Banshee Skill Augment Suggestion: Sonic Scream

[Noble_Cactus]

I've gotta say, I was a little disappointed seeing all of the offerings that came with this update when it came to the skill augmentations. Some frames got nice new tools to play with, others got straight upgrades (looking at Mirage). And still others got useless tweaks, like Banshee's Savage Silence. I can't see this augment being useful for even people who play stealth.

 

So I thought about how we could give Banshee a true sidegrade. After two minutes of standing around in the shower, I came up with this:

 

Sonic Shriek:
- Banshee stands in place and lets out a piercing shriek in front of her, visually represented by energy-colored distortion.
- This spell is a PBAoE cone that damages and staggers enemies in front of her during the cast, which takes a second or two to finish.
- After the spell finishes, enemies that are still alive are put into the "headache" animation that enemies do when they are stunned by Blind or Prism.
- Sonic Scream has a longer range than Sonic Boom, but it also has a narrower AoE. It has a bit of a slower startup animation than SB as well.
- For reference, see the Siren's scream from Killing Floor:

 

 

Though I am imagining a more mechanical-sounding screech rather than an organic scream to fit in with the rest of the WF abilities's sound design.

 

What this does for Banshee and her team:
- While SB knocks down enemies in a line, SS exposes them to headshots for Banshee and her teammates. It is slower to cast, but potentially more effective than SB in tight corridors or narrow spaces.

- In addition to the above, SS meshes a bit better with Sonar because it keeps enemies standing, thus better exposing the glowing weak spots. Again, the tradeoff is that SS keeps Banshee locked into place longer. It's a little less versatile and spammable than Sonic Boom, but it does a better job of locking down enemies for cooperative play.

 

I might have forgotten to list something important to the ability's design, so I may update this later. If you have any constructive criticism, please post. I'd like to see this ability refined with the help of the WF community so DE might take notice and ultimately add more true sidegrade augments to the game.

 

EDIT: Renamed "Sonic Shriek" because I feel it's more fitting for Banshee.

Edited October 25, 2014 by Noble_Cactus

[MechaKnight]

If I understood correctly, it's an alternative to using Sound Quake for a short quick burst. It's more focused, a bit quicker, and the energy cost is similar, but it's a narrow cone, not a radius. It's also more supportive in the sense of not having enemies stumble and fall randomly, so it helps your team aim. This comes at the cost of a slot so the advantages balance out.

 

This seems like a feasible option to implement. +1, good luck.

[Ryouhi]

Sounds like Valkyr's Paralys tbh^^'

Probably with more range in mind i guess?

[Noble_Cactus]

If I understood correctly, it's an alternative to using Sound Quake for a short quick burst. It's more focused, a bit quicker, and the energy cost is similar, but it's a narrow cone, not a radius. It's also more supportive in the sense of not having enemies stumble and fall randomly, so it helps your team aim. This comes at the cost of a slot so the advantages balance out.

 

This seems like a feasible option to implement. +1, good luck.

 

More or less. And yep, it was intended to help set up headshots for Banshee and her teammates.

 

Sounds like Valkyr's Paralys tbh^^'

Probably with more range in mind i guess?

 

More range, but only in one direction (in front of Banshee). Rough visual diagram:

 

O

^

^

^

X

 

O = Banshee

^ = Direction of shriek cone

X = Hapless Grineer Butcher

 

If I could enlarge the ^s, they'd get bigger the farther away they got from Banshee.

 

Thanks for the replies guys.

Edited October 25, 2014 by Noble_Cactus

[MechaTails]

Cripes, again? Would you guys please stop trying to buff shotguns already!? Theyre fine! :/

Lol jk

Sounds better as a new ability altogether, with new animation. Itd be weird to tweak a skill that comes from the hands and call it something that sounds like it comes from the mouth.

Sonic Scream sounds better, Sonic Shriek sounds more annoying than intimidating

[Noble_Cactus]

Cripes, again? Would you guys please stop trying to buff shotguns already!? Theyre fine! :/

Lol jk

Sounds better as a new ability altogether, with new animation. Itd be weird to tweak a skill that comes from the hands and call it something that sounds like it comes from the mouth.

Sonic Scream sounds better, Sonic Shriek sounds more annoying than intimidating

 

Heh ;)

 

Yeah, that's true. I guess what I was trying to do was come up with augments that drastically altered the base ability, though DE did say they were working on alt abilities at one point... Wonder what happened with that?

[MechaTails]

I asked semi-eloquently about new abilities in Design Council, but the post got quickly buried under 10 pages of whining about the 2 warframe slots that got removed. Try asking Lotus directly, it seems like an important enough question that she'd pass it along to devs

Oh yeah, and a mechanical/cyber vibe to the scream does sound cool, more to feed my head cannon about Banshee secretly being a Corpus mole :p

Edited November 1, 2014 by DarkTails

[OverlordMcGeek]

we need this bad. she needs some more loving

[MechaTails]

Someone suggested a similar augment for SB in DC. The augment would narrow the blast (maybe hit 2-3 enemies shoulder-to-shoulder) and have greater range along with more knockback.

 

More damage would be nice too since the beam is narrowed so much.

[Noble_Cactus]

Someone suggested a similar augment for SB in DC. The augment would narrow the blast (maybe hit 2-3 enemies shoulder-to-shoulder) and have greater range along with more knockback.

 

More damage would be nice too since the beam is narrowed so much.

Interesting. Well, I'll keep my eyes and ears open if I hear anything else from the DC on yon Internet.