Saryn's DPS

[ThatOddDeer]

Just now, PikeOrShield said:

Adding Primed Flow is like building a fancy refrigerator for a starving family.  General consensus is it's only worth adding if you normally have max energy without the mod or you carry around restores.  If a Saryn is energy inefficient, building for efficiency is better that having extra storage space you never use.

I like having it as insurance. I may have 100+ restores but I put 4 forma on her and I like being sure of how much I can use. Plus If I want to use QT It's good to have it available as an option. I don't even know what I'd replace it with consdiering I don't want to put a 5th forma in her and my other loadouts have my full power strength build and spore spreader build anyways

[Shuuro]

50 minutes ago, IamTheSparta said:

The -50% hp? the insane dots on everyone? The infinite energy for perma channeling maybe? Hell, do you have eyes? Do you even play saryn?

Everything done on that video wasn't really exclusive to Saryn though. I could do the exact same thing you did on an Ash, Banshee, Chroma, etc.

[Cyv001]

50 minutes ago, PikeOrShield said:

Adding Primed Flow is like building a fancy refrigerator for a starving family.  General consensus is it's only worth adding if you normally have max energy without the mod or you carry around restores.  If a Saryn is energy inefficient, building for efficiency is better that having extra storage space you never use.

Thing is, building for max efficiency cuts into your duration - which isn't good for Saryn. Primed Flow lets you use your abilities freely without that penalty.

[ThatOddDeer]

Since it's been a long time since I posted them, let's posit some saryn changes to put her into the melee debuffer frame role the devs seemed to have created for her.

 

1. Spore: Mostly fine as is. Would remove the arbitrary limit on only 1 spore can transmit toxin procs and make it so that it keeps track of all toxin procs rather than just the largest (it's supposed to combine but it really doesn't seem to do that very well not even with a lanka built for gas)

2. Molt: This ability has a lot of problems. It does not inherit saryn's aggro so enemies may very well still target saryn instead of molt ( I label this molt bug 1). It does not scale in any fashion other than power strength and does not gain aggro range like from power range unlike Loki's decoy( I label this as bug 2). My suggestion is to make it similar to snowglobe/tectonics/iron skin in which it inherits saryn's hp and/or armor value or has a small  period where instead of gaining hp from damage it stays at exactly 1hp for 2-4 seconds, allowing guaranteed aggro draw time while also allowing a skilled saryn player to time miasma to get the full benefit from a low hp molt.

3: Toxic lash. Probably saryn's most loved/hated ability. In order to maintain her identity as the melee debuffer caster I offer a few changes to make toxic lash have more synergy and less anti-synergy that it currently does.

First off I would change toxic lash's blocking bonus, wasted on most weapon types if you even build power strength, to either % damage reduction like eclipse or link or an armor increase; the armor increase would make sense if we make molt scale off armor, it's another source of power synergy. This would also allow saryn to at least make use of the ability even without a melee equipped, this makes it more balanced like speed or warcry which resemble the pattern of working at 100% potential with melee but still usable without.

Secondly, to reduce it's anti synergy I would take toxic lash not able to remove the last spore from an enemy, since that punishes you for trying to load up a target with toxic lash's poison. Furthermore, allowing toxic lash to restore more energy if you kill the target with a toxic lash buffed melee strike, 6 energy for 3 spores or 4 energy for 2 spores, and making it count as if the enemy didn't die by hitting a spore a saryn player would feel better about loading up a single target with toxic lash and wouldn't be punished for doing a lot of damage. I would also either make toxic lash's energy return scale from 1/2/3/4 or maybe allow the base 2 energy to scale with power strength

 

4 Miasma: By nuke standards this ability is lame. Requires either 162.5 energy or a very specific build to make full use of, has a CC that depends on enemy body type and doesn't scale with duration mods, on top of poor base range, which is acceptable for the melee debuffer frame, and the time investment to make this ability shine is not logical. This ability demonstrates co-dependency among abilities rather than any synergy, which I define as greater than the sum of its parts rather than needing all its parts to be equal to comparable alternatives. To change this ability to fit the corrosive blast wave fantasy it presents and to fit with saryn's debuffer and DoT theme, I would add a small % max armor per tick of miasma armor shred. However this small % max armor per tick could be augmented for every spore currently on the target, or by the same mechanic of counting if the target has viral and toxin procs, allowing further syngery between her whole kit and allowing her access to every type of debuff she could want that fits her toxic theme. I mean come on, if shurikens, sound, ice, trin's link, fear and soon-to-be magnets can shred % max armor, the corrosive blastwave could use similar treatment.

