The Problem In The Damage Bonuses Table

[BrazilianJoe]

I have looked at all damage types and got to the conclusion that they are imbalanced. This  compounds to all other imbalances in the game. Some damages have few bonuses. Others have too powerful status procs. I started looking at Heat damage (because Ember).

One problem is: HEAT IS CRAP.

It is not the best damage type against ANY faction.

Outside the infested, the only bonus it has is 25% damage vs. cloned flesh (Grineer).

It was supposed to be good vs. infested, but it only has bonus damage to the enemies which use light armor. Those fast and numerous mobs which are easily dispatched anyway.

And it's outperformed by gas. Heat has +25% vs. Infested and +50% vs. Infested flesh.
Gas has +75% and +50% versus those two armor types.

The most dangerous enemies though, are the ones we concentrate to dispatch fast because they are the gravest threat. In that, Corrosive is king with +75% damage bonus.

So the player is better off going straight to Saryn vs. infested which has a Corrosive ult, and weapons doing gas/corrosive damage.

So, Heat, Gas and Corrosive should be rebalanced to make Heat the king vs. infested.

But we shouldn't stop there. If we take a look at the damage table as a whole, we can see it's imbalanced:

If we add all +damage with all -damage on all armor types, we see that:
a) Finisher damage get a +300% damage bonus. It's a special case, so we will ignore this outlier.
b) Some damage types get a total +100% damage bonus: Gas and Magnetic.
c) Some damage types get a total +50% damage bonus: Impact, Puncture, Slash, Electricity, Heat, Blast, Gas, Viral.
d) Some damage types get a total +25% damage bonus: Cold.
e) Some damage types get a total 0% damage bonus: Toxin and Radiation.

And there's also the status, which is an entirely other problem.

How can this be managed:

1) Rebalance the aggregate damage bonuses so that every damage type has the same amount in the end.
2) In a manner which can easily accommodate new factions.
3) Rebalance the status effects separately.

How to rebalance damage types:

I propose to use a simple rule: For every faction which can be played against in-game, each damage type will end up having up to +25% damage bonus. This bonus is not confined to be applied to that faction however.

So, currently we have 3 major enemy factions: Grineer, Corpus and Infested. Corrupted doesn't count because they use enemies from other factions. So each damage type would end up having a total 75% damage bonus scattered across all armor types. It doesn't matter how many -% it has, as long as the total sum ends up in +75% (in the current 3 factions scenario).

If another faction is introduced (Cephalon as enemies) they would come with 4 more armor types and the aggregate bonuses would be +100%.

DAMAGE REBALANCE:

What am I taking into account here?

1) Primary damage types would be clear-cut vs. each one of the 3 primary factions, with an aggregate 100% damage bonus vs. a single faction.
2) No damage type would do more than 100% aggregate damage bonus vs. a single faction.
3) All finisher damage was changed to be 100% damage bonus vs. all armor types.
4) Each armor type was looked individually for average damage, damage bonuses and damage maluses, so that they all fall into a similar distribution of bonuses and penalties across damage types.
5) Damage vs. each armor type at or below 300% but above 200%
6) Damage vs. each armor type with at least 50% damage reduction and at least 2 damage types having reductions.
7) Average damage (adding bonuses and maluses) of each armor type between 150% and 200%.


OLD VERSION KEPT FOR HISTORY:

Impact: remove -25% damage penalty vs. flesh. add -25% damage penalty vs. Sinew, add 25% damage bonus vs. Robotics.

Puncture: add 25% bonus vs. Cloned.

Slash: reduce Alloy penalty to -25%.

-----

Cold: Add 25% damage bonus vs. both Machine and Robotic. -25% damage vs. flesh. damage bonus to Sinew +50%. +25% bonus vs. Infested, bonus vs. Shields reduced to +25%.

Electricity: increase Robotic and Machinery damage to +75%, reduce damage vs. Sinew to -25%. Dmg malus to flesh -25%, dmg bonus to Proto shields +25%.

Heat: Add 50% damage vs. Fossil, reduce dmg. vs. infested flesh to 25%. Removed damage bonus vs. cloned flesh.

Toxin: Add 50% vs. cloned flesh, remove damage penalty to Fossil.

-----

Blast: Add 25% damage bonus vs. Flesh & Infested. Remove 75% damage vs. Machine, added 50% damage bonus vs. Alloy. Reduce bonus vs. Fossil to +25%. Remove malus vs. Ferrite.

