The War Within: 19.1.0 Ash Revisited

[BaronessBlacksilk]

Nitain days in a row makes me sad. Can't even use anymore of the stuff.

[GGbroman]

Oh yeah before I forget. Why is Valkyr getting a prime?

Wasn't she created after a point where primes couldn't be created anymore (in the warframe Lore or something like that)?

If that is the case then maybe Valkyr prime shouldn't be called prime but instead be called something different so it doesn't mess with the Lore? (if i'm wrong please let me know cuz I forgot this part of the Lore).

[Dimonios97]

Thx for the Ash nerf, now is useless....

[Punnilingus]

Okay, so I have given it awhile, played for hours, and I can say, without a shadow of a doubt, that you made Ash an extremely useless frame. Why do I say that? Well, let's break it down, shall we?

1) Now the Blade Storm takes even longer to go from start to finish. 

2) Now 60% of those enemies you just spent ~30 - 50 seconds marking are now dead or will not be killed by the time BS completes. 

3) I am better off using my gun to shoot the 10 enemies I had marked, yet killed only 4 of them. 

4) The necessity of increasing strength FORCES lowered duration and efficiency, which means his other skills do NOT work together, they work against each other. Want a long stealth? Too bad because you needed to nerf the duration mod to make sure he had enough strength to kill the marked targets. 

5) The ultimate skill of Ash's now does the same thing, only worse, and doesn't do it efficiently. 

6) His Ulti is currently pointless to use as you could simply focus on stealth duration and shoot those enemies with more efficiency than running around in the middle of a mob targeting things. 

 

Now Ash's ultimate is nothing more than a secondary cleanup. It's true that from time-to-time you can catch a really good amount of enemies and it cleans them up well, but the BS actually lasts longer now than it did before, aside from hitting 1 target multiple times because pre-"fix" BS would keep hitting the same enemy until dead or - well, whenever. 

From speaking to people on Steam and reading comments on here, I can tell you the exact kind of people you listened to while killing Ash: the ones that do not play as a team and are more concerned with their own kill ratio than anything else. 

You also listened to a bunch of people who didn't even play Ash. The vast majority of Ash lovers - myself included - realize just how bad he is as a frame now, but those that rarely used him before? Well by God - they love him now, even though they really have nothing to compare it to. 

How to fix and keep targeting ---

Any enemies that Ash does NOT kill during the BS should remain targeted once it has completed, and have it reset back to 1 mark again. I really feel like this can bridge the gap between him being a horrible, pointless frame to being one that still has a use in a squad. 

Either do that or have his ultimate execute all kills at the same time while allowing him to remain in targeting mode. 

Another fix: make targeting mode much easier to recognize. I can't tell you how many times I thought I was in targeting mode only to realize that I wasn't. It's also kinda' bugged because it will sometimes hang on activation and the player is forced to hit '4' multiple times before it starts. 

All while the player could have just been shooting his gun or mashing the 'e' button over and over again mindlessly. 

 

As for the sorties -- Nitain and Forma? Seriously? Come the frag on. Who in your dev team thought this one up? They should be reprimanded for not playing their own game. 

[PhoenixFury]

Please give us the option to take 2k Endo instead of these new rewards.

Some of us have no further use for Nitain after building everything that requires it. As for Ash, well... More reason to not be using him, I suppose.

Edited November 27, 2016 by PhoenixFury

[-VF-Nightmare]

I did some more tests and confirmed that ash is useless now, the new teleport is not working, I can't teleport to anything besides an enemy or ally.

I usually use bladestorm to save myself from certain death when I got knocked down and surrounded by enemies, now the time I need to target them is enough to kill me.

[Punnilingus]

On 11/25/2016 at 6:05 PM, TheTundraTerror said:

Crush is only going to get you killed.

LOL. Are you serious? You clearly never use Mag. Yes, it's true that her usefulness drops off pretty fast, but Crush prevents death easily. What they need to do is allow her to cast it while running in order to negate the loss of damage at high-levels.  

But still, when I see someone say Crush will get me killed, I have to laugh at it. I don't play her often but when I do, I'm almost always #1 in kills. 