Edited April 8, 2016 by ThatOddDeer

[PikeOrShield]

9 minutes ago, Cyv001 said:

Thing is, building for max efficiency cuts into your duration - which isn't good for Saryn. Primed Flow lets you use your abilities freely without that penalty.

I never said anything about adding Fleeting Expertise or maxing efficiency.  I only stated that if a warframe is energy inefficient, it is better to mod for efficiency (just Streamline in this case) over storage space.  My response was to explain why Primed Flow could be less preferable over efficiency if a player is wanting to expend more energy than they can accumulate.

[Cyv001]

13 minutes ago, PikeOrShield said:

I never said anything about adding Fleeting Expertise or maxing efficiency.  I only stated that if a warframe is energy inefficient, it is better to mod for efficiency (just Streamline in this case) over storage space.  My response was to explain why Primed Flow could be less preferable over efficiency if a player is wanting to expend more energy than they can accumulate.

Ah, my mistake then. Whenever I use primed flow though, I never forego streamline. I'm not sure if any of my builds do.

[ThatOddDeer]

18 minutes ago, PikeOrShield said:

I never said anything about adding Fleeting Expertise or maxing efficiency.  I only stated that if a warframe is energy inefficient, it is better to mod for efficiency (just Streamline in this case) over storage space.  My response was to explain why Primed Flow could be less preferable over efficiency if a player is wanting to expend more energy than they can accumulate.

I am willing to candidly challenge this claim. When i am next free to test out the simulacrum, I will test how many ability casts I can achieve with each ability using only primed flow versus reaching 75% efficiency. I assume the breakoff point for efficiency being better is at least 50% if not higher.

[kitsu]

GOD DAMN I tested out the gas proc builds for saryn, my god those 2k+ tics of damage a second on a lvl 135 corrupted heavy gunner. Used a lanka with gas built in, pumped up the status chance and gas damage, then let the procs bounce around among the gunners in the simulacrum. Gas proc disease spreading madness is insane. A team with gas in their weapons just might decimate anything. This makes arbiters of hexis a strong ally with saryn as their weapons and augments proc 1000 gas damage aoe.

Forget press 4 to win, they nerfed that to the grounds it is useless now. Press 4 to spread the disease now. Max out that power, screw the effeciecny, so what of 25 energy to press 1 becomes 50, that's hardly anything to spread such a deadly disease.

[PikeOrShield]

6 minutes ago, ThatOddDeer said:

I am willing to candidly challenge this claim. When i am next free to test out the simulacrum, I will test how many ability casts I can achieve with each ability using only primed flow versus reaching 75% efficiency. I assume the breakoff point for efficiency being better is at least 50% if not higher.

I am not talking about how many casts you can pull off at max energy for both builds.  I am saying that if you consistently run low on energy in actual game-play, an efficiency mod will do you more good overtime than a mod that gives you more capacity that you never use since your running low on energy.

[ThatOddDeer]

5 minutes ago, kitsu said:

GOD DAMN I tested out the gas proc builds for saryn, my god those 2k+ tics of damage a second on a lvl 135 corrupted heavy gunner. Used a lanka with gas built in, pumped up the status chance and gas damage, then let the procs bounce around among the gunners in the simulacrum. Gas proc disease spreading madness is insane. A team with gas in their weapons just might decimate anything. This makes arbiters of hexis a strong ally with saryn as their weapons and augments proc 1000 gas damage aoe.

Forget press 4 to win, they nerfed that to the grounds it is useless now. Press 4 to spread the disease now. Max out that power, screw the effeciecny, so what of 25 energy to press 1 becomes 50, that's hardly anything to spread such a deadly disease.

As someone that tested a lot with gas lanka, it's not really spore bouncing around the procs, it's just the large range of the AoE and the sheer stopping power of the lanka. If you watch my video about the gas lanka, you'll see the main DoTs followed by a set of 1 smaller DoT once I used spore. In theory there should be many, many more DoTs but there simply aren't and that is confusing to me as a saryn main.

Edited April 8, 2016 by ThatOddDeer

[kitsu]

1 minute ago, ThatOddDeer said:

As someone that tested a lot with gas lanka, it's not really spore bouncing around the procs, it's just the large range of the AoE. If you watch my video about the gas lanka, you'll see the main DoTs followed by a set of 1 smaller DoT once I used spore. In theory there should be many, many more DoTs but there simply aren't and that is confusing to me as a saryn main.

