Opinion: Equinox should encourage, rather than discourage, form-swapping

[(PSN)Unstar]

To me, Equinox has an odd design.  On one hand, her 1st ability gives you temporary buffs for switching forms, which implies a gameplay style where the player is regularly switching forms.  On the other hand, her 3rd and 4th abilities require accumulation to work at their full potential, and this accumulation is lost when her form changes; these abilities imply a gameplay style where the player is staying within only one of her forms for lengthy periods of time.  Which is to say, Equinox's kit is in conflict with itself.

In my subjective opinion, I honestly don't see the point of having a Warframe that changes forms if players are discouraged instead of encouraged to change forms during gameplay; a form-changing Warframe that players only use a single form of in any given mission may as well not have the other form — just make that other form a different Warframe!  So in my opinion, I think the first ability has the right idea, and Equinox's 3 and 4 should be adjusted such that they naturally (ie without augments) flow well with a playstyle that involves regular form shifts.

If there's every time for an Equinox rework, I hope this feedback can be a part of that process.  Thanks for taking the time to consider it!

[Zakkhar]

35 minutes ago, (PSN)Unstar said:

On one hand, her 1st ability gives you temporary buffs for switching forms, which implies a gameplay style where the player is regularly switching forms.  On the other hand, her 3rd and 4th abilities require accumulation to work at their full potential, and this accumulation is lost when her form changes;

It is called build specialisation. You pick 1-2 abilities or/and build your setup around them and auguments for them and thats it. You seem to want to have a cookie and eat a cookie.

If switching between forms is your thing just invest in https://warframe.fandom.com/wiki/Energy_Transfer

and maybe  https://warframe.fandom.com/wiki/Duality

Edited November 29, 2023 by Zakkhar

[(PSN)Unstar]

3 minutes ago, Zakkhar said:

It is called build specialisation. You pick 1-2 abilities or/and build your setup around them and auguments for them and thats it. You seem to want to have a cookie and eat a cookie.

Modern Warframe designs and reworks tend to be about all about both having a cookie and eating a cookie!  They're all about abilities that synergize, rather than abilities that conflict. Personally would love to see what Equinox would look like given that treatment.

Edited November 29, 2023 by (PSN)Unstar

[Zakkhar]

1 minute ago, (PSN)Unstar said:

Modern Warframe designs and reworks tend to be about a cookie and eating a cookie!

Play them then.

What you are sayinng basically, is that they lack build variety.

 

Edited November 29, 2023 by Zakkhar

[NinjaZeku]

8 minutes ago, Zakkhar said:

they lack build variety

Being rewarded for sticking to 1 form on a 2-form Frame is not "build variety" but simply nonsense.

Equinox' form swapping most definitely could use some love, and no, that 4 Augment bandaid was certainly not it.

[The_Royal_Elf_Mika]

31 minutes ago, Zakkhar said:

Play them then.

What you are sayinng basically, is that they lack build variety.

 

equinox literally has like 2 builds and thats it... she has awful build variety.

i play steelpath, most new frames have several builds you can do and can usely use all their abilities effectively

 

equinox already gets punished for using half her kit due to abilities being reset on switch, forcing you to have to build them up again. she also has major energy issues with some of her abilities and some of her abilities are flat out outclassed by helminth abilities.

Edited November 29, 2023 by (NSW)Royal_Elf_Mika

[(NSW)Greybones]

Doesn’t seem a problem to me. Means if you want the different abilities according to the different scenarios, you’ll need to be more considerate about when to swap. Personally I quite like Equinox for the extra layer of complexity to my fights they introduce; if I didn’t want to think, I’d just go with whatever flavour of the month Meta is floating around, and would be disappointed if the game was foundationally designed like most players choose to play it

Edited November 29, 2023 by (NSW)Greybones

[lukinu_u]

It's just good game design.
The game give you upsides and downsides to both playstyles so you have good incentives to do both (mid mission) depending on the situation.

In the case of Equinox specifically, the swaping playstyle focus on versatility over raw power and vice versa for the one form playstyle. It encourage swapping when needing the abilities from the other form, but it discourage uncessary excessive swapping because staying in one form provide more strength.

[(PSN)Shaun-T-Wilson]

Theres a augment for the first ability (it makes a clone spector) that does encourage swapping if you into form swapping as a tactic.

[Hypernaut1]

Modern players don't like ANY resistance at all .. And it's boring. Not every frame needs to be a mindless nuke with set and forget abilities.

Equinox has several builds that she's can use. You can focus on day or night. You can focus on duration for her specter, you can create a slow build, etc. 

