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Heart of Deimos: Xaku Feedback Megathread


SilverBones

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Looks amazing(visually) and fun, feels useless.
Xaku is only okay if all 4 abilities are used at once, on a very specific build... Only 1 of her 6 abilities feels useful on its own.

Problems:

  • Xata’s Whisper - Reduces performance in most cases.
    * +40% void damage reduces frequency of other status procs (significantly). Losing slashes on slash focused weapon or viral/corrosive literally fits the broken theme because it makes this skill detrimental.
    * Only real use for this skill is damage boost with The Vast Untime, but that locks this entire frame into 1 build. Operator is far more convenient for sentient damage resets.... it also does more damage.
    * Void procs reduce damage on affected enemies. An average player will likely land a lot of headshots (either by aiming or by accident) and void bubble pulls projectiles towards body shot.
  • Grasp of Lohk - By far the most disappointing ability. It cannot kill, it cannot crowd control and it cannot safely disarm (low range and long cast time made sure of that).
    * It doesn't use enemy weapons, it only uses enemy weapon MODELS shots are always lasers (this one is just a disapointment).
    * Useless as an offensive power due to low base damage, low range, low fire rate, void element it cannot reliably kill normal (not deimos) infested in a single cast (in SO level 4, so like lvl 30-40s).
    * Not very good as utility ability when you need to disarm, loki is miles better and his radiation will likely end up doing more damage to groups of enemies than Xaku's void guns.
  • The Lost - One of the boring looking abilities, but ended up being the best of the kit. Still, 2 issues do exist:
    Different frames have different ways of switching and cycling through skills. Why?
    Deny is not strong enough  of an ability to have you stuck aiming for a second and then STILL have a chance to miss. 
  • The Vast Untime - I think we established that Xata’s Whisper and Grasp of Lohk are on the useless side and this ability is the only thing that can make them work.... somewhat.
    * Only initial blast triggers void weakness, so ability needs to be spammed. This is an ultimate ability, that costs 100 energy to cast (+ upkeep) on a low-energy frame. Do you see where I am going? Spamming this ability is the only thing that can make the first 2 skills better (not really "good", because of problems outlined above).

 

Proposed improvements (generally just think of usecases for each ability)

  • Xata’s Whisper - Decouple added void damage from weapon damage, so that void status does not proc over weapon mod statuses. Maybe just disable void status instead, idk... That way even if the damage boost is really small (due to resistances), this boost would not screw up existing weapon builds.
  • Grasp of Lohk - Where do I begin? This ability BADLY needs Cast speed or Range (weapon grab range) to avoid suicide casts.
    Also this skill lacks direction, badly. It does everything and is bad at everything. Consider what you want this skill to be and boost it in that area. Here are a few ideas:
    1. Powerhouse - needs more firepower (base damage/fire rate + shooting range)
    2. Melee support - since this is a melee-range skill at the moment consider making it scale off melee multipliers.It would be the sort of skill that would finish off enemies slightly out of melee range.
    3. Utility disarm skill - High disarm range, low shooting range.... still more power.
  • The Lost - 2 minor changes: 
    1. Hold button to switch and tap to cast. Maybe make it configurable.
    2. Deny should have a faster cast time.
  • The Vast Untime - Make it free or cost less energy for initial cast, but keep the upkeep energy cost. Have armor float around the outer perimeter of skill reach and everything within skill reach takes increased void damage.

 

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vor 7 Stunden schrieb DalanorTheLlama:

Wrong. For many months now shield gating exists and Rolling guard is in the game for while now as well.

Pretty sure you avoid more attacks by staying on the move and avoid line of sight than just Shield Gating and Rolling Guard. Especially Rolling Guard is primarily a tool for enemies against which your survivability becomes binary and is most of the time wasted mod space as long as you can still take damage.

The argument was more about that in a game where you actively avoid attacks a passive dodge stat is a bit sketchy as a primary means of survival.

Shield Gating and Rolling Guard are obviously great controlled means to avoid damage, especially in critical situations but they are certainly not the norm for the entirey of the game space.

 

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20 hours ago, (PS4)Silverback73 said:

Xaku isn’t so much “broken” as fragmented and health together by Void Energy.

Because is this, I think Xaku’s powers should thematically diversify in a unique way more along the lines of “where science and reason fail”.

As a Void-powered Weapon here is my unique suggestion along this theme:

Void-Powered Inversion:

When cast, adds 10%/20%/30% Void Damage to the CURRENTLY EQUIPPED weapon AND inverts (flips) Status and Crit Chance by 50%/75%/100%.

(For instance, a 30% base status/10% base Crit weapon temporarily becomes a 10% base status/30% base Crit weapon at lvl 3).

 

16 hours ago, Deathrunner-Aesir said:
20 hours ago, (PS4)Silverback73 said:

 

Based on your suggestion it would be very interesting to see all the new possibilities of weapon modding. I somehow hope DE use this idea

I guess there would be only few cases. The rest of damage types combination would be rarely used. However I can see how how some weapon would shine. Some mods would be interesting for status/crit things.

To be honest I bet you could build whole frame based on inversion/swapping:

  • health/shield
  • damage/speed (especially for melee)
  • primary/secondary stats (damage type, firerate, status/crit chance, multishot  - but not stats like type of attack e.g you won't change your beam weapon to the sniper)
  • running speed vs jump height
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So what i think about Xaku so far...

1 - The thing(he/she) is just too slow to cast skills, it's animations are slow even with natural talent... It hugely impact skill 2 and 3.

2 - Insted of 3 skill in one skill slot, just put one, ok? i think noboddy likes this amalgamation of skills, it is bad to use, it makes xaku slower yet. Just let defense strip skill, delete the others, people won't use other skills anyways (they are slow and bad, espcially the bean (it is veeeery bad, damage skills like so can't compete with weapons (true story)))...

3 - 4th skill is subpar, it would be fine if it was a 2nd skill, lets be honest here, the skill isn't bad, it just doesn't offer much, it is unecessary in low lvl missions and "meaningless" in high lvl missions. It could have a better duration, lower cost, and more effective ( dogde explosion doesnt make sense, so make it 75% dodge + 90% damage reduction, then it will be a good ult). Also what have u been drinking DE?? Second warframe in a roll with useless damage associated with the ult.