Most likely it is the density of the enemies that is messing with the DoT. As tested in the simularcrum, the farthest set should be about 7-8 heavy units, cast spores on one, then pop a headshot on them, the initial spread should start around something like 400-600, and mind you, this is testing on lvl 135 eximus corrupted heavy gunners. After the initial shot, aim for the one on the farthes left, pop a headshot, if another gas proc, should jump the DoT to 900-1500, then rinse and repeat. Headshots allow higher DoT yields but it should not be too hard to reach 3-4k DoT a second against such enemies. And my lanka isn't even fully moded, no forma, just a catalyst and built for raw damage, no crits just for testing.

I must say I am quite impressed it fairs quite well against such an enemy. This is almost like the kohm before the nerf, takes a little time to get going, but once it is there, its just rolling death at that point.

[ThatOddDeer]

1 minute ago, kitsu said:

Most likely it is the density of the enemies that is messing with the DoT. As tested in the simularcrum, the farthest set should be about 7-8 heavy units, cast spores on one, then pop a headshot on them, the initial spread should start around something like 400-600, and mind you, this is testing on lvl 135 eximus corrupted heavy gunners. After the initial shot, aim for the one on the farthes left, pop a headshot, if another gas proc, should jump the DoT to 900-1500, then rinse and repeat. Headshots allow higher DoT yields but it should not be too hard to reach 3-4k DoT a second against such enemies. And my lanka isn't even fully moded, no forma, just a catalyst and built for raw damage, no crits just for testing.

I must say I am quite impressed it fairs quite well against such an enemy. This is almost like the kohm before the nerf, takes a little time to get going, but once it is there, its just rolling death at that point.

The problem is that the lanka's gas clouds are doing all the work, not spores ability to transfer procs. In theory, according to how spore SHOULD work, you would need far fewer shots and gas procs to kill all those enemies but that isn't the case. I agree that the gas lanka is a secret weapon of mass destruction but don't attribute that power to saryn, because spores are not supplying the stopping power you are experiencing. 

[kitsu]

17 minutes ago, ThatOddDeer said:

The problem is that the lanka's gas clouds are doing all the work, not spores ability to transfer procs. In theory, according to how spore SHOULD work, you would need far fewer shots and gas procs to kill all those enemies but that isn't the case. I agree that the gas lanka is a secret weapon of mass destruction but don't attribute that power to saryn, because spores are not supplying the stopping power you are experiencing. 

Hm, tested with a loki to be sure, indeed it does stack for the crowds, though the duration isn't as good. An interesting thing I found is that using a max range high duration build with saryn and lank would yield about 200 regular crit and 400 head crit gas damage to enemies on the other end of the room, when increasing her power, that suddenly jumps upwards of 200-600 (very inconsistent for some reason) to 800-900 headshot crit damage to enemies across the room.

Actually, consistent gas procs do travel and stack across the room with 250% range.

[ThatOddDeer]

3 minutes ago, kitsu said:

Hm, tested with a loki to be sure, indeed it does stack for the crowds, though the duration isn't as good. An interesting thing I found is that using a max range high duration build with saryn and lank would yield about 200 regular crit and 400 head crit gas damage to enemies on the other end of the room, when increasing her power, that suddenly jumps upwards of 200-600 (very inconsistent for some reason) to 800-900 headshot crit damage to enemies across the room.

Actually, consistent gas procs do travel and stack across the room with 250% range.

The process of spreading a singular toxin proc is sound, spores seem to do that, it's just they've been advertised as spreading ALL the procs on a target which they clearly do not.

[kitsu]

11 minutes ago, ThatOddDeer said:

The process of spreading a singular toxin proc is sound, spores seem to do that, it's just they've been advertised as spreading ALL the procs on a target which they clearly do not.

Well, I found something odd in my tests. Decided to test just toxin on lanka, against lvl 135 corpus tech eximus. Not only did all toxin procs not spread, there was some eximus units that had 1/10 of their health left suddenly jump to 1/2 when recasting spores on them. Not sure if UI bug or actually game breaking bug. Oddly enough gas procs work too well against them, as they all died relatively fast from one gas proc on one spore spreading among all of them.

[ThatOddDeer]

21 minutes ago, kitsu said:

Well, I found something odd in my tests. Decided to test just toxin on lanka, against lvl 135 corpus tech eximus. Not only did all toxin procs not spread, there was some eximus units that had 1/10 of their health left suddenly jump to 1/2 when recasting spores on them. Not sure if UI bug or actually game breaking bug. Oddly enough gas procs work too well against them, as they all died relatively fast from one gas proc on one spore spreading among all of them.

