, Ember and some others need more love.

[Titanxo]

7 hours ago, DerGreif2 said:

7 hours ago, DerGreif2 said:

Every arrow is usefull. Even the noise arrow is usefull for reposition enemys when they are blocking your way and you dont want to kill them.

I wasn't saying its not useful I was saying that out of all her abilities noise is the least useful especially because if you don't want to kill enemies prowl and sleep get the job done much more efficiently.

 

9 hours ago, (XB1)Thy Divinity said:

Ivara is arguably the 2nd strongest frame in the game right now.  I'm having an extremely difficult time not erupting in laughter that this is even a subject.

DE Almost always does some type of change before a prime comes out regardless of where the frame is at in terms of power and this thread is just a discussion and share of what I feel would be a welcomed change.

 

9 hours ago, Marvelous_A said:

Navigator is the only ability which needs a change and you are only giving 3 lines about it 

you're right I didn't give it the attention I should have and to be fair its my second least used ability. But like I said its fun for niches just has a wonky flight mechanic. I use it to kill eidalons with a sancti castanas and power build myself.

 

10 hours ago, NonExistent90 said:

Prowl is decent, I think changing the pick-pocketing mechanic to allow for faster loot drop could be a little game breaking. Survival missions can be much easier than it is now

How so? She can only pick once per enemy just like nekros or hydroid and when DE made the changes where only one ivara can pick once per enemy even more people ditched her for farming from the few that were using her to begin with.

[DatDarkOne]

9 hours ago, (XB1)Thy Divinity said:

Ivara is arguably the 2nd strongest frame in the game right now.  I'm having an extremely difficult time not erupting in laughter that this is even a subject.

I'm having a hard time not laughing at this topic as well.  

Also, there is a good chance that Ivara Prime could come early in place of Equinox.  DE has done similar twice before.  

DE doesn't always make changes to frames before the Prime.  

[Atsia]

31 minutes ago, DatDarkOne said:

I'm having a hard time not laughing at this topic as well.  

Also, there is a good chance that Ivara Prime could come early in place of Equinox.  DE has done similar twice before.  

DE doesn't always make changes to frames before the Prime.  

Mind you, those were for the Christmas releases to get the sweet sweet money from us. All the other Prime dates habe been spot on. Plus, I don't see Ivara as being more popular than Equinox.

Edited January 25, 2019 by Atsia

[(XBOX)zThulsaDoomz]

13 minutes ago, Atsia said:

Mind you, those were for the Christmas releases to get the sweet sweet money from us. All the other Prime dates habe been spot on. Plus, I don't see Ivara as being more popular than Equinox.

You don't see it because Ivara is the deity of solo play.  You'd be surprised how many players actually use her on a frequent basis.

[DatDarkOne]

2 hours ago, (XB1)Thy Divinity said:

You don't see it because Ivara is the deity of solo play.  You'd be surprised how many players actually use her on a frequent basis.

^^^This!

[Blatantfool]

There really isn't a skill in Ivara's kit I'd want to see changed.

 Her 2 isn't fantastic but I'm cool with one bum skill and three amazing ones. Hell, her first skill is 4 amazing skills by itself. Then you still have Prowl and Artemis bow. On any given day where I'm really sitting down and playing the game I'm liable to play with a healthy amount of new players. I'm talking freshly into the game, still in their first Warframe. Ivara has tools to make teaching a new player a spy vault pathetically easy. One common new player gripe is that it is rough and unclear exactly what the game wants you to do in order to stealth properly. Some vault solutions just aren't obvious to new guys. 

[DatDarkOne]

27 minutes ago, Blatantfool said:

On any given day where I'm really sitting down and playing the game I'm liable to play with a healthy amount of new players. I'm talking freshly into the game, still in their first Warframe. Ivara has tools to make teaching a new player a spy vault pathetically easy

She is the perfect frame for helping brand new players without taking away any of their fun.  This is one of the things I love to do as well.  

[Redfeather75]

I think Ivara is so well designed that it's hard to imagine changing any skill.

The suggestion for prowl to steal from multiple targets at once is good.

 

Edited January 25, 2019 by Redfeather75

[Tricky5hift]

I honestly don't think any of her abilities need to be changed.

[DanteYoda]

Her invis needs to be permanent like lokis so she can bullet jump.

 

Her skill where she tracks her arrow is kinda garbage though.

Edited January 26, 2019 by DanteYoda

[MagPrime]

1 minute ago, DanteYoda said:

Her invis needs to be permanent like lokis so she can bullet jump.

She needs some kind of limitation to keep her from being overpowered and broken.  This change would make her  broken.

[DanteYoda]

Just now, MagPrime said:

She needs some kind of limitation to keep her from being overpowered and broken.  This change would make her  broken.

Shes not either, shes incredibly squishy and kinda pointless outside of spy missions, so my idea at least makes spy missions a lot more palatable..

[MagPrime]

3 minutes ago, DanteYoda said:

Shes not either, shes incredibly squishy and kinda pointless outside of spy missions, so my idea at least makes spy missions a lot more palatable..

I'm gonna have to defer to @DatDarkOne to explain how you're wrong on that one but, I will say that Ivara is a powerful Warframe when the player takes the time to understand her nuances. 

[DanteYoda]

1 minute ago, MagPrime said:

I'm gonna have to defer to @DatDarkOne to explain how you're wrong on that one but, I will say that Ivara is a powerful Warframe when the player takes the time to understand her nuances. 

Disagree, i'm sure you love Ivara, shes great fun for spy missions but outside of that there are so many better suited warframes for all the other content.. way way better..

She does to a point make the other stealth frames obsolete though, like Loki and Ash, they both could use overhauls.