The Dilemma Of Daggers; Why They're The Least-Used Weapons

[Aktriaz]

Warframe has no idea what role it wants to give it's daggers.

 

You'd think dagger's would be used for higher DPS on single targets, no? They're slow, don't have damage to justify lack of speed, but have lots of dashes and spinning attacks in their stances, pushing towards crowd focus.

 

Well, no.

 

Daggers have momentum, meaning they are reduced to a walking pace when attacking. Plus, daggers have VERY short range, making chaining attacks between ranged enemies very difficult when paired with momentum and the slow speed of daggers.

 

Well how about finishers? A lot of games use daggers or similar weapons for their stealth take-downs, are they at least good at that?

 

(ﾉಥ益ಥ）ﾉ ┻━┻

No. They have among the lowest possible finisher damage of all weapons.

 

Please, someone give me some insight on what Daggers mean to DE. They clearly have no idea what to do with them.

 

If you were to ask me how I'd do daggers, here's what I'd do;

 

-I'd give all daggers increased speed. No dagger would have a lower speed than 1.0.

 

-I'd remove momentum from daggers, and make it so they do not stagger enemies on normal attacks.

 

-I'd leave the damage how it is, but give them variety; some would have higher status or crit potential.

 

-Tweak the stances to be easier to use with the increased speed (no button holds or pauses).

 

-FINISHER DAMAGE. At least enough so they rival heavy weapons.

 

This is just my view on what role daggers should fill. If you think you got a better idea, voice it. God knows daggers need some love.

Edited January 31, 2015 by Actriaz

[Vyrn]

They are all faster than you'd think, given the number. The listed attack speed is wonky and doesn't always correspond to actual attack speed.

 

Also, their damage really isn't bad, especially with Pointed Wind (those nasty damage modifiers).

 

All that said, I'd agree here. I think a boost to their finisher damage, crit chance, and crit damage would be welcome changes. Their status chance is probably fine as is, but maybe a forced Bleed proc on all finishers would be a welcome addition.

 

As for removing momentum and stagger potential from daggers...yes, actually. That would befit them far more.

[Paradoxbomb]

That momentum is what kills them for me more than anything. If I wanted to fly around the battlefield and hit hordes of enemies with a fury of long-range spin attacks, I'd use a heavy weapon like the Jat Kittag. Daggers just fling you all over the place, and thanks to their short range and quirky attack animations you end up flying around your targets more often than hitting them.

 

Overhaul dagger attack animations so that they're faster and way more controllable and they may actually serve some use as quick combo builders/heavy unit slaughterers. Better stealh/crit bonuses are also a welcome addition as well.

 

 

EDIT: Rather than just buffing attack rate directly, it would be neat if they incorporated more multi-strike hits into the attacks, kinda like the Fang daggers in Melee 1.0 (to my knowledge, the Homing Fang stance is the only way you can perform such attacks at present).

Edited February 1, 2015 by Paradoxbomb

[Rakshal]

These suggestions seems good to me.

Edited January 31, 2015 by Rakshal

[Lactamid]

Stealth-attack damage and ground attack damage (finisher?) should be higher imo, possibly with a forced proc as well. To me knives are oportunistic weapons that goes towards weakspot-hits.

Low dam, high speed with high status and crit. Mainly piercing, some slash, pretty much no impact. Impact-stun hits could be used in combos though, rouge foul play style. Blinding or crippling (slow) would work too.

Edit: i do miss a "grab and stab" option as well.

Edited February 1, 2015 by Lactamid

[xca0]

Dagger 2.0

[MEEBOSS]

They are all faster than you'd think, given the number. The listed attack speed is wonky and doesn't always correspond to actual attack speed.

The daggers are pretty fast.  I guess the OP does not really use them.  But like another post says, they are awkward at times.  I have at times found my self going in circles with a target I was trying to hit.  I swing, they swing, we both miss and do this over again 3 or 4 times.  I have to step back in order to re-target in order to actually get a good hit in.  What I should have been able to do was jab one under the rib cage or up through the jaw since I was so close.  No way I should be missing with such a short blade while being so close.

 

Oh and can we get the dual ether daggers back on PC?

Edited February 1, 2015 by MEEBOSS

[Aktriaz]

The daggers are pretty fast.  I guess the OP does not really use them.

