Elemental warframes

[Viridias]

1 minute ago, Legion-Shields said:

Don't tools and machines that are designed to work in extreme temperatures have to be resistant to those extremes to some degree?

Work in, yes, but that's not what we're talking about here - that'd be something like a probe designed for the sun side of unterraformed Mercury. We're talking about the analog of a blowtorch (or flamethrower) which only needs to be made highly heat-resistant in the parts actually involved in combusting and funneling the burny stuff - the rest of the thing is altogether less robust.

[RX-3DR]

Just now, TheInternetGuy said:

There are a couple of other warframes that withstand their own powers like saryn and nova. A poison so potent, almost nothing can stand in its way. Anti-matter which which goes boom when it gets into contact with matter.

I mean long arms man is dum but it just seem counterintuitive to make a frame that possibly gets killed from using their own abilities. It's like making a knife's handle also sharp.

Here's the catch though, "withstand their own powers". Passive resistance is not resistance to their own powers but rather, resistance to a physical force, etc as a whole. A Nullifier's function effectively points out that there is a difference between their own powers and the actual element where Ember's abilities are affected but an Ignis' flames are not.

[Legion-Shields]

1 minute ago, Viridias said:

Work in, yes, but that's not what we're talking about here - that'd be something like a probe designed for the sun side of unterraformed Mercury. We're talking about the analog of a blowtorch (or flamethrower) which only needs to be made highly heat-resistant in the parts actually involved in combusting and funneling the burny stuff - the rest of the thing is altogether less robust.

Alright, that makes sense.

[BiancaRoughfin]

44 minutes ago, (NSW)Sk0rp1on said:

No, but frost and ember are more like  elemental beings. They seem to be made of or fueled by their element, they aren’t just wielding it. Lighting the Human Torch on fire probably wouldn’t work very well, for example.

They arent Elemental beings, they are biomechanical beings which can manipulate said element, they arent made nor fueled from said element.
Did you know Lasers can drop the temperature of a spot to Absolute Zero? Funny considering we are used to seeing lasers being used as high energy/temperature weapons that burn through things.

Using the same Logic Lukinu-u used, a FlameThrower isnt imune to Flames.

[(XBOX)YoungGunn82]

1 hour ago, Collin5Z said:

So I've been playing for a while and had many questions for this game which are left unanswered, but one that still bugs me is how come elemental frames like Frost and Ember, aren't resistant to their elemental attributes. Some might say is because it will cause them to have an advantage over other frames, but isn't the differentiation what makes each frame unique? Even though this is a sci-fi game, i just thought it doesn't make sense how Ember can inflict heat damage, but then can also suffer  from heat procs? 

[Viridias]

1 minute ago, BiancaRoughfin said:

Did you know Lasers can drop the temperature of a spot to Absolute Zero? Funny considering we are used to seeing lasers being used as high energy/temperature weapons that burn through things.

Laser cooling (totally not magic guise). Fun stuff but *rather* demands highly controlled conditions and not too applicable on scales above the atomic; for most practical intents and purposes weaponised lasers indeed are simply "heat rays" that dump energy into the target to melt it - or by preference, vaporize bits of it explosively. (WF tending to treat them as puncturing or cutting weapons is... debatable... at best but then this is the same vidya gaem physics where bullets are hitscan and pew pew laz0rs shoot glowy bananas slow enough to evade by stepping aside...)

[Birdframe_Prime]

57 minutes ago, (NSW)Sk0rp1on said:

No, but frost and ember are more like  elemental beings. They seem to be made of or fueled by their element, they aren’t just wielding it.

Ahhh, no, this is the exact opposite. They are Warframes, they use their element, weild it. They are not made of it. We actually craft them and (thanks to the Quests) we know exactly what Warframes are.

Plus, for the OP:

1 hour ago, Collin5Z said:

how come elemental frames like Frost and Ember, aren't resistant to their elemental attributes

This was actually raised, and the official answer from DE was this: 'We are not even looking into that, it's not on the table.'

They don't even have to tell us why.

[Rawbeard]

1 hour ago, Legion-Shields said:

Don't tools and machines that are designed to work in extreme temperatures have to be resistant to those extremes to some degree?

parts of them, yes, those exposed to those extreme temps. which would be internal and the hands area, I guess.

