Abyss of Dagath - Dev Workshop: Companion Improvements and Tweaks

[(PSN)Zbeatza]

7 hours ago, garbenzine said:

The fact that we can prevent sentinels from attacking by leaving off Assault is one of the aspects that gives them superior survivabilty.  They don't go charging into enemy clusters, or draw aggro to themselves with the mod removed.  Not equipping a weapon to prevent attacking isn't really an option, because of the way you get set mod bonuses from anything they have slotted(the mechanical behavior of it wouldn't be consistent anyway since none of the organic companions equip weapons).  If anything I'd want an Assault equivalent for the other companion types too.  With those though, they could make the Assault functionality inherent to the various special attack mods instead of it being a completely separate mod.

Removing a mod that allows them to attack to increase survivabilty is a BiG issue with the game, because you equip said weapon with mods to attack/kill the targets, help you out with damage or status. The companions die because of scalling, damage not being capped on enemies, makes sense a higher level enemy to be beffier than the player, it doesn't make sense in warframe because the players don't have levels and scalling on armor/health or damage(i'm talking about weapons not abilities, steelpath grineer is exactly the same as a MR30 player one tapping level 1 grineer to open a lith relic.

Also being able to use vig set on companion weapon and it applies to the player i consider it a bug, other set mods that actually say companion below the description work as intended(i assume).

[Roble_Viejo]

En 28/9/2023 a las 11:36, [DE]Momaw dijo:

Further Companion Quality-Of-Life Changes

Companions should have Target Enemy / Protect Zone / Regroup Commands
using the Mark Waypoint Input EXACTLY like Khal has during his Missions

And doing this would be extremely easy, just copy paste this System unto Companions

[Yunjuwo]

On 2023-09-28 at 7:36 AM, [DE]Momaw said:

Primed Pack Leader increases Pack Leader effect to 92 Health restored per hit, and increases Overguard cap to 1100.

Dev note: Pack Leader's healing was so strong that, functionally, any upgraded melee weapon would fully heal your Companion in a single hit. You would hit an enemy for several thousand damage, and your pet would proportionately receive thousands of Health. This change tries to make the healing values more sensible so that you can heal your Companion efficiently but not *instantly*. By letting you overflow into Overguard, it also provides some extra ability to tank large hits.

While I agree with both the reasoning behind and decision for Pack Leader's nerfs, our compensation being in the form of 1100 Overguard is... it can be better, honestly. Could we add a zero to these numbers? Bring Primed Pack Leader to 11,000 Overguard? That number seems decent enough on paper in the content for where we currently need Pack Leader.

  

On 2023-09-28 at 7:36 AM, [DE]Momaw said:

Sentinel Sanctuary and Companion Shelter Mods have been improved. The shield globe, while the player is performing a Revive, has been increased from 600 Health to 1800 Health.

Currently, our reward for reviving companions was getting them back, and these two mods served an albeit weak option to assist in doing so. I say weak because the content in where our companions get incapacitated, a mere 600 shields won't matter.

Since companions will now be immortal, it feels even more outdated to have these two mods in the game, since even if we ignore them, our companions will rejoin us in 60 seconds. In which case, might I suggest changing the functionality of these mods from protecting players during revives, to rewarding players if successfully performing a revive? Maybe something like health and energy orbs? That would be more incentivizing to use these two, I feel.

If we really feel the need to keep the functionality of these mods to protect players during revives, can we instead have something like damage reduction? The mod Firewall provides 75% damage reduction during hacking. That effect would fit nicely onto these two mods as well.

  

On 2023-09-28 at 7:36 AM, [DE]Momaw said:

Self Destruct has been altered and renamed. Formerly this would cause Sentinels to cause 600 Blast damage in an 18-meter radius on death. This is now renamed to Knock Out Blast and causes 600 Blast damage in an 18-meter radius on Incapacitation.

Will the renamed Knock Out Blast actually knock out enemies? Something like knockdown + 10 sec of sleep? Because that would make the mod useful for once.

