Summary of Issues with new Syndicate Melees - Edit: My apologies to Design Council

[Cpl_Facehugger]

8 hours ago, BlackCoMerc said:

The degree to which the so called Design Council dropped the ball on these is...troubling. As in "disband the whole thing, scrap these passives and let the actual game developers fix them" levels of troubling.

 

You really shouldn't comment on the council's inner workings unless you know how it works.

Let me explain:

What happened was, DE gave us a thread to brainstorm ideas. There were tons of ideas posted, and we were told to focus primarily on the syndicate's ethos - which for Meridian meant defending. Normally the council then gets to vote on three to six choices of these, from a list that DE's decided upon. That's how it works for augments, how it worked for Nova's design, and so on and so forth. 

Here though, DE looked over the suggestions and basically chose the worst of the bunch in most or all cases with no further input from the council. We very likely wouldn't have chosen credits, or if we did, we'd have chosen some of the better credit ideas, like "credits collected provide damage boosts" and the like. . 
 

[BlackCoMerc]

Just now, Cpl_Facehugger said:

You really shouldn't comment on the council's inner workings unless you know how it works.

Let me explain:

What happened was, DE gave us a thread to brainstorm ideas. There were tons of ideas posted, and we were told to focus primarily on the syndicate's ethos - which for Meridian meant defending. Normally the council then gets to vote on three to six choices of these, from a list that DE's decided upon. That's how it works for augments, how it worked for Nova's design, and so on and so forth. 

Here though, DE looked over the suggestions and basically chose the worst of the bunch in most or all cases with no further input from the council. We very likely wouldn't have chosen credits, or if we did, we'd have chosen some of the better credit ideas, like "credits collected provide damage boosts" and the like. . 
 

Thanks for clarifying how it works.

You have my apologies. It seems DE dropped the ball here, and not the council.

 

[Buttaface]

3 hours ago, TaylorsContraction said:

You clearly don't use your dagger to kill hordes of enemies and probably just for stealth. 

You're wrong. I've used daggers in every way imaginable on lots of different frames.

Rakta Dark Dagger is mastery fodder junk... objectively. So is Sydon.

[RealPandemonium]

44 minutes ago, Buttaface said:

You're wrong. I've used daggers in every way imaginable on lots of different frames.

Rakta Dark Dagger is mastery fodder junk... objectively. So is Sydon.

OK lol.

[TwevOWNED]

1 hour ago, RealPandemonium said:

OK lol.

The Karyst is better than the Rakta Dark Dagger, and almost every Polearm is better than the Vaykor Sydon.

[TaylorsContraction]

3 hours ago, TwevOWNED said:

The Karyst is better than the Rakta Dark Dagger, and almost every Polearm is better than the Vaykor Sydon.

The karyst needs melee combo ramped up to reach the damage potentials you're talking about, rdd does not. Different play styles, sounds to me like a bunch of folks are salty that rdd isn't another generic crit weapon that you slap on body count + blood rush. I like it as is, I can kill lv 140 eximus corrupted bombards and heavy gunners just fine using a few combos.

We already have karyst as a crit dagger and dark dagger is more for people who like using status weapons. We all know status isn't as fast at killing but that by no means rdd is "a missed opportunity". Thats just my opinion of course.

 

[Nekrosmas]

1 hour ago, TaylorsContraction said:

The karyst needs melee combo ramped up to reach the damage potentials you're talking about, rdd does not. Different play styles, sounds to me like a bunch of folks are salty that rdd isn't another generic crit weapon that you slap on body count + blood rush. I like it as is, I can kill lv 140 eximus corrupted bombards and heavy gunners just fine using a few combos.

We already have karyst as a crit dagger and dark dagger is more for people who like using status weapons. We all know status isn't as fast at killing but that by no means rdd is "a missed opportunity". Thats just my opinion of course.

 

But....the Dark dagger isn't even a all that good status weapon?

The augment only gives double status chance. Kinda sucks that I need all the dual stat mod for it to be consistent.

And btw, being a bit more demanding's not a bad thing. The RDD could be so much cooler - instead of doing the same old CL+finisher - whcih EVERY single other dagger can do just as well. RDD as a dagger itself is a nice weapon, but its passive ruins the uniqueness of it.

Whats the point having bit more shield? CC? Gimme a break if you gonna kill a group of mobs you might as well use your primary. Dagger are supposed to served for Assasination/killing enemies 1 by 1. The passive didn't help that, but  to encourage you to do things you shouldn't do in the first place when using a dagger, instead of buffing what it does best(single out enemies and killing it). Maybe it's only me, but isn't that wrong?

Edited September 17, 2016 by Nekrosmas

[Tesseract7777]

By the way, there is a lot of great discussion on this thread about what is/isn't wrong with the weapons, and what does and doesn't work -- I hope DE reads the whole thing. 