4 - i don't know why i would use 1st skill (but is better then lots 1st skills i guess), 2nd skill is ridiculous slow and u need to be in melee range, also its damage is debateble.

5 - Loking in its whole kit, for what reason would i use this warframe? Is it good in something? Personally i prefer Hydroid (take that is an ofense)...

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Honestly, Xaku has a lot of potential. All they need is a few decent tweaks and maybe a rework to an ability and then they could shine.

  1. Xata's Whisper - Right now this ability is the perfect excuse for DE to finally rework Void damage, as all it does is lower your overall DPS which is a significant debuff. A rework to the Void status is all that's needed to make this ability worth anything. (Also, a bit of petty gripe, but why is it when Xaku casts this that they get covered in Infested material similar to Parasitic Link? Xaku is a Void frame, not Infested.)
  2. Grasp of Lohk - Probably the one of the coolest themed abilities in the game, but sadly the execution isn't that great due to its very long casting time and very short range. These two aspects of the ability need to be buffed up and then it would be great, as right now Xaku isn't the type of frame who can take a long time with ability casting as he isn't exactly a very good tank.
  3. The Lost - Again, thematically this ability is cool. However, the cycling mechanic is once again a hindrance. Frames that have multiple abilities in one share the same issue; we have to hold to use and tap to cycle the ability. This has always been the awful way round IMO and it really shows on Xaku more than anyone else. Also, this is just my opinion, but I really do think Deny is 100% pointless. The damage is pitiful, the CC isn't as good as Accuse due to it not being a radial ability, the casting animation overly long, the laser isn't very big so there is a high chance of missing enemies and Xata's Whisper already allows us to reset Sentient resistances. Deny as it is right now really has no point in existing.
  4. The Vast Untime - My complaint here is the same as everyone's; 75% chance to dodge is just not good enough to survive in Warframe and is highly unreliable. Please change it back to damage reduction like you said on the TennoCon stream. Also, this is just a fashion complaint but can Xaku not throw all their armour off for this ability, as it really ruins fashion capability when you're just a skeleton with floating attachments running around. Just make it so that Xaku's Void tendrils become a lot more pronounced and grow around more pieces of their armour.

Overall, the main issues that affect Xaku are the fact that Void damage sucks right now, some of his abilities really need some tweaks to their range and casting time and his ultimate and passive are just not good at all in terms of keeping Xaku alive.

 

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On 2020-08-25 at 3:10 PM, Morisabeau said:

I've tried using it against both normal and Steel Path enemies, and you know what? I couldn't properly kill anyone beyond lvl 10 Infested.

I don't understand why I keep seeing people say this. It easily kills level 30, 40, 60, 100 enemies if you take 5-6 guns. 

And it does scale with enemy level, which is the only reason it can kill level 40+ enemies. People must only be using 1 enemy gun.

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I agree with everyone about Xaku abilities being lackluster, but as usual I want to drop in a random idea to discuss.

The Lost trio of abilities, besides obviously needed numbers tweaking and maybe rework in general I think it would be neat if these abilities had some minor synergy with frames other than Xaku. Something that would play up the part of Xaku being made of parts from different frames. Mostly for fluff and occasional combo.

For example Gaze debuff becoming slightly stronger if rooted target is hit by fire/poison affinity power. Or Accuse thralls granting damage buff to killer if being killed by exalted weapons.

It is way less important than making his basic kit playable and enjoyable, just an idea for future.

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1 hour ago, (XB1)The Overlord02 said:

I don't understand why I keep seeing people say this. It easily kills level 30, 40, 60, 100 enemies if you take 5-6 guns. 

And it does scale with enemy level, which is the only reason it can kill level 40+ enemies. People must only be using 1 enemy gun.

Maybe if you have the armor debuff up. But when you strip armor completely, even a non-riven'd braton is effective. That doesn't make the damage good. Against infested chargers or maybe (m a y b e) butchers, it'll be okay probably, up to a certain level. But once anything has even a modicum of armor, the guns do sub-200 damage each. That's frankly absurd.

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12 minutes ago, Rinleric said:

Maybe if you have the armor debuff up. But when you strip armor completely, even a non-riven'd braton is effective. That doesn't make the damage good. Against infested chargers or maybe (m a y b e) butchers, it'll be okay probably, up to a certain level. But once anything has even a modicum of armor, the guns do sub-200 damage each. That's frankly absurd.

It's funny how some people justify xaku's abilities with 200% strength defence strip and 2's scaling is decent at that point... 

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Xaku has been showing to be a little bit underwhelming with their set, so I'm just giving my ideas on how to make them more interesting to play, as well as giving more options of builds, as we are talking about three Warframes in one.

1.    Move Xatas whisper to a "hold 1" button function and put the actual Deny as their "tap 1". (Making it like Volt Shock, and Shock Trooper, for example)
2.    Turn Grasp of Lohk re-castable, with recast discarding older weapons and getting new ones.
3.    With the old Deny now on Xata's whisper, the new deny will be a healing ability that heals the target when it takes damage (literally denying the damage and healing them instead).
4.    The Bast Untime actually works by dealing 3 offensive effects on enemies (Damage, Slow, and Void damage vulnerability) and 2 defensive effects on Xaku (Dodge, movement/parkour speed). add a 3rd bonus to the defensive effect, that being damage reduction.
    And adding a little tweak:
    Xaku is made from three different Warframes mixed together, and on using its 4th ability, it just explodes all their parts. But how about Xaku exploding away just 2 of 3 of its armor and keeping 1 based on the lost ability set on its 3rd skill?
    Upon casting The Vast Untime, Xaku "use" 2 sets of its armor as shrapnel, each one dealing an exclusive debuff to the enemies and the remaining armor parts will give a particular buff to Xaku, as well to their skills with the values increased.

                      The Lost                                 The vast untime
Armor parts    Skill selected                          Defensive (what you keep)    Offensive (What does explode!)
Red                Accuse                                   Dodge                                    Slow    
Blue               Gaze                                       Moviment/parkour speed       Damage
White             Deny                                       Damage reduction                 Void damage vulnerability

    For example: When you use The Vast Untime, with accuse selected, the explosion will deal damage and void vulnerability on enemies based on the blue and white armor exploded, and you will keep the red armor parts, that will give you bonus dodge chance for the duration of the skill, or until you deactivate it, and you will be unable of using gaze and deny until it's over. But Xata's whisper, Grasp of Lohk and Accuse will have buffed stats.

