Zephyr should be good; a fix thread ::Edit 7th September::

[DerMaulwurf]

Thank you for actually trying to identify the problems with each ability and proposing fixes, instead of trying to shoehorn in your own vision about what an 'air frame' (whatever that is) is supposed to do.

 

One thing I would want to add is that right now each use of Tail Wind makes Zephyr less floaty until it gets back to the ground. Which effectively grounds you after a few uses. If that was removed, you could use the ability to repeatedly change directions in flight, which is another thing that bullet jump cannot do.

[Karav]

17 hours ago, Thaylien said:

Looking anywhere and casting Tailwind makes you Tailwind from your starting point to the direction you're going, however if you're on the ground looking down, it sends you upwards in the same direction, but opposite angle to your cursor. Sliding or crouching, however, turns a regular jump into a Bullet Jump, and players are used to that function in game, they learn it with the movement system. Sliding an pressing 1 Launches the player in exactly the same function, and activates the buff to Dive Bomb and so will be done as a deliberate function of the ability that a player can choose to use or not use depending on their movement.

I worry that this would make tailwind rather awkward to use. Getting launch angles right sounds like a royal pain. Currently, all I have to do is remember to jump first if I want to skim the ground. Of course, I may be wrong and it works brilliantly. The third option is making it work similar to bullet jump's aiming system and making any angle below the horizon make you skim the ground. Thoughts?

[Ranbanein]

I would do this...

1) Remove Passive, her abilities play with the physics engine enough. I enjoyed the "finesse" of mastering another character controller as well, but my experience after three years is that every non "hardcore"/"veteran" player HATES her passive. Give her something else, like increased launch velocity or something.

2) Tailwind & Dive Bomb given Atlas and Rhino 1 treatment. They should deal real damage, especially Dive Bomb.

2.5) Dive Bomb augment suction increased drastically. Can you imagine how fun it would be to have a max power range Zephyr dive bombing into a squad of enemies and picking them all up into a tornado?

4) Tornado turned into stationary, super big version of Vauban vortex. Keep elemental gimmick. Enemies drawn to center of tornado for simplicity's sake so that players can actually shoot the CC'd enemies.

4.5) Tornado augment reworked entirely, at the moment it is among the most useless augments in the game!

5) Turbulence bug fixes.

I feel like these would all take minimal effort to implement, and would do tons for her current QoL. I don't want her completely reworked at all (besides 4 augment. lol). 

Edited February 6, 2017 by Ranbanein

[Caelward]

I've brought up the idea of having a triggered condition that allows you to disable her passive before for the same reasons you guys outline DerMaulWulf and Ranbanein. This idea seems to land right in the middle of general opinion in my experience, I've had some players who like the idea and some players who argued very strongly against it. So I can tell you not everyone hates her passive. I don't like how it can rob control from you when you find yourself in the air against your will, but I'm willing to accept this as a downside of the frame. She's got bigger problems after all, and Thaylien and Renova have outlined some methods for bug fix that would make her time in the air even better.

@Ranbanein

There's some strong concepts in here that argue very strongly to increase the damage numbers and the other aspects of tailwind and divebomb, so don't worry, we're with you on that. The damage, the range, and more. They're right into the flaws and fixes of divebomb and tailwind. The abilities are not as effective against mobs as they really should be.

As for as the big tornado? Y'know I like it, but I'm hesitant to endorse it because Vauban's Vortex and Inaros' Sandstorm both exist. This makes it unlikely in my mind that we'll get to see a big Zephyr tornado, as much as I like it. Too much overlap I think. I agree that I've never been impressed with the tornado augment though...

@Karav

Being able to skim the ground is something I'd like to see and I tried to say that in my original control change concept. I noted maybe having it trigger when you're looking at something like 45degrees because I believe it's not that hard to very quickly look down, and that much angle should give you lots of leeway on using a forwards dash if you so desire. Zephyr's tailwind would skim the ground, but only if you're actually looking at it. Look up a bit and you go airborne instead, and when tailwind ends you transition into normal jumping movement. In the end though, whatever numbers I come up with are somewhat arbitrary. I'm sure it could be tweaked.

Another aspect of this I like is that you could take off from a standing start, you wouldn't have to start running to get up to full speed. You also wouldn't have to do the little awkward short hop to get tailwind going. Instead you'd tailwind and immediately be jumping afterwards at full speed. With the proposed changes in this thread you could immediatly combo that tailwind into another bullet jump as Zephyr's Tailwind would be nicely meshed into the regular warframe movement as to the current either/or sort of ability. From 0 to full speed in a moment. That slippery low friction run in place has always bothered me a bit, and this version of Zephyr's tailwind could be a quick bypass of that little flaw.

[Birdframe_Prime]

5 hours ago, Karav said:

The third option is making it work similar to bullet jump's aiming system and making any angle below the horizon make you skim the ground. Thoughts?

That's exactly what I was getting at. It's that exact function. Low angles make you skim the ground, but you'll find that if you aim at the ground it sends you upwards away from the ground. Try it, it's exactly what I meant. This goes the same for @Caelward too.