I have Dark, Ceramic, Karyst and Sheev. I have used daggers, and they could and should be faster. (At least in my opinion. Am I wrong to think daggers and dual daggers should have the fastest attack speed in the game?)

 

As it is, their damage doesn't justify the speed, and they have no utility to compensate.

[Stratego89]

I agree with the ideas here. My main gripe is the lack of movement when using daggers. They also should strike quicker, it's a small knife! As for anything else I'll leave that up to DE and other players to decide, I'm not good at weapon balance probably. Sidenote: Same problem with shotguns, DE can't decide what their role in the game is/should be.

[ThePresident777]

I agree daggers make no sense in Warframe.  They really aught to be a lot faster.  Faster to swing and faster to sheath/unsheath.  Daggers are an extension of the hand and Space Ninja hands are fast..  But, DE prefers slow even if it's not Space Ninja.

 

Daggers are so messed up that their damage type doesn't match their design.  Slashing type daggers do mostly puncture damage.  Puncture type daggers do radiation and no puncture.  Etc.  It's not high quality.

 

Note:  It was pointed out to me that the swing speed is not really a swing speed.  it's a modifier on the stance speed.  https://forums.warframe.com/index.php?/topic/393518-overtake-was-a-lesson-in-swing-speed/#entry4343959

 

Also, since U14, there was something weird about melee weapons.  It seems to me that not all attacks in a weapon have the same speed.  A weapon can have different speeds between it's normal attack and it's spin attack, for example.  So, a  melee weapon with a slower swing speed weapon can have a faster spin attack than a melee weapon with a faster swing speed.  I guess that follows directly from swinf speed being a modifier on the animation speed.  Different attaks have different animations and different melee weapons have different animations.

 

So, it's all an unpredictable mess.

[420degreequicksopeswag]

Dont forget dual daggers.

 

As you said, buff finisher damage.

 

I also have a few ideas to bring to this table.

 

Allow use of secondary if using a dagger at the same time.

 

Bonus channeling damage?

 

innate 200% bonus counter chance?

 

Hold e to throw dagger, and run over to pick it up? (hold some daggers in reserve)

Edited February 1, 2015 by 420degreequicksopeswag

[Vargras]

Daggers are in the same situation as shotguns, really.

 

A very select few (Fang Prime, Karyst) can hold their own, and the rest are complete and utter trash that you should only ever use if you need the mastery.

[ARavenousPanda]

personally, id remove "finishers" in general and make a a new mechanic ,to be called for now, backstab. When attacking an enemy who cant see you or from behind, a weapon does backstab damage [basically a finisher, but higher potential for more frequency] daggers would have 3000% damage, heavies would have 2000% and everything else 1000% [unless we want to break them down further, into thrown long weapons and long swords]

 

this removes the annoying animations [where i could kill like 5 enemies in that time, but i cant and get noticed because of the animation and number of enemies] makes weapon type more relevant [huge potential for stealth 2.0] and imo is  nice QOL improvement.

 

i find another problem [whilst on the topic of stealth] is enemy ai, kinda defeating the purpose of stealth. makes daggers even worse.

coupled with your suggestion i feel that daggers would become usable

 

 

PS: thoughts on daggers primary role? short range DPS?

i feel weapon types should be tiered, i.e. Daggers high dps potential, primarily single target and ECQC [extreme close quarter combat]. similar for fists, but more cc and potential gap closing, less dps. Swords hit a midground of moderate dps, moderate reach, etc. they are the barline weapons of Warframe. whips have huge range, fast attacks low DPH and are more for movement and utility than damage, so usually higher status than crit [imo]. then we have staffs and polearms and scythes. Staffs should be more like the whips, fast and mobile, polearms the swords of long weapons and scythes the heavy hitting for polearms. heavy weapons should have highest DPH but relatively low DPS, due to multihit potential and one-shot-ability. thrown weapons are mostly fine where they are atm.

whilst this does ignore niche weapons, warframe really should have a baseline and weapon tier [mastery locked] for weapons, as it promotes "uprading" whilst keeping weapon types relevant. Imagine a dragon nikana variant for daggers, but following the aforementioned mechanics, so that weapon is reflective of playstyle and not over what does most damage the fastest.


PPS sorry for mega post

[nofo]

^ Good post.

[ARavenousPanda]

perhaps a 0.2 flat MS buff when wielding a dagger?

