Ember Changes [Post 15.11.0 Megathread]

[(PSN)IkariWarrior83]

Forgive me for not reading the 30 pages of feedback, but I'll just chime in here and say that my biggest problem with Ember is that she's built like a support frame, but her abilities lean toward damage-dealing tank abilities. (the Glass cannon problem everyone has been mentioning)

 

I recommend buffing Ember's armor to at least equivalent to Oberon.  She needs something to fall back on when her energy is at zero.

 

Also: I agree with doing away with accelerant.  An ability to make your abilities more damaging (and doesn't help your allies unless they have fire damage or are playing ember, too) is redundant, flawed, and overall useless.

Edited January 30, 2015 by (PS4)IkariWarrior83

[Soul.Fire]

Forgive me for not reading the 30 pages of feedback, but I'll just chime in here and say that my biggest problem with Ember is that she's built like a support frame, but her abilities lean toward damage-dealing tank abilities. (the Glass cannon problem everyone has been mentioning)

 

I recommend buffing Ember's armor to at least equivalent to Oberon.  She needs something to fall back on when her energy is at zero.

 

Also: I agree with doing away with accelerant.  An ability to make your abilities more damaging (and doesn't help your allies unless they have fire damage or are playing ember, too) is redundant, flawed, and overall useless.

Yeah, the "armor buff" they gave her was a bit of a case of too little, too late, it really doesn't do an awful lot in the long run. I like your idea though, buffing her armor up to about Oberon's level, that would give her the survivability she so desperately needs. And Accelerant too me seems like a faux pass, one of those things you put in as sort of an afterthought because you went oh look, I need something here, well I'll just do this and call it good. I think her skills themselves need a slight damage increase, so she'd be on par with Oberon, since he's a caster but also can take a hit or two before falling over, her WoF needs to be given back the range, saturation and ability to hit multiple targets all at once or the same target over and over that it used to have, and if it's absolutely got to drain energy then it should cost less to cast and be a full toggle like Nyx's Absorb skill instead of having that horrendous duration cap. As it is now it doesn't make sense to have it as a toggle, and if you add duration to it you're sacrificing energy you currently need for Accelerant and are probably going to need later anyway.

Edited January 30, 2015 by Soul.Fire

[(PSN)IkariWarrior83]

Yeah, the "armor buff" they gave her was a bit of a case of too little, too late, it really doesn't do an awful lot in the long run. I like your idea though, buffing her armor up to about Oberon's level, that would give her the survivability she so desperately needs. And Accelerant too me seems like a faux pass, one of those things you put in as sort of an afterthought because you went oh look, I need something here, well I'll just do this and call it good. I think her skills themselves need a slight damage increase, so she'd be on par with Oberon, since he's a caster but also can take a hit or two before falling over, her WoF needs to be given back the range, saturation and ability to hit multiple targets all at once or the same target over and over that it used to have, and if it's absolutely got to drain energy then it should cost less to cast and be a full toggle like Nyx's Absorb skill instead of having that horrendous duration cap. As it is now it doesn't make sense to have it as a toggle, and if you add duration to it you're sacrificing energy you currently need for Accelerant and are probably going to need later anyway.

Accelerant is ironically the thing holding Ember back.  Oberon's base armor is 100-something, and when he takes too many bumps, he can fall back on Renewal to restore his HP, especially if he's taken cover and his shields are simultaneously regenerating.  Ember has no such skill.  I haven't used her much, but I will say that every skill is a good damage-dealer EXCEPT accelerant.  Accelerant is a cancer on the frame for two reasons:

 

1) It's a band-aid for her powers' underwhelming strength

2) It ties the useful range of her powers to the range of accelerant

 

#2 especially is a bad thing.  In the case of Fire Storm, it's not so bad since the range of both seems to be about equivalent, but if I want to hurl fireballs across the room, their usefulness deminishes greatly the further away my targets are.  World on Fire (in my experience with other Ember players) follows the player around, such that casting accelerant and then running away from that location limits the usefulness of Ember's most powerful ability.