1 hour ago, Ranbanein said:

I would do this...

I see.

Well, conveniently, this is pretty much the opposite direction to the one I'm heading in. I mean, not bad ideas, but there's some serious holes in them.

Let's take a look; the first would be that I'm not hardcore, I'm just a long-term player and I love her passive, it's what made me love her after I got her. Yes, it's divisive to some, but to be honest it's the original Passive, I wouldn't ever change it, only improve on it.

Second, I would say that you're kind of onto something with the 'rhino and atlas' treatment for her abilities, but not all the way. Zephyr isn't, primarily, a damage frame, never has been, but yes she should have the capability to do some damage, otherwise Dive Bomb wouldn't have the scaling function that it does. The problem with this is that repeated casts of Tailwind aren't all that common. A long duration build for exploiting Turbulence also carries her a long distance with Tailwind, and quick turns and instant returns to the same point aren't very easy, one thing you have to think about for this is the console and controller players, they have a fixed rate of turn and can't instantly reset their view the way a mouse user can, so it would be very difficult for them to exploit this mechanic.

I mean, yes, I see what you're saying, I just feel that the damage scaling from melee mods in addition to the damage scaling from height that I suggested for Dive Bomb would be enough, since the effect that players want from Tailwind is the mobility with some viable and reliable effect on the enemy if you choose to use it. The trouble with damage on that is that armour scaling can simply negate the chance of damage actually doing anything, while a complete rag-doll on enemies is universal.

Your Tornado idea would work, but that's because it's just a Vauban Vortex. A definite must when you're working on reworks is to not steal directly from other frames. My solution of just being able to shoot through the funnels would serve the same fix for shooting enemies that are suspended, and keeping them as four funnels would preserve the in game animations, models and textures, without sacrificing the functionality of a CC cast.

It would also make the augment relevant again, thanks to the improved seeking and speed, as you could keep the damage buff, but add in a stagger on enemies instead of the lift, meaning that enemies still can't progress across the area, enemies are still unable to shoot, and they are still repeatedly hit with a chance to proc status. In addition, adding shooting through the funnels makes the additional 8 tiny-nados not a hindrance to just shooting things.

And yes, a couple of bug fixes to Turbulence, there are... precisely three things she doesn't deflect that should be; Hellion Rockets, Swarmer Detron seeking shots and flamethrowers. But we know those are bug-fixes, we're just waiting on them at this point.

So tl;dr you don't have bad points... I just feel that they're not really applicable either because of how the abilities are used and controlled, or because of them taking too much from another frame.

Incidentally: 

2 hours ago, Ranbanein said:

4.5) Tornado augment reworked entirely, at the moment it is among the most useless augments in the game!

Try Explosive Legerdemain, the one that turns pickups (aka ammo, health and energy, things that you're looking for) into explosives that you then cannot pick up if they explode.

Or... how about Swing Line, which makes the one part of Ripline that players use least often thanks to Parkour movement only cost energy 1 in 5 casts if you're using it for movement.

Just thoughts.

[Caelward]

@Thaylien.

I'm not really attached to the exact facing that triggers a launch instead of a dash, I'm really most attached to being able to tailwind dash into full parkour movement from a standing start. That moment where your frame looks like they're running on ice just strikes me as silly every time I see it. And I see it all the time when using any sort of speed enhancing ability. So... jetstream. Yeah.

So yeah, mirroring existing movement doesn't put me off at all. Its just cutting out the hop when I want to tailwind through a narrow access. A way to tailwind in tight spaces without a jump that can serve to make it more cumbersome than helpful. Especially since low-grav will keep me in that awkward position for a longer period of time.

I like the idea of using this as a way to give Zephyr instant full speed. Almost like those cartoons where the character just dissapears off the screen, running so fast all they left was a puff of smoke. Not that effect like a dog trying to take off on a laminated floor. All you hear is toenails clattering on the floor with the poor thing running in place. Funny, but off-putting when it's you. I mean, the examples may be a bit extreme, but I think you get the idea. :D

[Birdframe_Prime]

2 hours ago, Caelward said:

I'm not really attached to the exact facing that triggers a launch instead of a dash

No, no, you've mis-understood ^^. I got you, you've just not got me getting you. I'm saying that everywhere is the basic Tailwind, any direction, even looking down, it will Tailwind as the current in-air Tailwind, it just uses the up/down detection that Bullet Jump uses to make sure that you don't try to Tailwind straight into the floor when you're standing still. The difference between the regular Tailwind and the Launch Tailwind is then going to be the crouch when you're on the ground! The same way that a jump becomes a Bullet Jump, crouching first makes a Tailwind become a Launch Tailwind whenever you're on the ground, in air it's all the regular Tailwind. This way it ties in almost exactly to the parkour movement system and becomes a conscious choice of 'jump/Tailwind' and 'bullet jump/launch tailwind'.

