DE, can Hydroid please get a rework.

[Archwizard]

14 hours ago, keikogi said:

I would give them no quarter. They choose the pirate theme themselves. Nobody forced them to pick it , this was not a community context and they had to do the winning theme. They could have made water siren or water deep sea creatures. Both are way easyer to do because they have more thematic wiggle room.

This does speak to larger issue of DE greenlighing projects with the simple question of Would not be cool If ? 

They don't even ask themselves the how to do it or if it is even possible. 

Case in point Khorra , it took the community to notice the a slash , impact and piercing damage frame might as well be slash frame because the other damage types sucks ass. How this frame wasn't shotdown before it was revealed on a live stream. 

Second case revenant, he was revealed and a good part of the dev team was just as confused as the audience about what is this. 

A minor case is the alchemists frame , it's already modeled before we even get a basic description on what it does. A literally did a "alchemists frame " myself and could describe it as modular skill frame ( some skill use a modular system of mixing itens to get an effect ) and people would know tje idea. I ended up changing the theme to witch because it allowed me to get away with the same modular modular skill but have more room for diferent stuff. If you want to check it out. Raven

I do think there's perhaps some undeserved harshness here. Revenant for instance was announced shortly after Rebecca held an open forum on twitter about a potential Vampire theme, so his theme was understandable not long after his announcement. Both Khora and Revenant are pretty solidly designed, and the Alchemist is coming from a track record of highly original designs and bears a theme with significant potential.

Hydroid came from a time when "Wouldn't it be cool if...?" was the standard, before a number of tools were available to frames like weapon-scaling or Arch-weapons. I'm not surprised his kit came out the way it did for its time.

I'm concerned, however, that he's been reworked once already to hype his Prime release, in an era where each frame has a specific role, and instead received mostly QoL fixes that leave his kit underwhelming.

I have to wonder how different his kit would be had Pirate frame been chosen as a theme today, rather than several years ago.

[keikogi]

1 hour ago, Archwizard said:

do think there's perhaps some undeserved harshness here. Revenant for instance was announced shortly after Rebecca held an open forum on twitter about a potential Vampire theme, so his theme was understandable not long after his announcement. Both Khora and Revenant are pretty solidly designed, and the Alchemist is coming from a track record of highly original designs and bears a theme with significant potential.

Revenant has hypnoses and vanish into mist as skills , also life steal mechamics. Pretty sure at some point got the Vampire memo ( literally can't recall sentients or eidolon pulling these tricks , sentient hack and and deceive , they displayed no mind control so far ; the particles of his dash are unretlated to the ones used by eidolons , vonvalis and sentients ) even his forth skill was some vampire relared ninses until people where like wtf is this shiet and steve steped in into the last minute. 

Khorra you are either unaware of her original desing or are trying to deceive if you are going to defend it. Do you know why her 3 skill changes her visual ? Her original skill set was bases around changing IPS type witch is a fundamentally flawed idea because IPS is not balanced at all. She was meant to come with a rework of IPS the somehow managed to make impact and piercing work. She is a testament to DE lack of understanding of theit own game. If the desing was salvaged after a rework and multiple hotfixes it is unrelated to my point of Khorra original desing is a testament to DE lack of basic planing when it comes to frame desing. It does not seem there is any idea what is the gameplay loop or mechamics used during initial planing. 

1 hour ago, Archwizard said:

Hydroid came from a time when "Wouldn't it be cool if...?" was the standard, before a number of tools were available to frames like weapon-scaling or Arch-weapons. I'm not surprised his kit came out the way it did for its time.

Man they did nkt even try to make his stuff good. I did not watch his reveal stream and got a seconf hand description of calling a orbital bombardment , turning into tsunami and calling a kraken. These skill sound like something that can be good but nobody even tried to give them the numbers , aoe , damage , scaling or reliability to be good. The orbital bombardment is more like a pebble rain , a mild anoiance , the tsunami covers less with than a sllide attack and the kraken ks just a bunch of wack inflatable tube men. 

