Frost: 2/5/2014

[Althix]

Frost still defends; he is just slightly worse at it now.

mmmmmmmhm. you know silly level 36 heavy gunner is killing Snowglobe in 2 seconds. so level 50 grineer even faster, level 100... yeah right.

slightly.

 

you know i was running void today with my Clan. And we found a heavy gunner with a snowglobe.

 

so i am sure that changes in Frost directly related to this new "leaders" with "advanced ai".

 

yeah right.

[Taranis49]

Frost now needs to cast his globe twice per wave against level ~60 enemies in a T3 defence.

He might be less useful against level 100 or so enemies, but he's still the king of (non-infested)defence missions, by far. :P

This seems like a reasonable change because invincibility for both his team the defence pods would just be silly against level 100s, as it was before.

He is now balanced.

 

I'd like to know what level 60 enemies you were fighting, because when running with a clanmate that was testing it in T3 Mob Defense, I didn't see it last beyond 3 seconds against level 30's. And it typically takes me longer than six seconds to clear a wave ;-)

[Luckyo]

The problem is that when you form a tactical squad, you choose and want players with different abilities.  You want a CC guy, an offense person like Nova, and healer like Trin and a defense like Frost.  Just because a (in my opinion) good Frost player stayed on the pod, doesn't mean he was unbalanced!  It means he knew his role in the bigger picture of the objective.  Having no true real life experience, I am going out on a limb saying that in combat, you have medics, snipers, support, etc.  You're not going to remove some of the medics medical supplies and give them guns and say "OK, now you're balanced."  And then take away ammo and weapons from a combat person and give him medical supplies so he's more balanced.  Everyone has a role, and it's important that not everyone is the same.  I don't know what's with everyone obsession with balance and making everyone the same, and making all the guns balanced and the same.  It's illogical, unrealistic, and makes for a boring game where you feel more like you're changing skins rather than actual Warframes. 

 

I too was on Xini, and my globe, while still in my duration setup, lasted 2 seconds on wave 5.  That's absurd.  And like another poster said, now we need to mod it (after my 3 forma) for strength, which throws off efficiency and duration, LOL.  It's a lose lose battle with frost and I don't expect to see him much anymore. 

I think you touched on the point of this nerf without seeing it. You're not supposed to mod it for duration, nor spam it any more. You're supposed to drop it where it's tactically needed now. Usually that's two points of defense missions - initial contact to soak up the sudden damage burst and situational save when someone goes down or cryopod is about to pop.

 

Before you just modded it for duration and basically played a turret bot under cryopod refreshing the globe and doing little else. Now you have to mod it for power, and be good enough to know when it's needed.

 

It's definitely a positive change in terms of emphasizing skill over dumb spamming.

 

And mind you, I also think that they will need to balance many other skills as well. Thing is, right now high waves in defense are boring bullet sponges. And the reason for that is massive power creep with abilities like frost globe offering immunity to bullets focing designers to essentially overwhelm us with numbers trying to push inside the globe forcing crazy level, hp and damage scaling to do anything to a proper frost/nova/etc OP frame team. While teams that don't have these frames stand no chance no matter the skill because higher waves have to be balanced for those overpowered abilities.

 

Once all those abilities have been reworked they will be able to implement proper end game, because end game will not have to be designed around things like immunity to all ranged mobs unless they push into melee range due to snow globe, or massive bullet sponginess to survive molecular prime, and so on.

Edited February 6, 2014 by Luckyo

[TankHunter678]

I actually switched to Loki because then I could at least move. Snow globe was like creating a bubble that you had to stay within or die. 

Yes people wouldn't notice if an ember only had world on fire. But the point is that they are pigeon holed into just casting those abilities like a frost is with snow globe. It actually kills a frame that I love. I have actually been in the process of ditching snow globe off my frost all together before this update even came across. Frost is my most used warframe but being a one trick pony is not up my alley, which frost has become. 

"Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." - Albert Einstein

I was going insane with Frost. 

