Tikari - The dagger wielding shadow rogue (warframe concept) [art included] (2)

[SirSpudicus]

Hello everybody!  So about two or three months ago I thought of a warframe concept and have been working to make it a good, detailed, and balanced idea.  For a little background, I am a huge fan of stealth and playing games in a different way so the idea focuses around the idea of being hard to hit and hard to find while also dealing damage.  So I'll get to it.

 

Name: Tikari - Means "dagger" in Finnish (according to google translate)

Main Idea: A Warframe who fights by being sneaky and attacking occasionally.  That is, using abilities to avoid damage while still being able to deal damage.

General Characteristics:

• Dagger based Rogue Assassin

• Female

• Fast movement speed (1.25 or 1.3)

• Low Armor (30 or 50)

• Medium Shield (base: 75  max: 225)

• Low to Medium Health (base 75  max: 175)

• High Energy Pool (base:150  max:225)

• Explanations:

Spoiler

The idea for a dagger based rogue assassin came from my liking of stealth and enjoying daggers.  I picked female for this warframe for two reason: 1) I've always liked the idea of a female assassin and 2) the two current "stealth" warframes are both male (Ash and Loki).  The stats are to make the warframe fragile.  I did this purely for the idea of making the player play in a different way than normal (I will explain later when talking about powers).  Given the idea that the warframe is a rogue warframe that doesn't want to be seen or take damage I went for a low armor amount, a smaller than average shield (slightly smaller than Nova's), and low health.  I don't want the warframe to be able to take a ton of damage but rather use her abilities to avoid damage.  The high energy pool is directly based on her abilities and wanting to use them as often as possible.

Abilities:

Passive: for passives, I have two main ideas.  The first one is the one I like the most.

• Rogue's Deception: If Tikari reloads while under cover of a shadow, she will turn invisible temporarily
  • More details:
    • Spoiler

      • Reloading while in a shadow or dark area grants 2-3 seconds of cloak
      • The first melee attack (if still cloaked) will do increased damage but cancel the cloak
      • Shooting does not provide a damage bonus and cancel cloak
      • If standing in a shadow and reloading, the effect will not continuously be applied
        • Only one reload cloak per shadow
      • Going through multiple shadows does not refresh the time until cloak drops
      • Has a cooldown of 30 seconds to 1 minute before the effect can be triggered again or have only a percent chance to trigger each time?

       

    • Explanation:
      • The idea of the passive focuses around the idea of being able to disengage from a fight easily.  Being able to avoid damage, reposition, and attack again is a main focus of what I want the warframe to do. In my eyes, attacking via shooting should give away your position, while meleeing an enemy should give a damage boost for using your advantage in a different (although risky) way.  The cooldown/percentage idea and non-refreshing cloak is to make it helpful yet not grant a guaranteed cloak at all times.
• Passive 2: Rogue's Agility: Taking damage increases Tikari's movement speed by 1% stacking up to 5 times.
  • More Details:
    • Spoiler

      • Taking damage increases the movement speed of the warframe, starting at 1% and stacking up to 5%
      • Effect fades after 5 seconds of not taking damage

       

  • Explanation:
    • The original passive (seen above) might be too strong (and could be a little much in terms of complexity) and may also be more helpful in certain tilesets than in others.  These facts made me try to think of a new passive ability.  One that seems to fit is to increase movement speed when damage is taken.  This still allows for a way to escape damage when needed although (in my opinion) it is a lot less effective and interesting/fun.  It fits with the theme well enough that it could work.

 

Main Powers: Note: These abilities have been given numbers but the only one guaranteed to be what I intend is the 4th ability

• First Ability - Blur: Tikari speeds up her bodies movements appearing as a blur which reduced the chance of getting hit by attacks while aiming down sights
  • More Details:
    • Spoiler

      • The warframe speeds up and moves fast enough to dodge most bullets while not actually moving in real time.
      • This would increase the chance of bullets missing which would reduce damage for the duration of the power
      • Similar to Zephyr’s Turbulence
      • Would last about 4-5 seconds (might be changed later)
      • Only works while aiming down sites

       

  • Explanation:
    • The overall theme of this warframe is to try and avoid damage while still being able to deal decent damage to enemies.  This ability is one to help with dealing damage.  Given the warframe’s characteristic of poor survivability (in terms of health, armor, and shield) the warframe needs help to do the damage which everybody expects.  Being able to avoid most damage using this ability provides the warframe a way to actually stand still and deal damage to a group of enemies when needed.  Making it only work while aiming is to make it so it can’t be spammed when running in order to be practically invincible at all times.

