Mirage Rework Concept

[(XBOX)PichuFrenzy]

After reading the recent Dev Workshop about Warframes changes, I think it's time that I write my first post here. Being someone that plays with Mirage a lot, I felt concerned about that Prism nerf that DE is about to do. That's something that should have been done a long time ago but increasing its damage isn't the correct way to balance this.

Mirage is a Warframe with two kinds of power:

• Weapon improvement powers: Hall of Mirrors and Eclipse, which can increase both status effectiveness (i.e. AOE status weapons & mirrors) and damage input (i.e. Eclipse while being in light & mirrors) 
• Crowd Control powers: Sleight of Hand and Prism

Once you get this, it becomes more clear that increasing the damage input of Sleight of Hand and Prism doesn't make much sense as players won't use them to kill enemies. 

So here goes my rework suggestion of Mirage powers. This rework idea is based on the current state of Mirage and is trying to add some synergy between the different powers. 

Hall of Mirrors: 

The point here is to create some synergy between Hall of Mirrors and Sleight of Hand. 

If Sleight of Hand is casted while Hall of Mirrors is active, the holographic mirrors become booby trapped. If one these mirrors comes in contact with an enemy, the said mirror will explode and blind enemies within a radius of 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 meters (not affected by Power Range) for 10 seconds (not affected by Power Duration). The destroyed mirror can be recast only when the duration of Hall of Mirrors expires. 

(Little note here: the self damage occurring when the clones expire before their projectile hit their target should be removed. I proc status to allies and myself too many times with the Torid and the Staticor because of this.)

 

Sleight of Hand:

The point here is to make this power useful outside of Corpus tilesets. 

Grineer Ramparts detonate when an enemy is/get inside them and inflict Finisher damage equivalent to the enemy's remaining amount of hit points (similar to the effect on Lockers).

Grineer Blunts deactivate for the duration of the ability. 

Grineer Sensor Bars deactivate for the duration of the ability. 

Orokin Turrets are now affected and fire upon nearby enemies even if they didn't get activated by pressure plates. 

Orokin Spinning Lasers Death Orbs stop rotating for the duration of the ability.

Orokin Thumper Death Orbs stop functioning for the duration of the ability.

Grineer doors and Orokin doors are locked down for enemies (doors will still open for allies) for half of the duration of the ability. Sleight of Hand must expire and be recast in order to lock down the doors again. 

 

Eclipse: 

The point here is to create some synergy between Eclipse and Prism. 

If Eclipse is active/casted while Prism is active, Mirage will be considered in light if she is within half of the range of the Prism's laser range and be considered in dark otherwise, not minding the lighting conditions of her surroundings. 

 

Prism:

The point here is to try to make Prism useful before the detonation, as people usually detonates it right after casting it. Furthermore, with the incoming nerf, Prism will just become a worse version of Excalibur's Radial Blind, which is pretty sad for a so called "ultimate power". 

Laser range and blind radius are inverted: laser range is now 8 / 12 / 15 / 25 meters (affected by Power Range) and blind radius is now 15 / 20 / 25 / 30 meters (affected by Power Range). In addition to the radiation damage, enemies hit by lasers are now blinded for 10 seconds (not affected by Power Duration). Lasers have innate Punch Through of 0.25 / 0.5 / 0.75 / 1 meter (affected by Power Strength). When the ability is deactivated, the prism will explode and blind enemies within the blind range considering Line-of-Sight. 

With the laser Punch Through being affected by Power Strength instead of Power Range, this will keep a balance of the lasers effectiveness if people go for a maxed out range build.  

 

Feel free to discuss some of these ideas below. 

Edited May 27, 2016 by (XB1)B2T PichuFrenzy

[--Q--uaint]

16 minutes ago, (XB1)B2T PichuFrenzy said:

If one these mirrors comes in contact with an enemy, the said mirror will explode and blind enemies within a radius of 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 meters (not affected by Power Range) for 10 seconds (not affected by Power Duration). The destroyed mirror can be recast only when the duration of Hall of Mirrors expires. 

I like this, but think that the mirror shouldn’t actually go away since that makes Mirage not very good for melee if she’s using SoH…

17 minutes ago, (XB1)B2T PichuFrenzy said:

Grineer Ramparts detonate when an enemy is/get inside them and inflict Finisher damage equivalent to the enemy’s remaining amount of hit points (similar to the effect on Lockers).

Nah, mang. That’s boring.

Grineer Ramparts now ragdoll any Grineer that tries to board them away, dealing a fixed amount of damage. The Rampart itself automatically acquires enemy targets and its damage is enhanced by Power Strength.
During the ability, the Rampart’s damage is converted to Finisher if manned by an ally.

20 minutes ago, (XB1)B2T PichuFrenzy said:

Grineer Sensor Bars deactivate for the duration of the ability. 

Make it more like the Corpus ones, but with its own unique flair:

Grineer Sensor Bars under the effect of the ability will now deal Blast damage and a guaranteed proc to any Grineer who walks through, but when an ally touches the field they will simply break.
If broken during the ability, the Sensor Bar will grant 250 energy in an AoE like a Death Orb activated by a Prime.

22 minutes ago, (XB1)B2T PichuFrenzy said:

Orokin Turrets are now affected and fire upon nearby enemies even if they didn’t get activated by pressure plates. 