EDIT: Oh, and take off the energy drain, please...

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On 2020-08-21 at 2:07 PM, SilverBones said:

Xaku is here with all their Void-Channeling glory! The newest Warframe is a creation of the community and has a lot of unique powers:

  • Passive - Xaku has a 25% chance that shots will pass right through them!
  • Xata’s Whisper - Add Void damage to all your attacks!
  • Grasp of Lohk - Take the enemy’s weapons and use them to fight back!
  • The Lost - Cycle through one of three abilities:
    • Accuse - create an area that turns enemies within its radius on their former allies!
    • Gaze - Trap enemies in a Void Cage, reducing Armor and Shields of other enemies in range
    • Deny - fire a Void beam that strips Sentient resistances, and hold aloft any survivors!
  • The Vast Untime - Shed your outer layers to increase your passive evasion chance to 75%, and gain a speed boost! Cast it again to reform!

If you have feedback to leave on the subject of Xaku, then please do so in this thread. Please remember that you should keep your feedback constructive and civil. If you like an aspect of the new content, tell us what you like. If you do not like an aspect, then tell us why, and what you would change to make it better!

Please bear in mind this is not a place to leave bugs you discover while playing. If you do need to report a bug, please use the dedicated Heart of Deimos Bug-Hunting thread!

Thank you!
 

Currently the community seems to have 3 big problems with Xaku, first Xaku has no real role they have low damage despite decent scaling and their CC is unreliable or ineffectual. Second Xaku's animations and cast speed are very hard to play around and whith a kit befiting of a caster slow casts and poor energy economy for little effect is a rough experience to play through. Third, Xaku feels like a discount version of several frames but without the good parts of any of those frames. Big feedback. This will be a full kit tweak reccomendation. ( NO NEW ANIMATIONS!) I am aware this will be a bit of work for the team but, will maintain the identity of Xaku while bringing them up to snuff. As Xaku is an amalgam of other frames I am leaning all in on that by using other frames as references for their abilities.

Firstly, Increase ability cast speed by at least 15% as it is currently incredibly clunky since he has only full-body abilities.

Passive: (Changed) Many as One:Xaku generates 1 energy/second for each nearby allied Warframe.(Affinity Range) Additionally, Xaku is able to Helminth Infuse 1 additional ability. (Fits the theme but will DEFINITELY need rules.)

Xata's Whisper: (Tweaked) Damage scaled down to 11/14/17/20%. Now also boosts ability damage.

Grasp of Lohk: (Big Tweak) Increase the max targets from 3/4/5/6 > 5/6/7/8. (The number of Void Hinds should stay the same.) For the duration of the ability, tap casting while active specifies a target for the Void Hinds.(Allows focus fire.) Hold casting while active toggles an overcharge which increases the damage by 50%(Unaffected by Ability Strength. While overcharged the ability is treated as a channel and drains 7/6/5/4 energy/second until toggled off or the ability ends.)

The Lost: (Tweaked) Increase cast cost from 75 > 100 Energy.  ACCUSE: Enemies under the affects of Accuse gain 2x increased damage from Xata's Whisper. Xaku gains 2.5% damage redirection for each Accused enemy. Damage redirected is funneled to each Accused enemy, not divided amongst them. GAZE: No Touchy! Great ability! DENY: Reduce the damage from 1000/2000/3000/4000 > 500/1000/1500/2000 and change the damage to Adaptive. Gains damage increase from Xatas Whisper which overides the damage to 50/50 Void / Adaptive. Suspended enemies are 25% more susceptable to Status Procs.

The Vast Untime: (Big Tweak) Reduced initial cast cost from 100 > 50. Drain unchanged. Add a rubble system where enemies killed with Void damage drop wisps of armor. Each armor pickup adds 50 flat armor for 15s to a cap of 1000 total. (Unaffected by ability strength.) On Cast all built up armor is removed and damage is incresed by the amount of armor accrued at cast. When in skeletal form Casting speed is increased by 25% and Movement Sprint & Parkour speed is increased by 30%(Unaffected by Ability strength)

In summary, these changes are made to make Xaku both more reliable within the current state of the game and hone in on his role as a Damage/Utility caster. The additional Helminth Infusion ability will need special rules applied to it to keep it from going wild, so here are my reccomendations for that. Firstly no doubling up of similar abilites. I.e No Roar + Eclipse, Firewalker + Infested Mobility, or Shock + Smite Infusion. Second, one of the two abilities infused must replace The Lost. I think this will allow for cool and creative combinations without creating "The One Above All Warframes." 

   

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Here's my ideas of improvements for Xaku!

Xata's Whisper: Improving void damage!

All status affects and damage types got major changes and updates, with only void damage being the odd one out!

An idea to improve void damage is to make its damage type neutral to all factions except sentients, and it's status affect the magnetic field getting bigger radius with each consecutive proc up to +100% larger field

As for the damage buff, it is currently too weak of a percentage to take account for, improving it to 50% at base like all multiplicative damage buffs would suffice.

Grasp of Lohk: improving DPS!

the only minor change i would give to this ability is for each weapon to deal it's damage with its actual fire rate and fire mode...so stealing a gorgon, means having an actual gorgon firing, this will improve DPS as most enemy weapons are auto anyway

The Lost: improving style!

ACCUSE: opening a radial fissure should have the actual fissure sound effect just for the cool factor

Faster casting speed?

The Vast Untime: don't do it!!!

having 75% dodge chance...you know what, that's actually pretty cool, just because of the luck factor, don't change it to damage reduction, it makes no sense and it's completely overused and boring!

HOWEVER i would improve the 75% dodge chance by making it a -75% chance to get hit, and 75% less enemy accuracy 

It just makes things a lot better, since Xaku is very weak, i wouldn't have it any other way though, i like weak characters, and i like that you try to add alternatives to flat damage reduction.

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Disclaimer:  I didn't check the wiki for any answers or tips.  I wanted this to be authentic to my experiences, so if I miss something everyone else knows, that's a kind of feedback too.