 

[GGbroman]

Hopefully DE re-takes a look at ash again and fix him so that he can be more of a team player and so that other team members don't hinder his abilities. as of right now bladestorm is good for solo gameplay but for survivals (and others missions) with other players he can be hindered from other players killing his marked enemies. The marking enemies thing either needs to be faster or the marking can be screen-wide and duration based (where every second (or less) another mark is added to the enemies on your screen at the moment) and on top of that you don't kill enemies but instead THREE clones are sent out to do your bidding while you focus on other stuff like reviving a fallen team mate (my god i wanna save a team mate while bladestorming ma) XD 

[Punnilingus]

On 11/25/2016 at 6:06 PM, CorrinAvatan said:

I'ma hold off on my own Ash rework review, but it seems that a lot of the problems I'm hearing about seem to be "oh, I die now, because I have to actively use the power".  

No, I don't die while using my Ash because I know exactly how to avoid dying with just about any frame. The problem with the rework is that his ulti is useless for anything but mopping up a room that's behind you - really. 

Sure, you can find groups here and there that you can get  good, strong BS in, but that doesn't happen often. Now, you're better off just shooting your gun at them or button-mashing '3' while sliding - as if this takes skill to do anyway. 

I suggest you run along and test it out before trying to take little snipes at people. 

[Punnilingus]

On 11/25/2016 at 6:14 PM, A_Midget_Walrus said:

Seriouisly though WHY cap it? Before i could get 1 extract off every ~10 minutes(3 no kuva 1.5 minute runs as Volt, 1 5 minute kuva extract run) as much as i want, now i have to do other things that often take longer, AND need a party instead of being easily solo'd, AND have a cooldown/limited spawn count. Nobody asked for this change, kuva farming was fine as it was.

 

Kuva farming NEEDED to be fixed. I'm not sure what you're talking about it taking longer or whatever. I ran 3 missions and pulled 3600 kuva in 10 minutes while you used to get, what, 1 every 5-8 runs? 

I HATED Kuva farming because there were times I'd see no siphon in 10 runs, but there I was zipping through Adora, mindlessly, hoping like hell there was a siphon, only to discover I had to go back and do the same thing over and over and over again, never knowing when it would show - or if it would show. 

This was a MUCH needed change and I haven't felt hindered by the cooldowns at all. I have other things I have to farm so if I don't see any kuva missions, I just run Heiracon and get indo and relics, then recheck, then do fissures, then do kuva. 

 

It works and it works well. 

[Dimonios97]

And now? what will be the next nerf?

- Simulor?

- Nova (4°)?

- Banshee?

They can try to make a sense to Limbo, or Zephir, but no....touch a (ex)best damage warframe of the game.

#R.I.P. Ash

Edited November 27, 2016 by Dimonios97

[CorrinAvatan]

1 minute ago, Necromateur said:

No, I don't die while using my Ash because I know exactly how to avoid dying with just about any frame. The problem with the rework is that his ulti is useless for anything but mopping up a room that's behind you - really. 

Sure, you can find groups here and there that you can get  good, strong BS in, but that doesn't happen often. Now, you're better off just shooting your gun at them or button-mashing '3' while sliding - as if this takes skill to do anyway. 

I suggest you run along and test it out before trying to take little snipes at people. 

I did playtest, and posted, and to be frank, the complaint I see the most is that the marking mechanic takes so long, that you die while trying to mark things.  From what I've seen other Ash players do, standing in the middle of the room, and dying, I think it's a valid point to bring up: people who try to use his power now like it worked back then, get a quite rude awakening.

However, in my own playtest, I find the usage of Bladestorm to be finicky.  I constantly re-marked enemies I didn't want to, had other enemies get marked when I was trying to mark a specific target, etc.  It also didn't get rid of the thing people were ACTUALLY complaining about: watching a cutscene when activating a power/pressing four and making a sandwich.  

To me, it seems that it does slow down gameplay quite a bit, needing to meticulously mark things, without having full control over what you marked or not (the timer for "double-mark" seems to be simultaneously too quick (when I don't want it to be) and too slow (when I want it quick).  Eventually, I ended up starting Mark mode, shaking my mouse, and hitting 4 again, because it didn't feel like it was making as much of a difference anyway.