I can understand that Frost was a one trick pony. The way to fix him was not to break the one trick but to expand upon his abilities given what he already has so that he utilizes those abilities in more situations. Then up his speed so he can keep up with other frames and be more useful in other game modes.

[LukeAura]

Before you just modded it for duration and basically played a turret bot under cryopod refreshing the globe and doing little else. Now you have to mod it for power, and be good enough to know when it's needed.

 

It's definitely a positive change in terms of emphasizing skill over dumb spamming.

 

And mind you, I also think that they will need to balance many other skills as well. Thing is, right now high waves in defense are boring bullet sponges. And the reason for that is massive power creep with abilities like frost globe offering immunity to bullets focing designers to essentially overwhelm us with numbers trying to push inside the globe forcing crazy level, hp and damage scaling to do anything to a proper frost/nova/etc OP frame team. While teams that don't have these frames stand no chance no matter the skill because higher waves have to be balanced for those overpowered abilities.

It's a good theory, but I can't help but feel if it was true Trinity would have blessing altered and the enemies in high end T3 defense and survival would be reworked to fit with the idea at the same time. 

[tris1]

I think you touched on the point of this nerf without seeing it. You're not supposed to mod it for duration, nor spam it any more. You're supposed to drop it where it's tactically needed now. Usually that's two points of defense missions - initial contact to soak up the sudden damage burst and situational save when someone goes down or cryopod is about to pop.

 

Before you just modded it for duration and basically played a turret bot under cryopod refreshing the globe and doing little else. Now you have to mod it for power, and be good enough to know when it's needed.

 

It's definitely a positive change in terms of emphasizing skill over dumb spamming.

 

And mind you, I also think that they will need to balance many other skills as well. Thing is, right now high waves in defense are boring bullet sponges. And the reason for that is massive power creep with abilities like frost globe offering immunity to bullets focing designers to essentially overwhelm us with numbers trying to push inside the globe forcing crazy level, hp and damage scaling to do anything to a proper frost/nova/etc OP frame team. While teams that don't have these frames stand no chance no matter the skill because higher waves have to be balanced for those overpowered abilities.

 

Once all those abilities have been reworked they will be able to implement proper end game, because end game will not have to be designed around things like immunity to all ranged mobs unless they push into melee range due to snow globe, or massive bullet sponginess to survive molecular prime, and so on.

frost snowglobe was not immune to all range attacks and never was op due to the fact

 

fusion moa

shockwave moa

railgun moa

napalms

scorchers

grinner=grenades

corpus=grenades

 

lets see hm thats quite alot of enmies that can get past snowglobe with little effort

 

besides frost has no skills at all that are viable any more

 

avalanche no cc/ small radius / rubbish damage

ice wave small radius /no cc/rubbish damage

freeze breaks on damge /single target/not hit scan

 

snowglobe= duration and health based (two cons pff) / cc ability now not usefull as the globe will die before enmies enter (stupid) hp 3500 dies in t3 deffense with hardly anyeffort

 

now lets put rhino and frost in comparing range

Stats:

Same stats.

 

Mobility:

Rhino is more mobile with the helmet and the fact that Iron Skin eliminates knockdowns and stuns which turns him into the typical "noob tube" game element. 1:0, lets go on.

 

Charge Vs. Freeze:

Short range, high damage, mobile (Charge) against high range, low damage, CC that easyly breaks (Freeze). Lets call it even. They are both pretty lacking.

 

Roar Vs. Ice Wave:

With Roar Rhino is more supporting than Frost with his offensive Ice Wave. You could call cold damge a supporting damage type though.

But tbh. Roar is pretty awesome even though it costs 25 more energy and Ice Wave is pretty lacking even though it costs 25 less. Freeze should not break to balance the ability sets so far if you ask me.

Side note: I would normally not compare those two abilities but after comparing all the comparable abilites thats what is left :)

2:0?

 

 

Before we compare Iron Skin and Snow Globe lets look at their ultimates.

... Do I even have to do this? Okay.