 

I would also like to take the time to apologize to the vast majority of the DC. I know all but a few of you want what is best for the game, and to improve both your own and other people's game experience. I know most of you take this very seriously. I now know that the DC wasn't even allowed to vote this time... which is absolutely ridiculous -- they should have been allowed to vote on the suggested ideas. 

A few trolls who might have suggested some stupid things are not reason to blame most of the DC and I was way too fast on the trigger on that. Granted, I don't know the inner workings, but I should have been more careful about what I said considering my ignorance there. Although, in all fairness, from what I have heard the DC usually does get to vote, and I had just assumed they did this time as well. 

It is clear DE is to blame here completely though. The DC offered up a bunch of suggestions as usual, some good, some not so good, perhaps a few bad on purpose ideas (this probably happens all the time). The difference is that usually the DC gets to vote so they can weed out the really bad ideas, and at least make sure most of the good ones are closer to the top... 

But they weren't given the chance. DE wanted to rush these out super fast in between the war within, they wanted them out now, so they opted for an incredibly sloppy release. Asked for ideas, but didn't even leave it for a vote. And we are left with another half baked release almost no one is happy with. The passives are pretty much quite literally all over the damn place, and a lot of them make very little sense for the weapon they are on. 

Let's face it... DE slopped this one out. And we should all be a little disappointed. I sympathize with them. They are working hard on The War Within, but with all respect to DE, if they weren't ready to do this properly they should have just waited. They shouldn't have rushed it out so incredibly poorly done. Yes, I know they release somewhat unfinished content sometimes, but the fact the DC didn't even get to vote shows how rushed these ideas were... very poor form DE. I am disappointed in you guys. I think I speak for most players that we would have rather waited a couple weeks for you guys to nail this stuff down with the DC more first instead of just releasing poorly thought out trash. 

[owendawgx]

Secura Lecta is an insult. Whoever approved it should have their credentials looked at because they clearly didn't know what they were doing. 

Gonna need a bit more effort than this, DE, these passives are embarrassing in how big the gap in effectiveness between some of them is. 

 

[TaylorsContraction]

21 hours ago, Nekrosmas said:

But....the Dark dagger isn't even a all that good status weapon?

You realize it has guaranteed procs in its combos, so it's very much a status weapon.

[Chipputer]

On 9/15/2016 at 8:29 PM, Buttaface said:

Dark Dagger are complete garbage

I am an Oberon and I highly object to you calling my favorite new immortality machine complete garbage, thank you very much.

[Fansay]

I've only had the chance to use Telos Boltace, Vaykor Sydon and Synoid Heliocor.

Sydon was my favourite of the lot.
Boltace passive does not benefit from the combo multiplier or blood rush, does benefit off maiming strike. If you're looking for a large range crit weapon it is out performed by the atterax hugely. However, seems to proc slash every time, though damage falls off with range.
Heliocor passive gives 1 specter every 30s (only lasts 30s). This specter does peanut damage.
Sydon's passive is cute...but largely impractical for the reasons said by others. HOW OFTEN DO YOU BLOCK?!

All the passives are kinda of a joke. Syndicate procs would be better. Having my weapon explode every 10s would be more effective than a specter doing nothing, a passive I don't use, and a low damage AoE slash proc that is obstructed by everything. As such I only use them as quick melee.


I believe that the best way to have implemented the syndicate melee passives would have been to have 2 passives. Every melee has a passive usable just through quick melee (like Boltace's slide attack), and another which is only usable when you have your melee equiped (like Heliocor's channeled specter), though still able to use the other passive.
E.g. boltace slide attack does its thing, when equipped every kill stacks a counter, at 10 you release a terrify debuff which slows (or something).
       heliocor attacks scan, channeled kills create specters. PLURAL!!! Or the specter lasts until killed or a better enemy is killed (and replaces it), and a doubling of specters stats so its mildly useful. Though i'd rather have an army of weak specters than 1 mediocre specter.
      sydon every status proc also procs slash ontop guaranteed (because that's what I want out of status weapons). Equipped, taking damage charges a counter (counts damage taken or hits taken, maybe varies with enemy level), at a certain limit a channeled slide attack will release the blind. Counter can continue counting to charge a larger radius blind. Enemies hit during Channeled slide affect it in some way?
Most players use quick melee over equiping their melee. Though it depends on the situation. As such I think every weapon should have 2 effects. Even if the equipped effect is just the syndicate proc, as that is better than the passives I've currently encountered.

[Nekrosmas]

5 hours ago, TaylorsContraction said:

You realize it has guaranteed procs in its combos, so it's very much a status weapon.

But unfortunately you won't kill things >Level 40 effectively enough to keep you alive if you not doing finishers. Bit Ironic that.