Scale their damage with Power Strength as well, please :3

24 minutes ago, (XB1)B2T PichuFrenzy said:

Orokin Spinning Lasers Death Orbs stop rotating for the duration of the ability.

Orokin Thumper Death Orbs stop functioning for the duration of the ability.

Perhaps instead:

Orokin Traps' energy color is changed to Mirage’s.
Orokin Traps no longer damage/CC allies, but grant 30 energy from a Thumper’s wave and 3 energy/s from a laser. (scale both with power strength?)
Orokin Traps store allied damage for application at the end of the ability, much like Mind Control targets.

29 minutes ago, (XB1)B2T PichuFrenzy said:

Grineer doors and Orokin doors are locked down for enemies (doors will still open for allies) for half of the duration of the ability. Sleight of Hand must expire and be recast in order to lock down the doors again. 

I don’t think this is a good idea at all.

29 minutes ago, (XB1)B2T PichuFrenzy said:

If Eclipse is active/casted while Prism is active, Mirage will be considered in light if she is within half of the range of the Prism’s laser range and be considered in dark otherwise, not minding the lighting conditions of her surroundings. 

I like this!

31 minutes ago, (XB1)B2T PichuFrenzy said:

Laser range and blind radius are inverted: laser range is now 8 / 12 / 15 / 25 meters (affected by Power Range) and blind radius is now 15 / 20 / 25 / 30 meters

Why not make them the same?

Otherwise, I like this change.

[alfaomega04]

24 minutes ago, (XB1)B2T PichuFrenzy said:

 

Feel free to discuss some of these ideas below. 

As a regular user of Mirage for interception missions, some defense and survival, I can honestly say: I hope her blind on prism get nerfed into oblivion. 

As or right now, Mirage is able to completely (nullies are an exception here) lock down 90% maps in the game indefinitely without the need of energy vampire or even dropping energy pizza's. This is the same reason why Excal had his rework. His blind would lock down any map for such low energy cost that it renders any other form of CC as extraneous. People abused it and it happens with the blind from prism as well. The difference was that Excal was always a one trick pony so when the nerf came, he was left without anything else. As for Mirage, she is one of the best DPS frames in the game and I have no idea why she should be the best CC frame bar none. 

So in conclusion: she does DPS, let her do dps. Nerf her blind extremely hard. 

[(XBOX)PichuFrenzy]

1 hour ago, ChronoEclipse said:

1 hour ago, (XB1)B2T PichuFrenzy said:

If one these mirrors comes in contact with an enemy, the said mirror will explode and blind enemies within a radius of 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 meters (not affected by Power Range) for 10 seconds (not affected by Power Duration). The destroyed mirror can be recast only when the duration of Hall of Mirrors expires. 

I like this, but think that the mirror shouldn’t actually go away since that makes Mirage not very good for melee if she’s using SoH…

The point here was to not be able to spam this combination of Hall of Mirror and Seight of Hand, and keep things balanced with a downside. I like having this high risk / high reward concept. That's the entire point of Mirage being a squishy frame while having high potential. 

 

1 hour ago, ChronoEclipse said:

1 hour ago, (XB1)B2T PichuFrenzy said:

Grineer Ramparts detonate when an enemy is/get inside them and inflict Finisher damage equivalent to the enemy’s remaining amount of hit points (similar to the effect on Lockers).

Nah, mang. That’s boring.

Grineer Ramparts now ragdoll any Grineer that tries to board them away, dealing a fixed amount of damage. The Rampart itself automatically acquires enemy targets and its damage is enhanced by Power Strength.
During the ability, the Rampart’s damage is converted to Finisher if manned by an ally.

Sounds fun. I just have a passionate hate for these turrets that destroys half of my squads during every grineer sorties. So as long as it prevent them from using these turrets, it's fine. 

1 hour ago, ChronoEclipse said:

1 hour ago, (XB1)B2T PichuFrenzy said:

Grineer Sensor Bars deactivate for the duration of the ability. 

Make it more like the Corpus ones, but with its own unique flair:

Grineer Sensor Bars under the effect of the ability will now deal Blast damage and a guaranteed proc to any Grineer who walks through, but when an ally touches the field they will simply break.
If broken during the ability, the Sensor Bar will grant 250 energy in an AoE like a Death Orb activated by a Prime.

I didn't think about changing the magnetic damage into blast damage. That's nice.

250 energy is too much. Something like 100-150 should be better. 

1 hour ago, ChronoEclipse said:

1 hour ago, (XB1)B2T PichuFrenzy said:

Orokin Turrets are now affected and fire upon nearby enemies even if they didn’t get activated by pressure plates. 

Scale their damage with Power Strength as well, please :3

Even then I think their damage will still be really low. I like using turret for distraction purposes not for damage. 

1 hour ago, ChronoEclipse said:

1 hour ago, (XB1)B2T PichuFrenzy said:

Grineer doors and Orokin doors are locked down for enemies (doors will still open for allies) for half of the duration of the ability. Sleight of Hand must expire and be recast in order to lock down the doors again. 

I don’t think this is a good idea at all.

With this idea, I was trying to simulate the laser barriers in Corpus tilesets that lock down enemies for a while before they finally make through the lasers. 

