Nerfing Telos Boltace

[Ziden_]

9 hours ago, DoomFruit said:

If that's the intent, then perhaps the intent is broken. The only one of the syndicate melee which I've ever seen in actual gameplay (as opposed to 30 and dump levelling) was the teltace. Why? Because you didn't need to cripple yourself by switching to melee mode in order to take advantage of (some of) its abilities. Its damage was nowhere near as high as you could get using something like a galatine prime, nikana prime or atterax. It didn't have the sniping capabilities of a redeemer or sarpa. It wasn't a status monstrosity like the lesion.

No, what it had was utility. You could smash crates in a wide range, making it so much easier to locate medallions and sculptures. And you didn't have to sacrifice your gun to do it.

The far better option would have been to buff the other syndicate melees up to its level - by making their special functions work in normal mode. Then people might actually consider taking them instead of galatine prime all day every day. But nooooo, instead they nerfed the single solitary nice new piece of gear into mastery fodder.

It's extremely rare that I ever see someone using dedicated melee mode in gameplay unless they're standing on a pad in LoR and blocking to prevent knockdown (and why can't we block in normal mode, again?). Why? Because sacrificing your gun is a stupid idea. And that's why the syndicate melees suck. Lesion doesn't need to be held in order to turn it into a speed proc monster. Atterax doesn't need to be held in order to make everything within 10 metres bleed. Nikana prime doesn't need to be held in order to shred that one thing right in front of you. Those are how you do melee right.

Thank you for adding an articulate and constructive response.  I agree 100% and as I stated in another response, the Telos Boltace exposed the weaknesses of the other syndicate weapons rather than itself being "overpowered."  But forum monkeys will keep spamming about how they dislike things and continue to get them nerfed as they do in every single game.

This game could be single player and they'd still call for nerfs on various items, it's ridiculous and pathetic.

[Rhekemi]

7 hours ago, DoomFruit said:

No, it is a nerf. It's objectively worse than it was before. That's the definition of a nerf - to bring something down in power level.

I'll concede the argument not because I think your definition is correct, but because it's pointless to continue. 

Even if you were right, it still wouldn't change these facts:

9 hours ago, Rhekemi said:

...

no other syndicate weapon does this. Not primaries, not secondaries, not melee. None of them. It shipped broken.

...

The Lesion, Atterax, and Nikana Prime are irrelevant to the Telos Boltace change. They don't have syndicate effects. Their quick melee functions work as intended.

Sancti Magistar, Vaykor Sydon, and Secura Lecta do have syndicate effects. Now the Telos Boltace is in line with them as they are all similar products. 

Call it a nerf. All right. It wasn't supposed to work that way. It was broken. You're arguing for DE to leave a broken melee weapon alone because you liked its utility. Y'all are complaining about a nerf, and why we can't have nice things as if that is true in this case. Why, though?

It's simply not what happened.

Just acknowledge that it was broken, that they fixed their mistake, and campaign for them to unfix it and break all the other melee weapons to match it. 

Remember that time a few weeks ago when a few people lost their minds over the Machete Wraith, Mara Detron and a couple of other things accidentally going up, then being removed?

DE put them back. They wouldn't have done it without people speaking up. I know. But they might change their minds here is the point.

Complaining about a nerf as if it is intentional, removed a good and balanced and intended mechanic, or is ruining the last hope for decent new content is tiresome. 

Why doesn't anyone ever just acknowledge what actually happened as a point of fact? Why do we always go straight to our feelings on nerfs and buffs and how this is the new last straw?

Why?

Forget whether it is or isn't a nerf, that's subjective and we can go back and forth.

It was broken. It's a fact. It wasn't supposed to work like that. 

That's an honest middle ground to start from. And that's my point: meet people (the devs) half way. Complain, sure, fine, but acknowledge this for what it was and stop accusing them of being lazy and nerfing one thing instead of buffing 5 things because it's easier. 

Then ask for them to do this:

Quote

DE should probably give all syndicate melee weapons the ability to use their syndicate effect on quick melee and spin attacks. It was broken and unintended, but it seems to be what people want. Sometimes you just have to give in, and DE has in some similar cases before.

