Possible way to fix Caliban

[(PSN)MYKK678]

Always loved the idea of Caliban, a proper Sentient frame, but the implementation of it I think we can all agree was pretty bad. Best guess is 99% of DE's focus was on finishing off work on The New War at the time and Calibans Testing might have fallen to the wayside due to time restraints.

Wanted to rework Caliban whilst also messing with the current animations as less as possible. Just looking to see what everyone would think if something like this was implemented.

 

Power 1: Razor Gyre renamed to Battalyst Scan.

Can keep the spinning animation to save resources as well as the ability to move around, but now the power forms an orb over Calibans Head which shoots out damaging scanning lasers. (Think about the slowly spinning laser attack the Battalysts do that always manages to down someone on the team). Revenant obviously has a "version" of this with Danse because of his connection to Eidolons, but now we'd get a proper Sentient version to use. It's a 1 power though so not OP levels of damage.

 

Power 2: Sentient Wrath.

Same animation, same sound effects and all. Sentients are masters of adaptation though, so instead of this power fairly uselessly ragdolling enemies, it acts as an Armour and Shield Strip (I know about Fusion Strike, we'll get to that). Considering it hits both defenses, would likely need a Cap of 60-70% or somewhere near that.

 

Power 3: Lethal Progeny.

I think everyone and their Mothers know the fix for this. The Conculysts are just too useless. I've even tried subsuming Nourish to help boost them and they accomplish nothing more than being distractions, and not very good ones either. Change them for ANY Shooting Sentient, any at all really. I'd even settle for Vomulysts at this stage. That, or another idea would be to change them for 3 Symbilysts (The Sentients with Shields for arms) to act as defenders who stay by your side. Difficult to implement this without the screen getting too packed though.

 

Power 4: Fusion Strike.

Armour Strip focus is dumped due to Sentient Wrath taking that over. Same animation. What this power now does though, is drag every enemy in a 180° angle from where Caliban is facing towards the centre beam. The damage of the end explosion is increased based on how many enemies are present at the time. Any enemies not killed by the explosion receive additional damage from the Lethal Progeny Sentients for X amount of seconds (unless they're Symbilysts).

 

Passive: Based on a Sentients Adaptive Nature.

Caliban has a built-in "Adaptation", receiving 10% Damage Reduction to the type of damage being received per hit, up to 90%. Once he reaches 90% however, every additional hit of that damage type increases his Ability Strength by 1% per hit. Capped at 50-60 max. Maximum of 2 damage types, and if a 3rd begins, it replaces 1 of the current 2, resetting the gathered Ability Strength bonus until this new 3rd one reaches max itself.

With these changes I didn't want to go too overboard. Wanted him to feel as Sentient as possible by changing his 1 for an actual known Sentient attack, but also didn't want Fusion to be too strong considering his Passive is pretty big.

Any feedback or suggestions welcome Tenno?

Edited August 5, 2023 by (PSN)MYKK678
.

[Azchenon]

Hi there ! I also love Caliban's concept and theme, and I'm so sad that he's not really viable/good at any of what he's trying to do.

For this reason, I also thought about ways to make Caliban more viable and fun to play.

I think Caliban has two major problems as he is right now : 

1st is that Razor Gyre is strictly useless, as it has no usecase ever. There will NEVER be any situation where Razor Gyre is useful/can out-DPS guns or melees. You could make it scale off of the equipped melee weapon like a stat stick, but I think that's just missing an opportunity for something cooler (we'll get back to it :D)

2nd is that he feels kinda disconnected from his sentient theme and indeed, from his sentient comrades. The rework I would propose put makes Caliban a true sentient general : leading and commanding his conculysts.

 

So here's the rework !

-Passive is unchanged (I can't really tell how much is needed in this department. I'll trust your opinion of it :) )

1- Now is Lethal Progeny (swapped 1 and 3).

The HUD now displays the number of Sentients active, their health, and whether or not they are currently replenishing your shields.

Lethal Progeny remains (technically) unchanged, but the other abilities gain a lot of synergy with it.

2 - Sentient allies summoned by Lethal Progeny that come in contact with the wave gain an aura around them (5m radius*range) that explodes once every second, dealing 500*Strength puncture(/or fire ? Idk) damage to all enemies in the area, for 25*duration seconds. The HUD change on Lethal Progeny also displays if your Sentients have the aura active.

3 - Becomes Razor Gyre (swapped with 3).

Damage increased to be that of the current "supercharged" mode, but at a the base energy drain.

Added functionality : Pressing left click during Razor Gyre now calls your sentient allies to your side. They begin rapidly spinning around you, blocking attacks and damaging enemies. In this state, they cannot attack, but the spinning deals increased damage and retain their other properties (draw enemy fire, shield, and damaging aura). Sentient allies keep spinning around you for as long as left click is held. Releasing left click propelled the sentients outwards to crash into enemies, and dealing damage.

