Can We Talk About Ember? Because I've Got A Bone To Pick With De Over Her Kit.

[piedol]

So it's been five months since this video came out:

 

 

I reference this video not because it summarizes my complaints neatly, and shows that she's been in her current state for some time. Since then, nothing has changed. Ember's still as sub-par as she was, and there's no word on whether this will change any time soon. Can we talk about that?

 

Personally, I got her by chance two weeks ago, having obtained all her prime parts without actually intending to, and deciding to build her and see what she was like, because as far as I'd understood at the time, being a relatively new player, she and Nova are the game's damage mages, with Nova being the glass cannon nuker, and Ember being the slightly more refined fire mage. Boy, was I in for a surprise.

 

Three of her abilities are centered around herself, meaning that if you want to do any meaningful damage, you need to be in the thick of things. Fine. I guess I'll play her as a battle-mage?

 

She's got no innate survivability mechanic save for a very brief stun on her 2, and a base armor of 125 (And that's with the Prime bonus), with average health and shields to boot. Looks like close range battle-mage is out the window there.

 

Only two of her skills scale with range, and these are her stun and ultimate. Now, this wouldn't be so bad, if it weren't for the fact that her 3, which has a static range, has SUCH a short radius that it's literally only useful against the Infested and melee enemies. The majority of enemies in the game, especially those in higher level content, are ranged. What good is a ring of fire with a chance to briefly make the enemy panic if, by the time they reach the point of being affected, they're already on top of you? And her ultimate? It does scale with range, but the issue here is the base range. 15 meters for an "ultimate" ability is just not acceptable, especially when you consider that it follows you around. So it's not like you can trap an area and leave enemies to funnel through it, taking damage along the way. No. You need to be in the thick of things, where you're most likely to get hurt, just so you won't waste the energy from casting this.

 

Some people might think that the Firequake augment makes this a bit more tolerable, as the cc can allow for some form of survivability through her ultimate that actually leaves it feeling useful in end-game content. But remember that an augment is supposed to change playstyles through a change in the ability, not be a necessity for it to be useable in the first place. In the case the augment is nothing but a crutch for a crippled skill.

 

And lastly, her ultimate is gated by FOUR mechanics: Duration, Strength, Range and Efficiency. For a skill that only offers flat damage and requires an augment for reliable CC (Meaning it does not scale into late game against enemies that aren't Infested), this is just overkill. You want to build for efficiency to keep the cost down? Hope you like spamming a skill with a 2 second cast time every ten seconds to keep it relevant. You want to build for decent duration so you can avoid all that re-casting? The cost just skyrocketed and now its range is below ten meters. You want to build strength to try and stay relevant for a bit longer in the game? Now you have to keep the duration low, because the cost is going bleed you dry keeping it on, and by lowering the duration to avoid this, you run into the previously mentioned issue with recasting. Because of this ability's design, you're largely forced to go with non-corrupt mods if you want it to not be bad beyond low level missions, meaning you can't specialize in any one area like every other Frame in the game is capable of doing.

 

Because of her ult's excessive number of power gates, her entire kit suffers when she tries to build around it, and when she doesn't, it leaves her feeling completely average in a game where everyone (Except Saryn, but let's leave that for another rant thread) can find some way to specialize their kit and playstyle to be useful in different mission types and against high-levelled content. In short; She's a caster frame that lacks damage, crowd control, survivability, and utility. She's more a Fool of all trades than a Jack of any, and she really needs some love to change that.

 

If you bothered to read all that, thanks. Am I right? Am I being  scrub and not seeing some hidden power in her design? Let me know, because I want to hear the community's opinion on my opinion.

Edited June 19, 2015 by piedol

[Azureorak]

I've always had the same thoughts on Ember being just too weak without some sort of survival skill. The removal of overheat in favor of accelerant is still a painful blow that's felt even to this day. I still remember the rage threads and all the complaints about it. Not to mention the amount of factors that go into her ultimate's scaling is absolutely criminal.

[TwelfthAngel]

Pretty sure they know all the frames still need a bit of an upgrade/polish but they sure ain't gonna be fast about it. 

"Hence why Excal, the oldest frame, just got a rework"

[UraLoop]

I might just be one of the few with this "unpopular" opinion but honestly I think Ember is fine. She is the mechanics-wise most OP frame, her damage is AMAZING (and she can buff Heat damage on her own weapons, or even add that to teammate weaponry), she has incredible bulk CC, and she barely ever gets hit with procs for Heat etcetera. Few frames can compare with how she just shakes out crowd control out of her sleeve with the mere press of 2, knocking them over with her 3 and getting them out of her sight, and her 1/4 constantly making enemies cringe from the heat. Too much people think of her as a pure Damage frame, too little as a CC/Burst hybrid. It's depressing to see my favourite frame get called bad over her "risky" (if you find stunlocking enemies risky) playstyle.

[Your_Very_Best_Friend]

Yeah, Zephyr, Ember, and Saryn all need to be noticed by DE. After Frost is reworked, I wanna see Ember and then Zephyr redone. (Possibly Zephyr first)

[Eminem2420]

I agree with you. I main Ember, and I think she fine the way she is.

[GreyEnneract]

Relying heavily on all 4 power mods destroys her viability.

[VKhaun]

I think her damage (including Accelerant debuff) is much better than people give her credit for and a lot of her "problems" stem from people trying to min-max her and being buried in drawbacks and compensation mods. If you just get enough damage to burn down trash and bring a gun to drop heavies she playes very well.I also feel like accelerant is far, far more powerful than most people on the boards realize both as a stun and a damage increase for your guns... but neither argument is worth having because all opinions lead to the same dead end facts that she does not work as a glass cannon mage in endless to reasonable durations and probably not in raids.