 

Rhino Stomp Vs. Avalance:

Rhino's stomp. 800 blast damge, 25 range, long lasting, non breaking CC. Rhino can buff its damage by 50% with Roar, short cast time.

Frost's Avalance: 1000 cold damge, 15 rage, 1 second freeze..., no ability synergy, long, recently decreased cast time.

Rhino archieved flawless victory!

Serious side note: Frost should have been the ultimate CC tank, not Rhino that already has his amazing Roar and Iron skin and long range ultimate.

3:0?

EDIT: Avalanced data are totally out of date now. It seems as if more changed than noted in the patch notes (yeah...). I have yet to confirm actual statements but it seems that it actually freezes enemies if they don't die which would be pretty awesome.

But still S#&$ty range. Though, it looks hillarious now :D

 

Now we finally get to Iron Skin and Snow Globe:

Iron Skin: 1200 heath, mobile, single target, no duration as well as cc, energy drain and poison immune etc.

Snow Globe: 3500 health, immobile, area of effect, 30 seconds duration, blocks shots (friendly and hostile) and slows enemies (slow range is not getting affected by power range).

 

Conclusion:

Even if we call Iron Skin and Snow Globe balanced, Rhino is way ahead of Frost already.

[Taranis49]

Lol.. same complaints about snowglobe now as when they changed Rhino's Ironskin, and ironically Rhino is still the most used warframe around (I mean really how often dont you see one in a squad?).

 

People didnt listen then when many of us said the issue wasnt the amount of damage the 'shield' absorbs its the damage enemies do, thats still the exact same issue now that Snowglobe got reduced.

 

Come-on people face it for 50 energy complete immunity to all ranged damage for an entire squad was too much.  It made the game boringly easy with frost and insanely difficuilt with others (simply look at any post asking about defence difficulity, the most common resonse was "use frost", that obviously means he was a crutch to use in that area, and obviously the game wasnt balanced for it).  Now maybe there will be some better balancing going on.

 

Not sure if you have a short memory or what, but Rhino was among the least-used frames immediately after the IS nerf because he had nothing to compensate; other frames either did the CC or tanking game better (including Ember, in the latter case). Right up until DE stopped being lazy and completely reworked the frame via giving him an entirely new ability (Roar) and merging his old third and fourth abilities (Rhino Blast/Stomp), as well as the addition of the Vanguard helm (which converted him from being among the slowest frames in the game into one of the quickest).

 

None of these things were done for Frost, he's no faster, and he's still not remotely competitive on the offense either.

 

Hell, globe didn't even provide "complete immunity", that's a myth; Railgun Moas and any attack with AoE was perfectly capable of bypassing it. Shorter ranged enemies like Fusion Moas would simply putz into the thing to engage (hint, which is what I've been asking for, a better AI that doesn't stupidly remain at stand-off range, but actually tries storming the globe and other pieces of cover... but god forbid, that approach would actually require effort).

 

Contrast this with frames like Nyx (which still utterly trivializes Infested Defense), Trinity (actually does provide complete invincibility for the entire team, and it's not static to boot), etc. God forbid some frames have roles they excel at.

Edited February 6, 2014 by Taranis49

[Celseus]

I can understand that Frost was a one trick pony. The way to fix him was not to break the one trick but to expand upon his abilities given what he already has so that he utilizes those abilities in more situations. Then up his speed so he can keep up with other frames and be more useful in other game modes.

 

Exactly.

 

Frost had poor damage output but had the ability to keep a single space safe as long, defending it. Now, Frost has below average damage output but can no longer keep defending a spot because that skill that allowed him to do so -had a very limited lifespan.

 

DE doesn't realize that they essential told Frost that he could not do what he was good at anymore. And instead of letting him be good at other things, they told him to stick with a marginally upgraded version of his other skills ....which don't really help steer him in that path either. Now he's stuck at the crossroads of "GG, uninstalling warframe" or "Oh well, time to play Nova!"