1 hour ago, ChronoEclipse said:

1 hour ago, (XB1)B2T PichuFrenzy said:

Laser range and blind radius are inverted: laser range is now 8 / 12 / 15 / 25 meters (affected by Power Range) and blind radius is now 15 / 20 / 25 / 30 meters

Why not make them the same?

Here I tried to make the lasers more attractive than the blind explosions while still being balanced. I felt that 30 meters was too much. 

 

59 minutes ago, alfaomega04 said:

As a regular user of Mirage for interception missions, some defense and survival, I can honestly say: I hope her blind on prism get nerfed into oblivion. 

As or right now, Mirage is able to completely (nullies are an exception here) lock down 90% maps in the game indefinitely without the need of energy vampire or even dropping energy pizza's. This is the same reason why Excal had his rework. His blind would lock down any map for such low energy cost that it renders any other form of CC as extraneous. People abused it and it happens with the blind from prism as well. The difference was that Excal was always a one trick pony so when the nerf came, he was left without anything else. As for Mirage, she is one of the best DPS frames in the game and I have no idea why she should be the best CC frame bar none. 

So in conclusion: she does DPS, let her do dps. Nerf her blind extremely hard. 

Except that we are in 2016 now. DE is more experienced now than they were years ago. They are not going to nerf any powers to the ground, especially something that is called "ultimate power". They are trying to make everything useful while preserving diversity and that's why I'm proposing these changes. 

Edited May 27, 2016 by (XB1)B2T PichuFrenzy

[(PSN)RenovaKunumaru]

An amazing concept. I like it.

[shootaman777]

On 5/27/2016 at 0:41 PM, (XB1)B2T PichuFrenzy said:

After reading the recent Dev Workshop about Warframes changes, I think it's time that I write my first post here. Being someone that plays with Mirage a lot, I felt concerned about that Prism nerf that DE is about to do. That's something that should have been done a long time ago but increasing its damage isn't the correct way to balance this.

Mirage is a Warframe with two kinds of power:

• Weapon improvement powers: Hall of Mirrors and Eclipse, which can increase both status effectiveness (i.e. AOE status weapons & mirrors) and damage input (i.e. Eclipse while being in light & mirrors) 
• Crowd Control powers: Sleight of Hand and Prism

Once you get this, it becomes more clear that increasing the damage input of Sleight of Hand and Prism doesn't make much sense as players won't use them to kill enemies. 

So here goes my rework suggestion of Mirage powers. This rework idea is based on the current state of Mirage and is trying to add some synergy between the different powers. 

Hall of Mirrors: 

The point here is to create some synergy between Hall of Mirrors and Sleight of Hand. 

If Sleight of Hand is casted while Hall of Mirrors is active, the holographic mirrors become booby trapped. If one these mirrors comes in contact with an enemy, the said mirror will explode and blind enemies within a radius of 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 meters (not affected by Power Range) for 10 seconds (not affected by Power Duration). The destroyed mirror can be recast only when the duration of Hall of Mirrors expires. 

(Little note here: the self damage occurring when the clones expire before their projectile hit their target should be removed. I proc status to allies and myself too many times with the Torid and the Staticor because of this.)

 

Sleight of Hand:

The point here is to make this power useful outside of Corpus tilesets. 

Grineer Ramparts detonate when an enemy is/get inside them and inflict Finisher damage equivalent to the enemy's remaining amount of hit points (similar to the effect on Lockers).

Grineer Blunts deactivate for the duration of the ability. 

Grineer Sensor Bars deactivate for the duration of the ability. 

Orokin Turrets are now affected and fire upon nearby enemies even if they didn't get activated by pressure plates. 

Orokin Spinning Lasers Death Orbs stop rotating for the duration of the ability.

Orokin Thumper Death Orbs stop functioning for the duration of the ability.

Grineer doors and Orokin doors are locked down for enemies (doors will still open for allies) for half of the duration of the ability. Sleight of Hand must expire and be recast in order to lock down the doors again. 

 

Eclipse: 

The point here is to create some synergy between Eclipse and Prism. 

If Eclipse is active/casted while Prism is active, Mirage will be considered in light if she is within half of the range of the Prism's laser range and be considered in dark otherwise, not minding the lighting conditions of her surroundings. 

 

Prism:

The point here is to try to make Prism useful before the detonation, as people usually detonates it right after casting it. Furthermore, with the incoming nerf, Prism will just become a worse version of Excalibur's Radial Blind, which is pretty sad for a so called "ultimate power". 

Laser range and blind radius are inverted: laser range is now 8 / 12 / 15 / 25 meters (affected by Power Range) and blind radius is now 15 / 20 / 25 / 30 meters (affected by Power Range). In addition to the radiation damage, enemies hit by lasers are now blinded for 10 seconds (not affected by Power Duration). Lasers have innate Punch Through of 0.25 / 0.5 / 0.75 / 1 meter (affected by Power Strength). When the ability is deactivated, the prism will explode and blind enemies within the blind range considering Line-of-Sight. 

With the laser Punch Through being affected by Power Strength instead of Power Range, this will keep a balance of the lasers effectiveness if people go for a maxed out range build.  

 

Feel free to discuss some of these ideas below. 

I think you're ignoring half of Mirage here.  The tank part of Mirage.  

Essentially, Mirage's crowd controlling days are gone, thanks to the LoS nerf bomb to Mirage's Prism.  Excalibur can do the same thing, but more efficiently, so there is no longer a need for a Crowd Control Mirage.  

