[Spoiler mode], and their current state.

[Loza03]

Operators make me sad.

There is nothing I dislike more than something dripping with untapped potential. Operators are one such element in Warframe. Portrayed in select story moments, cinematics and lore as among the most powerful, and terrifying, things in the known Warframe universe, quite literally brimming with an unlimited amount of void energy to blast at enemies in any number of forms. Able to warp, possess bodies and levitate.

In gameplay however, they are effectively a bog-standard third person shooter character, with some fairly clunky base abilities, and not even tremendously powerful at that. And the last time they received any updates was about 11 months ago. They get almost none of the cool side stuff Warframes can do - they can't use certain emotes, they can't fish or mine, they can't play the Shawzin or ride a K-drive and it was years before they could pet their dogs.

Simply put, Operators aren't a gameplay element or mechanic - they're a key to very specific locks. Which for something so advertised in game as the Tenno's true abilities, and with so many of their abilities apparently designed for regular gameplay (for example, Umbra's passive), is entirely baffling.

 

Void Damage

Grineer Health	Void Modifier	Corpus Health	Void Modifier	Infested Health	Void Modifier
Cloned Flesh	-50%	Flesh		Infested
Ferrite Armor		Shield		Infested Flesh
Alloy Armor		Proto Shield		Fossilized	-50%
Machinery	-50%	Robotic		Sinew

Why is void damage like this? It is the only damage type in the game to have absolutely no damage vulnerabilities whatsoever. Not even to Sentients - it just resets their damage resistances AFAIK. Bear in mind, you only gain access to void damage after the Second Dream, and only have consistent access to it after the War Within. You need to be hundreds of hours deep just to start having access to void damage. Bear in mind, every single enemy in the Grineer faction has either Cloned Flesh or Machinery. The entire Grineer faction is Operator-resistant. Of the updates that have had Operator-centric parts, 2/3 have been Grineer-led. The third was only Operator-centric by token association - that one being Profit-taker, with Little Duck and the Quills.

Also bear in mind that it does nothing to armour, and only one focus school has any means of dealing with it. Also remember Sentients have armour, making more or less anything but an Operator a better choice against a Sentient.

The only powerful sources of damage Operators have are the abilities that don't use their signature damage type.

Mobility

Operators, although being reasonably fast if you spend dozens of hours grinding for it, still have very minimal mobility in combat compared to Warframes. Their ground speed is mediocre, their void dash is clearly more a traversal tool than a combat one, since at base and in 3/5 focus schools it ragdolls enemies everywhere and takes them out of attack range. Outside that, Operators have no access to any kind of enhanced mobility, hence the 'bog-standard third person shooter' comparison. Which would be alright if they did decent damage, but as above, they do not.

It's not like enhanced mobility is impossible without compromising their 'spiritual power vs physical power' relationship with the Warframes. Shorter-range blinking, floating/flying, or even just clearly demonstrating that it's their void energy that's granting them enhanced physical feats - such as their limbs glowing or manifesting the old Transcendence energy wings on certain moves. Speaking of...

Abilities
Remember when Operators could do this?

Nothing Operators have currently matches the level of mystique or 'cool factor' that Operators have pre-TWW.

In addition, many of the abilities are somewhat weak or niche. Some are powerful, but many are hampered by damage typing, lack of ability to deal with armour, meaning they are of limited usefulness in most active combat. Compared to the animation work on Warframes, Operator powers leave a lot to be desired. Even the Transcendence animation is primarily a reuse of the 'revive' animation.

Focus

Focus, as a primary means of improving the Operators, is lacking. Whilst it would make sense as a means to further specialise your Operator, the fact that many of the Operator's base stat improvements are tied to a somewhat clunky system that takes many hours to get even small improvements in is a very awkward system. Consider how Warframes do receive base stat improvements as they level up, and how all the base stat mods that Warframes and Weapons can acquire are more or less easily acquired. Operators, by comparison, take considerably greater effort for equal or less reward.

 

All in all, Operators are generally lacking. Whilst I understand they are somewhat divisive among the community, I would imagine a large part is because of how mediocre they are, even after considerable investment.

I don't know what changes or improvements are coming past anyone else (such as Duviri Paradox), but I sincerely hope Operators get the attention they both deserve, and sorely need.

Edited November 30, 2019 by Loza03
Title edited for spoilers.

[DrivaMain]

I hope focus school nodes get a balance pass in The New War. Also, get rid of that -50% damage penalties on cloned flesh, machinery and fossilized. The Grineer are already heavily armored. Make Void damage a true neutral damage

[ixidron92]

I mean, perhaps wait for Duviri, because, you know, looks like operator changes to make them combat worthy are coming.

Edited November 30, 2019 by ixidron92

[HowDenKing]

23 hours ago, ixidron92 said:

I mean, perhaps wait for Duviri, because, you know, looks like operator changes to make them combat worthy are coming.

I'mma go out on a limb and say duviri will be another "island" where we're controlling Mr./Mrs. X (Adult Operator?) and otherwise we're still the same angsty kiddos.
Operators are in need of a complete revamp.
Schools right now are next to useless besides *really* niche stuff like energizing dash, or melee affinity bonus.
You barely see anyone use them for any extended period of time - at best as a movement tool.

Schools should represent the Focus of your Operator, and you should get proper abilities from them - essentially making them a Modular Warframe.
Maybe incorporate the base stats like health, etc. into the missing schools of Koneksi (Old Fusion Core Polarity) instead?

e.g. Unairu should allow your operator to gain a defensive ability like Rhino's Iron skin.

[(XBOX)LZonut]

One thing I hate the most about the operator is their void blast. I'm not a professional operator player, but to me it seems just plain weak. The damage does nothing unless you have buffs to it from the focus trees, which even then it won't do much in higher level content. The knockdown is barely that useful when I could just void dash at an enemy, keeping me safe while I'm in it, as well as being able to kill with magus lockdown. Void blast in my opinion should be removed for some parazon like void blade the operator uses for melee attacks.