Rework Rift Rework

[SevenLetterKWord]

Ever since his PvE rework, Limbo has been problematic in Conclave.
The ability to freely transition between the Rift and material planes allows Limbo players to simply deny combat, with minimal invested effort and great resulting effectiveness.
Any Limbo player with decent mobility could thus elude even the most skilled pursuers.
Limbo players could then hide in the Rift plane, enjoying functional immortality, until a good vulture opportunity presented itself.

Update 20.2.0 changed Rift functionality as follows:

On 4/12/2017 at 11:04 AM, [DE]Megan said:

• Entering Limbo’s Rift now removes shields. Exiting the Rift starts the Shield recharge delay timer.

Presumably this was intended to make entering the Rift a more tactical choice; if a Limbo player enters the Rift, he is more vulnerable to players who follow.

Unfortunately, the opposite is also true: because shield-loss applies to all frames, entering the Rift also renders pursuers vulnerable (excluding two health-only frames). Even worse, because non-Limbo players can only willfully enter the Rift by moving through Limbo's portals, a Limbo in the Rift will know the exact position of anyone else entering. Combined with the Rift's shield negation, this gives Limbo players an easy opportunity to deal lethal damage to any players who enter the Rift - they can pre-aim at the portal, and they don't have to worry about their target's shields. Ultimately, U20.2.0's change to the Rift did little to resolve the problematic playstyle introduced by Limbo's rework.

Now, I've thought of some complicated solutions...

Spoiler

Gradual Rift Transitions: Entering/Exiting the Rift takes five seconds for all players.
When any player enters/exits the Rift, he begins a five-second transition period, during which he remains partially vulnerable to damage.
A player halfway into the Rift will take half damage from material sources and half damage from Rift sources. Similarly, he will also deal half damage to material targets and half damage to Rift targets. A player 80% in the Rift will deal/take 80% Rift damage and 20% material damage. A player 20% in the Rift will deal/take 20% Rift damage and 80% material damage.
(These last two players shooting at each other will deal/take 20% Rift and 20% material damage, for 40% of normal damage total.)
Throughout the entirety of either transition, players are considered "in the Rift" for all other mechanics; they cannot collect pickups and they are affected by Stasis/Rift Surge.

This simultaneously addresses Rift hiding and Rift ambushes.
Unfortunately, it is both difficult for developers to implement and difficult for players to learn.

And I've thought of some prejudiced solutions...

Spoiler

Rift Drain: Limbo must pay two energy per second to remain in the Rift. Alternatively, the Rift drains 10 shield/health per second from all players.
Presently, Limbo can willfully enter the Rift at any point and remain there indefinitely at no cost. Either of these changes would prevent prolonged camping in the Rift.

Unfortunately, these would constitute significant deviations from PvE functionality. Additionally, they are particularly punishing for Limbo players.
Because rolling is an significant aspect of mobility in Conclave, it is important to avoid burdening Limbo players with extravagant costs for entering/existing in the Rift place.

But the best (and simplest) solution is probably just to change the Rift plane as follows:
Instead of totally negating damage, the Rift plane should reduce damage from the material plane by 50%.
(Similarly, players in the Rift should deal half damage to targets in the material plane.)

Edited April 16, 2017 by SevenLetterKWord

[-InV-igo95862]

1 minute ago, SevenLetterKWord said:

 

But the best (and simplest) solution is probably just to change the Rift plane as follows:
Instead of totally negating damage, the Rift plane should reduce damage from the material plane by 50%.
(Similarly, players in the Rift should deal half damage to targets in the material plane.)

I think that it is a bit too much. Previous Rift that was limited by timer and energy was fine. If new rift would drain energy I think it would be balanced. (or just replace Stasis with old Riftwalk)

[kusanome]

Removing removing shields for non-Limbo players by entering rift is enough.

[-Jackson]

On 16/04/2017 at 7:43 PM, -InV-igo95862 said:

I think that it is a bit too much. Previous Rift that was limited by timer and energy was fine. If new rift would drain energy I think it would be balanced. (or just replace Stasis with old Riftwalk)

The problem with that is entering the rift (aside from cataclysm) is upon rolling (or dashing, rather), which is sort of important for moving around.

Edited April 17, 2017 by -Jackson

[Witchydragon]

1 hour ago, -Jackson said:

The problem with that is entering the rift (aside from cataclysm) is upon rolling (or dashing, rather), which is sort of important for moving around.

You can also rift right back out, and use very little energy. I don't see a problem in Limbo users having to move around the map differently in order to conserve energy. It seems like an interesting restriction that would make playing Limbo uniquely different in mobility and energy usage. 

If Limbo gets such a powerful tool on roll, he should not necessarily have to roll as often as other frames. 

[(PSN)ATreidezz]

I agree limbo rift walk should have a limitation, i see how a player dash out from the rift to close a gap then pop a tigris in someone's face, then roll away & dash to the rift so fast. With mods like recover & air thruster, he could be unstoppable, especially since no energy needed & long ground dash capability to escape, far enough from any pursuer, its not that hard with a high mobility frame like him. I have yet to use the new limbo in conclave yet, but i bet i can do some serious damage with him.

[(PSN)o_0-ErX-0_o]

Either this gets a fix somehow or i can see everyone using Limbo. On PS4 it seems every match now has 2-3 Limbos.

[Stormdragon]

Limbo needs a limitation to his capability to stay in the rift, just finished a match where a player did nothing but leave the rift to pick up energy orbs and then go back in while expecting someone to go through his portal and get an easy kill. A timer + a cooldown should be good enough to make the rift a tactical move instead of a perma "can't touch this". Also since the only thing balancing Limbo's 1 shot potential on cataclysm was the casting animation (which currently lasts like 1 second) he shouldn't be able to cast it from his safe parallel dimension across the whole map to kill an entire group of enemies without any risk (just did a quick test and there's nothing preventing the limbo from casting cataclysm from the rift on a group of enemies at least 75m away from him)

Edited April 24, 2017 by Stormdragon

[SevenLetterKWord]

Three months later, this mechanic also remains incredibly annoying.

[.Zel]

Just remove the frame from Conclave tbh until they actually manage to fix it. And not just Limbo, any and all broken/imbalanced weapon/frame that will take time to fix.

Edited July 30, 2017 by .Zel

[SevenLetterKWord]

11 hours ago, .Zel said:

Just remove the frame from Conclave tbh until they actually manage to fix it. And not just Limbo, any and all broken/imbalanced weapon/frame that will take time to fix.

That would be a cop-out.
There is no need to remove content when several simple solutions exist.