Is Hydroid considered bad or weak?

[(PSN)robotwars7]

I wouldn't say he's bad, no frame is bad because they all have their uses, but Hydroid is definitely weaker than many other frames. he doesn't hold a candle to the new Tentacle king, Nidus. what Hydroid needs is a total rework, like what Limbo's been getting. if Limbo goes down well, then Hydroid's future will be looking very bright indeed, and we should be pushing DE to look at him next.

[Mak_Gohae]

he i purely CC, which means he is where Rhino was originally. Which means that people ignore all his abilities minus the one that they can use. 

For some reason in this team game the general player want to nuke room by himself. So a CCer that should be extremely helpful to the team is considered sucky cause he cant kill anything. 

One thing that DE messed him up with is taking away the negative range of Tempest Barrage, apparently, because of the augment mod. Now that you can control the spread that ability ends up hitting all sorts of obstacles not even landing on enemies. 

They need to let you control the spread of the first and 4. Maybe make it press and hold with the longer you hold the wider the spread is. So the normal press is the smallest spread. 

[Bobtm]

1 hour ago, Krhymez said:

Hydroid is beast. I can not wait for a primed version.

I think people listen to youtubers way too much on whats "the best". People tend to flock to what they say. Hence why everyone thinks "Akkad" is the best leveling spot.

 

Hydroid falls off around level 80-90 enemies, but up to there he is really good. 

Youtube nor its content creators have anything to do with Hydroid being subpar.  This also isn't something dealing with silly notions of "best" or of farming spots like Akkad, Bere, old the Dracos/Xinis of old.  It has to do with a frame that brings quite literally nothing to the table beyond a cool concept.  There's nothing actively unique about playing Hydroid beyond his concept alone.  Mechanically he's a limp noodle, having no unique traits.

At a gameplay level, Hydroid does nothing for us to keep his spot on the roster relevant.  Let's break it down to really hammer in this point;

• Hydroid's 1:  A crowd control ability.  Relies heavily on RNG as it doesn't immediately go into effect in its given area nor does it apply any rules like distance between targets when its effect goes active.  Beat out in terms of usability by every other CC-based 1st ability due to the fact that they act in a reliable matter, while Hydroid's does not.
• Hydroid's 2:  A crowd control ability.  Ragdolls enemies, pulling them forward as you dash forward.  Can be used as a movement tool under some circumstances.
• Hydroid's 3:  A crowd control ability.  Generates a fairly hard area denial over a small area.  Completely disables all player action during its use.
• Hydroid's 4:  A crowd control ability.  Summons a handful of tentacles at exceedingly random locations somewhat near where the player aims upon casting.  Suffers massively from inconsistency due to its RNG nature (alike his 1) making it a poor CC even at the best of times.  Tentacles ragdoll enemies and flop them around, dealing modest damage and keeping them corralled.

Do you see the issue?  It's that Hydroid has nothing to call his own on a mechanical level.  His kit consists of poor CC, average CC, poor area denial, and then poor CC + poor area denial, in that order.  As a frame he possesses nothing beyond what I just listed without his augment mods.

I like Hydroid at a conceptual level, and will on occasion run him during a Sortie mission or two.  But he's not in a good place right now, not by a long shot.

[JalakBali]

"Underwhelming" is more appropriate. His powers are not that great except in very niche situations, like tunnel loot farm or trapping enemies in the pool. I have seen very effective strategies against bosses where he just hid in the pool until the boss can be shot and whenever a big attack is coming he popped back in the pool. Undertow has no casting time so he can be Limbo without casting time but couldn't move around.

Water cannon is too random to be of any good. And the water movement power is just... pointless?

 

 

But at the very least, he's not Oberon, who has zero niche usage.

[(PSN)FriendSharkey]

No idea, I know I can wreak havoc with him at all levels, so I don't get the hate. Probably because he's husky rip-off of Jack Sparrow. 

[Lawmonark]

59 minutes ago, Bobtm said:

Youtube nor its content creators have anything to do with Hydroid being subpar.  This also isn't something dealing with silly notions of "best" or of farming spots like Akkad, Bere, old the Dracos/Xinis of old.  It has to do with a frame that brings quite literally nothing to the table beyond a cool concept.  There's nothing actively unique about playing Hydroid beyond his concept alone.  Mechanically he's a limp noodle, having no unique traits.

