Melee 2.5: Making Melee 2.0 Fit Warframe's Pace

[SableSonata]

Melee 2.0 was a fair upgrade, to be sure, and yet I see few people equipping melee weapons, and even most of those who do, generally do not use more than one combo, if they even bother to use anything other than the base combo. It seems like a waste, because all this work went into melee 2.0, and all that most players got out of it was 10 extra mod points and all-around melee weapon buffs.

 

The problem, primarily, is that melee 2.0 doesn't fit Warframe's fast pace. Equipping a melee weapon with a stance typically reduces the player's attack speed, and because it uses set animations, usually reduces the player's mobility by a fair margin. The majority of the content is also locked behind RNG and even with a stance, you have to give up your firearms to use most of the system.

 

Not that combos are a very good fit either. Most combos are long, and combined with the aforementioned reduction in mobility, players using combos can often spend upwards of half their time swinging at air to get to the part of the combo that actually lets them move to the next enemy.

 

 

My proposal begins thus:

1. Remove combos from stance mods, and make them integral to the individual weapons instead. Stance mods now offer unique bonuses to any melee weapon (+damage, + attack speed, +status/crit chance, etc). Much like auras, but benefiting only the player using it.

- This allows weapons to be unique, as each one has its own moveset, even if most of a weapon class would have very similar movesets initially. It allows for special, unique weapons like the Jat Kittag to have unique animations, rather than being just another generic [weapon class] with moveset determined by the stance mod. 

 

2. 'Combos' are accessible with quick melee. Equipping a melee weapon grants blocking, parrying, and channeling (reworked as below).

- This allows melee 2.5 to be used in normal play, mixed in with gunplay, rather than being a special mode. Having to switch weapons to access half of your attacks breaks Warframe's fast pace, and as a result, many players benefit very little from melee 2.0.

 

3. Make (most) 'Combos' short, contextual, and intuitive. The majority of 'combos' should be one contextual input, plus attack (or hold attack), and contextual inputs should offer similar effects across all weapons. For example, sprint+attack should always be a forward-mobility attack (the wall attack animation would work for most weapons); back+attack should give some amount of CC and move the player backwards, to be used when the player needs to break from combat; block+attack should be lower damage, but include some AoE or CC effect; crouch+attack should be a lifting attack (not all weapons would have this) that also brings the player into the air, where they can follow up with a jump attack (or if juggling/aerial attacking is ever implemented, that); etc.

- By splitting the animations among short, contexual, and intuitive 'combos', the system now rewards players for reading a situation and being able to use an appropriate attack for what they want to do. With certain stances now, it can take upwards of 2 seconds to get to the part of the combo the player wants, by which point, they usually don't need it anymore.

- It would be good to add 2-3 different animations for many of the attacks, so that they don't get too repetitive (things like spin attacks, jump attacks, sprint attacks, etc. would really only need one animation though), but regardless of how many animations it is, it still only counts as one attack, meaning players can transition seamlessly from one contextual attack to another, rather than having to either stop attacking for a second, or finish the current combo before the next can start.

 

4. Sliding is allowed, at least to some extent. Players mobility should not be limited by the animation (with the exception of certain special attacks, such as the Axes' spinning with Cleaving Whirlwind). Even if the player model slides around a little, it would be preferable to having limited mobility, and the animations could be touched up later.

 

5. Channeling uses Stamina instead of Energy. Sprinting, and regular attacks do not use stamina - only blocking and channeling. Stamina used is based on the stamina stat of the weapon. Stamina recovers more slowly than it does now.

- No stamina, no channeling. Penalties on channeling mods removed (except for perhaps Lifestrike), as they already take the place of another mod on the weapon, which is generally penalty enough.

 

 

 

While this idea may lack some of the flair of the current longform combos and canned animation sets, it would be much closer to Warframe's pace, and you'd see many more players using melee as a part of their repertoire, rather than almost-solely as a means of locomotion. It would allow for melee and gunplay to be interwoven, with players transitioning seamlessly from complex melee combos to shooting and back again without ever slowing down.

 

It also deals with the issue of much of the content being locked behind RNG, as stances are no longer required in order to access the majority of the system; they instead act more like aura mods, but only affecting the player using it. They're bonuses, rather than required, and since any stance could be used on any weapon, suddenly we don't need to dilute the mod tables by releasing 14 new stances in order to cover every weapon type.

