Map-Wide "Blinds"/Stuns (Mirage, Excal, etc.) need NPC Counterplay

[Xarteros]

I personally would really prefer if we had less specific counter abilities. Nullifiers are already enough of an annoyance, and just making specific power-immune/cancelling enemies will phase out more and more warframes from missions with those enemy types. 

What I think SHOULD happen is not a 'nerf', but a side-grade. Make Prism only blind enemies that it hits with its disco laser beams of fury. That way, you can't build it for infinite spam, and it's automatically controlled by LOS, since the beams don't penetrate terrain. Swap the blind on detonation to a high damage explosion with knockdown, or something, but within an appropriate radius (fairly short range, with damage falloff over distance). Make the damage based off how long the ability was active (like Ivara's Navigator shots), and you ensure it doesn't become a nuke spam.

Fixes excessive issues without nerfing base range, makes ability have some more damage as long as you aren't spamming and retains some CC on detonation to help make sure you aren't instantly mowed down if your Prism runs out (unless you throw it ages away)

[letir]

12 hours ago, LittleArachnid said:

Then lets go hating on other builds then? 

Shame on the people using the blind build in a way that just makes every other player look like crap. When I used them in the sorties I use prism to aid my teammates by blinding the enemies giving them time to capture zones and to take out enemies that are threatening them. I may also use sleight of hand to turn the doors against the enemy and having additional damage dealt to them. And for myself, hall of mirrors and ecclipse to be more durable on the field. It takes real experience using her blind build properly and not simply spamming prism all the time. 

I lol'd.

Real "experience" for 360% spammable skill, which cover entire Interception map, dosen't have any restrictions and leave enemies helpless.

[Sold0ut]

22 hours ago, Xarteros said:

I personally would really prefer if we had less specific counter abilities. Nullifiers are already enough of an annoyance, and just making specific power-immune/cancelling enemies will phase out more and more warframes from missions with those enemy types. 

What I think SHOULD happen is not a 'nerf', but a side-grade. Make Prism only blind enemies that it hits with its disco laser beams of fury. That way, you can't build it for infinite spam, and it's automatically controlled by LOS, since the beams don't penetrate terrain. Swap the blind on detonation to a high damage explosion with knockdown, or something, but within an appropriate radius (fairly short range, with damage falloff over distance). Make the damage based off how long the ability was active (like Ivara's Navigator shots), and you ensure it doesn't become a nuke spam.

Fixes excessive issues without nerfing base range, makes ability have some more damage as long as you aren't spamming and retains some CC on detonation to help make sure you aren't instantly mowed down if your Prism runs out (unless you throw it ages away)

If base Range could affect beam length and travel speed that would be a start, but I think it's more that Blind (much like sometimes stealth) is just way overpowered and needs some work to not shut things off entirely so much.

[Xarteros]

58 minutes ago, Sold0ut said:

If base Range could affect beam length and travel speed that would be a start, but I think it's more that Blind (much like sometimes stealth) is just way overpowered and needs some work to not shut things off entirely so much.

Well limit the blind so it has a limited refresh rate and can't be infinitely stacked then? There's only so much you can do to blind before it becomes utter garbage, and it'd become yet another case of the few spoiling it for the many because of annoying exploits or troll-like builds.

[Sold0ut]

7 hours ago, Xarteros said:

Well limit the blind so it has a limited refresh rate and can't be infinitely stacked then? There's only so much you can do to blind before it becomes utter garbage, and it'd become yet another case of the few spoiling it for the many because of annoying exploits or troll-like builds.

It would be one of many possiblities. Blindspam is one of the few things that can be solvedi n 10+ different ways, and applying all at once would be completely ridiculous.

[--RV--LadySpiderwick]

On 4/12/2016 at 9:38 PM, letir said:

I lol'd.

Real "experience" for 360% spammable skill, which cover entire Interception map, dosen't have any restrictions and leave enemies helpless.

Just because the blind build does require a spam-like behaviour with prism it doesn't mean spamming hall of mirrors and ecclipse is bad. There's a right and wrong way to play it. It's better to cast a prism and with good duration let prism run it's course, give it a break and recast prism again. It doesn't have to be 'spammed' just used at the right opportunity, of if the flow of enemies warrants reason to 'spam' prism. That's what I mean when I speak of experienced blind mirage players.

