BLU Chroma’s Companions 2.0 Suggestions : Addressing companion survivability to stop playing the “Stop fun and action every 5 seconds to revive the companion”, Reworking bad and outdated precepts, and Command wheel to give better control of companions.

[DrivaMain]

May 14th Update : Changed the new repair dispensary augment to adapt to the automatic respawn mechanic. Now affects all companions and cooldown reduced to 30 seconds.

[bnuy]

This is a fantastic post, I absolutely agree. Pets should be effectively immortal, from AI to the QoL they give us, it makes no sense for them to die permanently in mission. Stat-sticks in general need to be done away with, for pets and exalteds. Pets should have a separate little mod tab with a few slots for precepts, DE can remove mod cost entirely from precepts like we have on the Plexus for Tactical mods and the like. They also need to have their weapon modded separately, it makes no sense that sentinels can do this but other pets can't. Over-all looks fantastic and I hope to see this implemented in the near future, the sooner the better.

[CephalonCarnage]

On 2021-05-02 at 3:31 AM, DrivaMain said:

6. Companion Precept Changes

Shade's invisibility needs some work too - right now you can go invisible after you've walked up to an enemy and waved in its face. And even then, I think it takes 5 seconds to trigger.

The Huras invisibility works much better, at the least shade's should work the same.

On 2021-05-07 at 2:30 PM, Steel_Rook said:

I get the feeling that DE originally intended for pets to be a minor aspect of the game

I'm not sure of that - I think back int he day when they were first introduced their stats were decent. You can tell by the weapon damage being relatively appropriate for the health of the companion, so I think back before power creep when a sentinel's 5dps was a lot, companions survived a lot better. DE definitely designed them to be a major part of the grind, kavat codes anyone.

On 2021-05-04 at 4:07 PM, Steel_Rook said:

you can also let them use Sentinel weapons and fire from range instead of attacking.

I want fricking sharks kubrows^* with lasers on their heads.

* head-mounted lasers not recommended for kavats

[(PSN)IndianChiefJeff]

If Precept Mods were improved upon & naturally integrated into companions, I'd be in support of these suggestions. I've seen arguments against doing that because of certain abilities being counterintuitive to gameplay style. To that I say you wouldn't run Frost in spy missions or Ivara in defense missions, at least not in normal circumstances. Each companion should be unique in the way that they function, no single companion should act the exact same way when unmodded. Warframes & Necramechs have the benefit of a distinctly unique identity in their playstyle, for the most part, companions should as well.

As for radar & vacuum being naturally integrated (No child left behind, it's all or nothing), I wholeheartedly agree. [Insert name here] is a bit too...Well, their ideas aren't the best, to put it lightly. Yes, they've contributed a great deal towards this game, but their reception to player feedback these past few years has been almost entirely defensive. Basic functionality should come naturally to everything that we possess, Warframes included. Honestly, being able to detect an enemy at a greater distance & an increased looting diameter does not make for unbalanced gameplay in a looter-shooter, where the biggest concern would drift more towards the shooting aspect. 

The Plexus system offers so much to us, I'm disappointing by the lack of advancement made when it comes to modding everything else but the Railjack. It could help by cleaning up the clutter that is the mod selection, that would ultimately do this game wonders.

[DrivaMain]

52 minutes ago, gbjbaanb said:

Shade's invisibility needs some work too - right now you can go invisible after you've walked up to an enemy and waved in its face. And even then, I think it takes 5 seconds to trigger.

This is probably a bug, so I don't know if it needs any rework except some bug fixing on the trigger.

[DrivaMain]

Okay for some odd reason, Companion gearwheel and the TL:DR section got completely wiped out in the OP. I will try to add those back in as soon as possible.

Fixed, I also added more arguments on why I made those changes.

[Azamagon]

Excellent post!

As hopeless as it may be to expect something like this, I still really wish companions would get this kind of rehaul...

[DrivaMain]

1 hour ago, Azamagon said:

Excellent post!

As hopeless as it may be to expect something like this, I still really wish companions would get this kind of rehaul...