Corrosive: -25% damage to Shields.

Gas: Reduce damage bonus vs. Infested to +50%. Add +25% damage bonus to shields and proto shields.

Magnetic: -25% damage vs. Ferrite, reduced alloy penalty to -25%, added -25% penalty to Sinew. 

Radiation: Damage penalty vs. Fossil reduced to -50% and to infested reduced to -25%, damage bonus to Alloy reduced to +25%, damage bonus to ferrite armor +25%, Damage bonus vs. Machine & Infested Flesh +25%.

Viral: Increase malus to Robotic to -25%. Add bonus vs. Sinew 75%. Only Phorid uses Sinew right now, but a health type bing underused is a different flaw. more enemies will come, and some of the current enemies could use Sinew. EXIMUS?

VERSION 2 integrating improvements from the comments:



Impact: remove -25% damage penalty vs. flesh. add -25% damage penalty vs. Sinew, add 25% damage bonus vs. Robotics.

Puncture: add 25% bonus vs. Cloned.

Slash: reduce Alloy penalty to -25%.

-----

Cold: Add 25% damage bonus vs. both Machine and Robotic. -25% damage vs. flesh. damage bonus to Sinew +50%. +25% bonus vs. Infested, bonus vs. Shields reduced to +25%.

Electricity: increase Robotic and Machinery damage to +75%, reduce damage vs. Sinew to -25%. Dmg malus to flesh -25%, dmg bonus to Proto shields +25%.

Heat: Add 50% damage vs. Fossil, reduce dmg. vs. infested flesh to 25%. Removed damage bonus vs. cloned flesh.

Toxin: Add 50% vs. cloned flesh, remove damage penalty to Fossil.

-----

Blast: Add 25% damage bonus vs. Flesh. Remove 75% damage vs. Machine, added 50% damage bonus vs. Alloy. Reduce bonus vs. Fossil to +25%. Remove malus vs. Ferrite. Added 25% bonus vs. Infested.

Corrosive: -25% damage to Shields.

Gas: Reduce damage bonus vs. Infested to +50%. Add +25% damage bonus to shields and proto shields.

Magnetic: -25% damage vs. Ferrite.

Radiation: Damage penalty vs. Fossil reduced to -50% and to infested reduced to -25%, damage bonus to Alloy reduced to +25%, damage bonus to ferrite armor +25%, Damage bonus vs. Machine +25%, damage to Infested Flesh +25%.

Viral: Increase malus to Robotic to -25%. Add bonus vs. Sinew 75%. Only Phorid uses Sinew right now, but a health type bing underused is a different flaw. more enemies will come, and some of the current enemies could use Sinew. EXIMUS?

Here's the link to the table which I used to help achieving these numbers, and is much easier to visualize the WHYs of some choices.

http://goo.gl/4LhS2O


NOTE #1: You may disagree about changes like damage to Sinew. My proposal is to have Infested Eximii units to have Sinew Armor, since only Phorid uses them. Please consider this change along with these numbers.

NOTE #2: The statuses and their effects are also in need of rebalancing, as some seem to be so much better than others. I have not tackled this facet of the problem, YET.

NOTE #3: Please be civil and make you suggestions/disagreements in a constructive manner, I want to improve on these changes. Feedback IS WELCOME.

SECOND PROBLEM:NOT ALL STATUSES ARE MADE EQUAL.

So we have this situation, where there are some status effects which are just so much better than others. It's another problem which compounds directly to the proposed balance above, and the majority of commentaries on this balancing proposal point to problems regarding to status.

So I will add this second problem here instead of another topic:

STATUS EFFECT REBALANCING.

We can see that as teh game evolved, the devs introduced more interesting effects. the problem is that those effect were SO INTERESTING AND POWERFUL that they superseded what came before.

Non-elemental damage: They are straightforward, old-fashioned and uninteresting. Mostly superseded by elemental damage.
Primary Elements: More powerful and interesting effects.
Secondary Elements. Like before, the Secondarie's statuses occasionally overshadow even the primary element effects.

My spreadsheet now has another table dealing with just the status problem.

Right off the bat, the worst offenders:
Impact is very weak, and superseded by Blast, better in every sense.
Puncture is so weak we don't even remember it exists.
Toxin, which is superseded by Gas

Other procs may be a matter of opinion, but I ma not too satisfied with some of them.
Magnetic does not seem too useful, since the enemy eventually recovers all its shields.
Viral kinda scales, kinda does not scale. Seems to have its proc swapped around with Toxin. Both can be reworked.