1 hour ago, Archwizard said:

concerned, however, that he's been reworked once already to hype his Prime release, in an era where each frame has a specific role, and instead received mostly QoL

He has a prime and a skin , there is no hope for him.

[Aldain]

49 minutes ago, keikogi said:

He has a prime and a skin , there is no hope for him.

Vauban got a revisit/rework despite having both of those, so to say there's no hope would be incorrect.

[Archwizard]

1 hour ago, keikogi said:

Revenant has hypnoses and vanish into mist as skills , also life steal mechamics. Pretty sure at some point got the Vampire memo ( literally can't recall sentients or eidolon pulling these tricks , sentient hack and and deceive , they displayed no mind control so far ; the particles of his dash are unretlated to the ones used by eidolons , vonvalis and sentients ) even his forth skill was some vampire relared ninses until people where like wtf is this shiet and steve steped in into the last minute. 

Yes, that's what I was saying. He's half Vampire, half Eidolon. I would guess he started as a Vampire, and then gained Eidolon flair later in the process when they worked on integrating him into the story.

Quote

Khorra you are either unaware of her original desing or are trying to deceive if you are going to defend it.

I'm not sure why you're being hostile right now. I'm fully aware of Khora's history and what has been explained of her design process -- her Orb Weaver Spider inspiration, her original ability to switch between Puncture/Slash/Impact, the restructuring of her kit which originally had her whip as her ultimate.

I wasn't defending the original design, I'm saying that what she was released with was solid, and it illustrates how vast the change in paradigm has been since Hydroid's release. You may fully be correct that "she didn't have a gameplay loop during initial planning," which is why they threw that out and worked on her more. 
Designing frame kits is an iterative process; there's no reason to hold the designs that ended up on the cutting room floor against the ones that actually got implemented. With how broad their kits are, do you really believe recent favorites like Wisp and Protea just popped out of the ether fully-formed? They probably have a dozen outdated design docs apiece, and every one of them has exactly zero relevance to our feedback or their gameplay now!

We can point at Hydroid's current iteration and his original one, but this would only be to draw the comparison between the two about how little he has changed since implementation.

[(PSN)ForNoPurpose]

On 2020-09-28 at 10:20 PM, (XB1)sinamanthediva said:

Ash might be quicker at killing the enemies but that doesn't mean its easier or less of a chore.  In your OPINION you might prefer to use Ash over Hydroid but that doesn't make it better if I have to mash buttons to get the job done verses Activate my puddle of doom and go make some microwave popcorn.  Like I keep saying its all a matter of Play-style that makes people choose one Warframe over another.  So go be one of 3 people that choose to use Ash in an Interception, and I'll use what I think, is a excellent Warframe choice for Interception missions and we can both be Happy Warframe players. Have a pleasant tomorrow!

DE has taken a stance against "win while making a sandwich" frames. Banshee and ember got massive nerfs due to that gameplay style.

Yet not hydroid.. weird huh? Its almost like its not as effective...

[Archwizard]

On 2020-09-30 at 1:32 AM, Archwizard said:

I think, much like Ember, he could do with a complete restructuring to his kit, from the ground up. Something to make more than one of his abilities stand out from the rest.

So, with that said, the question is how to restructure him.

1. What kind of role is Hydroid meant to fit on a team?
2. What kind of abilities both fit his theme AND fulfill his role?

It's important to distinguish for the second question that "role" and "theme" are two different yet interwoven aspects of the design, before someone erroneously jumps down my throat that "he has a role, he's a pirate." 
For instance, Nekros is themed as a Necromancer, while his role is largely support-oriented, with an emphasis on team survival (mostly in the form of loot and CC). Ivara is themed as a Robin Hood frame, and her role is a mixture of stealth and sniper damage. Volt is themed as an Electric elemental, and his role is... ostensibly a caster, but in effect more of a supplier for buffs and CC.

It's important to note that most frames have two different roles baseline, with an emphasis on one or the other depending on how they invest their stats.

