The proposed Banshee passive is an awful idea

[Sixty5]

Today we learned about a number of proposed Warframe passives, among them Banshee. Now Banshee is a frame that I used to play a lot of, though I have moved away from her in recent times due to her not feeling as good as she used to, but I digress.

Her proposed passive is innate silence on all of her weapons, which on the surface sounds kinda decent, I mean, she is a sound frame, and silence fits into her theme decently. 

However as a passive it doesn't do anything for her kit. Banshee already has a silence on her 3rd ability, along with the ability to either equip a bow (Which works rather well on Banshee) or run a mod like Hush, which you have the option to do so given the damage boost on your 2nd ability.

So what you end up with is a frame that already feels lacklustre getting a redundant passive, and honestly that just feels bad to me.

 

The other sad thing is that there is so much other cool stuff you could do with a sound based passive. 

Personally I'd like her passive have something to do with infrasound disrupting enemies, making them less perceptive and less accurate. That way you incorporate more of the sound theme into her kit as well as making her stealth a little more potent and giving her a bit more survivability, two areas that she currently lacks in.

 

Maybe I am just a salty old Banshee main, but I really hate the idea of Banshee getting stuck with an almost worthless passive, especially when you have stuff like Mesa and Inaros who have passives that work well with their kits, or frames like Mirage whose passives give them something you can't get elsewhere. 

[(PSN)SwagSmasha]

Im not a banshee main so i can't really relate and I'll take your word for it but i thought the silent weapons passive was kind of clever and lets be honest no in this game will ever use hush.

[321agemo]

i was just thinking of how overpowered thats gonna be on stealth missions. i can finally carry stealth kill someone with shotgun, or i can choose not to use a silence mods.

 

though i wouldn't mind banshee having a passive that makes weapons less accurate against her, since she is squishy after all.

[Sixty5]

2 minutes ago, (PS4)SwagSmasha said:

Im not a banshee main so i can't really relate and I'll take your word for it but i thought the silent weapons passive was kind of clever and lets be honest no in this game will ever use hush.

I use Hush all the time for Spy and other stealth missions, you don't need a maxed out sniper to one shot enemies below level 50

1 minute ago, 321agemo said:

i was just thinking of how overpowered thats gonna be on stealth missions. i can finally carry stealth kill someone with shotgun, or i can choose not to use a silence mods.

 

though i wouldn't mind banshee having a passive that makes weapons less accurate against her, since she is squishy after all.

If you want a silenced weapon as Banshee just press 3, the ability is literally called Silence.

[(PSN)SwagSmasha]

Just now, Sixty5 said:

I use Hush all the time for Spy and other stealth missions

To each his own then i dont find that spy missions are hard enough to warrant use of silent mods and if i did feel the need to bring a silent weapon it would be either a bow or throwing stars.

[Blatantfool]

Right, so, while I 100% follow the logic of desiring Warframe passive's to be biased in favor of enhancing a kit I can't help but drop in and give my own two cents.

 It's be a crying shame if all passives DID specifically work directly with the kit. There is more potential there than just some behind the scenes boost to your skill effectiveness.

 It is natural and ultimately helpful to have passives that focus on further involving your favorite weapons in a Frame's theme.

 Banshee auto-silencing weapons would be pretty great. That means, as a Banshee player, you can incorporate weapons that aren't typically stealthy into her stealth niche without investing mod points on the weapon itself. This is a Warframe presenting you, the player, newer and possibly more effective options for Weapon building when it comes to her ballpark.

 This is awesome. Basically, it is a whole slot and 5 mod points you free up if Banshee is your stealth go-to.

 

 I think of it like this - Banshee's suggested passive doesn't SOUND like it helps her kit. If we were only giving merits based on some specific stat increase you'd be right to say that. What it does is TRY to aid her kit by bringing in a complete freedom to use whatever weapon your heart desires in combination with her skills. For all you know Banshee could turn into a stealth murder machine one of these random patches as DE adds a weapon that typically isn't stealthy to the game. Maybe a new sniper rifle or rocket launcher weapon, for example. She gets to use these weapons quietly with no investment being made.