 

• Second Ability - Disable: Tikari throws a special explosive dagger at an enemy weapon which causes the weapon to explode knocking the enemy down taking them out of the fight temporarily, and also disarming the enemy in the process.
  • More Details:
    • Spoiler

      • The warframe pulls a special exploding dagger and throws it to the enemy currently being aimed at to disable the enemy temporarily.
      • The warframe would throw the dagger at an enemy weapon
      • The animation would be very fast
      • The dagger would explode on impact
      • The explosion would do little damage but would be guaranteed to knockdown the enemy (blast proc)
      • The explosion would also permanently disarm the enemy

       

  • Explanation:
    • The entire reason for this power is to increase survivability when facing enemies.  The theme of the warframe fits the use of teleporting and special daggers.  The initial intent of the power was to allow the warframe to temporarily disable large threats for the battle.  This is done with the delay when the enemy tries to get the dagger out and the time spent when the enemy is recovering from the knockdown.  The teleporting behind the enemy part is mostly for effect.  Throwing the dagger could be a valid option but teleports fit in my opinion.

 

• Third Ability - Shadowport: Tikari throws a teleport dagger which acts as a beacon.  She can teleport to that exact location once at any time during the mission
  • More Details
    • Spoiler

      • The warframe throws a special dagger which can stick into walls, floors, teammates, or enemies and can be teleported to at a later time

      • The animation would be quick for throwing the dagger

      • The dagger can be teleported to once

        • Won’t disappear until teleported to

        • Hold to throw (in case player wants to reposition it), tap to teleport

      • If the dagger hits an enemy it will do a small amount of damage upon impact.

      • If teleporting to the dagger in an enemy, the teleport will happen and also add a stagger status to the enemy for finishers.

  • Explanation:
    • Unlike the other abilities, this one focuses more on escape rather than being able to survive being shot.  The long timer during which you can teleport opens up the ability to teleport to places you can’t currently see.  This would include other rooms and separates this teleport from the teleport of Loki and Ash (who need to see an entity to teleport).  Being a dagger, I thought making it deal damage makes sense and the teleport to stagger and open the enemy to finishers also allows it to be used in a somewhat offensive manner (although that isn’t the purpose).

 

• Fourth Ability - Rogue's Fury: Tikari equips her high damage personal daggers to destroy enemies.
  • More Details
    • Spoiler

      • The Warframe pulls out its personal double daggers to fight
      • Ability would be a channeling ability and drain energy over time
      • The daggers will have high damage and high attack speed (1.1)
      • The warframe’s movement speed will increase (increase by 0.1)
      • The daggers will provide a unique life steal effect which refills both health and shield
      • The daggers will include a unique stance.  It will have it’s own set of combos which are all quick (by nature of the attack speed) and the combos will include bits of longer range teleports (maybe a few feet) which will hit all enemies in its path
      • Secondary fire will throw a shadow or energy dagger with no travel time.
        • These would do low damage and not life steal
      • Blocking while in this mode provides a high parry chance to easily open up enemies to finisher attacks
      • Ability uses some melee mods to power the ability (like rifle mods do for Ivara's Artemis Bow)
  • Explanation:
    • Dagger based warframe needs daggers.  I imagine this ability to be similar to Exalted Blade, Hysteria, or Artemis Bow in the way that it takes energy over time (except Artemis Bow which uses energy per shot) and also provides a high damage attack.  It also provides a stance like Hysteria which I think is important to fit with the theme of the warframe with the teleports.  The high attack speed and damage is because this is the only ability which throws away the “run away and be sneaky” idea and goes for the “go berserk and kill everything” idea.  This is also the idea of life steal.  Since your health, shield, and armor do not increase, the unique life steal allows the warframe to increase its survivability greatly.  The survivability idea also fits with the movement speed increase (mostly just because I think the warframe should be fast and will need to be fast while in this mode since survivability is still low when not attacking enemies).  The shadow/energy dagger throw was mostly because A) throwing a dagger for this warframe doesn’t make sense (with retrieval) and B) a ranged attack is always nice when locked into melee combat (like Exalted Blades energy beams).  The non-life steal part of the thrown daggers is to make the melee the main focus of the power.  The high parry chance makes it so finishers are easily possible which is something that is very helpful when meleeing (and would look awesome).