 

Edited October 21, 2016 by Rhekemi

[DoomFruit]

24 minutes ago, Rhekemi said:

Why doesn't anyone ever just acknowledge what actually happened as a point of fact? Why do we always go straight to our feelings on nerfs and buffs and how this is the new last straw?

What? I did. I saw the nerf, acknowledged that it's a nerf and don't like it.

24 minutes ago, Rhekemi said:

Forget whether it is or isn't a nerf, that's subjective and we can go back and forth.

It is not subjective. It does less than it used to. That is the literal definition of a nerf - to lose capability. It gained absolutely nothing in return, so you can't even argue that it's a rebalance.

24 minutes ago, Rhekemi said:

It was broken. It's a fact. It wasn't supposed to work like that.

And as I mentioned earlier, perhaps it's their intent that is broken and not the weapon. How does restricting the unique abilities of these weapons to one small niche part of the game actively help things? How does that encourage people to take these weapons over swords, polearms and whips which perform just fine without having to wield them all the time?

24 minutes ago, Rhekemi said:

Then ask for them to do this:

Like this?

9 hours ago, DoomFruit said:

The far better option would have been to buff the other syndicate melees up to its level - by making their special functions work in normal mode. Then people might actually consider taking them instead of galatine prime all day every day. But nooooo, instead they nerfed the single solitary nice new piece of gear into mastery fodder.

 

[Rhekemi]

 

Quote

It is not subjective.

Well, I don't know what else to tell you except that it is, still, subjective.

It is subjective because when you (and many) look at it, you see the removal of a useful feature.

When I and others look at it we see the removal of a useful but unintended (was never meant to be a thing) feature.

This is why it is subjective and will remain so no matter how long we argue this.

Quote

It does less than it used to.

It was never meant to do that. It was a mistake. It's like getting mystery money in your bank account, then telling the bank the mistake they made was intended. No, it's a mistake.

Quote

That is the literal definition of a nerf - to lose capability. It gained absolutely nothing in return, so you can't even argue that it's a rebalance.

I can, and have based on all the other products in the line that launched not having such a feature. It's clear that it lost its capability because it was never meant to have it. 

Quote

And as I mentioned earlier, perhaps it's their intent that is broken and not the weapon.

That's an opinion. I don't entirely disagree with it.

It's also sidestepping a point of fact: it was broken, and members were enjoying an unintended feature. That this cannot be acknowledged is...I can't find the words. Saddening maybe. Mostly because I see why people want it back, I know they liked it, but being blind to what actually happened or refusing to acknowledge it is just...saddening and unnecessary.

Quote

How does restricting the unique abilities of these weapons to one small niche part of the game actively help things? How does that encourage people to take these weapons over swords, polearms and whips which perform just fine without having to wield them all the time?

Balancing the Telos Boltace to be on par, and not above, its syndicate melee counterparts was the goal. This is something complaining about a nerf (to a broken weapon) willfully ignores.

It isn't laziness. It isn't a refusal to do more work and buff 5 items. It's, "Oh, wait. That shouldn't be working like that. That's not what we intended. Make it work like its sister weapons we launched in the same line, on the same day, with brand new mechanics. Also, didn't make syndicate secondaries and primaries unique utility procs only work when you have them equipped? We did? Alright, make it work like those."

DE's miscalculation was to have the melee weapons work just like their primary and secondary counterparts, so I'll agree with your opinion on the "broken intent". Doesn't change the facts.

Quote

Like this?

To be honest? No. I'd like someone to outline a non-complaint (about the nerf) suggestion thread for how each syndicate melee effect should actually work when used in quick melee or spin attack. If no one else wants to, I can give it a shot later.

My point stands: the cycle of "nerf" > complain is tiresome, and when it really isn't a clear cut nerf, we ought to see it for what it is (an attempt to fix a broken and unintended mechanic), and just suggest how to please the community by making other things use the mechanic.

In this case, I don't think it's powercreep or overpowered since syndicate melee is a new category all its own. (IE: every new weapon isn't going to have this utility effect, just these. But then again, DE stated they're experimenting with more non-warframe passives. We'll see.)