 

[Stratego89]

15 minutes ago, (PS4)SwagSmasha said:

Im not a banshee main so i can't really relate and I'll take your word for it but i thought the silent weapons passive was kind of clever and lets be honest no in this game will ever use hush.

Funny, because I use hush on several weapons...

 

@OP I agree completely although for the opposite reason. The passive isn't redundant- it'll make silence redundant. Silence doesn't actually silence your weapons. Silence keeps enemies within range of you from hearing your weapons. It works poorly. Banshee needs a rework and one of the major things is that silence needs to ACTUALLY make everything in range of you silent so nothing outside that range can hear what is going on. It is at that point the passive becomes mostly redundant. I don't exactly have an alternative for her passive, but I can say without a doubt that making it just "always silent weapons" is a mistake.

[Blatantfool]

6 minutes ago, Stratego89 said:

Funny, because I use hush on several weapons...

 

@OP I agree completely although for the opposite reason. The passive isn't redundant- it'll make silence redundant. Silence doesn't actually silence your weapons. Silence keeps enemies within range of you from hearing your weapons. It works poorly. Banshee needs a rework and one of the major things is that silence needs to ACTUALLY make everything in range of you silent so nothing outside that range can hear what is going on. It is at that point the passive becomes mostly redundant. I don't exactly have an alternative for her passive, but I can say without a doubt that making it just "always silent weapons" is a mistake.

 

 Honestly, Silence ought to just be changed to fit the passive. I've always felt like it was a lackluster skill myself. Perhaps significantly boosting silent weapon effectiveness within it's range. Essentially meaning:

-Banshee's weapons are ALWAYS silent. This skill is a damage buff for her.

-Teammates with loud guns have their weapons made silent.

-Teammates already using silent weapons get a damage buff.

[MillbrookWest]

39 minutes ago, Sixty5 said:

Personally I'd like her passive have something to do with infrasound disrupting enemies, making them less perceptive and less accurate. That way you incorporate more of the sound theme into her kit as well as making her stealth a little more potent and giving her a bit more survivability, two areas that she currently lacks in.

As a banshee main, i agree with this ;)

I can kinda see the merits of using Hush as a passive. But it's usefulness is mooted in any mission that isn't 100% coordinated for stealth. 

The only way i see the DE proposed passive being of any real affect in co-op is if enemies agro to the sound of weapons. In which case, it would kinda serve a similar purpose to the idea in the OP whereby enemies go after other players (with their loud weapons) and leave banshee alone. The end result is similar.  

Granted, i don't know how agro works in the game, so i have no idea if it is something simple to implement on DE's end (which is what i think they prefer since they're bolting on Hush as a passive).

[NinthAria]

The problem isn't the passive, it's Silence. It's an okay CC, but Banshee already has good CC with Sonic Boom and Sound Quake; as others have pointed out, the actual functionality of Silence is a little obtuse compared to just auto-hushing all your weapons. Comparing the passive to mods that do something similar is kind of silly, because a lot of them do that--the point is it frees up mod slots/points that you'd otherwise spend using that. Ivara doesn't need to bother with Enemy Sense because she has it already; it's a similar case here.

[321agemo]

10 minutes ago, Sixty5 said:

If you want a silenced weapon as Banshee just press 3, the ability is literally called Silence.

Yes and no. Silence makes enemy deaf within a certain range, and if you fire you're unsilence gun and there's an enemy nearby unsilenced, it's going to be alerted. The passive basically guarentees nearby enemies won't be alerted, since its unaffected by your abilities range/ duration.

[Bouldershoulder]

6 minutes ago, 321agemo said:

Yes and no. Silence makes enemy deaf within a certain range, and if you fire you're unsilence gun and there's an enemy nearby unsilenced, it's going to be alerted. The passive basically guarentees nearby enemies won't be alerted, since its unaffected by your abilities range/ duration.

Aaand that brings us back to how her silence should work in the first place, since she is a sound based frame and not an otolaryngologist.

[Sixty5]

15 minutes ago, Blatantfool said:

Right, so, while I 100% follow the logic of desiring Warframe passive's to be biased in favor of enhancing a kit I can't help but drop in and give my own two cents.