 

Sidenote: I was killed by Grineer Napalm...twice.  There is no reason for Ember to be taking Fire Procs...NONE.

[Soul.Fire]

Accelerant is ironically the thing holding Ember back.  Oberon's base armor is 100-something, and when he takes too many bumps, he can fall back on Renewal to restore his HP, especially if he's taken cover and his shields are simultaneously regenerating.  Ember has no such skill.  I haven't used her much, but I will say that every skill is a good damage-dealer EXCEPT accelerant.  Accelerant is a cancer on the frame for two reasons:

 

1) It's a band-aid for her powers' underwhelming strength

2) It ties the useful range of her powers to the range of accelerant

 

#2 especially is a bad thing.  In the case of Fire Storm, it's not so bad since the range of both seems to be about equivalent, but if I want to hurl fireballs across the room, their usefulness deminishes greatly the further away my targets are.  World on Fire (in my experience with other Ember players) follows the player around, such that casting accelerant and then running away from that location limits the usefulness of Ember's most powerful ability.

 

Sidenote: I was killed by Grineer Napalm...twice.  There is no reason for Ember to be taking Fire Procs...NONE.

You too with the "Ember who takes fire damage" problem huh? It's true, there's no reason at all that she should take fire damage, it makes no sense for a fire-based frame to take damage from her own element, but the minute she gets hit, no matter what it's with, it always procs, fire, poison, corrosive, whatever, it always procs. Oh and the slash, the slash is irritating too. A hot coal/ember shouldn't be that susceptible to slash damage. I get that fire is a bit of an overpowered element in and of itself and they had to do some scaling, but she's much much weaker than she has any business being right now. There will probably be no admission of it, but she's really badly broken.

I see no point for all of her skills to be so damned dependant on Accelerant, and it doesn't reach far enough to make it worth the waste in energy. WoF should be just what it says, World on Fire, not explosions of fire in some places that have a target limit and can't hit the same target more than two or three times. How about Sargus Ruk's final ability huh? That's some serious world on fire, all those massive gouts of flame that you can't see through and that you can't get away from no matter how high up on the map you are XD 

[Riot_Inducer]

You know what's funny about that statement though is that spamming any flashy skill on any frame is considered being bad and weak.

Tell that to the people defending Miasma's broken duration formula in the Saryn threads, they seem quite content killing any use 3 of their abilities have if they get to spam 4 to nuke things. 

[(PSN)IkariWarrior83]

I don't mind taking heat/fire damage, but a fire-based frame should not itself catch on fire.  It seriously irks me that she has Banshee/Nyx/Mag armor rating (maybe more after the buff, but not enough), but doesn't have the Shields of God that Mag has.  They built her to be on the front lines, she needs to be able to survive on them. Accelerant/raw damage isn't enough when you're being gunned down.  

 

Just about every frame has some way to get the heat off (no pun intended).  Not including their ults: Mag has pull, Excal has Radial blind, Saryn has molt, Oberon has Smite and renewal, even Nekros has Terrify.  SOMETHING to get enemies to give the player a breath of air, even for 1 or 2 seconds.  Ember has fireball, but that doesn't proc 100% like it should, and firestorm does nothing for enemies attacking from a distance, and I've found World on Fire to be inconsistent.

 

I built Ember out of boredom because I hadn't done Mirage or Limbo quests yet.  Glad I didn't farm for Ember prime or pay plat for her.  Everything she does is done better by other frames.

 

Edited for formatting.

Edited January 30, 2015 by (PS4)IkariWarrior83

[Soul.Fire]

I don't mind taking heat/fire damage, but a fire-based frame should not itself catch on fire.  It seriously irks me that she has Banshee/Nyx/Mag armor rating (maybe more after the buff, but not enough), but doesn't have the Shields of God that Mag has.  They built her to be on the front lines, she needs to be able to survive on them. Accelerant/raw damage isn't enough when you're being gunned down.  