 

It makes it possible to have truly unique melee weapons, as each weapon technically has its own moveset (even if many would be identical at first). In the future, weapons can be diversified, and it can be done fairly easily, as individual animations could be swapped out, rather than entire sequences of animations.

 

Finally, it would be fairly easy overall. The combo system is already in place, and we already have many of the contextual inputs available; all they would have to do is chop up the longform combos and spread the various animations among the weapons' contextual attacks. Since most weapon types have two stance mods, it should be no trouble getting enough animations to create at least one solid moveset per weapon type, if not two, then add in the unique animations/combos for special weapons as soon as they can be made or salvaged (I'm sure there are a few dropped animations that could be brought back from Melee 1.0).

 

 

 

 

That's it. Melee 2.5. Would require minimal effort (relatively speaking), but would do a great deal (in my biased opinion) towards making melee truly relevant (not to mention much more ingrained) in Warframe, rather than being an overly-fancy system that, while fairly well done, feels like it belongs in a different game entirely.

[Shuuro]

These sound like great ideas. Bravo. A lot of thought and effort went into writing this.

 

If I may add just one thing: There really needs to be more than one button for melee, because doing E E E PAUSE E, or E E E HOLD E feels lackluster.

 

There should be a need to have a second, or even a third melee button in which each has it's own combo's, but also strings into each others combos as well.

 

Kind of like, weak, medium strong? Horizontal, Vertical, Diagonal?  I don't know. something like that.

 

It would give the players a more fulfilled sense they they actually did a combo, instead of just pressing one button at different intervals.

 

Edit: Oh and of course. A +1 to you.

Edited June 23, 2014 by Shuuro

[Hearthwin]

Once again. I refer you to PSO!

 

See the bottom right hand corner. Those attack go from Strong Attack (which is slow, but does more damage), Normal Attack (fast weak attacks), Special Attack (an attack that uses RNG to proc a weapon's special status effect or ability). Now comboing two normal attack and then a strong attack makes the strong attack execute faster than normal, and comboing two normal attack and then a special attack makes the chances of the status procing go up. PSO GUYS! 

 

This is very simple, but with Melee 2.5 we could use 3 buttons in a similar fashion to entice players to combo differently rather than spamming their normal EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

Edited June 23, 2014 by Hearthwin

[Hearthwin]

bump

[SableSonata]

This is an idea for Melee 2.5, not 3.0. Improving the system without changing it's fundamental mechanics, and without making a lot of work. That's why I kept with the one-button system. However, with context, there are the following inputs:

 

Attack

Back+Attack (I assume most players are going to be holding forward while attacking, so forward doesn't get its own attack)

Crouch+Attack

Sprint+Attack

Slide+Attack

Jump+Attack

Roll+Attack

Block+Attack (only when weapon is equipped)

All of the above with hold-attack.

 

That's plenty for Warframe, I think. At least until melee 3.0 does roll around. 

[MechaTails]

If the basis for this is because you dont think Melee fighting is fast enough then you're either using really slow weapons or you're doing it wrong.

 

I was messing around with my Lecta a while ago, trying specifically to find a way to use it "quicker" because the attack speed kinda sucks. Its great against mobs because the high status proc makes up for the attack speed, but its frustratingly slow against scattered enemies.

 

The solution was simply to incorporate more flying kicks and slide attacks when fighting to reach the next enemy faster. Kicks knock enemies down and slide attacks do tons of damage, so its a bonus to mobility, utility, and power at once.

 

That said, reading around makes me realize im in the vast minority of players who are willing to approach battles differently, so my opinion can be safely ignored.

Edited June 23, 2014 by DarkTails

[Shuuro]

If the basis for this is because you dont think Melee fighting is fast enough then you're either using really slow weapons or you're doing it wrong.

 

I was messing around with my Lecta a while ago, trying specifically to find a way to use it "quicker" because the attack speed kinda sucks. Its great against mobs because the high status proc makes up for the attack speed, but its frustratingly slow against scattered enemies.

 

The solution was simply to incorporate more flying kicks and slide attacks when fighting to reach the next enemy faster. Kicks knock enemies down and slide attacks do tons of damage, so its a bonus to mobility, utility, and power at once.

