BLADESTORM: Does it really NEED to Change?

[DEATHLOK]

This thread has made me realize the self-proclaimed pro gamer crowd won't rest until Warframes have no abilities and fight with rocks and sharpened sticks.

[Weltraumfred]

12 minutes ago, DEATHLOK said:

This thread has made me realize the self-proclaimed pro gamer crowd won't rest until Warframes have no abilities and fight with rocks and sharpened sticks.

Or it could mean that Bladestorm is indeed in its current form broken and its use pisses a sizeable amount of the playerbase off. And broken powers should be fixed. 

[Zareek]

On 8/8/2016 at 3:16 AM, Mineeden said:

How is pressing 4 fun?

Ive mained Ash since forever, and I appreciate the currently functionality of Bladestorm. "Fun" is subjective to everyone. If they change it, all they really do is switch the appeal of bladestorm from 1 group to another. It's working just fine, the game has other aspects that needs tweak, balance and fixing. 

Edited August 9, 2016 by Zareek

[MindHoney]

2 hours ago, Weltraumfred said:

In high Level content, where enemies become resistant to Ash's BS, it becomes highly annoying. Because Ash will grant the enemies invulnerability frames.

There is no point where ashes blade Strom falls off it dose finisher damage

[bWild]

9 minutes ago, Zareek said:

Ive mained Ash since forever, and I appreciate the currently functionality of Bladestorm. "Fun" is subjective to everyone. If they change it, all they really do is switch the appeal of bladestorm from 1 group to another. It's working just fine, the game has other aspects that needs tweak, balance and fixing. 

While I think bladestorm is fine in theory I think it is terrible for the overall game flow that ash targets are invincible for the other players. DE should basically allow people to shoot ash targets and keep the ability like it is. This is not that much of work like reworking the whole ability and allows more time to focus on other things. A totally rework of the ability can result in Ash losing his role as a range nuke which means that he will be useless like all the other new frames who don't bring anything to the table to actually compete with the older frames.

Edited August 9, 2016 by bWild

[haloamted]

18 minutes ago, Zareek said:

Ive mained Ash since forever, and I appreciate the currently functionality of Bladestorm. "Fun" is subjective to everyone. If they change it, all they really do is switch the appeal of bladestorm from 1 group to another. It's working just fine, the game has other aspects that needs tweak, balance and fixing. 

Thank god, a Ash mainer. 

Will this *bladestorm build take down lvl 110 enemies?

Edited August 9, 2016 by haloamted
*bladestorm

[Zareek]

6 minutes ago, bWild said:

While I think bladestorm is fine in theory I think it is terrible for the overall game flow that ash targets are invincible for the other players. DE should basically allow people to shoot ash targets and keep the ability like it is. This is not that much of work like reworking the whole ability and allows more time to focus on other things. A totally rework of the ability can result in Ash losing his role as a range nuke which means that he will be useless like all the other new frames who don't bring anything to the table to actually compete with the older frames.

What about other frames "god mode" abilities? If I recall correctly, Valkyr can become invulnerable.

[TotallyLagging]

8 minutes ago, MindHoney said:

There is no point where ashes blade Strom falls off it dose finisher damage

Yes there is, eventually you'll reach the point where enemies have so much health that you'll have to hit them for the entire duration of BS. 

...but it's irrelevant since most people doesn't go really far anyway.

Anyway, I wouldn't mind if BS were a little bit more interactive. Yes, yes, Valkyr has invincibility, but even with that you still have to move around and punch them. And Hysteria sucks. 

Otherwise I'll enjoy my Cutscene frame for when I'm too tired to play the game.

[bWild]

Just now, Zareek said:

What about other frames "god mode" abilities? If I recall correctly, Valkyr can become invulnerable.

I am not bothering about the strength of the ability. I really don't care about this. I just don't like it to watch the enemy dying without being able to shoot them. Players want fun. If you are Ash and have fun with bladestorm it's fine. But please don't make them invincible so that others have no chance to interact. It is not harming the ash player while it is making the game better for the others if they could shoot the targets.

[Weltraumfred]

6 minutes ago, Zareek said:

What about other frames "god mode" abilities? If I recall correctly, Valkyr can become invulnerable.

Interestingly, Hysteria just got nerfed*, AND that one just had invulnerability and massive Melee damage as opposed to Bladestorms invulnerability AND the ability to stab everyone in the room forever.

 

* clumsily

[Zendadaist]

The only change I want to see is the frikkin enemy invulnerability removed while it runs. It's rude to your team mates and turns mobs into immovable rocks that get in the way. If that was ditched so that the other Tenno and mobs can go about their business as normal, it'd be a far less obnoxious ability.

I run Ash when I don't want to waste time chipping away slowly at a giant pile of high level tough enemies; when I just want to get the job done quickly because I'm in a hurry. It prunes the concentrated blobs of hp sponges and the invulnerability gives me a chance to lessen the effects of debilitating procs (very high level infested Toxin procs for example)... When the missions get cheesy, I switch to Ash and get cheesy right back.