Currently, Hydroid has a Pirate/Water theme, but no clearly defined role; he could extremely generously be called a damage and CC frame, though the only tool of his kit capable of dealing scaling damage or reliably locking down a location is Undertow, which limits his own options at the same time. He can theoretically dip into other roles, but all of them require at least one augment and none of them are particularly effective.

But screw it! Just for the sake of argument, let's say he's meant to be a damage-dealer with CC applications.

So for this hypothetical restructure, the first requirement for a damage-dealer is to figure out what his main source of damage should be, because Undertow is... useful at times, but simply not sustainable as the primary source of his damage in most mission types. He needs something he can actually use while moving.
After he has that, we can build out the rest of his kit. For instance, if his source of damage is melee-based, he would need either a skill to close the gap to his enemy (either bringing him to them or bringing them to him), or a mitigation effect for the run-up; if his source of damage is ranged, he would instead want effects to make/preserve a gap instead (like Sonic Boom or Tail Wind's hover), or to prevent enemies from firing upon him while he prepares (like Turbulence or most CC effects)l; and mobile stealth effects or deployable grouping tools (Vortex, Larva) are pretty loose since they can be used for either of those purposes.
Admittedly, either of those damage sources could probably work for a Pirate -- either an underhanded swashbuckler with a cutlass and pistol, or a ship's captain calling down storms and cannon-fire.

What's particularly interesting about Hydroid is that he has several gap-closer effects between Tidal Surge and Undertow's grapples in addition to Undertow's complete negation of damage... but then the rest of his skills are ranged (unless Undertow is active and centering them on you) and stationary. Under current circumstances it's not defined whether he would be better suited to one distance or the other, but it definitely means that regardless of which direction you push towards, half of his kit would have to see significant changes to pull it together.
Either he pushes towards melee and focuses on Tidal Surge and/or grappling effects but probably loses one of his ranged skills to make room, or he pushes towards more ranged attacks and casting, and therefore most likely drops Tidal Surge and at least revamps one of his two ranged skills to have separate purposes (ie one for CC, one for damage). Either way I would expect a general revamp to Undertow to focus on its primary benefits to his kit and its applications in mobile missions.

Of course, this is all under the "damage frame" hypothetical. If we concentrate on his CC aspects... we're right back where we started, since building one frame on multiple forms of CC is extremely difficult. Even Vauban needed several adjustments to capitalize on his, and it ended with him getting a damage skill and several buffs anyway.

[Roobarb]

My ideas for a Hydroid buff slight polish ...

• Remove charging of his 1 and 4, set duration/strength/range/# of tentacles/whatever else using modded frame values
• Change his 1 augment from corrosive procs to armour/shield stripping
• Change 3 to deliver true damage instead of impact, increase the scaling damage from 2% base to 5%

And while you're on, fix the tentacle grab of his 3 as half the time it doesn't do anything on targets that are in range or is blocked if a dropped item is sitting in front of the camera.

[Naneel]

I also think he needs some more work, then just changing numbers.

His passive could be more useful. Equivalent to Oberon, giving Sentinels a buff, maybe also a buff to teamates (he is the captain after all ^^) 

Tempest Barrage in itself is nice and fun, but needs better numbers. It should at least be as good as the charged state. If the charge should remain it needs to be significantly faster or bring a new/altered effect. The Augment could also be better, as the Ability still hits randomly. 

Tidal Surge needs at least the same treatment as Gauss/Zephyr while colliding with walls/objects. Better would be bonus damage if you slam the enemies into a wall. Could also use more Damage in General as 600 is a bit low. Augment is fine.

Undertow sounds good on paper, but is slow and uninteractive in practice. I think this one should be reworked completely

Tentacle Swarm is funny, but annoying and unreliable. Shoould at least get the stats of the charged version as base.

 

[Archwizard]

On 2020-10-01 at 12:04 AM, Archwizard said:

So, with that said, the question is how to restructure him.

Just for the sake of argument, let's say he's meant to be a damage-dealer with CC applications.