For its stats, its kinda meh.  Its got terrible shields, so I would think it would be tougher.  Its health is good, and its armor is fine, and its energy is average. This makes the base frame seem confusing to me.  I'm not really feeling it as a tanky frame.  So I'm thinking support caster, but its energy is kinda low for that.  Then its abilities make it play more like a brawler.  So, I think its' stats needs to be tweaked to be more fighty or more wizardy.  Right now its stuck in that good-at-nothing area that makes it feel like I'm fighting my frame more than expanding on it when I mod.

Its passive is fun and helps it survive, but it kinda works against the fighty builds because you reduce the effectiveness of Rage.

Xata's Whisper:  A great ability.  If this was the Helmith ability then everyone would have this.  But what's all that black crud I get on me when I use it?

Grasp of Lohk:  It feels broken right now bc/ of its close range.  It feels to me like it uses a radial burst, but it should defiantly be a cone area-of-effect.  Right now it encourages me to surround myself at very close range to get the full effect, which makes this squishy frame get killed pretty often when I try to use it offensively.  The cone would let me project farther, and not encourage me to get surrounded.  Its duration is way too short, making the risk/reward calculation bad on this.  When I try to use it defensively it usually ends badly since the cast is very long.  I'd reduce this by half.

The Lost:  These all are fine, but they feel very similar.  Everything is a kinda pause/time-out thing.

Accuse:  This would be a great ability, if they stored damage like Nyx's Mind-control.  As it is, they almost always get nuked by a friend about 2 seconds after joining us.  At least Revenant's ability leaves little fire pillars behind when that happens.

Deny:  Love this one, the animation is fun.  But why do they float?  It makes it seem like a better version of Gaze.  The difference between this and Gaze feels vague to me.

Gaze:  Not liking this at all.  I didn't even know it weakened other enemies until I got this this post.  It just seemed like Deny's float, but with a weird damage storage thing.  I didn't like it from the first time I used it.

Vast Untime:  Another ability that seems to fight me as much as it helps me.  So the burst is good, and can be used in a pinch, but it does encourage me to surround myself and act like a front-line troop.  Xaku is too squishy to have two abilities that encourage me to get surrounded.  Then there is the defense part.  Raising the chance of a miss to 75% is awesome, and I love it, but that fights the character too.  If I'm suppose to be a fighter, then this makes rage even more ineffective.  If I'm suppose to be more a support/caster, then this is good.  But it means my best defense is my most expensive ability.  So I need to keep farming energy, so I can protect myself long enough to cast abilities that I shouldn't cast because I need that energy to stay alive so I can cast abilities?  Its a counter-productive loop.  That brings us to the high cost.  Seems to be it should cost energy to cast and be modded for duration, or it should be cheap to cast and have a per-second-drain.  Right now it has both, which makes it feel like its fighting itself again and costing too much.

Overall:  A fun frame that will probably get crushed by tough enemies, but is fun enough I don't really care.  A good frame that just needs a little tweaking to make the game play smoother.  Thanks for the new toy DE.

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Messed with Xaku a bit. Haven't forma'd them; this is strictly from a small amount of time playing a bare-minimum setup. I can't speak for any sort of high-end builds with them (although that's not going to stop me from trying, huehue). I might expand on these observations later after spending more time with him but I want to get my thoughts out before this thread inevitably decays into chaos.

Observations:
- Void damage is mostly a novelty; its actual benefits are very niche and its drawbacks include being ineffective against one entire enemy faction and a significant amount of another
- That said, Bullet Attractor is a fairly nice status effect, especially for imprecise crit weapons such as the Tonkor or Kuva Drakgoon that greatly appreciate guaranteed headshots; pity Xaku's only means of applying it (Xata's Whisper) is somewhat shaky and requires heavy loadout specialisation to make work Never mind, I was misinformed. Bullet Attractor does in fact attract towards the body, thus making headshots more difficult. That's... pretty bad.
- Xata's Whisper doesn't seem to affect Xaku's abilities which is very unfortunate as it'd be a nice way to get a bit of extra power out of them
- Grasp of Lohk has an obscenely long casting time for an ability that requires a somewhat fragile frame built around evasion to sit right in front of multiple enemies' faces to use effectively (the grab range is quite limited), similarly the targeting range of the guns feels a bit short
- Grasp of Lohk's max target count scales with Ability Range which is Weird(tm) but not bad per se.
- I think GoL is meant to be used alongside Gaze to improve its scaling. This is hampered somewhat by the fact that the guns will often aggressively shoot at the captured enemy and ignore other targets. Additionally, Gaze's short radius makes keeping enemies in its field unreliable and the short duration and high cost of both makes this somewhat impractical for lower efficiency builds.
- With the above measures and sufficient Ability Strength (>200%), GoL does in fact deal decent damage and is quite capable of killing level 100 Heavy Gunners (which I should note are in fact resistant to Void), although whether it's worth investing that much Strength is debatable.
- Deny's long casting time mostly negates any utility it would ever have as it's difficult to keep enemies lined up for long enough to cast it on them
- Deny has flat damage and therefore is probably doomed to not scale well
- You don't actually get much benefit out of keeping Vast Untime up as the damage, slow and void weakness both are not continuously applied to new enemies in its radius, leaving only the speed boost and evasion boost as persistent effects (neither of which scale with mods, incidentally)
- On that note VU's void resistance debuff not scaling with mods and not being reapplied is very unfortunate because if it did it would greatly improve how Xaku's damage scales and also better ameliorate Void's weakness against Grineer and heavy Infested
- Vast Untime is very unresponsive to modding! Only the slow effect and damage respond to Ability Strength so its actual power is extremely static; its utility can be improved to an extent through duration and range mods but its actual potency can't be improved much
- It almost feels unfair to judge Vast Untime since the rank scaling on its slow effect is very obviously jumbled (15 / 50 / 20 / 25 ???) but even if it was ordered properly I don't think it'd fix much

Things I like:
- Really cool aesthetic and theme
- Audiovisual design is top-notch as always
- I like evasion-focused frames because they reward me for moving around and playing smart
- I like Gaze because I have an inexplicable love for abilities that use an enemy as a beacon
- There's something comforting about Xata's Whisper's simplicity even if it is kind of dull and doesn't actually accomplish much
- Most of their abilities are pretty cool conceptually even if the execution is disappointing
- Having a gender-neutral frame is cool
- Using Grasp of Lohk on a crowd of enemies to steal all of their weapons at once is very satisfying
- Grasp of Lohk's gun cap scaling off of Range is weird but kind of cool
- Odd numbers on everything are cool; it reinforces their deformed, chaotic aesthetic
- They's a skellington
- They has a lazer