 It's be a crying shame if all passives DID specifically work directly with the kit. There is more potential there than just some behind the scenes boost to your skill effectiveness.

 It is natural and ultimately helpful to have passives that focus on further involving your favorite weapons in a Frame's theme.

 Banshee auto-silencing weapons would be pretty great. That means, as a Banshee player, you can incorporate weapons that aren't typically stealthy into her stealth niche without investing mod points on the weapon itself. This is a Warframe presenting you, the player, newer and possibly more effective options for Weapon building when it comes to her ballpark.

 This is awesome. Basically, it is a whole slot and 5 mod points you free up if Banshee is your stealth go-to.

 

 I think of it like this - Banshee's suggested passive doesn't SOUND like it helps her kit. If we were only giving merits based on some specific stat increase you'd be right to say that. What it does is TRY to aid her kit by bringing in a complete freedom to use whatever weapon your heart desires in combination with her skills. For all you know Banshee could turn into a stealth murder machine one of these random patches as DE adds a weapon that typically isn't stealthy to the game. Maybe a new sniper rifle or rocket launcher weapon, for example. She gets to use these weapons quietly with no investment being made.

 

That still doesn't change the fact that she already has an ability that already silences your weapons. 

She is already at a point where there is no reason not to have silence up at all times given the free stuns.

So what you are actually getting is a mod effect that is useless outside of non endless missions that you already have on your kit on an ability that you already want to have up at all times. About the only use for it is if you are running stealth missions to rank up banshee fast. It does nothing for her kit, a kit that is already rather bland.

 

I wouldn't have a problem with a passive that adds something to the kit that is already there, but Silence is all or nothing, stacking them does nothing.

 

It's an awful passive simple as that.

[Sixty5]

21 minutes ago, 321agemo said:

Yes and no. Silence makes enemy deaf within a certain range, and if you fire you're unsilence gun and there's an enemy nearby unsilenced, it's going to be alerted. The passive basically guarentees nearby enemies won't be alerted, since its unaffected by your abilities range/ duration.

Effectively Silence does the same thing as her proposed passive (Make nearby enemies unaware of your shots), all this does is make the Silence part of her Silence redundant, at which point you may as well call the ability Stun.

 

30 minutes ago, NinthAria said:

The problem isn't the passive, it's Silence. It's an okay CC, but Banshee already has good CC with Sonic Boom and Sound Quake; as others have pointed out, the actual functionality of Silence is a little obtuse compared to just auto-hushing all your weapons. Comparing the passive to mods that do something similar is kind of silly, because a lot of them do that--the point is it frees up mod slots/points that you'd otherwise spend using that. Ivara doesn't need to bother with Enemy Sense because she has it already; it's a similar case here.

The thing is that Ivara doesn't have enemy sense built into her kit already. 

This is the equivalent of giving Banshee Ivara's passive but having it not stack with Sonar.

 

Look at the other passives, Ember gets damage and energy regen, two things she loves (though accessing them sucks), Mag gets a free Sentinel power with her passive, Volt gets an interesting change to his playstyle, as did Hydroid. All banshee gets is a niche mechanic that is redundant because of her kit. 

[JudasMaiden]

TBH, I don't think its a bad passive, considering Banshee's theme. Just like a lot others said before me, it will remove the necessity of using Silencing mods. So, basically, you can bring along any weapon you want, without any fear of being detected. 

And as to your concern regarding her Silence ability being redundant with the passive, think about it from the perspective of energy economy. You are getting the ability to silence your weapons without having to expend any energy. I would say that is a major advantage, rather than a redundancy.

The "redundancy" you are talking about is, in my opinion, an advantage. It is kinda similar to Equinox's passive where Health pickups restore a percentage of her energy, and vice-versa, which is achieved in other frames by the use of the Equilibrium mod. Or Ivara having enemies being marked on the minimap, which is achieved by Enemy Radar on other frames.

The only proposed passives which were really meh (IN MY OPINION) were Ash's Passive of increased duration of bleed proc, considering that he already does a fuckton of bleed and finisher damage with his ult. Or Nyx's passive, which makes her a look like a Irradiating Disarm Loki rip-off. 