Hey we screamed for pet stasis removal for years and DE finally budge. Screaming keeps them notified.

[Azure.Hope]

I tend to take long breaks from the game because the Dev's "vision" over the years has generally driven me off, but I come back every so often and sometimes even drop a few dollars from time to time for funsies yet it seems like every time I return there's at least one more thing seemingly designed specifically to annoy the players and reduce the general QOL while there also being millions of more colorful flashy things added to the cash shop.  My gripe this time around is with them removing the ability to stasis my pet.  Due to this it's now, essentially, at 0% loyalty on a permanent basis as I refuse to log in daily to a game I'm not actively playing.  This also discourages me from playing further whenever I get the itch, indeed I just logged on and thought I'd play around some but then was reminded that my pet's at 0 loyalty because it was forcibly removed from stasis and, instead of playing the game, I came here to see if there was a way to stop this from happening.

Now I haven't found any way to accomplish that, yet I have found many other people complaining about pets and their maintenance.  I've found that I'm not the only one having a similar problem.  I've also found that apparently only kubrow (and infested thing) do the whole "lose loyalty over time" thing, which, ya know.  "Fantastic!"

So, I've been browsing around the forums for a couple hours now and finally looked at this post and I've gotta say that OP's suggestion to remove maintenance is golden, and option 1 of how to do survivability is fantastic, as well.  Now I've never much cared for the developer's "vision" in terms of QOL issues and them just generally not wanting to make the game more accessible, significantly less confusing, and significantly less reliant on the wiki; indeed, In terms of game "vision" they've made me believe through their actions and words that most of them are totally or near totally blind and they've convinced me that if their game weren't so unique and interesting at its core they'd have "visoned" it into the ground years ago.  It's keeping them afloat, certainly not the other way around, imo.

Yet, regardless of my opinion on how they've done their game so far, my real point is that I support OP's post.  I prefer the first option, yet the second is an ok stopgap for a time until the Devs are emotionally and mentally ready to actually give the players what they want and make the companions actually invulnerable.  Indeed, the only thing I've found I dislike about OP's post is the whole command wheel and how half of it actively disables combat things and the other half actively disables non-combat things.  I approve of prioritizing, yet disabling them entirely is not something I can get behind.

Beyond that, however, for what it's worth, I add my voice, wallet, whatever in support of OP's desire to remove maintenance and change up survivability.

[(XBOX)Umbra Howl]

I like everything on this thread but removing link mods

[DrivaMain]

53 minutes ago, (XBOX)Umbra Howl said:

I like everything on this thread but removing link mods

How are pets going to be balanced without Link-Mods? These mods are the reason why pets are in the sorry state we are now, DE or some players will say "Why bother with survivability? Just use Link-Mods with Inaros and you're set!". Forcing setups on a players on a game where you "Play however you want" stinks of hypocrisy. Another side effect of this is if DE somehow wants to release a new variant of health and shields mods with a gimmicky stat players are still not gonna use them because Link-Mods exist.

[Steel_Rook]

4 hours ago, DrivaMain said:

How are pets going to be balanced without Link-Mods? These mods are the reason why pets are in the sorry state we are now, DE or some players will say "Why bother with survivability? Just use Link-Mods with Inaros and you're set!". Forcing setups on a players on a game where you "Play however you want" stinks of hypocrisy. Another side effect of this is if DE somehow wants to release a new variant of health and shields mods with a gimmicky stat players are still not gonna use them because Link-Mods exist.

Pretty much this, yes. Not only are link mods a crutch preventing proper pet survivability balance, they also treat Warframes like a stat stick. Tying pet stats to Warframe stats prevents mixing and matching to cover each other's weaknesses. I'm of the opinion that items should never be interlinked like that.

[Zeddypanda]

9 hours ago, Azure.Hope said:

Now I haven't found any way to accomplish that,

You may have figured this out already, but you can effectively stasis your dog by equipping a cat before logging off.

[Azamagon]

@[DE]Rebecca

This thread is too good for the devs to ignore - it's basicly what we expected from Companions 2.0!