[(PSN)slightconfuzzled]

I think Equinox is generally fine as is, and still find them interesting and fun... but I also like and agree with your suggestions, and would probably enjoy/prefer if their design philosophy was more along those lines as well. Encouraging more swapping, or at the least, not discouraging it. Importantly, I also think it would be possible to do that without necessarily interfering or altering many peoples current play styles/approach with them. 

[crazywolfpusher]

Energy Transfer need to be a core part of the her kit. It should also apply to Pacify & Provoke. It doesn't make sense that she is punished for switching forms. Being able to keep both abilities active when using Metamorphosis would solve all the issues Equinox currently have. 

 

Edited April 9 by crazywolfpusher

[DrBorris]

I was going to come in here and call this a frigid take, but apparently people think Equinox's core design is good? Huh? What's the point of having a frame that can switch its kit mid-mission if all gameplay discourages that? 

I don't get the "keep your cake and eat it too" ideology some people are using as a defense of her current state. Yeah, you're supposed to make a build, but in Equinox's case making a build means forgoing her entire gimmick. Having to lean into one ability at the expense of another is solid design, ignoring abilities in favor of others is not. Especially when the frame's theme is balance.

If anything Equinox's kit should be designed in a way to discourage going all in on one form. There should be synergies between forms that you need to utilize to maximize her effectiveness. Otherwise what is the difference in having two distinct frames? This does get a bit difficult seeing as Equinox only has one active "gameplay" ability, as it stands the only active thing you can do is combine Rest/Rage, but there's at least something there. It was ages ago now, and it was comically cheesy, but the Sleep>Metamorphosis>Maim>Covert Lethality>nuke strategy was at least interesting.

 

I'm... the more I think the more it hurts. I can't fathom how people are spinning a conceptual change that increases the difficulty in maximizing the gameplay of a frame (having to balance 7 abilities with mutually exclusive castings is a lot) is somehow being perceived as asking for something to be made less "resistant." Guys... I get it, some people come in here and ask for the game to be removed from the game all the time, this ain't that. 

[(NSW)Greybones]

2 hours ago, DrBorris said:

Yeah, you're supposed to make a build, but in Equinox's case making a build means forgoing her entire gimmick

What do you mean? One build influences both sides, and you swap accordingly

If you want to specialise down a path, feel free, but she’s not a one-trick pony

[--Leyenda-yight6]

I agree, it does not encourage the use of both forms and using a single form takes away the interest of the warframe, it is like using sevagoth without its shadow and this for me makes it a very simple and boring warframe.

[NinjaZeku]

9 hours ago, (NSW)Greybones said:

What do you mean? One build influences both sides, and you swap accordingly

The "best" build I have found for my purposes removes her ability to even switch forms in the first place, by replacing her 1 with Gloom.

Thus, in Day form, I get a (better) version of her Night abilities all while having unrestricted access to nuking and Squad buffing.

Now. Don't get me wrong.

This is not me suggesting people how to mod / fix Equinox.

This is me saying that not using (over) half her kit makes her a better Frame to play.

This is bad, and needs improvement.

_{^{And for the record, this is not a call to nerf Gloom :P}}

[(NSW)Greybones]

1 hour ago, NinjaZeku said:

The "best" build I have found for my purposes removes her ability to even switch forms in the first place, by replacing her 1 with Gloom.

Thus, in Day form, I get a (better) version of her Night abilities all while having unrestricted access to nuking and Squad buffing.

Now. Don't get me wrong.

This is not me suggesting people how to mod / fix Equinox.

This is me saying that not using (over) half her kit makes her a better Frame to play.

This is bad, and needs improvement.

_{^{And for the record, this is not a call to nerf Gloom :P}}

This sounds like you’re saying they need to change Equinox because you took some other frame’s ability and replaced one of hers with it.

Is the idea that they address every single combination of abilities from different Frames, or is the idea that you did something unexpected and it played out bizarrely well and you respect that you took the ability to fundamentally change a piece of kit and it’s clearly not going to be well designed, or… what?

If you tell me that you’re also using Steel Path, with its bonkers modifiers for things like enemy armour and 4-player spawnrates (directly affecting abilities that are influenced by enemy density by cranking up their effectiveness compared to the standard game that those modifiers are modifying in broken ways), I’m going to wonder what the thinking is

[NinjaZeku]

52 minutes ago, (NSW)Greybones said:

This sounds like you’re saying they need to change Equinox because you took some other frame’s ability and replaced one of hers with it.

They need to change her because one ability from a different Frame, that every Frame has access to,
works better than using multiple of her innate abilities together.

She needs buffs to make using her Night form more attractive, and worth switching to.

53 minutes ago, (NSW)Greybones said:

you respect that you took the ability to fundamentally change a piece of kit and it’s clearly not going to be well designed

Equinox is indeed not well designed, in regards to her form switching.