 

Just about every frame has some way to get the heat off (no pun intended).  Not including their ults: Mag has pull, Excal has Radial blind, Saryn has molt, Oberon has Smite and renewal, even Nekros has Terrify.  SOMETHING to get enemies to give the player a breath of air, even for 1 or 2 seconds.  Ember has fireball, but that doesn't proc 100% like it should, and firestorm does nothing for enemies attacking from a distance, and I've found World on Fire to be inconsistent.

 

I built Ember out of boredom because I hadn't done Mirage or Limbo quests yet.  Glad I didn't farm for Ember prime or pay plat for her.  Everything she does is done better by other frames.

 

Edited for formatting.

All true and it certainly shouldn't be. The only one with comparatively abysmal defense is Nova, and at least her one good skill packs a pretty powerful wallop until you get a certain distance in T4 or on some high level planets. Ember however has more problems than she deserves, they tried to fix the CC with Fire Blast, the one my friends like to call Ring of Fire, but it's like Fire Ball and doesn't proc 100%, and it also tends to knock things away from the flames it creates, instead of lighting them up like candles. World on Fire used to be somewhat better, and a little more reliable, but I think it's become more buggy since the last update, altho I don't know, it could just be old bugs coming back up. I also just noticed earlier that PC gets updates a tad faster than PS4 and XB1. I'm thinking that you might have some unique difficulties there, some that maybe we don't have, but I could be wrong...

[Soul.Fire]

Tell that to the people defending Miasma's broken duration formula in the Saryn threads, they seem quite content killing any use 3 of their abilities have if they get to spam 4 to nuke things. 

Neh, that's them. I find it personally ok to spam any skill, whatever one you like is fine with me, but then that's because I'm also willing to try any frame once. I have Saryn, but I'm really not familiar with the most of her skills. I think she's severely underrated as a damage dealer, and especially as a melee damage dealer because of her ability to poison her melee weapon, but I rarely touch Miasma. I have noticed though that sometimes it lasts for a good long while and others it procs a bit, then kinda dissipates into thin air. The main thing I don't like about Ember is not so much the spamming of any one ability, it's the fact that all of her abilities are needlessly dependant on Accelerant, and it doesn't reach far enough to really be that useful to such a laughably squishy frame.

[Ryjeon]

Neh, that's them. I find it personally ok to spam any skill, whatever one you like is fine with me, but then that's because I'm also willing to try any frame once. I have Saryn, but I'm really not familiar with the most of her skills. I think she's severely underrated as a damage dealer, and especially as a melee damage dealer because of her ability to poison her melee weapon, but I rarely touch Miasma. I have noticed though that sometimes it lasts for a good long while and others it procs a bit, then kinda dissipates into thin air. The main thing I don't like about Ember is not so much the spamming of any one ability, it's the fact that all of her abilities are needlessly dependant on Accelerant, and it doesn't reach far enough to really be that useful to such a laughably squishy frame.

 

I just think that no amount of base damage buffing would make up for loosing the multiplicative heat boost you get out of Accelerant. And I also think losing the heat buff to weapons and to the sentinel would be a bummer. I think Accelerant makes her all around more versatile than just a caster frame. I specifically use Accelerant to buff heat damage on my melee weapon and to have an on-demand stun. I've only recently started adding WoF casts to my output. I think what Ember needs now is not more damage numbers but rather an Armor debuffing effect so she isn't so dependent Corrosive Projection.

 

But it seems people don't like the Accelerant mechanic. What would make Accelerant more satisfying to use?