[Rawbeard]

2 hours ago, (NSW)Sk0rp1on said:

Says who?

says the fact that they are a mass of infested flesh shaped into a humanoid weapon platform that can be used by Tenno without rejection issues.

[WhiteMarker]

2 hours ago, (NSW)Sk0rp1on said:

Says who? I think this really comes down to what the concept of the frames makes you imagine.

Are the elemental frames like the Human Torch and Mr Freeze, or are they just regular dudes with specialized weapons like Captain Cold and Heat Wave?

For some people, Ember being more like the human torch makes more sense.

May I ask, did you play all the quests already?
If so, then you should know what Warframes really are...
And in this case it doesn't matter what you think what Warframes are, because the game tells you exactly what they are.

If you didn't finish all the quests, you might want to do that.

[(XBOX)YoungGunn82]

DE could give elemental frames some sort of situational resistance to elements. Like Ember, her passive is when she is lit on fire, it gives her energy. 

They could do others as well. Like Frost wouldn’t be slowed if he steps on those ice patches. 

Will they? probably not. Because it would probably invalidate arcanes even more than they already are. 

[(NSW)Sk0rp1on]

28 minutes ago, WhiteMarker said:

May I ask, did you play all the quests already?
If so, then you should know what Warframes really are...
And in this case it doesn't matter what you think what Warframes are, because the game tells you exactly what they are.

If you didn't finish all the quests, you might want to do that.

Yeah, I finished listening to VO while doing a mission. 

My point is that the exact specific way warframe powers work has never been explicit. Also there’s a huge amount of inherited knowledge about how powers work in fantasy and superhero fiction. 

So, while it might not be canon that ember and frost have elemental resistances, it’s a reasonable thing to think about. 

 

[Viridias]

9 minutes ago, (NSW)Sk0rp1on said:

My point is that the exact specific way warframe powers work has never been explicit. 

Void Majiks^TM, that's been pretty explicit from about Day One. The "themes" of the different frames apparently serve as a symbolic framework to channel and focus the Immortal Spacekid Wizard mojo. (Margulis apparently eventually worked out that dreams made a decently reliable method for controlling and cultivating the Magic Kid powers so, yeah. Symbols. Laws of Magic.)

Quote

Also there’s a huge amount of inherited knowledge about how powers work in fantasy and superhero fiction. 

Which is wholly irrelevant since every author makes their own (sometimes intentionally different), as DE now does too. Tropes Are Tools not codified laws.

Edited June 16, 2019 by Viridias

[Tazrizen]

2 hours ago, Viridias said:

Work in, yes, but that's not what we're talking about here - that'd be something like a probe designed for the sun side of unterraformed Mercury. We're talking about the analog of a blowtorch (or flamethrower) which only needs to be made highly heat-resistant in the parts actually involved in combusting and funneling the burny stuff - the rest of the thing is altogether less robust.

That's great and all, but these frames aren't focusing damage on singular points, they're literally covering themselves in what they're using. Like can you tell me volt, the guy that collects electrical energy while running, holding electric barriers, discharging massive amounts of electricity from his entire body is not in some way protecting his integral components from electricity? Or that ember who's passive is based on eating fire procs for energy and damage; has an ability called world on fire would not have any protections from fire at all? 

 

Power tool metaphor aside, that really only makes sense as a comparing function. Like blowtorches are at least more resistant to it's own use than a human would be suddenly spouting out fire from their hands. Plus it's not like the person using said blowtorch wouldn't be using protection, the only time you ever see people not using protection for using a blowtorch or flamethrower are generally the stupid and soon to be injured people, protection isn't supposed to make you completely immune but it's just supposed to help you not get hurt by what you're throwing. 

 

[(NSW)Sk0rp1on]

4 minutes ago, Viridias said:

Void Majiks^TM, that's been pretty explicit from about Day One.

Void Magik is largely undefined and can basically do whatever it needs to do to satisfy the gameplay/narrative.

 

6 minutes ago, Viridias said:

Which is wholly irrelevant since every author makes their own (sometimes intentionally different), as DE now does too. Tropes Are Tools not codified laws.