Things I dislike:
- The lazer is in the running for the worst ability in his kit (which is saying something)
- Obnoxiously long casting times on pretty much everything
- Xata's Whisper's effect is almost unnoticeable even with VU's resist loss
- Xata's Whisper barely interacts with the rest of his abilities
- Xata's Whisper is actually kind of boring; the element is unusual but it's mostly a small damage bump that sometimes applies Bullet Attractor
- Vast Untime reminds me of Absorb in that it seems to have no idea what it actually wants to do, tries to be everything, and fails at all of it
- Vast Untime has a duration and thus must be constantly recast, which is extra annoying because the casting animation is fairly long
- Vast Untime's upfront cost is obscenely high for a channelled ability to the point where it feels like an oversight
- Vast Untime's actual interesting effect, the Void resistance penalty, doesn't scale and is not reapplied to new targets which, again, requires it to be constantly recast
- Deny scales very poorly, has a very narrow radius, and the casting time is literally crippling towards any function it'd like to have
- Gaze has a somewhat small radius which makes it unreliable for softening up enemies
- Accuse is extremely boring functionally (although the visual FX are delightful) and doesn't have nearly enough impact to justify the cost (it only brainwashes a few enemies and the CC ends when they die)
- Grasp of Lohk's duration is very poor which requires it to be constantly recast, which is annoying because of how long the casting time is (possibly intentional to avoid excessive autokilling but it feels like a bit much)
- Conversely, Grasp of Lohk can't actually BE recast until it expires which is annoying because it makes grabbing weapons more of a commit than I'd like; I don't see why just spending the energy and casting time isn't commitment enough
- Grasp of Lohk's gun targeting range is very short which makes me have to get closer to enemies than I'd like (as an evasion-based frame...)
- Grasp of Lohk's annoying to use in multiplayer because enemies will often die before you can finish casting it
- Accuse feels weirdly gimped for what it actually is (a soft, short-lived CC) -- not recastable, poor duration, poor range, limited number of affected enemies. Why is it so bad? I could at least understand if CC wasn't Xaku's focus but Xaku does appear to very much be a CC/debuff oriented frame, and Accuse is a soft CC to boot!
- The Lost in general costs way too much for what any of its components actually do
- Correcting people on Xaku's pronouns is going to be a mildly annoying phenomenon (I am 85% sure I have accidentally referred to them as "he" in this post despite my attempts to use the official terminology)

Things I want:
- Vast Untime's Void resistance debuff should scale with ability strength, and it should be a persistent aura that follows Xaku around for the duration. Just this single change will improve how VU interfaces with his other abilities, how the aforementioned other abilities scale with Ability Strength (as their own damage increasing from Strength will be compounded by the increased void weakness on enemies which will also be more reliably applied), and improve Xaku's performance against Grineer drastically, altogether allowing VU to function better as a capstone that ties Xaku together. Having the slow behave in this manner would be nice as well.
- At the same time, and I'm a bit hesitant to say this for fear of having a death squad sent after me: I almost want Vast Untime to have *fewer* functions so that it can focus on doing one thing Xaku needs well instead of doing a lot of things they don't need poorly. Xaku doesn't need increased movement speed or a very weak radial Void AoE that barely scales. They need something to shore up the rest of their kit.
- Vast Untime should be either a channelled ability or a duration based ability, not both. Literally nothing in its current functioning (to wit, a minor one-off radial debuff/CC) justifies its usage being so restricted. I would personally prefer that it be a channel since Xaku already has a lot of timed effects to juggle.
- Vast Untime should probably overall be made much, much stronger numerically to justify the absurd resource and opportunity cost. Alternately it could just be made to cost less, but I'd personally rather have a really strong ability with a high cost than a mediocre ability with a low cost.
- Deny should have a drastically shorter casting time and an expanded range -- specifically I'd like either the beam to be wider and/or for it to cause a radial splash when striking terrain. Currently, with how limited its AoE is, it'd be hard to give it any effect at all that justifies the casting cost short of giving it absolutely ruinous damage (which I suppose would be fine in and of itself, if boring). Additionally, it needs SOME kind of auxiliary scaling factor to keep its damage relevant at higher levels of play.
- Accuse should be recastable, not have an enemy cap, and I'd also like it to impart some kind of bonus for striking affected enemies with Void damage (my suggestion: transmit the damage radially to nearby enemies). The former changes simply make it better as an ability, while the latter will give another use for Void damage within Xaku's kit (as has been stated, Void damage is actually quite bad and so any utility for it will have to be supplied by Xaku themself) and make the ability less generic overall.
- Grasp of Lohk needs a much shorter casting time and/or longer duration. The former would make it safer to use (and more reliable in public lobbies where there's usually some lunatic with a Kuva Bramma and an itchy trigger finger waiting to kill any enemies you want to steal from), and the latter would make using it an altogether better use of your time and energy.
- I wouldn't object to Grasp of Lohk being given more damage so as to allow more build flexibility, although I don't think it's nearly as weak as some people say it is. I do think you need quite a bit of Ability Strength to make it work at the moment, and even if it were buffed you'd still need support from Gaze to make it capable of dealing with high-level targets, so I think a damage increase would be pretty reasonable.
- Likewise, I wouldn't object to Gaze being given somewhat higher numbers to make it more reliable and flexible.
- Xata's Whisper needs to just flat-out have a stronger effect. As it is, I'm not sure if it's even worth the minimal amount of time and energy (in-game and IRL) taken to cast it; the effect is so tiny, even just for the purposes of applying Bullet Attractor. It's a 25 energy cost ability so it obviously shouldn't be super overwhelming but it still needs to actually have a palpable effect. Having it affect your ability damage would also be nice, although if VU's -void resist was made more useable it might end up being overkill as then both effects would interact multiplicatively.


In my time playing Xaku I ended up almost entirely ignoring Xata's Whisper, Deny, and The Vast Untime; when I did use them it often felt like there was little to no actual positive impact.

