Fixing Frost Will Require Strong New Abilities

[Jamescell]

Edit: Yeah, it's a rant. Excuse any spelling errors and/or... other things that occur when typing on a mobile device. Ever since power creep, and the resulting enemy level-creep/rework of systems like damage, Frost has been a mess. In the past the best explanation of his problems was this: He is a on-trick-pony. Currently the best explanation of his problems is identical: He is a one-trick-pony. Forumers have been trying for ages to buff Frost, to fix Frost, yet their age-long struggle has been in vane. Even the most basic and logical improvements have been essentially ignored by those who are actually tasked with "balancing" frames and weapons ( you know who you are).

The War-forum community has been encouraged to think inside the lines, and this, have unsurprisingly, gotten good at it. Essentially a mentality of keeping things as similar to what is thought up by the brilliant balancing/ability creating team. A team that has shown how truly creative they are when retroactively "fixing" frames. Accelerant, death.. *Blade Storm, and Link are examples of their mastery of creativity and innovation. There aren't many sarcasm rich examples because honestly, not much has changed. The minds that brought us the Soma at mastery 6, the Boltor Prime, Nova, Mirage, and the new Nyx Absorb to name a few, have done a great job of selectively choosing the simplest and most intuitive ability changing suggestions possible from the community, if that is, they make an actually reasonable decision at all. Those who suggest that there be a simple knockback added to an ability are praised as genius while those who dare dream larger are effectively shunned, as "radical" ideas don't happen in these parts of town. Because ideas that could really change things aren't accepted, a common response being "it's good as is IDGAF" or "cool ideas but not similar enough to it's current state". My favorite of all of these responses is "I don't really think that this much creativity or change is warranted, minor tweaks are what we should focus on". Now why exactly is that? Why do people immediately think that trying to get a broken scale to balance is more productive than actually fixing it up or building a new one? Because only moderate ideas, only predictable buffs or nerfs, are actually accepted. Back in the days of U7 my creativity wasn't regulated by what is most likely to be implemented, as DE didn't have much of a history in terms of applying player feedback to the game. Now? Anything radically different that is thought of isn't even worth posting because of its assured failure to be productive or legitimately considered. It is a deeply bothersome and concerning state of affairs.

Sometimes the best solutions, in regards to repair, are new creation. Frost's abilities were conceptualized for a Warframe of times-past, and to be honest, even modern frames aren't amazingly put-together. Frost was born in an era where single-target freezing was almost-worth 25 energy, and damaging abilities almost always proved themselves useful. The abilities themselves, their very nature, is in essence, outdated. Changing any of Frost's current abilities in minute ways won't solve his (so far) time-less problem. Changing his current abilities but keeping their core functions and mechanics may fix things, but not perfectly, and in no way ideally. He will be left with abilities that feel as if they were never made to function in the way they do. An unavoidably sloppy amalgam of past failings and modern, half-azzed improvisation. I wholeheartedly encourage you all, when creating or discussing solutions to Frost's abilities, to consciously counteract the "ability conformity" mindset that has been encouraged and as a result, come up with solutions that are innovative and exciting. The best fix for Frost, and most other frames that need to be reworked is not extra oomph on mechanics that have been proven to be broken, but a new vision for these previously-adored souls.

Edited September 1, 2014 by Jamescell

[Eyeless]

[AdunSaveMe]

On the idea of 'new' abilities;

The problem with changing abilities completely is that however weak they may be, there will always be people that like them.

 

It doesn't matter how much evidence one might have for how bad it is.

It's a rubbish move to change what some players like, even if there's not a lot of those players*.

 

*I want this bit to be CLEAR because I know people will argue about this point and completely ignore what I'm saying

 

Whether it be large or small, tweaking or maybe overhauls that still keep the basic and core functionality are the way to go.

Complete replacement is not.

Edited September 1, 2014 by AdunSaveMe

[AdunSaveMe]

Anything radically different that is thought of isn't even worth posting because of its assured failure to be productive or legitimately considered. It is a deeply bothersome and concerning state of affairs.

That's a bit of a big assumption. Actually your whole post kinda smells like assumptions and generalization. 

 

I don't know what forums you've been using, but most of what I've seen goes well. There's always people that will do what you're saying, but there's also always people that will do the opposite and actually consider the ideas.

[VKhaun]

I agree about Frost needing new abilities and reworks, but I think the devs also agree and he's probably on the back freezer just waiting for new mechanics. Just like when they gained the ability to do toggle skills and went back to a few skills and revamped them to toggles (and continue to do so) I expect Frost will use future mechanics. Re-activating skills during their effect, multiple applications, marking targets, who knows?