At a gameplay level, Hydroid does nothing for us to keep his spot on the roster relevant.  Let's break it down to really hammer in this point;

• Hydroid's 1:  A crowd control ability.  Relies heavily on RNG as it doesn't immediately go into effect in its given area nor does it apply any rules like distance between targets when its effect goes active.  Beat out in terms of usability by every other CC-based 1st ability due to the fact that they act in a reliable matter, while Hydroid's does not.
• Hydroid's 2:  A crowd control ability.  Ragdolls enemies, pulling them forward as you dash forward.  Can be used as a movement tool under some circumstances.
• Hydroid's 3:  A crowd control ability.  Generates a fairly hard area denial over a small area.  Completely disables all player action during its use.
• Hydroid's 4:  A crowd control ability.  Summons a handful of tentacles at exceedingly random locations somewhat near where the player aims upon casting.  Suffers massively from inconsistency due to its RNG nature (alike his 1) making it a poor CC even at the best of times.  Tentacles ragdoll enemies and flop them around, dealing modest damage and keeping them corralled.

Do you see the issue?  It's that Hydroid has nothing to call his own on a mechanical level.  His kit consists of poor CC, average CC, poor area denial, and then poor CC + poor area denial, in that order.  As a frame he possesses nothing beyond what I just listed without his augment mods.

I like Hydroid at a conceptual level, and will on occasion run him during a Sortie mission or two.  But he's not in a good place right now, not by a long shot.

You must have never seen a "utilit" hydroid, you know, the ones that strip armor and can heal.

Most players dont play theses... because its all about the hentai spam.

 

IF they keep the current bug where auras are not stacking... i could see hydroid become i "must have" warframe. The ability to proc a corrosive status... would make him needed. This just show how armor and corrosive projection is.

 

[Kierlak]

18 minutes ago, Krhymez said:

IF they keep the current bug where auras are not stacking... i could see hydroid become i "must have" warframe. The ability to proc a corrosive status... would make him needed.

 

Lol, what? Frost beats him into a mushy pulp if you want non-CP armor strip, Banshee as well. Hell, even Ash would beat him for armor removal. Barrage is a terrible ability, inconsistent and unreliable, and using a mod slot to try and add armor strip to an ability you cant rely on to hit anything is completely laughable.

 

Hydroid is one of the worst frames in the game, no ifs, ands, or buts. He's propped up by 1 augment on a terrible ability.

[jfhsanseiIII]

I wouldn't say he's bad, but his abilities just don't really synergize.   If they flowed better, no pun intended, then he'd be more fun.  He could do with a rework that focused on making it all work together better.  

[Eliakin]

Before  Hotfix 17.0.4, best frame for farm

After Hotfix 17.0.4 Just another frame almost forgotten.

 

[(PSN)thowed]

The hips and legs mess up his fashion frame.

[Gaqlaxy]

I only used hydroid for farming purposed (*cough cough* ODD) but I think he is a pretty fun frame over all.

[(PSN)HaterReplicator]

Nah, Hydroid is pretty beast.

I met a good Hydroid player in NM LOR. His key to surviving level 80+ enemies is Undertow and melee. Build him with max energy and efficiency, Hydroid is ALMOST unkillable. His weakness is Nullifiers though. Avoid them.

[Bobtm]

16 hours ago, Krhymez said:

You must have never seen a "utilit" hydroid, you know, the ones that strip armor and can heal.

Most players dont play theses... because its all about the hentai spam.

I'm really unsure as to how you could have possibly come to that conclusion on this, so maybe I'll have to reiterate this again.

Hydroid without his augments is pointless and irrelevant.

He is currently the only frame that quite literally needs augments on in order to be considered as a benefit to a squad.  With his augments he's definitely alright and I have used him successfully during Sorties, though the RNG nature of his 1 and 4 are still a needless detriment.  The problem with Hydroid is that his baseline abilities have nothing going for them.  As I said before I'll say again, without augments Hydroid is nothing but a discount Vauban.  Worse at CC across the board without any points of merit in any particular realm of play.

I've seen everything Hydroid can possibly do.  Without augments he's pointless across the board, outdone by every CC-based frame hands down.  With his augments he's actually fairly interesting, despite retaining some usability/reliability issues.  So I'll end this with a very simple question;

Why should a frame require augment mods in order to be relevant?

[Mak_Gohae]

20 hours ago, JalakBali said:

And the water movement power is just... pointless?

it's a charge attack, it knocks people down just like Rhino's charge.

Why would you acknowledge the fact that it moves you but not the other battlefield effect?

[TennoPain]

I actually like how hydro looks (my looks like optimus prme)

[(XBOX)Grimsley Clause]

My Hydroid in JV wipes the floor with the rest of my team XD Love my little Pirate.