 

 

Art: All art was drawn by DynamoTom (@TheDynamoTom on twitter).  I am not an artist and he was nice enough to help me out.

These two pictures are my main concepts for what Tikari would look like.  The first picture shows her helmet, her body, and a clip that holds her hood and cape up.  To me, the hood and cape idea made sense because of the sneaky nature.  She would have her hood up most of the time so you can't see her face but it would fall off her head when using Rogue's Fury.  When the power would end, she would pull it back up to stay hidden.

 

The second picture contains concepts for her many daggers. The teleport dagger and explosive dagger would go on the inside forearm near the wrist with the blades pointing towards her body.  When she would use those powers the daggers would rotate to place the handle directly into her hand so she can use/throw it.  The ankle blades are just decoration and are attached to her ankles (I know, surprising).  The "Deco Slasher" is just a larger decorative dagger which is attached to her back. You would only be able to see it when she is falling and her cape would get caught by the air.  The show stoppers are her personal daggers and would sit on the side of her thighs in special sheaths.

 

That is the basic idea for my warframe concept.  If you have an questions, comments, concerns, or suggestions please comment.  I hope you enjoyed the idea.

 

 

CHANGES:

• Added a disarm aspect to Disable and adjusted the ability details accordingly as per suggestion from GrandMAsterDan (June 10)
• Added a detail to Rogue's Fury of using melee mods to "mod" the ability (June 11)
• Changed the wording around in order to more easily explain that Tikari is not a "Stealth" frame in the sense of invisibility frame but more rogue-like in nature (June 12)

Edited June 12, 2016 by SirSpudicus
Updating Concept Using Feedback

[Drufo]

It seems a nice mix of Ivara, Ash and Loki. I like the idea for the 1st passive. I'm not too fond of the 4th ability, but that's because I don't like much channeled-weapon abilities. 

Generally speaking it seems balanced, with the need of a bit of strategy to be used efficiently.

A pity it would hardly be implemented since there are already 3 stealth frames

[SirSpudicus]

Just now, Drufo said:

It seems a nice mix of Ivara, Ash and Loki. I like the idea for the 1st passive. I'm not too fond of the 4th ability, but that's because I don't like much channeled-weapon abilities. 

Generally speaking it seems balanced, with the need of a bit of strategy to be used efficiently.

A pity it would hardly be implemented since there are already 3 stealth frames

Thank you for the kind words.

I'm glad it seems balanced since I spent a lot of time trying to figure out how to do that well.  It might be hard to implement, yes, but you never know right?  :D

[(PSN)Volrath_Gix]

Personally I really like the concept of adding a 4th stealth frame, 2 male and 2 female. Plus it would be nice to see daggers getting some love and if the idea is adopted by DE in her bundle I'd like to see sais as the melee weapon for her.

[Pretzellis]

Hey, I like this!

However, I have some feedback.   I'll go by ability order.

Passive 1: This is an interesting one.  I've never played Mirage, and I don't know how well-implemented her shadow mechanics are, but I can still say that this would be fun to play around with.  Have you considered it being triggered by anything else other than reloading, like melee channeling or aiming down the sights?

Passive 2: This is cool, but I think that it's counterintuitive to the main gameplay pillars Tikari would be following, since it involves her wanting to get hit in order to trigger the passive.  Maybe you could have it triggered by stealthing, using another ability, or parkouring?

Ability A: I'll be honest here, this one is my favourite out of all the abilities you've slated (and that's definitely not a bad thing).  I can imagine using Blur and becoming basically unhittable by ranged (and even melee) enemies with the right power strength setup.  It's a great alternative to pure invisibility that I'd love to see implemented into the game because it has clear counterplay and weaknesses.