I think Xaku at least has a decent base to work off of, and I don't think they're nearly as bad as some people think they are. They're going to need a lot of TLC before they're in a good place, but I do see the beginnings of an excellent midrange skirmisher that focuses on disabling and weakening enemies while staying just out of reach and out of trouble. I just hope that they can get there.

Incidentally, in light of the negative reaction to Xaku's state at launch as well as some similar occurences in the past, I wonder how feasible it'd be to have test servers for Warframes so people can play around with them a bit (obviously in a restricted context) and give feedback before official release? It's pretty far outside the scope of this thread but I might as well put the idea out there.

E: Just to be clear: I actually do fairly like Xaku. I'd rate them a 6/10 (with 5 being "okay but not astounding" and 10 being "worthy of being my glyph for a year straight") at the absolute worst. They're in rough shape but there's still joy to be had from playing them. They look and sound incredible and have some unique ideas in there. They just need polish.

E2: I was incorrect about how Bullet Attractor worked. With that, I would like to agree with what an earlier poster said that Xata's Whisper should deal its damage in a separate proc so as not to interfere with the base weapon's status balance.

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9 hours ago, (XB1)The Overlord02 said:

I don't understand why I keep seeing people say this. It easily kills level 30, 40, 60, 100 enemies if you take 5-6 guns. 

And it does scale with enemy level, which is the only reason it can kill level 40+ enemies. People must only be using 1 enemy gun.

lol right? i was just in berehynia for like an hour and even against level 50+ grineer and with no ability strength investment at all the guns were killing the trash mobs for me just fine (which i think is what the ability is intended to do)

heavies were obviously more stubborn but i don't really expect or even want to be mowing down literally everything automatically, no less with default ability strength

wouldn't be upset if the damage was increased a bit tho because 200% ability strength being a baseline for high level stuff is a bit excessive

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Xaku is wayyyyyyy to slow for comfort. They cast abilities at the speed of room temperature water evaporating. + everything everyone else is saying. 
 

xaku’s 2 needs better scaling. Xaku’s 3 needs more fexibility. There’s only one good ability for Pete’s sake. And xaku’s 4 is pretty terrible. I only use it to deal more void dmg to the 3 enemies that I hit and I disable the ability. That says something. 
 

void dmg sucks. Make it good. 
Gracias. 

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What I would recommend as a status effect overhaul for Void damage would actually be an inversion of Sentient resistance. Basically, enemies take 5-10% more damage from void damage per stack.

The reason for this would be that it would play perfectly to Grasp of Lohk's strength. If that were given a status chance, it would greatly increase the value of every additional gun you steal, which is great for gameplay.

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Xaku
The Broken. Good concept, Bad Executed.

General criticism :

Almost all ability have needlessly long animation. Thus Natural Talent is needed to perform as intended.
Ability optimization is scattered among all stats. let's take a look at it :

1. Xata whisper, HIgher power str will hijack elemental priority to proc..which is imho, broken by design. because void dmg is inferior to other elemental or IPS effect.

 

2. Grasp oh Lohk, It look cool. i get it. But the activation range is absurdly close. and as i mention as general criticism, the animation is way too long. To optimize this skill we need good Range to cast it from a safer place, good Str to do a decent dmg, and good Dura to maintain the damage.


3. Gaze, it need 200% STR to 100% strip armor. a good dura and a range to make the armor strip area larger.
 

4. Vast Untime, 75% avoidance is useless. what mod or arcane optimized avoidance ? as far as i know there's only new deimos mod that utilize avoidance. Not to mention avoidance is a very unreliable def mechanism. (and i HATE depending my survivability to RNG). And seriously, why this skill has both drain, and also has timed duration. it literally is a double resource spent for a RNG-based survivability skill. 

i get it ok. this frame theme is the broken one. But optimizing xaku feel more like getting trolled by the devs.. 

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Xaku is fun. None of their abilities completely solves a problem in the game, but they seem like they can come to together to make a solid generalist frame. A lack of numbers on some of their abilities is getting in the way of that currently. Also void damage gets in the way of some of their abilities being successful because it's a poor damage type.

My picture of a generalist frame is one that can make a build that supports using most or all of their ability to good effect. Examples for me are Nezha, Mag, and Nidus. Xaku doesn't seem to be able to support all their abilities using a single build right now due to low base ranges. They're forced to build for 200%+ range, which is a hurdle that's only beaten by running Overextended and running Overextended sets off a chain reaction with a need for other corrupted mods which creates a further need to offset even more maluses. There is no dump stat to help simplify the build. 5 out of 6 of their abilities rely on strength for scaling, they all favor duration, and efficiency is needed to sustain the high costs on The Lost and Vast Untime. Improving the base range of their abilities will go a long way towards stabilizing the frame.

Void damage has no damage bonuses against any health types, two damage penalties, and a poor status effect. The status effect does nothing for melee and guns in warframe tend to have lenient aiming requirements. It's use cases are severely limited. Grineer armor is the strongest use case for Gaze, but Cloned Flesh halving void damage means that Xaku will be perpetually walled by Grineer. Fossilized armor is probably a fairer penalty, but only having penalties and no bonuses on a damage type makes it comparatively weak. Resetting sentient resistances isn't a particularly appealing niche in the current content climate due to a lack of sentient enemies. Helminth also opens up the niche to everyone and it's safe to assume that Mesas will being using subsumed Xata's Whisper to erase sentients from existence the next time a Murex fleet finds its way to the origin system. Void damage is lame currently, but Xaku should enjoy using void damage and gain some benefit from their access to it.

Taking the ideas of better ranges, better void damage, and a generalist frame concept, here are some possible improvements:

1. Xata's Whisper - Dealing void damage builds up to 3 charges, upon casting casting an ability 1 charge is spent to refund 50% of the ability's cost.

Xaku has broad access to void damage and this addition rewards dealing void damage without making any fundamental changes to the damage type. There's a couple levels of synergy with Gaze stripping armor and Vast Untime granting vulnerability. Built in energy economy gives them some breathing room with efficiency in the build.

If there are concerns with this effect as a subsume ability, it could be moved to the passive.

2. Grasp of Lohk - Range increased from 8m -> 10m

This power is already fairly good and a little range will put in a very comfortable place.

3. The Lost - Now an ability sequence rather than a selector wheel. Activating Accuse transforms the ability into Gaze which transforms into Deny. Reverts to Accuse after 16s of no other ability being used.