[AerinSol]

I've been a main Hydroid user since Nekros got the rework of his. His first is fine. Unpredictable, but fine. His second has been useless even before parkour 2.0. His 3rd has always irritated me to no end so I never touched it without first getting the healing augment for him. His fourth is a proper ultimate ability considering devs response on what number four abilities should function as. I do think they should redo the magnetic damage do viral at the very least. The most talked about enemies that are an annoyance have a resistance toward magnetic i.e. Bombards, Bosses, etc. Which is made even more undesirable when paired toward the faction of the Grineer. Elite Lancers are the common enemy type past level twenty.

I can make him look like a monster with the correct coloring done and his helmets.

Edited February 28, 2017 by AerinSol
#fashionframewars

[PsiWarp]

Hydroid sucks damage-wise (even though two of his powers do Finisher damage), but his CC has its merits. He excels at long range multiple area denial, however both 1 & 4 are pretty hit-and-miss with 4 having a target cap and wonky AI.

He wants to use Tempest Barrage repeatedly to cover big areas, knocking down all enemies in range... but the screen shake and rainfall just makes me cringe. He's also very squishy, like a water balloon and can easily pop come high level content.

[Trissila]

Hydroid is "bad" insofar as he does not trivialize endgame content (as the meta frames do), and his particular niche (control and loot) is done better by Nekros.

 

But he's perfectly viable if you're not a metaslave.

[(XBOX)EternalDrk Mako]

skill gap 

but hes good, id say his only issue is the non synergy between his skills , overall he can be a strong support 

[Azamagon]

To me, he has several problems:

As @Bobtm pointed out, he doesn't truly do anything vastly different with his abilities when he is un-augmented. I mean, he has 4 different skills for CC, that are more about covering eachothers' weaknesses: #1 is ranged and mobile, but unreliable and shortlasting. #2 is reliable and mobile, but melee-esque and shortlasting. #3 is reliable and longlasting, but immobile and close ranged. #4 is ranged and longlasting, but unreliable and only somewhat mobile. It's a rather dull kit, if you think about it.

The only true added benefits is brief but mobile invulnerability with his #2 and extended but immobile invulnerability with his #3. His kit is thus just not really synergetic or truly complimentary, it's just all about what part of your skill you want to be good or bad. Augments alleviate this a bit, but that shouldn't be necessary.

He is also insanely squishy, which doesn't seem to be fully fitting with his melee-caster-esque theme (as hinted by his knockdowny kit, where 2 of them are also rather melee-range-ish, and his passive). Yeah, spamming #2 can get him around sort of safely, and hiding with his #3 often saves his hide (heh). But it overall just doesn't feel right for him to play like that.

He needs more synergy and a complimentary reason to cast his various abilities. Some ideas:

#1 could be more damage-oriented (weaken base but scale it with primary mods?). Gives is a damage-role.
#2 could more reliably collect enemies as it travels, and could be used from #3 without needing to toggle off #3 first. Gives it a stronger mobility and crowd-gathering role.
#3 could let him cast abilities while submerged, and #1 hits on the pool could hurt enemies inside. Enemies nearby grabbed by #4 could be tossed into the pool, by using contextual button (X by default). Gives it more of a "safe harbour" / zoning-role, and is what mostly synergizes the whole kit together.
#4 could be about steadily grabbing enemies with a tentacular choke+drown (rather than slamming them frenetically), for reliable and non-disruptive CC. Gives it a better CC-role.
Passive could need some changes too, as it is a really odd and very niched one.
His statbased survivability could need some serious boosting too, and a mild energyboost wouldn't be bad either.

 

[VentiGlondi]

Hydroid could use some tweaks, such as removing the half a second delay on his #1, and a larger energy pool.

and a new set of textures

[Obviousclone]

just like banshee, he's very underwhelming and meh without augments

 

with augments he becomes a pretty solid warframe.

[ashrah]

undertow is best hydro skill... cz u can lock down area without any risk to get hit perfect for interception missions

[tutzdes]

Like it was said, obsolete. Hydroid is long overdue for rework.

 

He is unreliable as CC and his best CC ability disables him from play.

He is a mediocre DD, his best DD ability makes big baddies harder to kill. That diminishes his poor scalability even more.

Hybrid builds are bad due to poor ability synergy.

He is too squishy for a tank-support.

His two best abilities are meh without augments, so he effectively has 2 less slots than most other warframes.

 

My two personal gripes are his squishiness for a melee-frame and his inability to benefit from the range mods.