Gambit - The frame of random chance.

[(PSN)SpartanLegend_27]

I've been in creative mood recently, so for me, this means a set of new Warframe concepts. The first of these concepts being Gambit. A frame that relies on RNG seems fit for the game BUILT around RNG lol. This is a pretty raw concept, so no artwork to be seen, abilities may be broken or useless. Do let me know how he can be improved.
 

Base health: 100, base shields: 135, base armor: 110. 

Passive: Feeling Lucky? - Every time Gambit uses an ability, he rolls a 10-sided dice. this dice roll determines the strength and attributes of his abilities. Rolling a 1 damages him, while rolling a 10 refunds the energy used on the ability. Additionally, he has a "Luck" stat that can be increased with ability efficiency mods. At max luck rating (280%), he is guaranteed to never roll a 1 on any ability.

A1: Joker (20 energy) - Gambit tosses a wildcard at an enemy. It will damage the enemy upon impact, and if the ability rolls a 10, the card will also explode in a 4m radius. If it rolls the one, it will cost double the energy.

A2: Bluff (50 energy) - Gambit fakes a lunge for his enemy, but instead dodge rolls in the direction of his choosing. If he rolls a natural 10, you will be cloaked for 3s after dodging. If he rolls a 1, he lunges forward and misses the enemy with a melee.

A3: Up The Ante (60 energy) - Gambit wagers his shields, or health if no shields remain, on a roll. Health/shields wagered is converted to damage to enemies in a cone in front of you. If he rolls a natural one, he loses 50% more shields/health. If he rolls a natural 10, he does not lose any health or shields. 

A4: Hot Streak (80 energy) - Gambit's feeling lucky. He tosses out 10 cards in quick succession. If he rolls a 10 on this ability, each card procs slash damage. If he rolls a 1, he loses  health with each card throw.

Some interesting things to note regarding my thought process behind Gambit and his kit.

- I originally planned for Gambit to roll a 20 sided di with each move, but quickly found that over complicated the math behind his ability scaling, since I wanted each number to affect the strength of his abilities. 10 was the sweet spot between giving his abilities the right amount of random chance and making his ability scaing easy to keep up with. 

- Gambit is meant to be a damage frame, like Chroma or Equinox. Trying to make him fit any other niche made his concept just not work as well. 

- I toyed with the idea of Gambit's "Joker" being a type of exalted weapon, like Excal's Blade, which would make it separately mod-able. As you can imagine, that didn't go too well.

- His 3rd ability was the hardest part of his kit to come up with. I obviously didn't want to come up with another card based ability, and Bluff was the only other poker-ish/gambler lingo that I could comfortably fit into an ability, so this was what I ended up with. Alternative names for this ability have been "Ante Up", "Wager", and "Gamble." 
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Edited February 11, 2020 by (PS4)SpartanLegend_27

[Colyeses]

I don't think a strict better/worse RNG is a good basis for a warframe design. The risk of rolling ones in succession could very easily sour the experience, and RNG is simply not a very player-friendly thing to go by.

You could mitigate that, however, by going with a more side-grade RNG to provide a much higher base value. Potentially, you could expand on it by doing what Tinseltail does in Gems of War: She has a baseline effect, and then three different effects that each have a 50% chance to activate when she casts her spell.

For example, let's take Joker: When you cast this ability, it will toss a card that will deal damage upon impact. Additionally, it will always choose one of the following effects:

1) You throw three Jokers in a wide spread instead.
2) The Joker explodes in a radius.
3) The Joker crits.
4) The Joker bounces between enemies.

The baseline of this cast is just a simple single-target damage action, but it can take a variety of different shapes. There's also the option of allowing it to trigger multiple effects, though the difficulty with that lies in balance: You'd need to make the baseline rewarding enough to not make it feel disappointing if you don't trigger multiple effects.

Similarly, you could have a defensive ability either provide overshields, a healing buff, an armour buff or temporary lifesteal.

Another thing that occurred to me is that you could make the 4th ability temporarily put his luck into overdrive, and use that as a way to allow the 'jackpot' occurrences. IE: Joker can only activate one or two bonus effects when cast normally, but while 4 is active, it will always trigger two, sometimes trigger three, and very rarely score the full jackpot and activate everything.

Imagine that. Three Jokers bouncing between targets, exploding on every target hit for crit damage.

[(PSN)SpartanLegend_27]

I like the idea of the lifesteal, overshields, and a 3rd effect for the 1. I think having a heal and lifesteal both as effects for the same ability is a bit redundant. Maybe an armor shred or stun? 

[Blocker306]

Concept is good, but think about people who have absolutely no luck with RNG.