Edited April 14, 2016 by LittleArachnid

[letir]

Just now, LittleArachnid said:

Just because the blind build does require a spam-like behaviour with prism it doesn't mean spamming hall of mirrors and ecclipse is bad. There's a right and wrong way to play it. It's better to cast a prism and with good duration let prism run it's course, give it a break and recast prism again. It doesn't have to be 'spammed' just used at the right opportunity, of if the flow of enemies warrants reason to 'spam' prism. That's what I mean when I speak of experienced blind mirage players.

No, it's not.

Prsim deal moderate damage, but this damage going from thin beams and can be blocked by terrain. There is no reason to run Prism for damage, it sucking energy and can't compete with P42W skills like Bladestorm. Mirage main source of damage is her guns with Hall of Mirrors.

[--RV--LadySpiderwick]

2 minutes ago, letir said:

No, it's not.

Prsim deal moderate damage, but this damage going from thin beams and can be blocked by terrain. There is no reason to run Prism for damage, it sucking energy and can't compete with P42W skills like Bladestorm. Mirage main source of damage is her guns with Hall of Mirrors.

Seriously...what is that 'pay to win' about a single ability that comes with a frame by default. Also ash's play style is not the same as mirage, ash is an offensive frame and has more health, his abilities are also offensive ones too. Mirage's abilities are not offensive based, prism yes does moderate damage but it blinds enemies much like Excal's radial blind. Hall of mirrors and prism are more defensive abilities and make mirage last longer when being used in a mission. So how can you compare two different frames that have different play styles and different abilities?

Y'know what, maybe this wouldn't be an issue if DE give the enemy factions an improvement on AI. Because apparently most have a problem with the mirage blind build. Plenty of people cry and whinge over ash's bladestorm spam which in my opinion is more annoying than using prism because it makes squad mates lose out on kills. Seriously would you rather have someone 'steal' skills with bladestorm or have enemies blinded making them easier to take out?

[letir]

1 hour ago, LittleArachnid said:

Seriously...what is that 'pay to win' about a single ability that comes with a frame by default. Also ash's play style is not the same as mirage, ash is an offensive frame and has more health, his abilities are also offensive ones too. Mirage's abilities are not offensive based, prism yes does moderate damage but it blinds enemies much like Excal's radial blind. Hall of mirrors and prism are more defensive abilities and make mirage last longer when being used in a mission. So how can you compare two different frames that have different play styles and different abilities?

Y'know what, maybe this wouldn't be an issue if DE give the enemy factions an improvement on AI. Because apparently most have a problem with the mirage blind build. Plenty of people cry and whinge over ash's bladestorm spam which in my opinion is more annoying than using prism because it makes squad mates lose out on kills. Seriously would you rather have someone 'steal' skills with bladestorm or have enemies blinded making them easier to take out?

1. Press 4 to Win, not Pay to Win.

2. Nobody says anything about playstyle. You say something about "skillful" use of Prism. But best use of Prism it's constant CC from blind, Beacuse "offensive" frames much better in any other way of playing.

3. How can "improvemenyt" of AI help with constant barrage of CC? No matter how smart enemies, it's kinda hard to resist when you can't do anything.

4. I rather don't have punchbags in mission.

 

[AKKILLA]

On Friday, April 08, 2016 at 3:36 PM, Sold0ut said:

I just did today's Sorties; level 100 Grineer Interception. Three waves. Energy Reduction.

 

So what happened? I'll tell you what happened. A Mirage joined.

 

At which we just stopped playing. Mirage infinitely spammed Blinds across the entire map and then we went afk while she spammed one skill over and over and over again, maybe sometimes using an energy restore as we didn't have a Trin.

 

Not a single enemy moved out of its spawn, as Blind skills hit through walls, and with corrupted mods, across the boundaries of the entirety of playable space. That means enemies literally could not move from their Spawns.

 

I could even pick up screenshots from threads from 2014 here. Threads that got "lol OP wants nerfs lol OP sucks rofl nerfs are bad I don't wanna play the game" replies. It's not a new issue.