  

On 2023-09-28 at 7:36 AM, [DE]Momaw said:

Loyal Companion has been replaced entirely. Formerly it provided a 90% Bleedout-Link so that your Companion had a longer period of time where it could be revived. Since pet death is no longer a factor: Loyal Companion causes your pet to taunt enemies and draw fire to itself for 30 seconds if your Warframe falls below 35% Health. There is a 60-second cooldown between activations.

No complaints here. Seems pretty interesting honestly. However, I really wish we had something like this for warframes. Having 1 million Overguard as Rhino is cool and all, but it would see better use if we could use it proactively for the team. I know Guardian Derision exists, but that takes up a melee mod slot, and why would we waste that when we could use it for more damage, right? Even after the Focus School rework, there are some dead skills in there. One example is Reinforced Return.

Idea: Replace Reinforced Return with some kind of trigger(maybe consecutive void slings) that allows you to taunt enemies within affinity radius for X sec duration on a X sec cooldown. Now Warframe's "tanks" can actually tank. Proactive plays are always the most fun, and seeing it in a supportive format would be nice in today's damage-centric Warframe.

  

On 2023-09-28 at 7:36 AM, [DE]Momaw said:

Spare Parts: Replaced completely. Previously Spare Parts would cause Sentinels to drop rare materials on death. This has been replaced by Salvage Scanner, which causes your Sentinel to mark enemies for 5 seconds, choosing a new target every 15 seconds. Killing the marked enemy causes them to drop extra loot.

Dev note: Since Pets no longer die, we wanted to change their resource drop to something that was more interactive and rewards combat instead of your Sentinel randomly exploding.

 

Proactive and rewarding. I love it. Can already see the stats for the mod's increased usage.

On 2023-09-28 at 7:36 AM, [DE]Momaw said:

New Companion Mods

Referring back to the introduction, one of our goals with the Companion rework is to add opportunities for the player to work together with the Pet. Instead of a Mod that only affects your Pet, we looked for ways that you and your Pet could amplify each other. Our current plan is for these new Mods to be available at the Conservation vendors in Cetus, Fortuna, and Deimos. These new Mods are still in development, so we aren't quite ready to share them in this Workshop post, but full details will be available in the Abyss of Dagath patch notes.

Excited to see what's coming.

  

On 2023-09-28 at 7:36 AM, [DE]Momaw said:

Further Companion Quality-Of-Life Changes

A few further changes that are worth mentioning:

• Sentinels now avoid damage from Fire Eximus explosions if you also avoid damage with a successful Roll.
• The improvement to Shield Gating where it now scales with maximum Shield strength and fully resets as long as you have any Shield charge at all, also applies to Companions.
• Companions can now gain Overguard and Overshield.

 

Hallelujah

Edited October 1, 2023 by Yunjuwo

[Armadillidium_vulgare]

WHY DO YOU KEEP NERFING TRINITY? SERIOUSLY.

[L3512]

On 2023-09-29 at 12:23 PM, SteveCutler said:

I think you're misunderstanding the Dev Workshop. They're removing the restrictions on these abilities. See the full quote above, specifically the part mentioning "Pets were using some of the same mechanics that things like mission objectives did, which limited the effects of some healing or defensive powers". This is a buff. For example, Blessing currently gives only 50% DR to mission objectives, and therefore to pets. With this update, it'll give the full 75% to pets.

That's how I understood it, anyway.

Yes, you seem to be correct.

[TheRealMarbax]

If normal vacuum doesn't work on knocked out companion, release primed vacuum with grater range and imunity to disabling effect. Also would be nice if companions has some kind of energy and commands, so we can tell them where to stay, follow or attack, give them some spell that activates when certain level on energy is reached... I think now of ability that collect loot from whole map once a few minutes 🤔😉 quality of life, rare, end game companions spells that will be goals of all players... just dreaming.

[(NSW)ZombieBell]

2 hours ago, TheRealMarbax said:

If normal vacuum doesn't work on knocked out companion, release primed vacuum with grater range and imunity to disabling effect. Also would be nice if companions has some kind of energy and commands, so we can tell them where to stay, follow or attack, give them some spell that activates when certain level on energy is reached... I think now of ability that collect loot from whole map once a few minutes 🤔😉 quality of life, rare, end game companions spells that will be goals of all players... just dreaming.