[sanj66]

I think you touched on the point of this nerf without seeing it. You're not supposed to mod it for duration, nor spam it any more. You're supposed to drop it where it's tactically needed now. Usually that's two points of defense missions - initial contact to soak up the sudden damage burst and situational save when someone goes down or cryopod is about to pop.

 

Before you just modded it for duration and basically played a turret bot under cryopod refreshing the globe and doing little else. Now you have to mod it for power, and be good enough to know when it's needed.

 

It's definitely a positive change in terms of emphasizing skill over dumb spamming.

 

And mind you, I also think that they will need to balance many other skills as well. Thing is, right now high waves in defense are boring bullet sponges. And the reason for that is massive power creep with abilities like frost globe offering immunity to bullets focing designers to essentially overwhelm us with numbers trying to push inside the globe forcing crazy level, hp and damage scaling to do anything to a proper frost/nova/etc OP frame team. While teams that don't have these frames stand no chance no matter the skill because higher waves have to be balanced for those overpowered abilities.

 

Once all those abilities have been reworked they will be able to implement proper end game, because end game will not have to be designed around things like immunity to all ranged mobs unless they push into melee range due to snow globe, or massive bullet sponginess to survive molecular prime, and so on.

if it were a move to correct skill over dumb spamming then why isnt trinity or valkyr dealt with first? hell even valkyr got a buff, both can basically have permanent invulnerability, frost's globe as it were didnt guarantee you would win, and the value its currently reduced to even with strength mods dont stand a chance in maybe a t3 def, on  to the other point, what consideration was given to the fact that players farmed duration mods, and spent alot of cores to rank those mods up, not to mention time to farm cores as we all know atm rare 5's are truly rare now, no consideration was given to that, it can now in some cases be a point of utterly wasted time, i am lucky i got  almost  ever single mod in game and have most maxed or nearly maxed, but what about those who dont or arent as fortunate?

[ThePresident777]

First, I didnt use the word despise.  You seem to be getting emotional because someone can have a rational thought about this and see the bigger picture.  Sorry you are unable to.

 

Second, if DE wanted players to run and gun with one ability that is omnipotent for its role(mprime, globe, etc), then they would have left globe alone.  Im simply saying that there are a few abilities that make warframe selection and ability use very one dimensional.  Maybe DE is leaning toward a game that requires a bit more thought than pressing an 'I Win' button.  If you like your "hack and slash" type of gameplay where you just barrel through a ton of mobs spamming one ability, Diablo 3 is your game.  I have trouble understanding why players in games like it when one or two classes are so overpowered because of an ability... and im baffled why they would get frustrated when the developers try to make the game a bit more dynamic by forcing you to utilize other abilities or select other classes. 

 

Take a deep breath before you go to lash out at someone next time.  I stated my opinion.  Your next post was 100% directed at me and you made your entire post about me.  Umadbro?

 

LOL, bigger picture.  Here's the bigger picture.  Challenges button on the in game menu.  Fill the Challenges Button drop down list with Nightmare Mode and other challenges.  And, instead of killing snow globe, give the enemy a way to fight back because that would be all actionish and stuff.

[Venarge]

Buff the AI so rather than stand outside, they charge into a globe to attack.

Your move, sirrah.

So they all get slowed down by its passive ability to make them even easier to kill with melee....

Just wow. Making snowglobe even better. Strong move

[tris1]

So they all get slowed down by its passive ability to make them even easier to kill with melee....

Just wow. Making snowglobe even better. Strong move

pff the slow is useless now if the globe dies before anything gets in and thats 99 percent of the time

[Doom_Bunny]

So its not usable for healing a fallen partner? Its not usable for fighting bosses with high damage? it wasnt usable in the void missions against strong enemies?

I forgot, these are all defense missions... Oh sorry, these arent all defense missions.

So please. Dont try to bring this "defense only sh***"

Without frost doing all this most people would be dead. Using his snow globe as a support role saves so many people. So now I guess I'll just take all the hits with my body trying to revive someone or stop a constant barrage. While I'm at it I'll just go lay down over the system/pod to protect it. It's like it was frost's job or something to play these roles?