 

That said, deactivating the game with no enemy counterplay is just plain boring and unrewarding.

 

So, what can we do?

 

As I see it, there's two options.

A) Add counterplay to blinds. Nullifiers and Combas are a start, but they're less than a bandaid to an ongoing issue. Maybe have enemies that are immune to stuns and can wipe it off their teammates, with X seconds of immunity? 

Or

B) Nerf the range of it. As it is, Blinds don't last terribly long, but they entirely and utterly stun enemies for good across the entire map and are infinitely spammable. One way to alleviate this could be to just plainly cap the range. Why would I ever bother actually trying any defense-content if my enemies are literally unable to leave Spawn?

 

Oh look, we got exactly 100%-0% scores on all three waves. So complex. Our Valkyr actually toggled to the meditate taunt and only toggled out of it after every wave with no other reason than to not lose the rewards for afking too much.

 

I know this thread is gonna get plenty of bashes because it suggests, gasp, fixing something that is overpowered to the point of you not needing to play the game anymore. And I know, it would hurt the precious Draco, which many will see as 'a Noob's cry for nerfs'. But I think it's an issue that needs adressing.

I don't even care if DE need time for it, but they clearly are going against skills that just make loads of content not matter anymore. Mag's Shield Polarize will no longer be Instant. Volt's new skill will clearly be balanced to not stun everything indefinitely and forever. I'd like to see the same thing with Blind-Type stuns.

The Best way to fix blind abilities is ENEMIES LINE OF SIGHT that should determine whether the enemies blinded or not. So the enemies will have a cone line of sight that functions on blinds that reach the enemies cone sight. If the blind is being obstructed by a wall the enemy will not be blinded. This is common sense. LOS requires enemies AI to be fixed aswell

[magusat999]

On 4/8/2016 at 3:36 PM, Sold0ut said:

I just did today's Sorties; level 100 Grineer Interception. Three waves. Energy Reduction.

 

So what happened? I'll tell you what happened. A Mirage joined.

 

At which we just stopped playing. Mirage infinitely spammed Blinds across the entire map and then we went afk while she spammed one skill over and over and over again, maybe sometimes using an energy restore as we didn't have a Trin.

 

Not a single enemy moved out of its spawn, as Blind skills hit through walls, and with corrupted mods, across the boundaries of the entirety of playable space. That means enemies literally could not move from their Spawns.

 

I could even pick up screenshots from threads from 2014 here. Threads that got "lol OP wants nerfs lol OP sucks rofl nerfs are bad I don't wanna play the game" replies. It's not a new issue.

 

That said, deactivating the game with no enemy counterplay is just plain boring and unrewarding.

 

So, what can we do?

 

As I see it, there's two options.

A) Add counterplay to blinds. Nullifiers and Combas are a start, but they're less than a bandaid to an ongoing issue. Maybe have enemies that are immune to stuns and can wipe it off their teammates, with X seconds of immunity? 

Or

B) Nerf the range of it. As it is, Blinds don't last terribly long, but they entirely and utterly stun enemies for good across the entire map and are infinitely spammable. One way to alleviate this could be to just plainly cap the range. Why would I ever bother actually trying any defense-content if my enemies are literally unable to leave Spawn?

 

Oh look, we got exactly 100%-0% scores on all three waves. So complex. Our Valkyr actually toggled to the meditate taunt and only toggled out of it after every wave with no other reason than to not lose the rewards for afking too much.

 

I know this thread is gonna get plenty of bashes because it suggests, gasp, fixing something that is overpowered to the point of you not needing to play the game anymore. And I know, it would hurt the precious Draco, which many will see as 'a Noob's cry for nerfs'. But I think it's an issue that needs adressing.

I don't even care if DE need time for it, but they clearly are going against skills that just make loads of content not matter anymore. Mag's Shield Polarize will no longer be Instant. Volt's new skill will clearly be balanced to not stun everything indefinitely and forever. I'd like to see the same thing with Blind-Type stuns.

ACTUALLY, THERE'S A THIRD OPTION:

I see your concern, but I also think there is another option to deal with this. Mirage isn't the only problem of "killing while in spawn". Any skill that penetrates walls can cause this issue. I propose another solution - no "nerf" or "counterplay" necessary and very easy to implement.