Edited October 21, 2016 by Rhekemi

[Azrael]

Prior to the nerf, people could spam the telos boltace and basically blind everyone with all the particles and waves. They could also nuke the entire room without even knowing where the enemies were. People were making macros that turned missions into "run that way and ignore the enemies, you'll still murder everything and be basically invincible."

Now that it's been nerfed, people........ can still do exactly the same stuff. They just have to equip it. I was in a mission with a boltace spammer last night and he crashed someone's game, he was spamming so fast (he was volt, and I gave him a warcry, so it was partially my fault). He was still nuking the entire room at mach 10, no need to look for enemies 'cause they'll be dead before you can see them.

But we still have threads like these, where people talk about the "huge nerf" that the boltace received. It's still incredibly unbalanced. It's still stupidly strong and abusable. It's still an easy win button. But people still complain.

Would you guys appreciate it if you just had a panel you could hack at the beginning of every mission that made you auto-win? You could start the mission, hack the panel, and go back to the ship with your loot. Would that improve the game? After all, who cares about balance in a PvE game, right?

[shyguyk]

I'm confused as to how people throw around "I want to be op" and "there's no endgame content" without some sort of cognitive dissonance.

[Azrael]

Just now, shyguyk said:

I'm confused as to how people throw around "I want to be op" and "there's no endgame content" without some sort of cognitive dissonance.

Oh I definitely think there's some cognitive dissonance here.  :)

But it's all part of power creep. "Make us stronger." "Now make the enemies stronger." "Now we aren't strong enough!"

Such is video games...

[Azrael]

5 minutes ago, shyguyk said:

I'm confused as to how people throw around "I want to be op" and "there's no endgame content" without some sort of cognitive dissonance.

I thought this might be appropriate:

 

:)

[Chipputer]

6 minutes ago, shyguyk said:

I'm confused as to how people throw around "I want to be op" and "there's no endgame content" without some sort of cognitive dissonance.

Because, as is obvious by this thread, people like the OP don't understand what balance really is. They view balance as a set of ever increasing numbers, always trying to match and outdo each other. 

[GrimAtrament]

what did they nerf?

[Soketsu]

47 minutes ago, hazerddex said:

what did they nerf?

now you have to equip the weapon in order to active the effect

 

Spoiler

(so cant using your ranged weapon, and other long range melee weapon take again the upper hand in order to clean cache, with foes since the telos boltface don't deal huge damage compare to some other recent weapon

Spoiler

(galatine p)

 

 

[Ivan_Rid]

5 hours ago, Azrael said:

Prior to the nerf, people could spam the telos boltace and basically blind everyone with all the particles and waves. They could also nuke the entire room without even knowing where the enemies were. People were making macros that turned missions into "run that way and ignore the enemies, you'll still murder everything and be basically invincible."

Now that it's been nerfed, people........ can still do exactly the same stuff. They just have to equip it. I was in a mission with a boltace spammer last night and he crashed someone's game, he was spamming so fast (he was volt, and I gave him a warcry, so it was partially my fault). He was still nuking the entire room at mach 10, no need to look for enemies 'cause they'll be dead before you can see them.

But we still have threads like these, where people talk about the "huge nerf" that the boltace received. It's still incredibly unbalanced. It's still stupidly strong and abusable. It's still an easy win button. But people still complain.

Would you guys appreciate it if you just had a panel you could hack at the beginning of every mission that made you auto-win? You could start the mission, hack the panel, and go back to the ship with your loot. Would that improve the game? After all, who cares about balance in a PvE game, right?

One upvote is just not enough, good sire.

[lyravega]

23 hours ago, NightBlitz said:

what you're suggesting is called power creep

No, power creep is putting out more powerful stuff, not bringing everything in line with each other.

[Azrael]

29 minutes ago, lyravega said:

No, power creep is putting out more powerful stuff, not bringing everything in line with each other.

If you accomplish this by making everything more powerful, then it's powercreep. Especially since the boltace was kinda powercreepy on it's own.

[Rolunde]

Ah Telos Boltace, it was fun while it lasted. My only wish now is that they had just released it as it is now instead of how it was.