You may now jump during Razor Gyre. Hold space bar to perform a higher jump. Razor Gyre movement speed is increased.

You may now cast sentient wrath and Fusion strike during Razor Gyre. Casting Fusion strike in this scenario will case it to take effect in a circular area around you (just like battalysts ! :D)

4- Fusion Strike

 Now continuously applies Armor strip instead of only at the final blast.

 

 

Soo that's it. It's pretty different from what you proposed and would arguably take a lot more work (it doesn't add new animations but swapping abilities and adding this many functionalities to razor Gyre cannot possibly be easy).

The new gameplay focuses on summoning sentients, buffing them with Sentient wrath while also getting cc from the ability, and then going wild just zooming around in a spinny death machine that deals the cumulative damage of : razor Gyre, the sentient rotary formation, the sentient wrath aura going off 3 times every second, and Fusion strike on top of that with the Armor strip.

These are my suggestions. What do you think tenno ?

[(PSN)MYKK678]

2 hours ago, Azchenon said:

Hi there ! I also love Caliban's concept and theme, and I'm so sad that he's not really viable/good at any of what he's trying to do.

For this reason, I also thought about ways to make Caliban more viable and fun to play.

I think Caliban has two major problems as he is right now : 

1st is that Razor Gyre is strictly useless, as it has no usecase ever. There will NEVER be any situation where Razor Gyre is useful/can out-DPS guns or melees. You could make it scale off of the equipped melee weapon like a stat stick, but I think that's just missing an opportunity for something cooler (we'll get back to it :D)

2nd is that he feels kinda disconnected from his sentient theme and indeed, from his sentient comrades. The rework I would propose put makes Caliban a true sentient general : leading and commanding his conculysts.

 

So here's the rework !

-Passive is unchanged (I can't really tell how much is needed in this department. I'll trust your opinion of it :) )

1- Now is Lethal Progeny (swapped 1 and 3).

The HUD now displays the number of Sentients active, their health, and whether or not they are currently replenishing your shields.

Lethal Progeny remains (technically) unchanged, but the other abilities gain a lot of synergy with it.

2 - Sentient allies summoned by Lethal Progeny that come in contact with the wave gain an aura around them (5m radius*range) that explodes once every second, dealing 500*Strength puncture(/or fire ? Idk) damage to all enemies in the area, for 25*duration seconds. The HUD change on Lethal Progeny also displays if your Sentients have the aura active.

3 - Becomes Razor Gyre (swapped with 3).

Damage increased to be that of the current "supercharged" mode, but at a the base energy drain.

Added functionality : Pressing left click during Razor Gyre now calls your sentient allies to your side. They begin rapidly spinning around you, blocking attacks and damaging enemies. In this state, they cannot attack, but the spinning deals increased damage and retain their other properties (draw enemy fire, shield, and damaging aura). Sentient allies keep spinning around you for as long as left click is held. Releasing left click propelled the sentients outwards to crash into enemies, and dealing damage.

You may now jump during Razor Gyre. Hold space bar to perform a higher jump. Razor Gyre movement speed is increased.

You may now cast sentient wrath and Fusion strike during Razor Gyre. Casting Fusion strike in this scenario will case it to take effect in a circular area around you (just like battalysts ! :D)

4- Fusion Strike

 Now continuously applies Armor strip instead of only at the final blast.

 

 

Soo that's it. It's pretty different from what you proposed and would arguably take a lot more work (it doesn't add new animations but swapping abilities and adding this many functionalities to razor Gyre cannot possibly be easy).

The new gameplay focuses on summoning sentients, buffing them with Sentient wrath while also getting cc from the ability, and then going wild just zooming around in a spinny death machine that deals the cumulative damage of : razor Gyre, the sentient rotary formation, the sentient wrath aura going off 3 times every second, and Fusion strike on top of that with the Armor strip.

These are my suggestions. What do you think tenno ?

 

Yeah it's a really good concept actually. I think the thing I like most about it is the Hold Button to Summon Progeny to your side option. I never actually considered something like that.

The big problem with the concept though lies with one of the biggest problems with Caliban himself, The Conculysts. The synergy and adding extra damage is great, on paper. The Conculysts though are so bad that they just wouldn't be able to take advantage of it, meaning they'd be doing just as bad damage as they are now. I don't know what went wrong, Wukongs Clones AI seems pretty OK these days, as does Excal Umbra when out as Operator, but the Conculysts AI is just plain bad. Multiple times I've gone into random maps solo, summoned the Conculysts and just watched them and its atrocious. Theres no real way to fix them, which is why they just need to be completely replaced with Sentients that shoot instead of melee. You can't really mess up the former the same way the latter currently is.