Also, Sleight of Hand is a glorified Overload with almost NEVER useful effects, a reduced energy cost, and greater duration, which I believe are grounds for it to be removed from the game altogether, as was Overload.  

Here's what I proposed in the update 18.13 feedback thread, would you mind giving me some feedback on the idea?  

 

"

I don't understand this [nerf] at all.  

In my opinion, DE has created something else on the level of the pre-rework Volt.  The one gimmick that Mirage had to bring it into endgame content was its massive blinding capabilities.  Now, all it has is: 

Hall of Mirrors) Enemy accuracy reduction where they aim a meter or two away from you, sometimes hitting you regardless (AOE and explosives still kill Mirage almost instantly anyways, and endgame level AOE or explosives? Forget it, go home Mirage, you're dead) and weapon damage increase (which is useless in the endgame as there exist few weapons if any that can one-shot large crowds of level 100+ enemies even with the Mirage multishot bonus which has still been reduced from 5x to 3x anyways with the damage buff not even coming close to compensating for the lack of effect that the extra two sets of volleys of bullets used to have (in terms of elemental or weapon specific effects like the Sonicor).  The augment of this ability barely helps, with a cap of a 50% damage increase, and takes up an otherwise useful mod slot that should not have to be wasted on this mod for anywhere near decent damage.  

Sleight of Hand)  What even?  Why would this ability even get a damage buff?  It faces the same problem as Volt's Overload faced pre-rework: a lack of objects that can explode.  The augment barely assists in this issue, and takes up an otherwise useful mod slot to even make this ability do something to begin with, with a lackluster 250 damage in the explosion of each pickup, which is useless endgame anyways, since enemies don't die fast enough to make this useful.  Instead of slapping a damage increase band-aid on this in order to keep this prankster ability in the trickster's ability set as an excuse to keep it as a gimmick, why not come up with an actually useful ability that follows the same theme?  

Eclipse)  Now, this ability, with its amazing damage increase and damage receive reduction potential, is without a doubt the best in Mirage's kit.  The problem is that it is too inconsistent.  Now, given that this ability can make Mirage into the single-handed slaughterer or unbeatable tank, I would imagine that its inconsistency is the only thing keeping it in existence (case in point being Ember's Overheat).  However, no player wants to take 5-10 days to explore every meter of every tileset to find out where every patch of light and darkness is in every room in existence, and as such is stuck in a guessing game as to whether or not they will be able to take a hit or dish one out, and generally will guess wrong and die on a fairly often basis.  Now, someone at DE HQ acknowledges this problem, as the augment Total Eclipse spreads the buff of Eclipse to teammates within 5 meters of Mirage, which promotes standstill usage of Mirage, which takes the guessing game out of the equation, which makes Mirage a nice buffer for radial damage abilities, but not as one to increase how tanky teammates are, as tanks are generally supposed to keep on the move, as it is impossible to tank in Warframe against high level enemies to begin with (unless using Wukong), making the augment only useful in the light.  I like this ability, but I'll propose my ideal changes to Mirage after I finish explaining why I think DE took Mirage down a few tiers (tears :'( ) on the totem pole.  

Prism)  This ability in and of itself is a good ability.  However, with its massively underwhelming damage, specifically radiation damage (which is good only on the occasional Grineer unit), this ability, even with the damage buff, is useless in endgame scenarios.  In addition, the blinding capabilities have been made essentially useless here, as Excalibur does the same thing, but better, as shown by user OzoneSlayer in: 

Prism

62.5m blind

50 energy

No finishers

LoS

Extremely Long Animation that interrupts you

 

Radial Blind

62.5m Blind

50 energy

Finishers

LoS

Extremely short animation that doesn't interrupt you

Speaking in terms of efficiency, Mirage is now useless for blinding, as there is a frame that can do the same thing, but better.  

As stated previously, Mirage's only endgame viability in organised squads was as a Blinding Mirage, which is now less effective than a Blinding Excalibur, which is why I find it strange that DE would remove a Warframe's endgame capabilities without at least offering something else to make it endgame viable in organised squads.  This is what is referred to as a nerf bomb (similar to a nerf nuke, but it did not remove the Warframe from team play entirely, such as what happened to Hydroid).  

To fix this, I would propose that Mirage's 1st ability be almost identical to Equinox's 1st ability, with a light and darkness mode.  The 2nd ability would be Hall of Mirrors, except all 5 Mirages would be able to shoot, instead of 3 with an irrelevant damage buff.  This would also tie into the 3rd ability, Eclipse, in that in light mode, the other Mirages would be darkened, but still do the same damage as normal, so that the enemies only would have reduced accuracy at close range by noticing the shadow Mirage clones (the regular Mirage would still have a damage increase from Eclipse).  In darkness form, Mirage would be darkened but the other Mirage clones would be brightened, enhancing their damage, with Mirage still receiving the damage reduction of Eclipse, but more enemies will notice Mirage due to her bright clones and she will be under fire more often.  The 3rd ability, Eclipse, would have the damage reduction or damage increase function depending on night or day mode, but with a twist:  unless Hall of Mirrors is active at the same time, providing a drawback to using the Eclipse/Hall of Mirrors combination, then Eclipse will be only half as effective.  So, instead of a 95% damage reduction capped that Mirage can achieve, without Hall of Mirrors engaged which provides the drawback of drawing enemy fire, Mirage only receives a 50% capped damage reduction.  This promotes the combined usage of both abilities and and provides an incentive to use the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd ability in conjunction.  This provides endgame synergy to make a squishy Warframe into one capable of decently handling endgame scenarios (i.e. in swapping between being a glass cannon and a hidden mobile fortress).  