 

[Luckyo]

It's a good theory, but I can't help but feel if it was true Trinity would have blessing altered and the enemies in high end T3 defense and survival would be reworked to fit with the idea at the same time. 

I agree. But they are taking it one step at the time, and blessing is much, much harder to keep up than globe, and it does not shield the cryopod.

[Venarge]

pff the slow is useless now if the globe dies before anything gets in and thats 99 percent of the time

if you would have followed the discussion, the idea about ai running in the globe was meant to be an alternative to the "shield life"

So your comment is just invalid...

 

 

Without frost doing all this most people would be dead. Using his snow globe as a support role saves so many people. So now I guess I'll just take all the hits with my body trying to revive someone or stop a constant barrage. While I'm at it I'll just go lay down over the system/pod to protect it. It's like it was frost's job or something to play these roles?

He still can play these roles. Its just not that easy anymore.

People are just spoiled about his invulnerable shield.

Edited February 6, 2014 by Venarge

[Celseus]

To put Frost in a place of power and action.

 

This was de's description of what they intended for Frost's nerf. Now, as you can see, they accomplished nothing by nerfing Snowglobe. Instead, they just made Frost a crappier warframe.

 

If you truly wanted that, you should have just stuck with the improvements and left Snowglobe alone.

[sanj66]

if you would have followed the discussion, the idea about ai running in the globe was meant to be an alternative to the "shield life"

So your comment is just invalid...

 

 

He still can play these roles. Its just not that easy anymore.

People are just spoiled about his invulnerable shield.

 

 

if you would have followed the discussion, the idea about ai running in the globe was meant to be an alternative to the "shield life"

So your comment is just invalid...

 

 

He still can play these roles. Its just not that easy anymore.

People are just spoiled about his invulnerable shield.

well not really at wave 30 on t3 def a snow globe boosted by a 2 from the top blind rage and focus lasted 3 seconds, explain how can you revive someone in 3 seconds or kill a room full of mobs in 3 seconds if your down to your last cast on energy. fyi it was never invulnerable.

[Doom_Bunny]

He can only play these rolls on low level maps because on high level maps he will die to. Then it becomes a game of leap frog, where the person who was just revived has to revive the person that helped him. Snow globe gives you a few more seconds to revive a person (your still taking dmg from enemies charging into the globe). If they are not revived by the time it goes down you're dead. Say you revive the player, now you have to deal with masses of enemies half of which are heavies and new elemental people. You are dead either way unless that snow globe stays up for you and your newly revived friend to clear some of the enemies surrounding you.

[Oizen]

I dont think anyone here really has a brain. Or its just not attached right.

 

Lets Look at what new frost has:

 

Damage? No. There are frames that outdamage him. You'd be better off with any of them.

Defense? Nope. Globe falls too quickly, even fully maxed out. Better off with a Rhino if you wanna take a hit.

Crowd Control? Very bad Crowd Control. Vauban's CC outshines new Frost in every way imaginable.

 

 

So what does Frost offer? He doesn't have particularly good HP or Shields. He's Slow, His armor doesn't even come close to Valkyr's. He's literally nothing.

 

I honestly consider a frame that is outclassed in every single way by another to be worthless. And Thats where frost currently sits.

Edited February 6, 2014 by Oizen

[Taranis49]

Total bullsh****

 

snowglobe is nothing that can be balanced through buffing other stuff.

It was too powerfull for defense.

 

Except via buffing the enemy's intelligence so they actually storm the globe to get inside it rather than remaining at standoff range ;-) Seriously, the enemy AI's copy of Zap Brannigan's Big Book of War still has missing pages.

 

And I covered the point on Rhino too; immediately after the IS Nerf, it was basically relegated to the trash heap - it was one of the rarest frames to see in the game until DE stopped being lazy and gave it a complete rework with an entirely new #3 (Roar), and giving its new #4 the effects of both its old #3 and #4, as well as giving it an alt helm that instantly turned it from being among the slowest frames in the game into one of the quickest.