Players tend to gravitate towards the better CC in late game, so they will mostly bank after some AoE with can incapacitate enemies, i.e. stopping them from firing back. I am not sure giving AoE to everything would be the way to go though.

So I will post what I think could be some better balancing between statuses:

IMPACT: knocks the enemy's weapon from his hands, hurling it far away. Enemy stumbles to get the weapon from the ground. Has a chance to permanently break the weapon, causing the enemy to draw melee. Melee enemies will stumble as they were knocked off their air until they can recover and fight again. Enemy vulnerable to finishers.

PUNCTURE: Debilitates enemy. Enemy is unable to use powers (such as Ground Slam or hook) and Auras weaken. Enemy's accuracy is VASTLY reduced, and enemy stops after a few seconds to take breath around 5 times. Wears off eventually but should last more than 10 seconds.

SLASH: The sight of an ally vanishing away in a pool of blood has a chance to panic other enemies close by the bleeding one.

COLD: Keep basic effects as is. A double proc should increase the speed reduction to 75% and do a weaker area cold, reducing the enemies speed by 25% in the area. A third Cold proc would freeze the enemy for a few seconds and propagate a normal cold proc to enemies around. A fourth and subsequent proc would repeat the third proc's effect and reset the freeze duration.

ELECTRICITY: As is (AoE, damage and paralysis). Double proc paralyzes for longer.

HEAT: Not having the 'bypass armor' mechanics of slash and Toxin, it should cause the enemies to flail around every few seconds and tick longer. Robotic enemies shouldn't ignore the effect, since overheating can cause sensor malfunction.

TOXIN: Each proc removes 25% max health permanently. This value is affected by armor mitigation, thus a 50% damage reduction means only 12.5% of the max health is lost. Also gives enemy a temporary accuracy debuff. Stacks infinitely (but has diminshing returns).

BLAST: As is.

CORROSIVE: As is. Penalty stacks against weapon damage too, but temporarily. Every second, a tick removes 5% damage penalty.

GAS: Gas cloud prevents enemies from seeing clearly and breathing due to irritation. lens crystallization on robotic enemies will prevent proper operation. Enemies will draw melee when entering the cloud. Enemies will stumble after every attack. Status and critical chances inside the cloud are increased.

MAGNETIC: Deals an AoE debuff on enemy shields. Each proc makes the shields recharge 4x slower (stacks infinitely), shields will take 4x as long before they start recharging, and removes 25% of current shields. On bosses, the 4x slow recharge will start wearing off after a few seconds, 1x per second.

RADIATION: As is, but: Irradiated enemies should take and make more damage on enemies.

VIRAL: Enemy takes DoT on its health.
NEW MODEL:
Viral gets stronger by 5% per infected enemy in range.
Immune Response gets stronger by 10% on every tick, weakening Viral damage by a % equal to the accumulated Immune Response.
Reinfecting infected enemies reset immune system to 0% and adds the old damage to the new for the next tick.
If Viral damage is reduced to below 50, enemy's immune system clears the infection. (but can be infected again).

Single enemies take less damage, but grouped diseased enemies will make Viral damage more potent.



WHY THIS MODEL?
Warning: Number Soup!

Check my spreadsheet's 4th page for the nitty-gritty numbers.
http://goo.gl/4LhS2O

Let's compare to other DoT damages;
Slash: a 100 damage proc deals 700 damage over 7 ticks.
Fire: a 100 damage proc deals 700 damage over 7 ticks.
Toxin: a 100 damage proc deals 900 damage over 9 ticks.

Viral will have a tradeoff. Alone, it deals less damage and ends sooner.
But it has strength in numbers. Many Viral-infected enemies together will become a plague.

The formula is as follows:

Ptd = previous tick damage
Nie = Number of infected enemies in range around enemy
Ir = Immune response
Sp = Spread Power

Dmg = (Ptd + (Ptd * Nie * Sp) ) * (1 - (1*Ir)

Fixed values:
Ir = 0%, increases 5% per tick
Sp = 5%
Range = 10 meters radius

But it will get stronger by 5% per infected enemy around every tick (Spread Power).
The immune response will cut out a part of damage and gets stronger by 5% every turn.
Infection ceases if the would-be damage is less than 50 (the tick expires before the <50 damage takes effect).