Now, for the 4th ability.  This one, I think should have its function entirely changed, as DE seems to want to make Excalibur the better blinder, so instead of making Mirage have to compete with that, Mirage should have an entirely different function.  First off, the ridiculous casting time needs to be shortened.  If I have to explain this, then that most likely means that the person arguing with me over this knows nothing of Mirage or how to use her 4th ability.  I use Mirage with Speed Drift and Natural Talent, and get slaughtered all the time when casting the 4th ability.  It's not a matter of "all you need to do is use Natural Talent yada yada yada"  which is a common sentiment I've seen many times on this thread so far.  There's a delay that is unaffected by casting speed mods after the casting animation of Prism has gone by, which is what gets Mirage killed.  I propose that, in addition to removing that delay, we also remove the blinding capabilities of Prism, since they are now nothing more than a gimmick.  Instead, I would propose that Prism should share a percentage that scales with ability level and power strength of Mirage of the effects of Eclipse to all allies in LoS of the Prism, as well as have a substantial damage buff instead of the ineffectual one that we received a day ago, in addition to giving enemies either puncture and fire procs during the light form, and confusion (similar to that of Naramon focus) procs and reduced visibility in darkness form.  Also, the fact that Prism does radiation damage should be reconsidered to being a more universally useful damage type, such as corrosive or viral damage.  

So, all in all, what do you all think of this?  I'd like to hear some sort of feedback to this (and please don't just say "HEY, THAT'S EQUINOX'S GIMMICK"), whether it be criticism or not, so please make it constructive.  Thank you, and have a nice morning/day/evening (whenever this message may find you).  

-Shootaman777, a long time player/follower of this game.  (Long enough to remember Ember's Overheat and Rhino's duration based invulnerability)

"

 

Thanks for reading this, if you've got this far and haven't yet gone insane.     :D

I found your thread through reading through all the posts of the Mirage Update 18.13 feedback thread, and since I am trying to respond to every constructive comment to try to push all of them to be *that* much better, so that when the players come knocking on DE's door through the forums, we have a constructive idea that we can have a fair argument for and an idea to propose that DE can realistically consider (since Mirage is one of my favorite frames), I followed your link and have read through the entirety of your idea, and the feedback that I have for you on your idea is that you have half of the picture of Mirage with some numbers put together that might be able to work, given the right circumstances.  What I believe you to be missing is that Mirage is also (currently) capable of tanking, and 'once you get this, it becomes more clear' (in your words) that there is a lot more that you can do with Mirage than just make her one of the few Warframes where it matters which weapon you bring along for the mission and that depends on positioning (such as with how you proposed that Prism should create light or darkness for Eclipse to work), since positioning is a fickle thing and there are too many things to keep track of in that scenario, in my opinion.  

[--Q--uaint]

6 hours ago, shootaman777 said:

To fix this, I would propose that Mirage’s 1st ability be almost identical to Equinox’s 1st ability, with a light and darkness mode.

So it would grant armor/shield and speed/damage buffs? If not, what?

6 hours ago, shootaman777 said:

Eclipse will be only half as effective

I feel like the use of an ability should not nerf the effectiveness of another ability.

 

I have been mildly inspired with your suggestions:

Sleight of Hand is replaced with Glimmering Veil. It is a channeled Quiver-style ability, having two modes (dark and light). Dark-mode blinds any enemy who damages you for 2/3/4/5 seconds, and light-mode has a 10/15/20/25% reload speed boost and SoH’s effects on everything in a 4/6/8/10 meter radius.
The channeled cost would be low, and active dark/light modes would horse dark/light effects on her other skills.

Prism now begins emitting beams as soon as the cast animation starts. Damage type while in the light is Fire, damage type while in the dark is Radiation. Proc chance is 10% in light and 25% in the dark per second, scaling with Power Strength.

Edited May 29, 2016 by ChronoEclipse

[(XBOX)PichuFrenzy]

8 hours ago, shootaman777 said:

I think you're ignoring half of Mirage here.  The tank part of Mirage.  

I'm fully aware of Mirage's tanking abilities. As a proof here is my Mirage build. As you can see this is a blind-ish build with just enough power strength to get that 95% damage reduction in the dark (and 285% damage increase in light which is still very good), with also good duration and good efficiency to make every ability useful. I even prefer dark tilesets over light ones because it will allow me to move around more freely without the fear of getting one-shoted across the map. 

8 hours ago, shootaman777 said:

with the Mirage multishot bonus which has still been reduced from 5x to 3x anyways with the damage buff not even coming close to compensating for the lack of effect that the extra two sets of volleys of bullets used to have (in terms of elemental or weapon specific effects like the Sonicor)

Allow me to disagree here because my main loadout consists of two AoE status weapons that are perfectly viable for endgame thanks to Hall of Mirrors: Torid and Staticor. 