So your idea was, honestly and truly, understood. Trust me, I got it, and I think it would work. I just didn't want to lose the Launch function as a trigger for the buff mechanic, that was all, so I made sure there was still a way to do it.

[Karav]

Lets talk about your changes to tornado. What, if anything, should be done about the prioritization of elemental damage?

I'm not entirely sold on the idea of allowing all shots through tornadoes. Personally, I'd like to see tornadoes absorb the elemental damage of projectiles, and allow the rest (puncture/impact/slash) through normally.The tornadoes would then revert back to their original damage type after a few seconds. Some people have suggested making tornadoes absorb all projectiles. If this were combined with your your changes, it would effectively make a "no firing zone" whenever someone used the funnel cloud augment.

[(PSN)RenovaKunumaru]

I'm not particularly sold on the Tailwind changes. It's obviously to avoid having to short hop, but I've never had a problem with that. I like it in fact. 

That's just me though.

[Toran]

When I think of Zephyr I think of a lame bird. She really needs a complete overhaul, especially since Titania is around - I don't say Zephyr should be like Titania but Titania sure feels more bird-like .

• Skin: give her a sexy skin already. Her looks and aerodynamics are second to Big Bird of Sesame Street only...
• Passive: remove the slow glide and give her full aerial movement (speed of bullet jump, full steering, spread arms/wings animation)
• Tail Wind: in addition to Thaylien's idea: give her full aerial movement for Tail Wind too. It would be so cool if you could fully control the boost and not just launch her in one direction, imagine the speed and agility of a falcon catching its prey
• Turbolence:nothing to add to Thaylien's suggestions
• Tornado: complete rework please - I really hate it to have a Zephyr along that's using Tornado when on Defense/Exterminate, it's a completely messed up skill and can break a game. It happened often enough that the enemy got stuck under the ground/above the ceiling/behind the wall and couldn't be killed with AoE.

 

[(PSN)RenovaKunumaru]

On 05/02/2017 at 8:51 PM, Thaylien said:

This is something I feel I have to point out; since I'm hoping that the launch function will trigger the buff to Dive Bomb, this is exactly the kind of function you'll be using it for. But you wouldn't have to use it for that if you didn't want to; the buff I'm suggesting would allow a player to use the launch pretty much as an when they need to, and as long as they didn't touch the floor it would stay there, primed and ready, until they then used Dive Bomb. So you could, as you like to do, leave the ground early, survey the area, and choose a place to come down hard, but if you wanted to make use of the buff, instead of a bullet jump you would use the launch function to put the buff in place.

Does that make sense?

I mean, I just really like this idea of making her Tailwind tie in to the movement system more, and since things like Bullet Jump are already keyed to do this same function, more or less, it makes using her that much more intuitive.

If we really wanted to get technical, we could take this even another step further: How about when you press 1, it simply goes where you aim it or reflects like a regular Jump would so you can cast Tailwind while looking down and it works exactly the same way that the regularJump function does, no launching at all. But, if you were sliding or crouching, just like the Bullet Jump mechanic, you would Launch! So exactly like a Bullet Jump, using the same exact functions that we use for the movement system, it becomes contextual.

Looking anywhere and casting Tailwind makes you Tailwind from your starting point to the direction you're going, however if you're on the ground looking down, it sends you upwards in the same direction, but opposite angle to your cursor. Sliding or crouching, however, turns a regular jump into a Bullet Jump, and players are used to that function in game, they learn it with the movement system. Sliding an pressing 1 Launches the player in exactly the same function, and activates the buff to Dive Bomb and so will be done as a deliberate function of the ability that a player can choose to use or not use depending on their movement.

How's that for an idea?

I have no problems with an added buff to the Dive Bomb mechanic after a tailwind use however I find the movement mastery of Zephyrs Tailwind to be very rewarding when practiced and I'm just not into giving it this easier function.

Perhaps its for the better, but I already use low angled bullet jumps into Tailwind as a part of my normal style. What's being called into question is whether or not we'd like to have Tailwind adapted into Slash Dash or Rhino charge which it emulates now but in a function on cursor angles. I say pass. 

This idea doesn't support any of our previous arguments of why Tailwind is useful but instead treats it as a replacement to the bullet jump functions. Why would I even use the parkour mechanics when I could Tailwind cancel through the level. 

Bottom line, I think that Tailwind idea removes a bit of the experience when mastering the use of Zephyr. I don't think I'll push for this in her eventual rework, but if anyone has ever persuaded me on an idea its been you.

[Birdframe_Prime]

4 hours ago, (PS4)RenovaKunumaru said:

Bottom line, I think that Tailwind idea removes a bit of the experience when mastering the use of Zephyr. I don't think I'll push for this in her eventual rework, but if anyone has ever persuaded me on an idea its been you.

Heh, well thank you for that vote of confidence ^^

So, I do hear what you're saying, and maybe it is a step too far. The argument I'm just so tired of hearing from everyone that starts a rework thread is 'bullet jump makes Tailwind obsolete'.