 

They only redid snowglobe when they had an entirely new and unique timing mechanic, which made him endlessly scaling but more difficult to play. I know it was a nerf, but the gameplay we got was a step forward IMO.

 

He's been described as a tank/mage hybrid. If you just up and give him free caster skills then he's just an unfairly tanky mage frame. He needs abilities with gameplay checks and high skill caps, so that as a hybrid he's CAPABLE of great things but not as easily or as straightforwardly as a pure character. Not that you said otherwise, just making my position clear to third parties.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As for your rant, we've talked several times and you do like to get "creative" but the devs are trying to make a certain kind of game. A lot of times people try claim they're being "creative" to solve an issue but their creativity doesn't lead to gameplay, it just leads to autonomy.

 

A common example would be the requests for melee gap closers. It sounds so good on paper and there are clear examples of gap closers working well in RPG's, but in context it would just be pressing a button to warp to target over and over again. The devs have put in MANY action game gap closers, but people don't recognize them as such because they're not automated and that's what they really want from a gap closer; not having to aim or time or position, otherwise they would already be wall running, teleporting and slide attacking because if you're willing to do any of the three there are already lots of options.

 

Adding the kinds of moves people suggest would be dumbing down the combat, which often the same people claim isn't deep enough when they talk about melee 2.0... certain people in certain PM's to certain other people... >.>

Edited September 1, 2014 by VKhaun

[Zerohades]

As a fan of frost, what are your ideas concerning him?

 

My problem with him now is that i nearly don't use his powers except for 3 most of the time to slow ennemy while playing in melee and 4 to kill waves of low levels ennemy (so the 10-15 first minutes in def). 1 and 2 are just not bind and not used in any of my build concerning him.

 

I would love an "ice aura" in one of these 2 unpractical power, a bit like embers but, that do not make damage that only freeze things around him and make them slower to attack or that for example can give frost elemental type of damage to the bullets passing by this aura...

 

But either i don't know if the mechanic would be interesting  and liked by others :-)

 

Zerohades

 

Ps sry for english

[Jamescell]

I agree about Frost needing new abilities and reworks, but I think the devs also agree and he's probably on the back freezer just waiting for new mechanics. Just like when they gained the ability to do toggle skills and went back to a few skills and revamped them to toggles (and continue to do so) I expect Frost will use future mechanics. Re-activating skills during their effect, multiple applications, marking targets, who knows?

 

They only redid snowglobe when they had an entirely new and unique timing mechanic, which made him endlessly scaling but more difficult to play. I know it was a nerf, but the gameplay we got was a step forward IMO.

 

He's been described as a tank/mage hybrid. If you just up and give him free caster skills then he's just an unfairly tanky mage frame. He needs abilities with gameplay checks and high skill caps, so that as a hybrid he's CAPABLE of great things but not as easily or as straightforwardly as a pure character. Not that you said otherwise, just making my position clear to third parties.

 

As for your rant, we've talked several times and you do like to get "creative" but the devs are trying to make a certain kind of game. A lot of times people try claim they're being "creative" to solve an issue but their creativity doesn't lead to gameplay, it just leads to autonomy.

 

A common example would be the requests for melee gap closers. It sounds so good on paper and there are clear examples of gap closers working well in RPG's, but in context it would just be pressing a button to warp to target over and over again. The devs have put in MANY action game gap closers, but people don't recognize them as such because they're not automated and that's what they really want from a gap closer; not having to aim or time or position, otherwise they would already be wall running, teleporting and slide attacking because if you're willing to do any of the three there are already lots of options.

 

Adding the kinds of moves people suggest would be dumbing down the combat, which often the same people claim isn't deep enough when they talk about melee 2.0... certain people in certain PM's to certain other people... >.>

I am talking only about abilities and balancing abilities, not all categories of Warframe ideas/feedback. And yeah, I find it much harder not to rant when makings posts from an interface that prevents me from seeing the first half of the sentence I just typed up. This post was meant to be less ranty, but that's the way it turned out...

 

And still, the challenge of bulk complexity presented by melee shouldn't be players struggling to efficiently get to enemies or mashing keys just to land an enemy hit-box correctly due to the sloppy targeting/hot-box systems that we have. Instead the complexity of melee, and the challenge of the system should be reacting correctly to enemies with an array of combos that allow skilled players to maximize damage output, and avoid getting thrown around.

Edited September 1, 2014 by Jamescell

[fatpig84]

1 and 2 need a rework, 4 needs the Overextended "bug" back, 3 needs Duration not health.

 

 

So much this. We do not need a complete rework, just this will make frost more viable outside of Globe situations alone.

 

1 and 2 will need more time though.