These types of inconsistencies are what I feel hold back a large amount of saryn's potential.

[kitsu]

54 minutes ago, ThatOddDeer said:

These types of inconsistencies are what I feel hold back a large amount of saryn's potential.

I don't think this is an inconsistency of saryn, but a major bug that hinders sayrn in a large way, I need to test this with toxic lash.

If toxin procs are not auto popping the spores while electric status can, and the effects of toxin is not spreading as it is stated it should, it is a MAJOR bug that has handicapped saryn for god knows how long.

[(PSN)CoolD2108]

16 minutes ago, kitsu said:

I don't think this is an inconsistency of saryn, but a major bug that hinders sayrn in a large way, I need to test this with toxic lash.

If toxin procs are not auto popping the spores while electric status can, and the effects of toxin is not spreading as it is stated it should, it is a MAJOR bug that has handicapped saryn for god knows how long.

It's eather a bugg or, whats more likely, a visual issue.

Just look closely at the end of his video...all of them die simultaneous, even tho, as he claims, his undermoddet cloud and hardly used melee (peaked somewhere at 4k as he simply did not try) did all the work... the game is known to hide dots that procc more often then they're able to show so you can't confirm anything concerning this topic from the source he keeps refering to, aside from the fact that closed armor reduction works better on hard scaled enemys then raw dots do, for obvious reasons.

One thing is sure tho...he did a prior weapon showcase that did not take him longer then the intensive spore testing he has done...something did kill them, that's for sure, as he did clearly not.

[achromos]

9 hours ago, ThatOddDeer said:

Atlas needed buffs and got them. Was he nerfed afterwards? Not as far as I know.

 

9 hours ago, IamTheSparta said:

Why it would happen? She is strong, not op.

Both of you.  Think.

If you have a frame that ALREADY can melt level 100+ enemies if you use your head, and then the frame is made STRONGER.  There will be something called a imbalance. That will eventually need to be fixed (unless you are the poster child... aka, excal)

The difference between Atlas and Saryn, is that before Atlas's buff he WASN'T able to effectively use his abilities, his defensive ability that spawned a wall was able to block allies, and his summons were much LESS worth it.  Saryn right now?  What does she really need a major buff in?  All Saryn 'might' need is a slight buff to her Molt, and that's stretching it.  Most people who want a buff for her either:

A.) Don't have the mods required to get the usefulness out of her, and in that case it's their fault as you can obtain ANY of the relivant mods through trade if they aren't available to be farmed (and if you don't have plat... get your lazy behind to the void and farm some desirable prime parts to sell).

or

B.) They are stuck modding her in the OLD way, or mod her wrong.  I've seen some 'professional youtubers' mod her for absolute strength and duration while sacrificing Range then pit her against a more properly modded excal and say she's weak.  Wrong, absolutely wrong.  Saryn needs to prioritize, range an sure Some strength but I run with 80-90% duration all the time, you will never use all of the damage in that duration even IF your team waits patiently (good luck) and if i'm not wrong, Miasma ticks faster the lower your duration is too (yes, it may remove some damage ticks but you wont ever get to use them)

She's not broken, just how she plays has shifted.  Please, though.  Tell me... why she needs a buff?

Edited April 8, 2016 by achromos

[Ivan_Rid]

edit: nevermind, I finally got how Spores works, and yes, it seems bugged.

edit2: may be toxin procs combine only for purposes of burst (that is not displayed), but not dot?

Edited April 8, 2016 by Ivan_Rid

[Rambit23Z]

2 hours ago, achromos said:

 

Both of you.  Think.

If you have a frame that ALREADY can melt level 100+ enemies if you use your head, and then the frame is made STRONGER.  There will be something called a imbalance. That will eventually need to be fixed (unless you are the poster child... aka, excal)

The difference between Atlas and Saryn, is that before Atlas's buff he WASN'T able to effectively use his abilities, his defensive ability that spawned a wall was able to block allies, and his summons were much LESS worth it.  Saryn right now?  What does she really need a major buff in?  All Saryn 'might' need is a slight buff to her Molt, and that's stretching it.  Most people who want a buff for her either:

A.) Don't have the mods required to get the usefulness out of her, and in that case it's their fault as you can obtain ANY of the relivant mods through trade if they aren't available to be farmed (and if you don't have plat... get your lazy behind to the void and farm some desirable prime parts to sell).

or

B.) They are stuck modding her in the OLD way, or mod her wrong.  I've seen some 'professional youtubers' mod her for absolute strength and duration while sacrificing Range then pit her against a more properly modded excal and say she's weak.  Wrong, absolutely wrong.  Saryn needs to prioritize, range an sure Some strength but I run with 80-90% duration all the time, you will never use all of the damage in that duration even IF your team waits patiently (good luck) and if i'm not wrong, Miasma ticks faster the lower your duration is too (yes, it may remove some damage ticks but you wont ever get to use them)

She's not broken, just how she plays has shifted.  Please, though.  Tell me... why she needs a buff?