I just made this video against some high level heavy gunners eximus to illustrate that these two weapons work very well with her: 

 

After reading your rework idea, I feel like you are focusing too much on her Eclipse power and you are loosing that trickster feel of her. I think that she should be a warframe that jumps everywhere while fooling the enemy by using her mirrors, by trapping different things, by using her surroundings to take advantage and by blinding enemies here and there, hence her passive that offer increased mobility. 

I really don't want her to become another Banshee, Rhino or Equinox that is only focused on buffing allies and yourself, damage wise and resistance wise. She should rather be that annoying and confusing warframe on the Nyx side that is capable of distracting the enemy while still being able to do heavy damage when necessary. 

 

Edited May 29, 2016 by (XB1)B2T PichuFrenzy

[shootaman777]

When I said "I think you're ignoring half of Mirage here.  The tank part of Mirage", what I meant was that your rework idea did not mention tanking or survivability anywhere in it, not that I thought you did not know enough about Mirage to know that that was a thing.  

Also, how could I be losing the trickster feel of Mirage with my idea, when she is not a trickster to begin with, as the only one of her abilities that screams 'trickster' is Sleight of Hand, a useless ability?  Other than striking off this useless ability, nothing else in the kit would be changed at all with what I mentioned, except for adding a lot more damage potential to Mirage's 4th, less randomness to Mirage's 3rd from light to dark, and a system of calculated choice through using a combination of Eclipse and Hall of Mirrors which would be necessary to compensate for the randomness of light and dark having been removed from Eclipse.  In other words, how could you say that by removing a useless ability and tweaking a few 0's and 1's in what goes light and dark, I am losing the 'trickster' theme here, when there is none to begin with other than with the useless ability?  Also, did I not detail an entire section here to promoting her usage while mobile?  

In addition, this is what I had come up with for the augments:  

"

In addition, I have some augment ideas for the new abilities that I proposed to make Mirage more viable as a team player.  

-Hall of Mirrors augment, a name for which I have yet to determine.  This would give the option to hit x within 5 meters of a teammate and attach one of Mirage's mirrors to them, providing them with a mobile turret with its own AI and the weapons of the original Mirage that follows the other player in the same position around them as the mirror was around the original Mirage, for the duration of Hall of Mirrors.  This would also pair with Total Eclipse, as allies within 2-3 meters (the ones the mirrors are attached to) of the mirrors detached from Mirage would gain the benefits of Total Eclipse.  In other words, since in the idea I mentioned earlier would have the Mirage's mirrors having the opposite Eclipse effect as the Mirage herself, to provide tankiness to a squad, Mirage has to put herself in a more exposed position due to the brightness of the light form Eclipse on Mirage herself drawing enemy attention, as well as having to make herself into more of a tank that will not be as able to assist her team due to being in the shadows to provide teammates with the Total Eclipse buff of damage increase, providing a drawback for everything, where everything is a calculated choice, which DE seems to be a fan of.  

This would make Mirage's Total Eclipse, her best ability/augment combination, be more viable in team gameplay ANYWHERE, as now, the Total Eclipse buff is mobile if used in conjunction with this augment, which makes her a viable team buffer in ANY setting, with her own personal drawbacks.  In addition, this would promote communication and organisation between squad mates.  

This is what I believe DE always wanted for Trinity's Blessing, and as such I believe it deserves a chance with Mirage, since it is not Overheat (Ember) or duration-based invincibility (Rhino, Valkyr, etc.)- it has drawbacks, it is only damage received reduction or damage dealt increase, the stats can be made to be balanced, and it brings a frame removed from team play right back into it, without making Mirage the one-woman army who presses a button to make everyone invincible, as this requires coordination and has realistically surmountable obstacles.  

-Prism augment, that makes the fire and puncture damage from the light form of Mirage turn into damage with a percentage chance (affected by power strength, may fall off with range, hopefully not as dramatically as with the new Mag's abiltiies (I can't remember the new name of the reworked second ability, since I was so disappointed by the results of using Mag in the Simulacrum that I did not bother to remember the name of the new Bullet Attractor, nor what used to be so good as Polarize)) of procs (which can also be manipulated by augments such as Freeze Force, Venom Dose, Fireball Frenzy, Smite Infusion, and Shock Trooper) while the Prism is active.  Now, here's where it gets interesting, as opposed to cliched.  This idea I'm about to give is somewhat stolen from a YouTube video I saw on a Warframe concept idea for a Warframe that would be called Myst (the URL is https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ts2wi48vmMQ), as well as something I have thought of from using Mirage's Prism itself (since my energy color is almost always black, and on Mirage is no exception, so whenever I had used a blinding Mirage and blew up the Prism, I would see a black cloud of smoke).  This idea is that, during the darkness form of Mirage, blowing up the Prism before the duration of Prism has expired will result in a cloud of smoke matching Mirage's energy color (translucent enough to see through) will appear throughout the entire area of what formerly would have been blinded by the old Mirage and cause reduced visibility and a percentage chance (affected by power strength mods? drops off with range, regardless of power strength? who knows, this is just a concept idea, after all) at fear procs per tick at a rate of x ticks/second (proportional to power duration or strength) for any enemy inside the smoke cloud for the remaining duration of Prism.  