As a followup to this, assuming a complete restructure, I'm gonna throw a few hypothetical abilities out to play around with, hopefully suited for his theme and maximum potential. All of these should be considered "options" since some are mutually exclusive.

Spoiler

PASSIVE

1. Amplify: All of Hydroid's attacks have a chance to Soak enemies, doubling the potency of status effects they receive.

2. Tidal Surge: Hydroid's Bullet Jumps move twice as fast/far and ragdoll enemies within 3 meters.

DAMAGE SOURCE

1. Tempest Barrage is affected by Primary Weapon (Launcher) mods. Instead of raising the cost and radius, charging the cast instead concentrates the blasts into a smaller area, dealing more focused damage.

2. Liquid Steel: An Exalted Navy Flintlock and Cutlass combo ("Fortune" and "Glory"), using Dual-Wield mechanics. Both weapons can be modded separately with Secondary and Melee mods, respectively. The pistol has a single powerful splashing shot but slow automatic recharge (a la Archguns), while the cutlass emits tendrils of water pressure while attacking to extend its reach and whip nearby enemies.

3. Ahab's Harpoon: An Exalted Speargun ("Ishmael"). Primary Fire emits slow-moving bubbles that capture, suspend and periodically drown affected enemies, while Secondary Fire grapples enemies similar to a fishing spear.

CROWD CONTROL/SURVIVAL

1. Unleash the Kraken: A revamp to Tentacle Swarm; Hydroid summons a Kraken at the target location that lies in wait, acting as a proximity mine. When enemies have spent 2 sec in its radius it will automatically grapple them, suspending them in the air while strangling them for True damage.

2. High Tide: Hydroid renders himself stationary as he channels a violent whirlpool around himself, choosing the direction that the current flows with tap-cast. Enemies who attempt to enter the whirlpool are either continuously pushed back or helplessly pulled toward Hydroid (affected by his choice), with a chance to ragdoll them if they attempt to resist the current.

3. Call of the Seas: A second revamp to Tentacle Swarm/Undertow: Hydroid emits tentacles from his own body. Tap-casting will have an unoccupied tentacle grapple a distant target enemy, pulling them close and holding them up as a meat-shield to absorb incoming damage for Hydroid; a fixed number of enemies can be suspended in this manner by Hydroid, each on a separate hold timer. Hold-cast will grapple the nearest enemies up to capacity or, if already at capacity, silo all of the grappled enemies at the target location, dealing splash damage and radial knockdown on impact. Suspended enemies accumulate fire from Tenno similar to Mind Control, and receive this accumulated damage when the effect ends.

MOBILITY

1. Waverider: Yet another revamp to Tentacle Swarm/Tidal Surge: Hydroid can ride atop the head of his Kraken like a Velocipod, allowing him to attack while maneuvering at high speed. While the Kraken cannot be made airborne, jumps will allow the Kraken to create a geyser to propel Hydroid upward and throw all nearby enemies into the air. The Kraken will continue to "collect" enemies as it travels, dragging them behind with its tentacles, or crashing through them if they exceed its maximum tentacle count. (While dismounted, the effect could be similar to, say, CC1 above.)

2. Fluidity: A combination of Tidal Surge and Undertow: Hydroid enters a liquid state, granting him regeneration and a chance for incoming damage to pass through him while toggled active. Performing any maneuver will cause Hydroid to become a tidal wave that crashes through enemies, while crouching will reduce him into a puddle, making him invisible and intangible to enemies as long as he isn't attacking.

SAMPLE SETS

Sample set 1: Hydroid as a Melee DPS

• Amplify passive
• Call of the Seas for survival
• Fluidity for gap-closer
• Liquid Steel for damage
• Unleash the Kraken for CC

Sample set 2: Hydroid as a Caster DPS

• Tidal Surge passive
• Revamped Tempest Barrage for damage, alongside
• Ahab's Harpoon for damage and CC
• Waverider+Unleash the Kraken as one skill for mobility and CC
• High Tide for Survival

Sample set 3: Personal choice

• Amplify passive
• Tempest Barrage for chokepoint CC
• Call of the Seas as a means to grapple enemies at a distance
• Waverider (with enemy drag as synergy with Call of the Seas)
• Liquid Steel for damage

Naturally several of the abilities can maintain current names depending on the order they're placed (like Undertow for High Tide, or Tentacle Swarm for Call of the Seas/Unleash the Kraken.)

