The Sergeant Rework (Concept)

[Cephalon_Naiture]

I apologize up front if this is the incorrect category to place this, I'm not fully keen on what goes where. The Sergeant has been a long-standing boss, but right now, he's not even worthy of being called a "boss". He's just a glorified capture target to most of the community. This is my framework for a possible rework, on a similar level to the Jackal. I'm also dropping references to other foes as a means of basis and comparison. It is copy-pasted from a Google Doc, so the font size might be wacky. Just a fair warning.
 

REWORK: The Sergeant

 

Enemy Type: Corpus Juno Tech Ranger (unique to The Sergeant)

I decided to choose the Ranger class of Corpus because it aligns with most Corpus bosses being upgraded versions of previous classes (Raptors being Ospreys, Ambulas being a MOA, etc). The Sergeant is a humanoid Corpus, and is currently simply an upgraded Sniper Crewman. To give a unique form would be to introduce a class of Corpus that ideally should not have been encountered yet in atmospheric missions, and the Ranger is first seen (and currently only seen outside of Archwing) on Jupiter. This also opens up possibilities for extra mechanics against The Sergeant.

Since The Sergeant is of the Juno subfaction, I want to throw an idea out there to make his left hand golden as a tribute to Parvos Granum. This hand lets him visually separate himself more from Nef Anyo, who was his former identity before the Nef Anyo we know now came to be.

Opening Cutscene

The Sergeant is first seen on the ground, with the helmet up and giving orders to two Crewmen and a MOA in traditional Corpus language. When they walk away, The Sergeant then turns around and notices the player, switching to fluent English. After the short monologue, he will close his helmet before activating his jetpack and flying into the air, ending the cutscene.
 

Health and Shield Mechanics

I am toying with the idea of three health segments and a shield. This shield is invulnerable to all damage, but will be weakened as explained below. This gives him a similar shield to the Eidolons, where the Warframe cannot damage the shields in any way.
 

Phase 1

The Sergeant will be flying around with a Lanka. Should the player escape his sight for too long, The Sergeant will teleport to a location where the player returns to his sight. He will not be able to fire for roughly 3 seconds to avoid cheap shots. Otherwise, his Lanka will trace its path with a thin red beam, before firing a unique Magnetic round with a rather small chance to proc Magnetic during the first phase.

While The Sergeant is flying, Juno reinforcements will appear, alongside rarer Techs. A Juno Tech is guaranteed to drop a core that can be thrown at The Sergeant. Carrying a core will lock out use of primary weapons (except Arm-Cannons) like most objective pickups. A successful hit will reduce his current shields by 40%.

When the shield of The Sergeant is depleted, he will crash to the ground (in a similar nosedive as Zephyr’s Tailwind when directed at the ground) and start regenerating his shields at a rate of 10% per second. At this point, the player must reach The Sergeant and use a Parazon Finisher, which has the player force the Parazon into the jetpack, depleting all shields and disabling shield regen. The Sergeant will quickly throw a smoke bomb to retreat while switching to a Supra and, at close range, a Prova.

When The Sergeant reappears, he can then be damaged normally. When the first health segment is depleted, Phase 2 will begin.
 

Phase 2

The Sergeant will repair his jetpack as well as his shields before flying into the air again. Phase 2 is mechanically similar to Phase 1, but the cores will only deplete 20% of his shield, requiring five cores to be thrown in order to knock him out of the sky. Enemy reinforcements are unchanged. The Magnetic effect from The Sergeant’s Lanka is more likely to occur. Knocking The Sergeant out of the air will open him up to a Parazon Finisher again to render him vulnerable to traditional weapon fire.

The Sergeant is noticeably more cautious during the second grounded phase, and will use his smoke bomb to reposition more often. Depleting the second health segment will force him to transition to Phase 3.
 

Phase 3

The Sergeant will return to the air before a short cutscene where he will tap on a Corpus handheld screen to summon a unique Isolator Bursa called Sergeant’s Bursa. This Isolator Bursa must be downed and hacked to turn it against The Sergeant, in a manner similar to the Razorback. The hacked Sergeant’s Bursa will be able to damage the shields of The Sergeant, and will actively seek him out. Should either 15 seconds pass or 50% of The Sergeant’s shield be depleted since the previous hack, The Sergeant will take over the Bursa again and the process must be repeated.

When The Sergeant’s shield is depleted once more, he will once again be open to a Parazon Finisher. This final Parazon Finisher will destroy his shields, the jetpack, and the Sergeant’s Bursa. The Sergeant will once again be vulnerable to weapons for the final time. Depleting the third and last health segment will kill The Sergeant and complete the mission objective.
 

Overview

As he currently is, The Sergeant is the easiest and quickest boss in the game, where even Steel Path Sergeant can be killed in five seconds or less with absolutely 0 redeeming qualities. To me, this isn’t even deserving of the “boss” title. I want to make him unique, but I also don’t want to make him a full-on raid boss. The Jackal, for example, used to be quite easy, as it was simply shoot leg, shoot body, repeat. There was barely any uniqueness outside of the boss itself. I want to give The Sergeant a similar rework, where his difficulty is increased drastically but remains within the realm of possibility to newer players. Further, I wanted an excuse to have players use the Parazon again, as its only use against bosses is the Jackal and nemeses. The Parazon is a neat item, and as the Lotus says during the Jackal fight: “[The Parazon is] as lethal to technology as it is to flesh.” I want to see more uses against technology other than stabbing screens.

I understand that this would most likely be a nightmare to code and implement into the game, but I wanted to put my ideas out there. This glorified Sniper Crewman is far overdue for a rework, and I hope that he’ll be deserving of being a boss sometime in the future. 

[MantleCD]

mmmmm