I'd still say she needs that anti-synergy with Toxic Lash and spores fixed. I mentioned it in my last post.

[Ivan_Rid]

58 minutes ago, Rambit23Z said:

I'd still say she needs that anti-synergy with Toxic Lash and spores fixed. I mentioned it in my last post.

I dont think its that problematic if you can hit 2 enemies at once, and even when all spores are gone theres still 10(?) seconds window to finish them off at 50% hp.

What I dont get is what happens when you hit enemy with Toxic Lash and proc Toxin from melee weapon at the same time - do 2 spores pop? Or do procs combine as per

"If multiple Toxin procs are damaging an infected enemy, the initial base damage that triggered each individual Toxin proc will be combined when a spore's burst damage is calculated." and

" Only one spore on the infected enemy can transfer Toxin damage until that enemy becomes damaged by a new Toxin proc. "

By the way this situation is the only time those " multiple Toxin procs " happen. Because as it turns out Spores spread only the Toxic proc that popped them, and all Toxic procs that were accumulated on target prior to that are irrelevant.

Edited April 8, 2016 by Ivan_Rid

[Ivan_Rid]

9 hours ago, kitsu said:

I don't think this is an inconsistency of saryn, but a major bug that hinders sayrn in a large way, I need to test this with toxic lash.

If toxin procs are not auto popping the spores while electric status can, and the effects of toxin is not spreading as it is stated it should, it is a MAJOR bug that has handicapped saryn for god knows how long.

Embolist automatically procs toxin 100% of the time (unless overrided by another proc), but last time I used it as Saryn I found is very underwhelming exactly because it did not pop spores.

[Rambit23Z]

1 hour ago, Ivan_Rid said:

I dont think its that problematic if you can hit 2 enemies at once, and even when all spores are gone theres still 10(?) seconds window to finish them off at 50% hp.

It is against single targets. I've been spending lots of time in the Simulacrum, seeing what the minimal amount of hits I would need to kill a level 130 heavy gunner. (Best I've gotten is 16 but it's more likely 13 since I couldn't wait for the DOT's to tick.)

And it's a pain in the &#! to try and keep viral up on that target while hitting him due to all the spores being popped in one hit.

[ThatOddDeer]

29 minutes ago, Rambit23Z said:

It is against single targets. I've been spending lots of time in the Simulacrum, seeing what the minimal amount of hits I would need to kill a level 130 heavy gunner. (Best I've gotten is 16 but it's more likely 13 since I couldn't wait for the DOT's to tick.)

And it's a pain in the &#! to try and keep viral up on that target while hitting him due to all the spores being popped in one hit.

Are you using a weapon with slash procs and/or corrosive? That might botch your results. I suggest testing vs a favorable enemy as well, like a corpus tech, and using a weapon that won't proc slash mostly.

 

1 hour ago, Ivan_Rid said:

I dont think its that problematic if you can hit 2 enemies at once, and even when all spores are gone theres still 10(?) seconds window to finish them off at 50% hp.

What I dont get is what happens when you hit enemy with Toxic Lash and proc Toxin from melee weapon at the same time - do 2 spores pop? Or do procs combine as per

"If multiple Toxin procs are damaging an infected enemy, the initial base damage that triggered each individual Toxin proc will be combined when a spore's burst damage is calculated." and

" Only one spore on the infected enemy can transfer Toxin damage until that enemy becomes damaged by a new Toxin proc. "

By the way this situation is the only time those " multiple Toxin procs " happen. Because as it turns out Spores spread only the Toxic proc that popped them, and all Toxic procs that were accumulated on target prior to that are irrelevant.

Only 1 spore pops her hit and the procs do NOT combine as advertised. If they did combine I would see some impressive ticks on a group of heavy gunners after wailing on them. Even after getting to 2.5x combo and using charge attacks with my red crit scindo prime, the highest DoT I got from a headshot charge attack was 391. I then tried to stack multiple toxin procs with broken bull and nothing higher than 391. Spores aren't doing their job properly

Edited April 8, 2016 by ThatOddDeer