PROPOSAL:

Enemies in spawn spots cannot be killed. Spawn spots will be a "no fight zone". We cannot go in them, and the enemy cannot STAY in them. Enemies inside cannot be killed, and the spawn spot will not have anything that can block the enemies from exiting or hold them up. If by chance an enemy gets stuck in a Spawn area, the enemy will be erased an re-created in a specified period of time. Instead of the current process where an enemy gets stuck forever, that especially wouldn't work with my proposed change. This way enemies can always leave spawn, and hit the open battle area, and no need to nerf or drastically change anything.

[DarcnyssWolfe]

Radial Blind as-is is fine. Mirage's prism needs to be line-of-sight like Radial Blind and it would be far more balanced. Further possibly add in compounding diminishing returns to eventually force engagement rather than having perma-blind. Maybe even make targets un-re-blindable while still blinded but make the compounding diminishing still take affect, causing less spam and more plan.

[Sold0ut]

7 hours ago, magusat999 said:

ACTUALLY, THERE'S A THIRD OPTION:

I see your concern, but I also think there is another option to deal with this. Mirage isn't the only problem of "killing while in spawn". Any skill that penetrates walls can cause this issue. I propose another solution - no "nerf" or "counterplay" necessary and very easy to implement.

PROPOSAL:

Enemies in spawn spots cannot be killed. Spawn spots will be a "no fight zone". We cannot go in them, and the enemy cannot STAY in them. Enemies inside cannot be killed, and the spawn spot will not have anything that can block the enemies from exiting or hold them up. If by chance an enemy gets stuck in a Spawn area, the enemy will be erased an re-created in a specified period of time. Instead of the current process where an enemy gets stuck forever, that especially wouldn't work with my proposed change. This way enemies can always leave spawn, and hit the open battle area, and no need to nerf or drastically change anything.

Well, no. The 'no fight zone' would still not do anything. They'd leave it after spawning, and then they'd be permastunlocked and AI-disabled for a long while. That said, I did post some more suggestions on the first main post.

 

Also, something that seems to have stuck out to me.

 

Nova's slows seem to be extending blinds? Maybe that's just something I'm imagining. But extra long and sloooooooooow flailing makes enemies even more shut off than they already should be.

[--RV--LadySpiderwick]

11 hours ago, letir said:

1. Press 4 to Win, not Pay to Win.

2. Nobody says anything about playstyle. You say something about "skillful" use of Prism. But best use of Prism it's constant CC from blind, Beacuse "offensive" frames much better in any other way of playing.

3. How can "improvemenyt" of AI help with constant barrage of CC? No matter how smart enemies, it's kinda hard to resist when you can't do anything.

4. I rather don't have punchbags in mission.

 

Improvement of AI would make enemies more aware of their environment rather than blindly blundering into line of sight. Whatever, clearly you seem to have a huge hate for blind mirage and won't listen to someone whose used her enough so you're worth replying to anymore over this.

[zNightWolfz]

there is 1 easy solution for you all that complain so dam much  play with friends on invite and well then it wont affect you also play solo 

[ranks21]

light reflects and bounces off object and travels through stuff if in a concentrated beam (lasers) lets see if you guys can go 1 week without making unneccesary nerf suggestion.

Edited April 15, 2016 by ranks21

[Magneu]

11 minutes ago, ranks21 said:

light reflects and bounces off object and travels through stuff if in a concentrated beam (lasers) lets see if you guys can go 1 week without making unneccesary nerf suggestion.

That doesn't apply to enemies being blinded behind closed doors, where light has no possible way of getting through (also, different surfaces reflect light differently. . And if it was of a frequency high enough to go through walls to blind people, either (a) we wouldn't be able to see it, or (b) it would simply vaporize everything (been a while since I took physics). If one blind ability has LoS, all blind abilities get LoS.

Prism is broken CC that invalidates a major portion of gameplay, while Radial Blind is balanced, highly effective (them finishers), and plenty spammable. If we get to blind enemies behind closed doors, what's to stop DE from inventing an enemy that can shoot us from behind closed doors? It would be the only way enemies could retaliate. Prism has to change so powercreep doesn't trivialize the game even more.

