Scaling Abilities

[Acegikmo]

     This idea hit me while I was looking at the Typhus Warframe idea by Redskittlez, which was triggered by a thread I glanced at previously about what needs to be updated next after melee 2.0. Everyone talks about scaling in regards to armor and abilities w/o offering any kind of way to fix that. Abilities are supposed to be what you turn to when the stakes are high, clinch a fight when the chips are down. Energy should be something that builds with no capacity at all.

 

     Energy should regenerate like shields do, the only difference being that it doesn't stop. No cap. The damage on abilities will scale depending on how much energy you have stored. Obviously the percent values would be different on each frame and their abilities in reflection of the purpose they serve. Basically, Warframes don't have a max energy; as a result, all abilities use that energy as a percent. So a fireball being cast when energy is at 1000, does significantly more damage than one cast with 500.

 

     I understand that something like this would make a lot of waves and be really hard to make happen as it touches upon a lot of functions, but I haven't seen any threads about how to make abilities scale. Just complaints, Lots of rage, and general dissatisfaction. So this is just what I thought up practically on the spot, so if anyone has suggestions, suggest away.

[Barda1]

It might be hard to balance though. 20000 energy afker pops world-ender Molecular Prime.

Edited February 17, 2014 by Barda1

[XenosInfinity]

I would be interested to see this implemented since it would generally encourage people to use abilities more strategically.

Or it might just lead to Equilibrium/Rage built Embers incinerating entire maps, I suppose, but that's probably my inner cynic talking.

 

On the other hand, I would suggest that mobility powers have their cost and effect unaltered by this unless they're intended as a direct attack - for example, my Zephyr generally only has Turbulence and Tailwind slotted on her ability roster. I don't particularly want to cast Tailwind at, say, 200 energy, and be launched three times the normal distance when I can already cross an entire map with it.

[Cyrionn]

It has been discussed, some suggested that abilities should scale on ennemies max hp which is in my opinion far more balanced.

[Acegikmo]

    XenosInfinity: yes, this would cause a lot of existing mods to be need alterations in some way. Not to mention each warframe needs to be combed over thoroughly to decide what has flat cost and which ultimates would actually use 100% of the energy pool.

Edited February 17, 2014 by Acegikmo

[Acegikmo]

Cyrionn: that sounds like a good idea at a glance, but if you think about it for a minute, I need you to answer me 1 question. Is the percentage based on max health, or missing health? Either way, it would be pretty ridiculous late-game and nowhere else. What about all the missions you do outside of T3 Survivals and endless defense? I can tell you now I do a lot more of those than anything else.

      When I first started this game, I was actually pretty satisfied by how often I had energy to use versus the amount of gunplay I had to do. I could kill grineer pretty fast with weapons and I had just enough energy to stealth out of hairy situations when necessary. Now I have 90% efficiency, I can spam enemies into the ground if necessary, but it feels so weak to me. I want some constraints on my abilities. I would even go so far as to want some kind of bonus to my frame when I save enough energy past certain points. It would be even cooler if I could choose those bonus's through leveling other frames; to get that really cool bonus from that volt and put it in my vabaun or something.

     Also: how does % health damage work on purely armor units like heavy gunner?

Edited February 17, 2014 by Acegikmo