Chroma Rework / Tweak

[TheCleverJoker]

Chroma while many people will not agree isn't as bad as they suggest. The game has a fundamental limitation in the ways a warframe can tank damage, this only being made worse with the shield gating requirements for a lot of level cap builds or just outright avoiding damage to begin with. Chroma can tank anything that isn't a super high single damage instance with the right build. The main changes that Chroma needs to be made relevant going forward are to make Vex Armour have a one hit protection system or having a general system helping all health tanks, i.e health gating. Vex Armor could have a damage calculation change so that it is more like mirage though perhaps more of a 100% or 75% unmodded bonus. Changes to his Effigy could be to have it either be only a channel OR a health based dependency and to have the effigy bolster either his abilities or to have it take on a more supporting role. Effigy could have a grouping or repulsion effect based on if you tap or hold to cast, effigy could follow you allowing the credit boost to be more valuable. The recent augment needs to be changed so that chroma's defences are taken into account when applying the damage to Chroma making it more valuable to a build and avoiding the issues that arise from him having overguard. Making it so the Vex Armor buffs are based on just taking damage of any sort could also bypass the problems of overguard and make shield tanking a more viable option for him (though I think shield gating should be Hildryn's thing alone). Honestly, the biggest issue that people seem to have is that his primary buffing implement is to take damage which isn't feasible in level cap runs. As I have said, he isn't bad but in my opinion is just undervalued.

 

P.S. This post was made under the assumption that the changes to Vex Armour's conditionals was going to be a replacement rather than an addition. Most of the suggested changes are still valid in my opinion.

Edited April 12 by TheCleverJoker

[Nerthiril]

I don’t think most are saying that he is bad per say. Just he is outdated. His 1 and 4 have no use even being there and I’ve done 99% of my missions with chroma without even touching Effegy. (Only times I did was it was a mistake and didn’t leave it up for long). His 2 is barely useful and if you get wisp on your team his heat ward doesn’t work, and same with hyldren and electric. Cold is additive so it’s only truely useful when trying to get scorn stacks. After that it’s a very minor buff not really worth the energy investment. Then toxin no one really talks about because no one uses. Then finally 3. His “best most defining ability”. It can be replaced by any other damage ability and be better. Only truely good if you are using gunCO with a gun that is multiplicative, or longbow sharpshot. It does free up mod slots and arcanes. But most builds aren’t even so tight that you can eke out extra damage by replacing serration/merciless with Vex armor. You get more damage from roar or eclipse with serration/gunCO/merciless. Still fully usable in any content you want. Just overwhelmingly mediocre.