Regardless though if it weren't for the Conculysts ruining things as usual, it's a good concept alright.

[Azchenon]

Il y a 10 heures, (PSN)MYKK678 a dit :

Yeah it's a really good concept actually. I think the thing I like most about it is the Hold Button to Summon Progeny to your side option. I never actually considered something like that.

The big problem with the concept though lies with one of the biggest problems with Caliban himself, The Conculysts. The synergy and adding extra damage is great, on paper. The Conculysts though are so bad that they just wouldn't be able to take advantage of it, meaning they'd be doing just as bad damage as they are now. I don't know what went wrong, Wukongs Clones AI seems pretty OK these days, as does Excal Umbra when out as Operator, but the Conculysts AI is just plain bad. Multiple times I've gone into random maps solo, summoned the Conculysts and just watched them and its atrocious. Theres no real way to fix them, which is why they just need to be completely replaced with Sentients that shoot instead of melee. You can't really mess up the former the same way the latter currently is.

Regardless though if it weren't for the Conculysts ruining things as usual, it's a good concept alright.

Maybe it would work better by fixing the conculysts AI ? It might be built differently than the other AIs (I never played nyx or use specters so I don't really know) Either way increasing their base damage, attack rate, and decreasing their effective range so they always remain in shield range would be a good start imo. Then having the Hold to call progeny to your side during Razor Gyre + the aura from sentient wrath would give them the behaviour, damage and synergy they need don't you think ?

[(PSN)MYKK678]

11 minutes ago, Azchenon said:

Maybe it would work better by fixing the conculysts AI ? It might be built differently than the other AIs (I never played nyx or use specters so I don't really know) Either way increasing their base damage, attack rate, and decreasing their effective range so they always remain in shield range would be a good start imo. Then having the Hold to call progeny to your side during Razor Gyre + the aura from sentient wrath would give them the behaviour, damage and synergy they need don't you think ?

That's the thing though, I think the main issue with them is the fact that they're Conculysts. The AI is pretty bad alright, and I can't say why, but the problem with them being Conculysts is just the Conculysts Attack patterns in general.

When I was thinking about this and jumping into maps with Caliban, I also jumped into some Sentient maps to look at Conculysts themselves when they're enemies. Their attacks in general are actually just as bad. Slow melee hits and easy to dodge spinning animations. Usually you don't notice this because other Ranged Sentients are with them shooting at you from afar so it looks like the Conculysts damage is alright. But they're kinda just in the way, exactly how our Conculysts act now.

Switching them out for AI Sentients who shoot and have 90-100% accuracy really is the only fix. It would mean the death of the idea of calling Conculysts to your side during Razor Gyre, but maybe not the death of the idea completely. If Conculysts were replaced with Battalysts and Razor Gyre was changed into the proposed "Battalyst Scan", you could hold a button to summon the 3 Battalysts to your side and all 4 of you perform a sweeping scan attack. Like Revenants Danse but much bigger.

[Azchenon]

Il y a 4 heures, (PSN)MYKK678 a dit :

That's the thing though, I think the main issue with them is the fact that they're Conculysts. The AI is pretty bad alright, and I can't say why, but the problem with them being Conculysts is just the Conculysts Attack patterns in general.

When I was thinking about this and jumping into maps with Caliban, I also jumped into some Sentient maps to look at Conculysts themselves when they're enemies. Their attacks in general are actually just as bad. Slow melee hits and easy to dodge spinning animations. Usually you don't notice this because other Ranged Sentients are with them shooting at you from afar so it looks like the Conculysts damage is alright. But they're kinda just in the way, exactly how our Conculysts act now.

Switching them out for AI Sentients who shoot and have 90-100% accuracy really is the only fix. It would mean the death of the idea of calling Conculysts to your side during Razor Gyre, but maybe not the death of the idea completely. If Conculysts were replaced with Battalysts and Razor Gyre was changed into the proposed "Battalyst Scan", you could hold a button to summon the 3 Battalysts to your side and all 4 of you perform a sweeping scan attack. Like Revenants Danse but much bigger.

That makes sense. I like it. Would the battalysts retain the aura I proposed from sentient wrath ? What about the changes to Fusion strike ?

[(PSN)MYKK678]

3 hours ago, Azchenon said:

That makes sense. I like it. Would the battalysts retain the aura I proposed from sentient wrath ? What about the changes to Fusion strike ?

Technically they could but it wouldn't work as well. The aura worked on paper because the Conculysts were within a certain proximity to enemies, with all the blast explosions etc. The Battalysts wouldn't be close to anything, as when you watch any AI ally with a gun they tend to go for distance fighting. Battalysts can fly so they'd have an easier time getting distance than any other AI ally.