Honestly, to me, I think it would have been better if Ash pressed 4 to drop a "zone" within which clones would do the bladestorm thing, enemies that are in the zone or enter the zone get bladestormed, but Ash is free to fight with his buddies

[MokutoBunshi]

On 11/25/2016 at 7:02 PM, CorrinAvatan said:

Smeeta's Charm would work on Ayatan Stars and Syndicate Medals.  It was not uncommon to see people run Smeetas in Syndicate missions, especially the Grineer Interception that has the medals, and waiting for Charm to proc to collect all the medals.  I know I've gotten at least 22 extra 5,000 rep medals from that.  However, I wasn't aware until now that it was a "bug"

Thanks.

 

]\'[

[Bostyan]

On 11/26/2016 at 2:14 AM, SickSara said:

I just did sortie with my friend. Just the 2 of us. I took Ash just to test him out, because I never played him besides ranking him up. I killed everything with one hit. Sorry, buy your melee was bad you your build is sh*t.

I play it so don`t even try ok I say what it was true. For me ASH is out of the game.... And you didn`t kill everyone and don`t lie please!!!

Or your str is 200+ but ASH kill 100 lvl enemies with only 140-150 str now need 230+ str for same lvl of enemies :D and power usage was before very high now is insane.

Anyway if you like it play it I will not! 3x mark I will see on 50+m range yea sure LOL. Mark is nice but 1x, 2x 3x yea sure if was 1x mark yes will be ok but 3x :D Mark one time enemy on lvl 100 with only 150 str will be damage 10% wow  thats very useful.

I used ASH only in sorties because in normal missions I can use weapons or any other frame. But only weapons in surv or def sorties without frost you will die with ASH very fast. Is no time to mark every enemy 3x and look it if I mark it 3 times

Edited November 27, 2016 by Bostyan

[_sheepy_]

i need to try him

Edited November 27, 2016 by _sheepy_

[_Raiklar_]

22 hours ago, MeLbZ said:

Here's my opinion on the new Marking mechanics for Bladestorm:

• the act of passing my reticule left and right is visually disorienting for me, especially when im trying to get 3 marks on every enemy as fast as i can before they can kill me.  I've turned off my motion blur for this reason.
• I think it's good that the energy cost of each mark is lower when performing it while invisible by any source.   Now with duration mods, smokescreen will let me stay longer in a state of invisibility, giving me safety while i spend less energy marking targets.
• I can only put as much as 3 marks on a single enemy.  It's unsatisfying to not kill high-level enemies after 3 kill animations with a full power strength build, mainly because i have to go through the trouble of marking them again to finish them off.  While it took the old Bladestorm 10 animations to kill high-level enemies, at least I had to cast it just once. 

My suggestions:

• It would be nice if there were other ways to add marks other than passing the reticule on enemies.  Here are some examples i have in mind:
  • Giving Shuriken the ability to mark enemies that it hits.  Simply because it seeks-out up to two enemes that don't necessarily have to be on your reticule.
  • Allowing physical attacks (gun shots, melee attacks, bullet jumps) to mark enemies while in 'Mark Enemy' mode so that there's also a benefit in performing physical attacks.  This way, a player could get 3 marks on a single target in an instant by aiming at it and shooting two bullets. Also, Imagine adding extra marks to a line of previously-marked enemies with a slide attack. (moreover with a Telos Boltor!)
• it would help if there was a mark counter displayed somewhere in the hud to show how many enemies have been marked, or how many marks are currently active.  I would prefer this to appear on either on one of these areas:
  • the upper right of the HUD (where the buff indicators appear)
  • the lower right of the HUD (just above the melee combo counter)
  • Below the reticule and ability dots (in the same space where Atlas' Landslide multiplier appears)
• It wouldn't be OP to increase the mark limit per enemy so we can get a few more hits in.  (On the other hand, removing the limit will let players place as many marks on an enemy as available energy allows it, but it will somewhat bring back the problem of "press 4 and wait")
• Allow players to manually END or DISCONTINUE the Bladestorm animation  by holding down the ability button (A.K.A long press). Nobody wants to be stuck in killing motion when your priorities suddenly change from "KILL ALL ENEMIES!" to "REVIVE THAT FALLEN TEAMMATE!" or "ACTIVATE THAT LIFE SUPPORT!"

actually the true original only took one animation to kill high lvls and everything else in the room. was much better and there were no clones.

All i can say is Console enjoy Blade storm while it is still good cause once you get the patch it will kill Ash.