-KEEP TOTAL ECLIPSE, except add that "allies within 2-3 meters (the ones the mirrors are attached to) of the mirrors detached from Mirage would gain the benefits of Total Eclipse".  :D PLS

"

The point of this is to bring Mirage back to endgame style missions such as LoR raids by creating squad synergy through a combination of checks and balances, such as dual augmenting, making Mirage a buffer even on the go.  This is not to make Mirage always a buffer, it is rather to bring her into team play.  Plus, her only current usage in a squad is as a buffer; outside of a squad with Eclipse and Hall of Mirrors in soloing is currently where she shines anyways.  

In addition, this would make Mirage viable for affinity farming missions such as Draco or as a nuker anywhere, as with a far-hitting and highly damaging Prism with highly alterable damage types (via teammates buffing her with augments), she would be a versatile nuker.  

In response to your closing sentiment, I would say that she would not become just another buffer, as stated in the previous paragraph, and that this whole kit will promote her mobility, so she can "be that annoying and confusing warframe on the Nyx side that is capable of distracting the enemy while still being able to do heavy damage when necessary", as you put it.  

[shootaman777]

5 hours ago, ChronoEclipse said:

So it would grant armor/shield and speed/damage buffs? If not, what?

I feel like the use of an ability should not nerf the effectiveness of another ability.

 

I have been mildly inspired with your suggestions:

Sleight of Hand is replaced with Glimmering Veil. It is a channeled Quiver-style ability, having two modes (dark and light). Dark-mode blinds any enemy who damages you for 2/3/4/5 seconds, and light-mode has a 10/15/20/25% reload speed boost and SoH’s effects on everything in a 4/6/8/10 meter radius.
The channeled cost would be low, and active dark/light modes would horse dark/light effects on her other skills.

Prism now begins emitting beams as soon as the cast animation starts. Damage type while in the light is Fire, damage type while in the dark is Radiation. Proc chance is 10% in light and 25% in the dark per second, scaling with Power Strength.

So what would grant armor/shield and speed/damage buffs?  I don't know what you're specifically referring to here, as I do not often use Equinox's first ability.  

I'd agree that one ability should not nerf the other.  However, with such a blatantly overpowered ability as a standalone Eclipse with no random light/dark dilemma, this would be a concession to avoid a major nerf, by providing a nerf in advance to something else.  

And 'mildly inspired'.  Thanks, I think? xD 

Also, thanks for the feedback!  :)

[--Q--uaint]

On 5/29/2016 at 9:18 AM, shootaman777 said:

So what would grant armor/shield and speed/damage buffs?  I don't know what you're specifically referring to here, as I do not often use Equinox's first ability.

Equinox's first power gives a buff after the transformation that drops off over its duration. Transforming to night form gives bonuses to survivability, day form to murder.

I assumed your proposed first power would have a similar effect since it doesn't really make sense to have a power that does literally nothing.

On 5/29/2016 at 9:18 AM, shootaman777 said:

However, with such a blatantly overpowered ability as a standalone Eclipse with no random light/dark dilemma, this would be a concession to avoid a major nerf, by providing a nerf in advance to something else.  

My thought here is that denying Mirage the ability to regain energy while she forces light or dark would be a sufficient "nerf" to make it workable. Combined with the relatively high energy cost that a strong Eclipse is liable to have, I think it's fair.

As a comparison, Mesa's #2 and #3 give damage buffs and 95% DR. Both can be active at once, and neither is channeled.
The damage buff is extremely less than Eclipse's, but the only problems she has with consistency on her DR are melee (You shouldn't be getting melee'd, you're a Tenno.) and AoE (This is somewhat mitigated by the fact that Shatter Shield bounces rockets away from you so the AoE doesn't affect you.).

On 5/29/2016 at 9:18 AM, shootaman777 said:

And 'mildly inspired'.  Thanks, I think? xD 

You gave me interesting ideas. You're welcome. Or thank you. Not sure what I supposed to be saying here xP

[shootaman777]

33 minutes ago, ChronoEclipse said:

Equinox's first power gives a buff after the transformation that drops off over its duration. Transforming to night form gives bonuses to survivability, day form to murder.

I assumed your proposed first power would have a similar effect since it doesn't really make sense to have a power that does literally nothing.

My thought here is that denying Mirage the ability to regain energy while she forces light or dark would be a sufficient "nerf" to make it workable. Combined with the relatively high energy cost that a strong Eclipse is liable to have, I think it's fair.

As a comparison, Mesa's #2 and #3 give damage buffs and 95% DR. Both can be active at once, and neither is channeled.
The damage buff is extremely less than Eclipse's, but the only problems she has with consistency on her DR are melee (You shouldn't be getting melee'd, you're a Tenno.) and AoE (This is somewhat mitigated by the fact that Shatter Shield bounces rockets away from you so the AoE doesn't affect you.).

You gave me interesting ideas. You're welcome. Or thank you. Not sure what I supposed to be saying here xP

Thanks for the heads up on Equinox's 1st ability.  I had always assumed that it was a useless ability, and that the augment was the only thing that made it useful (which is kinda why I proposed the same as a first ability for Mirage).  xD 

When you say 'forces light or dark', when is that?  When using Eclipse?  When using the form swap ability?  

I had always thought Mesa's Shatter Shield was kinda useless and only repelled projectiles, not mitigating damage from status effects or melee attacks or AoE, and that her other ability was inconsistent unless soloing.  