Abilities B and C: I'm considering Disable and Shadowport together because of one thing that came up to me while reading them: they're both daggers that seem to have fairly similar gameplay when the ability is cast; basically, they both involve throwing daggers which do a thing.  So why not implement these two abilities together as a "Dagger Toolkit" type of thing similar to Vauban's Minelayer or Ivara's Quiver?  That way, you could implement more dagger types and still have enough design space for another ability.  Just what I was thinking.

 

Ability D (Ultimate): While I do love the exalted weapon-type ultimates and I believe that they add a lot to Warframe, I still think that they should only ever be implemented when necessary.  Valkyr?  Obviously; she's the berserker frame who always wants to get up close and personal.  Excal?  He's the sword frame.  Ivara? The bow/archer frame.  I think, therefore, that before you consider fleshing out Rouge's Fury more, consider this: do you want Tikari to be a "Dagger frame" or another alternative to stealth (the reason why I say this is because you've mentioned both avenues in your abiltity details sections)?  If she's a dagger frame, I'm all for you adding this ultimate. Just be aware, though, that there are already other exalted weapon ultimates and adding another probably won't add much to the game unless it's in a perfect spot to implement and it's made very unique.  I currently don't think it's in a good spot to implement right now because its gameplay goes against Tikari's apparent stealthy nature. My suggestion: why not implement true stealth (invisibility) or something similar to Tikari's ultimate instead?  There are currently no Ultimate-slotted stealth abilities.  Or (maybe even better?)  keep the daggers but find a fun way to keep the gameplay that the ultimate brings as stealthy and rouge-like as possible.

My two cents.  I like your concept overall, and great job on the art! Keep at it.

[SirSpudicus]

21 minutes ago, Endoxo_Kynigos said:

Passive 1: This is an interesting one.  I've never played Mirage, and I don't know how well-implemented her shadow mechanics are, but I can still say that this would be fun to play around with.  Have you considered it being triggered by anything else other than reloading, like melee channeling or aiming down the sights?

I'm glad that you find this interesting.  I've never really used Mirage's Eclipse ability either but I mostly added that bit of info to say that a system for detecting shadows is a thing already.  I have considered other triggers because the original idea was invisibility that happen right when you enter a shadow which seemed overpowered.  I have thought of crouching but the same OP nature can be easily seen.  The secondary use of the reload was to make it so you could escape easily when you need to reload thus making that animation time a lesser threat.

 

25 minutes ago, Endoxo_Kynigos said:

Passive 2: This is cool, but I think that it's counterintuitive to the main gameplay pillars Tikari would be following, since it involves her wanting to get hit in order to trigger the passive.  Maybe you could have it triggered by stealthing, using another ability, or parkouring?

These are all valid triggers (I especially like the parkouring one).  I honestly didn't put much thought into this one because I've always wanted the stealth one to be the passive.  I added this one because the idea of no energy cost and potentially constant invisibility might be OP overall. It was more of a backup plan than anything.

 

27 minutes ago, Endoxo_Kynigos said:

Ability A: I'll be honest here, this one is my favourite out of all the abilities you've slated (and that's definitely not a bad thing).  I can imagine using Blur and becoming basically unhittable by ranged (and even melee) enemies with the right power strength setup.  It's a great alternative to pure invisibility that I'd love to see implemented into the game because it has clear counterplay and weaknesses.

I'm so glad that you like this power.  To me, it was the most interesting one.  I also like how it is a dodging power that isn't invisibility and it isn't anything I've personally seen before (except in RWBY once but I thought of this before I saw that I think).  It would include dodging all damage so seeing a melee unit completely miss would be something I'd want to see.

 

30 minutes ago, Endoxo_Kynigos said:

Abilities B and C: I'm considering Disable and Shadowport together because of one thing that came up to me while reading them: they're both daggers that seem to have fairly similar gameplay when the ability is cast; basically, they both involve throwing daggers which do a thing.  So why not implement these two abilities together as a "Dagger Toolkit" type of thing similar to Vauban's Minelayer or Ivara's Quiver?  That way, you could implement more dagger types and still have enough design space for another ability.  Just what I was thinking.