It's so similar to 'Dive Bomb is just a melee slam for energy' as an argument that part of me just wants to say exactly what I did with Dive Bomb. The idea of adding melee-mod scaling into Dive Bomb's damage along with the guaranteed knock down would perpetually put Dive Bomb as a literal and inalienable upgrade to the melee slam, with even more options and freedom of use.

In my particular point for Tailwind, then, the idea of being a 'bullet jump for energy' is taken and made a complete upgrade. It's the next step from the discussions we had on your thread of letting people wall latch/run to cancel out of a Tailwind cast if they hit a wall, the whole 'tie it into the movement' discussion we had.

And, as I say, maybe it is a step further than it needs to be taken. But I truly think that this will be a step up to her movement casting.

The thing I want to be clear about is that the ability change should, and I say should with a degree of hope, not ever negate your preferred method of movement. You can still bullet jump into a Tailwind, or jump-cancel your existing momentum in the air to turn around and then cast Tailwind to go the other way, all of the tricks of aerial navigation that you and I have for exploiting her gliding and aerial steering will still be there.

What it does, however, is allow a player not to suffer from something I experienced several times in my last play session alone; on maps where the terrain is a little irregular, like Earth, Lua, Ceres and so on, what can all-too-easily happen is that a Bullet Jump at low angle can cause players, even experienced ones like me, to not realise that the animation is covering up the fact that we're about to touch the ground or an obstacle and so the follow-up Tailwind actually performs the Launch animation instead, sending you hurtling into the sky or the ceiling instead of forwards to where you want to go.

More than that, far from being a replacement to the bullet jump functions, it's an additional phase to them, it takes on what players learn about those and applies them to abilities that they aren't used to and evens out the learning curve. Learner Zephyr players will Tailwind from standing or running just because they can, more advanced players will learn about her steering, her momentum cancels, her height differences from standing to jumping, and her Launch mechanic over time the same way we did. However there will always be that option, in emergency, to just dash through enemies, ragdolling them, and escaping a bad situation.

Simply put, I feel that by using the same movement mechanics of 'normal button press = jump or crouch + jump = bullet jump' to differentiate a regular dash Tailwind from a launch Tailwind will end up being an intuitive change for those that haven't played Zephyr so much, and the same movement tricks that old-hands like us have developed the muscle memory for will still be just as viable so that we will still 'hop and dash' and won't suffer any negatives from it.

Does that set your doubts at ease? Or would you prefer to keep the old mechanics even so?

6 hours ago, Toran said:

When I think of Zephyr I think of a lame bird. She really needs a complete overhaul, especially since Titania is around - I don't say Zephyr should be like Titania but Titania sure feels more bird-like .

• Skin: give her a sexy skin already. Her looks and aerodynamics are second to Big Bird of Sesame Street only...
• Passive: remove the slow glide and give her full aerial movement (speed of bullet jump, full steering, spread arms/wings animation)
• Tail Wind: in addition to Thaylien's idea: give her full aerial movement for Tail Wind too. It would be so cool if you could fully control the boost and not just launch her in one direction, imagine the speed and agility of a falcon catching its prey
• Turbolence:nothing to add to Thaylien's suggestions
• Tornado: complete rework please - I really hate it to have a Zephyr along that's using Tornado when on Defense/Exterminate, it's a completely messed up skill and can break a game. It happened often enough that the enemy got stuck under the ground/above the ceiling/behind the wall and couldn't be killed with AoE.

 

Thanks for joining, Toran, and let me just address the positives in your post before I explain something I hold near and dear to my heart.

A new skin would be awesome, but I do like the Tennogen Hagoromo skin for her, it's quite elegant, and her Premium skin is coming up this year too. If you feel strongly about it, you can download and play about with the Tennogen program yourself, show us what you have in mind ^^

As for Tornado, that's kind of what my rework here is planning to solve; it changes up how Tornado works in practice, so that it doesn't annoy you or your team and is used as a heavy CC defense ability, so casting it on an Exterminate won't be a bad thing anymore, and in a Survival it's actually helpful instead of getting enemies stuck or thrown about. So... I agree with you it needs to be fixed, but it doesn't need to be completely changed.

Okay, on to the explanation; Flying wouldn't help Zephyr. It would make her worse. It's a gimmick, and not a very good one because Warframe has all its mechanics geared around being on the ground and only leaving it for short mobility over obstacles or enemies.

Now, while I appreciate this is a long held desire of many Zephyr players... Flight movement, of any kind, just won't help her. Environments are too confined in most tile sets to make it practical, and it literally turns off huge portions of the game for her. While in aerial movement, especially the kind you're describing, she literally can't do anything useful, such as revive a team member, activate life support, pick up data packages or power cells, she can't use consoles or, and this is a huge sin, use any form of melee stance. With no melee she can't ground finish, stealth attack or melee finish at all. Not to mention the fact that a rather dramatic portion of the game's more interesting weapons, like beam weapons, shotguns, weapons with travel time, are also incredibly more difficult to use if you're too far away thanks to flying around. And even further... there's nothing up there for her to fight. While you're flying around everything else is at ground level.

