Improving BoneWidow

[Feuershark]

1. Instead of having the shield in her "hand" as an ability, do the opposite. BoneWidow passively reduces damage coming from the left, 120° protection (from the front to the side) 3rd Ability becomes War Maiden, the shield moves to the torso, its energy is now used to provide 360° protection.
2. The way War Maiden protects is either : Iron Skin style (but that would be very repetitive) or it gives damage reduction depending on how much damage it receives during its 3 second. You could even add a damage buff, to fit the War Maiden name better.
3. Number one becomes Rebuttal/MeatHook. Rebuttal spends 5 energy for each enemy struck, ragdolling them. Switches to MeatHook when War Maiden is active. MeatHook doesn't change but has vastly increased damage on "pick" up and throw.
4. For Iron Bride :More combos, more CC moves, and much more range because 3 range is ridiculous on an archwing melee, the Pennant has as much range. If War Maiden is active, higher attack speed or damage or both.

[TKDancer]

those changes are way too conservative

this is closer to what should be done, 1st abilities:

1. Meathook: besides fixing the tracking so it doesnt take 4 attempts on average to actually hook enemies, it needs more utility:

              1.1. Healing: altho i still think all mechs should have the ability to be healed by being shot with amps/operator blasts like Loid in Iso Vaults, giving bonewidow, who is a melee fighter, self healing via holding enemies with meat hook would not be a bad idea
              1.2. Blocking: since it prevents blocking with her actual Shield, holding an enemy via Meat Hook should function as a shield with health tied to the health of the enemy you are holding, we'll get back to this
              1.3. Damage: just make it deal True dmg based on remaining health of the enemy at time of being thrown or smth, come on, or maybe have it be affected by Iron Bride's mods, just add to the ability's description that the mech infuses volatile energy to the grabbed target before yeeting them

2. Shieldmaiden: needs to not be Storm Shroud except worse in every way:

              1.1.  Shield Health: either remove it completely or GREATLY increase it, have the starting health increase with current base level of enemies in a given mission/open-world scenario and increase the absorption period
              1.2. Shield Cool Down on break: remove it, it already costs energy to re-summon
              1.3. Blocking: Increase base angle, have it be increased by mech power range
              1.4. Damage Resistance: while the shield should fully block all dmg within the correct angle, Bonewidow should receive substantial DR from outside this angle, around 70% with base mech power STR at ability rank 3, capping at 90% with enough STR
              1.5. Meathook as a makeshift shield: while meathook is active, it should work as a weaker version of shield maiden, with a narrower full blocking angle, and slightly reduced DR

3. Firing Line: its currently a band-aid for the Shield's shortcomings, maybe it could be salvaged:

              1.1. Pull Strength and Pull Range: Increase both, a lot
              1.2. Debuff: Apply a % defense debuff, removing shields/armor of affected enemies, even those immune to the pull
              1.3. Reduce base energy cost to 25

4. Iron Bride: This needs so much help, holy moly:

              1.1. Stats: This thing needs big increases to base damage, speed range and status chance
              1.2. Furor &  Necramech Fury: apparently DE forgot the archmelee speed mod only has a 10% boost AND also forgot to make Necramech Fury affect Iron Bride, amazing stuff really
              1.3. Combos: this thing needs an actual stance set up, 3 slow swings as the only moves we can do is COMPLETELY unacceptable and really points out to Bonewidow being rushed
              1.4. AoE potential: the Voidrig's Guard Mode/Arquebex, on top of its HUGE damage stats, provides RANGED dmg output with explosive AoE over a large radius, Ironbride's sword attacks need AoE potential to compete with that, preferably with NO ragdolling, just add many moves to it's combos that result in large explosions that deal good dmg
              1.5. Mod Availability: add more content that drops arch-melee mods that isnt tied to formorians/razorback
              1.6. Base polarities: Why the HELL does it only have 1 polarity at base???? it doesnt benefit from stances boosting capacity AND they made the 1 base polarity a Vazarin instead of a Madurai, most archmelee mods are Madurai, and both of the most expensive(capacity-wise) mods are also Madurai     

[Tienxia]

Repost from other threads, but with more reposts, more revisions!

 Meathook replaced by Fleshforged Sword, and relegated to a Shieldmaiden auxiliary.

