Base damage mods and their 100% necessity

[Hierarch777]

It's in every build, no matter the weapon. That's a mod slot reserved every time. To combat the mandate of this mod, I propose the following:

Have weapons gain 3% or 4% damage per rank, up to 90% or 120% at rank 30. This could allow you to introduce more options to your mod setups. 

"But Ivan, DE already made primed base damage mods. How are they going to compensate their removal"? 

They could give us Legendary Cores. Simple as. 

"But Ivan, the highest value of a base damage mod (Hornet Strike) gives 220% at max rank. 90%/120% is too low!" 

Think of it this way: Yes, you'll get less damage than from a base dmg mod. But you could add more practical dps by putting on a crit mod, status mod, fire rate, reload speed etc. There are numerous ways to counteract the loss of base dmg. Plus, there are arcanes like Rage and Precision, which give base dmg on headshots. 

Tldr: Remove base damage mods from game, give Legendary cores for removal, make base damage grow with rank of weapon up to rank 30.

[Mover-NeRo]

It will be just replaced by another 'must to have' mods.

I always take it as a progression thing. Ranking these mods to rank 8-9-10 brings little reward for a lot of effort ... specially for new players.

Let me ask you this way.. would you be happy if they were removed and weapons get  -1 / -2 mod slots? If not then you dont really mind the mods, you mind not enough mod slots.

[SpiritTeA]

I’m not very competent in this question, but it will completely kill status weapons which relay on slash/overall dot  procs

[Hokibukisa]

Yeah they should lower the strength of those mods to make them less of a must have. 55% like a bane mod

[(PSN)Madurai-Prime]

Are you gonna add some innate multishot, crit chance, status chance, and crit damage as well?

[lukinu_u]

That's half true.
Pretty much every fire weapon build use base damage mods BUT :

• Melee have 3 variants of the base damage mod : Primed Pressure Point, Sacrificial Pressure and Condition Overload. Condition Overload is the way to go in 95% of the cases, while Sacrificial Pressure is only good on status immune sentient while playing Chroma, but it's still 3 options.
• On primary/secondary you have the corrupted mod that give damage at the cost of accuracy. On secondary it has lower value, but on primary it has the same value and the lowered accuary can be benefitial on beam weapons and rocket launchers.
• Rivens exists, which can add base damage and replace Serration/Hornet Strike, which leave more space for other stuff.
• You can build your weapon for utility, on anything else that don't need damage : status spreader, CC weapons, set mods stat sticks, etc... In some extreme situations, you may want lower damage for certains builds to work, for example lower damage to get more status and use Healing Returns without your target dying.

I still agree these mods are too dominant, but I think we don't need to remove them, we just need more choices Primed Pressure Point VS Condition Overload provides.
Here are a few examples (for rifle) :

• +220% damage -30% total status chance
• +11% damage +300% headshot multiplier
• +220% damge +100% recoil
• +55% damage per status on the target
• +22% damage per successive shot on the target

Of course to bring in choices, only one of these base damage mods (including serration) can be equiped at the same time, a bit like how you can't use a mod + its primed variant.

[trst]

And you'll instantly find them replaced with the next set of "mandatory" mods.

I still find it odd that people find this an issue with the game, did yall never play a game with gear slots or skill trees? Most games with a vaguely similar progression system to warframe have their +base stats upgrades that you're forced to take in order for the game to be playable.

[lukinu_u]

il y a 2 minutes, trst a dit :

And you'll instantly find them replaced with the next set of "mandatory" mods.

I still find it odd that people find this an issue with the game, did yall never play a game with gear slots or skill trees? Most games with a vaguely similar progression system to warframe have their +base stats upgrades that you're forced to take in order for the game to be playable.

The same issue existing in other games doesn't mean it's not an issue.

[trst]

3 minutes ago, lukinu_u said:

The same issue existing in other games doesn't mean it's not an issue.

Since when is basic character/build progression an issue?

[Hierarch777]

No, just base damage. All the other stats should remain as is. 

I don't know if quoting works, since I'm writing from my phone. 

[Proscriptor]

43 minutes ago, (PS4)Madurai-Prime said:

Are you gonna add some innate multishot, crit chance, status chance, and crit damage as well?

no he's gonna add some innate multishot, crit chance, status chance, crit damage, fire rate, punch through, toxin and multiplicative bonus (innate faction/roar) as well

an also innate hunter munitions

[lukinu_u]

il y a 1 minute, trst a dit :

Since when is basic character/build progression an issue?