[Circle_of_Psi]

As I recall, hes getting a rework regardless, sorry OP

 

 

Edited August 9, 2016 by LegionCynex
Edited For Clarity

[LunarEdge7]

On ‎8‎/‎8‎/‎2016 at 9:33 AM, (XB1)Woofsie said:

I just thought of something. What if we changed Bladestorm to be an AOE that stays for a set duration on a specific area. Any enemy that enters is targeted by the clones and attacked. Like an actual storm.

But then you won't be (technically) taking part in the ability, so you can't see the cool animations.

Unless.. you just have to hold 4 and release while aiming on a place to 'target' the area and still be able to walk around 'n' shoot but not slash, then any enemy that gets in the zone will show up in your ability icon (like Mesa's 1 or Inaros' 4), except not percentage but number of enemies in the area. Press 4 once to teleport there immediately and kill with clones.

Each time a 4 is pressed, 50 energy drained for first finisher and 25 for every other consecutive finisher in the area. Clones are increased to 3 so a total of 4, 4 enemies being 'finished' at a time in the set zone. (Edit: Oh right.. and press 4 again mid-animation or after to stop trying to finish the enemies. If all enemies in zone are killed and no more enemies are there, you'll return to your original position [wherever you started to press 4 to finish enemies in target zone].

Range for how wide an area you can target. Base range on max rank Bladestorm will be.. 15 meters? 18?

I can already imagine synergising this with Smoke Screen and a Vectis Prime.

Snipe tougher enemies (Eximii) while you can in front of your target zone, then when the lighter mobs reach the 'target zone', press 4 and kill that group. Thus locking down/killing a potential troublesome mob for your team.

Edited August 9, 2016 by LunarEdge7
Synergy suggestions and some minor additions to my BS idea

[LunarEdge7]

1 hour ago, MindHoney said:

There is no point where ashes blade Strom falls off it dose finisher damage

Inb4 sortie condition enemies being resistant to lethal finisher attacks. GG WP xD

Edited August 9, 2016 by LunarEdge7

[motorfirebox]

1 hour ago, DEATHLOK said:

This thread has made me realize the self-proclaimed pro gamer crowd won't rest until Warframes have no abilities and fight with rocks and sharpened sticks.

Thank you for that incisive and helpful post. You've really added quite a bit to the conversation, and have demonstrated a clear willingness to engage thoughtfully on the issue. The way I see it, anyone who doesn't agree with your post is just a dumb-dumb stupidface.

[Tizodd]

6 minutes ago, motorfirebox said:

dumb-dumb stupidface

This made me literally laugh out loud just now.

[Birdframe_Prime]

12 hours ago, Padre_Akais said:

I'm seeing alot of cognitive dissonance, and loaded arguments (and numbers) being tossed around in support of and opposed to Bladestorm changes.

Hi! I'm the one throwing around numbers and also a true perpetrator of cognitive dissonance!

That said guys, this is actually a fair point.

We're walking in different directions on this because we're missing the real point here. Not whether Bladestorm should be changed, but how Ash is going to be changed.

That's the discussion.

I threw numbers and comparisons out there because of two things: First I wanted to show that Bladestorm is, in fact, overpowered. The damage numbers it can reach for the low cost of 25 Energy and a few seconds of watching a slideshow is frankly way too far in advance of any other ability that costs the same in time, effort and energy. That it should be looked at because nothing in game does that without having careful modding and multiplying weapon damage that also has to be carefully modded and forma'd to get the most out of it (Nova AMD spam requires a well modded frame and a well modded weapon, plus an understanding of what damage works and doesn't, something that not everyone is able to pull off, not to mention it needs a reliable host machine so that the animation doesn't keep spawning the cast off from where you expect). Ash you press 4 and kill just as many things with finisher damage.

The second thing, however, is that this doesn't matter in the slightest. This is the point of the dissonance.

It really doesn't matter if it's over-powered, not fun, too easy, any of it.

DE are changing frames based upon what function they have in game and what parts of their kit are being used for what. Just look at the changes they've made:

They took away Mag's infinitely-scaling damage ability that allowed people to camp T4 Survival for hours on end and replaced it with an ability that can deal proportional scaling damage based of the enemy damage that forces people to play her actively. They took away Saryn's negative duration function that allowed a min-max build that allowed 4 spam to overshadow her entire kit, and gave her a combo function that lets her do more damage with 4 if you combo correctly, but you have to actively play with her to get the combo. They added function to Vauban when his ability was under-used, they re-worked Excalibur when his ability (super jump) became obsolete, they added CC to Ember's Accellerant because nobody ever used it normally... and others still, they put the cost up on Hysteria because it was used so much and they made the 'death from overload' bubble really, really evident so that people knew exactly what the consequence of running out of energy meant.

Even back in 2014, back when I joined, they made a really big move: They found that the modding system they'd had for a year, where Abilities were also mods, was being subverted, people were taking out abilities in order to have an eight-slot modding system, ignoring at least two of the abilities that they'd worked so hard on designing. So they made the Abilities part of, and grow with, the warframe, and settled the modding system at 8 slots. Plus Aura. Plus Exilus.

Digital Extremes do not like it when parts of their warframes are not used, whether that's because the ability is weak, or because another ability is too strong and over-shadows the others.

