Phorid's Indentity

[Shrak-aeon]

As we all know, the boss Phorid used to drop Argon Crystals for a while after U14 was kicked in. This was eventually patched and our beloved Charger-On-Steroids is once left as a Nyx blueprint hoarder. I have been thinking, and the Argon drops brought this idea to my mind.

 

Since Phorid will inevitably be reworked. *Old if not even placeholder model and all that.* Then why not do this?

 

Phorid could be more rare to appear (not insanely more rare, just a tiny bit more rare than what he is now.) And he could still drop Argon, the new design idea would kick in here. Give Phorid a -reason- to drop such a material, the image in my mind right now is of an Infested Mass that has grown around deposits of this crystallized substance, mutating the strain which it has developed from (perhaps?). This could also give more room for a bit of improvement on Phorid's boss arena. Instead of the typical room without the platform we'd be facing Vor or Kela on, we could have the "heart" of an asteroid, filed with seams of crystallized Argon, with Phorid "sitting" in the middle of it all, assimilating more of this substance to fuel it's mutation and progress, to help it unite more minds to the consciousness of the infestation. Imagine stepping into the described Argon filled room, a large crystal in the middle with the "fleshy" technocyte skin visible here and there. Once the Tenno approaches, some of the crystals fall off and reveal the Argon infused Phorid, who is rather pissed for the Tenno interrupting his healthy diet of crystals.

 

Phorid could then have a more diverse attack pattern, instead of the ordinary Charger melee and the spines. The monster could for example, slam the ground repeatedly (not too quickly though), causing tremors that would knock the tenno down and deal moderate or low amounts of damage. Another attack would perhaps be similiar to the spine-strike, yet it would fire shards of argon that have been altered by the infestation. These shards could perhaps remain on the ground and radiate energy that steadily damages nearby warframes until the shards would be destroyed.

A third option could be that Phorid would basically fixate onto a randomly chosen player and chase them down for a certain moment, if he manages to catch the unfortunate Tenno, he'd grab them and slam to the ground, bringing his fist/club/tentacle/claws? down onto the poor bugger and perhaps cause a proc of some sort.

He could also have moments such as Vor, where once he gets damaged enough, he retreats into a "shield" (or in this instance, compresses his body into a small protective shell). During this period, Phorid could spawn small swarms of tiny infested (Yes I am looking at the cute lil' guys the upcoming Diseased Ancients will be spawning) But instead of biting at you, these little fella's would instead explode once they'd latch onto you, and after a set amount of time. This would offer the Tenno the choices of either backing away or utilizing heavy area of effect damage upon the little swarms while Phorid slowly joins the fight again.

 

With this idea I'd imagine him to still remain as a sort of quadruped, but he'd use his arms as aid for locomotion in a similiar manner to the typical gorilla. Argon would cover his back, the outer surfaces of his limbs and his head, but leave his abdomen open for attack.

 

Once again, this kind of an idea could give him a reason to drop Argon, make it less of a headache to constantly try and farm it from the Corrupted. However, making Phorid's "spawnrate" a bit smaller (once more, not too much though!), would give the players a choice to either try get the Argon there and now by running missions in the void, OR wait for Phorid to start making noise on a node, waiting intently to munch on some foolish Tenno to pass by his lair.

[Morec0]

As the name Phorid is derived from a type of fly that infests ants to spawn (the Grineer being the race that is at least partially inspired by ants) I suggest that they make him a flying, fly-like creature that (similar to what you suggest) can spawn little guys whenever he kills a Grineer.

 

further info:

https://forums.warframe.com/index.php?/topic/318392-infestation-invasion-assassination-update-ideas-phorid-and-giardia-corpus-boss-replacement/

 

The idea of having Argon growing out of it never occurred to me, though. It's very interesting, though I still feel like a lore reason would be needed for it to show up on him regardless.

[Evanescent]

Me Like. +1.

[direcyphre]

Lore reasons would be nice, but it would be just as nice to be able to acquire other rare materials in other select places either way.

[Sasquatchias]

What about giving him the ability to teleport/create portals into/around the Void? The Infestation must have had some way to travel to-and-from the Void if they were as problematic as the Orokin claimed them to be. 

 

Perhaps the new Phorid could have the portal device the Grineer/Corpus use in the Gate Crash missions fused in it's body, with the Argon possibly powering it by channeling Void energy through the crystals.

[Shrak-aeon]

Hmm. A possible lore-reason for this concept could perhaps be somewhere along the lines of Sasquatch180's idea, it could be that one of the factions were trying to open a portal so they could pillage tech from the Void, and instead they opened a path to where Phorid is, causing the crystal infused creature to seize the opportunity and begin spreading the infestation through the portal?