Edited January 30, 2015 by Ryjeon

[Soul.Fire]

I just think that no amount of base damage buffing would make up for loosing the multiplicative heat boost you get out of Accelerant. And I also think losing the heat buff to weapons and to the sentinel would be a bummer. I think Accelerant makes her all around more versatile than just a caster frame. I specifically use Accelerant to buff heat damage on my melee weapon and to have an on-demand stun. I've only recently started adding WoF casts to my output. I think what Ember needs now is not more damage numbers but rather an Armor debuffing effect so she isn't so dependent Corrosive Projection.

 

But it seems people don't like the Accelerant mechanic. What would make Accelerant more satisfying to use?

The thing is, it's not a flat damage buff she needs but a scaling one, a percentage of damage, the more you put on a fire the more it burns, so the more you put in Ember's fire, so to speak, the more damage it should theoretically/technically do. WoF drains energy as it's being used, in addition to its activation cost, so that's the biggest problem there because stacking skills takes a lot of energy. Plus Ember doesn't carry the Accelerant around with her like an aura so far as I can tell, it's stationary so it hinges on things actually coming to it or you have to shoot from it. Only if she carried it with her could I see it being less useless, because it does WoF no good at all right now, it does a certain amount of good to Fire blast because that's stationary, but it's horrible if you'e primarily using Fire Ball because the farther that flies, the farther away from Accelerant it gets and that makes it do less in terms of damage and fire/heat procs.

[(PSN)IkariWarrior83]

It's my understanding that the way Accelerant currently works is to affect the enemies in range at time of casting, making it a VERY short term skill in terms of practicality.  If Accelerant were a toggle-able skill where "Enemies within X range of Ember take more fire damage while active" that would essentially make her a Tenno flame eximus.  Just so we're clear: I'm very okay with that.  They should do the same with Snow Globe on Frost, or (in the case of snow globe) make an augment for it.

[Soul.Fire]

It's my understanding that the way Accelerant currently works is to affect the enemies in range at time of casting, making it a VERY short term skill in terms of practicality.  If Accelerant were a toggle-able skill where "Enemies within X range of Ember take more fire damage while active" that would essentially make her a Tenno flame eximus.  Just so we're clear: I'm very okay with that.  They should do the same with Snow Globe on Frost, or (in the case of snow globe) make an augment for it.

Yeah, for Frost I would rather have it be an augment rather than a full-on change to the skill. For Ember though, that would be a pretty good idea. The problem I can see there right from the start though is that we would then effectively have two skills sucking away her energy for not enough return.

[(PSN)IkariWarrior83]

Yeah, for Frost I would rather have it be an augment rather than a full-on change to the skill. For Ember though, that would be a pretty good idea. The problem I can see there right from the start though is that we would then effectively have two skills sucking away her energy for not enough return.

To that end, I'd say the solution would be to make Ember's Flame Eximus ability a thing, and remove the constant drain on world on fire, and have it be affected purely by duration mods.  Putting a timer and energy drain on that skill is the exact debuff Ember did NOT need.

 

Ember needs no debuffs at all.  Once I get her to rank 30, I'm never gonna use her again until they fix all the problems that suck the fun out of using her.

[Soul.Fire]

To that end, I'd say the solution would be to make Ember's Flame Eximus ability a thing, and remove the constant drain on world on fire, and have it be affected purely by duration mods.  Putting a timer and energy drain on that skill is the exact debuff Ember did NOT need.

 

Ember needs no debuffs at all.  Once I get her to rank 30, I'm never gonna use her again until they fix all the problems that suck the fun out of using her.

Yeah, she didn't have that issue, but since the last update to her they put both, and it's really, really bad. She was one of my favorites, second only to Nova, but now I don't play her much anymore, it's just ridiculous how she works now. It's really nice to have WoF as a toggle because it is a seriously noisy skill to have running for 45 seconds or more, but they didn't do it right at all, if it absolutely must be a toggle they need to make it work like Nyx's Absorb, so that there's no duration cap except how much energy you have and costs half what it currently does to cast.

Edited January 30, 2015 by Soul.Fire

[(PSN)DontKnowMe]

Let WoF target more than 3 enemies at time.