They will be changing Ash. Bladestorm may not be the same, but whether it is or not, the frame will change. Because DE want you to use all the abiliites. Modding for just one and ignoring the others, as thousands of players do because it's so easy to do on Ash, isn't what they want from the game.

So guys, how is Ash going to change, as a whole frame? What do you think DE will do to balance out his ability usage?

[BlackCoMerc]

The overall feeling is that it's not the ability, but:

 

Finisher Damage:

Should be Puncture/Slash? 

Combined damage

Should not be only frame to ignore all resistance

 

Enemies made Invulnerable:

Yep. Needs to go. That's a major issue.

 

Spam:

This isn't an Ash problem. Any more than it was a Saryn or a Mesa problem. Any more than it is a Nova or Frost problem.

This is a game design problem. And it needs to be fixed.

Because right now we are nerfing frames one after the other. One day, when the rot forces Efficiency to be fixed instead, half the Ultimate abilities in the game will be worthless due to having been "fixed" around 75℅ efficiency.

 

Edited August 9, 2016 by BlackCoMerc

[Kotsender_Quasimir]

5 minutes ago, BlackCoMerc said:

One day, when the rot forces Efficiency to be fixed instead, half the Ultimate abilities in the game will be worthless due to having been "fixed" around 75℅ efficiency.

this i 100% agree with. right now balancing (if any) is happening around a broken energy economy, this applies to skills as well as enemies (nullies etc.). i'd rather see some of warframe's foundations fixed first instead of building higher and higher shaky towers upon them.

(that being said several skills need to be changed regardless of cost because they're simply OP, dull and / or hurting variety. bladestorm is one of them.)

[BlackCoMerc]

1 hour ago, Kotsender_Quasimir said:

this i 100% agree with. right now balancing (if any) is happening around a broken energy economy, this applies to skills as well as enemies (nullies etc.). i'd rather see some of warframe's foundations fixed first instead of building higher and higher shaky towers upon them.

(that being said several skills need to be changed regardless of cost because they're simply OP, dull and / or hurting variety. bladestorm is one of them.)

Used Bladestorm for 50 minutes worth of Survival. Already bored with it.

That said...we're changing one floor of a tower based in a foundation of sand. I think it's high time we solidify the foundation, then work our way up.

Otherwise, when the foundation finally IS fixed... will the rest of the structure sitting atop even work correctly?

[MindHoney]

9 hours ago, eprstt said:

I cant see any sence to read another 6-8 pages about "ash is bad"

I usually would agree with you but, your point was

"nope. it not need to change.

no one can fix his hands or brain by removing this ability from ash. 

and one more thing - can some ather frames dealing damage more then ash? yup. ash over powered? nope. what's the problem?"

Witch adds nothing to the conversation and asks someone else to detail the last 6 pages of posts. I was asking you to that you're self. 

As you said your self there's no point in arguing this anyways, since he's getting a rework.

[BattledOne]

Short answer: yes.

[eprstt]

1 hour ago, MindHoney said:

I usually would agree with you but, your point was

"nope. it not need to change.

no one can fix his hands or brain by removing this ability from ash. 

and one more thing - can some ather frames dealing damage more then ash? yup. ash over powered? nope. what's the problem?"

Witch adds nothing to the conversation and asks someone else to detail the last 6 pages of posts. I was asking you to that you're self. 

As you said your self there's no point in arguing this anyways, since he's getting a rework.

brilliant. You agree usually, but my point not similar to Your point? and that the point why You disagree.
sorry. but my point is constant. ash not breaking rules, not have overpower, not easy to get. 
and a few more - marked targets can be damaged or killed (not all for clear. all but next 3 to kill). 

[MindHoney]

53 minutes ago, eprstt said:

brilliant. You agree usually, but my point not similar to Your point? and that the point why You disagree.
sorry. but my point is constant. ash not breaking rules, not have overpower, not easy to get. 
and a few more - marked targets can be damaged or killed (not all for clear. all but next 3 to kill). 

You missed what I was saying. With most people I would agree, you don't need to read 6 pages to catch up. The exception was you, your post was not adding anything.

The points you highlighted above where showen in a previous post to be wrong. 

Ash, on top of having one of the highest, if not highest single target damage with one of his augments, has a skill that clears a room. This same skill requires no setup, just one button press.

Other frames that are on ground for similar damage like masia, Syrian, or mag have to either combo, or can't do it for long. Ash, can do it for ever.

If you want the numbers there in one of the earlier page's. Saying that, this argument is point less as he is it changed. No matter how much winning we do, the change is coming. All we can do is help develop it into something we like.

[MindHoney]

2 hours ago, BlackCoMerc said:

Used Bladestorm for 50 minutes worth of Survival. Already bored with it.

That said...we're changing one floor of a tower based in a foundation of sand. I think it's high time we solidify the foundation, then work our way up.

Otherwise, when the foundation finally IS fixed... will the rest of the structure sitting atop even work correctly?

The problem with fixing the foundation is what do you do with it? Ya changing the sand for stone is obvious, but what do you do limit engery with out damping enjoyment?