I can see that Titania has put a chip on your shoulder, but her flying is barely even useful to her, and only because she shrinks down, gets exalted weapons and can cast longer range abilities. The same limitations on game functions all apply and you have to stop flying to do anything else at all. I've played extensively with Titania to see what all the 'flying' arguments were getting at and do you know what I found? The only thing Titania can do that Zephyr can't do better is hover in place in the air. That's it. She hovers. Zephyr doesn't hover, but if you point to anywhere on a map, any height, any difficulty to reach, Zephyr will get there before Titania. Existing, current Zephyr has better air mobility than Titania.

And I honestly can't see why you would want to cripple such a highly mobile frame by sticking her in some spread-armed T-pose in the air while able to do nothing to actually help a team or herself.

I know, I know, I know, before you get into this whole argument, that she could fly. DE could do that. It's possible. Nothing, however, will change the fact that flying isn't a helpful mechanic to any warframe, because it limits them severely in terms of game play.

Trust me, I wanted her to fly too when I first came to the forums, but then Wukong was released with Cloud Walker and I realised just how bad 3D aerial movement is for a warframe, and my views were only confirmed with Titania's release.

So while she could, here on this thread, with this rework, (and with a lot of logical thought backing us up) we believe that she shouldn't.

Thanks for your support, though.

18 hours ago, Karav said:

Lets talk about your changes to tornado. What, if anything, should be done about the prioritization of elemental damage?

I'm not entirely sold on the idea of allowing all shots through tornadoes. Personally, I'd like to see tornadoes absorb the elemental damage of projectiles, and allow the rest (puncture/impact/slash) through normally.The tornadoes would then revert back to their original damage type after a few seconds. Some people have suggested making tornadoes absorb all projectiles. If this were combined with your your changes, it would effectively make a "no firing zone" whenever someone used the funnel cloud augment.

Good first point, although I don't agree with you on the second.

Elemental damage will still be changed by shooting through them, however I do not believe it should fade, and I don't think it should add to the damage of the funnels. The shooting through the funnels is simply because absorbing projectile damage would make this ability both a heavy CC and a high damage dealer like Absorb and Magnetise, which isn't what this ability was supposed to be

If DE had wanted to make this a damage cast, they would have made it do damage in a serious fashion. Back when Zephyr was released there were still Nuke frames, and her philosophy is so based around evasion, defense and CC that I'm fairly certain the lack of damage is completely deliberate.

On the other hand, as I mentioned in the post, if the damage that Tailwind does actually deal was applied reliably (by standardising the amount of seconds, and thus damage ticks, the ability deals every time) it wouldn't be low damage at all. A neutral strength build will equal or exceed the damage of most other abilities in the same class, such as Avalanche, Crush, Stomp and so on. The only abilities that will out-damage it are Hydroid's finisher-damage-dealing Tentacle Swarm, Saryn's triple-damage Miasma (from having both a Toxin and Viral proc on enemies), and Ash's Blade Storm. And putting strength on her will only multiply that further.

If you remember Renova's thread, I actually ran damage numbers of different builds, a full strength build that would be in-game viable (as in the frame would still functionally run and not be crippled by the deficits from the corrupted mods in some way), would actually deal more damage per enemy per funnel capture than any other ability in its class apart from a full Bladestorm. The build would actually allow for two captures of an enemy using my changes, which means that it can, simply double that damage anyway.

But that's not the point of this, Karav, the point of this is the CC and, most importantly, the Status chance. Ten ticks of chance-to-proc status will almost guarantee at least one instance of the status, give that a corrosive on one funnel, a viral on another, radiation, heat, cold, all of these things capable of hitting an enemy multiple times in a funnel is far more powerful than the damage will ever be.

 

Edited February 7, 2017 by Thaylien
one more reply

[Cyba_Zero]

I must say I was quite surprised to read that Zephyr is the current least played frame, given she is probably my favourite frame in the game for sheer fun factor. Her health/shield scaling is very good and I love her durability-via-evasion. While her passive took a little getting used to initially, it became the largest contributor to her fun factor once I got the hang of it - the only drawback is when I want to land quickly e.g. for low doorways or ledge overshoots, but that is what melee slam is for. Perhaps the ability to cancel slow-fall temporarily by performing a mid-air slide might be a solution? Also her directional air control while falling could be more potent/reliable, and this would also help with ledge overshoots as well as increasing her fun factor further.

About the abilities as they stand: I generally play her as a duration-based CC evasion-tank with Agility Drift. I tried using Divebomb+Heavy Impact but found it not to be damaging enough beyond low levels. Now I barely use Divebomb because ground slam does the same. I love Turbulence. The Tornadoes are OK, but could be stronger given they are supposed to be her ultimate. Tailwind is good for extra direction changes while in mid-air and general mobility; I do not currently consider it a damage skill.

I agree strongly with the OP's suggestions for tweaks to optimise her skills. I will mention a few minor adjustments, though, which would be my preference.