Oh, I agree. I would frigging love it if I could ask my Vulpaphyla not to kill the kavat I'm trying to scan... those sweet, sweet genetic codes are out of my grasp if I even try to bring my buddy with me.

 

As for the energy, I dunno much. I would like to tell them whether to flank, follow, full frontal attack, or in some cases fall back and range attack. But I want that to be like, a pet command radial menu... maybe you get more commands as you rank them up the first time? After that they love you and they'll do whatever you want, even when you polarize... maybe you can train them? Like mini objectives during missions?

As for that loot collection command, that sounds super cool, but I dunno how that would work.

Overall I like your ideas! We can dream... we can dream.

 

 

[Setakat]

4 hours ago, Armadillidium_vulgare said:

WHY DO YOU KEEP NERFING TRINITY? SERIOUSLY.

It's not a nerf, its a buff. Currently Blessing treats pets as being in the same category as defense objectives, and limits the effectiveness of Blessing (It caps at granting 50% DR). With the changes, that restriction is being removed, which means your pets will get the same DR buff that you get.

[VENDOMINUS]

I'll give my 2 cents on the Companions:

1.Vacuum/fetch should still work while pet is down (as it is currently). Not sure why that'd be nerfed.

2.Loot radar should stay while pet is down.

3.Adding a mod that just says 10% lifesteal for pets would help pets stay alive or just add it to the lifesteal link one? That'd also give people a reason to actually mod damage on companions.

4.Adding a passive damage pillow (damage attenuation (either archoin/demolist/acolyte)). Just copy-paste it onto all companions, and that will help significantly at higher levels). If pets are modded and protected with skills, they may live long enough to survive heavy fire in high level content.

5.Adding passive vacuum and loot radar to players would also solve the whole inconsistency of loosing it when pet is down. (and increase range when both are up).

6.Giving us the ability to use the same commands Kahl has for non-sentinel companions would also be great in the future. letting is mark targets for the pets to attack or telling them to stay in an area (close to us (maybe withine 300 yards)) or just telling the to regroup would be nice.

 

7.I watched a YT video saying skills wouldn't work on companions for healing or DR. Reading it now seems like it will work. Hope it's the 2nd option.

8.Like most people have said just increasing EHP by 50% or so won't do much on it's own. While pets not having permadeath is the best thing coming out of this. I'd be good for this update to actually make companions great.

 

 

Edited October 1, 2023 by VENDOMINUS

[Probably_Asleep]

I hope the Smeeta Charm nerf isn't too severe. Realistically it's only +31.5% on average. (With Tek Enhance; thanks to TheKengineer for the math) That's certainly nice! But it's not game breaking. The reason Smeeta is used so often is--in my opinion--only because there aren't many better options.

And I think Warframes themselves prove this. We have frames that can reliably double loot, but it's not like everyone plays only those frames. Why not? Because fun trumps greed every time. Greed requires a payoff to feel good, but fun is a payoff that feels good.

So I think what we actually need is to make companions fun to use. Here are some brainstormed suggestions:

• Carrier: Double the Vacuum size
• Deathcube: Have its attack scale with enemy level
• Diriga: Let it equip an actual sniper rifle that you can use as an alternate Primary Weapon
• Djinn: It adds additional elemental damage to your secondary weapon (random at first but give it an augment that scans enemies and then finds their weakness)
• Helios: Removes 1 Eximus Overguard every 3 seconds and its weapon easily pops Neutralizer Bubbles
• Nautilus: Points in the direction of the nearest Objective or Disruption Mission Demolisher
• Oxylus: Doubles the spawn rate of Open World Wildlife
• Shade: Just add a zero to Ambush
• Taxon: Doubles your shield-gate duration
• Wyrm: Once per mission, can transform into a Cosmic Specter cloning your current loadout (reverts to Sentinel upon death)
• Para MOA: Can hold and fire your Arch Gun
• Lambeo MOA: Doubles Armor of defense objectives and increases you and your allies armor by 30%
• Oloro MOA: Generates a special drop item every 30s that, when picked up by you or your allies, gives you a Perspicacity buff
• Nychus MOA: You can ride on it; it will run at 1.5x your current Sprint Speed, and enemies get knocked down when you hit them
• Bhaira Hound: Doubles drop chance of Riven Slivers
• Dorma Hound: Doubles the drop chance of Blueprints
• Hec Hound: Doubles the spawn chance of Ayatan Statues and Rare Crates
• Huras: Have it stand on its hind legs and perform ninja melee moves; also have it imitate whatever Emote you're doing
• Raksa: Have its howl cast Confusion (radiation proc) over a wide area, killing confused enemies restores your shields
• Sahasa: Lower the chance, but have it dig specifically for rare resources
• Sunika: When you get downed, Sunika teleports you to your nearest ally to be revived
• Chesa: Pees on electronics, temporarily disabling Robot enemies (including bosses), and turning off Spy mission traps
• Helminth Charger: You can install a Helminth Invigoration on it, your Warframe gains 25% of the effect of the Invigoration when equipped
• Vizier Predesite: Release Spores that let you see enemies through walls, adds 5m punch-through on yours and allies Primary weapon
• Pharaoh Predesite: Status duration on self halved and immune to Toxin status completely
• Medjay Predesite: Assists in all Finishers, guaranteeing kill
• Adarza: Make Cat's Eye always on
• Smeeta: Just be yourself
• Vasca: Goes invisible when you get downed
• Sly Vulpaphyla: Any Mods the player has equipped that activate in air have double their effect 
• Crescent Vulpaphyla: When devolved, doubles Puncture's Critical effect and damage
• Panzer Vulpaphyla: (Pretty good already) Maybe just make Viral Quills an AoE attack?

I don't know about anyone else, but I'm pretty sure I'd find a use for each and every one of these. It would easily make me more willing to vary my companion choices.

[ShogunGunshow]

8 hours ago, Setakat said:

It's not a nerf, its a buff. Currently Blessing treats pets as being in the same category as defense objectives, and limits the effectiveness of Blessing (It caps at granting 50% DR). With the changes, that restriction is being removed, which means your pets will get the same DR buff that you get.

Seriously, some people need some reading comprehension.

[(XBOX)RaeOvSunshyn]

6 hours ago, (NSW)Probably_Asleep said:

I hope the Smeeta Charm nerf isn't too severe. Realistically it's only +31.5% on average.

I've learned over the years that the more hilarious that Pablo finds a nerf, the worse that nerf is. So I suspect they're going to absolutely OBLITERATE Charm -- imagine, like, 1.5% on average.

[Tahocess321]

hace 49 minutos, (XBOX)RaeOvSunshyn dijo:

I've learned over the years that the more hilarious that Pablo finds a nerf, the worse that nerf is. So I suspect they're going to absolutely OBLITERATE Charm -- imagine, like, 1.5% on average.

Yeah, with the new mentality DE has demonstrated with the heirloom packs, I suppose they do need to destroy the only f2p alternative to resource boosters to increase sales.

In the end, the companion rework is gonna be a lackluster set of changes that's barely gonna change the pet meta other than nerfing Smeeta to the ground. Wouldn't be surprised if "Echoes of 1999" update comes with a repricing of boosters in the shop.

[LupoDWolf]

the changes are all awesome and needed (tho DE, just make colar the ''weapon'' for beasts or something similar ) but making then having their current max stats already will make the feel of leveling then empty. not much for people who can 0 to 30 easily, but for newer players.

I've seem some complains before , that amps have a really bad feeling while leveling because you don't get anything for it, companions will feel more like weapons now. maybe just making their signature skills level with their levels , and add a window that would allow to change the machine ones that we can mix (moa and hounds)

[-AncientWarrior-]

On 2023-09-29 at 9:05 AM, HunterDigi said:

I am also concerned how Charm will be nerfed in the next iteration :(

Yep out of all the "changes" this is the most concerning.. The "DE RNG" Affinity Charm doesnt work consistantly anyway, it should be buffed not nerfed.. and while DE are looking at charm how's about fixing that ridiculous 60% crit reduction .. it should be a buff not a darn nerf..