 

She is not terribly interesting to play after she stops pwning everything and gets funneled into doing nothing but accelerant -> shoot stuff. It's like being a frame that's really good at not caring about powers and not caring about the Damage 2.0 system.

 

Short term, I think it would help a lot if they improved the duration and application of her fire damage buff augment. That would make an accelerant+guns build much more interesting to play and much more useful in a team, even at high levels. Maybe set her up so if she hits something with fireball everyone gets the buff refreshed or something like that.

 

Long term, after the energy "gate" is fixed so she can't just spam skills all day, I'd just like to see her damage buffed to insane levels. All her animating and mod conflicts will keep her in check I think. Let her be the one that's super OP, but in bursts. Maybe tweak her costs to be a bit higher than other frames.

[UraLoop]

#8 is what I've been wanting to hear! People want to minmax too badly, and though I think her damage even at 50+ is allright if learn to cast in tadem with gunfire and stunlock enemies, I do agree Ember could use a tad bit more QoL. Currently the most popular frames, who nobody is asking ANY rework for, are mainly bland "95% resistance high damage" one trick ponies like Nova and Mesa. I don't want to see Ember turn into that. Accelerant is the best thing that happened to her.

[piedol]

My biggest complaint is her ult. Build aside, Accellerant aside, playstyle aside, it doesn't feel satisfying given its short range, especially since it's a flat damage ultimate. If they increased its base range to 25, I would be ecstatic. A the moment it feel like "Neighborhood on Fire" would be a more apt name.

Edited June 20, 2015 by piedol

[SicSlaver]

I think all warframes should be, instead, nerfed to her state. No more 30+ seconds of slow or immobility or confusion. No more invulnerability. Only 5 seconds stuns and knockdowns top.

[ARavenousPanda]

ember is not "fine as is" she is workable, but as stated has many problems and conflicts. As is there is only one way to play her.

[fatpig84]

Her best ability is only accelerant and accelerant alone :)

It is like overheat being her best skill in the past.

 

Accelerant causes any fire based skill or weapon to hit ridiculous heights and that is the big draw for using her.

Granted WOF could use some tweaking.

 

And Fireblast ? The 50m radial knock down should not be affected by LOS.

[goggles2]

yes please some changes need to come imo she was better off before the last rework it felt like a massive nerf more than anything her ult was semi usable before now its completly useless now

[Junktron]

Yeah, Zephyr, Ember, and Saryn all need to be noticed by DE. After Frost is reworked, I wanna see Ember and then Zephyr redone. (Possibly Zephyr first)

I main Zephyr and I don't know why you would suggest she needs a rework.

 

1 is fine for mobility.

2 is the only one that could really use some sort of "buff" but its good for stopping mid flight.

3 with the augment is amazing and her best ability

4 has a good CC of not really killing stuff put just slowing down the pace

[SicSlaver]

I main Zephyr and I don't know why you would suggest she needs a rework.

 

1 is fine for mobility.

2 is the only one that could really use some sort of "buff" but its good for stopping mid flight.

3 with the augment is amazing and her best ability

4 has a good CC of not really killing stuff put just slowing down the pace

Yeah and I think her only problem is against hitscan grineers. Hitscan on numerous enemies is too BS.

[Dreadwire]

She was built to be nerf as a hobby

[SicSlaver]

Her 4th ability also takes too long to activate.

[-InV-igo95862]

And lastly, her ultimate is gated by FOUR mechanics: Duration, Strength, Range and Efficiency. For a skill that only offers flat damage and requires an augment for reliable CC (Meaning it does not scale into late game against enemies that aren't Infested), this is just overkill. You want to build for efficiency to keep the cost down? Hope you like spamming a skill with a 2 second cast time every ten seconds to keep it relevant. You want to build for decent duration so you can avoid all that re-casting? The cost just skyrocketed and now its range is below ten meters. You want to build strength to try and stay relevant for a bit longer in the game? Now you have to keep the duration low, because the cost is going bleed you dry keeping it on, and by lowering the duration to avoid this, you run into the previously mentioned issue with recasting. Because of this ability's design, you're largely forced to go with non-corrupt mods if you want it to not be bad beyond low level missions, meaning you can't specialize in any one area like every other Frame in the game is capable of doing.

 

 

You know that recasting World on Fire is good? It hits aditional enemies and procs knockdown.

[izzatuw]

You know that recasting World on Fire is good? It hits aditional enemies and procs knockdown.

That sounds good but her ult takes too long to cast so you can potentially go down while casting it.

[SicSlaver]

Remember DE even nerfed World on Fire for no reason at all by having it consume even more energy ruining duration builds?

[Kotommi]

Yeah, Zephyr, Ember, and Saryn all need to be noticed by DE. After Frost is reworked, I wanna see Ember and then Zephyr redone. (Possibly Zephyr first)

 

Why Zephyr?

[izzatuw]

Why Zephyr?

Well imo, a rework isn't needed but tweaks could be welcomed.

Her first (including abilities like Rhino Charge) could use some better control so you might not over do your flight.

Her 2nd... Could be better.

Her 4th seems like a nice looking CC but it seems weird in the bad way for the most part.

[TheBrsrkr]

Ember's abilities rely too much on Accelerant to work. There's a line between synergy and dependency, and Ember is way over that line.

[Hypernaut1]

How many players that main Ember have a problem with her? I swear it's mostly players who played her once or twice that like to make these "Ember is terrible and unplayable" threads.

Sure, I can nitpick and say what could be improved, but I have no problem whatsoever being highly effective with her.

She's also very good at getting a teammate out of heated situation. Her acceleratant and fireblast are effective at clearing areas for a revive. So, yes, she is good at team play too.

Her 4 is fine with duration. Another poster explained perfectly why the devs wouldn't want a walking damage 4 with no duration and the ability to pick up energy.