 

That said, reading around makes me realize im in the vast minority of players who are willing to approach battles differently, so my opinion can be safely ignored.

 

I'm with you on that, because who doesn't like these kind of set up's?

 

 

 It makes me so sad that people don't use the flying kick more. It simplifies heavy enemies.

 

I mean.. could you imagine the bleed damage on that? Geeze.

[Worira]

gapclosers

 

give me gapclosers

[SableSonata]

If the basis for this is because you dont think Melee fighting is fast enough then you're either using really slow weapons or you're doing it wrong.

 

I was messing around with my Lecta a while ago, trying specifically to find a way to use it "quicker" because the attack speed kinda sucks. Its great against mobs because the high status proc makes up for the attack speed, but its frustratingly slow against scattered enemies.

 

The solution was simply to incorporate more flying kicks and slide attacks when fighting to reach the next enemy faster. Kicks knock enemies down and slide attacks do tons of damage, so its a bonus to mobility, utility, and power at once.

 

That said, reading around makes me realize im in the vast minority of players who are willing to approach battles differently, so my opinion can be safely ignored.

Well that helps somewhat, but with many stances, even if they're just a couple metres away, you can't chain them into your combo, because the canned animations slow down your movement. Sure you can stop, run over, and restart a combo, but it would be nice if we could move towards them at regular speed while attacking.

 

It also doesn't change that combos don't feel intuitive, and even if a particular combo is good at a particular thing, by the time you actually get to that part of the combo, you very often don't need it anymore. 

 

And it still doesn't solve that 90% of Melee 2.0 requires you to put away your gun, when an ideal situation would let you use most of the system without breaking the flow of combat.

 

Not to mention the other issues this would address such as content (combos) being locked behind RNG, weapons all being generic [weapon class] with different skins because combos are tied to stances instead of weapons, channeling being largely useless because of how quickly it drains energy and how most channeling mods make it cost even more energy. 

 

With the current system, if you use melee without equipping it, all of the work that went in to Melee 2.0 amounts to an overall buff to melee weapons, and 10 mod points, wasting all of the effort spent on animations, combos, blocking, parrying, and channeling. In order to actually access melee 2.0, you have to give up your ranged weapons; otherwise you get melee 1.1.

Edited June 23, 2014 by SableSonata

[MechaTails]

I would agree with most of that, better transitions to the next enemy, more intuitive/selectable combos, etc. I rarely get any sort of decent chain going unless it's a MD/Defense mission. Something like the Batman games' combo system would be fun, you can instantly choose a move to suit the situation.. I think it's cool if DE wanted to do something original with their combo system, but it's just not working all that great.

 

I don't mind that we have to choose melee or gun mode, I mind the painfully slow delay while the modes are transitioning. Instant or near-instant switch would be better for this game, where enemies can shred your life away in moments, before you can even start blocking bullets.

[-SLX-J3tAc3]

Right on, DarkTails, Total agreement in absolutely everything here, you hit the nail on the head perfectly. A person that understands melee combat - very nice. We should do some missions together sometimes, we'd probably have a blast.

Oh, and add to the list: PLEASE do not forget to be able to CANCEL attacks. That's a critical factor in being able to attack and defend properly.

Edited June 24, 2014 by -SLX-J3tAc3

[Acos]

I too would have preferred a combo system that uses two buttons. My number one complaint with combos is that they are generally difficult to pull off in the sea of bodies that is Warframe. I can't see what I'm doing, there's numbers and magic everywhere, and there's little feed-back telling me if I pulled off a combo correctly. I don't 'feel' what I'm doing, if that makes sense. So as a result myself and many other players simply find weapons with simple combos and use those repeatedly. 

I would get rid of channeling entirely and instead when you equip your melee weapon have the option of doing heavy and light attacks. Combos are a derivative of both things put together, and melee become significantly more intuitive and fun. Heavy attacks do more damage, while light attacks build the combo meter faster.  

 

[grillv20]

I wish it just felt more like a fighting game when you switched over to full melee mode rather than a game of pressing E over and over...its so seriously lame just hitting E over and over to do "combos" its just really tacky.

[WubbaDubDub]

HUGE +1 to this.