And that's largely just stuff off the top of my head. There's tons of systems available now related to Water or with similar potential that weren't available when Hydroid was introduced -- Sharkwing, Fishing, K-Drives as Surfboards, unique resources, multi-state abilities, weapon damage scaling -- any of which could be pooled together for a completely unique frame while still using the resources that have already been made for him.

[Naneel]

I had an idea for a rework for undertow :

• you won't be invincible, but you can also move and won't turn into a puddle
• you can still grab enemies and store them "inside" you, for every enemy :
  • you need to pay an upkeep (about 0,1 - 0,5 Energy/s)
  • you will lose movement speed (about 1%)
  • you gain either simple damage reduction (about 5%) or, what i find better and more fitting, every enemy inside you has a chance to take the damage you would receive (about 10%)
  • the enmies will be damaged by the damage they take for you and what they would receive now in undertow
  • dead enemies will be droped

This would keep you mobile, but also ramain a defensive ability to keep you alive while also damaging enemies and take them out like it does now.

 

And also one for the passive Body of Water : Whenever you would receive fatal damage your are instead turned into a puddle, while forming back you are invincible but unable to move (should gain a cooldown (3-5 min) or another source of compensation)

[(PSN)MegaZatruz]

I hope that someone from DE is seeing these comments and take into consideration, at least

[-Onyx-Phalian]

On 2020-10-03 at 6:29 PM, (PS4)MegaZatruz said:

I hope that someone from DE is seeing these comments and take into consideration, at least

Me too, I am not even close to a Hydroid main but I hate that there is a frame which has literally no reason to be used as there are frames like Vauban who do ALL of his jobs better except resource farming which now Khora and even Atlas are pushing him out of that niche. 

[TehGrief]

Every Wednesday at 10:00 AM (EST) is officially when we can band together and turn the focus towards warframe revists and revises.
Warframes are the core product of this game, they are literally what is used by an individual to complete all of the content (not counting some specific content islands).
There needs to be more attention placed on correcting bugs, fixing mechanical issues, and proportionate balancing between warframes. 

Every time new content is added there is an increasing number of variables that will make balancing more difficult, however, if every other update was a revisit to warframes, weapons, bugs, etc. there would be less to do every patch. 

There is a terrible amount of forgotten or dead content in this game that can be trimmed and pruned to allow for more organic growth; it's sad to say that the best parts of this game are still the oldest, most intrinsic aspects (star chart missions, specifically endless ones).

 

I remember posting my own frustration about Hydroid and how his abilities are riddled with issues, you had commented and enlightened me to the aspect that I shouldn't just be asking for mechanical changes, Hydroid truly does need a whole rework. 

If you don't mind, I would love to throw my lot in with you; I've been posting about a specific issue that plagues Oberon (from a purely mechanical standpoint) for months now. 

See you next Wednesday!

[sunderthefirmament]

Would a carrot help?  I'll buy the deluxe skin if he gets a rework.  Until then, NTY.

[TehGrief]

18 minutes ago, sunderthefirmament said:

I'll buy the deluxe skin if he gets a rework.  Until then, NTY.

This is something that I have seen mentioned: when a prime or deluxe skin gets released, it should be released with reworks and tweaks to incentivize purchase. Hydroid's deluxe skin looks great, but Hydroid himself is not worth using - meaning fewer people are going to buy the skin. 

[XaoGarrent]

Oh yeah, I forgot Hydroid is still garbage lol.

Not sure who's more forgotten and unloved at this point, Hydroid, Valkyr or Banshee. Zephyr's still in a pretty bad place, but at least DE remembers she exists from time to time and gives her something that lets her be a meme for a little while.

[Xylena_Lazarow]

Let us use our normal guns with Hydroid 3 and Hildryn 4.