If what you call "basic character progression" is base stats increase without choices or drawbacks, it's bad because it's against diversity.

In a lot of MMO without a lot of gameplay, devs were stuck with mech stat based modifications, but with a 3D shooter game like Warframe, stats is not the only thing that influence how the player interact with environement and enemies. This mean you can balance stuff by altering game mechanics rather than stats to avoid one mathematically most efficient setup because it also depend on the player skill.

Here is a very simple example.
Imagine you have 3 choices and all of them inflence the same parameters in different ways, which are the follwing :

• +100% damage
• +80% damage, -100% recoil
• +120% damage, + 100% recoil

If you look at these, the second option provider a lower theorical damage output while the 3rd provider the best of 3, but remember you need to touch your target to deal the damage.
So, will you aiming skills will let you handle the +100% recoil to make use of the higher damage ? Will you instead go for lower damage with no recoil to land constant headshots with a SMG ? Or maybe just stick with the 1st option because the two other are too extremes for your play style ?

I took recoil as example because it's one of the thing that affect the player very differently depending on their personal skills but it can apply to more stuff, and everything that work differently depending on playstyle and possible synergies.
The thing I posted a few messages above with 5 examples of base damage mods variants is a good example on how you can easily bring diversity with slight variations of a same mods.

[BDMblue]

I just don’t like damage per level. It’s not how Warframe functions at its core.

New mods could be the way to go.

60% status 

20% for each consecutive hit.

20% for each meter the target is away from you.

60% for each enemy within 20 meters of you.

Im sure we could think up other ideas.

[Proscriptor]

6 minutes ago, lukinu_u said:

• +100% damage
• +80% damage, -100% recoil
• +120% damage, + 100% recoil

this is good, but this exact same mechanic exists in the game already (in limited fashion however) it's just moved over to the recoil mod itself

[lukinu_u]

il y a 39 minutes, Traubenzuckr a dit :

this is good, but this exact same mechanic exists in the game already (in limited fashion however) it's just moved over to the recoil mod itself

These mods affect recoil, but recoil itself isn't the important part about what I explained.

In the current situation, you will never trade a mod slot for sighly reduced recoil, unless you use a very specific weapon with insane fire rate and too much recoil to handle, like Grakata with Wild Frenzy equiped (which is the only example I have in mind where recoil mods are worth using).

However, if you have access to variant of existing mods with a sighly tweaked value and some other effect to reflect that (in my example, a bit less damage for reduced recoil, and a bit more damage at the cost of increased recoil), they become a worth using choice wihtout being mandatory, because the one you are using depend on the your weapon, playstyle, aiming skills, possible synergies, etc...

At the end you will use a damage mod in 99% of your builds, but since there are variants with their upsides and downsides, you will choose the one that fit your build and playstyle the most, which brings more diversity.

[Galuf]

base damage mods are important. As soon as they started to add damage optimasation through mods, there scalling has to be multi factor. If you remove base damage mods, you'll loose build diversity, wich can be counter intuitive at first. Atm you have between 2 and 3 base damage mods, not only 1. And in the early days of wf when mods was almost pure random(factions had more chances at some polarities) those mods was a payoff from playing the game(with serration and hornet strike beeing moderately rare).

So y, if you remove those all the system has to be reworked and it will not be for the best, DE is pretty good at releasing consistently crappy mod mechanics since few years ^^'.

[Proscriptor]

13 minutes ago, lukinu_u said:

In the current situation, you will never trade a mod slot for sighly reduced recoil, ...

in the current situation, you will potentially trade some fire rate for more recoil reduction

[trst]

1 hour ago, lukinu_u said:

If what you call "basic character progression" is base stats increase without choices or drawbacks, it's bad because it's against diversity.

In a lot of MMO without a lot of gameplay, devs were stuck with mech stat based modifications, but with a 3D shooter game like Warframe, stats is not the only thing that influence how the player interact with environement and enemies. This mean you can balance stuff by altering game mechanics rather than stats to avoid one mathematically most efficient setup because it also depend on the player skill.

Here is a very simple example.
Imagine you have 3 choices and all of them inflence the same parameters in different ways, which are the follwing :

• +100% damage
• +80% damage, -100% recoil
• +120% damage, + 100% recoil

If you look at these, the second option provider a lower theorical damage output while the 3rd provider the best of 3, but remember you need to touch your target to deal the damage.
So, will you aiming skills will let you handle the +100% recoil to make use of the higher damage ? Will you instead go for lower damage with no recoil to land constant headshots with a SMG ? Or maybe just stick with the 1st option because the two other are too extremes for your play style ?