^{P.S. your argument in your other threads are really weak. Should probably read into formal logic and calm down on the ad hominem.}

Edited April 15, 2016 by Magneu

[ranks21]

so you want the game to be to your liking because you don't like how something works whether it be abilities mods or weapons?? I got one for you and your types of nerf suggestors>> leave it to the devs they know what direction they want to take their game, broken op or otherwise. as for players like us I think its best for the new players have something to use against energy drainers heck I hope they enjoy the game and stick around long enough just as we did.

[DatDarkOne]

57 minutes ago, ranks21 said:

so you want the game to be to your liking because you don't like how something works whether it be abilities mods or weapons?? I got one for you and your types of nerf suggestors>> leave it to the devs they know what direction they want to take their game, broken op or otherwise. as for players like us I think its best for the new players have something to use against energy drainers heck I hope they enjoy the game and stick around long enough just as we did.

I love this post.  :D

[RealPandemonium]

1 hour ago, ranks21 said:

so you want the game to be to your liking because you don't like how something works whether it be abilities mods or weapons?? I got one for you and your types of nerf suggestors>> leave it to the devs they know what direction they want to take their game, broken op or otherwise. as for players like us I think its best for the new players have something to use against energy drainers heck I hope they enjoy the game and stick around long enough just as we did.

You're basically saying "well the game is what it is" just because the present situation, accident or not, is to your liking.

Additionally, DE has shown significant identity crises when it comes to what direction they want to take the game in.  They have also shown multiple times that they do not understand the mindsets of their players and do not really know what it's like to play the game on a regular basis.  They are taking steps to address these issues, but it's ludicrous to suggest that Warframe's current balance state is intended or desirable.  

[letir]

7 hours ago, LittleArachnid said:

Improvement of AI would make enemies more aware of their environment rather than blindly blundering into line of sight. Whatever, clearly you seem to have a huge hate for blind mirage and won't listen to someone whose used her enough so you're worth replying to anymore over this.

Prism dosen't have LOS restrictions. it seems that you aren't use Mirage enough.

[SergeiTheBeast]

Just make it LOS, i believe that should address the issue effectively, without over nerfing the ability. The ability to refresh the blind while the target is already blinded is a bit much as well but in high level missions like the sortie against bullet sponges, either you have 4 completely competent tenno *snort* GOOD LUCK WITH THAT ONE KID! or you resort to cheese tactics like that. It's a problem of the game itself not just a single ability

[--NovaPrime--]

I believe they spoke about making mirage blind LOS before and they said thy had trouble getting it to calculate is as excal is just around the player, but prism is a move ball that bounces...  and getting it to not be glitchy was a problem so they might of scrapped it it...  so it might just be better to make a debuff timer that scales with duration like the blind of like  0.5 seconds base where the enemy can actually shoot... cause at high level that still enough to almost kill people if not kill them if they are a full damage build.

Edited April 15, 2016 by iscofield

[Sold0ut]

10 hours ago, iscofield said:

I believe they spoke about making mirage blind LOS before and they said thy had trouble getting it to calculate is as excal is just around the player, but prism is a move ball that bounces...  and getting it to not be glitchy was a problem so they might of scrapped it it...  so it might just be better to make a debuff timer that scales with duration like the blind of like  0.5 seconds base where the enemy can actually shoot... cause at high level that still enough to almost kill people if not kill them if they are a full damage build.

Huh, never knew that there was a statement on the issue already. That said, in the end, it needs a change either way, even if it's not LoS. 

Heck, at this point I'm all for reworks of blind by itself, it might mess with skills the least. Make it not shut off AI but give them big inaccuracies; that would make even indefinite refreshing a non-issue. We already know that accuracy reduction is something that exists in the game.

[tripletriple]

If you apply Los to her prism it will simply become a radial blind and mirage will sink to nothing. The nerf mentality people have here shouldn't exist. It's a balance mentality that should be used.

Have it only able to blind for its intial duration and then after that enemies suffer from an accuracy debuff. Then increase its damage by 2x and make it stagger enemies that the laser hits encouraging it to be left up.

The enemies can still fight back but we have a viable and unique ultimate.