  • Accuse - Accused targets are briefly afflicted with panic and attempt to flee for 3 seconds.
  • Gaze - Also traps and creates an aura around targets under the effect of Accuse within 25m.
  • Deny - Shortly after the initial ray of light collapses, a second ray fires out from it's terminus and chains through nearby enemies trapped by Gaze.

These abilities feel like a random grab bag currently. Changing them into a linked series of abilities that all support each other would be a positive change. The most powerful of the three is Gaze and its defense reduction aura, but it suffers from low range. Increasing the radius from 8m to 12m would be a simple and effective change, but the other 2 abilities need some help and giving them synergy with Gaze is a good way to do it. Rather than a direct range increase, Accuse lets Xaku mark multiple targets for Gaze. This creates a novel way to increase the area effected by the defense reduction aura, especially with a panic effect that would hopefully force effected enemies to spread out a bit on their own. Deny is limited as a nuke due to it's small area of effect and lack of punch through. Letting it echo and rebound through an area littered with enemies trapped by Gaze broadens the area of effect without turning it into an out of control room wiper.

Accuse having a target limit should keep the linked abilities from scaling out of control.

If the selector wheel remains, I think it's still important to foster some kind of synergy between these abilities. Mind control and a line nuke are very weak abilities on their own, regardless of numbers. With no synergy I'd greatly prefer just having Gaze without the others so I didn't need to juggle the selector wheel and deal with hold to cast.

4. Vast Untime - Reduces shield recharge delay to .25 seconds. Shield recharge rate increased by 50% (scales with strength).

This ability seems like it's trying to shore up Xaku's weak base defenses. 75% projectile pass through chance is neat and thematic but with no other defense tools Xaku is highly susceptible to probability. Eventually enough enemies will hit them in a short enough window that they die. The chances aren't even particularly low. Defensive mods aren't enough help on their own due to unremarkable base values. Shield recharge getting pumped up would fit nicely on top of the speed and evasion theme by allowing Xaku to recover from mistakes or bad luck streaks faster. The change makes shield recharge rate mods more interesting and it creates added incentive to actively play around the shield gating mechanic. There are more effective ways of increasing defense, like % damage reduction and flat bonuses, but I'd enjoy having a unique defense tool.

I like Xaku's broad toolset. I hope to see them improved without making one ability dominate the others. Give us good void damage and a range boost and Xaku will be very solid.

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Reading the couple comments i have been I'm kind of shocked so many are having trouble with xaku. 

But feedback:

His passive could be improved but 25% chance for him to avoid damage isn't that bad. However, it doesn't synergize with the rest of the kit very much with the except of his 4th which as many have pointed out is a dodge chance and not the damage reduction. 

1) his first ability i concur with the above amendments to add the void damage after weapon damage has been given. Turning your standard weapons into a status roulette can get costly in steel path or even just soloing a kuva mission. This being said i liked a general void rework suggestion from Khan_Maykr, "For an actual Void rework, I'd suggest simply changing its proc so that it's more in line with how the Void has worked within the lore: Burning people alive and driving them mad. Ergo, instead of a bullet magnet bubble, I would suggest instead that Void damage reduces enemy health, shield, and armor by ~25% for the duration of the proc, as well as driving them temporarily insane so they attack each other as well. The sentient resistance stripping can stay, though. " Maybe not an actual burning as you all have the complete void lore. But a radiation proc and debuff to health, armor, and shield would feel more in line with the void than a baby version of Mag's bullet magnet. 

2) Grasp of Lohk i absolutely LOVE!! Unpopular opinion i know. Boosting the heck out of his range and duration with some strength i can easily topple level 80s especially with the synergy to Xaku's whisper. However, the ability to be within melee range is an incredible risk and i would prefer something closer to limbo's cataclysm with a point and grab. I do agree that a fire rate buff or way to increase the fire rate should also exist. The delay is less noticable with more stolen weapons but in swarms of enemies, looks at deimos, it becomes a game of keep away as your weapons fire. 

3) Deny is painfully in need of a buff and smoother activation. I propose turning it into a channeled ability similar to the operator void beam before you finish second dream. Holding the ability deals more damage the longer it is active and drains more energy respectively. Stripping sentient resistance and also allowing players to sweep around a room for a massive cc or room sweep at lower levels. 

Accuse could benefit from a range buff. 

I have absolutely no issues with gaze other than maybe add a way to scale the debuffs and make them more viable at higher levels. Steel path does add 100% after all. 

4) ok so... Aside from the massive influx of "damage resistance isn't dodge chance". His 4th is lacking in a great many fields. High cost, low range, and low damage. It feels like there were too many ideas so it was shoved together. 

Id lower the cost to give players more incentive to use it. Increase the initial range OR create a field around him that pulses the void damage vulnerability. I also like the idea of xaku reactivating his 4th to pull his pieces back to him. This causes enemies to be pulled towards him and makes them staggered or prone. This would give a great way to them capitalize on his 2, disarming enemies nearby.

Ultimately i really love this Warframe and am excited to see what comes out in the next weeks.

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A few more things to add:

Grasp of lokh /really/ needs to be recastable. Right now if you hit just one enemy youre stuck with a single gun for the entire duration. New guns should either be added or replace the last cast entirely. 

 

Another thing i found that could have pretty nice potential is that the void damage status proc allows you to make "blender" bubbles with the exergis for instance, like with mags bubble. Essentially you need a projectile based weapon with lots of punchthrough on it and decent status so that the void status will actually proc. Group enemies up and you have an instant blender when you use xatas whisper.

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There has been said a lot about each of Xaku's abilities, both impressions and ideas. Personally I don't like current implementation of The Vast Untime, I don't like radial Void damage on cast, I don't like minuscule 25% slow effect and I don't like mediocre void damage boost. A lot of people protest against huge cast energy cost together with channeling, but I would love to have much stronger, even if still energy hungry 4th ability instead of cheap spammable one. We already three frames theme on The Lost, why not to use it on Xaku's 4th? So here is my idea for Xaku abilities rework.