A 100 damage Viral following this model, in a lonely enemy, will deal 411 damage over 5 ticks. Kinda weaksauce.

But when there are more infected enemies around, the damage will scale.

Considering all enemies being infected at the same time, and never getting too far: (best case scenario):
2 enemies = 504 damage over 6 ticks
3 enemies = 614 damage over 7 ticks
4 enemies = 745 damage over 8 ticks
5 enemies = 905 damage over 9 ticks

In the best case scenario, it would take 5 tight-packed enemies for the disease to reach the same power as Toxin, which deals the most DoT among traditional damage types.

Design decisions:

Range should be fixed, if immune system reduces it, the disease will stop too abruptly.
Causing Viral to spread by proc would cause a geometric explosion of procs, CPU wouldn't handle, so instead we count neighboring infected and strengthen the disease, in a reverse-spread.
To save resources a single enemy won't stack procs, but re-procing the enemy adds to damage per tick and resets immune response to 0.

Balancing it out:
Spread Power at 5% may end up being too strong. It can be reduced to 4% or 3% for a gentler curve and still be powerful. Anything lower than that would seem too weak though.

Pseudocode:


Viral_tick (enemy) {
nie = get_number_of_viral_infected_enemies_in_range_around_me(enemy);
enemy.procs.viral.damage += nie * 0.05 * enemy.procs.viral.damage ;
enemy.procs.viral.damage = enemy.procs.viral.damage * ( 1 - (1 * 0.05 * enemy.procs.viral.tick_count));

if (dmg > 50) {
enemy.apply_damage(enemy.procs.viral.damage);
enemy.procs.viral.tick_count++;
}else{
enemy.procs.viral.remove();
}
}


Viral_proc (dmg, enemy) {
if (! enemy.procs.viral) {
enemy.procs.add(viral);
enemy.procs.viral.damage = 0;
}
enemy.procs.viral.damage += dmg;
enemy.procs.viral.immune_response = 0;
enemy.procs.viral.tick_count = 0;
}

-----

This would strengthen all statuses for more similar power envelope on their debuffs.

As usual, if you think these ideas are UP or OP, feedback is welcome.

Please look at the damage bonus rebalance in conjunction with the new status effects.

Edited February 20, 2015 by BrazilianJoe

[Kaokasalis]

You do know that infested sinew is only used by the Phorid right? Nor should radiation have bonus damage against ferrite armor.

 

While i do agree heat could be more effective against the infested, the changes you have posted here however would solve nothing else.

Edited January 23, 2015 by Ory_Hara

[HibikiGanaha]

You didn't take procs or spawn rates of different unit types into consideration with your numbers.

 

Heat proc is amazing.  6 seconds of the dude holding his face with damage over time.

 

Lots of oversight without taking the proc into account, you can't just look at the numbers.

 

One example is how radiation does -75% to infested.  Reason is the proc makes them fight each other since they are mostly melee.

[Tsukinoki]

I disagree about quite a few of your changes but 3 really stand out:
-Making radiation deal bonus damage to ferrite armor.
Sorry, but right now against Grineer you have to choose: Do I use radiation and deal ok damage against the rest of the grineer but great against the heavies, or do I use corrosive and deal great damage to most of the grineer but only ok damage against the heavies?
And that is a good thing.
With your change it would "Only bring radiation against grineer since it would be great against everything!" and there would be no point to bringing corrosive, unless you couldn't make radiation.

-The viral bonus to sinew:
It would be a completely pointless change.
Only phorrid uses sinew.
So you would make viral good against 1 unit in an entire faction...and it would still be pointless against literally every other infested and would be worst to slot in than heat.
Change for the sake of change is useless.

-Your list of changes to blast
Doing that would make blast one of the best elements in the game if you have a decent proc chance.
Being able to spam permanent knock downs to enemies WHILE dealing 75% bonus damage against grineer heavies?
Sorry but that is way to powerful.
You cant just look at the numbers and go "this damage type is weak...."
You have to take into account what happens when it procs.

And blast procs with a small AOE knockdown.
Having anywhere near a 75% bonus against heavies would be complete over kill.

The 75% bonus against machinery (latchers, rollers and regulators) doesn't matter that much and is balanced as it cant knock them down (and they have low hp anyways).
Putting that bonus against heavies (like bombards and napalms) is just insane.

