A Random Tenno Looks At Mesa

[ViolaRecluse]

Be advised that I'm poor college student Tenno, and that all I'm saying are based off of Her Warframe Profile video, her codex entry in-game and what people have said on the forums.

 

So, 15.5.

Mesa

 

I've been seeing a lot of people talking dirt about Mesa on these here forums.

More so the grind then the actual frame.

 

So here's a brief step by step on how to obtain her:

1) Obtain the quest start from Lotus and initiate.

2) 1 Corpus Spy mission followed by 3 Infested Hive missions and an Infested Sabatoge with a mini-boss.

3) Obtain Mutalist Alad V Key blueprint.

4) Skim through Infested invasions. (Unrelated to the event)

5) Do missions that feature a Mutalist Alad V Nav coordinate as a reward. x3

6) That's good for one key. Fight Alad V for a Mesa part.

7) Repeat steps 4 through 6 until you receive all the parts

7.5) Collect materials. 

8) Build time: 3.5 days at the very minimum.

9) Enjoy.

 

Steps 1 through 3 are easy enough.

4 through 7 are the tricky parts.

 

Step 4 through 7 relies heavily on RNG.

There can only be so many invasions at once.

One in three chance you get an infestation outbreak.

One in six chance it has the Nav coordinate you need.

Another one in three chance that Alad V will drop the part you need. Minimum of three runs.

(let's be honest, no one's that lucky.)

All in all, you'll need to collect three Alad V keys,

9 Nav Coordinates

27 infested missions

at the very least

 

It doesn't help if these missions are defense or survival; if they show up at all.

These missions are in very high demand since it's fresh out of the update.

And knowing high demand invasions, it's likely plenty of players will be cut out by players with much better gear who can breeze through a defense or survival.

 

Even if it is Defense or Survival.

 

so it'll be at least a week and a half before you bring her home. (ohmy.jpg)

 

Fixing this isn't going to be easy. Ho boy.

 

To keep her rather infested origins intact, keep the initial quest the same.

Introduce the new infested units outside of the event, albeit rarer.

Have those drop the nav coordinates and increase the nav coordinates required per key by maybe one or two.

 

Let's say your clan split up into groups and coordinated in such a way that you have all the parts already.

First off, congrats; I've never seen a more well organized clan.

 

Some people are complaining that she's underwhelming for such a long grind.

 

Base stats:

HP: 125

Shields: 75

Armor: 65

Power: 100

Stamina: 8

(Codex Entry)

 

Light and squishy. Nothing to gawk at.

 

Abilities: (Ability behavior taken out of the profile and Monolakes' video. Because I'm a Poorframe.)

Warframe Profile:

Monolakes Mesa Gameplay: 

(I should trademark that. Poorframe...)

 

Ballistic Battery:

 

Brief animation plays to signify toggle. Another, even shorter animation, plays to signify the single shot with the damage buff.

There is a damage buff cap signified by a percentile, similar to Rhinos' iron skin.

 

There some talk about this one, saying there's no real use for this one other than the occasional eximus or heavy.

To be honest I agree. On higher tier missions, your gun should be enough to kill in a few shots. An insta-kill here and there really isn't worth it.

 

The Damage cap really isn't necessary. Sure you could argue that Mesa could generate enough damage to one shot a boss.

But there are no more bullet sponge bosses anymore. Most of the bosses that were remade are multi-staged bosses requiring precision and decision. They won't take any more damage than that particular stage allows them to. 

The bosses that haven't been reworked are being reworked; might as well farm while you can.

The only way I can think of this as game breaking is one-shotting Phorid.

All that does is make Nyx faster to get. And if you have Mesa, you most probably already have Nyx.

Pretty sure he's gonna reworked as well.

 

It should also be a seamless activation like most other Warframes' first abilities. Everyone knows standing completely still for any amount of time is bad, especially a professional gunslinger like Mesa.

 

Oh wait...

 

Shooting Gallery:

 

Generates an orbiting ball of energy that buffs damage to the Warframe, Cycling periodically between your squad members.

It periodically spits out 1 to 6 energy balls that jam enemy weaponry.

Does not seem to target enemies whose guns were already jammed.

 

Again with RNG. It's unreliable at best simply because it will switch between allies at any moment. It's great for solo, but in a party it's undependable.

Gun jamming is great, but its' sporadic as well and cannot be targeted.

 

A fix can be targeted applications, not unlike many of the first ability augments that cast an element to an ally.

Gun jamming can be have a faster recharge, as many times you're facing a platoon of enemies much greater than six.

 

Shatter Shields:

 

Reduces and reflects incoming damage and diverts enemy projectiles towards enemies.

 

Copy of Zephyrs Turbulence. Diverting enemy projectiles has yet to be seen.

 

Honestly it'd be much cooler if she stood still and shot the bullets and/or missiles out of the air.

 

Speaking of which...

 

Peacemaker:

 

Become stationary and switch to Dual Regulators (Part of Mesa).

Every mouse click prompts a lightning reflex and a two shots that automatically and randomly aims at any one or two enemies that can be shot.

Any enemy regardless of range.

Concentrated fire (both shots at a single target) does not seem to do any additional damage.

You still take damage while making peace. Heh.

 

As always, pure damage Ults falter on higher end missions, not to mention RNG is shooting at the enemy.

Like prioritizing that guy hiding behind a box way back where when there's three heavy gunners RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU.

However, firing speed seems to be only limited by how fast your trigger-finger is and while there's a constant energy drain, firing bullets in rapid succession don't drain any additional energy.

 

A widely suggested fix is to change auto-aim and restrict it to the players current field of view. That way there's concentrated fire in the desired direction.

 

 

All in all pretty underwhelming. There's good reason that people are buying her with plat instead of grinding for her.