[Soul.Fire]

Let WoF target more than 3 enemies at time.

Yeah that too, it also needs to be able to hit them repeatedly if there are only three in the room, assuming they are still standing after the initial three or four blasts. Which is very often the case with heavy gunners and bombards.

[geninrising]

Hmm rather than all these changes we have been asking for, would things be acceptable if we asked for a defensive buff up to the point of say Rhino so that Ember could viably be a front line damage frame? That way we could put in a Steel Fiber and be much more resilient but even if we focused pure damage then it would still be enough defense to help out with her MO of rush into the fray to apply dps. Whereas the other squishee glass cannons can apply dps from a more safe location and therefore are justified in their lower armor ratings.

 

I think that would go leagues farther to shore up her kits overall playstyle PRIOR to buffing something else. Don't get me wrong I feel like her skills need some more fine tuning but it still feels like she is meant to be a close combat frame without the statistics to back that playstyle.

 

So to summarize:

1. Armor buffed to 190 to ensure her close combat style is not detrimental to her overall survival.

2. Fix Fire Blast so enemies do not avoid the ring of fire(why should enemies avoid this 1 skill out of all skills in the game).

3. Remove WoF's duration entirely or give it a guaranteed blast proc on hit.

[RealPandemonium]

3. Remove WoF's duration entirely or give it a guaranteed blast proc on hit.

Put that on an augment if anything.  Knockdown on every hit feels like training wheels to me, especially given how much CC Ember has available.  Super-consistent abilities are boring in comparison; Ember is all about being close to danger all the time and having to keep yourself safe while killing efficiently so that it's possible to cover all openings without running out of energy in a compromising situation.  She can be cheesy with Accelerant spam and her high damage but she can't just afk-clear every mission; you actually have to play your frame to succeed.

[geninrising]

Put that on an augment if anything.  Knockdown on every hit feels like training wheels to me, especially given how much CC Ember has available.  Super-consistent abilities are boring in comparison; Ember is all about being close to danger all the time and having to keep yourself safe while killing efficiently so that it's possible to cover all openings without running out of energy in a compromising situation.  She can be cheesy with Accelerant spam and her high damage but she can't just afk-clear every mission; you actually have to play your frame to succeed.

The point in that blast proc was to actually give WoF a reason to be so damnably frustrating. Currently the skill literally has no reason to exist in it's current iteration. With the new prohibitive costs to operate I felt that if they wanted to continue in this vein of a more costly ultimate ability, they need to make it worth a players while to use it.

 

Currently it is not only more expensive than a majority of the ults, it is one of only two abilities in game that harshly penalize you for increasing duration while simultaneously NEEDING duration to be effective. The only other ult that utilizes these mechanics has an added effect at the end of it's use that helps to make the ult more worthwhile.

 

I was simply attempting to make it clear what they could do via one or both methods to further alleviate this matter and potentially quell the litany of complaints from we forum users.

 

On the matter of an augment I say give us an augment that returns WoF to it's former glory but in a small radius. Allow the Phoenix to rise again. In fact I can absolutely assure you that Ember players would cease to be problematic for the developers if they allowed us that one small victory.

Edited January 31, 2015 by geninrising

[Wuppa]

I agree with the removal of accelerant and it's replacement with Overheat. I've been pretty disappointed with the removal of overheat because it was the one move that would keep Ember alive during the earlier Waframe days. Bring back over heat and give it a power strength boost that the accelerant gave when active on enemies. Having to blow 50 power for every new wave of mobs just so that Ember's fire damage was viable is just ridiculous. No other warframe has to do that. Overheat with added dmg will allow Ember to be mobile with the increased damage to fire moves.

 

Another thing i feel that it needed would be the removal of the time on WoF. If you make it a togle ability, having to recast it when the timer goes out is just a waste of power. If you just keep it as a toggle, it'll be the player's choice to use the power or not (depending on power pool).