You need to take into account what the different procs can do and consider that that is used to determine how their damage is balanced against each other.

[BrazilianJoe]

You do know that infested sinew is only used by the Phorid right? Nor should radiation have bonus damage against ferrite armor.

 

While i do agree heat could be more effective against the infested, the changes you have posted here however would solve nothing else.

 

That's another imbalance. How many enemies use each armor type? 

 

ANOTHER part of the equation. See, when you fix one part, you have to see what ties into that. 

 

But yes I am aware of that, and it's a waste. Sinew should exist in other enemies.

[BrazilianJoe]

I disagree about quite a few of your changes but 3 really stand out:

-Making radiation deal bonus damage to ferrite armor.

Sorry, but right now against Grineer you have to choose: Do I use radiation and deal ok damage against the rest of the grineer but great against the heavies, or do I use corrosive and deal great damage to most of the grineer but only ok damage against the heavies?

And that is a good thing.

With your change it would "Only bring radiation against grineer since it would be great against everything!" and there would be no point to bringing corrosive, unless you couldn't make radiation.

-The viral bonus to sinew:

It would be a completely pointless change.

Only phorrid uses sinew.

So you would make viral good against 1 unit in an entire faction...and it would still be pointless against literally every other infested and would be worst to slot in than heat.

Change for the sake of change is useless.

-Your list of changes to blast

Doing that would make blast one of the best elements in the game if you have a decent proc chance.

Being able to spam permanent knock downs to enemies WHILE dealing 75% bonus damage against grineer heavies?

Sorry but that is way to powerful.

You cant just look at the numbers and go "this damage type is weak...."

You have to take into account what happens when it procs.

And blast procs with a small AOE knockdown.

Having anywhere near a 75% bonus against heavies would be complete over kill.

The 75% bonus against machinery (latchers, rollers and regulators) doesn't matter that much and is balanced as it cant knock them down (and they have low hp anyways).

Putting that bonus against heavies (like bombards and napalms) is just insane.

You need to take into account what the different procs can do and consider that that is used to determine how their damage is balanced against each other.

 

 

This was just an initial iteration, I will check this and see what I can change. 

[Kruglov]

Ember has been reworked an I think that ability-wise, she is in a nice place

 

"Reworked"

 

She's in the same place she was before but now with 18% more health, and now requires more energy to use World on Fire which still functions the same crappy way it always did.

 

Fire Blast now has a ring of expanding fire that misses half the enemies nearby because small rocks or hip-high walls blocked it.

 

She is not in a nice place.

Edited January 23, 2015 by Kruglov

[BrazilianJoe]

She also moves faster.

And WoF instantly blasts up to 5 enemies in range at casting time. 

 

If Heat wasn't so crap at dealing damage she would be much more well-regarded. I am trying to divide the problems so solve them. 

 

Can't tackle everything at once. 

 

My point is: She has been buffed, and other parts of the game needs to be rebalanced as well. I think it is more productive to leave her as is, and rework damage balance. If she is still weak after that, then tinker with her again. Ember is not hte subject of this thread, I am talking about damage types here. Ember is just the jumping point which prompted me to look at it. 

[BrazilianJoe]

SECOND VERSION: 

Reduced blast damage to alloy to +50%. added +25% damage to Infested to compensate. This addresses the 'Blast OP vs. Alloy / Grineer heavies'). 

 

Reduced Radiation damage vs. Alloy to +25%, added +25% damage to Infested Flesh to compensate. So the player can choose between a 75% corrosive against Ferrite, or 3x 25% against different Grineer armor types. 

Edited January 23, 2015 by BrazilianJoe

[Dillon_J]

Ember's powers are good now but thats not the concern. The concern is she is extremely fragile. I'd argue the most fragile frame in game. In T4 getting shot fo even a second is a death sentence and trying to revive anyone with enemies nearby gurantees death. This is with max vitality and redirection. Ember shouldnt be getting killed by one burst of a dera.  And to say ember is meant for t4 is a stupid thing to say. Every frame should be useable everywhere or they should get a rework. Unless you are constantly spamming powers which isnt possible without support you will most likely die without hiding or always using cover.

[HibikiGanaha]

Just checked the wiki and heat is neutral or positive damage to everything in the game except proto shields.

 

The only units that use proto shields are corpus tech and sniper crewman, both of which are rare enemies.