 

Note the fact that none of this was done with Frost, it's still just as slow as it was before, and it still has the original lackluster offensive set that wasn't worth equipping beforehand (new animations /= new abilities).

Edited February 6, 2014 by Taranis49

[Fatalpulse]

This is really a huge nerf to the Frost Warframe.
The Snowglobe health limit totally brakes the frame, rendering him useless doing what he's supposed to do:
Protection. Level 30+ enemies melt the globe within seconds, not even enough time to regen a moderate amount of shield, the slow is practically useless except vs the non-ranged infested. Since the Vauban Bastille was also nerfed, there is no reason anymore taking a defensive warframe to defense/survival missions. Since the frost frame doesnt shine in any other aspect than his globe, you can consider him as useless now.


inb4 butthurt vauban players
 

[R4yleonard]

Please discuss below your experiences with Frost and how you would balance his abilities with these changes in mind, as well as prepare to return to this thread after the Update has been deployed with further feedback.

 

As a Frost user, I have to agree with what most people said. Frost IS SIMPLY TOO SLOW. Unlike the slow tank Rhino, who can cover distances with Rhino Charge, Frost doesn't have anything to do this. His ability is a ranged attack, an AoE attack, and a barrier. The barrier, combined with his slow speed, suggest his role is simply defense, while some suggest he's actually a jack-of-all-trade (Freeze = long range attack/support, Ice Wave & Avalanche = AoE/Crowd Control, Snow Globe = Defense). However, he's simply too slow to make it to the battlefield to show his offensive capability in a normal run.

My suggestion : increase his speed a bit so he won't really fall behind

[Ronyn]

I actually agree with DE that the old Snowglobe was so resilient it allowed for too easy a time to defend a spot.

Add to that, frosts other powers were too weak or too slow to be worth using.

<and the AI doesn't make it a point to rush into close quarters>

That combination of things resulting in rewarding a very passive style of play.

It also made frost a one trick pony, an extremely useful and highly sought after one trick pony..

 

SO..

Improving frosts other powers was a great idea. They are much more worth using now.

It makes me more viable in modes other than defense.

Although where his slow foot speed is not too bad in defense it is most detrimental in missions where everyone moving through it fast.

However snowglobe was brought down far too much to be viable in the late game.

I'm not looking for it to be full on invulnerable again but it needs a ton more HP or something to do its job.

[Doom_Bunny]

I could of sworn DE Rebecca closed this thread for review?
After taking more time to look into frost I find that only multiple (on lv 30) heavies can take down the globe or just one lv 50 heavy and their infantry. This does make tower defence difficult especially since we have to go for longer because nearly all of the rewards are keys or credits. I find tower mobile defence is still achievable with frost because the enemies don't grow in number and strength.

To the people who say frost is no fun, I say you must not like to be on the defence so don't be a defencive frame. Level him up and put him with the rest of the stuff you don't use. I do the same with other frames because I like to be on the defence or offence, I don't like being support because of my own reasons and I only like to be stealthy when I really want to be. So I level those frames then play them either when I need them or want them. I mostly use frost cause he fits the bill of being defencive and offencive and I still keep up with the pack (run, slide, run, slide). So find your frame that suits you, just don't forget about the others.

Frost's new alvanche is a versatile ability as I can use it either escape or deal damage until they defrost or explode. As for snow globe I'm unsure, it is very painful on higher levels but I must go to those levels to find that pot of gold at the end of hell.

(maybe reduce the chance of getting keys?...please)

[Phoenix86]

I'll say just 2 things:

 

- The Nerf was NEEDED to be consistent with what has been done to Iron Skin and Bastille

 

- Flat numbers are BAD, Snow Globe is a freaking snow storm that should slow and render useless projectiles as well as enemies running inside it by PERCENTAGES!! NOT FLAT NUMBERS!! (ie percentages: movement/melee speed/projectile's dmg reduced by 20-30-40-50% affected by focus/blind rage, hard capped at 90% max reductions for balance porpouses)

Edited February 12, 2014 by Phoenix86