• Change meathook to be an alt-fire when Shieldmaiden is equipped. Using alt-fire will do a shield bash (meathook animation, except with shield in hand) and send enemies hurling away. 
• Can hit multiple enemies on one strike.

Firing Line replaced by Pounding Vortex, and integrated as part of Exalted Ironbride's combos. 

• Auto-activates upon 2nd swing of sword combo (the one before the vertical slash) to lineup enemies for vertical slash.
• Adds [X*number targets*ability strength] Void damage for [X*ability duration] seconds if vertical swing strikes targets gathered by Firing Line.
• Guarantees 2x critical chance on any enemies lined up. 
• Base range increased to 1.5x current.

Shieldmaiden both reduces damage and blocks damage.

• Increased base HP to 4k, scales with [ability power*mech HP].
• Has armor scaled on [Bonewidow armor*ability strength].
• Provides energy field to reduce damage from angles shield block does not cover.
• Upon having Shieldmaiden's HP fully depleted, releases a radial blind that lasts 4 seconds*ability duration.
• Can use adjusted meathook to shieldbash and hurl enemies away.

Exalted Ironbride is separated into passive (default melee) and active (activated ability) portions.

• Passive mode (Ironbride) is default melee (unless Active mode is toggled).
  • Bonewidow default melee uses Ironbride instead of bare hands.
  • Used just like normal melee (press melee to instantly swap to sword, press aim to swap back to gun)
  • Add a dash attack that can transition to combo (smoother transition from slide/dash into melee combos)
  • Does 70% of Active mode's total damage.
  • Add charged heavy attack that transitions into normal melee combo.
• Active Mode (Exalted Ironbride) is toggled by using Exalted Ironbride. Enhances passive Ironbride mode with more features.
  • Has Firing line auto-activation after 2nd swing in combo, lining up enemies for vertical slash.
  • Increased base damage to 10k.
  • Shieldbash with sword out has guaranteed status procc+blind.
  • Allow jump attack to transition into combo.
  • Increased swing speed
  • Increased critical damage/chance
  • Add a fourth swing after vertical slash that does AOE explosion on strike.
  • Can still be swapped instantly between gun/melee. Does not drain energy while gun is out.

Abilities replacing Meathook+Firing Line: Fleshforged Sword and Pounding Vortex

Fleshforged Sword replaces Meathook. Allows mech to skewer enemies onto the Ironbride to increase damage and add auxiliary effects (affects both passive and active modes).

• Add +400 impact damage per enemy skewered (max 5)
• At 4+ skewered enemies, add knockdown effect to sword swings.
• Enemies skewered do not take damage from outside sources, but bleed out over X*Ability duration seconds (Higher duration = slower bleedout)
  • Bleedout applies DoT heal for Bonewidow equal to bleedout damage*ability strength.
• Enemies skewered can be hurled as projectiles with charged heavy attack (damage based on sword base+15% per enemy skewered).

Pounding Vortex replaces Firing Line. Lets Bonewidow punch the ground, radially sucking in all enemies within 35 meters to mech.

• Scales with ability range.
• Inflicts knockdown to all enemies.
• If used while Shieldmaiden is active, releases a flash to blind enemies for 2.5 seconds
  • Sets blinded enemies on fire.
  • Blind duration affected by ability duration.
• Chains into Heavy Attack, which heals Bonewidow for 5% total damage done.

QoL Changes

• Change Bonewidow shield holster position to left shoulder (e.g. same as how Tallgeese from GW has it's shield).
• Bonewidow no longer holsters shield after every boost/slide (made easier if shield is on shoulder, since it can holster itself with the sliding grip).
• Omnidirectional boosting 
• Remappable keybinds 

[TKDancer]

6 hours ago, Tienxia said:

Repost from other threads, but with more reposts, more revisions!

 Meathook replaced by Fleshforged Sword, and relegated to a Shieldmaiden auxiliary.

• Change meathook to be an alt-fire when Shieldmaiden is equipped. Using alt-fire will do a shield bash (meathook animation, except with shield in hand) and send enemies hurling away. 
• Can hit multiple enemies on one strike.

 

this is useless

[Tienxia]

2 minutes ago, TKDancer said:

this is useless

Maybe. It's an auxiliary movement for Shieldmaiden at that point, not an actual ability. I wanted to allow some form of yeeting that won't take away the buffs from Fleshforged sword.

I mean, we could also give it guaranteed armor stripping on hit or something too.