 

Heat is essentially neutral or provides bonus damage to every enemy in the game.

[Ryjeon]

Heat damage is fine. Especially when multiplied by Accelerant. It may not have an innate massive 75% damage boost versus anything but neither does it have any damage reductions versus anything except proto shields which only a few Corprus enemies possess. And it has a decent 25% damage increase against the flesh of all four factions making it a reliable decent all-arounder damage type which is perfect for Ember.

 

On top of that it is one of the most powerful status procs in the game combining a stun and damage over time in one. And it pairs nicely with Viral and Corrosive damage which are two of the best late-game damage types with status procs that increase heat's damage effectiveness even more.

Edited January 23, 2015 by Ryjeon

[Tsukinoki]

@HibikiGanaha
One small correction: nullifiers also use proto shields.
But with their bubbles its mostly a moot point.
And they have low enough shield and HP values once you get past their bubbles that it doesn't matter that it has a malus, it'll kill them regardless.

[BrazilianJoe]

Heat damage is fine. Especially when multiplied by Accelerant. It may not have an innate massive 75% damage boost versus anything but neither does it have any damage reductions versus anything except proto shields which only a few Corprus enemies possess. And it has a decent 25% damage increase against the flesh of all four factions making it a reliable decent all-arounder damage type which is perfect for Ember.

 

On top of that it is also one of the most powerful status procs in the game combining a stun and damage over time in one. And it pairs nicely with Viral and Corrosive damage which are two of the best late-game damage types that increases heat's damage effectiveness even more.

 

But there is a bit of a flawed logic in your argument.

 

Ember shouldn't require accelerant to be good. Heat damage is not exclusive to her abilities. But she banks on it, and according to lore she should munch infested on breakfast, sho it should be very good against them. But Gas does everything that Heat can do, but better. So that's inconsistent. 

 

 

Your statement that Heat does one of the best procs exposes another problem: Status effects are imbalanced. Which IMO is another thing which should be addressed. Every single status effect should be interesting and worth pursuing. If one overshadows the others, we have a balancing problem. 

 

Status effects are a different problem, and I intend to address it in time. 

Edited January 23, 2015 by BrazilianJoe

[Thelonious]

Heat is essentially neutral or provides bonus damage to every enemy in the game.

 

In theory yes. 

In practice, not that much:

 - the 25% bonus damage against grineer is highly mitigated by their armor. And what's not armored dies too fast for it to make any difference.

 - the 25% bonus damage against corpus is highly mitigated by their huge amounts of shield. You're better off just dealing cold damage, you'd get faster ttk.

 - the 25% bonus damage against light infested is ok. But again they die too fast for it to make any difference.

 

It's not that Fire is bad, it's just that everything else is a better choice. Except electricity (poor, poor Volt...). And Gas. 

Yeah the procs are fine (and fun!), but for 95% of the weapons in the game, procs are way too RNG-dependant to be reliable.

That's really not something I would take into account. 

 

It's not just Ember, all Elemental frames suffered a lot from Damage 2.0.

Saryn got reworked to include more combined-elemental damage, but the 3 others are not really "damage-oriented frames" anymore.

Fortunately, Volt and Frost also bring a lot of utility to the team, you don't pick them for the damage.

Ember, not so much :/

[MonkeyWaffles]

convert some of ember's damage to explosive since most of her skills go boom anyways (plus we don't have an explosive type warframe, while saryn is at least two dmg types, poison and corrosive). include guaranteed explosive proc to WoF.

 

suddenly, ember is much better!

[BrazilianJoe]

THIRD VERSION: 

 

Added a rework of the Status effects so that they have nicer effects with a more similar power envelope.

[Ryjeon]

But there is a bit of a flawed logic in your argument.

 

Ember shouldn't require accelerant to be good. Heat damage is not exclusive to her abilities. But she banks on it, and according to lore she should munch infested on breakfast, sho it should be very good against them. But Gas does everything that Heat can do, but better. So that's inconsistent. 

 

 

Your statement that Heat does one of the best procs exposes another problem: Status effects are imbalanced. Which IMO is another thing which should be addressed. Every single status effect should be interesting and worth pursuing. If one overshadows the others, we have a balancing problem. 

 

Status effects are a different problem, and I intend to address it in time. 