[Soul.Fire]

The point in that blast proc was to actually give WoF a reason to be so damnably frustrating. Currently the skill literally has no reason to exist in it's current iteration. With the new prohibitive costs to operate I felt that if they wanted to continue in this vein of a more costly ultimate ability, they need to make it worth a players while to use it.

 

Currently it is not only more expensive than a majority of the ults, it is one of only two abilities in game that harshly penalize you for increasing duration while simultaneously NEEDING duration to be effective. The only other ult that utilizes these mechanics has an added effect at the end of it's use that helps to make the ult more worthwhile.

 

I was simply attempting to make it clear what they could do via one or both methods to further alleviate this matter and potentially quell the litany of complaints from we forum users.

 

On the matter of an augment I say give us an augment that returns WoF to it's former glory but in a small radius. Allow the Phoenix to rise again. In fact I can absolutely assure you that Ember players would cease to be problematic for the developers if they allowed us that one small victory.

I think what they should do with WoF is make it work the same as Nyx's Absorb, so far as cost and duration are concerned, because while I hate the idiotically high cost, low damage and criminal duration cap of WoF, it's so noisy to run that I really like having it a toggle. But, the only way it was ever useful was when I could get 45 seconds easy out of it and it would hit either multiple enemies literally all over the map or it would hit the same 3 or 4 enemies over and over again when they survived. Even just taking out the idiotic caps where they aren't needed and the more penalty than return mechanic would be an improvement and would make me happy.

[Soul.Fire]

I agree with the removal of accelerant and it's replacement with Overheat. I've been pretty disappointed with the removal of overheat because it was the one move that would keep Ember alive during the earlier Waframe days. Bring back over heat and give it a power strength boost that the accelerant gave when active on enemies. Having to blow 50 power for every new wave of mobs just so that Ember's fire damage was viable is just ridiculous. No other warframe has to do that. Overheat with added dmg will allow Ember to be mobile with the increased damage to fire moves.

 

Another thing i feel that it needed would be the removal of the time on WoF. If you make it a togle ability, having to recast it when the timer goes out is just a waste of power. If you just keep it as a toggle, it'll be the player's choice to use the power or not (depending on power pool).

Yes to the Overheat. That is another thing that would solve a whole lot of our problems, get rid of the ridiculosity that is Accelerant and give us back the Overheat, that way Ember wouldn't be the damsel in distress frame she currently is, she'd actually have the survivability to do what she's supposed to, and her powers would likely do a decent amount of damage. Besides, Overheat was one of the greatest looking powers in the game, it made her look amazing on top of being a viable defense.

Wish I could +1 your post a dozen times, the time limit on WoF has got to go.

[RealPandemonium]

The point in that blast proc was to actually give WoF a reason to be so damnably frustrating. Currently the skill literally has no reason to exist in it's current iteration. With the new prohibitive costs to operate I felt that if they wanted to continue in this vein of a more costly ultimate ability, they need to make it worth a players while to use it.

They just need to *fix* the energy cost issue.  Make it 25 energy to activate like peacemaker and adjust the drain such that 10 second WoF costs 75 energy or something.  When you don't consider efficiency they current WoF is better than it's ever been (perhaps barring the pre-damage 1.0 Ember, which was either really cheesy or people have rose-colored glasses for it.)

[geninrising]

Quite frankly I'm beyond caring what they do on the ult as long as they make a change from how it is currently set up and continue to change it until we come to a point where the players do not feel as though we are being unjustly treated because of people abusing the energy loophole.

 

Also Fire Blast must have the AI interaction of avoiding the ring removed. The sheer fact that they avoid it is a form of prejudice towards the ability that makes no sense in a game where enemies will blindly run into a bastielle, vortex, or a myriad of other abilities and it flat out removes 50% of the reason you cast the skill to begin with. 

[(XBOX)LilHypezKiid]

I got an idea for accelerant, maybe it could turn armour target to flesh during the duration of the debuff. What do you think?