54 minutes ago, (NSW)Greybones said:

If you tell me that you’re also using Steel Path, with its bonkers modifiers for things like enemy armour and 4-player spawnrates (directly affecting abilities that are influenced by enemy density by cranking up their effectiveness compared to the standard game that those modifiers are modifying in broken ways), I’m going to wonder what the thinking is

I'll be honest, I'm the one who's confused "what the thinking is" here,
why are you bringing up Steel Path out of nowhere, what does that have to do with anything?

... well actually, you kinda hit on another weakness that Equinox has, high enemy density
makes Pacify drain too high amounts of Energy, since there's no cap on it, unlike Gloom :P

[(NSW)Greybones]

31 minutes ago, NinjaZeku said:

They need to change her because one ability from a different Frame, that every Frame has access to,
works better than using multiple of her innate abilities together.

She needs buffs to make using her Night form more attractive, and worth switching to.

Equinox is indeed not well designed, in regards to her form switching.

I'll be honest, I'm the one who's confused "what the thinking is" here,
why are you bringing up Steel Path out of nowhere, what does that have to do with anything?

... well actually, you kinda hit on another weakness that Equinox has, high enemy density
makes Pacify drain too high amounts of Energy, since there's no cap on it, unlike Gloom :P

Because Steel Path is all anyone points to determine whether something is balanced, despite it being a fundamentally broken and unbalanced mess itself.

And if it’s not Steel Path, it’s some other piece of the player’s kit, like a primary or melee, built way beyond the content they’re doing throwing off any way to actually determine how balanced a Warframe’s abilities are for that content.

And if it’s not that, it’s some kind of bizarre expectation that we’re meant to spam abilities and players don’t even bother taking into consideration things like energy cost/effect because they’re building to swim in so much energy that they’re not even considering whether to use the 25 or the 50 or the 100 for a certain scenario.

And if it’s not that- I could go on. The point is, when players are banging on about how to redesign a piece of kit, they’re using some really skewed metrics, some of which directly interfere with interpretation of the value of a skill (I’m pretty sure you’ve heard “The best CC is death”; congratulations, that typically involves building weapons for way beyond the content that’s designed for alternative builds that may not have as much power equipped).

If you’re going to claim that something needs to be changed, I want to see you doing tests with various tiers of builds designed for various tiers of content, using various classes and kit, taking into consideration that we always start from the modless baseline and the different levels of content reflect that and are designed to enable more than one way to make a build or loadout, and that even if you think the point of the game is to turn it off and breeze through, that’s not the goal when considering what to adjust to be either stronger or weaker.

Incidentally, nerf Gloom. Just like how AoE in Steel Path is skewed towards being overly viable by dint of the sheer amount of enemies (which if fewer enemies would spawn, then suddenly AoE wouldn’t be considered so crucial and it would be more in-line with single target like it already is in the standard game) or Viral/Slash is so much more effective because trying to chew through armour after SP modifiers suddenly becomes a lot less of an option, Gloom is skewing your perception, and you need to be more willing to judge a Frame on it’s own kit instead of what you pull off another

Edited December 1, 2023 by (NSW)Greybones

[(XBOX)Mastermitchel89]

On 2023-11-30 at 11:22 AM, Hypernaut1 said:

Modern players don't like ANY resistance at all .. And it's boring. Not every frame needs to be a mindless nuke with set and forget abilities.

On 2023-11-30 at 8:17 AM, (PSN)Unstar said:

I think the first ability has the right idea, and Equinox's 3 and 4 should be adjusted such that they naturally (ie without augments) flow well with a playstyle that involves regular form shifts.

I don't want tank controls, mostly any gamer wants more smooth less clunk at their fingertip tappers

I can't specifically tell if you guys are masochists or making it sound so far from reach to allow others the sight to see the point

•Equinox

Casting speed or Casting animations, are they clunky or smooth

Mod to ability builds, can players build both sets of abilities with their mod Choices (i don't care about steel path. It can burn li)

Ability use, are abilities worth using, Example. Decoy on a Revenent

The passive (not good enough to matter. Especially since Qol stuff with pickup sticks orbs)

 

Player choice, somewhat unique to equinox 2 in 1 Deal. And yet one

                                                                                                              remains...

[Zakkhar]

18 hours ago, DrBorris said:

I was going to come in here and call this a frigid take, but apparently people think Equinox's core design is good?

We do not think it is good, we think OPs argument for change is wrong.

[crazywolfpusher]

15 minutes ago, Zakkhar said:

We do not think it is good, we think OPs argument for change is wrong.

We think it's a very good argument and you are definitely wrong.

Edited December 1, 2023 by crazywolfpusher

[Zakkhar]

1 hour ago, crazywolfpusher said:

We

You mean I?

[DrBorris]

35 minutes ago, Zakkhar said:

We do not think it is good, we think OPs argument for change is wrong.