Passive: (tweaks) 25% evasion, which temporarily goes up to 100% during casting animations.
    (We already have frames with invulnerability on ability animations, I think it would be fitting to give Xaku 100% evasion considering animations feature disassembling)

Xata's Whisper: (addition)
Gives +26% Void damage with extra +3% per stack of Whispers (26 stacks max). Killing an enemy with Void damage gives +1 stack of Whispers, but no more than 1 whisper per 7 seconds. Whispers stacks constantly decrease by 1 per 13 seconds.
    (Instead of directly increasing the boost value lets make it stackable with an unusual gating limiter and add synergy with other abilities)
    
Grasp of Lohk: (tweaks)
Instead of the radial effect make it 120 degree cone-shaped effect. Increase range. Increase duration. Make it recastable.
    
The Lost:

Accuse: (tweaks)
Increase range, it is already limited in number of thralls. Accuse should be recastable if number of thralls active is less than max. Death of an enthralled enemy by other enemies or allies adds +1 Whisper to Xaku.

Gaze: (tweaks)
Increase range. It shouldn't make the target invulnerable, just root it in place and disable (paralyze, 100% slow, etc). Debuff area would be tied to the root rather than original target enemy. Two active Gazes max, upon casting third Gaze it would dispel first one if its duration hasn't run out yet.

Deny: (rework)
Instead of dealing damage Deny instantly kills anything that isn’t a boss. No punch-through or AoE, only one enemy affected. If Deny kills an enemy all other enemies in 2m (unmoddable) range around the void ray or 3m (unmoddable) around the target are levitated for 10 sec, Xaku gets 3 Whispers and Xaku power strength is increased by 13% (moddable) for 60 sec (unmoddable). Deny cannot be recast while power strength boost is active.
    (Instead of directly increasing the boost value lets make it stackable with an unusual gating limiter and add synergy with other abilities)

The Vast Untime: (rework)
Upon activation enemies in range are separated onto three groups. First group is Enthralled, like with Accuse ability. Second group is slowed down by 50% (up to 75% modded) and stripped of 50% of their armor. Third group is levitated (like with Deny ability). All enemies affected by The Vast untime receive Void damage vulnerability +100% (unmoddable). These effects persist for the duration of The Vast untime or until Xaku deactivates it.
For the duration of ability Xaku evasion increases to 95% (unmoddable), but Xaku loses all shields and has -50% (unmoddable) damage debuff.
Upon deactivation or duration timer running out Xaku receives +100 shields and +1 stack of Whispers per killed enemy that was affected by The Vast untime. Overflow shields increase value can go to overshields.


The reasoning behind this suggestion is to get much flashier and useful Xaku, which won't make them run around in skeletal form all the time. The Vast untime would have more impressive and satisfying effect on cast. It will create chaos among the enemies, like a mix of Nyx's Chaos, Rhino's Stomp and Nova's Prime. Hard controll effects, Void damage vulnerability and damage debuff would keep Xaku limited to killing enemies affected by the Vast untime and discourage from staying in the transformed state beyond that.
Losing shields and having only evasion as a defensive tool makes The Vast Untime a somewhat risky move in certain situations. It won't protect from a stray grenade or toxic coulds, so should be used with caution. On other hand damage boost from extra Whispers and overshields AFTER The Vast Untime would help Xaku in a more mundane manner, like being more resilient to AoE damage or lingering status effects.

While Nova is a pure caster, Xaku is a more of a hybrid, a caster-knight. Xaku has both powerful but risky control/debuff powers like Gaze or Vast untime, and at the same time more basic damage and protection boosts in form of Whispers and overshields from Vast untime resolution.
As byproduct such change would nerf Whispers for Helminth infusion, as it wouldn't be as powerful without being able to be charged with Vast untime.


As for the Void damage status effects, there have been various suggestions, good and bad. My favorite ones are:
1) Void status forces an extra tick of all current status effects on application and amplifies effects of other status effects that apply while Void status is active by X%.
2) Void applies one random status effect.
3) Void status increases recieved non-void damage by X%.
Where X is open for balancing.

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On 2020-08-30 at 8:56 AM, Jitsuryoku said:

Grasp of Lohk - By far the most disappointing ability. It cannot kill, it cannot crowd control and it cannot safely disarm

It can do all those things if modded well.

Its better than it works as it does as if it truely just stole weapons it would be useless vs infested. As it is you can get floating turrets even from disarmed enemies.

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Just tried Xaku, this is my opinion for now.

1. Xata's Whisper, contrary to what people said, it does not mess up status procs. It takes percentages of the damage you deal and inflict it as void damage. For example, you deal 10000 damage, 20% of it is dealt as void damage resulting in you dealing a separate instances of 10000 damage of your weapon and additional 2000 void damage. While void damage type and status effect is bad, the damage bonus is good for raw damage output, and it's really good with melees as void proc count as status effect for Condition Overload.

          Overall, a decent buffing ability. The problems are that void proc can mess up headshots and void damage are bad against cloned flesh and fossilized by -50%, this is really detrimental as fully stripped armor is important for void damage to has any significant impact. This also applies to their other abilities.

 

2. Grasp of Lohk. Has some problem,

  • Void damage type
  • Range is low, it already disarm limited targets, i see no reason the range is bad.
  • Enemies disarmed are based on power range rather than strength which is weird.
  • Can't be recasted. It's very infuriating disarming only 1 enemy and you have to wait until it expire to disarm again.
  • Target enemies affected by The Lost: Gaze, wasting shots on invulnerable enemy while there're armor stripped enemies which you want to shoot at in the first place.

The damage is fine, Void damage type doesn't. It could have faster casting speed and Xata's Whisper affecting it too.

 

3. The Lost,

  • Gaze, really good ability. Problems are: low radius, duration could be longer a bit, and can't cancel Gaze on enemies when you have no energy.
  • Accuse, also really good, my main tool for survivability. Problem is that it can't be recasted or canceled.
  • Deny, worst ability, cast time too long, damage falloff hard in high level, and somewhat need to be accurate. 

 

4. The Vast Untime, imo bad ability that i would replace.

  • Expensive energy cost with energy drain on top of duration. 
  • Dodge are unreliable. Dodge can be somewhat usable if the chance is really high.
  • Make enemies hit by the initial explosion take 50% more void damage, which is removed when you disable the ability.

The void damage vulnerability is not significant enough to use this ability and evasion is not good, it doesn't even protect you from aoe attacks and status procs.

 

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