Edited May 14, 2016 by JudasMaiden

[Sixty5]

Just now, JudasMaiden said:

TBH, I don't think its a bad passive, considering Banshee's theme. Just like a lot others said before me, it will remove the necessity of using Silencing mods. So, basically, you can bring along any weapon you want, without any fear of being detected. 

And as to your concern regarding her Silence ability being redundant with the passive, think about it from the perspective of energy economy. You are getting the ability to silence your weapons without having to expend any energy. I would say that is a major advantage, rather than a redundancy.

The "redundancy" you are talking about is, in my opinion, an advantage. It is kinda similar to Equinox's passive where Health pickups restore a percentage of her energy, and vice-versa, which is achieved in other frames by the use of the Equilibrium mod.

 

Sure it fits her theme, but there is so much more that could work way better, like something to do with infrasound, rhythms or echos, there is more to sound than just silent guns. Personally I'd want to see something that works off of Infrasound that makes enemies less observant and reduces their accuracy. This boosts her stealth capabilities in a way that she doesn't already have within her kit, as well as increasing her survivability in endless missions where stealth is useless, this sort of passive fits her kit better and helps her do her job.

As far as the energy economy goes, sure it helps, but Energy isn't really an issue in short runs anyway.

Finally I disagree, the Passive is redundant, Equinox having a free Equilibrium or Ivara having a free Enemy Sense are not issues, because it gives you the mod for free, Passive Silence is however redundant on Banshee because she doesn't need to run any mods to Silence her weapons. Those other frames you are getting something that you already have, and that you can stack, for free, whereas Banshee gets something that she already has that she cannot stack.

[matto]

I don't think it is that bad.

You get a silence passive that is personal, and use the Silence ability to share it as a support frame + the fact that it helps crowd control. Most people already use it for that anyway, for the confusion/stun it provokes so you can rush a mission, rather than playing stealth and unalerted. This is a direct consequence to the fast pace of the game, in which slow stealthing doesn't have its place (even if it's fun).

That being said, I agree it is a lack of creativity and that Banshee could use some survivability oriented buff.

So I just hope something like shield gates will be implemented to help the support frames by making them rely on shield while tank or offensive are on health or armor. That is, in my opinion, the key to make all those squishy frame viable.

Hush is useful but is also a waste of space that could be used for damage mods. Even if, as you said, a sniper doesn't need every slots to be filled with damage to kill a mob 50, or even 95% of Warframe content, it will be a waste for higher levels.

About your suggestion, creating confusion to the nearest mobs is also a part of Silence. I agree that deviating bullets would be something new for her though. But I think it is not as simple to code. It would be something like "gives damage reduction to nearest units in a area of Xm".

Anyway, I can't think of anything that wouldn't break the game or fall into a gimmick rather than a real passive, so I'm fine with it.

[321agemo]

12 minutes ago, Sixty5 said:

Effectively Silence does the same thing as her proposed passive (Make nearby enemies unaware of your shots), all this does is make the Silence part of her Silence redundant, at which point you may as well call the ability Stun.

 

I think im starting to see what you mean. Instead of the passive adding an alternate gameplay or improving her existing kit, the passive feels like its taking away from it.

[Sixty5]

Just now, matto said:

Hush is useful but is also a waste of space that could be used for damage mods. Even if, as you said, a sniper doesn't need every slots to be filled with damage to kill a mob 50, or even 95% of Warframe content, it will be a waste for higher levels.

Banshee has a 5x damage amplification ability, I think she can afford to drop a single mod slot and still one shot anything in any mission that you would want to stealth.

Banshee stops 1 shotting things only after you have gone rather deep into endless runs. At this point there is no mission in the game that puts you up against enemies of this level in missions that you can stealth.

 

Banshee needs a full rework rather badly, her kit feels so bland nowadays

[YasaiTsume]

I never was hot for any passives that were just a mini version of any one of their Abilities. (Cough Frost's passive so cool literally Cough)

[Sixty5]

Just now, 321agemo said:

 

I think im starting to see what you mean. Instead of the passive adding an alternate gameplay or improving her existing kit, the passive feels like its taking away from it.