I honestly never thought of mixing them together like that and I'm glad that you brought it up.  I will try to think of ways to potentially add this type of idea.  I separated them in my idea because I saw them as doing two different things for different purposes.  The Disable explosive dagger is an in-the-middle-of-battle-get-rid-of-big-units (like Bombards, Heavy Gunners, or Eximus enemies) while the Shadowport is mostly something to completely escape or get to life support quick or get back to your squad.  I do see what you are saying, though, and you make some good points about adding more daggers and another ability.  I will definitely keep this in mind.

 

35 minutes ago, Endoxo_Kynigos said:

Ability D (Ultimate): While I do love the exalted weapon-type ultimates and I believe that they add a lot to Warframe, I still think that they should only ever be implemented when necessary.  Valkyr?  Obviously; she's the berserker frame who always wants to get up close and personal.  Excal?  He's the sword frame.  Ivara? The bow/archer frame.  I think, therefore, that before you consider fleshing out Rouge's Fury more, consider this: do you want Tikari to be a "Dagger frame" or another alternative to stealth (the reason why I say this is because you've mentioned both avenues in your abiltity details sections)?  If she's a dagger frame, I'm all for you adding this ultimate. Just be aware, though, that there are already other exalted weapon ultimates and adding another probably won't add much to the game unless it's in a perfect spot to implement and it's made very unique.  I currently don't think it's in a good spot to implement right now because its gameplay goes against Tikari's apparent stealthy nature. My suggestion: why not implement true stealth (invisibility) or something similar to Tikari's ultimate instead?  There are currently no Ultimate-slotted stealth abilities.  Or (maybe even better?)  keep the daggers but find a fun way to keep the gameplay that the ultimate brings as stealthy and rouge-like as possible.

You bring up another good point.  The main idea was to create a dagger wielding badass (for lack of a better description).  The idea of stealth mostly comes from her passive and her type of "need" to avoid direct confrontation due to her health, armor, and shield amounts.  The classification of "stealth" was probably not correct although there are aspects of it.  I love stealth gameplay but I think I more love the having to think out what you are going to do and being sneaky rather than invisible so it is more focused on sneaking.  When I was passing the idea around between people I know, the idea of Rogue came up and I think that is a more apt description because she is more using daggers and tricks than invisibility and stealth.  So basically, Tikari in my mind is a dagger warframe over a stealth warframe.  This is kinda reflected in the way that she has dagger everywhere on her character model/concept art.  I may mess around with other ultimate ideas but I personally thought this made the most sense with her theme.

 

41 minutes ago, Endoxo_Kynigos said:

My two cents.  I like your concept overall, and great job on the art! Keep at it.

I'm so glad you liked my concept.  Your two cents were very insightful and I will keep your ideas in mind if/when going through and adjusting things.  The art wasn't made by me as I mentioned in the post but I will be sure to pass on the compliment.

Thank you for posting your thoughts!

[SirSpudicus]

1 hour ago, (PS4)Volrath_Gix said:

Personally I really like the concept of adding a 4th stealth frame, 2 male and 2 female. Plus it would be nice to see daggers getting some love and if the idea is adopted by DE in her bundle I'd like to see sais as the melee weapon for her.

I personally love daggers in warframe (both single and dual) and that was a big factor in my design.  I'm glad you like the concept.

[RetriNinspa]

Bad Potato, give up on life

Jk, love you really <3

[Neo3602]

I really like your idea OP, I do think an ability similar to Quiver would be a good fit for the frame.

[GrandMAsterDan]

Maybe for Disable, Tikari should throw an explosive dagger at the enemy's weapon causing it to explode (the blast proc + damage) thus disarming them. Given the fact that this is a single target ability, I don't think adding a disarm would be particularly OP. This would give the ability more longevity into the late game as you can permanantly cripple key threats like Corrupted Bombards or Heavy Gunners, instead of just knocking them down for 3 seconds.

It also emphasizes your warframe's finesse with knives as she can accurately and reliably blow weapons out of the enemy's hands. 

[Akiryx]

Very much liking this concept. 

