Why does the Combo Counter reset when switching between normal melee and exalted?

[Tzolkat]

A continuation of the archived discussion here:

...Except what brought me to dig this up is the reverse of @HappyApathy's original gripe.

There are situations where one would want to briefly activate an exalted melee ability, then return to normal melee after that. Expected behavior, from my perspective, would be that the combo counter would persist through this switch, minus any bonuses that are tied to a specific weapon. For example:

I'm running an eternal war Valkyr. My melee weapon has Drifting Contact and Blood Rush installed. I have an active Naramon passive that causes the combo counter to decay. And I'm running low on health. I hit Valkyr's ult, slash a few enemies in around the span of two seconds to recover health, and pop back out.

What I Expect to happen: My combo counter persists into hysteria, but Blood Rush and Drifting Contact do not. My crit chance with the talons is normal for the weapon, but I keep the standard damage multiplier I built up. If I go past the default 3 seconds between hits, the combo counter should begin to decay, per the Naramon passive. Warcry/Eternal War should continue to function normally. When I leave hysteria a couple of seconds later, the combo counter should again persist and I should be able to resume using my normal melee weapon at roughly the same damage output as before.

What Actually happens: Warcry/Eternal War continues to function, but the combo counter completely resets both when I enter and when I leave hysteria, negating any and all benefits of everything else I mentioned. Late game, that can be a pretty huge penalty.

 

The behavior present in-game is so jarring that I originally thought it was a bug. So, DE, what is the reasoning for doing a hard reset on the combo counter when there has not been any break in melee combat? I can switch to gunplay and it doesn't reset. So why here?

[DeMonkey]

16 minutes ago, Tzolkat said:

What Actually happens: Warcry/Eternal War continues to function, but the combo counter completely resets both when I enter and when I leave hysteria, negating any and all benefits of everything else I mentioned. Late game, that can be a pretty huge penalty.

Not quite.

What actually happens is that there's 2 combo counters, one for your melee weapon and one for Hysteria.

Upon switching to Hysteria the normal one runs in the background, but has no impact on the game. The Hysteria one then becomes active, and has to be built up separately.

Upon deactivating Hysteria it's combo is lost to the ether and you revert back to the normal one which has continued running in the background. Generally it'll have run it's course, however if you have the aforementioned Drifting Contact, Power Spike or a variation of both effects, then you can and will revert to your old combo counter pretty much as you left it if you're popping the 'Exalted weapon' briefly.

As should be obvious from the linked thread, I agree that the combo counter should be cross weapon, and should not be lost upon deactivating an 'Exalted weapon'.

[Tzolkat]

4 minutes ago, DeMonkey said:

Not quite.

What actually happens is that there's 2 combo counters, one for your melee weapon and one for Hysteria.

Upon switching to Hysteria the normal one runs in the background, but has no impact on the game. The Hysteria one then becomes active, and has to be built up separately.

Upon deactivating Hysteria it's combo is lost to the ether and you revert back to the normal one which has continued running in the background. Generally it'll have run it's course, however if you have the aforementioned Drifting Contact, Power Spike or a variation of both effects, then you can and will revert to your old combo counter pretty much as you left it if you're popping the 'Exalted weapon' briefly.

As should be obvious from the linked thread, I agree that the combo counter should be cross weapon, and should not be lost upon deactivating an 'Exalted weapon'.

Interesting, though the behavior I saw in onslaught suggested a hard reset. I will test under more controlled conditions to see if there are really two combo counters when I get home from work.

[DeMonkey]

10 minutes ago, Tzolkat said:

Interesting, though the behavior I saw in onslaught suggested a hard reset. I will test under more controlled conditions to see if there are really two combo counters when I get home from work.

Onslaught resets both upon changing room, along with the energy/ability reset.

[Tzolkat]

2 minutes ago, DeMonkey said:

Onslaught resets both upon changing room, along with the energy/ability reset.

Yes (and I find some aspects of that annoying as well). What I observed happened within one zone, however, so it most likely it wasn't caused by the conduit.

[DeMonkey]

13 minutes ago, Tzolkat said:

Yes (and I find some aspects of that annoying as well). What I observed happened within one zone, however, so it most likely it wasn't caused by the conduit.

Spoiler

 

There appears to be a fault with the audio, don't know how nor am I particularly bothered by it, mute the vid if necessary.

Main thing is the video works... hopefully.

[Tzolkat]

21 hours ago, DeMonkey said:

  Reveal hidden contents

 

There appears to be a fault with the audio, don't know how nor am I particularly bothered by it, mute the vid if necessary.

Main thing is the video works... hopefully.

I finally got a chance to test this in the simulacrum last night. I built up a combo counter and then toggled hysteria on Valkyr. I tried 2 seconds, 5 seconds, 8 seconds, and 10 seconds. The combo counter does return, but there is a 1s delay in its appearance on the UI, which explains my confusion during onslaught. Out of necessity I was slashing through enemies so quickly I thought it had built up again from nothing in that one second of delay. It still decays in the background while you are using the exalted melee weapon, though, and the ability has its own combo counter that doesn't appear to be preserved in any way. Definitely far from optimal.

[DeMonkey]

22 hours ago, Tzolkat said:

Definitely far from optimal.

Oh absolutely, I'd love it to be changed.