I do not currently like the occasional event of accidentally grazing the ground as I use Tailwind (usually while dropping through low doors) and getting launched upward to be promptly left behind by the team. I also feel that the suggestion of a backward launch while facing downwards on the ground could be counter-intuitive to some players. Instead, Tailwind use would be most natural if it sent you in the direction you were looking at when activated, with a launch bonus from standing when aiming at 45 degrees or higher. Your Divebomb suggestions are decent, particularly if the developers preferred to tweak rather than remake abilities, but could still be implemented as a down-facing Tailwind while airborne above the requisite height. Her 2 could then be replaced by a wind buffet that either throws enemies back in a wide cone/cylinder with a single, strong gust or alternatively a wind tunnel effect with a slightly longer duration, narrower (but possibly longer range) field of effect and pushes enemies away more gradually. The single, sharp buffet would probably be more easy to use while flying and would need a large enough area of effect to be worth using over, say, the Sonicor (which I usually equip on Zephyr for extra fun factor and for being safer than explosive Hikou).

All in all, sensible and constructive ideas, @Thaylien, and I hope the devs are reading!

[Birdframe_Prime]

53 minutes ago, Cyba_Zero said:

I also feel that the suggestion of a backward launch while facing downwards on the ground could be counter-intuitive to some players. Instead, Tailwind use would be most natural if it sent you in the direction you were looking at when activated

I fear that my description isn't clear now, more people commenting on this. If you've ever used Bullet Jump while looking at the ground, you'll note that you carry on in the same direction, but you are reflected upwards in that direction instead of pushing into the ground, this is what I was suggesting for Tailwind, not a backwards take-off, but the same exact detection that the current Parkour system uses, to tie it into the movement we all learn at the start of the game.

^^ Thanks for the feedback, but I'll re-iterate, I'm not trying to give her new abilities, DE only does that if an ability is obsolete, I'm trying to make her existing ones viable for the current state of play so that minimal programming needs to be done to fix her and our rework comes out faster. That, and... as much as people may think they'd appreciate an angle-detect Dive Bomb, I think that there's far more involved than it sounds, and a player seeking to, for example, Tailwind through a doorway that's a little below them, might find it annoying if the angle detection made them Dive Bomb into a pit or a Void Laser instead.

I do appreciate seeing a new forum member picking up the threads here, it's fun to find out what the newer opinions are.

[Cyba_Zero]

11 hours ago, Thaylien said:

I fear that my description isn't clear now, more people commenting on this. If you've ever used Bullet Jump while looking at the ground, you'll note that you carry on in the same direction, but you are reflected upwards in that direction instead of pushing into the ground, this is what I was suggesting for Tailwind, not a backwards take-off, but the same exact detection that the current Parkour system uses, to tie it into the movement we all learn at the start of the game.

Ah, I see now; that makes sense. That might also explain why sometimes my bullet jumps skew sideways seemingly at random even when I am not looking sideways; thanks.

11 hours ago, Thaylien said:

That, and... as much as people may think they'd appreciate an angle-detect Dive Bomb, I think that there's far more involved than it sounds, and a player seeking to, for example, Tailwind through a doorway that's a little below them, might find it annoying if the angle detection made them Dive Bomb into a pit or a Void Laser instead.

Actually, you make a good point. Low doorways strike again... the bane of Zephyrs everywhere!

[Karav]

15 hours ago, Thaylien said:

I fear that my description isn't clear now, more people commenting on this. If you've ever used Bullet Jump while looking at the ground, you'll note that you carry on in the same direction, but you are reflected upwards in that direction instead of pushing into the ground, this is what I was suggesting for Tailwind, not a backwards take-off, but the same exact detection that the current Parkour system uses, to tie it into the movement we all learn at the start of the game.

With these mechanics, balancing tailwind is going to be a bit of a nightmare. If tailwind rag-dolls enemies or grants guaranteed status, why would anyone use or upgrade bullet jump? I know you included a synergy with dive-bomb, but if using tailwind rag-dolls enemies straight up, a followup dive-bomb would have to drag enemies back down to the ground in order to deal any damage. I would suggest giving tailwind the knockdown that dive-bomb currently has, and dive-bomb the rag-doll animation effect.

[Birdframe_Prime]

6 hours ago, Karav said:

I would suggest giving tailwind the knockdown that dive-bomb currently has, and dive-bomb the rag-doll animation effect.

Hmm, again, good points, a full ragdoll might be too strong. But I never intended for it to be taken that they would be ragdolled upwards, or in fact anywhere but away from Zephyr's line of travel, just that where you would have previously hit and slid off like a wall (or got stuck on) she would now keep going and the enemy would be knocked away (rather than just knocked down).

This would make it a much softer CC and more of an escape tactic than an offensive one. This would then contrast with the offensive use of Dive Bomb where you're deliberately engaging the enemy with a radial attack with the specific intent of knocking down everyone in the range.