 

At first I didn't entirely agree with your #5 proposal, but after some thought I think it's actually a really good idea. As it stands now, a good Tenno can travel endlessly without ever depleting his Stamina bar [slide, spin, slide, slide, spin] all day long. Screw that business, let me run to my frickin' objective! I don't mind sliding, (now it's just a part of the game) but it's used as a speed boost and is our only aerial attack (along with the kick). So let us use our stamina for something a little more grand, but rename Stamina to something like "Channeling Energy" - it can be a separate, special Tenno energy pool that when tapped into allows feats of super-personness like stopping bullets with our fists or unleashing slashes so powerful they turn the enemy into dust!

[WubbaDubDub]

Need bumps!

Edited June 24, 2014 by WubbaDubDub

[Azamagon]

@ OP:

1 - I'd prefer MUCH MORE if stances were like that, just neat little bonuses of your own choosing, rather than necessities to even access combos in the first place. Good thinking :)

 

2 - I like this too, but with one remark: Blocking (and thus also parrying) should be available in Gun mode too. Imo, the only benefit of melee mode should be the channeling, nothing else. After all, wasn't the point of this thread to make melee fit Warframe's fast game pace? ;)

People are gonna say that it would make melee mode obsolete. I say, no it wouldn't, because you get the channeling powers + there could be a quickshot feature in melee mode, similar to how there is a quickmelee in gun mode, which would only be fair (and fluent). It could be done something like:

Gun mode - M1 = Shoot, E = Quickmelee

Melee mode - M1 = Melee, E = Quickshot

Obviously customizeable to your own choosing :)

 

3 - I like this a lot as well, but I wouldn't mind if there was very short combos though (like a combo which includes 2 or 3 chains, not more).

 

4 - I don't understand this point, care to explain it more?

 

5 - Yes, yes and YES!

I would add some more things though:

* Rolling, dodging (the stuff you can do while aiming) and wallrunning should also cost stamina though, however, with their respective benefits: Rolling and dodging could give a brief moment of very high damage resistance, while wallrunning drastically reduces enemy accuracy if they try to shoot at you.

* Like you said, all Channeling mods could have their penalties removed (except for Corrupted Charge, because it is an ACTUAL Corrupted mod, it is SUPPOSED to have a penalty on it), but I would also include removing the penalty of Life Strike while also nerfing its benefits as a counterbalance.

[Viverim]

Before y'all get too far into various buttons, remember this game is out on Playstation and Xbox.  You have to be able to replicate everything PC does on those systems.  One button melee is probably because all of the other console buttons are assigned to something else.

[SableSonata]

@ OP:

 

2 - I like this too, but with one remark: Blocking (and thus also parrying) should be available in Gun mode too. Imo, the only benefit of melee mode should be the channeling, nothing else. After all, wasn't the point of this thread to make melee fit Warframe's fast game pace? ;)

People are gonna say that it would make melee mode obsolete. I say, no it wouldn't, because you get the channeling powers + there could be a quickshot feature in melee mode, similar to how there is a quickmelee in gun mode, which would only be fair (and fluent). It could be done something like:

Gun mode - M1 = Shoot, E = Quickmelee

Melee mode - M1 = Melee, E = Quickshot

Obviously customizeable to your own choosing :)

 

3 - I like this a lot as well, but I wouldn't mind if there was very short combos though (like a combo which includes 2 or 3 chains, not more).

 

4 - I don't understand this point, care to explain it more?

 

5 - Yes, yes and YES!

I would add some more things though:

* Rolling, dodging (the stuff you can do while aiming) and wallrunning should also cost stamina though, however, with their respective benefits: Rolling and dodging could give a brief moment of very high damage resistance, while wallrunning drastically reduces enemy accuracy if they try to shoot at you.

* Like you said, all Channeling mods could have their penalties removed (except for Corrupted Charge, because it is an ACTUAL Corrupted mod, it is SUPPOSED to have a penalty on it), but I would also include removing the penalty of Life Strike while also nerfing its benefits as a counterbalance.

2 - I'm worried that making too much available in gun mode would just make equipping your melee weapon almost pointless. However, I would concede that you can block in gun mode, but you cannot reflect bullets without either equipping it or channeling. Quick shot would be nice though, if for no other reason than to deal with flyers. 

But, that is beyond the scope of my suggestion; it would be a nice addition, but my suggestion is meant to require as little effort as possible.