Edited November 27, 2016 by Ookami_Nihonto

[Punnilingus]

1 hour ago, CorrinAvatan said:

I did playtest, and posted, and to be frank, the complaint I see the most is that the marking mechanic takes so long, that you die while trying to mark things.  From what I've seen other Ash players do, standing in the middle of the room, and dying, I think it's a valid point to bring up: people who try to use his power now like it worked back then, get a quite rude awakening.

However, in my own playtest, I find the usage of Bladestorm to be finicky.  I constantly re-marked enemies I didn't want to, had other enemies get marked when I was trying to mark a specific target, etc.  It also didn't get rid of the thing people were ACTUALLY complaining about: watching a cutscene when activating a power/pressing four and making a sandwich.  

To me, it seems that it does slow down gameplay quite a bit, needing to meticulously mark things, without having full control over what you marked or not (the timer for "double-mark" seems to be simultaneously too quick (when I don't want it to be) and too slow (when I want it quick).  Eventually, I ended up starting Mark mode, shaking my mouse, and hitting 4 again, because it didn't feel like it was making as much of a difference anyway.

Honestly, to me, I think it would have been better if Ash pressed 4 to drop a "zone" within which clones would do the bladestorm thing, enemies that are in the zone or enter the zone get bladestormed, but Ash is free to fight with his buddies

4

+10 to this. 

It feels like they tried having Ash's ulti be focused on a very small number of enemies - a very specific type of enemy (bombard, what have you -- forgetting that Ash didn't always kill everything in sight before anyway). But in doing so, they screwed up one major component for that to work - uber damage to one enemy (to make sure the ONE thing you mark dies) and the marking mechanism, which is a joke if we are to be blunt. 

I keep reading from people who didn't like playing Ash before say they love it now because you can pick and choose the enemies you want to kill -- when I read this I just laugh. A bombard surrounded by butchers and all you want is the Bombard -- good luck trying to pull marking him off 3 times and only him. And even if you DO, it takes so long anyway that it would have been more useful had you just pulled out your Dread and started headshotting him. 

I like the idea of an "area" -- this is cool, but I also had an idea for a way to fix this:

When Ash enters 'target mode' he becomes stealth but can deal no damage - but while he's in targeting mode, every enemy he left-clicks on, a clone shoots out at the enemy and BS begins on that one target - if you want to do another clone on the same target, simply left click again, and again, using energy with each clone you send out. It could be where each clone to the same target increases in cost but one clone to different targets remains the same. 

And the stealth can be activated w/o cost, but the player has to start marking within a certain amount of time before the stealth wears off and if the stealth wears off without having marked anyone, then the cost of normal stealth is deducted from the player as a way to prevent free-stealth using target mode. 

What do you think of that?

[CorrinAvatan]

5 minutes ago, Necromateur said:

+10 to this. 

It feels like they tried having Ash's ulti be focused on a very small number of enemies - a very specific type of enemy (bombard, what have you -- forgetting that Ash didn't always kill everything in sight before anyway). But in doing so, they screwed up one major component for that to work - uber damage to one enemy (to make sure the ONE thing you mark dies) and the marking mechanism, which is a joke if we are to be blunt. 

I keep reading from people who didn't like playing Ash before say they love it now because you can pick and choose the enemies you want to kill -- when I read this I just laugh. A bombard surrounded by butchers and all you want is the Bombard -- good luck trying to pull marking him off 3 times and only him. And even if you DO, it takes so long anyway that it would have been more useful had you just pulled out your Dread and started headshotting him. 

I like the idea of an "area" -- this is cool, but I also had an idea for a way to fix this:

When Ash enters 'target mode' he becomes stealth but can deal no damage - but while he's in targeting mode, every enemy he left-clicks on, a clone shoots out at the enemy and BS begins on that one target - if you want to do another clone on the same target, simply left click again, and again, using energy with each clone you send out. It could be where each clone to the same target increases in cost but one clone to different targets remains the same. 

And the stealth can be activated w/o cost, but the player has to start marking within a certain amount of time before the stealth wears off and if the stealth wears off without having marked anyone, then the cost of normal stealth is deducted from the player as a way to prevent free-stealth using target mode. 

What do you think of that?

Also viable.  It depends on what the purpose of the frame is supposed to be.  Is he supposed to be a room/zone clearer?  Is he supposed to be more of a selective assassin?