[wanderere]

They just don't feel like syndicate weapons with no aoe, that is pretty much the hallmark of a syndicate weapon for me. 

I mean if they were worried about them being too op they could have halved their effects or range or something.

Hell the current effects on the syndicate melees could have gone on their standard weapon counterparts and maybe improved them a little.

[(PSN)lhbuch]

In my opinion some of the ideas that I saw in the DC were actually better than the ones that got implemented.

[bl4ckhunter]

2 hours ago, (PS4)lhbuch said:

In my opinion somemost of the ideas that I saw in the DC were actually better than the ones that got implemented.

FTFY 

 

on a side note if there's a piece of mr fodder between the syndicate melees is the synoid heliocor, the passive is weaksauce and the stats? do yourself a favour and use a jat kittag instead.

Edited September 18, 2016 by bl4ckhunter

[Kefka]

wow i disagree with so much this guy said and agree with so little... my only beef in this is that the synoid heliocors specters only last 30 fleeting seconds when it SHOULD last until they die instead cuz that would be useful. we have a weapon that gives more credits per kill which is easy and straight forward, we have one that gives overshield for radiation procced kills which you can inflict easily with staticor instead of the dagger itself, what i'm saying is that all the other weapons are better than their original and have good effects, all except the synoid heliocor which is a pain to get the effect on because you have to actually have it out AND be channeling AND it matters which enemy you kill with it... for all that extra care you have to put into using it effectively i believe we deserve for the target we clone into a specter to BE like a specter... to be a specter that is with us until death or until the mission is complete and it should be an exact duplicate of what you killed, stats and all.

[BornWithTeeth]

1 hour ago, HiroHideki said:

wow i disagree with so much this guy said and agree with so little... my only beef in this is that the synoid heliocors specters only last 30 fleeting seconds when it SHOULD last until they die instead cuz that would be useful. we have a weapon that gives more credits per kill which is easy and straight forward, we have one that gives overshield for radiation procced kills which you can inflict easily with staticor instead of the dagger itself, what i'm saying is that all the other weapons are better than their original and have good effects, all except the synoid heliocor which is a pain to get the effect on because you have to actually have it out AND be channeling AND it matters which enemy you kill with it... for all that extra care you have to put into using it effectively i believe we deserve for the target we clone into a specter to BE like a specter... to be a specter that is with us until death or until the mission is complete and it should be an exact duplicate of what you killed, stats and all.

Ok, first off, ouch. Please do not present posts as a single frantic block of text.

 

Second! Specters of enemy units are actually of far less use than you might think. Due to how scaling works in Warframe, all enemies at high levels have enormous amounts of hitpoints and damage resistance, but relatively poor damage. Comparatively, at high levels, all Tenno are complete glass cannons, capable of dishing out many times more damage per second than they themselves could survive without using flatout immunity powers. In other words.....at high levels, enemies have such high defences compared to their own attack power that they basically cannot effectively hurt each other. Try it. Go to the simulation space and generate a couple of really high level Grineer, then Radiation proc them or mind control one of them. Watch them beat the crap out of each other for much longer than it would take a Tenno to just kill them both.

 

Third, a couple of the effects are based on existing melee mechanics which, in and of themselves, are not that amazing. The Magistar is ok. Provided you can land a charged attack, which can be a little fiddly, it has a pretty good main power. Its passive, of Status resistance, may have been patched since, I don't know, but on release it was awful. It gave you Status resistance, but when it triggered, it caused you to get locked into a stagger animation. Meanwhile, the Vaykor Sydon has a power which can be described as "Stand there for several seconds taking some overspill damage from enemy shots. Don't move. Don't jump. Don't attack. Just stand there. A little longer. A little longer.....Ok, now, you can Blind the enemy for a duration which lasts, uh....fewer seconds than it took to charge it in the first place. You know what, sod it, just attack. Just kill the enemy. Stop mucking about."

 

People aren't saying that the weapons themselves are garbage. Some of them have real potential, and the aching problem here is that I really like the Vaykor Sydon. The problem is that their passives were poorly thought out, and possibly not properly playtested before release.

[WARLOCKE]

There is ZERO potential with the lecta and dark dagger. They are both flawed at conception. No tweeking will turn them into anything but mastery fodder. Im trying to not be negative here but I can see no use for the dark dagger. Any frame that could make use of daggers does not need overshields. Perhaps its status chance can be tripled. Thats about the only fix i can see.

[Nekrosmas]

6 hours ago, BornWithTeeth said:

and possibly not properly playtested before release.

Mmmm... I thought all PC players are playtesters....?

[BornWithTeeth]

Just now, Nekrosmas said:

Mmmm... I thought all PC players are playtesters....?

Then hopefully DE will listen, because the Vaykor Sydon does not have a functional Syndicate power. It has a dysfunctional gimmick which is simply not worth using in 99.99% of situations.