Alternative Ability System To Energy Or Cooldowns:

[(NSW)123er432]

After reading through these forums for a while, I have seen numerous threads regarding the current energy system and different ways the system could be improved. Methods include but are not limited to: Pure cooldown based Abilities, A combination of Energy and cooldown based abilities, and Natural regen for Energy.

All of these systems have their pros and cons, but one thing I notice is that all of these systems take away from gunplay, rewarding passive play and waiting for your more powerful abilities to be ready.

What if we instead Rewarded good Gunplay Abilities?

My suggested system(s): Make a resource system based off of kills. Each ability could have its own unique kill counter so you dont have to choose between which ability you want to use (usually your ultimate) WHILE still being awarded for using your skills smartly. Different abilities would obviously have different #'s of required kills to use ranging from maybe 2 for most single target abilities like shock or Pull to maybe 10-20 for ultimates.

Going with this system, Trinity's Energy Vamp ability could give partial Kill points for damage dealt, making the skill invaluable versus bosses or other hard to kill enemies. Energy Artifacts could maybe reduce the number of kills required for each skill by a flat or % amount, making them available more often.

Thoughts?

[G3rman]

Seems pointless for a caster class to have to kill things with its gun to use its abilities. This definitely isn't a system that should replace the energy because energy favors all classes equally; this encourages a certain type of play, when the developers have specifically stated they want it balanced between swords, guns, and abilities.

[AXCrusnik]

Seems pointless for a caster class to have to kill things with its gun to use its abilities. This definitely isn't a system that should replace the energy because energy favors all classes equally; this encourages a certain type of play, when the developers have specifically stated they want it balanced between swords, guns, and abilities.

This... also I don't want kills to fuel abilities. People generally fight over the kills too much as it is (not as in arguing but as in killing everything possible as fast as possible). I don't really care about my kill amount much thanks to that. This system sounds like it'll just make EVERY "stolen" kill infuriating, since I'll need them to do anything but use my loadout.

I think the current system is fine and all this talk about changing it is unnecessary. I don't see any problems with the energy system with how much they drop energy ball, plus you can use energy siphon, and if you have a Trinity, Energy Vamp

Edited April 9, 2013 by AXCrusnik

[(NSW)123er432]

Seems pointless for a caster class to have to kill things with its gun to use its abilities. This definitely isn't a system that should replace the energy because energy favors all classes equally; this encourages a certain type of play, when the developers have specifically stated they want it balanced between swords, guns, and abilities.

Im sorry but i'm not sure if I understand your argument. The first part of your post States "Seems pointless for a caster class to have to kill things with its gun to use its abilities" Which, on its own, is a fine argument. I agree, casters should be able to use their abilities more than more combat based frames like Rhino or Excalibur. With this system casters could be balanced by requiring less kills to use their abilities. the same could be done in inverse for frames that favor more gun/sword related combat. Also, swords could give more for the kill count to increase the incentive of using melee combat.

The problem with your first statement is you finish with " this encourages a certain type of play, when the developers have specifically stated they want it balanced between swords, guns, and abilities". This goes completely against your first argument regarding casters requireing kills to use their skills. Wouldn't this system make it so all forms of combat COULD be used equally due to the abilities riding off of Sword/Gun kills, making the use of both styles of combat perfectly usable by all?

[G3rman]

How does that make sense? It encourages combat equally by FORCING players to use sword and gun kills. Energy can be picked up and used by any warframe, and it can be gathered outside of combat with certain artifacts or orb hunting.

Melee and Guns aren't obstructed by the energy system at all. On the other hand, casters would suffer from this energy type because they cannot focus on using their abilities, but rather they must use their guns and melee.

There isn't any choice there which is bad design.

[vats3]

all i can say is the game would become about kill stealing

[(NSW)123er432]

After seeing some arguments against, I have to agree that this system is flawed. The kill system would make kill stealing terrible.

Thanks for the critique.