Defining his role should determine how Bladestorm should function, but I think what everyone agrees on is getting rid of the cutscene.

[-NG-Phantom]

Ash blade storm is bad now. change it back to the way it was!!!

[Punnilingus]

Just now, CorrinAvatan said:

Also viable.  It depends on what the purpose of the frame is supposed to be.  Is he supposed to be a room/zone clearer?  Is he supposed to be more of a selective assassin?

Defining his role should determine how Bladestorm should function, but I think what everyone agrees on is getting rid of the cutscene.

 

Well, his original name was Smoke and even before that was simply "Ninja." When I play him, I feel as if he's a Ninja Assassin, which is why I think the 'targeting mode' is actually pretty cool -- mark your target, then kill your target. Unfortunately, it doesn't work that way currently. 

I would be okay with him being used to take down the 'big guys' in just a few short cuts into their weak spots (which is what BS actually does - bypasses armor by finding weak spots/gaps in armor). I think if they went this route while ALSO having the ability to spread damage output over several enemies, he would be one of the most useful team-frames again (I've always seen him as a highly effective team-based frame). 

But if they are to go the route of single-shot assassin, then they must also increase his base stealth because currently, it's just too low. It requires far too many duration buffs to get anything remotely useful from his stealth skill - so if they lowered the # of enemies he can easily kill while increasing his ability to maintain stealth - I believe this would be great. 

They could also even allow him to stealth when near enemies - similar to shade sentinel but without the need for a shade. After all, he's a friggin' ninja! lol. Or, perhaps even when he walks up against walls he becomes nearly invis. 

So they could go this route or they could keep him as a room-clearer, which I think would be fine. Having targeting mode give him invuln while doing great damage at a fairly costly energy use would be a great way to rework him. 

So either way could be viable, but for me - he does 'feel' like he should be more assassination against large targets -- instant kill 1 and 2 enemies at a time or do lots of damage versus 20 -- if that makes sense. 

[AngelicRevenge]

Well forma is just stupid. -. Would have been good if its like 3 prebuilt forma but a forma bp is just stupid -.-

[Predaxxx]

ASH nerfed making him a usless warframe. an empty husk/ worthless .

[Anceto]

After trying out the ash rework, i can safely say that ash prime is going into that stack of unused frames for me, why you ask, well these are my reasons:

Bladestorm:

Prior to the rework, bladestorm can be used to clear a room with a reasonable energy cost after specializing in power strength and efficiency, but after the rework, you now have to run around like a headless chicken marking enemies before they kill you, and in higher level content, you're more likely to be found dead before you can use BS to clear rooms, and you can no longer use BS as a panic button to save you from death. The energy cost is a good and bad thing, before the rework, you will either waste or put your power to good use because bladestorm doesn't really care if you're killing only one or the entire room with it, the cost remains the same which makes it terrible to use in low amount of targets, while the rework on the other hand, while it doesn't cost you as much as before when you're only using it for a few enemies, the power consumption suddenly spikes when you try to kill the entire room, not including marking the same enemy more than once, so it effectively costs more time, more resources, and higher risk after the rework.

Invisibility:

Prior to the rework, not many would use it, because it stops you in your tracks and acts like a lesser loki invis, especially with the lower duration, after the rework, you can now use it while in motion, however the duration is still the biggest problem, even after using duration mods, so there's really no point, especially if you're trying to use it paired with BS' enemy marking mechanic, you're more than likely to run out of it before you've marked all.

Shuriken:

prior to the rework, not viable without augment, after the rework, still not viable without augment

Teleport:

not much to say about this, in order to make it viable you need to spend platinum or spend syndicate standing to get fatal teleport, without that it's mostly good for getting yourself unstuck from glitched maps.

so all in all, disappointed with the rework, feels more like an unnecessary nerf, the problems with bladestorm just doubled after rework, and the rest of ash's skills are still lackluster, so good job DE

[BenesatoZero]

And yet another wicked weapon cosmetic that I will not get because it's being held ransom at the cost of buying the Ash bundle. Honestly, I don't like Ash, love the Nikana, third time for me DE has linked a sick cosmetic to a frame I have no real intrest in.

[Atheist]

Personally i like Ash's rework, but energy cost of Bladestorm is too high.
Deluxe skin is meh, another samurai themed one :( I hoped that it will be something similar to Proto Excalibur.