I'm not sure what's wrong with the OP's argument (when reading it in good faith). When I say "core design" I'm not really referencing Equinox's current state in the game. I think we could all agree that she needs something. The core design I was referencing was basically dead-on with what the OP is criticizing.

As it stands, Equinox is designed as two independent frames that you can swap between mid-mission. Pacify/Provoke and Mend/Maim are both abilities that fundamentally don't synergize with her other form as neither ability has any impact on the battlefield after being disabled. The abilities being disabled when switching forms is only part of the issue being raised.

 

There are two ways I can think of to look at Equinox's "balance" motif.

• One is that of a split-personality. You can choose between two distinct playstyles and have the versatility of being able to switch when the mission calls for a change in tactic. The balance lies in being able to approach any situation in a choice of two options. (Current Equinox)
• The other is to maintain a constant balance. One form isn't enough, in order to reach true (effective) balance you need to balance the two distinct kits you have access to. (What the OP is proposing)

On paper, both of these options are viable ways of designing a frame with Equinox's core principle. I think the problem comes in with how Warframe is actually played. Even when theory-crafting complex content DE could make, I struggle to come up with anything that would ask a player to switch between a defensive and offensive form mid-mission. Unless the game pushes into very complex Raid missions, you just don't need a dedicated... well... anything. This means that using one form or another isn't a matter of balancing your output, but rather picking whatever you feel like using. That's not bad per-se, but it is quite close to just having two completely separate frames you pick between in the arsenal. I don't think Equinox going the split-personality route is objectively incorrect, or even "bad" design, but rather is a waste of a frame. A design ethos for Equinox that asks you to be constantly in a state of flux, never at full potential because you could be utilizing your other form's strengths, is something that has the grounds for a properly unique frame.

I'm not opposed to there being a build for Equinox that is dedicated to one form, but I would much rather see the builds that have you balance both forms be the "proper" way to play Equinox.

 

16 hours ago, (NSW)Greybones said:

What do you mean? One build influences both sides, and you swap accordingly

If you want to specialise down a path, feel free, but she’s not a one-trick pony

The problem is that she is a one-trick pony. Because of how her kit is designed you are encouraged to lean into a single trick. Recontextualizing "make her use both forms" as "a (single) path" doesn't feel all that fair. You can design around many paths that all use both forms. A core design of Equinox where she has 7 abilities to build around sounds a lot more diverse than one where she has (two sets of) 3. I give my opinions on "swap accordingly" above, I just don't think that is a design that works in Warframe.

 

To be fair, it may be too significant a rework to make Equinox a frame that constantly has to balance. In order to do that, at least one of Pacify/Provoke and Rest/Rage should probably be turned into single-cast abilities rather than toggles. That would allow the forms to actually interact with each other. But that is getting to a fairly significant rework, Equinox does still have a lot of room to improve within her current core design. A gameplay loop of bolstering defenses, nuking until those defenses wear off, than bolstering those defenses again is kind of there. I just feel as though that is a more static "path" that has less room for build/gameplay variety.

[(NSW)Greybones]

4 hours ago, DrBorris said:

The problem is that she is a one-trick pony. Because of how her kit is designed you are encouraged to lean into a single trick. Recontextualizing "make her use both forms" as "a (single) path" doesn't feel all that fair. You can design around many paths that all use both forms. A core design of Equinox where she has 7 abilities to build around sounds a lot more diverse than one where she has (two sets of) 3. I give my opinions on "swap accordingly" above, I just don't think that is a design that works in Warframe.

How is that not just specialising, a thing we can do with every frame via how we build and especially when utilising things like corrupt mods? From the modless baseline, the moment we start slapping mods on to customise her abilities, we can potentially start warping that balance by shifting the attributes available (sometimes outside sources can impact as well, like if someone brings a 9999 SP-built weapon into a level 80 mission that’s not designed for a 9999 SP build, and that weapon shifts the balance of the whole kit and a Warframe’s CCing abilities suddenly aren’t useful).

In combat though (not the Arsenal screen), if someone hasn’t specifically built to specialise like a one-trick pony (like this community loves to do) and the rest of the kit is aligned with the mission as well and isn’t skewing towards weapons that hog all the kills while the Warframe ends up just a weapons platform, then you’re swapping amongst both forms according to the scenario and how it unfolds. I wouldn’t be surprised if these notions seem unfamiliar though, because that takes actually trying to build for balanced gameplay with more variety instead of doing the popular thing of building to blow the game away with ever fewer specialised builds meant for way higher-level content than what’s being done and one-trick ponies, and seeking that balance can actually reveal a lot about a weapon or Warframe or whatever’s design in general that gets missed when someone lives and breaths unbalanced SP

Edited December 1, 2023 by (NSW)Greybones