54 minutes ago, GrandMAsterDan said:

Maybe for Disable, Tikari should throw an explosive dagger at the enemy's weapon causing it to explode (the blast proc + damage) thus disarming them. Given the fact that this is a single target ability, I don't think adding a disarm would be particularly OP. This would give the ability more longevity into the late game as you can permanantly cripple key threats like Corrupted Bombards or Heavy Gunners, instead of just knocking them down for 3 seconds.

It also emphasizes your warframe's finesse with knives as she can accurately and reliably blow weapons out of the enemy's hands. 

and I agree with the above ;3

[SirSpudicus]

2 hours ago, GrandMAsterDan said:

Maybe for Disable, Tikari should throw an explosive dagger at the enemy's weapon causing it to explode (the blast proc + damage) thus disarming them. Given the fact that this is a single target ability, I don't think adding a disarm would be particularly OP. This would give the ability more longevity into the late game as you can permanantly cripple key threats like Corrupted Bombards or Heavy Gunners, instead of just knocking them down for 3 seconds.

It also emphasizes your warframe's finesse with knives as she can accurately and reliably blow weapons out of the enemy's hands. 

That is an amazing idea.  Thank you for bringing that up, I will definitely add that.

[DrNever]

Really like this concept. First ability is very interesting, the "quiver like" ability with the thrown daggers would be awesome but i already see it difficult to be implemented because the teleport one is a two cast ability. The 4th needs some tweaks, maybe the dual daggers could make her invisible every time she performs a stealth kill or a stealth finisher.

[DrNever]

And what about something like an innate covert lethality for the 4th? Would it be too OP for a passive?

[SirSpudicus]

8 hours ago, DrNever said:

Really like this concept. First ability is very interesting, the "quiver like" ability with the thrown daggers would be awesome but i already see it difficult to be implemented because the teleport one is a two cast ability. The 4th needs some tweaks, maybe the dual daggers could make her invisible every time she performs a stealth kill or a stealth finisher.

I'm glad you like the concept.  I was kinda thinking something similar with the quiver like ability but it might still work.  I do see the appeal to the invisibility stealth kill/finisher but I put that ability in to add one ability that isn't "work to survive as long as possible" but is actually "I can actually run in and do a ton of damage."  That being said, I don't see Tikari's 4th ability as being used in a fashion that you will be able to get stealth finishers unless you also mean parry kills (which I think would push it to being a bit OP given the high parry chance I would like Tikari to have in this ability).  I will think about it but those are my thoughts right now.

 

6 hours ago, DrNever said:

And what about something like an innate covert lethality for the 4th? Would it be too OP for a passive?

I would be open to giving the dagger master automatic covert lethality in her 4th ability just as an ability perk.

[DrNever]

I know that the 4th is like this to give her some damage and survivability, but i can imagine her 1st already giving her a lot of survivability (like zephyr's turbulence). If you want her to be a stealth frame, she really needs invisibility.

[SirSpudicus]

10 hours ago, DrNever said:

I know that the 4th is like this to give her some damage and survivability, but i can imagine her 1st already giving her a lot of survivability (like zephyr's turbulence). If you want her to be a stealth frame, she really needs invisibility.

I'm not exactly trying to make a stealth frame, I was trying to go for sneaky and Rogue-like.  The invisibility passive is more of a Rogue trick than anything.  My description is a bit bad at really conveying that.  The survivability of her 1st ability is quite large but with the limitation of having to ADS, it can't be used in her 4th and is purely to allow for damage to be done when the odds are against Tikari's survival.  The play style I imagine with Tikari is not one of "you can't be seen" but rather one of "you don't want to be seen."  By this I mean I don't want her to be invisible for long periods of time, I want her to be able to escape danger.  I honestly prefer to do stealth with a frame other than Loki or Ash so I was trying to build this concept in a different way in order to look at "stealth" in a different way and making a dagger frame (which is a standard weapon for Rogue's in many games) fit very well because Rogue are also deceivers and tricksters.  Calling her a stealth frame is not what I intended and I will make changes to more clearly convey that.

[Sirpoopie]

Very interesting concept. Would love to see another stealthy frame in the game. Stealth is so much fun. Her abilities seem overall pretty cool. Would love to see what comes of this!.