I took recoil as example because it's one of the thing that affect the player very differently depending on their personal skills but it can apply to more stuff, and everything that work differently depending on playstyle and possible synergies.
The thing I posted a few messages above with 5 examples of base damage mods variants is a good example on how you can easily bring diversity with slight variations of a same mods.

Sure having diversity in these staple mods would be nice but it's still the same core concept as you'll need to have one of them slotted. And knowing how the community is such a system would eventually devolve down to one of them being the "best" choice based on the weapon.

But I'm not saying I disagree with your idea just that on the topic of removing base damage mods it both doesn't help the underlying issue to remove them nor is having them in the first place really an issue to begin with.

[lukinu_u]

il y a 38 minutes, trst a dit :

Sure having diversity in these staple mods would be nice but it's still the same core concept as you'll need to have one of them slotted. And knowing how the community is such a system would eventually devolve down to one of them being the "best" choice based on the weapon.

Eventually, but take a look at Blood Rush VS Sacrifial Steel.
Blood Rush is 100% better if you understand the game and make great use of it, but a large part of the community still stick with Sacrifial Steel and non-combo based builds, because they are much easier to use. In a lot of case including this one, a large part of the community choose ease of use over performance.

It mean there isn't really a "best choice" because the "popular choice" isn't about efficiency but about comfort and ease of use, so the best option still have the drawback of being harder to use. That's why a lot people use heavy attack builds, Ignis, Nova, etc... those are clearly underpeforming compared to the "good stuff" but their ease of use make them more popular among the less skilled players.
With a system like that, you constantly trade ease of use for performance or the opposite, so you reward the player not only for their time spent farming and ability to do maths, but also for their skill and willingness  to trade ease of use for strength, which bring the theory craft to a next level.

Conditional mods do that well, but we don't have enough stuff like, and more would be beneficial to the game at any level.

[0_The_F00l]

I support this,

 

Hell i made multiple suggestion of the same thing in the past and not just that , but counter balances for MS and elemental damage mods too.

The Flat DPs these mods provide makes them "Mandatory" in most situation.

[Aldain]

Can we get rid of Multishot instead?

[Lost_Cartographer]

6 hours ago, Mover-NeRo said:

It will be just replaced by another 'must to have' mods.

I always take it as a progression thing. Ranking these mods to rank 8-9-10 brings little reward for a lot of effort ... specially for new players.

Let me ask you this way.. would you be happy if they were removed and weapons get  -1 / -2 mod slots? If not then you dont really mind the mods, you mind not enough mod slots.

While a valid question, the idea is that we have 8 slots to play with, not 6.  The way scaling works in this game, core damage mods are mandatory, with multi-shot being strongly recommended.  You CAN get away without multi-shot, it's just why would you when the extra bullet is practically guaranteed to happen EVERY shot?  Practically a free crit.

Among all the remaining mods, these two mods are WAY more valuable than any other mod.  The "mandatory" mods that replace them will always be debatable, and on a more weapon by weapon basis regardless.

[Hierarch777]

After some more pondering, I concluded that maybe nothing has to change about base dmg mods. 

We can already slay entire hordes, so moving base damage increase to weapon rank would be unnecessary power for us. 

[Berzerkules]

I almost never run damage mods on my guns, but I really only use them as utility weapons. Here is mod config on the 2 I have equipped at the moment 

Miter

Spoiler

Kuva Nukor

Spoiler

Edit. I guess amalgam serration is on Miter but I just use it for movement speed. 

[Hixlysss]

17 minutes ago, Hierarch777 said:

After some more pondering, I concluded that maybe nothing has to change about base dmg mods. 

We can already slay entire hordes, so moving base damage increase to weapon rank would be unnecessary power for us. 

If nothing else Guns are still massively lagging behind Melee in terms of ability to scale to higher level content. If a change does occur to 'remove' mandatory damage mods it should be done primarily to weapons.

And it  can be done, it would just require a complete and total overhaul of every mod. Like imagine if Serration was gone and weapons just got more damage as they increased in level, or more stats in general as they level up(Kinda like warframes get more HP/Energy/Shields, personally i'd love a return to the old level up skill tree.) but to keep things balanced other mods would have to get tweaked depending on how things are changed. If they make it so every weapon has a built in serration/pressure point/ect that ranks up to max when they reach level 30 then...honestly that wouldn't require a big grand overhaul IMO as it would just be like having that mod, the hard part is coding it into every weapon and making sure it doesn't get wonky with other weapons(Kuva weapons for example).