[Xana_Skullsunder]

perhaps a 0.2 flat MS buff when wielding a dagger?

 

Ah hell, why not? Still more logical than coptering.

[Vargras]

PS: thoughts on daggers primary role? short range DPS?

For a while, daggers were favored because they staggered on every hit, which meant items like Fang were a popular weapon choice. You could easily stunlock a Gunner while your buddies finished it off.

 

That's no longer the case, but I feel like daggers should be primarily designed and built around status chance and effects. It's a very common RPG archetype for the rogue, wielding their daggers, to employ all kinds of poisons and such against their enemies. This is something we sort of see with the Karyst already, which has toxin damage and a respectable 15% status chance at base level.

[Eric1738]

i think most of the time finisher multiplier is irrelevant. daggers are underused because they have poor dps, short range and no unique features. most of them are literally short "long sword". yet long sword has crimson dervish. daggers have nothing.

 

i actually think daggers could have innate finisher damage, so at least it ignores armor and shield.

Edited February 1, 2015 by Eric1738

[rockscl]

Make a dagger be the quick melee weapon, leave a real weapon for melee stance

[Otaiken]

Better, faster and deadlier finishers.

 

Move speed boost on equip.

 

% dodge chance while attacking.

 

100% proc chance hits in combos.

 

All of the above and daggers might have a chance. They'd still be a DPS weapon though and DPS melee is gimped in this game as you just eat way more damage to achieve the same result.

 

Also, remove the slowdown in combos. Why is it there? Why do BOTH stances have AoE slashes? For a weapon with negligible range! I tried it, you will NEVER hit the second infested behind the one you're currently attacking. You can always just hit one enemy around you.

Edited February 1, 2015 by LocoWithGun

[Inez]

I have Dark, Ceramic, Karyst and Sheev. I have used daggers, . . . . and they have no utility to compensate.

 

Except being the best coptering weapons in the game. In a game that favors speed and mobility.

 

Daggers are in the same situation as shotguns, really.

 

A very select few (Fang Prime, Karyst) can hold their own, and the rest are complete and utter trash that you should only ever use if you need the mastery.

 

Unless you value speed and mobility.

[BrazilianJoe]

I have been proposing that all melee weapons should have "Melee Time". It's liek a "Bullet Time", for melee weapons. 

 

An aura of slowness which would reduce the speed of enemies close to the player, with a falloff. 

 

Melee weapon speed would influence the strength of this aura. Daggers being the fastest, would have the strongest slowness. 

[gvidzix]

I have been using Karyst for the past three months, and I hardly switch to any other melee,

- fast enough to copter and take out heavy gunners (maybe not as fast as nikana, but fast enough).

- average damage, not low, but not high

- looks cool

 

But I will welcome dagger buffing with open arms, as atm Karyst is my favorite melee.

As it seems other daggers are really somewhere in forgotten corner.

Edited February 2, 2015 by gvidzix

[Feyangol]

I use my ceramic dagger really often only for the utility, because the most melee weapons aren't good for more than this utility ...

[-SLX-J3tAc3]

 

 

 

 

 

I agree daggers make no sense in Warframe.  They really aught to be a lot faster.  Faster to swing and faster to sheath/unsheath.  Daggers are an extension of the hand and Space Ninja hands are fast..  But, DE prefers slow even if it's not Space Ninja.

 

Daggers are so messed up that their damage type doesn't match their design.  Slashing type daggers do mostly puncture damage.  Puncture type daggers do radiation and no puncture.  Etc.  It's not high quality.

 

Note:  It was pointed out to me that the swing speed is not really a swing speed.  it's a modifier on the stance speed.  https://forums.warframe.com/index.php?/topic/393518-overtake-was-a-lesson-in-swing-speed/#entry4343959

 

Also, since U14, there was something weird about melee weapons.  It seems to me that not all attacks in a weapon have the same speed.  A weapon can have different speeds between it's normal attack and it's spin attack, for example.  So, a  melee weapon with a slower swing speed weapon can have a faster spin attack than a melee weapon with a faster swing speed.  I guess that follows directly from swinf speed being a modifier on the animation speed.  Different attaks have different animations and different melee weapons have different animations.

 

So, it's all an unpredictable mess.

^Truth here. However, the team will straighten this out in due time, I'm sure. Add another thing on the "to-do" list.

Edited February 2, 2015 by -SLX-J3tAc3