Even then I think they're slightly disappointed by her abilities.

 

And now, the moment you've all been waiting for... (not really)

 

MY PERSONAL REWORK

(spoilers because no one's interested.)

(or are you?)

 

I like her stats. Maybe a slight buff to shields but largely keep them the same.

 

Change her abilities.

 

Remove the damage cap and casting animation on the first ability. There's no sense in either of those being there.

 

Change the second ability to a toggle. You switch to your Regulators and your bullets will deal not damage, but status effects.

If an ally is shot, they will receive the damage boost. Time limited, but extendable with additional rounds.

Shooting an enemy will jam their guns. A second shot will stagger them, extending their time out of commission.

Shooting infested would probably handicap them, dropping their movement speed like a rock and diluting their aura if applicable.

Every shot would drain a small amount of energy.

 

Merge the third and fourth ability together and replace third ability with a reload and weapon switch speed buff.

Or something along those lines I don't know.

 

Peace maker would now draw from enemies view-able from the players FoV. It would remain largely the same, but now holding down the aim button would make Mesa automatically shoot down enemy bullets and projectiles.

She won't be able to fire offensively and energy would be drained much more quickly, but it will effectively remove damage within a specific range around her.

 

That there is a real gunslinger. Relying on her guns to get her out of a firefight. Adds a tremendous amount of end game viability as well as a variety of other mods to add then just Damage mods.

 

tl;dr 

Her grind is way too long and she won't last long past Phobos enemy level-wise.

 

Correct me if (and when) I'm wrong.

I'll fix it if I'm not too busy on homework.

 

And another few things,

-There's not enough argon to go around, but EVERYTHING NEEDS ARGON.

-30 minutes on Eris? Man, NO ONE can solo that. What happened to solo friendly content? 

-You expect me to scan 30 of those tiny rat maggots? I can barely aim my gun, much less a scanner.

Edited November 29, 2014 by P1NK13P13

[Aver]

i agree with most of what you said, but mesa scales a lot better than most frames since she scales with gun damage, the highest damage available to us.

[Jugganatha]

Look at mesa...

[ViolaRecluse]

i agree with most of what you said, but mesa scales a lot better than most frames since she scales with gun damage, the highest damage available to us.

 

With which abilities? I am unaware of any damage scaling. Do tell.

[ViolaRecluse]

Bump because I'm productive when most normal people are sleeping and I kinda want people to see this :u

[RyouichiKitsune]

pink dude i dont heve own mesa yet ( helm and chassis) and i dont want her...im just doing it cuase i think the new boss is fun. if i get the parts cool...but i dont think ill be buying a slot for a damn near useless frame for a while..just my 2 cents

[Kaliphear]

With which abilities? I am unaware of any damage scaling. Do tell.

Mesa's Peacemaker supposedly (I have yet to actually confirm this in game because I am exceedingly lazy) does its damage via a weapon damage modifier. I'm not sure if it's exclusively scaled off your secondary, or if it scales off the damage of all your equipped weapons, or if it just scales off the damage of the weapon you have out when you transition, but testing will mete that out I'm sure.

 

Also worth noting a few things:

- Mesa's Shatter Shield has a base damage reduction of 80%, and scales up to a hard cap of 95% via power strength. It does actually reflect projectiles, but to the nearest enemy not necessarily to the place the shot originally came from.

- Mesa's Peacemaker has a firm range of 50 meters. Power range, positive or negative, has no effect on this ability whatsoever. In addition, it utilizes very "loose" line of sight mechanics, and will acquire almost as many targets you think it should miss as it does miss targets you think it should acquire. Also, the ability will automatically target Vor's stomach in the void, meaning you can stand in place and track him through his teleportation and still deal consistent damage (I do not know if the ability automatically targets an enemy's vital spot or not, I just know it works on Vor).

- Since Mesa's Ballistic Battery, Shatter Shield, and Peacemaker do not interact with Power Range at all, building Mesa should focus on maximizing Power Duration (for her Shatter Shield and Shooting Gallery), Power Efficiency, and Power Strength.

 

All in all she's very good when she has something like a Nova to slow down the enemy's advance or a Frost to give her a barricade to sit behind and set up her Peacemaker. Shooting Gallery is pretty unreliable on the whole, Ballistic Battery might have a use on bosses but requires too much setup otherwise, and she winds up leaning on her Peacemaker in the same way Ash leans on Bladestorm.

[.Czern]

Mesa's Peacemaker supposedly (I have yet to actually confirm this in game because I am exceedingly lazy) does its damage via a weapon damage modifier. I'm not sure if it's exclusively scaled off your secondary, or if it scales off the damage of all your equipped weapons, or if it just scales off the damage of the weapon you have out when you transition, but testing will mete that out I'm sure.

Even if it does, it scales very poorly because I see no difference in it's damage while using Marelok or Akmagnus. The only way to increase it's damage is building for power strength.

 

I'm pretty disappointed that 1st ability has a damage cap, I thought it would be an awesome skill to quickly kill high-lvl heavies but it works fine anyway. Over 20k damage headshot on lvl 30 Grineer Bombard is much more than enough :p

2nd ability is unreliable and isn't that helpful as you'd expect it to be.

While I like the 3rd ability, I must say that it's definitely overpowered, with 95% reduction you can stand in the middle of a big crowd for quite a long time. But without that Peacemaker would be too dangerous since it requires line of sight and doesn't outreach enemies. In my opinion Shatter Shield is fine as long you don't overuse it - being invulnerable gets boring really fast.

[(PSN)infernalrage]

I have Mesa, she's pretty strong. I wouldn't change her at all. She's fine. Apparently she's good with Frost and Limbo.