 

 

My logic is simply this: Heat is functional as an all-rounder damage type. Gas is a specialized damage type as are most combined damage types. Ember doesn't need to specialize against one faction because Accelerant allows her to mutliply her damage against all of them equally well. For frames who are not Ember Heat pairs well with other damage types that are specialized (corrosive,viral,magnetic) without suffering damage diminishment, while at the same time adding a significant damage over time and crowd control effect. That DoT effect means that Heat does bonus damage to everything.

 

As for Ember she is provided with a tool that can multiply this heat damage up to 7 times. Allowing her to boost her own heat arsenal without having to rely on damage buff frames like Nova or Banshee though she benefits from them too. I've taken Ember up to level 100 heavy gunners and torn them to pieces with crit-Heat dual cleavers and no other damage-buffing frames. And I've done so quite safely thanks to the crowd-control of Accelerant, and the panic-effect of the heat proc. I didn't even use World on Fire but with the rework I would now add it to my attacks increasing my overall damage all the more, and all of it Heat.

 

Heat is possibly the most universal and versatile damage type in the game.  Without the Accelerant buff Heat quite naturally falls behind the combined types because singular elements cannot reach the same modded damage on weapons. Though of the singular elements Heat has the highest potential with extra special mods like Blaze, Wildfire, and now Primed Heated Charge. Nevertheless Ember is equipped with a tool to multiply this Heat damage to levels rivaling and surpassing combined elements even against their specialized targets. Ember's Accelerant mechanic is part of her strength. It's not a setback. Saying she shouldn't require Accelerant to be good is like saying Rhino shouldn't require Iron Skin or Nova shouldn't require M Prime. It's her signature feature that most sets her apart.

Edited January 24, 2015 by Ryjeon

[MechaKnight]

My logic is simply this: Heat is functional as an all-rounder damage type. Gas is a specialized damage type as are most combined damage types. Ember doesn't need to specialize against one faction because Accelerant allows her to mutliply her damage against all of them equally well. For frames who are not Ember Heat pairs well with other damage types that are specialized (corrosive,viral,magnetic) without suffering damage diminishment, while at the same time adding a significant damage over time and crowd control effect. That DoT effect means that Heat does bonus damage to everything.

 

As for Ember she is provided with a tool that can multiply this heat damage up to 7 times. Allowing her to boost her own heat arsenal without having to rely on damage buff frames like Nova or Banshee though she benefits from them too. I've taken Ember up to level 100 heavy gunners and torn them to pieces with crit-Heat dual cleavers and no other damage-buffing frames. And I've done so quite safely thanks to the crowd-control of Accelerant, and the panic-effect of the heat proc. I didn't even use World on Fire but with the rework I would now add it to my attacks increasing my overall damage all the more, and all of it Heat.

 

Heat is possibly the most universal and versatile damage type in the game.  Without the Accelerant buff Heat quite naturally falls behind the combined types because singular elements cannot reach the same modded damage on weapons. Though of the singular elements Heat has the highest potential with extra special mods like Blaze, Wildfire, and now Primed Heated Charge. Nevertheless Ember is equipped with a tool to multiply this Heat damage to levels rivaling and surpassing combined elements even against their specialized targets. Ember's Accelerant mechanic is part of her strength. It's not a setback. Saying she shouldn't require Accelerant to be good is like saying Rhino shouldn't require Iron Skin or Nova shouldn't require M Prime. It's her signature feature that most sets her apart.

In summary, heat isn't strong but it's generalized enough to have a damage bonus against everything. Its status can also crowd control and inflict damage over time, making it the single most versatile element to deal every generic effect we like in a damage type--instant damage, damage over time, and stun.

 

What bad there is for heat damage's bonus multipliers, Ember compensates by stacking tons of heat damage with Accelerant buffing. At least fire is always good in a general sense against most enemies we care about. Mag and Volt have it rough in void since Bombards and Lancers are heavily resistant to their elements via their alloy armor. Since grineer are the most durable enemy in the game, the effective use of these two warframes heavily relies on the use of Corrosive Projection.

 

Still, the trouble is that Ember isn't dealing damage to defensive components, only health. She has no bonuses until she gets past armor or shields for the factions which have them. Perhaps if her status rate were increased, she could serve as continuous damage and stun. What if Accelerant increased status duration of fire?

Edited January 24, 2015 by MechaKnight

[Azawarau]

Hey OP

 

I liked that part where you said fire damage isnt lowered by many things

 

OH WAIT-

[Ryjeon]

In summary, heat isn't strong but it's generalized enough to have a damage bonus against everything. Its status can also crowd control and inflict damage over time, making it the single most versatile element to deal every generic effect we like in a damage type--instant damage, damage over time, and stun.