To answer your other question, I would give you the exact answer as I gave to Renova; the movement for Zephyr is something that actually has a surprising amount of skill and map awareness to it, and by adjusting the mechanics to mimic those of the parkour movement that would not negate all the movement we use currently. Players who have been playing the game long enough to get to Zephyr will be used to the movement system and so it will be a natural progression of that, while the older players who have the muscle memory to use jumps and hops in their movement already will still be able to do that without any difference in performance. 

Hmm... I should probably put this into the original post...

[(PSN)RenovaKunumaru]

On 2/8/2017 at 9:02 AM, Karav said:

With these mechanics, balancing tailwind is going to be a bit of a nightmare. If tailwind rag-dolls enemies or grants guaranteed status, why would anyone use or upgrade bullet jump? I know you included a synergy with dive-bomb, but if using tailwind rag-dolls enemies straight up, a followup dive-bomb would have to drag enemies back down to the ground in order to deal any damage. I would suggest giving tailwind the knockdown that dive-bomb currently has, and dive-bomb the rag-doll animation effect.

I think the idea is to give Zephyr the same knockdown effect she already has just applied to enemies in the path of Tailwind upon collision.

 

[Azamagon]

Some quick thoughts (both my ideas, and some already stated ideas):

1) Tailwind

* ALWAYS launches you where you aim (the upwards launch is moved over to Dive Bomb, when on the ground, more to that later)
* Always slashprocs and knocks enemies down, adds +1 to melee combo counter for each enemy you collide into. Colliding with enemies doesn't stop Zephyr either, she just keeps going.
* Holdcast = Continuous flight forward.
* Can be steered.
* Doesn't interfere with any other action while it is being used, is thus technically onehanded, even when held down

2) Dive Bomb (renamed into Gale Force?)

* When used on the ground, launches her upwards. In an AoE around the liftoff point, this launch deals flat minimal impact damage and knocks enemies down.
* When used in the air, very quickly dives to the ground (blinking speed). The damage of this dive-attack scales with power strength, height, melee mods and melee combo counter. The range scales (besides from Power Range mods) with height, but never giving you more than up to double the range (after Power Range mods are considered). Besides hurting enemies, the divebomb will also ragdoll enemies.
* Heldcast (when in the air) shows you where/how you will dive (with an aiming circle), tapcast is simply just casting it.

Question: Should the dive bomb be slightly aimable (never more than 45 degrees forward/down though, to not step on Tailwind's mobility-toes)?

Edited February 13, 2017 by Azamagon

[Karav]

10 hours ago, Azamagon said:

Tailwind....

* Can be steered.

Could you elaborate? Does your trajectory follow the cursor? Is it a straight line with some basic strafing? How sharp a turn (if any) will you be able to execute?

10 hours ago, Azamagon said:

Question: Should the dive bomb be slightly aimable (never more than 45 degrees forward/down though, to not step on Tailwind's mobility-toes)?

Some have suggested a tap for straight down, hold for an aimed ground pound.

[(PSN)Ozymandias-13-]

I'm not a big fan of Zephyr, but with these changes I could really enjoy her since it covers all of the points I dislike about her.

One thing I would love for her Tailwind to do though is act more like Wukong's Cloud Walker without the invulnerability or Finisher proc. Make it a toggle that allows you to slowly move in any direction.

 It would give her an advantage with headshots, naturally, but also allows for easy synergy with Divebomb (even with your proposed changes with the targeted area). I know many Zephyr mains that wished she could fly like Titania but I never felt that was appropriate for Zephyr to that extent. I do think subtle manipulations of air to hover could be within her purview. Of course, this would likely require her Turbulence to be reworked to avoid her becoming completely unkillable when out of reach of melee enemies. Maybe a high chance to deflect, and a Turbulence health bar?

 

[TheGoodNamesGotTaken]

I really am loving this thread, so many good ideas going around

I'll throw some of mine in to.

Passive: If you want to cancel the upward momentum and return to the ground then look towards the floor and hit crouch. I feel like it's important to state only upward momentum since it would feel clunky to stop just so you don't hit your head on something. I think it would also help with being able to cancel out of tailwind.

Tailwind: my personal wish here but wouldn't it be cool for mods like Lighting dash, toxic flight and firewalker to affect tailwind in some way? maybe it's just me

Divebomb:

On 2/3/2017 at 9:20 PM, Thaylien said:

A nice addition that discussion further down the thread has pointed out is the inclusion of the aiming mechanic from Nidus' first ability. While in the air, pressing 2 casts Dive Bomb as normal, it's still as quick, as instant, as ever. Choosing to hold 2, however, will place a highlight, an aiming circle on the ground to show the point of impact and the area of effect. Particularly useful if this buff function comes in, showing a clear and easy difference between the un-buffed version and the buffed. Players can still move and strafe, Dive Bomb will still go straight down, but the placement of the ability from height becomes far, far more reliable.

Love this idea

I don't think I can comment on tornado since I rarely use it unless I do a interception

[Birdframe_Prime]

15 hours ago, Azamagon said:

* Doesn't interfere with any other action while it is being used, is thus technically onehanded, even when held down

Hey Azamagon, welcome back ^^ This might be a little far, I'm all for making it more interactive, but it is still a movement cast. You can't reload or perform other actions while Slash Dash, Avalanche and Rhino Charge are used, so I think the same rules would apply.