The way the rest looks, it seems in Steel Path, pets will be "down, not down, down, not down" for the entire mission, with the nerfs to the link mods and pack leader mods, keeping the kats on their feet might be a mission in itself...  and jeez really vac on vac off .. :(   things like vacuum should just be a standard on all the time, down or not, especially since companions are no long are actually dieing why should the mods stop working ..

The Prime Pack Leader nerf is a concern as thats the big "Keep Kats Alive" mod for me ..

but we will see in 16 days if DE have done their usual or done it right for once :) 

[Famecans]

Hi, it's me again, the annoying guy who criticizes almost insignificant aesthetic details difficult to fix in the spaghetti code, I'm sorry, I'll try to be quick

Some older sentinels/attachments/skins have broken color maps; areas that should be metallic are white and opaque and are not associated with metallic channels:
(The first image shows sentinel skin and attachments that have correct metal and color channels)

Spoiler

Nychus Moa Kit has his neck completely inside the head:

Spoiler

The Hound's belly below has mesh issues, there are aesthetically strange distortions during the animation:

Spoiler

Moas has the most aesthetically confusing crafting kits.
There are dirty pieces that don't match any moa piece;
There are metallic color maps that do not fill all metallic parts;
There are pieces with dark shading that alters colors significantly.
Nychus Moa is an example of a polished moa kit. metals, materials and color chanels has the same aesthetic in all pieces.

Spoiler

The trade of genetic imprint codes would have more value if aesthetics could be shared, skins and colors platinum perfectly shared in the genetic code. some rules is: only the progenitor can replicate multiple imprints; Imprint code with skins and colors cannot be accessed or used by another companion of the purchasing account; selling the imprint has a fixed tax of 2.000.000 credits.

Spoiler

thanks for reading👍

Edited October 1, 2023 by Famecans

[Famecans]

11 hours ago, (NSW)Probably_Asleep said:

I hope the Smeeta Charm nerf isn't too severe. Realistically it's only +31.5% on average. (With Tek Enhance; thanks to TheKengineer for the math) That's certainly nice! But it's not game breaking. The reason Smeeta is used so often is--in my opinion--only because there aren't many better options.

Smeeta only works for dropped resources, I think DE should rework their resource concepts maybe add drop tiers.

I don't intend to use Smeeta in frames that are not associated with farming but I think Smeeta would be insignificant if the reward system had drop chance progression. In this case, smeeta would only be useful for short-term matches while players with endurance builds would achieve drops with greater consistency.

[Probably_Asleep]

7 hours ago, (XBOX)RaeOvSunshyn said:

I've learned over the years that the more hilarious that Pablo finds a nerf, the worse that nerf is. So I suspect they're going to absolutely OBLITERATE Charm -- imagine, like, 1.5% on average.

Bleak! So bleak it's oblique! I hunted down the exact moment in the Dev Stream and I fear you might be right:

https://www.youtube.com/live/0hj8lf9cGU0?si=Rz9fytOk6f2k7FPa&t=3472

Quote

Now, next year we want to do a second pass. Uh--nerf Charm--and then that one we're gonna revise, like, all the abilities and the utilities--nerf Charm--and then we're gonna (laughs) and then we're gonna (laughs harder). Anyways, and then we're, we're definitely gonna do that part. We know that even, even ones that don't die, we know they're still really uneven. Ah, so we will revise that--eh--next year, but first we need to--uh--first we need them to not die to kinda see where things settle, and then we'll work on that second part. But know that that part is coming.
--Pablo, 2023

So maybe if we all get together and agree to not use Smeeta at all this coming year, then they'll leave Charm alone! (So ya it's inevitable)

Personally I think if they just separated Affinity and Resource doubling into separate Charms rolls, then that would cut it down considerably without being a ridiculous nerf. But my biggest fear is that they'll just change it from a doubling to a +25% booster. That would hardly valuable, and assuming it rounds to the nearest integer then that would make single-item drops like Riven Slivers receive zero benefit. Nightmare scenario in that case.