[TKDancer]

16 hours ago, sunderthefirmament said:

Would a carrot help?  I'll buy the deluxe skin if he gets a rework.  Until then, NTY.

i'd buyt it after a rework and a fix to the color channels so it properly has more metallics to match the weapon skins

[Leqesai]

22 hours ago, Xylena_Lazarow said:

Let us use our normal guns with Hydroid 3 and Hildryn 4.

[(PSN)mahoshonenfox]

Is he really bad? People categorize him as a loot frame. I don't use loot frames but how does he compare to the likes of Atlas, Khora and Nekros. I know Hydroid's pilfering ability can work with others. Does it need power strength? I know Atlas needs power strength to be reliable.

[Hypernaut1]

1 hour ago, (PSN)mahoshonenfox said:

Is he really bad? People categorize him as a loot frame. I don't use loot frames but how does he compare to the likes of Atlas, Khora and Nekros. I know Hydroid's pilfering ability can work with others. Does it need power strength? I know Atlas needs power strength to be reliable.

i dont know. I cant think of a situation in WF that i cant handle with Hydroid. im lost at all these "hydroid sux" threads. But hey, if DE wants to buff him im all for it. 

[TheGodofWiFi]

15 hours ago, Hypernaut1 said:

i dont know. I cant think of a situation in WF that i cant handle with Hydroid. im lost at all these "hydroid sux" threads. But hey, if DE wants to buff him im all for it. 

Whether or not Hydroid can handle things is irrelevant, its how he handles them.

You can handle the entirety of Warframe's content with a Seer or a Stug pistol if you really wanted to. Doesn't mean they are not a garbage weapons that take about ten times the amount of effort/time other weapons do to kill enemies/get through content. You could literally run through Warframe with a Sheev, Seer and an MK1-Paris, even without top-end mods. It would just take you a hel of a lot longer than someone using actually good weapons.

Same situation with Hydroid. You can do whatever content you want with him if you know what you're doing, like any other frame in this game. Doesn't mean he isn't terrible due to his AFK-promoting playstyle, mechanically clunky RNG-reliant abilities and just generally being inferior in every way to other frames in his category.

If we judged a weapon or frames badness by whether or not you can actually play the game with it, then nothing would get changed. Honestly I see this argument so often to defend bad frames/weapons I feel like I'm in Groundhog Day.

[LascarCapable]

Hydroid does only two things but does it decently : Crowd Control and Area Denial.

• Tentacle Swarm is your main area denial method. It locks down an area fairly effectively. Enemies will usually not be able to go through the swarm without being picked up.
• Tempest Barrage is your alternative area denial method. The one you will use while the main area denial tool is running, mostly pre-emptively on chokepoints.
• Tidal Surge can be used to rush down hallways or pick up enemies inside undertow. You can also use it as a yeet button, but considering the massive jump forward you will do, this is impractical.
• Undertow is something you can use to gather enemies around and bunch them up at the place of your convenicence. It's also you may way to avoid being damaged.
• Passive is supposed to allow you to block very small chokepoints for no energy.

There is a clear CC identity in Hydroid's kit that I think should be kept. However, it doesn't mean there is no room for improvement. As years passed, some issues started to show up in Hydroid's kit.

• Lack of versatility makes him less desirable compared to most warframes.
• No sustain whatsoever unless you use specific tools, when sustain of either energy or health (or both) has slowly became a standard.
• Undertow forces him into a very passive playstyle, despite the fact that it's your main survivability power.
• Tempest Barrage how has the annoying tendancy to make enemies uncontrollably jump, thus making aiming rather annoying.
• Passive only has random chance to happen and that's just annoying.

I won't suggest a rework here, but I think trying to fix these issues without changing the main identity of each of Hydroid's power would be the best thing to do.

 

[Desdemona-XI]

I would say that Hydroid's not nearly as bad as most people reckon, however there are two major elements to his kit that undercut his usefulness. especially compared to his new 'rival' Khora. 