If they'd never have given us quick melee blade waves then they'd never have had to take them away. (Some say it was never intended, I don't really know what the official word on this is. If that's really the case then "fixed" now. If not well "oops unexpected consequences" or something like that I guess?)

I imagine if that's what they would have done in the first place the salt levels of the forums might be just a little lower right now... /shrugs/

[Azrael]

15 minutes ago, Rolunde said:

I imagine if that's what they would have done in the first place the salt levels of the forums might be just a little lower right now... /shrugs/

Of course. Unfortunately DE is not perfect and makes mistakes. More mistakes, perhaps, than sometimes seems reasonable. Part of the problem is the lack of a test server. But at the end of the day, if we are left with a good game that is fun to play, and the boltace is good and fun to use, then that should be enough.

[DoomFruit]

15 hours ago, Rhekemi said:

To be honest? No. I'd like someone to outline a non-complaint (about the nerf) suggestion thread for how each syndicate melee effect should actually work when used in quick melee or spin attack. If no one else wants to, I can give it a shot later.

1: Make charge attacks work in quick melee for all weapons, not just gunblades and glaives. This, along with improving all melee weapons, makes the sanctistar useful. Change the syniocor to spawn spectres on charge attack kill instead of channelling to bring it in line with the sanctistar.

2: Make the secura lecta give its extra credits when kills are made with quick melee.

3: Let us block without having to use melee mode, then change the vaydon so that the blind effect can take place after a set number of blocked hits, and without having to maintain block all through those hits (example: block 3 hits, release block and move around, stand and block 3 more hits, total blocked hit counter = 6). If that's too powerful, then perhaps add a slow decay to the blocked hit counter when not actively blocking.

4: Rakta dark dagger: this one's trickier. Perhaps the decreased detection radius could apply for a decent period of time (read: something actually useful, like 20-30s) after doing any kind of finisher attack (whether it's on a stealth kill, a counter kill or on a grounded enemy). Actively wielding the weapon could have the decreased detection apply regardless as it does now, and perhaps pause the aforementioned timer as well.

5: Telos boltace gets its spinwaves back for use in quick attacks, increased mobility still applies while actively wielding the weapon (and perhaps for a couple of seconds after switching away?).

 

 

Edited October 22, 2016 by DoomFruit

[DarcnyssWolfe]

3 hours ago, DoomFruit said:

1: Make charge attacks work in quick melee for all weapons, not just gunblades and glaives. This, along with improving all melee weapons, makes the sanctistar useful. Change the syniocor to spawn spectres on charge attack kill instead of channelling to bring it in line with the sanctistar.

2: Make the secura lecta give its extra credits when kills are made with quick melee.

3: Let us block without having to use melee mode, then change the vaydon so that the blind effect can take place after a set number of blocked hits, and without having to maintain block all through those hits (example: block 3 hits, release block and move around, stand and block 3 more hits, total blocked hit counter = 6). If that's too powerful, then perhaps add a slow decay to the blocked hit counter when not actively blocking.

4: Rakta dark dagger: this one's trickier. Perhaps the decreased detection radius could apply for a decent period of time (read: something actually useful, like 20-30s) after doing any kind of finisher attack (whether it's on a stealth kill, a counter kill or on a grounded enemy). Actively wielding the weapon could have the decreased detection apply regardless as it does now, and perhaps pause the aforementioned timer as well.

5: Telos boltace gets its spinwaves back for use in quick attacks, increased mobility still applies while actively wielding the weapon (and perhaps for a couple of seconds after switching away?).

 

 

I could live with this. Problem is most people are complaining about the telace is that it nukes low levels better than anything short of world on fire, despite its numerous mini nerfs it started with (Los, drop off, no combo counter, partial spin damage).

Glad DE didn't cave to the "masses" and straight nerf the stats but I'm hesitant to believe they won't cave in the near future.

[Nikkytae]

to begin with the other syndicate weapons lacked the damage potential, in which telos boltace would have been great if it was able to compare to the other syndicate weapons... in its' original state(pre nerf). i invested a few forma in this weapon and now its all gone to waste because the AOE slide attacks dont work anymore unless i am wielding them, and even so, the range is almost puny. it was fun while it lasted.