True, but the way lore is acquired in warframe is pretty deep in the game and easily ignored. I can accept that warframe has different rules about elemental powers in their lore, but it’s not unreasonable for people to question it.

There’s a lot of things that are not in the game for pragmatic reasons even though they make sense. Custom run animations for instance. Makes sense for Titania to hover while running, but an all new run animation that suits each character is to expensive to build. Titania runs normally for practical reasons, not lore reasons.

I think that some people feel the same way about elemental resistance for ember or frost. I can see gameplay reasons for not including them because they eliminate a large part of the challenge, but lore wise, it’s just intuitive to enough people that you can’t burn ember and you can’t freeze frost. 

[Legion-Shields]

1 hour ago, Rawbeard said:

parts of them, yes, those exposed to those extreme temps. which would be internal and the hands area, I guess.

I would imagine the outer layer of armor of a suit designed to constantly expose itself to extreme heat would count as one of those parts.

[SneakyErvin]

4 hours ago, RX-3DR said:

Here's the catch though, "withstand their own powers". Passive resistance is not resistance to their own powers but rather, resistance to a physical force, etc as a whole. A Nullifier's function effectively points out that there is a difference between their own powers and the actual element where Ember's abilities are affected but an Ignis' flames are not.

Not really. It points out that the fuel or source is different but not the actual damage. The shield simply nullifies the void that binds the molecules in the powers together. That is why an Ignis works but a fireball from Ember doesnt. Same as the reasonw why a Nullifier can walk through a corpus facility without crashing all widows or glass floor at the same time as he breaks down Gara's wall. It is also why exalted weapons work against nullifiers until the actual dome hits a warframe. Exception being Mesa where I'd say it simply scrambles her targetting.

So nullifiers arent a reason as to why frames shouldnt have innate resistance to their element. Frost is likely built to withstand extreme cold and Ember extreme heat, while Volt is probably designed to either be powered up by electricity (his speed for instance) or just be a conductor or similar. He kinda already works like a dynamo since the more he moves with friction under his feet, the more power he builds up. We also already know Frost is extremely cold because his passive pretty much indicates that. So how exactly can you freeze something or hurt it with cold when it is already at such sub-temperature levels that simply touching it may freeze you in an instant? 

Edited June 16, 2019 by SneakyErvin

[Tinklzs]

I do follow and agree with the logic that if a frame utilizes (or is designed around) an element it should get some resistance to it (NOT immunity).  Even fire will be devoured by fire if the rival fire's power is greater. https://e360.yale.edu/features/fighting-fire-with-fire-california-turns-to-prescribed-burning

 

However, there aren't many cases where we fight fire, frost or.. whatever atlas would be (since we don't have 'earth' damage, maybe physical?). The issue here is, in order to really utilize what you're asking for we need a rework on enemies and how they work (which kind of fits in to how we need a general re-balance anyways). But that definitely won't be happening for sometime soon, at least with the roadmap that DE has laid out.

 

TLDR:
Yes it makes sense for them to be resistant (NOT immune) however the current combat system is too simplistic and not fleshed out enough to fully benefit or be worth the hassle currently.

[k05h]

Actually I find it way more irritating that Hydroid can drown in a pond.

[(PSN)Silverback73]

5 hours ago, (NSW)Sk0rp1on said:

its a pretty common trope that a fire based creature or person is also immune to fire.

Full resistance might be too gambreaking, but some form of damage and/or time reduction in the proc could work.

This makes sense to me.  A natural 20% or “x 2” mod multiplier for elemental resistance mods like you get with fire rate and bows.

[Birdframe_Prime]

4 hours ago, (NSW)Sk0rp1on said:

Void Magik is largely undefined

Fun point; Void Magik is kind of undefined, but is actually limited to what the Tenno can do.

Warframes were designed and created before the Tenno existed as a way to combat the Infested. They were a 'controllable' form called the Helminth strain, but the Warframes turned on their masters exactly the same way that the Sentients and Infested did before them.

Warframe powers exist without the Tenno.

Tenno just have this innate Transference ability via their Void Magik and also have the ability to understand and 'tame' the Warframes. That's why the Warframes then defeated the Sentients and fought against the Infested even though Warframes are made from the Infested.