While Pilfering swarm gives a guaranteed drop, where pilfering strangledome does not, Hydroid's flailing 4 makes enemies too inconvenient to hit, and deals too little damage at even upper-star-chart enemy levels, (which I believe should be the yardstick)  this makes his 4 cumbersome, and once a tentacle has an enemy its not a threat to any other enemies, which seems ridiculous given how hard it slams things around.

So I would say have his 4 move from wildly flailing to lifting enemies and constricting them with the tentacles mostly still, and also bashing other enemies with the occupied tentacles for damage ticks, perhaps scaling off of enemy health to allow more expidited kills and less flailing (and useful flailing when it happens) 

The second element is a little more complex, See, Hydroids skills are good, only when augmented.
- his 1 is trashy damage and knockdown cc, augment gives it a corrosive proc, which is markedly better but still a bit impractical and dull for an augment and the cost scaling up with charge makes the expense-reward exchange of it a little unbalanced.
- His 2 is an okay mobility skill except it cant be cancelled out of except by casting his 3, it also ragdolls and pulls enemies around but kind of haphazzardly. but his augment, allows it to cleanse procs, same as above, better, but not by much, impractical cause you cant cancel out of it, and dull for an augment, as that's literally identical to several other augments.
-His 3 is by and large.. okay. Warframe is a mobility game, but theres also plenty of frames with less mobile powersets, even so however, the puddle crawl is the Slowest power ever. The problem is his 3 renders him invisible, but also, unarmed. and while it can build up to decent damage, the ramping energy cost of it makes it exhaustive to use, its like Grendel's 1 but you lose your guns too. Its augment makes it a useful heal, except your team is almost never going to stand on you so you keep having to move to them.
-His 4 ofcourse is. as above said, a bad cc, with slow damage that becomes difficult to work with rapidly, and is, for the most part without its augment, Useless.

I would honestly say, take these augments and Make them all or mostly innate. corrossive procs arent 100% armor strippers any more and other augments will strip 100% of armor in less time than peppering procs will take.
granting a status cleanse to him innately would actually see the power used more often i'm sure.
an innate heal is something a lot more common in warframe than it was when he launched, and would go far into seeing him become useful.
and While i'd be willing to let pilfering swarm stay as an augment (cause of its 100% chance of loot) the above changes should at least make it viable as a zone controller and damager while letting allies clear the tentacles of enemies

On top of that I would also suggest the following minor tweaks

Increase charge speed on his powers, and lower their upper cost perhaps
Allow tidal surge to be held like gauss's 1 and steered, (I think we all wanna see tidal hydroid just barrel around a corner sweeping a corridor of enenmies up with him
Increase Undertow's movement speed, and decrease its additional cost while moving, Or make that a new augment, and allow hydroid to maybe pop half up from his pool to take a quick shot, or allow him to mellee strike an enemy in the pool, maybe an  swirling movement causing effectively a ground finisher on one enemy for an extra energy cost, or allow the undertow to summon a couple tentacles on its own, or sprout its own field of tentacles when his 4 is cast.

[(PSN)mahoshonenfox]

According to the wiki, Hydroid's Pilfering Swarm is a guaranteed 100% more loot drop at base with no stat investment. And it stacks with other loot abilities like Nekros, Atlas, Ivara, etc. If his main role is a loot frame then that's pretty good. Atlas and Ivara needs investment in power strength to even reach 100%.Nekros can't even mod his chance rate.

If the problem is just killing enemies trapped in the tentacles, then highly explosive weapons can handle that. His purpose is to boost loot and it looks like he can handle that well. If he's gonna be reworked, they should move away from the water theme and just make him a full on pirate warframe, focusing on stealing and looting enemies. Passive that increase drop chance/quantity. Ability that steals loot from an enemy while still alive then kill the enemy to make it drop loot again. Increase credit drop. Ability that guarantees energy orbs or health orbs on kill. Crate breaking abilities that increase crate drop rates and quantities. Etc. Even if he isn't the strongest warframe, everyone will still play him if DE focuses on the looting aspect.