Also, I get meleed a lot, since I love using melee, but am not a pro, so I get meleed back, and quite often at that.  xD

And... Thanks and You're Welcome, I suppose.  (?)  Idk what I'm trying to say.  xD

[--Q--uaint]

On 6/2/2016 at 4:07 PM, shootaman777 said:

When you say 'forces light or dark', when is that?  When using Eclipse?  When using the form swap ability?

I mean Glimmering Veil has two modes, much like Ivara's Quiver. When you hold-cast, it activates. Whichever mode it's in forces her other abilities to act like she's in the dark or in the light.

This would make it possible to use Eclipse for survivability in the Void and damage in the Eris tileset in a consistent manner.

Making Prism have two different effects whether in light or dark would make the ability worth more, as well, in all facets of play.

However, Glimmering Veil should probably be #2, since HoM ain't gonna go back to having all 4 clones shoot and HoM actually does something useful without other abilities.

On 6/2/2016 at 4:07 PM, shootaman777 said:

I had always thought Mesa's Shatter Shield was kinda useless and only repelled projectiles, not mitigating damage from status effects or melee attacks or AoE

I think status effects do still wreck her, now that I think about it. It definitely doesn't work on melee or AoE, but e.g. Bombard rockets will bounce off and explode somewhere else if you just let them hit you.

On 6/2/2016 at 4:07 PM, shootaman777 said:

that her other ability was inconsistent unless soloing.  

They just patched that out, actually. The buff jumps between allies, but is always on her.

[shootaman777]

2 minutes ago, ChronoEclipse said:

I mean Glimmering Veil has two modes, much like Ivara's Quiver. When you hold-cast, it activates. Whichever mode it's in forces her other abilities to act like she's in the dark or in the light.

This would make it possible to use Eclipse for survivability in the Void and damage in the Eris tileset in a consistent manner.

Making Prism have two different effects whether in light or dark would make the ability worth more, as well, in all facets of play.

However, Glimmering Veil should probably be #2, since HoM ain't gonna go back to having all 4 clones shoot and HoM actually does something useful without other abilities.

I think status effects do still wreck her, now that I think about it. It definitely doesn't work on melee or AoE, but e.g. Bombard rockets will bounce off and explode somewhere else if you just let them hit you.

They just patched that out, actually. The buff jumps between allies, but is always on her.

What is Glimmering Veil?  The name you gave to the form-swapping ability?  Or is it something to instantly force the effect of the other mode, while still in the original mode?  

Wouldn't having an ability with such limited function be almost wasted as a 2nd ability?  I mean, aren't those supposed to be really good standalones?  Well, I suppose we're not exactly proposing the most mainstream idea here. xD

About Prism, I'd agree.  But the question remains; which effects, and what do you keep in reserve for an augment to bring into play?  

When I said that in my experience that the damage buff of shooting with 2 mirrors did not make up for the lack of effect, I was referring to my experience while using the Quanta/Vandal (for the cubes), regular weapons for status effects, and the Phage.  I prefer a more status-oriented approach to the game, followed by damage to finish the job, since statuses make the damage so much more efficient (i.e. corrosive proc'ing a Grineer, magnetic proc'ing a Corpus'' shield, viral proc'ing an infested, etc.).  Essentially, I would prefer getting 5 viral effects across 5 enemies, lowering all their health then finishing them, as opposed to getting a viral proc on 3/5 enemies but doing slightly more viral damage to them (which wouldn't help much), and having all 5 enemies still be alive.  That's just my take on the 3 as opposed to 5 shooting mirrors thing.  

Thanks for the heads ups about Mesa.  

[--Q--uaint]

5 minutes ago, shootaman777 said:

What is Glimmering Veil?  The name you gave to the form-swapping ability?

On 5/29/2016 at 3:16 AM, ChronoEclipse said:

Sleight of Hand is replaced with Glimmering Veil. It is a channeled Quiver-style ability, having two modes (dark and light). Dark-mode blinds any enemy who damages you for 2/3/4/5 seconds, and light-mode has a 10/15/20/25% reload speed boost and SoH’s effects on everything in a 4/6/8/10 meter radius.
The channeled cost would be low, and active dark/light modes would force dark/light effects on her other skills.

I'm not sure whether changing mode while the ability is active should change the active mode. Probably, tapping the key again should just cancel the ability and you can only swap while the ability isn't active.

8 minutes ago, shootaman777 said:

Wouldn't having an ability with such limited function be almost wasted as a 2nd ability?

It has more function than SoH lol... The point here is to give her the option to have a low drain in exchange for controlling the effects of her other powers.

The direct effects of the ability are not strong, but the energy cost would be quite low and not have to be refreshed.

11 minutes ago, shootaman777 said:

About Prism, I'd agree.  But the question remains; which effects, and what do you keep in reserve for an augment to bring into play?

On 5/29/2016 at 3:16 AM, ChronoEclipse said:

Prism now begins emitting beams as soon as the cast animation starts. Damage type while in the light is Fire, damage type while in the dark is Radiation. Proc chance is 10% in light and 25% in the dark per second, scaling with Power Strength.

It would still do more damage while in the light, which makes it alternate between damage and CC depending on light level. Dark Mirage would control the map and be tanky, while Light Mirage would murder the map so she doesn't have to tank.

13 minutes ago, shootaman777 said:

When I said that in my experience that the damage buff of shooting with 2 mirrors did not make up for the lack of effect

I entirely agree; DE made the change because of performance reasons, so it's not coming back.