Otherwise, fairly good thoughts.

Not sure about moving the launch to Dive Bomb, although in some ways this really does make sense... I might re-consider later, but I'm putting myself on the 'no' side of this option for now. Mostly to preserve as much of the original abilities as possible and prevent the need for more coding by DE.

15 hours ago, Azamagon said:

* Can be steered.

Also would like an explanation here. I previously thought this would be a good idea, but Tailwind is such a fast movement that steering really isn't needed. I mean, yes, extendable would be a nice addition, but considering how easy it is to bounce out of with the other changes made, there really isn't a reason to have more than a slight trajectory change function to it.

15 hours ago, Azamagon said:

Besides hurting enemies, the divebomb will also ragdoll enemies.

This is something I considered in the original post, but discarded because even Ragdoll can be interrupted in game by certain conditions. A fast Animation would guarantee the effect far more certainly and could also be adapted to the other functions, such as the Dive Bomb Vortex mod, or later buffs such as a longer-duration knock down effect far more easily than Ragdoll can.

15 hours ago, Azamagon said:

Question: Should the dive bomb be slightly aimable (never more than 45 degrees forward/down though, to not step on Tailwind's mobility-toes)?

With how mobile she is in the air? What would be the need? You can travel huge distances with a simple aim glide, and even just tapping the roll button in the air will move you quite a way. Keeping it straight down will mean less need for coding, again, and the aiming function can also be keyed to the character's Z angle mapping in relation to the terrain, so needs no effort to implement.

On to the next visitor!

2 hours ago, (PS4)Riko_113 said:

One thing I would love for her Tailwind to do though is act more like Wukong's Cloud Walker

Hey, nice to meet you. You might not know, but I'm one of those that's thoroughly against any kind of toggled hover/flight mode on Zephyr. Mostly because of how mobile she is, and how much this function actually takes away from a warframe in the game (i.e. there are multiple, essential functions that warframes use that are impossible if the player is not grounded, it's why Titania can't pick things up, revive, activate consoles or pods, or anything else while in Razorwing, for a specific example).

While Flight or hovering does seem in keeping with the bird-like Air Caster frame, the abilities she has propel her, and I don't believe that any kind of steady hover will actually add anything to the frame, only take things away.

Especially with a risk of reworking Turbulence to have a health bar... eesh, that would be completely the wrong way to go with that ability XD

Thanks for joining us, though, I do enjoy the input.

And to the next visitor!

1 hour ago, TheGoodNamesGotTaken said:

 I think it would also help with being able to cancel out of tailwind.

Thanks for coming! You know you can already, right? Pressing Shift cancels out of tailwind in mid-flight, although does maintain your momentum. The thing is that Tailwind is so short anyway that people usually don't notice.

Glad you like the changes I've thought of, and if Tailwind becomes more linked to the movement system, then maybe those mods could also affect it. I feel that they would only really be useful on the Launch mechanic though, so it might be too situational.

As for Tornado, that's the key to this whole thing! You'd be able to use it anywhere, almost. You'd be able to use it like Tentacle Swarm, Bastille or Vortex, as a genuine heavy CC move. By adjusting the range you could make it applicable for Interception, for Defense, even for Survival. It still wouldn't really be suitable for Exterminate or Spy, but Captures, Excavations, Mobile Defense... it would fit in everywhere that area-denial CC is needed.

Imagine that it wouldn't be a bad ability anymore... just think of that... Zephyr's Tornado not a bad cast? I wouldn't know what to do with myself XD

Thanks everyone for stopping by, I'm really glad I started this thread now.

[(PSN)Ozymandias-13-]

50 minutes ago, Thaylien said:

Hey, nice to meet you. You might not know, but I'm one of those that's thoroughly against any kind of toggled hover/flight mode on Zephyr. Mostly because of how mobile she is, and how much this function actually takes away from a warframe in the game (i.e. there are multiple, essential functions that warframes use that are impossible if the player is not grounded, it's why Titania can't pick things up, revive, activate consoles or pods, or anything else while in Razorwing, for a specific example).

I definitely understand that. It was just a preference of mine, as an alternative, because of how broken her current "special" forms of mobility were so I didn't consider her a mobile frame. With the suggested changes in the OP (flowing more naturally into other forms of movement, and not animation locking her with every action she takes) her mobility would be useful again so hovering wouldn't be needed after all.

[Birdframe_Prime]

28 minutes ago, (PS4)Riko_113 said:

her mobility would be useful again

Oh, don't get me wrong, current Zephyr out-manuevers pretty much everything except a full-speed Volt and a Warp Nova, as long as you know what you're doing with her ^^

That doesn't stop me from wanting to lower that entry-level skill to allow more and more players to get up to the same speed as I can. Hence, why I'm suggesting adjusting the system to allow for better integration of movement into the ability.