The only problem I ever had with the idea of Fusion creating permanent armour strip areas is the possibility of it leading to the newest AFK Loadout. Normally it'd be fine, but if you're in a map with narrow corridors or even place yourself in a room with only 1 entrance, you can place down this permanent power and every enemy is suddenly as squishy as a standard lvl30 enemy. I'm sure through a mix of Railjack crew summons, Spectres and Kahl Summons that someone could potentially create the new AFK loadout and then we're stuck with the "brand new Wukong".

It's why I moved the ability to Calibans 2, it has a 360° hit like fireblast or pillage, gets rid of the absolutely useless lifted ragdoll effect, and it means it has to be used more than once so there's no chance of accidentally creating another AFK.

[(XBOX)Mastermitchel89]

On 2023-08-05 at 10:30 AM, (PSN)MYKK678 said:

Caliban has a built-in "Adaptation", receiving 10% Damage Reduction to the type of damage being received per hit, up to 90%. Once he reaches 90% however, every additional hit of that damage type increases his Ability Strength by 1% per hit. Capped at 50-60 max. Maximum of 2 damage types, and if a 3rd begins, it replaces 1 of the current 2, resetting the gathered Ability Strength bonus until this new 3rd one reaches max itself.

Much prefer if its 3 resistances that max between 85-90, reason voruna gets free status immunity yet caliban only gets half of a really good mod (adaptation mod could be special and apply calibans current resistances to allies)

The rest is like a way of molt augmented arcane allowing a chance for literally anything but the 8 useful arcanes

[(PSN)MYKK678]

2 hours ago, (XBOX)Mastermitchel89 said:

Much prefer if its 3 resistances that max between 85-90, reason voruna gets free status immunity yet caliban only gets half of a really good mod (adaptation mod could be special and apply calibans current resistances to allies)

The rest is like a way of molt augmented arcane allowing a chance for literally anything but the 8 useful arcanes

I was originally thinking 3 but it seemed a bit too powerful for a Passive. Most of the options to improve him started off stronger than they ended up, and then balance had to be considered so they were all brought down to a certain level. Adaptation is on a timer, the passive isn't, so if enemies in a mission are all applying similar damage both effects are almost permanent.

I'm not sure I understand the last part though? Molt Augmented gives you permanent Ability Strength based on number of enemies killed up to 250. The passive gives seperate ability strength increases based on 2 past-90% resistances and can reset on gaining a new third one. They're both seperate.

[(XBOX)Mastermitchel89]

testing: Lethal proginity; the conculyst AI looks similar to normal conculysts ie hostile to the player before anything else. In others words calibans summoned conculysts aren't hostile enough to enemies 

Also i should be able to nekros and refresh All summoned timers by casting while all 3 are active

Making it a 50\50 to whether its a battalyst or conculyst for benefit of different playstyles

Their level plus boosts seem fine on zarimon and an archon exterminate but they just aren't distracting or attacking well enough for what sentients are supposed to be

Weirdly they also ignored narmer units more often than usual then obliterated a enemy conculyst like it insulted them personally

[(XBOX)Mastermitchel89]

On 2023-08-05 at 10:30 AM, (PSN)MYKK678 said:

Passive: Based on a Sentients Adaptive Nature.

I don't want to overdo but since sentients can share their adaptation

Like Caliban shares to player but should also for Companions atleast

[(PSN)MYKK678]

1 hour ago, (XBOX)Mastermitchel89 said:

I don't want to overdo but since sentients can share their adaptation

Like Caliban shares to player but should also for Companions atleast

I was thinking something similar too, even had the thought once of Calibans passive making his Pets/Companions either completely immune to all damage or just certain types/elements. But the Devs were working on Companion updates (hopefully to be discussed during TennoCon) when I came up with the above Caliban Fix so I decided against it until after we see the Companion updates.

[(XBOX)Mastermitchel89]

On 2023-08-22 at 7:31 PM, (XBOX)Mastermitchel89 said:

testing: Lethal proginity; the conculyst AI looks similar to normal conculysts ie hostile to the player before anything else. In others words calibans summoned conculysts aren't hostile enough to enemies 

Also i should be able to nekros and refresh All summoned timers by casting while all 3 are active

Making it a 50\50 to whether its a battalyst or conculyst for benefit of different playstyles

Their level plus boosts seem fine on zarimon and an archon exterminate but they just aren't distracting or attacking well enough for what sentients are supposed to be

Weirdly they also ignored narmer units more often than usual then obliterated a enemy conculyst like it insulted them personally

Looking at Lethal progenity, whether its battalysts or conculysts their teleport range is just too close not even making past 25 metres the cutoff point

If anything sentients wraith need to motivate them with a speed or fire rate, and (rage buff- lock them into combat and preventing them from teleporting away) maybe it could be deactivated by using the ability again

Edited August 30, 2023 by (XBOX)Mastermitchel89

[(XBOX)Mastermitchel89]

Chain threading ho ho hoA