[88th_Phantom]

On 10/21/2016 at 1:38 AM, Jin_Kazama said:

They didnt nerf it, you just gotta wield it to use its power. Just like how you have to wield the sancti hammer to get its effects. and ALL the other weapons effect require them to be held.

Just because they Fixed it, doesnt mean its a nerf.

Said it perfectly.

Furthermore OP, powercreep may be inevitable, that doesn't mean it shouldn't be mitigated where needed, especially when its as easy as this.

[Rhekemi]

8 hours ago, DoomFruit said:

1: Make charge attacks work in quick melee for all weapons, not just gunblades and glaives. This, along with improving all melee weapons, makes the sanctistar useful. Change the syniocor to spawn spectres on charge attack kill instead of channelling to bring it in line with the sanctistar.

2: Make the secura lecta give its extra credits when kills are made with quick melee.

3: Let us block without having to use melee mode, then change the vaydon so that the blind effect can take place after a set number of blocked hits, and without having to maintain block all through those hits (example: block 3 hits, release block and move around, stand and block 3 more hits, total blocked hit counter = 6). If that's too powerful, then perhaps add a slow decay to the blocked hit counter when not actively blocking.

4: Rakta dark dagger: this one's trickier. Perhaps the decreased detection radius could apply for a decent period of time (read: something actually useful, like 20-30s) after doing any kind of finisher attack (whether it's on a stealth kill, a counter kill or on a grounded enemy). Actively wielding the weapon could have the decreased detection apply regardless as it does now, and perhaps pause the aforementioned timer as well.

5: Telos boltace gets its spinwaves back for use in quick attacks, increased mobility still applies while actively wielding the weapon (and perhaps for a couple of seconds after switching away?).

 

 

Quite decent.

3 and 4 seem off. Not sure what to suggest yet.

[Ziden_]

On 10/21/2016 at 1:26 PM, Azrael said:

Prior to the nerf, people could spam the telos boltace and basically blind everyone with all the particles and waves.

Your problem here is with the graphical portrayal of a weapon's ability.  Why not just ask for them to change the graphics instead of requesting them to nuke the weapon?  You also mention low level clearing.  There's no need to alter a weapon because of low level clearing.  There are tons of frames, weapons, and abilities that clear just as fast if not faster than the boltace.

[Chipputer]

43 minutes ago, Ziden_ said:

Your problem here is with the graphical portrayal of a weapon's ability.

Why don't you read, and include, the rest of that paragraph before you try and talk about what their "problem" with the weapon is? Bonus, a bit of the next paragraph, even:

On 10/21/2016 at 1:26 PM, Azrael said:

They could also nuke the entire room without even knowing where the enemies were. People were making macros that turned missions into "run that way and ignore the enemies, you'll still murder everything and be basically invincible."

Now that it's been nerfed, people........ can still do exactly the same stuff. They just have to equip it.

Don't misrepresent what the people you're arguing against are saying.

[(PSN)Shaun-T-Wilson]

To be clear the "nerf" was that you had to be using the telos boltace to use a powerful aoe spin attack, rather than any spin attack.  The change makes sense since the ability itselt is weapon grade compared to ofter syndicate weapons special effects.

[Azrael]

3 hours ago, Chipputer said:

Why don't you read, and include, the rest of that paragraph before you try and talk about what their "problem" with the weapon is? Bonus, a bit of the next paragraph, even:

Why, thank you.  :)

 

4 hours ago, Ziden_ said:

There's no need to alter a weapon because of low level clearing.  There are tons of frames, weapons, and abilities that clear just as fast if not faster than the boltace.

Are you honestly going to claim that the boltace - when used the way the spammers have been using it - isn't more powerful than most other room-clearing weapons? There are videos of people using it to kill sortie 3 assassinate targets such as the hyena pack, and literally all they did was spin around the room at very high speed. The Boltace can clear rooms at a pretty decent level, and it even scales well against grineer and corrupted because of it's guaranteed slash procs that it deals out across the entire room at extremely high speed.

And my point was: you can still do all that stuff! The weapon is just as powerful as it was before! You just have to hold "f" before you start. Is that really so onerous?