Exactly. 

Currently Banshees play pattern consists of either:

Casting Sonar and Silence every time they drop off, and shooting stuff, with a 1 and 4 thrown in for CC

or

Casting Silence every time it comes up and meleeing everything in sight with a 1 thrown in now and then.

Either way Silence is ideally always up while you are fighting regardless, making the passive pretty much useless.

[JudasMaiden]

37 minutes ago, Sixty5 said:

Sure it fits her theme, but there is so much more that could work way better, like something to do with infrasound, rhythms or echos, there is more to sound than just silent guns. Personally I'd want to see something that works off of Infrasound that makes enemies less observant and reduces their accuracy. This boosts her stealth capabilities in a way that she doesn't already have within her kit, as well as increasing her survivability in endless missions where stealth is useless, this sort of passive fits her kit better and helps her do her job.

As far as the energy economy goes, sure it helps, but Energy isn't really an issue in short runs anyway.

Finally I disagree, the Passive is redundant, Equinox having a free Equilibrium or Ivara having a free Enemy Sense are not issues, because it gives you the mod for free, Passive Silence is however redundant on Banshee because she doesn't need to run any mods to Silence her weapons. Those other frames you are getting something that you already have, and that you can stack, for free, whereas Banshee gets something that she already has that she cannot stack.

I would like the idea of infrasound or something like that, but then again, it sounds more like an ability than a passive, not to mention that it would require re-adjusting enemy AI programming, which is a lot of work for a passive. A rather better passive according to me would be an echo-like passive wherein if Banshee fires her weapons, the enemies get confused about the source of the firing, and run in the other direction from the source of firing. Or better yet, a passive in which enemies and objects are highlighted through walls, much like a codex scanner.

And yes, Energy economy IS an important factor. Try doing those high level infested missions, where Parasitic eximuses spawn like crazy.

And yeah, I agree with your third point that her passive cannot be stacked. But then again, as they said in the Devstream, her passive has not been finalised yet, so you can expect some changes. Maybe they will add some bonuses instead of just plain silencing of weapons (who knows, maybe an increased damage bonus from weapons by taking into account the stealth multiplier). So, its too early to be sure. Lets see what they come up with.

 

Edited May 14, 2016 by JudasMaiden

[Stratego89]

1 hour ago, Blatantfool said:

 

 Honestly, Silence ought to just be changed to fit the passive. I've always felt like it was a lackluster skill myself. Perhaps significantly boosting silent weapon effectiveness within it's range. Essentially meaning:

-Banshee's weapons are ALWAYS silent. This skill is a damage buff for her.

-Teammates with loud guns have their weapons made silent.

-Teammates already using silent weapons get a damage buff.

Swap it around and I'd agree. Silence properly silences everything in range like I mentioned it needs to before (and actually makes your weapon silent like hush. As well as all allies' weapons in range). Then the passive would be Banshee does increased damage or something with silenced weapons- be it with hush or her skills. Her sonar is already in need of a nerf as it is and it gives teammates more damage than it even should. She has no need to have ANOTHER skill giving them more damage on top of that.

[Vapis]

5 hours ago, (PS4)SwagSmasha said:

Im not a banshee main so i can't really relate and I'll take your word for it but i thought the silent weapons passive was kind of clever and lets be honest no in this game will ever use hush.

I used hush, On a sniper rifle when using it with ivara's headshot in prowl benefit. worked pretty well.

[TheScytale]

I agree with OP.

Ivara and Equinox got passives that do look like mods. However, the passives' strength is nowhere near the maxed mods, and if you want the optimized effects, you'll need to equip them anyway. But that's not the case for banshee. Her passive would make even a 100% hush useless, and Silence as well, since the passive isn't dependant on range, contrary to the ability. That's what creates the redundancy. 

Passives should be "weak" (even if inaros' isn't that weak) bonuses that do no really alter the gameplay or loadouts, but feel like a good addition. This isn't the case with Banshee's unnecessary one.