 

3 - Initially, I suggest single-link combos, but there's no reason they can't add longer (signature) combos.

 

4 - Currently, the distance your warframe covers during many combo animations is (mostly) fixed, and most of the time it's smaller than the distance you would normally be able to move in the time that the animation takes, leading to slower overall movement while attacking. My suggestion is just that the warframes will be able to move at at least their normal speed during the animations, even if it looks like they're sliding a little because the animation doesn't match their move speed.

 

5 - Those are also good ideas. 

[Starender]

you can dash only in melee mod:

 

DASH - each time you double tap any direction you quickly move yourself

cost - few stamina

 

SUPER DASH - during channeling, DASH go faster and further

cost - few stamina and few energy

 

SUPER DASH CANCEL - DASH to cancel your actual combo

cost - few energy

 

 

DASH STRIKE - DASH then quickly strike with your melee weapon to perform a vertical attack

cost - medium stamina

 

SUPER DASH STRIKE - during channeling, DASH STRIKE to perform a strong vertical attack

cost - medium stamina and few energy

 

 

CHARGE - maintain your guard then dash to stun your ennemy for few seconds

cost - medium stamina

 

SUPER CHARGE - during channeling, CHARGE to stun your ennemy for medium seconds then quickly strike to perfom a finisher

cost - medium stamina and medium energy

 

 

 

and here comes MELEE 2.1

[Azamagon]

2 - I'm worried that making too much available in gun mode would just make equipping your melee weapon almost pointless. However, I would concede that you can block in gun mode, but you cannot reflect bullets without either equipping it or channeling. Quick shot would be nice though, if for no other reason than to deal with flyers. 

But, that is beyond the scope of my suggestion; it would be a nice addition, but my suggestion is meant to require as little effort as possible.

 

3 - Initially, I suggest single-link combos, but there's no reason they can't add longer (signature) combos.

 

4 - Currently, the distance your warframe covers during many combo animations is (mostly) fixed, and most of the time it's smaller than the distance you would normally be able to move in the time that the animation takes, leading to slower overall movement while attacking. My suggestion is just that the warframes will be able to move at at least their normal speed during the animations, even if it looks like they're sliding a little because the animation doesn't match their move speed.

 

5 - Those are also good ideas. 

2 - Well yeah, there could be other incentives for going into melee mode, like more efficient blocking (+ channeling of course) or something like that *shrugs*

Allowing quickshooting is quite important for the flow though. I know it's not a small fix, but I think it is worth mentioning at least (you know, for the "bigger picture" of fixing melee and its issues).

 

3 - Alright, cool :)

 

4 - Ah, so by sliding you meant allowing full movement during attacking? Sliding otherwise refers to sprint+crouch, so was a bit confusing. But a BIG yes to allowing movement during attacking, it's one of my biggest annoyances with the melee fighting in Warframe!

 

5 - Thanks! ^^

[Laecerelius]

I wonder if they could make it so that you switch from your gun to melee stance if you hit the weapon swap button while quick meleeing.  I mean, your weapon is already out so it makes sense but I dunno if it'd be hard to code or anything like that.

[Sasquatchias]

Its downright criminal how little attention this topic is getting.

[SableSonata]

I'm going to give this a bump because so far I haven't seen any negative feedback at all, let alone reasonable negative feedback. Hopefully more people will be willing to read it, even though it's a bit lengthy.

Edited June 27, 2014 by SableSonata

[Hexagoros]

Melee needs work.  It needs to do more damage, and 'flow' better.

 

Running into melee is riskier and harder, but the 'reward' is almost nothing compared to ranged weapons.  Heck, most ranged weapons can deal a lot more damage in a much shorter time compared to their melee counterparts.

Edited June 28, 2014 by Hexagoros

[SlyBoots]

-snip-

 

Players mobility should not be limited by the animation

 

-snip-

 

QFT

 

how did i miss this thread when i looked around before starting my own? i have to agree across the board, really like your suggestion for the combos.

 

gapclosers

 

give me gapclosers

 

also this.

 

Its downright criminal how little attention this topic is getting.

 

yep, reminds me of how nearly noone paid attention to the fact that the damage rework destroyed all inherent melee crowd control (guaranteed stagger on hit).

Edited June 29, 2014 by SlyBoots