 

What bad there is for heat damage's bonus multipliers, Ember compensates by stacking tons of heat damage with Accelerant buffing. At least fire is always good in a general sense against most enemies we care about. Mag and Volt have it rough in void since Bombards and Lancers are heavily resistant to their elements via their alloy armor. Since grineer are the most durable enemy in the game, the effective use of these two warframes heavily relies on the use of Corrosive Projection.

 

Still, the trouble is that Ember isn't dealing damage to defensive components, only health. She has no bonuses until she gets past armor or shields for the factions which have them. Perhaps if her status rate were increased, she could serve as continuous damage and stun. What if Accelerant increased status duration of fire?

 

Her drawbacks are pretty much the same as every other warframe. She requires planning on the part of the player and the team to overcome rapidly scaling health and armor pools. Even without Ember a team should be stacking Corrosive Projections or a means to readily degrade enemy armor. And after that they should have some source of Viral damage to halve the hp pools. Without these tools every non-finisher damage type eventually suffers. If the team doesn't have corrosive projections I use a corrosive/heat Serro, along with a viral/heat sentinel and side-arm. With this set-up matches rarely go long enough for my damage to start falling off significantly, which is about an hour into a T1 survival.

 

As for her status rates she has been recently buffed so that her ultimately has a highly increased status rate. Between that and Accelerant it's fairly easy to keep a room on stun lock-down. So I think her burning damage and status application is in a good place. Although I would like to see some form of "Melt Armor" applied to her kit perhaps via Fire Blast applied if enemy is affect by Accelerant. But on the other hand if she could do everything herself then she wouldn't need teammates. So I think her drawbacks might not be a bad thing from a balance standpoint.

Edited January 24, 2015 by Ryjeon

[BrazilianJoe]

Again, this post is NOT ABOUT EMBER. Her heat damage was merely the seed of this study. 

 

It's about DAMAGE TYPES NOT BEING EQUAL.

 

They don't stack bonuses equally against different health/armor types, and they don't have similar procs. 

 

I have complemented OP to present rebalanced damage bonuses against different health/armor, and suggested new/improved effects for status procs, so that they are more or less in the same power envelope. 

 

Updated OP with a model for a Viral proc spreading disease. 

[Ryjeon]

You specifically called out Heat as bad when it's one of the best. So I'm hesitant that your damage rebalancing would be much of an improvement on our current system. But for the most part your changes seem okay.  But I think Heat is a good model for balance and should not be altered in any way. It doesn't need bonuses to ancients because it already pairs well with Corrosive damage and having that extra damage vs infested flesh is still a nice perk in this kind of mix. Losing its bonuses versus cloned and corprus flesh would result in it becoming weaker versus other factions and right now it's in a good place as decent damage and cc versus all of the factions. Which is a nice change of pace considering so many other damage types are so specialized.

 

If anything Gas is a bad damage type because it only has a bonus vs an enemy that is easy to kill with other damage types and it has severe reductions versus common enemy types of other factions. It also uses up elements that are important for killing the priority targets of the faction it's supposed to be good at since you can't mix it with Corrosive or Blast to deal with Ancients.. So it's pretty much weak against all four factions.  I don't understand why its weak against grineer and corprus flesh since many of them aren't wearing rebreathers. I would think gas should do extra damage to them.

 

What I do agree with is that several status procs can serve to be more impactful. Taking Gas as an example its severe damage drawbacks could be made up for with a status proc more powerful than it's mini-aoe. Perhaps it could leave lingering gas clouds like the torid with a chance to lock humanoids up in a choking animation. Gas really should be a stronger version of Heat offering similar output vs all factions but with a strong area cc component. But it is significantly weaker in status proc and damage bonuses than other combined types like Corrosive, Radiation and Viral, and even Magnetic and Blast.

 

And I agree with you about the physical damage types needing rebalancing in both damage and status procs. Puncture proc is practically non-existent. And Impact damage really needs some love.

Edited January 27, 2015 by Ryjeon

[Astrotrap]

Presently, Gas is near-useless thanks to Toxic Ancients.

 

Heat is best for light Infested, but Corrosive is overall a superior choice for Infested.

 

Sorry, status weapons.