 

2 hours ago, Famecans said:

Smeeta only works for dropped resources, I think DE should rework their resource concepts maybe add drop tiers.

I don't intend to use Smeeta in frames that are not associated with farming but I think Smeeta would be insignificant if the reward system had drop chance progression. In this case, smeeta would only be useful for short-term matches while players with endurance builds would achieve drops with greater consistency.

Ya the annoying thing is that I use other companions in my day to day life! I use Smeeta when I'm farming Resources/Affinity, but that's not the only thing I do in the game. I use Shade Prime in my Archon Hunt Missions (with a subsumed Dispensary and it's Augment) because it makes the mission so much easier. I use Deathcube or Djinn with Helstrum and some Synth mods to make low-efficiency builds viable with Equilibrium. Oxylus I use for fishing and gathering plants for Helminth/Grove Specters. Oh and of course Helios whenever I'm running a mission on unscanned enemies. Vulpaphylas of course get used a lot in my general Steel Path missions.

 

I just don't think the problem is actually Charm. There are plenty of companions that have good abilities. But Charm is linked to grinding which takes by far more time than other content. I get done with an Archon Showdown in less than 20 minutes, but I'm running hours to get enough Void Traces to unlock a Prime weapon. Just because I'm using Smeeta more doesn't mean there's a disparity in Companion preference. The disparity is in the content itself!

[Valfaun]

On 2023-09-30 at 5:58 PM, ShogunGunshow said:

There are other mods coming with the update that are supposed to enable some synergistic play with your pet so it's a little early to make a broad judgment like that.

well... true, they did mention new mods, at least for the pets. but hardly a word on sentinels in that regard. also no word at all on sentinel weapons.

reading their post, it just doesn't seem like DE's intentions reach far enough and i guess i simply don't believe in them to make the kind of changes that would be necessary to make all those pets and sentinels finally truly useful beyond level 30 star chart missions. i do realize they need to consider game design elements like intentional difficulty and powercreep and they've previously already said they want to avoid "gameplay automation", but... there's gotta be a valid path somewhere between useless and overpowered

[Joewoof]

All this is great, but I hope DE also touches on making pet mods more accessible. For players that want to farm them, there's only one node on Earth to reliably do so, and that is Cervantes. Sure, you might get lucky by killing dogs in random missions, but that's hard to target-farm as well.

As of now, the easiest way to get something like Link Armor is to transmute uncommon mods of the same polarity, and for something that is so crucial to pets, there should be more options for farming these things, or at least an improvement in drop rates.

Edited October 2, 2023 by (NSW)Joewoof

[BlueQuiller]

It'd be great if the forum let you make tables because these bullet points are a real clumsy data display format rn.

[Taverius]

(Primed) Pack Leader changes seem like a miss to me.

I can still full-heal near instantly, I'm just pushed towards Melees with very fast multi-attack stances like Warfans, and slower Melees like Heavy Blades get shafted.

How about "Heals x% for x seconds after melee attack"?

How about we divest it from Melee altogether?

[[DE]Momaw]

Just to clarify, Fetch/Vacuum and Animal Instinct continue to work while your pet is Incapacitated. So anybody who was sad about that can stop being sad :)

[Absolute_Kriatura]

2 minutes ago, [DE]Momaw said:

Just to clarify, Fetch/Vacuum and Animal Instinct continue to work while your pet is Incapacitated. So anybody who was sad about that can stop being sad :)

Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!

[Cerikus]

1 hour ago, [DE]Momaw said:

Just to clarify, Fetch/Vacuum and Animal Instinct continue to work while your pet is Incapacitated. So anybody who was sad about that can stop being sad :)

Whoooooooohou!

Amazing. Glorious. What a time to be alive. Thank you. Glory to Digital Extremes and everyone who worked on the companion rework. 

And I 100% mean all of this. Long live the Warframe.

+1

I love it. 18th October will be probably the best day of this year.